EDUCATOR'S RATING OF PRINCIPAL
4.10 CONCLUSION
The baseline study set out to capture a general sense of how certain principals in the eThekwini Region are leading their schools in transformation. While there is evidence that the policies which seek to address the injustices of the past and to create a system of education that is quality driven for all learners have been implemented, the principals in the study are approaching the process of transformation at different tempos. What has emerged is that there are differences in what they perceive to be their roles, what roles they claim to be performing and the roles they are actually performing as leaders. This finding indicates the contradiction of the perceptions of principals being leaders.
The macro level changes occurring over the last decade has resulted in micro level changes at the school site. And the person responsible for implementing these changes is none other than the principal, but shelhe has to accomplish this task in collaboration with other stakeholders in education. In effect, not only the role function of the principal has to be reconfigured, but the power and authority, once the domain of the principal, has to be shared. So the principal has to assume a multi-dimensional role and to work in collaboration with educators, parents, learners, superintendents and community members. The baseline study indicates that not all principals are rising to this enormous challenge of leading transformation at the school. There appears to be a continuum from ensuring that the school merely continues to function to ensuring that
Chapter Four: Conflicting Views On Principals As Leaders L Bhagowat
the school is functioning effectively. In other words, principals fall broadly into one of the following categories, which have been ranked with the majority of principals falling within the first category and the minority falling within the fourth category:
1. overwhelmed by change and going with the flow 2. maintaining stability
3. managing change 4. leading change
Those who are overwhelmed by change are simply going with the flow; they don't have the capacity to lead the transformation process or the power to reject the infiltration of the transformation policies, so they withdraw and allow the process to take its course. Other principals do their utmost to maintain stability. They are aware that they are accountable for what transpires at the school site, so all they do is ensure that the existing structures are in place and do not allow the boat to be rocked.
Then there is another cohort of principals managing school transformation. They are working towards providing new and improved infrastructure in the areas of material and human resources. Many have upgraded existing facilities and installed new ones.
They have worked towards implementing policies in relation to site-based management and governance and the overall efficient operation of the school. The fmal category of principals is not only managing the transition at the school site, but is leading the process by inspiring stakeholders to share the vision for the institution based on the principles of equity and redress. In addition to ensuring an environment conducive to education for all, irrespective of colour, creed or culture, they view their colleagues and governors as human beings with potential and capacity to actively engage in transforming the school.
By means ofthe baseline study, I have explored the extent to which certain schools in the eThekwini region are being transformed and how the principals in these schools construct themselves within this context of school transformation. Principals' construction of themselves as leaders has a major implication in terms of the transformation agenda of schooling. Their construction of leadership could actively promote, slacken or hinder the process of transformation. Hence, in understanding school transformation it is important to also understand the principal who shapes
Chapter Four: Conflicting Views On Principals As Leaders LBhagowat
transfonnation at school and more importantly the conflict situations that shelhe confronts in herlhis professional capacity. The fmdings of this investigation identify the following conflict situations that come to bear on the principal:
1. past oppressive system with the present democratic system
2. decentralization of education while maintaining core elements of centralization
3. stakeholders that support school transfonnation and those that resist it 4. roles of management versus roles ofleadership within the principalship
In respect to my report assuming the narrative fonn, this chapter has made strides in developing three important features ofthe genre of the novel:
1. Firstly, the major theme which revolves around the conflict between management and leadership roles.
2. Secondly, the whole notion of conflict which is experienced by principals who are conflicted about their roles as leaders.
3. Thirdly, the background and setting which reveals the different tempos at which school transfonnation is occurring.
The next chapter will explain in detail through life history narratives how principals construct themselves to shape transfonnation at the school. The canvass that I have landscaped in this chapter sets the tone for the background, setting, theme and the notion of conflict for the stories of my three life history participants which unfold in Chapter Five: Topical Life Histories.