Purpose: The study aimed to explore the authority and power of kindergarten superintendents in public education to elucidate their leadership dynamics. Design/methodology/approach: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 24 Israeli kindergarten teachers about the authority and power of their superintendents. Thematic analysis was used to…

Purpose: Developing an enabling bureaucratic structure for school organization has been an important aim of education governance reforms in China, like many societies across the globe, since the 1990s. However, there is a lack of valid measures to investigate the extent to which the Chinese education governance reforms facilitate the development…

Purpose: Given the context of accountability-driven policy environments, research has shown that school leaders perceive bureaucratic rules and protocols in negative ways, but they also utilize organizational structures and routines to lead changes. To better understand both enabling and hindering mechanisms of bureaucracy in schools, this study…

Purpose: Using a large-scale school improvement program in Sweden as a case, this article aims to explore the state governance of a large-scale school improvement program in Sweden and how officials at the state agency level made sense of the reform ideas and operationalized them in policy actions. Design/methodology/approach: Data were integrated…

Purpose: This study examines the social organizational structure of one early childhood education (ECE) center in Finland and the relationship between this structure and the roles and the responsibilities of the members of the organization. Design/methodology/approach: The research is a qualitative case study with ethnographic features. Its…

Purpose: This qualitative study discusses the importance of effective leadership practices in connecting the macro-, meso-, and micro-contexts in which school leaders operate, considering the colonial and apartheid history of South Africa and the current era of neoliberal philosophies by exploring the degree to which school leaders in historically…

Purpose: To improve school organisational performance and innovativeness, and meet diverse student needs, school leaders should be innovative, risk-takers and proactive, thus applying entrepreneurial practices/strategies and market mechanisms. This study aims to investigate, from a schoolteacher's perspective, the degree of entrepreneurial…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explain the influence of a school's operational structure on organisational learning capacity (OLC), and how this either supports or disables any aspiration as a learning organisation. Design/methodology/approach: Two organisational working models are described, one based on same-age structure and another…

Purpose: The study was designed to investigate the effects of the decentralization of education through the perceptions of education managers. Design/methodology/approach: This was a qualitative case study research. The decentralization notification of 2014, issued by the secondary education department, Government of Balochistan, Pakistan was…

Purpose: The quality and market viability of international branch campuses (IBCs) depend upon their integration with university headquarters. Recent trends toward localizing branch-campus hiring have raised questions about the extent to which non-parent-campus lecturers will support global integration pursuits. This paper aims to examine IBC…

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to investigate the effectiveness of accountability mechanisms employed in financial management practices of school principals in the Eastern Cape Provincial Department of Education. The strengths and weaknesses of the systems and mechanisms of the processes to hold school principals accountable are explored…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the key determinants of effective school-based management (SBM) for improved teaching-learning environments and student achievements, while identifying the major reasons as to why poor implementation of SBM is associated with lower student achievements. Design/methodology/approach: Both dimensions…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine how principals, deputy principals, heads of departments (HoDs) and teachers as leaders exercise their agency within and through the organisational structure of their schools to improve academic quality. Design/methodology/approach: A case study was conducted in the wider context of school-based…

Purpose: One of the most debated policy discourses that have engaged the attention of countries as well as the donor community is the varied pathways in improving the delivery of education through decentralisation and community participation. A key policy expectation is that through the active participation of the community, education quality and…

Purpose: Educational organizations have to continuously adapt their structures, processes and practices to meet the evolving institutional and social challenges raised by the external environment. From this point of view, organizational change is a fundamental ingredient of the recipe for success in educational management. The purpose of this…