Abstract
The evaluation and inspection of many public services, including education, has become increasingly common in most countries in the developed world (McNamara & O’Hara, 2004; MacBeath & McGlynn, 2002). There are various reasons why this may be the case. It can be argued that it is, on the one hand, part of the movement towards low trust policies derived from the ideology of neo-liberalism which seeks to apply the values of the market to the public sector. On the other hand, it can be argued that increased evaluation is a necessary and defensible component of democratic accountability, responsibility and transparency (O’Neill, 2002). The research reported here sets out to explore the idea of a personal vision or core of ethics as being central to educational leadership, through in-depth interviews with a number of school leaders. The chapter begins by briefly placing educational leadership in the modern context, characterised by the paradox of apparently greater decentralisation of responsibility to schools being in fact coupled with a further centralisation of actual power and greatly increased surveillance of performance (Neave, 1998). Relevant developments internationally, and then specifically in the context of Ireland, are described. It is suggested that in Ireland the modern educational context may indeed be creating difficult ethical and moral dilemmas for leaders to face. To see if this is so in practice, five in-depth interviews with school principals are reported. The evidence arising from these interviews indicates that school leaders do feel guided by a strong moral or ethical compass.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Ball, S. J. (2003). The teacher’s soul and the terrors of performativity. Journal of Education Policy, 18(2), 215–228.
Bottery, M. (2004). The challenges of educational leadership. London, England: Paul Chapman Publishing.
Bottery, M. (2007). Reports from the front line, English head teachers’ work in an era of practice centralisation. Evaluation, 35(1), 89–110.
Boyle, R. (1997, January–March). Civil service reform in the Republic of Ireland. Public Money and Management, 17, 49–53.
Boyle, R. (2002). A two-tiered approach: Evaluation practice in the Republic of Ireland. In J. E. Furubo, R. C. Rist, & R. Sandahl (Eds.), International atlas of evaluation (pp. 261–272). Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.
Briggs, A. R. J. (2007). The Oz effect: An examination of middle management roles and perceptions of professionalism in an Australian TAFF. Management in Education, 21(3), 17–21.
Day, C., Harris, A., Hayfield, M., Tolley, H. & Beresford, J. (2000). Leading schools in times of change. Buckingham, England: Open University Press.
De Jong, T., & Kerr-Roubicek, H. (2007). Towards a whole school approach to pastoral care: A proposed framework of principles and practices. Australian Journal of Guidance & Counselling, 17(1). 1–12.
Department of Education and Science, Ireland. (1999). Whole school evaluation. Dublin: DES.
Department of Education and Science, Ireland. (2003a). Looking at our school, an aid to self evaluation in primary schools. Dublin: DES.
Department of Education and Science, Ireland. (2003b). Looking at our school, an aid to self evaluation in second level schools. Dublin: DES.
Dunphy, M. (2007, October 8). OECD project report: Improving school leadership in Ireland. Paper presented to a meeting of the Society for Management in Education in Ireland, Dublin.
Elliott, J. (2004). Making evidence-based practice educational. In MG. Thomas & R. Pring (Eds.), Evidence-based practice in education (pp. 164–186). Maidenhead, England: Open University Press.
Elmore, R. F., & Fuhrman, S. H. (2001). Research finds the false assumption of accountability. Educational Digest, 67, 1–9.
Fullan, M. (1982). The meaning of educational change. New York: Teachers College Press.
Fullan, M. (2004). The moral imperatives of school leadership. London: Sage.
Gibton, D. (2004). Legalised leadership. London: Institute of Education.
Giddins, A. (2004). Sociology (4th ed.). London: Policy Press.
Government of Ireland. (1998). Education act. Dublin: Stationery Office.
Gold, A., Evans, J., Earley, P., Halpin, D., & Collarbone, P. (2003). Principled principals, values driven leadership: Evidence from ten case studies of “outstanding” school leadership. Educational Management and Adminstration, 31(2), 127–138.
Hansson, F. (2006). Organizational use of evaluations: Governance and control in research evaluation. Evaluation, 12(2), 159–178.
Hopkins, D., Ainscow, M., & West, M. (1994). School improvement in an era of change. London: Cassell.
Hoyle, E., & Wallace, M. (2007). Educational reform, an ironic perspective. Evaluation, 35(1), 9–25.
Irish Times. (2007, October 5). Department published more than 1,000 reports on schools. Irish Times, 11.
Irish Times. (2007, October 1). Principals to report on “underperforming” teachers. Irish Times, 8.
Kilpatrick, S., Falk, I., & Johns, S. (2002, June 16–19). Leadership for dynamic learning communities. Refereed conference paper presented at Lifelong Learning: Building Learning Communities Through Education. 2nd International Conference, Yeppoon, Central Queensland, Australia.
MacBeath, J. (1999). Schools must speak for themselves: The case for school self-evaluation. London: Routledge-Falmer.
MacBeath, J. (2006). New relationships for old—Inspection and self evaluation in England and Hong Kong. International Studies in Educational Administration, 34(2), 2–18.
MacBeath, J., & McGlynn, A. (2002). Self-evaluation, What’s in it for schools? London: Routledge-Falmer.
McNamara, G., & Kenny, A. (2006, October). Quality evaluation: Policy, theory and practice in the education sector. Paper presented to the Joint International Conference of the European Evaluation Society and the UK Evaluation Society, London.
McNamara, G., & O’Hara, J. (2004). Trusting the teacher: Evaluating educational innovation. Evaluation, 10(4), 463–474.
McNamara, G., & O’Hara, J. (2005). Internal review and self-evaluation: The chosen route to school improvement in Ireland. Studies in Educational Evaluation, 31, 267–282.
McNamara, G., & O’Hara, J. (2006). Workable compromise or pointless exercise? School-based evaluation in the Irish context. Educational Management, Administration and Leadership, 34(4), 546–582.
McNamara, G., & O’Hara, J. (2008). Trusting schools and teachers: Developing educational professionalism through self-evaluation. New York: Peter Lang.
Meuret, D., & Morlaix, S. (2003). Conditions of success of a school’s self-evaluation: Some lessons of a European experience. School Effectiveness and School Improvement, 14(1), 53–71.
Moos, L. (2003). Educational leadership: Understanding and developing practice. Copenhagen: Danmarks Paedagogiske Verlag.
Neave, G. (1998). The evaluative state reconsidered. European Journal of Education, 33(3), 265–284.
Nevo, D. (2002). School-based evaluation: An international perspective. Oxford: Elsevier Science.
O’Neill, N. (2002). A question of trust. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Trust.
Pearson, L. C., & Moomaw, W. (2005). The relationship between teacher autonomy and stress, work satisfaction, empowerment, and professionalism. Educational Research Quarterly, 29(1), 37–53.
Peters, R. S. (1973). Authority, responsibility and education. London: Allyn and Unwin.
Pring, R. (2004). Conclusion: Evidence-based policy and practice. In G. Thomas & R. Pring (Eds.), Evidence-based practice in education (pp. 201–213). Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Roche, K. (1999). Moral and ethical dilemmas in Catholic school settings. In P. Begley (Ed.), Values and educational leadership (pp. 255–272). Albany, New York: SUNY Press.
Simons, H. (2002). School self-evaluation in a democracy. In D. Nevo (Ed.), School-based evaluation: An international perspective (pp. 17–34). Oxford: Elsevier Science.
Slattery, P. (2003). Hermeneutics, subjectivity and aesthetics: Internationalising the interpretative process in US curriculum research. In W. F. Pinar (Ed.), International handbook of curriculum research (pp. 651–666). New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Sugrue, C. (1999). Primary principals’ perspectives on whole school evaluation. Irish Journal of Education, 10(2), 15–31.
Thrupp, M., & Willmott, R. (2003). Education management in managerialist times. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Wolf, L., & Craig, D. (2004). Tiptoe through the plateaus: Personal reflections on interviews with Andy Hargreaves and Molly Quinn. Journal of Curriculum and Pedagogy, 1(1), 131–153.
Woods, G. (2007). “The ‘bigger feeling’, the importance of spiritual experience in educational leadership. Evaluation, 35(1), 135–155.
Wright, N. (2003). Principled bastard leadership? A rejoinder to Gold, Evans, Earley, Halpin and Collarbone. Educational Management and Administration, 29(3), 139–143.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
McNamara, G., O’Hara, J. (2009). Ethical Leadership in an Age of Evaluation: Implications for Whole School Wellbeing. In: de Souza, M., Francis, L.J., O’Higgins-Norman, J., Scott, D. (eds) International Handbook of Education for Spirituality, Care and Wellbeing. International Handbooks of Religion and Education, vol 3. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9018-9_51
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9018-9_51
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-1-4020-9017-2
Online ISBN: 978-1-4020-9018-9
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawEducation (R0)