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PurposeOne of the features of the New Zealand secondary schools system is that achievement closely reflects the taught curriculum. The National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) directly assesses student achievement on the secondary school curriculum through a combination of criterion‐based internal and external assessments. The nature of NCEA means school‐level results not only reflect student achievement but also the ability of leaders to organise, deliver, and monitor a relevant curriculum for students. This paper aims to describe how NCEA data were used to develop a simple but fair system to assess the relative performance of secondary schools.Design/methodology/approachNo standardised measures of performance prior to Year 11 are available in New Zealand. Nor are student‐level data available. In the absence of these, multiple indicators of gross performance, added value and improvement over time were analysed using a schools‐of‐similar‐type methodology.FindingsResults indicated that schools in the low and middle SES communities were more likely to be improving than others, but these improving schools were also more likely to be already high‐ or mid‐performing. Low‐performing schools were least likely to be improving.Originality/valueSome advantages of this methodology are its ability to be utilised with any publicly available standards‐based achievement data, its validity as an indicator of leadership and organisational performance, and its ability to track school performance trends over time.

Many studies claim the importance of goal-setting for school improvement but few outline specific practices. This study highlights specific goal-setting practices associated with successful school improvement efforts. It reports on a 2-year collaborative research project, which closely examined three principals’ goal-setting practices in the context of their schools. It documents principals’ and staffs’ efforts to improve equity in outcomes through detailed case studies. Case studies drew on principal and teacher interview data, workshop artifacts and discussion recordings, observations, school reports and school achievement data. The in-depth case and cross-case analyses focused on micro-level leadership practices and their impact on school-wide practices. This study highlights four key leadership drivers for improvement. These include: justifying goals in ways that challenge teachers’ beliefs about current achievement to raise commitment; embedding tight and rigourous monitoring practices with a focus on problem-solving and improvement; distributing responsibility and leadership; and developing the capability and collective responsibility of middle leaders. Our discussion highlights how leaders’ belief systems can enable or constrain their ability to influence their schools’ cultures.