This article reports the findings of a qualitative study that examined what it means to be a principal in the context of rurality. We argue that principals in the 21st century encounter complex work situations that make it hard for them to manoeuvre. Furthermore, for principals in the context of rurality, such complexities pose multiple dilemmas, given that rurality exposes principals to multiple challenges. Using a case study within an interpretive paradigm, we interviewed and observed five principals from rural schools in the Limpopo province. The study found that principals’ leadership focuses dominantly on administrative tasks. It further identified social and institutional complexities that principals encounter and argues that these complexities compel to treat rural schools as systems. While we hail this view of schools, it emerged that some units of the system appear to be thwarting the progress of principals in leading rural schools. We conclude that, at times, principals’ leadership in the context of rurality can be defined as a leadership that shuns policies and issues of social justice for the purpose of finding what works in their contexts.
This inquiry sought to explore the teachers’ and students’ challenges and attitudes concerning mandatory online instruction at the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020. Using a qualitative case study, a single international school in Doha, Qatar was sampled to participate. The data was generated from interviews with seven teachers who participated in one-on-one in-depth interviews and from six groups of students who participated in focus group discussions. An inductive data analysis approach was employed to analyse the data. The findings revealed various technical, pedagogical, and social challenges experienced by both teachers and students. The participants’ attitudes to online learning were mixed as others preferred this mode of learning while some preferred learning in physical classrooms. The implications point toward the need for teacher professional development that targets the use of online teaching platforms. They further point to the need for teachers and school administrators to find strategies to make online learning more interactive and to assign work that reduces the amount of time spent on the screen.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.