Principals’ leadership in Mexican upper high schools: The paradoxes between rules and practices

Abstract

This article discusses the type of organization and leadership that underlies a competency-based management rule established in Mexico (2008) applicable to principals in public upper high schools. This rule, identified as the 449 Agreement, describes competencies and communicates expected behavior. Implementation, however, is mediated by the principals’ interpretation, as found in the semi-structured interviews conducted with a group of selected acting principals. The analysis of this management rule is based on a theory of decision-making and a theory of organizations where different assumptions on peoples’ behavior are made. We provide evidence to support the contention that each school principal acts according to its context, and that compliance with the Agreement is not facilitated by its rules design. We conclude that the rules design of the competency-based management model in question is dominated by a perspective of personal heroic leadership that assumes an omniscient and omnipresent manager and that also promotes a centralized management model for all schools. In future research, inquiry could focus on the question of whether transformational leadership based on motivation and instructional leadership based on guidance and coaching for teachers could also be nurtured by rules compatible with the pervasive normative leadership type.

Systematic review of research on educational leadership and management in Latin America, 1991–2017

“…We identified 21 studies that evidenced an explicit focus on leadership. These included: studies of instructional leadership (Borden, 2011; Fromm et al, 2016); ethical and social justice leadership (Cuellar and Giles, 2012; DeMatthews et al, 2016; Silva et al, 2017); transformational leadership (Cuadros et al, 2016; Slater et al, 2003); leadership responses to the particular school contexts (e.g., Ahumada et al, 2016; Romero and Krichesky, 2017; Santizo Rodall and Ortega Salazar, 2017; Slater et al, 2002; Weinstein and Muñoz, 2014); and analyses of the policy context for school leadership in Latin America (Flessa et al, 2017; Weinstein and Hernández, 2016).…”

“…The most notable finding with respect to other topical foci was the scarcity of topics for which there was a concentration of studies. Indeed, the only other topics with more than five studies were “school effectiveness and improvement” (e.g., Bellei et al, 2016; Burgess and Dixon, 2012; Cervini, 2009; Elacqua et al, 2011; Martinez-Abad and Chaparro Caso López, 2017; Troncoso et al, 2016; Valenzuela et al, 2016; Willms and Somer, 2001), ‘principals’ (Ahumada et al, 2016; Borden, 2011; Cuadros et al, 2016; Cuellar and Giles, 2012; Galdames et al, 2017; Santizo Rodall and Ortega Salazar, 2017; Slater et al, 2008; Weinsten and Muñoz, 2014), and ‘education reform and change’ (Elacqua et al, 2016; Greybeck et al, 2004; Montemayor et al, 2008; Schiefelbein and Schiefelbein, 2000; Vicente, 2016).…”

“…In addition, we identified two longitudinal surveys (Troncoso et al, 2016; Valenzuela et al, 2016) and five longitudinal qualitative case studies (Arredondo Rucinski et al, 2009; Bellei et al, 2016; Greybeck et al, 2004; Montemayor et al, 2008; Vásquez et al, 2014). Qualitative studies included: single site case studies (DeMatthews, 2016; Greybeck et al, 2004; Montecinos et al, 2014; Montemayor et al, 2008; Silva et al, 2017; Slater et al, 2008; Vásquez et al, 2014; Walbe Ornstein et al, 2009); multiple site case studies (Arredondo Rucinski et al, 2009; Bellei et al, 2016; Cuellar and Giles, 2012; Slater et al, 2003); and studies where qualitative methods were employed to access perceptions of a particular role group (Bellei et al, 2016; Miller, 2015; Santizo Rodall and Ortega Salazar, 2017).…”

“…As shown in Figure 8, and consistent with the historical trends (Bridges, 1982;Haller, 1979;Hallinger, 2017;Hallinger and Heck, 1996;Leithwood et al, 1990), surveys were the most commonly used form of data collection (21 studies). Interviews were used in 14 studies (e.g., Ahumada et al, 2016;Cuellar and Giles, 2012;DeMatthews et al, 2016;Miller, 2015;Santizo Rodall and Ortega Salazar, 2017;Silva et al, 2017;Slater et al, 2003), direct observation in four studies (DeMatthews et al, 2016;Romero and Krichesky, 2017;Slater et al, 2008;Walbe Ornstein et al, 2009), and document analysis in four studies (James, 2014;Romero and Krichesky, 2017;Vásquez et al, 2014;Walbe Ornstein et al, 2009). The quantitative emphasis in the Latin American literature took on additional significance when we analyzed the studies by their use of statistical tests.…”

Educational management: An entrepreneurial vision of basic education

“…Los constantes cambios dentro del marco de la globalización han ocasionado que los directivos deban enmarcarse dentro de una de las siguientes posturas: como administrador educativo (enfocándose únicamente en el proceso educativo) o como gerente educativo (asumiendo un rol que va más allá del área educativa); no obstante, el directivo solo podrá asumir la segunda postura siempre y cuando tenga conocimientos de herramientas de las Ciencias Administrativas (Burbano, 2017), y considere a las políticas educativas como base para la toma de decisiones (Santizo y Ortega, 2018), las mismas que deben impactar no solamente en la sociedad, sino también en la vida de los alumnos (Vicente, 2016). Ello es ampliado por Robbins y Judge (2013) y Chiavenato (2014), quienes sostienen que la gerencia, además de conocimientos, debe poseer tres tipos de habilidades: técnicas (realizar tareas utilizando métodos), humanas (saber trabajar en equipo) y conceptuales (proponer soluciones a diversos problemas durante el ejercicio de su función).…”