The Monitoring Role of the Academic Middle Manager in Secondary Schools

Abstract

This article examines aspects of the monitoring role of academic middle managers insecondary schools since the implementation of the Education Reform Act of 1988,drawing on the perceptions of middle managers. The data were collected from a largescalepostal survey of middle managers in three local authorities and three case-studyschools. Middle managers acknowledge the need for management tasks, including themonitoring of colleagues teaching, to be part of their role but still experience difficultiesin fulfilling this task. One suggested cause of this difficulty is the fact that the departmental team is perceived by middle managers to be against the monitoring of its work.

Managing Curriculum Change from the Middle: How Academic Middle Managers Enact Their Role in Higher Education

“…Coupled by being also referred to as teachers and hence people whose possible avenues of social influence in their departments are then rooted in a seemingly inconsistent work role where the incumbent is both superior and professional colleague (Paulsen, 2008;Jones & Duckett, 2006), academic middle managers can best be understood in two context, i.e., the school wide context and department context (Wise, 2001). In the school wide context, by virtue of their position in the school hierarchy, middle managers are seen as operating at the interface between different levels and different sources of influence and change with their role shifting towards managerialism in which the middle managers find themselves managing the intersection of traditional and new organisational cultures and trying to exert school-wide influence (Wise, 2001;Hancook & Hellawell, 2003).…”

“…In the school wide context, by virtue of their position in the school hierarchy, middle managers are seen as operating at the interface between different levels and different sources of influence and change with their role shifting towards managerialism in which the middle managers find themselves managing the intersection of traditional and new organisational cultures and trying to exert school-wide influence (Wise, 2001;Hancook & Hellawell, 2003). In the department context, middle managers are tasked with ensuring good teaching and learning, a role that has traditionally been recognised as at the heart of the middle manager's work and which comes with the inherent problems of the monitoring and collegiality duality Wise, 2001). As a result of this role conflict and role ambiguity, tensions are therefore frequently observed that characterise this duality in the work role of the academic middle manager Wise, 2001).…”

“…In the department context, middle managers are tasked with ensuring good teaching and learning, a role that has traditionally been recognised as at the heart of the middle manager's work and which comes with the inherent problems of the monitoring and collegiality duality Wise, 2001). As a result of this role conflict and role ambiguity, tensions are therefore frequently observed that characterise this duality in the work role of the academic middle manager Wise, 2001). Middle managers are also referred to as specialists in subject knowledge, didactics and pedagogy within their specific knowledge domains (Busher, et al, 2000), whose expertise and legitimacy is grounded on professional knowledge (Clegg & McAuley, 2005).…”

“…Among such models are the Wise (2001) model which is premised on the idea that AMM responsibilities fall somewhere on the continuum according to whether the AMM is principally concerned with management of tasks (task-orientation) or with the management of people (people-orientation) and the Floyd & Wooldridge (1994;1996;2000) typology of middle manager influence on strategic change which posits that the AMM performs the following four different roles: championing strategic alternatives, facilitating change, synthesising information, and implementing deliberate strategy. Among the typologies of AMM role in change which stands out and which shall be discussed in this study is the Floyd & Wooldridge (2000) typology as shown in Figure 2.…”

The System of Middle Leadership in Secondary Schools in England and Its Implications for the Lithuanian Education System

“…Two significant tensions affecting subject leaders are first, 'between expectations that [the] role had a whole school focus and their loyalty to their department, and second, between a growing school culture of line management within a hierarchical framework and a professional rhetoric of collegiality' (Bennett et al, 2007). The monitoring of colleagues' work and passing on assessments to more senior colleagues are an example of a situation in which these tensions can emerge (Glover et al, 1998) as classroom observation by middle leaders has been seen by many departmental members as demonstrating a failure of trust and an implementation of a culture of surveillance (Wise, 2001). …”