The Impact of

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The Impact of School Leadership on Pupil
Outcomes Qing Gu, Pam Sammons and Christopher
Day Project Team C. Day, P. Sammons, D.
Hopkins, A. Harris, K Leithwood, Q Gu, E.
Ahtaridou, E. Brown, C. Penlington, A. Kington
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Key Aims of Research
To identify and map empirically grounded direct
and indirect causal and associative relationships
between effective leadership and pupil outcomes
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Research Design Integrating evidence about
effective / improved schools
Qualitative strand
Quantitative strand Attainment VA analyses
Literature Review
Survey 1
20 Case Studies
Survey 2
Single and cross case analysis
SEM Models
Integration
Values Strategies Consequences
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Sampling for the Survey Phase

• Analyses identified 3 groups of schools that had
  experienced sustained improvement or stable high
  effectiveness, relative to schools serving
  similar pupil intakes across 3 years 2003-2005
• Low to medium
• Medium to high
• Sustained high
• No recorded change of headteacher
• The level of social disadvantage of the pupil
  intake (by FSM band) to include sufficient
  numbers of disadvantaged schools

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Quantitative Methods

• Analyses of attainment and value added data (FFT,
  DCFS) for all schools in England 2003-2005
• Questionnaire survey of 1,500 headteachers and
  5,600 key staff in their schools
• Identification of effectiveness and leadership
  characteristics by school improvement group
• Confirmatory factor analysis to explore
  dimensions of leadership school processes
• Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) to
  investigate relationships with change in pupil
  outcomes

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Case Studies

• Selection
• Filter 1 Schools with both headteacher key
  staff questionnaires
• Filter 2 Ofsted results Excellent / Very Good
  and good in last inspection for leadership
• Filter 3 Total years as a head in current
  school 4
• Based on three visits (1 day) per term per year,
  case studies involve
• 20 headteachers (10 primary, 10 secondary)
• 70 key staff (20 primary, 50 secondary)
• 120 colleagues (60 primary, 60 secondary)
• 600 pupils (x2 cohorts)

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Initial Literature Review

• Seven Strong Claims
• School leadership is second only to classroom
  teaching as an influence on pupil learning.
• Almost all successful leaders draw on the same
  repertoire of basic leadership practices.
• The ways in which leaders apply these basic
  leadership practices not the practices
  themselves demonstrate responsiveness to,
  rather than dictation by, the contexts in which
  they work.
• School leaders improve teaching and learning
  indirectly and most powerfully through their
  influence on staff motivation, commitment and
  working conditions.
• School leadership has a greater influence on
  schools and students when it is widely
  distributed.
• Some patterns of distribution are more effective
  than others
• A small handful of personal traits explains a
  high proportion of the variation in leadership
  effectiveness

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The observed variables for the five-factor CFA
model on Leadership Practice (Secondary)
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Correlations between the five latent variables in
relation to Leadership Practice (Secondary)
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Cross Case and Survey Analyses Interim Findings
Structural Equation Models HT Perceptions of
Leadership Practices and Changes in Pupil
Outcomes over Three Years
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A Tentative Model (Secondary)
Use of Data
0.15
Setting Directions
Distributed Leadership
0.36
0.11
0.32
-.19
Developing People
Teacher Collaborative Culture
Assessment for Learning
0.32
0.40
0.22
0.29
0.12
0.23
0.31
027
0.70
Staff
High Academic Standards
Use of Observation
0.55
0.16
0.15
0.44
0.26
0.15
0.16
0.25
Improvement in Pupil Behaviour
0.22
Redesigning Organisation
Improvement in School Conditions
Pupil Academic Outcomes
0.14
0.33
0.24
SLT Collaboration
0.33
0.34
0.40
0.51
0.14
Positive Learner Motivation Learning Culture
0.20
Improvement in Pupil Attendance
0.22
0.40
0.42
0.29
0.11
0.17
Leader Trust in Teachers
External Collaborations Learning Opportunities
0.16
L T
0.19
0.18
0.17
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A Tentative Model (Primary)
Developing People
0.51
Setting Directions
Distributed Leadership
0.17
0.25
0.11
Use of Data
Teacher Collaborative Culture
Assessment for Learning
0.40
0.23
0.34
0.25
SMT
0.14
0.26
0.46
High Academic Standards
0.37
0.13
0.20
0.16
Reduction in Staff Mobility Absence
0.34
Redesigning Organisation
Improvement in School Conditions
Pupil Academic Outcomes (English)
0.45
0.31
Staff
0.19
0.25
0.23
0.22
0.23
0.38
Pupil Attend-ance
Pupil Beha-viour
0.14
0.39
0.47
SLT Collaboration
0.22
0.21
0.14
0.18
0.33
0.59
Pupil Motivation Responsibility for Learning
0.21
0.13
Leader Trust in Teachers
External Collaborations Learning Opportunities
0.13
0.12
L T
0.29
0.19
0.20
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Cross Case and Survey Analyses Interim Findings
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Differences by School Improvement Groups

• The categorisation of schools into three
  distinctive groups reveals statistically and
  educationally significant differences in certain
  leadership features and practices
• There are important relationships between school
  context and the school improvement group, and
  between school context and headteachers time in
  post
• There are distinct features that differentiate
  schools in the three improvement groups. There is
  strong evidence that schools in the Low to
  Moderate / High Group made greater improvements
  in changing school culture, climate and reported
  greater change in pupil behaviour, attendance,
  motivation and engagement over the three year
  period
• Headteachers and staff in the Low to Moderate /
  High Group were more likely in the three year
  period to prioritise strategies to improve
  teaching and learning and the use of data than
  those in the Stable High effective group

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School Context and School Improvement Groups
Primary
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Numbers of heads in post over last decade in the
school and improvement group (secondary)
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Differences by Sector, Context and Time in Post
of Headteacher

• There were some differences between the
  leadership practices and influences of primary
  and secondary head teachers.
• Effective Head teachers employ different
  improvement strategies depending on their
  experience and time in post and their perceptions
  of the need for change in their school and its
  context.
• During their early years in post in a school
  (0-3 years), head teachers are most active in
  initiating changes to effect improvement.
• There are relationships between the extent of the
  disadvantaged context of schools (FSM band) and
  the amount of change in leadership practice and
  the emphasis reported by primary and secondary
  heads.

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Who they are

• Values, predispositions and attributes
• Moral purpose
• Emotional understanding
• Calculated risk
• Progressive Trust (theory X to theory Y)

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What they do

• Create a collective vision high expectations,
  SLT, drive, standards, holistic
• Improve conditions for teaching and learning
  Building, security, finance and behaviour
• Redesign organisational roles and functions
  broadening participation and distributing the
  leadership
• Enhance teaching and learning data informed,
  personalised, innovative, pedagogies
• Change and enrich the curriculum
  differentiation, relevance, outreach
• Enhance teacher quality C.P.D. and succession
  planning
• Build relationships within the school community
• Actively establish relationships outside the
  school community
• Throughout 1 8 progressively build trust

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Dianas Line of Success
A Line of Success

• 2. Taking ownership an inclusive agenda
  (20002002)
• Vision and values developing schools mission
• Distributing leadership
• Persisting priority on teaching and learning
• becoming a thinking school
• curriculum development
• Performance management and CPD
• Inclusivity integrating students from different
  social and cultural backgrounds
• Focus on monitoring and evaluation

• Coming out of special measures (1999-2000)
• Enriching teaching and learning environment
• Making school secure
• Improving teaching and learning in classrooms
• Leading by example
• Establishing a student behaviour policy and
  improving attendance
• Vision and values
• Developing resources

Ofsted Inspection 2007 (Outstanding)
Ofsted Inspection 2002 (Very Good)
Success of leadership in terms of effect upon
broad pupil outcomes
4. Everyone a leader (2005- present) Creative
partnership and creativity Self
evaluation Personalised learning
3. Developing creativity (2002-2005) Restructuring
leadership Involving community Assessment
(personalised) Placing staff well-being at centre
of school improvement Broadening horizons
Ofsted Inspection 1998 (Special
Measures)
2003
1999
2001
2002
2000
2004
2005
onward
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Dianas Line of Success
A Line of Success and SATs results

• 2. Taking ownership an inclusive agenda
  (20002002)
• Vision and values developing schools mission
• Distributing leadership
• Persisting priority on teaching and learning
• becoming a thinking school
• curriculum development
• Performance management and CPD
• Inclusivity integrating students from different
  social and cultural backgrounds
• Focus on monitoring and evaluation

• Coming out of special measures (1999-2000)
• Enriching teaching and learning environment
• Making school secure
• Improving teaching and learning in classrooms
• Leading by example
• Establishing a student behaviour policy and
  improving attendance
• Vision and values
• Developing resources

Ofsted Inspection 2007 (Outstanding)
Ofsted Inspection 2002 (Very Good)
4. Everyone a leader (2005- present) Creative
partnership and creativity Self
evaluation Personalised learning
3. Developing creativity (2002-2005) Restructuring
leadership Involving community Assessment
(personalised) Placing staff well-being at centre
of school improvement Broadening horizons
Ofsted Inspection 1998 (Special
Measures)
2003
1999
2001
2002
2000
2004
2005
onward
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Key Messages

• Successful leaders show many similarities in both
  their values and what they do. How they act
  varies according to school context,
  organisational history, current performance
  sector. (Claims 2 and 3)
• Social context and leadership judgments about
  organisational history affect their priorities
  and emphases. (Added knowledge)
• Successful leaders are those who are able to
  diagnose, initiate and adapt. It is the
  layering of combinations of fit for purpose
  values-led strategies over time which make a
  difference to pupil outcomes. (New claim)
• School improvement groupings and sectors count.
  (Added knowledge)
• National leadership and management training and
  development programmes should have at their core
  
• examination of core values and personal
  pre-dispositions
• enhancement of diagnostic, problem-solving ,
  interpersonal, emotional and adaptive
  competencies.
• interpretation of strategies and actions through
  the lenses of organisational history,
  socio-economic context and the standards agenda

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THANK YOU