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2007 - The Leadership Challenge - Improving
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learning in schools

2007

The impact of leadership on student outcomes:


Making sense of the evidence
Viviane Robinson
University of Auckland

Follow this and additional works at: http://research.acer.edu.au/research_conference_2007


Part of the Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research Commons

Recommended Citation
Robinson, Viviane, "The impact of leadership on student outcomes: Making sense of the evidence"
(2007).
http://research.acer.edu.au/research_conference_2007/5

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The impact of leadership on student
outcomes: Making sense of the evidence
Abstract in the preparation of this paper is
gratefully acknowledged.
Published empirical research was
used to synthesise the evidence Introduction
about the impact of different types
of leadership on students’ academic There is unprecedented international
and non-academic outcomes. The interest in the question of how
first analysis involved a comparison educational leaders influence a range
of the effects of transformational and of student outcomes (Bell, Bolam,
instructional leadership on student & Cubillo, 2003; Leithwood, Day,
Viviane M.J. Robinson Sammons, Harris, & Hopkins, 2006;
outcomes. The second involved
The University of Auckland, Faculty of the inductive development of five Leithwood, Seashore Louis, Anderson,
Education, School of Teaching, Learning sets of leadership practices and the & Wahlstrom, 2004; Marzano, Waters,
and Development estimation of the magnitude of their & McNulty, 2005; Witziers, Bosker, &
Auckland, New Zealand effects. The comparison of the effects Krüger, 2003).
of instructional and transformational This interest reflects the conviction of
After completing her doctoral study at Harvard
University, Vivianne Robinson took up a position
leadership indicated that the effect of the public and politicians that school
at the University of Auckland, New Zealand the former is consistently and notably leaders make a substantial difference
where she is now Professor in the Faculty of larger than the effect of the latter type to the quality of teaching, and hence
Education. She is an organisational psychologist, of leadership. The second analysis the quality of learning, in their school.
specialising in organisational effectiveness and
improvement, leadership and the relationship
revealed five leadership dimensions While this belief is supported by the
between research and the improvement of that have moderate to large effects qualitative research on the impact of
practice. Her work has been published in on outcomes: establishing goals and leadership on school effectiveness and
international handbooks, and leading international expectations; strategic resourcing; improvement (Edmonds, 1979; Maden,
journals such as Educational Researcher and
Educational Administration Quarterly.
planning, coordinating and evaluating 2001; Scheurich, 1998), quantitative
teaching and the curriculum; promoting research suggests that public confidence
Viviane is also Director of the graduate in the capacity of school leaders to
programme in educational management at the
and participating in teacher learning and
University of Auckland, and Academic Director development; and ensuring an orderly make a difference to student outcomes
of the First-time Principals Programme – New and supportive environment. The outstrips the available evidence
Zealand’s national induction programme for more leaders focus their professional (Hallinger & Heck, 1998; Marzano et al.,
school principals. This programme prepares newly 2005; Witziers et al., 2003).
appointed principals through a programme of
relationships, their work and their
residential courses, online learning and mentoring. learning on the core business of The purpose of this paper is to address
teaching and learning, the greater the paradoxical differences between
She is passionate about doing research that
makes a difference to practice, and it is this their influence on student outcomes. the qualitative and quantitative evidence
passion that motivates much of her research and It is suggested that leadership theory, on leadership impacts by taking a
writing. She has recently published a best-selling research and practice needs to be
book, based on her experience teaching teachers
fresh approach to the analysis of the
more closely linked to research on quantitative evidence. Rather than
how to do research that is both rigorous and
relevant to their job situation (Robinson, V. M. effective teaching, so that there is conduct a further meta-analysis of the
J., & Lai, M. K. (2006). Practitioner research for greater focus on what leaders need overall impact of leadership on student
educators: A guide to improving classrooms and to know and do to support teachers outcomes, we focused on identifying
schools. Corwin Press).
in using the pedagogical practices that the relative impact of different types of
Viviane’s keynote address will draw from her raise achievement and reduce disparity. leadership.
recent work as a writer of the Iterative Best
Evidence Synthesis on Educational Leadership. This paper was completed with the Two quite different strategies were
This work is part of the New Zealand Ministry of financial support of the Iterative Best used to identify types of leadership
Education’s Best Evidence Synthesis programme
Evidence Synthesis program of the and their impact. The first involved
which is designed to support a more evidence-
based policy-making process as well as to make New Zealand Ministry of Education a comparison between the impact
relevant research findings accessible to school (http://educationcounts.edcentre.govt. of transformational and instructional
practitioners (http://www.minedu.govt.nz/goto/ nz/goto/BES?). The assistance of Dr leadership (Hallinger, 2005; Hallinger
bestevidencesynthesis).The leadership synthesis
analyses national and international evidence on
Ken Rowe of the Australian Council & Heck, 1998; Leithwood, Tomlinson,
the impact of leadership on a wide range of for Educational Research and Dr Claire & Genge, 1996; Leithwood & Jantzi,
student outcomes. Lloyd of the University of Auckland 2005). The second strategy for

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determining leadership type was however, for more homogenous Impact of
grounded in particular leadership subsets of the studies. transformational and
practices, as described by the survey
items used in the relevant research,
The relative impact of transformational instructional leadership
and instructional leadership was
rather than in abstract leadership Transformational leadership has weak
determined by computing three
theory. (<.2 ES) indirect effects on student
different average effect sizes – one for
outcomes. While it has moderate
the transformational leadership studies
Research methods and two for the instructional leadership
effects on teacher attitudes and
perceptions of the school climate and
A search of the international literature studies. The latter was necessary in
organisation, these effects do not, on
yielded 24 studies, published between order to ensure that transformational
the whole, flow through to students.
1985 and 2006, that provided evidence leadership studies were compared with
Those instructional leadership studies
about the links between leadership instructional leadership studies that
that used similar designs to those used
and student outcomes. The majority employed similar research designs.
in the transformational leadership
of studies (15 of 24) were conducted
The first step in determining the relative group, showed effect sizes that were,
in schools in the United States of
impact of different types of leadership on average, three times larger than
America. Two studies were conducted
practice (henceforth called ‘leadership those found in transformational
in Canada and one only in each of
dimensions’) involved inductively leadership studies. The second group
Australia, England, Hong Kong, Israel,
deriving the relevant dimensions. This of instructional leadership studies (i.e.,
the Netherlands, New Zealand and
was done by inspecting the author’s those that sampled schools where
Singapore.
descriptions of the components of students were achieving above and
Fourteen studies examined leadership their composite leadership variables, below expected levels, rather than from
in elementary school contexts, three and of the wording of their leadership the full range of outcomes) showed
in high schools, and seven studies indicators (survey items). Five even larger effects of instructional
included a mix of elementary, middle dimensions captured the common leadership. These latter studies suggest
and high schools. Thirteen of the 24 meaning of the components and that the leadership of otherwise similar
studies confined their analysis of school indicators. Each study was then coded high- and low-performing schools is
leadership to the principal only, while against the five leadership dimensions very different and that those differences
eleven took a broader, more distributed and, where the data were available, matter for student academic outcomes.
view of leadership. Twenty studies effect sizes were calculated for each In summary, two different analyses
examined academic outcomes, three leadership indicator or component. suggest that the impact of instructional
examined non-academic outcomes, and The result was an average effect leadership on student outcomes is
one included both. size for each of the five leadership considerably greater than that of
dimensions, thus providing a second transformational leadership. Admittedly,
Analytic strategies answer to the question of the impact of these findings are based on a small
different types of leadership on student number of studies and effect size
Relevant information from the 24
outcomes. statistics.
studies identified was entered into a
spreadsheet under headings concerning
the context, sample, leadership theory Findings Impact of particular
and measure, research design, and main The results of our comparison of leadership dimensions
findings. It was possible to identify and transformational leadership and
As a result of a detailed analysis of
estimate the magnitude of effects for 19 instructional leadership are presented
the published research, we identified
of the 24 studies. A decision was made first, followed by the analysis of
five leadership dimensions that had
not to calculate an overall leadership the impact of particular leadership
a particularly powerful impact on
effect size, as the wide variety of dimensions.
students. The five, along with brief
leadership constructs, measures and
descriptions, are listed in Table 1.
research designs employed across the
24 studies, makes such a calculation The list of dimensions is unusual in
problematic in terms of both that it does not include the typical
comparability and precision. Average distinction between leading tasks and
effect size estimates were calculated, leading people or relationships. This

The Leadership Challenge: Improving learning in schools

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Table 1: Leadership practices derived from studies of effects of leadership on students may or may not be applied in ways
that serve key pedagogical purposes.
Leadership practice Meaning of dimension
There is some evidence that this type
Establishing goals and Includes the setting, communicating and monitoring of learning of leadership has a moderate indirect
expectations goals, standards and expectations, and the involvement of staff and effect on students and that it may be
others in the process so that there is clarity and consensus about
particularly important in regions where
goals.
there is a chronic resource shortage.
Strategic resourcing Involves aligning resource selection and allocation to priority
teaching goals. Includes provision of appropriate expertise through Dimension three: Planning,
staff recruitment.
coordinating and evaluating
Planning, Coordinating and Direct involvement in the support and evaluation of teaching teaching and the curriculum
evaluating teaching and the through regular classroom visits and provision of formative and
curriculum summative feedback to teachers. Direct oversight of curriculum There was considerable evidence that
through school-wide coordination across classes and year levels and this leadership dimension makes a
alignment to school goals.
strong impact on student outcomes.
Promoting and participating Leadership that not only promotes but directly participates with It involves four types of leadership
in teacher learning and teachers in formal or informal professional learning. practice:
development
1 Involving staff in discussions of
Ensuring an orderly and Protecting time for teaching and learning by reducing external
supportive environment pressures and interruptions and establishing an orderly and teaching, including its impact on
supportive environment both inside and outside classrooms. students;
2 Working with staff to coordinate
and review the curriculum, e.g.,
distinction has been eschewed here that the degree of staff consensus developing progressions of
because close examination of the about school goals is a significant objectives for the teaching of writing
leadership indicators used in these discriminator between otherwise similar across year levels;
studies shows that relationship skills are high- and low-performing schools 3 Providing feedback to teachers,
embedded in every dimension. (Goldring & Pasternak, 1994). based on classroom observations
In schools with high achievement that they report as useful in
Dimension one: Establishing or high achievement gains, the goal improving their teaching;
goals and expectations focus is not only articulated by 4 Systematic monitoring of student
Leadership makes a difference to leaders but embedded in school and progress for the purpose of
students through its emphasis on clear classroom routines and procedures. improvement at school department
academic and learning goals. In a work Successful leadership influences both and class level.
environment where multiple conflicting interpersonally and by structuring
demands can make everything seem the way that teachers do their work Even though the measures of leadership
equally important, goals establish what (Ogawa & Bossert, 1995). in these studies included more than the
is relatively more or less important principal, the effect of these leadership
and focus staff and student attention Dimension two: Strategic practices appears to be smaller in high
and effort accordingly. The importance resourcing schools than in primary schools. Clearly
of relationships in this leadership we need to know much more about
The word ‘strategic’ in the description
dimension is apparent from the fact the pathways through which leadership
of this dimension signals that this
that leaders who give more emphasis to makes a difference to students in high
leadership dimension is about
communicating goals and expectations schools.
securing and allocating material and
(Heck, Larsen, & Marcoulides, 1990; staffing resources that are aligned to
Heck, Marcoulides, & Lang, 1991),
Dimension four: Promoting and
pedagogical purposes, rather than
informing the community of academic
participating in teacher learning
leadership skill in securing resources
accomplishments and recognising
and development
per se. Thus, this measure should
academic achievement (Heck et al., not be interpreted as an indicator of This leadership dimension is described
1991) are found in higher performing skill in fundraising, grant writing or as both promoting and participating,
schools. There is also some evidence partnering with business, as those skills because more is involved here than just

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supporting or sponsoring other staff in (Heck et al., 1990; Heck et al., 1991). For educational leadership researchers,
their learning. The leader participates in An orderly and supportive environment the challenge is to focus more closely
the learning as leader, learner or both. is also one in which staff conflict is on how leaders influence the teaching
The contexts for such learning are both quickly and effectively addressed (Eberts practices that matter. There is much
formal (staff meetings and professional & Stone, 1986). to be gained from a closer integration
development) and informal (discussions of leadership theory and research with
about specific teaching problems). Discussion demonstrably effective pedagogical
This leadership dimension had a strong practices and teacher learning.
The main conclusion to be drawn
impact on school performance. In high- from the present analyses is that
achieving and high-gain schools, teachers particular types of school leadership
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