Michèle Schmidt

Closing the Achievement Gap: A Metaphor for Children Left Behind

The No Child Left Behind Act presents an unprecedented challenge to current educational policy matters. While aimed at addressing the needs of disadvantaged children by claiming to promote equity, justice, and social citizenship among all youth, the new accountability seems to be concerned more with the imperatives of the marketplace. The education framework currently in place becomes a vehicle for social mobility for those few privileged citizens who have the resources and power to make their choices matter, but merely a form of social constraint for those who lack such resources. This paper problematizes the current efforts of reform and examines to what extent they actually benefit the children they are designed to serve.

A feminist postcolonial examination of female principals' experiences in South African secondary schools

A central theme that dominates most studies on gender and leadership in education is the emerging tendency towards mitigating pervasive forms of discrimination against females. Yet, women still remain, for the most part, a minority within leadership positions in education. Despite policy initiatives emphasising gender equity, discrimination, prejudice and stereotyping continue to perpetuate the myth of womens submissiveness and remain a redoubtable barrier for impeding women in acquiring leadership positions. The awareness of gender politics combined with challenges related to gender equity in organisations remain a thorny concern in education circles. This paper examines the barriers South African women experience. A qualitative approach was employed using a post-colonial feminist perspective. Findings indicate that stereotypes concerning female inadequacy as leaders persist and act to distort perceptions of male and female performance and potential.

The instructional leadership role of primary school principals

AbstractThis study explores the instructional leadership (IL) role of primary school principals from the perspective of South African principals and their understanding of IL within their own context of schooling. Using semi-structured interviews with six school principals, this study found that most principals experience great difficulty in balancing their administrative responsibilities with their instructional responsibilities. However, the majority of the principals demonstrated innovative means of resolving challenges that blocked them from being leaders as learners. They remain mired between the old and new paradigms of instructional leadership, yet understand the impact instructional leadership can have even in incremental steps for creating learning communities and fostering the learning of their teachers, themselves and their students. The study shows that the traditional role of principals as managers has been expanded to instructional leaders. The manifestation of IL varied amongst the principa...

Portfolio Assessment as a Tool for Promoting Professional Development of School Principals: A South African Perspective

Poor matriculation results in South African urban schools have resulted in the implementation of professional development programs for principals who wish to improve their qualifications and practice. This article studies principals’ perceptions of the efficacy of using portfolios to assess their professional growth. Using a poststructural lens to theorize portfolio use, interview data were examined to discern what themes consistently evolved when principals were engaged in self-evaluating their own professional practice through a methodological framework of portfolio development. The findings revealed insights into the efficacy of the use of professional portfolios in the professional development of principals.