School principals have an important role to play in successful schools and how they run. Leaders contribute to student learning through their influence on other staff, organisational capacity and context. The importance of school leadership makes it vital to better understand how effective leaders can best be recruited, developed and retained.

The OECD Improving School Leadership Activity aims to provide in-depth analyses of different approaches to school leadership in 22 volunteer countries. The fact that so many countries are taking part underlines the importance of leadership issues around the world.

The Australian Country Background Report prepared by ACER in 2006 provides a national overview of information and research on school leadership, including leaders’ roles, the links between leadership and student learning outcomes, the attractiveness of the leadership role, and training and professional development for school leaders. The report also includes several short case studies of innovative practices in school leadership and the development of school leaders.

The Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (previously Education, Science and Training) released the Australian report in January. Later in 2008 an international comparative report by the OECD will draw on all the country reports to provide analysis and recommendations for OECD countries to consider.

The Australian research reviewed by the ACER team confirmed that success was more likely when the schools were collegial, consultative and involve partnerships. The review also revealed that there are major concerns in regard to attracting, developing and retaining effective school leaders. Australia is experiencing serious leadership supply problems, including the replenishment of principal vacancies, the identification of aspirants for vacancies and ‘next generation’ school leaders, and workplace well-being issues associated with leadership.

Teacher employers, leaders’ professional associations, and universities have initiated a wide range of programs in response to the issues of leader supply and demand, including measures to address leadership capacity building, first-time and experienced principal mentoring and professional learning programs for leading teachers and assistant principals.

While the majority of principals experience high job satisfaction, they were also concerned about role expansion, increasing overload, ambiguity, conflict and stress. The role of the principal has been affected by devolution to school level of greater school decision-making responsibility and accountability. This may point to the need for a review and possible redesign of the principal role and other senior leadership roles, as well as enhanced support.

A key challenge for developers of school leadership programs is to identify factors that are essential in the preparation of school leaders, including the capacity to take on a broad range of responsibilities and facilitate shared leadership, and the relationship between leadership and student outcomes. There is an expanding range of leadership learning activities in Australia, but there is also a need for more research and evaluation of the programs that have been developed. Much of the existing school leadership research is small-scale and localised, and the findings are difficult to generalise.

The ACER team who prepared the Australian report was Michelle Anderson, Peter Gronn (Monash University, now at Glasgow University), Lawrence Ingvarson, Andrew Jackson (now at Monash University), Elizabeth Kleinhenz, Phillip McKenzie, Bill Mulford (University of Tasmania) and Nick Thornton (now at the Lauriston Institute). The team was advised by representatives from government and non-government education authorities and professional associations.

The full report is available for download from the DEEWR website.

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