Distributed leadership practices in vocational and training high school

Abstract

Considering the relevance of leadership for school change, there is a need to review Distributed Leadership practices in Technical Professional Secondary Education establishments. Especially when considering the possible incidence of this style of Distributed Leadership in school improvement processes. It is for the above that the present work proposes to carry out a case study in a Chilean high school that has the attribute of a trajectory of sustained improvement, in order to understand how the members of the management team have acquired practices of Distributed Leadership, a team that corresponds to the position of director, head teacher and head of specialties. The research methodology corresponded to a narrative methodology; perspective that allows the construction of knowledge from the participants' own experience. As results, it was obtained that for the process of acquiring leadership practices, both personal and organizational aspects are involved, aspects that respond specifically to the personal and organizational histories of the case study. The conclusion is that both, previous experiences and knowledge of the management team and the characteristics of the educational center come together in the acquisition of distributed leadership practices and mark a value in terms of school improvement. Redesigning the organization, developing professional capabilities and innovating in teaching and learning processes have been key distributed leadership practices for school improvement in the case of the vocational training center investigated.