School Leadership in Chile: Breaking the Inertia

Abstract

Chile’s school leadership is in the midst of a difficult transition in which principals must face new demands and implement innovative practices even though they lack the legal powers and training to do so properly. The search for school leadership is part of a more far-reaching push for decentralization and greater accountability of schools that would grant principals a more central role. The purpose of this chapter is to describe the tensions of this developing movement in regard to the principals’ position, actual leadership practices, and existing opportunities for training. The text also offers suggestions for educational policy that could favor the proper channeling of this transformative force. The content of the chapter is based on available statistics and intensive use of the results of a national research project that its authors are directing. Given the singular importance of the private sector in education in Chile – enrollment in private and private subsidized schools is higher than that of public schools – special attention is paid to the implications of these institutional management conditions for the exercise of leadership.