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Leading learning in Asia – emerging empirical insights from five societies

Philip Hallinger (College of Public Health Sciences, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand) (Faculty of Education, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg, South Africa)
Allan Walker (Faculty of Education and Human Development, The Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Hong Kong)

Journal of Educational Administration

ISSN: 0957-8234

Article publication date: 10 April 2017

1182

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to synthesize findings from studies of principal instructional leadership conducted in five East Asian societies. The authors first identify similarities and then differences in approaches to instructional leadership across the societies. Then the findings of the synthesis are compared with broad findings from the global literature on principal instructional leadership.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper employs a thematic approach to synthesizing findings from the five qualitative studies.

Findings

The authors identified numerous similarities in practices of instructional leadership across the five societies. These included first, a top-down approach to defining the mission and goals of schools whereby principals worked within a fairly narrow zone of discretion. Second, principals devoted relatively little attention to coordinating the curriculum due to working within strict national curriculum frameworks. Third, principals executed their instructional leadership practices with an ever-present sense of the need to honor hierarchical relations and maintain harmony among staff and other stakeholders. Differences across the five societies centered on the extent to which the instructional leadership role of principals was explicitly defined and the extent to which they received training for the role.

Originality/value

This synthesis sought to build upon reviews of research published in a special issue of this journal two years ago. The synthesis and this body of research papers have contributed toward moving empirical research on educational leadership broadly, and instructional leadership in particular, forward in East Asia.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to acknowledge the funding support of the Research Grant Council (RGC) of Hong Kong for its support through the General Research Fund (GRF841512).

Citation

Hallinger, P. and Walker, A. (2017), "Leading learning in Asia – emerging empirical insights from five societies", Journal of Educational Administration, Vol. 55 No. 2, pp. 130-146. https://doi.org/10.1108/JEA-02-2017-0015

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2017, Emerald Publishing Limited

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