Conclusion
A recent publication sponsored by Division A of the American Educational Research Association (the largest association of its kind in the world, with many international members) claimed that research on school leadership has generated few robust claims. The main reason cited for this gap in our knowledge was a lack of programmatic research; a paucity of accumulated evidence from both small- and large-scale studies, the use of a variety of research designs, and failure to provide evidence in sufficient amounts and of sufficient quality to serve as powerful guides to policy and practice. We have no quarrel withthis assertion.
This assertion, however, should not be taken to mean that we know nothing of importance about successful school leadership. There are some quite important things that we do know, and claims that we can now make with some confidence. Not taking pains to capture what we know not only risks squandering the practical insights such evidence can provide; it also reduces the likelihood that future leadership research will build cumulatively on what we already know. Failure to build on this would be a huge waste of scarce resources.
This executive summary has presented, in the form of seven strong claims, the most important results of previous school-leadership research. We explore these claims in more detail in our full review of the literature. This literature review, the jumping-off point for a large-scale, mixed-methods empirical study, will extend the number of robust claims that we can legitimately make about successful leadership in a range of schools. In so doing, it will significantly increase the quality and quantity of evidence of what successful school leadership means in practice.