Conceptual and methodological issues in studying school leadership effects as a reciprocal process

Over the past three decades a substantial body of scholarship has examined the effects of school leadership on student learning. Most of this empirical research has framed leadership as an independent variable, or driver for change, in relation to school effectiveness and school improvement. Yet, scholars have for many years observed that leadership is also influenced by features of the organizational setting in which it is enacted. This leads us to conclude that the predominant approaches to studying school leadership effects provide an incomplete picture of the processes and paths by which leadership contributes to school learning. In this paper, we examine the potential offered by conceptualizations of leadership as a reciprocal, or mutual-influence, process that unfolds over time as an approach to studying leadership for learning. We explore a variety of conceptual and related methodological issues that confront researchers who wish to employ this potentially rich but challenging approach to understanding how school leadership contributes to student learning. Copyright © 2011 Taylor & Francis.