School leadership for an effective school change in education: A grounded theory study of school leadership

Change can be described as "transition of a system (organism, person or organization) , a process or an environment from a certain situation to another state". This concept also applies to school is one of the most important cornerstones in the education system. It is the subject that schools, a training organization in the change process, adapt to itself to this situation. School organization is an open system in continuous interaction with the environment. Therefore, it must be changed to adapt to the changes in the environment. Change is a requıired fact for the continued presence of each organization. To maintain long-term existence of an organization is not possible without change. The existence and applications of an effective leader is very important in a successful school change. Leadership, can be defined as orientation process in which a person influence other people's activities to perform certain individual or groups objective. Aim of this study is to develop a theory using grounded theory methods and examining the role of school leaders for a successful change at school. School principals, teachers and parent-teacher association in Kepez and Muratpaşa district in Antalya formed the working group in the research. There was carried out 29 individual interview in 5 school as 3 school principal, 7 vice principal, 2 parent teacher association principal, 17 teacher. Content analysis and descriptive analysis techniques was used to analyze the data. The continuous comparative analysis technique was also used. NVivo 10.00 software was used for the data analysis. It was reached three sub-models in the period of seeking answers to the question of "which theory can explain the role and effect of a school leader on implementation an experienced change process to school change effectively" and consequently the school change model show up.