Opinions of school principals on the professional status of school management

In addition to being one of the necessary phenomena for individuals to lead a qualified life, education also has the feature of changing and transforming societies. Schools are institutions where education is given formally. The fact that schools are institutions where individuals who will shape societies are trained makes it important to manage schools effectively. The effective organization and management of the school is necessary for the education system and the school to achieve their goals. This situation requires the school administrator to have competence and qualifications in the field of school management. In this study, the professional status of school administrators in Turkey was evaluated based on the criteria of appointment and promotion of school principals, their working conditions and their views on the professionalization of administratorship. This research was designed using the case study model, one of the qualitative research designs. Research data were collected through face-to-face interviews. The study group of the research consists of school principals working in Muğla Province. The study group was determined by using maximum variation sampling, one of the purposive sampling methods. The data of the study were collected through face-to-face interviews with school principals using a semi-structured interview form developed by the researcher. The collected data were analyzed using the inductive analysis technique. According to the results obtained from the research; school principals stated that the regulation on appointing administrators changes very often, this situation causes uneasiness on them, and that the time required to be a teacher in order to be a deputy principal in the regulation is insufficient and the time required to be spent as a vice principal to become a school principal is insufficient. School principals state that they should receive a preliminary training on technical issues before starting to work as a manager, that there should be no obligation to attend classes, and that the necessary regulations should be implemented urgently to carry out school management as a professional profession based on postgraduate education, instead of serving as a four-year assignment. In addition, school principals stated that besides the heavy workload specified in their job descriptions, their powers were limited and the wages received were not equivalent to the responsibilities they had undertaken.