Toxic leadership in educational leadership

The purpose of this research is to determine the characteristics of toxic organizations, toxic leaders, educational organizations with features of toxic organizations, and toxic leaders in educational organizations. To that end, both domestic and foreign literatures were researched and data gathered were resolved and analyzed accordingly to answer sub-problems. Because the present condition was reflected as it exists, this study is a descriptive one. As results of the research, it is concluded that all organizations more or less contain potentially toxic properties, toxicity quickly and regularly spread, when it finds a place for itself within the organization, toxic leader uses his success and accomplishments to mask his/her unethical behavior and poor decision-making process, toxic communication and unfair practices result in toxic school culture. In order to decontaminate the toxicity in schools, it is recommended for school administrators to specifically focus on the possible source/s and spreaders of toxicity, to increase trust and increase organizational commitment by sharing authority, to establish an open and transparent communication network, to balanced work life with social and family life by staying away from workaholism, and to allocate more space to healing feelings such as kindness, warmth and caring within attitudes and behaviors. Keywords: Toxic Leader, Toxic School, Toxicity, Toxic Culture