Dilemmas faced by school principals in implementing legislation and decision-making process

The aim of this research is to identify what kind of decision process school principals follow in case of dilemmas they experience in applying the national education legislation. The study group of this phenomenological research consists of 15 school principals working in public primary, secondary and high schools in the Şehzadeler and Yunusemre districts of Manisa province in the 2021-2022 academic year. The method of collecting research data was through interviews. The researcher created an interview form using scenarios about dilemmas that the school principals may encounter in the implementation of the national education legislation. Maximum diversity sampling method was used while determining the study group. The data obtained through the interview form were analyzed with the content analysis method. According to the findings of the study, the decisions of the principals who experienced dilemmas were based on the framework of the issues they prioritized. It was observed that principals interpreted dilemmas differently from each other depending on the effect of their personal values, emotions and experiences. It has been revealed that school principals are stuck in a dilemma between regulations and senior management requests, between giving privilege to the teacher who helps the school and giving privilege to all teachers, between ensuring the principal's self-security and prioritizing the safety of the student, between obeying the orders of the superiors and being fair, complying with the legal regulations and bureaucratic processes and analyzing events that involve imminent danger. It is seen that school principals decide by giving priority to their values in case of a dilemma they experience in applying the legislation. In case of dilemmas involving material and procedural transactions, it has been observed that they preferred to both protect their position and not take any individual risks by applying the legislation. When making decisions, school principals gave priority to the interests of the student, the interests of the organization, the professional motivation of the teacher, being fair, the continuity of bilateral relations with the supervisors, the right granted to the student, the right granted to the teacher, the continuity of education, and the occupational health and safety of students and teachers. It has been observed that principals use the strategies of appealing to reason, consulting colleagues, depending on their emotions, values and experiences while making decisions in dilemmas. Decisions made by school principlas in the dilemmas they face are affected by the status and security of the school administration profession in the law, personal values, the environmental and economic situation of the school, similar past experiences, the ineffectiveness of the legislation in regional and structural differences, the search for support in bilateral relations, and the physical and structural factors of the school. School principals felt positive emotions when they made decisions based on their values whereas they felt negative emotions when they made decisions according to the requests of the pressure groups, their superiors and the legislation they did not find right but had to implement. In the context of this result, various suggestions have been developed for practitioners and researchers. Keywords: legislation, dilemma, decision making.