A DESCRIPTIVE STUDY OF PRINCIPAL

LEADERSHIP AT A HIGH-PERFORMING

TITLE I CHARTER SCHOOL IN SOUTH

CAROLINA USING MCREL’S BALANCED LEADERSHIP 21 RESPONSIBILITIES

ARGOSY UNIVERSITY - WASHINGTON, DC

NAOMI TAHIRH GOMEZ

Dissertation Proposal Defense

Chapter 1 – Introduction to the Study

Chapter 2 – Review of Literature

Chapter 3 – Methodology

Chapter One

Introduction

The Study’s Objective/Research

Question This study’s objective is to determine qualities or competencies that

are essential in the successful running of a Title I charter school in

South Carolina.

The research question is: What are the qualities or competencies that

are essential in the successful running of a Title I charter school in

South Carolina?

In order to contribute to the ongoing progressive literature pertaining

to charter school leadership.

Background of Charter Schools

In 1983, the National Commission on Excellence in Education

claimed the United States was a nation at risk, where “educational

institutions seem to have lost sight of the basic purposes of schooling, and of the high expectations and disciplined effort needed to attain them” (Gardner, Larsen, & Baker, 1983, p. 5-6). The

report also suggested that the educational system had a “rising tide

of mediocrity that threatens our very future as a Nation and a people” (p. 1).

As a potential remedy to this decline in academic status, the first

charter school was introduced in The United States in 1991 in

Minnesota (Hughes, 2010).

Background of Leadership

Research

Beginnings of Leadership Research Include

1840s - Great Man Theory

1920s – The Trait Theory

1960s – Situational Leadership Theory (Northouse, 2012).

Leadership Theories covered in this study

Transformational Leadership

Authentic Leadership

Triple-Strength Leadership

Purpose of the Research

The purpose of this research is to contribute to the knowledge base

regarding successful charter school leadership.

To conduct a leadership study on effective leadership practices, in

hope of assisting charter school systems find ways to improve.

Significance of the Study

This study aims to determine qualities or competencies that are

essential in the successful running of a Title I charter school in South

Carolina.

The results may be able to assist current and prospective charter

school leaders in South Carolina to lead more effectively.

In gaining perspectives of the leadership and stakeholders on what

has worked for this school, the research will contribute to the

literature related to maintaining successful charter schools.

Chapter Two

Literature Review

Related Literature – Successful Charter Schools

Merseth, Cooper, Roberts, Tieken, Valant, and Wynne (2009) conducted a two-year study in collaboration with Harvard University

about promising strategies and practices in five high-performing

urban charter schools in Massachusetts.

Lawton (2009) conducted a literature review study on effective

charter schools and charter school systems.

Mailot’s (2005) study in New Jersey on successful charter school principals

Related Literature – Leadership

Transformational Leadership

Authentic Leadership

Triple-Strength Leadership

Related Literature – Charter School

Leadership Competencies

Campbell and Grubb (2008) study included this craigslist job posting

for a charter school principal:

“oversee the development and day-to-day operations of all academic

programs and school operations; recruit, evaluate, and manage staff;

develop and maintain relationships between parents, students, teachers,

classified staff, community members, governance board and all other

stakeholders; show a demonstrated ability in helping students graduate from

high school prepared for success in institutions of higher learning;

demonstrate an intellectual dexterity to synthesize the vision, goals, and

objectives into an operational plan . . . Bilingual (Spanish-English) preferred.”

(p. 3)

Chapter Three

Methodology

Methodological Design of the

Research Study

Methodological Reasoning

The researcher chose a mixed-method study as it uses both methods of quantitative

and qualitative for a fuller picture of the subject, that using just one of the methods

would not be able to do alone.

Creswell (2013) explained that using a mixed-method design assists in providing a

better understanding of the research topic.

Theoretical Framework

Subjects

- Parents/Guardians and teachers will participate in the quantitative section of the study.

- Teachers N = 25

- Parents/Guardians N = 179

- Total N = 204

- The Principal at Calhoun Falls Charter School will participate in the qualitative section of the

study.

Selection of the School

- The reason why Calhoun Falls Charter School was selected

- The researcher wanted to study a successful Title I charter school.

- Calhoun Falls Charter School was recognized as a Title I Reward School for Performance by South Carolina Department of Education for the past two

school years.

Reward Schools must have the following:

The school attained a grade of an “A” or a “B” as a Federal Accountability Score for the two most recent school years.

The schools had at least fifty percent of their student population receiving free or reduced lunch.

Reward Schools must not have any significant achievement gaps.

Reward Schools must have had at least one grade tested on the state assessments. (South Carolina Department of Education, 2014).

Survey Instrument The researcher selected McREL’s Balanced Leadership 21 Responsibilities because of its

ability to be applied to a school leadership study (Marzano, Waters, & McNulty, 2005).

McREL’s Balanced Leadership 21 Responsibilities will be converted to questionnaire format, using a Likert scaled. The Likert scale used in this study is:

7 To an Extremely Large Extent

6 To a Very Large Extent

5 To a Large Extent

4 To a Moderate Extent

3 To a Small Extent

2 To a Very Small Extent

1 To an Extremely Small Extent

I am not familiar with the principal in this capacity

McREL’s Balanced Leadership 21

Responsibilities

1. Affirmation

2. Change Agent

3. Contingent Rewards4. Communication

5. Culture

6. Discipline

7. Flexibility

8. Focus

9. Ideals/Beliefs

10. Input

11. Intellectual Stimulation12. Involvement in Curriculum,

Instruction, and Assessment

13. Knowledge of Curriculum,

Instruction, and Assessment

14. Monitoring/Evaluating15. Optimizer

16. Order

17. Outreach

18. Relationships

19. Resources

20. Situational Awareness21. Visibility

Survey Instrument for Parents

• Affirmation

• Change Agent

• Focus

• Flexibility

• Ideals/Beliefs

Recognizing and celebrating the legitimate successes of individuals withinthe school as well as the school as a whole; also recognizing andacknowledging failures when appropriate.

Being willing to challenge school practices that have been in place for a long time and promoting the value of working at the edge of one’s competence.

Establishing concrete goals relative to student achievement as well as curriculum, instruction, and assessment practices in the school, and keeping these prominent in the day-to-day life of the school.

Inviting and honoring the expression of a variety of opinions regarding the running of the school and adapting one’s leadership style to the demands of the current situation.

Operating from a well-articulated and visible set of ideals and beliefsregarding schooling, teaching, and learning.

Survey Instrument for Parents

Continued

• Optimizer

• Order

• Outreach

• Situational Awareness

• Visibility

Providing an optimistic view of what the school is doing and

what the school can accomplish in the future.

Establishing procedures and routines that give staff andstudents a sense of order and predictability

Being an advocate of the school to all relevant constituents and ensuring that the school complies with all important regulations and requirements.

Being keenly aware of the mechanisms and dynamics thatdefine the day-to-day functioning of the school and using that awareness to forecast potential problems.

Being highly visible to teachers, students, and parents throughfrequent visits to classrooms.

Survey’s Open-Ended Questions

The first open-ended question is geared to understand why a

teacher chose to work at a charter school or why a parent elected

to have their child attend a charter school;

asked to gain further insight into the participant’s thoughts on charter

schools in South Carolina.

The second of the open-ended questions will ask if the participant

has any further questions or comments.

to offer a platform for participants to offer insight regarding the topic or

ask questions to resolve misunderstandings regarding the study

Survey Validity

The survey instrument, McREL’s Balanced Leadership 21

Responsibilities, was used in other studies

(Jacob, Goddard, Kim, Miller, & Goddard, 2014)

(Gonzalez, 2009)

Coastal Montessori Charter School (personal communication, 2015),

a South Carolina charter school, replied with two independent

positive responses regarding the study’s use of the instruments.

Use McREL’s Balanced Leadership 21 Responsibilities in the charter

school community nationwide

Survey Validity

The construct validity is established through:

The leading research facility of the study, McREL

the publisher of the research study, Association for

Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD)

The depth of experience of the researchers of McREL

Balanced Leadership 21 Responsibilities

Interview Validity

Why each question is valid:

Question one: What is your experience in previous leadership roles

within and outside of the educational field? 1a. How did (answer

from question 1) help you lead a charter school?

Question two: Working in a Title I school is a considered working with

an at-risk student population. What types of challenges do you

encounter in training your staff to deal with this learning environment?

Interview Validity

Question three, four, and five: How do you attract highly qualified

teachers to work at Calhoun Falls Charter School? How do you lead

efforts to garner community support? and How do you lead efforts to gain parental engagement?

Question six: How do you balance the vision and mission of the

board of trustees with your own goals?

Interview Validity

Question seven: What do you like about leading a charter school?

Question eight: What are the biggest challenges you find leading a charter school in South Carolina?

Question nine: Do you have a personal development plan to continue professional growth as a leader?

Question ten: If you were to give guidance to someone who was seeking to become a charter school principal, what is the single greatest piece of advice you would give them?

Survey Reliability

The researcher will use Cronbach’s alpha to test reliability and

measures internal consistency of the survey. This will be conducted

during data analysis.

Interview Reliability

Interview reliability. Will be established through inter-rater reliability.

Procedures for Conducting the

Study

Received Organizational Approval

Received approval to use and modify McREL’s Balanced

Leadership 21 Responsibilities for the study

Study needs to be approved by Argosy’s internal review board

Research Study Proposed Schedule

It is proposed that the study will be conducted in the spring of 2015.

Pre-testing will be concluded with three teachers and three parents of students at a Title I public school in South Carolina.

The researcher will obtain emails to the teachers and parents of students through the administrative office of the school.

The researcher will attempt to collect 80% of the surveys in a week via SurveyMonkey.

If there is less than 80% participation, the researcher will communicate via email to the non-participants and ask for participation or for them to complete an opt-out form.

Analysis of quantitative data begins

After the surveys have been collected, the researcher will conduct an in-person interview with the principal.

Analysis will be conducted of the interview

Results will be presented both in quantitative and qualitative forms for a more complete representation of the leadership at the Title I charter school.

Analysis of the Data SSPS will be used to interpret the quantitative data sets that will be collected, using

descriptive statistic applications.

In this study, descriptive statistics will include univariate analysis

Mean

Median

Mode

Range

Quantiles of the data-set

Variance and standard deviation

The researcher will use Chronbach’s alpha to measure internal consistency and

support the reliability of the survey.

The findings of the interview will be coded and classified for analysis

Research Questions

Main research question:

What are the qualities that are essential in the successful running of a Title I charter school?

Supporting research questions

What are the highest rated responsibilities used by the principal according to the

teachers?

What are the highest rated responsibilities used by the principal according to the

parents?

What is the range of use of the 21 responsibilities of the principal according to the

teachers?

What is the range of use of the 21 responsibilities of the principal according to the

parents?

Research Questions Continued

What is the leadership style that the charter school principal being

studied exhibits?

How did the principal acquire the skills necessary in running a successful Title I charter school?

What skills are useful in serving a Title I student population?

How does the principal manage-up?

What motivates the principal?

What expertise is essential to running a successful charter school as

a principal in South Carolina?

Expected Contribution

The purpose of this research is to contribute to the knowledge base regarding

successful charter school leadership at the principal level.

This research study will serve as contributing to the gap in research specific to leadership and the qualities or competencies that are essential in the successful

running of a Title I charter school in South Carolina.

In gaining perspectives of the leadership and stakeholders on what has worked for

the charter school to be studied, the research will contribute to the literature related

to maintaining successful charter schools.

Closing Statements

The study will investigate the principal of Calhoun Falls Charter School as a leader

South Carolina Department of Education recognized this school as Reward School two years in a row, which determines the school is

high-performing

that it is a Title I charter school

that the success is sustainable

Importance: To contribute to the ongoing literature of sustainable charter school success, for future and current charter school leaders.

Thank you for your time and consideration

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