The Challenges for New Principals in the 21st Century

A volume in International Research on School LeadershipSeries Editors Alan R. Shoho and Bruce Barnett University of Texas at San Antonioand Autumn Tooms University of TennesseeThis book series International Research on School Leadership focuses on how present-day issues affect thetheory and practice of school leadership. For the inaugural book we focused on the challenges facing newprincipals and headteachers. Because the professional lives of school leaders have increasingly impinged ontheir personal well-being and resources have continued to shrink it is important to understand how newprincipals or headteachers share and divide their energy ideas and time within the school day. It is alsoimportant to discover ways to provide professional development and support for new principals and headteachers as they strive to lead their schools inthe twenty-first century. For these reasons The Challenges for New Principals in the Twenty-First Century: Developing Leadership CapabilitiesThrough Professional Support is dedicated to exploring the rarely-examined experiences of those who enter the role as new principals or headteachers.By giving voice to new principals and headteachers we are able to determine what aspects of leadership preparation ring true and what aspects proveto be of little or no utility. Unlike leadership texts that focus on conceptual considerations and personal narratives from the field this book highlights acollection of empirical efforts centered on the challenges and issues that new principals and headteachers experience during their initial and crucialyears of induction. We solicited and accepted manuscripts that explore the multi-faceted dimensions of being a new principal or headteacher in thetwenty-first century. Our goal was to create an edited book that examines the commonalities and differences that new principals and headteachersexperience from an international perspective. This edited book is comprised of six chapters each ofwhich contributes an unique perspective on the responsibilities that new principals and headteachers areexperiencing at the dawn of the twenty-first century.