The importance of culture of schools in Cyprus for their strategic leadership and management

Essay from the year 2009 in the subject Pedagogy - The Teacher, Educational Leadership, , language: English, abstract: Leadership is a way of motivating a group to enable them to achieve their aims. It also involves being responsible for the group as a whole. A leader is either appointed by the senior levels of management or elected by the group. However, it has been argued that a leader can not have all the skills required therefore the optimum will be to have as a leader someone who is flexible but when it is required s/he will let the leadership to the others. According to various researches it has been proved that leadership skills are increased when the appropriate educational culture prevails. The school principal is the leader of the school. It is going to be examined how leadership styles and theory can affect the way schools in Cyprus are managed and their correlation with culture. According to the Teacher Training Agency (1998) in UK and the National College for School Leadership have emphasized the fact that 'the key to unlocking the full potential of pupils in our schools lies in the expertise of teachers and headteachers'. Various researchers have proven that there is a positive correlation between the students' achievements and the quality of teaching and there is also a positive correlation between the quality of leadership and the quality of teaching. All of these factors are influenced by the culture of the school and the education system.

Born in Athens, Greece, I studied economics, agricultural policy analysis, marketing and communication with new technologies and human resources management (BSc, MSc, DProf). I am an author of more than 40 books specialized in economics, accountancy and management. I have been an MBA lecturer for 19 years and I have taught more than 800 students and seminar attendants. I have worked as a Manager at Microsoft and other IT and Telcom companies. I am a registered consultant on entrepreneurship and innovation of European Union for small and medium enterprises and certified by Chartered Institute of Marketing. An active blogger, I write about economics at mastroyanni.blogspot.com. My articles have been published at numerous magazines, newspapers and blogs. About me and my books you may read at my blog: http://mastroyanni.blogspot.gr/