An Exploration of Factors That Foster Collaboration Between School District Leaders and Principals

Abstract

Education researchers claim collaboration between school district leaders and principals is one of the key factors in successful school districts. Collaboration creates alignment and coherence throughout the organization. Factors that foster this collaboration are limited throughout education literature. This qualitative study explored factors that fostered and inhibited collaboration between school district leaders and principals. A phenomenological study was designed to capture the lived experiences of school district leaders and principals as they participated in collaboration about instructional and organizational decisions. Interviews with eleven school leaders and observations of meetings provided insight into the phenomena that occurs when school district leaders and principals interacted during collaborative decision-making. Study findings revealed factors that foster and inhibit collaboration between school district leaders when making instructional and organizational decisions. In response to the findings in this study, a collaboration model was developed to address systematic changes in the decision-making process. This study provided practical implications to building trust and implementing collaborative structures that create coherence throughout an educational organization.

Keywords: collaboration, school district leaders, principals, collaborative structures, instructional decisions, organizational decisions, district administration