Website design By BotEap.comAll about the Book

Website design By BotEap.comThis is the first book on educational leadership, published in Pakistan. Dr. Jan-e-Alam Khaki and Dr. Qamar Safdar are the editors of this book. The book consists of a series of empirical studies conducted by qualified educational researchers in Pakistan, directly or indirectly associated with AKU-IED. There are several thought-provoking and insightful themes in this book; each complements our learning experiences. The book is divided into four sections and fourteen chapters; each section and chapter is intertwined with each other and illuminates the problems and their corrective measures. Section one describes educational leadership development in Pakistan. The second section deals with Leadership Diversity: Perceptions and Leadership Practices in Pakistan. The third session looks at the role of educational change agents, and the fourth section explores the future prospects for educational leadership in Pakistan. For detailed information on the book, we decided to focus on the first two sections and reviewed the opening six chapters.

Website design By BotEap.comIn the first chapter, Dr. Sajid Ali and Muhammad Babur highlight the issues and nature of governance before and after independence. The structure of education during the British period and after independence is analytically compared. The chapter indicates that the participation of educational leadership is lacking in both periods, which causes various problems in the educational system, ineffective management and indistinct teaching methodologies, etc. In the second chapter, Zubaida Bana reflects on the understanding of effective leadership. Using the Katha (storytelling) approach, he initiates the discussion on the points of a principal imaginatively discovering the meanings of allegories and metaphors to understand the roles and responsibilities of an effective educational leader in his school. The leadership Katha described in this chapter stimulates our minds that each person has the ability to lead. Some may lead to a larger space; others can drive in a smaller landscape.

Website design By BotEap.comThe third chapter is about the journey of a female pedagogical leader in a traditional context in Pakistan. The writer reflects on the critical incidents she encountered in her personal and professional life that helped or hindered her path to becoming an educational leader. The notion of ‘leader as a bridge between management and stakeholders’ and ‘leader as lifelong learner’ is evident in her story. In the fourth chapter, Qamar Safdar explores the roles of two effective early years principals in two private schools. The writer reflects on the capacity and ability for the integral development of children. Chapter 5 deals with an ethnographic study carried out by Mola Dad Shafa in a rural context in northern areas of Pakistan. The author discusses the challenges faced by principals and how they addressed them. Chapter six, ‘Effective School Leadership Practices’ is a PhD research by Dr. Jan-e-Alam Khaki. In this case study, Khaki explores the roles and beliefs of three effective secondary school principals and their influences on teaching and learning practices in schools.

Website design By BotEap.comKey learning from the book

Website design By BotEap.comBeing a Teacher Training student, I was unaware of the different types of leadership and their characteristics. The first time, in our LP course, I heard the terms instructional, moral, transformational, participatory, managerial, contingent, and pedagogical leadership. But these terms were not very clear to me; For the most part, I thought of them as just theories with no connection to the practical life of a leader. Reviewing this book gave me access to not only understanding and differentiating different types of leadership, but also relating it to real life situations.

Website design By BotEap.comI have learned many new things about effective leadership from this book, but due to the limited word limit, I will describe some of the crucial points. As I analyze the first chapter of the book, I feel the same way that governance and planning have a role in the deterioration of the education system in Pakistan. It takes a long time to plan and frame the policy, then send it to the national assembly and senate for debate and translate it into law. Then the pilot testing of the policy takes a long time and when it comes to implementation, the government changes and therefore the policy. It creates an atmosphere of despair, but when I go through the second chapter (Leadership Katha), it gives hope. Here I learned that nothing is unattainable in this world. Each person is capable of contributing to the change process and all have the capacity to lead. We must not stay waiting for some power of the cosmos to come to help us; It’s time for everyone to show up and lead.

Website design By BotEap.comThe third chapter of the book was the most inspiring and learning factor for me. Here I learned how a person (particularly a woman), with her strong will, sincerity and zeal breaks the chains of traditional rules. While reading that article, I was deeply thinking that someone has to initiate and take the first step towards collective development. This article brought me to my own context, where the woman is still considered the property of the man and only the reproductive machine. Education, including good nutrition, is the exclusive right of the male child. Here, my older sister (who could not get an education on her own) by sending her daughter to school, she proved herself to be a breaker of the traditional rules. Some of the other women begin to follow in her footsteps by sending their daughters to schools. Ten years ago, there was not a single literate girl in my village, but thanks to that small step, more than forty or fifty girls have completed their primary education so far. In addition, I also learned that the leader is a lifelong learner. He/she learns through self-reflection and by negotiating and discussing problems with others and seeking guidance from him/her.

Website design By BotEap.comOverall, this book serves as a trailblazer in exploring our thinking about our own role as leaders and proves to be the best resource for policy makers to develop alternative approaches to dealing with school and teaching and learning practices.

Website design By BotEap.comConclution

Website design By BotEap.comThis book very obviously describes the role of leadership and management in an educational organization. A leader who is a role model must motivate and encourage the staff because the performance and commitment of the people employed in any organization makes it effective. Through critical analysis of the book, I came to know that this book has stories and cases from the Pakistani context, so many of the ideas fit with my own. Therefore, it would be easier for my future role as a teacher educator to address issues related to school management and leadership effectively.