| The purpose of this dissertation was to examine the elementary principalship from the perspective of political agency. The primary research question for the study was, "How and for whom will the site administrator use different forms of political agency (influence, power, authority, persuasion) to implement district and State adopted curriculum and instructional programs?" The methodology was largely qualitative, with a small quantitative portion administered. The research design and conceptual framework were based on the principles and techniques of grounded theory, and were used to identify the manner in which selected elementary principals engaged the tactics of political agency. The study was grounded in the curriculum and instructional decisions that affect the school site, either from mandated school board adoptions or State Frameworks. The rationale for this is that most districts are not exactly the same in the adoption cycle. If they are, they tend to be in different stages of the adoption process. Therefore, political agency, decision-making and instructional change are really the focus, with analysis of the adoption acting as a means to discover the types of techniques and tactics used by principals. The central idea was to establish the area of study (political agency, decision-making and instructional change), with grounded theory emerging from the data derived from analyzing adoptions while focusing on the principal.; The case studies clearly revealed that selected elementary school principals are effectively able to be instructional leaders. They were able to turn their vulnerabilities into strengths, "work" the system to their advantage, focus on curriculum and instruction instead of routine administrative tasks, and run very effective schools. All of the principals were able to minimize the effect that instructional constraint has on creating conflict at the school site. They accomplished this by engaging the tactics of political agency, of which there were common and unique forms. A theory of administrative behavior is presented in the conclusions based on the tactics of political agency utilized by each principal in the study. |
