Middle School Elementary School Principal Role Conflict Research

At present there are many cases of research on the roles of elementary and middle school principals. But the research on the conflict of roles between elementary and middle school principals is limited. The conflicts trouble the principals too much, making it hard for them to decide what to do. They are the cause of tensions and pressure on different roles. To be in the conflicts for too long has great pressure on principals and affects the life and work of them seriously, thus troubles the improving of teaching quality and school level, and finally hinders the development of society and its economy. This paper tries to define and classify the roles of elementary and middle school principals based on the theory of roles. As previous research is poor and limited, the author mainly explores on the definition of conflict, the connotation of conflict of different roles and the differentiation of conflict of roles between elementary and middle school principals, and finally draw a conclusion about the different types of conflicts, all of which are based on theory of sociology and social-psychology and Education administration theory.Then the author analyses the reasons for the conflicts from both the internal factor and the external factor aspects: the internal factors are mainly about the acting ability of principals and the lack of adaptability, while the external factors lie in the inefficiency of principal-responsibility system, the differences between different roles and the unreasonable evaluating system over principals. Hence the author presents effective ways to lessen the conflicts: inside the school we should strengthen the acting ability of the principals themselves and their adaptability; outside the school we must optimize the working environment for principals, including optimizing and consummating the school leadership system, improving the expectation and raising the reasonability of evaluation on principals from their role partners. The key issue that this paper aims to solve is defining conflicts of roles between elementary and middle school principals, summarizing all the types of conflicts, finding out reasons for the conflicts and solutions to the problems.