Quest for the Stages of Life and Professional Careers of Czech School Headteachers
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| Year of publication | 2009 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
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| Description | In the last almost two decades, the Czech educational system underwent dramatic changes largely affecting the expectations related to schools and their leading representatives. As a major consequence, schools are now expected to be able to absorb the metamorphoses of the external circumstances and rather autonomously decide about their own profilation and prospects. A dominant role in the new adjustment was assigned to headteachers (Pařízek, 1992; Walterová et al, 2004; etc). The expectations related to them are still being increased by the amplified demands for the quality of the provided education. The current knowledge indicates that the manner in which every headteacher performs his/her role - thus what the headteacher is doing in the school when confronted with said expectations - is a manifestation of his/her previous experience and the objectives to achieve in life and professional career (Pol, Hloušková, Novotný, Zounek, 2005; Pol, Novotný, 2005). The target of our research is to contribute to the knowledge of the theory and practice of the headteachers' work in the context of their life and professional careers. Life and professional career is understood as an imaginary line created by an individual along his/her aims in life. It is influenced by the environment and related to the competencies, interests and opportunities of each individual (Hierbert, Borgen, 2002; Gysbers, Heppner, Johnston, 1998). This contribution will present answers to a major question of our research: What shapes the life and professional career of a headteacher of a Czech school? We will mainly be interested in who becomes school headteacher, in which stages of their lives headteachers adopt their position, which particular stages in the execution of their job are typical, which critical incidents are related to the position of the headteacher, and so forth. |
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