Charalampos Pavlou
American Academy, Larnaca, Cyprus
Adamos Anastasiou
School Consultant, Thessaloniki, Greece
Abstract
Nowadays, organizations continuously face the challenge of scaling their productivity to the needs and demands of a fast-changing society. This implies that any modern organization must undergo changes, some of which can be minimal and adapted to existing structures, or sometimes extensive, in which case these can largely transform an organization. In a school environment, change implies that teachers must undergo professional development, so as to keep up with the expectations of any stakeholders involved, as well as ensuring innovation in productivity. However, this is not an easy task, since implementation of change can encounter resistance and create conflict. Employees of an organization – in this case the teachers at a school – may seem unwilling to instigate changes, due to several factors that will be investigated later on. It is therefore vital that school leaders focus on the well-being and emotional needs of their teachers, and to find the techniques to employ changes smoothly. Therefore, it is interesting to investigate how change connects to professional development and how leaders address conflict and ensure the smooth running of the process.
Focusing on the issue of change in schools, it is important to comprehend the factors affecting every decision. Schools function as learning organisations and every organization aims for high standard productivity. In this case, it is important to speak in terms of school effectiveness. School effectiveness encompasses several areas that need to be addressed. What comes to mind first when discussing about such, is the level of student engagement and academic achievement. In order though to discuss the extend of student academic performance, it is necessary to examine teacher effectiveness. Effective teachers will ultimately encourage their students to thrive for success. Innovative learning strategies, effective teaching and positively challenging goals generate a school climate of confidence, motivation and subsequently of academic success. It is therefore, to a large extent the role and responsibility of school leaders to create a constructive atmosphere in which all stakeholders will work towards improvement and a climate of progress and success.
Keywords: change, professional development, school leadership, teachers’ emotions and effectiveness.
JEL: I21; I28; J24
DOI: 10.52244/c2025.11
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