Education Commons^™

Ambivalence Toward Bureaucracy: Responses From Korean School Principals, Hyun-Jun Joo, Taeyeon Kim

Department of Educational Administration: Faculty Publications

Purpose – Given the context of accountability-driven policy environments, research has shown that school leaders perceive bureaucratic rules and protocols in negative ways, but they also utilize organizational structures and routines to lead changes. To better understand both enabling and hindering mechanisms of bureaucracy in schools, this study explores how Korean school principals understand and perceive bureaucratic structures using a lens of ambivalence. The authors draw on Weber’s theory of bureaucracy, with a particular focus on the paradoxical aspect of bureaucracy that might be experienced by individuals within the system.

Design/methodology/approach – This study analyzed qualitative data collected from 26 …

Troubling Unintended Harm Of Heroic Discourses In Social Justice Leadership, Taeyeon Kim, Courtney Mauldin

Department of Educational Administration: Faculty Publications

We aim to problematize the ways in which school leaders who seek social justice conflate heroic leadership discourses in their practices. Using qualitative data collected from an urban school principal, this study examines heroic metaphors utilized by the principal when describing social justice leadership and how heroic-centered approaches contradict with achieving social justice goals in school. The findings suggest that the principal’s idea of social justice leadership relies on discourse around “battles to win”, a savior complex, and seeing herself as the central model for driving change. Such heroic discourses reflect the principal’s sole reliance on herself as a savior …

Reimagining Accountability Through Educational Leadership: Applying The Metaphors Of “Agora” And “Bazaar”, Taeyeon Kim

Department of Educational Administration: Faculty Publications

This study aims to explore reimagined accountability through collective efforts initiated by school leaders and to challenge the fixed notion of accountability prescribed by policy scripts. Drawing on studies highlighting humanizing leadership and the metaphors of “agora” and “bazaar,” I investigate how school leaders (re)construct and (re)define meanings of accountability in their daily practices. Using portraiture as research method, I analyze qualitative data collected through observation, interviews, and artifacts in a rural school in the United States, over the course of the 2018–2019 school year. In contrast to prevalent discourses around technical, performance-driven approaches to accountability, the principal and teachers …