Uloge i zadaci direktora škole u Srbiji : nekad i sad

Abstract

Standardi kompetencija direktora ustanova obrazovanja i vaspitanja u Srbiji (2013), kao i zakonska regulativa koja se odnosi na direktore, propisuju kompleksne i raznovrsne uloge i zadatke. Novija istraživanja u oblasti obrazovnog liderstva pokazuju da su direktori veoma opterećeni, zbog čega im je posebno teško da uspostave ravnotežu između dve najvažnije uloge: pedagoškog lidera i menadžera škole. Cilj ovog rada je da utvrdimo da li je pomenuti problem, na koji direktori ukazuju, nov ili je postojao i u prošlosti. S tim u vezi, analizirale smo radove o direktorima škola koji su objavljeni u časopisu Nastava i vaspitanje u periodu od početka izlaženja časopisa (1951. godine) do osamdesetih godina 20. veka. U tekstovima smo tragale za opisima uloga direktora, za sadržajem zadataka putem kojih se ove uloge ostvaruju, kao i za iskazima autora koji potencijalno ukazuju na problem balansa između dve najvažnije uloge. Na osnovu analize sadržaja 14 tekstova utvrdile smo da su autori značajno više pažnje posvetili razmatranju pedagoško-instruktivne uloge direktora, nego razmatranju uloge direktora kao menadžera škole. Pedagoško-instruktivnu ulogu opisuju kroz sledeće zadatke: planiranje i programiranje nastavnog procesa, posete časovima, praćenje rada nastavnika i pružanje neophodne pomoći posebno mlađim nastavnicima, praćenje učeničkog znanja i napredovanja, planiranje i organizacija individualnog i kolektivnog stručnog usavršavanja nastavnika, stvaranje uslova za efikasnu saradnju sa školskim pedagogom i tako dalje. Na osnovu istraživanja i iskustava iz školske prakse autori su ukazivali na to da je pedagoška uloga direktora zapostavljena, zbog njihove opterećenosti poslovima koji pripadaju menadžerskoj ulozi. Pored toga, ukazivali su i na nedostatak istraživanja u oblasti pedagoškog liderstva, kao i na potrebu za organizovanjem seminara koji bi se programski zasnivali na stvarnim interesovanjima i potrebama direktora škola. Dakle, rezultati naše analize upućuju na relativno dug vremenski period postojanja sličnih problema u oblasti obrazovnog liderstva u Srbiji, što bi trebalo da predstavlja dodatni podsticaj za istraživače i kreatore obrazovnih politika u pronalaženju adekvatnih strategija podrške direktorima škola u balansiranju ključnih uloga. U radu se diskutuje o rešenjima – kao što su distributivno liderstvo, mentorstvo i facilitacija prilikom uvođenja novih direktora u posao – koja su se u drugim obrazovnim sistemima pokazala kao efektivna za unapređivanje kvaliteta rada škole.

Standards of competencies for principals of educational institutions in Serbia (2013), as well as the legislation related to principals, stipulate complex and diverse roles and tasks. Recent research in the field of educational leadership shows that principals are overburdened, and therefore have difficulties in balancing out the two most important roles: of educational leader and school manager. The objective of this paper is to determine whether this problem, signalled by the principals, is new or has existed in the past as well. In this regard, we analysed the articles on principals published in the journal Teaching and education from the beginning of its publication (1951) till 1980s. In the articles, we searched for descriptions of the principals’ roles, the content of their professional tasks, as well as for authors’ statements that potentially point to the problem of balancing the two most important roles. Based on the content analysis of 14 articles, we found that the authors paid much more attention to educational and instructive role of the principal than to the principal’s role of a school manager. They describe the educational and instructive role through the following tasks: planning and programming of the teaching process, visits to classes, monitoring the work of teachers and providing necessary assistance particularly to younger teachers, monitoring of students’ knowledge and progress, planning and organization of individual and collective in-service teacher trainings, creating conditions for efficient cooperation with a school counsellor and so on. Based on the research and experience from the school practice, the authors indicated that the educational role of principals was neglected due to burden of tasks belonging to managerial role. In addition, they pointed to the lack of research in the field of educational leadership, as well as to the need for organizing seminars which would be topically based on real interests and needs of principals. Therefore, the results of our analysis point to a relatively long period of similar problems in the field of educational leadership in Serbia, which is supposed to provide additional motivation to researchers and educational policy makers for finding adequate strategies for supporting the principals in balancing their key roles. The paper discusses solutions - such as distributed leadership, mentoring, and facilitation in introducing new principals into job - that have proven effective in other education systems in improving quality of school’s operation.