Do school leaders lead? The perception of educational actors concerning the school transformation

In an era that values school autonomy, we know little about how school actors interact to improve teaching practices and organisational performance. This paper presents the perceptions of Portuguese school leaders, teachers and members of the self-evaluation teams regarding collective engagement in producing classroom transformation. The transformational capital initiative is a construct that measures the openness and will for mobilising changes. Multiple linear regression analysis used data from a survey to determine relationships between transformational capital initiative, school vision, decisional capital, mobilising and learning-supportive leadership, teachers' collaboration, innovative behaviour and involvement and innovation climate. The findings include (i) differences in the perceptions regarding leadership among school actors and (ii) weak to moderate effects of leadership, teachers' collaboration and innovative behaviour in promoting classroom transformation. The results suggest that schools are loose coupling systems where classroom transformation is a product more of teachers' individual will than of collective organisational planning.