Socially Focused, Situationally Driven Practice: A Study of Distributed Leadership among School Principals and Counselors

Abstract

This study investigated how school counselors and principals perceive their professional relationship with each other. Specifically, it used Q methodology to develop 45 statements about the relationship between the school counselor and the principal. Subsequently, 39 professional school counselors and principals sorted the statements. Four factors emerged, each representing a distinct view of this relationship. The factors were analyzed using a distributed leadership framework. Although each factor contains constructive attributes of the school-counselor–principal relationship, one factor contains characteristics closely approximating the distributed leadership framework reflected in the literature and in the current school counselor and administrator professional standards.