Exploring female leaders’ practices and styles of leadership in Saudi primary schools

School leadership practices have become one of the most important areas of study in education science on the international scene, especially with regard to Middle Eastern countries. This thesis explores the leadership practices of school principals (leaders), recommending effective approaches to school leadership practices in girls’ primary schools in Saudi Arabia. It has been suggested that a deeper understanding of the experiences and perceptions of school leaders (formerly referred to as school principals in Saudi Arabia) will help improve leadership in the Saudi education system, enabling Education Offices to support school leadership practices more successfully to enhance the quality of education in Saudi Arabia. The aim of this thesis is therefore to explore leadership practices in Saudi primary schools, Education Offices, and the Ministry of Education (MoE) by gathering and examining the views of Saudi women in leadership roles in these contexts. Consequently, it is hoped that this study will extend the educational leadership and school improvement literature. A mixed methods approach was adopted to answer the research questions, as well as to validate the data collection and data analysis tools. Data on the views of female leaders in girls’ primary school leaders, Education Offices, and the MoE were gathered through in-depth interviews (qualitative) and via a multi-factor questionnaire (MLQ: quantitative). This study was reported in two phases: a qualitative phase, with qualitative findings on school leaders’ increasingly complex roles, and quantitative findings derived from the MLQ survey to discover the most commonly adopted leadership styles in girls’ primary schools in Saudi Arabia. Awareness of different school leadership styles appeared to be deficient in several areas that could significantly influence the quality of educational outcomes. Furthermore, a considerable gap was identified between practices recommended by the MoE and actual school leadership practice. However, the survey revealed that a transformational leadership (TF) style was most frequently adopted by school principals (leaders), followed by the passive (P), and transactional (TS) leadership styles. In addition, the TF and TS leadership styles were positively correlated with outcomes