The need for school leadership and assessment capability in disruptive times

Abstract

This study explores school leaders’ and teachers’ experiences of leadership in assessment during the Covid-19 lockdowns. A total of 148 school leaders and 582 teachers participated in a survey, and 15 school leaders from four schools also participated in focus group interviews. In Norway, the pandemic led to closed schools for long periods, from spring 2020 to spring 2022. Moreover, all final exams were cancelled, and all final gradings were made by individual teachers. In a disruptive and chaotic situation, it was up to school leaders at each school to ensure that teachers’ assessment practices used to decide students’ final grades were valid and reliable. The extraordinary circumstances that the pandemic created in schools also created a need for leadership functions beyond the ordinary. It seems that the disruptive situation during the Covid-19 school lockdowns led to a re-distribution of school leadership tasks connected to assessment, which in turn motivated more development and innovation, even stronger collaboration, and a more focused ability to solve problems related to assessment challenges in school. This study also revealed a need for more teacher support and assessment capability within school leadership to ensure fairness, validity and reliability in final assessment.