The final symposium paper uses comparative education methods to reflect dimensions of running across research traditions and paradigms approaching curriculum, evaluation, and leadership. In developing this framework, we identify and compare the dominating theoretical frameworks in leadership research and curriculum in the U.S. and Finland / Europe. Specifically, we compare the Nordic-German tradition of Didaktik and ‘critical’ education with Dewey’s (1916) pragmatism and Pinar’s (2004) concept of curriculum as complicated conversation as well as significant research studies emanating from these frameworks. Further, we identify ways in which these different theoretical traditions and related research studies may be understood in relation to broader (macro) historical and cultural political contexts of Finland and the U.S. Leadership research, from e.g. the International Successful School Principalship Project (ISSPP) and related evaluation studies are utilized to consider how professionals influence organizations and institutions in the midst of the growing critique about neoliberalism. The paper concludes by proposing new research fields and questions that move beyond the current neoliberal critique. Such a research field may appear productive for schools as reflective professional learning communities being critically policy aware in their curriculum content and pedagogical developmental work.