This is a set of three new academic papers from previous contributors to the BELMAS Leadership Preparation and Development (LPD) Research Interest Group (RIG) analysing recent developments in School Principal Leadership Preparation and Development programmes across three countries in Russia, Sweden, and England. The three female authors have worked together for a 50th Anniversary BELMAS special event in February 2021, and are coming together again here to show case their national leadership preparation research, but also the overlapping themes across the three countries around neo-liberalism; challenges to principal autonomy; altering governance structures that are taking place in schools as market forces become ever more present although opaque in form.

The account from Russia examines the recent changes in Principal Development programmes and the motivating forces behind these.  The account from Sweden examines the Higher Education programme for School Leaders delivered in Mid-Sweden University, and the paper from England examines the changing role of National Professional Qualication (NPQs) for school leaders in England and who provides them, as they have moved away from being delivered in universities.

Southworth (2009) suggests the following key factors, experienced from work with school leaders and inspectors, as critical to support learning-centred leadership and school improvement strategies: planning processes, target-setting, communication systems, roles and responsibilities of leaders, policies for learning, teaching and assessment and marking. Separately and together these structures and systems ensure the school is an open organization where everyone is familiar with one another’s role, responsibilities and achievements. When structures, systems and processes become the norm, the culture of the organization takes on a particular form, and this is witnessed inside each national case study.

School leaders are considered vital in this work (Huber & Muijs, 2010). School leadership and school improvement are highlighted by researchers, practitioners and political representatives as essential if schools are to meet future requirements and fulfil their mission to enable all students the possibility to develop and achieve their educational goals (Huber & Muijs, 2010; Leithwood, Sun & Pollock, 2017; Leithwood, Day, Sammons, Harris & Hopkins, 2006; OECD, 2013; Pont, Nusche & Moorman, 2008).

It is evident in research, the principal has a central role in development work (Ekholm, Blossing, Kåräng, Lindvall & Scherp, 2000, Fullan, 2007; Huber & Muijs, 2010; Johansson 2011, Timperley, 2011). Different international and national evaluations of school and school leadership points to the principal's key role in school improvement (Pont, Nusche & Hopkins, 2008; Pont, Nusche & Moorman, 2008; Skolverket, 2011; Skolinspektionen, 2010, 2012). The principal is the one who shall lead the educational work and create the conditions for development. The principal shall also clarify and communicate goals and lead the teachers in development processes. These three papers will examine this role of the school principal and how it is dealt with on the national level, and examine the leadership development pressures and expectations that currently exist and in so-doing attempt to explain some of the system accountabilities for these within each nation state, with reference to their own educational leadership system antecedents and precursors.  Thus giving an overview from the three countries as to where school leadership preparation and development currently stands within these countries.   

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