Abstract
Ph.D. (Education Management)
Worldwide educational institutes are faced with the challenge of creating more opportunities for leadership and personal development for learners, with a view to a successful career. After the 1994 election many changes took place in education, not only in the academic field, but also with regard to leadership identification. With the establishment of school governing bodies and in particular the fact that learners in high schools occupy a portfolio on the school governing board, representing the remainder of the learners, major emphasis has been placed on the election of leaders. However, a major gap exists in the system, because in the White paper for Education and Training the Department of Education only provided guidelines for the election of leaders in high schools. Therefore no information, guidelines or legislature regarding the election procedures, criteria and responsibilities, exist for primary schools. The result is that every primary school employs its own set of procedures or processes according to its own criteria and requirements for leadership identification. There is a lack of a global process and criteria based on scientific methods and objectivity. Leadership is discussed in Chapter 2 where the building of relationships and the appreciation of every situation is accentuated. The different leadership styles have their own advantages, but also disadvantages. It is essential for primary school learners to be exposed to all the different leadership styles to assess the pros and cons of each style. It seems that the best leadership style is the one which is both task directed and relationship directed.
The learners should receive as many opportunities for leadership development as possible, as they are the future leaders. It has further been noticed that learners have the ability to be taught leadership. It has also been found that learners with high emotional intelligence achieve more success than learners with low emotional...