Abstract
The appeal to introduce inclusive education in schools was made more than 20 years ago. The Education White Policy 6 suggested transforming and changing the entire education and training system to enable mainstream education and training to recognise and address the causes and effects of learning difficulties in ordinary schools. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the transformative leadership practices of principals in transforming rural primary schools to be inclusive. This study was motivated by the research question, “How could rural primary school principals transform primary schools to be inclusive?” The main objectives for this study were to explain what transformative leadership entails, identify transformative leadership practices of rural primary school principals in leading inclusive schools and recommend how transformative leaders can lead rural primary schools in the school community. Data was collected through semi-structured Zoom interviews and a focus-group interviews and analysed using Atlas.ti. Themes and subthemes were identified when analysing and interpreting data. The emerging themes were transformative leadership practices towards inclusive schools, opportunities to accelerate transformation, and challenges towards inclusive education. The findings in this study show that transformation towards inclusive education requires educational leaders who are transformative, visionary and innovative, share good practices, and collaborate with the School-based Support Team, Circuit-based Support Team and District-based Support Team. This qualitative study outlines school principals’ challenges in leading and managing conversion towards inclusiveness in rural primary schools. It was hoped that the study would highlight some of the transformative leadership practices and challenges school leaders encounter while transforming their schools to be inclusive.
Keywords: Inclusive education; transformational leadership; transformational practices; Full-service school; Mainstream school