Author Type

Graduate Student

Date of Award

2001

Document Type

Thesis

Publication Status

Version of Record

Submission Date

October 2026

Thesis/Dissertation Advisor [Chair]

Maslin-Ostrowski, Patricia

Abstract

The purpose of this multi-ease qualitative study was to examine the application of Bowen Family Systems Theory to the high school principalship. More than eighty interviews were conducted of twenty-five participants from the Sun County School District (a pseudonym). The questions pursued related to how a working knowledge of Bowen Family Systems Theory (BFST) could help principals understand the following: their schools as a system, their leadership roles in their schools as a system, and how to become more effective in their schools as a system. Beside a review of the problems affecting the principalship practice in this country, was an analysis of systems theories generally and BFST specifically. This study also included a review of leadership generally and educational leadership specifically. Six BFST elements were used as a coding platform to explicate more than twenty stories collected from the thick, rich data in this research. This study concludes that a working knowledge of BFST may help some principals in achieving more effective solutions in their practice. BFST offers the principal a theoretical platform from which to operate. Principals who have a working knowledge of BFST can understand the significance of their leadership roles not only in terms of their schools as systems, but also in terms of their schools as parts of a larger societal system and process. The recommendations from this study include the suggestion that BFST can help provide structure and strategies to help the principal navigate educational leadership challenges for greater success in the school system. Principal development through BFST could help school districts diminish and abate high levels of principal turnover and burnout. Local school districts in concert with local universities could include programs in BFST for educational leadership development for principals. While BFST may not be a silver bullet for the high school principalship practice, it could offer greater understanding in considering the educational leader as a helmsman of education. It could help foster and forge partnerships with other disciplines by inviting their leaders to be participants in the educational system called school---in which they are already stakeholders in the larger societal system and societal process. This is the prescience, promise, and potential of the applicability of BFST to the high school principalship.

Extent

170 p.

Comments

College of Education|Thesis (Ed.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2001.|FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection|College of Education

Identifier

FADT11943

Format

pdf

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