ABSTRACT
These days primary school management is a high-risk enterprise. Once a career in teaching meant a job for life, but not any more. Reforms introduced by the past and present central government have dramatically raised the stakes for headteachers and their colleagues on the professional staff in the UK, as in many other western countries. Not only have ministers expected staff faithfully to implement their imposed agenda of innovations but also, with the advent of new external accountability measures, the consequences of resistance or failure to attain externally determined standards of pupil learning can ultimately be job threatening. The performance of schools is now much more likely to be found wanting and publicly exposed. Where the marketisation thrust of past central government reforms has taken hold, parents may vote with their feet by withdrawing their children, resulting in a reduction in the school budget based on pupil numbers from which staff salaries are paid, and the possibility of redeployment or redundancy.
