Policy Document Analysis: A Practical Educational Leadership Tool and a Qualitative Research Method

Özet

This paper presents policy document analysis as practical tool that can be put to valuable use by educationalleaders and can also be adopted as a research method. Educational leaders are at the forefront of policy interpretationand consequently need knowledge and skills that enable them to analyse policy as part of their work indeveloping, implementing and reviewing organisational policy. They need to be able to look behind the policyto know what forces brought it into being; to tap into policy history to know how it was constructed; and mostimportantly, evaluate the way it is working to achieve its stated purposes. The analysis of policy documents isalso an established and appealing qualitative research method, especially for students engaged in postgraduateresearch associated with educational leadership and policy studies because policy documents offer backgroundinsights into understanding educational problems in both research and practice. In this paper advantages anddisadvantages associated with using documentary analysis as a qualitative research method are outlined andpractical document analysis tools and approaches are presented.