Master Programs

The proposed Master of Education in Educational Leadership for School Improvement is a 30-credit, two-year program. The program is designed for aspirant and in-service school leaders who hold senior leadership roles such as Cluster Managers, School Principals, and Vice-Principals, and for aspirant and in-service Middle leaders such as Heads of Faculty, Subject Heads, and Lead Teachers. Through this program, students will build practical, theoretical and research-informed knowledge and understandings related to educational leadership and school improvement in the context of UAE. The understanding that informs the design and content of this program is shaped by a notion of practice as the adaptive application and enactment of knowledge, skills, and values in particular contexts of ELSI. Students will be supported to incorporate leadership inquiry and self-reflection approaches to developing and expanding their leadership and school improvement practice repertoires. Throughout the M. Ed. in ELSI program, students will be challenged to reflect on their roles and to make links between theory, practice and research in relation to school self-evaluation, school effectiveness, innovation, entrepreneurship, and change, leading teaching, learning and assessment, and  educational leadership and school improvement in the context of UAE.  Through the educational leadership and school improvement inquiry course, students will be supported to make links between theory, practice and research while developing and enhancing a variety of leadership tasks such as establishing, embedding and achieving buy-in for the school vision, mission, and school strategic plan, establishing and sustaining a culture and supports for professional learning at school, managing school data systems and analysing data to inform teaching and learning decisions, and designing element(s) of the school improvement plan.

• Apply, adapt and innovate leadership practices for school improvement.
• Develop strategies for embedding innovative pedagogies at your school that promote independent learning including assessment for learning, dialogic teaching, and promoting metacognition.
• Bridge theory, research, practice and values.
• Experiential learning with a strong practice focus.
• Learn from school-based educational leadership experiences in your own context.
• Adopt collaborative inquiry approaches to tackling real-life school-based challenges and priorities.
• Apply research-informed practices in context of educational leadership for school improvement.
• Learn to lead innovation, entrepreneurship, and change in your own context.

• Establish yourself as an instructional leader.
• Build your capacity in educational leadership for school improvement.
• Enhance your skills in leading teaching and learning at your school.
• Develop your expertise in school self-evaluation.
• Lead professional development at your school.
• Positively impact the lives of students and teachers.

• Build essential practical and theoretical knowledge and skills about educational leadership.
• Bring together practice and theory with values, research, and policy to lead innovation and transformation at school.
• Critically reflect on your leadership practices and values.
• Continue as a life-long learner.
• Develop creative locally relevant strategies for school improvement.

The Master of Education in Educational Leadership for School Improvement (M.Ed. in ELSI) aims to support aspirant and in-service educational leaders further expand their knowledge, skills, understandings and practices of educational leadership and school improvement by:  

1. Critically exploring research-informed, leadership practices, principles and values of effective school improvement and educational leadership practice.
2. Synthesizing, interpreting and adapting for practice advanced, leading-edge theory and research related to effective leadership for educational change and innovation.
3. Developing in-depth contextualized knowledge and skills for the effective leadership of school systems and cultures for promoting entrepreneurship and innovation.
4. Critically reflecting how theories, practices, and leadership of organizational learning and school self-evaluation contribute to school improvement.
5. Developing critical understandings of how relationships between educational leadership, national educational policy, and school inspection and accountability systems affect school improvement.
6. Developing and critically reflecting on knowledge and understandings related to effective leadership of teaching, learning, curriculum, and assessment.
7. Developing and using a range of leadership inquiry and research methods for critically examining and analysing the effectiveness of educational leadership and school improvement practices.

• A 2-year Masters program offered full-time over 6 terms
• The program offers two exit points
  • 24- credits: Postgraduate Diploma of Education in Educational Leadership for School Improvement
  • 30- credits: Master of Education in Educational Leadership for School Improvement

The M. Ed in ELSI program is offered in a blended learning model, offering candidates flexibility through a balanced online learning (48% online and 52% face-to-face classes). Classes are taught from Sunday to Thursday.