Abstract:

Following the “school as leaning organization” – SLO – concept and model proposed by Kools & Stoll and OECD – UNICEF, the present paper explores the extent to which the key features of learning organizations already exist in schools in Romania. It is based on previous results of a theoretical approach which showed that: (1) since at teachers’ level the implementation of the new curriculum (skills-based, focused on students) is supported by a national project, another course of action to gain focus on students, but at organizational level, would be re-conceptualization of schools using the SLO model; (2) the model and concept starting baseline implementation could be given by the national performance indicators and descriptors identified as being correlated with dimensions and key-characteristics of the proposed SLO model. The present approach in an experimental one, at a sample of 238 urban and rural schools externally evaluated in the first semester of the school year 2018 – 2019 and the results highlight that the minimum levels of incidence of several key-characteristics of SLO’s varying between 30.67% and 73.10%. Means that, without explicitly and intentionally introducing the SLO model, certain key-characteristics specific to it are identifiable at their level.