Who is this template for?
This template is tailored for those leading and supporting school improvement in Irish post-primary settings. Whether you are a Principal, Deputy Principal, Assistant Principal, or part of the In-School Management Team, the framework offers a practical approach to reflective leadership. It is equally valuable for Subject Department Heads, Programme Coordinators, and Special Education Teachers who contribute to whole-school development. Board of Management members, Patron Bodies, Trustees, ETB Chief Executives, ETB Directors of Schools, and members of the Department of Education Inspectorate will also find this template useful for quality assurance, governance, and strategic oversight. In essence, it’s designed for anyone involved in advancing leadership and effectiveness across post-primary schools.
Why use this template?
Based on the LAOS 2022 Quality Framework for post-primary schools, this template delivers a range of valuable benefits for school leadership, including:
- Alignment with National Standards: Ensures that evaluations are directly mapped to the LAOS 2022 Quality Framework for post-primary schools, supporting compliance with Department of Education expectations.
- Clear Visual Overview: The abacus format provides a user-friendly, visual summary of leadership strengths and areas for development specific to the secondary context.
- Evidence-Based Self-Evaluation: Promotes robust self-evaluation by encouraging the attachment of notes, documentation, and data as supporting evidence.
- Targeted Action Planning: Guides leaders from reflection to action, converting insight into clear, measurable improvement steps.
- Supports Professional Growth: Fosters ongoing professional development and reflective practice for individuals and leadership teams in the secondary sector.
- Fosters Collaborative Reflection: Enables multiple school leaders to contribute, reflect, and build a shared understanding of leadership practice at the post-primary level.
- Strengthens Leadership Capacity: Focuses on the core domains set out in LAOS, helping schools cultivate leadership across all levels.
- Versatile Use: Ideal for annual reviews, ongoing cycles of monitoring, or preparation for external inspection and whole-school evaluation.
How does it work?
This template uses the intuitive, research-backed iAbacus process: making a judgement, verifying with criteria, providing evidence, analysing helping and hindering factors, and planning for success. The structure is built around the following key areas for post-primary leadership:
- Leading learning and teaching
- Managing the organisation
- Leading school development
- Developing leadership capacity
Gaining Strategic Insight
Post-primary Principals or leadership teams can use iAbacus’s 'Overlay' and 'Stack' features to compare leadership evaluations across different year groups, departments, or post-primary schools within a network. This allows for the identification of shared strengths, sector-specific challenges, and priority areas, supporting a strategic, whole-school approach to leadership development and improvement planning in the post-primary sector.
Clear, Professional Reporting
All completed evaluations can be exported as professional, visually-engaging PDF reports. These are ideal for sharing with the Board of Management, Department of Education inspectors, or senior leadership teams, providing a concise, evidence-rich summary of leadership self-evaluation and actionable improvement plans for post-primary schools.
References / Source Material
How to Get Started
New to iAbacus? Discover how this template can support your improvement strategy. Book a personalised demo or start a free trial to explore the full platform. Visit www.iAbacus.com to learn more.
Already a subscriber? You can find this template in the template library within your iAbacus account. Simply log in, create a new abacus, and select it from the list to get started.
