While research on Irish-medium immersion education (IME) has heralded benefits such as cognitive skills, academic achievement and language and literacy development, many studies have also identified challenges to its successful implementation. Immersion-specific research-validated tools can help school leaders navigate the school self-evaluation journey, critically review and evaluate the quality of aspects of their school’s provision and plan for improvement. This paper reports on one theme, leadership, from a larger study, Quality indicators of best practice in Irish-medium immersion (Ó Ceallaigh and Ní Shéaghdha, 2017). Qualitative in nature, the study was guided by the following research question: What are IME educators’ perceptions of best practices in IME?. The study explored 120 IME educators’ perceptions of best practice in IME to inform the development of IME quality indicators. Individual interviews and focus group interviews were utilised to collect data. Data analysis revealed particular themes related to best IME leadership practices. Findings in turn informed the design of an evidence-informed school self-evaluation tool for IME settings. The various functions of the tool will be explored with a particular emphasis on building teaching and leadership capacity in IME through the school self-evaluation process.

虽然对爱尔兰中型浸入式教育（IME）的研究已经预示了认知技能，学术成就以及语言和读写能力的发展，但许多研究也发现了其成功实施所面临的挑战。经过浸入式研究验证的工具可以帮助学校领导者进行学校自我评估的过程，严格审查和评估学校提供的各个方面的质量，并制定改进计划。本文针对一项主题进行了报告，该主题来自一项规模更大的研究，内容涉及爱尔兰中等浸入式最佳实践的质量指标（ÓCeallaigh和NíShéaghdha，2017年）。本质上是定性的，该研究受到以下研究问题的指导：IME教育者对IME最佳实践的看法是什么？该研究探讨了120位IME教育工作者对IME最佳实践的看法，以指导IME质量指标的发展。利用个人访谈和焦点小组访谈收集数据。数据分析揭示了与最佳IME领导实践有关的特定主题。这些发现反过来又为IME设置提供了一个基于证据的学校自我评估工具。将探索该工具的各种功能，特别强调通过学校自我评估过程来建立IME的教学和领导能力。这些发现反过来又为IME设置提供了一个基于证据的学校自我评估工具。将探索该工具的各种功能，特别强调通过学校自我评估过程来建立IME的教学和领导能力。这些发现反过来又为IME设置提供了一个基于证据的学校自我评估工具。将探索该工具的各种功能，特别强调通过学校自我评估过程来建立IME的教学和领导能力。