School Principals in Spain: Interplay of Leaders, Teachers and Context García Martínez, Inmaculada Molina Fernández, Elvira Ubago Jiménez, José Luis Principals Middle leaders Secondary schools Leadership This paper analyzes the Spanish school principal figures and their future patterns of leadership and development, according to educational policies in Europe. The first part presents a comprehensive overview of the situation of school principals in Spain, according to the Spanish policy; in the second part, its real practice in a secondary school is evidenced based on the results of a conducted research. The tensions and dilemmas currently faced by school principals in Spain will be analyzed: pedagogical leadership versus management-oriented principals. The interviews carried out reveal the meaning that the different agents give to “leadership”. A climate of trust and collaboration has been established between the management team, middle leaders and teaching staff, necessary conditions for the development of a shared school project and ensure its sustainability for achieve school improvement. 2020-04-21T11:56:11Z 2020-04-21T11:56:11Z 2020-02-16 journal article García-Martínez, I., Molina-Fernández, E., & Ubago-Jiménez, J. L. (2020). School Principals in Spain: Interplay of Leaders, Teachers and Context. Sustainability, 12(4), 1469. http://hdl.handle.net/10481/61423 10.3390/su12041469 eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/es/ open access Atribución 3.0 España MDPI