Alberto’s life story: transforming a disadvantaged school by appreciating the child’s voice Lucena Rodríguez, Carmen López, Alberto Cruz Gonzalez, Cristina Domingo Segovia, Jesús Principal leadership professional identity professional development life history This article present a case study of a principal who successfully leads a disadvantaged school in Spain. Through his life story, we investigate the personal and professional factors that have shaped his current professional identity, and we identify the mai successful educational practices that the principal has implemented in order to achieve improvements in educational outcomes. Findings reveal a set of professional practices that have been invigorated from his leadership for the improvement of education. In short, he is committed to leading by appreciating the voice of the child and having respect for the children and it is this that forms part of the collective ideology of the school and is the most outstanding role of his professional identity. 2025-01-14T13:27:21Z 2025-01-14T13:27:21Z 2021-02-26 journal article https://hdl.handle.net/10481/99142 https://doi.org/10.1080/00220620.2021.1893286 eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ open access Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 Internacional