The criteria for evaluating distinguished schools and their role in the development of school plans from the point of view of school leaders in Kuwait

The aim of this study was evaluate the criteria for choosing distinguished schools in Kuwait from the point of view of school principals in Kuwait as well as the quality of the mechanism used to evaluate schools, and the extent to which school principals employ school excellence standards in the development of their school plans. To achieve this, the study followed the survey descriptive curriculum and a questionnaire was designed to find out the views of school departments The results of the study included that, high standards of school excellence are available in the project of selection of distinguished schools, especially those associated with a leadership focused on learning and attention to creative and talented students ,also distinguished schools are evaluated according to multiple and varied performance indicators. The study also concluded that the level of school principals' employment of outstanding school standards in the development of school plans was particularly high with regard to addressing negative phenomena of certain student behaviours. Moreover, there are no statistically significant differences in the degree to which headteachers employ distinguished school standards in the development of their school plans attributable to the variables of years of experience and the school district. The study made a number of recommendations, the most important of which: holding training programmes for school principals on how to operationalize school excellence standards in their school plans and providing full support to schools.