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summary171SIntroductionThis dissertation is about the role of school vision in school culture, professional development and the commitment of teachers. The starting point here is that the way in which the school is organized, more specifically via the school vision in this study, strongly determines the school culture, how teachers continue to develop professionally and remain committed to their work. This assumption has been investigated in the context of Dutch secondary education, with reference to possible differences in school culture, teacher professionalization and commitment in relation to the school vision.In the Netherlands, ‘freedom of education’ (vrijheid van onderwijs) is enshrined in the constitution. This freedom relates to the ‘denomination or conviction’ (richting) and ‘design or organization’ (inrichting) of education. ‘Freedom of conviction’ relates to the ideological basis of schools. ‘Freedom of organization of teaching’ relates to the right schools have within the legal frameworks to decide independently about the design of their organization and their pedagogical approach. Dutch schools that use ‘freedom of conviction’ or ‘freedom of organization of teaching’ to shape education on the basis of an explicit school vision are funded in the same way as mainstream schools that do not have an explicit vision. An explicit school vision is a clear representation of what the organization thinks (Isaacson & Bamburg, 1992), what its ideal school looks like, and the goals the school pursues (DuFour & Eaker, 1998; Gurley et al., 2015), based on philosophy or on pedagogical principles or on both. Due to the equal funding of schools, schools with an explicit school vision in the Netherlands are accessible to all pupils and not just to children of well-to-do parents. Teachers in the Netherlands also have a choice. They are not, as in many other countries, placed in a specific school by the government, but can choose to apply to any school with a vision that appeals them.This ‘freedom of education’ is not uncontroversial. Following a number of incidents at religious schools, in recent discussions on this subject the accent has switched to how schools perform their role of providing civic education, with more explicit focus on the democratic state under the rule of law (Onderwijsraad, 2021). There is limited research in which Dutch schools are compared on the basis of their school vision. What research there is focuses on student outcomes. Research into Dutch Reformed schools (Dijkstra, 1992), Waldorf schools (Steenbergen, 2009) and traditional educational renewal schools (Sins & Van der Zee, 2015) showed hardly any differenace between pupil performance at these schools at that at mainstream schools without an explicit vision. However, the fact that an explicit school vision has Ester Moraal.indd 171 22-09-2023 16:13