Abstract
School years is the period when people spend their times throughout their educational lives in their institutions and social relations are the social ties set and continue for some time between at least two people consciously and meaningfully for a certain purpose. As these processes are important in people's life and their leadership development since very early ages, the main concern of this study is to discover the role of school years and their social relations outside the school (family, social environment) on woman leaders' leadership development. In this qualitative study, interviews were conducted with 20 selected women who are currently working as administrators at some public universities and some public schools of Ministry of National Education (MoNE) in Istanbul province and have obtained great successes academically at their institutions. The data were analyzed with inductive method. Results indicate that school years and social relations have an important role in woman leaders' leadership development process.