Background. So-called “effective schools” are characterised by features such as a strong and purposeful school leadership and a favourable school ethos. A prior study showed that a school's degree of teacher-rated ethos was inversely associated with student gambling and risk gambling. Building on these findings, the current study aims to examine the associations that teachers' ratings of the school leadership share with gambling and risk gambling among students in the second grade of upper secondary school in Stockholm (ages 17-18 years).

Methods. Data were drawn from two separate surveys performed in 2016: the Stockholm School Survey (SSS) and the Stockholm Teacher Survey (STS), with information collected amongst 5,191 students and 1,061 teachers in 46 upper secondary schools. Gambling and risk gambling was measured by student self-reports in the STS. School leadership was assessed by teachers' responses to ten items in the STS, which were added to an index and aggregated to the school level. School-level information from administrative registers was also linked to the data. The statistical method was two-level binary logistic regression analysis.

Results. Teachers' average ratings of the school leadership were inversely associated with both gambling (OR 0.96, 95% CI 0.93-0.998, p = 0.039) and risk gambling (OR 0.94, 95% CI 0.89-0.99, p = 0.031) among upper secondary students, whilst adjusting for sociodemographic characteristics at the student and the school level.

Conclusions. The findings lend further support to the assumption that characteristics of effective schools at different levels of the school organisation may reduce students' inclination to engage in health risk behaviours.

Key messages. Teachers’ ratings of the school leadership were inversely associated with student gambling and risk gambling, whilst adjusting for student- and school-level sociodemographic characteristics.The findings indicate that a strong school leadership, being one key feature of effective schools, may reduce students’ inclination to engage in health risk behaviours.