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Principals Role in Restructuring Schools
Principals Role in Restructuring Schools G M Crow, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA K D Peterson, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA ã 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
From Restructuring to New Structures The school principal’s role has undergone significant changes since the last edition of the international encyclopedia was published. Since our last description, the principal’s role in restructuring schools and the complexity of both the role and the context in which this occurs have increased. The importance of the knowledge society, the globalization of society, and the increasing demographic diversity of schools have called for new, or at least changed, roles for school principals. Clearly, the specific nature of these changes varies with national and regional contexts; but internationally too, the roles of principals are changing (Cheung, 2000; Crow et al., 2002; Earley and Weindling, 2004). In this article, current changes in the nature of school improvement and the resulting changes in the principal’s roles, relationships, rules, and results are identified. The article ends with an identification of implications of these changes for research, policy, practice, and preparation.
Current Changes in the Nature of School Improvement Although there are several changes in the nature of school improvement, four major movements have been identified: re-culturing, professional learning communities, distributed leadership, and social justice. These four movements are believed to be especially important for understanding how the principal’s role has changed. These movements and other external pressures on principals, however, create tensions and conflicts within the role, which will also be identified. Reculturing The first major change in principals’ roles is centered on the ways these school leaders shape the cultures of their schools. While many countries are increasingly pressing schools to become more tightly structured, more focused on outcomes and accountability, the school principal is being pressed to be more managerial and administrative. Nonetheless, researchers (Deal and Peterson, 1999; Fullan, 2001; Gurr et al., 2006) point out that schools, like other organizations, must attend to the culture of the organization. Reinforcing and, where necessary, reculturing school
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cultures are crucial roles of principals. Shaping the school culture means being able to read, assess, and reinforce key elements of the underlying norms and values, rituals and ceremonies of the school (Deal and Peterson 1999). Principals must be managers – structuring roles and responsibilities, implementing school improvement plans and so forth – but they also must be symbolic leaders reinforcing fundamental norms and values in their daily meetings, decisions, and interactions. Professional Learning Community The second major change in the nature of school improvement is the creation of professional learning communities. This strategy emerged from at least two ideas: teachers as professionals and organizational learning. The perspective of teachers as professionals focused on the unique knowledge and skills and the need for teachers to have the appropriate discretion to diagnose student needs and identify and implement responses to those needs. Rather than treating teachers as lone professionals isolated in their classrooms performing these diagnosis, identification, and implementation tasks, the literature on professional learning communities emphasizes the community of professionals who work together to promote student learning. This idea emerged from the organizational learning literature (Senge et al., 2000) that emphasized the importance of the social rather than individual construction of knowledge and learning environments. This literature also acknowledges that student learning occurs throughout the school rather than only in the classroom. McLaughlin and Talbert (2006) define teacher learning communities as ‘‘teachers’ joint efforts to generate new knowledge of practice and their mutual support of each others’ professional growth’’ (p. 75). The characteristics of professional learning communities have been identified (Louis et al., 1996; Scribner et al., 2002; Smylie and Hart, 2000), as fostering collaboration, de-privatizing practice, and committing to shared values around student learning. Principals have a special role in these professional learning communities. Crow et al. (2002) note that principals must nurture the intellectual capacity of teachers rather than view themselves as the only source of ideas, help teachers develop a common mission, and advocate for the schools in the face of external challenges (p. 198). Earley and Weindling (2004) identify the cultural role of
Principals Role in Restructuring Schools
principals in learning communities that includes questioning the status quo, affirming the knowledge of all individuals in the organization, and distributing leadership. McLaughlin and Talbert (2006) found that principals who were unwilling to share control with teachers or who de-valued teacher contributions undermined school improvement efforts.
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Conflicts/Tensions in School Improvement These four recent changes in the nature of school improvement are contested areas, routinely debated in various educational arenas. For school principals, they create at least three types of conflicts or tensions in advancing school improvement and student learning.
Distributed Leadership A third major adaptation in the nature of school leadership is the attention to distributed leadership. Distributed leadership, different from the focus in the 1990s on the structural notion of shared leadership, focuses on the interactions and actions of the principal and staff that move school improvement forward (Spillane, 2006). The distributed leadership paradigm suggests that principals and teacher leaders should focus on the artifacts, routines, policies, and social interactions that move the school forward, improve practice, and enhance learning (Leithwood and Jantzi, 1998; Spillane, 2006). This model seems to suggest that school principals need a deeper understanding of the social, cognitive, and contextual factors that combine to produce outcomes. The focus in the school becomes more on the practice of leadership than the school administrator. School principals therefore need to learn how to spread leadership routines across tasks, processes, and interactions.
Social Justice A fourth shift in the nature of school improvement is an emphasis on social justice, specifically ensuring equitable educational outcomes and closing the achievement gap (Gillborn, 2001; Ladson-Billings, 2006). Although equity is not a new concept in school improvement, government mandates and advocacy movements have raised the stakes. For example, the US Congress’s No Child Left behind Act has, at the least, increased the rhetoric and the expectations that all students can and should learn. Although the Act and other similar governmental mandates are clearly contested in educational and political arenas, the resulting demands on principals are more intense than before. In addition to government mandates, advocacy activities geared to raise the consciousness of policymakers, educators, and the public to reverse the oppressing and privileging tendencies within education, that disadvantage student groups based on race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, language, or disability, have increased. These activities, both inside and outside educational organizations, have added a new element to the principal’s role and require greater attention to how these student groups are impacted by school and societal forces (Skrla et al., 2004).
Accountability and Professionalism A major tension that exists in the school reform literature in general and for the principal’s role in supporting reform is the potential conflict between accountability and professionalism. Accountability is an international phenomenon (Leithwood and Earl, 2000), but is multifaceted and involves different contexts, such as government agency, local educational authority, school site council, and parent board/association (Marks and Nance, 2007). Even within, for example, the government context, accountability may involve different approaches, for example, market, decentralization, professionalization, and management (Leithwood, 2001). As Leithwood maintains, professionalism may be a type of accountability. Frequently, the tension and conflict are between other approaches, such as managerial or market accountability and professionalism. Major governmental initiatives in several countries around increasing student achievement for all students have intensified accountability by raising the stakes by connecting the increase in student test scores to student graduation and to school resources. In addition, some governmental initiatives have connected the increase in achievement scores to job security or performance pay for educators. As noted previously, one initiative in new school reform agendas has been professional learning communities that emphasize a stronger, discretionary role for teachers and administrators. This professionalism argues for valuing the expertise and practical knowledge that teachers develop over time and the need for teachers to have the discretion to use this knowledge in responding to the individual and unique needs of their students. Professionalism places the decision-making role in the hands of educators rather than regulators or the market. On the face of it, there are major inconsistencies and contradictions between some forms of accountability and professionalism. One seems to place decision-making authority in the hands of regulators and policymakers, while the other places it in the hands of educators. Emphasizing accountability seems to diminish professionalism. However, the tension is not necessarily this simple. As Hargreaves (2003) has argued, there is a difference between standardization and standards. A managerial accountability approach that emphasizes standardizing not only the
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outcomes but also the processes of education clearly diminishes the importance of the educator’s discretionary role. By contrast, accountability that emphasizes the need for research-based standards that can be used by educators to guide and evaluate their practices toward advancing learning for all students, does not necessarily contradict professionalism. The future of this apparent tension will depend on regulators, governing boards, and educators as they develop balances in standards that reflect and inform educator practices. However, the various accountability demands on schools ‘‘creates significant leadership dilemmas (Wildy and Louden, 2000), and school leaders attempting to respond to their government’s demands for change can be excused for feeling that they are being pulled in many different directions simultaneously. They are being pulled in many different directions simultaneously’’ (Leithwood, 2001: 228). New Expectations for Tight or Loose Coupling The structures of schools appear to be changing in terms of their structural coupling. For many decades, schools in the United States, for example, were allowed to be relatively loosely coupled, with considerable flexibility accorded to teachers and principals regarding curriculum, instruction, and the expectations for student achievement, for example, the types of students expected to learn (Weick, 1976). Recently, US policymakers at all levels have increased the outside expectations for: tighter design of curriculum (state standards), required instructional strategies (such as direct instruction), and specific targeted student achievement guidelines (No Child Left Behind Act). In the US, this change in the structural requirements of schools has put pressure on principals to become more administrative, bureaucratic, and evaluative. Interestingly, in some countries, for example, Taiwan, that had employed tightly aligned curriculum and assessment for decades, there is a movement to reduce governmental reigns, allowing schools to develop locally relevant curricula (Hughes and Stone, 1999). Principals in these countries must now engage in less of the administration of existing programs to more work on innovation and creation of emergent programs. Neither approach to restructuring, from loose to tight or from tight to loose is easy or simple and produces tensions for principals. New Forms of Organization Recent approaches to restructuring have involved new forms of schools, such as charter schools, middle college high schools, and schools-within-schools. These different forms are changing the roles of principals. Charter schools in countries such as the United States and Canada (O’Reilly and Bosetti, 2000) are designed to be free from the majority of curricular and assessment requirements
of the government. In these schools, principals often must be able to establish a coherent vision and set of administrative structures, actively recruit students, engage in marketing practices, and work with a governance board. But some researchers have noted the tendency for these schools to ignore fairness and equity considerations (Hausman, 2000). Middle college high schools were developed to serve disconnected youth who have shown some academic potential but have dropped out of school or are likely to. Located on college campuses, these small (100– 140 students) high schools meet on an innovative schedule, offer regular and college classes, provide more personalization and counseling, and a chance to both graduate from high school and gain college credits (Grier and Peterson, 2007; Weschsler, 2001). Principals in these schools must seek new organizational structures, connect on an individual basis with disaffected youth, and find ways to foster a culture of support and personalization. Finally, the small-schools movement has encouraged the development of schools-within-schools. In these contexts, principals must become innovators and school design experts who are able to develop a unique mission and set of structures within the same building as another school. In these settings, principals must blend and balance educational leadership with political leadership as they negotiate use of space, facilities, and equipment.
Resulting Changes in the Principal’s Role In the previous edition of the international encyclopedia, new roles, relationships, rules, and results that principals confronted were identified. In this section, these areas are discussed but shifts are suggested that have resulted from the contemporary changes in the nature of school improvement and the conflicts/tensions in school improvement identified earlier in this article.
New Roles Changes in the Political Role of Principal The changes and tensions we identified earlier have created new political roles for the principal to facilitate school improvement and advance student learning. These involve both internal and external roles. Through facilitating professional learning community and distributed leadership, the principal is confronted with an increase in potential conflicts over values and resources. Although involving more people in the collaboration and decision-making process has significant benefits as the research on professional learning communities has demonstrated, costs of time, coordination, and resource allocation exist and many of these involve potential conflicts (Crow, 1998). In addition, the principal’s political role in advocating for social justice
Principals Role in Restructuring Schools
and the rights of all students to learn can confront the principal with resource and ideological conflicts. The principal’s political role also changes in external terms. The demands of accountability and the tension between different accountability contexts and approaches, for example, market and professionalism, (Leithwood, 2001; Marks and Nance, 2007) set up potential conflicts among groups such as district/LEA administrators, governmental regulators, parents, out-of-school social service experts, and teachers. These political conflicts can involve disagreements that require the principal’s attention and expertise in resolving conflicts around allocating resources, defining achievement goals, and balancing achievement and social justice. Changes in the Cultural Role of Principal The restructuring of schools from loosely coupled (Weick, 1976) organizations to more tightly structured, standardsbased educational settings actually accentuates and extends the culture-shaping role of principals (Deal and Peterson, 1999). With schools tightening their curriculum, increasing their external accountability requirements, and, at times, defining instructional approaches in the classroom, being able to assess and nurture a professional school culture is even more important. Principals are required oftentimes to re-culture existing school norms so they match the standards-based rules and responsibilities. In fact, using data for decision making and school improvement is a useful and important task, but one that is new to many school cultures. Therefore, principals and teacher leaders will need to find ways to reinforce, articulate, and support new cultural norms and traditions. Changes in the Environmental Role of Principal Many of the new forms of school organization as well as accountability demands have changed the environmental role of principals. Clearly, principals have for several years held a role beyond the school. However, as Crow et al. (2002) note, market competition and accountability among other forces have required the principal to become more entrepreneurial and to take on a larger societal role. These environmental roles involve reminding teachers and parents of external expectations, such as market or governmental interests, advocating for social justice in communities, and educating community, regulatory, and policymaking audiences of student and teacher needs and perspectives. Changes in the Instructional Role of Principal The combination of changes in the specificity and focus of student learning outcomes, standards-based curriculum reform, the availability of computer-managed student
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achievement data, and intense accountability systems have substantially changed the instructional role of principals. Increasingly, principals are expected to be highly skilled users of computer-based statistical analyses of student achievement data. Principals and their teacher leaders now must know statistical fundamentals, be able to identify critical questions related to student achievement, and then analyze quantitative student performance data. Additionally, they need to be able to use those analyses to drive school improvement, planning, curriculum refinement, and instructional changes. These new roles require sometimes new and sometimes deepened skills in the use of data for decision making, computer skills, an understanding of statistical reasoning, and complex knowledge of the change process that is often not taught in preparation programs. Moreover, principals have the additional instructional role of removing barriers to teachers’ use of data for instructional decision making (Ingram et al., 2004). In some cases, this involves resolving conflicting policy demands and creating technical cultures that support norms of data use.
New Relationships The new roles that have been identified for contemporary principals imply new relationships as well. The number and diversity of stakeholders to which the principal must relate have increased dramatically (Crow et al., 2002). In addition to school and community stakeholders, principals must interact with other social service and healthcare professionals involved in students’ well-being and with regulators and policymakers seeking to ensure student and educator productivity. In addition to the increasing number and diversity of stakeholders, the internal and external boundaries of schools are blurring. For example, students are increasingly taking college courses before they complete their high school graduation. Community groups see the school as a pivotal agency and resource to influence policy and implement programs. The school is increasingly an ideological battleground, with the principal confronting disputes, advocating student and family interests, and forming alliances.
New Rules These new roles and relationships more frequently arise without rules or with new, fluid rules. Principals face these conflicts and tensions without the scripts common to school leadership practice in the past. The rapidity of change in a knowledge society, the demands for customized responses, and the contextualization of leadership require principals to think quickly, create unique responses, and be ready to adjust their responses to constantly changing circumstances
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(Crow et al., 2002). In addition, the new rules of the principalship demand not heroic, sole leadership practice, but shared and distributed practice. As Murphy (2000) argues, this involves leadership from the middle, rather than the top.
New Results The principal’s role in restructuring for school improvement now exists in a context with a new set of expected results. Internationally, this varies with national context and purpose. In many settings, the importance of student achievement for all students is more pronounced than before. Principals and other educators are expected to ensure student learning not only for the most able or even the average, but for all students. This result, however, is being contested as educators, regulators, policymakers, and other interest groups confront the ideological and resource consequences (Ladson-Billings, 2006). Increasingly, educators, parents, and others are expanding the notion of student achievement to include affective components in which principals are expected to include civic, esthetic, and affective instructional goals as well as other sociopsychological effects such as student engagement in school (Leithwood and Earl, 2000). In other international contexts, the results take on a more governmental perspective in which schooling is a vehicle for nationalistic visions, norms, and strategies (Hughes and Stone, 1999; Tsai, 2002). As education is recognized as a powerful instrument for furthering governmental initiatives and interests, the principal’s role takes on a different set of results and the principal becomes an agent of the state with responsibility to promote national objectives.
Implications Internationally, the late 1990s and early twenty-first century has been a period of rapid and widespread change in educational policy and practice. These changes and the press for restructuring schools have necessitated the rethinking of principals’ roles and practices. Clearly, given these changes there is considerable need for systematic, field-based studies of these changes on the daily work of principals, on the nature of leadership in these new contexts, and on the interaction of new structures and new behaviors. At the same time, there is a need for the reconsideration of preparation, licensure, and the professional development of school leaders. Preparation needs to be reconfigured to address the new realities of the work. Licensure, in settings where it is used, needs to be redefined to address the continued changes that will occur. Finally, professional development of principals needs to be deepened and expanded to reflect the wider array of
demands coming from the new relationships, new rules, and new results expected of school principals.
Bibliography Cheung, R. M. B. (2000). Securing a better future: A Hong Kong school principal’s perception of leadership in times of change. In Dimmock, C. and Walker, A. (eds.) Future School Administrators: Western and Asian Perspectives, pp 225–248. Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Crow, G. M. (1998). Implications for leadership in collaborative schools. In Pounder, D. G. (ed.) Restructuring Schools for Collaboration: Promises and Pitfalls, pp 135–153. Albany, NY: SUNY. Crow, G. M., Hausman, C. S., and Scribner, J. P. (2002). Reshaping the role of the school principal. In Murphy, J. (ed.) The Educational Leadership Challenge: Redefining Leadership for the 21st Century, (101st Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education), pp 134–161. Chicago, IL: National Society for the Study of Education/The University of Chicago Press. Deal, T. and Peterson, K. (1999). Shaping School Culture: The Heart of Leadership. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Earley, P. and Weindling, D. (2004). Understanding School Leadership. London: Paul Chapman. Fullan, M. (2001). Leading in a Culture of change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Gillborn, D. (2001). ‘‘Raising standards’’ or rationing education? Racism and social justice in policy and practice. Support for Learning 16(3), 105–111. Grier, T. and Peterson, K. (2007). Middle College High Schools: Secondary Schools for Disconnected Youth. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association, Chicago, IL. Gurr, D., Drysdale, L., and Mulford, B. (2006). Models of successful principal leadership. School Leadership and Management 26(4), 371–395. Hargreaves, A. (2003). Teaching in the Knowledge Society: Education in the Age of Insecurity. New York: Teachers College Press. Hausman, C. S. (2000). Principal role in magnet schools: Transformed or entrenched? Journal of Educational Administration 38(1), 25–46. Hughes, C. and Stone, R. (1999). Nation-building and curriculum reform in Hong Kong and Taiwan. The China Quarterly 60, 977–991. Ingram, D., Louis, K. S., and Schroeder, R. (2004). Accountability policies and teacher decision making: Barriers to the use of data to improve practice. Teachers College Record 106(6), 1258–1287. Ladson-Billings, G. (2006). From the achievement gap to the education debt: Understanding achievement in U.S. schools. Educational Researcher 35(7), 3–12. Leithwood, K. (2001). School leadership in the context of accountability policies. International Journal of Leadership in Education 4(3), 217–235. Leithwood, K. and Earl, L. (2000). Educational accountability effects: An international perspective. Peabody Journal of Education 75(4), 1–18. Leithwood, K. and Jantzi, D. (1998). Distributed Leadership and Student Engagement in School. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association, San Diego, CA. Louis, K. S., Kruse, S. D., and Marks, H. H. (1996). Schoolwide professional community. In Newman, F. M. A. (ed.) Authentic Achievement: Restructuring Schools for Intellectual Quality, pp 179–203. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Marks, H. M. and Nance, J. P. (2007). Contexts of accountability under systemic reform: Implications for principal influence on instruction and supervision. Educational Administration Quarterly 43(1), 3–37. McLaughlin, M. W. and Talbert, J. E. (2006). Building School-Based Teacher Learning Communities. New York: Teachers College Press. Murphy, J. (2000). The Quest for a Center: Notes on the State of the Profession of Educational Leadership. Columbia, MO: University Council for Educational Administration. O’Reilly, R. R. and Bosetti, L. (2000). Charter schools: The search for community. Peabody Journal of Education 75(4), 19–36. Scribner, J. P., Hager, D., and Warne, T. R. (2002). The paradox of professional community: A tale of two high schools. Educational Administration Quarterly 38(1), 45–76.
Principals Role in Restructuring Schools Senge, P., Cambron-McCabe, N., Lucas, T., et al. (2000). Schools that Learn. London: Nicholas Brearley. Skrla, L., Scheurich, J., Garcia, J., and Nolly, G. (2004). Equity audits: A practical leadership tool for developing equitable and excellent schools. Educational Administration Quarterly 40(1), 133–161. Smylie, M. A. and Hart, A. W. (2000). School leadership for teaching learning and change: A human and social capital development perspective. In Murphy, J. and Louis, K. S. (eds.) Handbook of Research on Educational Administration, pp 421–441. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Spillane, J. (2006). Distributed Leadership. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Tsai, C-T. (2002). The Chinese-ization and the nationalistic curriculum reform in Taiwan. Journal of Educational Policy 17(2), 229–243. Weick, K. (1976). Educational organizations as loosely-coupled systems. Administrative Science Quarterly 21, 1–16. Weschsler, H. S. (2001). Access to Success in the Urban High School: The Middle College Movement. Reflective History Series. New York: Ford Foundation. Wildy, H. and Louden, W. (2000). School restructuring and the dilemma of principals’ work. Educational Management and Administration 28 (2), 173–184.
Further Reading Crow, G. M. (2006). Democracy and educational work in an age of complexity. UCEA Review 48(1), 1–5. Deal, T. and Peterson, K. (1999). Shaping School Culture: The Heart of Leadership. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
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Dimmock, C. Walker, A. (eds.) Future School Administrators: Western and Asian Perspectives. Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Earley, P. and Weindling, D. (2004). Understanding School Leadership. London: Paul Chapman. Gorinski, R. and Shortland-Nuku, C. (2006). Building Innovative Communities of Professional Learning: A Leadership Practice Challenge. Paper presented at the Commonwealth Council for Educational Administration and Management, Nicosia, Cyprus. Gronn, P. (1999). The Making of Educational Leaders. London: Cassell. Leithwood, K. and Jantzi, D. (2000). The effects of transformational leadership on organizational conditions and student engagement with school. Journal of Educational Administration 38(2), 112–129. Matthews, L. J. and Crow, G. M. (2003). Being and Becoming a Principal. Role Conceptions for Contemporary Principals and Assistant Principals. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon. McLaughlin, M. W. and Talbert, J. E. (2001). Professional Communities and the Work of High School Teaching. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. Murphy, J. (ed.) (2002). The Educational Leadership Challenge: Redefining Leadership for the 21st Century (101st Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education). Chicago, IL: National Society for the Study of Education/The University of Chicago Press. Mulford, B., Silins, H., and Leithwood, K. (2004). Leadership for Organisational Learning and Student Outcomes: A Problem-Based Learning Approach. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Southworth, G. (2003). Primary School Leadership in Context. Leading Small, Medium, and Large-Sized Primary Schools. London: RoutledgeFalmer.
From Restructuring to New Structures The school principal’s role has undergone significant changes since the last edition of the international encyclopedia was published. Since our last description, the principal’s role in restructuring schools and the complexity of both the role and the context in which this occurs have increased. The importance of the knowledge society, the globalization of society, and the increasing demographic diversity of schools have called for new, or at least changed, roles for school principals. Clearly, the specific nature of these changes varies with national and regional contexts; but internationally too, the roles of principals are changing (Cheung, 2000; Crow et al., 2002; Earley and Weindling, 2004). In this article, current changes in the nature of school improvement and the resulting changes in the principal’s roles, relationships, rules, and results are identified. The article ends with an identification of implications of these changes for research, policy, practice, and preparation.
Current Changes in the Nature of School Improvement Although there are several changes in the nature of school improvement, four major movements have been identified: re-culturing, professional learning communities, distributed leadership, and social justice. These four movements are believed to be especially important for understanding how the principal’s role has changed. These movements and other external pressures on principals, however, create tensions and conflicts within the role, which will also be identified. Reculturing The first major change in principals’ roles is centered on the ways these school leaders shape the cultures of their schools. While many countries are increasingly pressing schools to become more tightly structured, more focused on outcomes and accountability, the school principal is being pressed to be more managerial and administrative. Nonetheless, researchers (Deal and Peterson, 1999; Fullan, 2001; Gurr et al., 2006) point out that schools, like other organizations, must attend to the culture of the organization. Reinforcing and, where necessary, reculturing school
66
cultures are crucial roles of principals. Shaping the school culture means being able to read, assess, and reinforce key elements of the underlying norms and values, rituals and ceremonies of the school (Deal and Peterson 1999). Principals must be managers – structuring roles and responsibilities, implementing school improvement plans and so forth – but they also must be symbolic leaders reinforcing fundamental norms and values in their daily meetings, decisions, and interactions. Professional Learning Community The second major change in the nature of school improvement is the creation of professional learning communities. This strategy emerged from at least two ideas: teachers as professionals and organizational learning. The perspective of teachers as professionals focused on the unique knowledge and skills and the need for teachers to have the appropriate discretion to diagnose student needs and identify and implement responses to those needs. Rather than treating teachers as lone professionals isolated in their classrooms performing these diagnosis, identification, and implementation tasks, the literature on professional learning communities emphasizes the community of professionals who work together to promote student learning. This idea emerged from the organizational learning literature (Senge et al., 2000) that emphasized the importance of the social rather than individual construction of knowledge and learning environments. This literature also acknowledges that student learning occurs throughout the school rather than only in the classroom. McLaughlin and Talbert (2006) define teacher learning communities as ‘‘teachers’ joint efforts to generate new knowledge of practice and their mutual support of each others’ professional growth’’ (p. 75). The characteristics of professional learning communities have been identified (Louis et al., 1996; Scribner et al., 2002; Smylie and Hart, 2000), as fostering collaboration, de-privatizing practice, and committing to shared values around student learning. Principals have a special role in these professional learning communities. Crow et al. (2002) note that principals must nurture the intellectual capacity of teachers rather than view themselves as the only source of ideas, help teachers develop a common mission, and advocate for the schools in the face of external challenges (p. 198). Earley and Weindling (2004) identify the cultural role of
Principals Role in Restructuring Schools
principals in learning communities that includes questioning the status quo, affirming the knowledge of all individuals in the organization, and distributing leadership. McLaughlin and Talbert (2006) found that principals who were unwilling to share control with teachers or who de-valued teacher contributions undermined school improvement efforts.
67
Conflicts/Tensions in School Improvement These four recent changes in the nature of school improvement are contested areas, routinely debated in various educational arenas. For school principals, they create at least three types of conflicts or tensions in advancing school improvement and student learning.
Distributed Leadership A third major adaptation in the nature of school leadership is the attention to distributed leadership. Distributed leadership, different from the focus in the 1990s on the structural notion of shared leadership, focuses on the interactions and actions of the principal and staff that move school improvement forward (Spillane, 2006). The distributed leadership paradigm suggests that principals and teacher leaders should focus on the artifacts, routines, policies, and social interactions that move the school forward, improve practice, and enhance learning (Leithwood and Jantzi, 1998; Spillane, 2006). This model seems to suggest that school principals need a deeper understanding of the social, cognitive, and contextual factors that combine to produce outcomes. The focus in the school becomes more on the practice of leadership than the school administrator. School principals therefore need to learn how to spread leadership routines across tasks, processes, and interactions.
Social Justice A fourth shift in the nature of school improvement is an emphasis on social justice, specifically ensuring equitable educational outcomes and closing the achievement gap (Gillborn, 2001; Ladson-Billings, 2006). Although equity is not a new concept in school improvement, government mandates and advocacy movements have raised the stakes. For example, the US Congress’s No Child Left behind Act has, at the least, increased the rhetoric and the expectations that all students can and should learn. Although the Act and other similar governmental mandates are clearly contested in educational and political arenas, the resulting demands on principals are more intense than before. In addition to government mandates, advocacy activities geared to raise the consciousness of policymakers, educators, and the public to reverse the oppressing and privileging tendencies within education, that disadvantage student groups based on race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, language, or disability, have increased. These activities, both inside and outside educational organizations, have added a new element to the principal’s role and require greater attention to how these student groups are impacted by school and societal forces (Skrla et al., 2004).
Accountability and Professionalism A major tension that exists in the school reform literature in general and for the principal’s role in supporting reform is the potential conflict between accountability and professionalism. Accountability is an international phenomenon (Leithwood and Earl, 2000), but is multifaceted and involves different contexts, such as government agency, local educational authority, school site council, and parent board/association (Marks and Nance, 2007). Even within, for example, the government context, accountability may involve different approaches, for example, market, decentralization, professionalization, and management (Leithwood, 2001). As Leithwood maintains, professionalism may be a type of accountability. Frequently, the tension and conflict are between other approaches, such as managerial or market accountability and professionalism. Major governmental initiatives in several countries around increasing student achievement for all students have intensified accountability by raising the stakes by connecting the increase in student test scores to student graduation and to school resources. In addition, some governmental initiatives have connected the increase in achievement scores to job security or performance pay for educators. As noted previously, one initiative in new school reform agendas has been professional learning communities that emphasize a stronger, discretionary role for teachers and administrators. This professionalism argues for valuing the expertise and practical knowledge that teachers develop over time and the need for teachers to have the discretion to use this knowledge in responding to the individual and unique needs of their students. Professionalism places the decision-making role in the hands of educators rather than regulators or the market. On the face of it, there are major inconsistencies and contradictions between some forms of accountability and professionalism. One seems to place decision-making authority in the hands of regulators and policymakers, while the other places it in the hands of educators. Emphasizing accountability seems to diminish professionalism. However, the tension is not necessarily this simple. As Hargreaves (2003) has argued, there is a difference between standardization and standards. A managerial accountability approach that emphasizes standardizing not only the
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outcomes but also the processes of education clearly diminishes the importance of the educator’s discretionary role. By contrast, accountability that emphasizes the need for research-based standards that can be used by educators to guide and evaluate their practices toward advancing learning for all students, does not necessarily contradict professionalism. The future of this apparent tension will depend on regulators, governing boards, and educators as they develop balances in standards that reflect and inform educator practices. However, the various accountability demands on schools ‘‘creates significant leadership dilemmas (Wildy and Louden, 2000), and school leaders attempting to respond to their government’s demands for change can be excused for feeling that they are being pulled in many different directions simultaneously. They are being pulled in many different directions simultaneously’’ (Leithwood, 2001: 228). New Expectations for Tight or Loose Coupling The structures of schools appear to be changing in terms of their structural coupling. For many decades, schools in the United States, for example, were allowed to be relatively loosely coupled, with considerable flexibility accorded to teachers and principals regarding curriculum, instruction, and the expectations for student achievement, for example, the types of students expected to learn (Weick, 1976). Recently, US policymakers at all levels have increased the outside expectations for: tighter design of curriculum (state standards), required instructional strategies (such as direct instruction), and specific targeted student achievement guidelines (No Child Left Behind Act). In the US, this change in the structural requirements of schools has put pressure on principals to become more administrative, bureaucratic, and evaluative. Interestingly, in some countries, for example, Taiwan, that had employed tightly aligned curriculum and assessment for decades, there is a movement to reduce governmental reigns, allowing schools to develop locally relevant curricula (Hughes and Stone, 1999). Principals in these countries must now engage in less of the administration of existing programs to more work on innovation and creation of emergent programs. Neither approach to restructuring, from loose to tight or from tight to loose is easy or simple and produces tensions for principals. New Forms of Organization Recent approaches to restructuring have involved new forms of schools, such as charter schools, middle college high schools, and schools-within-schools. These different forms are changing the roles of principals. Charter schools in countries such as the United States and Canada (O’Reilly and Bosetti, 2000) are designed to be free from the majority of curricular and assessment requirements
of the government. In these schools, principals often must be able to establish a coherent vision and set of administrative structures, actively recruit students, engage in marketing practices, and work with a governance board. But some researchers have noted the tendency for these schools to ignore fairness and equity considerations (Hausman, 2000). Middle college high schools were developed to serve disconnected youth who have shown some academic potential but have dropped out of school or are likely to. Located on college campuses, these small (100– 140 students) high schools meet on an innovative schedule, offer regular and college classes, provide more personalization and counseling, and a chance to both graduate from high school and gain college credits (Grier and Peterson, 2007; Weschsler, 2001). Principals in these schools must seek new organizational structures, connect on an individual basis with disaffected youth, and find ways to foster a culture of support and personalization. Finally, the small-schools movement has encouraged the development of schools-within-schools. In these contexts, principals must become innovators and school design experts who are able to develop a unique mission and set of structures within the same building as another school. In these settings, principals must blend and balance educational leadership with political leadership as they negotiate use of space, facilities, and equipment.
Resulting Changes in the Principal’s Role In the previous edition of the international encyclopedia, new roles, relationships, rules, and results that principals confronted were identified. In this section, these areas are discussed but shifts are suggested that have resulted from the contemporary changes in the nature of school improvement and the conflicts/tensions in school improvement identified earlier in this article.
New Roles Changes in the Political Role of Principal The changes and tensions we identified earlier have created new political roles for the principal to facilitate school improvement and advance student learning. These involve both internal and external roles. Through facilitating professional learning community and distributed leadership, the principal is confronted with an increase in potential conflicts over values and resources. Although involving more people in the collaboration and decision-making process has significant benefits as the research on professional learning communities has demonstrated, costs of time, coordination, and resource allocation exist and many of these involve potential conflicts (Crow, 1998). In addition, the principal’s political role in advocating for social justice
Principals Role in Restructuring Schools
and the rights of all students to learn can confront the principal with resource and ideological conflicts. The principal’s political role also changes in external terms. The demands of accountability and the tension between different accountability contexts and approaches, for example, market and professionalism, (Leithwood, 2001; Marks and Nance, 2007) set up potential conflicts among groups such as district/LEA administrators, governmental regulators, parents, out-of-school social service experts, and teachers. These political conflicts can involve disagreements that require the principal’s attention and expertise in resolving conflicts around allocating resources, defining achievement goals, and balancing achievement and social justice. Changes in the Cultural Role of Principal The restructuring of schools from loosely coupled (Weick, 1976) organizations to more tightly structured, standardsbased educational settings actually accentuates and extends the culture-shaping role of principals (Deal and Peterson, 1999). With schools tightening their curriculum, increasing their external accountability requirements, and, at times, defining instructional approaches in the classroom, being able to assess and nurture a professional school culture is even more important. Principals are required oftentimes to re-culture existing school norms so they match the standards-based rules and responsibilities. In fact, using data for decision making and school improvement is a useful and important task, but one that is new to many school cultures. Therefore, principals and teacher leaders will need to find ways to reinforce, articulate, and support new cultural norms and traditions. Changes in the Environmental Role of Principal Many of the new forms of school organization as well as accountability demands have changed the environmental role of principals. Clearly, principals have for several years held a role beyond the school. However, as Crow et al. (2002) note, market competition and accountability among other forces have required the principal to become more entrepreneurial and to take on a larger societal role. These environmental roles involve reminding teachers and parents of external expectations, such as market or governmental interests, advocating for social justice in communities, and educating community, regulatory, and policymaking audiences of student and teacher needs and perspectives. Changes in the Instructional Role of Principal The combination of changes in the specificity and focus of student learning outcomes, standards-based curriculum reform, the availability of computer-managed student
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achievement data, and intense accountability systems have substantially changed the instructional role of principals. Increasingly, principals are expected to be highly skilled users of computer-based statistical analyses of student achievement data. Principals and their teacher leaders now must know statistical fundamentals, be able to identify critical questions related to student achievement, and then analyze quantitative student performance data. Additionally, they need to be able to use those analyses to drive school improvement, planning, curriculum refinement, and instructional changes. These new roles require sometimes new and sometimes deepened skills in the use of data for decision making, computer skills, an understanding of statistical reasoning, and complex knowledge of the change process that is often not taught in preparation programs. Moreover, principals have the additional instructional role of removing barriers to teachers’ use of data for instructional decision making (Ingram et al., 2004). In some cases, this involves resolving conflicting policy demands and creating technical cultures that support norms of data use.
New Relationships The new roles that have been identified for contemporary principals imply new relationships as well. The number and diversity of stakeholders to which the principal must relate have increased dramatically (Crow et al., 2002). In addition to school and community stakeholders, principals must interact with other social service and healthcare professionals involved in students’ well-being and with regulators and policymakers seeking to ensure student and educator productivity. In addition to the increasing number and diversity of stakeholders, the internal and external boundaries of schools are blurring. For example, students are increasingly taking college courses before they complete their high school graduation. Community groups see the school as a pivotal agency and resource to influence policy and implement programs. The school is increasingly an ideological battleground, with the principal confronting disputes, advocating student and family interests, and forming alliances.
New Rules These new roles and relationships more frequently arise without rules or with new, fluid rules. Principals face these conflicts and tensions without the scripts common to school leadership practice in the past. The rapidity of change in a knowledge society, the demands for customized responses, and the contextualization of leadership require principals to think quickly, create unique responses, and be ready to adjust their responses to constantly changing circumstances
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(Crow et al., 2002). In addition, the new rules of the principalship demand not heroic, sole leadership practice, but shared and distributed practice. As Murphy (2000) argues, this involves leadership from the middle, rather than the top.
New Results The principal’s role in restructuring for school improvement now exists in a context with a new set of expected results. Internationally, this varies with national context and purpose. In many settings, the importance of student achievement for all students is more pronounced than before. Principals and other educators are expected to ensure student learning not only for the most able or even the average, but for all students. This result, however, is being contested as educators, regulators, policymakers, and other interest groups confront the ideological and resource consequences (Ladson-Billings, 2006). Increasingly, educators, parents, and others are expanding the notion of student achievement to include affective components in which principals are expected to include civic, esthetic, and affective instructional goals as well as other sociopsychological effects such as student engagement in school (Leithwood and Earl, 2000). In other international contexts, the results take on a more governmental perspective in which schooling is a vehicle for nationalistic visions, norms, and strategies (Hughes and Stone, 1999; Tsai, 2002). As education is recognized as a powerful instrument for furthering governmental initiatives and interests, the principal’s role takes on a different set of results and the principal becomes an agent of the state with responsibility to promote national objectives.
Implications Internationally, the late 1990s and early twenty-first century has been a period of rapid and widespread change in educational policy and practice. These changes and the press for restructuring schools have necessitated the rethinking of principals’ roles and practices. Clearly, given these changes there is considerable need for systematic, field-based studies of these changes on the daily work of principals, on the nature of leadership in these new contexts, and on the interaction of new structures and new behaviors. At the same time, there is a need for the reconsideration of preparation, licensure, and the professional development of school leaders. Preparation needs to be reconfigured to address the new realities of the work. Licensure, in settings where it is used, needs to be redefined to address the continued changes that will occur. Finally, professional development of principals needs to be deepened and expanded to reflect the wider array of
demands coming from the new relationships, new rules, and new results expected of school principals.
Bibliography Cheung, R. M. B. (2000). Securing a better future: A Hong Kong school principal’s perception of leadership in times of change. In Dimmock, C. and Walker, A. (eds.) Future School Administrators: Western and Asian Perspectives, pp 225–248. Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Crow, G. M. (1998). Implications for leadership in collaborative schools. In Pounder, D. G. (ed.) Restructuring Schools for Collaboration: Promises and Pitfalls, pp 135–153. Albany, NY: SUNY. Crow, G. M., Hausman, C. S., and Scribner, J. P. (2002). Reshaping the role of the school principal. In Murphy, J. (ed.) The Educational Leadership Challenge: Redefining Leadership for the 21st Century, (101st Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education), pp 134–161. Chicago, IL: National Society for the Study of Education/The University of Chicago Press. Deal, T. and Peterson, K. (1999). Shaping School Culture: The Heart of Leadership. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Earley, P. and Weindling, D. (2004). Understanding School Leadership. London: Paul Chapman. Fullan, M. (2001). Leading in a Culture of change. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Gillborn, D. (2001). ‘‘Raising standards’’ or rationing education? Racism and social justice in policy and practice. Support for Learning 16(3), 105–111. Grier, T. and Peterson, K. (2007). Middle College High Schools: Secondary Schools for Disconnected Youth. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association, Chicago, IL. Gurr, D., Drysdale, L., and Mulford, B. (2006). Models of successful principal leadership. School Leadership and Management 26(4), 371–395. Hargreaves, A. (2003). Teaching in the Knowledge Society: Education in the Age of Insecurity. New York: Teachers College Press. Hausman, C. S. (2000). Principal role in magnet schools: Transformed or entrenched? Journal of Educational Administration 38(1), 25–46. Hughes, C. and Stone, R. (1999). Nation-building and curriculum reform in Hong Kong and Taiwan. The China Quarterly 60, 977–991. Ingram, D., Louis, K. S., and Schroeder, R. (2004). Accountability policies and teacher decision making: Barriers to the use of data to improve practice. Teachers College Record 106(6), 1258–1287. Ladson-Billings, G. (2006). From the achievement gap to the education debt: Understanding achievement in U.S. schools. Educational Researcher 35(7), 3–12. Leithwood, K. (2001). School leadership in the context of accountability policies. International Journal of Leadership in Education 4(3), 217–235. Leithwood, K. and Earl, L. (2000). Educational accountability effects: An international perspective. Peabody Journal of Education 75(4), 1–18. Leithwood, K. and Jantzi, D. (1998). Distributed Leadership and Student Engagement in School. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association, San Diego, CA. Louis, K. S., Kruse, S. D., and Marks, H. H. (1996). Schoolwide professional community. In Newman, F. M. A. (ed.) Authentic Achievement: Restructuring Schools for Intellectual Quality, pp 179–203. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Marks, H. M. and Nance, J. P. (2007). Contexts of accountability under systemic reform: Implications for principal influence on instruction and supervision. Educational Administration Quarterly 43(1), 3–37. McLaughlin, M. W. and Talbert, J. E. (2006). Building School-Based Teacher Learning Communities. New York: Teachers College Press. Murphy, J. (2000). The Quest for a Center: Notes on the State of the Profession of Educational Leadership. Columbia, MO: University Council for Educational Administration. O’Reilly, R. R. and Bosetti, L. (2000). Charter schools: The search for community. Peabody Journal of Education 75(4), 19–36. Scribner, J. P., Hager, D., and Warne, T. R. (2002). The paradox of professional community: A tale of two high schools. Educational Administration Quarterly 38(1), 45–76.
Principals Role in Restructuring Schools Senge, P., Cambron-McCabe, N., Lucas, T., et al. (2000). Schools that Learn. London: Nicholas Brearley. Skrla, L., Scheurich, J., Garcia, J., and Nolly, G. (2004). Equity audits: A practical leadership tool for developing equitable and excellent schools. Educational Administration Quarterly 40(1), 133–161. Smylie, M. A. and Hart, A. W. (2000). School leadership for teaching learning and change: A human and social capital development perspective. In Murphy, J. and Louis, K. S. (eds.) Handbook of Research on Educational Administration, pp 421–441. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Spillane, J. (2006). Distributed Leadership. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Tsai, C-T. (2002). The Chinese-ization and the nationalistic curriculum reform in Taiwan. Journal of Educational Policy 17(2), 229–243. Weick, K. (1976). Educational organizations as loosely-coupled systems. Administrative Science Quarterly 21, 1–16. Weschsler, H. S. (2001). Access to Success in the Urban High School: The Middle College Movement. Reflective History Series. New York: Ford Foundation. Wildy, H. and Louden, W. (2000). School restructuring and the dilemma of principals’ work. Educational Management and Administration 28 (2), 173–184.
Further Reading Crow, G. M. (2006). Democracy and educational work in an age of complexity. UCEA Review 48(1), 1–5. Deal, T. and Peterson, K. (1999). Shaping School Culture: The Heart of Leadership. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
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Dimmock, C. Walker, A. (eds.) Future School Administrators: Western and Asian Perspectives. Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Earley, P. and Weindling, D. (2004). Understanding School Leadership. London: Paul Chapman. Gorinski, R. and Shortland-Nuku, C. (2006). Building Innovative Communities of Professional Learning: A Leadership Practice Challenge. Paper presented at the Commonwealth Council for Educational Administration and Management, Nicosia, Cyprus. Gronn, P. (1999). The Making of Educational Leaders. London: Cassell. Leithwood, K. and Jantzi, D. (2000). The effects of transformational leadership on organizational conditions and student engagement with school. Journal of Educational Administration 38(2), 112–129. Matthews, L. J. and Crow, G. M. (2003). Being and Becoming a Principal. Role Conceptions for Contemporary Principals and Assistant Principals. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon. McLaughlin, M. W. and Talbert, J. E. (2001). Professional Communities and the Work of High School Teaching. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. Murphy, J. (ed.) (2002). The Educational Leadership Challenge: Redefining Leadership for the 21st Century (101st Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education). Chicago, IL: National Society for the Study of Education/The University of Chicago Press. Mulford, B., Silins, H., and Leithwood, K. (2004). Leadership for Organisational Learning and Student Outcomes: A Problem-Based Learning Approach. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Southworth, G. (2003). Primary School Leadership in Context. Leading Small, Medium, and Large-Sized Primary Schools. London: RoutledgeFalmer.