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This volume shows how school districts can and do make essential contributions to the renewal and enhancement of American education. It expands the conversation on what school districts are, what they do, and how they can enhance the quality of teaching and learning in US schools.
Leading School Renewal explores how school principal leadership behaviour impacts on school change endeavours, and in particular pedagogic renewal, which is a form of educational improvement that is primarily concerned with the growing of the knowledge, skills and beliefs of education in a manner that optimises students’ life options. The authors identify attributes of principals who have engaged in school renewal and examine the influences on their leadership behaviours and disposition towards renewing their schools while also acknowledging the influence of site-specific contextual variables. The authors propose that certain leadership behaviours exhibited by school principals are integral with renewing a school’s pedagogic focus. They argue renewal is a preferred form of sustainable educational change because it relates to deep-seated cultural changes in approaches to pedagogy, curriculum and school structures. Whilst also maintaining that leadership is at the heart of school improvement and principal leadership practices which are based on a clear sense of purpose, values and beliefs about learning and teaching can transform a school into a learning organisation. Including a foreword by Professor John Hattie, this book is appropriate for all school leaders and educators who want to learn more about school leadership behaviours and highly effective school change.
As a result of today's crisis in education, people are beginning to realize that schools involve far more than providing children with knowledge and skills. Schools are communities and, like all communities, may be healthy or unhealthy. School Renewal addresses the problems and challenges of a school community. Through the use of fairy tales, myths, and the personal experience of Waldorf education, Torin Finser describes how both teachers and parents can come to grips with common problems such as burnout, interpersonal conflicts, and the traps of routine. Most important, the author stresses that an educational community must come to terms with the many unseen dimensions of each individual. He shows how these little-understood aspects of the mind can be cultivated and nourished to keep the school and education alive. School Renewal does not offer formulas and slapdash solutions. Rather, it encourages a whole new way of thinking about education and personal growth - for children and for the adults who care about them. "...if one wish could be granted me on behalf of school renewal, I would ask for significant improvement in the quality of sleep afforded to parents and teachers. No other change has the potential to do more good than simply eliminating the state of chronic exhaustion found by the end of the week in most schools." "Torin Finser understands what it's like to deeply care about the education of our children. His message will be a healing balm for those open to his wise and practical counsel. I want to rush out and buy a copy of this book for every teacher and parent I know." --Eric Utne, founder of Utne Reader "Extremely accessible, down to earth, and full of very important insights. I highly recommend this book." --Dave Alsop, Chairman, Association of Waldorf Schools of North America "Splendid ... not just teachers, but parents, students, and just plain stressed-out citizens would benefit from the wisdom, information, and insight Finser offers." --Joseph Chilton Pearce, author of Magical Child and Evolution's End "Wise guidance for those of us who want to be good stewards of our children and the schools that serve them." -- Parker J. Palmer, author of The Courage to Teach and Let Your Life Speak "An exciting and refreshing book for parents and teachers ... in his clear and concise writing, Torin has shown us how to bring common sense back to our schools." --Jim Grant, Executive Director, Staff Development for Educators "For Finser, school renewal is about self-development ... the suggestions offered here contribute to new ways of thinking about education and personal growth. Highly recommended for school administrators, teachers, community groups, and parents." --Library Journal "Shows that a healthy school community is one that is able to recognize and work with the problems that can mar even the most liberal and creative educational systems: burnout, stress, and interpersonal conflict." --NAPRA Review
Harold Kwalwasser has put together a call to action for education reform that makes a clear case for what has to be done in order to educate all children to their full potential. He visited forty high-performing and transforming school districts, charters, parochial, and private schools to understand why they have succeeded where others have failed. The analysis in Renewal: Remaking America's Schools for the Twenty-First Century brings together all of the necessary changes in one dynamic strategy. Many schools, even though facing seemingly impossible odds, have succeeded brilliantly. But their histories also reflect that there are neither silver bullets or demons. The heart of successful reform is systemic change, which requires the patience, understanding, and commitment of every adult who has a role in the process, from parents and taxpayers, to the school board members, superintendents, and teachers, and on to state legislators and members of Congress. Renewal offers a clear picture of how to move away from the mass-production style of education that most schools offered throughout the twentieth century to a new, more innovative, and flexible model that can meet this country's promise of truly educating every child and preparing each of them for the challenges ahead.
"Once again Goodlad has his finger on the pulse of education. . . .Excellent reading for the professional educator." --Choice Goodlad picks up where he left off in Teachers for Our Nation'sSchools --providing the vision and rationale behind centers ofpedagogy that can bring schools and universities together in aclose, renewing relationship.
What can today’s educational leaders do to create schools that are purposeful, moral, and successful? In this book, Glickman and Mette provide a powerful set of guidelines that will lead to true school renewal. Using a practical framework for school, district, and community leaders, their roadmap replaces dependence on top-down state and federal regulations, focusing instead on the creation of locally guided initiatives to address local goals. Filled with real-world examples, charts, and illustrations, the text gives teachers, principals, students, parents, central office personnel, school boards, and community members exactly what is needed to remake their schools. Building on Glickman’s highly acclaimed classic, Renewing America’s Schools (1993), this resource is must-reading for anyone involved with school change in today’s divisive and complex times. “My life would have been a whole lot easier if this book had been written when I was in the principal’s office.” —George Wood, former principal and superintendent, Stuart Ohio “This timely and critical book demonstrates how teaching and learning, and a democratic school community, are the key assets to solving our problems. It is not just the future of our schools that is at stake, but democracy itself.” —William Mathis, National Education Policy Center
This book offers practical guidelines and suggestions on how to establish, maintain, and evaluate a unique type of network, one that is driven by teams of school-based practitioners; such a network is created and governed by practitioners who decide what services they want, modify the services to meet changing needs, and play key roles in the network leadership.
The primary purpose of this study is to learn from the experiences of schools across the U.S. that are engaged in a largely process-oriented reform strategy. Schools vary in their capacity for productive self-reflection. The authors examine the process of self-assessment that many schools engaged in during this time of widespread public attention to the equlaity of schools. The schools examined in these cases reveal a complex interaction between the nature of the self-reflective activity the schools were engaged in (in this case, a National Education Association school review process entitled KEYS to Success in Schools), the contexts that shape the school, and the readiness on the part of school staff to engage in systematic reflection around issues that affect teaching and learning. The act of self-reflection in schools may not provide, by itself, a source of new ideas, alternative models, and a sense of what might be possible for the school to accomplish. Some external agent can often provide the impetus for (or constrain) the actions of school staffs in examining their programs and capacity for renewal. The acts and outcomes of self-reflection are inevitably guided and/or constrained by various contexts (including the school's history, culture, structure, and supports and pressures provided from communities, districts, and states).
Compassionate Leadership for School Improvement and Renewal aims to equip educational leaders with the knowledge, skills, and learning experiences necessary to approach their work from an intentional stance of compassion. Schools serve as both sites and sources of suffering; yet compassionate leadership can facilitate healing for students, educators, and community members. The moment is right to move the field toward a compassion-centered approach to leadership. In recent years, people around the world have experienced unfathomable loss and suffering due to the COVID-19 pandemic, persistent inequities and subsequent social justice protests, war and violence, and catastrophic natural disasters. These events created perpetual anxiety, stress, fear, uncertainty, loss, and grief for millions of people—including educators. Now perhaps more than ever, people need to give and receive compassion. The purpose of the volume is to build educational leaders’ capacity to demonstrate compassion, foster collective compassion within their schools and districts, establish organizational environments in which compassion is routinely given and received, and, subsequently, transform schools into sites of healing. Ultimately, through the unique contributions of each chapter, this volume offers a path toward school improvement that is both renewing and sustaining. ENDORSEMENTS: "As a former school counselor and school administrator, my view about compassionate leadership is one grounded in relational practice. This may be obvious to some, but unfortunately lost on many. This thoughtful volume edited by Kara Lasater and Kristina LaVenia explores a desperately needed reformulation of school leadership for our times. Compassionate leadership takes enormous courage because it works against much of the institutional ethos that forms and frames the role, thinking, and behaviors of those ostensibly charged to both manage and lead schools." — William C. Frick, University of Oklahoma "The education system is in its most challenging period in decades, perhaps in the past century. The need now is to address student, staff and organizational suffering. Lasater and LaVenia et. al., offer antidotes in this volume by providing up to date research, theory and insight to cultivate, conceptualize and practice compassionate educational leadership. For those who teach and lead with their heart, this book is essential reading." — Joseph A. Polizzi, Sacred Heart University "In an increasingly challenging educational landscape, leaders find themselves facing teacher shortages, student trauma, and learning loss. Schools could easily become institutions rife with secondary trauma and burned out professionals operating in stark contrast to the unifying motivations that drew each of us into this profession. This volume reminds us that among the many skill sets leaders must employ, organizational and leader compassion fulfills a fundamental human need and unlocks a means by which schools can transform from professional survival to the joyful work of changing lives for the better." — Joshua Ray, Greenwood Public Schools
