Colleen A. Capper

From the Field: A Proposal for Educating Leaders for Social Justice

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to suggest the structure and content of an educational leadership program whose aim is to prepare principals for social justice work. Research Design: The authors have conceptualized foundational components for a comprehensive principalship program focused on social justice. They assert that educational leaders for social justice must have three goals at the forefront of their efforts: (a) They must raise the academic achievement of all the students in their school, that is, high test scores do matter; (b) they must prepare their students to live as critical citizens in society; and (c) both of these goals can only be achieved when leaders assign students to inclusive, heterogeneous classrooms that provide all students access to a rich and engaging curriculum. The components addressed for this social justice—oriented principalship preparation program include (a) how students should be selected for such a program and (b) an outline of the knowledge and content for educating social justice leaders. The importance of induction/praxis after students graduate from these programs is discussed. Conclusions: The aim of this article is to provoke a discussion in the field and spark faculty to engage in ongoing conversations and thinking about their own programs and to imagine new avenues for future research in this area. Faculty also can use these suggestions as a guide to assess their efforts and to bolster program quality, sensitive to the unique needs and schooling contexts of their particular students.

Toward a Framework for Preparing Leaders for Social Justice.

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to propose one possible framework for conceptualizing the preparation of leaders for social justice. To this end, three central questions guided this conceptualization: “What are the common themes in the literature and research on preparing leaders for social justice?”; “How can this framework serve as a guide for developing a course, set of courses, or an entire program toward preparing leaders to lead socially just schools?”; and “How can this literature and conceptualization inform future scholarship in administrator preparation?”.Design/methodology/approach – This work included a review of 72 pieces of literature. To address the research questions, the growing body of leadership for social justice literature was reviewed. Each of these articles was analyzed and explicit recommendations for preparing school leaders noted. These recommendations were then catagorized into the proposed framework.Findings – Three domains: critical consciousness; knowledge; and pract...

Spirituality? It's the Core of My Leadership: Empowering Leadership in an Inclusive Elementary School.

Administrative leadership is considered critical to successful implementation of inclusive schooling practices whereby students with disabilities are educated with other students. This ethnographic study of one principal was conducted over a 15-month period in a midsize midwestern city. The results: (a) a supportive environment for critique encourages teacher autonomy and risk taking while communicating trust that teachers can succeed; (b) a supportive environment is open to critique about how to reach inclusion but not about the goal itself; (c) in a facilitative community, the principal and teachers ask questions and consider alternative frameworks for inclusion; (d) creating a just, democratic environment coalesces the staff, and the principal models inclusive practices; and (e) principal behaviors are undergirded by a spirituality grounded in six beliefs: valuing personal struggle, recognizing the dignity of all people, blending the personal and professional, believing people are doing their best, listening, and dreaming.

Critically Oriented and Postmodern Perspectives: Sorting Out the Differences and Applications for Practice

The purpose of this article is three-fold: (a) to locate and describe several aspects of what the author terms critically oriented theories, which in addition to critical theory and feminist theory include critical race theory and queer theory; (b) to describe more fully poststructural perspectives including critical pragmatism and feminist poststructuralism; and (c) to identify key questions from each perspective that can help persons in the field of educational administration think about and respond to research and specific leadership situations in ways that push beyond traditional approaches. This article challenges the assumption that some critically oriented perspectives and postmodern perspectives have little utility for administrator practice. The author offers teaching suggestions to stimulate further conversation about making critical and postmodern ideas more accessible to educational leaders. In so doing, these ideas can lend support to leaders who wish to cocreate inclusive school communities.

(Homo)sexualities, Organizations, and Administration: Possibilities for In(queer)y

The purpose of this paper is to consider the possibilities for research with lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender school administrators and for the broader study of queerness in schools as organizations. Scholars need to consider both modernist and postmodernist practicalities related to (a) significance, (b) research focus, (c) methods, and (d) theoretical perspectives. I also explore how sexualities shape and are shaped by organizational life. Researchers should explore the (hetero)sexual culture and structure of schools, and the (homo)sexual ruptures and resistances to heterosexuality.

Segregated Programs Versus Integrated Comprehensive Service Delivery for All Learners Assessing the Differences

The purpose of this article is to address the principles of a comprehensive whole-school restructuring to serve not only students with disabilities educated in inclusive environments but also all learners who have been labeled to receive services from federally mandated programs, such as special education, limited English, at risk, or Title I. The number of students who qualify for such services is growing. Unfortunately, these students often spend the largest part of their day leaving their classroom to receive special instruction, resulting in a disconnected and fragmented day. We address the outcomes of traditional programs and the underlying principles necessary to support inclusive services versus creating segregated programs. The principles are classified into four cornerstones: core principles, location of services, curriculum and instruction, and funding and policy.

Ironies and Limitations of Educational Leadership for Social Justice: A Call to Social Justice Educators.

In this article that reviews this special issue, we identify 5 ironies and limitations of educational leadership for social justice: (a) the meaning of inclusive practice, (b) the intersection of identity and difference, (c) the emphasis given to student achievement, (d) the lack of policy and practice coherence, and (e) the separation of superheroes from critical collaborative leadership. Although we discuss each issue separately, these conceptions are interrelated and intersecting. We conclude with a call to educators for social justice to change their work in several fundamental ways.

A Measure of the Quality of Educational Leadership Programs for Social Justice: Integrating LGBTIQ Identities Into Principal Preparation

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate how aspiring principals in the United States are prepared for social justice leadership, by focusing particular attention on equitable leadership for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and questioning (LGBTIQ) persons as a measure of the preparation program’s commitment to social justice. Research Method: The research design involved a cross-sectional survey instrument completed by 218 full-time faculty teaching in 53 different University Council for Educational Administration university principal preparation programs. We performed descriptive analysis of Likert-type scale responses with cross-tabulation of selected survey questions and constant comparative analysis of open-ended questions. The descriptive analysis provides a one-moment-in-time snapshot of the perceptions of particular education leadership faculty. As such, the data are illustrative of certain patterns evident across the national sample rather than definitive of these programs. Findings: Findings indicate that LGBTIQ identities and themes are only marginally integrated into U.S. principal preparation programs, inclusive of those identified as social justice programs. Social justice programs that do address LGBTIQ identities frequently depend on one faculty member or course to do so, rather than being integrated throughout the program. Implications for Research and Practice: Strategies are clearly needed for integrating LGBTIQ equitable leadership into U.S. principal preparation. More fundamentally, the study challenges the manner in which social justice discourses are constructed. It suggests that the quality of social justice preparation is appropriately measured, in part, and enhanced by the form of communal engagement with identities and experiences marginal within the social justice discourse itself.

Rural Community Influences on Effective School Practices.

Explores how rural communities support or constrain school‐level processes which enable effective instruction to occur. Grounded in a conceptual framework of school context indicators, reviews the research and literature on rural education to describe rural community characteristics. Then utilizes analytic induction to consider how these characteristics may influence the school processes identified. The findings suggest that rural community influences are not immutable, and that communities can both constrain and enable structural and cultural aspects of schools which shape effective instruction, depending in large part on how the school mediates the community′s influences. Then offers suggestions for research and development in rural schools.

“We're not Housed in an Institution, We're Housed in the Community”: Possibilities and Consequences of Neighborhood-Based Interagency Collaboration

My purpose in this article is to explore neighborhood-based, interagency collaboration using qualitative methodology. Interagency participants believed that neighborhood-based collaboration (a) provided treatment at the core of student struggles (i.e., within their families and communities), (b) shared blame and responsibility among service providers for student problems, (c) increased accessibility of services for the neighborhood, and (d) personalized services for neighborhood residents and a vehicle for agency public relations and outreach. Constraints and consequences of neighborhood-based interagency collaboration revolved around increased observation and control of neighborhood resident behavior to match White middle-class norms, which could allow educators to shirk their responsibility for change at the school level