IPDA Conference, Belfast, November 2007

Conference Sub theme

Design Issues for Successful Professional Development

Bridging the gap between leadership development programmes and transformational schools in England and Asia

Authors:

Dr Coleen Jackson, University of Chichester

Dr Robin Precey, CanterburyChristChurchUniversity

For further contact regarding this paper please contact: or . Please do not publish part or all of this paper without the authors’ permission.

Abstract

This paper seeks to critique an innovative theoretical framework for a professional development programme (Greenan & Dieckmann) and develop it for school leaders so that they may transform their schools.

It uses the framework and draws on recent small-scale research involving, 1,200 participants, undertaken by the authors into botha national programme in England and programmes for school leaders in China and Pakistan developed by UK Universities. This work initially examines participants’ perceptions of the impact of the programme on their leadership learning and changes in their leadership behaviours. The work further seeks to identify ways of confirming sustainable school improvement with quantitative and qualitative schooling outcomes as a result of the programme. An integral part of each programme design is the development of learning alliances and partnerships between schools and universities, national organisations, local education bureau and multi-agency collaboration.

As a result of this research there are key findings which are explored which have relevance to those involved in designing, developing and evaluating leadership training programmes.

The state of education in England, China and Pakistan and its relationship to what we know about effective leadership.

The education system in England appears to be moving from one focused on standards which incorporates a narrow range of measurable targets for schools to a far broader one resting on the 5 lofty aspirations of The Children’s Act DfES (2004)where the health, safety, potential for achievement of economic well-being, the making a positive contributions and indeed the happiness of children are the judgement fields for schools and their leaders.Integrating the 2 potentially divergent aims of raising academic standards and meeting the broader agenda is a real challenge for all working in public service but especially for school leaders

China is at a critical stage in its development. Major social and cultural changes are taking place in China as a market economy system forms, globalisation, the mass media and the internet impact cultural diversity and value pluralism emerge, politics decentralises and as family structures change (Qi Wanzue & Tang Hanwei 2004). Global competitiveness in order to cater for the demands of the international markets (Chan & Ka-Ho Mok 2001) is a major force driving changes. These seismic societal changes are rapidly steering education but are also being steered by the education system. There are tensions in China as there are in England. The movement to an international quality assurance system, that is an outcome of global competitiveness, has led to a focus on basic skills and testing. On the other hand there is an increasing realisation that creativity and independent thinking are important. Central control is being replaced with decentralisation and the growth of private education (Ka Ho 1997) in some areas particularly in Special Economic Zones such as Shenzhen.

In Pakistan, the education system is more fragmented in the division between the State and Private sector. Recently the Government has been mirroring the private sector in ensuring training and development for its teachers. The future of Pakistan rests on is workforce and the aspiration to be full partners in the global knowledge society. Education in highly valued and seen in terms of social mobility.

Two points have emerged regarding leadership of our schools in the 21st century. Firstly, leaders are critical in making a difference to their schools, and secondly leadership can no longer be a solitary activity.What is clear is that leadership can make a difference in achieving aims for schools whatever these may be.School leaders are seen as pivotal to school improvement (Leithwood and Levin et al 2005) However, this is not just the province to the headteacher. The importance of developing, nurturing talent and sharing leadership throughout the school is critical to transforming schools (Leithwood, Day, Sammons, Harris, Hopkins 2006).

The focus of the current education agenda requires school leaders who are less managerial or transactional and more focused on leadership, leadership learning and transformation.Marsh (2000) claims that solitary leadership can be a directive and clinical view of instructional leadership and that this no longer fits the realities of time and workload for current education leaders. That view blocks the development of the collaborative leadership, culture and expertise needed for success in the reforms, and assumes that reforms can be aligned and packaged in outdated and rigid ways. Marsh suggests that a new role will emerge with three perspectives. The first is a role that takes regard of a cultural and organisation transformational perspective. The second perspective is that the role is strategic yet results driven but thirdly it is one that firmly links management support to educational improvement perspectives (p129).

The links between leadership style and the culture of the organisation have moved thoughts towards the notion of leadership as ‘transformational’, having the potential to alter the culture context in which people work. Theoretically and conceptually transformational leadership has the potential to profoundly change how leaders behave and work within and outside their organisation (West et.al, 2000).This in turn demands transformative professional development programmes for those preparing for and those already in formal leadership roles that make possible transformational change in schools and in the lives of young people.

The importance of criticality in transformational leadership

Transformational leadership in relation to learning is an elusive concept. Transformation involves people changing in order to succeed within shifting environments but in the process remaining true to core beliefs. Transformational leadership is about the process as well as the purpose. “Transformational leadership…..searches for ways to help motivate followers by satisfying high-order needs and more fully engaging them in the process of work” asserts Horner (2003:32).Burns (1978:37) maintains “transformational leadership is about the ability of the leader to change subordinates by maximising the talents of each individual through a leadership posture sensitive to the needs of others”. There appears some consensus in the literature that involves building a vision of a better future; establishing organisational goals; providing intellectual stimulation; offering individualised support; modelling values; seeking best practice and demonstrating expectations of high performance. Most significantly, transformational leadership entails creating a productive culture and developing structures to foster participation in decision-making (Leithwood, Jantzi and Steinach (1999).

If these are some of the ingredients for transformation then critical perspectives, although often resisted, are essential for quality education. Questioning and critical analysis inevitably raises the issue of power. Who defines a better world? Some might argue that there is no place for criticality in school leadership. Their view might be that the job of schools in Western society has been and is to enculturate and socialise youth. Certainly the notion of leaders critically questioning in schools in China or Pakistan would not be encouraged by their respective governments. There is the view that those elected to power in government know best and school leaders need to do what they are paid to do unquestioningly. The world that all children go into is not simple, static, fair and perfect. It is complex, rapidly changing, unjust and damaged. It is in desperate need of care, nurturing and improvement. School leaders need to be able to see and evaluate the possibilities as far as they are known today but also be equipped to lead through what is coming and is, as yet, unknown. In this situation a moral compass becomes absolutely essential and the one that a school leader grasps needs to point in a direction that he or she wishes to travel in these difficult times and not just be one that they are trudging unquestioningly. These leaders have to engage their staff and students and do their best, in turn, to equip them with these abilities if they are to face their future with confidence.

Although Shor and Freire (1987) acknowledge the limits of education on the political transformation of society, they also recognise that in the classroom the transformative focus may be more in relation to developing a critical lens and practicing application to hypothetical situations rather than actual life situations. However, school leaders have opportunities to put ideas into practice albeit with external political, social and economic constraints. Critical thinking is pivotal to becoming a leader alongside being a reflective practitioner, particularly one with a passion for social justice and equity however unpopular this stance may be with others. Leaders need to want and be able to question previously uncritically accepted assumptions, beliefs, values and perspectives in order to make them more open, accessible and validated. Freire’s concept of “conscientization”, Mezirow’s theory of perspective transformation and Habermas’s “emancipatory action” domain of learning resonate with Cranton’s view that “Perspectives transformation is the process of becoming critically aware of how and why our assumptions have come to constrain the way we perceive, understand, and feel about the world; changing these structures of habitual expectation to make possible a more inclusive, discriminating, and integrating perspective; and finally, making choices or otherwise acting upon these new understandings” (1997:22).

To understand these concepts and put them into practice, leaders need to step outside the complexities of their situation and this is best done through professional learning experiences.

The importance of transformative learning for transformational leadership

All learning requires a change of state but not all change is transformational. Miller and Seller (1990) helpfully point out the differences between transmissional, transactional and transformational education. These may be equated to knowledge transfer, sharing and creation. There is a place for passing on information although it is not a simple process. There is also a place for transactional learning, which recognises that the learner is not a “blank canvas” and that experience and interaction with other learners is important. Although the differences between this and transformational learning are often blurred, the latter is more profound and deeper. This section explores some of the different models available related to transformative learning experiences.

Mezirow’s theory of transformative learning, which is based on psychoanalytical theory (Boyd and Myers 1988) and critical social theory (Scott:1997) has three common themes – the centrality of experience, rational discourse and critical reflection. He asserts that critical refection on experiences is necessary for individuals to change their meaning schemes (specific beliefs, attitudes and emotional reactions) and this can, in turn lead to perspective transformation. However these perspectives are acquired over a lifetime and, even if change is felt to be necessary and desirable, old habits die slowly. The meaning schemes of individuals do change routinely through learning as individuals most usually add to or integrate ideas within existing schemes. Less common is the replacement of old meaning schemes with new ones. Mezirow argues that deeper perspective transformation leading to transformative learning occurs much less frequently and is usually the result of a “disorientating dilemma” which is triggered by a major (life) crisis or transition although it may result from the accumulation of transformations in meaning schemes over a period of time (Mezirow 1995:50).

Mezirow’s approach is one based on a logical, rational, analytical deconstruction of experience. He suggests that this can happen through a series of phases that begin with a disorientating dilemma and include self-examination, critical assessment of assumptions, recognition of shared transformations with others, exploration of new roles and actions, development of a plan of action, acquisition of new skills and knowledge for putting the plan into action, trying it out, developing competencies and self-confidence in new roles of the reintegration into life on the basis of new perspectives. Critics of Mezirow’s ideas claim that they are too rationally driven (Taylor 1988). Some see transformative learning as an “intuitive, creative and emotional process” (Grabov 1997:90). Others believe that it is a symbiotic process of rationality and emotion. Boyd and Myers (1988), for example, state that this process hinges on the notion of discernment, which is composed of the three activities of receptivity, recognition and grieving. First an individual must be open to receiving “alternate expressions of meaning”, and then recognise the message as authentic. Grieving is the critical phase of discernment and hence transformative learning when an individual realises that the old ways of seeing and dealing with the world are no longer relevant and s/he moves on to adopt new ways and finally integrates the new with the old.

One of the most ambitious definitions of transformative learning, the precursor to transformative leadership is that of O’Sullivan (2003): “Transformative learning involves experiencing a deep, structural shift in the basic premises of thought, feelings and actions. It is a shift of consciousness that dramatically and irreversibly alters our way of being in the world. Such a shift involves our understanding of ourselves and our self-locations; our relationships with other humans and with the natural world; our understanding of relations of power in interlocking structures of class, race and gender; our body awareness; our visions of alternative approaches to living; and our sense of possibilities for social justice, peace and personal joy”

Transformative learning is a deeply challenging, truly educational, intensely liberating process. It is a journey with no prospect of reaching a final destination. It is essential that our school leaders to embark upon it to shape their views of the world and of the schools that they run and the adults and children whom they lead.

How then can transformational leadership be learned? There are proven ways. Burbules and Berk’s (1999) emphasise practising criticality as essential in educating leaders who might build learning communities and take the risks necessary to foster democracy and social justice rather than “those teachers who play it safe by simply massaging the rhetoric” (Greenan and Dieckmann 2004: 242). They stress four components to such learning; the ability to think outside conventional frameworks and to analyse across disciplines; maintenance of the essential tension of controversy; an interactive collaborative construction of meaning; and fallibilism (as with Ellsworth’s (1989) inability to know fully). Darder (1997) supports the idea the transformational development is possible by suggesting that in fostering a cultural critical pedagogy “Students can learn to make problematic views of life; search for different ways to think about themselves; challenge their self-imposed as well as institutionally define limitations; affirm their cultural and individual strengths; and embrace possibilities for a better world” (p342).

One of the most useful analyses of opportunities for transformative learning is that by Greenan and Dieckmann (2004). They develop this in evaluating a teacher education course in the USA but their thinking has wider applications. They argue, based on the sorts of work of others discussed in this paper, that criticality underpins the process and that in turn there are three interrelated elements to this:

  • Aunique course structure that is founded on transformational learning enabling:
  • Awakenings- the transformation of learners through the concepts explored, the personal and institutional epistemologies constructed and the reconstruction of identity through:
  • Praxis- “the intentional capacity to identify and implement alternatives”(Miron and Lauria 1998 p 189)

Figure 1 below (adapted from Greenan and Dieckmann) indicates the relationship between these elements and further deconstructs what these are:

Figure 1: Concept Map of Transformation Themes and Relationships (from Greenan and Dieckmann 2004 p244)

Transformative leadership programmes - the research

Context

This paper draws on three research projects undertaken by the authors who have extensive experience of facilitating leadership development programmes. Firstly, one of the author’s of this paper coordinated an evaluation (Fawcett, Precey, Quintrell and Sieber 2007) into the longer-term impact of the New Visions programme. The NationalCollege for School Leadership (NCSL) New Visions programme was designed for primary, secondary and special school headteachers in their first three years of headship. It does not profess to be a training programme but rather is based on the belief that “the opportunity for new headteachers to engage in innovative and collaborative enquiry over an extended period offers a powerful model for learning. The emphasis on knowledge creation, rather than knowledge transfer, will impact on headteachers’ thinking, practice and growth as leaders” (New Visions Programme Guide). The programme was built upon the 10 propositions that underpin the work of the NCSL and is rooted in transformation and criticality. It recognises the significance of embedding specific patterns of leadership the early years of headship through a six-day programme spread over a year. Research into the impact of the programme took place in 2007 after it had been running for 4 years through 7 cohorts with1,655 participants. It was felt that there had been a sufficient time gap between the end of the programme and the research period to try to judge any sustained impact of the programme on leaders’ behaviours and their school’s development. This work drew and built on two independent projects provided both formative and summative evaluations of the pilot programmes for Cohorts 1 and 2 of the New Visions programme. These concluded that the programme did indeed have a significant impact on participants’ knowledge and skills and on their leadership practices, but had a limited effect on classroom practice and students outcomes (Bush et al 2003 and 2004). These pieces of research could only evaluate short-term (less than a year) impact.