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Findings
of the Review Team -
It really is about Leadership
By now most of you have had your school review, served on a review team, and shared the review recommendations with your faculties. Just as you pore over the report you receive, my colleagues and I at Cornerstone study all of them, learning from the carefully crafted descriptions of your progress and determining what our work is as we see issues and areas where schools seem to be stuck. Those recommendations are not just for you. They are for all of us. In the leadership column of the newsletters this year, Janet Cumbee, Pat Faulkner, Martha Roberts and I have shared a number of resources from which you can draw as you address those recommendations with your leadership team. For this issue, I want to share a resource we often overlook--School Review. There is much we can learn about leadership from the findings of School review teams, findings representing your observations in your words. What could be more credible than that! The following are excerpts about leadership, lifted verbatim from School Review findings. No school is described more than once. Since I didn't contact you to get your permission to share your review, no school names are listed. (Feel free, however, to smile when you recognize your school or findings to which you contributed as a team member.) What the Review Team said about shared leadership in one school... Leadership from the top is essential and the need for it does not diminish. However, there is an increasing need for leadership to be shared and institutionalized, and the school has fully recognized this. There is now a climate in which teachers and others enthusiastically take formal or semi-formal leadership roles. There are times when a conversation of one teacher with another is exactly what is required to free an obstruction, and that makes it a small but important dimension of leadership. That culture of shared responsibility has been well established in the school and is in striking contrast with the situation four years ago. And about another Cornerstone School, a Review Team wrote... Many individuals contribute to making the school an energetic and dynamic community of learners. Grade level team leaders provide valuable leadership and a communication network; they are well regarded as role models. They work closely with Cornerstone coaches to mentor new teachers; they participated in the development of the literacy action plan; and they provided input in preparation of the Y4 self-evaluation document. One Review Team wrote about what leadership looks like when a school is developing a culture of learning... The leadership of the school has been successful in promoting and sustaining a vibrant literacy culture. The principal is a very successful motivator, and expresses her appreciation of the faculty. She is very visible about the school, knows what is going on in the classrooms, and herself models good practice in literacy teaching from time to time. She sets the tone. She has complete trust in her coaches who contribute much expertise and dedication to their role. This strong leadership is further strengthened by the fact that it is shared among many staff, some of whom have adopted the role of co-coaches, in order that they can serve as a further resource for teachers in the areas of environment, motivation, routines and rituals, and oral language. This model of shared leadership has been a strong contributory factor in building the strong learning community. Here is what some of you serving on a Review Team documented as the impact of leadership... The school is successful because
These findings affirm that the principal must be the principal learner... The principal is an active learner. She participates in grade level meetings and staff development. She leads by example; she believes in doing what she expects from the staff. The principal takes part in book studies and a writing class after school hours. She promotes rigor in the classroom by requiring teachers to have and follow a daily agenda posted in each classroom. Her leadership is evident in each aspect of the learning community. And in another school... The principal has promoted a culture of literacy by herself becoming literate in the strategies of Cornerstone and by designing opportunities for others to learn. Review Teams found that even successful leaders continue to challenge themselves... The highly effective leadership team is committed to the principles of Cornerstone and there is a productive system of faculty, grade level, and other meetings that successfully promotes professional collaboration. The review team's impression is one of a school that never rests on its laurels, but is constantly reflecting on its achievements and striving to do even better. This climate of inquiry and "pushing the boundaries" carries over into the classrooms, to the considerable intellectual benefit of the students, who regularly are asked to make decisions, both hypothetical and practical, in relation to their learning. And when school leadership is supported by district leadership... The school is a vibrant learning community where teachers are passionate about improving their teaching and the students' learning. They see Cornerstone as a unifying force among the staff and a focus for staff development. Even teachers newer to the school say it has a comfortable philosophy and practice within which to work, even if they are not yet conversant with all its detail. The principal and the district administrators fully understand the thinking behind Cornerstone and support it optimistically. This has encouraged many of the teachers to feel confident about breaking away from long-standing habits and working in ways that they have always felt would be more beneficial to the intellectual growth of students. It is obvious from these findings that strong principal leadership and shared leadership make a difference. Rather than suggest that our work is done, however, these excerpts should illustrate some powerful next steps for school leaders who want to fully implement and deepen what we are learning together. In buildings where there is little interest in literacy best practice and other indicators of school change (and unfortunately we still have one or two in our network) or where coaches struggle to spread the work alone, we can continue to point fingers elsewhere in the school if we wish. But the review teams' findings—your findings—are clear. It's leadership. |
