Eye on Leadership
Leading with Intention: Defining Beliefs, Aligning Practice, Taking Action

by Edna Varner Cornerstone Leadership Fellow

If the title of this article makes you think, “Where have I heard that before?” you are right. I shamelessly copied from Debbie Miller’s new book, Teaching with Intention: Defining Beliefs, Aligning Practice, Taking Action. I considered doing what we educators do--admit only to “borrowing” the title, but, alas, I have no intention of giving it back.

When I taught full time, I thought like a teacher. Every book or magazine article, every gadget, picture, or artifact I saw in an outdoor market, on routine trips to businesses, during long waits at favorite events, or in far away places on summer vacations--every experience sent my thoughts traversing time and space, racing through our language arts curriculum and seeking out opportunities to use my latest discovery.

Once I became a teacher leader, then a principal, then a leadership coach, I started thinking like a leader, adrenaline pumping every time I saw something I could translate into leadership practice. Over the years, this has become as automatic as my fluency skills. I see “Teaching with Intention” and immediately I think, “Leading with Intention”. I read Chapter 1 of Debbie Miller’s book, “Picture Perfect” How Does Your Ideal Classroom Look, Sound, and Feel?” I start thinking, “How does a school look, sound, and feel when a principal and the school team lead with intention?”

I skim Chapter 2: Defining beliefs and aligning practices, and I see perfect agenda items for leadership teams struggling to determine why the leadership team should meet. Chapter 3: Taking Action, reminds me that action is more than “doing something”. (See “Closing the Knowing Doing Gap,” by Rick DuFour, et. al. in On Common Ground.) Taking action is about “accomplishing what we intend”.

Leading with Intention: Meeting the Needs of those Lost in Transition

Whether schools are transitioning to a new way of partnering with District and Cornerstone (as are six schools in Muscogee County and Springfield) or taking a fresh look at existing practice in light of current data, a different way of working is change. Leaders can hope for the best as faculties embrace (or refuse to embrace) change, or they can be very intentional about meeting needs during the transition period—the period of moving from the old to the new.

When I hear that teachers are still not on board in their third year of implementation, or I am drawn into a discussion about a district mandate that teachers are convinced limits their ability to use researched-based strategies, or sadder still, when I see an improvement goal that requires mere compliance or feedback that celebrates the illusion of intent, I wonder if people are simply lost in transition. How many have not yet made the changes they need to make because they are struggling with beliefs and reservations that bar the way?

Barbara Jazab, (Springfield District Reading Supervisor/Cornerstone Coach) and I have been trading notes from different books on transition by bestselling author and transition guru, William Bridges. In “Assessing Your Transition Readiness” and “Planning for Transition”, he offers key strategies that may surface reasons why some people get stuck while others make significant progress. These are adapted from Bridges’ list:

Questions for leaders to ask during transition:

1. Is there a fairly widespread sense that the change is necessary? Is the change solving a real problem [and is the problem clearly defined], or do people think that it is happening for some other reason?
2. Do people accept that the change represents a valid and effective response to the underlying problem [or the valid next steps for those experiencing success]?
3. Have the endings [outcomes, intentions] explicit in this change been talked about publicly? Has the organization set up some way to monitor the state of the transition?
4. Are there people within the organization who have expertise in leading change (and the transition to it) so that those affected by the change have a role in implementing it?

Of course, asking the questions is only part of the work. When people are lost in transition, they need to be led rather than left to find their way. Each of the above questions should suggest action steps for a leadership team:

1. Is the change necessary? Share the problem or reason that makes the change necessary or wise. Use both data and research.
2. Does the change represent a valid and effective response to the data? Routinely look at the research. Look at what is occurring in model classrooms in your school, across the District, and across the Cornerstone network.
3. Have the outcomes been talked about publicly? Look at the content for professional development time and meeting opportunities. Plan how you will explain, encourage, and reward progress or its lack.
4. Do you have leaders with expertise in leading change and transitions? Look at what you currently do to build principal and teacher capacity to address current and future issues. Monitor what works and what hinders progress during the transition to the change so that you can draw on past experience as you make future changes.

A Snapshot of Two Schools: What Leading with Intention Looks Like

Dr. Ann Stennett and her team at Warner Elementary School demonstrated how important leadership is during a transition when we visited the school this month. While Warner does not know all it needs to know about their new partnership with District and Cornerstone, they have already been laying the foundation for it. The “First Lessons” being implemented in classrooms are designed to build community so that independent learning, differentiation, and rigor are the norms for students. The leadership at Warner demonstrates how important it is to build that same kind of community among adults. Rituals and routines of adult engagement established over the years could explain why in the first month of school in Springfield, the team has already introduced Cornerstone to the faculty and every faculty member has a Cornerstone notebook to which they are adding as they learn.

The school makes yearly AYP, but making AYP does not represent the leadership’s highest aspirations for students. Since they are successful based on their test score history, some staff are asking, “Why are we a Cornerstone School?” That takes me back to Bridges’ questions about transitional leadership and Debbie Millers’ comments about beliefs. Cornerstone is not a deficit model. We start from strength, and that abounds at Warner. But even in schools that struggle to make gains, Cornerstone starts with principals who are instructional leaders and strong teachers to model the way for others. So why is Cornerstone in a school that consistently makes AYP? Working with a school like Warner Elementary provides a wonderful opportunity to show what is possible for student learning when the intentions stretch well beyond test scores.

To do just that, Ann Stennett already keeps her faculty steeped in the research on literacy and leading. School wide they are reading and discussing Mike Schmoker’s Results Now. We know their next chapter is “Authentic Literacy” because the teachers are reminded in the Friday Focus, a weekly memo that celebrates faculty events like anniversaries, communicates announcements, shares a weekly joke or humorous story submitted by one of the teachers, and reminds the staff to read the next chapter for their book study. When we talk about the book study, Dr. Stennett tells us that it is not enough to read about improving instruction. The teachers know this and that explains why they bring student work to the discussions as well as anecdotal descriptions of how the book studies are impacting their lessons.

Across town, Lisa Bakowski, principal of Sumner Avenue, is getting feedback from the school review team. She volunteered for the first school review. At the time she volunteered, she had the able support of Carole Leverock, District Literacy Coach, but she did not have the equivalent of a school-based coach/staff developer. Lisa volunteered any way. Her intention is to gain as much clarity as possible about what her school should address as priorities for improving achievement.

Lisa is working on shared leadership with members of the faculty who have informally stepped up, but she does not have an established leadership team. She has great confidence in the potential of her staff and a vision for achievement at Sumner Avenue. The school review team affirmed that. Like other schools, the staff worked hard last year, but they are disappointed with their recent test scores. They know they can do better and they know they have to do something different. The school review team saw a number of strengths the school can build on.

In addition to what the review team observed, what they heard from interviews with the principal and teachers was a widespread openness to learning with Cornerstone. Sumner Avenue School has what Margaret Wheatley calls, a “willingness to be disturbed”, that is, a willingness to have beliefs and ideas challenged by what others think. In “Partnering with Confusion and Uncertainty,” Wheatley says,

To be curious about how someone else interprets things, we have to be willing to admit that we’re not capable of figuring things out alone. If our solutions don’t work as well as we want them to, if our explanations of why something happened don’t feel sufficient, it’s time to begin asking others about what they see and think.

Most of us weren't trained to like confusion or to admit when we feel hesitant and uncertain. In schools and organizations, value is placed on sounding assured and confident. People are rewarded for stating opinions as if they are facts. Quick answers abound; pensive questions have disappeared from most organizations. Confusion has yet to appear as a higher order value, or a behavior that organizations eagerly reward.

And as life continues speeding up (adding to our confusion), we don't have time to be uncertain. We don't have time to listen to anyone who expresses a new or different position. In meetings and in the media, often we listen to others just long enough to determine whether we agree with them or not. We rush from opinion to opinion, listening for those tidbits and sound bites that confirm our position. Gradually we become more certain, but less informed, and far less thoughtful.

What the faculty at Sumner Avenue Elementary is demonstrating is a willingness to rethink how they can more effectively use some of the structures and processes already in place, adding new learning in colleagueship with District and Cornerstone partners. They welcomed the school review recommendations to inform their intentions. In doing so, Sumner Avenue has taken a giant step in the direction of improving achievement.

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