Building upon the Foundation

EDU 8672
Instructional Leadership

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Why most professional development initiatives fail...

Thinking about instructional leadership...

Designing a Professional Development Program:
Building upon the Foundation

Having established a solid foundation for professional development by leading teachers to share a vision about schooling and by forming a cadre of teacher leaders capable of actively engaging in supervising instruction, curriculum, and student learning, the instructional leader is now free to focus one's energy upon overseeing the formulation and implementation of a comprehensive program for professional development. With the basic infrastructure in place to support school change (Moffett, 2000), the instructional leader can now attend to the many problems and issues embedded in the attempt to offer teachers a relevant and meaningful professional development program.

Why most professional development initiatives fail...

The primary issue instructional leaders must contend with concerns how to sustain the forces of change that the instructional leader is intent upon unleashing in the school (Fullan, 2000). Many, if not most, professional development initiatives---which oftentimes begin as good ideas and are accepted with varying degrees of enthusiasm by teachers---fail to effect any significant instructional, curricular, or student learning change for a variety of reasons.

Four practical reasons provide instructional leaders insight into why many (if not most) promising professional development initiatives fail to sustain change over the long term (Moffett, 2000).

First, the support infrastructure needed to sustain change is not in place (Ucelli, 1999, cited in Moffett, 2000, p. 38). Unfortunately, administrators, teachers, and stakeholders all too often do not share a common vision about the purpose of schooling. Likewise, communication channels tend to be more narrow and restrictive (e.g., administrators and stakeholders mandating what teachers are to do) than wide (e.g., more collaborative efforts that unite administrators, teachers, and stakeholders in a common endeavor, albeit from differing and many times divergent perspectives). In addition, human resources development and deployment systems frequently are poor. Moreover, promising professional development initiatives fail because innovations oftentimes are imposed like a template upon and not adapted to the school's idiosyncratic context. Lastly, assessment and evaluation processes are disjointed from what teachers are learning as they experiment in their classrooms with suggested changes.

A second practical reason Moffett (2000) offers to explain the failure of many professional development initiatives relates to school culture. That is, change is oftentimes predicated by a structural frame analysis (Bolman & Deal, 1997) as administrators and stakeholders assert that, simply by changing the organization's structures, instruction, curriculum, and student learning will be changed. What this framework overlooks, however, is a pervasive organizational culture that mitigates against professional discourse that fosters the formation of a community of professionals who can capably deal with and overcome the instructional, curricular, and learning challenges evidencing themselves. This framework also overlooks the societal forces influencing students that certainly impact their attitude and approach to schooling.

A third practical reason explaining why change oftentimes is not sustained in schools relates to the rate of administrator turnover. Although statistics vary, it appears that the tenure of successful principals is rather short, with the average tenure of a successful principal ranging from three to five years. With these women and men moving from one school to another school or from one school to the district office, many promising professional development initiatives are not given sufficient time and support to take root and become firmly established in the school's culture. And, when a new principal arrives on the scene---who may very well have different ideas about and plans for professional development---promising initiatives begun under a previous principal begin to "wither on the vine" as yet another promising initiative is introduced.

Moffett (2000) suggests one final reason to explain why many promising professional development initiatives fail. This reason has to do with the pervasive practice of importing experts into the school to introduce exciting ideas about instruction, curriculum, or student learning. This practice, in itself, is not necessarily negative. However, when the experts finish their presentations, they leave behind the school and the teachers in them. This is not helpful in terms of professional development because, while the teachers may understand the concept presented and feel enthusiastic about experimenting with it in their classrooms, the teachers lack the refined capacity to develop the mastery, confidence, and sense of ownership that teachers need if they are to experiment with and implement exciting ideas in their classrooms.

Individually and collectively, these practical reasons challenge instructional leaders to remember that successful a comprehensive program for professional development will take time, perhaps longer than one's term of service in the school. At a minimum, Fullan (2000) argues that it will take three years in elementary schools and six years in secondary schools for change efforts to "go to scale," that is, to endure long enough to evidence substantive change in instruction, curriculum, and learning. Because measurable change will not be immediate as teachers begin experimenting with new approaches and experience frustration as new challenges arise, instructional leaders should also expect that things will get worse before they get better, what Fullan (1991) has called the "implementation dip."

But, as instructional leaders focus their energies upon developing a school culture that supports change, strengthening communication, building relationships, sticking with the professional development program for the long term, frontloading support during implementation, seeking program coherence, stabilizing turnover, restructuring the use of teacher time, and balancing pressure with support, it is possible for instructional leaders to sustain the forces of change in schools (Moffett, 2000, pp. 35-38).

Thinking about instructional leadership...

A comprehensive professional development program, then, builds and expands upon the solid foundation of shared vision and shared leadership. Success occurs slowly and painstakingly as the comprehensive professional development program gradually reflects the goals teachers identify and set, builds upon preceding professional development activities, and engages teachers in professional discourse with other teachers, administrators, and various stakeholders (Birman, Desimone, Porter, & Grant, 2000).

However, all of this---what Fullan calls the "inside story" (2000, 581-582)---implicitly addresses only the structural elements associated with many successful professional development programs. What this story does not narrate and is a fundamental prerequisite to successful professional development is the a priori fundamental change needed in the instructional leader if the program is to be successful, that is, sustained over time.

The following are some of the nonstructural challenges confronting instructional leaders if they are to be successful in their leadership role:

To be attentive to the "inside-out" and "outside-in" stories that are crucial to successful professional development (Fullan, 2000, 583-584). It is not enough for instructional leaders to direct attention exclusively upon the internal dynamics and structures associated with successful professional development programs. In addition, instructional leaders must deal with other social and cultural forces that impinge upon schools as well as the external agencies that can help to make schools more effective in achieving large-scale change.

The rationale for attending to all three "stories" is that instructional leaders must work at fusing the three stories into a "grand narrative" of school change, the synergy of which will evidence itself in three dimensions. The first dimension, spiritual change, becomes evident in teachers whose motive is to make a real difference in the lives of their students. The second dimension, political change, becomes evident when teachers exhibit the capacity to overcome obstacles and to persist in change efforts despite the inevitable setbacks they will encounter. The third dimension, intellectual change, becomes evident as teachers demonstrate their ability to discover, select, integrate, and utilize new pedagogical techniques effectively. By fusing the three stories into a grand narrative, Fullan asserts, E = M + C + A². That is, the rate of the school's efficiency ("E") in achieving change is equal to the teachers' motive for change ("M," that is, their will, purpose, and commitment), plus the teachers' capacity for change ("C," that is, their skills, "know how," and available resources), plus the assistance and accountability mechanisms ("A²") used to support change efforts.
To recognize that one's character is equally as important as the content of the professional development program. The structural features that frame the context for professional development as well as the core features characterizing the processes that should occur during professional development experiences (Birman, Desimone, Porter, & Grant, 2000) oftentimes are the only items that instructional leaders concern themselves with. Part of this emphasis upon structuring professional development programs is a logical consequence of one's training program; that is, these are the focal matters that typical certificate programs present to aspiring instructional leaders. A second element of this emphasis upon structuring professional development programs emanates from the literature that instructional leaders may read; that is, much of the professional literature published in periodicals like Educational Leadership, Phi Delta Kappan, and the NASSP's or NAESP's Bulletin emphasize these more practical matters.

Some recent research has focused upon what teachers report to constitute successful head teachers in English schools (Day, 2000), contradicting any exclusive emphasis upon structural features. Evidently, teachers attribute much of a head teacher's success not to behaviors adopted from the world of commerce and finance but behaviors that express the head teacher's character as teachers observe and interpret it. In particular, teachers identify the head teacher's ability to express care, equity, high expectations, and achievement as important. Additionally, the teachers cite teacher being people centered, achievement oriented, inward and outward facing (that is, dealing with internal and external constituents and stakeholders simultaneously), and the capacity to manage multiple tensions and dilemmas as especially significant to the head's success. In sum, this research suggests that that values not expertise may be crucial to successful instructional leadership, at least in as far as teachers describe this phenomenon.

Successful professional development, defined as "a comprehensive program that fosters personal and professional growth in teachers' attitudes and practice and that perdures for at least three to five years," does not begin with structural matters but instead with a shared vision about schooling and shared leadership within the school that translates the shared vision into changes in instruction, curriculum, and student learning. A shared vision along with shared leadership provide the solid foundation upon which instructional leaders can work to foster a culture that is capable of sustaining change. While many instructional leaders have been trained to attend primarily to the important structural matters that influence success, more recent research suggests that successful professional development begins first not with teachers but with the instructional leader, whose character sets the tone for change and motivates teachers to serve as the primary agents of change in schools.

References

Birman, B. F., Desimone, L., Porter, A. C., & Garet, M. S. (2000, May). Designing professional development that works. Educational Leadership, 57(8), 28-33.

Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (1997). Reframing organizations: Artistry, choice and leadership (2^nd edition). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Day, C. (2000, April). Beyond transformational leadership. Educational Leadership, 57(7), 56-59.

Fullan, M. (2000, April). The three stories of education reform. Phi Delta Kappan, 81(8), 581-584.

Fullan, M. (with Stiegelbauer, S.). (1991). The new meaning of educational change. New York: Teachers College Press.

Moffett, C. A. (2000, April). Sustaining change: The answers are blowing in the wind. Educational Leadership, 57(7), 35-38.