Distributed Leadership Matters: Perspectives, Practicalities, and Potential

Distributed leadership; engaging the many rather than the few in school improvement; has long been a promising theory. But it must be implemented effectively before educators and students can reap the rewards, including improved learner outcomes and stronger organisational performance.

Distributed Leadership Matters offers pragmatic approaches for realising these benefits. First, Alma Harris shows why harnessing educators collective expertise is an improvement strategy worth adopting. Then she details the collaborative processes that make it happen. Insights include:

• How to translate the research on distributed leadership into tangible results for your school
• Methods for building the social capital necessary for sustainable institutional change
• How to distribute leadership widely and wisely through professional collaboration

The answers to three key questions lie at the heart of this book:

• Are you committed to improving the learning outcomes of young people, whatever their context and whatever it takes?
• Do you believe that the key to school and system improvement resides in supporting teachers to be the very best they can be?
• Do you agree that collaborative learning with impact is achievable and sustainable?

The first question is about moral purpose, why we as educators do what we do in order to make a difference to young lives and life chances. The second question reinforces that teachers are not our best resource; they are in fact our only resource in securing better outcomes for young people. Teachers matter far more than they know. The third question implies that professional collaboration is one way in we can achieve better teaching and learner outcomes. We have everything we need to improve our schools and districts within them: the real challenge is to make more powerful and effective professional connections.

The old-fashioned top-down leadership style no longer works for today's schools. Distributed Leadership Matters is a bold step into the future.

Table of Contents

Preface

Introduction

1. Leading Educational Change and Improvement. What Does Educational Change for Improvement Require?
2. Leading System Reform. What Are the Challenges of Reform at Scale?
3. Future Leaders. Why Distributed Leadership Is Needed More Than Ever in a Changing World
4. Distributed Leadership: The Facts. What We Know About Distributed Leadership and Improved Outcomes and Performance
5. Distributed Leadership: The Dark Side. How Distributed Leadership Can be Misused, Misrepresented, and Misconstrued
6. Distributed Leadership: Building Social Capital. How Distributed Leadership, in the Form of Professional Collaboration, Contributes to Building Social Capital for Organizational Improvement
7. Distributed Leadership: Professional Learning Communities. How Distributed Leadership, in the Form of Powerful Collaborative Teams, Contributes to Organizational Improvement
8. Distributed Leadership: Professional Learning with Impact. Leading Effective and Disciplined Professional Collaboration

References

Appendix

Index