Poco a Poco: Leadership Practices Supporting Productive Communities of Practice in Schools Serving the New Mainstream

Item

Title

Poco a Poco: Leadership Practices Supporting Productive Communities of Practice in Schools Serving the New Mainstream

Abstract/Description

Purpose: Culturally and linguistically diverse students frequently do not receive equitable educational opportunities. Schools across public and private sectors that are striving to ameliorate this problem typically work in isolation, not collaboratively. This article examines how communities of practice emerge within a network of schools striving to effectively educate these students.

Data Collection and Analysis: We employ qualitative case study methodology drawing data from relational network survey data, archival documents, interpersonal communications, and field notes. In cycles of coding, we analyze these data to identify the learning architecture that structures the communities of practice within this network.

Findings: First, we found the emergent communities of practice were extemporaneous, tentative, and localized. Second, we found that applying the learning architecture shed light on the nature of the learning within these communities of practice. In this case, it revealed that the communities of practice (a) enjoyed relatively strong levels of participation but relatively ineffective reifications, (b) experienced a dynamic tension between local and global influences, and (c) allowed individuals to negotiate new identities in varied and complex manners.

Conclusions: This study shows the messiness that unfolds as school leaders pursue organizational learning toward the end of improving educational opportunities for culturally and linguistically diverse students, and how the learning architecture framework can help school leaders make sense of and respond to this in a nuanced manner.

Author/creator

Scanlan, Martin

Kim, Minsong

Burns, Mary Bridget

Vuilleumier, Caroline

Date

2016

In publication

Educational Administration Quarterly

Volume

52

Issue

1

Pages

3-44

Resource type

en Research/Scholarly Media

Resource status/form

en Published Text

Scholarship genre

en Empirical

Language

en

Open access/full-text available

en No

Peer reviewed

en Yes

ISSN

0013-161X

DOI

10.1177/0013161X15615390

URL

Official Publisher's Webpage (SAGE Journals)

Citation

Scanlan, M., Kim, M., Burns, M. B., & Vuilleumier, C. (2016). Poco a Poco: Leadership Practices Supporting Productive Communities of Practice in Schools Serving the New Mainstream. Educational Administration Quarterly, 52(1), 3–44. https://doi.org/10.1177/0013161X15615390

Cited in

Continuous Improvement and "High Leverage" Educational Problems

Item sets

OB Citations - Continuous Improvement and "High Leverage" Educational Problems

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