Culturally Responsive School Leaders: Actions, Barriers and the Impact of Critical Self-Reflection

The importance of culturally responsive pedagogy has gained prominence in the last few decades. Educational leaders have a significant impact on student outcomes and, as such, it is important that leaders are culturally responsive to meet student needs. The purpose of this study was to use qualitative case study methodology to gain a better understanding of culturally responsive school leaders including their daily actions, the barriers they face and the role of critical self-reflection in their practice. The research design and methodology of this study take into consideration the study’s focus on culturally responsive school leadership through the theoretical triad framework of critical race theory, critical social theory and transformative learning theory. This research study used individual case studies with a cross-case analysis as a research design. This qualitative study answers two research questions: 1. What is the relationship between critical self-reflection and the role of culturally responsive school leaders in transforming their schools to align with culturally responsive pedagogy? 2. What actions do leaders make to enact culturally responsive practices in schools, and what barriers do they face enacting those practices? There were five major findings from the analysis of data in this study. The first was the impact of a leader\u27s background on their leadership. All of the participants in this study shared how their background impacted their perspective as a culturally responsive school leader. The next three findings focused on how leaders respond to the needs of their students and then transform the school to meet those needs. One of the primary actions of a culturally responsive school leader is first to understand and know the needs of their students and then to address those needs directly. Another finding of the study was how the culturally responsive school leader cultivates a culturally responsive school environment. Next, each of the participants expressed how they are a catalyst for change through the daily actions they take to transform their schools to meet the needs of all students. Finally, by using critical race theory as a lens for this study, the fifth finding emerged of Culture as a Gateway to Race. This finding focuses on how culturally responsive school leaders tend to use the safer term of “culture” as a gateway to the discussion of race when working to create culturally responsive schools. The results and findings of this study provide opportunity for future research related to culturally responsive school leadership. The focus of this study on critical self-reflection supports the importance of critical self-reflection to the work of culturally responsive school leadership. The findings of this study also support the body of literature regarding the importance of culturally responsive practices being intertwined into every action a leader takes. This study additionally supports the research regarding the importance of opposing the status quo through the confrontation of barriers to equity and social justice

Climate Scenario analysis for pension schemes:a UK case study

This paper demonstrates how climate scenario analysis can be used for forward-looking assessment of the risks and opportunities for financial institutions, using a case study for a UK defined benefit pension scheme. It uses a top-down modelling tool developed by Ortec Finance in partnership with Cambridge Econometrics to explore the possible impacts of three plausible (not extreme) climate pathways of the scheme’s assets and liabilities. It finds that the funding risks are greater under all three climate pathways than under the climate-uninformed base scenario. In the absence of changes to the investment strategy or recovery plan, the time taken to reach full funding is increased by three to nine years. Given that most models currently used by actuaries do not make explicit adjustments for climate change, these modelled results suggest it is quite likely that pension schemes are systematically underestimating the funding risks they face

Climate scenario analysis:An illustration of potential long-term economic & financial market impacts

This paper illustrates the potential impacts of climate change on financial markets, focusing on their long-term significance. It uses a top-down modelling tool developed by Ortec Finance in partnership with Cambridge Econometrics that combines climate science with macro-economic and financial effects to examine the possible impacts of three plausible (not extreme) climate pathways. The paper first considers the impact on gross domestic product (GDP), finding that GDP is lower in all three pathways, with the most severe reduction in the Failed Transition Pathway where the Paris Agreement climate targets are not met. The model then translates these GDP impacts into financial market effects. In the Failed Transition Pathway, cumulative global equity returns are approximately 50% lower over the period 2020–2060 than in the climate-uninformed base case. For the other two pathways where the Paris Agreement targets are met, the corresponding figures are 15% and 25% lower returns than in the base case. Results are provided for other asset classes too. These demonstrate that climate change represents a significant market risk, with implications for financial planning, modelling and regulation

On isotropic cylindrically symmetric stellar models

We attempt to match the most general cylindrically symmetric vacuum space-time with a Robertson-Walker interior. The matching conditions show that the interior must be dust filled and that the boundary must be comoving. Further, we show that the vacuum region must be polarized. Imposing the condition that there are no trapped cylinders on an initial time slice, we can apply a result of Thorne's and show that trapped cylinders never evolve. This results in a simplified line element which we prove to be incompatible with the dust interior. This result demonstrates the impossibility of the existence of an isotropic cylindrically symmetric star (or even a star which has a cylindrically symmetric portion). We investigate the problem from a different perspective by looking at the expansion scalars of invariant null geodesic congruences and, applying to the cylindrical case, the result that the product of the signs of the expansion scalars must be continuous across the boundary. The result may also be understood in relation to recent results about the impossibility of the static axially symmetric analogue of the Einstein-Straus model.Comment: 13 pages. To appear in Classical and Quantum Gravit