Communication, Collaboration and Commitment: Overcoming Conflict with Engaged Leadership

Leadership is the ability to build and sustain high performance teams to achieve identified goals. Communication, Collaboration and Commitment are specific elements central to the survival and effectiveness of successful teams. This interactive presentation provides participants with a framework and solutions for being an engaging leader who resolves conflict

Navigating Stormy Seas: Critical Perspectives on the Intersection of Popular Culture and Educational Leader-"Ship"

This article, utilizing a postmodern mediated cultural framework, critically situates the sociopolitical context of public education within the constructs of a lost ship at sea. Seeking to rupture false assumptions of popular culture and its impact on the learning community, I further explore critical possibilities regarding the intersection of popular culture and educational leader-"ship.

Beyond the Politics of K-20 Education: Navigating, Negotiating, and Transgressing the Academy - A Brother Speaks!

Educators, who come to the academy in which I serve, are searching for answers. These individuals struggle with how to implement local, state, and federal legislation, seek efficient and effective ways to provide optimal learning experiences for all members of the learning community, and strive to make sense of the dynamic cultures in which they work professionally. During this era of market competition, globalization, and educational accountability, the challenge of the academy is transforming those aspiring educational leaders who are concerned more with "the bottom line" into critically conscious democratic leaders who seek to develop free thinking members of our society. Given the call for "principal executives," democratic education and freedom have been reduced to the ability to achieve academic standards and acquire material goods, wealth, and power without critiquing the consequences of inequity, greed, and inequality

From social justice to collaborative activism: changing the landscape of academic leadership

The new millennium arrived with great economic prosperity; however, currently the United State faces a weaker economy, a depressed housing market, a costly Iraq war and all the old problems of the late 20th century; power, race, identity, violence, and ethics. Current challenges for educators: 1) the increase number of charter schools; 2) voucher programs; 3) increases in immigrant populations; 4) for profit educational organizations; 5) inadequate funding for No Child Left Behind; 6) inequities regarding accountability; 7) and the re-segregation of public schools along class/racial lines. These challenges have broad implications for higher education. According to Hopkins (1997) education is considered to be the most accessible means for achieving social, political, economic, and cultural liberation in the United States (Gause, 2008, In-press). This article speaks to transforming schools by changing the landscape of academic leadership in an educational leadership preparation program in the southeastern part of the United States. The author engages discourses situated in social justice, collaborative activism and critical theory to speak to the purpose of public schools and the role of democratic education in public life

Guest Editor's Introduction: Edu-tainment: Popular Culture in the Making of Schools for the 21st Century

Popular culture is the very sea of our existence, It is often contextualized in terms of the "music of the day" or "music of the generation." From that perspective let us just for a moment entertain the thought of rap music. Rap music, in its brief history, has been coded as the "voice" of the urban African American male whose desire is to express his manhood and disrupt society. Hip-hop culture and rap music as an art form, which began as a contemporary form of African American expression, has emerged as an articulation of a culturally specific art form in a dominant cultural context. Initially, its popularity and global impact or hybridity positioned it as a counter-hegemonic musical medium with counter-narratives to dominator culture—although presently this is no longer true

Integrating Lesbian/Gay/Bisexual/ Transgender Topics and Their Intersections With Other Areas of Difference Into the Leadership Preparation Curriculum: Practical Ideas and Strategies

A theory and practice of social justice is fraudulent when it does not fully address lesbian/gay/bisexual/ transgender (LGBT) individuals and their intersections with other identities. Faculty who claim to be concerned with social justice cannot focus on one or perhaps two areas of difference while ignoring or giving short shrift to the others. After all, public school leaders oriented toward social justice cannot pick and choose among areas of difference with their students, staff, and community members. These leaders must lead for social justice across areas of difference; faculty should expect no less of themselves. Many LGBT students or students per-ceived to be LGBT face daily harassment at schools, and LGBT staff, families, and school leaders themselves generally find schools unwelcoming. This article offers practical teaching strategies and teaching resources that can raise consciousness, increase knowledge, arid develop leadership skills to prepare leaders to confidently meet the needs of LGBT individuals in their schools

Transforming leaders, creating communities: changing schools through transformative leadership

When the culture of the school presents a barrier to resolving its many problems, we must become proactive transformational leaders. Such a role involves understanding the schools culture and transforming custodial organizations into creative learning communities. Such changes require a transformational leadership that is creative, courageous, and visionary

Old school meets new school: unsettling times at Freedom Junior-Senior High

This article is a case study designed to challenge the beliefs, values, and ideology of graduate students in educational leadership preparation programs regarding social justice and democratic education. This case is designed to assist students in developing the knowledge, skills, and dispositions to navigate the micropolitical environments that exist in learning communities. This case navigates the multiple sociocultural and political issues a superintendent might experience regarding demographic and cultural change. The case is multilayered and can be used in courses for the principalship and/or superintendency, as well as courses in the foundations of education and leadership

The Counterstory and the promise of collaborative compassion in education

The current socio-cultural political climate in the United States, the renewing of the Patriot Act, disaster relief or the lack thereof, the ongoing threat of terrorism and the corroding of essential civil liberties, the rise in materialism and environmental destruction, the demonization of those in poverty, and the privatization of a free public education force us to ask the following question: What is the promise and purpose of a democratic education

The ghetto sophisticates: Performing black masculinity, saving lost souls and serving as leaders of the new school.

The educational discourse chronicling the experiences of African American educators continues to be limited while the anthropological and sociological literature appears to be more inclusive. In reviewing the literature I have found the typical representation of African American educators to be negative. Educational literature in regards to African American educators since my birth year 1966 continues to focus on how African American educators maintain the status quo and how the dominant middle class values of society are reproduced through dominant pedagogy. This is the duality in which African. Americans must struggle. And because of the absence of the marginalized and silenced "other" within the literature, very few first-person narratives, which articulate the issues in which African American educators experience in educating today's youth is in existence. This has created a "state of uncertainty," (my emphasis) for myself and the practitioners studied, because of the works of other black educators, i.e., Mc Whorter (2000), Hale-Benson (1982), Delpit (1995), Ladson-Billings (1994), regarding what works for black children. This state of uncertainty is predicated upon the various conservative, liberal, and progressive politics that frame the writings of these academicians; as well as, the range of discourses. The discourses curricula, educational leadership, culture, teacher preparation and language are also informed by the researcher's position regarding the intersections of their race, class, and gender