Complex and Diverse Cultural Contexts and Organizational Capacity System Impacts on Student Performance. Thomas Alsbury, Seattle Paci c University; Adam Swinyard, Spokane Public Schools
This study explores how complex and diverse school culture can in uence effective implementation of reform efforts aiming to improve student learning. The study found a signi cant relationship between improvements in reading and math pro ciency rates in middle schools and the school’s use of an organizational monitoring system. Framed around organizational learning theory, ndings indicate that the use of organizational monitoring systems are linked to improved student learning.
Developing System-Level Capacity to Support Local Instructional Reform. Jean Mrachko, University of Michigan
In the context of a large-scale school improvement initiative, my aim is to understand
the speci ed vision for the role of network-based implementation consultants and to observe the mechanisms involved in translating this vision into enacted practice. Through the investigation of these operations, I investigate the development of new knowledge to guide innovative forms of leadership practice and the work of replicating and activating that knowledge among leaders across the system.
Preparing Leaders to Actualize Systems Reform. Lok-Sze Wong, University of Michigan
The purpose of this paper is to examine the changes to leadership practice needed in order to construct and lead complex, coordinated instructional systems, and the learning opportunities that would build this capacity. Building on studies of coordinated systems in the organizational learning literature, I examine whether the concepts of shared understandings, shared work, and heedful interrelating are applicable to constructing unique instructional systems. Local leadership may be charged with developing these capacities in others.
Unintentionally Fragmenting Instruction: Administrators’ Unintentional Sensegiving and Systems Reform Outcomes. Lok-Sze Wong, University of Michigan
While the new NELP standards call for leaders to be prepared to champion systems reforms, little is known about the knowledge and skills required. This paper examines what knowledge is lacking but needed in administrators’ practice to lead the construction and management of coordinated instructional systems. Building on the concept of sensegiving from organizational studies, which examines how leaders shape others’ sensemaking, I study administrators’ sensegiving in their efforts to actualize a systems reform.
An Organizational Capacity Framework: Supporting Educational Reform in Complex Contexts. Kathryn N. Hayes, Christine Bae-Lee (California State University, East Bay)
Attaining educational reform goals in complex urban contexts is dependent on building organizational capacity. Lacking, however, is a framework that adequately conceptualizes those resources, or capitals, that contribute to organizational capacity. Based on a systematic review of the literature, this paper presents an organizational capacity framework that integrates relevant capitals using a social ecological model—forming a foundation for research establishing which capitals leaders can target to facilitate reforms in complex urban contexts.
