Socially Collaborative Schools

This book examines vertical tutoring and mixed-age group lessons.

A collection of articles from a group of commentators on American education, this book covers areas such as the creation of community in schools, the use of such ideas as commitment, the use of incentives and the promotion of colleagueship and leadership.

To commemorate the 10-year anniversary of the International School Leadership Development Network (ISLDN), this book is a compilation of the work conducted by network scholars. This volume is the first comprehensive overview of the studies conducted by ISLDN members engaged in examining how social justice leaders and leaders of high-needs schools address the social conditions, learning experiences, and performance of their students. Other international school leadership research consortia have emerged in the 21st century; however, the ISLDN is the second longest operating project, after the International Successful School Principalship Project (ISSPP). Since its creation in 2010, ISLDN scholars have delivered papers at a variety of international conferences and shared findings in research publications, including books and special issues of journals. Until now, ISLDN research findings have been disseminated separately for the project’s two strands: (a) social justice leadership and (b) leadership in underperforming high-needs schools. Therefore, the purpose of the book is to document the history and evolution of the ISLDN and to provide descriptions and reflections of the project’s research findings, methodologies, and collaborative processes across the two strands. This volume captures studies of school leaders from 19 countries representing six continents - Africa, Asia, Australia and Oceania, Europe, North America, and South America. The authors examine important external and internal contextual factors influencing schools in different cultural settings and provide insights about the values and practices of social justice leaders working in high-needs school settings. Numerous practical strategies are provided for school leaders working in schools with similar conditions. The concluding chapter by the co-editors synthesizes the structural factors, personal beliefs and values, and contextualized change management strategies that shape school leaders’ actions aimed at ensuring the best learning outcomes for their students. Besides capturing the range of findings emerging from various ISLDN studies conducted over the past decade, several chapters critically examine the project’s current contributions to the field. Authors suggest broadening the dissemination of our findings to increase the visibility of the project, expanding the research methods beyond qualitative interviews, incorporating studies from non-Anglophone countries, and augmenting the scope of our analyses and research focus. These researchers’ journeys also reveal the obstacles to and benefits of engaging in these types of international collaborative research ventures.

Across the United States, schools face the daunting issue of confronting the widespread effects of bullying, which threaten the physical, emotional, and intellectual well?being and development of youth. Creating and Negotiating Collaborative Spaces for Socially?Just Anti?Bullying Interventions for K?12 Schools is a theoretically and empirically grounded edited volume that describes practical ways to address bullying at both systemic and individual levels. Central to the scope of the book is a diversity?focused approach to assessing and conceptualizing discrimination and bullying among marginalized youth, such as LGBTQ, mixed race, gifted and talented, and special needs populations. Interspersed with concrete, real?life examples, each chapter in the volume expands on the multiple dimensions of bullying as well as research?backed anti?bullying interventions. The book advances previous literature by addressing contemporary issues in bullying. Special topics include teacher?to?student bullying, cyberbullying, restorative justice practices, and assessment of attitudes toward addressing bullying.

In an ideal world, collaboration between and among students would happen often and progress smoothly. Since that is not always the case, teachers look for practical information that they can use immediately in the classroom to help their students work together. This book contains 15 detailed cases of problems in collaboration. The cases allow teachers to try different solutions to these problems. Topics include: definition of collaboration; practical aspects; ethical aspects; communication; conflict management and resolution; working with parents and families, and more.

Schools are complex social settings where students, teachers, administrators, and parents interact to shape a child’s educational experience. Any effort to improve educational outcomes for America’s children requires a dynamic understanding of the environments in which children learn. In The Social Organization of Schooling, editors Larry Hedges and Barbara Schneider assemble researchers from the fields of education, organizational theory, and sociology to provide a new framework for understanding and analyzing America’s schools and the many challenges they face. The Social Organization of Schooling closely examines the varied components that make up a school’s social environment. Contributors Adam Gamoran, Ramona Gunter, and Tona Williams focus on the social organization of teaching. Using intensive case studies, they show how positive professional relations among teachers contribute to greater collaboration, the dissemination of effective teaching practices, and ultimately, a better learning environment for children. Children learn more from better teachers, but those best equipped to teach often opt for professions with higher social stature, such as law or medicine. In his chapter, Robert Dreeben calls for the establishment of universal principles and practices to define good teaching, arguing that such standards are necessary to legitimize teaching as a high status profession. The Social Organization of Schooling also looks at how social norms in schools are shaped and reinforced by interactions among teachers and students. Sociologist Maureen Hallinan shows that students who are challenged intellectually and accepted socially are more likely to embrace school norms and accept responsibility for their own actions. Using classroom observations, surveys, and school records, Daniel McFarland finds that group-based classroom activities are effective tools in promoting both social and scholastic development in adolescents. The Social Organization of Schooling also addresses educational reforms and the way they affect a school’s social structures. Examining how testing policies affect children’s opportunities to learn, Chandra Muller and Kathryn Schiller find that policies which increased school accountability boosted student enrollment in math courses, reflecting a shift in the school culture towards higher standards. Employing a variety of analytical methods, The Social Organization of Schooling provides a sound understanding of the social mechanisms at work in our educational system. This important volume brings a fresh perspective to the many ongoing debates in education policy and is essential reading for anyone concerned with the future of America’s children.

Building and Maintaining Collaborative Communities: Schools, University, and Community Organizations is a new and noteworthy volume in the literature on collaboration among schools and universities. It expands the playing field to include both publically and privately funded community organizations and the effects of the interaction of the three on projects in a multitude of settings both domestically and in international venues. Asked to analyze their projects following the Slater Matrix, nineteen examples provide an inside glimpse into the success and limitations of each project. Chapters are organized in order of complexity of type of collaboration. The editors expect this to be a useful guide for university personnel, school administrators, and community organizations wishing to embark or expand on projects involving schools, universities, and community organizations. In a time of short resources and uncertain sustainability, it should serve as a useful tool in making decisions in the planning, process, carrying out, and analysis of each endeavor.

Equity and social justice have become central to the work of schools. Teachers and leaders are at the forefront of building socially just schools. Issues related to equity and social justice in education, however, are complex and deeply contested. Professional learning is critical to enable teachers and school leaders to develop the understandings, skills and confidence to grapple with often challenging issues. This book brings together a range of contributions from different systems. The contributors to this book explore ways in which professional learning can support efforts to bring about socially just schools. The authors adopt a variety of perspectives, with some looking at professional learning around a broad concept of social justice and the task of the gap between advantaged and disadvantaged learners. Other contributors explore the question of professional learning in relation to a specific issue or area of practice to raise awareness and deepen knowledge and skills. Barring one, all the chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue in the journal Professional Development in Education.