The Role of School Leadership in Setting the Conditions for Impactful, Sustained Social Justice Professional Development

The racial diversity of children in US public schools continues to increase while most teachers and school leaders are White. In addition, systemic racism, whitewashing of curricula, microaggressions and deficit mindsets persist within schools across the country. These pervasive injustices that plague the student experiences of children of the Global Majority must be addressed with focused, sustained intention. This study offers social justice school leadership as an effective strategy to dismantle oppressive approaches to schooling. Specifically, it will explore how social justice-oriented school leaders set the conditions for impactful, sustained staff development. By employing multiple case study methodology, the experiences of staff within two New York City public schools that have established commitments to culturally responsive/relevant teaching (CR/RT) will be explored. Semi-structured interviews were used to uncover how school leaders leveraged both adaptive and technical leadership to enact school-wide efforts to embed CR/RT into instructional practice. Analysis was built on an existing framework to identify specific leadership roles that best support impactful social justice professional development over time. This study seeks to understand frequently overlooked aspects of this topic by delving into mindsets and actions, acknowledging both formal and informal school leadership and how such efforts play out within multiracial staff.

Committee
Lemuel W. Watson, EdD, Chair

Philomena Essed, PhD

Shannon R. Waite, EdD

LINK: https://antioch.zoom.us/j/640371973 (Defense Room #1) MEETING ID:  640 371 973

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