Chapter 6: Accents of Positive School Leadership: Applying Community Frameworks in Educational Spaces

Historically, educational leadership has been characterized by rote formulas and power-over dynamics, often working from “fundamental frames for thinking about how schools should be structured and coordinated, how compliance within them should be achieved, what leadership is, and how it works” (Sergiovanni, 1994b, p. 215). This outdated leadership trend replicated systems of management from outside of education. According to Hallinger (1992), educational institutions sought to imitate corporate management. In doing so, school districts and leaders fell into the trap of maintaining the status quo. With such a management approach, “there is an assumption in organizations that hierarchy equals expertise” (p. 216). The higher up in the hierarchy one was, the more that person was perceived to know about education. In these institutions, the voices of the school community members were often ignored.