Policy and Leadership in Changing Landscapes: A School Board's Response in a New Immigrant Destination

• In Event: 75.013 - How Leaders Negotiate the Influence of Social Context on Organizational Structures and School Policies

Abstract

In the context of shifting demographics nationwide, school boards play a critical role in establishing policies that promote or hinder diversity and respond to diverse students’ needs. Our study examines how one school districts’ school board members made sense of and responded to their increasingly linguistically and racially diverse student body. Using document analysis and interviews, our analysis suggests that the school board largely did not acknowledge the changing demographics of their schools’ populations. This relative silence was punctuated by the school board’s patchwork efforts to address the unique needs of their newly diverse student body through part-time support services, isolated program and curriculum interventions. The research has implications for improving school boards’ responses to their increasingly diverse population.

Authors

• Kristina Brezicha, Georgia State University

• Erica Beth Sausner, Pennsylvania State University

• Hilario Junior Lomeli, The Pennsylvania State University - University Park