Fiddling With the Flame of Disequilibrium: A Study of Distributed Adaptive Leadership and Detracking

• In Event: The Politics of Equity and Social Justice in Student Achievement

Abstract

This case study examined leadership exercised in detracking restructuring efforts in a large suburban high school, to reduce racial inequities. Theoretical grounding includes Oakes’ political, normative, and technical obstacles to detracking and Heifetz’s adaptive leadership, where leaders simultaneously surface and attend to competing perspectives. “Fiddling with the flame of disequilibrium” balances levels of discomfort to prompt deep questioning but not sustain resistance. Data, 75 interview hours of multiple constituents, revealed the superintendent’s adaptive leadership style, concurrent with multiple players' crucial adaptive leadership, a model we call distributed adaptive leadership. This nuanced portrait illuminates the complex demands of leadership in negotiating contested terrain of deep institutionalized reform for equity—it cannot be done alone—with possibilities for enacting change.

Authors

• Sharon M. Chubbuck, Marquette University

• Cynthia M Ellwood, Marquette University