The Role of Proactive and Adaptive Leadership in the Adoption and Implementation of Two Major Policy Innovations

• In Event: 52.022 - Defining Characteristics and Practices of "Odds-Beating" Elementary Schools Implementing the Common Core Learning Standards and the New Annual Professional Performance Review

Abstract

Purpose
While all districts in New York State are required to implement CCLS and student-performance-based APPR for teachers and school leaders, and must do so within a prescribed timeline, implementation is not overly scripted. District and school leaders enjoy considerable discretion as they proceed with implementation.

How do district office and school leaders frame this adoption and implementation challenge? What strategies do they employ? What are the school-level adoption and implementation outcomes that derive from these strategies? When inter-school and -district comparisons are made, what are the salient commonalties and differences?

This study was designed in response to these main questions. Nine elementary schools and their district offices were purposively sampled; with special interest in six whose performances on CCLS-aligned assessments were higher than predicted, given their student compositions.
Theory

To address the endemic complexity in this study’s design, the research team integrated four main theoretical strands. The first was adoption and implementation theory (e.g., Fixsen, et al., 2012). Recent research on districts and schools that make progress in achieving educational equity for students comprised the second strand (e.g., Knapp, et al., 2014; Raffo, 2014). School and district leadership was the third strand (e.g., Elmore, 2004; Knapp, et al., 2014; Honig, 2014; Honig & Copland, 2014). The fourth strand emphasizes the relationship between workforce characteristics and organizational factors (e.g., Day & Gu, 2014), especially Bryk &Schneider’s (2002) research on relational trust and Holme &Rangel’s (2012) research on organizational social capital.

Methods

Findings from key informant interviews with district and school-level leaders were triangulated with focus groups with teachers and support staff as well as classroom observations. Methods also included a school climate survey for all school staff and instructional surveys for mainstream teachers.

Data Sources and Analytic Procedures

Guided by our theoretical framework with its core concepts, cross-case analysis was employed to explore key leadership themes. Special interest resided in comparative analysis of district and school leaders’ strategies for their respective innovation adoption and implementation agendas. Data from key informant interviews and focus groups were analyzed using NVivo software. Special interest resided in teachers’ views of their principal and district office leaders.

Findings

Cross-case analyses yielded consequential inter-school differences. In “odds-beating” schools, leaders demonstrated both proactive and adaptive leadership. They were proactive when they anticipated the innovations and had developed organizational capacity for implementation. They were adaptive when they allowed implementation flexibility instead of top-down scripted, compliance-oriented protocols. In fact, some regularly elicited teachers’ needs and provided responsive professional development.

What’s more, they employed bridging, buffering and brokering strategies, both drawing on and building relational trust, to facilitate implementation. Superintendent-principal relationships helped to explain implementation policies that were clear, coherent, and aligned. In contrast, in “typically performing” schools, some leaders relied on top-down, compliance-oriented implementation strategies.

Significance

Research on industrial-age schools emphasized that access to a competent teacher was the most important determinant of student success. Leadership was secondary. With the CCLS and the APPR leadership shares the top ranking. Leadership preparation and policy need to be adjusted accordingly.

Authors

• Francesca T. Durand, The Sage Colleges

• Hal A. Lawson, University at Albany - SUNY

• Michelle Feder