EDUCATION LEADERSHIP AND DIVERSITY

Education Leadership and Diversity

Education Leadership and Diversity

Introduction

The aim of this article is to present a personal perspective on learning leadership and educational diversity. Learning to lead, and leadership in education which enables learning, are each construed as two distinct parts of a symbiotic relationship forming learning leadership. Educational diversity is defined as a range of individual differences, comprising a set of social and personal factors, which form a key aspect in any and every educational setting. The argument presented in this paper is therefore a blending of leadership theory with recent research (Rayner and Gunter 2005; Rayner et al. 2005) and continuing professional development for school management and Special Educational Needs education (Lance, Rayner, and Szwed 2007; Rayner 2007). The perspective draws upon the fields of educational management and leadership, knowledge management, individual differences and educational inclusion.

A need for new approaches to meet the challenge of diversity in the work-place and education is difficult not to exaggerate. Lee (2008) makes a case for this view forcibly in a recent appraisal of educational research in the USA. She concludes that, we cannot articulate a generative and robust science of learning and development without explicit attention to the diversity of the human experience. The National Science Foundation and the Institute of Education Sciences, the two largest sources of federal funding for education research, both explicitly call for attention to diversity. (Lee 2008, 272)

The approach adopted here presumes at the outset that a working practitioner in education is faced with a social and personal diversity in the learner and is engaged with and immersed in the work of learning. This perspective, in part, extends Schn's (1983) concept of the reflective practitioner, to develop the notion of a “thoughtful practice”, acquisition of “practitioner wisdom” and the model of a “thinking practitioner”. It also includes an expectation that a practitioner by necessity engages in their own learning and knowledge management when working with colleagues or taking a lead in their own professional development.

To this end, the article begins by offering a proposition about the nature of professional learning, knowledge management and educational diversity. This, in turn, links to the continuing need to develop a particular form of “learning leadership” and “learning to lead” in the management of inclusive education. The proposition is, arguably, valid in any educational phase of provision or setting. It is, for example, captured in Middlehurst's assertion in a recent overview of leadership theory when applied to higher education that, leadership development needs to be built not upon generic leadership competence frameworks, but on tailored processes that recognize the contingent, relational and negotiated reality of higher education leadership. At the heart of leadership, there is, or should be, a learning process that will deliver both better science and better outcomes for leaders and led in higher education. (Middlehurst 2008, 337)

Discussion

A set of principles for learning leadership are then examined in relation to a proposition of professional learning, knowledge and the idea of the “thinking practitioner” developing ...