Improving the Capacity of School System Leaders and Teachers to Design Productive Learning Environments

Leadership and Policy in Schools, 10:125–144, 2011Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 1570-0763 print/1744-5043 onlineDOI: 10.1080/15700763.2010.502610

Improving the Capacity of School SystemLeaders and Teachers to Design Productive

Learning Environments

BRUCE SHEPPARD and DAVID DIBBON†

Memorial University, St. John’s, Newfoundland, Canada

In this article we report on the results of an innovative researchpartnership with the largest school district in one Canadianprovince where we are exploring how educational leadership prac-tices and the factors that influence these practices interact toimpact student learning. This article makes a clear connectionbetween leadership and student learning and makes a significantcontribution to the knowledge base regarding what we know aboutleadership in educational contexts, how and how much leadershipmatters within that context, as well as how important those effectsare in designing productive learning environments that facilitatethe learning of all children. Using Arbuckle’s Amos 17 and maxi-mum likelihood estimation, we employed path analysis proceduresto develop a best-fitting nested model to examine the interrela-tionships among three primary sources of formal leadership foreducation found in schools, school districts, and government, andhow these leaders interact with one another and with professionalteachers, parents, and other community stakeholders to directlyand indirectly impact the existence of a clear focus on studentlearning. We conclude with a discussion of the pathways in ourbest-fitting model as we explore in detail the interrelationshipsamong the primary sources of leadership and discuss the directand indirect effects of each of these leadership sources on oneanother and on the extent to which the factors individually andcollectively impact a school’s focus on student learning.

†This article was published posthumously.Address correspondence to Bruce Sheppard, Faculty of Education, Memorial University,

St. John’s, Newfoundland A1B 3X8, Canada. E-mail: [email protected]

125

126 Bruce Sheppard and David Dibbon

EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION

I had the great privilege of working with David Dibbon in quite differentsettings over an extended period of time. We first met when he asked meto supervise his doctoral dissertation. Turned out to be a pretty easy job.David was a self-starter if ever there was one. He produced a very interest-ing study about organizational learning in schools, one that had significantimplications for practice. We had several opportunities following his dis-sertation to share our work together with other senior school leaders. Asalways, David’s contributions were powerful and his work ethic more thanremarkable. As he moved from school leadership roles into university fac-ulty and then university administration roles, his commitments to improvingpractice remained as strong as they had been as a school leader and doctoralstudent. Even in the face of helping to raise his own young family, he some-how found the time to take on the additional role of school board trustee.Energy, commitment, integrity are all words that begin to capture my imageof David. Would that we had many more like him. But he was one of kindand will be sorely missed as a colleague, scholar and friend.

—Kenneth Leithwood

INTRODUCTION

Schlecty argued that systemic change in education is desperately neededbut, before we make these changes, we must better understand how thestructure and culture of schools and school systems “affect the behaviourof teachers and students in classrooms, and [how] this behaviour [is] relatedto what and how students learn in schools” (2005, p. 1). In concurrencewith Schlecty’s view, but adding to it, we have argued that for meaningful,sustained improvement to occur in schools and school systems there mustbe “recognition that schools are just one component of a complex adaptivelearning system that is composed of multiple dynamic interrelated subsys-tems that interact to influence student learning (Sheppard, Brown, & Dibbon,2009, p. 102). In such an adaptive system, provincial and school districtleadership, policies, and practices interact with one another to exert a directinfluence on how teaching and learning is manifested in classrooms, schools,and districts. Classroom practices are also impacted by such things as theprofessional learning experiences of school administrators and teachers, aswell as the attitudes, beliefs, and opinions of other constituent groups (e.g.,unions, professional associations, parents, the community, business groups,researchers, and the media). Even though school leadership provided byboth formal leaders (e.g., school administrators) and informal professional

Productive Learning Environments 127

leaders (i.e., teachers) helps shape the nature of the school learning environ-ment, other variables such as school and classroom conditions, along withstudent/family background conditions, have a major influence on both thelearning conditions and on student learning (Sheppard et al., 2009).

In spite of the increased desire of policymakers throughout much ofthe world to improve student learning outcomes in their public schools,with few exceptions, student achievement continues to be persistently lowerthan the expectations of either the policymakers or their publics, and thisis especially so in the most challenging contexts (Levin, 2006; Lupton, 2005;Harris & Ranson, 2005; Reynolds, Harris, Clarke, Harris, & James, 2006). Inresponse to the lackluster performance of public schools and repeated fail-ures of reform efforts, politicians have looked to school leaders for solutionsand have held them increasingly accountable for improved student out-comes (Day, Sammons, Hopkins, Leithwood, & Kington, 2008; Robinson,2010). The reaction to the heightened expectations of school leaders, aspreviously noted, has been “unprecedented international interest in thequestion of how educational leaders influence a range of student outcomes”(Robinson, Lloyd, & Rowe, 2008, p. 636). Results from this increased researchattention to the determination of the impact of educational leaders uponstudent outcomes have contributed to a growing consensus that attemptingto find substantive direct connections between leadership provided by aformal leader and student achievement is an overly simplistic approach thatis simply wrongheaded (Anderson, Moore, & Sun, 2009; Creemers, 1994;Creemers & Kyriakides, 2004; Huber & Muijs, 2010; Mascall, Leithwood,Strauss, & Sacks, 2009; Witziers, Bosker, & Kruger, 2003).

While formal school leaders do have a positive impact on student learn-ing, “it is widely understood that the effects of [their] leadership on studentsare largely indirect” (Leithwood, Patten & Jantzi, 2010, p. 2). Concomitantly,there is growing evidence that to lead schools and school systems success-fully requires more than the leadership of a single formal leader who is heldsolely accountable for improved student test scores irrespective of the class-room teachers, the students, and the multiple conditions that impact studentlearning (Copland, 2003; Hallinger & Heck, 2009; Harris, 2009; Leithwood,Harris, & Hopkins, 2008; Leithwood, Louis, Anderson, & Wahlstrom, 2004;Levin, 2006; Sheppard et al., 2009; Wang & Walberg, 1991). For instance,Hallinger and Heck have concluded that,

the reality of leading schools requires a broader set of leadershipresources. It may be the case, that some of the “nagging problems” thathave accompanied studies of school leadership effects arise from the factthat we have only been measuring an important but incomplete portionof the school’s leadership resources. Thus, future research would do wellto assess the contribution of leadership contributed by the principal aswell as by other key stakeholders. (2009, p. 113)


In light of the above, rather than attempting to identify a directlink between formal leaders and selected student outcome measures, theresearch reported in this article is focused on unraveling the interrela-tionships among three primary sources of formal leadership for educationfound in schools, school districts, and government (Sackney, 2007). It seeksto determine how these formal leaders interact with one another andwith informal leaders—specifically, professional teachers, parents and othercommunity stakeholders—to directly and indirectly facilitate or inhibit theexistence of a clear focus on teaching and student learning that “has beenidentified as a key characteristic of effective and improving schools . . .

[and] the singularly most important factor in raising achievement” (Harris,Chapman, Muijs, Russ, & Stoll, 2006, p. 416).

Our conception of leadership, within a complex adaptive system ofwhich schools are only one component, is synonymous with what we havedescribed elsewhere as collaborative leadership:

An approach in which there are two categories of leaders—formal leadersand informal leaders . . . [Informal leaders such as] teachers are viewedas partners, rather than as followers, and leadership is defined throughthe interaction of leaders, constituents, and situation . . . Within thisapproach . . . both formal leaders and constituents have an important,yet distinct, leadership role to play. (Sheppard et al., 2009, p. 15)

Beyond the leadership of school administrators within a school, formal lead-ers include decision makers within government and school districts, whileinformal leaders include teachers, parents, other members of the commu-nity, and students. Like us, Crowther, Kaagen, Ferguson, and Hann (2009)have observed that within this framework, formal leaders recognize andperform their bureaucratic and fiduciary responsibilities, but remain keenlyaware of their democratic leadership responsibilities that require them tofoster teacher leadership. As well, they share our view that the ability ofthe organization to learn “is dependent on the capacity of the organiza-tion to facilitate collaboration among individual learners [constituents asinformal leaders] who assume distributed leadership responsibilities andlearn from one another” (Sheppard et al., 2009, p. 16). Formal leadersfacilitate the engagement of other constituents as leaders by being trans-formational and inclusive, and by providing opportunities for professionallearning and collaborative engagement. As constituents and formal leadersbegin to accept their role as collaborative leaders, there is a fluid movementfrom being a constituent in one context to being a formal leader in another,while all leaders and constituents are focused on the essential purpose ofschooling—student learning.

In a collaborative leadership model, therefore, teachers are both lead-ers and constituents (Crowther, 1997; Crowther et al., 2009). It appearsunequivocal that teachers have a powerful direct effect on student learning


(Creemers, 1994; Creemers & Kyriakides, 2004; Hill & Flynn, 2006; Marzano,Pickering, & Pollock, 2001; Willms, Friesen, & Milton, 2009; Wright, Horn, &Sanders, 1997) and on the success of reform initiatives (Dibbon, Galway &Warren, 2009; Knapp, 1997). In respect to teachers’ direct effect on studentlearning, Willms et al. concluded that “the role of the classroom teachermay be . . . even more important than students’ family background” (2009,p. 21). Clearly, individual teachers make a great deal of difference for goodor bad, as they work directly with their students; however, if an entire schoolis to make a positive difference to all students, the school ecology mustevolve as a learning organization (Senge, 1990). Yet, an organization suchas a school can only learn as individuals learn and share knowledge withone another (Hall & Hord, 2006). That is, school (organizational) learningis dependent upon teachers who value and engage in professional learningand who are willing to engage as collaborative leaders who teach, and learnfrom, one another (Sheppard et al., 2009) in a quest to facilitate actions thatare directed toward the accomplishment of whole-school success (Crowtheret al., 2009).

Unfortunately, neither individual teacher professional learning norteacher leadership appears to be common within the public school system(Sheppard, 2008). Not all teachers aspire to be leaders, and “environmentsthat support and nurture teacher leadership are not endemic to manyschools” (Crowther et al., 2009, p. 10). As a matter of fact,

most schools continue to operate as traditional hierarchical bureaucra-cies; therefore, the common expectation is that someone at the top ofthe organization will set the direction. Simply stating that an organizationis now going to be collaborative, that leadership will be distributed, andthat all constituents will now be leaders will most likely result in failure.(Sheppard et al., 2009, p. 27)

Having recognized this aforementioned reality, Crowther et al. have con-cluded that “the development and sustainability of teacher leadership isinseparable from [a] strong principalship and supportive systemic frame-works” (2009, p. 22).

In respect to teacher professional learning, schools have functionedtraditionally within the norms of the one-room schoolhouse that is charac-terized by the isolation of one teacher from the other (Glickman, Gordon, &Ross-Gordon, 2007). Consequently, the most common professional develop-ment experience for teachers has been the one-shot, large-group workshopexperience that has a terrible reputation among teachers, administrators, andresearchers for being of little or no value to teachers looking to change orimprove their practice (Sheppard et al., 2009; Smylie, 1996). Recent evidence,however, suggests that when professional development and teacher collab-orative leadership are combined in the form of mentoring, coaching, and


study groups, and is focused on meeting the professional needs of individualteachers, it is more likely to lead to an increase in teachers’ knowledge andskills and to positively influence teaching practices (Garet, Porter, Desimone,Birman, & Suk Yoon, 2001; Penuel, Fishman, Yamaguchi & Gallagher, 2007).Both of those factors are included in our leadership framework: the extent towhich teachers engage in collaboration with their colleagues and the extentthey perceive their professional development to have helped them becomemore effective in the use of data and in curriculum decision making.

As well, in our school leadership model, we include parents and othercommunity members as important constituents in school effectiveness. Whilethis role is not quite as clear as that of other groups (Leithwood, Jantzi, &McElheron-Hopkins, 2006), there is little doubt that it is a significant one“as study after study has reinforced the fact that social background fac-tors explain more than half the variation in pupil achievement” (Harriset al., 2006) and have a profound influence on students’ post-secondaryand career choices (Atlantic Evaluation and Research Consultants, 2008).For instance, having determined that England’s school improvement strat-egy based upon principles of accountability and standards had largely failedstudents living in the most challenged contexts, Harris and Ranson con-cluded that if school improvement is to be effective for the most sociallydisadvantaged students, the approach with the most promise is “localizedand community-based action . . . [that is] accountable to the local needs ofthe community and the young who live there” (2005, p. 584). Chrispeels,Castillo, & Brown (2000) reached a similar conclusion in respect to theimportance of parent and community engagement to school improvement.While studying the effectiveness of school leadership teams, they foundthat the teams who were the most successful at bringing about meaning-ful improvement in student learning related well, not only within the team,but with the total school community including parents, students, and theschool district. Having made these observations, however, they noted thatthe relationships between school leadership teams, parents, the community,and the school district require further exploration before research findingsare employed to guide leadership efforts directed at improving teaching andstudent learning.

While there are many other factors that have been found to directlyor indirectly influence student learning, it is not our intent in this article tostudy an endless list of possibilities. Rather, our particular focus is to con-tribute to the evidence in respect to key sources of leadership and how theyrelate to one another and to selected school conditions to influence studentlearning. To that effect, the leadership framework that we have describedin our literature review above includes the following: (1) provincial, districtand school formal leaders, (2) the engagement of teachers as collaborativeleaders, (3) the extent to which teachers value professional development,(4) the extent to which parents and the community are engaged in their local


TABLE 1 Factor Descriptions.

Factors Description

Student Learning Focus The school goals are focused on student learning andteachers have a collective sense of responsibility forthose goals

Community Engagement This school works closely with parents, communityservice groups, businesses, professionals, etc. andvalue them as partners in the decision makingprocess

Parent Engagement Teachers have a productive working relationship withparents and include them in decision making

Teacher Collaboration There is ongoing collaboration among teachers aboutteaching and learning

Teachers Value ProfessionalDevelopment

Teachers believe that their professional developmenthas helped them become more effective in the useof data and in curriculum decision making

Collaborative Leadership School administrators are professional, collaborative,engaging, and innovative. They give the school asense of overall purpose and protect the school fromdistractions

District Leadership The district has found an appropriate balance betweencentralized decision making and local schoolautonomy and provides guidance and support toteachers and the school

Provincial Leadership Provincial policies and goals are clearly communicatedto the school district; however, schools havefreedom and flexibility to do their work

schools, and (5) teachers’ perception of the extent to which their school isfocused on student learning (see Table 1).

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The research described in this article represents data collected in phaseone of a mixed-methods, longitudinal study investigating the key sources ofleadership for public education and how they relate to one another and toselected school conditions to influence student learning. The research beganin the spring of 2008 and will be conducted over a four-year period. In thisfirst phase, all teachers in the largest school district in one Canadian provincewere asked to complete surveys to gather information about the design ofthe learning environments in which they work. There were 2884 teacherseligible for the survey and 1804 of them returned usable surveys for a returnrate of 63%. For this particular work, we employed path analysis, a subset ofstructural equation modeling (SEM), using Amos17.0.0 Software (Arbuckle,2008) and maximum likelihood estimation to develop a best-fitting model toexamine the relations among each of the leadership groups and conditions


Learning

Focused

Teacher

Collaboration

Teachers

Value PD

Collaborative

Leadership

Provincial

Leadership

District

Leadership

Parent

Engagement

Community

Engagement

0,

e2

0,

e6

0,

e4

0,

e3

0,

e5

0,

e7

0,

e1

1

1

1

1

1

1

1

FIGURE 1 Theoretical model.

that we have outlined in our leadership framework described above. Thisleadership framework is presented as our theoretical model in Figure 1.

Using maximum likelihood factor analysis, the Kaiser-Meyer-OlkinMeasure of Sampling Adequacy, the Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity, and throughthe use of the Eigen One Rule and the Scree plot, we identified thesurvey items that best fit each of the variables in our theoretical framework:three leadership variables (provincial leadership, district leadership, schoolleadership); one teacher-leadership variable (collaborative engagement);one parent variable (parent engagement); a community variable (commu-nity engagement), and one student variable (student-learning focused).The internal consistency reliability coefficients (Cronbach Alpha) for thesesubscales ranged from 0.76 to 0.92 (see Table 2).

Prior to conducting path analysis procedures, we verified that therewere no concerns with multicollinearity through the application of multipleregression analysis that allowed us to check the tolerance, variance inflationfactor (VIF), and the condition indices of each predictor of student focus.Tolerance levels were all found to be above 0.50, no VIF values were greaterthan 2, and no condition index was above 15. The AMOS Sample Momentsoutput for each model confirmed that all condition indices employed ineach model remained below 15 and the highest correlation among the fac-tors was 0.53, well within the 0.85 limit recommended by Brown (2006).As well, analysis of our data indicated that an assumption of multivariate


TABLE 2 Internal Consistency Reliability Coefficients of Factors.

Variable label Cronbach alpha

Provincial Leadership (PL) 0.83District Leadership (DL) 0.76School Administration Collaborative Leadership (CL) 0.92Teacher Collaboration (TC) 0.79Teachers Value Professional Learning (TVPD) 0.87Parent Engagement (PE) 0.79Community Engagement (CE) 0.80Student Learning Focus (SLF) 0.77

normality was reasonable. While the frequency distribution of the depen-dent variable, focus on student learning, was slightly negatively skewed; itfell within an acceptable range (skew within +2 and −2) to be considerednormally distributed (Garson, 2009), and no corrective transformations weredeemed to be necessary.

We tested our theoretical model through the application of the follow-ing model fit indices: chi square (χ 2), Standardized Root Mean SquaredResidual (SRMR), Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI), Root Mean Square Error ofApproximation (RMSEA), and Akaike Information Criterion (AIC) (Garson,2009; Hu & Bentler, 2000). Following recommendations put forth by Hu &Bentler (2000), we set the following cutoff values as evidence of a relativelygood fitting model: SRMR < 0.08, TLI >= 0.95, RMSEA <= 0.06, and chi-square statistic (p > 0.05).1 The final of our fit indices, the AIC measure,does not have a cutoff value as the other indices; rather it is used as acomparison to other alternative models with the lower value indicating thebest-fitting model. In this study, the AIC measure of our theoretical modelwas compared to the saturated and independence models included in theAMOS output.

RESULTS

After having identified the theoretical model as presented above in Figure 1,we tested it. A review of the selected fit statistics revealed that the theoreticalmodel was not a “good” fit. The chi-square value was statistically significant[χ 2 (8) = 297.92, p < 0.000], as was expected. As noted in the methodologysection above, given the large sample size, this was not deemed to be suf-ficient justification to reject the model. However, while the SRMR (0.0639)was at an acceptable level, all of the other fit indices were indicative ofa poor fitting model: TLI = 0.787, RMSEA = 0.142. Also, the AIC value(369.919) was larger than that of the saturated model (88.00). A review ofthe estimates of this model indicated that the critical ratio of each pathwas significant (p < 0.05), and therefore, none were removed. Followingthat, we reviewed the modification index output. This output recommended


TABLE 3 Modification Index Path Recommendations.

Recommended paths

F6TeacherCollaboration <— F14DistrictLeadershipF8ParentEngagement <— F10ProvincialLeadershipF8ParentEngagement <— F14DistrictLeadershipF7CommunityEngagement <— F12TeachersValuePDF12TeachersValuePD <— F10ProvincialLeadershipF12TeachersValuePD <— F8ParentEngagementF12TeachersValuePD <— F7CommunityEngagementF1LearningFocused <— F14DistrictLeadershipF1LearningFocused <— F8ParentEngagement

the addition of seven paths that we deemed to be theoretically appropri-ate (see Table 3). Having made these additions, we retested the nestedmodel. Results revealed that the critical ratio of the path from collaborativeleadership to parent engagement was non-significant. We removed the non-significant path from the nested model and retested it. The chi-square valuewas not statistically significant [χ 2 (1) = 0.258, p < 0.612] and the otherfit measures were well within the range set for this study: SRMR = 0.0018,TLI = 1.004, RMSEA < 0.001, and the AIC value (86.258) was lower thanthat of the saturated model (88.00). We accepted this model as the best fitto the data (see Figure 2).

.55

Learning

Focused

.22

Teacher

Collaboration

.30

Teachers

Value PD

.25

Collaborative

Leadership

Provincial

Leadership

.28

District

Leadership

.10

Parent

Engagement

.40

Community

Engagement

e2

e6

e4

e3

e5

e7

e1

.53.07

.21

.12.16

.46

.14

.10

.05

.06

.15

.10

.14

.20

.11

.06

.30

.25

.30

.08

.14

.07

.24

.16

.08

.40

.14

FIGURE 2 Nested model.


This best-fitting nested model explains 55% of the variance of theextent to which teachers perceived their school to be focused on studentlearning. We employed the standardized parameter estimates to assess thestrength of the effects of each variable on another using the following guide-lines: < 0.10, a small effect; > 0.30, a medium effect; and > 0.50, a largeeffect (Kline, 2005). As can be seen in the model (Figure 2), provincialleadership has a large direct effect (0.53) on district leadership, as wellas a measurable, albeit small, direct effect upon all other model variables:collaborative leadership (0.07), teacher collaboration (0.16), parent engage-ment (0.06), community engagement (0.11), the extent to which teachersvalue professional learning (0.19), and the extent to which teachers viewtheir school to be focused on student learning (0.12). At the next level,school-district leadership has a large direct effect (0.46) upon the extent towhich school administrators (principals and vice-principals) are perceivedto be collaborative leaders which, in turn, has a direct medium effect uponteacher professional collaboration (0.30) and community engagement (0.30),and a somewhat larger effect upon the schools’ focus on student learn-ing (0.40). The direct effect of teacher collaboration on both parent andcommunity engagement (0.20 and 0.14 respectively) is within the smallrange. Similarly, there is a small direct effect of parent engagement uponcommunity engagement (0.24).

In respect to the standardized total effects (direct and indirect effects)of each variable in the model (Table 4) on a school’s focus on student learn-ing, the engagement of school administrators as collaborative leaders has thelargest effect (0.51), followed by provincial leadership (0.43), district lead-ership (0.39), teacher collaboration (0.25), community engagement (0.11),parent engagement (0.10), and finally, the extent to which teachers valueprofessional learning (0.05). This review of the total effect that individualfactors have on a school’s focus on student learning is clearly consistentwith a growing evidence base that attempting to improve student learningthrough accountability mandates focused on only one or two sources of

TABLE 4 Standardized Total Effects.

PL∗ DL SCL TC PE CE TVPD

DL 0.526 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000SCL 0.313 0.459 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000TC 0.324 0.274 0.295 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.000PE 0.199 0.194 0.060 0.203 0.000 0.000 0.000CE 0.367 0.361 0.353 0.185 0.243 0.000 0.000PVPD 0.436 0.261 0.126 0.147 0.175 0.079 0.000SLF 0.427 0.390 0.512 0.248 0.101 0.106 0.053

∗See Table 1 for the complete variable labels.


leadership is likely to lead to disappointment (Levin, 2006; Lupton, 2005;Harris & Ranson, 2005; Reynolds, Harris, Clarke, Harris, & James, 2006).

DISCUSSION OF RESULTS

While the above findings that are confirming of previous work are interest-ing and informing, a more important aspect of this work is that it bringssome clarity to the nature of the complex adaptive learning system as ituntangles at least a portion of the multiple dynamic interrelated leader-ship subsystems that interact to influence student learning. For instance,the model reveals that provincial leadership has a large direct effect (0.53)on district leadership, but only a small effect upon all other model variables.Recognizing that the only large direct effect of provincial leadership is uponschool-district leadership may be somewhat instructive to those who haveeither eliminated school districts or are contemplating it (Sheppard et al.,2009). This finding is particularly striking when one compares the directeffects of provincial leadership (0.07) with that of school-district leadership(0.46) upon the extent to which school administrators are perceived to becollaborative leaders, which in turn has a direct medium effect upon teacherprofessional collaboration (0.30) and community engagement (0.30), andeven a somewhat larger effect upon the schools’ focus on student learn-ing (0.40). Clearly, this suggests that school districts are more likely thangovernment policymakers to be successful in their efforts to directly impactschool administrators and local school effectiveness. This finding related tothe importance of school districts as an important systems link between gov-ernment and schools is consistent with a growing evidence base that schooldistricts are essential to systemwide learning (Clem & Battino, 2006; Datnow,2005; Elmore, 2002; Fullan, 2005; Hightower, Knapp, Marsh, & McLaughlin,2002; Honig, 2003; Leithwood, Leonard, & Sharratt, 2000; McLaughlin &Talbert, 2003; Peterson & Cosner, 2005; Phelps & Addonizio, 2006; Sheppardet al., 2009). For instance, McLaughlin and Talbert have concluded thatsupportive school boards . . . are essential to system-wide learning as they“promote and invest in learning through the system—in the central office, inschools, in cross school teacher networks, [and] in units such as the businessoffice that typically are excluded from professional development focused oninstruction” (2003, p. 25). Similarly, Fullan contends that “if you have yoursystems hat on, you know right away that [it] is a mistake” (2005, p. 65) tobypass or downplay the role of school districts in attempting to bring aboutmeaningful reform.

In light of the above-noted evidence related to the importance ofsystems leadership and the role of school districts in facilitating it, it isinteresting that Hopkins applauds what he refers to as “the emergence ofa systems leadership movement” (2010, p. 223) in England where the school


system is “relatively decentralized with many leadership and managementdecisions taken at the school level” (Day et al., 2008, p. 7). Hopkins (2010)observes that within the emerging systems leadership movement schoolhead teachers (principals) assume roles as system leaders by

developing and leading a successful educational improvement part-nership between several schools . . .; partnering another school facingdifficulties and improv[ing] it . . .; acting as a community leader to bro-ker and shape partnership and/or networks of wider relationships acrosslocal communities to support children’s welfare and potential . . ., [and]working as a change agent or expert leader within the system, identify-ing best classroom practice and transferring it to support improvementin other schools. (pp. 213–214)

In his view, the potential of this movement is that it could become the “keydriver in ensuring that every student reaches their potential and that everyschool becomes great” (p. 223):

If our goal is “every school a great school” then policy and practice hasto focus on system improvement. This means that a school head has tobe almost as concerned about the success of other schools as he or sheis about his or her own school. Sustained improvement of schools is notpossible unless the whole system is moving forward. (p. 212)

While we share Hopkins’ enthusiasm regarding the potential of systems lead-ership, we contend that it is unlikely to become a common phenomenonwithout the leadership of an agency such as a school district. If the growthof systems leadership is to be left to blossom on its own through an evo-lutionary process, it should not be expected to occur in the near future.Moreover, findings in this current study suggest that if it is to be pro-moted through government policymakers, the engagement of a mediatingagency such as a school district may be a preferred path. As a matterof fact, in a recent work (Sheppard et al., 2009), we have documentedthe efficacy of a school district to facilitate the emergence of school prin-cipals as systems leaders. Therein, we reported that as a consequenceof structural changes and direct leadership interventions, one school dis-trict was able to facilitate, within a four-year period, considerable systemsleadership across its schools (Sheppard et al., 2009). It is our view, there-fore, at least in contexts where school districts continue to exist, pervasivesystems-level leadership by school principals is more likely to be real-ized through the engagement of all three leadership sources: government,school district, and school principals. As we have noted elsewhere, waitingfor system leadership to develop one school at a time might be analo-gous “to throwing pebbles in the North Atlantic Ocean with the hope of


building a causeway to connect . . . Canada to the UK” (Sheppard et al.,2009, p. 34).

A second finding of note in this study is that parent and communityengagement has only a small positive effect (0.07 and 0.10 respectively)upon the extent to which a school is focused on student learning. Whilethis is somewhat consistent with other findings (e.g. Chrispeels et al., 2000;Leithwood, Jantzi, & McElheron-Hopkins, 2006), it further contributes to theunderstanding of this complex issue.

Leithwood et al. found that “parent participation had the second weak-est [of all variables under investigation], but still significant relationship (0.20)on perceived student outcomes” (2006, p. 459). They concluded that whilethere appeared to be little empirical support for parent leadership in theschool improvement, it was a complex matter and that “it is hard to denythat parents ought to have a say in how their children’s schools are run”(p. 461). While it is not apparent that Chrispeels et al. attempted to finddirect effects of parents and community on the schools’ focus on studentlearning, they found indirect positive effects. School leadership teams thatworked well with community and parents were more likely to work bet-ter as a team, to have better relationships with the school principal andother school staff, and to report greater use of data, all of which they foundto have significant direct positive effects on the schools’ focus on studentlearning. Beyond the positive effects of parent and community membersthat are consistent with our findings, they found negative effects upon pro-fessional relations and the team’s use of data to inform their decision makingwhen parents and community were directly engaged as members of schoolleadership teams.

Given the evidence of the effects of home and community backgroundupon student learning and children’s career aspirations (Atlantic Evaluationand Research Consultants, 2008; Levin, 2006; Lupton, 2005; Reynolds et al.,2006; Teddlie & Reynolds, 2001), our study findings and those of othersthat report small effects of parent and community upon a school’s focus onstudent learning suggest that parents and other community members maynot be engaged in their children’s schooling to the extent, or in the man-ner, desired. Given the accepted norms that have isolated schools from thecommunity and parents, our findings suggest that school insiders (teach-ers, school administrators, school districts, and governments) may have aleadership role to play in encouraging more meaningful parent and com-munity engagement in public schooling. Our model reveals that each ofthose insider leadership groups has significant direct effects on one of thetwo, parent or community engagement, and total effects upon both (seeTable 4). Of particular note is that the two school-level leadership fac-tors have the highest direct effect upon one or the other of parent andcommunity engagement: school administrators as a collaborative leader on


community engagement (0.30) and teacher collaboration on parent engage-ment (0.20). The magnitude of these effects suggests a point of leverageto improve the extent of meaningful parent and community engagementin school leadership focused on student learning. Given the existing gapbetween the increasing support for parent and community involvementin public schooling by policymakers and the empirical evidence of itsminimal effect on student outcomes, this potential leadership leverage formore meaningful engagement of parents and community requires furtherinvestigation.

Another finding of particular interest relating to parent and communityengagement is their association with the extent to which teachers placevalue on professional development. The association between these fac-tors (the value teachers place on their professional development and bothparents and community engagement) was not among the paths that wehypothesized in the original theoretical model, but one that was included inthe Modification Index recommendations during our analysis of that model.Our first reaction to this recommendation was to reject it, since it appearedto lack theoretical merit. However, the findings of Chrispeels et al. (2000)provided a somewhat compelling explanation of why we should explorethese links further. First, they found that teachers were more likely to bemore meaningfully engaged in using data and research to improve studentperformance in schools where there existed effective professional relationsthroughout the community. Given that in our study the factor, teachers valueprofessional learning, was defined as “teachers believe that their profes-sional development has helped them become more effective in the useof data” to support student learning, the merit of investigating the rela-tionship between community engagement and teachers value professionaldevelopment was clear. Their second finding that the presence of parentsand community members on school leadership teams negatively impactedprofessional relations in both elementary and secondary schools was instruc-tive, as well. In their discussion of this issue, they drew upon a previousstudy conducted by Jenni (as cited in Chrispeels et al.) who observedthat teachers avoided expressing their views in meetings unless they werespecifically challenged. This latter finding, we speculated, might suggestthat teachers lacked confidence in their level of professional expertise insuch circumstances. If this were so, then increased parental engagementin a school might lead teachers to seek meaningful professional develop-ment as a means of maintaining their image or boosting their confidenceas professionals who have specialized expertise. Having added those paths,and having found that both paths from parent and community engagementto teachers valuing professional development are significant (0.18 and 0.08respectively), we join with Chrispeels et al. in calling for further investigationof these relationships.


SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

Results of this study support the importance of the leadership role of gov-ernment policymakers and school boards. We draw this conclusion on thebasis of our finding that they have a significant effect on all other leadershipsources that impact the focus of schools upon student learning. As well,it reconfirms the prominent role of formal school leaders (head teacher orprincipals) while revealing that those formal leaders who are deemed to beprofessional, collaborative, engaging, innovative, and focused on an overallpurpose have the largest effect upon the schools’ focus on student learning.

Our findings, consistent with many others, raise questions related to theenthusiasm of policymakers for mandated school councils (e.g. Leithwoodet al., 2006), the elimination of school boards (e.g. Fullan, 2005), and theiroverdependence upon school principals who are expected to singlehand-edly transform low-performing schools into schools that are high-performing(e.g. Hallinger and Heck, 2009). In respect to school councils, for instance,the Canadian province where we conducted this study has mandated thatschool councils composed of parents and community members must beestablished in each school for the purposes of developing, encouraging,and promoting policies and practices to improve student achievement. Ourresults that reveal only a small effect of both community and parents uponthe schools’ focus on student learning suggest that the purposes articulatedin government policies may not be fully realized. A legitimate question mightbe whether the time required of school principals and teachers in workingwith school councils could be better spent on factors that have been foundto have a direct influence upon student learning, such as the use of studentdata to inform decisions about how to meet the needs of individual studentsand lesson planning.

We conclude with two observations related to the research such as thatreported in this article and its implications for practice. First, while this workwas not directed at the study of professional learning communities, giventhe study’s focus on the engagement of multiple constituents as leaders andlearners in the collaborative pursuit of improved student learning, it is relevantfor those who work and study in this field. We agree with Rose, who notes that“good ideas can become one-dimensionalized as they move from conceptionthrough policy formation to implementation” (2010, p. 6). To that effect, theauthors raise a caution in respect to the overexuberant acceptance of eitherdistributed leadership or professional learning communities as a potentialquick fix for the realization of school goals. In recent years, we have witnessedthe cooptation of these terms by many schools, school districts, governments,and consulting firms as the current labels of choice without any considerationof their theoretical underpinnings or the growing evidence base. Such a trendis cause for concern, as we have observed that it is typical for conceptsand emerging theories that are cooped in this manner to be understudied,


superficially understood, poorly implemented, and ultimately dismissed infavor of the newest fad. As such, the theory never reaches maturity and thefull potential is never fully appreciated. At a time when we’re focusing somuch attention on school improvement and effectiveness, it is appropriateto step back and remind ourselves what we’re ultimately trying to achieve—productive learning environments for all students.

Second, while findings of the specific study reported herein point to theimportance of the engagement of multiple sources of leadership in the facil-itation of a school’s focus on teaching and learning, we caution that thesefindings are based upon perspectives expressed by teachers through thecompletion of a survey in one school district only. Within that context, thiswork contributes only another small piece of understanding to the complexissue of educational learning and improved student learning. It is unlikelythat schools will become professional learning communities by mandate orthrough the application of a recipe, or that any single approach will becomethe “silver bullet” that will ensure learning success for all. The confluenceof current evidence suggests that meaningful improvements in success ratesrelated to student learning will more likely occur over time, in an envi-ronment that is focused on shifting toward a more collaborative leadershipapproach that inherently “involves considerable risk and is dependent uponthe existence of mutual respect and trust between constituents and formalleaders” (Sheppard et al., 2009, p. 123).

NOTE

1. Even though a non-significant chi-square statistic (p > 0.05) would be a good indicator of modelfit, we did not set a non-significant chi-square statistic as an essential element for our determination of agood fitting model because a large sample size such as in this study (N = 1804) almost always results ina statistically significant chi-square statistic.

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Improving the Capacity of School System Leaders and Teachers to Design Productive Learning Environments