Final Paper
EDUC 403
12/9/13
Walking In My Shoes
“In thinking of
America, I sometimes find myself admiring her bright blue sky—her grand old
woods—her fertile fields—her beautiful rivers— her mighty lakes, and
star-crowned mountains. But my rapture is soon checked, my joy is soon turned
to mourning. When I remember that all is cursed with the infernal spirit of
slaveholding, robbery and wrong,— when I remember that with the waters of her
noblest rivers, the tears of my brethren are borne to the ocean, disregarded
and forgotten, and that her most fertile fields drink daily of the warm blood
of my outraged sisters, I am filled with unutterable loathing, and led to
reproach myself that any thing could fall from my lips in praise of such a land.
America will not allow her children to love her. She seems bent on compelling
those who would be her warmest friends, to be her worst enemies. May God give
her repentance before it is too late, is the ardent prayer of my heart. I will
continue to pray, labor and wait, believing that she cannot always be
insensible to the dictates of justice, or deaf to the voice of humanity.” –
Frederick Douglas
I
start this paper with this quote knowing that I am part of the healing process
this country needs to go through and that I relate deeply to Frederick Douglas’
love and loathing of this country. Like
him I find myself called to leadership to “labor and wait” for justice and humanity
in education. It is my stance that a
spiritual renewal around leadership is needed and therefore I am using
spiritual terms of growth (borrowed from my church, East Bay Church of
Religious Science) This paper will use four stages of “spiritual growth” and
how I have been contemplating their roles in my leadership growth.
To
Me
By Me
As
Me
Thru
Me
“These are the four stages of our God in this life,”
Reverand Eloise stated as I sat and listened with my congregation last month,
on a Sunday early morning service. This
paper will reflect my understanding of my current educational leadership
journey and how it has cycled in and out of leadership roles sometimes public
and formal and some in the private shadows.
In this journey my relationship to “God” or “Higher Spirit” has always
been my guide. When thinking about
leadership and education I felt I could only express it using these four stages
to define my philosophy and beliefs about leadership. Through these stages I
always found myself refocusing on the
context of the mission and purpose of schools and education. Finally I hope to show in my concrete
examples a working application of my understanding around human learning and
the role of teaching in advancing that learning and how it is not only my
current career and parental choice but one that is a spiritual choice as well.
“To me”
phase
At one point I felt the educational system was
happening to me, I had a victimized point of view. Similar to the introductory quote from
Fredrick Douglas, I felt for many years this country had wronged my people
(Mexican, Native American and Irish) in a wide variety of ways. For example, as a female student of color who
came from a low income family, most of the time public schools and “the academy”
was a struggle; socially, financially, culturally, and spiritually. However to
me it was just a struggle to push under the rug. I now see how wrong I was in trying to push
my past behind me and to think I don’t bring that past to my current leadership
especially to my educational leadership.
As a public educator I became very frustrated when I
felt that the system was starting to “happen to me” as a teacher and in an
urban public school as well as to my daughter involved in that system. As Sinclair and Wilson state in New
faces of leadership, “Outsiders” or Biculutralism in adaptive leadership bring
those viewpoints and values to leadership practice; “identities which do not
rest on membership of a single social group or tribe but are able to inhabit
multiple groups and cultures without feeling threatened or paralyzed,” have a
different lens of leadership. In this moment of not wanting to be a victim or
have my daughter “suffer” a type of situation I went through I decided to take on every type of leadership
role SFUSD offered in my school site as well as outside.
“By Me”
phase
In this phase where I decided to take on the system I
never felt such frustration at times as well as supreme success. I now realize after really looking at the
various organizational frames I was trying to balance and juggle many roles. Not only did I have an intention to keep
people at the center of my choices specifically students and teachers, or
teaching and learning, but I realize I was also trying to change structures and
political frames. The multiple cultures
became a huge struggle for me to balance.
Not only was I holding multiple roles as a teacher leader on site but I
became heavily involved in teacher leadership in the political frame or with
various Teacher Unions. I wanted to
tackle bureaucracy nationally and state wide and became a part of AFT and CTA
in a variety of capacities; CFT Common Core Teacher Leader, CTA Proposition 30
Release Time Member, CFT Teacher Leader for Policy Change in San
Francisco. During this time however I
was also doing teacher leadership by becoming Nationally Board Certified. However
as Wilson states in his text, “Bureaucracies in which 2 or more cultures
struggle for supremacy will experience serious conflicts as defenders of one
seek to dominate representatives of the others.”(p.101)
This conflict that was so made so
clear to me as Union Representative and then National AFT leader as well as CTA
leader was made controversial when I was not only trying to defend teachers but
sticking up for my students as an advocate.
I knew that the various cultures I was surfing in and out of as well my
past points of view were all valid voices.
Yet being pulled in many
directions I felt I needed more concrete understanding of what all these leadership
conflict/choices I had taken on meant. I
felt a leadership disequilibrium and “The Call” I had needed clarification if I
was going, “To be the change I wanted to see (Gandhi).
The various ‘cultures’ surrounding leadership and
education became a whole different culture in and of itself and I felt I needed
a clearer “mind map”. This is what has led me to research Educational
Leadership especially here at Mills which has a social justice, feminist lens. Being aware of “the system” and that I was
now a part of that system (that I at times felt victimized from) I felt needed
to be able to make educated choices. Until now I refer to these leadership
dilemas as “culture” however can relate to Bolman and Deal when analyzing how
the conflict of structures and human resources as different frames and lens of
how organizations function.
“The assumptions of
the structural frame reflect a belief in rationality and a faith that the right
formal arrangements minimize problems and increase quality and
performance. Where the human resources
perspective emphasizes the importance of changing people (through training,
rotation, promotion, or dismissal), the structural perspective focuses on
designing a pattern of roles and relationship that will accomplish collective
goals as well as accommodate individual differences.” (p.101) Now after a year and half of my Masters program
at Mills I feel like I am once again transitioning as well as see a different
side of my leadership in education manifested.
“As Me”
phase
Now that I am truly understanding
the roles in educational leadership and how it has affected my choices as a
leader, parent and teacher I find myself in a metacognition about
education. I used to dread conversations
around problems of learning and now through the help of various Professional
Learning Communities including my Union leadership I find myself actively
engaged and not emotionally overwhelmed.
For example, when brainstorming with teacher leaders from SFUSD (chosen
by AFT for a year long team approach to educational policy) some of my main
concerns when deciding how I wanted to engage in public policy in education. I
brainstormed this picture.
In this AFT “think tank” of teacher leaders
we were asked to think of an “ideal” world in the land of educational
decisions. I felt and do feel that
multiple stakeholders need to find ways to communicate and listen to one
another in order to make decisions that are taking all points of view into
consideration. This perspective was definitely influenced by the idea that I am
modeling the type of leadership I want to see.
Through participation in Mills Ed. Program, my teacher leadership as
well moving to a new district this year I am finding myself ready for the next
phase of my leadership as well as my understanding of decision making.
As I am moving forward through the stages of my
leadership I find that I am no longer victimized but educated in and by my
experience. I no longer attract
conversations that feel isolating in intention or demoralizing in its
victimized viewpoint of bureaucratic
systems. There are many leaders out there doing the work and modeling that
commitment in bureaucracies as well as in their day to day decisions. I too am
that walking and breathing entity in which teaching and learning is more
than a task or goal, but is a way to empower humanity especially this country
that my more than half of my ancestors have been a part of for thousands of years.
“Thru Me”
phase
A reflection question was once posed to us in our
class, how and why should a leader nurture relationships in an organization? I
emphasize this question in this part of my paper because I believe that a phase
I am approaching will require me to not only recall this question but many I
have had here at Mills with automaticity or leadership messages working “thru
me”.
I remember what my classmates had to say about
it that day…..
My
classmates key words:
·
Healthy
communication
·
Nurturing
strengths
·
Being aware of
your weaknesses
·
Reflection in
Action
This question for me was obvious –
organizations are made of people. According to Bolman and Deal, one of the
frames of looking at organizations through human relationships has the metaphorical
symbol of “Family”. Boleman and Deal
make that point that central to a good organization noting that when positive
human resources needs are met, skills and relationships are valued
organizations thrive. I agree with this
image of leadership as EMPOWERMENT. I
would like to take it one step further and say that thru my understanding of
education and community we can’t help but know that we are a “family” working
together to make our society better. That education doesn’t happen to us, by
us, or as us, but thru us. And as I
manifest that leadership truth as a career choice in education, a parenting
choice, and spiritual choice
I
echo the words of many of my spiritual partners and guides when I say….
I
let it go
I
let it be and
So
it is.
