Educational administration and social justice

After observing that texts in educational administration have largely failed to address the problem of the justice and fairness of social and educational arrangements, this article goes on to examine the necessary relationships between ethical leadership, community and the notion of social justice. Such relationships are argued to be necessarily political, although the field of leadership has historically seen administration as a substitute for politics. The relationship between social justice and disadvantage is examined, as are current approaches to community, choice and diversity. The importance of both redistributive and recognitional approaches to social justice is emphasized as a basis for a model of educational administration centred on the problem of the justice and fairness of social and educational arrangements.

Aesthetic dimensions of educational administration and leadership

The Aesthetic Dimensions of Educational Administration and Leadership provides an aesthetic critique of educational administration and leadership. It demonstrates the importance of aesthetics on all aspects of the administrative and leadership world: the ways ideas and ideals are created, how their expression is conveyed, the impact they have on interpersonal relationships and the organizational environment that carries and reinforces them, and the moral boundaries or limits that can be established or exceeded.

The book is divided into three sections.
Section I examines various philosophical traditions in aesthetics as they inform administrative life, focussing on major modern traditions arising from Kant, romanticism and Nietzsche, Collingwood, the pragmatic school, and critical theory.
Section II explores four aesthetic sources for administrative critique - architecture, literature, film, and movement - as they serve both to understand the social construction of administration and leadership and provide a critique of values, roles, power and authority.
Section III examines more topical and applied problems of charisma, heroism, and authority in practice, concluding with a discussion of the aesthetic analysis of politics and power within the context of contemporary educational administration and leadership theory.

While presenting a significant departure from conventional studies in the field, the international contributors reflect a continuity of thought on the creation, use and abuse of administrative and leadership authority from the writings of Plato through to contemporary theory. This book should appeal to school administrators and leaders and those aspiring to these roles.

Educational administration and social justice

This paper argues that social justice is central to the pursuit of education and therefore should also be central to the practice of educational administration. Social justice in education, as elsewhere, demands both distributive justice (which remedies undeserved inequalities) and recognitional justice (which treats cultural differences with understanding and respect). But, given that cultures are always in the process of change, education is a key agency for negotiating cultural change through the exploration and negotiation of difference. Educational administration as a field can no longer escape the consideration of such issues as they are brought to the fore by the recognition of the failure of schools and school systems to ameliorate injustice in the distribution of resources and to recognise and celebrate difference as a means to social and cultural progress. We still need a model of educational administration centered around the problem of the justice and fairness of social and educational arrangements. Given the renewed interest in such issues, perhaps what was impossible twenty five years ago might now be achieved.

Educational administration and the management of knowledge: 1980 revisited

This paper revisits the thesis of a 1980 paper that suggested a new approach to educational administration based upon the New Sociology of Education. In particular it updates answers to the six key questions asked by that paper: what counts as knowledge; how is what counts as knowledge organised; how is what counts as knowledge transmitted; how is access to what counts as knowledge determined; what are the processes of control; what ideological appeals justify the system. These questions were foundational in the development of a socially critical perspective and a cultural approach to educational leadership and administration.

Teaching educational leadership and administration in Australia

Despite the ubiquity of programmes in educational administration and leadership little is known about the resources used to teach them. This article reviews the sources currently employed in such programmes in Australia by examining the textbooks, book chapters and journal articles specified for 53 separate units (papers) offered at 15 of the key institutions that responded to requests for copies of their reading lists. Surprisingly, few of the units prescribed textbooks (35), relying instead on book chapters (243) and journal articles (362). While there was a very eclectic spread of sources across institutions, 10 major themes emerged. However, there appeared to be little emphasis on Australian research on educational leadership and little reference to major Australian authors of the previous decades. This may be because the field has become global. The second part of the article therefore examines an audit of the contributions made by Australian authors to the global literature represented by leading journals in the field. The audit shows that during the period 1977-2007 an average of 12-13% of papers in key journals were contributed by Australian authors, perhaps more than might be expected given the comparative size of the Australian community.

Educational leadership and Nancy Fraser

Drawing on the work of Nancy Fraser, this book offers a critical view of contemporary educational leadership and reform discourses, exploring how her key concepts of redistribution, recognition and representation may apply to social and therefore educational justice.Fraser offers a political and pragmatic reconciliation between feminist, neo-Marxist, critical and post-structuralist theories. This book outlines how Fraser has worked on and worked over theories of social justice and how this can inform how we can understand educational theory, policy and practice generally. In particular, the book focuses on the field of educational administration and leadership (ELMA) as it relates to equity issues such as school choice and inequality, gender and inclusive leadership, and alternative schooling. Fraser’s argument about ‘scaling up’ social justice theory is shown to be highly salient given the emergence of the field of transnational education policy and its role in the context of intensified nation-state and edu-business competition.Overall, through the lens of Nancy Fraser’s unitary framework, this book considers epistemological questions about the nature of knowledge, examines the relationship between the state, the individual, education and social movements, addresses the difficulties and dilemmas which arise due to the intersections of gender, class, race, sexuality and culture in a globalized context, and illustrates how the principles of social justice can be mobilized by leaders in everyday practice.

Culture and leadership in educational administration: a historical study of what was and what might have been

This paper examines the consequences for school leadership of the abandonment of Waller's insights into the school as a social organism and the embracing of the cult of efficiency as the foundation for the analysis of school culture. Tracing the separation of conception from execution, leadership from teaching, administration from education through the cult of professionalism and functionalist sociology, the paper argues that a more appropriate basis for understanding both leadership and the culture of the school can be derived from ethnographies of schooling which show the complex interactions of internal and external cultures in the construction of leadership and the culture of the school.

Towards a critical practice of educational administration [Turkish]

Beginning with a brief critique of the behavioral science approach to educational administration, this paper traces the roots of an alternative perspective through examination of the new sociology of education and critical social theory. Arguing then for the location of a critical practice of educational administration in a cultural analysis of the habitus of education, the author discusses the metaphorical, ritualistic, and linguistic features of that habitus with reference to empirical studies. Fianlly, it is argued that the practice of a critical and reflexive educational administration is necessarily located within a critique of domination and a commitment to struggle in the interest of a better world.

Serving community : prosocial engagement in educational administration

The rise of managerialism in the 1990s entrenched bureaucratic practices as core education and training for educational administrators. As the educational divide between those who achieve and those who fall short continues to problematize the success of educational reforms, the work of administrators becomes critical to review. The current challenge for educational administration is to provide an environment that genuinely serves the interests of complex diversity and social justice in education systems by building the frameworks that respects differences, protects the weak, and regulates the strong. By taking a more prosocial stance with issues relating to cultural diversity, equity, and democracy, educational administration can transform society, the school, and the classroom, through humanistic and interpretive management practices, and influencing pedagogy, curriculum, educator training, and the socio-political system.

Teaching educational administration in Thailand : a participatory approach

A participatory approach was used to teach educational administration topics relevant to the Thai reform agenda. Students were also required to carry out a workplace project based on their studies. Data indicated that the content and pedagogy of the university course were an effective form of professional development for school administrators.

Interactive television in schools : an Australian study of the tensions of educational technology and change

This paper outlines some key issues that arose from several projects that investigated the use of interactive television in schooling. In this paper we draw on these projects, to illustrate and discuss how a (then) new form of distance education -- satellite-based, narrowcast ITV -- was designated for use in primary (elementary) and secondary (high school) classroom settings, how it was implemented, and how it collapsed as an endeavour. Issues raised by students, teachers and administrators are related to each to illustrate how ITV slowly declined over several years, despite its usefulness for some and strong support from those involved.

Is it only 'what works' that 'counts' in new knowledge economies? Evidence-based practice, educational research and teacher education in Australia

Recent texts on globalisation and education policy refer to the rapid flow of education policy texts producing or responding to common trends across nation states with the emergence of new knowledge economies. These educational policies are shaping what counts as research and the dynamics between research, policy, and practice in schools, creating new types of relationships between universities, the public, the professions, government, and industry. The trend to evidence-based policy and practice in Australian schools is used to identify key issues within wider debates about the ‘usefulness’ of educational research and the role of universities and university-based research in education in new knowledge economies.