Lateral Capacity Building

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Principal Learning Teams
"How collaborative conversations create smart
organisations" Perkins
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Sustaining Reform

• Sustainability
• (Fullan Definition)
• Sustainability is the capacity of the system to
  engage in the complexities of continuous
  improvement with values of deep human purpose.
• 
  
  Fullan, 2005
• Sustainability
• (Hargreaves
• Definition)
• Sustainability does not simply mean whether
  something will last. It addresses how particular
  initiatives can be developed without compromising
  the development of others in the environment now
  and in the future.
• 
  
  Hargreaves Fink, in press
• 8 Elements of
• Sustainability
• 1. Public service with moral purpose
• 2. Commitment to changing context at all levels
• 3. Lateral capacity building through networks
• 4. Vertical and co-development relationships
• 5. Deep learning
• 6. Dual commitment to short-term and long-term
  results
• 7. Cyclical energizing
• 8. The long lever of leadership

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Definitions

• Collegiate Groups informal or needs based,
  self-initiated groups. Often formed initially for
  personal professional relationship support or for
  technical support. Can also be used as a term to
  describe a preferred option within the Principal
  Performance and Development Cycle.
• Lateral capacity building term developed by
  Michael Fullan to explore benefits of peers
  working together to support improvement
• Systems Thinking a term developed by Peter
  Senge as the fifth discipline, where leaders need
  to view their role in a larger, changing
  environment
• Principal Learning Teams - terminology first
  heard at OSE Leadership meeting in 2005.
  Describes best our work and intent. Provides us
  with a clear new way of assisting our work.

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The jigsaw of professional readings

• Elmore (2004) The Hollow Core of Leadership
  practice in education
• Perkins(2003) King Arthurs Round table
• Heifetz and Linsky (2002) Leadership on the
  Line
• Fullan(2005) Leadership and Sustainability
• Senge(2000) Schools that Learn
• Sergiovanni(1984) Leadership and Excellence in
  Schooling (Model of Transformational Leadership)

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(No Transcript)
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Principal Learning Teams
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Elmore
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Sergiovanni
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Model of Transformational Leadership

• Technical
• Human
• Educational
• Symbolic
• Cultural

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Perkins
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Action poetry

• Requires agents of transformation who are ready
  and willing to act in progressive ways

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Senge
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Five key disciplines of organisational learning

• Personal Mastery
• Shared Vision
• Mental Models
• Team Learning
• Systems Thinking

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Heifetz Linsky
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Fullan
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8 elements of sustainability

• Public Service with a moral purpose
• Commitment to Changing Context at all Levels
• Lateral Capacity building through Networks
• Intelligent Accountability and Vertical
  relationships
• Deep Learning
• Dual commitment to Short-term and Long-term
  results
• Cyclical Energising
• The long lever of leadership

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(No Transcript)
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Lateral Capacity Building

• Building lateral capacity means connecting
  schools within a district and even more broadly
  to develop new ideas, skills, and practices that
  increase the ability of individuals and
  organizations to bring about improvements. In
  England, for example, the Bristol Local Education
  Authority's 19 secondary schools include 10 that
  are above and 9 that are below the national norm
  on various measures of performance. During the
  past year, the district leadership and the 19
  principals have paired schools and departments to
  raise the bar and close the achievement gap. This
  new way of learning is a feature of the
  district's evolving culture.
• When done well, these efforts have considerable
  benefits. Individual school principals become
  almost as concerned about the success of other
  schools in the district as they are about their
  own. Teams working together develop clear,
  operational understandings of their goals and
  strategies, fostering new ideas, skills, and a
  shared commitment to districtwide development.

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The way forward for us

• Utilise Innovations and Excellence Clusters as
  Principal Learning Teams (PLTs) for the trial
  period from term 2 2006 till term2 2007. (As
  stated in RO Memo 3/2/06).
• Where necessary, Principals may request a change
  from this grouping, by submitting the feedback
  sheet, included as App.3 in the Resource Folder
  Papers.

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Why I E Clusters?

• Can be utilized to value-add by incorporating
  IE Cluster Educator and Regional AGQTP
  Coordinator
• Are readily identifiable and geographically
  present less travel time. Further potential time
  savings may occur by coinciding PLT meetings with
  IE Cluster management meetings
• See 2006 as the Pilot year 2007 and beyond will
  see a clearer picture of what works best and what
  different groupings may enhance learnings
• Focus on developing a learning climate and
  sharing learnings to inform structure.
• Focus Group to assist evaluation.

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Resource Materials

• People find meaning by connecting to others and
  they find wellbeing by making progress on
  problems important to their peers and of benefit
  beyond themselves
• Fullan
• It is a shared responsibility to add to the
  evolving resource list

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Resource Folder

• The enhanced role of the SEO in supporting school
  improvement through PLTs 2006 paper
• Meeting sheets and suggested organisational
  arrangements
• National Protocols
• Active Listening
• Effective Schools Model including AIP links
• Fullan article

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Professional Conversations 2006

• Supplement /support learnings
• 3 readings per session,one event per term, at
  Geelong and Warrnambool (and elsewhere if
  sufficient interest).

Focus Group

• Expression of Interest (as invited in RO Memo
  3/2/06)

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Capacity Building

• Capacity building is defined as actions that
  lead to an increase in the collective power of a
  group to improve student achievement, especially
  by raising the bar and closing the gap for all
  students. Capacity building synergizes three
  things new skills and dispositions enhanced and
  focused resources new and focused motivation or
  commitment.
• Fullan

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Core Principles School Improvement

• 1. Focus systematically on the priority for
  improvement that is likely to have the greatest
  impact on teaching and learning.
• 2. Base all improvement activity on evidence
  particularly data about relative performance
  against benchmarks.
• 3. Build collective ownership through leadership
  development.
• 4. Create time for staff to learn together, to
  make performance more consistent and effective
  across the school.
• 5. Embed the development work through the
  schools, systems and practices.
• 6. Collaborate with other organizations.
• Fullan

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• Learning
• In the Chinese language, two characters
  represent the word learning. The first
  character means to study. It is composed of two
  parts a symbol that means to accumulate
  knowledge is placed above a symbol for a child
  in a doorway.
• The second character means to practice
  constantly, and it shows a bird developing the
  ability to leave the nest. The upper symbol
  represents flying the lower symbol, youth. For
  the Asian mind, learning is ongoing. Study and
  practice constantly, together, suggest that
  learning should mean mastery of the way of
  self-improvement.
• Senge

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I See You

• Among the tribes of northern Natal in South
  Africa, the most common greeting, equivalent to
  hello in English, is the expression Sawu bona.
  It literally means, I see you. If you are a
  member of the tribe, you might reply by saying
  Sikhona, I am here. The order of the exchange
  is important until you see me, I do not exist.
  Its as if, when you see me, you bring me into
  existence.
• This meaning, implicit in the language, is part
  of the spirit of ubuntu, a frame of mind
  prevalent among native people in Africa, below
  the Sahara A person is a person because of
  other people.
• If you grow up with this perspective, your
  identity is based on the fact that you are seen
  that the people around you respect and
  acknowledge you as a person.
• Senge

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• But how can you possibly learn if you do not
  retain a healthy measure of curiosity? And how
  can you continue to be authoritative unless you
  continue to learn?
• Heifetz Linsky

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Activity

• Individually complete the Individual Skills
  Audit sheet
• In pairs, share your response.
• Table Groupings responses to inform PLT
  Reference Group
• Focus on
• What are the learning opportunities this
  initiative presents?
• Areas for improvement?
• (Forward table response to Grant)
• THANKYOU