0.1 Beyond convention, beyond critique: toward a third way of  (Page 10/12)

A second issue concerning community is whether we should prepare principals to be “heroic individuals” or “communal leaders.” Bogotch (2002) describes the former:

• Heroic individuals often have a single-mindedness to pursue their own vision tenaciously and apart from others who may not share their particular vision. Such visions, or notions of social justice, begin and end as a discrete, yet coherent belief system that separates nonbelievers from true believers. (p. 148)

Communal leadership, in contrast to heroic leadership, “shifts the locus of moral agency to the community as a whole” (Furman, 2004, p. 222). Communal leadership invites all members of the school community to engage in dialogue on their diverse views and construct a vision of social justice appropriate to the local context. Moreover, in communal leadership the meaning of social justice is under continuous construction in order to address a continuously changing context (Bogotch, 2002; Furman, 2004).

Preparing communal leaders is more consistent with the “third way” proposed in this article than preparing heroic individuals. Communal leadership skills proposed by Furman (2004) include:

• Listening with respect;
• Striving for knowing and understanding others;
• Communicating effectively;
• Working in teams;
• Engaging in ongoing dialogue; and
• Creating forums that allow all voices to be heard. (p. 222)

Of course, to become communal leaders pre-service principals need to learn not only the skills of communal leadership but also how to teach those skills to members of a school community (Furman, 2004). It also seems appropriate for pre-service principals, working collaboratively, to construct their own communal visions of social justice, but such construction should wait until students have developed a fairly high level of cultural expertise.

Another strategy that can be used to prepare principals as communal leaders is appreciative inquiry, presented by Ludema, Cooperrider, and Barrett (2001) as an alternative to critical theory. Appreciative inquiry begins with a “discovery phase” in which members of an organization (or school community) decide (a) what they value most about their organization, their work, and their colleagues and (b) what opportunities are available for making the organization even better. After the discovery phase, participants collaborate in a “dream phase” (envisioning a better future), a “design phase” (planning for a better future), and a “destiny phase” (constructing the better future). Although appreciative inquiry projects in schools are long-term endeavors, pre-service principals can engage in scaled-down projects with small groups of teachers.

Critical theory might question activities like constructing communal visions of social justice or leading appreciative inquiry. Where is the unmasking of unequal power relationships, the critique of hegemony, and so forth? Perhaps the words of Mahatma Gandhi, one of the great crusaders for social justice in world history, will lessen the critic’s concerns: “Higher education stands for unity, for catholicity, for toleration, and wide outlook. The culture a university imparts should make you find the points of contact, and avoid those of conflict” (cited in Fischer, 1963, p.38).