What makes an effective school

Dr Scott EacottOffice of Educational Leadership

School of EducationThe University of New South Wales

Dr Scott Eacott

AcknowledgmentsNew South Wales Department of Education

The University of New South Wales

The Office of Educational Leadership

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Presentation Overview• Introduce my claims

• A relational approach– What is meant by effective?– The role of context– Productive thinking

• Dialogue and debate

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MY CLAIMSNaming it upfront

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Claims• Schools are good at what they prioritize

• Education is political

• Contested – but do we contest?

• Clarity | Coherence | Narrative

A RELATIONAL APPROACHSetting the scene

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A relational approachFive relational extensions:• The centrality of ‘organizing’ in the social world creates an ontological

complicity in researchers (and others) that makes it difficult to epistemologically break from the spontaneous understanding of the social world;

• Rigorous social scientific scholarship would therefore call into question the very foundations on which the contemporarily popular discourse are constructed;

• The contemporary social condition cannot be separated from the ongoing and inexhaustible recasting of organizing;

• Studying relationally enables the overcoming of the contemporary, and arguably enduring, tensions of individualism and collectivism, and structure and agency; and

• In doing so, there is a productive – rather than merely critical – space to theorize.

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EFFECTIVENESSAsking questions of label

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We are a really good school. We are effective. We say we will educate the kids in a holistic manner, and that is what we do. Although we are answerable to our political masters, at the same time you have to be true to yourself and enact what we see as a good education (Eacott, 2013, p. 27).

Eacott, S. (2013). Asking questions of leadership: using social theory for more than critique. Leading & Managing, 19(1), 18-31.

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Different foci• School effectiveness

– Achievement | Successful• School improvement

– Value added measures• Teacher effectiveness

– Effect | Impact

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What do you see as the purpose of schooling?

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Why is this important?• Broad principle/s

– Challenges of ‘shared’ visions– One size fits all

• Justification– Embracing professionalism

• Critique– Different form of supervision

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Some challenges• In era of LSLD why do we look to others to

define whether we are effective?

• Turnaround literatures do not help. Who decides and for what?

• Absence of context in ISSPP, AESOP similar, but does context matter?

Some thoughts• Effectiveness begins with clarity

• Then, you are judged in relation to coherence

• You construct the narrative of your school

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Dialogue and Debate

A presentation at:

Queanbeyan Secondary Executive Conference

Hotel Rydges – Capital HillCanberra ACT AUSTRALIA28-29 October 2015

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Contact Details

Dr Scott EacottPhD MLMEd GradCertPTT BTeach/BSocSci FACEL

Director, Office of Educational LeadershipSchool of EducationUniversity of New South WalesSydney NSW AUSTRALIA 2052

P: +61 2 9385 0704 Academia.eduT: @ScottEacottResearchgateE: s.eacott@unsw.edu.au UNSW profile W: http://scotteacott.com ORCID

@ScottEacott