CHAPTER 8.

Mary Rapp’s case: Achieving systemic reform in a public school

Judith Fonzi & Raffaella Borasi

8.1. Mary’s story

  8.1.1. Introduction to Mary’s case

In this chapter we report on the case study of Mary Rapp as an innovative Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction, from 1997 to 2006, in a suburban district where she had been an elementary principal for the previous nine years.

This was a period of great change in K-12 education, as recommendations from educational research clashed with conflicting political and economic pressures.  On one side, we had studies calling for change in who we teach (claiming that all students have the right to a high quality education and that the needs of many students have been underserved by our current system), what gets taught (to keep up with advancing knowledge and our increasingly complex and technological world), how we teach (in light of current research about how people learn), and how we assess learning (to determine if what learned can be applied in meaningful situations). In contrast, in the political arena we witnessed a movement towards accountability and standardization, which often translated into high-stakes tests privileging routine skills and knowledge, which in turn influenced what got taught and encouraged more drill and practice (in contrast to recommendations of research about how people learn).  These opposing calls for reform were also occurring together with cuts at the state and local level that required districts to reduce per pupil spending, resulting sometimes in counter-productive changes such as increased class sizes and reduced funds and opportunities for professional development. Add to this mix a laundry list of state and local calls for change and you have K-12 education chaos!

Despite this challenging and at time disheartening context, Mary never gave up coming up with new ideas to increase the learning opportunities offered to students in her district, and carrying them out in the face of inevitable resistance and obstacles.   Among the innovations she promoted were ambitious and high-impact ones such as developing district-wide “curricula” for all subjects and grades to ensure all students’ exposure to high quality content and instruction, leading a comprehensive reform initiative in K-12 mathematics instruction, and contributing to new models for professional development and teacher evaluation. As such, her story shows us what a committed, capable and innovative school leader can do to significantly improve instruction and learning for all students – even within the many challenges of public education.

Throughout her career as an educator – first as an elementary teacher in both private and public settings, then as a principal and assistant superintendent at Penfield, and even later as a faculty preparing future school leaders – Mary’s actions were informed by a vision for education that she refered to as a “humanistic philosophy.”  At the core of this vision was that schools should foster and enhance students’ ability to think and problem solve and do so in a way that honors individuality – thus educating them for participation in a democracy.  In her own words:

“I feel so strongly that the student’s cognitive uniqueness and identity have to be fostered, enhanced … I came out of a Catholic education, which stressed memorization and which had no recognition of who I was or of helping me to develop who I was … I really want kids to learn to think well … so that they’d know how to identify a problem and to approach solving it … but [also] to do this in such a way that really honors individuality.  … my point is, it was about educating students for democracy.  And it was about what you needed in a democracy – this ability to think for oneself, and to be oneself, and … to be a member of a community.” (Mary)

To better understand the context in which Mary operated as a school leader, in Figure 8.1 we have provided some key factual information about the Penfield district at the time of our study.  Additional information about other aspects, such as district culture and its changes overtime, or specific issues and pressures Mary faced, will be introduced in the narrative of her “story” as most appropriate.

Figure 8.1. Penfield District Profile (as of 2006, when Mary retired)

  8.1.2. Highlights of Mary’s professional journey

Early experiences as a teacher

Some people can pinpoint the moment they decided on their career. For others, it is an evolution of places and experiences. Such was the case for Mary. A graduate of catholic schools, where she said she was typically taught to memorize not problem solve, Mary reported that her decision to become an educator and her vision for education truly began as an undergraduate at the University of Rochester (UR).  At that time, Mary was one of a group of students who, under the leadership of a professor, started a school based on the British Infant School System – the Atkinson School.

“When I was doing my undergraduate work, I became involved with a group that started a school. It was the late 60s/70s and there was a group of people that I was part of that felt that public schooling was not maximizing the potential of young children. And a number of us were in a psych of education class together and so we started to pull this together, and we started a school called the Atkinson school. … And it was a school for preschool to fifth graders and we intended it to be modeled on the British Infant School model.” (Mary)

“…it was great fun, there was a lot of energy in this group. I was not the leader, it was the professor who was leading the group and numbers of us from the class joined, and people from the community also joined.” (Mary)

The school, which Mary calls her “first initiative,” lasted nine years, although Mary only stayed on for the planning and first year of implementation, as she disagreed with the philosophy of the Head Teacher. Mary then spent a few years teaching in a private elementary school, where she was able to carry-out her beliefs about what schools should do for kids. She soon moved on to teach in a public school, driven by the desire to offer the same opportunities to all children.

“I had a belief…that what we wanted to do at the Atkinson School, and what I did do at this other small private school … should be available to kids at public school.” (Mary)

Her first job in a public school involved teaching first graders who were not ready for formal schooling. So, she proposed and carried out a new program to address this situation:

“I started to teach 1st grade in [a public] school and at that point we had kids coming in to first grade who were not ready for the curriculum. First grade curriculum was pretty “lock-step” then, so my next foray was to propose a program to the school principal that would be specifically designed for two groups of kids: a group of kids who weren’t ready for their first grade curriculum … to be integrated in the classroom with a group of kids who were ready for 1st grade, so they would have role models.” (Mary)

Experiences as an innovative elementary principal

After nine years of teaching, Mary moved on to be principal of a rural elementary school. Three years later, in 1987, Mary became principal at an elementary school in the Penfield District.

When Mary applied to the Penfield District, there were two principalship positions open, and she really wanted to work in the more progressive school—so she told the Superintendent she would only consider that job!  Mary recalls:

“[This] elementary school is a school that doesn’t have walls. So the classrooms were organized into groups of six, five classrooms around a central area. The school was started in ‘69, about the same time I was starting the Atkinson School, with the idea that there would be a different kind of education available to kids. And the teachers were really thinking about continuous progress when they started the school. And I really didn’t want to go to the “normal school,” I wanted to go to [this more progressive] elementary school … When the Superintendent called to offer me the job I had the boldness to say, “I really would be happy to work with Penfield but only if I could be principal of the [progressive] Elementary School … and that I really wasn’t interested in [the other] elementary school.” (Mary)

As she started as principal of her elementary school in Penfield, Mary felt reaffirmed in her belief that this was the kind of school she wanted to lead:

“It’s a wonderful school; the culture was so strong. Teachers could see each other, their teaching improved because they could hear each other. They’re absolutely committed to kids; there’s never any question that you had to do what’s right for kids” (Mary)

Mary soon learned that the culture in the district was one where “teachers do their own thing when and how they want to”. As a result, she also discovered that, as kids moved through the grades, they were often encountering repetition, gaps, and instruction informed by very different beliefs about how students learn. There was little coordination within and across grades.

“So I got there and analyzed the situation there and found that the faculty was still very committed to continuous progress, but over time that had gotten translated into: everybody in the math class had a workbook and you worked through the workbook at your own pace. And so there really wasn’t much going on in the way of instruction. … So that was a real concern to me. And also at that school, there were four basal programs in use with the idea being that children learn differently … which meant that a child could be learning all phonics in 1st grade and Look-Say at 2nd grade and back to phonics in 3rd grade and onto something else in 4th grade.” (Mary)

Looking into the district’s policies, Mary also learned that the district at the time did not have a policy or practice of coordinating curriculum or instructional practices – something she felt was important to ensure that all students had the best opportunities to learn and grow. So, one of her first initiatives as principal was to establish and co-lead a committee that would develop a comprehensive “reading curriculum” for her school. This reading curriculum was intended to help coordinate what teachers were doing within and across grade levels, as well as improve reading instruction overall by articulating common goals, identifying research-based instructional strategies, and generating a list of good literature for students.

“So I was the administrator on the Language Arts committee and we wrote the first-ever ‘reading curriculum’ for Penfield, which was not lock-step…it was a continuum of skills that you started with. And then we started reading real books. This was back when basals didn’t even have snippets of good literature. That was back when they read ‘sit on the mat, the cat’s name is Pat. Pat the dog.’ … So we chose literature [for children to read].” (Mary)

Because reading instruction is the responsibility of all elementary classroom teachers, this innovation impacted all of the teachers in Mary’s school and significantly affected how teachers did their work. In addition to fostering changes in classroom instruction, this innovation fostered changes in their professional practice. Teachers began talking about their beliefs, instructional practices and curriculum in other content areas.

As a principal, Mary continued to seize opportunities to influence the culture of the school and kept the focus on maximizing the potential of every student.  She realized early on that a key to ensuring that students had the best learning opportunities was to focus on teaching quality and teacher decision-making. The process used to evaluate teachers in her school at the time entailed “grading” the teacher as S or U at the end of the year, with a few descriptive sentences and a separate “grade” for each of 7 or 8 categories; she started questioning if this evaluation process was adequate to foster teachers’ growth and improve their instructional practices.

Unsatisfied with the current process for teacher evaluations, Mary used existing permissive language on the teachers’ contract and obtained the cooperation of the union and her teachers to initiate a new portfolio-based process that she believed would encourage her teachers to “extend their thinking” and “become better at what they do”:

“My idea was that my teachers would be better teachers if I could help them be better thinkers about teaching. So, one of the ways to do that was to get them involved in portfolios. So I got permission from the union to set aside the negotiated program that they used to evaluate teachers, and teachers started setting goals and sharing their goals with me, and then collecting evidence of their progress toward that goal over the course of the year. And then every 3 years, teachers in Penfield have a very big evaluation and I would use their portfolio as the basis for that evaluation.” (Mary)

This system was successfully put into place in the elementary school where Mary was the principal.  Interestingly, a few years later the entire district revised its teacher evaluation system, using what done in Mary’s elementary school as an inspiration and model:

“Having done that in [my] elementary school, it opened the way for a completely new evaluation system in the district. It’s not a portfolio system as such, but what happened was the union and the administration set up a committee that would seek to change the evaluation system. And here we had at [my] elementary school this lovely model that was in action already and while it took that committee probably six years to actually change the evaluation system, what we came out with was an evidence-based system. And so it truly made an impact.” (Mary)

A few years later, Mary was faced with another challenge related to the evaluation of her teachers, which motivated yet another innovation.  This involved the introduction of “Collegial Circles” – that is, groups of teachers meeting on a regular basis to investigate and learn about a topic, issue, or instructional strategy they are all interested in, with the goal of improving one’s practice – as an alternative to direct classroom observations by the principal. This was a novel idea at the time, although Collegial Circles are quite widely used in public schools. What prompted this change was the personal need to figure out a way to handle the number of  classroom observations she was expected to conduct as a principal.

“In the middle here, we created something called ‘Collegial Circles.’ This was borne out of need…I was still principal, my faculty was turning over, I was getting new teachers and lots of people were retiring. New teachers need to be observed many more times than tenured teachers and I was dying…because I was having pre-observation conferences, I was observing, I was having a post-observation conference, I was then writing up the conference and giving it to them and if they wanted to talk about it … they could meet with me again. So I was dying. So I proposed to the union that teachers, on their off years, the year they weren’t getting their three-year big [review]… that teachers could put themselves into small collegial circles, identify an action plan or problem they wanted to solve or something they wanted to study; and that they could do that instead of being observed that year.” (Mary)

The Collegial Circle option also later became part of the district-wide new evaluation process for teachers, supporting the goal of teacher improvement and fostering a more collaborative culture within and across grade levels.

“And again, that went from [my] elementary school to the district, so, for several years now, all the teachers in the district have had the ability to be in a collegial circle on the years that they’re not receiving their big evaluation and they do it, if their principal agrees, in lieu of an observation session.” (Mary)

Each of these school-based innovations informed major district-wide initiatives later on, as Mary moved to the position of Assistant Superintendent for Instruction.

Moving to the role of Assistant Superintendent

Mary explained that her move from Principal to Assistant Superintendent was a carefully thought-out one. On one hand, she felt satisfied with what she had accomplished for her school and was ready to move on:

“I had been at the principalship for 9 years, and I had set goals and they had been accomplished … truly very ambitious goals had been accomplished. So it was time either to set a new round of goals or to move on. This was very conscious thinking at that time … I didn’t have the heart to set a whole new set of goals … I started thinking about what would be next with my life.” (Mary)

At the same time, she also felt the drive to move to a higher administrative position as a way to impact more students:

“Here I am, now the district is my palette and I’m still back to thinking, “we should be able to do in public school what we were able to do in the little private schools.” Okay, I did it in the classroom, I did it at the school, now let’s see if I can do it at the district.” (Mary)

So, when the Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction (ASI) left and Mary was asked to take on this position (first as Interim, and then as a permanent role), she was ready for it.

By this time, the mid 90s, the calls for change were approaching full volume. The national standards movement was sweeping the nation and impacting all of the state’s curricula. New laws regarding students with disabilities brought these students back into the mainstream classrooms. The state education department instituted grade 4 and 8 assessments in mathematics and ELA and began what would be become a series of changes to the high school graduation requirements. We were also seeing local budget cuts, school closings, and urban flight. But Mary remained optimistic, and she spent nine very active years as ASI coordinating and leading collaborative work that sought to maximize the potential of all students while honoring their individuality.

In what follows, we will report on three major innovations Mary carried out as ASI, chosen as especially illustrative of her practices in this position.

  8.1.3. Mary’s innovation #1: Writing the first district-wide curricula

How the idea came about and was evaluated/refined

Coming into the position of Assistant Superintendent, Mary knew that the district did not have articulated curricula – i.e., learning outcomes and means to assess these outcomes across grade levels and within subject areas.  And, based on her prior experience developing a first reading curriculum as an elementary principal in the same district, as well as her knowledge of the literature, she continued to believe that without such curricula, reform would not go very far:

Mary wanted all students to have more and better opportunities to learn.

“So the vision for curriculum was to get commitment amongst the teachers and to build a set of agreements about what it is we teach.  So that a student would have an integrated, coherent, program.  … that a student moving through the school district would have learning opportunities that have been consciously coordinated across levels.” (Mary)

She also knew from her previous experience developing the reading curriculum in her elementary school that engaging teachers in the process of curriculum writing could have a positive effect on their professional practice.

“Well, one of my beliefs is that … one of the easiest ways for people to change is to be engaged in activities.  And so, if I can get a teacher engaged in using this curriculum, because it’s organized around essential questions and concepts, if I can get a teacher doing that a little bit, what I’m actually doing is helping their thinking change about what you do when you teach.  So that’s really powerful to me, and that was one of the issues when we wrote curriculum—not only that it had to be robust, but in its robustness, it’s the magnet pulling teachers into more sophisticated thinking about teaching.” (Mary)

Mary knew that putting together these curricula would not be easy, as it would require teachers to give up the common assumption that “they could do whatever they wanted” behind their closed classroom doors – the current culture in the district.  But, having already successfully accomplished the writing of the reading curriculum at her elementary school, Mary had confidence that she could succeed in this endeavor.  She also felt that the organization was as ready as it could ever be to undertake such an initiative.

Mary was willing to put the time and effort needed to oversee this initiative personally, as she believed it would represent one of the most critical components in implementing her vision.

Mary was very aware that writing curricula for all subjects and all grades in the district would be a monumental, daunting and time-consuming task.  However, she ultimately decided to undertake it because of her belief that this would make a real difference in terms of the learning opportunities offered to all students in the district for many years to come.

“Having a guaranteed and viable curriculum is a research-based indicator of opportunities for students to learn. You can expect a large effect-size in student achievement in the school district that has a viable and guaranteed curriculum.” (Mary)

Planning and gathering the needed resources

To achieve the ambitious goal of developing district-wide curricula, Mary employed the “signature process” she had developed earlier in her administrative career.  Before involving others in this initiative, Mary engaged in what she calls a “period of input” where she spent time developing her own thinking about writing curricula by attending national conferences, reading the literature and talking with researchers and experts, as well as listening to other people in the district so that she could get a sense of the value others in her district might offer. She explained:

“Because, when I move forward with one of these projects, I always engage teachers, but I have to be grounded myself before engaging teachers, so that I have a sense of the value of what’s being offered.” (Mary)

Towards the end of this “input” period, Mary secured the collaboration of a few influential and strategic colleagues – the curriculum assessment coach, the coordinator of professional development, and a principal – to grapple with the idea of written district-wide curricula in all subjects, and more specifically to develop a format or template to ensure consistency and high-quality across these curricula.

“The big issue—the big decision—was how to organize the format of the curriculum. Because the form in which we were going to ask people to do this work was going to direct their thinking, so we needed to come up with a format that could remain robust for ten years—because by the time we had a whole curriculum, at the appropriate level of quality, it might be ten years!” (Mary)

“Writing curriculum … entailed choosing a framework that would work, that would be standardized across the district and would point people in the right direction. So enduring understandings, essential questions, alignment of assessment to the unit outcomes—that all got expressed in a template, by me with teachers, and now five or six years later we’ve almost written curriculum for everything we teach.” (Mary)

She also thought strategically about who else in the district should be involved to gather the necessary support for such a major initiative, as well as to begin to develop people who could later lead the curriculum writing work across the district.  Most notably, she involved the curriculum development committee in creating the template to be later used by each curriculum writing group – as this committee was made up of teachers and has some decision power on how the summer curriculum work would be defined and assigned.

“There’s a curriculum development committee that is a teacher committee (they have people who make the decisions about summer funding) so that group of people had to first sign on to the goal that I wanted, then participate in some way in getting this template designed and used universally.” (Mary)

She also used this process as a way to develop people who could later lead the curriculum writing work in the district in ways that she could not, given as official role as ASI.

She purposefully did not publicize these first informal efforts until she was confident in what she wanted to propose.

Implementing and monitoring the initiative

Mary purposefully implemented this initiative incrementally, starting with carefully selected subjects and grade levels, with an overall plan that would cover all subjects and grade levels over a few years – and then hopefully start all over again. She felt that curricula should not become stale and the process of regularly reviewing curricula would maintain the district and the teachers on the cutting edge.

Mary identified three critical elements in the implementation of this initiative after the template had been created by the small group:

1. Rolling out the template, thus establishing the expectations about how curricula should be written.
2. Getting people to use the curricula that had been written.
3. Establishing a system to ensure quality control of the written curricula.

Each of these elements presented its own challenges, which Mary set out to address creatively using her deep understanding of the district’s culture and operations. The first step, rolling out the template, was more challenging than one might expect, because the culture of the district at that time was, “you do whatever you want, whenever you want.”  So, teachers not only had to buy into a change in practices (i.e., having district-wide written curricula) that would take away some of their autonomy, but they also had to use a given template for writing these curricula.

Indeed, Mary received considerable objections from the teacher’s union for changing the process for writing curricula.

“Now I will say, this was very unpopular with the union …  “How dare she tell us how to write curriculum?” And so there was a lot of pushback.  And basically, I was a stone wall. I didn’t engage, because my title as assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction … empowers me to make these kinds of decisions. [I said] ‘I made it in consultation with teachers. It is what it is, and after you’ve used it for a year, I’d be glad to hear your input and consider adjustments, but this is it folks.’” (Mary)

The curriculum development committee, in conjunction with the team that developed the template, decided that teachers had to attend a workshop introducing the template and its rationale before they could participate in the summer curriculum writing. This group, together with Mary, also identified what curriculum writing would be funded in the first summer (as the curriculum development committee was in charge of deciding how to spend the funds which had already been ear-marked for the summer).

Mary also expected teachers to resist implementing the completed curricula as teachers have “doors that close” and they have patterns of behavior – the culture in the district being that ‘I am in charge of what happens in this class and I make those decisions’.  This culture, coupled with the fact that teachers – who already felt pressed for time – were going to have to search for materials and develop new lessons and assessments on their own time, required a very carefully thought-out implementation plan. Implementation had to be embedded in everyday practice; it had to become part of what was expected of teachers and administrators. Having anticipated this, Mary laid the groundwork to push on implementation in two ways: (a) through the required principal observations, and (b) by setting new expectations for the annual reports to be presented to the Board of Education:

“… principals were directed, requested, cajoled, into – at the pre-observation conference – asking the teacher, “where does the lesson you’re teaching fit into the written curriculum? What unit are you on? What goals are you reaching for?” so that people would say, “hmm, better get that document out.” And of course, after that happens once you tell your colleagues and pretty soon people are coming in ready” (Mary)

“Then another pathway I used was [in] designing the format that we would use for the next cycle [of program reviews by the Board of Education] [where] I added the number of units that had been written in the district’s curriculum template. So that meant that for the next five years, every time we were going to the Board of Education to talk about [a program] they had to go and count their units.” (Mary)

During this implementation, however, Mary found that the quality of the curricula that had been produced during the summer work was uneven.  Earlier on, Mary had identified a teacher who was especially talented at writing curricula and had her facilitate the required pre-requisite workshop.  To ensure more consistent quality in the curricula produced, she proposed that the curriculum development committee require all subsequent curriculum writing projects to be facilitated by a teacher skilled at curriculum writing.

At the time of our interviews Mary was proud to share that 90% of the programs in the district had a written comprehensive and cohesive curriculum to guide teachers’ instruction.

“Well, we’ve already rewritten things that we wrote six years ago. But the template has stayed relatively the same; we’ve made very few changes in it. And it still has vitality for many years to come.” (Mary)

Ensuring long-term sustainability and/or bigger impact

This approach to curriculum writing came together with a process that could be replicated for different subjects and grade levels overtime, and it included the expectation that it would be repeated after a certain number of years to keep each curriculum vital through revisions and updates.

It is important to note that calling for a change in practice from one where teachers are free to teach what they want when they want, to one where all students in a grade level or course will be held to the same learning outcomes, transformed the entire culture of the district from one of isolation toward one of collaboration on behalf of students. Moving forward, instruction would be guided by research and best practices in the field.

The ability demonstrated in this initiative to get key players to develop ownership for the vision and the process, as well as to anticipate challenges and needs, are emblematic of Mary’s leadership skills.

  8.1.4. Mary’s innovation #2: An attempt at addressing differentiated instruction

How the idea came about and was evaluated/refined

Relatively early in her tenure as ASI, Mary became aware that district administrators (including the superintendent), as well as teachers, were realizing the students were not being well served by the “one size fits all” approach to instruction that pervaded the district. This was true in general, but it was particularly obvious in mathematics. At the middle school, some students were bored and some were not succeeding. In the high school, the state test scores were not as high as they should be.

Working with a group of teachers and administrators, Mary seized this public discontent as an opportunity to challenge teachers and administrators to examine their instructional practices.  This started with a movement towards differentiated instruction (DI) (Tomlinson, 1999), initiated by a middle school teacher.

“I learned about differentiated instruction in the process of trying to figure out what to do about math. […] This was NOT a case where I was out in front at conferences learning. This was a case of the teacher [and a principal] bringing it to me, “have you looked at this?” And I hadn’t. I had a principal in the middle school who saw DI as THE answer to the middle school instructional divide. And she very much wanted that to be the initiative for her school. I supported her with resources … so that got moving with my support but not my leadership.” (Mary)

Planning and gathering the needed resources

Several teachers and principals were sent to Dr. Tomlinson’s differentiated instruction leadership training and became the districts’ teacher leaders for this initiative.

Implementing and monitoring the initiative

While the concept of differentiated instruction was initially recognized as ‘the right thing to do for kids,’ as time went on these teacher leaders began encountering considerable resistance from their peers. Some teachers felt burdened by the expectation that they could, should, and would differentiate every lesson and assessment tool, while others felt they had already accomplished differentiation using their own methods. Ultimately, some teachers began to challenge the underlying principles of the formal differentiated instruction program and solicited allies among parents and community members.

In order to maintain a commitment to the underlying principles informing differentiation, Mary decided to quietly move away from Tomlinson’s formal program but continue to push teachers to consider the needs of all students.

While this may be considered by some a “failed innovation,” we included it in our story to show how Mary was a master at knowing when to move full speed ahead, when to slow down, and when to shelve initiatives. She had a network of people who were her eyes and ears on the ground. She trusted their interpretations and was comfortable making mid-course corrections.  At the same time, in a way this initiative prepared the ground for a larger systemic reform initiative of the K-12 math program, which Mary initiated soon after her “strategic retreat” from pursing differentiated instructions.

  8.1.5. Mary’s innovation #3: Leading a district-wide mathematics reform initiative

How the idea came about and was evaluated/refined

Developing a more rigorous K-12 mathematics program and improving student mathematics achievement was a major initiative that Mary undertook as Assistant Superintendent of Instruction over a period of several years.

This initiative began in response to a few simultaneous ‘grass fires.’ These ‘grass fires,’ which might also be thought of as ‘the perfect storm,’ included (a) K-5 teachers’ desire for a new mathematics textbook; (b) middle school teachers’ and administrators’ dissatisfaction with how students were accelerated in mathematics; (c) the district’s engagement in writing district-wide curricula (as part of the initiative described as Mary’s Innovation #1), and (d) the creation of a professional development team to develop a professional development plan for the entire district. Though Mary considered this set of circumstances to be a “hot political issue,” she also believed there was opportunity here for effecting some significant and needed change. From her vantage point looking across the district, she actively sought a way to weave these disparate factors together to improve mathematics instruction and ultimately student achievement.

This is a good example of how Mary capitalized on her role as ASI to create synergy among different forces and events, always directed towards the implementation of her overall vision.

“I think this happens over and over again, because I’m in a position in this district where I can see how all the things connect.” (Mary)

At this critical time, Mary met Judi Fonzi, a mathematics educator from the University of Rochester who had been working with some local districts to implement an inquiry approach to teaching mathematics and was putting together a grant proposal to support the continuation of this work. After some mutual interviewing, the two decided that their visions and goals were aligned, and Mary invited Judi to work with the teachers in the district.

“Judi Fonzi — here’s the opportunist [in me]— offered resources to us in terms of ways of thinking about mathematics and materials for mathematics and a research project. And Judi sort of interviewed me and I sort of interviewed her—it was happening simultaneously—and I judged that I had a connection to the University of Rochester, so that’s a good start because that’s my alma mater, but I judged that the two organizations’ interests could mesh, that we could benefit from this. And so the UR started to help us to look at materials, which then became more than I ever bargained for!  (laughs)” (Mary)

The decision to partner with the UR was grounded first of all in Mary’s belief that engaging in systemic change addressing both curriculum content and pedagogy in mathematics that would be very instrumental to giving students in the district the opportunities to learn significant content and learn to “problem solve and think” – goals that were at the very core of her vision.  She was also not concerned about finding the necessary funding to support the initiative, as she had always been able to find sufficient internal funding to implement any initiative she thought really worthwhile.  Furthermore, she realized that the grant, if funded, would provide even additional resources.

So, Mary began to work with Judi to reconceive her initial idea to make some changes in her district’s mathematics program, in such a way that would allow her to capitalize on this new opportunity and aim even higher than she had originally expected.

Planning and gathering the needed resources

As a result of this collaboration, the Penfield district joined with a few other districts and the UR to write two grant proposals, one to the New York State Education Department and later one to the National Science Foundation (NSF), that were both awarded. The first grant was to develop a cadre of lead teachers that would work with their colleagues to learn about mathematics reform, begin making changes in their instructional practices, and examine for possible adoption the recently published mathematics curricula materials that had been developed as part of a major effort from the National Science Foundation. The second grant was designed to continue the development of lead teachers and to focus on deepening and enhancing teachers’, administrators’, parents’ and community members’ mathematical content knowledge.

Mary recognized that this collaboration was critical to her reform initiative, because the grants brought not only financial resources that she could use synergistically to achieve her goals, but also critical expertise the district did not have:

“To provide [similar] professional development we would have had to figure out ourselves where we were going, we would have had to read all of the research.  I have no idea how far we would have gotten without the resources that Judi brought to the project.” (Mary)

 Person-power for carrying out the initiative was also enhanced by the two grants, as they made it possible to create and support a cadre of teacher leaders engaged in a leadership development program to learn to support their colleagues.

Interestingly, Mary chose to structure all these new teacher leadership positions through short-term contracts as “teacher on special assignment (TOSA)”.  She created two 5-year such positions, and hired substitutes to cover for their original duties.

Implementing and monitoring the initiative

This complex initiative spread over many years and was not implemented in a linear or pre-determined way. The following points represent the initial steps which focused primarily on the elementary grades, with the middle and high school grades weaving in over time, mostly as a result of grant funding.

• A few middle school teachers, who had been working with Judi Fonzi prior to the formal arrangement with the district, asked Mary if they could pilot some of the new NSF-funded curriculum materials with a group of students over three years. Mary agreed and worked with the principal to figure out the necessary scheduling changes.
• K-5 teachers attended conferences funded by the state and NSF grants to learn about NSF-funded instructional materials.
• K-5 texts from one of the NSF-funded curricula were adopted, and their implementation was phased in over a seven-year process, one grade at a time.
• Professional development went on, supported by the district and the grants, to prepare teachers to teach using these non-traditional curricula and employing the constructivist pedagogy called for by these materials.
• The mathematics teacher leaders also played a very important role throughout this process.

Mary played a key role at critical points in this process.  For example, she inserted a new criterion into the K-5 text decision-making process—the book or program had to be consonant with the NSF approach to teaching mathematics (i.e., one informed by constructivist learning theories).

“It comes time to make a decision for the elementary school about books.  And those decisions are generally made by an elementary committee.  The process is they make a recommendation to the elementary principals’ group that I chair and then the principals and I make a decision and take it to the board.   We’d been working in the project for a year and – I don’t know how I got away with this, but I did! – I said that whatever was to be recommended for the elementary book or program, needed to be consonant with the National Science Foundation approach to teaching mathematics. … How I got away with it? I think it was [because] the teachers who were on that committee were convinced enough that that was the right thing to do.” (Mary)

She also worked closely and very strategically with the middle school principal in order to address the initial resistance from some teachers in that school:

“At the middle school, there was more resistance amongst the teachers but [they had] a very influential principal, a very strong principal who was a very strong ally of mine … and we were able to sit together and design.  Once we knew where we wanted to go, we had a teacher colleague or two … who could help us know how realistic it was. …  So we knew how fast we wanted to go there.  And then … [the teachers leaders] would propose input for the principal, who went to the department and made the case.  He had the skills to use his own position and his own influence and to call a vote of the department and to have a unanimous vote, and then to write it up in a memo to me so that it was carved in stone and everybody knew how the decision had been made.  So it wasn’t that there wasn’t resistance, but the principal and I and the teacher leaders would sit down and figure out “What are we going to do and how are we going to make that happen?” (Mary)

 Mary recalls how at first everything seemed to be working very well, especially at the elementary level:

“And during all that time, we had committees working, we had all of the professional development from the university, we had [an] elementary principal really doing a lot of leadership.  We had parent meetings.  It was a very smooth implementation. There wasn’t a bump in the road.  I mean, it was hard learning, it took a lot of time, but in terms of doing it, I think it went really smoothly. … I’m not sure I know everything that happened, but it just kept happening.  And part of keeping it moving was, at that point in the grant, we had teacher leaders … the teachers who supported teachers were getting training so they would be good at that and would be thoughtful about that, and so I think that’s why that implementation went so smoothly.” (Mary)

However, as the high school began to implement an NSF-funded mathematics curriculum, a few teachers who had refused to participate in the professional development began complaining about the content and instructional approach. Despite Mary’s early awareness of the situation, her intervention to provide a forum for everyone to present their thoughts, and her decision to slow down the implementation, these disgruntled teachers made their feelings known to students and some parents.

A small, but very vocal, group of parents began a campaign to “get rid of the new programs and return to how and what we used to teach”. Mary pressed forward, gathering examples of powerful student thinking from implementing teachers, calling on supportive parents to share their thoughts and the experiences of their children, presenting the research and emerging data from her district and across the country.

Throughout this initiative, which spanned several years, Mary kept careful watch on student registration in high level math courses and achievement overall, and regularly reported out to the faculty and the Board of Education that both factors were improving.  This monitoring and reporting was critical to ensure the Board of Education’s support for the reform agenda.

Ensuring long-term sustainability and/or bigger impact

Despite these obstacles, by the time Mary retired the district had adopted reform-based curricula at the K-8 level, and teachers at all levels had participated in intensive professional development that affected their teaching practices and the opportunities to learn central mathematical ideas offered to their students.  As such, this initiative had catalyzed the use of a more student-centered approach to instruction district-wide.

Mary was hoping that the following elements (which she had purposefully worked on) would help to sustain this radical reform in a number of complementary ways:

• Having adopted district-wide K-12 math curricula – as they would not change at least until the new cycle of curriculum review took place.
• Having adopted reform-based instructional materials – they would continue to guide teachers’ content choices.
• The success experienced by math teachers that engaged in the change practices.

While these strategies did help, a number of backward steps were also taken since Mary’s retirement.

  8.1.6. Updates on Mary’s story

After 9 years as an Elementary Principal and another 9 years as an Assistant Superintendent, Mary decided it was time for her to retire from her school district.

Her career as a change agent in education was not over, though, as she then brought her wealth of experience and wisdom to the preparation of future school leaders at the University of Rochester.   For another decade, as a clinical faculty member at the Warner School of Education, Mary was very influential in strengthening their K-12 leadership preparation program, where she spearheaded several curriculum innovations informed by her vision and experiences, as well as changes in accreditation standards.

8.2. Analysis of Mary’s entrepreneurial activity

  8.2.1. Mary’s practices about vision

Mary’s clear vision for education was a vital force throughout her career, as illustrated by her story and explicitly stated by Mary herself:

“Well it’s always present…it’s like the air you breathe, it’s like the water you swim in if you’re a fish…it doesn’t have to be conscious” (Mary)

Indeed, all her major initiatives were consistently driven by her belief that schools should foster and enhance students’ ability to think, problem solve and develop as individuals. When deciding whether to engage in a specific innovation, her key question was “is this good for kids?” Her vision also affected decisions with respect to hiring personnel, especially in leadership positions, as she looked for people who shared a similar commitment to student learning and respect for students’ individuality.

Most importantly, her vision was what gave her the strength to face the inevitable difficulties that accompany engaging in innovation:

“We absolutely have to be courageous … that’s where that piece about vision comes in. Because it has to be worth it to go out and be the standard-bearer of change, because schools are just not set up to change … schools just hate change, whatever it is.” (Mary)

Effectively communicating her vision to the various stakeholders (i.e., superintendent, Board of Education, teachers and administrators, parents, community leaders) was critical to gain these constituencies’ buy-in for specific initiatives. Indeed, Mary herself considered this communication a very important part of her job. Her own steadfast passion and commitment to her vision, along with her ability to articulate it and support it with relevant research, proved to be effective tools to realize that vision.

  8.2.2. Mary’s practices about opportunities

Mary was always thinking about how to improve instruction and student learning.   Looking across her story, we can see that her ideas often came from recognizing opportunities for innovation from a few different and interrelated sources.  In most cases, the stimulus was presented by a problem or unmet need she recognized in her students – for example, her curriculum writing initiatives were motivated by the realization that students had too many “gaps” and repetitions as they went through the various grades, and the mathematics reform initiative started with the recognition that students were not achieving at their fullest potential in mathematics courses.  Sometimes the problem or unmet need she reacted to was something that she or her staff were experiencing – as in the case of the development of new teacher evaluation procedures.  She also listened and followed up on ideas from her staff – as illustrated in the case of the differentiated instruction initiative.  Reading, going to conferences and talking with experts played an important role in all her innovations, as they made her more alert to problems and opportunities, and helped her “ground” and refine her original ideas.

She was always very attentive to her community, “scanning the environment” to recognize new opportunities and assess the “readiness” of her institution to pursue these opportunities.

“Well, part of that is being an opportunist.  Because if you have a belief system about what should be happening, and there’s something out in the external world that will help make your case, snag it!” (Mary)

“An ‘environmental scan’ is a really important thing. You’ve got to know what’s going on …with your union …your schools …principals …community …budget…” (Mary)

When asked how she decided whether to follow a specific opportunity she identified, Mary claimed that all her ideas were filtered through her vision.  She also told us that she asked herself the following three questions: 1) Is it good for kids? 2) Can I pull it off? 3) Is this the right time? If the answer to all three were YES, then the project was a go!

It is worth noting that this set of questions does not include “do I have the resources?” or “can we afford it?”.  While this may seem surprising in a climate where many public schools constantly struggle with budget cuts and deficits, it reflected the reality for Mary at the time.  As discussed in more depth in the section on Resources, Mary felt very confident that, given her understanding and control of the district instructional budget, she could always find the needed resources for a worthwhile project – so this was not a determining issue for her.

  8.2.3. Mary’s practices about risk

While Mary’s initiatives never involved great financial risks, embarking in any major innovation presented considerable risks to her reputation and position – especially when we consider that educational institutions seem to tolerate the risk of “missing the boat” much better than “sinking the boat” (as suggested by Brown & Cornwall, 2000).  The more radical the innovation, the greater the risk of upsetting some of the constituencies – as demonstrated in the case of reforming the mathematics program. Mary recognized that schools do not like change and knew that each time she promoted an innovation she would encounter resistance and some personal risk:

“In this work you’ve got to be willing to have people say awful things about you, you’ve got to be willing to stand by what’s best for kids, you have to be willing to hurt people’s feelings, sometimes … There’s just a lot of things that are uncomfortable that I would have preferred not to have done in my life, [but] that are required if you want to do something other than the status quo.” (Mary)

While aware of these risks and their potential consequences, Mary was willing to take them on whenever she concluded that an initiative met some critical needs and had a reasonable chance for success. As she said in the case of the curriculum writing initiative:

“‘it had to be done!’ It’s so self-evident that it had to be done, that I couldn’t imagine anybody saying anything to me that could convince me that it wasn’t the proper thing to do.” (Mary)

At the same time, Mary recalled times when she decided not to pursue an initiative she thought was worthwhile, or to pull back from an initiative she had already started, because she felt that the “risk-reward” balance was not right.

“If you take on too great a risk, you are really undermining what it is you are trying to accomplish – now that’s not smart. So, keep the risk/reward equation in mind as you decide what you’re going to do, and take only as much of a risk as you think you can manage.” (Mary)

Indeed, far from being reckless, Mary was very careful about evaluating the risks associated with every innovation she wanted to pursue, as well as figuring out ways to minimize those risks.  She told us that her first step was to ensure that the superintendent would support the initiative and was willing to support her if things went wrong.  Indeed, it was because of the trusting relationship she had developed with her first superintendent, and the mentorship he provided, that she felt comfortable undertaking some innovations she might otherwise have thought too risky:

“I didn’t feel like much of anything was a risk to discuss with [my superintendent] because he was so honest and so forthcoming that I could tell him whatever I was thinking and he’d support it or not, but he’d tell me – so it didn’t … feel like a risk.” (Mary)

Mary was very purposeful and strategic when involving key players in the initial discussions about a potential initiative, deciding whether and how to launch an initiative, and in the planning of an initiative.  This was done not only to benefit from their input, but also to have them develop ownership for the initiative and its success, and thus reduce the risk that they would oppose it – as illustrated in the curriculum writing initiative. Similarly, she was careful to keep key constituencies informed of the progress of an initiative to maintain their support.   Other times, depending on the nature of the innovation and her reading of the political climate, she would purposefully work quietly and try to stay “under the radar screen.”

Finally, it is important to note that she approached her innovations with the expectation that there would be resistance and that she would not be successful every time.  Therefore, fear of failure did not deter her from embarking in a difficult and risky project. And, though she always gave her initiatives her best thinking and effort, she was also ready to face the consequences if things did not work out:

“You try your best – you have to be willing to have that fall apart and face the music”. (Mary)

  8.2.4. Mary’s practices about resources

As Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction in the Penfield district, Mary had responsibility for curricula and instruction decisions and had ultimate control over the district budget.

“Penfield is a funny place.  We’re a funny size, we’re too big to be small and we’re too small to be big.  And so I have control of a tremendous amount of [resources]. I mean, any professional development that any of the 500 teachers go to during the day, I have to approve.  I know what everybody’s doing. Any instructional purchase that is made in the entire district, I have to approve.  It all comes here, so I can see what’s leftover and I can see how money is being spent here and not spent there and you know what? If I go into somebody’s budget now, which I just did, and their textbook money isn’t spent, I can call up that principal and say, ‘I need those dollars for…’” (Mary)

While Mary acknowledged that she had to live within her budget – and in fact, she was very fiscally responsible – she had the freedom to redeploy funds to support her innovations.

“There’s redeployment, you move it around and I’m good at it. … I could move dollars across many categories and I’ve just had a tremendous amount of financial freedom.” (Mary)

In theory, this meant that, as ASI, if she thought a program was important, she could initiate it and fund it. In practice, as we have seen from her story, things were not that simple. Nevertheless, she did find that this control over the use of many district resources was critical to her success initiating and carrying out specific innovations at the district level.

Mary was also successful in capitalizing on grants to support some of her initiatives – as illustrated in the case of the mathematics reform initiative.  However, Mary was aware that her suburban district was not always eligible nor likely to be funded by grants as a large urban district would, so she did not often pursue this funding strategy. Rather, she was ready to seize opportunities when they presented themselves – especially in terms of entering into partnerships with other districts and higher education institutions.  When grant funds were available, though, she was able to make the best use of them, creating synergies with internal funds:

“… once I understood the district budget and the grants, I could see how to organize so that I freed up money – I made it more efficient – and freed up money that then became at my discretion.” (Mary)

This analysis of Mary’s financial practices enables us to better appreciate why she felt that resources were never a major constraint for any of the initiatives she promoted.  Indeed, when asked if there were any projects she had to forego because of a lack of funds, Mary confidently responded, “No, I did everything I wanted to do”.

At the same time, it is important to note that she was quite good and creative at minimizing expenses (“bootstrapping”), and she proactively sought ways to leverage internal funds with external sources whenever possible (such as participating with other schools in state and federally funded projects that would cover some of the costs of the innovations she wanted to pursue, and taking advantage of state funds available for collaborative projects).

Mary was also very good at using creatively temporary leadership positions – such as “teacher on special assignment” (TOSA) and “principal on special assignment” (POSA) – to appoint project leaders for a particular initiative.  While this would require her to hire a long-term substitute for the original position, this was usually quite affordable and within her budget, and had the additional benefit of guaranteeing the project leader the ability to go back to his/her position once the assignment was completed.

Mary fully realized the key role of human resources and she was especially aware of the importance of choosing the right people to lead and participate in the teams that would implement a specific initiative.  She worked hard and strategically to make this happen, despite the challenges presented by a public school setting, where teachers’ tenure, union contracts, and even more the commonly held expectations about the roles and rights of teachers and administrators, make it very difficult to make changes after a hiring has taken place. So, she tried to hire the right people in the first place, as she played an important role in hiring the teachers in her school (as principal), and the principals and administrators in her district (as assistant superintendent).  One of her key hiring criteria was to secure people who shared the same commitment to promote and support learning for all students.

If people did not work out in their position, she first tried to support them as much as possible to see if the situation could change. However, if this did not happen, she was ready to do whatever it took to move them to a different position or out of the district (a difficult and sometimes politically challenging move).

“I have a very long fuse. I don’t know if forgiving is the right word—but I work a long time with someone before I give up on them. But the giving up happens very fast when it happens! So you try real hard to structure the situation so that they can learn, and think aloud with them and you try teaching them. And if they can’t learn, you have to cut your losses.” (Mary)

Mary recognized the pivotal role played by the leader in charge of a specific initiative – a role she had often played as principal, but not so often as assistant superintendent.  For each of her initiatives, Mary identified key persons in the district that she trusted (or with whom she could develop trust) and that had the trust of their colleagues.  These people would be her eyes, ears and “shepherd of the ideas” on the ground.

“Once the project is decided, then [you need] … someone in a confidential relationship with me …  that I can really trust that they’re not filtering, that they’re speaking truth to power, and that is out there gathering—it’s not gathering, it’s testing out the idea, and then bringing it back and talking it through to kind of evaluate it and decide what to do.” (Mary)

Picking the right people for this role, and building mutual trust, was especially critical. Maintaining good communications with each project leader was also important to her, so she made sure that there were regular opportunities to meet face-to-face or though written reports. Mary recalled for us an instance that well illustrated how this worked and the importance of this role in her overall strategy:

“She was making some decisions for me, so how you pick that person?  That person has to think like me.  We have to have a lot in common, because—she’s a surrogate out in the field, making judgments all of the time.  So, you know, [NAME] sent me the email before the parent group got upset about math facts, because she had had a conversation with the people around the schools and she knew that it was coming—that it was trouble, that it was real—before the parents ever said a word!  Teachers knew it, [NAME] heard them because her job was to be out and about, and her judgment was ‘tell Mary right away.’ … you have to know this person really well, and know how to work effectively with them. And that means knowing yourself and your own style well, so that you can manage the information that comes in with that person in a way that keeps the project going.” (Mary)

Mary also told us that she made a conscious effort to identify and mentor teachers and administrators that demonstrated potential in this direction and develop their leadership capacity. Indeed, she identified the cadre of capable leaders she developed during her tenure as assistant superintendent as one of her greatest legacy to the school district.

“I needed people in the schools who had the same belief system, and sometimes … I found people with the same belief systems, but they didn’t have as much experience or as much knowledge.  That meant “growing them up”, sending them to conferences, getting them out talking to people from other districts, and really promoting them, their own development for its own sake obviously, but also because they could become influential helpers. … there have to be people in all the right places, and that just doesn’t happen spontaneously.” (Mary)

  8.2.5. Mary’s practices about growth

Mary’s desire to “expand her sphere of influence” was the main motivating factor behind her moves from being a teacher (where she could affect the students in her class), to being a principal (where she could affect the students in her school) and finally to being an assistant superintendent (where she could affect the students in the entire school district).

“I started out in the classroom, I went to the principalship because I wanted to do in a school what I could do in a classroom, and [now as ASI] I wanted to do to a district what I did in a school.” (Mary)

Along with her change in position came a shift in her role in implementing innovation.  She often found that she could not affect change as directly as Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum and Instruction as she could in her previous position as Principal. This shift in role is very consistent with the literature on entrepreneurship which suggests that, as their organization grows, successful entrepreneurial leaders have to give up direct contact with – and, thus, ability to influence – the implementation of specific innovations.

  8.2.6. Other interesting elements of Mary’s case

Balancing quickness and thoughtfulness in decision-making

Mary differed somewhat from most of the other case study subjects in her decision-making style, as she was deliberately thoughtful and usually took some time to think through a problem or decision, looking at the literature and consulting with important constituencies and trusted colleagues – what she referred to as a “period of input”.  However, after that phase, most often a solution/decision would somehow emerge quickly and holistically, and she was then swift in acting on it.  She described this process as follows:

“I remember when I learned this in graduate school. It was when I was doing these reviews of literature and I couldn’t write—I couldn’t write it at the end. And one time, for some reason or another, a week went by when I stopped reading and then I wrote and, holy mackerel, there it was! And so I said, ‘okay! Think about it a long time and then stop…’…So there’s percolation, but there’s also filtering. And there’s also synthesis of ideas and information from a lot of different places … it has to come together as a whole, you have to be able to get your arms around it and that’s something that minds do.” (Mary)

At the same time, Mary recognized that there are situations where the timeframe to make a decision is limited, and in those cases she was willing to make a decision with the information available even if limited.

“I love this quote from Colin Powell who said, ‘If you know 40% of what you need to know to make a decision, you don’t know enough. If you know 90% of what you need to know to make a decision, you know TOO much.’” (Mary)

Engaging staff in innovative activities as a means to achieve change in beliefs

Mary believed that, if appropriately designed, the tasks or initiatives teachers engaged in could challenge their existing beliefs and practices and thus impact the school culture.  As reported earlier, she explicitly said “one of my beliefs is that … one of the easiest ways for people to change is to be engaged in activities.”  She believed that if teachers could be convinced to engage in some new effective teaching practices, the better outcomes achieved by their students as a result would make them want to continue those practices.  Indeed, one of the main reasons she put so much emphasis on developing rigorous district-based curricula and in adopting NSF-funded math curriculum materials, was that she believed this would force teachers to engage in new teaching practices.

This position is consistent with one of Gee’s key identity theory principles, as he stated that professional identify development most often started with participating in key practices and discourses of one’s community of practice (Gee, 2001; Leuhmann, 2007).

Key role played by project leaders

Mary recognized the importance of having the right people in charge of implementing a major innovation – what she referred to as the “shepherds” of an initiative.  Especially when she realized that, as ASI, she could not take direct responsibility for the implementation of each district-wide initiative, she thoughtfully brought key people into the conversations very early on and worked directly with them to develop a vision and plan for implementing the initiative.  Then, once the initiative was underway, she counted on regularly scheduled meetings with her implementation “shepherds” as well as their spontaneous feedback to provide her with enough opportunity to support and adjust the work as necessary.  She pointed to the curriculum writing initiative as a good example of how this process would work when successful.

The importance of having support from the “top”

Mary spontaneously talked about the importance of having a supportive superintendent, and the important role played by her first superintendent, who was already in that position when she began as a principal and remained in it until 5 years prior to her retirement. In his longevity he had won the respect and support of the entire Penfield community, and as a mentor and supporter of Mary’s he taught her how to do the same.

“The superintendent I worked for took me on as a protégé and he thought out loud for me, when I had a problem he would model how I might talk about it with the person I needed to deal with it, and that was very powerful. … So having him—for those first 13 years was important because he was giving me permission, he was probing and making sure my thinking was sound and then he was helping me do the politics of making education better.” (Mary)

Pros and cons of moving higher in the hierarchy

Mary observed that, as ASI, her role as a change agent was quite different from when she was a building principal.  First of all, she explicitly identified changing the culture of the school she was leading as a principal as one of her goals, and she felt that she had been quite effective in this endeavor. She believed that as the head of the building everything she did was closely observed and thus could act as a model, so she behaved accordingly. For instance, when she interacted with teachers, staff, or students she did so in an inquiring way, and whenever she was confronted with a problem or dilemma she made her thinking visible. In contrast, she did not feel that as assistant superintendent she could have as much effect on the overall district culture. She believed that since she was not the head of the organization she was not as closely observed by, or have the same ability to act as a model for, the district’s constituencies – this was reserved for the superintendent.

“…I really didn’t feel I contributed anywhere near as directly to the culture in Penfield as I did to the culture in the school.” (Mary)

Another important difference Mary noted in her two leadership roles was that as principal she worked directly on initiatives, whereas as Assistant Superintendent she often needed to find others who could lead and carry out that work.

“At H Elementary School I was a lightning rod, I was a proposer. In this world, I’m much more of a permission-granter, resource provider, recognizer of good ideas brought in from other people…I can’t affect change as directly in this role as I could with the principalship. Here, I’m completely dependent on others. At the principalship, you’re dependent on your teachers always, but I had daily contact with them. I could nudge that culture, I could affect their thinking, I could help them get to the place where I thought we should all be. But here, I can’t do that, I’m isolated. So I need other people to do that.” (Mary)

Impeding factors of public schools

Mary identified the following characteristics of her district – which are common to most public schools – as creating obstacles to her vision and progress:

• Teachers are with kids all day every day:  In her district teachers only had one “free” period a day, otherwise they were in classrooms with their students until the end of the official work day leaving no time to work with them on new initiatives; and, preparing for and recovering from having a substitute teacher is a huge task for teachers – so they did not have the time to prepare for, nor reflect on, the innovations undertaken.

• K-12 schools are very slow to change: In K-12 schools there are few accountability measures, especially for tenured teachers and administrators, and this is coupled with a culture of independence with respect to what and how one teaches significantly slows institutionalization of reforms – this creates a systemic problem of consistency that can seriously undermine systemic reform.
• Tenure system does not allow for sufficient flexibility: as tenured teachers are guaranteed employment (barring some major infraction) regardless of their productivity or willingness to meet student needs, many tenured teachers have little incentive to be innovative.
• Teachers’ and administrators’ unions don’t always promote what is good for kids: As a union’s primary function is to look out for its members (i.e., teachers and administrators), fighting for what is best for students and their learning takes a lower priority; as teaching and learning sometimes involves “costs” for teachers and administrators, this can create a tension for those professionals who want to support initiatives but also want to have union support when needed.
• Parents advocate for their own children sometimes at the expense of what is best for all:  while Mary welcomed and recognized the important role of parents’ voices, she was also aware that parents at times can cause roadblocks to worthwhile reform because they do not see – or care sufficiently – beyond what is best for their own child; in contrast, she saw it as her responsibility to work for what is best for all children in the district.

“One of the interesting things about parents, though, is this question of “who are my clients?” Parents would like me to believe that the taxpayers are my clients because they tell me that … But I believe that democracy is my client, and that’s a very different thing. … Parents, and I am one, are selfish about their children and want for their child and do not consider the many. And my job is to consider the many and to consider how to prepare the many to be citizens, and that means critical thinking, that means literacy.” (Mary)

  8.2.7. Concluding thoughts about Mary’s case

We find this case-study inspirational, as it shows that much can be accomplished by entrepreneurial instructional leaders in K-12 public schools, despite the undeniable challenges of the current situation and the many forces conspiring against reform.  Mary showed us how even today it is possible to support school professionals to keep the focus on doing what is “good” for kids, rather than requiring teachers and administrators to do more with less and use high stakes tests as the whip.

Throughout her 18-year career as a school leader at Penfield, Mary engaged in many innovations that, taken together, added considerable value to the organization and the students it serves.  Among the most important and sustainable of her achievements we would like to highlight promoting a learner-centered approach to instruction and a new way of thinking about mathematics instruction, developing a set of curriculum maps for all subjects and grade levels that will guide what is taught in the district for years to come, developing a budget structure and base that could continue to have room to sustain important initiatives in the future, and developing some leaders within the district that could continue to carry on her core values and be change agents.  At the same time, her initiatives sometimes yielded benefits that were more limited in time, and yet were still very valuable for the students who were served during that period of time – for example, this was the case with her differentiated instruction initiative, and some aspects of the mathematics reform (such as the adoption of specific NSF-funded curricula and textbooks at specific grade levels).  As such, we believe that the value of those initiatives should not be dismissed.  Mary herself was very aware that in school reform one has to start with ambitious goals that may take years, sometimes even generations, to fully achieve, and therefore success should be measured in terms of the progress made, rather than whether or not that ultimate goal was achieved.

“I consciously would say to myself at the end of the day “did I move the work forward today?” and if I said “yes” then I could go home and feel satisfied. I never asked if I got the work done, because the answer would have been “no” and it would have been too discouraging.” (Mary)

 Not surprisingly, given the responsibilities and authority associated with the roles of principal and assistant superintendent for instruction she assumed during her career at Penfield, Mary’s major initiatives focused on curricular and pedagogical innovations.  She also made explicit efforts to make her initiatives sustainable over time, to make them part of the “system” and thus affect students in that school or district even beyond her departure – a goal that was achieved in many cases, even if not with every single initiative.  It is also interesting to note that the nature and scope of her initiatives changed significantly with her official role. As a principal she focused her attention on her own school and as the assistant superintendent the district was her context.

Because Mary took on two different leadership roles in the same organization, her case also makes clear how the position held in the organization can greatly affect the entrepreneurial behavior of an educator.  Not only will the scope and nature of the innovations be different, as commented above, but also the role one plays in those innovations changes – as Mary reported that as principal she was directly involved and in charge of the implementation of innovations she initiated, but as ASI in most cases she needed other trusted people to play this key role.  Looking back, Mary stated that being ASI did not give her the “same satisfaction” as being the principal, yet what she accomplished as ASI would “live longer”.  So, there may be important trade-offs for educators to consider when they choose to move to higher administrative positions in the organization in response to their drive to increase their impact and influence.

Mary’s story also illustrates the complexity involved in making systemic changes in curriculum and instruction in public schools.  These innovations involve so many stakeholders and can trigger so many conflicting forces that leading this kind of change will always require someone who had a strong vision and commitment and is also sufficiently thoughtful and political to have the capacity to lead the system and the people involved.  While not easy, Mary’s case demonstrates that it can happen!

8.3. Commentaries on Mary’s case

We are collecting readers’ insights and lessons learned from reading Mary’s case on the companion website, and we invite you to add yours by following the specific guidelines provided in the “Guidelines for Contributions” document.

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