Getting accountability right within a systems approach to school reform by Mavis Sanders

My February 2014 AJE article, “Principal Leadership for School, Family, and Community Partnerships,” raises questions about accountability in reforming districts and schools. Specifically, what is the optimal balance of district-level supports and accountability needed to maximize the buy-in of key school actors such as principals? What are the effects of different district-level accountability strategies on school actors’ responses to external reforms? These are not trivial questions because schools are likely to remain theaters of reform into the foreseeable future. If these reforms are to effect any lasting and consequential change, district and school leaders must work collaboratively. Therefore, figuring out the balance of carrots and sticks that can elicit such collaboration is a worthwhile effort.

The specific reform highlighted in my study was developed by researchers at the National Network of Partnership Schools (NNPS). NNPS was established in 1996 to assist schools, districts, and states in developing partnership programs that acknowledge the importance of and facilitate family and community engagement in the learning process. Three core principles characterize the NNPS reform. The first is a broad definition of family and community engagement based on Joyce Epstein’s framework of six types of involvement: 1) parenting, 2) communicating, 3) volunteering, 4) learning at home, 5) decision making, and 6) collaborating with the community (Epstein, 2011). The second is a team approach to partnership program design and implementation. The third principle is a goal-focused approach to school, family, and community partnerships to achieve measurable academic and behavioral outcomes for students. NNPS encourages a systems approach to school, family, and community partnerships, promoting simultaneous state, district, and school membership with specified activities and responsibilities for each level (See: www.partnershipschools.org).

I found that in the focal districts – one urban and one suburban, a systems approach led to dedicated district staff being identified to provide the professional development, resources, and supports needed for school-based teams to plan, implement and evaluate the NNPS framework for partnerships. This infrastructure provided principals with opportunities to build the relationships vital to school, family, and community partnerships, as well as to observe and experience the benefits associated with them. In fact, principals’ understanding of how the NNPS framework for partnerships could help them to achieve important goals for school improvement and students’ learning was closely linked to their buy-in over time.

However, despite district coordinators’ best efforts, buy-in was not forthcoming among some principals, especially authoritarian principals who were entrenched in a protective or school-to-home transmission model of family involvement. As Susan Swap described twenty years ago, when working from a protective model principals view home and school responsibilities as separate and actively limit most home-school interaction (Swap, 1993). Principals working from a school-to-home transmission model determine when and how home-school interaction occurs with little or no input from students, or their families and communities.

In the suburban district, accountability through formal principal evaluations encouraged these principals to leave the district or take “seriously” its expectations for school, family, and community partnerships. At the close of the study, NNPS coordinators in the urban district were working to have partnerships included in principals’ formal evaluations as well. Thus, a systems approach to reform implementation may be most effective when district reform leaders are equipped with carrots and sticks to, at once, encourage principal buy-in and hold principals accountable for their professional choices and actions.

However, within current conversations about education reform, accountability has become an issue of contention. In public education, accountability is increasingly associated with punitive measures tied to narrowly defined outcomes such as standardized test scores. Critics, such as Gert Biesta, argue that the managerial tone that accountability in education has taken has eroded “relationships of responsibility” that are essential for effective schooling (Biesta, 2004). They call for a new more democratic approach to accountability. For example, Michael Fullan (2011) has called for intelligent accountability, which:

1. Relies on incentives more than on punishment;

2. Invests in capacity building so that people are able to meet the goals;

3. Invests in collective (peer) responsibility—what is called “internal accountability”;

4. Intervenes initially in a nonjudgmental manner;

5. Embraces transparent data about practice and results; and

6. Intervenes more decisively along the way when required.

This suggests that, as in the case districts, efforts should be made to create relational cultures within organizations so that democratic or intelligent accountability can be normalized.

Yet, embedded in this more democratic approach to accountability is the presence or promise of “decisive action”. This suggests that, as in the case districts, efforts should be made to create relational cultures within organizations so that democratic or intelligent accountability can be normalized. However, a punitive element must also exist within such accountability frameworks to ensure that organizational norms are respected and goals are met.  Research examining how effective leaders leverage incentives and penalties in our schools, districts, and state offices of education, then, is critical for a deeper understanding of how accountability can be a constructive force for meaningful education reform.

References

Biesta, Gert. 2004. “Education, Accountability, and the Ethical Demand: Can the Democratic Potential of Accountability Be Regained?” Educational Theory 54 (3): 233– 50.

Epstein, Joyce. 2011. School, Family, and Community Partnerships: Preparing Educators and Improving Schools. 2nd ed. Boulder, CO: Westview.

Fullan, Michael. 2010. All Systems Go: The Change Imperative for Whole System Reform. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

Swap, Susan. 1993. Developing Home-School Partnerships: From Concepts to Practice. New York: Teachers College Press.

MAVIS G. SANDERS is professor of education and affiliate professor in the Language, Literacy, and Culture doctoral program at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Her research focuses on the processes and outcomes of school, family, and community collaboration; education leadership; school reform; and African American student achievement.