This book offers workable frameworks and theory that school leaders can use to guide their work and engage in critical reflection. Lopez reconceptualises student engagement from an equity and diversity perspective and looks at ways that leaders can be supported on their journey through collaborative mentorship, while bridging the theory to practice gap.

Culturally Responsive School Leadership focuses on how school leaders can effectively serve minoritized students—those who have been historically marginalized in school and society. The book demonstrates how leaders can engage students, parents, teachers, and communities in ways that positively impact learning by honoring indigenous heritages and local cultural practices. Muhammad Khalifa explores three basic premises. First, that a full-fledged and nuanced understanding of “cultural responsiveness” is essential to successful school leadership. Second, that cultural responsiveness will not flourish and succeed in schools without sustained efforts by school leaders to define and promote it. Finally, that culturally responsive school leadership comprises a number of crucial leadership behaviors, which include critical self-reflection; the development of culturally responsive teachers; the promotion of inclusive, anti-oppressive school environments; and engagement with students’ indigenous community contexts. Based on an ethnography of a school principal who exemplifies the practices and behaviors of culturally responsive school leadership, the book provides educators with pedagogy and strategies for immediate implementation.

This powerful third edition offers fresh approaches that enable school leaders to engage in effective interactions with students, educators, and the communities they serve.

The ebook edition of this title is Open Access and freely available to read online. Presenting theoretical pieces and case studies from Malta and Australia alongside applied social theory, Denise Mifsud unravels the conceptual confusion around the terms social justice, equity, and inclusion in relation to schooling.

A bold, brain-based teaching approach to culturally responsive instruction To close the achievement gap, diverse classrooms need a proven framework for optimizing student engagement. Culturally responsive instruction has shown promise, but many teachers have struggled with its implementation—until now. In this book, Zaretta Hammond draws on cutting-edge neuroscience research to offer an innovative approach for designing and implementing brain-compatible culturally responsive instruction. The book includes: Information on how one’s culture programs the brain to process data and affects learning relationships Ten “key moves” to build students’ learner operating systems and prepare them to become independent learners Prompts for action and valuable self-reflection

The roles of school leaders are ever-expanding. Along with the increase comes heightened expectations to create and sustain school environments that embrace the cultures of all students and families. To accomplish this optimally inclusive learning culture and climate, school leaders must possess the acumen to view all aspects of their responsibilities through a culturally responsive lens, hence, culturally responsive leadership. Culturally Responsive Leadership for Social Justice and Academic Equity for All offers a multi-faceted approach to culturally responsive leadership as it connects the concept to the various responsibilities of school leaders. The book also challenges school leaders to see the connective and comprehensive nature of culturally responsive leadership in their daily duties and responsibilities, introduces the concept of culturally responsive leadership and its benefits for all students, and prompts and initiates an educational leadership mindset that seeks to explore the impact of culturally responsive leadership further. Covering key topics such as equity, school culture, and professional development, this premier reference source is ideal for administrators, policymakers, researchers, scholars, academicians, practitioners, instructors, students, preservice teachers, and teacher educators.

This book explores an exciting new critical leadership model arising from critical theory and critical pedagogy traditions, and provides examples of applied critical leadership, ultimately expanding ways to think about current leadership models.

Widely understood to be the best tool of social change, education offers a space to interrogate persistent and damaging oppressions, calling into question the cultural and political antecedents, as well as the current politics and practices, that have facilitated inequity. Educational leaders themselves, however, have much to learn about dismantling systems that maintain these barriers. Diversity Leadership in Education offers a deep look into the complexities and opportunities afforded by new models of diversity leadership. Authors from across North America explore how diverse leaders are key to improving the school experience for marginalized students. Indigenous, Black, racialized, and collaborative forms of leadership contribute to decolonizing educational settings by unsettling hegemonic ideas; these include the dominance of equity myths in educational administration and pedagogical whitewashing around issues germane to social justice. Unpacking privilege in education systems, the volume speaks to incorporating social justice in everyday leadership practices through advocacy, solidarity, spirituality, relationality, and reconciliation. It profiles diversity leadership as a rudder, steering a more inclusive and equitable society.

The field of education has been and will continue to be essential to the survival and sustainability of the Black community. Unfortunately, over the past five decades, two major trends have become clearly evident in the Black community: (a) the decline of the academic achievement levels of Black students and (b) the disappearance of Black teachers, particularly Black males. Today, of the 3.5 million teachers in America’s classrooms (AACTE, 2010) only 8% are Black teachers, and approximately 2% of these teachers are Black males (NCES, 2010). Over the past few decades, the Black teaching force in the U.S. has dropped significantly (Lewis, 2006; Lewis, Bonner, Byrd, & James, 2008; Milner & Howard, 2004), and this educational crisis shows no signs of ending in the near future. As the population of Black students in K-12 schools in the U. S. continue to rise—currently over 16% of students in America’s schools are Black (NCES, 2010)—there is an urgent need to increase the presence of Black educators. The overall purpose of this edited volume is to stimulate thought and discussion among diverse audiences (e.g., policymakers, practitioners, and educational researchers) who are concerned about the performance of Black students in our nation’s schools, and to provide evidence-based strategies to expand our nation’s pool of Black teachers. To this end, it is our hope that this book will contribute to the teacher education literature and will inform the teacher education policy and practice debate.

This open access book explores the transformative experiences of participants in the University of Sydney’s National Centre for Cultural Competence (NCCC) programs. The establishment of the NCCC was viewed as a critical point of departure for developing an institution-wide agenda of cultural competence. The NCCC’s work since its inception reflects efforts to lay important foundations for cultural change at the University. With the ultimate aim of establishing cultural competence as an agent for transformational change and social justice education, the NCCC has steadily expanded its research and teaching work both within and beyond the University of Sydney. Further, it has developed foundational resources to support and encourage University staff to integrate cultural competence philosophy and pedagogy in their curricula, teaching and research. This includes the ability to engage meaningfully with the cultures, histories and contemporary issues in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. The NCCC programs have been designed to encourage participants to learn about who they are and how they can positively impact the transformational change the University has begun. The book presents participants’ reflections on their experiences at the organisational and personal level. Readers will gain insights into a range of topics including cultural competence, communities of practice, policy implementation, and transformative leadership at the interface between higher education and professional lives.