reading 1.7 burford, c. (2002). future catholic school leadership: the search for justice and joy....

Reading 1.7

Burford, C. (2002). Future Catholic school leadership: the search for justice and joy. Paper presented at the APCSSA National conference,

Coolangatta, Queensland, October 3.

Reading 1.7 – Burford, C. (2002)

• To challenge students, staff and parents to personally meet the challenges in their life be it academic endeavour, personal commitment, justice perspective or moral behaviour can be confronting, threatening and personally, professionally and politically dangerous, yet this is the stuff of visionary, transforming and optimistic leadership for teachers and administrators. (pp 26/27)


• Burford’s position on the future views teaching and learning as relationships (p.29)

• They need to be formed around our ethical perspectives (p.29)

• His challenge is for us to be “ethically fit” leaders, committed bonders and models of beliefs and values for children in a context that is about tolerance, understanding and joy (p.29) and to create and maintain ethical, authentic, relevant and joyful relationships within a learning community (p.2)


• Just and joyful relationships are complex especially when mentioned in the same context as authority, accountability, responsibility, authenticity, efficiency and effectiveness (p.2)

• Calls for us to move from society to community, from secular to sacred if real learning is to occur (pp 2, 18, 24/25) –cites Sergiovanni, Starratt


• Life in schools is full of confusing paradoxes which lead many of us retreat into established practices valued for their capacity to answer the needs of the past (p. 3)

“In times of change learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beutifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists” Hoffer, 1995 (cited on p.3)


• These calls have been around since at least the 1960s (Postman and Weingartner, 1969, cited p.4)

• Postman (1996) Ellyard (1998) and Beare (2001) assert that the need for a pedagogy for meaning making seem surprisingly similar still in the early part of the new millennium after 30 years of avoidance (p.4)


• Leaders of learning will need to be reflective, risk-taking, collaborative, purposed, meaningful, autonomous, proactive, empathetic, intuitive, creative, transforming, politically skilled, networking and mature (p.5)

• These qualities will rest in relationships, which will only develop around people who are in themselves genuine in their beliefs and values


• Praises Tasmanian Essential Learnings document (2002) and Catholic Education SA (2002) for adhering to these values (pp 4/5, 7)

• Elsewhere (but worst of all in NSW in 2002) real learning for meaning remains on our educational wish list submerged in the educational politics of disciplinary based learning and outcomes based assessment (p. 6)


• EDUCATION IS NOT LIKE BUSINESS!!!• The type of relationship required within a

helping organisation differs from that of a corporate or bureaucratic organisation

• Educational communities are essentially about helping people grow and learn to live (p.8 – lists appropriate characteristics on pp 8/9)


• If people are going to take risks and challenge their existing practices they will need to be in a culture of trust, support and integrity (p.9).

• Lists a number of elements of pedagogy for real learning that could be incorporated into any framework, school or classroom (p.10)


• Coins the phrase “ethical coupling” to describe the phenomenon of professionalism occurring almost in isolation from, and in spite of, the administration of the organisation (p.11)

• The challenge for the educational leader is to nurture the “ethical coupling” of followers to each other, to their profession of teaching, and to the purposes of educational communities (p.12)


• It is the stuff of the radical new movement to put morality, spirituality and ethics and the heart back onto the educational stage. (p.14)

• Says this is like the old IQ of traditional models, versus the EQ of the emotional intelligence models (p. 14)

• These concepts of ethical and moral confidence and emotional intelligance are embedded in the ethical, caring school model which must be at the core of all learning (p.14)


• Asserts that life in all schools functions across four areas of relationships:– Community– Teaching and Learning– System, and– Resources


• The answer to just and joyful leadership lies in ethics and moral conscience (p.15) – our challenge is to decide what is good for our children and our communities (p.15)

• A good litmus test:– “What would the person/s that I respect the most

think about my action on this decision and am I willing for this decision t be universally known? (p.16)


• We need learning and faith communities that are populated by adults who are ethical as well as caring, optimistic, enthusiastic, honest, friendly, with a sense of humour and fun (p.16)

• A school community committed to an ethic of caring will be grounded in the belief that the integrity of human relationships should be held sacred, and that the school as an organisation should hold the good of human beings within it as sacred.” (Starratt, cited on p.18)


• cites Starratt (p.25) “the need for our vision of justice to be implanted in the structures of the school”

• The justice call will continue to be our major challenge in living in educational communities (p. 26)

• We can hardly expect anyone to follow us or create high expectations or institutionalise values and beliefs if we have difficulty in critiquing practice central to our beliefs and communicating confidence and optimism about our purposes and positions (p.26)

• The ethical option is to challenge and change the unacceptable (p.27)


• We can hardly expect anyone to follow us or create high expectations or institutionalise values and beliefs if we have difficulty in critiquing practice central to our beliefs and communicating confidence and optimism about our purposes and positions (p.26)

• The ethical option is to challenge and change the unacceptable (p.27)

reading 1.7 burford, c. (2002). future catholic school leadership: the search for justice and joy....

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