A diffusion approach to study leadership reform
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/09578231111146452 |
| Pages | 354-377 |
| Date | 05 July 2011 |
| Published date | 05 July 2011 |
| Author | Curt M. Adams,Gaetane Jean‐Marie |
| Subject Matter | Education |
A diffusion approach to study
leadership reform
Curt M. Adams and Gaetane Jean-Marie
Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, University of Oklahoma, Tulsa,
Oklahoma, USA
Abstract
Purpose – This study aims to draw on elements of diffusion theory to understand leadership reform.
Many diffusion studies examine the spread of an innovation across social units but the objective is to
examine diffusion of a collective leadership model within school units. Specifically, the strength of
reform diffusion is tested to account for differences in instructional capacity and to explain the spread
of leadership reform within Title I elementary schools.
Design/methodology/approach – A mixed method designwas used to understandhow social factors
facilitated the diffusion of leadership reform, and to test for a diffusion effect. Qualitative data were
derived from interviews, field notes, observations, and documents using a grounded theory approach.
Open and axial coding techniques were used to develop coherent categories of major and minor themes.
Quantitative data were hierarchical, with teachers and students nested in schools. A random-intercepts,
means-as-outcomes model was used to test for a diffusion effect on instructional capacity.
Findings – Strong principal leadership, a commitment to collective responsibility and shared
influence, frequent and open communication, and time to build capacity were conditions that
supported diffusion of the leadership model. Diffusion of the leadership model mattered for
instructional capacity. Each indicator of instructional capacity was more prevalent in schools that had
diffused the leadership model to the mentoring and sustaining stages.
Research limitations/implications – The study is limited to one type of reform and 36 Title I
elementary schools from an urban and urban fringe district in a Southwestern state. Further, the study
does not delve deeply into facilitative factors within various stages of the diffusion processes. It
focuses on social factors that enable schools to bring the leadership reform to scale.
Practical implications – Framing reform as an intervention to be implemented in schools, rather
than a social process that institutionalizes planned change, trivializes the actual complexity of
transforming practice. Regular interactions among school members around the school’s vision,
coupled with leadership and time, contributed to reform diffusion and improved instructional capacity
in this study. Reform diffusion, a process that takes time, strong leadership, and regular social
interactions, needs to be given more consideration as a valuable process to improve school
performance.
Social implications – The findings suggest that facilitative factors of diffusion can advance reform
and improve capacity simultaneously. Successful reforms, defined as ones that disrupt traditional
cultures and achieve goals, evolve through developmental stages that eventually lead to a changed
culture. The rate of this evolution may vary, but the temporal process of establishing a shared
understanding; designing, experimenting, and developing new tools; fostering expertise; and forming
strong social networks are foundational supports for authentic and sustainable reform.
Originality/value – Reform diffusion offers an alternative framework to better understand the
institutionalization of planned change in schools. The findings, while limited to elementary schools
engaged in leadership reform, provide support for studying reform as an holistic social process that
encompasses the design, adoption, implementation, and institutionalization of planned change.
Keywords Diffusion theory,Leadership reform, Change management, Performance management,
United States of America
Paper type Research paper
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0957-8234.htm
JEA
49,4
354
Received June 2010
Revised November 2010
Accepted December 2010
Journal of Educational
Administration
Vol. 49 No. 4, 2011
pp. 354-377
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0957-8234
DOI 10.1108/09578231111146452
The unprecedented investment in externally designed reforms has not significantly
altered the achievement landscape. To be fair, schools, districts, and states have
improved performance over the years, but reform policies and external interventions in
general have failed to achieve the systemic turnaround that proponents claimed they
would (Dee and Jacob, 2009). We believe the narrow conceptualization of school reform
is a reason why many improvement efforts, even well designed initiatives, wither
before practices change and performance improves. In spite of what language in policy
debates may suggest about reforming schools, school reform is not as simple as
passing improvement legislation or adopting an external intervention. Rather, reform
manifests overtime as collective commitment and purposive action advance planned
change from its initiation to its institutionalization (Datnow and Stringfield, 2000;
Fullan, 2005; Hall and Hord, 1987; Sarason, 1996).
Institutionalization of reform remains an elusive outcome for many schools, and
increased pressure for swift performance turnarounds and a burgeoning marketplace
of external interventions perpetuate the myth that improvement depends on products
instead of social conditions that maximize performance. Even policies and
interventions supported with extensive empirical evidence are only as effective as
their implementation (Gross et al., 2009; Stein et al., 2008). The implementation effect is
so strong that Honig (2009) argues questions about what works should be replaced
with what works for whom, when, where, and why. Quite simply, large-scale reform
will continue to elude school leaders if factors contributing to the successful spread of
planned change are not understood.
In this study, we draw on elements of diffusion theory to understand leadership
reform. Many diffusion studies examine the spread of an innovation across social units
(see Mintrom, 1997; Mintrom and Vergari, 1998; Katz et al., 1963; Rogers, 2003), but our
objective was to examine diffusion of a collective leadership model within school units.
Specifically, we tested the strength of reform diffusion to account for differences in
instructional capacity and to explain the spread of leadership reform within Title I
elementary schools. Two research questions guided the study:
RQ1. Does diffusion of a collective leadership model make a difference in
instructional capacity?
RQ2. What elements of the school social system contributed to reform diffusion?
Before delineating the theoretical properties of diffusion, we describe the leadership
model examined for this research and define instructional capacity.
Cross-boundary leadership and instructional capacity
Collective leadership is defined by the degree to which control of teaching and learning
is based on collective responsibility and shared influence among school role groups.
The collective leadership model in this study is called cross-boundary leadership.
Leaders in the middle, leaders on the ground, and community leaders define the three
interdependent role groups that the model aims to unite (Blank et al., 2006). At the
school level, leaders in the middle are site administrators: individuals responsible for
coordinating teaching and learning and who possess formal power and authority
through their position (Parsons, 1964). Leaders on the ground are teachers, counselors,
support staff, and parents: individuals with informal power and intimate knowledge of
the school context and teaching and learning needs. Community leaders have
A diffusion
approach
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