Chen Schechter - Böcker

Leading Holistically explores systems thinking in educational leadership—a comprehensive framework that enables leaders to improve their practice by taking a holistic perspective, instead of relying on a one-size-fits-all solution to discrete aspects of their organization. Aiming to expand the existing literature on systems thinking in educational leadership and policy, renowned educational leadership scholars come together in this valuable book to examine systems thinking at the school, district, and state/national levels, providing strategies to guide educators toward success. This important book unpacks the complexity and nuances of systems thinking in educational leadership and policy, helping educators face the growing complexity, change, and diversity in education to realize the promise of improvement for all those connected to and involved in the important endeavor of education.

Leading Holistically explores systems thinking in educational leadership—a comprehensive framework that enables leaders to improve their practice by taking a holistic perspective, instead of relying on a one-size-fits-all solution to discrete aspects of their organization. Aiming to expand the existing literature on systems thinking in educational leadership and policy, renowned educational leadership scholars come together in this valuable book to examine systems thinking at the school, district, and state/national levels, providing strategies to guide educators toward success. This important book unpacks the complexity and nuances of systems thinking in educational leadership and policy, helping educators face the growing complexity, change, and diversity in education to realize the promise of improvement for all those connected to and involved in the important endeavor of education.

This book explores a range of issues related to minority educational leaders' role in their society, in particular those working in a divided society under conflict.The political and cultural challenges faced by minorities in divided societies raise the specific and important need to study leadership from a new perspective, based on the leaders' role in their society and community, and on their role in leveraging their school toward integration in their society while staying aligned with environmental changes.The authors present a new theoretical framework of "leadership for society" with practical implications for effective leadership in complex societies. The book also develops our understanding of minority education in the reality of conflicts between the state and the minority's identity. The authors believe that school leaders’ participation in the extended community will improve and affect the development of schools and enable leaders to negotiate cultural, social and political complexities.

This book explores a range of issues related to minority educational leaders' role in their society, in particular those working in a divided society under conflict.The political and cultural challenges faced by minorities in divided societies raise the specific and important need to study leadership from a new perspective, based on the leaders' role in their society and community, and on their role in leveraging their school toward integration in their society while staying aligned with environmental changes.The authors present a new theoretical framework of "leadership for society" with practical implications for effective leadership in complex societies. The book also develops our understanding of minority education in the reality of conflicts between the state and the minority's identity. The authors believe that school leaders’ participation in the extended community will improve and affect the development of schools and enable leaders to negotiate cultural, social and political complexities.

This book traces the policymaking processes of the Review of Funding for Schooling (2011), which fundamentally changed school funding policy in Australia. School funding is a key element of any equitable school system. This is because the distribution of government funding for schooling leads to significant differences in the educational opportunities available for individual students, schools, and communities. The book shows that although education policy is often thought about as an abstract process, it is a series of small critical moments that create the policy and progress implementation towards or away from equity in school funding. Sinclair offers a new theory for understanding and then impacting in real-time the policymaking process towards equity in school funding, the “critical moments theory”. In doing so, he identifies where education leaders, teachers, policymakers, scholars, and community members all have the agency to influence policy from conceptualisation to implementation.

This book traces the policymaking processes of the Review of Funding for Schooling (2011), which fundamentally changed school funding policy in Australia. School funding is a key element of any equitable school system. This is because the distribution of government funding for schooling leads to significant differences in the educational opportunities available for individual students, schools, and communities. The book shows that although education policy is often thought about as an abstract process, it is a series of small critical moments that create the policy and progress implementation towards or away from equity in school funding. Sinclair offers a new theory for understanding and then impacting in real-time the policymaking process towards equity in school funding, the “critical moments theory”. In doing so, he identifies where education leaders, teachers, policymakers, scholars, and community members all have the agency to influence policy from conceptualisation to implementation.

Leverage Professional Wisdom with Asset-Based Professional Learning  Many professional learning designs are built on the assumption that we learn best by studying our failures. However, learning from failure often evokes responses of denial, avoidance and the same defensive dynamics that contributed to the failure in the first place. Schechter’s resource, presents the Collective Learning-from-Success approach. This fresh, new, assets-based framework will shift educators’ minds from focusing in isolation on failure to continuously deliberating together, sharing past experiences and best practices, and solving problems related to teaching and learning. Whether you serve as a teacher, school or district leader, or a policy maker, your professional growth will benefit by reflecting on actionable knowledge through collective inquiry.  This book offers educators an opportunity to come together in forming a productive alternative to the learning from failure paradigm. The Collective Wisdom of Practice provides a model for how to learn from successes by providing • An assets-based approach to designing and implementing professional learning • Strategies to focus on learning from educators’ past successes • Multinational case studies, sample learning materials, templates, and tools • A framework that can be applied to multiple levels, such as grade and subject areas, building level, system level, and  policy level Grounded in more than 20 years of extensive research in the US and internationally, this approach will have a powerful influence on professional learning. Learn to nurture your wisdom of practice to meet the challenge of preparing students to be co-creators of society. 

School leadership is a complex and challenging profession, with principals working in technological, dynamic and uncertain environments. They often experience resistance to their activities and challenge to their authority which can lead to considerable mental and emotional stress. This was never more apparent than during the COVID-19 pandemic, when many school principals faced unprecedented uncertainty and challenges.Schechter and Halevi answer questions such as what promotes the development of resilience among school principals? What hinders it? What are the characteristics and practices of school principals’ resilience? They go on to explore how school principals with high levels of resilience are more able to recover from times of stress and crisis than those with lower levels of resilience, examining the characteristics and practices of resilience used by school principals. Resilient Leadership serves as a basis for new and renewed thinking regarding school resilience dimensions in training, mentoring, and professional development, and is essential reading for academics, researchers, students, school leaders and policymakers in educational leadership.

This book presents a new approach to school leadership – Holistic School Leadership, whereby school leaders lead schools through systems-thinking concepts and procedures.