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1. Developing the next generation of black and global majority leaders for London schools.......................... 1

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Developing the next generation of black and global majority leaders for London schools Johnson, Lauri; Campbell-Stephens, Rosemary . Journal of Educational Administration ; Armidale 51.1

(2013): 24-39.

ProQuest document link ABSTRACT

Purpose - The aim of this paper is to discuss the views of black and ethnic minority school leaders about the

Investing in Diversity program, a black-led program developed in 2004 to address the underrepresentation of black

leaders in the London schools. Major themes are identified from interviews with black and South Asian women

graduates of the program and recommendations made for leadership development strategies to help aspiring and

current black and global majority headteachers "bring who they are" to their leadership.

Design/methodology/approach - Qualitative case study data about the Investing in Diversity program include

document analysis of curriculum modules and participant observation of the weekend residential, survey

satisfaction data from several cohorts, and face-to-face interviews with a purposive sample of seven headteachers

from African Caribbean, African, and South Asian backgrounds who completed the Investing in Diversity program

six-seven years ago. These semi-structured individual interviews were conducted in the spring of 2012 during an

all-day visit to their schools and focused on barriers and supports in their career path, approach to leadership, and

their views on their leadership preparation. Findings - Participants identified black and ethnic minority

headteachers as role models, the importance of mentoring and informal networks, and opportunities to lead as

supports to their career path to headship. Many of their long-term informal networks were established with other

BME colleagues who attended Investing in Diversity. Barriers included subtle (and not so subtle) discrimination

from parents, teachers, and administrators for some of the participants. Research limitations/implications -

Observational studies and interview studies, which included a bigger sample of black and ethnic minority

headteachers, would extend this research. Practical implications - This study provides suggestions for schools and

local authorities about leadership preparation strategies that make a difference for aspiring BME leaders.

Originality/value - There is a paucity of research on the views of British BME headteachers. This study adds to the

research base on BME leadership development in Britain and contributes to international research on self-defined

black leadership perspectives. FULL TEXT

Educational leadership development in international contexts

Edited by Stephen Jacobson and Lauri Johnson

With a population of over eight million, London is the largest city in Europe and has emerged in the twenty-first

century as a global city of unprecedented diversity ([19] Hill, 2012). Migration to the UK is at record levels ([42]

Travis, 2012). More than 300 home languages are spoken in the London schools and 67 percent of secondary

school students are students of color ([2] BBC News, 2011). From the first immigrants who came from the

Caribbean in the late 1940s, Britain's black population has grown to 3.5 percent of the total British population and

11 percent of the London population. The black population in the schools is higher, with over 17 percent of the

students in the inner London schools of African origin and 11 percent of Caribbean background. British Asians of

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Indian, Pakistani, and Bangladeshi descent represent 13 percent of the London population. Some inner London

boroughs like Newham and Tower Hamlets are over 30 percent Asian ([36] Rogers, 2011a).

London is also a city of vast disparities between the rich and the poor and a continuing racial and ethnic

achievement gap. The achievement of African Caribbean, racially mixed children (white and black Caribbean),

Pakistani, and traveller/Roma students fall in the bottom quartile of that gap ([13] Department for Education,

2012). Young black males have been particularly affected by these disparities. The London Development Agency

has described the situation facing African Caribbean boys in the London educational system as "catastrophic"

([23] London Development Agency, 2004). In the face of the recent recession long-term youth unemployment in

Britain is the highest in a generation, with the unemployment rate for young black men at 55.9 percent ([1] Ball,

2012).

Despite the growing diversity in London schools, black and minority ethnic (BME)[1] teachers are greatly

underrepresented and the city has the largest gap (37 percent in inner London and 24 percent in outer London)

between the proportion of pupils and the proportion of teachers from a minority ethnic group ([15] Department for

Education and Skills, 2006). The latest Department for Education's School Workforce Census indicates that while

BME teachers have increased from 3.8 percent in 2004 to 5.4 percent in 2010, only 2.4 percent of headteachers are

from a BME background ([12] Department for Education, 2011). Government statistics show that BME teachers are

much less likely to be promoted to leadership positions than white teachers ([34] Powney et al. , 2003). Black male

headteachers in England's 21,600 state schools number just 30, a fact which has led both university researchers

and community leaders to characterize the lack of black and other educators of color in leadership positions in

Britain as institutional racism ([40] Shepard, 2011; [5] Bush, 2011).

Research on BME headteachers in Britain

In Britain the literature about school leaders of color has focussed on documenting the shortage of BME educators

and their failure to progress into senior leadership positions[2] . Recent studies commissioned by the National

College for School Leadership have documented the discrimination that BME educators face as they attempt to

move into leadership positions. [6] Bush et al. (2006), in their survey of 64 BME leaders in state schools, note that

key barriers to promotion include: BME teachers tend to assume leadership positions at an older age than white

teachers; they experience difficulties if they have been educated or taught outside Britain; and they reported

examples of racism, particularly in predominately white schools, from senior managers, middle leaders, local

education authorities, parents, and governors. In a 2009 study of 556 state school teachers of ethnic minority

background conducted by National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT) and the

National College, 44 percent of the teachers surveyed said they had suffered discrimination because of their

ethnicity and 70 percent said it was harder for ethnic minority teachers to become headteachers than it was for

white teachers ([29] NASUWT and National College, 2009).

Recent efforts to diversify school leadership in Britain is often tied to succession planning as impending

retirements, along with perceptions of the difficulty of the job and a long apprenticeship (often 20 years as

teachers and deputy heads) has led to a shortage of headteachers just as British schools are becoming

increasingly racially and culturally diverse. In the National College for School Leadership's[3] campaign on

succession planning, [5] Bush (2011) notes that "the diversity aspect has been the least successful" and that

discourse about the need for more BME leaders is nonexistent or marginalized in many local educational

authorities (p. 191).

[24] Lumby (2006) argues there has been little discussion about social justice-oriented leadership development in

England because transformational and distributed leadership approaches tend to dominate and homogenize the

field. In particular, there is a paucity of research that examines the leadership philosophies and practices of black

headteachers and other school leaders of color, how they respond to their unique cultural contexts, and leadership

preparation programs that might help nurture and support their self-defined perspectives on leadership.

This colorblind approach ([27] Mabokela and Madsen, 2005) to leadership preparation, where leadership theories,

practices, and curriculum are viewed as neutral and free of cultural perspectives and beliefs, characterizes aspiring

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school leaders as a homogeneous group "where what they do matters more than who they are" ([26] Lumby and

Morrison, 2010, p. 5). This approach to school leadership extends beyond Britain to other national contexts as well.

In a recent comparative study between a racially diverse English and South African school, [25] Lumby and

Heystek (2012) found that white leaders at both schools ignored issues of race and that recent dramatic

demographic changes appeared to have little impact on how the leaders viewed themselves and exclusionary

practices in their schools. The authors conclude that leadership development programs should encourage aspiring

leaders to reflect on their identities.

The current study

This paper considers leadership development strategies that will support aspiring and current black and global

majority[4] school leaders to "bring who they are" to their leadership and respond to the unique contexts in which

they lead. In particular, we describe the curriculum and evaluation responses to Investing in Diversity, a black-led

leadership development program developed in 2004 to address the underrepresentation of black middle level and

senior leaders in the London schools ([21] Johnson and Campbell-Stephens, 2010). We then identify key themes

that emerged in individual interviews with seven black and global majority school leaders who have assumed

headship in London since participating in the Investing in Diversity program. The paper concludes by providing

recommendations for leadership development strategies that might support future aspiring BME leaders as they

attempt to move into headteacher positions.

Methodology and data sources

An initial qualitative case study ([28] Merriam, 2009) of the Investing in Diversity program was conducted over a

two-year period (2008-2010) by the first author. Data sources for this case study included archival data about

changing demographics in London; class handouts and written instructional materials from the program; a

summary of survey responses from over 100 former Investing in Diversity participants (see [9], [10] Coleman and

Campbell-Stephens, 2009, 2010); field notes collected during participant observations of an Investing in Diversity

residential weekend seminar; and in-depth interviews with four lead instructors in the program about the

conceptions of leadership promoted in the program ([21] Johnson and Campbell-Stephens, 2010). This paper

summarizes and extends those findings through interviews with Investing in Diversity graduates who have been in

post as a headteacher in London for the last two to five years. Potential participants were recruited by e-mail.

Seven headteachers who agreed to participate were interviewed by the first author, a white American researcher,

during an all-day visit to each of their schools conducted between March and May, 2012. These qualitative semi-

structured interviews, which lasted an average of one and a half to two hours, focussed on barriers and supports in

participants' career paths, their approach to leadership, and their views on their leadership preparation.

Interviews were audiotaped and transcribed by the first author. These transcriptions served as the primary basis

for data analysis. Initially open coding techniques were used to analyze the data. As [41] Strauss and Corbin (1990)

note, open coding "pertains specifically to naming and categorizing of phenomena through close examination of

data" (p. 62). Once preliminary codes were derived from individual interviews, application, and analysis of these

codes across participant transcripts continued through a constant comparative approach in order to develop

larger themes from the data ([17] Glaser and Strauss, 2006). To provide multiple perspectives on the data, slices of

interview data as well as emerging themes were analyzed and discussed with the second author, a former British

headteacher of African Caribbean background who developed the Investing in Diversity program.

The Investing in Diversity program

Investing in Diversity was developed in March 2004 as a "bespoke" (custom made) leadership development

program for black and global majority educators with the express purpose to change the "face and heart of

leadership" in London ([7] Campbell-Stephens, 2009, p. 322). Sponsored by the London Centre for Leadership in

Learning at the University of London, funding was originally provided through the London Challenge (later termed

City Challenge), which was designed to improve educational outcomes for students in urban contexts. Investing in

Diversity's stated philosophy encouraged black and global majority educators to embrace the "additionality" they

bring to their leadership ([7] Campbell-Stephens, 2009).

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Participants

About a thousand London teachers completed the Investing in Diversity program from 2004 to 2010. Based on the

most complete demographic data available, participants were predominately women (71 percent) and black (69

percent), from an African Caribbean (36 percent), African (24 percent), or black British (9 percent) background.

However, south Asians (of Indian, Pakistani, or Bangladeshi background) were also recruited and made up another

20 percent of the participants. The remaining 11 percent of program participants were racially mixed (black white

or Asian white). In general, participants who attended the Investing program were teachers who were applying for

their first leadership position as middle-level leaders, although there were some assistant and deputy

headteachers who also participated. While program participants came from all 33 local authorities in the greater

London area, many were from neighborhoods that enrolled high percentages of black and south Asian students

such as Waltham Forest, Tower Hamlets, and Newham ([22] London Centre for Leadership in Learning, 2007).

The program curriculum

The Investing in Diversity program was organized over a 12-month period, beginning with a residential weekend

and followed by ten after school or "twilight" sessions and a whole-day seminar at the end of the year. Every

residential weekend began with a keynote address presented by Professor Gus John, the first black Director of

Education in the country, and a longtime African Caribbean community activist who has been at the forefront of

equal rights and racial politics in Britain for more than 30 years ([20] John, 2006). During the weekend residential

participants engaged in consciousness-raising activities that challenged participants to explore what black

educators bring to leadership. They also participated in a small group management simulation where they

analyzed real-life case studies drawn from the instructors' experiences as headteachers in urban schools.

Participants received structured group feedback on their work as a team after this simulation and individual one-

to-one feedback on emerging leadership skills.

The concept of moral purpose was introduced during the weekend residential and then taken up in the first twilight

session. Participants were asked to reflect on their moral purpose because "your moral purpose (or lack of it),

speaks directly to who you are and what you stand for as an educator" ([33] Portelli and Campbell-Stephens, 2009,

p. 16). Some of the other twilight sessions throughout the school year included data analysis, finance, leading

teams, leading innovation in learning, and school improvement. In these modules participants were encouraged to

question how specific policies and practices might affect groups of students who have traditionally been failed by

the British education system. For instance, the module on the racial achievement gap critiqued the government's

contextual value-added measures (CVA)[5] , which were built on the premise that academic progress for racially

and ethnically diverse groups will innately be slower than those of their peers.

Instructors

All of the instructors or master tutors in the Investing in Diversity program were leaders of African Caribbean,

African or south Asian descent, mainly senior school leaders but also professionals from business and other

sectors such as the criminal justice system. Instructors were selected for both their expertise in the subject area

they taught as well as their consciousness about diversity issues. They were encouraged to bring their

perspectives and lived experiences as black and global majority leaders to the classroom. By hiring lead

instructors from a variety of school settings and political perspectives, "the intention was to create an

intellectual/practitioner space for aspiring black leaders to discover, define, and refine their craft" ([7] Campbell-

Stephens, 2009, p. 323). Lead instructors such as Ivy Brathwaite[6] , who is a high profile headteacher in a large

North London primary school, had already developed a city-wide reputation for mentoring BME colleagues through

the National Professional Qualification for Headship (NPQH)[7] and were actively involved in recruiting participants

to the program.

Evaluations

Over a six-year period each Investing in Diversity cohort completed evaluation surveys at the conclusion of their

program administered by staff from the London Centre for Leadership in Learning (Institute of Education,

University of London). The program consistently received high rates of satisfaction from participants with an

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average of 85-90 percent of respondents expressing they were highly satisfied with the course and 96 percent of

participants describing the residential weekend as "excellent" ([22] London Leadership for Learning, 2007).

In 2007 an electronic questionnaire sent to 250 teachers who had completed the program yielded a 58 percent

response rate (146 participants). Follow-up telephone interviews were conducted with ten participants. This survey

assessed the program's effect on improving self-confidence, clarifying areas for professional development, and

identifying patterns of promotion of program graduates. Survey results indicated that over 90 percent of

participants said the Investing in Diversity program was helpful (25 percent) or very helpful (68 percent) in

boosting their self-confidence. Nearly all respondents (96 percent) said the program was helpful or very helpful in

clarifying areas of professional development, and 64 percent of participants said that Investing had encouraged

them to participate in other forms of career development or leadership development programs. Almost two-thirds

of the responding participants (92 participants) indicated they had applied for promotion since completing the

program, and two-thirds of those reported they were successful (60 participants).

Perhaps most revealing were the open-ended comments on the surveys. An analysis of these comments in

Investing in Diversity's impact report indicated that participants felt they had been exposed to positive and

inspirational black and global majority role models; benefited from the networking with other colleagues; were

more likely to challenge the status quo in their school around issues like the achievement gap; and felt empowered

to "make a stand to be taken seriously" ([22] London Centre for Leadership in Learning, 2007). While no large scale

evaluation has been completed on the Investing program, recent interviews conducted with seven current

headteachers who participated in the program in 2004 and 2005 extend the survey results and provide a

longitudinal view of the influence of leadership development on black and global majority headteachers' personal

and professional lives.

Portraits of Investing in Diversity headteachers

[38] Shah (2010) argues that educational leadership concepts, theories, and practices evolve in context, informed

by culture, and belief systems. The cultural context of the seven headteachers interviewed for this study involved

their own (or their parents) immigration to Britain from the Caribbean, Africa, or the Indian subcontinent, high

expectations for the students and staff in their schools, and a sense of responsibility to provide opportunities for

leadership development and "give back" to their respective neighborhoods and ethnic communities. Their schools,

six primary and one secondary, are located in seven different boroughs which span the four quadrants of greater

London. These schools include high-immigrant populations, high percentages of children with English as an

additional language (EAL), and a high-poverty index in six of the seven schools as measured by the percentage of

children who receive free school meals (FSM). Six of the seven schools were struggling academically when these

BME leaders assumed headship, and two were failing and had been placed under "special measures" by Office of

Standards in Education, Children's Services, and Skills (OFSTED)[8] . Brief profiles of the seven interviewees and

their paths to headship are described below.

Divya Singh is in her fifth year as headteacher of a secondary school in Hounslow, West London in the

neighborhood where she grew up as a child. Her parents immigrated from India in 1953 and Divya notes she was

the "only Black child in her primary school in the 1960s[9] ." The secondary school where she serves as

headteacher is now a prime destination for economic immigrants, including Afghani, Polish, Nepali, Pakistani, and

Somali students as well as second and third generation students of Indian origin. Over 50 languages are spoken in

the school.

Divya served as a Deputy Head at a school in Newham that was in special measures before she assumed the

headship at her current school. Although student results in Maths and English were low at the school when she

arrived, in their latest OFSTED inspection in Fall 2011 the school obtained a "good" rating for the first time in its

history.

Frances Williams is the headteacher of a small working class Church of England school in Southwark, South

London with a student population who are African (from Nigeria, Ghana, and Sierra Leone), African Caribbean, and

white British. She grew up 5 minutes from the school, and spent her entire teaching career (14 years) at a nearby

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state school where she coordinated three different subject areas and progressed to assistant headteacher before

she accepted her current position in January 2009. The school had been in "special measures" and came out right

before she assumed headship. With a Welsh mother, a Trinidadian father and a Nigerian stepfather, Frances feels

she's adept at crossing cultural borders and has developed emotional intelligence skills that enable her to work

effectively with a diverse group of families.

Thomasine Edwards was born in Antigua and immigrated to London at the age of ten where she completed

secondary school and nursing training. After 14 years working as a nurse, Thomasine became interested in

teaching in her mid-30s through volunteering at her children's school.

When she assumed headship of this Church of England school in June 2006 the school was 90 percent African

Caribbean. Now the school is one-third Muslim. During her first OFSTED inspection in 2007 the school received a

"notice to improve." Thomasine worked hard to raise expectations, hired a diverse staff, engaged with parents, and

improved the physical plant in an effort to turnaround this inner London school. In their recent March 2012

OFSTED inspection the school received a "good" rating and were cited for inspirational teaching and a strong

leadership team.

Ayo Badu is headteacher of a large primary school in Tower Hamlets, East London whose student population is 99

percent Bangladeshi and Muslim. She grew up and completed her university education in Nigeria and then moved

to London over 20 years ago when her prospective husband was studying in England. After working in sales and as

an administrative officer in the county courts, Ayo became a teacher 14 years ago and quickly progressed to be

deputy head at her first school.

Ayo completed the Investing in Diversity course in 2005 and went on to teach a module on the program. She

believes it was the confidence she gained from the program that enabled her to apply for the headteacher position

at her current school. One of her first projects was to create an outside garden and play area at the school. The

yard includes rope bridges, a climbing wall, and wooden benches available for parents shaded by stands of

bamboo, because, as she notes, "a lot of the children [in the school] live in overcrowded accommodations and do

not have access to play areas."

Yasmin Ali was born in Pakistan, immigrated to England as a child, and then returned to Pakistan where she

attended secondary school. She has been the headteacher of a large primary school in Newham, East London, for

the past five years. Located in an historically white working class area, the demographics of the neighborhood

have changed and the population of the school is now one-third African, one-third white working class, and one-

third recent immigrant children from a variety of countries. Yasmin admits she particularly empathizes with the

new immigrant children in her school:

I make a real effort with the child that's just sitting quietly. Because having moved around and attended lots of

schools, you never felt as if you belonged. Sometimes I wished somebody had asked me, "Are you OK?" So that's

the kind of headteacher I've become by experience.

When Yasmin attended the Investing in Diversity residential she particularly appreciated the focus on moral

purpose:

I think for me it brought it back home, what it is all about, rather than just meeting targets. I felt really inspired by

that residential. Knowing that we have a moral purpose, knowing that we have a moral imperative to do the right

thing at all times.

Radhika Gupta grew up in India where she began her teaching career in a Sikh school and quickly moved into a

middle management position. When she immigrated to England in 1985 she worked as a supply (substitute)

teacher for a couple of years before she secured a job as an EAL lead teacher and then as an information and

communications technology (ICT) coordinator in a school on a council housing estate in Brent[10] . Radhika then

became deputy head at a predominately white school in Northwest London before she was recruited in 2005 to

assist the headteacher in her current school who was experiencing difficulties. She was formally appointed

headteacher of the school in 2007.

The student population in her current school in the borough of Hillingdon (Northwest London) is Punjabi, Tamil,

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Pakistani, and Somali. The school has won national awards for their outdoor learning curriculum, which includes

organic gardening, composting workshops for parents, and a campaign for children to bike to school. The school

curriculum also maintains an emphasis on international studies and world religions, which reflect Radhika's

personal interest in sustainability and global perspectives.

Amy Clarke is the acting headteacher of a state-supported Hindu school in Northwest London. She was born and

grew up in Birmingham where her parents settled when they immigrated to England from Jamaica in the 1960s.

Amy remembers the headteacher of her secondary girls school as a role model who believed in her and gave her a

second chance when she ran into difficulties in school. Amy worked as a parent and community liaison in a

primary school, coordinator of a mentoring program in a secondary school, president of her local teachers' union,

and an educational consultant before assuming a deputy headship at the school in 2011. She quickly became

acting head when the headteacher, a graduate of Investing in Diversity, went out on long-term sick leave.

Amy developed a black teachers group in the National Union of Teachers (NUT) and led a module for secondary

teachers in the Investing in Diversity program. She brings this political consciousness to her current school where

she has urged the governors to adopt a greater inclusion of Hindu culture in the school and participated, along

with her entire faculty and staff, in a nation-wide strike to support teacher pensions.

Path to leadership

The path to headship for these seven women BME school leaders moved in fits and starts. Some, like Thomasine

Edwards, came into education in her 30s through volunteering in her children's school after a 14-year career in

nursing. Others, like Frances Williams and Yasmin Ali, left on maternity leaves and juggled childcare for their

preschool children early in their first headship. Radhika Gupta admits that it took longer to move up the career

ladder in England because her previous school leadership experience in India was not recognized.

For several of the participants barriers in their career paths included subtle (and not so subtle) discrimination from

parents, teachers, and governors. Radika discussed how the headteacher and staff in her previous all White school

did not "see her leadership potential." Divya Singh remembered how some fellow teachers along the way implied

that her promotions to middle-level leadership positions were not based on merit. As a black woman leader in a

predominately Muslim school, Ayo Badu noted that early in her tenure several fathers had refused to talk with her

and acknowledge her leadership authority. In the most blatant example, Yasmin Ali faced down open opposition

from white working class parents who signed petitions to have her removed when she first assumed headship.

When it became apparent that some of the teachers in the school were tacitly supporting the recall effort, Yasmin

invited both parents and teachers to a community forum and successfully confronted the situation. While

interviewees did not shy away from discussing racism, their narratives centered on how they had addressed these

issues openly and worked to establish "open and transparent" leadership.

Like many female school leaders in England ([8] Coleman, 2007), participants reported they had not set out to

become headteachers. These women were thrust into the role when their headteacher went on long-term sick

leave or when they were enlisted to assist another school in difficulty. Senior leadership experiences, along with

support from BME colleagues, convinced them they could do the job and be successful.

Headteachers' views on leadership development

Three themes that emerged from the interviews about the influence of their leadership development included the

importance of affirmation, the role of mentoring and informal networks, and the need for real-life opportunities to

lead.

Confidence and affirmation: "you can do it, and we will help you"

Research on BME teachers and leadership development often cite their "lack of confidence" to pursue leadership

positions. We believe this lack of confidence might be attributable, in part, to the lack of affirmation and

encouragement many fail to receive from supervisors in their schools. Our interviewees acknowledged that at key

points in their career "no one mentioned they could be the head." Their participation in Investing in Diversity served

to confirm their leadership potential. As Thomasine noted, "(it) made you as a Black or Asian person feel valued.

My thing is they shouldn't have to, but there is a need for it."

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For some affirmation also came in the guise of the "tough love" they received from other BME headteachers and

mentors during the Investing in Diversity residential. Divya was challenged by the individual feedback she received

during the management simulation. In her words:

For me that was the most powerful part [...] I'd had feedback from the NPQH. But for me there was baggage. I didn't

feel it was rigorous enough. There were too many mixed messages for me and I didn't sense people's honesty.

What I felt about the feedback I got from [the instructors in Investing in Diversity ] was, "This is said to you in words

of love. Look, I'm going to give you some hard messages here. But there's no other agenda here but telling the

truth."

The instructors and BME colleagues she met that weekend urged her to "quit dragging your feet and go for

headship." Seven years later Divya remembers that this encouragement is what convinced her to apply for

headteacher positions.

Ayo Badu describes Investing in Diversity as "a lot more practical and down to earth" than the NPQH leadership

modules she completed. She believes the program helped to give her strategies to "deal with the barriers":

It was the positivity [in Investing ] [...] yes, it's challenging, yes you face racism, and yes, you face people who are

biased against you, people who are ignorant anyway. [Those] who felt a Black person couldn't do anything positive.

People coming out saying, yes, that's there. We're going to fight with you to break down some of these barriers.

Yes, there will be barriers, but these are ways to deal with these barriers.

When Radhika completed the Investing in Diversity program in 2005 she found it "quite inspiring. Self-esteem was

boosted every time you go. Its like someone sitting there telling, 'You can do it. You can do it. This is something

you can do.'" For these women the Investing in Diversity program helped affirm they could be headteachers. When

times get tough in her present school, Thomasine Edwards remembers the advice she received from her Investing

in Diversity mentor Ivy Brathwaite, "Nobody can stop you achieving what you want to achieve but you."

The role of mentoring and informal networks

While traditional mentoring relationships often envision a hierarchical relationship between an experienced head

and a novice school leader ([3] Bolam et al. , 1995), the black and south Asian headteachers interviewed referenced

family support and more informal co-mentoring relationships with colleagues who had encouraged them to pursue

leadership over the course of their career. Amy Clarke cited her mother and supportive teachers in her Birmingham

secondary school who had "stood up for us as Black students" when they were excluded from athletic

competitions back in the early 1980s. She continued to develop strong relationships with BME colleagues during

the course of her career through her political and community involvement. Others, like Divya Singh, pointed to

black colleagues she had met through Investing in Diversity who challenged her to "go for headship." These co-

mentoring relationships and informal networks have been sustained over time. Five of the seven headteachers are

still in touch with fellow BME colleagues whom they met through the Investing program who continue to provide

professional support as well as personal advice. As Amy Clarke notes, "Part of my network is knowing whether its

12 o'clock at night or 4 o'clock in the morning I can send a text and someone's going to reply."

While all of the interviewees acknowledged membership in formal headteacher groups organized by their local

authority, it is their fellow BME headteachers, including Investing in Diversity instructors like Ivy Brathwaite, that

they would "ring up" when they had an upcoming OFSTED inspection or needed advice on how to handle a difficult

issue with parents. They accessed these informal co-mentoring relationships when completing the NPQH,

researching job openings, and preparing for interviews. The social and professional capital ([18] Hargreaves and

Fullan, 2012) that is developed through these informal mentoring relationships, particularly for leaders of color

who may have limited access to formal mentors and sponsors, has received little attention in the literature and

might be a fruitful area for further research.

Opportunities to lead

As [16] Earley (2009) notes, aspiring leaders often point to experiences working alongside other headteachers as

the single most powerful learning experience in their development. The participants in this study identified key

moments along their career path where they were given opportunities to practice leadership before they were

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appointed as headteachers. Divya recounted how her previous headteacher, whenever she was going to be out of

the building, would formalize Divya's leadership role with the other teachers in the building:

She'd announce, "Alright, I'm out for two days. Divya's in charge." [I would] actually sit in the head's office. The PA

[Personal Assistant] has to come to you and inform you [about] things."

Frances remembered early in her career when she was thrust into a senior leadership position by circumstance:

The headteacher's father had died, and the Deputy's sister had died. I started in September and this all happened

from October until Christmas, and basically I just had to take over. I was acting like a headteacher. And I really felt

what it was like having to be eyes open, everywhere, be accountable, people coming to you as the final buck. Me

having to delegate. So I thought, "Oh. Maybe I can DO this."

Radhikha described how she ended up as the acting headteacher in her current school:

One day in 2005 one of my school improvement partners came into the school. He spoke to my head and said, "Do

you mind if I borrow Radhika just for a couple of weeks?" She said [to me], "Its very flattering for you, but not so

good for me. John D has asked for you to go into another school and lead the school for a short time because the

headteacher is away."

These interviewees noted that opportunities that "put you in the seat of the head" are critical in order to provide

real-life leadership experiences as well as build confidence and the motivation to pursue headship.

Several of the headteachers interviewed also expressed a moral responsibility to give back and prepare the next

generation of BME leaders. This is, in part, the motivation for the leadership development programs some of them

have enacted in their schools. Thomasine has instituted a coaching program for her middle managers. Both Divya

and Ayo have volunteered to mentor interns in the new BME Headteacher Internship Program ([14] Department for

Education, 2012) initiated by the National College for School Leadership, which provides deputy heads with a

coach and the opportunity to pursue a ten-day internship in another school as a working headteacher. In addition

to acting as a mentor, Divya nominated one of her deputy heads to pursue an internship in another school as well

as sponsored a BME intern in her own school. She underscores the need for current headteachers to build a legacy

for future black and global majority school leaders. In Divya's words:

I'm only here because of what people have done before me and therefore I have a sense of responsibility [...] My

path has been opened because of the struggles of [the people] who have gone before me. And I need to be sure

that I open that path for the people that come behind me.

Lessons learned: future directions for BME leadership development

What might we learn from the perspectives of these black and south Asian headteachers who participated in the

Investing in Diversity program? Recent research on the NPQH argues that leadership development for headship

should be personalized and customized to the identified needs of the individual ([11] Crawford and Earley, 2011). In

turn, [4] Brundrett and Anderson de Cuevas (2009) urge a reexamination of the curriculum content of leadership

preparation programs to ensure that key topics are included that assist school leaders in developing the reflective

consciousness, knowledge, and skill sets required to lead on issues of social justice.

Like [39] Shah and Shaikh (2010), who studied the barriers that Muslim male teachers experienced in their

progression to senior leadership, we believe that the racial and cultural background, gender, and the religious

affiliation of aspiring headteachers matte, not only in terms of the types of opportunities they are provided (or not)

to lead, but also in terms of the focus of leadership development programs. We argue for customized programs

([31] Ogunbawo, 2012) that encourage black and global majority aspiring leaders to reflect on their identities and

the "additionality" they bring to leadership as well as critically analyze the structural changes necessary to enable

them to move up the ranks to headship. BME men, for instance, are now underrepresented in relation to BME

women in headteacher positions at both the primary and secondary levels in England and may require particular

attention and consideration in terms of leadership preparation to network as a group and devise strategies of

support.

First, strategies to recruit and prepare school leaders of color necessitate an institutional acknowledgement and

commitment that there are multiple ways to lead effectively. As Divya notes:

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[...] its not that there aren't enough [BME] people around [...]. [its] about an understanding that one size doesn't fit

all. Although we might have a view of what the next head or deputy or assistant head should look like [...] we all

don't fit a box [...] leadership doesn't come in one shape or size.

Second, more opportunities should be provided for senior level leadership experience, or what the headteachers we

interviewed called "sitting in the seat of the head." While our study includes the voices of black and global majority

educators who have successfully navigated the career path to headship, they acknowledged that other BME

colleagues have not been given opportunities to lead. School participation in schemes like the BME Headteacher

Internship Programme is an effort to create those opportunities.

Third, black and global majority headteachers can serve an important and underutilized link in the pipeline to

increase the diversity of the next generation of London's school leaders through their informal networks, their roles

as mentors, and their leadership roles in black staff groups. Providing financial and material support for expanding

these networks in schools and at the local authority level might build on the existing social capital and contribute

to their sustainability.

Leadership development programs for aspiring black and global majority leaders remain fragile in the face of the

lingering recession and shifting funding priorities under the current Coalition government in England. Investing in

Diversity, while originally funded for just one year, successfully expanded their funding for an additional five years,

but took in its last cohort in 2010. New initiatives sponsored by the National College for School Leadership such as

the BME Headteacher Internship Programme appear promising but currently serve only a handful of aspiring

headteachers.

The National College for School Leadership acknowledges that it can take ten years or more for aspiring school

leaders to become headteachers. Continuing research should be conducted on the graduates of programs like

Investing in Diversity to track their progress (or lack of it) as these aspiring headteachers attempt to move up

through the system. Developing the next generation of black and global majority school leaders in the London

schools requires not only the belief in the vital importance of diverse leadership, but also the political will and

constant vigilance to make it happen.

The Guardian

Footnote

1. While the term BME is widely used in the British research literature, it is contentious for some because it fails to

differentiate between groups based on their cultural background and position in the racial hierarchy. We have used

this term when citing particular research studies or government reports.

2. These research studies on BME educators include teachers and aspiring leaders of African Caribbean, African,

and south Asian descent, as well as those from European immigrant groups (such as Albanians and Cypriots) who

are underrepresented in British schools. Studies often conflate the views of this ethnically diverse group of

educators and do not identify the specific racial and cultural background and life experiences of the research

participants (see [32] Osler, 1997).

3. The National College for School Leadership (NCSL) is a government-funded center that initiates and coordinates

professional development and research on school leadership in England. As the British Government and priorities

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have changed over the last few years there have been changes in the name, the organizational structure, and the

delivery system for professional development. NCSL was recently subsumed under the Department for Education

and is responsible for establishing networks of "teaching schools" to deliver professional development throughout

the country.

4. The term black and global majority was used in the Investing in Diversity program as a reflection of the reality

that people of color are a majority in the world and increasingly in the urban contexts of western countries ([33]

Portelli and Campbell-Stephens, 2009). We have used this term when referring to the participants in the Investing

program.

5. CVA is a statistical procedure that was used by the UK Government which was intended to show the progress

children have made while attending a particular school by taking into account nine factors that the government

believed would affect the academic performance of students such as gender, eligibility for free school meals, first

language, and ethnicity among others. This practice was discontinued in 2012.

6. All names are pseudonyms.

7. The NPQH is a modular curriculum based on Master's level criteria "designed to develop the knowledge, skills,

and attributes of a successful headteacher." For teachers this has required support from their headteacher or line

supervisor to begin the process, a 360 degree diagnostic assessment, participation in staff development activities

and coaching, a minimum nine-day residency in another school, and the development of a portfolio which is

presented to a board for assessment of professional knowledge and understanding, leadership effectiveness, and

readiness for headship. As of 2012 completion of the NPQH is no longer mandatory before appointment to

headship (see [30] National College for School Leadership, 2012).

8. All schools in Britain must undergo periodic inspections by OFSTED to assess the school's curriculum and the

academic achievement and social and emotional development of students. Special measures is a designation

assigned when a school fails to make adequate progress and appears to lack the leadership capacity to make

improvements based on the judgment of the inspectors. A school in special measures will have regular short

notice inspections. If the school fails to improve over time the headteacher and/or governing body can be removed

and the school eventually closed.

9. Divya uses the term black in a political sense to mean those people of African, Caribbean, and south Asian

descent and other groups who are discriminated against on the grounds of their race, culture, color, nationality, or

religious practice. The historical use of this term in Britain arises from the understanding that while individual

ethnic groups have faced racism and discrimination differently, there is much that unites people of color in terms

of government policy, particularly regarding immigration and the way these groups have experienced education

(see [35] Richardson, 2007).

10. A council estate is a government-sponsored housing complex, often occupied by low income and/or working

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class residents. In the 2011 census Brent was the most ethnically diverse borough in London and throughout the

UK, with 54.2 percent of the borough's population born outside of Britain (see [37] Rogers, 2011b).

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Appendix

About the authors

Lauri Johnson is an Associate Professor and Program Coordinator of Educational Leadership at Boston College.

She researches how white educators conceptualize race, historical and contemporary studies of community

activism in educational reform, and culturally responsive policies and leadership practices in national and

international contexts. Her writings on these topics have appeared in several international journals and in three

books : Dealing With Diversity Through Multicultural Fiction: Library-Classroom Partnerships (ALA, 1993), Urban

Education With an Attitude (SUNY Press, 2005), and Multicultural Policies in Canada and the United States (Joshee

&Johnson, University of British Columbia Press, 2007) which won the 2008 American Educational Studies

Association Critics' Choice Award. Lauri Johnson is the corresponding author and can be contacted at:

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lauri.johnson@bc.edu

Rosemary Campbell-Stephens is the Director of RMC UK Ltd. She is a former headteacher and OFSTED inspector

who developed Investing in Diversity (IiD) for the London Centre for Leadership in Learning, Institute of Education,

University of London. Within the broad field of leadership, race equality, equity, and social justice, her particular

interests lie in not only diversifying the face of leadership, but enabling a new cadre of leaders to lead radically

differently across sectors with a particular focus on education and health.

AuthorAffiliation

Lauri Johnson, Lynch School of Education, Boston College, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Rosemary Campbell-Stephens, Institute of Education, University of London, London, UK DETAILS

Subject: Educational leadership; School administration; Teachers; Education; Research;

Population; Internships; Recessions; Multiculturalism &pluralism; Succession

planning; Coalition governments; Unemployment

Location: United Kingdom--UK England

Company / organization: Name: London Development Agency; NAICS: 237210

Classification: 9130: Experimental/theoretical; 8306: Schools and educational services; 9175:

Western Europe

Publication title: Journal of Educational Administration; Armidale

Volume: 51

Issue: 1

Pages: 24-39

Publication year: 2013

Publication date: 2013

Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Place of publication: Armidale

Country of publication: United Kingdom

Publication subject: Education

ISSN: 09578234

Source type: Scholarly Journals

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LINKS Check for full text via FindIt!

Language of publication: English

Document type: Feature

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/09578231311291413

ProQuest document ID: 1282259538

Document URL: http://search.proquest.com.ezproxylocal.library.nova.edu/docview/1282259538?acc

ountid=6579

Last updated: 2013-09-09

Database: Education Database,ABI/INFORM Global

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