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January 2012 2012 48: 424 originally published online 24Educational Administration Quarterly

Muhammad Khalifa Principal as Community Leader

Paradigm in Successful Urban School Leadership:ed-New-ReA

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432922EAQ48310.1177/0013161X11432922 KhalifaEducational Administration Quarterly © The University Council for Educational Administration 2012 Reprints and permission: http://www. sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav

1Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA

Corresponding Author: Muhammad Khalifa, Michigan State University, 407 Erickson Hall, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA Email: [email protected]

A Re-New-ed Paradigm in Successful Urban School Leadership: Principal as Community Leader

Muhammad Khalifa1

Abstract

Purpose: This article examines the impact that a principal’s community- leadership has on school–community relations and student outcomes. Comparisons are drawn between leadership behaviors that empha- size school-centered approaches and community-centered approaches. Research Methodology: Ethnographic research methodology was con- ducted over a 2-year period, during which the researcher conducted partic- ipant observations, interviews, and descriptive and interpretive memoing. Findings: The principal’s role as community leader—including high princi- pal visibility in the community and advocacy for community causes—led to trust and rapport between school and community. Consequently, parents who were previously hostile changed their relationship with school, and supported his or her handling of their children. This led to improved aca- demic outcomes for students. Implications: This study has implications for how principals view their role, presence in, and relationship with the community. It also offers reflection on how and where the center of school– community relationships should be (i.e., school vs. community).

Article

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Keywords

academic achievement, at-risk students, community leadership, empirical paper, school leadership, school–community relations

A strong relationship between students’ school and home environments was one of the most valuable assets utilized by early Black school leaders in seg- regated communities (Horsford, 2009; Morris, 2008, 2009; Siddle Walker, 1993, 2000, 2009). Few studies have focused on modern urban principals who exemplify historical Black models of community-school relations. Thus, this ethnographic study builds on historical findings in which principals in Black segregated, pre-Brown (the 1954 Supreme Court Decision Brown v. Board of Education) schools served as a “bridge” (Morris, 2002) or “con- duit” (Siddle Walker, 2000) through which the community was served. This study extends dialogues about the unique challenges of school leadership in urban communities by critiquing separatist models of school–community relations—referred to in this study as “traditional” models. Thus, this study contests the notion that school officials can operate in the best interest of school children without the voice of the community stakeholders (Dawson, 1984). Drawing upon school–community relations theory (Epstein, 1987) and research on early Black principals in segregated schools (Horsford, 2009; Kaprinski, 2006; Morris, 2008; Siddle Walker, 1993), this current study seeks to understand how a principal can enhance the social and academic lives of children by serving as both a community and school leader. Specifi- cally, three questions were investigated: (1) Why have the goals of school- community partnerships primarily centered on school or district (and not community) goals? (2) Why is there a tacit assumption that principals can serve a neighborhood community without maintaining a regular presence in the communities they serve? And (3) what are the practices of principals who foster the type of school–community relations that lead to student academic and social success?

What follows is a review of relevant literature that explains the concept of school and community overlapping spheres that focuses on the historical and current cultural aspects of Black school and community leaders and ulti- mately supports the link between community leadership and school leader- ship in urban communities. Following the literature review is a section describing the methods used in implementing the study, including the site selection, participant selection, and the procedures used in data collection and analysis. Prior to the section in which the findings from the research are shared is a rich description of context in which the school exists. Findings

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from the study are presented according to the major themes that emerged through analysis of the data. The article closes with a discussion of the con- clusions generated based on the findings and the implications the findings have for school leadership in urban communities.

Literature Review Three areas of research are relevant to my investigation of a principal who positively influenced the social and academic outcomes of his alternative school students: (a) research that conceptualizes the relationship between school and community as overlapping spheres, which allows me to operation- ally define what counts as effective school–community relations; (b) research that suggests community leadership is an essential component of school lead- ership in urban communities; and (c) the historical and current cultural aspects of Black school and community leaders. The information presented in the literature highlights what elements of school–community relations may be most useful for principals in urban and predominantly African American contexts.

School and Community as Overlapping Spheres In articulating an understanding of overlapping spheres relevant to urban contexts, history provides examples of how effective school and community relationships existed. Before the Brown v. Board of Education (1954) deci- sion, Black segregated schools and the communities they served were almost indistinguishable and exemplify what current theory describes as an overlap- ping sphere of communities and schools (e.g., Epstein & Sanders, 2006). Furthermore, the overlapping spaces that families/communities and schools occupied were beneficial for both the school and the community (Anderson, 1988; Epstein, 1987; McGaughy, 2000; Sanders & Harvey, 2002). Siddle Walker’s (1993) historical analysis of one such school illustrated how “the parents depended on the school’s expertise, guidance and academic vision, and the school depended on the parents’ financial contributions” (p. 175). Siddle Walker’s (1993) historical analysis of early Black schooling chal- lenges current understandings of parental involvement; the parents in her study were involved in the school in culturally specific ways. So for exam- ple, while parents may not have attended traditional PTA-style meetings, they collectively served as the economic backbone of the school. These historical expressions of African American school–community relationships allow for the following definition of school and community relations:

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collaborations between school and community stakeholders that benefit school, community, and student performance. This resonates with Epstein’s theory of overlapping spheres (Epstein, 1987), which asserts that “students learn more and succeed at higher levels when home, school, and community work together to support students’ learning and development” (Epstein & Sanders, 2006, p. 87).

In this study, community refers to structures, institutions, and relation- ships that operate in the spaces community members occupy. “Community” is performed in residences, markets, churches, Masonic lodges, schools, and other neighborhood milieus. Though community members may indeed share norms, they may also have diverse, even divergent, norms (Shields & Seltzer, 1997). These diverse and even divergent expressions of community have implications for how school leadership best operates in urban areas; prior scholarship suggests that school leaders should play an active role in com- munity settings.

Community Involvement as an Essential Part of School Leadership

“People with the least amount of power must be central to the decision- making process” (Normore, Rodriguez, & Wynne, 2007, p. 656).

In addition to the research that acknowledges the benefits of overlapping school and community spaces, a number of studies highlight leadership behavior as central to expanding a school in a way that serves community needs (Gold, Simon, Mundell, & Brown, 2004; Osterman, Crow, & Rosen, 1997; Van Voorhis & Sheldon, 2004). Several studies have demonstrated that school leadership can play a role in community-oriented goals, improve the neighborhood community, and thus improve the lives of students (Carpenter-Aeby & Aeby, 2001; Siddle Walker, 2005). In other words, lead- ership plays a central role in the development of the entire child, which is crucial to his or her continued academic success. Essentially, a better com- munity member will be a better student (Hale, 1986; Ladson-Billings, 1995; Noddings, 2005).

In operationalizing this overlap, the community-based leadership per- formed by principals must be coupled with a deep understanding of the sur- rounding neighborhood community being served. Denhardt and Glaser (1999) found that in order to effectively address community needs, leaders in urban communities must understand “the character of the target community,

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and [demonstrate] a willingness to support community desires and direction in bringing about change” (p. 152). This might mean reaching out in ways that consider parents’ historical, social, or even racial histories. For example, because of extensive histories of racial discrimination and exclusionary prac- tice, Black parents often have difficulty connecting with public schools (Diamond & Gomez, 2004; Lareau & Horvat, 1999). Diamond and Gomez (2004) found that working-class Black parents tend to view school and home as separate spheres and were less able to “customize” a quality education for their children than middle-class Blacks. But in addition to having a deep understanding of the neighborhood contexts, urban school leaders must build trust if they are to develop community relations with parents.

Unfortunately, it is often difficult to build this trust. Trust, rapport, and social capital can all be built when principals expand their role to include community leadership as defined by the community. In fact, in many post- Brown, urban public schools, there are significant differences and disconnect between school leaders and community leaders. Community leaders enjoy support and stature in the community; trust is central to any community lead- ership (Chang, 1993; Purdue, 2001). Community leadership, for the urban community, is that which represents community interests. This point is high- lighted in Pfautz, Huguley, and McClain’s (1975) historiographic study, as they examined African American community leadership in Providence, Rhode Island. They found that Black school leaders are “socially anchored in the black community” and that many are also “street leader(s)” whose “repu- tation might continue to be the most available power source” (p. 466). Therefore, school leaders who serve urban Black communities, but who ignore the historical cultural relationships with, and behaviors of, local com- munity leaders may have difficulty building trust—an essential component of effective community leadership.

In addition to school–community overlap, understanding, and trust, the focus of school and community relationships has traditionally been informed exclusively by school interests (such as test scores, as opposed to commu- nity-based interests, such as employment or neighborhood safety). That is, although studies on contemporary schools acknowledge the importance of overlapping school and community spaces (e.g., Sanders & Harvey, 2002), most educators have approached the issue of school–community relations with school interests as the centerpiece and unit of analysis. And in practice, these overlapping spaces are not commonly found in contemporary urban communities (Goldring, 1986; Lareau & Horvat, 1999). This all suggests that principals remain very traditional in their approach to school–community relations (Osterman et al., 1997). For example, a number of scholars

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(Delgado-Gaitan, 1991; Lopez, Scribner, & Mahitivanichcha, 2001) found that traditional methods of involving parents in school were not accessible to Latino families; for school leaders to be effective with marginalized com- munities, innovative community approaches must be developed and employed.

It is increasingly clear that for principals to develop these effective approaches to school–community relationships, they must seek understand- ing and service within the neighborhood community. Indeed, it has been difficult for principals to understand that most urban communities are char- acterized by difference and not by homogeneity (Fine, Weis, & Powell, 1997; Shields & Seltzer, 1997) and that community goals for education can be very different from that of school faculty and staff (Williamson, 1997). Yet these understandings will not be realized by viewing the community only from a school context perspective. Thus, principals, especially urban principals, must move beyond their school walls in order to gain an understanding of the unique social and cultural conditions of their neighborhood communities. In doing so, they may find that grades, behavior, and test scores are not the pri- mary issues at the forefront of community-based interests. The hope is that principals’ increased community presence will help them develop and main- tain culturally appropriate school and community leadership practices.

Cultural Aspects of School and Community Leaders When addressing the main question of how principals can serve as commu- nity leaders, it is important to consider the community context. As Van Voorhis and Sheldon (2004) suggest in their understanding of school- community relationships, “principals hold the key to initiating programs and processes” (p. 66). It is also important to acknowledge that a comprehensive approach—involving supportive families and social networks—is most impactful for the academic and social success of students (McGaughy, 2000; Williams, Davis, Cribbs, Saunders, & Williams, 2002). However, when faced with contexts they do not understand, principals rely more on the theo- retical or standardized, generic behaviors with which they are comfortable (Larson, 1997). But this bureaucratic, predictable decision-making is often culturally inappropriate, unresponsive, or even detrimental toward commu- nity needs (Larson, 1997). Instead, a nuanced, culture-specific leadership approach is needed for effective community relations, especially in times of misunderstanding. A number of scholars have demonstrated how this has happened in the pre-Brown era, particularly in Black segregated schools of the American South. They give hope that culturally appropriate approaches

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to urban school leadership might occur by integrating historical models of Black principals with current concepts of overlapping spheres and commu- nity leadership.

According to Morris (1999), early Black principals viewed their “own role as one that extends beyond the boundaries of the school” (p. 594). Both Morris’s (1999) and Siddle Walker’s (1993, 2000, 2005) studies of exem- plary early Black principals identified Black principals who were as visible, active, and trusted as any other Black community leaders such as pastors, political figures, or organizational heads. These principals also viewed them- selves as the “bridge” between themselves and the broader White community and as advocates for community-based causes. In her historical analysis, Tillman (2004) similarly suggested that “the Black principal represented the Black community; [and] was regarded as the authority on educational, social and economic issues” (p. 104).

Moving from a pre-Brown to a post-Brown era, scholarship on contempo- rary Black principals also demonstrates that culture plays a central role in the effectiveness of school leadership; principals who understand their students can better serve them. Lomotey (1987), for example, found that in general Black principals lead differently than White principals. Moreover, this dis- tinct Black school leadership style has a positive impact on the academic achievement of Black students because it is based on a unique understanding of, and connection to, the Black community. Building on these earlier stud- ies, Gooden (2005) found that Black secondary principals show a compas- sionate understanding of Black students and their communities. These principals also demonstrate that social capital, fluid interactions, and high community-based visibility are relevant to school–community relations (Purdue, 2001). In turn, good community relations lead to improved aca- demic outcomes for children. Hence, when principals remain behind the school walls, they are breaking with this historic tradition. Consequently, their ability to address (and understand) the needs of the community and the students in their schools is diminished. Therefore, it seems logical to ask how principals can actually become community leaders.

When addressing the question of how school leaders become community leaders, historical analyses suggest that for early Black principals, advocat- ing for community causes is integral to community leadership. This would entail becoming heavily involved not only in school-based concerns but also in community causes such as the many civil rights issues of the era. For example, Siddle Walker (2005) reveals that Black, pre-Brown educators mobilized advocacy groups, enlisted professional organizations, drew up peti- tions, and formed interracial alliances that challenged the racial oppression of

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Black communities and students. But this community advocacy was not lim- ited to pre-Brown schools. According to Gold et al. (2004), contemporary principal advocacy and organizing can actually lead to substantive and sus- tainable school reform. Therefore, consideration of principal-advocacy allows us to unpack ways in which school leaders can place community issues (as opposed to merely school issues) into the center of the school–community relationships. Advocacy for and understanding of community-based causes and performing culturally responsive leadership all inform the conceptual lenses of this study. This study focuses on a principal who integrates the tra- ditional Black school leadership style into his role as a contemporary urban school principal. My specific research questions were as follows: (1) Why have the goals of school–community partnerships primarily centered on school or district (and not community) goals? (2) Why is there a tacit assump- tion that principals can serve a neighborhood community without maintain- ing a regular presence in the communities they serve? And (3) what are the practices of principals who foster the type of school–community relations that lead to student academic and social success?

Research Methods and Design Little is understood about the continuity of modern urban leadership practice with models provided by Black principals who served in the pre-Brown era (Siddle Walker, 1993); thus, this research is fairly unique. In addition, the research questions center on school-centered versus community-centered goals, both principals’ presence and behavior in the neighborhood commu- nity, and principals’ practices in school–community relations that influence students’ academic and social success. Because these questions deal with overlapping contexts, flexibility and subsequent in-depth cultural observa- tions were necessary components of this research. Thus, ethnography was chosen as a method.

Ethnographies occur in natural settings and allow for a flexible research process that is responsive to the normal events that occur (Creswell, 1994). According to Spradley (1979), “ethnography is the work of describing cul- ture” (p. 3). But it is important to consider how ethnographic data are recorded. In this regard, Chilcott (1987) argues that ethnographic research must be more than a reporting process; rather, he says, “ethnographers must provide readers with a sense of cultural theory and problem orientation that dictate the focus of research” (p. 212). In this study, I believe that the extended time and observation methods entailed in an ethnographic study enabled me to unearth a number of practices and networks that would have remained

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unnoticed with any other research method. For example, I observed aspects of the school and neighborhood communities during the last 6 months of the study that were obscure at the outset of my research, so the school culture and its acceptance of hyperghetto (Wacquant & Wilson, 1989) street culture, urban dress, and African American English could not have been contextually understood without an extended ethnographic approach. Thus, through eth- nography, I was able to locate the place and importance (or lack thereof) of these aesthetic patterns without attaching meaning to them in a way that a researcher with less time may have done. Moreover, this ethnography has allowed me to grasp a deep understanding of both the school and community culture and of how the parents and students understand their school and community.

This methodology has allowed me to gain much greater understandings about the contexts that I studied. I first noticed that the cultural and social patterns recognizable to students did not resemble those depicted by Afrocentric or even historical Black culture from the U.S. South; rather, as Wacquant and Wilson (1989) describe, their environments were rife with cyclical patterns of crime, drugs, teen pregnancy, violence, overlapping com- munity-prison culture, and school failure. This is not to say that there were not recognizable patterns of resilience, agency, and success; in fact, I argue that the school profiled in this study—Urban Alternative High School (UAHS)—is exactly that. And at base, UAHS offers a glimpse of how a school leader enacted leadership both in a mistrustful community and in an alternative school. Yet the detailed and nuanced data, the researcher’s close cultural/racial similarities with most participants, and the extensive time spent collecting data in the field contributed to a compelling portrait of an atypical, but effective, school leader. In the forthcoming sections, I describe how I selected and gained access to the research site and offer brief descrip- tions of the participants. This is followed by a description of the research site and the role of trust and how it informs the delicate relationship that parents and community members have with their schools.

Research Site Selection and Access Initially I was interested in effective leadership practices for marginalized and at-risk middle and high school students. Both the literature (Dunbar, 2001; Raywid, 1983) and my initial exploratory interviews of principals in the area led me to focus on alternative schools. Urban students and students of color are often marginalized, and a number of exclusionary practices in traditional schools lead these students to alternative schools (Dunbar, 2001)

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and into eventually to what is often referred to as the school-to-prison pipe- line (Ferguson, 2000). Specifically, Dunbar and Villarruel (2002) describe how zero-tolerance policies disproportionately affect African American and Latino students. This is also illustrated in the works that show the overrepre- sentation of students of color in the special education classroom and low educational tracks (Gay, 2002); scholars such as Blanchett (2006) and Ferri and Connor (2005) show how this is a result of White privilege and rac- ism. Similarly, Watts and Erevelles (2004) explain that negative student typologies—such as “at-risk” or “deviant” students—are socially con- structed. According to their research, it is actually a system of racism and oppression—and the students’ natural reaction to, for example, prison-like school environments—that lead to students being labeled as deviant. This system leads to students of color being disproportionately placed in alterna- tive schools. Alternative schools often contribute to the delinquency and school failure of the very children that they claim to help (Dunbar, 2001; Raywid, 1983). Alternative schools for at-risk youth have been most often described as a “dumping ground” for students whom traditional schools no longer want (Dunbar, 2001; Kelly, 1993; Raywid, 1983). And Dunbar (2001) shows that alternative schools can often have the opposite effect for which they were intended—that is, to make kids even more deviant or maladapted to the normative structures and expectations in school.

These bodies of research—the social construction of deviance, marginalization/ criminalization of students in public schools, the enduring failures of alter- native schools, and the role of racism—played a role in that it was my inten- tion to choose a “successful” school. To this end, I visited six alternative high school campuses in a tri-county area in selecting a research site. Except for UAHS, these schools fell within a pattern suggested by research on failing alternative schools. Four of the six schools had high principal turnover and all but UAHS had low graduation rates. UAHS was distinctly different from the other five alternative schools and was ultimately selected because of the aca- demic and social successes that the students experienced. For example, the students had a high school graduation rate that remained above 95% and over two thirds pursued concrete plans after graduation—mostly college or uni- versity attendance, with some going into the military. Furthermore, UAHS departed from the tendency of schools to disproportionately place students of color into special education programs. Though less than 10% of Davistown’s (city in which UAHS was located) students are diagnosed with a learning disability, 18% of UAHS students were identified as eligible for special edu- cation services—most being diagnosed with hyperactivity disorders (UAHS Annual Report; Enrollment Demographics). However, at UAHS, although

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there were two reading specialists who would rotate and pull students from class for extra help, a part-time social worker who addressed social and familial issues, and other learning specialists who would visit the school on a part-time basis, there is no discernable special education program. Moreover, classroom teachers would refer any students needing the extra services, and students would often even request these services themselves. The principal and the staff expressed satisfaction about their successful student perfor- mance and seemed eager to share their story with others.

After I chose the alternative school and met with the principal, I was given full access to the research site. On my second visit, the principal said to me, “you can go anywhere here; you don’t need an appointment; just like parents. That’s how I run the school.” Once access to the site was secured, selecting individuals to participate in the study was the next task. The participants selected included the school principal, 13 current and former students of UAHS, nine teachers and five support staff, three community members, and members from five different families of current UAHS students. To gain a comprehensive perspective on the school leader in both his school and com- munity contexts, individuals from different roles were selected and data were collected from and about them through various methods.

Participants Principal. The principal was African American and had been a student,

teacher, and principal in a large urban school district. He was raised in an African American community context. This upbringing in an African American community is similar to what most UAHS students and parents experienced. At the time of this study, he was in his 33rd year as the leader of the school and had taught some of the parents, and even some grandparents, of the current student population.

Students. UAHS serves students in Grades 8 through 12 with a total popu- lation of approximately 100 students. According to the most recent data pro- vided by Standard and Poor’s School Matters, approximately 65% of the student population is African American and the remainder is primarily White, with 10% of that being Hispanic or multi-racial. For the 2-year period of this study, the Black population fluctuated between 80 and 90 of the total 100 students. All students at UAHS had experienced academic or behavioral problems in traditional public schools and were referred or recommended to UAHS. Although Joe interviews each student and a “representative family member,” his policy is to never turn a student away from entry into UAHS. Most students attending UAHS went on to graduate from high school, and

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over 60% went on to some form of post-secondary education. A total of 13 current or former students were selected for interview as a part of this study.

Staff. The teaching staff is relatively experienced, with most having more than 5 years of teaching experience. The majority of the teaching staff is White (total of 11 White staff members: 8 teachers, 1 curriculum support staff, and 2 reading specialists), even though the principal is Black and was the founding administrator of this alternative public school. The school had 5 Black teachers and 1 Black social worker out of a total of 16 professional staff members. This is a considerably higher Black staff presence than any of the other schools in the district.

Representatives from the community. An important subset of the participants for this study needed to come from the community. Data from families’ and community members’ interviews and observations were essential for under- standing the context in which the school operated. For example, these partici- pants offered insights on the level of trust that the community had for the UAHS principal and other district personnel. The three community members who were interviewed for this study have been active in the community and had children as students either in Urban Alternative High School or in one of the other schools in Davistown. Additionally, members from five different families of current UAHS students were interviewed. The families and neigh- borhoods of UAHS students are characteristic of any large, poor urban area (Sugrue, 1998). Many of the parents are working-class and lack a college education. Many families maintain homes in one of the city’s subsidized housing units. The social and cultural capital that traditional White students enjoyed (Bourdieu, 1977; Coleman, 1988; Lareau, 2000) was not accessible to UAHS parents because their capital tended to be devalued by traditional school teachers and administrators. In fact, many parents would share their experiences and provide innumerable examples of their exclusion and mar- ginalization within the district.

Data Collection and Analysis This 2-year ethnographic study occurred during the 2006-2007 and 2007- 2008 academic school years at Urban Alternative High School (UAHS). I visited UAHS one to two times per week for the first year of the study. As time passed, I increased my visits and observations. During the last 6 months of the data collection process, I visited the school three to five times per week for the entire school day. In addition, I participated in nine home visits throughout the study. Along with open-ended interviews, participant obser- vations, field notes, examination of data, and media sources, I shadowed the

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school leader as he traversed the school and community environments. I shadowed the principal in 23 community visits—that is, his trips to locations outside of the school, such as homes, restaurants, district administration offices, stores, and a prison. As I observed the principal’s leadership behav- iors (school-based or community-based), I conducted purposive interviews. During these interviews, I obtained details that enriched my descriptions and interpretations of those observed leadership behaviors.

Not all of the interviews, however, came with ease, trust, and accessibility. Initially, a number of the students and teachers expressed suspicion about my presence, with one teacher referring to me as “a spy from downtown (the school district’s administrative offices).” Others were trusting from the out- set. Trust and rapport increased due to my prolonged presence at UAHS (Babbie, 1992; Creswell & Miller, 2000; Glesne, 2005) and the personal and social interactions that I developed with participants. Specifically, four fac- tors likely contributed to the open and comfortable relationship I experienced with the staff, students, and principal: my race, my ability to speak in African American forms of English, my ability to engage in aspects of African American and urban culture, and my ability to cogently respond to conversa- tions and dialogues common in the Black community. For example, when students joked with the principal, I knew when to chuckle and when to remain silent, as a student may be ostensibly joking but in reality expressing pain or fear. Indications of trust included the increasing number of teachers and stu- dents who invited me to enter their classrooms and spaces—examples include students engaging me in conversations about local hip-hop artists or inviting me to their own performances as beginning rap artists. All of these small but important microcultural affiliations enhanced my accessibility, trust, and rap- port with the participants in this study.

Following each personal encounter, observation, or interview, I organized my data into broad themes. Interview responses and field notes were coded based on categories of school and community leadership, community rela- tionship (positive support of or negative resistance to the principal/school), principal’s impact in the community, and student achievement (both social and academic). Triangulation—such as examining newspaper articles, mem- ber checking, referring to district, county, and state data, and interviews of community members unconnected with UAHS—and alternative interpreta- tions were discussed to ensure trustworthiness of findings. The prolonged engagement also allowed me to check the data for consistency over an extended period. This extended trustworthiness to the data (Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Seale, 1999) and allowed for me to grasp a more complete and vivid description of the research context.

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A Site Description: The Importance of Trust

Throughout the data analysis and even at the outset of this study, it was apparent that the students and parents trusted the UAHS school leader, yet it was also clear that they maintained a deep mistrust for the other administra- tors and educators at the traditional schools in the district. UAHS was designed in the early 1970s to address the lingering problems of low Black academic achievement in the district and to placate the local Black protest culture and anger that was so endemic during the civil rights era. UAHS students come from any one of the traditional high schools in Davistown. According to the principal, all students referred to UAHS were at risk of school failure and dropout or had dropped out of one of the local traditional schools: “By the time I get ‘em, they are in need of serious help. In fact, most of them wouldn’t make it through school if it wasn’t for this program.” Here and in fact frequently, the UAHS principal alluded to the extent to which UAHS students had experienced school failure and had therefore fallen into a pattern of marginalization in the district. These intergenerational academic and social failures led to a deep mistrust of Davistown teachers and admin- istrators.

A context of mistrust. A number of indicators suggest that UAHS parents specifically, and Black Davistown parents generally, did not trust staff at traditional schools. Articles in newspapers, parent-held community meetings, and interviews suggest that parents and community members were suspicious of traditional schools. For example, the city’s newspaper routinely featured articles about Davistown’s racial achievement and suspension gaps. When asked about a newspaper article that reported the district’s tendency to sus- pend Black students 10 times more frequently than White students, Ivory— parent to a 13-year-old UAHS student—responded, “It don’t surprise me! They was doin’ that when I was a student there. That’s one of the number one reasons that Nikki (her daughter) go here (UAHS), ‘cause I can’t trust them over at those other schools.” The newspaper articles on the racial suspension gaps also highlighted this mistrust. In one instance, a representative from an African American parent support group said, “Either they don’t know how, or they don’t want to teach Black kids.” This rationale is perhaps why several community meetings were held in local churches to address “the racism in Davistown” school district. It is, then, not surprising that Lareau (2000) found that working-class parents maintain separateness between themselves and the schools that serve their children. The context in this current research corroborates Lareau’s finding but suggests that—at least for the working- class African American parents featured in this study—they did so because of

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the lack of trust, resulting primarily from a history of racism and marginaliza- tion. In fact, low graduation rates, poor academic achievement and aca- demic tracking, disproportionate sanctions by school and city officials, and persistent racism all contributed to the low trust that the community held in traditional school officials.

Parental expressions of this mistrust were actually ubiquitous throughout the study. In another instance, Mrs. Jones, a parent of two daughters at UAHS, spoke of “sneaking into the back door” (interview, November 14, 2007) of Harrison High School—the district’s traditional school that her daughters attended before coming to UAHS. She believed this “sneaking” was neces- sary because, in her view, the teachers and the schools were unfairly targeting her girls and not educating them properly. Whenever she arrived at the school—often after being called by the principal—Mrs. Jones sat for a “long time” in the office while, as she suspected, the teachers were given time to get their classes “together.” When the phone calls home increased, Mrs. Jones visited the school on her own initiative and asked if she could sit in class with Taushaunda (the eldest of the two girls and the one most often sanctioned in school) and observe. Even then, the office staff called the teacher and gave the teacher 15 to 20 minutes “to straighten the class up and start teaching.” So Mrs. Jones said that she began to visit the school through the backdoor or loading dock, observe her daughters for 10 or 15 minutes from the hallway, and “sign in to the sign-in book on the way out of the school.” Mrs. Jones’s actions—as is the case with the behavior of many parents at UAHS— demonstrated protest to, in her view, an oppressive system that was not fair to her and her family. She was not prepared to accept the narrative about her own daughters that was forwarded by the school; rather, she was determined to (1) develop her own counternarrative about “what was really going on” at the school and (2) challenge oppression or, in her words, “disagree with what they were doing to us [African American families].” This mistrust of school and feelings of maltreatment in Davistown’s traditional schools were actually expressed in the statements of all of the parents interviewed for this study. Yet the trust they had for the UAHS principal stands in stark contrast to the mistrust they held for teachers and principals in traditional schools.

Trust in the UAHS leader. While parents were mistrustful of traditional school principals in Davistown, they trusted the UAHS principal, relying on him for counsel and help with both personal and educational matters. An indication of this trust in him was demonstrated by the interactions that occurred between community members and him. Parents would frequently come to UAHS asking questions and informing the principal about their chil- dren and personal lives. These exchanges were just as likely to occur in the

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community. Community members—some former UAHS students and par- ents, and some not—would engage Joe on a personal level or seek counsel. In one restaurant encounter with a parent, he counseled a concerned mother who had problems with her son’s behavior and school performance at one of the traditional schools. Though her son Willie had never attended UAHS, the parent herself was a student there many years ago. Joe informed her about her options and told her to think about going to meet with Davistown’s superin- tendent about the case; Joe said that he would go with her if she decided to go. Much like this restaurant exchange, the home visits were equally as tell- ing. I accompanied Joe on one particular home visit in which he delivered a report card to Sharon, whose daughter attended UAHS. They discussed grades for the first five minutes, but for the remaining time, they discussed housing, the racial climate in the district, and the administrators they thought were being “fair toward Black kids.” The trust that the community held for Joe was likewise apparent from the interactions parents had with Joe at UAHS. Sometimes visitors wanted advice and sought counsel, but at other times, they were just paying a visit to a well-established and entrusted com- munity leader; indeed, this was further indication that the community held deep trust in his leadership.

Findings This ethnographic study investigated three questions: Why have the goals of school–community partnerships primarily focused on school or district (and not community) goals? Why is there a tacit assumption that principals can serve a neighborhood community without maintaining a regular presence in the communities they serve? And what are the practices of principals who foster the type of school–community relations that lead to student academic and social success? Overall, the findings suggest that the principal’s high visibility in the community and advocacy of community-based causes led to trust, credibility, and rapport with the UAHS neighborhood community. This bond was enough to foster an atmosphere whereby parents who were previ- ously distant and mistrustful of schools became supportive of UAHS and its principal. The principal established an “official” presence in and advocacy for the community, but this overlap also squarely placed parents and com- munity members into the school context. In addition, the impact that the newfound parental inclusion had on the students was noteworthy; the posi- tive school–community relationship ultimately contributed to successful school leadership and positive social and academic outcomes for students. Ultimately, the UAHS principal was able to establish community credibility

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and trust, and parents were overwhelmingly supportive of his handling and treatment of their children. The fluid and intimate relationship he developed and maintained with the community was the leadership behavior needed for success in this urban context.

The particulars of these findings are organized into three major sections. In the first section, I relate how the principal created structures and processes that embraced, and even merged, the home and school environments; these vivid descriptions of this “overlap” allow us not only to see leadership behav- iors in the school but also to see a clear understanding of how spaces were created for community-based leadership and the impact this had on the aca- demic and social lives of students. The second section focuses on principal advocacy of community concerns—as opposed to only educational goals— being placed at the center of administrative efforts. It is in the section that I also elucidate how these particular leadership behaviors (i.e., community- based advocacy) lead to parental support and trust—elements that ultimately facilitated a more effective leadership within the school environment. This all leads up to the third section of these findings, in which I present the impact that this type of leadership had on UAHS students. In each section, I also note similarities between these current findings and historical models of African American school leaders. Ultimately, all of these sections illustrate the ben- efits of a principal who also serves as community leader.

School–Community Overlap: Building Trust and Rapport The first major finding of this study is that the principal performed leader- ship in a way that led to school and community overlap, which in turn led to community rapport and trust of the principal and school. Actually, building trust in communities is the biggest challenge to developing meaningful col- laborations (Chang, 1993). Chang (1993) indicates that existing power- relationships and racial differences intensify the complexity of collaborations. Chang’s findings were confirmed at UAHS and the surrounding community in that the traditional school leaders were unable to develop a trusting rela- tionship with the African American parents and community members. But by establishing a school–community overlap, the UAHS principal was able to understand the community’s concerns and thus place them at the center of the relationship. This led to an increased and unprecedented trust between Davistown’s Black parents and a school leader. In deconstructing this find- ing, I highlight not that the UAHS principal shared a cultural background with many of the African American students and families, but that he placed their community-oriented concerns and goals at the center of school–community

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relationships. Indeed, urban community members rarely have a voice in how school–community relations occur. The principal in this study differed from this norm in that he validated local culture and gave community voice in creating an overlapping school–community space (Epstein, 1987).

In the community surrounding UAHS, the principals acted as a community leader and a bridge between the formal institutions and the community— essentially giving the community access to his more privileged social net- works; as a result, community members had greater access to opportunities in Davistown and UAHS. Parents and community members believed that they had equal opportunity to resources and fair treatment from an “official.” This, in part, allowed the principal and staff to develop a culture of success at the school. Conversely, these findings suggest that because trust and rapport were nonexistent between traditional school leaders and the neighborhood community around UAHS, the parents were not supportive of leadership behaviors at the traditional schools. And they tended to interpret school administrative action in much the same way they would have interpreted, say, police racial profiling or judicial injustice. The examples shared below dem- onstrate not only the school–community overlap but also the specific leader- ship behaviors that were enacted in fostering such an integrated context.

Fostering overlap: Bringing the community into the school. Part of fostering overlapping school and community spaces was allowing unrestricted, com- fortable opportunities for parents to enter the school. In this regard, UAHS parents were frequently present at UAHS and maintained constant dialogue with Joe and the UAHS staff. Joe learned from parents what was happening with UAHS students and the community, and they comfortably became involved with their child’s education. Consequently, UAHS served as an extension of the neighborhood communities. Community functions were common at the school, and members of the community—parents, former stu- dents, extended family, and young children and siblings of UAHS students— were almost constantly in contact with the UAHS staff. One former UAHS student illustrates this school–community overlap as she explained her experiences of being pregnant, and then a teenage mother at a time that the school did not offer motherhood services:

You know, like all my baby stuff, he was like helping me with every- thing, milk, everything. I didn’t have to worry about nothing when I was pregnant with her and after I had her ‘cause he made sure I took my butt to school and my mom watched my baby. If my mom didn’t watch my baby, I took her to school with me. (Margret, former UAHS student)

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The overlapping contexts prompted former student, Ahmed, to remark, “It wasn’t just an education at (UAHS). It was an upbringing” (interview, April 26, 2007). The educational model at UAHS had both a deliberate presence of the community in the school and a strong presence of the school in the com- munity (teachers and Joe going to students’ homes, churches, and other com- munity functions).

Fostering overlap: School presence in the community. The UAHS principal established the school overlap in the community by leveraging staff and other resources to support a regular community presence. Though all teachers were required to partake in report card delivery, the UAHS staff members with the most visible presence in the community were the principal and the school- community liaison. Both would simply visit students’ homes to “check in to see how everything is going.” Just as parents may drop by the school unan- nounced, Joe will “pop up at your (a student’s) house without warning,” according to Dominique, an 11th-grade UAHS student. The UAHS school- community liaison, Khadijah, explained:

If we call your house a couple of times and a student doesn’t respond, either Joe or myself are going by [the house]. We feel very comfortable doing so, and students know that. We’re welcomed ‘cause it’s in the best interest of the kids.

Field notes collected during home visits show how the UAHS principal served the neighborhood community beyond the location of what was osten- sibly required from school principals. During home visits, parents commonly asked Joe for advice. From transportation, legal or job-related issues, to aca- demic and racial marginalization in the district, the parents trusted Joe’s opinion and sought his help. Most parents seemed unaware that Joe needed their input as much as they needed his.

In highlighting the school’s presence into the community, it is most note- worthy that the principal played a major role in fostering this overlap. As demonstrated in the following example, Joe’s willingness and alacrity to advise parents was an indication of his community leadership; Shelia was a current UAHS student, and her mother and grandmother previously attended UAHS. A visit to Shelia’s home demonstrated Joe’s willingness to help on any issue—even those unrelated to Sheila’s status at UAHS.

Toward the end of the home visit, the mother again prompted Joe to speak about the education of her other children. She handed Joe her son’s report card (who was not yet old enough to attend UAHS). Joe commented, “Why you takin’ fundamentals of math? You should be takin’ algebra.”

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As a school leader, he adapted to their unique needs. Sheila has a sister who is a year older than her but who attended one of the district’s traditional high schools. During the visit, their mother explained to Joe that she was about to put Sheila’s sister in UAHS because she was starting to mess up in school. Joe then spoke to both Sheila and her sister:

Boys love pretty girls that are dumb. You should be independent stu- dents. Your grades aren’t bad, but they can improve. You’ve got two years left. College should be in the picture. I think you can do better than this [pointing to Sheila’s sister’s grades].

These types of exchanges earned Joe the trust and credibility that he needed to serve this urban community. The UAHS principal exemplified how a school principal could also serve as a community leader—being both responsive to, and an advocate for, community concerns. Put simply, Joe concerned himself with (non-school) issues that were important to commu- nity stakeholders. In this instance, he was speaking to a family about educa- tional, social, and even familial issues that were completely unrelated to his position at UAHS. When independently interviewed, Sheila and her family confirmed that Joe was a family friend and supporter—perhaps, in their real- ity, even more than he was a principal. When they faced difficulties or bewil- derment with regard to educational or social issues, they turned to him. Past African American principals have similarly served their communities; many historical African American principals and educators were de facto commu- nity leaders because many worked in segregated, and often hostile, environ- ments (Savage, 2001; Tillman, 2004).

Leadership behaviors in support of school–community overlap. The school and community overlap that was exemplified by Joe occurred through a number of leadership behaviors. More specifically, the explicit and observable behav- iors that supported community overlap and trust were (a) constructed per- sonal exchanges in which the principals and staff interacted with students and parents, (b) home visits, and (c) mentoring, or in some cases, even challeng- ing teachers that were exclusionary toward students. Not only did Joe estab- lish his presence in the community, but he also rationalized why he uses school resources—in this case, time flexibility in the work schedule—to establish this overlap:

If you (i.e., teachers) do report cards you get a day off too! You can make it a three-day weekend you know, and they usually do. Most of the teachers don’t take that time off, because they don’t mind going

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into the homes. You (teachers) get to see something different, you know, when you uh go to the homes. They sit in the kitchen just like you and I did over at that parent’s house yesterday. (Joe, UAHS principal)

This quote indicates the deliberate use of resources—here instructional personnel—to develop structures that strengthened school–community over- lap. This suggests that a key finding—that leadership behaviors of the UAHS principal created opportunities for school–community overlap—is similar to what earlier scholars (Epstein, 1987, 1995) have described. Joe’s focus and advocacy on community-based causes led to mutual trust between the school and community, and eventually to changes in the UAHS student behavior. In further elaboration of leadership behaviors, these findings suggest that UAHS principal’s practices, such as giving a speech at a local church, speaking out at board meetings or disciplinary hearings to advocate for a specific student or cause, and showing up at a student’s house for dinner, are indeed leader- ship behaviors. In the following sections, I provide categories and examples that typify countless leadership behaviors that occurred throughout the study. These examples are meant to elucidate how leadership happened, how it was situated within school–community relations, and how the leadership behav- ior ultimately impacted student behavior and/or achievement.

Personal exchanges with students and parents. In much the same way that scholars described a principal’s close and personal connectedness with segre- gated Black communities (Horsford, 2009, 2010; Siddle Walker, 1993, 2009), Joe initiated and participated in close personal exchanges as he enacted school and community leadership. He routinely engaged in personal conver- sations with students and parents, often about community-based issues. The times of the day that this usually happened were before and after school; in one such morning exchange, he encouraged a mother to stay in contact regarding her elder son’s (non-UAHS student) criminal court proceedings:

What’s going on with the case? You know, you gotta keep me informed ‘cause if I don’t know what’s happening, I can’t help. You know, it helps if you have someone go down there with you some time.

These types of personal exchanges helped him to become close with par- ents and students and to earn their trust. It allowed him to personalize his conversation with them and encourage them in student-specific or situation- specific ways. In one case during the hall passing, Joe walked up to Marcus—a UAHS senior who, according to his teachers, was doing quite well—and said: “Step into my office, I wanna talk to you about something.” Marcus

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responded, “I already know, it’s cool now.” Joe snapped back, “Marcus, you don’t even know what I want! Well, I need to talk to you anyway. I need to know.” When Marcus stepped in, Joe asked him about an earlier confronta- tion that he had with his ex-girlfriend Mary. “Naw, she be stalkin’ me!” “Well, you need to come and tell me when that happens. But we don’t put our hands on girls. Real men don’t do that” Marcus, nearly yelling responded. “Man, I aint never touched her!” The conversation went on for some time as Joe shared a story about a person he knew who went to prison for a number of years for striking his fiancée in the face. The personalized nature of the dialogues made Joe vulnerable to his students and parents, but he seemed to trust them every bit as much as they trusted him. Moreover, the conversation led to an increased rapport and trust. Students and parents saw Joe as real, as one of them, a person with problems too, but who cared about them and their issues.

In another example that demonstrates these personable exchanges, a par- ent came in and waited by his office door. Joe immediately saw her face and stepped away from the conversation he was having with a couple of UAHS teachers. When we entered his office, the parent—who graduated from UAHS 20 years earlier—explained that her daughter was found guilty of stealing from the local shopping mall. “I should have sent her to you; I just don’t know what to do with that girl.” “Send her to her father” Joe responded. “Well, he aint up to no good either . . . he aint gonna do nothin,’” she responded. “We gonna get it right,” Joe encouraged. “Bring her here after school and we will take care of her.” The parent said, “I might just enroll her here, but the problem is that she need to drop her brother off at school and she ‘a miss the bus if she do that” (i.e., come to UAHS). Joe repeated his offer, “Look, she’s around bad influences, just tell her to catch the bus, and she can come here. Wait, did she get probation? . . . I’m a talk to her probation offi- cer.” Exchanges like this show Joe’s concern for community members, including those who were not affiliated with UAHS. Additionally, this con- versation is evidence that he served—in this case offering parental counsel directly from the school—as a community leader. As a consequence of these personal exchanges and nurturing relationships, parents and students were willing to trust Joe despite their general mistrust of other principals in Davistown. This finding confirms that the close school–community ties his- torically enacted by Black school leadership (Horsford, 2009; Morris, 2008; Siddle Walker, 1993) can be enacted in a contemporary urban school- community context.

Unannounced home visits. Another leadership behavior that promoted school–community overlap happened when the principal created a safe and

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accessible space in the community for himself and UAHS school staff. This sometimes would be at well-publicized community events or by delivering report cards directly to student homes. But at other times, the principal would informally visit a student’s house for dinner and build his relationship with students and their families. These visits occurred frequently during this study, and I share examples of this in forthcoming sections; however, an interview with a former student, Darrell, offers a lucid glimpse of how this leadership behavior works. Actually, Darrell had graduated from UAHS over 10 years ago. He continued to occasionally visit the school and speak with Joe and other staff. When Joe visited his family at home, he said that the conversation was rarely about “academic progress and school stuff.” Rather, he would just “swing by and shoot da breeze.” In other words, he would casually speak to Darrell’s mother and grandmother about what was happening in the neigh- borhood and in their personal lives. Interview data revealed that during home visits, the principal, parents, and children would laugh, joke, and talk about popular culture. They might in one instance grieve together and at other times suggest solutions to problems facing their community and school. Such exchanges built an extensive rapport between community and school. Accordingly, Joe was a natural part of the community, and the community members were a natural part of school. This communicative reinforcement of school–community overlap (Epstein, 1987) created an inclusive atmosphere that eased tensions and suspicions that Black parents generally held about Davistown principals.

Mentoring or confronting exclusionary teachers. A third leadership behavior that fostered trust and community overlap was the UAHS principal’s encour- agement or, if necessary, enforcement, of student inclusivity. UAHS students and their parents were actually aware of the marginalization they faced in the district. One way that Joe filled the roles as both school and community leader was by promoting a culture of inclusion at UAHS. With some of the more egregious exclusionary teacher behaviors, Joe would enforce a culture of inclusion. One common example was that he prevented teachers from placing students in the hallway for inappropriate conduct and poor achieve- ment. So initially, Joe would assume the role of a mentor to teachers. But if teachers persisted in their exclusionary practices, he confronted them and enacted leadership behaviors that enforced a culture of inclusion at UAHS.

Mentoring played a central role in fostering community overlap because many traditional teachers who joined the UAHS teaching staff had neither community-based approaches nor inclusionary teaching practices. Thus, in promotion of this goal, Joe became a mentor to his teachers. In one example of how these mentoring relationships occur, Mike, a UAHS social studies

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teacher, reflected on how Joe unabashedly offered him help. He recounted how Joe approached him in his first year at UAHS and said, “Man, you gotta do a better job at controlling your students. Try to identify the ring-leader, and use him. And I can tell you who it is, but you need to find out and develop a relationship with him.” Joe mentored all of the new teachers in a similar way. Mike was able to learn quickly, but Carroll, the UAHS art teacher, found the teaching more difficult; it took 2 years to adjust, as she explained, “After the first year, I thought I was not going to be able to do it. I thought ‘I just don’t get it.’ But then, I started documenting everything and I would ask him (Joe) is this more like what you want? Eventually, it started to work out.” In our interview, she explained that at her previous school they would “sim- ply send kids to the office. But here, that doesn’t fly.” She said that Joe was “forcefully encouraging” at times, and that eventually she learned to work harder—and more inclusively—with students in her classroom.

However, when the mentoring and advice did not work in changing teacher exclusionary behaviors, Joe would confront what he believed to be racist or unfair practices toward the at-risk Black UAHS students. For an example of this, we look at Joe’s relationship with Mary, a middle-aged White woman who served as a UAHS biology teacher. Mary was in her 24th year of teaching, the last 5 of which were at UAHS. On one particular day, Jackson was standing outside her classroom. As Joe and I walked up, he asked the student why he was in the hallway. “‘Cause Mary put me out,” Jackson responded. Joe forcefully opened Mary’s door and said, “The stu- dent has to remain in the classroom and complete his assignments.” After the student entered the classroom and Joe walked away, he expressed frustration, “She just doesn’t listen, man; she doesn’t know how to teach Black kids!” Joe informed me that he tried to mentor her into constructing an inclusionary classroom culture, but to no avail. In his view, she refused his mentorship and continued to exclude Black children. So in the staff meeting that week, Joe returned to the issue. As he opened the meeting, he said, “Several teachers are still placing children in the hallway; in a situation, you could lose your job for that!” He continued, “Now anyone doing that is a racist, and doesn’t want to teach Black kids.” This leadership behavior—mentoring and enforcement— showed kids and their parents that the principal was willing to advocate for the inclusion of kids. In return, they entrusted Joe with leading their children. Again, Joe’s leadership behavior resembled principals in the historical Black community who resisted racism and fought for the inclusion of their com- munity (Anderson, 1988; Morris, 1999, 2008).

In point of fact, these behaviors were effective for Joe because, like the pre-Brown, African American principals, he promoted UAHS as a

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community-linked, relevant school (Siddle Walker, 1993). He was able to cre- ate structures at UAHS that would accommodate and leave a permanent space for the community. Therefore, when considering many of the experiences of racism and marginalization that UAHS Black parents faced, Joe’s leadership resonated because they viewed him as a community member with similar interests. Even more, he was a leader from within the community. Thus, when problems erupted between the Black community and the predominantly White authority, they called on their trusted school and community leader—Joe. Despite the fact that this was a small alternative school that had a longstanding principal, there are a number of behaviors that principals who serve the same demographic population could learn. That is, while charisma certainly played a role in Joe’s success at UAHS, these findings suggest that other urban school leaders could enact similar community overlap and advocacy behaviors. Table 1 illustrates some of these behaviors and how they differ from traditional school principals. But in the following section, I demonstrate that one of the most important leadership behaviors was the principal’s advocacy for community- based causes.

Principal Advocacy in the Community: A Way Toward Building Trust

Advocacy for community causes. The findings in this research suggest that when principals show concern and advocate for community causes, skeptical, distant parents begin to trust and support the principal. These findings report that advocacy lends credibility to the principal, and thus allows him to lead the school with parental support, involvement, and trust. This finding is not surprising given prior research on the topic; Pfautz et al. (1975) found that school–community relations improved when the school leader acted as a “street leader” socially anchored in the community he served. Many of Davis- town’s traditional schools had exemplary standardized test scores, safe and clean environments, high post-secondary college attendance rates, and other markers of good schools. But because African American, ESL, and Latino students were often not included in these successes, many Davistown parents still resisted these traditional school administrators. Also, some parents likely resisted because in their own youth, they were mistreated and abused by teachers (McKenzie, 2009). Moreover, “school-related” accomplishments, such as high standardized test scores, are not necessarily coterminous with community interests or goals. Indeed, a history of abuse—and acts that are interpreted as abuse or racism—culminates in the mistrust that the commu- nity has for official institutions. At UAHS, however, the principal was able to

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Table 1. Comparison of Community-Based/Traditional Leadership Behaviors

Leadership Behaviors (Both Educational and Community-Based) UAHS Principal (Examples)

Other Principals in Davistown (Examples)

Community overlap activities

Weekly home visits, speaking engagements in community churches, support at community advocacy meetings, involvement in student defense hearings

PTA, support for fundraising activities, basketball/football games, open house

Principal–parent discussions (African American UAHS parents)

Significant time spent discussing “non-education” issues with parents, mutual advising and information sharing, usually collaborative

The meetings are strictly about student behavior and academic performance, often informing parents of child’s poor behavior/performance

Purpose of community visits

Advocacy-based, family- oriented, dinner meetings, friendship visits

Very structured educational reasons (for example, reading day at the community library), very impersonal

Parental perceptions of principal

Fair with children, has great concern for children and community related issues, as a friend

Not fair with Black children, not collaborative; as an uncompromising authority figure

Rapport and accessibility to the community

Informal; parents always welcome in school; principal always welcome in community homes

Formal; no strong presence in community; appointments always needed

Goal of school– community relations/ partnerships

Community-based goals: ending racism in Davistown; helping parents in need; educating community about relevant info

School-based goals: raising testing achievement scores; improving attendance; addressing truancy, bullying, gangs

Community- based advocacy activities

Speaking at rallies held by community, directing parents where to get help and info for educational/ personal issues, visiting victims of discrimination/ crimes

None observed or referenced in interviews

(continued)

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Leadership Behaviors (Both Educational and Community-Based) UAHS Principal (Examples)

Other Principals in Davistown (Examples)

Trust with community

Trusted by parents, students, and community members; parents trusted decisions made about child

Not trusted by parents, students, or community members; parents suspicious/ resistant to decisions

Rapport with community

Maintain a very strong mutual dialogue with community; strong rapport

Minimal or nonexistent rapport with parents, students, community

Table 1. (continued)

put the community at ease through his advocacy for causes that the commu- nity interpreted as fighting against oppression and opening up previously blocked opportunities.

Principal’s commitment to student and community advocacy. One central way that Joe established overlap and a community leadership role—which con- tributed to his success as a school leader—was by his advocacy for commu- nity causes. Part of this was Joe understanding advocacy to be a central part of his role as principal. In fact, he seemed to take pride in his advocacy for children, and he described himself as an advocate. In one example, the local police called Joe and informed him that they would be picking up a male student from the school who had groped a female student. Joe did not allow the officer to arrest the student on school grounds. Joe’s opinion was that the student was in school learning and had not caused any problems in school. He believed that the student’s education should not be compromised. If the stu- dent committed the offense in the community, then Joe felt that is where he should interact with the police and not in a school. Here is Joe’s recollection of the event:

Now, we had a kid here Wednesday that the police department said that he groped a girl. How does he know? They said his name came up. You can’t come out here [to the school]! I had them scared because I could have challenged it (all the way up into the legal system), but I didn’t. But they can’t take him from school.

Indeed, occurrences like this left a belief with students and parents that Joe prioritized the interests of their children over all other interests. These glimpses

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of community leadership suggest that the principal’s commitment to student and community advocacy, particularly to community-based causes, was nec- essary for leadership in this urban context.

Another manner in which Joe frequently advocated for students occurred during the school board and disciplinary hearings held by Davistown School District. These hearings determine if an offending student will be perma- nently barred from attending any of the district’s schools for prior violations and offenses. The UAHS parents felt that the hearings were racially biased against Black students, and Joe routinely intervened:

See I had my parents go down to the meeting, and they put it on TV. I had them raise hell, and they stopped the meeting. Then they wanted to bargain then. I don’t mind a protest. That’s what America’s about isn’t it? See the thing about it is, I don’t think I’ve changed as far as my belief system. But when I was in Iowa, I was doing the same thing with White kids.

When I asked him directly about his involvement in the hearings, Joe fondly reminisces about how he fights to keep Black students in school when they are disproportionately targeted by the expulsion hearings:

Researcher: Describe what has happened during the hearings. Joe: See this is a hearing when they want to put a kid out for the rest of

the year, and the kids appeal to the Board. The other day a kid [who the district was trying to expel], a woman said he hit her I said “well show me how he hit you.” She said “he bumped up against me.” I said, “I aint buying that.” I carry a lot of weight on them things.

R: If you weren’t there, do you think that a lot more kids would be expelled?

J: Oh yeah! I got to look out for them. I got to. Who else is in this district is going to look out for these Black kids? Who? Give me a name of one. Give me a name of a Black administrator who will stand up for these Black kids . . . I’m an advocate for kids.

Joe’s advocacy for student inclusion in school, as well as community- based causes, contributed to the trusting relationship he had with the com- munity. Like many Black, urban, and alternative school students (Dunbar, 2001; Gregory, Skiba, & Noguera, 2010), UAHS students were often excluded from school and faced legal court cases. UAHS was unique in that the principal personally advocated for a number of these legal cases.

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Moreover, the UAHS principal utilized additional school resources for stu- dent and community-based advocacy. Thus, the community-liaison and the social worker often assisted the principal in student and community-based advocacy.

Although many UAHS staff members played significant roles in advocat- ing for students, the UAHS principal took a leadership role in the advocacy. In his leadership performances, he actually modeled ways that this advocacy occurred. In one instance, a parent who said that she did not “trust any school employee” allowed Joe to pick up her son and bring him to school an hour before any of the other students and before most teachers arrive. Joe told her that her son needed to catch up with others in the class and that it would be good that he got some discipline before he “tried to slip out at the end of the day.” The parent readily agreed; her agreement was a marked difference from her responses to traditional school staff. This example, however, would still be a form of educational advocacy for students. What is most remarkable and perhaps rare in school leaders was his demonstration of community advocacy. Yet if urban principals begin to advocate for community causes, they will likely earn the trust and support that Joe did among his stakeholders.

Glimpses of community-based advocacy. Joe’s visibility and advocacy in the community were major components of his school leadership. This, perhaps more than anything else, gained him the credibility as a fair person who clearly cared about the interests of children and their families. One example, which we will call the Veteran’s Park incident, is perhaps the clearest exam- ple of how Joe demonstrated advocacy for the community’s interests. Veter- an’s Park is a local park situated in an accessible area to many of Davistown’s low-income, African American youth. The swimming pool is the main attrac- tion for these youth, and many of the city’s most affluent residents also swim there. During the summer months, some years prior to this study, five young Black Davistown youth were accused of taking a pager and cellular phone that belonged to a middle-aged, White professional who was also swimming at the park. The staff of the pool unjustifiably, and without parental consent for a minor, searched and detained all five Black youth and infringed on their rights by accusing them of taking the items.

None of the accused youth were UAHS students, yet the parents had heard of Joe’s reputation in the community and called him immediately. In the months following the incident, Joe and a few parents organized several pro- test marches around the property of Veteran’s Park. He also requested the involvement of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). After a brief police investigation, officials determined that the students were innocent of

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any wrongdoing. Parents, students, and community members—led by this community-responsive school leader—rallied in support of the children. After pro bono legal representation and a community-based protest regarding the violation of the students’ human and civil rights, the municipal offices of Davistown settled the case by paying $100,000 to the young complainants. The settlement was split into five $20,000 trusts that were to be held until the students turned 18. In this case, the community trusted Joe enough to call him. And as a consequence of the media publicity and Joe’s increased com- munity presence during the incident, community members began to trust him even more. Indeed, when students could convince their parents that tradi- tional school principals were unfairly targeting them in school, no student could convincingly level such claims against Joe. As one of the parents involved in the protests said, “they (parents) know they can trust him because he’s gonna come out when he doesn’t even have to, and do the right thing, so you know he’s gonna do the right thing in school.” This statement illustrates parental trust in Joe, which translated into support of Joe’s administrative behaviors in the school.

Results of community-based advocacy: Trust and rapport. The findings here indicate that the UAHS school principal took concrete steps to build trust and rapport. Joe explained that as a new principal at UAHS, he gained entrance to the community through his desire to become a part of the community, his recognition that community participation was necessary for school success, and his inclusion of staff members who were from the community he was serving. I asked him about the staff members who were instrumental at the inception of UAHS. He responded by saying, “In the beginning I had a sec- retary who had grown up in the community and knew everyone.” Joe’s advo- cacy and perceived fairness led to parents and community members’ trust in him as he pushed their children to succeed:

He’s (Joe) hard on them. But he works with them and everybody knows he cares, “You gotta problem? You need to come and sit down and talk to me. Well, let’s figure it out.” He tells ‘em, “There’s always good in you, no matter what. Let’s bring that good out of you.” (Nikki, parent of two girls at UAHS)

In addition to his leadership behaviors, the UAHS principal encouraged the UAHS staff to bond with the community. Local county Intermediate School District (ISD) reported in the 2005 “High School Senior Exit Survey” that 75% of UAHS students reported that they frequently “experienced teachers who communicated with my family regarding my education/career

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development.” In contrast, only 16% of students in the county reported the same frequency of communication between their parents and teachers; the percentage was even less for Davistown’s Black youth. This indicates that rapport was developed through the administrative structures implemented by the UAHS principal. UAHS teachers attributed their positive relations with students not only to smaller class sizes but also to the principal scheduling release time for teachers to visit students in their homes. Furthermore, the principal had several non-educational meetings that were held at the UAHS building; these meetings—such as community breakfasts and other various community meetings—contributed to parents’ view of UAHS as a commu- nity structure, and not an official or oppressive school structure. Additionally, Joe relied heavily on the initial mandatory interview as an opportunity to forge a positive relationship with the parents of UAHS students.

The aforementioned examples illustrate the UAHS principal’s solid role as community leader. They also illustrate a cultural continuity with historical school leaders who demonstrated similar unique and community-based approaches to leadership (Gooden, 2005; Horsford, 2010; Lomotey, 1987, 1989; Morris, 2008; Siddle Walker, 2009). As he led at UAHS and in the sur- rounding community, Joe adapted to and prioritized the needs of the com- munity. Actually, some newer incoming parents at UAHS arrived with suspicion toward UAHS faculty and administration. But the administrative behavior and structures described here were enough to get most parents involved in their children’s education. Purdue (2001) shows that community leaders act as “key points of contact between government regeneration initia- tives and local residents in neighborhoods” (p. 2221). He further argues that the community’s trust in the leader is central to any such collaboration. In the case of UAHS, the cultural relevance and community-based advocacy of the school leader led to the community’s trust in his leadership behaviors, which in turn were manifested in improved academic and social behaviors of UAHS students.

From Community to School: The Educational Impact and Student Outcomes The previous findings offer a portrait of a principal who earned community trust by promoting school–community overlap and advocating for community- based causes. Yet another central finding is related to the impact that this type of leadership has on students’ self-concepts, behavior, and academic achievements. By gaining the trust and support of previously mistrustful parents, the UAHS principal was able to—without parental resistance, and

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usually with parental support—enact a type leadership that greatly enhanced students’ academic self-concepts. Prior research indicates that when stu- dents have a positive self-concept, they perform better in school (Brookover, Thomas, & Paterson, 1964; Pajares & Schunk, 2001). If students believe they can learn and that they are good students, then their school performance improves (Pajares & Schunk, 2001). Carter (2008) found, for example, that Black high-achieving students conceptualized their own identities as includ- ing both their Blackness and their intelligence. Similarly, Khalifa (in press) found that poor, hyperghetto students were able to merge “smartness” with their indigenous, urban neighborhood identities. After coming to UAHS, the students began to redefine themselves in ways that included long-term plan- ning, cessation of risky behaviors in the community, improved behavior at school, and high academic achievement.

The academic and social behaviors exhibited by UAHS students prior to attending UAHS were strongly associated with high school dropout. The social behaviors coterminous with dropout risk were skipping class, fighting with other students, strong disrespect toward school staff, illicit drug use, promiscuity, alcohol abuse, profanity, and noncompliance with academic norms and expectations. However, the students at UAHS report that they changed their behavior after coming to UAHS. According to Joe and his staff, roughly 90% of the students who come to UAHS graduate (state data indicate a consistent retention rate—i.e., freshmen, sophomores, and juniors who returned to UAHS—of 98%). That translates into a consistently low dropout rate, year after year. My interpretation is that this positive change in student self-perception and redefinition of student identity is what Joe, with community support, has been successful in helping students achieve. Moreover, this mental/psychological shift in students has led to positive aca- demic and social gains for UAHS students.

Academic changes in student outcomes. Interviews with students demon- strated that the school principal was also able to positively impact their view of school and consequently their academic achievement. Previously, many of the students expressed that they were not comfortable with their traditional schools. One of the most striking findings in this research is the positive edu- cational identities that became available to students after attending UAHS. At UAHS, it is acceptable to be Black, or poor, even ghetto, and academically smart. Because of how discursive community environments around the school informed indigenous neighborhood identities, a normalized yet schol- arship-based identity was often not available to students until reaching UAHS. The propensity for UAHS students to identify with academic achieve- ment was corroborated by the local Independent School District High School

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Senior Exit Survey; when asked how important academic coursework was in 2002, only 67% of the students in the local county compared to 88% of UAHS students said that it was “very important.” The data in this study sup- port the findings of this survey. In case after case, students expressed their newfound commitment to excel in school and change what they described as “negative” behaviors. In one case, Darnell, a former UAHS student who is now taking classes at a local community college, explained:

When I was in middle school, I used to try to fit in, and I smoked with ‘em and drank with ‘em. Then when I came here, I learned that that’s not cool. So I just said, I’m not gonna do that no more. Joe was always tellin’ us not to do those things ‘cause it wouldn’t lead to nothing later in life.

As this quote suggests, the principal’s behaviors were directly responsible for accepting indigenous identities while molding academic identities. Joe rein- forced positive behavior and identity by using school-wide sessions that included all school and community stakeholders (called Rap Sessions), princi- pal-student exchanges during hallway passing, initial and subsequent parent- student-administrator conferences, home visits, and virtually any contact he had with UAHS students. Moreover, at UAHS school failure was something that students defined as an undesirable or unacceptable trait. For example, Raymond, a current UAHS student, had dropped out of one of Davistown’s traditional high schools and wore a court-mandated tether on his ankle. He believed his disposition toward school drastically changed after coming to UAHS:

I’m successful here. I was getting’ strait E’s; I’m doin’ good, I have like B’s and C’s now. Because when I was at Harrison and stuff like, I wasn’t really thinking about what I did, what I wanted to do, and about taking my life more seriously. Then when I came here, that’s when I thought about what I want to do and how I want my life to be better. I mean, I’m still street, but I do my thang here too though. (Raymond, current UAHS student)

This example, and many others like it, indicates that students began to merge an academic identity into their own self-conceptualizations and self- images. This integration of academic excellence into their cultural identity is similar to that described in pre-Brown all-Black schools (e.g., Siddle-Walker, 1993). The school leadership behavior was well supported by the community, and thus, Joe was able to push the students without community resistance.

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Behavioral changes in student outcomes. In addition to these academic achievements, the trust and rapport that Joe harnessed through his commu- nity leadership was also used to push students toward positive behavioral gains. In fact, the social behaviors of students in the school were frequently sanctioned in the traditional school environment. The students in this research, as well as their parents and teachers, unequivocally note that the attitudes of the children in this study became more positive at UAHS. This changed happened in virtually all UAHS students but is well captured in the case of Ahmed. He was a former UAHS student who was removed from a traditional school for attacking the gym teacher for, what he believed, was disrespect. After coming to UAHS, he began to attend classes and was never aggressive toward UAHS teachers. He explained how Joe would unexpect- edly and routinely join his family for dinner. When asked why he changed his behavior after coming to UAHS, Ahmed explained how Joe helped him mod- ify his attitude, behaviors, and overall disposition toward school:

He was on me daily. He would see me in the morning and drop some- thing in my ear; like one morning I came in and the day before, I had gotten into a beef with this dude from The Heights [a local subsidized housing project]. Joe whispered to me, “now you know what happened yesterday, I don’t want no problems today. You gotta stay positive and don’t try to fight every battle.” It made me stop and think like, “It’s not worth it.” I listened when he talked.

Ahmed and other students claimed that their own social behaviors and posture toward school had changed since coming to UAHS. Their previous diffidence toward school was replaced with assertion, their apathy with deter- mination, and their resistance with acceptance of UAHS norms. But beyond their academic and social behavior changes at school, the students also believed that their overall home and school behavior changed. For students who previously had poor school experiences, the UAHS school culture exuded alternatives that somehow accommodated both the aesthetic trap- pings of their neighborhood identity and an identity coterminous with aca- demic and social excellence.

Identity changes in relation to student outcomes. In juncture with the positive academic and behavioral changes, the findings here indicate that the princi- pal’s close relationship with the community affirmed the students’ indigenous identities and allowed students to successfully integrate them with newfound academic identities. Before coming to UAHS, nearly all UAHS students were in serious academic trouble or had completely dropped out of school.

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Yet in narrative after narrative, students shared how they were staying true to their hip-hop, urban, or street identities, but how they now imagined them- selves going to college. In some cases, they even viewed college as a way to expand or improve their hip-hop endeavors. Joe would tell them that if they wanted to be music producers or music video directors, they still needed col- lege. In the school-wide assemblies called Rap Sessions, Joe would ask the students, “Who plans to go to college?” Every student would raise his or her hand. Even those who were academically or socially struggling at UAHS maintained their plan to graduate from UAHS and attend college. This is an indication that the students merged academic identities with their neighbor- hood identities. The data are rife with examples of these new merged or hybridized identities. One student, who was already a part of a local rap group that performed around Davistown, responded, “I’m already in college now! I’m takin’ two classes at (Battleland Community College)!” He was responding affirmatively to questions about future plans for education. Other students responded similarly. LaTasha said she was going to Smith College— a women’s college that her cousin, also a former UAHS student, currently attended. “It’ll be that, or Spellman, ‘cause I kinda want to go to a Black col- lege too.” These remarks were coming from students who had once been in academic trouble or had even dropped out. But now, high post-secondary educational aspirations were the dominant narrative among current UAHS students. In sum, the students’ academic and social performances improved as a result UAHS leadership, and the students were now comfortable and felt a sense of belonging in school.

Discussion While using research that highlights the accomplishments of early African American principals who played an active community leadership role, this study examined how a principal improved the academic and social lives of students by serving as both school and community leader. A number of stud- ies have provided evidence regarding the benefits of school–community partnerships (Arriaza, 2004; Dawson, 1984; Epstein, 1995), but the prevalent practice has been for schools to control the dialogue, to have school-oriented goals at the center of the relationship, and to place community-related goals and interests at the periphery. I realize that resituating a school principal’s role—not only to encompass the neighborhood community but to be located squarely within it—is neither applicable to all contexts nor obligatory for effective leadership practice. Yet the model presented in this research offers insight to urban principals seeking to enlist uninvolved parents, particularly

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if parents’ disengagement is associated with tacit diffidence or even manifest hostility. This approach is highly relevant to principals serving communities that have deep memories of marginalization and who have always been pre- sented with school–community relationships that were framed solely by school administrators and educators. I also realize that parents and commu- nity members are not always victims; some actively resist and intentionally stay away from schools, while in other cases, parental distance may be a result of the myriad social problems that often characterize urban and lower income areas. In one instance, a parent, who was homeless for 7 months dur- ing the time of this study, conceded that she never returned the phone calls of any Davistowns’ traditional school administrators when they called her about her son. She believed that they were picking on her son, and “not being fair because they were punishing him more for the same thing that other boys were doing.” Yet she expressed trust and satisfaction with Joe and his treat- ment of her son. This example is reverberated throughout this research, because it clearly demonstrates that for some communities, school leaders must earn credibility, trust, and establish rapport; for urban, African American, and other marginalized areas, these are earned in the community and not granted from within the school walls. It is not enough for principals to occa- sionally go out into the surrounding neighborhood communities; rather, in order to gain community trust and credibility and to establish rapport—and consequently community support for school leadership behaviors—the prin- cipal should advocate for community causes and concerns. I argue that Joe’s success can be achieved by school leaders who are willing to establish a school–community overlap and advocate for community-based causes and concerns. These leadership characteristics have less to do with charisma and the personality of Joe and more to do with the principals’ perceptions and willing- ness to venture into unchartered, or even ostensibly hostile, territory.

Implications In this study, I demonstrate that school leaders play a primary role in crafting school and community relationships that lead to positive academic and behavioral changes in students. I further show that in urban contexts, this leadership can be enacted by fostering school and community overlap and advocating for community-based causes. But one might ask, for whom is this work useful? I argue that leaders who serve marginalized populations will benefit most from this work. Principals should understand that parents from such communities are often least likely to engage official structures such as schools. Thus, any leader should be willing to engage the community to the

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extent necessary to earn the trust and ensuing support of the communities they serve. The alternative is for parents to continue to maintain a distance from school. And as demonstrated in this study, there are social, political, and historical reasons that many of these parents and children are marginal- ized. Yet I have found here that community-based advocacy can lead not only to stronger community relationships, but that such advocacy is also morally appropriate given their unique and often oppressive histories. Despite Joe’s racial and cultural similarities with the community he served, I argue that even principals who come from cultural backgrounds different from their students can have a positive impact by building trust if they are willing to venture out into the community and reconsider traditional para- digms of school leadership. In fact, White principals who serve Black or Latino students may actually need more “community face time” to build trust than principals with shared cultural backgrounds. As it were, culturally dif- ferent school leaders may have more to prove (and more to learn) and may benefit more from implementing this renewed paradigm in school–community relations. Hence, implications for school principals are many: that principals bear the responsibility and must lead the initiative in building more trusting relationships with urban and African American parents; that principal advo- cacy for community issues leads to increased trust and credibility, and this will in turn help them lead schools better; and that having an overlapping space of school and community is more culturally appropriate for some com- munities and can lead to higher student success.

Finally, this study has several implications for how leadership preparation programs train prospective principals and consequently how principals view their roles. As I have experienced—both in educational leadership programs as both a student and faculty member—the domain often entitled School– Community Leadership emphasizes almost exclusively how school leaders can shape the culture within the school itself. And “parent participation” in school often ignores community-based concerns. Therefore, given the con- clusions of this study, I believe that urban leadership preparation programs must broaden their understanding of what school and community relations are, where they are located, and how they operationally occur.

Conclusion Primarily, this research challenges ubiquitous views of traditional school- community relations. That is, traditional school principals in urban areas expect parents to come into the school and for the partnerships to exist within the paradigm of school-driven goals (e.g., how can parents partner with schools

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to raise test scores?). Unfortunately, these traditional approaches are often at odds with school–community understandings within African American com- munities, given their historical and culturally specific models of school leadership. In the views of a number of Davistown Black parents, school is at least different from, and often oppressive to, the communities in which they live. Therefore, as in many urban communities, traditional positions of authority are mistrusted and resisted by Davistown’s Black community. Yet the principal at UAHS—by establishing a strong community presence, by creating opportunities for parents to come into the school, and through community-based advocacy—was able to garner the trust that was necessary to lead a school that served this unique urban demographic. This type of community support and credibility allowed the principal to implement school-level policy with parental support rather than fierce resistance or separateness. This approach is the embodiment of community-based leader- ship, and though it is a demanding approach, it ultimately will extend better chances at academic and social success to Black students.

Why is a new (or more appropriately, renewed when considering earlier scholarship) approach or paradigm needed? In research on school leadership, scholars often situate school leadership behaviors exclusively within a school context. Yet, I would argue that visiting a church, fighting for the rights of marginalized and abused children in the community, leading a rally against racism in schools, or going to homes on personal visits all contribute to stu- dent success in school and therefore are leadership behaviors. Through such activities, urban principals earn an asset essential to successful school leader- ship—the community’s trust. Therefore, how can a principal’s leadership in the community contribute to their leadership in school and, of course, student success? It is by principals going into communities and bringing community members into the school, placing the community issues at the center of school–community partnership goals, and advocating for community-based goals. This new approach is needed because many of the school–community approaches that are currently used in school are not historically or cultur- ally appropriate for the unique (urban, Black, Latino, etc.) communities they serve.

Although there are limitations in this study—such as the small sample size and emphasis on one school, the purposive selection of respondents and the research site, and the inaccessibility to other principals in the district (and even other community members we could not interview)—there are still a number of important implications for leadership preparation and research that we may realize from this study. Finally, I offer a number of cautionary notes that are relevant to this study. For one, this research runs the risk of

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essentializing “good versus bad” principals, or presenting principal as “Hero” (Loewen, 1995). But as an ethnographer and former urban administrator seeking practical solutions to the challenges of urban school leadership, it is not my goal to overcome these research limitations as much as to recognize them. This work will succeed, in my view, if it opens a conversation about how school leaders can improve their schools by serving the community. And secondly, I realize that the implementation of insights offered by this study will occur differently from one context to another. But because of the similarity of these findings to historical analyses of scholars I earlier refer- enced, such as Siddle Walker, Morris, and Horsford, I believe that many urban and predominantly African American schools would benefit from this new paradigm of school leadership.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publica- tion of this article.

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Bio

Muhammad Khalifa, PhD, is an assistant professor of Educational Administration at Michigan State University. His research focus is primarily on culturally relevant school leadership, urban school closure, and school–community relations. He has recently looked at the role of school leadership in racialized school discipline gaps. In addition to his urban work in U.S. schools, he recently engaged in transnational research and development that focuses school leadership and the schooling experi- ences of East African residents and refugee students.