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Trang 3Copyright 1996 by
Bauer, Scott Charles
All rights reserved
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Trang 7Scott Charles Bauer spent his first eighteen years living in Carle Place, a small community on Long Island, and was a graduate of Carle Place High School, class of 1976 After spending a year recuperating from injuries sustained in an automobile accident that occurred on Labor Day weekend during his freshman year, Scott attended the New York State School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University, from which he earned a Bachelors of Science degree in January 1981 and
a Masters of Science Degree in August 1983 Scott took a leave of
absence from Cornell in 1984, and joined the staff of Organizational Analysis & Practice in as an Associate He became a partner at OAP in
1988 At Organizational Analysis and Practice, Scott focused on two areas: assisting school districts with planning and implementing shared decision making programs; and assessing the efficacy of school district administrative structures in supporting the implementation of total quality management In 1994, Scott returned to full-time graduate study at
Cornell Over the past decade, Mr Bauer has worked on a wide variety
of research and consulting projects dealing with the organizational design of professional service organizations, and has contributed papers to
scholarly journals in education and organizational studies
ili
Trang 8I hardly know where to begin First, I want to acknowledge and thank the individuals in each of the research sites I studied for their
knowledge and expertise, their cooperation, and their trust I owe them a debt of gratitude for their ability to share their experiences and concerns, for their openness and willingness to work with me as a researcher and consultant, and for their sincere desire to improve their organizations From the outset, my goal has been to find ways to integrate theory and practice; they helped me at least begin to see that this is a desirable and worthwhile goal, and one which they support
Second, I want to thank my colleagues at Organizational Analysis and Practice (OAP), specifically Stephen Mitchell, Joseph Shedd, and
Rose Malanowski I will not try to describe how much I learned from
these characters, nor how much I enjoy their insights, our conversations, or their company Each contributed a large part of what I now consider my “professional self.” Our work in the Cooperative Relationships
Project, especially, and our training and research projects involving
shared decision making and total quality in individual school districts, are evident in this work Each and every day I benefit from having worked
with them and use something that they taught me Many times,
throughout this project, I got on the phone to bounce an idea off of them, and received as feedback an insight that propelled me a little closer to where I wanted to be They have the capacity and the ability to help me (and many others) think, and I treasure our conversations as learning
Trang 9experiences almost as much as working with them in the field
Third, I owe a million thanks to my special committee members:
Professors Samuel Bacharach and Lawrence Williams, and Dean David
Lipsky From Sam, who got me into this mess in the first place,
(something I credit him with, not blame him for), I have received ongoing friendship, support and encouragement, and the benefit of his uncanny ability to sit down with me for just a few minutes and alter how I look at something in its entirety Likewise, Larry and David have been
encouraging and supportive for a long time, and I thank them for this and
for their wisdom I continue to learn from each of our discussions, and in
very important respects, both have been role models for me and have contributed to my development in immeasurable ways I also want to
thank all three for their patience For years, Sam has asked, “So when are
you going to get serious about this?” Thanks for allowing me the luxury of being able to complete this when I felt I was able to do the kind of job I wanted to do
Finally, I want to thank my friends and family for their
encouragement and love My long-time friends on Long Island, Mark and Nancy, and in Ithaca, Mike and Donna, kept me somewhat sane with their encouragement and good humor, and my newer friends, those who
shared an office with me while I was writing (Paul and Vanessa, Dave and Cindy, etc.), attempted to drive me crazy at the same time by looking over my shoulder and asking, “Are you done yet?” While they were at it, they all gave me pats on the back (when I needed it most)
I want to especially thank Peggy Beers for daily support, hugs, and
Trang 10
doubt whether I would have had the patience she had or the fortitude to
put up with my craziness (e.g., stopping conversations mid-stream to run
up to the office to jot down some notes or scribble a diagram)
Likewise, I want to acknowledge the love and companionship of Mickey, Stewart, and Alexander, (whom I miss daily.) The fact that they
are kitties in no way diminishes their contribution to my work (especially since Mickey developed the habit of assisting me whenever I used my computer at home, sometimes adding her two cents by walking on the keyboard)
My parents, Julius and Hildreth, my sisters and their spouses, Joan, Jay, Amy, Lynn, and Tom, and their children, (my nephews and niece), David, Maureen, and Jared, continue to let me know that they are proud
of me, (even if they secretly - or not so secretly - think I screw my life up just a little bit) Throughout, they let me know that they are there for me
whatever I want to do
The words “support” and “encouragement” are repeated over and over in these acknowledgements, perhaps because I am out of new words; more likely, it is due to the fact that a lot of people have been there for me for a very long time I chose not to dedicate this to anyone in
particular, not because I am ungrateful, but because I am truly grateful to so many
In a true sense, my work in organizational theory and design, my research and consulting work in schools, and this dissertation, are
collective products I cannot imagine having completed this without the
vi
Trang 11have neglected to single out here in writing I hope they forgive me for this
Finally, I take full responsibility for the work presented here; any
errors or omissions are mine alone
Trang 12TABLE OF CONTENTS
Biographical Sketch 6 cece eee e eee cent e eee e eee n nes ili Acknowledgments - sẽ nh nh nh nh nhỉ iv
Table of Contents ` LH viii
List of Tables - sen nh nh nh nh nh th iX List ofFigures -. {sẽ nh nh nhe nh nh nh nh nh nhớ Xx Chapter 1 Introduction -<< ch nh nhỉ 1
Chapter2 Reform_ -. ch nh nh nh nh nh nhớ 18
Chapter3 Restructuring - «cà nh nh nhe 42
Chapter4 Site Based Management: Definition and Rationale 89
Chapter 5 Does Site Based Management Work? 121
Chapter6 Metro: Operationalizing Site Team Processes 155
Chapter 7 Metro: Do Team Processes Matter? 182
Chapter 8 Designing Site Based Systems ‹ 212
Chapter9 Design Process Data - cà nỉ nỉ 258 Chapter 10 Design Questions: Focus ‹-‹ccỉ 314 Chapter II Design Questions: Scop© -.‹‹ {ch c 341 Chapter 12 Design Questions: Structure ‹-‹- 372
Trang 13Table 6.1 Table 6.2 Table 6.3 Table 6.4 Table 6.5 Table 6.6 Table 7.1 Table 7.2 Table 7.3 Table 7.4 Table 7.5 Table 7.6 Table 8.1 Table 11.1 Table 12.1
Metro Survey Response Rate by School 164
Metro Survey Distribution of Respondents 165
Metro Survey Resource / Support Factors . 170
Metro Survey Design Factors - - - - 174
Metro Survey Effectiveness FacfOrS - - 179
Metro Survey Descriptive Statistics of Factors 180
Zero Order Correlations for Variables in the Regression AnalysÌS - «nh nh nh nhớt 189 Regression Analysis Equation Ì - - 199
Regression Analysis Equation 2 - - - 200
Regression Analysis Equation 3 - 202
Regression Analysis Equation 4 -.-. 204
Regression Analysis Equation 5 ‹ - 205
A New Compact for Learning Strategic Objectives 216
Potential Areas for Site Team Decision Making 352
Stakeholder Group Representation on Site Teams 391°
ix
Trang 14
Figure 7.1 Figure 7.2 Figure 7.3 Figure 7.4 Figure 7.5 Figure 7.6 Figure 8.1 Figure 8.2
Figure 11.1 Traditional Design Approach
Figure 15.1 A Process Model of Shared Decision Making LIST OF FIGURES
Summary of Regression Hypotheses . - Relationships between Effectiveness in Promoting Infuence and Design Factors - - Relationships between Effectiveness in Improving
Decision Making and Design Factors
Relationships between Effectiveness in Improving Educational Services and Design Factors
Relationships between Satisfaction with Council and Design Factors {nhà Relationships between Satisfaction with District Program and Design Factors
Overview - Shared Decision Making Design Process
The Role of Focus in Design
Trang 15Public schools in this country changed little over the past century in terms of their basic structure The education system was created to
meet the needs of an industrial society; indeed, the schools adopted many
features of the factory model that emerged at the turn of the century.! This model served the country well for the better part of the century, both in industry and in education, but most agree that it has outlived its utility More precisely, the world has changed in such fundamental ways that the
organizations designed for the needs of an industrial society must be transformed to meet the needs of a new age
The current education reform movement arose largely from the recognition that the country’s economic health increasingly depends on a well educated workforce.? The same environmental forces challenging
American business and industry contributed to the sense that the schools were not doing their job preparing students for the 21st century In addition, a constellation of forces contributed to the emergence of education as a dominant issue on the national agenda, among them the changing nature of the family, changes in workforce needs, and changes in the make-up of the school age population Whatever the reason, the consensus was that schools must improve
'David Tyack, "Schoo! Governance in the United States: Historical Puzzles and Anomalies," in Decentralization and School Improvement:_Can We Fulfill the Promise? ed Jane Hannaway and
Martin Carnoy (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1993)
Trang 16In the initial period or “wave” of the current reform movement, change was mandated That is, the traditional bureaucratic structure of the school system was reinforced by imposing top-down changes such as
standardized curriculum and testing, teacher competency examinations, and merit pay schemes The states were the most active players in reform There was an unprecedented volume of activity in this initial period, but the evidence suggests that the impact on teaching and learning was negligible? Mandated change did little to affect classroom activity
The more recent period of reform, generally referred to as the restructuring movement, is based on the assumption that the traditional structure of “smokestack education” undermines educational
effectiveness.> Along with its virtues, schools inherited the inflexibility
and resistance to change endemic to large-scale bureaucratic systems Many of the failures of the first wave of reform reflect the fact that there is only so much change possible within the structure of the traditional school system At a time when broad agreement exists on the need to fundamentally redesign education to prepare students for the information age,® a more flexible and adaptable structure is needed
In contrast to the assumptions of the first wave reformers, those
3Susan H Fuhrman, Richard F Elmore, and Diane Massell, "School Reform in the United
States: Putting it into Context,” in Reforming Education: The Emerging Systemic Approach, ed Stephen L Jacobson and Robert Berne (Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press, Inc., 1993)
4yamieson A McKenzie and David M Ruetschlin, Administrators at Risk: Tools and Technologies for Securing Your Future (Bloomington, IN: National Educational Service 1993)
5Jerome M Rosow and Robert Zager, with Jill Casner-Lotto and Associates, Allies in
Educational Reform: How Teachers, Unions, and Administrators.Can_Join Forces for Better Schools
(San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, Inc., 1989)
SJohn C Hill, The New American School: Breaking the Mold (Lancaster, PA: Technomic
Publishing Co., 1992) For a discussion of the reform movement, see chapters two and three
Trang 17
who support restructuring believe that the problem with schools is not the
people working in them - administrators, teachers, students and other
stakeholders in the education process - but the system itself:
The schools are filled with intelligent, conscientious, even
idealistic people eager to be effective The problem is that the system they are caught in - schools as we still organize and run
them, prevailing notions of curriculum and instructional methods,
the existing allocations of responsibility and authority - has become obsolete For all the changes around us, the American school today is more as it was in 1900 or 1950 than it is different And what worked in the 1900's will not work in the 2000's Either we will make now the fundamental changes needed in the ways we raise and educate our children, or we can begin the slide into a darker and less prosperous time.’
The school as an organization must be redesigned to fulfill new purposes
Furthermore, the locus of change cannot be the statehouse; instead, a
central tenet of the restructuring movement is the need to make the school the center of change.® Rather than imposing reform from above,
stakeholders at the school level must be involved in designing and implementing reform
Since the beginning of the second wave of reform, there has been near universal agreement that teachers, parents, principals, and other
school staff should be more involved in making decisions on educational matters A series of commission reports published in the late eighties
“The University of the State of New York, The State Education Department, A New.Compact
for Learning: Improving Public Elementary, Middle, and Secondary Education Results in the 1990's (Albany, NY: The University of the State of New York, The State Education Department, March 1991), pp 1-2
8enneth A Sirotnick, "The School as the Center of Change," in Schooling for Tomorrow: Directing Reforms to Issues That.Count, ed Thomas J Sergiovanni and John H Moore (Boston: Allyn
Trang 184
endorsed the notion of site based management,’ as did associations of
teachers and administrators.'° Expanded use of employee involvement in ena nanck Cn eencren ho Sate Aba nL mmet La pio
industry during the eighties no doubt contributed to the interest in decentralizing change in education.'’ Employee involvement has been called the number one strategy in creating the change sensitive
organization," and has been associated with the creation of “learning
organizations”? and total quality systems.’ The use of team structures,
including quality circles, semi-autonomous work teams, and cross- functional teams, has been on the rise.'®
See, for instance, National Governor’s Association, Time for Results: The Governor’s.1991 ion (Washington, D.C.: National Governor’s Association Center for Policy Research and Analysis, August 1986); Education Commission of the States, What’s Next? More Leverage for Teachers? (Denver: Education Commission of the States, July 1986); Carnegie Commission on
Teaching as a Profession, A Nation Prepared: Teachers for the 21st Century (Hyattsville, Md.:
Carnegie Forum on Education and the Economy, May, 1986); Holmes Group, Tomorrow’s Teachers:
A Report of the Holmes Group (Lansing, MI: The Holmes Group, Inc., April, 1986)
l0council of Chief State School Officers, Success for All in a New Century: A Report by the
Council of Chief State School Officers on Restructuring Education (Washington, DC: Council of Chief State School Officers, 1989); National Association of Secondary School Principals / National Education
Association, Ventures in Good Schooling: A Cooperative Model for a Successful Secondary School
(Reston, VA: NASSP, NEA, August 1986); National Education Association, Site-Based
Decisionmaking: The 1990 NEA Census of Local Associations (Washington, DC: National Education Association, Research Division, 1991)
LÍ Tosenh Shedd, Involving Teachers in School and District Decision-making (Ithaca, NY: Organizational Analysis and Practice, Inc., 1987)
12att Hennecke, “Toward the Change-Sensitive Organization,” Training, 28, no 5 (May
1991), 54-63
\3pavid A Garvin, “Building a Learning Organization,” Harvard Business Review, 71, no 4
(July-August 1993), 78-91
lstanley J Spanbauer, A Quality System for Education: Using Quality and Productivity
Techniques to Save Our Schools (Milwaukee: ASQC Quality Press, 1992)
ge, for instance, Richard S Wellins, William C Byham and George R Dixon, Inside Teams: How 20 World-Class Organizations Are Winning Through Teamwork (San Francisco:
Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1994), and Glenn M Parker, Cross-Functional Teams:_Working with Allies,
Trang 19In education, support for the notion that the schools must be empowered change agents in the school improvement process has been advocated for decades.'® In fact, over 60 years ago, Buchholz concluded that giving teachers the control they need to structure educational
programs to meet the needs of their students was a pedagogical
necessity.!7 In 1940, Cillie found that decentralized educational systems
exhibited greater adaptability and flexibility than centralized systems, and that they were more responsive to the needs of their students." Studies of educational problem solving and decision making in the fifties and sixties consistently showed that the opportunity to actively
participate in decision making enhanced the likelihood that policies would be supported,’® and many schools have a long history of involving staff in policy development through participation on committees and task
forces.”
More recently, interest in promoting decision making participation grew after release of the Rand studies of educational change in the mid-
seventies,2! which found that unless the individuals ultimately
\6sirotnick, "The School as the Center of Change.”
M7 Heinrich Ewald Buchholz, Fads and Fallacies in Present-Day Education (Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries Press, 1931)
18Erancois S Cillie, Decentralization or Centralization?_A study in Educational Adaptation (New York: Teachers College Press, 1940)
Sherry Keith and Robert Henriques Girling, Education, Management,.and Participation:
New Directions in Educational Administration (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1991)
291osenh B Shedd and Charles Read, "School Committees and Shared Decision Making: Are We Reinventing Wheels?" The Council Journal, 11, no | (April 1994), 89-102
21 nonna K Crawford, Richard J Bodine, and Robert G Hoglund, The School for Quality Learning: Managing the School and Classroom the Deming Way (Champaign, IL: Research Press,
1993)
Trang 20
6
responsible for implementing change are involved in the change process, the change will not be permanent The effective schools research of the - Jate seventies and early eighties identified school decision making ee cere ene tne nen A on ee gl he A BA A
structures as associated with more effective schools, as well,” expanding the interest in adopting team-based participation structures at the school level
It should come as little surprise, then, that adoption of site based management” has been widespread A recent survey of state education
departments showed that 44 reported adopting some type of site based
management or shared decision making program A survey of National Education Association locals showed that 30% reported use of some form of site based decision making, with another 15% reporting that their district was in the planning phases of implementation.” A recent survey by the American School Boards Journal indicated that 70% of the
22S ce Janet Hageman Chrispeels, Purposeful Restructuring: Creating a Culture for Leaning and Achievement in Elementary Schools (Washington, DC: The Falmer Press, 1992); Stewart C
Purkey and Marshall S Smith, "Too Soon to Cheer? Synthesis of Research on Effective Schools," Educational Leadership, 40, no 4 (December 1982), 64-69
235 later chapters will demonstrate, terminology is an issue in the study of decentralized decision making in education For simplicity, the term “site based management” will generally be used throughout this work
24 Janice L Herman and Jerry J Herman, “A State by State Snapshot of School-Based Management Practices,” International Journal of Educational Reform, 2, no 3 (July 1993), 256-262 States like Kentucky, Texas and New York have mandated the adoption of some form of site based
management, while others have endorsed the idea by initiating pilot programs or providing incentives
to districts for adopting a program See, for instance, West Virginia Education Association, WVEA- AEL Site-Based Decisionmaking Casebook: A Joint Study, Available: ERIC (ED 332331), 1991;
Task Force on School/Community Based Management, School/Community-Based Management:_Final
Trang 21respondents felt that their district practiced site based management.”
Another survey, this time of members of the Council of the Great City Schools, showed that 85% of the nation’s largest districts implemented some form of site based management,”” among them several high profile pilot projects such as those in Chicago and Dade County (Miami) Florida Other countries have adopted some form of site based management as
well, including Australia and Great Britain.* Recently, the concept of
faculty and staff participation in decision making was also endorsed by its inclusion in the Baldrige National Quality Award Education Pilot Criteria? A “quality” school system is one in which faculty and staff participate in making educational decisions
Does Site Based Management Work?
While there is widespread support for the concept of site based management, the literature reveals that there is skepticism regarding whether restructuring decision making can fulfill the promise of promoting school improvement Studies of the implementation of various forms of site based management show that there is seldom an
?6Thomas H Gaul, Kenneth E Underwood and Jim C Fortune, “Reform at the Grass Roots,”
The American School Board Journal, 181, no | (Jan 1994), 35-40
27 Sarrel Drury and Douglas Levin, School-Based Management:_The Changing Locus.of Control in American Public Education (Washington, DC: Office of Educational Research and
Improvement, 1994)
28posalind Levacic, “Local Management of Schools: Aims, Scope, and Impact,” Educational Management and Administration, 20, no 1 (1992), 16-29; Gilbert Austin and David Reynolds, “Managing for Improved School Effectiveness: An International Survey,” School Organisation, 10, no
2-3 (1990), 167-178
29 Mfalcolm Baldrige National Quality Award - Education Pilot Criteria 1995 (Gaithersburg,
MD: U.S Department of Commerce, Technology Administration, National Institute of Standards and Technology, 1994)
——
Trang 228
explicit connection between the practice and school performance.*°
Likewise, studies fail to show much support for the connection between the implementation of site based management and intermediate benefits such as improved morale, stakeholder influence, and the use of quality planning practices.”!
The literature on site based management is itself deficient in many regards First, even as researchers assert that site based management is poorly defined and that there is no single, best approach to implementing the process, a single model is stressed This model defines site based
management as devolving authority over issues relating to budget, staffing, and certain aspects of curriculum to the school site, normally to a council made up of the building principal, teachers, other school staff and parents By stressing this definition, researchers and practitioners in effect promote devolving administrative decisions to the site council, resulting too often in confusion over the goals of site based management and the role of site administrators in a collaborative system
Second, there are few systematic studies of the implementation of collaborative decision making processes Most of the literature consists of advocacy pieces associated with a district’s implementation of the process, plan descriptions, and anecdotal accounts of “what works."32
3Cohen, Restructuring the_Educational System
3 See, for instance, Jane L David, “Synthesis of Research on School-Based Management,” Educational Leadership, 46, no 9 (May 1989), 45-53; Karin M Lindquist and John J Mauriel, “School
Based Management: Doomed to Failure?” Education and Urban Society, 21, no 4 (August 1989), 403-416; Betty Malen, Rodney T Ogawa and Jennifer Kranz, "Unfulfilled Promises: Evidence Says
Site-Based Management Hindered by Many Factors,” The School Administrator, 47, no.2 (Feb 1990):
30-32, 53-56, 59
> Betty Malen, Rodney T Ogawa and Jennifer Kranz, "What Do We Know about
Trang 239
The ambiguous nature of the subject, and the fact that different sites define “site based management” differently makes it difficult to compare studies The commission reports advocating adoption of decentralized
a
decision making offer no suggestions as to the steps needed to implement it° and the literature on site based management seldom addresses the implementation process itself,>* focusing instead on reviewing extant programs in terms of their progress in meeting stated goals
The overwhelming consensus in the literature on existing site
based management programs is that districts and schools seldom fully implement site based systems.” Issues of “insufficient capacity” are
most often cited as explaining the failure of site based management “Capacity” equates to district support for site teams in terms of providing authority, training, time, information and other resources necessary to team operation Districts rush to implement site based management without considering what it takes to make the transition from traditional decision making structures Nevertheless, a growing number of
researchers conclude that educators need to rethink their support for site
Control in American Education, volume.2: The Practice of Choice, Decentralization and School Restructuring, ed William Clune and John Witte (London: The Falmer Press, 1990)
33Sharon C Conley and Samuel B Bacharach “The Holmes Group Report: Standards, Hierarchies, and Management,” Teachers.College Record, 88, no 3 (Spring 1987), 340-347
34 fatthew B Miles and Karen Seashore Louis, "Mustering the Will and Skill for Change,"
Educational Leadership, 47, no 8 (May 1990), 57-61 A similar gap in the research on employee
involvement in industry is noted in John L Cotton, Employee Involvement:_Methods for Improving
Performance.and Work Attitudes (Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications, 1993)
35wohlstetter, Priscilla and Allan Odden "Rethinking School-Based Management Policy and
Research." Educational Administration Quarterly 28: 4 (Nov 1992): 529-549
Trang 2410
based management as a reform strategy
Gaps in Site Based Theory and Research
This perspective is seriously flawed First, as Stewart Purkey
observed, it is illogical to conclude from an examination of poorly implemented site based management programs that the process is not worthwhile.” The literature says more about how districts and schools
enact site based management than about the process itself, or as Sarason pointed out: “Good intentions married to good ideas are necessary but
not sufficient for action consistent with them.”
Second, the inability to compare different site based management processes speaks volumes about a huge gap in the literature, one that calls
into question the conclusions about the efficacy of site based
management as a reform strategy Too often, the actual process of site based decision making is treated as a “black box” by researchers Studies
seldom describe exactly what school site teams do when they implement site based management Instead, studies look at sites after implementing the process to determine if espoused outcomes were reached, or
alternatively researchers examine sites with site based management and
compare them to sites without, but again, they are compared in terms of
outcomes Most studies focus, then, on support issues to explain variance in attainment of outcomes Seldom are the actual processes used by site teams factored into the picture; the “black box” represents what actually
37 Stewart C Purkey, "School-Based Management: More and Less than Meets the Eye," in Choice and Control in American Education, volume.2:_ The Practice.of Choice, Decentralization and
School Restructuring, ed William Clune and John Witte (London: The Falmer Press, 1990)
Trang 25occurs at the school site
The behavioral sciences have two broad functions: first, to
describe phenomena being studied in the empirical world, and second, to 3 establish theories by which these phenomena may be explained and
predicted.” Theory may be defined as a statement of relationships
among units observed or approximated in the empirical world;
approximated units are constructs that are assumed to exist, and observed units are the variables that are operationalized by measurement A theory is considered to be useful if it can both explain and predict
Bacharach states that a frequent problem with organizational theory is that incomplete theoretical systems are used to make
predictions, even though they do not provide adequate explanations of the empirical reality in question.” It is my contention that the theory dealing with site based management can be similarly criticized Site based management theory is underspecified in the sense that important aspects of practice are unaccounted for in both descriptions of the
phenomenon and in explanations of the relations between various aspects of implementation The theoretical systems proposed lack sufficient scope; they fail to account for dimensions of site team process, in particular
Put another way, theory on site based decision making deals on the level of construct The literature includes a description of the broad factors that must be considered in explaining and predicting the
39gamuel B Bacharach, “Organizational Theories: Some Criteria for Evaluation,” Academy
Trang 26
MT
phenomenon, along with some propositions regarding the relation between these factors, but theorists seldom deal at the level of variables
and measures The literature lacks a vocabulary to discuss site based management at the level of variable, and this results in an inability to create sound models that reflect the complexities of practice
C 5 ] \ 7 i | 5
The research presented in this dissertation is an attempt to address
this gap in the literature by focusing on the question: What are the critical variables involved in the successful implementation of site based
management? Particular attention is paid to the need to include variables relating to site team decision making and communication processes in developing a useful theory of site based management
Instead of considering site based management as a unitary concept involving the decentralization of authority over budget, staffing, and curriculum to site councils, it is argued that it is best to view site based management as an exercise in organization design The design of site based processes represents a strategic choice process; each district and
school implementing site based management must determine the best “Fit” between different practices and the organization’s goals, existing structures and processes, human resource capabilities, district history and experience with collaborative processes, and other factors in the
organization’s context
Four broad sections are presented Chapters two through five present a review of the literature on restructuring and site based
Trang 27one hand, and the pattern of the current education reform and
restructuring movement are first highlighted, followed by a review of the specific literature on the implementation of site based management
Chapters six and seven present research on site based team
practices based on an evaluation of a large, Midwestern city’s site based pilot program Factor analysis is used to analyze survey data to first develop measures of site team decision making and communication processes, and these measures are then used in regression analysis to determine whether process variables are important predictors of the perceived effectiveness of site councils
Chapters eight through fourteen present the results of an action research process used with New York State school districts to construct
site based management processes under the state’s recent mandate In recognition of the fact that site based management processes will differ from district to district, the design metaphor was used with district level planning teams to construct a process that each district subsequently
implemented District planning teams discussed and weighed the potential answers to a series of “key design questions” in order to
develop their own site based management process Taken as a whole, the use of this methodology uncovered the critical variables hypothesized by teams as important to their success in implementing site based
management Additionally, the development of the methodology itself is important to the success of site based management; using the key
Trang 2814
insiders felt “fit” their district, and in the process ownership was built Thus, the design process represents a methodology that not only allows the creation of a site based plan tailored to district needs, but also suits the practice of sharing decision making in the sense that the plan is
designed collaboratively using a process that emphasizes authentic
dialogue among stakeholders.”
Finally, in the last chapter, a process theory of site based decision making is proposed based on the survey and action research studies presented The process theory is speculative; it has not been
operationalized and tested Nonetheless, it is important to move in the direction of developing a comprehensive theory of site based
management that overcomes the liabilities of the extant literature; thus,
the theory proposed incorporates a focus on student performance and achievement and considers team processes as important to both team success and individual participants’ motivation to engage in change activities
Contribution of This Work
The research presented is intended to contribute to the research literature by adding to our understanding of the role of site team decision processes and the operationalization of site based management Using organizational design as a metaphor for structuring school districts’ strategic choice of site based management practices, the variables that are critical to the implementation of site based management, and which need
Trang 29
to be incorporated into theory, are uncovered, and various design choices are developed This helps not only to clarify various aspects of the practice of site based management, but also provides researchers with an expanded vocabulary for categorizing and discussing the impact of these variables on outcomes The design process helps develop an
understanding of the role of the district in promoting restructuring and
school based change, as well, a subject that has been largely unexplored
in the literature on site based management
Taken as a whole, this research is intended as a response to the call
for the development of a “theory of practice”” or “practical theory.”
Bacharach and Mitchell observed that organizational theorists tend to develop broad, overarching theories that are applicable to all
organizations, with little attempt to see how these theories apply
empirically in daily organizational life.“* To a large degree, cognition, volition and self-interest of individual actors or interest groups are ignored in favor of describing common patterns across organizational contexts In contrast, researchers in education administration tend to rely on detailed empirical descriptions of school organization rather than developing broad theory; case studies are the preferred methodology for describing the idiosyncrasies of school systems
““Thomas l Sergiovanni, "Developing a Relevant Theory of Administration,” in Leadership and Organizational Culture: New Perspectives.on Administrative Theory-and Practice, ed Thomas J
Sergiovanni and John E Corbally (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1984)
43g amuel B Bacharach and Stephen M Mitchell, “The Generation of Practical Theory:
Schools as Political Organizations,” in Handbook of Organizational Behavior, ed Jay Lorsch
(Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1987)
Trang 30Thus, neither organizational theorists nor educational researchers have achieved the ideal of a practical theory Organizational theorists’ fondness for developing general models limits
applicability of their work to the study of schools as organizations At the same time, an overemphasis on idiosyncratic aspects of schools also works against the generation of knowledge useful to both scholars and practitioners What is needed is a middle ground that recognizes the unique properties of schools as organizations
and develops general theories based on these properties
The challenge is to find the appropriate balance Practical theory must |
generate a theoretical understanding of schools as organizations that
applies broadly while remaining sensitive to the specific properties of
school systems.** It must emphasize both expanding the knowledge base
and improving practice; this involves stepping beyond the “what is” question of the researcher and venturing into the practitioner’s normative
question, “what ought to be.”””
Researchers in educational administration have long recognized this dilemma There is widespread agreement that there is a gap between research and practice, and that educational research often has very little impact on practice.** The present work attempts to strike the balance
needed to generate practical theory first, by establishing broad
propositions regarding the critical variables using traditional research methodology, and second, by using an action research methodology to
45 tbid, p 410
46B acharach, “Organizational Theories ”
47 Sergiovanni, “Developing a Relevant Theory of Practice.”
48p obert Boostrom, Philip W Jackson, and David T Hansen, “Coming Together and Staying Apart: How a Group of Teachers and Researchers Sought to Bridge the 'Research/Practice Gap,” Teachers College Record, vol 95, no 1 (Fall 1993), 35-44
Trang 31more fully articulate these phenomena in collaboration with organizational “insiders.” The methodology itself insures that the research is relevant to practitioners by involving them as knowledge
creators in the research process, guided by the structure of the key
questions and strengthened in terms of generalizability by employing the method at many sites
Rosow and his colleagues warned: “The road to educational reform is paved with slogans and buzzwords, well intended but
dangerous Phrases such as teacher empowerment, participation, school- based management, and the like are attractive, but putting these ideas into practice can as readily frustrate as advance the attainment of desired
goals.” If concepts like site based management are to be more than buzzwords, the gap between research and practice must be narrowed Researchers cannot settle for generating vague theories at the level of “construct,” but instead must articulate theory relevant to practice at the level of “variable.” Practitioners need to be involved in the production of knowledge as well as its consumption
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REFORM
The beginning of the current reform movement is dated to the publication of the National Commission on Excellence in Education’s report, A Nation at Risk, in 1983.' The impetus for reform was primarily economic; the belief that America was losing ground to the Japanese, Germans, and other economic competitors was connected to the
education system’s apparent inability to produce literate and numerate graduates.” The assumption was that the nation’s preeminence in the
sciences, mathematics, technology and commerce was threatened by a mediocre education system,’ and furthermore, that restoring the schools
to their former level would be instrumental in regaining our competitive edge The maintenance of high living standards was directly correlated to improving our education system.‘
The supposed “total collapse” of the education system has been
INational Commission on Excellence in Education, A Nation.at Risk: The Imperative for
Educational Reform (Washington, D.C.: U.S Government Printing Office, April, 1983)
Joseph Murphy, “Restructuring America's Schools: An Overview," in Education Reform in the '90's, ed Chester E Finn, Jr., and Theodor Rebarber (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company,
1992) See also Michael W Kirst, “The Crash of the First Wave: Recent State Education Reform in the United States, Looking Backwards and Forward,” in Education Reform: Making Sense.of it All, ed Samuel B Bacharach (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1990)
3carol Ascher, The_1993 Educational Reform Reports, ERIC/CUE Digest Number 22 (New
York: ERIC Clearinghouse on Urban Education, May 1984)
‘Stanley J Spanbauer, A Quality System for Education: Using Quality and Productivity
Techniques to Save Our Schools (Milwaukee: ASQC Quality Press, 1992) 18
Trang 33debunked as grossly overstated;’ in fact, there is considerable support for the notion that the schools are doing well, given the societal problems
with which they contend Schlechty, for example, stated that schools are doing a much better job of meeting yesterday’s standards of preparing a workforce for factory jobs Schools are not less efficient than they once were; instead, they have been asked to take on tasks they were not designed to take on.° Bracey makes this point in his fourth report on the condition of public education, when he lists the most pervasive school problems of yesterday’s schools along with those of today’s:
The catalogue of horrors for the 1940's included, in order, talking, chewing gum, making noise, running in the halls, getting out of place in line, wearing improper clothing, and not putting paper in wastebaskets The list for the 1980's was dramatically different: drug abuse, alcohol abuse, pregnancy, suicide, rape, robbery, and
assault.’
Furthermore, Shanker reminds us that a return to the “good old days” of schooling would mean a return to seventy percent dropout rates, a relatively small percentage of graduates going on to college, and
inequitable treatment of minorities, among other things
Whether schools are viewed as a cause of the country’s economic woes, a source of salvation, or both, the current reform movement can be
pauline B Gough, “Moving Beyond the Myth,” Phi Delta Kappan, 76, no 2 (October 1994), p 99
ỐPhillip C Schlechty, Schools for the Twenty-First Century:_Leadership Imperatives for Educational Reform (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1991)
7Gerald W Bracey, “The Fourth Bracey Report on the Condition of Public Education,” Phi
Delta Kappan 76, no 2 (October 1994), p 115
8 4 Ibert Shanker, "Reforming the Reform Movement," Education Reform:._Making Sense_of It All, ed Samuel B Bacharach (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1990)
¬
Trang 34seen as part of a broader transition affecting all organizations, the
transition to the post-industrial age or “information age.”” Just as private sector firms must adjust to the new economic realities associated with
this transition, schools, too, must make adjustments to be compatible with
changing environmental conditions
Educators tend to ignore the experiences of organizations in the
private sector, often vehemently arguing that schools are so different
from profit-seeking enterprises that there is nothing to learn from them." While it is obvious that schools differ from private concerns in certain
fundamental regards, an examination of trends in industry show that it is equally obvious that educators can learn a great deal from organizations’
experiences in the private sector There is a striking similarity between the response of private sector firms to the emerging demands of the
information age and the patterns of the present education reform
movement For instance, David Kearns observed that the bureaucratic
responses to environmental pressures that epitomized the first wave of educational reform might have been predicted by looking at trends in industry a decade earlier: “To an extraordinary parallel, schools are doing just what American business did in the late sixties and seventies - instead of genuine restructuring, new labels were applied and
management grew rapidly.”'! Instead, just as industry was abandoning
? Austin D Swanson, "Restructuring Educational Governance: A Challenge of the 1990's,"
Educational Administration Quarterly, 25, no 3 (Aug 1989), 268-293
10 muel B Bacharach and Sharon C Conley, “ Education Reform: A Managerial Agenda,” Phi Delta Kappan, 67, no 9 (May 1986), 641-645
Trang 35highly centralized approaches to change, education reformers adopted
them.”
Environmental forces associated with the transition to the
information age are acting on all social institutions and organizations To fully understand the impact of these forces on education, it is beneficial to consider the broad context in which reform is occurring, the pressures leading to reform and restructuring in industry, and the response of organizations in the private sector to these pressures In particular, this informs the later discussion of site based management by framing the emergence of employee participation and total quality management as a strategic responses to the need for organizations to create flexible and adaptable organizational structures
The purpose of this chapter is to provide a context for the
discussion of educational restructuring and site based management A brief historical review of the development of schools and their purpose in American society follows The current trends leading up to widespread restructuring in industry will then be juxtaposed against the initial wave
of the education reform movement Special attention will be paid to the forces contributing to the trend toward implementing participation practices in both organizational contexts
Schooling in America: A Brief History
"Education restructuring is best understood in its historic context The reason schools need to be restructured is because they no longer fit the needs of post-industrial society “Given that our present system of
Trang 36
schooling was designed to meet the needs first of an agrarian rural society and then an urban industrial society, it should not be surprising to find
there is a need to redesign our schools.”
The “common school” of the last century emerged in an agrarian society, and served its needs by training citizens and inculcating a sense of morality and civic duty The purpose of the common school was to “preserve and transmit the fundamental truths on which the republic was
founded; the truths were rooted in the heritage of Western civilization.”"’
Hundreds of thousands of common school “districts” emerged as settlers crossed the nation Governance of the common school was similar to a town meeting Even in cities, school governance was decentralized to the ward structure.'5 The school was considered a place of virtue, akin to a place of worship Common culture served to standardize instruction more than administrative or political centralization."®
In contrast to the common school of the 19th century, which focused on imparting a sound basic education and promoting a common culture, the schools of the early 20th century were asked to serve
different purposes as well as a different student population As the United States became a nation of immigrants, schools were called upon to sort and Americanize and to determine students’ potential for carrying
3g chiechty, Schools for the Twenty-First Century , pp 34
4G Alfred Hess, Jr., "Decentralization and Community Control," in Reforming Education:
The Emerging Systemic Approach, ed Stephen L Jacobson and Robert Berne (Thousand Oaks, CA:
Corwin Press, Inc., 1993): p 74
'Sgwanson, "Restructuring Educational Governance "
l6David Tyack, "School Governance in the United States: Historical Puzzles and Anomalies,"
in Decentralization and School Improvement: Can We Fulfill the Promise? ed Jane Hannaway and
Trang 37
out the work of an increasingly urban industrial society The modern high school and vocational school emerged to fit these demands, to track
students into their appropriate caste.”
Centralization of schools emerged with urbanization of American society, and the school district emerged out of the combination of former ward level school governance structures.* Turn of the century reformers sought to depoliticize schools, to take governance away from local
politicians and ward bosses, and put them in the hands of professionals In the process, they also sought to define the “standard” school system “Tf there was ‘one best way’ - and these reformers believed that there was - then centralized authority and expert administration were necessary to
its implementation.””
The last decade of the 19th century and the first two decades of the 20th saw an incredible degree of centralization of schools The number of school systems dropped from literally hundreds of thousands to approximately 15,000, the same number that exists today Ward boards were eliminated in cities, and the number of individuals sitting on boards of education in cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants dropped from an average of 27 to seven New, specialized central office functions emerged, as well To illustrate, in 1889, the average city district had four employees who spent the majority of their time supervising, whereas by
1920, New York City had over 1,300.”
17s chiechty, Schools for the Twenty=First Century
185 wanson, "Restructuring Educational Governance ” l2 Tvack, "School Governance in the United States ,” p 14
Trang 38
eo
eee
24
The prevalent structure of the American school system emerged out of this period “A school became standard because it conformed to a
professional model, often written into state law and local policies and
eventually engraved on the public mind as essential to the institution.”
A teacher became a person certified under state law to practice teaching, a high school a separate building where teens spent a certain number of hours a day studying certain courses for roughly an hour at a time Accountability was defined as conforming to standard practice States
assumed a prominent role in standardizing the form and process of |
schooling, and perhaps most importantly, while all this occurred, the classroom remained largely self-contained and insulated from above Characteristics of schools as loosely coupled systems, with administrative structures decoupled from the technical work activity of the
organization” were institutionalized The “schooling rules” were born.”
Schlechty suggests three metaphors that characterize the various
purposes of schooling during this transformation.” During the Common School era, the school was a “tribal center.” The school’s purpose was to induct children into the community, the teacher acted in loco parentis,
20 ibid 2libid,, p 13
22y arl E Weick, “Educational Organizations as Loosely Coupled Systems,” Administrative Science Quarterly, 21, no 1 (1976), 1-19
?2John W Meyer and Brian Rowan, “The Structure of Educational Organizations,” in
Organizational Environments:_Ritual and Rationality, ed John W Meyer and W Richard Scott
(Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1992); John W Meyer, W Richard Scott and Terrence E Deal, “Institutional and Technical Sources of Organizational Structure: Explaining the Structure of Educational Organizations,” in Organizational Environments:_Ritual and Rationality, ed John W Meyer and W Richard Scott (Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1992)
Trang 39
and parents entrusted their children to the care of the school Teachers took a symbolic (if not literal) vow of poverty, and were in turn treated with reverence, and the principal or “principal teacher” as a minister of
sorts
The school as a “factory” best summarizes the evolution in the industrial period Following in the footsteps of private sector
organizations, schools adopted many of the principles of scientific management They established production standards with which they could sort children The concept of failure was introduced along with the graded school system and graded reader The concept of “grade” itself refers to the idea that a student might not “make the grade.” The high
school emerged as an assembly line, with tracks for fast, modified, and
slow learners The image was that students were products to be molded, their background providing the raw material, and the teacher a worker or technocrat, the holder of knowledge and deliverer of a service Over
time, as schools became larger and more differentiated, curriculum
experts assumed the role of preparing “teacher proof” curriculum and materials In Tayloristic fashion, “thinking” was separated from “doing.” The principal in the factory school was no longer a tribal leader or
minister, but instead a manager Skills of supervision became key More recently, during the post-war period, rapid expansion of
suburban school systems and a concurrent decline in urban schools led to
further centralization in the name of equity.”> Federal laws and court
25 swanson, “Restructuring Educational Governance " See also Margaret L Hadderman, State vs, Local Control of Schools, ERIC Digest Series Number 24 (ERIC Clearinghouse on
Trang 40decisions required desegregation and fought sexism, Public Law 94-142 mandated services for the handicapped, the courts required assistance for non-English speaking students, and various funds were earmarked for services to underprivileged youth.” The image of the school promoted during this period is that of school as “hospital.””’ If the legitimate role of the school is to redress the inequities of modern society, then
specialized professionals like social workers and psychologists must play a role in educating Poor and rich alike deserve the same services, and to place them on equal ground, the school must assume new and different roles such as feeding, clothing, and treating the needs of the
underprivileged Educators responded with the creation of new
administrative offices to coordinate these programs Accountability for these new services became accounting, literally tracking federal and state funds as they passed through the system Over this period, as regulations and the development of categorical programs targeted the needs of neglected groups of students, local control over education was greatly diminished2® This is reflected in the states’ expanded role in financing education: until 1979, local districts’ aggregate share of finance on education exceeded the states’, and by the beginning of the current reform movement in 1983, the local districts’ proportion had declined to
26T yack, "School Governance in the United States ”
28michael W Kirst, “Who Should Control the Schools? Reassessing Current Policies,” in Schooling for Tomorrow: Directing Reforms.to Issues That Count, ed Thomas J Sergiovanni and