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Leading for Racial Equity: Systems
Transformation Framework & Planning
January 30, 2017
Nikum Pon, PhD | Director, Equity in Education
Email: npon@psesd.org
Phone: 425.917.7845
GUIDING QUESTION
What leadership moves do I implement to disrupt and dismantle inequitable practices and systems so that all students have equitable access to resources and achieve at high levels?
LEADERSHIP LESSON #1
There is no reason to shoulder the difficult work of leadership if you do not have a compelling higher purpose to serve.
SYSTEMS TRANSFORMATION OVERARCHING CONCEPT
Systems or organizations are made up of people. If we change people, then we change systems or organizations.
Value Gap 🡪 Opportunity Gap 🡪 Achievement Gap
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE?
Manager
Leader
SYSTEMS TRUISM
A system, any system, produces what it is designed to produce
LEADERSHIP LESSON #2
One of the most seductive ways your organization rewards you for doing exactly what it wants is to call you a “leader.”
- The Practice of Adaptive Leadership
HOW DO WE TRANSFORM SYSTEMS?
Adaptive leadership is the practice of mobilizing people to tackle tough challenges and thrive.
-Heifetz & Linsky
TECHNICAL VS ADAPTIVE
Technical problem
Adaptive challenge
LEADERSHIP LESSON #3
“The most common leadership mistake is treating adaptive challenges as if they were technical problems.”
- Ron Heifetz, Founder Center for Public Leadership Harvard’s Kennedy School.
ADAPTIVE CHALLENGE ARCHETYPES
– Diverting attention
– Displacing responsibility
BUILD AN ADAPTIVE CULTURE
Adaptive Challenges exist within people and their interactions with one another. Addressing adaptive challenges must be done by people connected to the problem.
The problem is the people with the problem.
ANTIRACIST MULTICULTURAL ORGANIZATION
MONOCULTURAL → → → MULTICULTURAL → → → ANTIRACIST → → → ANTIRACIST MULTICULTURAL
Racial & Cultural Differences Seen as Deficits Tolerant of Racial and Cultural Differences Racial and Cultural Differences Seen as Assets
1
EXCLUSIVE
A Segregated Institution
2
PASSIVE
A ‘Club’ Institution
3
SYMBOLIC
CHANGE
A Multicultural Institution
4
IDENTIFY
CHANGE
An Antiracist Institution
5 STRUCTURAL
CHANGE
A Transforming Institution
6
FULLY
INCLUSIVE
A Transformed Institution in a Transformed Society
Continuum on Becoming an Antiracist Multicultural Institution
REFLECTIONS: WINDOW OR MIRROR
Outward Reflection typically has a tendency toward tracking students, which may fall into a deficit perspective.
However, Inward reflection from a strength-based student-centered perspective allows us to ask the right questions and continue to think about how we can change our own practices toward eliminating the opportunity gap.
WHY 🡪 HOW 🡪 WHAT ��