Setting the Table for Transformative Educational Leadership
Just as parents strive to have regular family dinners in order to create space for connection, conversation, and support, school leaders set tables with various school community members. Some leaders meticulously plan every detail, like a formal holiday meal, while others take a more casual, potluck approach. Whatever your style, who you invite to the table and how included they feel can go a long way toward fostering the type of effective, cohesive schools where students, teachers, staff, families, and community partners can help each other thrive.
Rethinking Traditional Engagement Structures
Educational leaders often feel the burden of solving problems alone. However, Ron Heifetz, founder of the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard, emphasizes that true leadership involves engaging others in solving problems together. He says that rule one is to bring people into the problem in order to understand the nature of the problem. Then he suggests disappointing expectations that the leader will fix the issue, instead giving the problem back to the people and helping them to mobilize as a group.
Leslie Torres-Rodriguez, superintendent and CEO of Hartford Public Schools, makes it a point to work in this way. She emphasizes the importance of targeted outreach and sustained engagement of students, teachers, families, and community partners in her district. “For example, when we look at who comes to board meetings, we know that our most marginalized communities do not, so we cast a wide net. We reach out,” she says. “Our tent is quite wide.”
Torres-Rodriguez says one thing Hartford Public Schools does to involve stakeholders is to host youth summits. These gatherings provide essential feedback loops so relationships can be built. In these summits, school leaders make it a point to co-creat
e spaces where “the hardest truths are shared, as well as the dreams and aspirations of families, educators, and students.” Torres-Rodriguez says, “When you create opportunities for proximity, you’re building trust. When you build trust, people are more likely to talk about their experiences.”
Richard Lemons, executive director of Partners, applauds the community engagement work Torres-Rodriguez and her team do in Hartford and explains that it is sometimes difficult to reimagine how schools and communities can work together on behalf of students.
Lemons notes that educators work within entrenched cultural scripts that shape education; we have notions of what schools look like, where the principal’s office is, what the role of parents should be. “These scripts are inherited,” Lemons says. “We didn’t write them, we rarely question them, we just do them. Changing these scripts requires intentional leadership that disrupts the status quo.” Some of these cultural scripts shape how we conceptualize and take action on behalf of parent and community engagement–open comment sessions at board meetings, PTA meetings, booster clubs, and parent-teacher conferences.
Lemons says that successful change efforts tend to occur when we create conditions for people to experience agency, trust, and support. “Plans don’t transform schools—people do. And not just those with formal authority,” he says. “Otherwise, all schools would have transformed by now. I’m talking about really listening to people.”
Moving Beyond Performative Engagement
Educational leaders frequently use language like “buy-in” when introducing new initiatives, implying a need to market and manipulate rather than genuinely collaborate. This disconnect is symptomatic of a broader issue. K-12 education systems have historically adopted a paternalistic approach, focusing on educators’ “expert opinions” regarding what students, parents, and teachers need without involving them meaningfully in decision-making and implementation.
Because of this, engagement efforts can feel performative rather than substantive. For example, teachers hold significant power within K-12 education, but they are often treated as passive implementers rather than asked to be co-designers of educational transformation. Similarly, students are typically excluded from discussions about their learning experiences and are given ceremonial roles without real influence.
To create meaningful partnerships, we must move beyond these superficial gestures. The focus should shift to asking teachers, students, parents, and community partners: What is your vision? How can we co-design solutions worth pursuing together?
Elevating Marginalized Voices
High-quality teaching and learning happens when students, teachers, families, and community members are treated as valued partners. Bringing them into the conversation early and often enhances the quality of solutions and increases the likelihood of successful implementation.
Kerry Lord, Director of Programs at Partners, says she’s begun to see access as a keystone to leveling the playing field. “Bringing different voices into the conversation disabuses us of problematizing students,” she says. “If I can’t imagine what it would be like to wake up at 5 a.m. to take two buses to school, I won’t understand the experience of a child who does. Then my compassion and empathy diminish. Without hearing their story, I may see them as a problem to be fixed rather than as someone encountering societal barriers.”
Lord also challenges leaders to rethink how they define “diverse” perspectives: “Oftentimes, when we talk about diversity, we talk about non-male and non-white, but what we’re really asking is, how do we add voices that have been historically excluded to change the conversation we are having about excellence in education? The reason we want different perspectives at the table is so we can deliver the highest quality of instruction for all our students.”
Equity work should not be something done “to” communities, but “with” them. This means placing those who have historically been marginalized at the center of the conversation. By shifting from a more hierarchical approach to one that empowers lots of different voices, schools can create more inclusive and effective solutions.
Designing for Sustainable Improvement
As we know, sustained improvement doesn’t just happen. Intentional frameworks for fostering collaboration begin with efforts to understand the needs and experiences of students, teachers, and families. However, building these solutions requires more than understanding—it demands active participation and intentionality. Schools must foster conditions that amplify marginalized voices and recognize teachers as professionals with agency over their work.
Kathy Greider, Superintendent of Farmington Public Schools, and her team, have taken an intentional, collaborative approach. “Everything we do comes from our core improvement documents which were co-constructed with our community,” Greider explains. She says these guiding documents remain in place for a decade, ensuring alignment and sustainable change over time.
One practice Greider has instituted in her district is including students in instructional rounds. Students analyze classroom practices alongside educators and administrators, and often lead the debriefs. Their participation is essential. “They identify the next level of work from their perspective, which is then given to schools to act on,” Greider says.
Greider emphasizes that values-driven working structures allow for coherence and innovation to coexist. “We value coherence, like ensuring alignment from grade to grade, but we also value emergence. Teachers and students come up with innovative goals that align with our values. We’re always learning and adapting to new challenges.”
The Path Forward
Transforming schools requires time, intentionality, and a willingness to do the hard work of genuine collaboration. This means moving away from top-down approaches and embracing a more inclusive, participatory model of leadership.
Educational lead
ers must commit to bringing more stakeholders to the table, creating new ways of working together, and building structures that foster meaningful engagement. By doing so, we can create schools that are not only equitable and inclusive but also vibrant and transformative.
Greider reminds us that bringing all voices to the table isn’t just about efficiency—it’s about creating joy and fulfillment in education. “I see people leaving this profession,” she acknowledges. “We need to make the work joyful and fulfilling. If our educators have joy, that joy transfers to our students.”
Her guiding question for all school leaders is “Who’s at your table?” The answer may be one of the strongest indicators of success for a school community.
