The professoriate is a powerful and privileged position. As faculty design leadership programs and plan courses, discourse about gender and race is often limited or treated as a taboo subject. The power and privilege to avoid equity discourse in preparation programs leads to similar avoidance in school communities where practitioners report fear and limited knowledge and skills to confront gender and race issues. This article examines faculty perceptions of discourse about gender and race in educational leadership programs, departments, and classrooms. The author employs critical and feminist perspectives related to power, privilege, and fault lines to discuss faculty fear and a lack of openness to learning about gender and race issues. The author concludes that to understand the praxis of creating equal opportunity in diverse school communities, educational leadership faculty must move beyond program rhetoric and experience the complex and challenging practices of learning how to enact equity.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Anderson, G. L. (1990). Toward a critical constructivist approach to school administration: Invisibility, legitimization, and the study of non-events. Educational Administration Quarterly, 6(1), 38-59.
2.
Apple, M., & Weis, L. (1983). Ideology and practice in schooling. London: Falmer Press.
3.
Bayles, E. (1960). Democratic educational theory. New York: Harper & Brothers.
4.
Bensimon, E. (2003). Why equity matters: Implications for a democracy [Brochure]. Los Angeles: University of Southern California.
5.
Bjork, L., & Ginsberg, R. (1995). Principles of reform and reforming principal training: A theoretical perspective. Educational Administration Quarterly, 31(1), 11-37.
6.
Brunner, C. (1999). Sacred dreams: Women and the superintendency. Albany: State University of New York Press.
7.
Cochrane-Smith, M. (1995). Color blindness and basket making are not the answers: Confronting the dilemmas of race, culture, and language diversity in teacher education. American Educational Research Journal, 32(3), 493-522.
8.
Darling-Hammond, L. (1992). Reframing the school reform agenda. School Administrator, 4(9), 22-27.
9.
Delpit, L. (1995). Other people’s children: Cultural conflict in the classroom. New York: The New Press.
10.
Dewey, J. (1907). School and society. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
11.
Dewey, J. (1916). Democracy and education. New York: Macmillan.
12.
Dillman, D. A., Christenson, J. A., Carpenter, E. H., & Brooks, R. (1974). Increasing mail questionnaire response: A four state comparison. American Sociological Review, 39, 744-756.
13.
Fay, B. (1987). Critical social science. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
14.
Ferguson, K. E. (1984). The feminist case against the bureaucracy. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
15.
Follett, M. P. (1924). Creative experience. Toronto: Longmans, Green, and Co.
16.
Foster, W. (1986). Paradigms and promises. Buffalo: Prometheus Books.
17.
Giroux, H. (1988). Schooling and the struggle for public life. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
18.
Glass, T. (2000). Where are all the women super intendents? School Administrator, 6(57), 28-32.
19.
Goldman, J. (Ed.). (2001). The school administrator. Washington, DC: American Association of School Administrators.
20.
Good, T., & Brophy, J. (1987). Classroom complexity and teacher awareness. In Looking in classrooms (pp. 26-54). New York: Harper.
21.
Grogan, M. (1996). Voices of women aspiring to the superintendency. Albany: State University of New York Press.
22.
Grogan, M. (1999). Equity/quality issues of gender, race, and class. Educational Administration Quarterly, 35(4), 518-536.
23.
Grundy, S. (1993). Educational leadership as emancipatory practice. In J. Blackmore & J. Kenway (Eds.), Gender matters in educational administration and policy (pp. 165-180). London: Falmer Press.
24.
Gutman, A. (1988). Democratic theory and the role of teachers in democratic education. In J. Hannaway & R. Crowson (Eds.), The politics of reforming school administration: The 1988 yearbook of the Politics of Education Association (pp. 183-199). New York: Falmer Press.
25.
Heberlein, T. A., & Baumgartner, R. (1978). Factors affecting response rates to mailed questionnaires: A qualitative analysis of the published literature. American Sociological Review, 43, 447-462.
26.
Herrity, V., & Glassman, N. (1999). Training administrators for culturally and linguistically diverse school populations: Opinions of expert practitioners. Journal of School Leadership, 9(3), 235-253.
27.
hooks, b. (1990). Yearning: Race, gender and cultural politics. Boston, MA: South End Press.
28.
hooks, b. (1994). Teaching to transgress: Education as a practice of freedom. New York: Routledge.
29.
Johnson, A. G. (1997). Privilege, power, and difference. Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill.
30.
Kempner, K. (1991). Getting into the castle of educational administration. Peabody Journal of Education, 66(3), 104-123.
31.
Lather, P. (1991). Getting smart. New York: Routledge.
32.
Lemert, C., & Gillan, G. (1982). Michel Foucault: Social theory as transgression. New York: Columbia University Press.
33.
Lewin, K. (1948). Resolving social conflict. New York: Harper & Brothers.
34.
Lipman, P. (1998). Race, class, and power in school restructuring. Albany: State University of New York Press.
35.
Loden, M., & Rosener, J. (1991). Workforce America! Managing employee diversity as a vital resource. Burr Ridge, IL: Business One IRWIN.
36.
Logan, J. (1999). An educational leadership challenge: Refocusing gender equity strategies. The AASA Professor, 22(4), 1-8.
37.
Lomoty, K. (1995). Social and cultural influences on schooling: A commentary on the UCEA knowledge base project, domain I. Educational Administration Quarterly, 31(2), 294-303.
38.
Mabokela, R. O., & Madsen, J. (2003). “Color-blind”leadership and inter group conflict. Journal of School Leadership, 13(2), 130-158.
39.
MacIntosh, P. M. (1989). Curricular re-vision: The new knowledge for a new age. In C. S. Pearson, D. L. Shavlik, & J. G. Touchton (Eds.), Educating the majority: Women challenge tradition in higher education (pp. 400-412). New York: American Council on Education.
40.
Marshall, C. (2000). Policy discourse analysis: Negotiating gender equity. Journal of Educational Policy, 15(2), 125-156.
41.
Marshall, C., & Anderson, G. (1995). Rethinking the public and private spheres: Feminist and cultural studies perspective on the politics of education. In J. Scribner & D. Layton (Eds.), The study of educational politics (pp. 169-184). Washington, DC: Falmer Press.
42.
Marshall, C., & Rusch, E. (1995). Gender filters in the deputy principalship. In B. Limerick & B. Lingard (Eds.), Gender and changing educational management (pp. 79-94). Rydalmere, NSW: Hodder Education.
43.
McCarthy, M. (1999). The evolution of educational leadership preparation programs. In J. Murphy & K. S. Louis (Eds.), Handbook of research on educational administration (2nd ed., pp. 119-139). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
44.
McGee Banks, C. (2000). Gender and race as factors in educational leadership and administration. In The Jossey-Bass reader on educational leadership (pp. 217-256). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
45.
Oakes, J. (1985). Keepingtrack: How schools structure inequality. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
46.
Ortiz, F. I. (1982). Career patterns in education: Women, men, and minorities in school administration. New York: Praeger.
47.
Owens, R. (1995). Organizational behavior in education. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.
48.
Parker, L., & Hood, S. (1995). Minority students vs. minority faculty and administrators in teacher education: Perspectives on the class of cultures. Urban Review, 27(2), 159-174.
49.
Pohland, P., & Carlson, L. T. (1993). Program reform in educational administration. University Council for Educational Administration, 34(3), 4-9.
50.
Poplin Gosetti, P., & Rusch, E. (1995). Re-examining educational leadership: Challenging assumptions. In D. Dunlap & P. Schmuck (Eds.), Women leading in education (pp. 11-35). Albany: State University of New York Press.
51.
Poplin, M., & Weeres, J. (1992). Voices from the inside: A report on schooling from inside the classroom. Claremont, CA: Institute for Education in Transformation.
52.
Rapp, D. (2001). The implications of raising one’s voice in educational leadership doctoral programs: Women’s stories of fear, retaliation, and silence. Journal of School Leadership, 11(4), 279-295.
53.
Riehl, C. (2000). The principal’s role in creating inclusive schools for diverse students: A review of normative, empirical, and critical literature on the practice of educational administration. Review of Educational Research, 70(1), 55-81.
54.
Rusch, E. A. (1999). The principal as a piñata. In F. Kochen, B. Jackson, & D. Duke (Eds.), A thousand voices from the firing line: A study of educational leaders, their jobs, their preparation, and the problems they face (pp. 29-43). Columbia, MO: UCEA.
55.
Rusch, E. A. (2002).The [un]changing world of school leadership: From discourseto practice. In G. Perreault & F. Lunenburg (Eds.), The changing world of school administration (pp. 60-79). Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press.
56.
Rusch, E. A., & Marshall, C. (1996). Troubled educational administration. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, New York.
57.
Schattschneider, E. E. (1960). The semi sovereign people. New York: Holt, Rinehart& Winston.
58.
Schein, E. (1994). Organizational and managerial culture as a facilitator or inhibitor of organizational learning [Working papers, online]. Available: http://www.learning.mit.edu/res/wp/10004/html.
59.
Scheurich, J., & Laible, J. (1995). The buck stops here—In our preparation programs: Educative leadership for all children (no exceptions allowed). Educational Administration Quarterly, 31(2), 313-322.
60.
Shakeshaft, C. (1989). Womenin educational administration. Newbury Park, CA: Corwin Press.
61.
Shakeshaft, C. (1999).The struggle to create a more gender-inclusive profession. In J. Murphy & K. S. Louis (Eds.), Handbook of research on educational administration (2nd ed., pp. 99-116). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
62.
Shields, C., Larocque, L., & Oberg, S. (2002). A dialogue about race and ethnicity in education: Struggling to understand issues in cross-cultural leadership. Journal of School Leadership, 12(2), 116-137.
63.
Skrla, L., & Scheurich, J. (2001). Displacing deficit thinking in schooldistrict leadership. Education and Urban Society, 33(3), 235-259.
64.
Smith, D. (1987). The everyday world as problematic: A feminist sociology. Boston: Northeastern University Press.
65.
Smith, D. (1990). The conceptual practices of power. Boston: Northeastern University Press.
66.
Smythe, J. (Ed.). (1989). Critical perspectives on educational leadership. Philadelphia: Falmer Press.
67.
Winfield, L. (1986). Teacher beliefs toward academically at risk students in inner urban schools. Urban Review, 18(4), 253-268.
