Wisdom in Their Words: A Phenomenological Study of Practical Wisdom in School Leadership

Abstract

This study examines the perspectives of seventeen school leaders across seven US states to understand what practical wisdom entails in school leadership and how it shapes leaders’ experiences. It builds on recent scholarship that shows the potential of practical wisdom—or the deliberative capacity that illuminates the ethical dimensions of our decision-making—to help school leaders connect the many complex decisions that they make each day with their larger goals of personal and community flourishing. Guided by moral leadership as a conceptual framework, this study leveraged a constant comparative analysis of leader perspectives to identify specific practices, aims, and resources in practically-wise school leadership. Leaders from racially, socio-economically and geographically diverse contexts described practically-wise practices, which included listening, gathering information, clarifying, and modeling; practically-wise aims, which included attending to emotions, context, and roles; and practically-wise resources, which included physical artifacts, relationships with colleagues, and past professional experiences. Findings also show how leaders’ experiences with practical wisdom supported self and community flourishing through inward-oriented, outward-oriented, and action-oriented practices. This phenomenology of what practical wisdom entails and how it is experienced by school leaders provides empirical support for the importance of practical wisdom in educational leadership, as well as implications for a growing number of professional development models that aim to cultivate wise leadership in school settings.