Cream Skimming in an Early College High School: A First-Year Principal’s Dilemma in a High-Performing Campus

Abstract

Schools of choice need to provide equitable access and opportunities to all students, including students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals. In the context of Early College High Schools, principals and school districts should be partners in ensuring admissions processes are non-discriminatory. In this fictional case, a new principal in a high-performing early college high school becomes concerned that the school has been denying or not actively recruiting students with disabilities and emergent bilingual students. However, when she raises her concern with her supervisors and predecessor, she gets no support. The teaching notes of this case review the literature on ethical leadership, school administration dilemmas, and bounded ethicality.

Background

The Early College High School (ECHS) initiative was created in collaboration with Jobs for the Future and the Gates Foundation in 2004 (Walk, 2020). Guided by the belief that all students can succeed in advanced academic coursework if given the opportunity, ECHSs allow students to earn up to an associate degree during high school through partnerships between school districts and local institutions of higher education (IHE), often community colleges. ECHS students are enrolled in dual credit courses, which confer high school and college credit simultaneously, as early as ninth grade. ECHSs then offer comprehensive academic and social support to ensure students can successfully complete college courses. The ECHS initiative was designed to enhance college access, readiness, and completion by accelerating students toward a college degree. At the same time, ECHSs aim to increase equity by targeting and serving historically underrepresented student groups (e.g., first-generation college students, low-income students, and students of color) (Martinez & Deil-Amen, 2015). The ECHS model has become popular nationwide, with hundreds in operation across rural, urban, and suburban contexts, and with close to 200 in Texas alone, the setting of this fictional case. In some locales, an ECHS operates within a comprehensive high school while in other cases the ECHS is a stand-alone public school.

While the ECHS model has college access and equity objectives, it can also be viewed as a market-driven reform initiative because ECHSs are “schools of choice,” offering an alternative to traditional high schools. Students are not simply assigned to ECHSs like they are to traditional public schools. Rather, students must apply to attend an ECHS. Requirements for admission vary across states, districts, and ECHSs. Texas, for example, prevents ECHSs from using academic records to exclude applicants from admission and requires schools to use a lottery to admit students. However, even with a lottery, eighth-grade students must still go through an application process that involves, at minimum, being aware of the ECHS opportunity and submitting a written application. This process can lead to an applicant pool of students who are either more motivated and academically engaged and/or have parents who understand the school system and benefits that ECHS offers. Like their traditional counterparts, ECHSs are subject to accountability mandates around test proficiency and graduation rates, however, they are also expected to confer as many college credits and associate degrees as possible.

ECHS principals and traditional high school principals confront similar challenges. However, ECHS principals also confront unique challenges given the choice context and the IHE partnership components of the reform. For example, like traditional high school principals, ECHS principals are responsible for supporting students in earning their high school diploma while also preparing them to pursue their postsecondary goals. In an ECHS, however, college course-taking starts as early as ninth grade, placing pressure on principals to ensure students have the proper academic support. ECHS principals, like principals in other choice schools (charter schools, private schools, etc.), are also responsible for attracting applicants and carrying out an admission process that is not necessary in traditional public high schools with neighborhood-based enrollment. Yet, few researchers have examined the role of the ECHS principal to understand the common and unique aspects of working within this reform model (Duncheon & DeMatthews, 2018; forthcoming). In particular, little research has considered what kinds of ethical challenges principals of ECHSs might confront.

This fictional case uses insights from our prior research to examine the experiences of a first-year principal walking into a high-performing ECHS that has won local, state, and national awards and distinctions. These distinctions were based on achievement and graduation outcomes, university acceptances and scholarship money awarded, and site-based evaluations by educators. As the principal is getting acquainted with her new school, she learns that her predecessor may have engaged in certain tactics to strategically recruit higher-performing students and that her supervisors might be looking the other way given the school’s track record of success.

Del Sol Early College High School, Mr. Rodriguez, and Ms. Garcia

Del Sol ECHS is located along the U.S.-Mexico border in the southwestern United States. The local school district in which Del Sol is embedded has a majority Hispanic (95%) student population, most of whom identify as Mexican American according to U.S. Census data. Nearly 80% of students in the district are classified by the Texas Education Agency (TEA) as “economically disadvantaged.” Nearly 30% of students are classified as emergent bilingual students and 14% received special education services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Historically, few students from the surrounding communities completed an associate degree or had the opportunity to attend an elite university.

Del Sol, in its 15th year of existence, has produced incredible results since it was initially created in 2005. The school is an award-winning campus that has consistently demonstrated measurable results for students as measured by state assessments and other metrics tracked by TEA. Many of the school’s students earn a community college degree while still in high school and many also go on to elite universities across the state and nation. The state and district have identified the school as a “model campus,” and principals and teachers from across the state and nation visit the school to learn more about their approach to serving low-income Hispanic students. Del Sol consists of approximately 400 students with one principal and assistant principal. The student population is 96% Hispanic, 1% Black, and 3% White. Approximately 55% of Del Sol students are classified by the state as economically disadvantaged and approximately 5% of students are identified as emergent bilinguals. Only seven students receive special education services under the IDEA. Like the student population, most of the campus’ 20 teachers identify as Hispanic (85%). Approximately 85% of the teachers on the campus have more than 11 years of teaching experience. In 2022–2023, the campus had no new teachers. The teachers are motivated and committed to the school’s mission. For example, before they are hired, teachers agree to support students after school and on weekends with supplemental academic tutoring and by sponsoring extracurricular clubs.

The former principal of Del Sol was Mr. Rodriguez, a Hispanic man who identifies himself as Mexican American. Mr. Rodriguez served for 14 years in the position. Prior to serving as the principal of Del Sol, Mr. Rodriguez had 25 years of teaching and assistant principal experience. He was a politically savvy and innovative educator who cared deeply about Del Sol students. Mr. Rodriguez was adept at reading the political landscape in his community and felt it was important to adapt the ECHS model to fit his community, teachers, and students. For example, he built strategic relationships with the school board and community college board members, advocated for policy changes at the state level, and sought ways to maximize his school’s resources and programs through his policy knowledge and professional network. He was known by teachers as a motivator who set high expectations for staff. Mr. Rodriguez believed that Del Sol should offer more than an associate degree to students, but also an opportunity to leave the city and attend a competitive university.

Ms. Garcia replaced Mr. Rodriguez upon his retirement. She identifies as Mexican American, and like Mr. Rodriguez, she grew up in the community. She is in her 10th year as an educator and quickly moved from teacher to instructional coach, to assistant principal in the district before being named the principal of Del Sol. This was Ms. Garcia’s first time working in a choice school and she had no experience in an ECHS setting. The school board and superintendent appointed Ms. Garcia as principal at Del Sol largely because of her track record of increasing student achievement in the district’s lowest-performing campuses. The superintendent noted at the school board meeting confirming her appointment,

She is a product of our district as a student. As a teacher in her second year, she was named teacher of the year by her principal and peers. Her work ethic and commitment to serving our community is unparalleled. We can trust that the district and the state will continue to be proud of Del Sol under her leadership.

She would begin the next school year as principal but with some support from the retiring Mr. Rodriguez.

Case Narrative

First Days on the Job

Mr. Garcia was excited to arrive at Del Sol in early August. She understood that taking on a school leadership role during the COVID-19 pandemic would be tough, but she felt prepared and was grateful that Mr. Rodriguez agreed to provide her with mentoring and support. She created a “to-do” list that included reviewing the school improvement plans and achievement and demographic data over the past five years. She also scheduled an initial meeting with Mr. Rodriguez. She asked her secretary to schedule one-on-one interviews with each teacher so that she could learn more about the school and understand how she could maintain and build upon the school’s long-standing success. She also wanted to meet with some of the community college teachers to get a better sense of who was teaching her student.

Her first meeting with Mr. Rodriguez was insightful and different from when they met in the interview process. Mr. Rodriguez was less formal now and he wanted her to understand how he thought about being a principal of an ECHS. He said,

I want you to take what you know from your prior experiences and apply it here as necessary, but don’t be trapped by those experiences. You also must stop, think, and be creative. A great early college high school principal has to be more innovative.

He explained a bit further,

You have flexibility here to try new things since the school is high performing. And you have some leeway from the district because this is already an exemplary campus. So, you aren’t trapped like principals in other schools worrying about test scores.

She asked Mr. Rodriguez for any advice and he responded, “Yes, remember that as long as you continue to produce results for the district, the district will pretty much let you do what you want in terms of academics and administrative decisions.” Ms. Garcia appreciated the advice and she felt like she would have a better idea of how to innovate and continually improve the school once she got to know the teachers and students a bit better.

Upon meeting several teachers, Ms. Garcia recognized that Mr. Rodriguez had been adept at motivating staff to work exceedingly hard. All teachers led student clubs and provided tutoring, frequently without extra pay. One teacher said, “We all just go the extra mile here for kids. We are mission driven.” Another teacher said, “We knew what we signed up for. Mr. Rodriguez said, if you want to work here and really make a difference, then you have to do clubs.” A few teachers noted that the work was unrelenting, and the pandemic made managing extra and unpaid duties extremely difficult. However, all the teachers spoke fondly of the students. The teachers used words like “bright,” “dynamic,” “engaging,” and “thoughtful” to describe students, which was exciting for Ms. Garcia who was used to dealing with a few teachers who maintained deficit perspectives of low-income students of color. She was excited to get to know her students and decided to review more of the school’s data.

The Honeymoon Period

Three weeks into the school year in mid-September, Ms. Garcia was reviewing student demographic data and reading individual student files. She knew that part of her job was to help each student be successful in college and that would require an individualized approach. The students at Del Sol appeared to be very similar to the district demographics in some ways, but Ms. Garcia noticed some specific differences. She knew the ECHS model was not supposed to deny access to any marginalized student group, yet the school’s demographics historically enrolled almost no students with disabilities and a significantly lower percentage of emergent bilingual students relative to the district. ¹

At her next meeting with Mr. Rodriguez, she asked why the school’s racial demographics were like the district’s demographics, but so few students with disabilities and emergent bilingual students were enrolled. Mr. Rodriguez noted that, “A lot of those parents weren’t as interested in attending an early college high school and you could see a similar trend with other early college high schools in the region.” He offered a few additional justifications: First, the school’s small size limited the types of students with disabilities that could be served. He noted, “We aren’t equipped to have students with intellectual disabilities or students with emotional and behavioral disabilities in attendance, because they need specialized programs.” Second, he contended that there were many emergent bilinguals at the school, they had simply opted out of receiving services when they were admitted. Mr. Rodriguez felt this was a good thing, “The focus was on learning in English and getting college credit. If they wanted to pursue Spanish further they could take it for college credit.” Mr. Rodriguez also reminded Ms. Garcia that just because a student was not classified as emergent bilingual, it did not mean the child’s home or primary language was English. He said, “It just meant they tested out of services before coming here.” Third, the school seemed to attract and admit a different group of marginalized students—students who were likely to be labeled social outcasts and experience bullying in a large comprehensive school setting. “Remember,” Mr. Rodriguez added, “ECHS is a lot of work, and we don’t have sports, so we tend to get the nerdy kids who are academically inclined.” He also specifically noted that the school served a sizable proportion of LGBTQ students who were seeking a smaller, safer school community. Ms. Garcia respected Mr. Rodriguez’s response but still maintained some concerns. She wondered, “Is the school doing enough to include marginalized students by attracting LGBTQ students, despite their exclusion of students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals?” She knew a school should not discriminate against admitting students with disabilities and she did not believe opting out of bilingual education services was a “good thing.”

With these concerns in the back of her mind, Ms. Garcia focused her energies on getting the year off to a good start. The first two weeks of school flew by without any problems. She reflected on how the school was “such a well-oiled machined” and that teachers took a great deal of ownership over their work and supporting students. She also loved her new students. She was impressed by how organized, motivated, and engaged Del Sol students tended to be, especially given the freedoms they had by attending classes at the community college. Ms. Garcia told her mentor (a retired principal for whom she once worked) that “the students are just brilliant and motivated.” Students moved relatively seamlessly from the ECHS campus to the community college campus. She observed classrooms as well as after-school programs, clubs, and tutoring sessions. She noticed a few areas of improvement, but overall felt lucky that the school was in such great shape. Teacher and student attendance was high and there was a strong desire by all the staff and students to be on campus.

In her third week, she decided to broach the topic of admissions and student demographics with her staff. She was wrapping up her teacher one-on-ones, which were generally insightful, positive, and productive. She also held a follow-up meeting with the teachers, counselor, and assistant principal, who were part of the school improvement team and attendance committee, to finalize their school improvement plan to submit to the district. She used these opportunities to ask why more students with disabilities and emergent bilingual students were not enrolled. She learned that the school was not appropriately staffed to provide these services and that prospective students and parents were often informed that “certain services weren’t available.” The assistant principal noted, “Well, Mr. Rodriguez felt we could use those resources in other places, so we just never staffed those positions and did not have the enrollment needs anyway.” He added, “We can spend that money on hiring more English, math, and science teachers, or use it to pay for other activities.”

Several teachers felt that students with disabilities would not be well-served given how students are expected to take college coursework. Others noted that the school did serve students who were once emergent bilingual students, but who have tested out of services. A few teachers who were concerned about denying access to these student groups reported expressing their concerns to Mr. Rodriguez, but never gaining any traction. Since Ms. Garcia was new to the ECHS environment and to the school, she decided to listen to the team and schedule a follow-up. She then gathered information on the ECHS model as well as legal and non-discriminatory requirements related to bilingual and special education. The school would begin recruiting students and having admissions in the coming months, which would be an opportunity to reshape the student body in ways that match the district’s natural proportions. It was time to review the school’s approach to admissions.

Admissions and Enrollment

Mr. Rodriguez had a well-designed process for student admissions. Del Sol would have five parent information sessions per year during the fall semester. Four information sessions would be in English and one would be in Spanish prior to the January application deadline. He explained that at these information sessions, he would share a variety of aspects about the school, such as the ability to earn free college credit in a small school environment. He always emphasized to prospective families that all students were welcome to apply, but they should expect to work very hard and be committed to a more academically challenging experience. Ms. Garcia asked, “Do you have parents ask about special education?” Mr. Rodriguez explained that few parents of children with disabilities were interested in the ECHS model given the rigorous curriculum but for those who asked he would say,

We don’t have the same special education services that other high schools have because we are so small. Our school offers smaller classes and tutoring so there’s lots of academic support for all students, but if your child needs resource room or a separate special education classroom, we simply don’t have the staff for that.

He noted that parents either decided that their child would do okay without those services or, more often, opted not to have their child apply. Once students applied and were selected from the lottery, the school reached out to families of admitted students, which Mr. Rodriguez said was another opportunity to confirm the student’s interest in the program, reiterate the school’s expectations, and clarify what services were or were not available.

Ms. Garcia appreciated Mr. Rodriguez’s insights about the recruitment and admission processes but also wondered if Del Sol was possibly steering away certain parents and students. She recalled Mr. Rodriguez giving her the advice that if the school did well the district would not pay much attention. She also kept thinking that the parent information session and the post-selection follow-up conversation could be opportunities for the principal or school personnel to dissuade certain students from attending, particularly those with disabilities and/or emergent bilinguals. The conversations after lottery selection might also have been an opportunity to persuade parents that their child no longer needed bilingual education services. She tried to ask a few teachers and the school’s counselor about the process, and they expressed confidence in the way admission had been run. The counselor echoed Mr. Rodriguez’s view that students with disabilities often were not interested in the ECHS. One teacher shared the view that, “It would be really hard for a student who was struggling academically to successfully complete our coursework and finish the associate degree.” Ms. Garcia sensed that there may be problematic views held by her staff about the ability of students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals to succeed in an ECHS. However, she could not confirm if the previous principal was explicitly discouraging these students from applying. With some concerns and limited information in hand, Ms. Garcia would have some questions when she next met with her supervisor.

Confronting Inequities

Ms. Garcia was preparing for a December check-in with her supervisor, the associate superintendent of secondary schools. Prior to the meeting, she found out that her superintendent would join them. She was nervous but she believed everything on campus was going well and she was still meeting regularly with Mr. Rodriguez who seemed happy with the school’s leadership. Both her supervisor and the superintendent had positive feedback for Ms. Garcia, which was a relief for her. They spoke about a variety of topics and initiatives as well as some upcoming IHE partnership meetings at which she was expected to present. As the meeting was wrapping up, Ms. Garcia raised her concerns about the school’s low enrollment of students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals. She stated, “I’m concerned we are missing some students here or we have some unknown barrier stopping certain kids from being admitted.” Both the superintendent and associate superintendent nodded in agreement. The superintendent said, “Yes, you are right. It’s a difficult situation.” He continued, “You are a small campus, so you don’t have the economy of scale of a larger comprehensive high school where we have many special education and bilingual education teachers and programs.” The associate superintendent chimed in,

It’s just very expensive to enroll more students with those needs at a smaller high school. Mr. Rodriguez knew that too. Plus, students need to be able to succeed in courses over at the community college, and the college doesn’t offer services.

Ms. Garcia was navigating unfamiliar waters in this conversation. She heard her supervisors acknowledge the issue, but also make excuses. She wasn’t exactly sure how to proceed. She decided to ask if there could be some additional resources to hire several special education teachers and a bilingual education teacher if the newly admitted class was more diverse. “Hmmm, that is a good question. I’m not sure about finances right now or if we could even find the personnel for it,” said the superintendent. He got up and left for his next meeting and thanked Ms. Garcia for bringing it to his attention. When the superintendent was gone, her associate superintendent took a different tone. She said, “Let’s not rock the boat on this one. You are new and we gave you a big responsibility here.” Her supervisor added, “Let’s just focus on the mission, getting our kiddos out of here with an associate degree and off to a four-year college. That’s a big enough task given the current student population so keep up the good work.” Ms. Garcia was frustrated and responded, “Yes, I understand, but ethically, is this fair to deny this great opportunity to certain students? I mean isn’t access the whole purpose of the school?” The associate superintendent did not respond directly to her questions, but rather said, “Let’s keep this on the plate for next year, but for now, let’s just focus on staying the course.”

Ms. Garcia left the meeting feeling somewhat dejected. She grew up in this district as a student, teacher, and now principal. She had always been committed to serving all students, and that especially included students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals. She felt the mission of the school should be to serve all students in line with the ECHS model. She said to herself, “How can I live with myself if the school I lead would not admit the child version of me, an emergent bilingual?” In her 10-year career, she had not felt this far out of alignment with her district or as confused as to how she might move forward. Ms. Garcia thought to herself perhaps this is just “part of the territory” of being a principal and having to make tradeoffs. She was leading a great school, but one that was not living up to serving the entire community. Ms. Garcia was at a critical reflection point in her leadership career.

Teaching Notes

ECHS in Context: Increasing College Access and Equity in an Era of Market-Driven Reforms

The ECHS model is designed to facilitate college access and success—and specifically, confer associate degrees—for students who have been historically underrepresented in higher education (Berger et al., 2010). The assumption is that, by providing comprehensive academic and social support, ECHSs can create an accelerated pathway into college for students who might otherwise have less opportunity to attend. Research on ECHSs has linked program participation to increased likelihood of college enrollment and bachelor’s degree completion, demonstrating the model’s benefits for students of color and low-income students (Song & Zeiser, 2019). This mission to serve underrepresented groups distinguishes ECHS from other college preparatory programs, such as Advanced Placement (AP), that tend to serve White, higher-income, and continuing-generation students (Kolluri, 2018). In Texas, ECHS policies and procedures are outlined in the ECHS Blueprint, which defines the target population as follows:

The ECHS shall identify, recruit, and enroll subpopulations (in addition to those who are at risk as defined by PEIMS) that are historically underrepresented in college courses (e.g., first generation college goers, students of low socioeconomic status, English learners, and students with disabilities).

Texas ECHS policy is therefore explicit that English learners and students with disabilities should be targeted for admission.

Yet, the ECHS’s equity-oriented theory of action is complicated by the fact that ECHSs are schools of choice. Students must apply and be admitted to these schools to attend. School choice is a key feature of market-based reform more broadly, which positions students and their parents as consumers of education as a private good (Ellison & Aloe, 2019). In this context, students and parents are expected to identify and choose the best educational option for them, while schools are incentivized to increase achievement so that they can attract the highest-performing students. Put another way, schools have a disincentive to serve students who are lower achieving or who may require more resources, such as students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals. Meanwhile, self-selection patterns can result in more privileged or motivated students, or students with highly engaged parents, selecting options that are perceived to be of higher quality (Altonji et al., 2015). In an ECHS, school leadership or staff may feel pressure to confer as many associate degrees as possible to demonstrate the ECHS’s success. In turn, they may be motivated to admit students they believe will be the most successful in completing a rigorous college curriculum (Duncheon, 2020). These dynamics potentially create tensions for ECHS principals navigating choice-based admissions: How can they maximize the proportion of students who successfully complete a college degree while also serving students who have been historically excluded from higher education and may require more academic support?

At the center of this case was Ms. Garcia’s concern that students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals were underrepresented on her campus, which may be due to the school’s admissions processes. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and the Bilingual Education Act provide an important set of rights to students that cannot be legally denied by a publicly funded school. Yet, evidence of “cream skimming” high-performing students and “pushing out” lower-performing students or students with disciplinary histories has been well documented in research focused on school choice programs, which include charter schools and district-run magnet and open enrollment programs (Altonji et al., 2015; Kho et al., 2022). Several studies reported a reduced likelihood that students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals were enrolled in choice schools (Zimmer et al., 2019). More recent research focused on how principals market their schools to parents help to explain why particular student groups are excluded or enroll in lower numbers at certain choice schools (DiMartino & Jessen, 2018; Jabbar & Creed, 2020; Kotok et al., 2021). Marketing behaviors and admissions tactics that purposefully attempt to limit access to any student group seeking access are illegal and out of step with the Professional Standards for Educational Leaders (PSEL) (National Policy Board for Educational Administration, 2015). PSEL Standard 3 is particularly relevant to cream skimming behaviors because it calls upon principals to: “Confront and alter institutional biases of marginalization, deficit-based schooling, and low expectations associated with race, class, culture and language, gender and sexual orientation, and disability or special status” (p. 11).

Dilemmas and Bounded Ethicality

Ms. Garcia begins to ask questions of her predecessor and then her supervisors, but she is not supported in her efforts to disrupt this admission pattern. Instead, her supervisors recommend that she just focus on college readiness for her current students, and perhaps enrollment patterns can be addressed in the future. Ms. Garcia also does not have concrete evidence of specific practices that have denied access to these student groups although she understands that her school is not staffed appropriately to serve students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals. Ms. Garcia is confronting a series of dilemmas. She recognizes the need to increase the enrollment of students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals on campus in alignment with federal law, but her school does not have the immediate resources or the support of the district administration. Her supervisors did not outright deny her request but rather told the first-year principal to focus on sustaining the current enrollment patterns and wait until next year to make changes. In addition to the challenge of persuading district leaders to provide resources, Ms. Garcia recognizes that some of her own staff may hold problematic views about the academic potential of students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals. Thus, cultivating buy-in within her own building may pose a challenge. Her teachers might be resistant to any attempts to change an admission process that, in their eyes, may be working well.

This case can be viewed through the construct of ethical leadership. Principals often confront ethical dilemmas in their work which require them to engage in ethical leadership practices (Arar et al., 2016, Arar & Saiti, 2022; DeMatthews & Izquierdo, 2017, DeMatthews & Serafini, 2021; Crawford, 2017; Ehrich et al., 2015; Kim & Lowery, 2021). A popular definition of ethical leadership is as follows: “the demonstration of normatively appropriate conduct through personal actions and interpersonal relationships, and the promotion of such conduct to followers through two-way communication, reinforcement, and decision-making” (Brown et al., 2005, p. 120). This definition highlights the importance of relationships and promoting ongoing two-way communication and decision-making. The definition also highlights a need for consistency, which suggests that resolution of an ethical dilemma may take time. Thus, Ms. Garcia might consider how to first foster conversations with her own staff around admission policies and, more broadly, questions of who the ECHS is designed to serve. She might also continually engage in efforts to reshape the conversation she had with her supervisors and admissions committee. Her leadership efforts might include connecting them with important information on non-discriminatory practices, sharing parent and student testimonials, or developing a modified admissions plan with a core group of staff to present to the supervisors. In a review of ethical leadership scholarship, Stefkovich and Begley (2007) noted that “research on how principals respond when confronted with ethical dilemmas suggests that the best interests of students figures prominently as a meta-organizer and ultimate influence on their decision making” (p. 206). Perhaps, Ms. Garcia will try multiple strategies while keeping the law and the best interest of the district’s students in her decision-making processes.

Research on ethical dilemmas and leadership also suggests that Ms. Garcia might fail, and aspiring leaders should be aware of some of the potential pitfalls. Chugh et al. (2005) applied bounded rationality and the recognition of the ways heuristics influence decision-making to consider situations where “the self” is central to ethical decision-making processes. They challenged the idea that people can be fully ethical all the time and instead suggested that “social and ethical situations are particularly likely to trigger bounds on conscious thinking and biases in unconscious thinking” (p. 79). These situations trigger self-processes, which unconsciously serve to protect one’s view of self and place bounds on ethical thinking. Bounded ethicality has been defined as “the systematic and ordinary psychological processes of enhancing and protecting our ethical self-view, which automatically, dynamically, and cyclically influence the ethicality of decision-making” (Chugh & Kern, 2016, p. 86). Chugh and Kern (2016) concluded,

Ethical behavior emerges from dynamic processing which means that the same individual can face the same decision multiple times, but behave differently on different occasions. This variability occurs because current and future behaviors are partially shaped by recent past behaviors, which will vary from occasion to occasion in their impact of self-view and degree of self-threat. (p. 93)

Since Ms. Garcia is a new principal, she may already feel a heavy sense of self-threat. Central to bounded ethicality are self-view, self-threat, self-enhancement, and self-protection, because individuals care deeply about their self-concept and self-esteem (collectively described as self-view) (Sedikides, 2012). Individuals have a certain level of expectation concerning their self-view and a certain level of tolerance for threats. When one’s self-view is threatened beyond a tolerable level, individuals can be put in a psychologically uncomfortable state until their self-view is restored (Chugh & Kern, 2016). Bounded ethicality highlights the internal constraints and automatic-intuitive processes that shape ethical behavior. As Zhang et al. (2015) noted, individuals exhibit bounded ethicality when they make “unethical decisions that are outside of their own awareness and are inconsistent with their consciously held ethical values” (p. 311). If she continues to push her supervisors, her level of tolerance for self-threat may limit her ability to make ethical decisions on this issue or on future issues. Ms. Garcia will have to find ways to bolster her self-view and insolate herself from self-threat, perhaps by building a strong network of mentoring support outside of her district and building more internal capacity within her school.

Teaching Activities

Discussion Questions

The discussion questions provided below are a starting point for whole group or small group discussions that can be proceeded by additional teaching activities listed below. The questions center around three main themes: (a) the ethical dilemmas associated with school leadership; (b) navigating professional relationships with mentors and supervisors; and (c) continuous improvement efforts to advance equity and achievement.

1. What do you think about the series of dilemmas Ms. Garcia faces (e.g., a recruitment approach that enrolled historically marginalized groups, as well as other vulnerable subgroups such as LGBTQ students, but also may put barriers up for students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals; principal supervisor who pushes the principal to slow her pace of change with the admissions process)? How should ECHSs think about admission in a choice context? How should a principal weigh the completion goal with the goal of providing equitable access to all historically marginalized groups?

2. How might a principal approach choice-based admission processes in ways that support greater equity for emergent bilinguals and students with disabilities?

3. What additional data might Ms. Garcia seek out and utilize to bolster her request that the school district offer more support for special education and bilingual education on her campus?

4. What are some strategies for a principal to discuss equity-related concerns with a supervisor?

5. How might the fact that Ms. Garcia was in her first few months as a first-year principal impact the way her supervisors understood her request?

6. How might your own personal identity and level of experience impact the way others in your school or district perceive your leadership actions?

7. How might you handle a supervisor denying your request to address a seemingly obvious equity concern on your campus?

8. Beyond ECHS, this case highlights how racist and ableist assumptions can influence whether and how educators create postsecondary opportunities for their students. How can principals dismantle harmful stereotypes in school communities that lead to labeling some students as college-bound and others not?

9. ECHS can be difficult to implement in practice. What can principals do to ensure all students are successful in dual credit classrooms and among teachers and professors with differing trainings, values, and expectations?

Additional Learning Activities

1. Read the Texas Early College High School Blueprint, Benchmark 1, on Target Population: https://tea.texas.gov/sites/default/files/2020-21_ECHS_Blueprint_5-28-20_Final.pdf. How might this document help you advocate for more resources for your school?

2. Create a student recruitment and admission plan for an ECHS. Assume that, like at Del Sol, all students can apply, but you do not have enough slots for all interested students. Recognizing that the application process itself can be a barrier for many students and families, how can you prioritize equitable access, especially for groups such as students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals?

3. Review federal and state policy concerning non-discriminatory practices for students with disabilities and emergent bilinguals. Then, consider the extent to which these policies are implemented within local schools and districts in your area.

4. Read, A New Model for Ethical Leadership (Bazerman, 2020) and how leaders can maximize value, overcome barriers, create value through tradeoffs, and better use time. Consider how ethical leadership practices can be used to navigate the situation presented in this case.