Journal articles by Amanda Roberts
This article reports data from a study investigating distributed leadership (DL) and its relation... more This article reports data from a study investigating distributed leadership (DL) and its relationship to social justice and democratic values. The research comprised a case study of a UK secondary school, which describes itself as having a finely distributed leadership culture, and involved teaching staff, non-teaching staff, senior leaders and students who took part in an arts-based method of data generation (collage creation) and interviews. The study examined participants’ meanings and perceptions in relation to leadership and social justice. Our analysis of the data highlights contrasting image patterns (hierarchical and holarchic); a dominant view of DL as the exercise of pro-active agency, but also awareness of ways in which this is unequally spread across the school; and the value of seeing DL as comprising multiple features each of which may be distributed differently. This paper concentrates on participative and cultural justice. It suggests that work on further delineating multiple aspects of DL would be valuable, and that attention needs to be given not only to developing flexibility of institutional structures, but also core cultural values (social justice and democracy) and holarchic social environments in which relationships are fluid, supportive and encourage belonging and independent thinking.
Papers by Amanda Roberts
Progress in Palliative Care, 2021
This article charts the learning from an online, artmaking programme supporting individuals with ... more This article charts the learning from an online, artmaking programme supporting individuals with a lifelimiting illness. The programme sought to fill a gap caused by the temporary closure of face-to-face UK hospice-based day therapy programmes during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants' comments on this arts-based programme illustrated the sense of disrupted and diminished identity, linked to a deceased sense of agency, which terminal illness can bring. Responding to this need for increased agency led to the development of the PATCH (Palliative care patient-led change) programme. Individuals with a terminal illness will be invited to join an online collaborative group, to identify a specific issue they wish to address and to lead the change they wish to see. The PATCH group will be supported by a facilitator and a team of volunteers, whose roles will include supporting participants in planning and executing their change strategy. This article presents the conceptual underpinning for the PATCH programme, offering a tentative theory of the relationship between identity, moral purpose, agency, illness and the leadership of change for those living with a life-limiting illness. Challenging stereotypical views of palliative care patients, it explores a new community and asset-based approach to end-of-life care which supports individuals at the end of life in developing a positive self-view.
Professional Development in Education, 2013
This paper explores the complex processes involved in the self-construction of academic identity ... more This paper explores the complex processes involved in the self-construction of academic identity in a UK School of Education. Drawing on the research of four academics, it begins by discussing teacher educators' varying perceptions of the need to re-configure their identity to meet the expectations of a twenty first century Higher Education workforce. It proposes the formation of this identity to be a dynamic, career-long process. Diverse scaffolds for the development process are proposed, including opportunities for new teacher educators to be apprenticed into an academic role, the centrality of communities of practice and the importance of the supported development of academic skills such as writing for publication.
Improving Schools, 2005
This article explores the leadership of a closing school. It draws on the case of Newley School, ... more This article explores the leadership of a closing school. It draws on the case of Newley School, a mixed comprehensive for students aged between 11 and 18 years, and examines the primary leadership activities undertaken during the 12-month period when the school reopened temporarily as a ‘new’ school. These activities were driven by the imperative of ensuring the provision of a positive learning environment for students. The article examines the key factors underpinning the cultural change required to secure this environment. It moves on to explore the impact of cultural change activities from the viewpoint of some of the school's main stakeholders – students, parents, teachers and governors. It highlights the importance of short-term culture building and provides insights into the potential benefits of school federations. The article concludes with implications for school leaders attempting to manage cultural change.
Improving Schools, 2011
This article explores the learning arising from a pilot inter-school visits programme in Stevenag... more This article explores the learning arising from a pilot inter-school visits programme in Stevenage, Hertfordshire. Teachers from two schools undertook a series of visits with the aim of developing learning and teaching in their schools. The pilot sought to understand ways in which such a collaborative visits programme could be used to build professional knowledge across school boundaries. It suggests that such knowledge-building is the precursor to a change of practice. An investigation of the literature reveals potential issues in making tacit knowledge visible and in recording teachers’ learning so that it can contribute to a developing professional knowledge base. The article discusses how these issues manifested themselves in practice and offers a framework for professional learning visits which underlines the continuous nature of professional learning, the need for reflection to decode what has been learned and the need for active and continuing participation by host and visito...
Improving Schools, 2009
This article explores students' potential to make a difference to their school through a Stud... more This article explores students' potential to make a difference to their school through a Students as Researchers programme. It begins by discussing the impetus for the current increase in student voice initiatives in schools. It continues the debate around issues of student empowerment and students' identity as change agents through an analysis of the development of a Students as Researchers (SAR) programme designed to support school improvement. The article investigates the possibilities for impact offered by a stepped approach to the student research process, early planning for impact and a strong student/teacher partnership. Issues are illuminated though reference to the authors' work with Students as Researchers groups in several UK schools. The article concludes with an exploration of ways of enhancing the impact of students' work on the development of their schools.
This paper focuses on the HertsCam Network, a network of teachers and schools supported by a coll... more This paper focuses on the HertsCam Network, a network of teachers and schools supported by a collaboration between a university faculty of education and a local education authority in the UK. It explores its potential for impact on the quality of teaching and learning in schools. It describes the development of the network, its aims, membership and structure and briefly outlines what has been learnt from an ongoing research project about the potential of the HertsCam Network to support teacher leadership within Hertfordshire schools.
British Educational Research Journal, 2018
This article contributes to theorising the value of collage as a methodological approach. It begi... more This article contributes to theorising the value of collage as a methodological approach. It begins with a discussion of the methodological difficulties of exploring hidden meanings and individual experience through the research process. The illuminative potential of arts-based methodologies in qualitative research is then investigated. The article makes the case for the specific advantages of using collage to explore the experience of leadership, through a discussion of two collage-based studies. It proposes a variant of the 'think aloud' process, used in conjunction with collage, as a route to producing deep understandings of the multiple ways in which leadership is experienced and understood as a social process. The argument is made that collage enables the accessing and sharing of profound levels of experience not accessible through words alone and considers the impact of the physicality of collage on its potential to release these profound insights. A five stage process for the analysis of collage is then set out. The article concludes by offering a theory of the value of collage as a methodological approach to exploring experiences of leadership, through use of the concepts of physicality, wholeness and participant agency.
Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 2018
In the context of evolving global challenges and opportunities, this article explores the kind of... more In the context of evolving global challenges and opportunities, this article explores the kind of leadership that moves beyond the philosophy of dependence which pervades many of the everyday assumptions of educational leadership practice. The article argues for educational leadership that places relational freedom, self-determination, and critical reflexivity as the driving aim of distributed leadership by teachers, students and others in non-positional leadership roles. A project arising from the International Teacher Leadership initiative is examined in order to offer practical illustration.
Educational Management Administration & Leadership, 2015
This article examines ‘policy’ and ‘policy response’ through documentary analysis and an illustra... more This article examines ‘policy’ and ‘policy response’ through documentary analysis and an illustrative study of policy implementation. Our approach is informed by Foucault’s (2009) theory that power relations in society are conditioned by a culturally generated set of ideas, and that these relations contain the space for both coercion and resistance. Our aim is to consider the potential for policy compliance and contestation by: (1) describing policy and policy response, drawing attention to the neoliberal hegemony that has come to dominate policy discourse globally; and (2) considering how social agents respond to a particular instance of policy. We provide documentary analysis of the interpolation of leadership into policy development in Scotland following the OECD (2007) report, and offer a small scale illustrative study of the implementation of the Leadership Standards for Social Justice in Scotland (GTCS, 2012). The head teachers in our study drew upon the discourse of marketiza...
In this paper we adopt a critical perspective on the implementation of policy on school leadershi... more In this paper we adopt a critical perspective on the implementation of policy on school leadership and equity in Scotland, viewing policy as both an attempt to solve problems and an attempt to persuade social actors to subscribe to particular beliefs that delineate action. We begin by offering a definition of "policy response", and then examine how policy "conversations" establish consensus around such things as school leadership and equity. We examine Scottish policy on school leadership and equity and consider what practices this policy does, and does not permit. In so doing, our examination of the implementation of policy on school leadership and equity in Scotland acknowledges that such policy is in part extemporized, and in part the attempt to make inevitable a "de-stated" account of governance. We conclude by contextualising our forthcoming empirical study of the Leadership Standards for Social Justice in Scotland.
International Journal of Leadership in Education, 2015
This paper reports data from a study investigating distributed leadership (DL) and its relationsh... more This paper reports data from a study investigating distributed leadership (DL) and its relationship to social justice and democratic values. The research comprised a case study of a UK secondary school, which describes itself as having a finely distributed leadership culture, and involved teaching staff, non-teaching staff, senior leaders and students who took part in an arts-based method of data generation (collage creation) and interviews. The study examined participants' meanings and perceptions in relation to leadership and social justice. Our analysis of the data highlights contrasting image patterns (hierarchical and holarchic); a dominant view of DL as the exercise of pro-active agency, but also awareness of ways in which this is unequally spread across the school; and the value of seeing DL as comprising multiple features each of which may be distributed differently. This paper concentrates on participative and cultural justice. It suggests that work on further delineating multiple aspects of DL would be valuable, and that attention needs to be given not only to developing flexibility of institutional structures, but also core cultural values (social justice and democracy) and holarchic social environments in which relationships are fluid, supportive and encourage belonging and independent thinking. of 3 29
International Journal of Inclusive Education, 2014
Responding to Thrupp's (2003, p. 169) call for writers on school leadership to offer 'analyses wh... more Responding to Thrupp's (2003, p. 169) call for writers on school leadership to offer 'analyses which provide more critical messages about social inequality and neo-liberal and managerialist policies' we use Foucault's (2000) theory of power to ask what lessons we might learn from the literature on school leadership for equity. We begin by offering a definition of neoliberalism; new managerialism; leadership and equity, with the aim of revealing the relationship between the macropolitical discourse of neoliberalism and the actions of school leaders in the micropolitical arena of schools. In so doing we examine some of the literature on school leadership for equity that postdates Thrupp's (2003) analysis, seeking evidence of critical engagement with/resistance to neoliberal policy. We identify three approaches to leadership for equity that have been used to enhance equity in schools internationally: (i) critical reflection; (ii) the cultivation of a 'common vision' of equity; (iii) 'transforming dialogue'. We consider if such initiatives avoid the hegemonic trap of neoliberalism, which captures and disarms would-be opponents of new managerial policy. We conclude by arguing that, in spite of the dominance of neoliberalism, head teachers have the power to speak up, and speak out, against social injustice.
This article analyses modes of participation which enable schools to develop as democratic commun... more This article analyses modes of participation which enable schools to develop as democratic communities of learning and leadership. It mines a rich vein of work sustained at Cambridge over many years. Contributors to this work have included Arnot. The modes of participation considered include student voice or consultation, students as researchers, participative pedagogy and student leadership. These resonate with the values of the Leadership for Learning (LfL) endeavour (MacBeath & Dempster, 2009) in which shared leadership is a cornerstone. This article explores the relationship between the key concepts of learning, participation and democracy. It draws its analysis from a series of key projects initiated under the umbrella of LfL in Cambridge in recent years, including the "Influence and Participation of Young People in their Learning" project (MacBeath et al., 2008), the "Evaluation of the Learning to Lead Initiative" project (Frost & MacBeath, 2010) and the &q...
The Covid-19 crisis led to an increase in the 'total pain' of many terminally ill patient... more The Covid-19 crisis led to an increase in the 'total pain' of many terminally ill patients who faced a reduction in support, due to the temporary closure of front-line palliative day therapy services. A hospice volunteer, I instigated an online day therapy programme for patients previously attending face-to-face day therapy. Participant feedback revealed the importance of providing a space for ongoing peer support for participants' changing sense of identity, an issue for time-limited day therapy programmes. An exploration of key concepts associated with palliative care established the multiple connections between such changing identity and arts-based approaches to living well. This article charts how I used this understanding to develop an alternative, online arts-based support programme, Live well, die well. It explores the links between ongoing mutual support, arts-based activity and the reactions to a shifting identity in patients with a life-limiting illness.
I would like to thank Dr David Frost, for his thought-provoking commentary on so many early draft... more I would like to thank Dr David Frost, for his thought-provoking commentary on so many early drafts of this thesis and Janet Roberts, for her unfailing encouragement. Finally, I would like to thank my colleague Lynn, whose comment, 'I'm not the sort of person who writes', inspired the study presented in this thesis.
This paper offers a review of the literature on school leadership and equity in order to help pro... more This paper offers a review of the literature on school leadership and equity in order to help provide policy with an evidence base on school leadership from the perspective of equity. It does so by: (i) considering how discourses constitute objects; (ii) exploring the rationale of policy on school leadership and equity; (iii) considering the various models of school leadership and equity; and (iv) examining literature on the practical application of ideas about school leadership and equity. In so doing, this paper draws attention to the positive claims made internationally about the utility of school leadership strategies to promote social justice in modern multicultural societies. In particular it considers the alleged value of the dual concepts of 'equality of opportunity' and 'equity of results'. Drawing upon Foucault's (2009) account of discourse formation, this paper cautions that literature on the efficacy of school leadership and equity may help constitute a "destated" account of governance that places onus on school leaders to take responsibility for social processes that may, in reality, lie beyond their control.
Professional Development in Education, 2013
ABSTRACT
Book chapters by Amanda Roberts
Empowering Teachers as Agents of Change: Enabling a non-positional approach to teacher leadership, Edited by David Frost, Cambridge: Leadership for Learning: The Cambridge Network, 2017
This chapter suggests the following key principles as important for enhancing collaborative leade... more This chapter suggests the following key principles as important for enhancing collaborative leadership practice which can best support learning and social justice:
-- Agency: make the freeing of teachers’ agency a priority so teachers can initiate and lead change together on aspects of practice about which they feel passionate.
-- Support: create cultural and communal support structures to help teachers in developing a collective identity and the confidence and strategies to involve others in their attempts to change practice.
-- Equity: make advancing equity - respect, participation, fair opportunities for learning and lessening socio-economic inequalities - an explicit aim of teachers’ collaborative practice.
-- Learning: ensure teachers’ collaborative practice nurtures a breadth of learning that includes cognitive, emotional and social development as members of a community of professionals, as well as the predisposition and capacity to think independently and critically as an individual.
The principles were established through the identification and preparation of five UK case studies (Woods et al 2016)
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Journal articles by Amanda Roberts
Papers by Amanda Roberts
Book chapters by Amanda Roberts
-- Agency: make the freeing of teachers’ agency a priority so teachers can initiate and lead change together on aspects of practice about which they feel passionate.
-- Support: create cultural and communal support structures to help teachers in developing a collective identity and the confidence and strategies to involve others in their attempts to change practice.
-- Equity: make advancing equity - respect, participation, fair opportunities for learning and lessening socio-economic inequalities - an explicit aim of teachers’ collaborative practice.
-- Learning: ensure teachers’ collaborative practice nurtures a breadth of learning that includes cognitive, emotional and social development as members of a community of professionals, as well as the predisposition and capacity to think independently and critically as an individual.
The principles were established through the identification and preparation of five UK case studies (Woods et al 2016)
-- Agency: make the freeing of teachers’ agency a priority so teachers can initiate and lead change together on aspects of practice about which they feel passionate.
-- Support: create cultural and communal support structures to help teachers in developing a collective identity and the confidence and strategies to involve others in their attempts to change practice.
-- Equity: make advancing equity - respect, participation, fair opportunities for learning and lessening socio-economic inequalities - an explicit aim of teachers’ collaborative practice.
-- Learning: ensure teachers’ collaborative practice nurtures a breadth of learning that includes cognitive, emotional and social development as members of a community of professionals, as well as the predisposition and capacity to think independently and critically as an individual.
The principles were established through the identification and preparation of five UK case studies (Woods et al 2016)
Collaborative leadership as we examine it in the book is a deeper conception than the idea of distributed leadership that is often applied or studied. We see collaborative leadership as both emerging from the perpetual process of complex interactions across the school involving not only school leaders but teachers, support staff, students and others (hence as emergent), and shaped by individual intentions which express meaning, purpose and goals and the will to make a difference (hence as the product of intentionality). Our concept of collaborative leadership draws attention to both the context that gives rise to leadership and the human sparks of creativity and freedom generated by teachers, students and others as they work together.
The book argues that integral to a desirable conception of collaborative leadership is an explicit value-base - a philosophy of co-development rather than dependence. It explains how collaborative leadership practices can be guided by co-development values, where progress is achieved with and by helping others as co-creators of the learning environment of the school. The practical process of developing collaborative leadership is explored through ideas on reciprocal learning, values clarification, reframing leadership and collective identity construction. The book is a crucial aid in developing distributed leadership practice, through teacher leadership, for example, that is more collaborative, innovative, critically reflexive and capable of advancing social justice.