Steven Kolber and others on Twitter have been discussing the possibility of a Twitter book club around the recently published (and excellent!) education book Flip the System Australia: What matters in education. Based in the unique Australian context, this book situates Australian education policy, research and practice within the international education narrative. It argues that professionals within schools should be supported, empowered and welcomed into policy discourse, not dictated to by top-down bureaucracy. It advocates for a flipping, flattening and democratising of the education system, in Australia and around the world. It brings together the voices of teachers, school leaders and scholars in order to offer diverse perspectives, important challenges and hopeful alternatives to the current education system.

As one of the editors, and author of Chapter 1, below  I share a first pass at some possible questions for readers, based around the sections of the book. My co-editors and the book’s various authors may have additional or alternative ideas.

Foreword and Introduction

• What do you understand the editors to mean by the term ‘flip the system’? How is this relevant to education? Does the phrase connect with you, or would you describe it in a different way?
• Why do you think this book might be important? What might Australia have to offer the education world?
• What do you hope to get out of reading the book?

Part I: Teacher identity, voice and autonomy

• How do the authors in this section focus on what matters, rather than what works? What does matter in education?
• What comments do the authors make about commercialisation in education? Do these resonate with your own experience?
• Why and where might teachers voices be shared? Do you think this is important and even possible? Why / why not?

Part II: Collaborative expertise

• What kinds of collaboration do the authors present as effective and beneficial? Why is collaborative expertise something worth investing in and pursuing?
• What warnings do the authors offer around collaboration in education? What differentiates good, productive collaboration from toxic or ineffective collaboration?
• What is the role of wellbeing in collaboration between teachers, school leaders, schools and education systems?

Part III: Social justice

• To what systemic inequities do the authors refer? Which of these reflect your own experience?
• What is the role of voices and stories, versus policies and systems, in democratising education and addressing inequity? In what arenas could and should equity in education be addressed?
• What are teachers, schools and systems already doing? What could they stop doing and what could they start doing to address social justice issues in education?

Part IV: Professional learning

• What is the role of professional learning in a flipped education system? Why is it important?
• How do the authors describe effective professional learning? How does this sit with your own experience of professional learning for educators?
• What seem to be the necessary conditions for professional learning to be effective and make a difference? What points made by the authors should be considered by school and system leaders?

Part V: Leadership

• What are the tensions and complex demands of school leadership, as described by the authors?
• What do the authors of this section suggest as ways to effectively lead in schools and education systems? On what should leaders focus? What should they do and what should they avoid doing?
• Do the authors in this section agree, or are there conflicting accounts of what is important in school leadership? What does this reveal about the complexities of leadership in education?

Conclusion

• This is a book that shares diverse perspectives from a range of authors from a multiplicity of contexts. What threads and themes did you notice as you read the book? What draws the book’s contributions together? What differences did you notice?
• What quote stuck with you from one of the chapters? Whose chapter stood out to you, spoke to you, or surprised you?
• What is your overall response to the book? How are you left feeling?
• What do you now understand the phrase ‘flip the system’ to mean? How might you flip the system in your own education context?