Category Archives: Professional Learning

Remaining intellectually and emotionally alive in the work of leadership

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Photo of my belt, sparkle enhanced by Gemini

Carrying professional weight

As we move through our professional lives, we find ways to carry increasing weight. We develop systems, routines and strategies to help us. Ahead of the day or the week, we brace for the work and the firehose of tasks: to-do lists to complete, conversations to conduct, emails to answer, decisions to make, and meetings to manage. Leaders are often expected to be endlessly available, responsive, decisive and consistent. We can feel perpetually busy; hamsters on the wheel running to stay in place, or Sisyphus eternally pushing his boulder up the same hill.

Our calendars reduce our days into linear, compartmentalised coloured blocks. The relational happens in meetings, corridor conversations, office pop-ins, lunchroom banter, and in the tone, cadence and timing of written communications. Blocking reflective time into the calendar cannot guarantee the conditions in which thinking comes alive, so the strategic finds its place in progressing projects, reviewing plans, revising policies, and reporting on initiatives delivered. Perhaps we make time for family and self through movement, recovery, and opportunities for social connection or being in nature, probably in the early morning, late evening or on weekends. And then we repeat the cycle, continuously reflecting on how doing more, or doing better, can help us carry more.

The sparkle in work and life

As we reflect on a given week, we might see glimmers of joy, reward, connection or achievement. An event enjoyed, a milestone reached, a task completed. But we often defer pleasure, renewal, reflection and being ignited by those things that light us up, to an imagined future where the current pile of things has been cleared (the weekend, the next holiday, when a specific project is finished, when things ‘settle down’). I wonder what becomes of our identity, our energy, and our inner life when we continually postpone what restores us.

In a recent conversation with a colleague, I was offered a unique metaphor to explore how we equip ourselves for the work and its weight. This colleague had caught sight of my black sparkly powerlifting belt, designed to protect the lifter’s core to enable lifting heavier weight in the gym. The thick, wide leather belt and its heavy-duty lever buckle is something practical that supports me to do hard things. It is also covered in black glitter, at once an item of function and delight. Occasionally, it starts a conversation in the gym. It reminds me that carrying weight does not require me to put aside what delights me, and that in fact what catches the light can provide fortification in the necessary work of bracing and carrying load. My belt resists the binary that the useful must be separate from the beautiful. In effort there can be pleasure. In exertion, playfulness. Of course, I can also choose to put the load down, and take the belt off.

Engaging in what keeps us intellectually and emotionally alive

My doctoral research explored how professionals learn and grow throughout their careers. It found that learning was not confined to formal development. Rather, professional learning emerged across the whole of life: in relationships, parenthood, postgraduate study, difficult experiences, reflection and conversations with others. It was life-wide, personal and nonlinear.

Our professional apparatus, too, is broader than our suite of technologies, courses and efficiencies. Part of what sustains us and grows us in our work includes the places, relationships, rituals and life experiences that keep us intellectually alive, emotionally engaged and attentive to the world around us. These help us think, notice, imagine and connect. They sustain not only our wellbeing, but our professional judgement, creativity and capacity to contribute.

The challenge is to equip ourselves with what we need for the load that must be carried, while retaining the glint of what makes the work energising. We can consider what ignites our thinking. We can notice where we are and what we are doing when our best ideas emerge, such as when we experience Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s sense of flow, where we are entirely engrossed in, and propelled by, the work. We might notice what brings us a sense of calm and peace, and what accompanies us in moments of struggle.

Integrating these opportunities into the everyday is what fortifies us. Writing, reading, walking, creating and spending time in nature are often framed as ‘taking a break’ from our duties, but in reality, these are the spaces where cognitive work is enabled. Bolts of inspiration and clarity in decision making frequently stem from unconscious mental processing. We experience breakthroughs when we step away from a problem and occupy ourselves elsewhere. Creativity is enabled when we step outside of conscious striving, allowing ourselves to relax into noticing and being.

Constant striving is not how we do our best work. Pursuing intellectual, emotional and spiritual nourishment is not separate from the work of serving our families, colleagues and communities. It is part of how we remain able to think well, lead well and do the work.

What sustains us can be beautiful. The thing that helps us carry weight can also catch the light.

Reflective supervision for educators

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School leadership can come with joy, weight and loneliness, and the challenge of sustaining the self in the role long term. Adding to the alarming data from the longitudinal Australian Principal Occupational, Health, Safety and Wellbeing Survey, which shows the deteriorating mental health of school principals and high intention to quit their jobs, is the recent report by Professor Jane Wilkinson et al. (2025) on the invisible emotional labour and psychosocial risks of principal work.

At this week’s Australian Secondary Principals’ Association National Summit in Canberra, Federal Education Minister, The Hon Jason Clare MP, announced that the Commonwealth will contribute funding to a national pilot for reflective supervision for principals, coordinated by Headspace, in response to growing concern about the health and wellbeing of school leaders.

This week, I also completed my second two-day intensive for the Reflective Supervision in Education course at the University of Sydney, led by Professor Michael Anderson, Associate Professor Reverend Geoff Broughton and Associate Professor Mary Ann Hunter.

Recommendation 3 of the Unveiling the Ripple Effect: How Offensive Behaviours Impact School Leaders’ Productivity report (Dicke et al., 2025) is to institutionalise professional supervision and reflective practice for school leaders through a range of implementation actions. This, the authors argue, will create a systematic avenue for leaders to process complex experiences, strengthen coping mechanisms, and enhance professional growth.

Given these intersecting moments and the emergence of supervision for educators, this post explores what supervision might offer school leaders and the education system.

Reflective supervision is something Kristen Douglas and I talked about in a 2025 The Edu Salon podcast episode. In the episode Kristen explains that leaders need to “slow down to speed up”, with “down tools, balcony view, reflective practice” time to “talk, process and offset”. More recently, Associate Professor Paul Kidson and I spoke about reflective supervision on the podcast, with Paul pointing out that supervision is about principals’ work being sustainable so that “they can turn up in their work as humans to be able to serve their communities as best they can.”

As a school principal and coach whose PhD explored transformational professional learning, I have been intrigued by the concept of ‘supervision’ as I learn more about it and train to become a supervisor myself. What follows are my reflections at this moment in my journey.

Supervision is like and unlike it sounds. It is not ‘to supervise’ or oversee. Rather, it is about resourcing the self, and providing a space for someone to develop or experience “super vision” or a kind of super-seeing – a broader range of perspectives about their work leading to reflection, insight and ignition. In this way, it can be a useful process to support school leaders to make decisions amid complexity, hone their ethical and relational judgement, and mitigate the isolation they might find in their roles.

One metaphor for an aspect of what supervision offers is ‘pit time’, referencing the time coal miners were given for the restorative washing off of the grime of the day’s work, in order to enter their home and personal lives unmarred by the muck of the day. Supervision can offer a place for school leaders to find renewal and rejuvenation, remaining deeply engaged in the work of being with and for community, while being with and for themselves. It can help people to show up with intentionality and authenticity, at work and at home. However, if supervision is positioned only as a download space or wellbeing support, we risk underestimating its role in professional judgement, ethical decision making, and sustainable leadership practice.

Especially intriguing to me is the place of and for ‘soul’ in supervision. Michael Paterson (2019) says that “at the heart of reflective practice lies a dialogue between Soul, Role and Context” (p.15). He describes ‘soul’ as what makes a person tick, what gets them out of bed in the morning, and what fires them up from the inside with purpose and meaning. He challenges us to ask: “How do your soul and role fare at work? How do the requirements of your role sit with your deepest values? How does your context inhibit or release you for others? To what do you default at work: context, role or soul?” (p.16).

I am also particularly struck by Parker Palmer’s confronting statement that “as we become more obsessed with succeeding, or at least surviving … we lose touch with our souls and disappear into our roles” (p.15), at great cost to our sense of self, alignment, purpose and connection. I have been sitting with the discomfort of that question.

Do we lose touch with our soul as we disappear into our role? How might supervision connect soul, role and context?

Often in mentoring or coaching relationships, we explore, tease out and dig deep into our roles and our contexts, leading us to operationalise and positively act to perform in our roles and serve our contexts. Supervision occurs at the nexus of soul, role and context, attending to the inner world, core purpose, the crux of our heart and self in our work, and the interconnectedness of us as human beings in ecosystems of individuals, groups, structures and systems.

Supervision, I am discovering, is something that happens in relationship. It is a ‘walking together’ in reflective dialogue that opens, broadens, deepens, nudges and uplifts, moving us beyond the immediacy of events or the desire for a quick fix. In the walking together, supervisee and supervisor engage in a multiplicity of the whats and whos of professional practice. What is going on for someone externally and internally? Who is affected by the way they approach their work, and in what ways? What might they draw upon or do to better serve those in their communities?

Supervision invites a different pace to the day to day. A slowing down, an introspection, and a space of openness and safety. It can help us untangle complexity or notice what was previously peripheral, or unarticulated, or limited by habit. It can challenge us to look inwardly to places we might not normally allow ourselves to go or to awaken parts of ourselves we have pushed aside or dampened. It might ask us to put down the armour momentarily to consider our softness and vulnerabilities – something school leaders often train ourselves to harden in the name of resilience, performance and survival in the job. It can also invite us to look outwardly at those unseen others affected by the ways in which we engage in our work.

I am reminded of Christian van Nieuwerburgh’s work on a coaching way of being, and the importance of attending to the energy, words and needs of the person in front of you. I am reminded of Trista Hollweck’s work on professional accompaniment as a reciprocal learning journey involving walking alongside others with curiosity, empathy, nonjudgement and compassion. Supervision is a practice of accompaniment, attunement and presence that serves the supervisee and also those unseen others influenced by the way they show up. It works through intense listening, absolute presence, intentional questions, naming what might otherwise remain unspoken, and appropriate challenge, through a balance of intuitive and technical decisions by the supervisor, and the relational interplay between supervisee and supervisor.

In the current policy landscape, and at a time where much of the language of leadership is oriented towards direction, influence, and decision-making, supervision offers a way of approaching practice that values attention, curiosity, and the willingness to sit with uncertainty. In a profession characterised by pace and pressure, it offers a different kind of space in which leaders might come to know their work, and themselves, differently. In this moment of policy attention, how supervision is understood and enacted will shape its contribution to professional practice, resilience, and the sustainability of school leadership.

Post script: The day after this blog post was published, the 2025 Australian Principal Occupational Health, Safety, and Wellbeing Survey report was released (Dicke et al., 2026).

References

Dicke, T., Kidson, P., Marsh, H., (2026). The Australian Principal Occupational Health, Safety, and Wellbeing Survey (IPPE Report). Sydney: Institute for Positive Psychology and Education, Australian Catholic University.

Dicke, T., Rowston, K., Basarkod, G., Jardine, A., Clarke, T., Ko, H., & APPA, (2025). Unveiling the Ripple Effect: How Offensive Behaviours Impact School Leaders’ Productivity (APPA and IPPE Report). Sydney: Institute for Positive Psychology and Education, Australian Catholic University.

Paterson, M. (2019). Discipled by praxis: Soul and role in context. Practical Theology, 12(1), 7-19.

Palmer, P. J. (2004). A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey Toward an Undivided Life. San Francisco, CA, Jossy-Bass.

Wilkinson, J., Walsh, L. Grice, C., Longmuir, F., Chandler, P., Keddie, A., & Delany, T. (2025). Invisible Labour: Principals’ Emotional Labour in Volatile Times. Report One: Technical Overview of the Project. Monash University.

The global landscape of educational leadership

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On 31 October, UNESCO launched the 2024/5 Global Education Monitoring (GEM) Report, Leadership in Education: Lead for Learning, which engages with Sustainable Development Goal 4 ‘Quality Education’. The report explores global research and practice in educational leadership, capturing the current landscape, possibilities, practices and challenges of leadership in education around the world.

Below, I briefly summarise some of my key takeaways from the GEM Report.

Impact: School leadership matters

The report notes that leadership in schools is second only to teaching in the classroom for its capacity to impact on student outcomes and experiences. If we are to improve outcomes for students, it is vital to understand the impacts, influence and ingredients of school leadership.

The report notes that those principals who have a significant positive impact on schools tend to set transformative directions, use policies and reforms to drive purposeful change, enable safe and positive environments, build relationships, develop people, provide feedback, manage resources strategically, and work to improve classroom teaching. It also notes that school principals in Australia have been reporting higher levels of stress, burnout and depression in recent years (with women reporting this more than men), with workload quantity, lack of time for engaging with important work, and the seeming impossibility of managing life outside of the job, being major reported causes.

Australia’s Professional Standards for Principals, developed by the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership in 2014, define the principal’s role as focused on five areas: leading teaching and learning, developing self and others, leading improvement and change, managing the school, and working with the community. Based on the work of Ken Leithwood, the GEM Report identifies four key roles of the school leader as: setting expectations and vision, focusing on learning and leading instruction, fostering collaboration, and developing people to improve school outcomes.

Autonomy: There can be no leadership without the opportunity to make decisions

The context for leadership affects those things a leader does in setting expectations, such as sharing vision, holding high expectations, setting a personal example, representing the community, and staying abreast of trends, data and information to inform decision making. Standards and accountability mechanisms for schools and school leaders vary from system to system and school to school. The GEM Report found that in 20 high-income countries, the more principals had the primary responsibility for human and financial resource decisions, the more likely it was that a country would be among those ranked more highly in terms of average performance in mathematics.

School leaders have more chance to make a positive difference if they have autonomy, support and well-defined responsibilities. Education systems need to empower school principals with sufficient autonomy to manage financial and human resources and to make decisions related to teaching and learning. Autonomy must, however, come with adequate support, sufficient resourcing and appropriate accountability measures.

Collaboration: School leaders cannot and should not lead alone

School leaders are not solo heroes, but part of an enmeshed ecosystem of influence. As I often say, leading is an action and a way of being, not a role or a formal title. All can lead. In schools, this might mean senior leaders, middle leaders, teachers, school services staff, students, parents and community members.

Shared school leadership and collaboration among empowered stakeholders strengthens decision making, contributes to enacting a shared vision, and leads to lasting improvements in educational outcomes and school cultures. School leaders have a central role to play in developing school culture and climate; maintaining a safe, healthy school environment; raising resources strategically, building networks; managing risk; nurturing collaboration; enabling others to act; and consulting with families and community.

School leaders who build the capacity of others, ensure they are accessible, provide training and resources, foster a collaborative environment, involve others in decision making, are involved in collaborative structures and processes, and distribute leadership among and across the organisation, are more likely to see the school’s vision realised.

Schools can promote shared school leadership by establishing clear communication channels, ensuring transparent decision-making processes, implementing regular feedback mechanisms, ensuring clarity of roles, and recognising unique contributions. School leaders can keep track of staff professional development needs, provide individualised professional support and mentoring opportunities, ensure evaluation of practice, and reward good performance.

Collaborative relationships (such as those built through committees, teams and other collaborative structures) strengthen governance, improve decision making, enhance accountability, and foster inclusive and resilient environments. Fostering safe, inclusive and culturally responsive environments is key to ensuring a climate of care and challenge where collaboration can thrive, where shared vision can be realised, and where all students, staff and wider community can flourish.

Lessons from the Yolŋu people of East Arnhem Land

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Nyinyikay sunset

I have just returned from a week on Country in East Arnhem Land, being immersed in Yolŋu culture and community alongside 25 other educators from South Australia and New South Wales, as part of an Aboriginal Cultural Immersion Program run by Culture College.

As I begin to process my learnings, below I reflect on three of my takeaways from this experience. I do not aim to tell the stories of Yolŋu or to share the knowledge they so generously shared with me, but rather to reflect on my own story and experience.

  • Tune in – to self, others and Country.

The Yolŋu have a deep, ancient and ongoing connection with land, story and ancestry. It is the land from which Yolŋu law, knowledge and custom emerge. Across the week we were encouraged to ‘Let Country be the teacher’ and to listen to what the land and our surroundings tell us.

When we arrived at Gulkula, 31 kilometres from Nhulunbuy, we were welcomed with a purifying smoke ceremony and a bush medicine healing. At the Yirrkala Art Centre we experienced a sound healing through the playing of a yidaki and immersed ourselves in the histories of the Yolŋu, cross-hatched in ochres and clays from the land onto bark and trunks. The stories of the land were also woven into basket works made from pandanas leaves painstakingly harvested, stripped, dried, dyed and entwined.

Between Gulkula and Nyinyikay we travelled winding rainbow-dirt roads in colours of rust red, burnt orange, buttery ochre, wattle yellow and cotton white. Landscapes of eucalypt-green leaves and bleached stringybark trunks were punctuated by mauve star-shaped flowers, architectural termite towers and smouldering charcoal husks soon to sprout new green shoots, representing the renewal and new beginnings that come from fire and smoke.

On arrival at Nyinyikay we were painted with clay from the land and welcomed with a traditional dance of the ancestral animal of the Country and of the people welcoming us. We walked on Country with Nyinyikay family to learn about food and medicine available from the bush.

On this journey we were helped to embrace a deep tuning in – to self, to Country, to others. As we sunk deeper into Yolŋu time, space opened up to breathe and be, to listen and learn.

  • Respect culture, wisdom and truth.

For Yolŋu, ancestors and the oldest members of family and community are shown the utmost love, kindness and respect. Age and wisdom are valued and revered, in stark contrast to the glorification of youth in Western cultures. For Yolŋu, grey hairs and deep facial lines are signs of a life well lived, of sacred knowledge known and shared, of legacy protected, and of challenges overcome.

We felt the honour of learning from Elder Djapirri Mununggirritj, and Nyinyikay martriarch Nancy Mutilnga Burarrwanga (fondly referred to as ‘Old Lady’ by her family). We were privileged to learn from the wider family of all ages and from its emerging leaders. We learned that in Yolŋu society, only those who know themselves and act with respect and integrity are taught ancient, sacred and powerful knowledges. One must demonstrate their capacity to bear the weight of the responsibility of carrying and passing on those knowledges. We witnessed the great power, privilege and responsibility that comes with leading, and the capacity of an individual to inspire.

We walked and worked, listened and yarned. We engaged in women’s business for the women and men’s business for the men – opportunities for knowledge telling, yarning, connecting and supporting one another. Together with our hosts, we shared stories and photos, jokes and laughs. We spent an evening under the stars dancing ceremonial dances together. Each evening, our group of educators gathered in a circle around the fire to reflect upon our day and our learnings.

  • Community is all.

In Yolŋu society, all is balanced and all are equal. We learned about the two moiety (groups) that make up the Yolŋu worldview, and keep the equilibrium in all things. Like the Kaurna concept of yara (reflecting reciprocity and ‘twoness’), the moiety are two complex halves that make up a harmonious whole. No matter someone’s age, race, background, needs or idiosyncrasies, all are welcome, all are included, and all are loved. All are family and family is all.

Each of we 26 visitors to these Aboriginal-owned lands were overwhelmed by the deep care and deep presence of our Yolŋu teachers. The compassionate welcome and safe space we received from Yolŋu was one of generosity, kinship and total acceptance. We were embraced as family and bestowed mälks (skin names) and Yolŋu names.

Reconciliation is represented in the Yolŋu metaphor of ‘the place where freshwater and saltwater meet’, and find balance as they come together and unite. In a symbolic act of reconciliation, of coming together, we visitors worked alongside the Nyinyikay family to help build the wall of their fish trap on the mangrove mudflat.

Djapirri reminded us that we are all “wired for love” and should “speak from the heart”. Abundant love, openness and trust were tangible to all of us in the way the people interacted with one another and with each of us. Walking with and learning from Yolŋu reinforced the need for us all to be active in moving towards a reconciled Australia. It brought to the fore the importance of belonging, identity and a relational community in which each member is seen, heard, held, respected, and welcomed with open hearts, open minds and open arms.

Nyinyikay Country

Professional learning post-pandemic

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Source: Alina Grubnak on unsplash.com

During the pandemic, professional learning, like everything else, needed to adapt. With many borders closed, air travel less available, and people experiencing varying stages of public restrictions and lockdowns around the world, more learning happened at home. Like remote learning for schools and higher education organisations, professional learning courses and conferences pivoted to online formats. Presenters presented from home, and participants participated from home. Education organisations capitalised on cost-effective online options for professional learning.

At my school we looked to the virtual, but also to the local and internal. We engaged consultants in targeted and ongoing work alongside our staff, provided opportunities for staff to present their expertise and practice to one another, and arranged time and forums for staff to engage collaboratively in whole-school strategic priorities. We continued, when and where possible, to provide opportunities for intentional and meaningful face-to-face professional learning and to connect with external experts and organisations.

Virtual professional learning, so ubiquitous in 2020 and 2021, has many benefits. It is better for the planet. Without travel and catering, it has lower carbon and economic costs, and a lower environmental impact. It allows greater equity of access for those who may not be able to afford travel, accommodation, and conference costs.

A 2021 paper in Nature Sustainability by Skiles et al. and a 2022 paper by Yates and colleagues in The Lancet confirm that virtual conferences provide environmental sustainability and participant equity benefits. The virtual format overcomes social, economic, and travel-related barriers for those most likely to be impacted by these. It increases participation and representation of those from institutions and countries with limited resources, women, professionals with a disability, and early career researchers and practitioners. It also provides opportunities for increased accessibility through the use of live captions, live chatbox Q&A, and recording sessions for participants to watch later.

However, virtual professional learning has its downsides. After a couple of years of online learning formats, there is a level of Zoom or virtual professional learning fatigue. Digital access in low income countries continues to be a barrier to participation in virtual conferences. Despite some sessions being recorded, time zones of global conferences often favour those in Europe and America. As someone in Western Australia, rarely have the times of international virtual conferences been friendly. Over the last couple of years, I have been scheduled to present at times such as 1am and 4am. Learning or presenting from home also requires the presenter or participant to manage competing demands, not to mention juggling the use of a stretched wifi network across the household’s multiple devices and technology needs. I have attempted to listen to virtual conference keynotes in my kitchen while cooking dinner and trying to focus on the words of the speaker rather than the sounds of my family.

There is something immersive and nourishing about the in-person conference experience. While I may have been able to attend more conferences virtually than I would have been able to in person over recent years, I have missed being there, in situ, with the sights, sounds and smells of another place. I have missed the time afforded by solo travel to sit with ideas, consider them, and think beyond the transactional busyness of the day-to-day. It is often ‘being away’ that allows the space for clarity and creativity of thought, moving us beyond the narrowness of the here and now, to broader perspectives and possibilities. Mostly, I have missed the human connection, including serendipitous meetings; and corridor, coffee, and dinner conversations with colleagues and presenters.

I have found in my own research (Netolicky, 2016a, 2016b, 2020), that professional learning is highly individualised, context-specific, and that the ways in which we professionally learn are many and varied. Experiences that shape our professional beliefs and practices can be professional and personal, formal and informal, in and out of so-called ‘professional learning’ contexts, solo or collaborative. Effective professional learning can cost a little or a lot. It can happen in person or online. It can take air miles, accommodation budgets, and well-known presenters, or be located on site at work, or in a car while listening to a podcast, or at home via a webinar. Professional learning is a core part of staff belonging and wellbeing. For schools, it should be judicious and simultaneously aligned with the individual’s professional goals and the school’s strategic priorities. It benefits from being ongoing in some way – whether that is a continuing partnership between professional learning provider and school, through a mentoring or coaching relationship, or by a small group of colleagues sharing and developing their learning together after attending a conference or course.

As the world opens back up, and previous models of professional learning become possible once more, Yates et al. challenge us to find new, innovative, and hybrid ways to provide professional learning. They challenge us to focus on planetary health and equity, as well as on effective learning, networking, and collaboration. Organisations can and should continue to consider in what ways they invest in and support the learning of their staff, the kinds of opportunities they provide and promote, their professional learning environmental footprint, and the inclusivity of their offerings and practices.

References

Netolicky, D. M. (2020). Transformational professional learning: Making a difference in schools. Routledge.

Netolicky, D. M. (2016a). Down the rabbit hole: Professional identities, professional learning, and change in one Australian school (Doctoral dissertation, Murdoch University).

Netolicky, D. M. (2016b). Rethinking professional learning for teachers and school leaders. Journal of professional capital and community, 1(4), 270-285.

Skiles, M., Yang, E., Reshef, O., Muñoz, D. R., Cintron, D., Lind, M. L., Calleja, P. P., Nerenberg, R., Armani, A., Faust, M. K., & Kumar, M. (2022). Conference demographics and footprint changed by virtual platforms. Nature Sustainability, 5(2), 149-156.

Yates, J., Kadiyala, S., Li, Y., Levy, S., Endashaw, A., Perlick, H., & Wilde, P. (2022). Can virtual events achieve co-benefits for climate, participation, and satisfaction? Comparative evidence from five international Agriculture, Nutrition and Health Academy Week conferences. The Lancet Planetary Health, 6(2).

Reflections on teaching and school leadership during Term 1 2022

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source: Sprudge

Term 1 2022 may have occurred at and for about the same time as it usually does in Australia, but it felt like an especially long for educators.                 

In Western Australia, with more restrictions in place than some other states, signature experiences of Term 1 included the following.

  • Mask-wearing for school staff, and for students in Years 3 and up.
  • Classrooms with air purifiers, CO2 monitors and open windows.
  • Schools taking on the role of contact tracing and communication.
  • Restrictions to gatherings at schools, resulting in parent information, parent teacher interviews, assemblies, and activities being held online, outdoors, or in small groups.
  • The latest iterations of remote and hybrid learning as students and teachers were absent from school due to isolation and illness.
  • Teacher absences and shortages.
  • Teachers classed as potential ‘critical workers’.
  • The hard border into WA softening.
  • The acting federal Education Minister making remarks about “dud teachers” “dragging the chain” and “not delivering the learning gains our children need”.

The administrative requirements of Covid-19 directions for schools, combined with restrictions on getting together in person, meant that educators’ experiences of the term were largely transactional, operational, and cumulatively exhausting. School leaders and teachers worked to keep school communities safe, informed, and with a sense of calm normalcy. We put one foot in front of the other, complied with requirements, and ensured that learning and pastoral care continued for students. But we missed some of those things that buoy us in our work: relationality, community, and connection.

At my school we employed as many relief staff as we could to take the pressure off our teachers. We offered opportunities for staff to work flexibly or from home when we could. We scaled back and reimagined meetings, doing these differently or not at all, according to their purpose and our community’s needs. We carefully considered administrative requirements and evaluated the effectiveness, efficiency, and flexibility of assessment tasks and feedback practices. We interrogated the reasons for our ways of doing things, generated alternate ways to achieve our aims, and questioned whether the aims themselves needed to be rethought or relinquished. What was important during this time? What could we do differently? What could be let go?

We found small ways to connect with one another. There were no whole-staff meetings or morning teas, but we met in smaller groups (on balconies, in the quadrangle, in well-ventilated spaces). We held some free coffee Fridays where drinks at the coffee van were paid for by the school, facilitating incidental outdoors conversations between colleagues, as well as offering a gesture of thanks to our hard working staff. We thanked individuals for specific contributions. I called most teachers who were home isolating or ill, to check in and see how they were. We introduced a Staff Appreciation Award so that staff could recognise colleagues for their support.

While it was tempting to hold off on all but the most essential work, we knew that engaging with our professional selves, professional goals, and core purpose was key to staying connected and uplifted. We held our annual goal setting meetings and booked into professional learning experiences. We provided opportunities for staff to collaborate in small groups and teams to have energising, productive conversations around practice, with each other and with external experts. As well as teaching our students, it was pockets of meaningful collaboration that sparked moments of professional delight. Working together with colleagues and engaging in robust dialogue, thoughtful reflection, and collaborative planning, provided a lightness, an energy, and a reminder about our shared moral purpose: educating each student in our school community.

None of this is perfect, but we are doing our absolute best. We remain committed to the learning, care, safety, and success of our students.

Someone asked me recently what I have been proud of, and the first thing that came to mind was: showing up. The challenge for those in schools is to maintain enough wellbeing, community, connection, kindness and belonging, to sustain us through what will continue to be a challenging year. During this break between terms, I hope that educators around the country are filling their empty cups by finding time to regenerate and to connect with themselves and with their families and friends.

Key concepts for leading professional learning

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A recent report purports to dispel myths about professional learning, including the apparent ‘commonly held’ beliefs that ‘professional learning is a waste of time and money’ and that ‘districts should implement research-based PL programs with no modifications’. These claims run counter to much literature around professional learning which argues that effective professional learning is a lever for improving student learning and achievement by improving teaching, and that context is crucial for any education model (and that therefore any model should be tailor fit to context).

This week I presented to a group of school leaders about leading professional learning. Part of my preparation for the presentation took me back to the roots of my work in this space, and those concepts I have come across that have stuck with me, become part of my thinking, and continue to anchor my work. I explain some of these below, in addition to others I discussed on the day, such as trust, context, teacher expertise, and teacher agency, self-determination and self-efficacy.

HOLONOMY

Holonomy is an ecological concept that has captured my attention for years, drawing together the individual and the larger system. Art Costa and Bob Garmston (2015) base their conception of holonomy on Arthur Koestler’s work around the word ‘holon’ as something which operates simultaneously as a part and a whole. Holonomy encapsulates the simultaneity that each person is both an independent individual and an interdependent part of the larger system, at once self-regulating, responsive to the organisation, and able to influence those around them.

This speaks to me of what we must consider when leading professional learning: balancing the needs of the individual and the needs of the organisation or system.

HOLDING ENVIRONMENT

Introduced to me through the outstanding work of Ellie Drago-Severson on leading adult learning, is the notion of the ‘holding environment’. With its roots in Donald Winnicott’s psychology concept, this is an environment of psychological safety in which members of the community or organisation feel ‘held’ in a culture of high care and high challenge.

Ellie was the first to really challenge me to consider how we honour where each adult learner is at, differentiate learning for adults in schools, and take an invitational, growth-focused approach to professional learning.

MEANINGFUL COLLABORATION

In Chapter 4 of Transformational Professional Learning, I explore that 1) collaboration does not happen by calling a group of people a ‘team’, or by organising for a group of people to be in a room together; and 2) feeling good working with colleagues is not professionally learning. Politeness, compliance, avoidance, and silence may make for an easy, harmonious-feeling meeting, but do not result in rigorous collective work that moves individual, team and organisation forward.

Rather, collaboration occurs when there is a clear shared purpose, collective accountability, collaborative norms, a focus on data to inform, and protocols for collaborative ways of working. Taking the time to create the conditions for skillful collaboration, to structure and nurture intentional collaborative practices, and to develop people’s skills in graceful disagreement and productive conflict, facilitates meaningful collaborative opportunities that develop teachers and positively impact students.

SEMANTIC SPACE

The importance of language is explored by Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey (2001), and Bob Garmston and Bruce Wellman (2016). The notion of semantic space—‘how we talk around here’—is outlined by Stephen Kemmis and Hannu Heikkinen (2012), and Rachel Lofthouse and Elaine Hall (2014).

Talk defines and drives emotions, relationships, belonging and action. Talk is a terrific barometer of professional culture, allowing us insights into beliefs, values and behaviours. We can ask: What are the staff water cooler conversations like at our school? How do we collectively talk about our work and practice? What questions do we ask? What contributions do we make? What shared language, and ways of speaking and listening, do we use? How do we talk around here?

In a recent episode of my podcast, The Edu Salon, Adam Voigt says: “The language that the leaders of a culture use, shapes the kids that grow in it, and they leave speaking that way as a result. If you’re looking to transform culture you can’t do it without changing words.”

I have this year written on my office whiteboard something I remember Rachel Lofthouse saying at a conference in 2017:

The talk is the work.

We need to value, focus on, create space for, and put effort, intentionality, time, and learning, into the talk in our schools.

References

Costa, A. L., & Garmston, R. J. (2006). Cognitive coaching: A foundation for Renaissance schools (2nd ed.). Heatherton, Australia: Hawker Brownlow Education.

Drago-Severson, E. (2004). Becoming adult learners: Principles and practices for effective development. Teachers College Press.

Garmston, R. J., & Wellman, B. M. (2016). The adaptive school: A sourcebook for developing collaborative groups. Rowman & Littlefield.

Kegan, R., & Lahey, L. L. (2001). How the way we talk can change the way we work: Seven languages for transformation. John Wiley & Sons.

Kemmis, S., & Heikkinen, H. L. (2012). Future perspectives: Peer-group mentoring and international practices for teacher development. In Peer-group mentoring for teacher development (pp. 160-186). Routledge.

Lofthouse, R., & Hall, E. (2014). Developing practices in teachers’ professional dialogue in England: Using coaching dimensions as an epistemic tool. Professional Development in Education, 40(5), 758-778.

Netolicky, D. M. (2019). Transformational professional learning: Making a difference in schools. Routledge.

Staff development and wellbeing

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Wellbeing is an area in schools that is becoming increasingly important, including the wellbeing of staff. Being well, and being an organisation that supports staff to be well, is complex. This is especially true in schools where work comes in intense, relentless waves, and caring for others can deplete staff resources for looking after themselves.

Staff wellbeing is more than free food and fitness classes, although these can be nice to have. Nurturing staff wellbeing might take various forms, such as providing initiatives that support staff health, modelling sustainable work-life behaviours, maintaining predictable timelines, ensuring clear policies and procedures, streamlining communication, considering workload issues, ensuring a range of internal and external support mechanisms are available for staff, recognising staff efforts, celebrating staff achievements, leading with empathy, and making decisions with the needs of staff in mind.

Meaningful work, a sense of community, shared values, and a feeling of ‘fit’, are also important. Investing in staff professional learning, valuing staff by supporting them in pursuing their own goals, and working to develop staff sense of belonging to community, are ways to foster staff wellbeing. We feel buoyed when we feel that through our work we are part of something bigger than ourselves and that we are making a positive difference beyond ourselves. We want to know that what we do matters. And we want to be able to contribute professionally without eroding our own wellbeing or burning out.

Collaborative, vibrant cultures of trust allow staff to flourish. I have often quoted an excerpt from Susan Rosenholtz’s 1991 book Teachers’ workplace: The social organisation of schools. She describes educators in effective schools as “clumped together in a critical mass, like uranium fuel rods in a reactor” (p. 208). I love to imagine a school’s staff as a mass of fuel rods, huddled together and buzzing with an energy that feeds the group, creating fission that results in a chain reaction of positive changes rippling through the organisation.

Somehow, in 2020, in my teaching and learning portfolio at my school, we managed to review and redesign our student school reports, craft a Teaching and Learning Philosophy, and develop Learner Attributes that describe the qualities of lifelong learners that we aim to cultivate in our students. All while working with Executive and Council to finalise the school Strategic Plan. In addition, we managed to develop a refreshed staff development model, which I am thrilled to launch with staff this week as they return for the new academic year.

Importantly, the staff development model has emerged out of collaboration and consultation with staff in all areas of the school, in all sorts of roles (from teaching to administration), from multiple faculties and multiple year levels. The meetings I had last year with groups of staff passionate about the professional growth of themselves and others were always energising and left me filled with excitement for the possibilities. Emerging as it did from people within the school, I am pleased that the resulting model aligns with the best of what research says provides meaningful opportunities for professional learning, and with my own belief that staff development should be focused on growth and support, and on trusting and empowering staff to develop themselves in ways that are meaningful to them.

The staff development model builds on what has existed previously. Key features include:

  • Alignment with school strategy while honouring individual needs.
  • Opportunities for all staff, not only teaching staff. We are and educational organisation committed to the development of all our people, so staff development needs to reflect this.
  • A focus on staff individuality and agency. The COVA principles apply: choice, ownership, voice, and authenticity.
  • A range of development and review processes that include self-reflection against professional standards, goal setting, easy-to-generate feedback from appropriate stakeholders, and intentional, supportive conversation.
  • A suite of options from which staff can choose, with differentiation for career stage, professional interests, and vocational aspirations. These options were developed by a range of staff who know their colleagues and the school culture. I’m eager to see how they are received and taken up.

I look forward to building on the foundation of this model, and working iteratively with staff to improve it over time based on staff needs and feedback. Tomorrow, staff return and we will feel the buzz of the beginning of another year, grateful to be together (although at a physical distance appropriate for our COVID-19 times) and ready for what lies ahead.

Book-versary: Transformational Professional Learning

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Yesterday marked one year since my book Transformational Professional Learning: Making a Difference in Schools was published.

Thank you to Andy Hargreaves for writing such a wonderful foreword, that began with the following words.

Most Forewords begin with an invited expert in the twilight of their professional lives, setting out his or her wisdom on the state of the field that the ensuing text of the book addresses. Eventually, in the last two or three paragraphs, the expert then gets around to saying a few kind things about the book itself.

But in this case, we need to turn things around. This is, simply, an extraordinary book. I have never seen anything quite like it. I have read books by outstanding researchers, some of them former teachers, myself (at my best) included, who have and who can convey empathy and a studied grasp of the work of teachers and how it connects to their lives and their worlds. I have also read very engaging books by teachers and leaders about their own worlds and work that are full of ideas, absorbing anecdotes, practical wisdom, and a sprinkling of insights from researchers and thought leaders in the academic world to back them up.

This book is something else, though. As a synthesis of the field of professional learning and a critical exploration of its less fashionable and more unusual aspects—like self-directed learning, or attending courses—I can recall scarcely any better ones in the academic community itself. Unlike many researchers who collate all the evidence before them and draw circumspect conclusions about what it all means, Deborah Netolicky goes further and, in her own voice, as both academic and practitioner, she expresses it all from a constructively critical and also professionally candid perspective.

Thank you to Alma Harris, Carol Campbell, Pasi Sahlberg, Ellie Drago-Severson, Bruce Wellman, Rachel Lofthouse, and Nicole Mockler for providing generous endorsements. Alma, for example, wrote the following.

Occasionally, a book comes along that a field desperately needs. Transformational Professional Learning is such a book. It is clear, accessible and profoundly practical. Cutting through the vast literature on professional learning, it reminds us that the ultimate end game is making a difference to learners. Put simply, this book is a must read.

Thank you to those who have read the book, reviewed it, invited me to speak about it, and shared annotations and photos of where you’ve read it around the world. Thank you to those who have engaged with me in discussions about its ideas.

Meaningful professional learning that makes a real difference to teachers and school leaders (and therefore students) remains an ongoing professional passion. The conversation and work continues.

Teacher expertise, voice and action

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On Monday night I participated in my first ever TeachMeet, held online and hosted by Steven Kolber. I used my 8 minute speaking slot to explore something I’m wondering about: to what extent is the COVID-19 pandemic strengthening or diminishing the teaching profession?

The video is here on YouTube, and I speak at the 1.33 mark. Below, I explore this wondering and its tangents.

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Governments have tightened their control over citizens and over teachers and schools during the COVID-19 pandemic. Schools have been acted upon by new rules and a barrage of offers by technology companies for increased tracking, monitoring and surveillance.

The catch cry ‘We’re all in this together’ has been ubiquitous during this pandemic, but we are all experiencing the current reality in different ways. Those who are disadvantaged are more disadvantaged and at greater health, economic and educational risk during this time.

I am a teacher of over 20 years and a school leader, researcher, editor and author. The ripples of COVID-19 have brought into sharp focus just how important the work of teachers, school leaders and schools is, to individuals and to a functioning society.

I’ve never been prouder of my profession than this year when we have locally, nationally and globally addressed challenges unlike those I’ve seen during my career. It has been messy and uncomfortable at times, shining a spotlight on existing inequities and gaps, but teachers and school leaders around the world have worked tirelessly to do their best for their students and communities in constantly evolving circumstances and amid a swirling maelstrom of human complexities.

Expertise

Teachers are credible, professional experts. Teachers know what and how to teach. They are specialists in curriculum, in pedagogy and in their own students. During distance learning they may have been operating without the usual non-verbal cues they get in classrooms, and having to learn and experiment with new modalities, technologies and tools. During this period of upheaval and transformation, they remained experts in how to teach, generate evidence of student learning and provide constructive, often individualised, feedback.

There was a brief moment during the pandemic when teacher expertise was heralded and recognised  by the masses. Teachers were—momentarily—hailed as heroes and front line workers. The #teachersrock hashtag did the rounds on social media. The celebration of teachers was short lived, however, and we were soon back to hearing the tropes of schools failing students, teachers and parents at odds with one another, and teachers failing to live up to the expectations or the media and society at large.

In Australia, our Prime Minister said that the distance learning being provided by teachers was ‘child minding not teaching’. The Federal Minister for Education ordered all independent schools to ensure that they returned to face to face teaching. In my state, the Western Australian Premier said at a press conference that private school parents should ask for a reduction in fees if schools remained on distance learning plans when the state government had said that returning to schools was safe. A Western Australian principal was stood down after urging parents to keep children home because she was worried that the school would not be able to ensure hygiene and distancing requirements. She has been reinstated but it was reported that she had been ‘reminded of the limits of her authority’.

For the teaching profession, this public erosion of respect for teacher expertise is especially frustrating.

Voice

As I have written, particularly in Flip the System Australia, there is an absence of teacher voice in much formulation of policy, on advisory boards, and on media panels. Experts often speak for or about teachers. Sometimes, teachers are consulted, but rarely are teachers invited to the decision making or policy making table. Increasingly, teachers are invited onto media panels.

Teachers and school leaders operate in an environment of performance, constantly judged against—as co-presenter Ruth Smith said during the TeachMeet—by what can be measured rather than against what we might value. During this COVID-19 pandemic, the educational environment of performativity within which teachers and school leaders operate has shifted to alternate indicators of performance.

Parents and teachers continue to be pitted against each other, as adversaries rather than allies. Schools are judged on their social media posts about online learning, hygiene measures, virtual community events or wellbeing initiatives, rather than on standardised test scores. During periods of distance learning teachers were performing their work in front of parents and families, via screens that projected teaching into homes. Our normal measures of performance may have been disrupted, but education has remained a space of performance to be judged and commented on by others.

Voice is about value. Being heard. Having a say. Being an efficacious agent able to act and influence.

There are challenges to any call for teacher voice. There is the busy reality of the lives of teachers and school leaders. Time, vulnerability (risk to self) and ethics (risk to students) are all obstacles to teacher voice. We are representatives of our schools and have limitations to the extent to which we can be the public voice of our profession. We work with children and their families, entrusted to our care. Their stories are not ours to tell and our first mandate is to keep children safe. Our service is first and foremost to the students in our schools.

Action

The COVID-19 pandemic has increased teacher collaboration within schools and between schools, systems and countries. Teachers and school leaders have become more agentic decision makers in their own contexts, tasked more than ever with finding productive solutions to the challenges in their own schools. Grassroots teacher professional collaboration, job-embedded learning-as-we-go and anywhere-anytime professional resources have emerged as silver linings to the COVID crisis.

In schools, teachers can be consulted on decisions. Meaningful and honest feedback from all stakeholders can be used to inform decision making. Even better is ground-up change in which teachers collaborate around strategic and improvement goals.

Beyond schools, teachers can be offered seats on panels, advisory committees and at policy tables. Teachers can share their voices on social media, blogs, podcasts, and in books and research studies.

As Adam Brooks said at our Flip the System Australia Perth launch, as teachers and school leaders, ‘We are the system’. And as Reni Eddo-Lodge says, quoting Terry Pratchett in her book Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race, ‘There’s no justice. Just us.’ Teachers and school leaders are the system, it’s ‘us’ that can change that system from the inside. We need to be the change we want to see.

We can ask ourselves:

  • When are we choosing to speak?
  • Whose voices are we amplifying, elevating and seeking out?
  • What productive, positive action could we take?