Teachers College Press Radical University-District Partnerships: A Framework for Preparing Justice-Focused School Leaders

This inspirational book provides a concrete model of why university-district partnerships are essential to preparing justice-focused school leaders, and how these partnerships can thrive. Readers will find details of one such partnership, Leadership Education for Anaheim Districts (LEAD), which incorporated high-impact practices for equity, self-knowledge, and system change. Using the LEAD partnership as an example, this accessible text provides supports for launching a similar radical partnership, including converging goals, a student-centered theory of action, and key resources. It offers guidance for sustaining a radical partnership through the inevitable questions and conflicts that will arise, including coteaching of all content by university and district partners, and the mutual respect needed for successful joint work. The text includes core pieces of LEAD’s leadership preparation curriculum and instruction that encourage new forms of leaders and leadership, including strategic inquiry, multilingual-learner shadowing, and one-on-one coaching and mentoring. Radical University-District Partnerships is a call for universities and school districts to work together toward preparing educational leaders who will bring greater justice for all children. Book Features: A focus on preparing principals to lead schools in ways that change outcomes for historically underserved students (K–12). A framework for radical partnerships that is horizontal, authentic, and engaged in justice. Chapters coauthored by a team of university faculty, district administrators, and program graduates. Voices of program graduates who share their experiences in LEAD and how it impacted their leadership learning. A look forward to next steps for practicing and theorizing, including ways to adjust LEAD programming based on the editors’ research findings and successful expansion to a second school district.