When I entered the teaching field, I knew my skill would grow and I would change the world. By the end of my first day of teaching, I was rethinking that goal. Teaching was hard work and the world so big. So I decided to shift my goal and focus on changing my students. No doubt, this would be easier since I had direct contact with them. I quickly discovered student lives are enormously complex with great variability; and I didn’t have access to most of the variables: home life, socio-economic status, and the like. So I decided to focus on changing my bulletin board.
I imagine my path is similar to many educator’s. The great majority of them are high-quality, hard-working individuals who really want to influence society. But education is charged with controversial variables and political wrangling (and sometimes just flat-out bad teachers); and these factors grind schooling to a crawl. Educators become disillusioned with the system and lose their lofty goals. This results in headlines where teachers abuse students, parents attack teachers, and students become eager for anything other than school.
Every organizational system has it’s problems, and only leaders will draw the organization out of it’s systemic shallows. Education is in need of more quality leaders–and not just those with a lofty title. Educational leadership is most influential where students intersect the system. Every educator can learn to live as a leader by overcoming three common leadership challenges.
1. Overcoming the Fear of Conflict
While school personnel regularly face conflict in their environments, there is a tendency to ignore the irregularities observed in other educators. Leading in the educational environment means educators will need to confront educators.
2. Overcoming the Distaste of Paradox
Equitability is a popular education word meaning fair and impartial. Too often “equitability” is understood as “equal” and educators become frustrated when everyone is not treated the same. Educators can lead by responding to various needs with situationally correct responses–sometimes with behaviors that seem contradictory.
3. Overcoming the Insecurity of Ambiguity
The correct answers of life are not generally available in multiple choice form, and the process of elimination rarely leads to only two life choices. Life offers substantial ambiguity and strong leaders embrace the lack of clarity. Educators can lead by recognizing answers come slowly and embracing the process of discovery.
Leadership has challenges in every environment. Tenacious leaders face the obstacles head-on confident the hurdle is not insurmountable. Unfortunately, the perception of education among stakeholders–be they community member, legislator, or educator–is of a broken system. Educators, themselves, offer an apt solution to a perpetual problem.
What do you think are additional leadership obstacles educators can overcome?