ETL504 has opened my eyes to a world of possibility – one where change can be made. I started this subject with preconceived ideas of what leadership was, having had a taste of it in my earlier career. I was happy to have those ideas expanded upon, and they certainly were. While collaboration and working alongside colleagues already came to mind as aspects of leadership (Marreiros, 2022a), I have since learnt about a couple of leadership styles which fit in with the collaborative nature of leadership which I aspire to. The video of a dancing guy (Hughes, 2010) made it very clear to me that to lead you must have followers, which may be obvious, but hadn’t been to me prior to this video. Reflecting on this video also made me realise that there is bravery in both being the first follower and the leader as Hughes (2010) so eloquently puts it “the first follower transforms a lone nut into a leader” (0:46). The bravery of those who lead is not to be underestimated.

Investigating different styles of leadership, such as instructional, transformational, distributed or servant was enlightening, particularly as I had previously thought that style of leadership was more of a personality choice, rather than including situational analysis of the position within a company, such as a school. As I noted in a forum post reflecting on an article by Blanchet (2022), I do believe that nurturing and building relationships with those you are trying to lead is of utmost importance and will certainly be continuing to use this as the first tool in any leading I do, one from a position of trust (Marreiros, 2022c). In a forum post regarding leadership for program adoption, I did analyse a situation which I had seen play out where wellbeing processes were being put into place (Marreiros, 2022b). So many aspects of the leadership process in this scenario were started off well, with professional development given, time allocated, however, the notion of change fatigue came through ending in a poor result to date. The idea of change fatigue was one which was new to me, and as shown in Dilkes, Cunningham and Gray’s paper (2014), it is not new. I need to be aware in my future practice that while I may be enthusiastic, not all parties will be, possibly because of this very reason of fatigue and cynicism. I also need to be aware of following up on projects which have been started and ensuring that reflection and evaluation are constantly and consistently used in the process of achieving an end goal.

The idea of backward mapping, as discussed in Holmes, Clement and Albright (2013), in creating strategic planning was a newer concept to me. Where, the reality is that you often have a goal in mind, the concept of stepping it backwards from the final goal made sense to me. Creating a plan for change, particularly longer-term changes, such as timetabling for collaborative teaching, will require such a strategy to be put into play.

As a teacher librarian without the formal authority of a principal or assistant principal I have come to understand the style of leadership which I now adopt and will continue to do so, is servant leadership. As Bier (2021) reports, servant leadership has the development of community and the advancement of all, along with ethical decision making at its heart. Something I aspire to have too.

References

Bier, M. C. (2021). Servant leadership for schools. Journal of Character Education, 17(2), 27-46.

Blanchet, M. (2022, Feburary 1). What does trust look like in a school? Edutopia. https://www.edutopia.org/article/what-does-trust-look-school

Dilkes, J., Cunningham, C., & Gray, J. (2014). The new Australian curriculum, teachers and change fatigue. The Australian journal of teacher education, 39(11), 45-64.  https://doi.org/10.14221/ajte.2014v39n11.4

Holmes, K., Clement, J., & Albright, J. (2013). The complex task of leading educational change in schools. School Leadership & Management, 33(3), 270-283.  https://doi.org/10.1080/13632434.2013.800477

Hughes, M. (2010, June 12). Leadership from a dancing guy [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hO8MwBZl-Vc

Marreiros, K. (2022a, July 2). The likelihood of leadership. Stepping Bravely Into the Unknown – This Teacher’s Journey to becoming a Teacher Librarian. https://thinkspace.csu.edu.au/sbitu/2022/07/02/the-likelihood-of-leadership/

Marreiros, K. (2022b, September 5). RE: Program adoption [Forum Post]. ETL504, Interact 2. https://interact2.csu.edu.au/webapps/discussionboard/do/message?action=list_messages&course_id=_62876_1&nav=discussion_board_entry&conf_id=_127077_1&forum_id=_281621_1&message_id=_4065843_1

Marreiros, K. (2022c, July 14). RE: What does trust look like in a school [Forum Post]. ETL504, Interact 2. https://interact2.csu.edu.au/webapps/discussionboard/do/message?action=list_messages&course_id=_62876_1&nav=discussion_board_entry&conf_id=_127077_1&forum_id=_281618_1&message_id=_4113955_1