A critical consideration for practice is educational equity. We believe that caring school leadership is an essential means of promoting educational equity in schools. We have woven equity into the design and fabric of our model. We see every aspect of the model contributing to it. To be genuinely caring of students, a school leader would be caring of each and every student, especially those students who have been marginalized, who struggle to fit in and achieve in school, who have not received support, and who have not been provided high-quality opportunities to learn. To be caring calls on school leaders to work on behalf of each student, address their needs and concerns, help them achieve their interests, move forward on their life projects, and promote their well-being and human potential.
To be caring is to be driven by virtues that require a school leader to value and be empathetic and compassionate to each student, to be kind and fair, honest and authentic, patient, trustworthy, and respectful. To be caring demands that leaders be attentive and understand each student for who they are as individual learners and persons. This involves understanding them as members of groups; of races, ethnicities, religions, and cultures; and of different socioeconomic situations, each with historical and social and political dynamics. To be caring is to be motivated to support each and every student’s success and well-being and to act in ways consistent with the knowledge and understanding derived from caring’s attentiveness. The foundational elements of caring pull school leaders away from unproductive, deficit ways of thinking about some students and direct leaders toward more positive ways of thinking about and acting toward all students—ways that are socially, racially, and culturally responsive, equitable, and efficacious. Caring does not mean lowering expectations. Education leadership scholar Muhammad Khalifa argues the following:
Principals must both take the lead … [as] “warm demanders” and maintain relationships directly with students. These relationships will allow leaders to encourage students to succeed academically in ways that students will interpret through the lens of love and care.22
22Khalifa (2018, p. 158).
It is difficult to imagine any other pathway. Caring leads toward equity of opportunity for every student. Moreover, it is difficult to imagine credible school leadership for educational equity that does not place caring at its core.
We now turn to our three collections of stories of different ways in which caring school leadership is practiced. Each collection represents one arena of practice shown in our model of caring school leadership.
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The details of the components are as follows
Foundations of Caring Leaderships consists of Aims, Positive virtues and mindsets, and Competencies (knowledge, skills, dispositions).
Arenas of Caring Leadership Practice consists of Being caring in relationships with Students, Cultivating caring communities in schools, and Fostering caring in families and communities. Within this component, Cultivating caring communities in schools consists of Developing the caring capacity of others and Supporting organizational conditions for caring.
Outcomes for Students consists of Positive psychological states, Social integration and responsibility, Capacity for achieving goals, Engagement, Academic success, and Capacity for caring.
All three components are connected cyclically with one way arrows.
Collection I Stories of Being Caring in Relationships With Students
Introduction
This collection of stories illustrates the first arena of caring school leadership practice: how principals and other school leaders can be caring in their relationships with students. These stories focus primarily on the interpersonal aspects of leadership. They show how principals and other school leaders can develop caring relationships with their students. They also show what principals and other school leaders can do so that these caring relationships become more trusting, helpful, and durable. Many of these stories illustrate the benefits to students and school leaders when caring relationships form and flourish.
Each story in this collection makes visible in one way or another the aims, positive virtues and mindsets, and competencies of caring. Like stories in the other collections, not all of these stories are positive. You may find some ambiguous and even troublesome. Some you might consider negative examples, revealing problems that may arise out of the best of intentions.
Hug? Andrew Dominic Bachmann, Grade 2
The stories in this collection are grouped by level of school. Otherwise, they are not presented in any particular order. Nor do they represent the full extent of ways that principals and other school leaders might be caring in their relationships with students. You may begin by reading stories from the level of school in which you are most interested, but we strongly encourage you to read stories from the other level for the insights and lessons they provide. An example of caring in a high school or middle school may be very helpful in an elementary school and vice versa. Across the stories in this collection, pay attention to the importance of knowing and understanding students both as persons and as learners. Consider the role of context and how principals’ and other school leaders’ knowledge, skills, assumptions, biases, and sense of professional role function in their relationships with students.
A number of the stories in this collection illustrate accessibility and presence in developing caring relationships with students. It is difficult to imagine principals being able to know students, understand their needs and interests, and be caring of them if they are not accessible and present. Presence is both physical and mental, the latter meaning that principals must be continually mindful of students to be caring of them. Many stories illustrate different ways that principals and other school leaders can be attentive to students to know and understand them so as to be caring of them. Some of these stories show practices of observing and noticing and how leaders can inquire to increase their knowledge and understanding of students. Most of these stories also illustrate how principals and other school leaders not only listen but hear what students have to say. Several stories demonstrate the importance to some students of persistence and longevity in caring relationships—even what can happen when caring relationships end.
Most of the stories in this collection portray different ways in which principals and other school leaders can act or give care on behalf of students to address their needs and help them learn and grow. Some illustrate ways in which principals and other school leaders discern the needs and interests of individual and groups of students to provide meaningful help and assistance, doing so in a caring manner. Several stories tell how school leaders engage others on behalf of students. Sometimes acting in the best interests of students means making difficult decisions, perhaps engaging in what René Antrop-González and Anthony De Jesús call hard caring. Several stories illustrate hard caring, and some tell of decisions and actions with which you may not agree. Last but not least, several stories show how acting on behalf of students can conflict with district rules and how principals bend these rules toward the students rather than bend students toward the rules.
Figure 1.1 shows the stories in this collection, by number, in which examples of such caring school leadership practices can be found. You may use this figure