R/D8

I liked the idea of ecological systematic change presented in chapter 21 though I have always thought of that type of change occurring only when the state department of education takes over a school district that has continually failed to make adequate yearly progress. I have never seen an organization go through ecological systematic change up close and the book’s examples are rather vague--which is understandable since it takes more than a couple pages to fully analyze a topic with this level of complexity--so it is hard to have a detailed understanding of the concept. However, I like the idea of reevaluating the entire system and its environment than simply trying to incorporate quick fix programs as a solution to larger problems.

I think that the idea of doing an honest evaluation of an entire school district and including its relations with the community in that evaluation gives everyone a chance to be heard and avoids singling out a certain group as the reason for expectations not being met. It also makes it easier to hold people accountable when they have helped design the system and have agreed upon their role in the system. It is similar to allowing students to assist in creating the classroom rules. Letting students aid in establishing the rules gives them a greater sense of ownership of those rules and a better understanding of why the rules are in effect. Likewise, I believe that if all groups affected by the redesign are included in the redesign process, it will have broader acceptance and will be less likely to end up in a cyclic pattern of change and reversion.

With that being said, I do worry about fair representation. The process needs to be planned out so that it provides everyone affected by it with plenty of opportunity to have their voice heard. I think that the hardest part would be selecting leadership teams, particularly the “starter team” in the GSTE process that depends on only five to seven leaders to represent all of the major stakeholder groups. I also imagine that finding the necessary financial resources to fund this whole process would be difficult. With the current unhealthy state of our economy, there would be a lot of competition for any government funds that would be available for this type of action. I imagine private and local business funding would also be pretty scarce. Plus, a product-based approach to change with a clear end result defined, although it might not be accurate, would probably sound better on paper than a process-based approach when competing for grants.

I was disappointed though that this chapter did not give much explanation about what part an IDT specialist would play in this process. The most specific that it got was to say that IDT specialists understand systems and effective processes and that they also focus on making improvements in the core work of a district: classroom teaching and learning. Who would have guessed?! I am curious what kind of daily tasks that an IDT specialist performed in any of the project examples.