Blazing New Trails - Connexions

48 CRITICAL ISSUES IN SHARED LEADERSHIP
or organizational level, as long as those involved grow and learn. Leithwood et al. (2009b)
added that hierarchy, influence, and followership remain crucial components of distributed
leadership, in any of its forms.
However, such reconfiguration of authority in schools is not without its critics.
Although generally in favor of professional learning communities, Fitzgerald and Gunter
(2008) questioned whether they are “a seductive functionalist way in which teacher
commitment to no-liberal reform has been secured” (p. 331). In other words, teachers may be
most effective when they teach, not when they attempt to lead or to share in school-level
decisions. Nevertheless, interest in professional learning communities continues to rise.
It is important to note that all professional learning communities are not alike, and not
all even lead to positive outcomes (Mayrowetz, Murphy, Louis, & Smylie, 2009; Timperley,
2009; Wahlstrom & Louis, 2008). In fact, Leithwood, Mascall, and Strauss (2009a)
speculated that beyond some optimal amount, distributed leadership may obscure the purpose,
mission, and needed actions in schools. They also suggested that “such leadership may simply
be used as a subtle strategy for inculcating among staff the values and goals of more powerful
members of the organization” (p. 4). Leithwood, Mascall, and Strauss (2009b) concluded that
the knowledge base on distributed leadership is still in such an undeveloped state that
examining the relationship between it and student learning is premature.
Spillane, Camburn, and Pareja’s (2009) and Park and Datnow’s (2009) research
revealed various patterns of co-leadership with the principal, including such participants as
classroom teachers, other professional staff members, formal teacher leaders, assistant
principals, non-teaching staff, students, and subject area specialists. They found that these
patterns varied from activity to activity. For example, principals in their study tended to be the
lone leader more often in the social studies and writing areas and to share leadership more in
reading and math. Anderson, Moore, and Sun (2009) and Printy (2010) also found that
leadership structures varied for different tasks and initiatives within the same school. This was
most likely when the principal claimed expertise for certain tasks or when the principal
wanted to increase teacher motivation for certain initiatives. However, these authors
concluded that their findings were too inconclusive to provide any guidelines for practice.
Distributed leadership may involve the entire school (generally a relatively small
school) or smaller groups of teachers, e.g., departments, grade levels, or interdisciplinary
teams of teachers serving particular groups of students (McEwan, 2009). It may be formal or
informal, but it should be designed “to encourage collective solving of specific problems of
practice and the sharing of knowledge” (Printy, 2008, p. 189).
MacBeath (2009) discussed six forms of distributed leadership in schools: formal
roles, pragmatic distribution based on necessity, strategic, incremental, cultural, and
opportunistic. However, MacBeath’s study of six schools revealed that no leaders “fitted
neatly” into any of these six categories (p. 53). Rather, they drew on a broader repertoire of
leadership structures, as situations and needs presented themselves, based on their personality
and experience.
Spillane (2006) discussed three major structures: different leaders separately
performing different tasks, multiple leaders performing tasks jointly, and multiple leaders
performing the same tasks in different contexts, but supporting the same goal. Harris (2009)
identified four types of distributed leadership patterns in schools: ad hoc, autocratic, additive,
and autonomous. These provided a sampling of the ways leadership can be shared in
professional learning communities.