Leading System Change

It is estimated that world governments spend more than two trillion dollars on education each year, developing extensive initiatives such as ‘Raising the bar and closing the gap’ in the UK and ‘No child left behind’ in the US. Almost every country in the world has education reform high on its agenda. Yet, many argue that education reform has not made significant improvement in decades and that assessment practices remain remarkably similarly to those prevalent a century ago. In response to the dramatically changing needs of students in the 21st century there has been a surge of research calling for system wide reform and the promotion of assessment as a tool for learning. Leading system wide change in assessment practice is a critical challenge for educational leaders across the world.

System Leadership
A concept common to recent literature on leading system change is ‘system leadership’ (Fullan, 2002, 2005, 2011; Fullan, Hill & Crevola, 2005; Hopkins, 2007; Hopkins & Higham, 2007). While there is no one consistent definition of system leadership there appears to be general consensus that system leadership is a concept which includes harnessing the effect of leadership across the system and working together for the common good of all students and all schools. Ballantyne, Jackson, Temperley, Jopling and Lieberman (2006) in a paper for the National College of School Leadership (NCSL) describe system leadership as follows.

…system leaders are leaders who build leadership capacity within their own schools at the same time as working beyond their schools on behalf of all children in their locality… They are moved to make a difference – and to do so across a local system and in partnership with others. p.2

In Leadership and Sustainability: System Thinking in Action (2005) Michael Fullan argues that system leadership is characterised by ‘system thinking’ where leaders, while focusing intensely in their own area, are connected to and supportive of the bigger

References: Black, P., & Wiliam, D. (1998). Inside the Black Box-Raising Standards through Classroom Assessment. Phi Delta Kappan, 80(2), pp.139-148. Elmore, R.F Fullan, M. (2002). The change leader. The Educational Leadership. 59(8). Retrieved from http://www.cdl.org/resource-library/articles/change_ldr.php Fullan, M. (2005). Leadership and Sustainability: System Thinkers in Action. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press, Toronto, Ontario Principals Council. Fullan, M. (2011). Choosing the wrong drivers for whole system reform: Seminar Series 204, Centre for Strategic Education, Victoria Fullan, M., Hill, P., & Crevola, C Elmore, R.F. (2004). School Reform from the Inside Out: Policy, Practice, and Performance. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press. Gardner, J., Harlen, W., Hayward, L., & Stobart, G. (2008). Changing assessment practice: process, principles and standards. Retrieved from http://www.aria.qub.ac.uk. Hopkins, D. (2007). Every School a Great School. McGraw-Hill Hopkins, D Mansell, W., James, M. & the Assessment Reform Group (2009). Assessment in schools Fit for purpose? A Commentary by the Teaching and Learning Research Programme. London: Economic and Social Research Council, Teaching and Learning Research Programme. OECD (2005). Formative Assessment: Improving Learning in Secondary Classrooms, Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, Paris. Stiggins, R