‘A useful book for those who want to find balance in their lives and add a dimension of spirituality to their leadership.’
—Kenneth Killian, Assistant Professor
Vanguard University of Southern California
‘The information is approachable, nonthreatening, and personal. The authors discuss their own past roles as educational leaders, providing instant credibility.’
—Jennifer Baadsgaard, Assistant Principal
Roosevelt High School, San Antonio, TX
Revitalize your leadership and help shape a better future for the students you serve!
This fourth volume of The Soul of Educational Leadership series offers key strategies for identifying the moral and ethical dimensions of school leadership practice. With thought-provoking contributions from top leadership figures like Terrence E. Deal, Dawna Markova, and Scott Thompson, this enlightening resource combines research with innovative ideas for practice and emphasizes:
- Spirituality within a life-sustaining context
- The role of spirituality in empowering leaders as agents for transformative change
- A moral obligation to create safe and supportive learning spaces for students
Spirituality in Educational Leadership helps educators align everyday practice with core values in ways that will make a significant difference in their professional and personal lives.
Table of Content
Acknowledgments
About the Editors
About the Contributors
Introduction – Robert W. Cole
1. What’s Spirituality Got to Do With It? – Paul D. Houston
2. The Spiritual Dimension of Leadership – Stephen L. Sokolow, Paul D. Houston
3. Spiritual Courage: Leading From the Inside Out – Dawna Markova
4. Appreciative Inquiry: A Strategy for Reshaping Education That Builds on Strengths and Hopes – Bea Mah Holland
5. Community in School: The Heart of the Matter – Eric Schaps
6. The Stories of Practicing Superintendents: The Struggle to Make the Right Decisions – Claire Sheff Kohn
7. Personal Growth in the Workplace: Spiritual Practices You Can Use – Christa Metzger
8. Spiritually Oriented Leadership in a Secular Age – Chuck Bonner
9. Spiritual Leadership: The Invisible Revolution – Scott Thompson
10. Leadership on a Teeter-Totter: Balancing Rationality and Spirituality – Terrence E. Deal
Index
About the author
Robert W. Cole is proprietor and founder of Edu-Data, a firm specializing in writing, research, and publication services. He was a member of the staff of Phi Delta Kappan magazine for 14 years: assistant editor 1974-1976, managing editor 1976-1980, and editor-in-chief 1981-88. During his tenure as editor-in-chief, the Kappan earned more than 40 Distinguished Achievement Awards from the Association of Educational Publishers, three of them for his editorials. Since leaving the Kappan, Cole has served as founding vice president of the Schlechty Center for Leadership in School Reform (1990-1994). At CLSR he managed districtwide and communitywide school reform efforts and led the team that created the Kentucky Superintendents’ Leadership Institute. He formed the Bluegrass Leadership Network, in which superintendents worked together to use current leadership concepts to solve reform-oriented management and leadership problems.As senior consultant to the National Reading Styles Institute (1994-2005), Cole served as editor and lead writer of the Power Reading Program. He and a team of writers and illustrators created a series of hundreds of graded short stories, short novels, and comic books from Primer through Grade 10. Those stories were then recorded by Cole and Marie Carbo; they are being used by schools all across the United States to teach struggling readers.Cole has served as a book development editor for the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), for Corwin Press, and for Writer’s Edge Press. He has been president of the Educational Press Association of America and member of the Ed Press Board of Directors. He has presented workshops, master classes, and lectures at universities nationwide, including Harvard University, Stanford University, Indiana University, Xavier University, Boise State University, and the University of Southern Maine. He has served as a special consultant to college and university deans in working with faculties on writing for professional publication. Recently he began serving as managing editor and senior associate with the Center for Empowered Leadership.