Beyond the Schoolhouse introduces eight paradigm shifts that are
urgently needed to challenge inequities in education and improve the
conditions for historically marginalized school children. The book
provides educators and scholars with actionable strategies to shift the
paradigm from schools alone to engaged partnerships with families and
communities. Too many educators enter the profession with an
incompatible paradigm, one that asks educators to resolve the problems
facing school children from behind the closed doors of the school. The
book offers a new paradigm, one that opens the power of partnerships to
improve the conditions for school children from within and beyond the
walls of the schoolhouse.
Drawing thoughtfully on leadership theory, current research, and
evidence-based practice, the author engages practitioners and scholars
in a spirited and candid conversation about why partnerships with
families and communities are needed in this era of rapid cultural change
and soaring inequalities. The book features scenarios from the field
along with lessons learned on the pitfalls and possibilities embedded in
the paradigm shifts. The scenarios reveal how the partners leveraged
their power to disrupt historical patterns of racism, classism, and
nativism. The book offers a compelling analysis of the power of school,
family, and community partners to embrace dramatically different
paradigms for schooling. With anecdotes and illustrations, the author
invites readers to consider their role in engaging in meaningful
partnerships that reflect the community's best hopes for the education
of their children. Her narratives offer a deeply rooted understanding of
the possibilities and pitfalls of school, family, and community
partnerships in a diversity of settings, including urban, rural, and
tribal schools and systems in the U.S. and abroad.
The chapters build hope and a realistic optimism that engaged partners
can leverage their talents and resources and work together to bring best
practices to scale for the benefit of children of diverse identities,
cultures, and ethnicities. Chapters contain strategies and tools to
tackle the growing inequalities which keep far too many children on the
margins of schooling and furthest from justice and equity. Strategies
include equity-focused protocols, structured questions for dialogue in
virtual and face-to-face settings, and resources for extended
reflection. The book may be useful for scholars in academic circles,
principal and teacher preparation providers, novice and experienced
educators and administrators, and the allies, school board members, and
elected officials who are invested in enriching the education and
well-being of school children and the families and communities they
serve.
