The city-wide plan will link all team members and all levels of the school system through commonly agreed upon principles. The plan will include a city-wide operating framework that will guide approaches at the district and school levels. The consultative process that we are undertaking will provide information for the development of the operating framework. The goal of the school leadership team is to provide those closest to students with genuine opportunities to decide and plan how best to increase student achievement and improve the school overall. Using the information gathered through meaningful consultation, the plan will include the core principles that will guide city-wide implementation of leadership teams.
Schools are now at different levels of readiness.
The plan will recognize that all schools with proper support and assistance, in time, will have school leadership teams operating successfully to improve student achievement. The legislative and regulatory framework does not directly address the practical ways in which accountability for decisions on the part of the principal should be balanced with the decision making authority of the full team. Most teams spend some time defining those arenas of school operations in which the principal has sole discretion and those which should involve team deliberation. Many successful teams use a consensus based decision making approach in which members agree to continue dialogue until a decision is reached that meets the requirements of all teams members, including the principal. Other teams identify procedures for dealing with situations in which the principal does not feel that it is appropriate to implement the recommendations of a majority of team members.