Session Information
26 SES 04 C, Ethics, Trust and Professional Discretion in the Realm of Educational Leadership
Paper Session
Contribution
Increasing diversity in North America and Europe potentially impacts not only school resources and operations, but also the type and frequency of ethical dilemmas faced by educational leaders. These dilemmas may relate to fiscal resource management, student achievement, policy implementation, school climate, and social capacity for difference.
According to the European Commission (n.d.), “Schools across Europe are seeing a rise in the number of children born and raised in a different country. This can place strain on language teaching capacity....At the same time, increased diversity is an opportunity to make schools more inclusive, creative and open-minded.”
As a value proposition, this statement by the EC resembles an ethical charge. Concern with ethical behavior, with ethical decision-making, and with the ability to work through ethical dilemmas has increasingly become part of the preparation of educational leaders in the U.S.
This purpose of this study is to capture baseline data as part of a larger research project on reforming school leader preparation programs through a reconceptualization of leadership ethics. Theoretically we draw on John Dewey’s concept of moral imagination and use his ideas to provoke possibilities to further our understanding of ethical decision-making. Ultimately we claim Dewey’s insights strengthen the conceptual foundations for moral/ethical education.
While much research on ethical behavior among school administrators is focused on principals and superintendents, this study focuses on School Business Official (SBOs), the individual charged with overseeing a local school district's finances in many states of the US. The state of Illinois currently requires SBOs be certified through a state-approved program. Certification is intended to ensure SBOs are competent fiduciary agents adhering to ethical practices established by the Association of School Business Officials International. As school systems adapt and search for creative solutions to contemporary diversity challenges (eg. socio-economic, political, cultural), understanding ethical decision-making in relation to financial resource management is paramount.
Our research questions are as follows:
What are the types and frequencies of perceived ethical dilemmas that Illinois SBOs encounter, and do these vary by context (trends in diversity, financial stressors, geography, achievement)?
What is the self-perceived level of moral imagination among SBOs, and does this vary by context?
What characteristics are associated with levels of moral imagination?
Our research provides useful insights for our European colleagues as they consider the importance of ethical leadership when it comes to the education of diverse student populations, and to conceptualize the nature of this ethical leadership in terms of Dewey’s (1908, 2010) moral imagination.
Moral imagination is characterized by at least two key features: empathetic projection and creative appraisal (Fesmire, 2003, 65). Empathetic projection is the ability to sympathetically take on the needs, interests and concerns of others. More than a form of sentimental identification, it requires agents to develop an embodied understanding of how another feels in the precise situation at hand (Werhane, 1998, 31).
The second feature of moral imagination is creative appraisal, which requires agents to envision and actualize possibilities that are not readily apparent. Werhane (1998) likens creative appraisal to Kant’s notion of imaginative free play, which entails both imaginative reflection (exploratory) and a willingness to reframe one’s conceptual scheme (corrective).
We consider creative appraisal analogous to Dewey's (1908) concept of “dramatic rehearsal," a process whereby agents “reflect, envision, and weigh alternate possibilities and concomitant moral consequences” (You and Rudd, 2010, 41). According to You and Rudd (2010, 42) dramatic rehearsal captures the essence of moral imagination because it takes seriously the idea that “the survival and prosperity of social democracy is contingent on whether community members would like to live a shared life and move forward together.”
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
Dewey, J. (1908). Theory of the Moral Life. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Dewey, J. (2010). Democracy and Education (Los Angeles: IndoEuropean Publishing, 2010), 160. European Commission (n.d.). Migration and Ethnic Diversity: Why Is It Needed. http://ec.europa.eu/education/policy/school/migration-ethnic-diversity_en. Retrieved January 18, 2017. Fesmire, S. (2003). John Dewey and Moral Imagination: Pragmatism in Ethics. Indiana University Press. Odom, S. F., Andenoro, A. C., M’Randa, R. S., & Jones, J. L. (2015). Undergraduate Leadership Students' Self-Perceived Level of Moral Imagination: An Innovative Foundation for Morality-Based Leadership Curricula. Journal of Leadership Education, 14(2), 129-145. Werhane, P. H. (1998). Moral Imagination and the Search for Ethical Decision-making in Management. Business Ethics Quarterly, 75-98. You, Z., & Rud, A. G. (2010). A Model of Dewey's Moral Imagination for Service Learning: Theoretical Explorations and Implications for Practice in Higher Education. Education and Culture, 26(2), 36-51. Yurtsever, G. (2006). Measuring Moral Imagination. Social Behavior and Personality: An International Journal, 34(3), 205-220.
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