Partners in Learning
Learning to Lead Change: Building System Capacity

Leadership for Change Library

Stepping Up: Leading the Charge to Improve Our Schools
Larry Lezotte, Kathleen McKee
Okemos, MI: Effective Schools Products, 2006
304 pages

Not quite the founding father of effective schools research, but very much the reigning head of the clan, Larry Lezotte (and his colleague Kathleen McKee) have written a book with big ideas and diagnostic tools a plenty.

The stage is set by starting with five principles:

Principle 1: The current system of public education is ideally suited to produce the results it is now producing.

Principle 2: The current results the public education system is producing are not to ones this country needs or wants.

Principle 3: The education system must change in response to our changing society.

Principle 4: Simply put, sustainable reform and the very survival of public education requires effective leaders who can create and manage a process for change that inspires commitment and action from others.

Principle 5: Our children and our schools deserve nothing less.

In pursuing these principles the authors furnish leader assignments for each of the 11 chapters in the book: context for sustainable reform, beyond good management, laying the groundwork for leading change, leading by design through an inclusive process, creating shared vision, leading and learning for all, choosing the vital signs, leading the search for solutions, building the bridge from goals to action, making it happen, and the endless journey of leadership.

The book contains three rich Appendices: Appendix A contains 19 exercises or instruments including ones on: obstacles to change (and what to do about them); system check-up for promoting successful change; and a leadership self-assessment tool. Appendix B provides a concise 5-page summary of the 7 Correlates of Effective Schools including a comparison of first generation and second generation versions of the correlates. Appendix C lists additional online resources for change.

Why We Like This Book
Full of wisdom from the leading authority on effective schools. A book that incorporates three key components for success: effective leaders, a blueprint for action, and the right tools to support the process. A no-nonsense book that urges change, supplies ideas and instruments, and gives the message that there should be no excuses. A bonus is that there are some 200 pithy, wise change sayings from over the millenniums.