Butterflies and storms

One of the key ideas of chaos theory is that small changes (a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon) can have a big impact (a storm in New York).

In a school with which I am associated, there has been a total turnover of staff in the office area (edge of chaos?) and several small but significant changes have occurred quite rapidly. The office now opens at 8.30,

Previously some office/admin people had been arriving earlier and the office had been informally open prior to 8.30 and they dealt with early bird parents (and other visitors) and students, and teaching staff who need to be in their classrooms by 8.30.... On any day, there were only a few of these early-bird 'customers' and for some of them the new arrangement can be 'catastrophic'.

For the rest of the school, it appears to be business as usual, except for the disruptive consequences of what might flow from the new arrangements.

Thus this small change (the butterfly) results in

(a) No consequences for most members of the school community

(b) Minor inconvenience for some, but...

(c) Very difficult situations for some individuals and some activities, and

(d) Occasionally, large scale disruption in terms of being catastrophic for all concerned and organisation as a whole.

On a small scale, the organisation is often rescued from the above by individuals and small groups (communities of practice) who absorb, contain and/or develop workarounds to deal with the disruptions and overcome the dysfunctions.

Not opening the school office until 8.30 is the butterfly that causes some storms (problems) for some people in other places and at other times . It is true that many of the problems arising are simply minor disruptions and/or some dysfunctions in other parts of the school throughout the school day. Many are hardly noticed. And there are also resultant storms in other places well beyond the school. Examples include: parents are late for work; misunderstanding occur; important matters not addressed because of the lack of an opportunity to communicate;...etc.

Whose performance?

Increasingly, education systems worldwide are reporting public school performance based on measures of student performance. In some countries this practice includes serious consequences for under-performance, e.g, closures, mergers, staff sackings...*

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Most of the discussion on 'school performance' misses the main point. It is the government's responsibility to provide good quality public education for all its communities. Schools simply act on behalf of the government. Individual schools are directly guided and constrained by the government's policies and practices. Individual 'school performance' is actually government performance in that locality. In releasing the data, the government is actually reporting on the effectiveness of its own policies and practices. Viewed in this was the data is always interesting.

 

(*) One can only presume that these consequences are intended to imply the existence of strong committed leadership by those with responsible. But that begs the question: If those leading the system are so committed and strong, how is it possible for schools in the system to under-achieve?

More Emperor's New Clothes

Australian state and federal governments are keen to publish performance comparisons between like schools. But one has to wonder...

"Why are parents so concerned about comparing their own school with like schools?"

Of course they are not!! When was the last time anyone heard a parent wanting to compare like schools? .
The approach is widely understood as an attempt by governments to put all schools under pressure to improve by publicly identifying those that are 'under performing'. Publishing the results is based on a rationale of 'transparency'. But the rationale of transparency is patently false in a number ways :

• The approach actually hides the limited ability on the part of the education systems to promote and manage school change and improvement in more effective and constructive ways
• By focusing on 'school performance' the approach also hides the damaging effect of governments and education systems as they continually tamper with schools through demonstrable policy change rather than by supporting sustainable school improvement
• The approach also hides the differences between unlike schools, many of which are critical. And many of the root causes of these differences are beyond the capacity of the school to redress (in the short term): material resources, facilities, social capital and levels of crime, domestic violence, mental illness....

Most parents are not interested in comparisons of like schools at all. They do want to know how good their school is because they simply want a good education for their children. For example, when parents move their children from one school to another they don't search for like schools... they simply look for a good or better school in a manageable location.

To publish actual differences between all schools and the related contextual factors is almost certainly too problematic for any government and/or school system. The distribution of (dis)advantage and the difficulties of addressing the inherent injustices represent an (as yet) unmanageable challenge and a political powder keg.

That is, publishing league tables is a simplistic, low level approach to school improvement. Structuring the tables around 'like schools' is a deceptive and issue-avoiding approach that is likely to be ineffective and counter-productive. And this is a pity when there are a number of complexity-based approaches that offer genuine possibilities for rapid and sustainable gains through making sense of what is currently happening and identifying realistic opportunities for improvement.

Risking experts

Based on a current Tasmania initiative to improve student literacy rates it seems that experts generally propose a four part strategy::

1. Assess the performance of the subjects (in this case, students)
2. Respond by developing and applying resources (usually based on programs with which the expert has been deemed successful)
3. Provide training for staff (in order to ensure compliance)
4. Prove that the strategy works by running pilot studies (the easy part)
   

But as Myron Tribus says, "There is a simple answer to every question, and it is usually wrong". For example, such proposals generally involve serious 'misinformation', especially for the clients. Common misinformation includes

• The expert's recommendations are innovative and somehow 'visionary' (rare in education)
  
• The recommended practices are not currently in use (they usually are to a greater ot lesser extent)
  
• The strategy will solve the problem (education is a complex endeavour and does not have simple solutions)
  
• If it fails the blame should go to those who failed to implement the strategy properly (however, managers are responsible for the effectiveness of the system).

When staff accept this misinformation as valid, there are likely to be serious OH&S issues around stress and and mental health.

Perhaps as a result of the 'feel-good' vibes of the strategy, those charged with stewardship of the system generally fail to give careful consideration to the possible dangers involved, including

• grossly misrepresenting the current practices
• repeating previous practices in the hope of achieving different outcomes
• alienating those responsible for achieving the intended outcomes
• damaging the credibility of those responsible for achieving the intended outcomes
• making it harder for parties (in this case, schools, families and communities) to work together
• grossly over estimating the transferability of 'best practices'

Most pilot studies are usually quite successful, not so much because they demonstrate the veracity of a strategy but because of the Hawthorne effect.

The intentions may be right, the 'experts' may make their very best contributions. However, such strategies are fundamentally flawed if they are not based on a sound understanding of the current reality, the history of the local situation, and initiatives that nurture the emergence of more effective and sustainable local actions and arrangements.

Signals and use of data

Some parties would like education to be 'data driven', which is OK if one has a good understanding of data, and the complexity of the phenomena represented by the data.

But there are dangers in taking a simplistic approach to the use of data including

• the critical factors are often unknown and even unknowable (Deming)
• cause and effect are frequently separated in place and time
• we naturally give more attention to strong signals and than weak signals
• most recorded data relates only to strong signals
• clues for achieving progress are very often hidden in weak signals

For example, there are three useful signs of progress in relation to problematic student behaviour. In the usual order of progress, they are

• incidents are becoming less frequent
• recovery time is being shorter
• incidents are becoming less severe

All of these signals are weaker than specific incidents themselves. thus we continue to record incidents, and while we may observe incidents becoming less frequent, we are less inclined to actually record these kinds of observations. Of these three, most significant and the weakest indicator (signal) of progress is the second one: incidents are resolved more easily and quickly.

Unfortunately this sign of progress is frequently obscured by subsequent incidents, particularly because they may be as serious are earlier incidents. And this tends to imply 'no progress at all'. Worth considering? I think so.

Check out the Support Planner website for more on Signals.

Schools are for people

What if this was really true?  What would if take for this to be true for your school?

I know you want your school to be for its people: students, staff, families, the local community. But I also know that the official version (teachers teaching students in class) is really quite simplistic and often naive. The real stories tell something more.

Would you like to take part in a blog experiment? Instead of using the Comments to debate my attempts to make sense of schools maybe you could make a brief comment and then illustrate it with a story from your own (recent) activity and experience - good, bad or indifferent.

Let's start by gathering the range of things that people like you do in connection with schools.

What is one of the things that you have done recently that needs to be better and more widely understood?

As the themes become clearer we can focus on particular aspects and learn together.

Worth a try? I think so... it seems to me that the present orthodoxies are not serving anyone very well.

Looking forward to learning with/from you and your stories.

Implementation

I have long used the working definition that

• Something is only implemented when it becomes part of the organisational culture.

That is, it has become part of 'the way we do things around here to achieve our core purposes'. The advantage of such an approach is that, once achieved, it requires minimal support and direction... it is genuinely sustainable at minimal cost ($, time, disruption... Such an approach also links the implementation directly to purposes (actual values) and everyday practices.

One key indicator of whether something has been implemented (or not) is the existence of a related organisation-wide on-going conversation.

This means that getting something operational is only an early stage in the implementation: devices are deployed, policies are published, people are trained, compliance processes are in place... and so on.

Implementation requires the continuing construction and reconstruction of purposes, knowledge, arrangements and actions... and these can only occur in conversations between those involved. As these conversations mature, patterns of thought and activity emerge such that they become part of the culture... 'the way we do things around here'.

Most organisations are littered with things that were operational but never fully implemented.