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<name>The School Leader as Bricoleur:Developing Scholarly Practitioners for Our Schools</name>
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  <md:created>2005/07/27 13:09:25 GMT-5</md:created>
  <md:revised>2006/06/09 16:28:57.132 GMT-5</md:revised>
  <md:authorlist>
      <md:author id="jenlinkpatri">
      <md:firstname>Patrick</md:firstname>
      <md:othername>M.</md:othername>
      <md:surname>Jenlink</md:surname>
      <md:email>pjenlink@sfasu.edu</md:email>
    </md:author>
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  <md:maintainerlist>
    <md:maintainer id="jenlinkpatri">
      <md:firstname>Patrick</md:firstname>
      <md:othername>M.</md:othername>
      <md:surname>Jenlink</md:surname>
      <md:email>pjenlink@sfasu.edu</md:email>
    </md:maintainer>
    <md:maintainer id="ncpea">
      <md:firstname>National Council of Professors </md:firstname>
      
      <md:surname>National Council of Professors of Educational Administration </md:surname>
      <md:email>stdyxn12@shsu.edu</md:email>
    </md:maintainer>
  </md:maintainerlist>
  
  <md:keywordlist>
    <md:keyword>Bricolage</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Bricoleur</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Critical epistemology</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Critical leadership</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Critical practice</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Criticalist</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Democracy</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Democratic leadership</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Epistemology</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Inquiry-of-practice</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Knowledge-of-practice</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Leadership practice</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Leadership praxis</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Leadership preparation</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>New epistemology</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>New scholarship</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Post-formal</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Praxis</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Scholar-practitioner</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Scholar-practitioner leader</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Scholar-practitioner leadership</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Scholarly inquiry</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Scholarly knowledge</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Scholarly practice</md:keyword>
    <md:keyword>Social justice</md:keyword>
  </md:keywordlist>

  <md:abstract>Bricoleur, as presented herein,  is used metaphorically and in a postmodern or post-formal (Kincheloe &amp; Steinberg, 1999) sense to represent methods, practices and cultural materials that the scholar-practitioner uses as s/he  interacts in the complex web of relationships among knowledge, inquiry, practice, and learning. The purpose of this discussion is to critically examine the role of the school leader within the multiple contexts of the school. Specifically, I offer an examination of the school leader as a scholarly practitioner who must draw upon a wide range of scholarly methods, practices, and knowledges necessary to working within and across the political, cultural, economic, and social dynamics of the school and society.</md:abstract>
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<note>This module has been peer-reviewed, accepted, and sanctioned by the National Council of the Professors of Educational Administration (NCPEA) as a scholarly contribution to the knowledge base in educational administration. </note><para id="id15529691">The School Leader as Bricoleur: Developing Scholarly Practitioners for Our
Schools</para>

<para id="id6447247">The educational leader in today’s school
setting is confronted with a myriad of complex problems—problems
that reflect the increasing diversity of a changing society, the
press of political agendas, and the expectations of a public that
is more and more concerned with the quality of education its
children receive. Problematically, leadership preparation programs
are challenged to prepare educational leaders equipped with a
repertoire of skills, dispositions, knowledge, and methods up to
the challenges that leaders face in the pragmatic world of schools.
Increasingly, leaders and the programs that prepare leaders are
faced with the challenge of reconceptualizing leadership
preparation and practice. Toward this end, the metaphor of school
leader as bricoleur offers some valuable insights and important
considerations.</para>
<para id="id3400675">Conceptualizing the school leader as bricoleur
directs attention to the complex and problematic nature of schools
in which the leader conducts his or her practice. The result of the
bricoleur’s methods of practice is a bricolage (Denzin &amp;
Lincoln, 2000), a construction that arises from the reflexive
interactions of different types of knowledge, mediating artifacts,
and methods in relation to the social contexts, cultural patterns,
and social actions and activities that comprise the daily events of
the school. Increasingly, educators of school leaders in colleges
of education as well as leader practitioners in schools are
becoming aware of the need to rethink leadership preparation and
practice. In the ferment of rethinking leadership preparation and
practice (Murphy, 2000), there is a clear focus on reconsidering
the relationship of inquiry, knowledge, and practice (Anderson
&amp; Herr, 1999; Riehl, Larson, Short, &amp; Reitzug, 2000). More
specifically, the questions driving these current discourses
include “What is the role of inquiry and scholarship in
leadership?” “Who is responsible for determining what type of
knowledge is important to leadership?” “What type of leadership do
we need to meet the challenges confronting schools and education in
American today?”</para>
<para id="id9928325">In this article, I address, in five parts, the
questions set forth in the preceding paragraph by examining the
meaning of scholar-practitioner leadership in relation to the
complex activities of leading within schools. First, the construct
of scholar-practitioner leadership is examined, providing a
background for exploring the intricacies of scholarly practice
through the metaphor of bricoleur. Second, criticality is examined
in relationship to the work of school leaders within social
contexts of growing diversity. Third, the notion of school leader
as bricoleur is presented as a lens for examining the meaning of
scholarly practice in schools. Fourth, the school leader as
bricoleur will be examined pragmatically. Finally, the article
concludes with reflections on the scholar-practitioner leader as
bricoleur and the leader’s work as bricolage.</para>
<section id="id14892101">
<name>Scholar-Practitioner Leadership</name>
<para id="id14838632">The construct of scholar-practitioner
leadership is premised on an alternative epistemology of inquiry as
practice, wherein the leader as scholar and his or her leadership
practice are inseparable from scholarly and critically oriented
inquiry. Scholar-practitioner leadership is grounded in a
postmodern—postpositivist view of leadership, which seeks to blur
boundaries in the knowledge-practice and inquiry-practice
relationships. The foundation of scholar-practitioner leadership,
in part, is historically grounded in the works of Dewey (1935) who,
in speaking of educational administration, writes of the
educational administrator:</para>
<para id="id14838636">His leadership will be that of intellectual
stimulation and direction, through give-and-take with others, not
that of an aloof official imposing, authoritatively, educational
ends and methods. He will be on the lookout for ways to give others
intellectual and moral responsibilities, not just for ways of
setting tasks for them . . . He will realize that public education
is essentially education for the public; directly, through teachers
and students in the school; indirectly, through communicating to
others his own ideals and standards, inspiring others with
enthusiasm of himself and his staff for the function of
intelligence and character in the transformation of society. (p.
10)</para>
<para id="id3222017">Dewey’s conception reflects characteristics of
a practitioner who is a scholar as well as practitioner, an
individual who understands the intellectual, moral, and social
responsibility of education in relation to transforming society.
Embodied in the work of the educational administrator/leader are
the values of social justice, equity, caring, and democracy. The
conception offered by Dewey is one of educational leaders as public
intellectuals engaged in scholarly practice, that is, practice at
the local level guided by a purpose of educating the public and
transforming society. Scholarly practice brings to the foreground
an understanding of the importance that inquiry and knowledge,
situated in the place of practice purpose, has in preparing the
“public” to transform society.</para>
<para id="id15532550">Historically, the “scholar” was most often
associated with academe and the university setting, and therefore
his or her practice was understood as one of formal research and
the development of formal knowledge (codified knowledge). More
recently, efforts have been undertaken to reexamine the meaning of
“scholar” within the context of educational leadership2 preparation
and practice (Anderson &amp; Jones, 2000; Jenlink, 2001b, 2001c;
Riehl, et al., 2000). Preparing educational leaders as scholars
invests largely in understanding a “scholar” as someone who values
inquiry. Scholars “do not assume that they know the right answer
and they do not assume that there is an answer that is right for
all places” (Riehl, et al., 2000, p. 413). Rather, the educational
leader as scholar values “interacting with people who push them to
greater insight. . . . They understand that all social problems
arise from a social context. They recognize that this social
context may be distinctively different for people who do not
reflect the social, racial, and ethnic norms of this nation” (p.
414). Importantly, as a scholarly practitioner, the educational
leader is self-aware of “the assumptions underpinning their own
beliefs and those of others. They willingly hold their arguments
and ideas up to critique and encourage others to so as well” (p.
414).</para>
<para id="id14302236">Relatedly, scholar-practitioner leadership,
as a construct, represents a complex set of relationships among
inquiry, knowledge, practice, and theory. These relationships have
a critical intersect of the core value for and understanding of a
“new scholarship”.3 This “new scholarship” defines practice,
knowledge, and inquiry within the practice-based world of teachers
and administrators, acknowledging the value of “local theory” and
“knowledge-of-practice.” Also shaping the conceptual and practical
meaning of scholar-practitioner leadership is a dimension of
criticality that transforms leadership practice into leadership
praxis.</para>
<para id="id14345743">The complexity of knowledge-practice and
inquiry-practice relationships represents an emerging framework for
a “new epistemology”4 of leadership practice and suggests
alternative methodological considerations for the school leader.
The evolution in leadership practice has been shaped, in part, by a
shift from positivistic to postpositivistic considerations, and a
shift from more orthodox or traditional views of educational
administration to more postmodern, poststructural, and post-formal
views of educational leadership. Figure 1 provides a referent for
further examining the scholar-practitioner construct in
relationship to leadership preparation and practice. Learning to
lead, that is, leadership preparation, may be examined as moving
from a more formal, traditional orientation as often characterized
from a positivistic epistemological orientation wherein
knowledge-for-practice is codified and delivered. In contrast,
learning to lead for the scholar-practitioner is concerned less
with transitional orientations of knowledge and inquiry and more
with engaging in a “new epistemology” of knowledge and practice
articulated through the inquiry as praxis. In this sense, learning
to lead is situated in the place of practice and works to transform
social practice and address social issues and problems in the
school and larger societal contexts.</para>



<para id="id14787875">Scholar-practitioner leadership as
represented in Figure 1 exists along multiple planes and/or
multiple dimensions of space, each contributing to the definitional
structure of the construct. A post-formal (Kincheloe &amp;
Steinberg, 1999) approach to analysis of the scholar-practitioner
leadership construct instructs the articulation of Figure 1,
providing a level of complexity by acknowledging the importance of
the etymology or historical origins of knowledge integral to the
school leader’s work. Also important from a post-formal perspective
are contexts, patterns, and processes incorporated into the
activities and practices that enable the school leader to address
the array of problems and issues embedded within leaders’ work. A
central element in scholar-practitioner leadership is criticality,
which, depending on the degree of criticality, transforms inquiry,
knowledge and practice.</para>

<media type="image/jpg" src="jenFigure.bmp"/>

<para id="id13929557">As noted in Figure 1, criticality – critical
leadership praxis – borders on the left and bottom, however this
element is better understood as a dimension of space, defined by
the level of criticality that transforms conventional leadership
practice into a leadership praxis. Importantly, criticality shapes
the practice of the scholar-practitioner, and defines the practical
space of in which the scholar-practitioner carries out his or her
practice. In this sense, if practice is defined by a critical
orientation that is concerned with social justice and equity,
asymmetrical power relationships, or marginalization based on race
or ethnicity, then the culture and practiced place of the school is
defined as well by the critical orientation.</para>
<para id="id15787822">Criticality, as an element of
scholar-practitioner leadership, brings into relief the dialectical
tensions necessarily important in the school leader’s work as s/he
sorts out issues such as difference, equity, justice and the often
problematic nature of leadership.. As suggested by the outward
movement from the primary axis point in the lower left corner, the
degree of criticality in relation to types of knowledge and inquiry
helps us to understand the definition of degree of scholarly
practice that necessarily occurs. The ideal degree of scholarly
practice for school leaders seeking to create democratic learning
communities would exist at a point along the primary axis, moving
outward to a level of inquiry and/or knowledge-of-practice. It is
within this range that the “new epistemology” of practice is best
represented. In the section that follows, the criticalist dimension
is further examined.</para>
<para id="id13920334">The Scholar-Practitioner as
Criticalist</para>
<para id="id15445926">The scholar-practitioner as criticalist is a
person who uses different critical lens to interrogate and
otherwise make visible hidden issues of power. These lens include
Frankfurt School critical theory as discourse of social
transformation (Adorno, 1982, 1991, 1997; Gramsci, 1992, 1994;
Kincheloe, 1993; McLaren, 1995a, 1995b; Horkheimer, 1972);
poststructural theory including interpretative and historical
analysis (genealogy) of power/knowledge (Foucault, 1972, 1980);
poststructural deconstruction (Derrida, 1973, 1978, 1982);
poststructural feminist methods (Capper, 1995, 1998); critical
pragmatism (Cherryholmes, 1983, 1988, 1999); and post-formal theory
(Kincheloe &amp; Steinberg, 1999).</para>
<para id="id15394498">At its heart, leadership is “a critical
practice, one that comments on present and former constructions of
reality, that holds up certain ideals for comparison, and . . . is
oriented . . . toward a reconceptualization of life practices where
common ideals of freedom and democracy stand important” (Foster,
1989, p. 52). Criticality in leadership is largely dependent on the
lens one applies to practice, and therefore resides in large part
within one’s worldview of human social, political, cultural, and
economic theory and the activities that are guided by those
theories. Critical approaches to educational leadership are
concerned with “finding ways to help schools improve the life
situations of disadvantaged groups and advocating measures which
they believe will advance the value and practice of social justice,
democracy and equity” (Ryan, 1998, p. 257).</para>
<para id="id15618941">The criticalist “attempts to use his/her work
as a form of social or cultural criticism” (Kincheloe &amp;
McLaren, 1994, p. 139). As a criticalist, the school leader engages
in his or her work through leadership praxis5 guided by inquiry
that is reflective, ethical, critical, and intentional.
Praxis-oriented scholarly practice refers to “activities that
combat dominance and move toward self-organization and that push
toward thoroughgoing change in the practices of . . . the social
formation” (Benson, 1983, p. 338). The work of the school leader as
criticalist seeks to illuminate and otherwise interrogate the
social context of schools, with the inquiry focused on supporting
efforts for change in social practice and cultural conditions. A
critical leadership praxis is used to uncover the subtleties of
oppression embedded within the cultural reproduction of society,
most often associated with the public school as an often
non-critical instrument of society whose function is to prepare the
next generation. A critical leadership praxis is also concerned
with inequity and injustice that surface within the curricula and
instructional systems of schools, as well as asymmetrical power
relations that all too shape student and teacher identities along
ideological lines that work to control and disadvantage some while
advantaging others.</para>
<para id="id15453193">The praxis of the leader is guided by a
critical epistemology6, an epistemology that avoids oppression
because its concept of truth presupposes equal power relations and
seeks symmetry in the distribution and use of power. The
scholar-practitioner leader as criticalist is concerned with the
relationship between knowledge and thought as well as power and
claims of truth within the context of her or his practice. In this
sense, leadership praxis is emancipatory, “grounded in a critical
consciousness, which will manifest itself in action that will
always be becoming emancipatory” (Grundy, 1993, p. 174). For the
educational leader as criticalist, the question is not “Am I
emancipated and how can I emancipate my staff?” but rather ”How can
I engage in forms of critical, self-reflective and collaborative
work which will create conditions so that the people with whom I
work can come to control their knowledge and practice?” (p.
174).</para>
<para id="id14125017">The school leader as criticalist must
consider more than claims of objective reality since social
relations involving forms of power are always entailed in any
representation of her or his practice in relationship to the larger
context and related patterns and processes in which the leader’s
practice is embedded. Scholar-practitioner leadership is marked by
approaches to inquiry, which recognize that knowledge is “socially
constituted, historically embedded, and valuationally based. Theory
serves an agentic function, and research illustrates (vivifies)
rather than provides a truth test” (Hendrick, 1983, p. 506).
Concerned over a number of epistemological issues,
scholar-practitioners use their scholarly practice to ensure that
issues related to power relations, marginalization, or cultural
reproduction do not contribute to oppressive conditions.</para>
<para id="id14125021">Scholar-Practitioner Leader as
Bricoleur</para>
<para id="id15134288">The word bricoleur and its cognate bricolage
come from bricole, a corruption of which is the English term brick
wall. The root word of bricole means rebound. Bricoleur, as
Levi-Strauss (1966) has noted, is “used with references to some
extraneous movement” (p. 16)—movement in physical terms such as a
ball rebounding off a wall, in sociological terms the social
interaction in activities, and in psychological terms the
interacting and cognitive rebounding of ideas, concepts, and
feelings experienced as one individual works in relationship to
others.</para>
<para id="id15532090">The etymology of the term bricoleur is
connected with the works of the German sociologist and social
theorists Georg Simmel and, by implication, Baudelaire (Weinstein
&amp; Weinstein, 1991).Noting the association with Baudelaire,
bricolage, as Norris (1987) suggests, is a French word that refers
to the “ad hoc assemblage of miscellaneous materials and signifying
structures” (Levi-Strauss, quoted in Norris, p. 134). The bricoleur
works in association with his or her culture and the material
practices and artifacts available in the culture. Spivak (1976)
says “the bricoleur makes do with things that were meant perhaps
for other ends” (p. xix). Weinstein and Weinstein (1991) explain
the bricoleur as a person who is “practical and gets things done”
(p. 161). As Norris (1987) notes of the bricoleur, s/he is “happy
to exploit the most diverse assortment of mythemes—or random
combinartory elements” (p. 134).</para>
<para id="id14958826">Bricoleur as presented herein, is used
metaphorically and in a post-formal7(Kincheloe &amp; Steinberg,
1999) sense to represent methods and practices, and cultural
materials that the scholar-practitioner uses as s/he interacts in
the complex web of relationships between knowledge, inquiry,
practice, and learning. While Levi-Strauss (1966) suggests that a
bricoleur is an ordinary person who does the best that she or he
can do with what is at hand, Denzin and Lincoln (1998), provide a
view of bricoleur that more closely aligns with the construct of
scholar-practitioner when they suggest that “the bricoleur
understands that research is an interactive process shaped by his
or her personal history, biography, gender, social class, race, and
ethnicity, and those of the people in the setting” (p. 4). As the
scholar-practitioner interacts with others within a community of
practice, his or her scholarly practice works with the practice of
others to create a bricolage, or composite of methods, materials,
actions and experiences, and sensations and perceptions.</para>
<para id="id15460136">Within the context of research, inquiry, and
scholarly practice, the bricoleur is one who draws from many
different disciplines, using the methods necessary to his or her
work. As Denzin and Lincoln (2000) note, there are “many kinds of
bricoleurs–interpretive, narrative, theoretical, political . . .”
(p. 4). As an example, the “interpretive bricoleur produces a
bricolage–a pieced-together set of representations that are fitted
to the specifics of a complex situation” (p. 4). Nelson, Treichler,
and Grossberg (1992) describe the methodology of cultural studies
“as a bricolage. Its choice of practice, that is, is pragmatic,
strategic and self-reflexive” (p. 2). Becker (1998) suggests that
the bricoleur uses the tools of his or her craft, “deploying
whatever strategies, methods, or empirical materials are at hand”
(p. 2), resulting in a bricolage that is contextually sensitive and
which addresses the specificity of the phenomena or problem or
decision. The bricoleur, in creating the bricolage, draws from a
vast array of methods, materials, and practices within the context
of one’s practice, acknowledging the importance of methodological
diversity.</para>
<para id="id14664058">Table 1 exhibits types of inquiry methods and
knowledge that the school leader as bricoleur would draw from in
his or her scholarly practice. The inquiry methods and different
types of knowledge serve as mediational tools and artifacts,
assisting in addressing the vast arrays of problems and issues the
school leader is presented with on a daily basis. The type of
inquiry and/or knowledge selected is important in that the school
leaders engaged in scholarly practice moves beyond the work of
“technician.” As the bricoleur works within the practical space of
the school, s/he must draw from a diverse set of knowledge and
method, forming a bricolage of practice that is cultural and
politically responsive to the needs of the school and events of the
moment. Whereas in more traditional settings, the school leader
works from a limited scope of what stands as knowledge, the
bricoleur understands knowledge is constructed within and through
practice, and recognizes the need for a new epistemology of
practice shaped by criticality. As scholar-practitioner, school
leaders are engaged as a transformative intellectual (Giroux, 1988)
who work to bring about social change and transform their social
practices as well as working with those around one’s self to
transform their social practices.</para>
<media type="image/jpg" src="jenTable.bmp"/>

<para id="id15288354">Applying the notion of bricoleur to
understanding the work of the scholar-practitioner leader, while
simultaneously considering the many kinds of bricoleurs noted by
Denzin and Lincoln (2000), suggests that the scholar-practitioner
leader as bricoleur can take many forms. The
scholar-practitioner-as-interpretive-bricoleur is “always already
in the material world of values and empirical evidence. This world
is confronted and constituted through the lens that the
[scholar-practitioner’s] paradigm or interpretive perspective
provides” (Denzin &amp; Lincoln, 2000, p. 367). The scholarly
practice of the interpretive-bricoleur would depend “upon the
questions that are asked, and the questions depend on the context”
(Nelson, et al., 1992, p. 2), and on the nature of the practical
ground from which decisions and problems emerge. Given the multiple
methods that the interpretive-bricoleur would necessarily draw on
for his or her practice, the methodology of the bricoleur would
become the bricolage of the scholar-practitioner leader. As Denzin
and Lincoln (2000) explain, “the strategy of inquiry comprises the
skills, assumptions, enactments, and material practices that the
[scholar-practitioner]-as-methodological-bricoleur uses” (p.
371).</para>
<para id="id14565724">When considering the implications of the many
types of bricoleurs, it is important to note that the
scholar-practitioner leader as political-bricoleur, or as
criticalist-bricoleur, or as epistemological-bricoleur, would
represent multiple dimensions or ways of practice for the
scholar-practitioner leader. The political-bricoleur would
necessarily draw on an array of inquiry methods and strategies to
interact within and/or negotiate the politics of education. The
criticalist-bricoleur would likewise draw on his or her scholarly
practices to engage as a criticalist, a leader concerned with
social justice, equity, power, “truth,” difference, and caring. The
critical-bricoleur would engage with the material practices to
ensure overcome the marginalization and oppression experienced in
schools, to challenge cultural reproduction which advantages one
population while disadvantaging others.</para>
<para id="id5738377">As an epistemological-bricoleur, the
scholar-practitioner leader would necessarily use his or her
scholar practices to address the problematic nature of knowledge,
beginning to examine the types of knowledge, who creates knowledge,
and the relationship of knowledge, inquiry, and practice.
Epistemological considerations will be shaped by a lens of
criticality that assists the bricoleur in examining for
disadvantaging practices that tend to marginalize and silence
indigenous knowledges. The bricoleur would also work to create
symmetry in power and knowledge relationships between and among all
cultural workers and social actors in the school community.</para>
<para id="id15657056">The scholar-practitioner leader as bricoleur
understands that his or her scholarly practices necessarily “bring
the world into play” (Denzin &amp; Lincoln, 2000, p. 1019), and
understands that the set of scholarly practices are not neutral.
Rather, the practices and inquiry methods are informed by
particular paradigms and ways of seeing the world as well as by the
cultural or positional identities one has in relationship to his or
her experiences in preparation and practice. The
scholar-practitioner leader uses his or her scholarly practices to
attend to the time, place, and space of the problems or decisions
at hand. The scholar-practitioner leader as bricoleur must think
“historically and interactionally, always mindful of the structural
processes that make race, gender, and class potentially repressive
in daily life” (Denzin &amp; Lincoln, 2000, pp. 1019-1020).</para>
<para id="id15298387">The nature of material practices within the
historical, cultural, and political contexts of schools turn the
scholar-practitioner leader into a methodological and
epistemological bricoleur, into a person whose work is that of
making sense of the world around oneself, studying and inquiring
into the phenomena of personal practice while simultaneously using
scholarly practice to inform decisions, construct solutions to
complex problems, and create knowledge as well as critically
examine knowledge in relationship to its use.</para>
<para id="id10566330">The work of school leaders is coursed to and
fro with pedagogical, political, social, cultural, economic, and
professional issues and needs. The bricoleur’s means for
accomplishing his or her work as a school leader are determined in
large part on the basis of preparation as an educational leader and
his or her past experiences. The bricoleur’s means must reflect an
understanding of the leader’s role as scholar as well as a firm
grasp of the socio-historical contexts, cultural patterns, and
varied processes necessary to leading the school
successfully.</para>
<para id="id15131296">Such issues as high-stakes testing and
accountability generate high tensions within the school and
district, often demanding the school leader to respond to pressures
from external agencies as well as pressure from local community
members. The complex nature of problems like those aligned with
standards and accountability require the bricoleur to use multiple
means of accomplishing the leader’s work. Whether an issue of
high-stakes testing or an issue of social justice or an issue of
changing curriculum and instruction or any of the myriad issues and
events that comprise the very life of the school and the school
leader’s work, the bricoleur must delve into his or her repertoire
methods and means to address each one individually. Pragmatically,
the school leader as bricoleur must consider the consequences of
his or her actions in such a way as to be contextually sensitive
and culturally responsive.</para>
<para id="id15555304">Importantly, as bricoleur the school leader
must know when to apply what method as well as what types of
knowledge are important in the socio-cultural, pedagogical, and
professional currents of the schools activities (see Table 1 as
exemplar of methods and knowledges). The bricoleur’s work is to
balance the technical demands of daily life in the school with
intellectual needs of the students and faculty, fostering an
academic environment for learning as well as a democratic community
for students, practitioners, and parents.</para>
<para id="id15467848">Reflections</para>
<para id="id15306516">Preparing school leaders as bricoleurs who
are scholars of practice is a critical consideration amidst
mounting concerns for “revitalization of democratic public life”
(Giroux, 1994, p. 31). Importantly, the bricoleur does not merely
focus on whether actions taken will achieve the desired outcome,
s/he also weighs the critical implications of these consequences. A
critical concern for justice, caring, and democracy becomes a
measure that is used to evaluate the intended actions and their
subsequent consequences. The implication for leadership preparation
is significant, if faculty are to integrate the ideas set forth in
Figure 1 and Table 1.</para>
<para id="id14352081">Fostering a “new epistemology” as discussed
will require a rearticulation of leadership preparation and
reorientation of leadership practice. In turn, this will require a
multi-dimension view of the space within which learning and
practice takes place; the intersection of inquiry and knowledge
that are “of practice” will need be defined criticality, thus
creating a multi-dimensional space that transforms the nature of
both preparation and practice. Figure 1 suggests that the
scholar-practitioner is authentically engaged in practical inquiry
of his or her practice, and is constantly seeking to transform
social practice. For leadership preparation that is concerned with
the aspirant bricoleur, Table 1 offers a suggested bricolage of
knowledge and methods, which work interdependently to shape the
nature of curriculum and culture, instruction and policy concerned
with preparing bricoleurs. However, the types of knowledge and
inquiry, if they are to animate the transformation of practitioner
to bricoleur, must be understood in relation to what is and is not
the bricoleur’s way of practice. Rather than a limited scope and
breadth of knowledge and method, the practicing bricoleur works to
form a diverse set of knowledge and methods that serve his or her
work. For the bricoleur, there is not a one-best way or means, but
multiple perspectives and means of solving problems and making
decisions.</para>
<para id="id14914874">This means that as curricula and
instructional delivery systems will necessarily be examined in
relation to the types of knowledge and methods denoted in Table 1.
A heuristic to critically examine existing, more traditional
systems, would be developed and use to instruct the design of new
systems of learning that provide the experiences needed for the
transformation to bricoleur. It is important that note that
becoming a bricoleur, that is, the processes necessary to the
transformation, will require that both the student and professor of
leadership engage authentically as scholar-practitioners. This will
not be easy work for either; however, it is necessary work. The
transformation to bricoleur begins with accepting the need to
transform one’s self, both the professor and the student.</para>
<para id="id15788398">Becoming a bricoleur requires an
understanding of and commitment to education that is concerned with
society and its future. Toward this goal, the scholar-practitioner
as bricoleur must continuously engaged in learning new skills,
knowledges, and methods as well as continuously challenging old
practices, knowledges and methods. The scholar-practitioner as
bricoleur must be a student of his or her practice within the
larger context of being a student of social action for the
transformation of society.</para>
<para id="id13937301">END NOTES:</para>
<para id="id6759284">1An earlier version of this manuscript was
presented at the National Council of Professors of Educational
Administration (NCPEA) 55th Annual Conference, August 9-13, 2001a,
at the University of Houston, Houston, Texas.</para>
<para id="id15416226">2Leadership has been variously researched and
written about for decades, and therefore is not explored within
this paper as such an activity in and of itself would fill volumes.
However, for purposes of this paper, educational leadership as used
throughout will connote the practices and activities of individuals
at all levels of the school and educational system that, through
their actions, demonstrate an understanding of purpose and moral
imperatives that guide and facilitate the practices and activities
of others. As used in concert with scholar-practitioner, leadership
is the processes and actions of any person (teacher, principal,
parent, and student) who seeks cultural and social change through
social critique and praxis.</para>
<para id="id5843990">3“New scholarship” reflects the ideas
expressed by Anderson and Herr (1999), Jenlink (2001c), and Schön
(1995) and provides the foundation for “scholarships of leading.”
Schön (1995) suggests that practitioners as “new scholars must
produce knowledge” (p. 27). These new scholars must have a “new
scholarship” that will challenge existing epistemologies of
institutional knowledge. Anderson and Herr (1999) note that we are
on the “threshold of an outpouring of practitioner inquiry that
will force important redefinitions of what ‘counts’ as research.
This “new scholarship” also involves halting but rigorous efforts
at collaboration between academics and school professionals around
scholarly practice” (p. 14). Jenlink (2001c) explains the new
scholarship as “scholarship wherein the practitioner is a scholar
of practice, seeks to mediate professional practice and formal
knowledge and theory through disciplined inquiry, and uses
scholarly inquiry and practice to guide decisions on all levels of
educational activity” (p. 14).</para>
<para id="id14174328">4Epistemology is the branch of philosophy
concerned with the theory of knowledge. Central issues in this
branch of philosophy are the nature and derivation of knowledge,
the scope of knowledge, and the reliability of claims to knowledge.
“New” connotes for purposes of this article that postpositivistic
and post-formalistic perspectives used in matters of knowledge.
Knowledge is viewed as a social construction of individuals within
the socio-historical and socio-cultural contexts of organizations
and communities.</para>
<para id="id15150767">5Praxis, as used here, connotes a necessary
relationship between theory and practice. In this relationship,
theory means social, cultural, political, and economic theory.
Practice connotes actions and activities that an individual takes
part in to fulfill his or her professional, political, and
social/civic responsibilities. Praxis is the intentional creating
and recreating of conscious self-awareness, seeking to become aware
of “the manifestations that our practices represent as
intended-action, and the effective power that we have in our self
formative capacity to transform ourselves as well as the world in
which we live” (Lum, 1993, p. 39). A critical praxis means the
dialectical relationship between thought and action/subjectivity
and objectivity/theory and practice (Freire, 1972).</para>
<para id="id14491302">6A critical epistemology, from Kincheloe and
McLaren’s (1994) perspective, includes an understanding of the
relationship between power and thought and power and truth claims.
Foucault (1979), in his exploration of disciplinary practices,
offers an important dimension to understanding critical
epistemology when he focuses on the knowledge and power
relationships that shape practices, often by fragmenting knowledge
and promoting a form of rationality that facilitates
control.</para>
<para id="id15553515">7Post-formal refers to a way of thinking,
understanding, and explaining particular phenomena within the
social context of their occurrence or where they are experienced.
Post-formal thinking and inquiry use a critical hermeneutic
composed of four elements: etymology (historical origins),
contexts, patterns, and processes. Within the post-formal view of
thinking, or as the case may be, view of practice multiple methods
are used to approach the project and accomplish the work. (For
further explication, see Kincheloe &amp; Steinberg, 1999.)</para>
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