Releasing the Imagination: Creating an Impactful Leadership Practice

We offer school and systems leaders a collaborative learning space to explore the integration of visual and performing arts into academic learning. Through Visible Thinking strategies, we promote deep reflection, spark curiosity, and help participants forge new connections. By incorporating creative pedagogies and performance arts, we support educators in enhancing student outcomes and using learning spaces to foster mindfulness and healing from emotional trauma. Come, join us!

Using creative practices can be an effective equity strategy when approaching problems of practice as it lifts up the voices of all stakeholders and supports transformational change within the collective educational community. Tools of creativity and equity support leaders to make the changes in their sites that are people centered, and become a model for more systemic changes in their districts. Additionally, teachers trained in arts-centered classroom practices are able to create more equity centered learning spaces for students (Marshall, 2014) (Hammond, 2015) (Green & Teja, 2017) (Tishman, Perkins and Richart, 2008) (Hanley, 2013).

The arts help to critically address equity and justice across diverse communities; and themes and ideas such as inclusion, systemic equity, systems change, and identity expression.

In this professional learning series, leaders will unpack the implications of creative practice to support a variety of school outcomes:

Support creative practice and thinking as a system for reflection towards continuous learning and improvement in leadership practice that results in equity centered school-wide transformation
Increase leadership support of arts-centered integration as a strategy to create more equity centered learning spaces for students and staff
Build leaders' comfort in artistic processes: support, valuing access, and commitment to the arts for learners who are historically marginalized and underserved, recognizing that arts integration in core curricular areas supports academic achievement and outcomes

Present the arts as a proven method for learner access to core curriculum through culturally relevant pedagogy
Engage in the arts is a practice of mindfulness and healing. It can build resilience, confidence, social emotional practices and self-empowerment
Engage a collaborative school culture to create systems of change

Session Calendar and Content

Meetings will be held in person.

Schedule:

Saturday, September 21, 2024; 10:00am–1:30pm
Saturday, November 16, 2024; 10:00am–1:30pm
Saturday, February 8, 2025; 10:00am–1:30pm
Saturday, April 26, 2025; 10:00am–1:30pm

Structure:

PART 1 - The Intelligence of Artistic Work

Offering an experiential level of learning that supports leaders in having authentic, whole learner experiences in the arts as a tool to investigate and understand complex problems and ideas, so that they see the power of embedding creative processes into their leadership practice and as a tool for whole school change. Supporting leaders to see how arts experiences are rigorous and part of academic dialogue and learning:

Immersing in arts experiences and playing with materials and arts processes to understand the intuitive mind;
Introduction to Creative Strategies (Marshall 2015) that support leaders to map their own artistic intelligence;
Meaningful applied learning experiences that are problem-based and context-specific to support models of how these practices are solutionary pathways;
Addressing how these practices support emotional intelligence and growth, build culturally responsive cultures of learning and open the door to deeper and more engaged academic rigor and understanding;
Examining the role of the imagination in leading, and unpacking and understanding the implications of creative thinking in leadership;
Introduction of creative practices as supportive methodologies towards sustaining equity centered learning environments to improve student and teacher outcomes.

PART 2 - Exploring Arts Process Strands & Professional Leadership Standards through Critical Making

Embedding Professional Standards for Educational Leaders and Arts Performance Strands (Creating, Responding, Connecting and Performing/Producing)

Engage in a variety of Studio practice experiences to make the connection between hands-on/minds-on knowledge (visual/somatic-movement/written and oral experiences);
Communicating ideas in authentic ways;
Experience iterative cycles of inquiry, iteration through working with a variety of material and approaches, communal practices, and individualized learning;
Engaging collaboration as a practice of exchange and knowledge;
Allowing for a process-centered learning including: struggle, emergence, disequilibrium, courage, release and joy to for leaders to reconnect with themselves as learners;
Offering a time for leaders to release, rest and explore in playful ways.

PART 3 - Reflection and Movement towards change through maintaining a creative practice

Using Visible Thinking strategies, rituals, routines and protocols in each session to engage deep reflection, make new connections, new curiosities and inquiries;
Leaders share practices, approaches, strategies, problem solving and learning from each other through discussion of their processes, what was learned and how these processes engaged learning;
Reflection at each session about how these practices build stronger communities and break down systems of inequity at their sites.

Who Should Participate?

Site leaders, systems leaders, teacher leaders, counselors, school psychologists, TOSAs.

21CSLA programs are free to participants employed in Title II districts and schools in six Bay Area counties: Alameda, Contra Costa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, and Solano.

Click here to see schools served by the 21CSLA grant. If you do not see your school, district or charter system, please contact us at 21csla_bayarea@berkeley.edu.

Registration

Click here to register