Justice in the Gaps: School Leader Dispositions and the Use of Data to Address the Opportunity Gap

Theoretical framework

We proceed in this study with a “justice in the gaps” theoretical framework, drawing together the literatures on dispositions, opportunity gap, and data use (Ladson-Billings, 2006; Milner, 2010, 2012a, 2012b; Murphy, 2003; Murphy & Shipman, 1999) to query how school leaders define their commitments to addressing inequities. We acknowledge that the use of data toward the ends of equity and justice in schools is challenging and its success a rare feat, subject as it is to many pitfalls described in the literature. The asset-based beliefs about children that are embedded in the discourse about the opportunity gap and educational debt are relatively new to school leader preparation, and so their use and prevalence among practicing school leaders is not fully known but potentially vital for creating new plans of action for addressing opportunity gaps. Our way in to studying school practices is by tapping into the dispositions that school leaders describe about their own practice. Their articulations of their own views about children we suspect have deep meaning for the educational experiences of their students.

The opportunity gap disposition

For the participants who mind the gap as a gap in opportunity, the disposition toward their students is asset-based, grounded in the value of the community, and expressed as a commitment that they intend for their students to see and understand. Furthermore, the disposition is connected to their positionalities—their individual histories and identities in relation to race, ethnicity, social class, and experience (Alcoff, 1988; Shapiro & Gross, 2013).

At the time of her interview, Scarlett Johnson had just completed her first year as principal of her urban elementary school. Johnson, an African American woman, is the principal at a school with 92% African American students and 84% students identified as economically disadvantaged. When asked about her understanding of the achievement gap, Johnson said,

So, that is something that I hate, that terminology, so I don’t use it. I don’t like the word, the terminology achievement gap, because that puts it on the child. It kind of blames the child . . . because it is their achievement, it’s a gap in your achievement versus a white child’s achievement.

Johnson added,

What I like to call it is an opportunity gap. Our students have not had the same opportunities . . . But, as soon as we give them those opportunities, they can achieve at or above the level of white students.

With a hint of resentment, Johnson described her antipathy toward the language of the achievement gap because it places a judgment on the student. She replaces it with a clear understanding of what the literature calls the opportunity gap.

Johnson’s disposition toward the opportunity gap is further explained by the value she ascribes to the diverse population of students in her school and neighborhood:

In a lighthearted tone, Johnson indicated her belief that diversity is mutually enriching. Furthermore, she declared the community she serves influences her dispositions. In the passage above, when she talks about the community, she shifts from “they” to “we” and “us,” suggesting a positionality distinct from most other school leaders in the sample. Johnson names her school as a community and identifies with the community in which she works.

As evident elsewhere in the interview, Johnson’s disposition toward her students reflects a personal and professional commitment. Students’ perseverance drives her; she said she could not be an educator “without our kids saying ‘I am still here, I am still in it, I still want to be here.’ And they show up every day with the same attitude—‘I am here’—and that is powerful.” According to Johnson, justice in the gaps means providing her students with the same opportunities as those of more affluent school districts.

Two other participants presented similar sense-making about an opportunity gap but without using that specific language. Both are African American women, Maya Gaffney and Allison Edwards. At the time of the interview, Gaffney had just finished her first year as principal of an urban middle school. Her language about the achievement gap incorporates concern for equity:

[O]ur situation is to look at things from an equity standpoint. Equity does not mean equal, but right now I think the achievement gap is largely attributed to giving everybody the same thing because . . . we don’t look at how people learn things differently, we don’t look at cultural competency . . . [When my teachers tell me] “I treat all of my students the same.” Well, to do that is a disservice, because they are different.

From this statement, we can understand Gaffney’s interpretation of the importance of educators acknowledging cultural differences in students.

Gaffney identified two forms of opportunity gaps relevant in her context—her school district’s gifted and talented model and access to highly effective teachers—that according to her perpetuate racial achievement gaps:

[Students in the gifted program] are in separate classes, they have separate education, sometimes they have better teachers, and so that [contributes] to it too. The other part of that I think sometimes also is . . . when we think about teachers and quality of the teachers, our students who are the most neediest weren’t getting the most highly qualified teachers, so they were behind even more.

Here, Gaffney presented two historical practices that researchers attribute to the opportunity gap and distinctly different career trajectories (e.g., Miranda et al., 2014; Oakes, 2008).

A glimpse into Gaffney’s disposition can be understood in how she prioritizes relationships with her students:

I try to get to know them, know where they live, know their parents, understand their circumstances . . . We have kids that come to our school, they have lots of baggage they come with. And so I try to make sure I have relationships with kids so that if there is something going on with them that I need to know that is impacting their ability to learn, I can figure out what I can do, so that, that obstacle is not in the way. While they are here, for the time that they are here, it’s to make things as smooth as possible, so they can focus on learning.

This statement shows something of the resolve of Gaffney’s concern toward empathy; regardless of the circumstances that her students face, her responsibility as a school leader is to make sure students learn.

Similarly to Gaffney, Allison Edwards had just completed her first year as principal of her elementary school at the time of the interview. Edwards situated the achievement gap as based on students’ race and SES. Edwards described the value and meaning of education “is to give everyone hopefully an equal opportunity, a fair chance at being successful. And not just money successful, but being a productive citizen.” Moreover, she made the following remark about what education would be like if she were in charge:

It would be ensuring that every child is getting an appropriate education . . . meaning that they were cared for, that they were loved, that their external factors that affect them, they are acknowledged. But, you know, still be able to carry on with the business during the school day.

As the above response illustrates, Edwards named a major argument made by opportunity gap scholars—acknowledging the external factors to engage effective in-school practices. For Johnson, Gaffney, and Edwards, their positionalities as African American women contribute to their dispositions toward their students (Alcoff, 1988).

Abstract and/or technical disposition

A second set of dispositions about justice in the gaps was more prevalent in our sample and spanned many types of schools and districts—an abstract and technical disposition toward gaps in achievement. School leaders in schools with a small percentage of students of color revealed a lack of direct strategies to reduce the gaps. For example, Kevin Labby, a White male in his fourth year as principal of an outer-ring suburban high school with less than 10% students of color, does not use data to support his students of color. As Labby said, “There is no specific plan for that, you know. If we see a group isn’t performing like other groups we use that information to take action.” This passage is a coalescence of his further remarks about his school context and his lack of a stated disposition toward supporting students of color. His claim is abstract (“If we see a group . . . we take action”), but his leadership practice does not take into account gaps.

Scott Aboud is a White male in his fifth year as principal of an urban high school in an old steel town. His student population—high poverty and nearly equal percentages of White and Black students—could provide a context to spark justice in the gaps. Yet, we found that was not the case. One response in particular highlights his disposition. He describes the following conversation he had with a White female teacher who wanted to improve her instruction with Black males:

I once had a teacher . . . tell me that the one thing she wanted to be better at is teaching black males how to read. And I don’t know of any teacher who, that is a group . . . that is a subgroup of kids, who are notorious for struggling in school. Find that answer, you won’t be teaching here, right; you are making millions of dollars. And so, you know . . . I think that there are things that they could do better. Sure, but I think for the most part, I think that they do a pretty good job dealing with diverse groups of kids.

In the context of the rest of his interview, these comments evidence a missed opportunity to engage in reflective dialogue toward justice in the gaps with his teacher. Rather than engaging the teacher’s interest in developing her capacity, the principal seemed to think it was futile or at the very least beyond his own capacity.

Later, Aboud identified two subgroups—students in special education and Black males—scoring below others on standardized testing. To address these challenges, his school has changed its special education instructional model toward a push-in model and co-teaching. He added,

With the black subgroup . . . the students in that subgroup that are struggling are almost all special education kids and . . . you know to address them specifically would be, it would be almost be . . . I mean it sounds terrible to say, almost like applying the same response twice . . . to me that, you know, that subgroup of black males is umm, they need more than . . . there is more than academic issues that cause their academic difficulties . . . and we don’t do anything about it frankly, unfortunately we don’t.

In this statement, Aboud reveals the predicament he faces in his school. When asked how he uses data to support his diverse students, he started with a laugh and followed with a pause:

We don’t do it in general . . . Everybody knows that you should be using it . . . but it is so time consuming and we have so many kids who need support that we don’t, we just don’t do it.

On one hand, this principal recognizes the abstract need for race-conscious practice. On the other hand, he lacks a framework for making it happen. As in interviews with other principals of schools with a combination of both White and non-White low-SES students, this principal has no language or rationale for cultivating a specifically race-conscious strategy, and time is seen as an obstacle. Although the gaps in achievement are evident and acknowledged, there is neither the capacity to respond nor the conditions in place to develop the capacity. When confronted with resistance or restrictions, Aboud’s disposition commits to inaction (found within Level 1 of achievement gap disposition).

Straddlers

Another group is the “straddlers,” school leaders whose understanding of the gap straddles the abstract/technical and opportunity dispositions. These school leaders initially defined the achievement gap using the technical language. At the same time, these leaders also demonstrated a semblance of an alternative and shifting interpretation on the gap. Six of the 22 school leaders were straddlers—two in urban settings, one in an inner-ring suburban setting, and three in outer-ring suburban settings. Moreover, these school leaders were influenced by their dispositions, beliefs, educational experiences, and work experience.

Arthur Lawrence, an African American male in his first year as principal of an urban 6-12 magnet school in the city center, defined the achievement gap as the difference between how his school educates Black and other minority students in comparison with White students. Lawrence initially revealed something of an abstract Black–White binary definition on the achievement gap, stating, “How are we educating our African American students, our minority students, how do we ensure that they are just as successful as white students on our standardized achievement test as well as in the classroom.” Unlike those school leaders who hold an abstract/technical disposition on the gap, however, Lawrence also revealed a strong disposition and courage to engage with issues of race in his school. Lawrence emphasizes culturally responsive and culturally relevant pedagogy with his teachers:

For Lawrence, the inaction of educators—and their inability to be responsive in their pedagogy—has resulted in gaps.

Two White male school leaders working in suburban districts also indicated a straddler disposition. Andrew Baker said that race or class do not lead to achievement, “but there is definitely a connection between the two,” thus suggesting reliance on a technical definition. Baker also described his experience working in an urban school district in a Southern state, where a focus on narrowing the achievement gap was taking place. He described this experience as both “dynamic” and “beautiful.” When he became the principal of the school, “We just kept growing the school from there, and it was [pause] professionally it was so exhilarating [pause] but it was also exhausting.” Although he no longer works in a school district with a large population of Black and low-SES students, Baker’s previous experience in working toward narrowing the achievement gap—by his indication succeeding—continues to have influence on his disposition on the gap.

A second White male school principal, Jack Maddon, describes how his school has the largest population of Black students (10%) and low-SES (50%) students in his district, an otherwise upper-middle-class suburban district. In his eighth year as leader of his elementary school, Maddon identified issues related to preschool experience, nutrition, educational exposure at home, and prenatal care as influencing achievement gaps. Furthermore, Maddon described how the school is directed toward closing the gap. He stated, “So closing the gap is one of those things that we try. [Pause.] We pride ourselves on, we put everything in place. If one intervention doesn’t work, then we try another one.” Although Maddon holds many principles of the opportunity gap disposition, he did not convey race-consciousness when describing his leadership practice. In his practice, diversity means socioeconomic diversity: “I mean diverse students are the kids that you know . . . we would say the low-SES or the children in the high-SES.”

We identified a fourth group of school leaders whose interviews about the achievement gap were so different and so influenced by the contexts in which they work that they do not adequately fit into the previous three categories. We identified these as “other straddlers” (see Table 1). These school leaders referred to the gap as “effort gap,” “cultural construct,” or “culture.” These school leaders’ dispositions are also shifting; however, we cannot determine if they are shifting to an asset-based approach (as evident in the next section on context). Nevertheless, as displayed in Figure 1, their disposition to the gap mainly holds to the technical and/or abstract ideology.

Dispositions matter

One of our respondents, Maya Gaffney, predicted that the implementation of the Common Core Curriculum would bring to the surface the deficit-thinking mind-set broadly held by teachers. She believes that long-held racist practices in her urban school district will surface because of the expectation in Common Core that all students experience rigorous content. One example she provided is that previously in her district, only students in advanced or gifted classes were exposed to novels like The Metamorphosis. Now, all students in the 10th grade will be required in her district to read a book similar to The Metamorphosis. Consequently, she predicts teachers will raise the argument that “students can’t handle it and that they can’t do it.” Her response to this teacher argument was, “Well they haven’t been prepared, but they can do it if we give them access to the books. You learn how to read; step one, read; step two, read some more; step three, read.”

Gaffney pointed out that through conversations with her teaching staff, she has gathered that some teachers in her school do not see the value that Black and Latino students bring to the school. She had this to say: “Just based on their conversations about students and even with a lot of my Latino students, they approach from a deficit-mind-set of these students, and I hate that, ‘these students have nothing.’” As a result, Gaffney implemented a community walk as professional development to strategically confront teacher biases:

I am purposefully taking them to the places where my black students live, where my Latino students live . . . They have to see that, because our kids come with so much that can be tapped in at school and it’s not looked at as a valued resource. And so with that, I am trying to make them see it, more and more.

Gaffney has decided to take a stand and confront educators in her school who hold a deficit-thinking mind-set.

Two other school leaders in the urban, center-city district explained how they have implemented a district initiative that looks to challenge the racial perception of teachers. According to these two school leaders, the district has promoted the use of Glenn Singleton’s (2014) book Courageous Conversations About Race. Singleton (2014) argues that “tightly held beliefs and understandings regarding the significance of race make it difficult for teachers to comprehend, examine, and rectify the very ways in which race dramatically impacts achievement” (p. 6). With this in mind, Arthur Lawrence, the principal of a high school, contended that to address achievement gaps in his school requires “discussing race, and how does race impact student achievement” as he tapped his finger on the table. He uses Courageous Conversations to focus on equity with his staff. He added, “We always have to [taking a deep breath] keep that open eye toward practices that may not be equitable, you know, and how are we addressing those things within the school.” This is a specific intervention by a school leader with a straddler disposition, who responds to what he perceives as an achievement gap with an institutional response—a structural change that moves toward a more holistic response. In other words, he institutes an intervention consistent with an opportunity gap disposition, but without conveying that disposition. Unlike many principals in the district, he took Courageous Conversations seriously and made its implementation a priority in his school.

Scarlett Johnson, the urban principal mentioned in a previous section who operates with an opportunity gap disposition, further underscores the value of having professional development on race toward challenging “White privilege.” She stated,

First and foremost, one thing we do here is we do equity training, where we talk about, even how white privilege shows up in us, when we are dealing with our children and we want to check that baggage at the door and make sure that we are not looking down, especially on our black males, that this is how they are and they are never going to get better.

Johnson has used professional development to implement equity training that confronts negative biases toward Black males by her staff. In fact, as she sees it, this training is important for all her staff because “white privilege shows up in us, people of color as well.” Although it is important to note that she has made some observation where she has “had some [teachers] where you are looking at them, I know you’re not all the way on board, but it is what it is right now, where people are working on it.”

Moreover, Allison Edwards, who also operates with an opportunity gap disposition, demonstrated the responsibility necessary to challenge her teachers’ biases in a suburban context. She has observed some resistance from teachers when working with students of color and of low-SES. She said she has created a culture in her school of open and honest dialogue with her staff. Yet, she described how she has challenged those teachers who attempt to use external factors and use data as an excuse for why a student should not be in a particular class. Indeed, these open dialogues sometimes become fierce and sometimes “more than heated, but I feel like if we don’t allow each other to say what is on our mind and what we really feel . . . about standardized [testing] and accountability, we wouldn’t be a productive school.” This kind of detail demonstrates her resilience as a school leader in challenging cultural norms in schools that negatively affect some students.

Edwards has observed that some of her staff members use data to determine a student’s ability and do not do the necessary work to improve the educational experiences of those underperforming students. She finds that the positive use of data for teachers is to use the information obtained on students to guide their instructional practices. Yet, she feels that some teachers attempt to blame the students for not learning because their instruction works for the majority of students, but her response is “well we no longer have that option to let those . . . that [bottom] 25 [%] down here to just let them go, it’s not appropriate.” This statement shows something of the resolve of Edwards to ensure that students who are underachieving are not ignored.

As Ruth Johnson (2002) argues, a push for higher expectations for students who have traditionally not achieved will encounter resistance. Accordingly, Edwards says, “I need to change the culture” of teachers using data as an excuse to place students in lower level classes, “which is . . . going to be difficult to do, but you know . . . it will be difficult, but it will be achievable.” Edwards revealed the courage that school leaders require to transform school cultures disadvantages diverse students.

Contexts matter

Our analysis suggests that school context matters greatly for how school leaders think about justice in the gaps. Based on what they told us in interviews, leaders in well-off districts and in schools with a low percentage of students of color rarely attend to the achievement gap. Based on how these school leaders talk about gaps, these leaders lack a specific disposition to address justice in the gaps and/or they are inhibited by their school context. In these schools, it seems that principals do not have to take action and therefore do not have a well-developed disposition toward opportunities for students of color. In nearly all schools with large numbers of students of color, opportunity dispositions are evident in the principals, except in a few cases: In these settings, there are large numbers of both White and Black students who meet the thresholds for free or reduced-price lunch. These school leaders group economically disadvantaged students together and race-consciousness does not inform these leaders’ practice.