Educational Leadership and Glocalization

The term "glocal" has been in use for the past 10+ years. However, a 2010 article by Jeff Brooks and Anthony Normore in the journal Educational Policy (title of article is title of this blog post) has piqued my interest in glocal educational leadership.

Much of my focus at the WLU Faculty of Education has been on classroom glocal practice. I am trying to help new teachers develop practices and dispositions which connect the global and local. However, the work of Brooks and Normore (educational leadership and glocalization) may be an area I need to explore further.

Brooks and Normore identify nine areas in which educational leaders must develop glocal literacy: political literacy, economic literacy, cultural literacy, moral literacy, pedagogical literacy, information literacy, organizational literacy, spiritual/religious literacy, and temporal literacy. In each domain area, they provide examples of glocal connections. For example, regarding economic literacy, principals need to understand more than just their own school budget but also need to recognize broader economic influences (e.g. why is there an increase in foreign language classes? why do we see financial literacy as important for students? why do specialized programs for the arts often get cut in favour of literacy and numeracy initiatives when budgets get shaped?).

I'm currently writing an article to extend their work. One focus of the article is to consider whether these nine domain areas are constructed from a particularly North American perspective? i.e. does research from "the south" collaborate these nine areas or would others be included (or deleted)?

A paper that my colleague Dr. Gaetane Jean-Marie (University of Oklahoma) and I have developed will be shared at a symposium that Normore will be at in Brisbane, Australia next month. I'm looking forward to continuing the dialogue with them as we explore how to operationalize (i.e. make into practice) their framework.