Skip to Content

Stanford GSB News

 

National Educational Leaders Leverage Business and Education to Improve Schools

July, 2003

STANFORD GRADUATE SCHOOL OF BUSINESS—Twelve teams of school leaders from large, diverse school districts around the country, including San Francisco; Cleveland, Ohio; and Portland, Ore., gathered at Stanford University June 22-28 for a one-week executive education program to learn how to combine principles from business and education to run schools better both operationally and instructionally.

The inaugural Executive Program for Educational Leaders (EPEL), sponsored by the Stanford Educational Leadership Institute, was a joint initiative of the Stanford University School of Education and the Center for Social Innovation at the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

"U.S. schools are now being asked to do something they have never before attempted—succeed at teaching all students to high standards," said education Professor Linda Darling-Hammond. "These new demands cannot be met without changing the core technology of schools—how they are organized to support more powerful teaching and more in-depth learning. Just as American businesses have had to restructure to increase their flexibility and productivity, so schools need fundamental redesign. And we need to develop the leaders who can accomplish this."

Combining knowledge of school redesign from education with knowledge of organizational change from business, superintendents, principals, and teachers explored the core issues surrounding school and district restructuring and effective management. Working with the Stanford faculty and one another, the teams created action plans for addressing challenges unique to their districts.

"The shift toward viewing schools as 'organizations' and superintendents and principals as 'leaders' highlights the tremendous potential to foster educational innovation by drawing on the extensive knowledge about organizational effectiveness and leadership that has been developed in the business world," explained James Phills of the Business School faculty.

Darling-Hammond and Jerry Porras, business professor emeritus, are among the featured faculty who led sessions such as "Redesigning Complex Systems for Student Success," "The Leader as an Organizational Architect," and "Instructional Leadership and Organizational Restructuring."

The Stanford Educational Leadership Institute (SELI) seeks to support current and emerging educational leaders in acquiring the resources and tools they need to transform education systems and sustain schools that are more powerful and equitable sites for teaching and learning. The institute's work draws upon knowledge of organizational design and leadership from the fields of business and education. SELI is funded by the Goldman Sachs Foundation.