260 K-12 LEADERSHIP PRACTICES
A second finding worthy of note is what was not included in the top three terminal values.
Rarely noted by participants were terminal values such as wisdom, freedom, or equality.
Furthermore, the participants held most deeply the instrumental values of honest, responsible
and loyalty rather than, for example, instrumental values of courage, imaginative and broad-
mindedness, values that would seem needed by 21st century social justice change agents, risk-
takers and systems’ challengers. If our democratic educational system is based on the
separation of church and state, how will our school leaders justify decisions that may
contradict their organized religion, for example, the teaching of sex education or evolution,
and choosing textbooks free of religious bias or religious proselytizing? Will decisions be
made following religious doctrine, or democratic beliefs, if conflicts exist? How does one
challenge a system without courage or without a strong belief in freedom if one does not hold
these values in high regard?
A third finding that may seem noteworthy for educators of future leaders is that 25% of
the students included both honest and loyalty in their top three instrumental values. Questions
that arose for this educator included: If loyalty is so highly valued, what happens when
legitimate challenges to that loyalty surface? How could decisions be made to fire an
incompetent teacher, for example, if one so highly valued loyalty and/or family security? Who
wanted to be the one who lost a family its paycheck? Would a principal hire loyal employees
or honest faculty who could speak truth to power? Can loyalty and honesty to authority co-
exist in employees?
Because of the findings of this study, and the subsequent concern for the seeming
contradictions inherent in values-held versus values-needed, this educator began to research
how educators can affect adult values. Five conclusions were made about how one can
approach the preparation of future school leaders relative to the findings in this study;
however, the conclusions are treated in this section as part of a feedback loop. Once this
educator analyzed the inventory data, she began to research values literature. Thus, this author
made conclusions with the literature in mind and an orientation to future classroom activities.
CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR LEADER EDUCATORS
A major conclusion made from this study and subsequent literature review was that this
educator had to do something to help her students not only understand the importance of
values to their work as school administrators, but to get the adult graduate students to rethink
and perhaps change some of the deeply held values that may be in conflict with their future
work. This would prove no easy task, based on the literature. Carl Rogers stated, “The curious
paradox is... we cannot move away from what we are, until we thoroughly accept what we
are. Then change seems to come about, almost unnoticed” (cited in Beck, 1993, p. 225).
Critical and experiential theorists have suggested that educators who teach future school
leaders must rethink their pedagogical practices to grow leaders who can lead in diverse,
student-centered, team settings (Cherryholmes, 1988; Dewey, 1916; Freire, 1998; hooks,
1994; Kellner, 2003; McLaren, 1998). This instructor decided, then, to take a cognitive
approach to get students to realize the depth of their beliefs and how those beliefs influenced
decision-making. This educator developed two working hypotheses. First, once students could
see the links between values-held and decisions through reflection and discourse, students
would begin rethinking values-held. Second, once students began to rethink values held,
perhaps they would begin to change their values to match those values needed by 21st century
school leaders.