Context Matters: Lessons Learned from Successful Superintendents about Professional Development 279These superintendents were not the proverbial managers dressed in gray flannel suits. The
six female and six male leaders personalized and constructed the role of superintendent by
bringing their unique biographies, values, and diverse perspectives to this executive
leadership position. These superintendents also had deep professional knowledge about
education, teaching and learning, and the processes, policies, and politics needed to make
their child-centered school systems highly successful. Another quality of these context-
responsive leaders was the clear sense of purpose in their work. They expressed deep moral
commitment to education and were passionate about the importance of schools and their work
in them in a democratic society. Each understood the larger societal picture of education yet
never lost sight of children and their learning and development. Much of the
superintendents’ work is accomplished through and with others. Establishing trusting and
lasting relationships with people both inside and outside the school system was critical to their
success as leaders. This should not be surprising given that much of their own preparation
and development as leaders was anchored in social interaction and social learning. Perhaps
this also explains their preference for active learning through social interaction. These
context-responsive leaders were keenly aware of place including a sense of history, the timing
of actions and choices, geographic locations, as well as community and organizational
cultures.
Becoming Context Responsive Leaders: Socialization and Professional Learning
If CRL is what characterizes the success of these superintendents, how do both aspiring
superintendents and practicing administrators become such leaders? Which learning
environments and socialization experiences support the development of context-responsive
leaders? We use the CRL Framework as a heuristic to consider the array of socialization
experiences and formal teaching/learning strategies that help aspiring leaders acquire the
skills of a context-responsive leader. We end with a brief description of environmental
conditions that support the learning and professional development of context-responsive
leaders.
DISCUSSION
CRL practices are grounded in a complex mix of knowledge, skills, and dispositions.
Mapping the knowledge base of education leadership preparation and practice has been
pursued by scholars and practitioners for decades. Each of these efforts to map the
knowledge domains of education leadership has influenced our thinking about the design,
content, and delivery of leadership preparation programs and on-going professional
development for school leaders. Maps, whether they depict geographic spaces or professional
knowledge domains, are helpful in organizing essential features and in providing direction.
Yet, they are only partial representations of reality; they are not isomorphic to it.
Historically, representations of knowledge domains for education leadership have
primarily been depicted as categories of propositional knowledge in various taxonomies,
models, frameworks, and more recently in standards specifying knowledge, skills, and
dispositions. Though recognized, other forms of leadership expertise, including
procedural/process knowledge, personal knowledge, and tacit knowledge, tend to be
marginalized in these representations. Thus, at the outset, we recognize the inherent
limitations in any two-dimensional or narrative representation of CRL. We admit that it lacks