EDU 502 : Educational Leadership: Practice and Inquiry

EDU 502 approaches educational leadership as the facilitation of a complex web of interconnections in which various actors, student and non-student alike, form together with the surrounding society. Students study and analyze aspects of educational leadership through both theories and practices to inform and reflect on a variety of issues and cultures, each with their own unique norms and assumptions, historical evolution, and guiding myths. The course utilizes firsthand accounts of organizational leadership experiences and case studies in an effort to understand education and its connection to broader society from multiple perspectives. Taking place over the Winter Block, this course examines both leadership theory and research methods that are descriptive, field-based, interpretive, and discovery-focused. A two-day long “shadowing” experience with local educational leaders, both school-based and non-school-based, provides real-world practice for experiential learning and investigation.