Bringing Educational Psychology to School Improvement Teams

By Jeffrey A. Greene, Associate Professor and Interim Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

My back has often complained about the small chairs and desks in our meeting room, but I have truly valued serving on my children’s School Improvement Team (SIT). SITs are a wonderful way for educational psychologists to engage with the public and contribute to their community. Strong public engagement helps K-12 schools be responsive to the needs of their students, parents, and guardians. The specifics of SITs can vary across states, but in North Carolina they are typically comprised of parents or guardians, school leadership, and teachers. The parents and guardians on the SIT have important responsibilities including reviewing, amending, and approving each school’s Improvement Plan (i.e., an annual strategic plan for continuous quality improvement), reviewing and approving school leadership capital and operating budget requests, soliciting feedback and critical comments from the school’s constituencies, advising the school leadership team, and assisting with the leadership team selection processes. Interested school community members can usually visit during the public portion of SIT meetings, where they can learn more about what their SIT does and how to be involved. In North Carolina, SIT members run for positions, with the school community voting based upon short biographies distributed with the ballot.

As an educational psychologist, I have been able to bring a unique perspective to the discussions via my expertise in learning and teaching, and I have learned quite a bit about what is currently happening in schools, which in turn informs my research, teaching, and practice. Indeed, each parent or guardian on the SIT brings an important perspective; some have legal expertise, others have teaching expertise, and all of us can share our experience as people who work with and deeply care about the school. The more expertise we can bring to SIT discussions, such as findings from the scholarship of educational psychology, the better the decision making. For example, like many states North Carolina faces school funding challenges that often force leadership teams to make tough decisions about which positions to fill, and which to leave vacant. After school leaders work with teachers to make these decisions, they come to the SIT for approval. I firmly believe that school leaders and teachers have the best perspective on their own staffing needs, and as an educational psychologist I have been able to share the research on class size and academic achievement to help them further explore and justify their decisions. As another example, in one discussion I can recall parents asking questions about the role of homework in learning and achievement, and how homework policies should be structured and communicated. Again, I was able to bring educational psychology scholarship into the discussion, which I believe helped us reach a stronger consensus on the ways the school could better frame and utilize homework as a tool for learning. When SIT members wonder about the best ways to foster productive discourse in classrooms, I can refer them to interventions like Quality Talk (www.qualitytalk.psu.edu), and when they lament students’ writing skills, I can make a pitch for Self-Regulated Strategy Development (http://www.thinksrsd.com). And, of course, there have been times when a well-meaning SIT member has brought up a popular educational myth (e.g., learning styles, digital nativism, etc.), and in those moments I have been able to carefully and positively share the research debunking that myth, and help identify empirically-supported alternatives to further the school’s goals for teaching and learning.

I think that last point is an important one. Frankly, educational psychologists bear some responsibility for the continued proliferation of educational myths. When we retreat to our offices and academic journals, we lose out on opportunities to vaccinate our society with empirically-supported knowledge, and therefore we should not be surprised when we find the disease of educational myths spreading. On the other hand, when we engage with the world, such as through being a member of a SIT, we inoculate our communities and ensure a healthier perspective on learning and teaching. Nonetheless, I want to stress that most of my time on the SIT is not spent debunking myths but rather positively collaborating with others to leverage all of our expertise to make good decisions that help our school leaders and teachers be successful.

Being a SIT member has been an enjoyable and rewarding experience. We meet for about two hours per month during the school year, with just a couple of additional hours per month for planning and various tasks such as reading budget materials. Our SIT is a very manageable commitment that I encourage educational psychologists to consider, assuming it fits with the demands and expectations of their position.

I hope my expertise in educational psychology has been beneficial to my SIT, and I have to say that I have learned much from my colleagues as well. I leave our meetings with new research ideas, and tangible examples of authentic educational challenges to discuss in my courses. Educational psychology research and practice must be grounded in what is currently happening in learning environments such as schools, and SITs are a great way to serve both the community and our own work. I hope other educational psychologists consider bringing their expertise to the public through SIT membership.

This post is part of a special series curated by APA Division 15 President E. Michael Nussbaum. The series, centered around his presidential theme of "Evidence-Based Change through Psychology, Policy, Professional Learning, and Participatory Practice," is designed to help education researchers extend the impact of their work. Those interested can learn more about this theme on page 7 of Division 15's 2017 Summer Newsletter.