The Constructivist Leader Redux

When the first edition of The Constructivist Leader was published by Teachers College Press, Columbia, it became a best-seller, used by top universities around the world.  Why?  This text proposed a new view of leadership that challenged centuries of tradition: leadership as interchangeable with leader; leadership as position and role of an individual with formal authority.  The Constructivist Leader suggested that leadership was larger than leader and not a function of position and role.  Leadership transcends formal authority to become a broader function of learning and culture: leadership as “reciprocal, purposeful learning in community.”  Such learning is constructivist, rather than behaviorist, in nature.

In 2002, The Constructivist Leader, 2^nd edition, was published smack in the early years of “No Child Left Behind.”  As predicted, NCLB ushered in a sad decade predicated on testing in which our children became less educated, less inspired, less thoughtful.

Now, we have been asked to write a third edition.  This edition promises to set straight the challenges to schooling, bringing constructivist learning and leading back into the limelight and into the schools.  Once again we can resume our mission to create achieving and sustainable schools inhabited by children and adults who are critical and creative thinkers, problem-solvers, and responsible citizens.

Co-authors Deborah Walker, Diane Zimmerman, Joanne Cooper, Mary e Gardner and Morgan Lambert will be joined by remarkable educators Elizabeth Reilly, Linda Henke, Julie Biddle and Jan Huls-Nuno.  If any of you have been pursuing this work in constructivist leadership, we would like to hear from you. E-mail me at Linlambert@aol.com.  We’ll keep you informed as we move forward.

Next: Home again—what I’ve learned about literature and leadership.  Linda

 

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