Kranstons

464958
Research on Leadership EducationCranston and Kusanovich

JRL8110.1177/1942775112464958Journal of
Article
Journal of Research on
The Drama in School Leadership Education

8(1) 2855
The University Council for
Leadership: An Arts-Based Educational Administration 2013
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DOI: 10.1177/1942775112464958
the Ethical Dimensions jrl.sagepub.com
of Decision Making for

Educational Leaders
Jerome A. Cranston1 and Kristin A. Kusanovich2
Abstract
This article considers the implications and effectiveness of a performing arts-based
pedagogy in the professional development of school leaders. It reports on the findings
from a study that exposed educational leaders to methods of dramatic analysis as a
means of reflecting on the ethical dilemmas found in personnel management.Through
the dynamic enactment of dramatized scripts representing highly charged situations in
school leadership, participants came to recognize the limitations of merely discussing
cases, the benefits of active learning to developing empathy amid the complexities of
schools, and some of the ethical challenges inherent in their roles as school leaders.
Keywords
qualitative methods, interpretivist paradigm, instruction/pedagogy topics, leadership,
ethics, arts-based, leadership preparation
Introduction
Education is necessarily a moral enterprise (Hallinger & Heck, 2002), and whether one
is a site based or system administrator, making difficult decisions is inherent to the
profession. Ethical questions can range from the abstractWhat do we mean by mor-
ally good?to the concreteWhat is the right thing to do in a specific classroom?
1
University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Canada
2
Santa Clara University, CA, USA
Corresponding Author:
Jerome A. Cranston, University of Manitoba, 239 Education Building, Winnipeg, MB R3T2N2, Canada.
Email: Jerome.Cranston@ad.umanitoba.ca
Cranston and Kusanovich 29
A fundamental challenge facing educational administrators and school leaders then is

to join the heaven of grand visions, lofty ideals, and moral principles with the earth of
concrete actions that actually work. How can they make better judgments about differ-
ent, often competing, ethical approaches amid a background of psychologically com-
plex human interdependency?
Applying frameworks for ethical decision making to hypothetical situations in open
dialogues between leaders creates awareness of the different approaches that could be
considered (Begley, 2010; W. C. Frick, 2009; Reitzug, 2008; Shapiro & Stefkovich,
2005, 2011; Velasquez et al., 2009; among others). But in what ways does talking
about an ethical framework result in an empathetic understanding of complex deci-
sion-making processes? Do the approaches typically used in educating school leaders
help them consider not only the inputs to decision making, such as an ethical frame-
work, but also the outputs, experienced as the reality and impact of the decisions them-
selves? According to Tuana (2007), simply identifying that a situation involves an
ethical issue does not necessarily mean that one experiences the action as ethical or
feels any personal investment in the ethical decision-making process. For Tuana,
moral imagination, ethics sensitivity, and ethical reasoning skills are as important as
all other kinds of literacies with which schools traditionally concern themselves. Given
this critical role that Tuana ascribes to the moral imagination, methods that help exer-
cise the moral imaginations of school administrators and leaders seem worthy of care-
ful examination. Therefore, something more than just access to a moral or ethical
framework is necessary. We argue that stories of lived experience are critical to the
learning process, and advocate for the use of arts-based methods to exercise the moral
imagination of administrators in preparation programs.
Overall, teaching with cases is common in business and public administration
(Brennan & Ahmad, 2005; Gloeckler, 2008; Hallahan & Kauffman, 2006; Mintzberg,
2004; Ruggiero, 2002) as well as in educational administration (Ashblaugh & Kasten,
1991; Kowalski, 2011; Midlock, 2011; Strike, Haller, & Soltis, 2005). It is assumed
that in the workplace, educational leaders will be able to draw on these hypothetical
cases to inform their real-world decision making (Strike et al., 2005). However, it may
not be fair to assume that simply through reading and discussing other peoples deci-
sions one becomes an effective decision maker in any local context given the unique,
creative tensions between the multiple constituents involved in schooling.
In fact, classic cases rarely illustrate the complexity of the power or status differen-
tials between characters. They may also lack the emotional nuances or rituals that exist
in schools between people who construct uniquely lived, embodied realities.
Consequently, even after having studied cases at some point in their professional prep-
aration, school leaders could become overwhelmed as they attempt to solve problems
with complex, interpersonal dimensions. Furthermore, they may have examined ethi-
cal dilemmas in an isolated context and not been given an opportunity to witness the
playing out of an ethically charged scenario (Strike et al., 2005).
The purpose of this interdisciplinary research study was to examine the nature of
school leaders learning when they engaged in a performing arts-based androgogical
30 Journal of Research on Leadership Education 8(1)
approach to case study as one dimension of their professional development. Although

the methods explored here are focused on the adult learner, we will refer to the teach-
ing methods of the workshop as pedagogical in the most general sense. The research
examines the effects of studying educational leadership cases as theater, and includes
significant explication of the parallels between the seemingly disparate, certainly
unique terminology, approaches, concerns, and methods of each field. It reports on the
outcomes of workshops that exposed educational leaders to methods of dramatic anal-
ysis, process, and performance as a means of reflecting on the ethical dilemmas found
in personnel management.
This was not a workshop in which the text was improvised or ever changing. Nor
was it a workshop that let educational administrators merely role-play. All participants
were directed as an actor would be. Just as with traditional cases, the dramatized cases
were written prior to the workshop; participants could constantly refer to and grapple
with the texts. This directed, fixed-script approach was analyzed for the way in which
it might shift participants experience from knowing about the ethical dimensions of
decision making to gaining an affective, emotional understanding of the complexity of
school administration (Clark, Dobson, Goode, & Neelands, 1997).
Three ethical dilemmas were explored in the dramatic texts developed for the
workshop: the ethics of supporting an underperforming teacher over a long period of
time while students are obviously suffering; the ethics of determining discrimination
in the midst of curricular reform calling for a new team; and the ethics of how to fire
a teacher in an ambiguous situation while retaining that persons dignity. The three
plays, titled Grace Period, Discriminating, and How to Fire a Teacher, respectively,
were performed on the last day of the workshop. Every participant had a very specific
role as a unique stakeholder in the situation. The intent of the study was to examine
how the rigor and learning modalities of dramatic art may help educators focus on
ethical decisions in educational administration and develop more robust understand-
ings of school leadership.
A Reliance on Cases
Case study approaches can be described as short, realistic, action-oriented story-like
accounts designed to raise issues and provide some insight into the context of the prob-
lem (Fry, Ketteridge, & Marshall, 1999; Ruggiero, 2002). In addition, when written
well, they describe practitioners in action (Hallahan & Kauffman, 2006). In fact, many
authors (Brennan & Ahmad, 2005; Gloeckler, 2008; Hallahan & Kauffman, 2006;
Mintzberg, 2004; Ruggiero, 2002) contend that case study approaches in teaching,
which have had a long, celebrated history in disciplines such as law and business, have
now become synonymous with education for management and leadership preparation.
Proponents of this pedagogical approach argue that the reading of cases is a practical
way to expose students to a variety of management problems, to which they can apply
the knowledge and skills they have acquired (Sawyer, Tomlinson, & Maple, 2000). They
also claim that the case approach can span the gulf between theory and practice (Strike
et al., 2005). Some even allege that case studies make learning come alive because cases
mirror real life (Graham, 2011). Cases, it is suggested, let students share knowledge and
insight, draw on their own experiences (Graham, 2011), and learn from others mistakes
without the heavy costs associated with making the same mistakes in a real-life situation
(Gurd, 2001; Smith, 1987). Regardless of the reason why the case approach is heavily
used in leadership preparation programs, Leavitt (1991) noted that there is an almost
religious devotion to it because many professors believe that this is the best way to learn
how to manage schools (Kowalski, 2011; Midlock, 2011; Strike et al., 2005).
However, critics of the approach contend that, oftentimes, cases are presented and
studied as shallow renditions of life gutted of context and devoid of emotion
(Mintzberg, 2004). Indeed, others have argued that the case approach has proven to be
a poor method of learning the kind of proactive skills required to balance against the
kind of reactive pressures that are present in many difficult management decisions
(Smith, 1987). In fact, Mintzberg (2004), a vociferous critic, invoked the language of
marketing approaches to critique the case approach and highlight the fact that it fails
to capture the dramatic tension of real-life experience, as he states:
Dozens of students sitting in neat rows pronouncing on stories they read the
night before captures the essence of leadership, exposes the big picture, gives
them responsibility for decisions, promotes learning by doing, puts the students
at home in any management situation, turns them into risk takers, and makes
them general managers. It all sounds a bit silly, except for the fact that tens of
thousands of graduates have left Harvard believing it. (p. 51)
Furthermore, although the proponents of the approach claim it engages students in

thinking about how to apply management concepts, almost all cases present static
events that ignore the dynamic processes of management (Brennan & Ahmad, 2005;
Mintzberg, 2004). Others (see Argyris, 1980), contend that the approach not only fails
to teach students to question the underlying values and policies operating in their firms
but also actually encourages the opposite.
It is not the aim of this article to provide a comprehensive critique of the value of
the case study approach as a pedagogical tool. Rather, we simply present that for
decades, rightly or wrongly, many professors involved in the preparation of educa-
tional leaders have relied, perhaps to some degree heavily so, on these mostly seden-
tary approaches and low-stakes environments with the belief that they would engender
in students the ability to lead schools from an ethical center.
Ethics, Morals, and Values in Drama

and Educational Leadership
There is a growing empirical literature within the field of educational leadership that
attests to practitioners struggling with negotiating competing and irreducible value
stances and moral standpoints from their various publics (W. C. Frick, 2009). For
educational leaders, the key conflict is experienced as value incongruity between the
personal and organizational/ professional; part of moral leadership is the very real
intrapersonal grappling that occurs when normative rationality and technical rational-
ity do not align (J. Frick & Frick, 2010). In drama, as well as in literature, this friction
is referred to as the central conflict within a play and it is expected to exist; everyone
working on a play seeks to know the conflict to gain understanding. In plays as in life,
different characters operate from differing ethical frameworks, and that helps us see
how different ways of prioritizing our values lead to different perceptions and actions,
ultimately creating harmony or dissonance within our experience. The dramatic arts
help us to fully perceive the multiple humanities operating within conflict and chal-
lenge us to take a creative risk that, though not harmful, is more challenging than a
traditional role-play reading task in a classroom.
Decisions guided by any ethical framework have the potential to cause conflict
because they reflect one set of priorities, which may or may not match all other pos-
sible sets of priorities. For example, if a school leader values the quality of relation-
ships and creating a sense of belonging and mutuality over other considerations, then
he or she might use what J. Frick and Frick (2010) called an ethic of connectedness
which has specific implications on our actions or decision-making processes. In an
ethic of connectedness in schools, peer support, peer norms, curricular evaluation, and
staff and administrator training all aim to develop and enhance a sense of connected-
ness in the school community. Strategies for increasing connectedness within a school
setting are always multifold, but no matter what the source or system, creating trusting
relationships among students, teachers, staff, administrators, and families is always a
part of the equation of an ethic of connectedness. The negative implications of a well-
earned spirit of connectedness might be a closing off to newcomers or outsiders, or the
devaluing of individual accomplishments.
Second, for every ethical framework one can study, there is a parallel in the dra-
matic arts that practices that ethic or gives it praxis. For example, part of the disciplin-
ary intent of theatrical training is to understand connectedness not only as a concept
but also to experience it in every project and endeavor. Connectedness is fostered,
demanded, practiced, applied, and eventually mastered in the ensemble-driven enter-
prise of creating a performance, as is the ethic of critique, care, and so on. The lan-
guage of ethics is strongly present in the language theater artists use to fathom the
meaning of any dramatic work and accomplish it as a creative act. In fact, Spolin
(1963) would say the dramatic arts take as their focus the central problem of being a
human being.
There is no understanding of ethical frameworks without some discussion of under-
lying values that shape them. Our values have syntax and are nested in ever-expanding
circles or spheres, according to Begley (2004) who said that in matters of values, we
move from what is in our closest circle, considerations of self, to our motivations, to
our understandings, to our values, and then end with attitudes that lead to actions. The
values syntax of Begley resembles the theatrical process used in actual production-
oriented theater or process-oriented theater like applied drama. One begins with
understanding ones character and his or her motivations, given knowledge and values.
Then one creates movement, gesture, vocal inflection, and interactions with others that
express the attitudinal posture of the person, which gives rise to believable and likely
actions such a person would make. This is precisely why the art, which can spring out
of absolute fiction, rings so compellingly true. Applied drama helps us witness the
values syntax in the order Begley suggested, and helps us create images and referents
for what an ethics, such as an ethic of connectedness (J. Frick & Frick, 2010), or any
other ethical framework might look like. Case studies may be more like dramatic
scripts than has been acknowledged. They simply may need to be played out before us
and not just read in solitude for their full import to be discovered.
From Framework to Outcomes:

Witnessing Dramatic Decision Making
Rather than considering just one ethical framework, such as that of critique, or care,
or connectedness, among others, Shapiro and Stefkovich (2011) offered that the ethic
of profession encompasses all the ethical perspectives, and that school leaders can and
should utilize multiple ethical perspectives as needed or even simultaneously. They
also point out that such solutions are highly significant in a more complex, globalizing
world with increased diversity of students and stakeholders. Eyal, Berkovich, and
Schwartz (2011) noted that the adoption of the multiple ethical paradigms approach
to dilemmas faced by principals contrasts with earlier approaches that assumed ethical
dilemmas should be solved by adopting a single ethical posture, and then they go on
to develop an instrument to test which of the multiple paradigms might or might not
tend to correlate.
With this recent emphasis on a kind of breadth from multiple, simultaneous ethical
frameworks working together as backdrop, we turn to the applied drama to help us
visualize how that looks when working within this directed, fixed-script method. In
watching or doing a play with a set outcome, that is, an outcome based on a complex
network of decision making and interactions, which has been derived from the content
of a standard case study, one can witness characters who may be motivated by multiple
ethical perspectives trying to do the right thing. In addition then, by contrast, one can
observe that the actions born from difficult ethical dilemmas tend to have a singularity
about them that belies the multiplicity that the reasoned, integrative, and most likely
thoughtful decision-making process might have actually entailed. The decision to fire
a veteran teacher may have come about through the application of multiple ethical
frameworks applied by well-intentioned administrators trying to do the right thing, but
when accomplished has the same strong effect as if one had only been motivated by a
single thought, such as, I want to get that teacher fired. Not an ethical motivation at
all, it seems, and yet, the result is similar if not equal.
What a drama about such a decision-making process does is allow us to see the
funneling effect of ethics on action and feel what is at stake as we see who benefits
most and who is most pained. Drama prevents us from ignoring the intensity of the
inevitable outcomes of our ethical decisions, no matter how well synthesized or mul-
tiple are the ethical frameworks that led us to them. The directed, fixed-script method
reveals to us what any good comedy or tragedy would, that is, that actions are rarely
perceived exactly as they are intended to be perceived, and that the results of our deci-
sions rarely feel or are understood exactly as we had predicted they would be.
What is critical to this interdisciplinary work is to acknowledge that without imagina-
tion, we cannot perceive even one outcome, let alone the infinite that are possible. Drama
helps us access the moral imagination and watch how things actually or potentially play
out. In the workshop, we consciously apply one ethical framework based on the work of
Begley (2010), to all of the performed scenarios, and have found this to be very genera-
tive in terms of dialogue and thoughtful inquiry. Others could of course be used.
Drama As a Conceptual Orientation

for Educational Leadership
Most ethical frameworks stress the cognitive domain, articulating those things that are
easily verbalized or reasoned. Yet, the psycho-emotional domain features prominently
in the most difficult interactions between school staff and administrators and among
administrative teams, as does a physical reality in which these interactions take place.
We sought a new conceptual orientation for understanding the fuller picture of school
leadership, and particularly for understanding how relationality, a cognitive, psycho-
emotional, and physical phenomenon, is felt by stakeholders in decision-making
processes.
Katz and Quill (2008) argued that although one might be able to teach about ethical
virtues through the detailed analysis of cases, learning about them through an art like
literature, for example, offers distinct insights into what characters do in actually mak-
ing decisions. For Katz and Quill, the characters found in novels
often have to muddle through messy situations and make decisions on a less
than fully rational basis, sometimes misunderstanding their own motivation
and/or the situations they find themselves in, but dramatizing how deeply
embedded features of their character manifest themselves through their conduct.
(p. 1)
They also contend that the meaning of cases will be amplified if they are refash-
ioned as literary works because when presented as static facts, cases lose the signifi-
cance of the nuances that shape the dynamics of human interaction (Katz & Quill,
2008).
However, the process of turning cases into well-written, possibly more nuanced
literary works, though admirable, has its limits. This process still fails to call on the
bodily kinesthetic dimension of our knowledge and does not require us to exercise our
intuition or imagination in any communal space. Real decision making happens in real
time, on our feet, and requires an attunement to reason and intuition and others. As
Spolin (1963) suggested about the dramatic orientation in general, the intuitive can
only respond in immediacy right now. It comes bearing its gifts in the moment of
spontaneity, the moment when we are freed to relate and act, involving ourselves in the
moving, changing world around us (p. 4). In addition, Grosz (1994) reminded us that
lived experiences are always embodied. In this way, although the best-written stories
might allow us to imagine what we might do if we faced a similar situation, only
drama provides us with an approximation of how we might act and actually feel were
we to be placed as an actor who had to play the scene (Grosz, 1994).
We realized that methods that performing artists routinely use to create and under-
stand a fictional character can conversely be used to gain familiarity with the nonfic-
tion characters with whom we all work, and are. The embodiment of the decision-making
process involves the physicalization of the dynamics between persons, where actual,
often unstated objectives usually complicate stated objectives and where uneven status
levels play out in the midst of a negotiation in wordless ways. Peoples feelings are
rendered visible to us in actions, revealing a dramatic tension inherent in a whole
range of interactions (Meyer, 2004). We turned to the art of drama to help us under-
stand and process the content of highly charged decision-making moments in schools
because it can hold this complexity.
J. Frick and Frick (2010) have explored the importance of an ethic of connected-
ness for effective school leadership and the experience of a school district in nurturing
and building a connectedness within the school community. They contend that this
ethic of connectedness must be enculturated. The disciplinary term ensemble-building,
which is used in the theater arts to describe those processes and methods that create
interpersonal and intrapersonal trust, care, listening, attentiveness, responsiveness,
and reliability, can perhaps best be understood, in educational leadership ethics terms,
as an example of the ethic of connectedness (Frick & Frick, 2010) that seems so
desired in the quest for real school improvement. The theater arts, by developing an
ethic of connectedness, or by being ensemble-building enterprises, then, contain
within them the acculturated practices for which Frick and Frick are calling, which is
why synthesizing tactics between the theater arts and educational leadership becomes
compelling and natural to consider.
According to J. Frick and Frick (2010), community is not defined as an entity but
rather an ongoing set of processes that include communication, dialogue, and collabo-
ration. This position purports that being and acting ethically cannot be achieved with-
out collective commitment to the constructive methods of communal process.
How then do we get to know an ongoing set of processes that comprise such a place
as a school? Sedentary reading seems to fall short as an answer. Solo decision making
seems to lack the reality check of a dynamic workplace. Enacting the above proposi-
tions with educational leaders through the use of applied drama requires the very clear
modeling of a collective commitment to constructive methods of communal processes.
Alternative approaches that help us study leadership in its three-dimensionality seem
worthy of consideration given the recent scholarship in educational leadership ethics
that points in these directions.
If we look at the lists of traits or dispositions of moral leaders, as delineated, for

example, in the work of Starratt (2004) as responsibility, authenticity, and presence, or
in Begley (2005) who proposed reflective self-honesty, relational sensitivity, and dia-
logical openness, what emerges are qualities of character that are easily and readily
available to analyze, enact, and practice in an interdisciplinary manner. Each trait
above has a potentially performative aspect. We can literally witness these qualities as
they are actively lived in our colleagues whom we admire. Although we cannot stare
at our coworkers, in attending to drama, we are given permission to gaze at a play that
is somewhat life-like and can elicit profound emotion and cognition, even kinesthetic
response, simultaneously.
The inherent by-products of the theater processes include being accountable to oth-
ers to do ones part; being real or finding the reality within an imagined situation long
enough to hold it and study it and feel it; being in the moment; discovering truths;
being sensitive to others by seeing and listening; taking in all viewpoints, including
personal history; and immersing oneself in a world of dissonant or consonant beliefs
(Spolin, 1963). Applied theater counts on these disciplinary specific educational ben-
efits without pointing toward a professionally produced final product as the goal of
doing theatrical exploration.
The extensive applications of dramatic methods from the art of theater, broadly
conceived, to other subjects has yielded dozens of categories under the broadly
arching terms of process drama (ONeill, 1995) or applied drama (Nicholson,
2005) that have unique histories but also do at times overlap in their techniques
and outcomes. Oftentimes, these forms of drama rely heavily on improvising roles
and not knowing how things will turn out (Nicholson, 2005; ONeill, 1995).
Conceptually, they are modes of learning that allow learners of any age to use
imagined roles to explore issues, events, and relationships (Crumpler, Rogers, &
Schneider, 2006).
Drawing heavily on process and applied drama techniques, the directed, fixed-
script approach focuses participants on learning and thinking about some of the ethical
dilemmas inherent in educational administration, gives them the foundational content
one would have in a traditional case study, and allows them to develop an embodied
understanding of complex decision making (Clark et al., 1997). With drama as a con-
ceptual orientation for understanding the dynamics of leadership, we attempt a more
authentic, more fully realized simulation of the lives of school leaders.
Engaging Drama in School Leadership

The illuminations of the intersections and mutual implications between theater and
ethics in the writings of Ridout (2009) provided the theoretical orientation used in this
study. Ridout suggested that theater is exceptionally well suited to dramatize ethical
situations. Ridout posits that since the time of Plato, the theater, though the home of
fiction, is a practice and a place through which we can experiment with ethical action
and seek truth.
In this interdisciplinary work, we turned to the theater arts for their analytic meth-
ods, vocabulary and dynamic embodiment of human situations. Ridout (2009) helped
bridge the idea of drama and ethics as he pointed out that the two fields revolve around
the same core question, insofar as both theater and ethics ask, How shall I act?
The study attempted to illuminate not only how theater might provide an avenue to
study ethical acts but also how it might allow students to gain a sense of embodying
them. This is significant because Begley (1999) argued that preparation programs
designed for educational administrators should not treat ethics as another management
strategy to be observed from a distance. Rather, professors of educational administra-
tion ought to immerse educational leaders in the struggles associated with the chal-
lenges of determining what is right, not just what is most expedient, or efficient, or
effective under a specific set of circumstances (Begley, 1999).
In light of the theoretical orientation provided by Ridout (2009), three key ques-
tions about developing school leaders warrant serious consideration:
1. How might insights and techniques lent from theater methods help educators
to more actively construct and engage new understandings of the typical
situations encountered in the school as a workplace environment?
2. How might theater broaden our understanding of difference and help educa-
tors develop empathy?
3. When given opportunities to experience the dynamics of human interplay
from a dramatic perspective, do educators experience new attitudes, out-
looks, or capabilities regarding their felt understanding of the ethical dimen-
sions of school leadership?
This study attempted to answer these questions by observing and also asking edu-
cators to share their experiences of participating in a workshop that used an innovative
directed, scripted approach to explore some of the ethical dimensions of school
leadership.
Methodological Approach
Many researchers have realized that disciplinary specialization has costs, not the least
of these being fragmenting knowledge and narrowing understandings that only partially
inform problem solving encountered in real life (Kafatos & Eisner, 2004). Educators are
not purely students of some subject matter. Rather they should be students of problems,
and problems cut right across the borders of any subject matter or discipline (Popper,
1963). Artists consider their work in making a scene come to life to be a problem-
solving endeavor. Thus, this study adopted an interdisciplinary orientation that allowed
for the creative and critical expression of knowledge, skills, and dispositions from two
seemingly different specialties. Taken together, theater and educational administration
integrate two different sets of problem-solving skills as a means to shed new light on
contemporary problems in personnel management (Brewer, 1999).
When academic researchers collaborate with theater artists, they bring together
their respective areas of expertise to a project and create a synergistic product that
more effectively balances science and art (Saldana, 2010). It is fairly accepted that
interdisciplinary approaches, when they bring together the authentic learning from
their respective fields or disciplines, can yield great insight (Popper, 1963). Theater is
an interesting partner to education because theater is a powerful tool for building com-
munity. It is also a creative, social activity that allows for the exploration of concepts,
issues, and problems central to the human condition (Clark et al., 1997).
An interpretative analytic framework and case study methodology were used in this
qualitative, arts-based research study. Because, as McCammon (2007) contended, the
dominant methodology in drama/theater education research is the descriptive case
study, (p. 950) our project, which reenvisions the use of cases in educational leader-
ship development, became a case study in itself (McMillan, 2010). Arts-based research
is an umbrella term for diverse research practices and can include, among other things,
performance scripts and theater performances as methodological tools (Hesse-Biber &
Leavy, 2011).
Our interest in meanings, perspectives, and understandings led us to apply a quali-
tative research approach to the entire workshop (Johnson & Christensen, 2012). As
Belliveau and Lea (2011) asserted, arts-based research often draws on traditional qual-
itative research tools to gather data, and these data collection tools can include items
such as open-ended questionnaires and field notes. Thus, the primary sources of data
came from participants responses to a set of pre- and postworkshop open-ended ques-
tionnaires, and from nonparticipant observer field notes made during the workshop by
a research assistant who was not a workshop facilitator (Johnson & Christensen, 2012;
McCammon, 2007; McMillan, 2010; Plano Clark & Creswell, 2010).
The preworkshop questionnaire consisted of eight items that asked participants to
provide some background demographic data about themselves and to note any previ-
ous experience with case study pedagogical approaches to exploring ethical dimen-
sions of school leadership. The postworkshop questionnaire, which consisted of 12
items, asked the participants to express their opinions about the value of this directed,
fixed-script approach and also included questions about key concepts participants
thought they might take away from the workshop. The open-ended questionnaires
were designed to allow participants to provide answers to open questions in their own
terms or in a manner that reflected their own perceptions rather than those of the
researchers (Johnson & Christensen, 2012).
The nonparticipant observer recorded the specific activities of the workshop and
noted participant comments and interactions that the research assistant felt noteworthy
(McMillan, 2010; Plano Clark & Creswell, 2010). Throughout the data gathering, the
researchers tried to remain cognizant of the caution offered by Beare and Belliveau
(2008) who suggested that one of the biggest challenges in art-based approaches to
research is maintaining a balance between the art and research foci.
The researchers did not attempt to predict what the outcomes might be for partici-
pants, but analyzed the data using a recursive, also referred to as a constant-comparative,
approach (McMillan, 2010; Plano Clark & Creswell, 2010) to see whether this unique
endeavor in professional development for school leaders might in some small ways build
their perceptions of their creative capacity as active and empathetic learners, and deepen
their awareness of the ethical dimensions of educational leadership.
The recursive analysis involved identifying a set of key themes by reading and
rereading the questionnaires and field notes, and organizing themes into a coded hier-
archy (McMillan, 2010). Clustering lower order codes developed higher order themes.
This approach allowed flexibility in some of the themes being developed a priori from
the literature review, whereas other codes were developed during the analysis process
(McMillan, 2010). All methodological procedures complied with ethical guidelines
approved by two university ethics boards.
The Participants
A total of 3 men and 11 women participated in the study. Seven of the participants
held formal school leadership positions, such as principal, vice-principal, or depart-
ment head. Three were teachers. Two others held leadership roles at either a postsec-
ondary institution or in education-related community-based programs. Finally, two of
the participants were full-time students who aspired to be educational administrators
at some point.
The Workshop
The authors cofacilitated a 2-day intensive workshop in theatrical methods for educa-
tional leaders focused on developing, studying, and experiencing directed, fixed-
script dramas. The workshop, which drew on classic and contemporary
ensemble-building methods that are frequently applied in the service of developing
performing arts projects, is best characterized as a form of applied/process drama
(Nicholson, 2005; ONeill, 1995) as it was largely process oriented and not designed
for a performance for a larger audience external to the workshop (McCammon, 2007).
As such, the participants had to work alone in writing, drawing, thinking, and moving;
with a partner in pair-share exercises; accomplish dozens of carefully ordered and
progressively challenging movement and vocal exercises like mirroring, statues,
action/reaction; and in discussing the ever changing and developing sense of trust,
ensemble, connectedness, etcetera, they might be experiencing. They also worked in
small groups to rehearse and perform their assigned play, taking roles that did not
reflect their current professional position. Thus, we had principals playing students,
teachers playing administrators, and so on.
Each group worked with the director to explore entrances, stage movement pat-
terns, interrelations between characters, postures, gestures, vocal choices, and con-
cluding stage pictures. All of the choices made were built on the vocabulary of theater
we had established through the entire workshop. Life experience and imagination
helped participants create believable portrayals of their characters. The entire group
functioned as a cohesive ensemble in exercises, discussions, and during large-scale

group drawings and brainstorming projects. All of this served to warm-up and free
the body, voice, and mind for the culminating work of staging the plays in small
groups for other participants to witness and discuss (Spolin, 1963). Group discussion,
based on Begleys (2010) framework, on the ethical dilemmas highlighted in each
script followed the performances. A final, individual-written reflection concluded the
workshop.
The Scripts
In this project, we scripted and dramatized fictional but universal narratives that had
been previously taught as straightforward cases in an education graduate-level course.
The important intervening step between the stand-alone cases borrowed from an edu-
cational administration course and the fixed scripts was the writing of a fictional
book-length narrative that created a literary arc through all of the stories and put them
in relation to one another. The scripts, fully formatted with stage directions and set-
tings, were adapted from various scenes in the book-length narrative. As mentioned
previously, three one-act plays titled Grace Period, Discrimination, and How to Fire
a Teacher were used at this workshop.
Participants each took a role in one of the one-act scenarios and were able to wit-
ness the other plays as audience members. The nuanced coaching and direction mim-
icked a professional theater setting, with director as dramaturg, facilitator of creative
choices by the actors, movement and vocal coach, and integrator of all elements. This
approach in part addresses the criticism supported by Abbs (1992), who alleged that
drama, used extensively as a medium for cross-curricular learning, has lost its integ-
rity: Devoid of art, devoid of the practices of theater, devoid of artistic and critical
terminology, drama became a method of teaching without a subject (p. 2). The high
quality of the presentations and moments of authentic insight about human nature,
discovered through the directed, fixed-script method, conveyed the ethical dilemmas
in each scenario all the more clearly.
Notwithstanding the strong performances elicited from this process, the intention
of the workshop was to explore the complex intersections of methodologies in drama,
educational leadership, and ethics that might facilitate understandings and the con-
struction of meaning among educational leaders when exposed to these two worlds of
expertise with ethical concerns as an intersection; it was not to turn participants into
advanced actors or educational leadership professionals into directors.
Findings
The findings drawn from the analysis of the data collected during the workshop
revealed that, overall, the participants found that a theatricalized approach to under-
standing the ethical dimensions of decision making for educational leaders had tre-
mendous value. For the purposes of this article, we focus on three emergent themes
that presented themselves in the written comments of several participants and were
supported by the data derived from the field notes. The first theme was the partici-
pants reactions to a theatrical approach to studying cases in general. The second was
their perceptions about and experience of theater as an imaginative experience of
otherness. The third theme highlights their perceptions of leadership and ethics not
only as understood cognitively but also as developed through the embodied, felt
dimensions of the physical and emotional learning domains.
Scripts and Dramatic Approaches Get Cases on Their Feet

It was clear to all participants who read the workshop description that we were going
to approach typical school leadership cases differently. It is therefore not surprising
that throughout the workshop, participants took numerous opportunities to articulate
that they found the idea of studying cases as scripts interesting in many ways.
However, what emerged in the analysis of the data were actual values statements
regarding the worth of an intentional, embodied, active mode of learning in their
field. In fact, they made a point to note, variously, how this approach to understand-
ing the contextual dimensions of school leadership was different from other ways
they had studied educational leadership, and they seemed intrigued by what the
workshop might offer. This sentiment is illustrated by the comments made by two
participants, who stated,
Usually when we discuss [educational leadership] cases we are on the outside

of case studies looking in, but this is very different. (P-14)
[I find it] much easier to internalize by seeing the situations performed. I hate
being asked to read through a case so that we can then discuss it. I was happy
when I found we could watch them and do them instead of just reading about
them. (P-3)
During the workshop exercises and rehearsals, many participants noted that the
scripted and enacted approaches were unlike other experiences with more traditional
approaches to learning from cases. For example, participants stated,
This workshop approach was so much less theoretical than the traditional case
study approaches [I am used to], and I like this one better. (P-10)
I know I remember much more through acting than simply reading a study in an
education class. (P-7)
I think most people understand situations better when they can see them played
out in front of them. (P-2)
Most of the cases I had read previously were in the context of legal case studies,
where you tried to guess the verdict and why the jury decided that way. They
were mostly put into a win/lose situation. (P-8)
Usually it [studying cases] is a solitary study and personal reflection, or some-

times it involves a passing, small-group discussion. But, its usually not a per-
sonally creative and physical investment. (P-14)
Many of the participants comments illustrate that although traditional teaching

approaches to studying cases might be touted as pedagogical tools that allow students
to think on their feet, the participants did not perceive that those approaches really
allowed for purposeful, embodied interaction with experience.
In addition, many of the participants agreed that their past experiences of enacting
cases in educational leadership, oftentimes described as role-plays, were awkward or
limited ways of understanding the dilemmas or construction of meanings those cases
were purportedly meant to deliver. For different reasons, they had found the role-plays
frustrating. A powerful example was offered by one of the participants who contrasted
his previous experiences of role-plays with the theater methods and approaches of the
workshop:
Ive had some experience with role-plays, which were often open-ended by design.
But, these written scripts were not. It was different knowing where or how the story
will end and having to try and work within that, and it focused me to think about
the specific words and actions, and not just portray the facts of the case. (P-14)
Furthermore, a number of participants explained how they had experienced open-

ended role-plays, where a partially sketched-out character description lets learners
improvise multiple outcomes and interactions. Many expressed that the usefulness of
unscripted role-plays had depended on the quality of each individuals improvisational
skills, which were not always refined enough or even enough to make the case seem
realistic. They also noted that oftentimes, the usefulness of the exercise suffered as the
performance tended to degenerate into frivolity. As one participant stated,
Most of the time, when weve done role-plays, things have gotten carried away
and people start to bring in things that have nothing to do with the case. I am
not sure if they are overly self-conscious or what, but in the enjoyment of play-
ing a role they overact and the whole thing becomes unrealistic. (P-11)
One innovative aspect of the workshop that elicited favorable comments was how
it involved theatrical techniques, stage direction, and relied on a script that could be
read, studied, and returned to. The following statement of one participant, which was
recorded during one of the workshop breaks, illustrates this sentiment:
I think there is a lot that can learned by drawing on the [drama] techniques we
learned and used [in the workshop] to help us learn how to reflect on some of
the really hard ethical challenges that come with being a leader. (P-2)
The participants remarked that they saw unique value in the use of scripted plays as
learning tools for those who are, or hope to be, school leaders. They felt the script and
stage direction helped them develop awareness of some of the complex, organizational
politics that are involved in many decision-making processes:
The scripts were so real in many ways. In exposing others to these kinds of
personnel dilemmas, I think it can prepare them to think on their feet through
simulation rather than a trial-by-fire, real-life first-time exposure . . . This pro-
cess definitely helped validate a process of feeling my way through the possible
outcomes of the real-life dramas we can expect to encounter. (P-10)
I definitely think I learned more about what leaders go through, and will retain
the information. I am kind of surprised how much I enjoyed the theatricalized
scripting of case studies. (P-12)
I think this [experience] absolutely helps me envision a solution or multiple

solutions to the real-life problems in ed. leadership, in different ways than I did
before. (P-11)
It was almost nightmarish to go home the first night, crack open the script, and
read about a dilemma I had just lived and suffered through recently at my
school. I might not have believed every detail otherwise, but it was all there.
(P-6)
Frequently in rehearsing and acting out the scripts during the workshop, it was
noted by the nonparticipant observer that the participants made comments that the fac-
tors that are considered by administrators in their decision-making processes were not
really as black and white as many might have previously thought. By literally having
to jump into a role, armed with some tools with which to do so, the participants indi-
cated that they were immersed in the communal, ensemble dynamic of live theater,
which was a new way of knowing for many of them, and involved gradations of mean-
ing rather than easy pronouncements.
Opportunities to Imagine and Enact

Provide a Greater Sense of Empathy
Not only did participants note that their understandings of the complexity of the ethics
of personnel management in schools increased, but they also described how taking on
a character that was different from their own seemed to open them to experience
anothers perspective that they would otherwise not have known. One participant
remarked at the end of the first evening that she had been cast in a role that put her
into the position she was hoping to one day hold, that of school principal. She noted
that, in preparing for a role in the scene she had been led to reflect deeply on who she
would be in actuality someday, and in her notes, she mentioned that she had never
actually visualized herself as principal until that workshop experience. Other people
also said they were playing roles they did not hold currently but that one day they
could indeed see themselves in those positions.
It seemed that participants could easily commiserate with the teacher and student
characters found throughout any given play, having for the most part lived both roles,
though they were often challenged by playing teachers or students that bore little or no
resemblance to their own attitude, experiences, or circumstances. It was the hard reality
of administrators and human resources staff trying to do the right thing that captured
their imagination. The ethical dilemmas faced by those in charge of the hiring, retention,
and firing of teachers were quite intriguing for many participants who had never had to
deal with those particular ethical issues, as supported by one participant who stated,
I may be able to act out various scenarios on my own to practice, visualize and
feel the consequences of various solutions . . . But, Ive never seen human
resources this way. (P-7)
Two further examples of how the workshop deepened understandings and transpar-
ency of the impact of the kind of personnel-related issues that transpire in schools are
illustrated by the following comments:
The [scripts] helped me envision what the human resources people go through
when faced with some really tough challenges. (P-7)
Ive always felt that our district human resources [personnel] had it hard, espe-
cially as I watched the painful process of a school in my former district being
shut down. Now even more, I do not envy their job. Its clear that the work takes
a toll on them. (P-5)
The empathy expressed for those in the role of human resources directors in schools
alone was significant.
Furthermore, a number of participants noted that the theatrical approaches of the
workshop enlivened their overall perspectives on all relationships in schools. For
example, in a conversation with one of the workshop facilitators, a participant stated,
I started to wonder what [I would do] if I was that character instead of this one? How
should or would I act in that situation? (P-1), whereas another participant commented,
Ive been thinking: If I was his character [pointing at another participant], what would
I do or want to do in the scene? This [approach] helps support a process of thinking
through the possible outcomes of some real-life dramas. (P-9)
Several of the participants stated that they had been told in lectures or workshops
that it was important for those in leadership positions to try to see the challenges they
faced from multiple perspectives but had not been exposed to a practice that could
teach a person what this really meant. In this workshop format, the notion of empathy
was not just a notion to be spoken about but had to be enacted to fully understand the
drama. This can be illustrated by the following comments two participants shared:
[Now] I appreciate more and get a feeling of the story behind the story, and the
perspective that brings from having to act it out. (P-3)
Ive lived many of these scenes from [only] one side and never knew how being
on the other side felt. (P-11)
Theater allows us to digest an issue from a different perspective. (P-12)
Regardless of what your truth is, you know, those things you hold to be true,
now I can get a sense of how others may perceive my actions and me differently
than I perceive my own actions. (P-5)
Throughout the second day of the workshop, many of the participants noted that the
characters in the scripts often resonated with them personally, as they had to navigate
through messy situations and make decisions on less than a fully informed basis.
Participants appreciated the way art allowed them to hold complexity, if only in an
ephemeral way, long enough to witness its many facets, one of which is this walking
in the shoes of another.
Interestingly, no one thought that having his or her own perspective challenged
was a bad thing, and some of the participants were clearly moved by the mental
and emotional pain and suffering of certain characters. Participants seemed wel-
coming of the possibility that by working through the cases as scripts and building
compassion for multiple characters in a scenario, they might be more astute and
alert to the right course of action should they encounter a situation like this in the
future:
Drama does help you see many sides of an issue and gives you a chance to think
creatively how you might act in the same situation. (P-2)
If I really want to practice being in the shoes of someone else and anticipate
their motivations or get their perspectives, I need chances to try it out . . . Drama
is real-life emotional engagement in a specific situation. (P-14)
Seeing things before they happen, and experiencing facets of the human condition
that we would never otherwise see, may be two of the great gifts of theater not only to
education but also to the world.
Another dimension of empathy that was written and spoken about by educational
leaders in the workshop was their growing awareness themselves as creative beings:
I had already thought about leadership as being somewhat creative, but now my
thinking about leadership as a creative act has changed. (P-14)
My thinking about myself [as a leader] has [actually] changed as a result of the
workshop. (P-4)
Id already considered leadership to be a kind of artistic act, both literally and

figuratively, and this workshop simply reinforced that for me. (P-5)
Because the artistic self can go unnourished in our professional day jobs, redis-
covering that self could be seen as a form of self-empathy or compassion for self. In
addition, some participants noted that the workshop became more revelatory than they
had expected, insofar as it revealed a more explicit philosophical understanding of the
connections between creativity, ethics and leadership:
The workshop showed me that as a teacher or leader I have a great capacity to

teach others how to be creative. Leadership is not black and white but mostly
grey . . . and drama shows that. (P-7)
Ive never thought of leadership as a creative act, not really. But after this work-
shop I guess I will from now on. (P-3)
Now I am thinking that leadership is about strategy, tact, human relations and
sensing others. [I now see that] the same is true for acting. (P-2)
Decision-making, at least ethical decision-making, means considering more

roles, considering more people. Rather than taking one of the obvious solutions,
I ought to consider my and others reactions to ethical dilemmas. (P-1)
Clearly, the interdisciplinarity of the workshop connected to many participants

intuitive notions of how leadership demands a sort of creativity in action. If empathy
itself is a creative act of the imagination, without the fostering of creativity, empathy
might be limited. Here, it appears that the workshop provided real opportunities to
develop both.
A Directed, Fixed-Script Approach

Develops a Felt Sense of Relational Trust
The participants commented on how being directed and acting through the scripted
plays helped them develop a different understanding of how interpersonal relationships
are felt in ethically charged situations. As one participant wrote in response to a question
about what he might take away from the workshop in the postworkshop questionnaire,
The thing that I think will most resonate with me in my day-to-day work in
schools will be the reminder to take time to build trust and give opportunities
for successful interaction before entering high stakes work or decision-making.
(P-9)
Many also noted how the use of scripts and having to act in the real time of the
workshop performance enhanced their understanding of the importance and complexi-
ties of what it means to be committed to relationships in the workplace. One partici-
pant stated,
Other experiences that Ive had in studying educational administration seemed

to lack the human dimensions of trust building. I also found it a real challenge
to try and reflect on what is going on in the relationship in many case studies
previously as it was presented as if the relationship existed outside of time.
(P-11)
Participants suggested that although they had known that education is based on
various dimensions of human morality and relationship, they had never really felt how
hard it was to try and live out all of the competing commitments that exist between
people who work in schools:
Ive always known its [teaching and learning] about relationships and building
trust, but it also just takes time and lots of effort. In the plays I could feel that.
(P-10)
When we were working on our scripts in a group, and maybe because of the
vocal and theater exercises we practiced, I began to really consider the question
of how it feels to develop trust with someone. Maybe it has something to do
with dismantling boundaries between people; I am not sure but it makes me
think. (P-12)
Many noted how the workshop allowed them to move beyond thinking about their
bodies in a self-conscious manner, and begin to experience how their bodies felt as
they enacted scripts that depicted ethically charged scenes. As two participants noted,
What stood out for me is the fact that ethics and theater can be [so] closely
related. In the midst of the dramas I experience in school, the ones I know I feel
even when I try not to think about how I feel, I now get a sense of how I might
be able to detach myself and try to feel the situation as a scene. I think this will
help me in my work with people. (P-3)
I do need to remember that I do not know the entire personal situation of every
person involved. There is a certain amount of empathy that needs to take place
when knowing a situation will not turn out well for someone involved. But,
tough decisions do need to be made. (P-8)
Finally, the participants noted that taking time to act and also watch scenarios
between characters representing school staff opened some avenues of reflection on
the topic of relational trust and its impact on school culture and climate. The partici-
pants expressed that by engaging stories as scriptsand literally performing ethical
dilemmasthat the relationships between stakeholders in the cases were brought to
life. The rehearsal and performances of the cases illuminated the reality of personal
human experiences and the importance of relationships. Many noted how the dramas
helped them better understand how ethical dimensions of educational leadership might
be practiced.
Discussion
In educational leadership preparation, thinking through or talking through scenarios
brought up in cases is a predominate mode of learning (Kowalski, 2011; Strike et al.,
2005). Exercises that claim interactivity or kinesthetic components, like traditional
role-play, are often low-stakes activities and can be conducted without challenging
values or ethical practice deeply or transforming meaningfully (van Ments, 1999;
Wilheim, 2002).
Repositioning leadership preparation in a creative, interactive, fully-kinesthetic
atmosphere (Nicholson, 1999) made sense to the workshop participants of this study
who engaged with passion, energy, and thoughtfulness, and who seemed satisfied with
their ability to go out on these creative limbs of imaginative dramatic play (Egan,
1992). Indeed, the arguments made by Mintzberg (2004) regarding the lack of tacit
knowledge in the case approach and Smith (1987), who characterized some of the
pedagogical uses of the traditional case study approach as poor methods for learning
the kind of proactive skills required in management decisions, were strengthened by
the consistently positive response of participants experiencing this arts-based and cer-
tainly more kinesthetic approach. It was clear that there was tremendous value in
allowing people to move beyond the reconfirming dialogues they have with them-
selves in their heads as they study cases (Takacs, 2003).
After experiencing these creative processes, participants questioned other more
staid modes of learning, perhaps because the content of the cases was delivered or
experienced through multiple learning literacies. In addition, because we did not
design this project to include a norm by which we could make a more quantitative
comparison of the learning gains when these exact three themes were taught as more
straightforward cases in a graduate classroom setting, we had to rely on the partici-
pants own memory of their experiences with studying similar case content in a typical
graduate school class. Although it would be interesting to create such an experiment,
that was not the intent of this particular research project. Indeed, the workshop meth-
ods allowed administrators, teacher-leaders, and graduate students vistas into the real,
felt dimensions of educational leadership using learning literacies in an integrative
way that allowed the space for the discussion of all of the methods they have used to
develop their approach to ethical decision making thus far. The pedagogical approach
of the workshop (OToole, 2009), by virtue of engaging the theater arts, required that
the cognitive, affective, and psycho-motor domains be explored simultaneously and
fully to create a believable, multidimensional character who would bring to life the
words in the fixed scripts and embody the connectedness of people facing an ethic
dilemma in which conflict is inherent.
It also appears that by inhabiting a role and physically walking in someone elses
shoes (Kana & Aitken, 2007; McNaughton, 2004), learners can access a fuller picture
of human frailty and strength. Empathy is seen as the process of putting ones self in
the place of another and trying to experience the events of her or his life from that
persons perspective. We begin to empathize when we get a felt sense of what it might
be like to think, feel, or just be like another (OToole, 2009). The findings suggest
there is value in exploring theatrical ways of thinking about ethics, ones in which we
judge our behavior in the guise of an imaginary spectator within us and also see
others in light of our own creative imaginings of being them (Ridout, 2009, p. 33).
What started to emerge in this study was this intentional investigation of otherness as
a trait of an effective leader, in essence, the moral imagination that Tuana (2007) artic-
ulated as a base for ethics. Applied drama developed a trusting environment in which
to act out these sometimes trying or even traumatic narratives that are all too recogniz-
able by the seasoned school administrator (Kana & Aitken, 2007) such that learners
could empathize with the humanity in each and every character within a scenario.
The embodied learning assisted the ethical inquiry that was a through line of the
workshop content. When there is a crisis or a reckoning in personnel management in
schools that requires a creative and ethical response, people in proximity with one
another move through the problems in an embodied way while thinking about and
feeling them. Arguably, although the intentions or reasons for an act tell us something
about the morality of the individual, it is the ends of the act that tell us about the moral-
ity of the action (Ciulla, 2007). Ultimately, the study of ethics, usually the domain of
lecture and discussion, came alive through the dramatized scenarios that each partici-
pant lived through in the nuanced fiction, that is, theater (ONeill, 1995). Clearly, eth-
ics is grounded in practice, and theater and ethics are about how one ought to act
(Ridout, 2009; Starratt, 2008).
The present analysis suggests that, at a minimum, theatrical approaches to the ethi-
cal dimensions of leadership are worthy of consideration by those invested in finding
effective ways that support the ongoing development of school leaders. The findings
of this study suggest that such theatrical approaches have the potential to contribute to
effective leadership in multiple ways, some of which have been illuminated. The spe-
cial relevance to school leadership, indeed any form of organizational leadership,
revolves around the fact that leadership is enacted from a leader and follower
perspective. The drama found in school leadership can be viewed as a metaphor for
understanding human behavior as staged performance (Sinha, 2010). We can read oth-
ers and be read like a character in a play. The gestures, posture, voice, and word
choices we use are expressive; even when we mislead, we are expressive. A leader
who finds ways to stay in office most of the day is acting like he or she does not want
to be seen in his or her school. A leader who gets angry while explaining that everyone
needs to be more civil with one another cannot hope to fulfill the request. A leader who
takes time to listen fully to a teachers complaint may have acted just like the com-
plainant in another scenario earlier in his or her own professional life. When we take,
even temporarily, drama as a conceptual orientation for our work in schools, much is
potentially revealed to us about ourselves and our potential to contribute creatively,
compassionately and ethically to a schools climate and culture.
One of the unique facets of this workshop was the pairing of two people as facilita-
tors who admittedly could not do one anothers work. The results of this research do
not show so much how one teacher not schooled in theater may take on portions of this
work, but rather how two disciplinary specialists can provide something as an artist
educational researcher practitioner pair. Thus, the encouragement is given to practitio-
ners in the field of educational and leadership ethics to collaborate with skilled and
experienced performing artists whose dramaturgical skills can explore key themes in
anothers field of inquiry. Such collaborations should yield more lively and engaging
enactments of small scenes or larger one-act plays in the classroom, and will hopefully
build upon this present research. The only way to gain access to theatrical methods to
replicate or integrate them into ones own teaching is to experience theater as an
embodied art through full investment into the learning process with a skilled mentor
or facilitator. After that experience, the educational practitioner will have a multitude
of tactics from which he or she may draw to implement elements of appropriately.
Clearly, what is needed is more empirical research that tests some of the ideas pro-
posed in this article. Given the complexities that are inherent in school leadership,
more robust understandings of what constitutes effective preparation pedagogies hold
great promise not only for those who lead schools but also for all those who invest in
educational success.
Conclusion
Strengthening the capacity for potent and authentic leadership in contemporary school
contexts is more important than ever. Educational leaders are not passive recipients of
a story that occurs at school but are, instead, active participants in their events, ten-
sions, problems, and solutions (McNaughton, 2004). We suggest that in this second
decade of the 21st century, we should consider an inspired turn in leadership develop-
ment that, at its best, demands and supports new goals such as skill-building, mindful-
ness, creativity, and dialogue.
We found strong indications that the performing arts disciplines provide us with
alternative pedagogical approaches to generate meaningful and lasting insight into the
stories inevitably found in leadership preparation programs. Further iterations of the

workshop will need to be conducted and researched for us to better understand correla-
tions between specific elements of the entire process and the ways in which these are
creatively and intellectually interpreted by participants. Although not conclusive, the
findings of this study point toward a natural fusion of the ethical and the creative act,
and how theater methods like the closely directed, fixed-script approach we have
developed can provide a tangible experience of that integration.
School leaders, who might generally admit to dreading the drama of the workplace,
were given access to useful ethical frameworks that could help them evaluate difficult
real cases more responsibly and responsively. The stories they enacted became poi-
gnant, tense, gut-wrenching vistas into the profession, and the discussions regarding
ethical choices in educational leadership became passionate, emphatic, and clarifying.
Whereas we have the possibility of ignoring concepts we should be exposed to when
they reside as cases, stories made real through collaborative dramatization and reflec-
tion are arresting, demanding, and unforgettable.
Imagine reframing the drama of the workplace as a means to understand how to
better problem-solve. The drama in school leadership, when perceived as an unfore-
seeable series of chaotic, not-in-the-plan behaviors of coworkers, is depleting. The
drama in school leadership, when studied as drama through dramatic means, trans-
forms by bringing forth in the leader a creative, collaborative sensibility. Leaders
trained in this way, who learn to anticipate complexity and develop empathy, who are
aware of the thorny situations that will inevitably present themselves, and who know
how to actively engage in complex decision making, will likely be better prepared to
thrive in the diverse and changing world of schooling in the 21st century. The leader
who asks himself or herself How shall I act? needs to be given time and space and
direction to reflect on that felt understanding in community with others; the leader
who considers his or her role as inherently creative and ethical will not be stuck in a
singular, bounded vision of a situation, but will live out the answers to that profound
question in ways that surely benefit the complex collaboration we call school.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship,
and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship,
and/or publication of this article: This research project was supported, in part, through a
Hackworth Grant from the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.
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Author Biographies
Jerome A. Cranston, PhD, is an assistant professor and coordinator of the educational admin-
istration area group in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba. He researches
and teaches as part of an interdisciplinary, international community of inquiry on topics of
educational leadership and systemic inequity. His work uses critical perspectives to explore
organizational structures and behaviors that act as blinders to social injustice in the education
system.
Kristin A. Kusanovich has directed, choreographed, and produced more than 100 solos and
ensemble works in dance, drama, musical theater, opera, film, and video. She received her
master of fine arts in choreography and performance from New York Universitys Tisch School
of the Arts and her bachelor of arts from Santa Clara University in Dance with a minor in math-
ematics. Currently, she is a senior lecturer in the Department of Theatre and Dance and the
Liberal Studies Pre-Teaching Programs at Santa Clara University.

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Research on Leadership EducationCranston and Kusanovich

The Drama in School Leadership Education

of Decision Making for

Jerome A. Cranston1 and Kristin A. Kusanovich2

A fundamental challenge facing educational administrators and school leaders then is

approach to case study as one dimension of their professional development. Although

Furthermore, although the proponents of the approach claim it engages students in

Ethics, Morals, and Values in Drama

From Framework to Outcomes:

Drama As a Conceptual Orientation

If we look at the lists of traits or dispositions of moral leaders, as delineated, for

Engaging Drama in School Leadership

functioned as a cohesive ensemble in exercises, discussions, and during large-scale

Scripts and Dramatic Approaches Get Cases on Their Feet

Usually when we discuss [educational leadership] cases we are on the outside

Usually it [studying cases] is a solitary study and personal reflection, or some-

Many of the participants comments illustrate that although traditional teaching

Furthermore, a number of participants explained how they had experienced open-

I think this [experience] absolutely helps me envision a solution or multiple

Opportunities to Imagine and Enact

Theater allows us to digest an issue from a different perspective. (P-12)

Id already considered leadership to be a kind of artistic act, both literally and

The workshop showed me that as a teacher or leader I have a great capacity to

Decision-making, at least ethical decision-making, means considering more

Clearly, the interdisciplinarity of the workshop connected to many participants

A Directed, Fixed-Script Approach

Other experiences that Ive had in studying educational administration seemed

stories inevitably found in leadership preparation programs. Further iterations of the

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

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