Alternative Education: Administrators’ Perspectives on Effective Leadership Practices

As a future administrator and alternative educator for over 24 years, I wondered what successful alternative administrators do to best support their staff and students. This curiosity led me to begin a comprehensive search for inspirational alternative Southern Vancouver Island administrators. In May 2020, I received ethical approval from the REB to conduct semi-structured qualitative interviews with six to twelve of the most extraordinary leaders I could find. Participants had to have been in their position in the last five years and be willing to share their personal stories, lessons learned, hopes for the future, and any other wisdom they thought new administrators like myself should know. My research study, therefore, qualitatively looks into what Vancouver Island alternative education administrators, from 2015-2020, learned, experienced, and consider to be effective leadership practice in alternative schools. In the end, I was fortunate to find eight remarkable alternative administrators, including past and present principals, vice-principals, and assistant superintendents, that agreed to meet with me over Zoom. Their professionalism, passion, excitement and sometimes tears, as we explored their leadership experiences and strategies with trauma and burnout, have been emotional and powerful.

Preliminary analysis indicates that themes and commonalities in their experiences and stories are emerging. I believe what is learned from these leaders will significantly contribute to the academic conversation around alternative school leadership in BC. The data could potentially provide powerful Southern Vancouver Island leadership strategies and practices, which may help to improve alternative education experiences for teachers and students both here and beyond.

Please ask me anything! Do you want to know why I picked semi-structured interviews, the qualitative method, how I received permission to do the research in the two districts that approved me, or how to get going on the Ethics Review Board process? How about how to get help with the library, access to old thesis, finding writing support for your papers, navigating Zoom, COVID issues, or what software to use for analysis? I’m here to help, so please do not hesitate to ask.