Collaborative Agency in Educational Management: A Joint Object for School and Community Transformation

Abstract

This research paper discusses activities developed in a school located in a favela in the city of São Paulo, Brazil, and its surrounding community to deal with the issue of flooding. First, I present a review of the literature on educational management suggesting an expansive learning perspective, then I introduce the notion of collaborative agency as theoretical background. Methodologically, this study focuses on critical collaborative research and formative intervention, which implies different subjects taking part and negotiating decisions to be made during the research beyond school settings. The analysis is based on categories of description and argumentation, which contribute to the scrutiny of different voices and activities in the respective school and community. Thus, I discuss how collaborative agency contributes to the transformation of the given context: first, how the community becomes involved in the activities of the school, and second, how the school is involved in the activities of the community to overcome the problem of flooding. KEYWORDS | Collaborative agency, educational management, school-community transformation, critical collaborative research, formative interventions. RESUMO

Collective concept formation in educational management: An intervention study in São Paulo, Brazil

“…As direct continuation of the present study, Lemos and Liberali (in press) and Lemos Liberali and Toiviainen (in progress) analyze how educational managers plan activities based on the process of concept formation in educational management. Lemos (2017) reports on how the emerging new management concept, and plans based on it, are turned into practical local action. Such longitudinal studies might also include formative interventions, such as the Change Laboratory, that facilitate and push forward collective concept formation as an important component of transformation of practice (Sannino, Engeström, & Lemos, 2016).…”

Gestión del tiempo, trabajo colaborativo docente e inclusión educativa

“…El tiempo es un elemento del currículum y de la gestión educativa (Lemos, 2017), definido por una parte como una estructura lineal, estática, que ordena un plan determinado (Neufeld, 1991), y, por otra, como una dimensión compleja y flexible que responde a una necesidad y un momento (Hargreaves, 1992).…”

Education Model Based on Life Skill (a Meta-Synthesis)

“…Educational management has been understood as a tool or a technique to organize school work (Souza in Lemos, 2017), called as a science or process which based on resources managing to reach the productive education goal according to the planning effectively and efficiently (Surya, 2011). Kumpulainen et al (2010) associates it as school administration, whereas Bush (2011) states a field of study and practice concerned with the operation of educa-tional organizations.…”