Leadership for Social Justice in High-Poverty Schools: Exploration of Equity and Fundraising in an Urban-Suburban School

Abstract

School fundraising is a practice that is common in many schools in the United States. This is also true in high-poverty schools where there are many financial needs that are often not met. Lincoln Elementary School is one of these schools. A well-intentioned first-grade team of teachers develops and works to implement a plan to fundraise using their students to get monies for needed classroom technology. A problem arises when the reward designed to incentivize students to raise funds is put into question by one of the first-grade student’s parents. This complex case considers inequity, fundraising, intentions, principal decision-making, critical consciousness, and leading high-poverty schools using a lens of social justice.

Swimming Against the Current: Resistance to a Black Superintendent’s Fight to Lead With Equity in an Urban School District

“…Are there ways for Black superintendents to not assimilate into the predominate White culture or cater to White norms and still remain influential in the pursuit of equity? Critically conscious leaders analyze and attempt to improve inequitable systems (Freire, 1970; Skousen & Domangue, 2020). Are Black critically conscious leaders destined to be challenged because structures that have been normalized—like unequitable funding, racial isolation, housing segregation, and lack of employment in high-paying jobs—continue to oppress communities in a way that will continue to produce inequitable outcomes?…”

Which Elementary Schools Benefit From Philanthropy in California’s Sixth Largest District? Implications for Educational Equity

“…Though participating in school fundraising can foster a sense of community and shared mission (Christensen et al, 2016), the activity complicates the social dynamics of a school. Sociologists have described how fundraising skews power and authority away from official school site leaders like principals toward the parents who are most capable of fundraising (Skousen & Domangue, 2019); shifts the character, priorities, and values of a school site significantly (Posey-Maddox & Bloomfield Cucchiara, 2014); generates conflict about decision making, accountability, and authority (Laureau & Muñoz, 2012); and marginalizes families of color (Freidus, 2019) and families of lower-socioeconomic status (Posey-Maddox, 2012). These aforementioned sociologists have described how fundraising introduces a dynamic whereby school priorities become biased toward the interests of donors and caution when principals and teachers spend more time attending to the demands of donors, they have less availability to focus on the needs and concerns of students.…”