Exploring the journey of school improvement: classifying and analyzing patterns of change in school improvement processes and learning outcomes

Abstract

Based upon case study research, Jackson (2000) earlier proposed that school improvement could be conceptualized as a journey, and that the improvement challenges which schools face are determined, in part, by their location in that journey. This study sought to build upon these propositions by determining if it was indeed possible to classify schools according to different patterns of academic growth during their “school improvement journeys”. Then the research examined whether these patterns of school improvement could be linked to contextual conditions of the schools and changes in specific alterable school-level variables. The study found that schools could be successfully classified according to several predominant patterns of school improvement and that these patterns of growth in learning could be linked to features of the school context as well as to changes in collaborative, learning-directed leadership and school academic capacity.