“Getting things done” in community schools: the institutional work of community school managers

Abstract

ABSTRACT Community schools extend traditional school responsibilities by providing additional resources to support students, families, and communities, and ultimately attempt to change the school institution. Integral to the institutionalization of community schools are community school managers (CSMs) and their institutional work. Drawing from institutional theory, this study uses interview data to explore the deliberate actions taken by CSMs to create institutions, focusing on their efforts to develop their institutional identities and change normative associations. Institutional identities of CSMs were defined by their implementational responsibilities and organizational positioning. While CSMs skillfully identified, provided, and allocated resources within their implementational identity, the organizational identity remained ambiguous, lacking clarity on their organizational position or consistency in the teams on which they served. CSMs struggled to create normative associations that linked the resources they provided to the community school strategy. Moreover, the local leadership structure and principal support significantly and differentially impacted CSMs’ institutional work.