Empowerment, at least from a teacher's aspect allows for a teacher to be fearless in the growth and refining process of achieving the goals of the shared vision of the school. This writer believes empowerment and buzzword are both relative terms. For instance, during the civil rights movement African Americans were empowered through central leadership (Malcolm X, M.L. King Jr.) to stand up for certain unalienable rights. What if there were some African Americans that did not think those rights mattered, or what about the white majority that was causing these oppressions, were either of those two empowered? Just say no, was a term coined in the 1980's when crack cocaine was becoming more prevalent. This buzz phrase was easier said than done. We don't hear just say no anymore, however, the message lives on. We hear, that's not cool, crack kills, this is your brain on crack, never-the-less the message remains constant.
Having said all of that, this writer takes the stance that to those who:
o Allow staff to have continuous, meaningful input in the decision making process.
o Purpose to give staff authentic ownership.
o Help staff make connections from the big vision to their own individual daily tasks. Empowerment is not a buzzword it is a strategy. To those who play the appearance game empowerment is a buzzword. Unfortunately, their success as a leader is probably a buzzword as well.
Olayinka Alege
Managers often involve other people in various ways in making decisions, but leaders go beyond that. Leaders are able to create and communicate a vision that inspires followers. This sentence sums up the moral and ethical considerations any leader will face. A soft theory X type leader will not be comfortable creating a vision that is shared and definitely will not see the need to do the work to motivate people to believe in its principles. Instead she/he will use guile and Machiavellian subterfuge in their styles to get people to think they have their best interest in mind.
The soft X leader probably doesn't even think he/she is compromising any ethics or morals as their initial premise is not built upon trust or acceptance. They are more directive and authoritative in nature, thus their thoughts and decisions would be more corralled and final. It is possible the soft X actually thinks a good deed is being done by listening to make people think they matter at all.
Newton Miller II has spent 40 years in urban settings and understands that the culture of the community drives the culture and climate in its schools. One must consider that research states schools with high-poverty and high-minority enrollments are taught by a disproportionate number of under qualified teachers, which adversely affects learning outcomes. It has been this writer's observation that teachers in these districts spend less time developing reasoning skills and are more apt to rely on worksheets as the primary pedagogical approach. Students who have internalized a pervasive sense of helplessness and hopelessness and who also see no connection between their education and economic mobility remain disengaged in school and mark time until they are eligible to drop out.