Transforming Educational Leadership: Non-Traditional Narratives to Promote Equity in Uncertain Times

As educational settings in the United States become more diverse and uncertain, students need support in new and formative non-academic ways. To combat the deep inequalities that persist across the educational system, we need transformative leadership. Yet given rigid institutional rules, a legacy of structural barriers, and political attacks meant to discredit and defund schools, how can educational leaders effectively promote equity and champion the rights of all students?

Transforming Educational Leadership sets out to answer this question by examining the lived experiences of leaders from a range of vantages--students, parents, educators, organizational leaders, and scholars. Drawing key lessons from their narratives and considering them alongside theory from sociological and leadership studies, Anindya Kundu presents tools for emerging and seasoned leaders, equipping them to build better systems to address stakeholders’ basic needs, apply research to make sense of complex problems, maintain conviction in the face of staunch opposition, promote the agency of everyone served, and uphold dignity through educational leadership. Ultimately, Transforming Educational Leadership calls us to action: to broaden our conceptions around what educational leadership is and should be, to become the leaders we can be, and to reclaim education as our collective responsibility, so we can together learn to root out and heal the inequalities that plague the US education system and its learners.

Anindya Kundu is an Assistant Professor of Educational Leadership at Florida International University. He is a sociologist of education who studies student agency and educational leadership, both as means to combat inequality in and around schools. Anindya’s first book, The Power of Student Agency (2020) was a finalist for the Association of American Publishers’ PROSE Award. Anindya is well known for his two global TED Talks which have amassed over 6 million views. His work has been featured in The Miami Herald, NPR, USAToday, MSNBC, among other outlets. Anindya received his Ph.D. in sociology of education from New York University.