Amount Awarded: $25,000
The proposed project develops new knowledge and innovate practices of school leaders and interdisciplinary teams who work together across institutions and professions to support students “in risk”. Students “in risk” we define as having diverse and complex needs (for example related to absenteeism or learning difficulties) that require school staff (e.g., principals and teachers) working together with other professional actors such as school psychologists, social workers, and healthcare providers. We will select two highly diverse urban lower secondary schools, one located in the State of California in the USA, and one in Norway. In these interdisciplinary settings, participants must negotiate perspectives, integrate different types of expertise, and make informed decisions about how best to support students. This formative intervention in professional practices triggers processes of development and change in interdisciplinary teams in schools working to accommodate students at risk. In formative interventions the starting point, the processes and the results are owned by the practitioners (Engeström, 2011). To make it concrete to the practitioners, Change Laboratories (CL) were designed as a concrete method and arena for workplace learning (Engeström, 2001). It involves that researchers intervene with theoretical models and mirrors of practices and that the practitioners present various tools for professional learning such as plans and visions. The mirrors of practices are based on collections of various types of data being collected by the researchers between the workshops. The workshops are subject to videorecording. The recordings are used as sources of planning prior to the workshops, but also for research. We plan to facilitate 3-6 workshops in each case. This project embodies a research-practice partnership (RPP), aiming to generate knowledge that supports professional collaboration, particularly for school leaders who often coordinate these efforts. It also provides a platform for international dialogue on leading interdisciplinary work to meet students' needs.