In this section, you will continue to expand your vision of disciplinary literacy by focusing on the essential question:

How can I, as a leader, enact change in my school to improve disciplinary literacy?

You will review key elements of leading change and reflect on how your leadership skills can support that work.

Spark Activity

Read these two quotes from Oregon's Adolescent Literacy Framework:

A shared community vision and a commitment to the development of a culture of literacy are hallmarks of successful secondary literacy programs.”

- Oregon's Adolescent Literacy Framework, page 12

Effective school and district leadership is essential for fostering inclusive middle and high schools.”

- Oregon's Adolescent Literacy Framework, page 50

As a leader, what words or phrases from these quotes resonate most with you? Why? Building on your reflections, consider the following questions. You may wish to capture your thinking in your journal space.

In your school context, where do you see evidence of a culture of literacy? Where are the opportunities for growth?
What challenges could make it difficult to sustain a focus on disciplinary literacy over time, and how might you address them?
How might you engage colleagues across disciplines so that literacy becomes a shared responsibility rather than the work of a single department?

Step 1. Read

School leaders are instrumental in shaping the conditions that make literacy growth possible. Changing schoolwide practices doesn’t happen in a single step. Leaders must attend to multiple, interconnected elements of leadership that together influence beliefs, culture, systems and classroom practice.

In this section, we will use a framework adapted from WestEd’s Restorative Practices Guide to explore four elements of leadership that are essential for sustaining literacy improvement over time:

Adaptive: The mindsets, values and beliefs that guide decision-making.
Relational: The ways leaders build trust, relationships and shared purpose.
Structural: The systems and resources (time, schedules, policies) that make change possible.
Technical: The instructional practices, tools and strategies that directly impact classrooms.

Together, these elements help leaders consider not only what changes need to happen for stronger literacy outcomes, but also how to create the conditions where those changes can take root and last.

Read more about each of these elements below. These elements are integral in creating change within a school setting and can help us consider the ways in which we approach integrating disciplinary literacy practices across our school sites and supporting educators in adopting these practices in their classrooms.

Select the arrow to the left of each section to expand that section.

Adaptive Elements

Adaptive leadership is about the mindsets and beliefs that shape how leaders define student potential and literacy success.

These include the mindsets, paradigms, values and belief systems that individuals in a school hold. A shared community vision, grounded in the belief that all adolescents can become proficient readers and writers, and a commitment to developing a culture of literacy are hallmarks of successful secondary literacy programs. Adaptive elements also include holding high expectations, affirming students’ cultural and linguistic strengths and designing instruction that builds belonging, motivation and engagement.

Examples include:

School leaders and educators consistently communicate high expectations for all students, including multilingual learners and students experiencing disabilities.
Staff model asset-based mindsets by recognizing and integrating students’ cultural and linguistic assets into lessons.
Decision-making is guided by a shared literacy mission that prioritizes equity and career-connected learning.

Relational Elements

Relational leadership is about building trust and a shared purpose, so literacy work becomes collective, not individual.

These are actions that build relationships and foster agency, community and social capital, or the networks of trust, mutual support and shared resources that help individuals and communities thrive. Relationship elements include creating environments where students feel a sense of belonging in academic disciplines, have opportunities for authentic voice and choice and can connect their learning to personal, cultural and career goals.

Examples include:

Administrators actively seek and act on educator feedback to improve literacy initiatives and address implementation barriers.
Instructional leaders engage in classroom walkthroughs and coaching cycles that prioritize relationship-building and instructional growth.
Partner with families and community organizations to support literacy in real-world contexts (e.g., oral history projects, community research).

Structural Elements

Structural leadership is about putting the right systems, time and resources in place to make literacy improvement possible.

These include critical infrastructure and resources like funding, scheduling, time and other school policies. Providing educators with professional learning opportunities and time for planning and collaboration is fundamental for advancing disciplinary literacy across school sites.

Examples include:

Provide dedicated scheduling time for collaboration between general education teachers, multilingual learner specialists and special educators.
Offer professional learning opportunities that are aligned with educator needs and shaped by their feedback on what support is most helpful for implementing disciplinary literacy practices in their classrooms.

Technical Elements

Technical leadership is about ensuring strong literacy instruction happens in every classroom, every day.

These encompass the instructional practices, programs and interventions that directly impact students’ day-to-day learning. This requires knowing what effective disciplinary literacy looks like, supporting teachers in implementing high-quality practices and materials and using assessment feedback to sustain growth. Technical elements include implementing culturally and linguistically responsive instructional strategies and materials, integrating career-connected learning into disciplinary literacy and designing lessons that promote extensive disciplinary reading, writing and discourse.

Examples include:

Embed authentic texts from multiple disciplines and career pathways into units.
Utilize high-quality instructional materials that are culturally responsive.
Use formative assessment practices that provide ongoing feedback and build students’ confidence and agency.

Step 2: Reflect

We focus on adaptive and relational leadership because often leaders jump straight to the technical solutions without first attending to these foundations. Without a strong foundation in adaptive and relational elements, technical work rarely leads to lasting change.

Take a moment to reflect on your adaptive and relational leadership skills using the Leadership Self-reflection Tool below. This tool is designed to help you examine the mindsets, paradigms, values and relational practices that shape your leadership. You will rate yourself on each statement to identify strengths, growth areas and next steps.

Optional: Go Deeper

The following resources explore ideas related to leading for change. Consider how these ideas support leadership related to disciplinary literacy.

Tool: Leading Systems Change
Reflection Guide: Essential Conditions for Collaboration
Article: School Leadership Key to Transforming Education
Report: State Collaboratives

This tool supports leaders in strengthening self-awareness, collaboration and systems thinking through reflection prompts that support equity-driven, inclusive change.

(External link) - Leading Participatory Systems Change: A Reflection Guide on Key Competencies

This reflection guide presents seven interdependent conditions along with self-assessment prompts and action ideas to help agencies improve equitable, sustainable and coordinated cross-sector work.

(External link) - Essential Conditions for Advancing and Sustaining Cross-Sector Collaboration: A Reflection Guide for Child-, Youth-, and Family-serving Agencies

This article from the National Institutes of Health argues that truly transformative and equitable school change relies on organizational leadership where school structure, governance models and culture shape how innovation and collective agency can be effectively sustained.

(External link) - Why is school leadership key to transforming education? Structural and cultural assumptions for quality education in diverse contexts

This report shares six key principles from WestEd-facilitated state collaboratives to guide equitable, enduring systems change at scale.

(External link) - Equitable, Sustainable Systems Change at Scale: Lessons Learned From State Collaborative