The Leadership of Learning Communities in a Culture of Unhappiness

It is currently fashionable to call for leaders of educational organisations to be leaders of 'learning communities'. Yet there are at least two ways in which such calls may fail. One stems from the definition of a 'learning community', which, whilst usually seen as non-problematic, raises difficult and sensitive questions. This article will then begin by examining possible different meanings. The second potential failure stems from the fact that whilst it may be possible to conceptualise the leadership of a learning community, it may nevertheless be impossible to realise it because of a failure to see and counter an ecology of the forces which surrounds leadership and learning communities, forces which this article divides into global, national and local. It is argued that these forces combine to create a low-trust culture of unhappiness, which in turn generate crises of teacher morale, recruitment, and retention. The result, this article suggests, is that whilst educational leaders work within such counterproductive parameters, educators are likely to continue to work from predominantly negative states of mind. and many kinds of learning communities are unlikely to be realised.