CES Fall Forum 2016

South Australia is making inroads into relational schooling design despite systemic forces that work against this agenda. In this workshop, we offer current research revealing the common ideological threads manifesting across three progressive South Australian secondary public schools highlighted by three leaders through interview as key components of their leadership for personalised learning agenda. These thematic threads include: the courage to lead ‘against the grain’ of systemic compliance; re-structuring and re-culturing schooling to promote relational connectedness, positive learning mindsets and flipped classrooms; personalising and negotiating the curriculum around student learning passions; and continually seeking new approaches to professional learning through investing in and researching richer forms. Using hermeneutic methodology, our workshop will offer school development storylines that reveal how these experienced leaders have embraced radical pragmatic educational leadership ideologies to do whatever it takes to place students at the centre of everything they do.