BY DANIELLE LEGARE

A new book by Ian Mette, associate professor of educational leadership and policy at the University at Buffalo Graduate School of Education, offers an answer.

“Culturally Responsive Instructional Supervision: Leadership for Equitable and Emancipatory Outcomes”—co-edited by Dwayne Ray Cormier,  Mette and Yanira Oliveras—introduces a developmental framework for school leaders to implement culturally responsive instructional supervision. Published by Teachers College Press in June 2024, the book responds to the growing need for instructional practices that value student diversity, ask leaders to acknowledge their privileged identities, reject whiteness as the norm and promote a sense of belonging.

“How we give feedback to teachers matters. How we center the identities of the students we’re serving matters,” Mette said. “This book connects school leadership and teaching. We like to think of it as a labor of love—it was three years in the making.”

While culturally responsive teaching has been a focus in the field of education, Mette’s publication bridges the gap between instructional practice and leadership.

“Dr. Mette’s recent book makes an important contribution to our work preparing future educational leaders. We have recognized, for some time, the importance of culturally responsive instruction in the classroom, but this work helps building and district leaders think about their roles both challenging and supporting teachers to effectively incorporate these pedagogical strategies into their teaching,” said Nathan Daun-Barnett, associate professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy.

The book is designed for a broad audience, including principals, assistant principals, instructional coaches, teacher leaders and central office staff.

“Anybody that supervises and gives feedback to teachers about their instruction should read this book,” said Mette. “Instructional leaders need to be equity leaders first and foremost.”

The publication emphasizes a shift from traditional deficit-oriented perspectives toward a focus on students’ strengths, the assets they bring with them to the classroom every day and their identities and cultural backgrounds.

“We need to stop thinking of things as objective and clinical because that is not the way that kids interpret instruction. They bring with them their own cultural identities,” he said.

Leading scholars, including Noelle Arnold, Mark Anthony Gooden, Muhammad Khalifa and Linda Tillman with Terri N. Watson, contributed to the publication.

“We feel humbled by everyone’s contributions,” Mette said. “They co-signed on the book and helped us make key connections between culturally responsive supervision and school leadership.”

According to Mette, the book explores race and other sociocultural factors that shape student identities, such as ethnicity, gender, class and orientation, among other lived experiences. “We know it’s critical that kids see themselves not just in the curriculum but in the instruction,” he said. “If students see themselves, they’ll engage and want to come to school.”

Mette and his co-editors see this book as a jumping-off point for future scholarship.

“The hope is that some research will be done over the next couple of years and maybe a second edition of the book,” he said. “There’s an opportunity to write a whole other book—perhaps a handbook for observation tools for culturally responsive instructional supervision.”

For Mette, his research is rewarding.

“It’s easy when you love it,” he said. “If it’s something inside you that you’ve wanted to see for a while, the work is easier.”