Leadership Academies > Genius & Joy Academy

Culturally Responsive School Leadership
Legacy Academy

Empty space, drag to resize
Featuring the original framework for Culturally Responsive School Leadership (CRSL) by Muhammad Khalifa, and the applied leadership learning approaches of Dr. Katie Pekel, this academy is the product of four years of development working with thousands of leaders across the country. Establish the foundational practices of CRSL through this exceptional 2.5 day transformational learning experience.   
Empty space, drag to resize
Write your awesome label here.

A culturally responsive leadership development experience
that takes you beyond reflection and into action. 

Dr. Muhammad Khalifa's groundbreaking work on CRSL forms the foundation for this 2.5 day academy. Based on the book and his seminal research published in some the most prestigious academic journals, this academy catalyzes school leaders at all levels into a new paradigm of leadership. 
Empty space, drag to resize
Develop Culturally Responsive Leadership Expertise

Discover the four domains of Culturally Responsive School Leadership and develop both practical knowledge and deep understanding of how to enact them in your school or organization. 


Historicize Educational Inequity  
Uncover the taken-for-granted structures, practices, and underlying beliefs that uphold inequity year after year in our educational systems. Learn to visibilize historical continuities and lead your staff to disrupt them.     

Center Minoritized Students, Families, and Communities
Understand the power of working with your community to create racially just schools. Discover cultural assets and ancestral knowledges to center in your approach to the leadership of culture, climate, teaching, discipline, and community engagement. 

Access Powerful Tools and Resources
Put your learning into action by moving beyond reflection and into equity systems and process design. Create the roadmap you need to shift your leadership paradigm and the educational practices of the staff that you influence.  
Learn More

Host this Academy

What you'll learn

In this academy, you will learn how to...
  • apply the CRSL Framework to self-assess your leadership practices and set personal goals for your own growth and development
  • visibilize deficit mindsets and leverage tools to disrupt them within yourself and among the educational staff you support
  • relate community-based ways of knowing and being to your school's leadership practices and approaches to instruction in order to transform the sense of belonging among your minoritized students 
  • create culturally responsive systems by developing the structures and processes your school, district or organization needs to have in place to finally achieve authentic racial equity


Download an agenda of this 2.5 day Academy.

How you'll learn

Academy Prework (5-10 hours of reading and journaling)
Six weeks prior to every CRSL Academy, we provide you with a digital packet of scholarly and practical readings and resources. We ask our participants to spend time reading and reflecting in order to be prepared to have deep learning experiences at the academy. 
Attending the Academy (2.5 days or 5 half days)
Academies are offered to our partnering educational organizations as either in-person events or online/virtual events.
Participants will spend the academy learning from expert presenters and engaging in active, socialized learning experiences focused on applying culturally responsive school leadership knowledge and skills to their professional contexts. 

Who will benefit

This academy is appropriate for many different kinds of educational leaders, including (but not limited to):
  • Teacher leaders
  • Coaches, TOSA's, and specialists
  • Principals and assistant principals
  • District administrators and superintendents
  • Higher education officers and leaders
  • Charter school directors and supervisors
  • Leaders from other educational organizations and NFPs 
Empty space, drag to resize
Dr. Muhammad Khalifa; CRSLI Founder and author of
Culturally Responsive School Leadership
Empty space, drag to resize
Dr. Katie Pekel; Executive Director of Educational Leadership at the University of Minnesota

Request a Quote

Follow us on social