“Walking in Beauty”: A Case Study of a Successful Principal Cultivating Native Ways of Knowing,Being,and Leading in a Public School on the Navajo Reservation

Introduction and Purpose

When asked about leadership ways of knowing, being, and leading in today's schools amidst contemporary pressures, influences, and complexities (e.g., political debates about race and history, digitalization, and accountability), “walking in beauty”–Hózhó in Navajo– may not be the first image that comes to mind. Yet Hózhó, the Navajo philosophy characterized by living and being with balance, equanimity, and self-determination, is at the heart of a Navajo principal's leadership in a public elementary school located in a reservation community. “Walking in beauty”, Principal Begay leads his school from the middle, navigating and balancing systems for common district and state curriculum and citizenship expectations with the Navajo cultural traditions, self-determination, and sovereignty. In this article, we draw on empirical findings, Navajo philosophy, and ecological systems theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1979) to present a Navajo school principal's way of leading his successful school with a tribal culturally responsive mindset and pedagogy amidst multiple layers of influences, complexities, and historical traumas. In the International Successful School Principalship Project (ISSPP) that includes this school, success is defined in terms of academic learning outcomes, wellness, and quality of life (Day et al., 2025), all of which (in this case) are grounded in Hózhó.

The research team featured a Navajo male scholar (with 20 years of experience as a superintendent and principal in Navajo schools), a Choctaw female scholar and former principal in a public school district with increasingly diverse student populations and high numbers of Indigenous students, a white male scholar, a white female scholar, and a Lebanese female scholar, all of whom have experience as educational leaders and research backgrounds in educational leadership. They are all members of the International Successful School Principalship Project (ISSPP). Their diverse researcher backgrounds and experiences shape research perspectives on school principal leadership practices. Two Indigenous members have both personal background experiences to live and witness the challenges and joys faced by Indigenous children and families. Their education, leadership experiences, and college degrees have also shaped their worldviews. The two former educational leaders and researchers who identify as White recognize their privileges and are committed to resisting bias. The Lebanese female scholar and former principal recognizes that she has experienced similar and different challenges from those of the Indigenous team members. All research team members have experience working with Indigenous students during their leadership tenures. As a team, they are committed to the conduction of research with Indigenous communities to learn more about Native ways of knowing, being, and leading amid the contemporary situation of multiple layers of influence and rapid, complex changes.

The United States, like many nation-states, has a history of colonization of Native American people and land. Ongoing assimilation through, for example, boarding schools for Indigenous children, has resulted in trauma over centuries, through the contemporary situation. Scholars (e.g., Brayboy, 2014) have documented the loss of Indigenous languages and cultures as part of historical trauma. Schools located in reservation communities that serve Indigenous children also face pressures from tribal, state, and national policies for accountability to curriculum standards. In other words, U.S. schools that serve Indigenous students are culturally and historically situated within a complex interplay among federal, state, and tribal policies, schools, and districts, and historical legacies of colonialism. While we focus specifically on a Navajo principal's leadership grounded in Navajo philosophy of Hózhó, we use Native American, Native Indigenous, and Navajo interchangeably to include all diverse cultures (Benally, 1994).

The overall intention of this paper is to present a Navajo principal's ways of knowing, being, and leading a school to success amidst multiple layers of complex influence (Bronfenbrenner, 1979), culturally and historically situated and grounded in Hózhó. More specifically, this case study is about a Navajo school principal's leadership grounded in the teachings of his tribal elders. Findings have implications for principal leaders in other school settings worldwide. We, thus, conclude with implications for leadership preparation and practice.

Framing Leadership Success and Sustainability in Navajo Philosophy and Systems Theory

For this article, we return to historical perspectives on education that describe Navajo philosophy, as well as extant empirical studies of school leadership and theories of social influences on human development and their complexities. In Navajo tradition and, hence, educational philosophy, nothing is static; every aspect of life is underpinned by a basic concept of dynamic change (Benally, 1994). Moreover, the Navajo philosophy is one of balance and sustainability (Benally, 1994; Singh Gill, 2021). Western traditions often emphasize a division between sacred and profane knowledge, whereas in the Navajo tradition, no such division exists. Holism, as a way of life, as an expression of beauty and interconnection, recognizes that if one part falls out of place, it will affect all the other parts, and therefore the cycle itself becomes dysfunctional (Benally, 1994; Singh Gill, 2021). In the Navajo universe, there is a constant movement inherent in all things. At the core of this view is a holistic, ordered universe in which everything is interrelated, and all the pieces of the universe are enfolded within the whole. At the same time, every piece contains the entire universe, creating a network of relationships and processes in constant flux (Begay & Maryboy, 2023). Such perspectives are important to leadership amidst layers of (often conflicting and competing) influences and complexities.

In the Navajo tradition, people are taught by their elders about balance and holistic ways of knowing and thinking. In one story, tribal elders tell that the four directions symbolize east, south, west, and north as well as various stones, seasons, colors, and energies (Keovorabouth, 2021). The energies are broken down into masculine and feminine, with each person embodying both. East and north represent masculinity, while west and south represent femininity (Lee, 2015). This helps us understand the balance each person can achieve in their lifetime; for example, it also explains the Two-Spirit identity within the Navajo tradition. A Two-Spirit identity is defined as an identity held by individuals who possess both masculine and feminine energies and hold distinct social roles within the community (Benally, 1994). In another story, all the people were living in peace until the men brought to everyone's attention that they could survive on their own. The women similarly argued that they did not need the men to survive either. This is when the people became divided, with one side crossing the river to build their own camp. Over time, neither camp was prosperous, and the people were dying. In the men's camp, people tended crops, raised children, and cooked, while in the women's camp, people hunted, gathered, and protected the camp. These roles were not necessarily gender-specific but rather social roles. Eventually, each camp stabilized, and the people came forward, informing the others that, to survive, they needed to embrace the masculine and feminine energies, demonstrating that one cannot survive without the other. From then on, people were able to come back together in harmony. The Third World was destroyed by flooding, bringing the Diné Navajo people into the Fourth World that we are in now, with four remaining monsters still alive today: poverty, hunger, cold, and death (Keovorabouth, 2021). Moreover, Diné /Navajo people have endured colonization, the Long Walk, and boarding schools designed to assimilate Native American children into Christian worldviews and to disregard their cultures and knowledge.

We overlay the Navajo philosophy of Hózhó (Benally, 1994; Werito, 2014), grounded in balance, on systems that Principal Begay identified as important to his leadership and his school's success. More specifically, we use Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological systems theory from human development psychology as a secondary theoretical framing that explains multiple layers of influence from the closest with families to the broader macro social, political, historical, and contemporary influences of time. For our theoretical framing, we consider how Indigenous ways of knowing and being contribute to principal leadership practices in a case-study school with multiple layers of influence and complex change.

Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological theory of social development provides us with analytical language to understand multiple layers of influence in systems in the environment, as well as the individual's relationship to the environment. In other words, the interaction between the person and the environment (e.g., the school) is considered reciprocal (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). In Navajo philosophy, we also see the interaction between person and environment as symbiotic, grounded in balance and equanimity. Bronfenbrenner (1979) conceptualizes the environment relevant to human development as not limited to a single, immediate setting but also encompasses interconnections among such settings and external influences emanating from the larger surroundings. For example, despite attempts to diminish, belittle, and totally transform tribal concepts, belief systems, and values of leadership, strong school leadership for tribal nation-building remains one of the most important assets in tribal communities. School, as an ecological environment, is conceived as operating across multiple systems, each contained within the next. Bronfenbrenner (1979; 1995) refers to these systems as the micro-, meso-, exo-, macro-, and chronosystems defined as follows:

A microsystem is a pattern of activities, roles, and interpersonal relations experienced by the developing person in a given setting with particular physical and material characteristics. A mesosystem comprises the interrelations among two or more settings in which a developing person actively participates.

Bronfenbrenner (1995) argued that human development is powerfully shaped by conditions and events occurring during the historical period through which the person lives. Moreover, the chronosystem explicitly acknowledges the influence of historical events (e.g., the trauma experienced by Native American people because of colonization) and continues to shape the development of adults and students in schools. In this case, we consider broader social influences, including historical trauma, on Native American children and their education in schools. Further, we consider contemporary education as shaped by the lingering effects of the pandemic and by evolving state testing policies and related district policies within the status quo of settler-colonial education (RedCorn, 2020). There are numerous complexities occurring within school, district, and reservation communities, as well as at the state, national, and transnational levels.

When we put ecological systems theory into dialogue with the Navajo philosophy of balance and walking in two worlds, and in some cases three worlds, we need to think in a trans-cognitive way whereby we learn to see with bifocal and trifocal vision: the long-term, intergenerational view and the shorter-range, focused attention of Western perspectives on systems. In other words, we see the interplay between the individual and systems with multiple layers of influence and rapid, complex changes. Examining the interplay between the principal/leader and systems’ influence through Hózhó, we see balance as a relational process where individual existence is understood as inseparable from the collective and the earth. Educationally, we must be willing to be uncomfortable with the unknown and to learn to respect it. Having psychological, human development, openness to paradox and complexity is also important, as it is being able to not just express compassion but also internalize it. These tribal values and practices help make a trans-systemic synthesis possible.

In sum, from a tribal leadership perspective, we see leadership as working in balance, mediating, and negotiating ecological systems in ways that foster compassion and human development. Here, leadership is walking in beauty, supporting sustainability, and leading from the middle with equanimity. In Navajo philosophy, ecological systems are related to resilience, symbiosis, and the role of small-scale disturbance. Such philosophical thinking does not ignore power and the need to criticize but extends these with resilience and disturbance in ecological systems.

Furthermore, in pursuing self-determination, nation-building, and the reclaiming of educational sovereignty, tribal governments and tribal communities have sought to reform schools not only to be culturally appropriate but also to ensure the core academic subjects are relevant, expanding or challenging young people's thinking. In that context, some tribes have sought to recast the mission and purposes of schools to meet their unique social, cultural, and economic needs. This is no different for the Navajo Nation, including the public schools operating on Navajo land. Amid a constantly changing educational landscape for Native students, tribal leaders and their stakeholders look to local school leaders, such as Principal Begay and his colleagues, to inform them of exemplary practices and future developments in K-12 education. In some cases, these changes are influenced by the political backdrop of tribes asserting sovereignty and pursuing self-determination; however, Indian education leaders, while employed in a state- or tribal-contracted school, are still required to accommodate both tribal and state education standards, including in federally funded BIE schools. (Martin, 2021).

Few studies of educational leadership, including culturally responsive leadership studies (e.g., Crow et al., 2017; Johnson, 2007; Shields & Hesbol, 2020), have explicitly focused on Indigenous schools and leadership. Khalifa et al. (2019), Grande (2008), and Brayboy (2005) are among the few. Drawing on an ethnography of a successful principal, Khalifa et al. (2019) argued that leaders can engage students, parents, teachers, and communities in ways that positively impact learning by honoring Indigenous heritages and local cultural practices. Khalifa et al.'s (2019) research yielded three basic premises. First, a full-fledged and nuanced understanding of ‘cultural responsiveness’ is essential to successful school leadership. Second, cultural responsiveness will not flourish and succeed in schools without sustained efforts by school leaders to define and promote it. Finally, culturally responsive school leadership includes crucial leadership behaviors, including critical self-reflection; the development of culturally responsive teachers; - the promotion of inclusive, anti-oppressive school environments; and engagement with students’ Indigenous community contexts.

Closely related, there is a growing body of scholarship in North America on inclusive (Ryan, 2006) and transformative leadership (e.g., Shields & Hesbol, 2020) that has yielded important insights into how leaders work for social change in schools. For example, the American Indian School Leadership program at Northern Arizona University promotes self-determination and Native nation-building through critical coursework that acknowledges the unique needs and cultural contexts of tribal-school communities, empowering them to lead their own educational institutions and build stronger, self-governing nations. While integrating tribal knowledge into leadership training is essential, it can face hurdles from state regulators and accrediting bodies. Key obstacles include maintaining cultural sensitivity, ensuring authentic representation, and providing equitable access to these insights while adhering to institutional accreditation standards (Martin, 2021).

Internationally, in the International Successful School Principalship Project, of which the Mesa case with Principal Begay is a part, scholars added a focus on leadership identity (Crow et al., 2017), focusing on relationships among the principal's background, including racial, ethnic, and cultural background, and his/her leadership practices. In these cases, principals drew on their backgrounds to relate with students, parents, and community members as they enacted the other core leadership practices. Closely related, Johnson (2007) proposed a framework for culturally responsive leadership that incorporates practices fostering inclusive school environments for culturally diverse students and families. In addition to the core leadership practices and communication (setting directions, developing people, redesigning the organization, managing the instructional program) proposed by Leithwood and Riehl (2003), Johnson (2007) found that principals drew upon their own backgrounds or habitus as well as knowledge of cultural diversity to support teachers to connect students’ cultural backgrounds with the academic curriculum, used effective cross-cultural communication, and developed learning communities grounded in multiculturalism. Johnson (2007) conducted ISSPP cases in New York and England grounded in culturally responsive leadership. Johnson's (2007) research drew on Ladson-Billings (1995) framework of culturally responsive teaching for African American children in U.S. schools.

Focusing specifically on culturally responsive teaching in Indigenous education, Grande (2008) and Brayboy (2005) argue for educators to challenge and resist the type of Indigenous erasure brought about by settler colonization. In their view, educators should theorize how power and domination inform the processes and procedures of schooling and develop pedagogies that disrupt their effects. In other words, educators should challenge power dynamics within education while also creating space to affirm Indigenous worldviews and perspectives. Brayboy (2005) and Grande (2008) argue against deficit perspectives for Indigenous students, positing educational approaches such as Red Pedagogy (Grande, 2004, 2008), which is grounded in Indigenous knowledge and praxis, offering educators and scholars decolonizing pedagogies to address the broader political and cultural challenges facing U.S. education. According to Grande (2004), “The trauma of struggling against colonialism manifests most acutely in American Indian students” (p. 5). In Grande's (2008) view, educators working with Indigenous learners need approaches to schooling that emphasize the political nature of education. More specifically, Red Pedagogy encourages educators to: 1) treat the personal as political where the politics of schooling are understood through the structural lens of colonialism and capitalism; b) construct self-determined spaces where Indigenous students learn to navigate racist, sexist, and capitalistic structures; and c) allow Indigenous learners to evaluate what being Indigenous means in today's environment and arm them with a critical analysis intersecting systems of domination and the tools to navigate them (Grande, 2008).

From a similar perspective, focused on humanization and the historical task of the oppressed, Brazilian education philosopher Freire (1996) proposed a pedagogical approach to humanization through “reading the word” and “reading the world” (p. 26), which bears some similarity in its intent to Red Pedagogy (Grande, 2008). In terms of pedagogy, Freire (1996) argued that all education, in the broadest sense, was part of a project of freedom and was eminently political because it offered students the conditions for self-reflection, a self-managed life, and particular notions of critical agency. In Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Freire (1996), argued that pedagogy at its best is about neither training, teaching methods, nor political indoctrination. For Freire, pedagogy is not a method or a priori technique to be imposed on all students but a political and moral practice that provides the knowledge, skills, and social relations that enable students to explore the possibilities of what it means to be critical citizens while expanding and deepening their participation in the promise of a substantive democracy. As Aronowitz (2009) stated,

Thus, for Freire, literacy was not a means to prepare students for the world of subordinated labor or ‘careers’, but a preparation for a self-managed life. And self-management could only occur when people have fulfilled three goals of education: self-reflection to know thyself, which is an understanding of how they live, in its economic, political, and psychological dimensions. Specifically, critical pedagogy helps the learner become aware of the forces that have hitherto ruled their lives and especially shaped their consciousness. The third goal is to help set the conditions for producing a new life, a new set of arrangements where power has been, at least in tendency, transferred to those who literally make the social world by transforming nature and themselves. (p. ix)

Drawing on Tribal knowledge and praxis, culturally responsive practices, and research, the Corn Pollen Model Framework (Werito & Vallejo, 2022) was developed by Dr. Shawn Secatero (Canoncito Band of Navajos) to equip students with such culturally relevant knowledge and skills for leadership in state schools and Bureau of Indian Education-funded schools. The curriculum is taught within a framework that incorporates tribal knowledge and praxis, focusing on Indigenous resilience, sovereignty, and self-determination. Similarly, the American Indian School Leadership program (Martin, 2021) aims to develop a cadre of Indian administrators with tribal ways of knowing and leading, beyond traditional administrative preparation, with an explicit aim of improving the leadership of Indian-serving schools.

In sum, Secatero's (2018) description of the Corn Pollen model illustrates that Indigenous education is rooted in a sacred relationship with Nature, where the land and all its inhabitants serve as teachers (Secatero, 2018). By observing natural phenomena, students gain insights into universal processes and their roles within the interconnected web of life, supported by place-based and land-based pedagogies. Some Indigenous scholars have noted that, during the early years of American educational philosophy (e.g., Dewey, 1916, 1938), the way in which Euro-American educators employed progressive education often undermined Indian self-determination rather than encouraging it (e.g., Kee & Carr-Chellman, 2019; Robbins, 1983). Nevertheless, the American Indian “New Deal” reforms show that progressive ideas were also used to promote culturally relevant education in Native-serving schools, aligning with Indigenous educational philosophies (Robbins, 1983). Likewise, the Alaska Native Knowledge Network (Barnhardt, 2008) and the critical pedagogy of Freire (2020) both challenge the Western-centric “banking” model of education by emphasizing dialogue, cultural knowledge, and real-world context. While working in different settings—Freire in Latin America and the Alaska Native Knowledge Network—their principles combine to foster a transformative educational practice that empowers learners and affirms Indigenous epistemologies. Consequently, a key application of Freire’s (2020) work in the American Indian School Leadership program and the Corn Pollen model is the development of culturally relevant and responsive educational practices for Indigenous peoples, including the preservation and promotion of tribal languages and traditional forms of knowledge. Freire's critical pedagogy offers a framework for confronting colonial oppression in Native American education, emphasizing problem-posing education and critical awareness to empower Indigenous students to transform their unjust realities. At the same time, unlike the Corn Pollen Model (Secatero, 2018), Freire's (2020) critical pedagogy does not explicitly consider leadership practices.

Echoing the developers of the Corn Pollen and the American Indian School Leadership models, we see the need to enhance understandings about education for those who have been historically traumatized, with Indigenous education theorizing (Hózhó) and its relations to leadership practices amidst multiple layers of influence and rapid, complex changes (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). In other words, we see the need to consider leadership practices amid the contemporary, complex, and rapidly changing context grounded in tribal teachings and philosophy. Brayboy et al. (2018), and Grande (2008) provided important Indigenous perspectives on relations among race and education, yet Brayboy et al. (2018) and Grande (2008) did not explicitly consider school leadership amidst contemporary and rapidly changing layers of influence on schools. Freire (2020) provided important insights into education and critical pedagogy in relation to oppressed or traditionally marginalized people, but he did not explicitly consider Indigenous philosophy, including Hózhó, or leadership practices in schools grounded in this philosophy. The case study of a Navajo leader featured in this paper illustrates principal leadership in schools facing multiple and rapidly changing influences, including digitalization, lingering pandemic effects, and climate change, all of which are further shaped by historical trauma.

Research Methods and Design

The research methods featured a mixed methods case study approach (Creswell & Tashakkori, 2007) as used by the International Study for the Successful School Principalship Project (ISSPP). The ISSPP includes 27 nation-states, with research teams studying principal leadership contributions to school success in academic outcomes, student well-being, and quality of life, amid multiple layers of influence from communities and states to macro politics and ideologies, at a point in time that is also culturally and historically situated. Teams further consider the complexities, dynamics or changes within and between layers. ISSPP has established criteria for selecting cases, requirements for selecting study participants, and the process for conducting the research. Specifically, three research questions were of interest in this context: 1) What are the key enablers and constraints for achieving school ‘success’ in different schools and/or groups of schools? How, and in what ways, do principals contribute to school success in diverse contexts?; 2) What are the personal dispositions and professional knowledge, qualities and capabilities needed in enabling leaders to be(come) successful in different contexts?; and 3) How do different key stakeholders within and outside the school community and at different levels of the education system define successful school leadership practices?

Using mixed methods comparative methodology design, we draw upon different data sources and design elements to gain multiple perspectives (Creswell & Tashakkori, 2007; Patton, 2002). Specifically, data sources include semi-structured qualitative interviews, focus groups, and a survey (Creswell & Tashakkori, 2007) to provide a deeper understanding of school success and the principal's leadership contribution to that success within specific contexts. Thus, researchers integrate qualitative interview and survey data to support triangulation and trustworthiness or validity (Denzin, 1978). For the purpose of this paper, triangulation included four types: 1) triangulation of survey and interview data; 2) triangulation through the use of different researchers; 3) triangulation of theory, using the multiple perspectives of Navajo education philosophy and related research on culturally responsive leadership as well as Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological systems theory to interpret the results; and 4) triangulation through the use of multiple research methods. Data analysis featured an iterative process of inductive and deductive coding (Cresswell & Cresswell, 2022). We discuss each phase of the research process further below.

Walking in Beauty: Navajo Principal Leadership in Context

In this section, we present findings on the Navajo principal leaders’ contributions to school success in an elementary school in a reservation community and part of a public school district. Findings about the principal's leadership practices that contributed to school success are presented in themes that emerged inductively from the data and then considered deductively through Hózhó, Navajo educational philosophy, and ecological systems theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). We begin with a description of the school context and the principal.

Discussion

The overall intention of this paper is to present a Navajo principal's way of leading a school to success (in a Hózhó way), including critical pedagogy (e.g., Freire, 2020; Grande, 2008) and culturally sustaining pedagogy (RedCorn, 2020) amidst multiple layers of influence (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). We examined the individual principal leadership of the Mesa school (micro-) context in relation to the collective of the reservation community, district, state and nation state amidst lingering influences from historical trauma and the more recent COVID-19 pandemic. Principal Begay developed a shared direction for Mesa school around learning systems that were supportive and challenging for all students, provided professional development, and developed leadership capacity among teachers to realize self-determination in Hózhó. In so doing, Principal Begay intentionally walked in two worlds guided by Navajo values and elder teachings.

We observed that Principal Begay understood research-based leadership practices but was very careful in how he applied (Western) research-based leadership practices without compromising locally held cultural beliefs and expectations. Teachers, parents, and students recognized that Principal Begay developed the school culture with a holistic approach grounded in Navajo traditions. He began each school year by bringing new teachers into a tribal elder's home where the elder demonstrated culturally responsive teaching practices in a Navajo way. Teacher leadership team members also presented data in a holistic way, helping all teachers generate questions and ideas. In so doing, the principal developed capacity for leadership in the school and led everyone to be accountable to both the Navajo culture in the community and the state standards. He focused attention on multiple systems and structures for teaching as well as Navajo history and culture. In this way, Principal Begay influenced what Bronfenbrenner (1979) referred to as the micro system of the school through the exosystem, with attention to two worlds simultaneously. Begay openly talked with teachers and students about historical trauma and lingering challenges as he taught about Navajo history during morning meetings and created systems for student academic success. He worked to create linkages between ecological systems in ways that honored the Navajo culture and philosophy and provided students with opportunities for learning and growth. There was accountability to the Navajo history and culture beyond accountability to district and state accountability policies.

Although Principal Begay did not use terms like chronosystem, he and other interviewees talked at length about how historical events and contemporary events come together in the educational process. He exhibited direct instructional leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic, teaching kindergarten when he could not find a teacher for that class. He supported parents, children, and community members through an extremely difficult time with losses of family and lack of internet access for education As a Navajo, he believed in the necessity of ceremonies and circles in order to support children, teachers, and parents to sustain harmony and balance and support learning. Here learning is how to become a human being, how to evolve into one's true self. Life itself is sacred, including learning as an ongoing process (Benally, 1994).

Drawing on the literature and our findings, we argue that we need to consider successful school principalship amidst a complex context of multiple influences and rapid changes through Navajo Hózhó ways of knowing. What might Indigenous leadership and the Hózhó Navajo philosophy offer to leadership navigating multiple systems of influence, including externalized evaluations in states and nation states? How can a dialogue among Navajo philosophy and culture and Western systems required by the district, state, and nation state support sustainability and balance amidst rapid changes in Arizona schools and beyond?

Western ecological systems theories and Navajo educational theories offer their own frames of reference and theoretical logic that contribute to the understanding of leadership. Through the study of Bronfenbrenner's (1979) ecological systems theory of human development, we understand how multiple layers of systems influence children's education and leadership thereof in schools. Closely related, empirical studies of principal leadership from ISSPP cases demonstrate the influence of principals and their interactions with these systems of influence in the school context. We see leadership practices as directly and indirectly influencing school practices, including those practices that challenge historical trauma and provide spaces for all teachers and children to grow and thrive. Through the study of Hózhó Navajo education theory (Benally, 1994; Singh Gill, 2021) related to leadership and complex systems, we gain a language for a way of thinking and leading in balance for beauty and sustainability. While Freire (2020) and Grande (2008) provide a pedagogical framework for teaching Indigenous students about historical trauma and oppression stemming from politics and colonization, their frameworks did not explicitly include a lens of balance and sustainability amid complexity, or a leadership through education philosophy. In dialogue, Navajo education philosophy or Hózhó, Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory, and critical, culturally sustaining pedagogy (Freire, 2020; RedCorn, 2020) expand leadership theorizing, study, and practice.

Conclusions and Implications

Few studies of principals have been conducted in Indigenous communities (Khalifa et al., 2019) and fewer studies have featured a successful Native American principal and his/her leadership contributions to a school. Indeed, few empirical studies of successful leadership from ISSPP have been conducted in tribal schools, and this is the first ISSPP case study to our knowledge grounded in an Indigenous education philosophy (e.g., Hózhó). Additional research is needed to provide other stories of successful principals in Indigenous communities as well as other communities with traditionally marginalized students. To date, the Arizona team has collected studies from one school located in a reservation community. Our intentions are to collect further cases in this region and others serving Indigenous children and to return to this case to follow any changes as the teaching staff has now become fully Navajo.

The Mesa case study with Principal Begay has implications for leadership preparation and development. Educational leadership for schools serving Indigenous communities must be conducted at a depth of understanding of culture as well as leadership practice. Such a depth of understanding requires more than one leadership course on culturally responsive practices. Leadership programs may not adequately prepare individuals to lead in Native-serving schools and tribal communities; therefore, courses should focus on developing culturally responsive leadership skills, understanding self-determination and tribal sovereignty, knowledge of community-based governance, and systems to address underachievement issues for children in reservation communities.

Findings from the Mesa case study of Principal Begay have implications for principal preparation, as new principals will continue to lead amidst complexities. At the authors’ university, the first author initiated a leadership program for Indigenous leaders, including research-based leadership practices as well as development theories like ecological systems theory, and Indigenous philosophies like the Navajo Hózhó. Similarly, the Corn Pollen Model Framework (Secatero, 2018; Werito & Vallejo, 2022) provided us with a model of Indigenous leadership preparation. Additional case studies are needed for findings that inform leadership preparation and development. Our research team hopes to collect further data with additional Native American principals and communities. Our theoretical framing of Navajo philosophy in dialogue with ecological systems theory and culturally responsive practices that inform our empirical findings will provide examples for leaders “walking in beauty” to educate all children with strong academic systems, wellness, harmony, and equity in a world of tensions, dissensions, and rapid complex changes.