Joe Hamp

The Trust Agreement Project: a Study of One School District's Bold Experiment with Democratizing the Workplace Joe Hamp

The Trust Agreement Project: Twenty years ago, the Patterson City School District (PCSD) implemented a series of restructuring reforms that radically altered power relationships within that district. These reform policies, known as Trust Agreements, shifted decision-making authority away from management, vesting new authority in the hands of school sites, their teachers and the union. It is the intent of this historical study to tell this unique story of the PCSD's experiment with shared-governance practices, detailing their historical contexts as well as presenting how Trust Agreement policies are regarded in the PCSD today. This study specifically focuses on how the democratizing nature of these reforms, seen through the lens of Cultural Theory, altered power relationships within the PCSD, affecting cultural norms and leadership processes in ways that need to be understood in order to move forward.