school systems that learn- paul ash

January 29, 2014

Paul B. Ash pash@sch.ci.lexington.ma.us

School Systems That Learn

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Improving Professional Practice, Overcoming Limitations,

and Diffusing Innovation

Think About…

Why do achievement gaps exist even in well-funded school districts?

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Think About…

Why do achievement gaps exist even in well-funded school districts?

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It’s not possible to close them.

The district needs to find “just the right initiatives.”

The district has reached its maximum capacity.

Our Hypothesis…

The district has reached its maximum capacity.

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Limitations to School Change and Capacity Building 1.  Laws and regulations 2.  Mindsets and limiting beliefs 3.  Standardization (vs. differentiation) 4.  Isolation (as opposed to collaboration) 5.  A narrow view of professional

development 6.  Viewing teaching and student learning

as separate acts

Strategies That WON’T Close Achievement Gaps OR Build Capacity

• Fire all underperformers • Hire more outstanding teachers •  Increase teacher evaluation

The 4 Effective Drivers of + Change

•  The Importance of Trust •  Collaboration in All Directions •  Capacity Building for All

Educators •  Leaders at All Levels

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Synergy of the Four Drivers

Synergy When all four drivers are present at high levels, the system catalyzes an increase in educator capacity, professional practice, and student performance.

Overarching Theory When a school system learns, continuous improvement enables educators to close achievement gaps and ensures that all students grow and develop as learners.

Appreciation of a System

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Systems Approach

“Every system is perfectly designed to achieve exactly the results it gets”.

Paul Batalden Dartmouth Medical School Director,

Based on a quote from W. Edward Deming (1990)

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The Importance of Trust

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Vulnerability Trust

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Patrick Lencioni “The Importance of Trust”

Video from World of Business Ideas http://www.youtube.com/watch?

v=gwj9bMLiV4E

Five Big Fears (Students)

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•  Fear Of Making Mistakes •  Fear Of Looking Like A Fool •  Fear Of Having A Weakness

Exposed •  Fear Of Not Being Liked •  Fear Of Failure

Six Big Fears (Educators)

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•  Fear Of Making Mistakes •  Fear That Errors Will Erase Prior Success •  Fear Of Having A Weakness Exposed •  Fear That Asking For Assistance Will

Diminish Respect •  Fear Of Looking Like A Novice •  Fear of Conflict

Psychological Safety

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To gain the power of collaboration and continuous learning, psychological safety is

needed.

Signs of Psychological Safety*

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Educators can disagree with peers and authority figures, ask naïve questions, own up to mistakes, or present a minority view without fear of ridicule or marginalization. *Edmondson

In Your Experience…

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What percentage of the teams that you have observed demonstrated signs of psychological safety?

Capacity Building

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Research Professional development can have a positive impact on student learning

•  Meiers & Ingvarson (2005) – Australia study •  Supovitz (2001) •  Garet et al (2001)

Traditional Model of Professional Development

After school courses – Teachers select courses based on their individual needs, rather than choosing courses based on district/school needs. During school PD – Programs are usually no more than a few hours to a few days/year, and often not aligned with school or district goals.

A New Systemic Model of PD Five Streams that Improve Educator

Capacity to Improve Student Learning:

•  Data Teams Analyze Student Work •  Frequent Quality Feedback from

Supervisors •  External Sources of Knowledge •  Internal Sources of Knowledge •  Self-Reflection

3 Qualities of Effective PD •  The district has clear learning goals for

every student and growth mindset for all educators and students?

•  The district frequently assesses student progress toward their learning goals?

•  The school district has an ongoing system of professional learning for all educators that is designed to increase performance

Key Findings Successful programs include: • Avoiding narrow outcomes to easily measured

topics • Opportunities for teacher reflection,

collaboration, and building professional community

• Focus on subject matter learning • 14 to 49 hours of learning time with follow-up,

active learning, feedback, and collaboration

A New Model

High quality professional learning is

coherent, consistent, systemic, and sustained.

Poll: Which intervention has the largest effect size?

Lowering pupil-teacher ratios Increasing teacher salaries Increasing teacher experience Increasing teacher education

Providing Adequate Funding

Greenwald, Hedges, and Laine, 1996

Questions

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In Summary

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• School systems are designed not to change (6 limitations)

• Just adding more and more initiatives will have limited impact on student learning

• All systems have a maximum capacity

Four High-leverage Strategies

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We increase educator and student learning by: • Increasing Trust • Building individual and collective

capacity • Building leadership at all levels • Collaborating in all directions