If you have been invited to this group, you are among a very small group of experts in school improvement who have been extended the opportunity by ISPI to earn your CSIS by contributing to the School Improvement Field Guide: Facilitating Success. (You do still have to pay your fee as I have explained to most of you, but you do not have to do the part of the application that is the documentation of yourwork.)
Many of you have already started contributing via mail so I thought I would put this into a blog so you could see what everyone else is saying and contributing. If you do not have the CSIS standards, please go to www.ISPI.org and choose the Certification tab and then choose CSIS. You can download the application and handbook with the standards from there.
First a shout out to Georgia Evans who has done excellent work in helping get the Intro and Chapter 1 to the publisher for review, and to Penny Smith who has contributed to the self assessments and other content. Janie Fields has allowed me to vacuum her brain regularly, and John Green is taking the lead on our Values development as well as other contributions.
John reviewed the draft we sent to the publisher and came up with a brilliant insight: We are addressing the "what" with the CSIS standards and the "how" with the info and tools in the Field Guide, but we have failed to address the "why" or the values in which the work of school improvement and transformation is grounded. We asked John to take the lead in working with all of you to create a set of values for school improvement specialists. If he chooses to do so, look for a posting by John asking you for input.
Penny made this comment about a query I made about how school improvement which focuses on systemic factors should model 21st century teaching and learning: She told me, "Yes, this makes perfect sense. Application of skills and problem-based learning is a critical component to 21st Century Learning. This is compatible to the concept that there are many ways to solve problems and divergent thinking should be encouraged as opposed to discouraged. By considering multiple strategies for solving problems, students learn to validate their learning and display efficacy as they develop skills that transfer across content areas."
How do get those you are guiding to explore systemic factors in the work, workers and workplace? How do you get them to set performance targets beyond the gaps in current performance (as measured by state tests) that the data show and shoot for students not only exceeding standards but demonstrating fluency in 21st Century Skills? How do you model this in your facilitation? I know one of you who is amazing at that -- so Thomas Van Soelen, weigh in here!
Phyllis Edwards emphasized this with her district on Tuesday as the year kicked off. She has broken the bonds of her folks teaching to the tests and given them the freedom to take risks. Phyllis, let's hear your thoughts on that! How did you do that?
I had a fabulous morning interviewing Buster Evans the stellar sup in tech savvy Forsyth County. If you are not following their journey, you are missing something big! Buster, you said getting people to focus on the changes needed to create 21st Century Schools was your biggest challenge. How are you facilitating that change with groups?
General John Fryer you brought Duvall County back from the brink and made it a world class district with emphasis on global competition. How did you get people to see beyond the gaps in student performance with others around the world and to see what had to change among the adults who impacted the students' performance?
And last but not least, we are reaching out to Vicki Denmark who is VP of Innovation at Advanc-Ed (SACS-CASI to most of us in the SE). (She has the first couple of chapters under review.) Vicki is refining a school improvement model based on the acquired knowledge of Advanc-Ed and experts like you. Vicki, you are neck deep in this work codifying a model. What do you think?
If I left anyone out, chalk it up to my age and forgetfulness. I am sure I have your name in a safe place, but I forgot where that safe place is! My phone charger, half my favorite swim suit, a black cocktail dress, our can opener and a pie plate are with it. (There probably is a story behind that, but I forgot that, too.)
This book allows us to wed all of Judy's enormous expertise in Performance Consulting with your in the trenches school-based experience. John has helped us see that we have a unique opportunity to offer up a set of values for this unique craft and profession that supports the standards and code of ethics (also in the Handbook).
OK folks, we need your brains!! Let us all hear from you!
"How do get those you are guiding to explore systemic factors in the work, workers and workplace? How do you get them to set performance targets beyond the gaps in current performance (as measured by state tests) that the data show and shoot for students not only exceeding standards but demonstrating fluency in 21st Century Skills? How do you model this in your facilitation?"
ReplyDeleteWe contend that every time a meeting takes place, learning should be occurring. If folks at the meeting can't claim the learning, then maybe the meeting shouldn't be happening. That sort of modeling is necessary to assist schools (who are more tangled in technical aspects of change rather than the adaptive, balcony approach (Heifetz)) to back away from the problem and get on the balcony.
Using protocols to structure conversations is one way to help folks have a *different* conversation than what they have already had. We have said to schools, "You may have looked at this data set before, but today we're going to have a different conversation about it." What often results are new insights and different ways of moving forward.
I, as a facilitator, sometimes struggle with the proclivity of teachers to immediately CAP: "classroom application penchant". Experiences that are designed for adults to meaningfully engage together are immediately brought to classroom application without deeply considering the possibilities for adult learning. It seems that we might feel guilty sometimes about having processes and procedures for us - not just for the students.