[To celebrate our upcoming book, Leadership for Deeper Learning, I am publishing an excerpt each day for a week before its release. We interviewed leaders at 30 different ‘deeper learning’ schools around the world in 2019 and 2020. We then followed up those interviews with site visits, observations, on-site photographs and videos, and additional conversations. Our goal was to try and parse out What do leaders at innovative schools do that is different from their counterparts in more traditional schools? As you might imagine, we saw some fantastic leading, teaching, and learning. We describe what we saw in detail in the new book and, in Chapter 7, articulate a Profile of a Deeper Learning Leader that’s based on empirical research, not just anecdotes. We think that this book makes a unique contribution to what we know about leadership in deeper learning schools. The book is written for a practitioner audience and is full of concrete, specific examples to get folks thinking about possibilities. Also, every main chapter concludes with Key Leadership Behaviors and Support Structures. If you order it, let me know what you think!]

Excerpt 07

Trusting Teachers as Creative Professionals

As might be guessed in schools that give students high levels of autonomy, throughout our visits we also witnessed leadership behaviors and school structures that treated teachers as creative professionals. The relationship between leaders and teachers in these deeper learning schools might be akin to how a managing partner treats architects in a design firm, for instance. Leaders set a high expectation of professionalism for teachers in the building but then provided the space and support for creativity. Few, if any, ideas were rejected outright. A culture of “Yes, try that!” permeated the buildings that we visited. There were high expectations of professional conduct and student learning outcomes, but those were embedded deeply within a culture of trust and respect.

This culture of trust then extended to the overall vision, direction, and governance of the school. We saw countless examples of teachers who were empowered to take additional – and authentic – leadership roles that went far beyond serving on a committee or helping with a school event. In our conversations, teachers could regularly explain and defend the choices that they made in their classrooms and could link those choices to the overall vision for the student learning experience. Beyond that, however, they also could describe, champion, and advocate for the choices made by the school as a unified team. The pronoun “we” was used consistently in these conversations.

Within these contexts of teacher autonomy and empowerment, teacher professional learning does not fit traditional patterns. Teacher professional development isn’t typically decided by administrators. Teacher professional development isn’t a ‘one off’ or ‘toe dip’ into whatever faddish topic du jour that school leaders think is necessary. At the schools we visited, there were high levels of intentionality, investment, and sustainability around teachers’ professional learning. Those experiences were networked. They were frequently teacher-led. And, most importantly, they were personalized to what individuals and teams of teachers needed, all within the larger context of the vision and goals of the school. In the same way that these deeper learning leaders expected their teachers to meet a high bar of creative professionalism, in turn these teachers expected their leaders to meet that same high bar when it came to fostering adult learning and professional growth within the building.

Leadership for Deeper Learning, Chapter 7

[To celebrate our upcoming book, Leadership for Deeper Learning, I am publishing an excerpt each day for a week before its release. We interviewed leaders at 30 different ‘deeper learning’ schools around the world in 2019 and 2020. We then followed up those interviews with site visits, observations, on-site photographs and videos, and additional conversations. Our goal was to try and parse out What do leaders at innovative schools do that is different from their counterparts in more traditional schools? As you might imagine, we saw some fantastic leading, teaching, and learning. We describe what we saw in detail in the new book and, in Chapter 7, articulate a Profile of a Deeper Learning Leader that’s based on empirical research, not just anecdotes. We think that this book makes a unique contribution to what we know about leadership in deeper learning schools. The book is written for a practitioner audience and is full of concrete, specific examples to get folks thinking about possibilities. Also, every main chapter concludes with Key Leadership Behaviors and Support Structures. If you order it, let me know what you think!]

Excerpt 06

As we have learned in previous chapters, principal Michelle Schmitz brought a new vision of elementary education to the plains of Western Missouri. The entire vision for EPiC Elementary was created by tapping into the wisdom of others. The school was founded by leaders asking the community, “If you could have the chance to do education differently, what would it be?” Michelle reflected on the inception of the EPiC Elementary model:

We invited all of our stakeholders in the community, including council people, business people, students, and staff . . . every faction of a stakeholder that you could think of. We walked in there and we asked the question and it changed our lives. They started saying stuff like, “We want our kids to collaborate. We want our kids out in the community. We want our kids to do education differently.” From that point on in our community, we knew that we had the backing to really just blow up education and what it looked like.

Michelle went on to say:

We started to think about what school could look like. We focused on three timeless pillars. [Our first pillar was] empowering creativity, because creativity can take you for a lifetime. That’s a skill that you’re going to need well beyond high school and college. We also talked about equipping learners, meeting students where they are. So every single child in our school, no matter what their level, they’ll move forward. We also talked about engaging communities. What that means is going out in the communities, talking with experts, being different, having our doors open so the community can come in.

Looking at that, that’s our innovative start. Kids here get to create. We continue to learn – and continue to try to be like our environment around us – so that when kids come to school, they do not downshift. They actually upshift. We really embrace our environment, and want it to be the same inside the school as outside.

Leadership for Deeper Learning, Chapter 6

[To celebrate our upcoming book, Leadership for Deeper Learning, I am publishing an excerpt each day for a week before its release. We interviewed leaders at 30 different ‘deeper learning’ schools around the world in 2019 and 2020. We then followed up those interviews with site visits, observations, on-site photographs and videos, and additional conversations. Our goal was to try and parse out What do leaders at innovative schools do that is different from their counterparts in more traditional schools? As you might imagine, we saw some fantastic leading, teaching, and learning. We describe what we saw in detail in the new book and, in Chapter 7, articulate a Profile of a Deeper Learning Leader that’s based on empirical research, not just anecdotes. We think that this book makes a unique contribution to what we know about leadership in deeper learning schools. The book is written for a practitioner audience and is full of concrete, specific examples to get folks thinking about possibilities. Also, every main chapter concludes with Key Leadership Behaviors and Support Structures. If you order it, let me know what you think!]

Excerpt 05

One of the most important resources that schools have is time. Most traditional schools are locked into static time blocks, whether they have a traditional 7- or 8-period daily schedule or an alternating-day block schedule with longer class times. At Legacy High School, Tom Schmidt and Ben Johnson, the secondary assistant superintendent, talked to us about how they divided the day into 22 modules, or ‘mods,’ which has allowed for tremendous flexibility. While students in most schools spend equal amounts of time in each subject every week, students at Legacy High School have the ability to determine much of their schedules. For instance, a student who is strong in math might spend less time in math class, while a student who is strong in science might spend less time in science class. Teachers also vary their own time, depending on their own preferences and what they think their students’ learning needs are. Instead of teaching five 50-minute classes each week, a Social Studies teacher might offer three 60-minute classes and a 40-minute review class one week, while a Biology teacher down the hall might offer two 80-minute lab sections, a 60-minute direct instruction section, and a 40-minute group work section during the same week. Students with non-allocated mods can utilize them for homework, study groups, outside internships and job shadowing, community-based service learning, passion projects, and school clubs, or simply to take a break during an otherwise busy day.

One of the strengths of Legacy High School’s approach is that many teachers are coordinating together on instruction and scheduling. The four Algebra teachers, for example, might keep their classes roughly on pace with each other. If a student has to miss her Algebra teacher’s introduction of a new concept because of a conflict with an outside internship or a hockey competition, she can just attend another teacher’s session instead. Teachers and peer tutors also collaborate to provide context-specific help sessions, called Saber Centers, throughout the week. The Biology teacher might give an assessment after 20 minutes of her 60-minute class, dismiss the twenty students that have the concept down, and work with the other ten students for the remaining time. Students who still need more support can attend one of the Saber Center mods and get individualized tutoring from one of the other Biology teachers or a fellow student. Outside of the main classrooms are numerous flexible spaces that allow for individual work and small group collaboration. As Tom noted, it’s like “a college schedule in a high school environment. You have some heavy days, you have some light days. We have students who take up to eight classes but on any given day they only have five per day.”

Ben told us that the flex mod schedule has really opened up possibilities for students to engage in deeply-personalized projects, community internships with outside partners, and capstone experiences that they can leverage for college admissions. Tom added that their alumi return and affirm their college preparedness: “They know how to function in a large group, they can manage their schedule… if they’ve got class on Tuesday and Friday, they know how to prioritize their work in between.” Students also have exercised their collective voice and requested additional learning opportunities such as outdoor recreation, environmental science, and culinary arts to fill their open mods. Legacy High does everything it can to fulfill these requests. It all seems to work. Tom told us, “If I went to our staff right now and tried to take away the flex mod scheduling [and return to a traditional schedule], I’d have torches and pitchforks at my door.”

Leadership for Deeper Learning, Chapter 5

[To celebrate our upcoming book, Leadership for Deeper Learning, I am publishing an excerpt each day for a week before its release. We interviewed leaders at 30 different ‘deeper learning’ schools around the world in 2019 and 2020. We then followed up those interviews with site visits, observations, on-site photographs and videos, and additional conversations. Our goal was to try and parse out What do leaders at innovative schools do that is different from their counterparts in more traditional schools? As you might imagine, we saw some fantastic leading, teaching, and learning. We describe what we saw in detail in the new book and, in Chapter 7, articulate a Profile of a Deeper Learning Leader that’s based on empirical research, not just anecdotes. We think that this book makes a unique contribution to what we know about leadership in deeper learning schools. The book is written for a practitioner audience and is full of concrete, specific examples to get folks thinking about possibilities. Also, every main chapter concludes with Key Leadership Behaviors and Support Structures. If you order it, let me know what you think!]

Excerpt 04

At Envision Academy, the goal is to “force epiphanies for kids.” Envision’s approach of relying heavily on performance assessments and formalized defenses in 8th, 10th, and 12th grades is designed to help deliver that result. Laura, the principal, told us: “Watching kids, young people, stand up in front of a group of their teachers and peers and families to defend their work is just such a powerful thing.” To get to this powerful point for students, though, requires a lot of previous powerful work on the part of teachers.

At the heart of Envision Academy’s approach is its problem-based learning orientation that focuses on teaching students to think. As many teachers can tell you, this type of teaching for student ownership and empowerment is difficult and requires a different set of instructional skills. It also requires a mindset shift away from the teacher as the classroom manager and deliverer of content. Laura shared:

We want teachers to move away from this idea that ‘you’re a curriculum writer’ to ‘you’re an instructional designer.’ You design the instructional experience. You have a million choices to make on a daily basis about what you do and when and how and why. Then use the data that you collect about student thinking to inform your instructional decisions moving forward.

When we asked Michelle and Susan, the principal and instructional coach at EPiC, what a more traditional elementary school can do to start work like theirs, they discussed how professional learning starts with the vision: “It does not matter what the building looks like but, if a leader has built a collective vision, it will work. It cannot be a single person. Any school can do this work as long as they have this driving force and this collective effort.”

Leadership for Deeper Learning, Chapter 4

[To celebrate our upcoming book, Leadership for Deeper Learning, I am publishing an excerpt each day for a week before its release. We interviewed leaders at 30 different ‘deeper learning’ schools around the world in 2019 and 2020. We then followed up those interviews with site visits, observations, on-site photographs and videos, and additional conversations. Our goal was to try and parse out What do leaders at innovative schools do that is different from their counterparts in more traditional schools? As you might imagine, we saw some fantastic leading, teaching, and learning. We describe what we saw in detail in the new book and, in Chapter 7, articulate a Profile of a Deeper Learning Leader that’s based on empirical research, not just anecdotes. We think that this book makes a unique contribution to what we know about leadership in deeper learning schools. The book is written for a practitioner audience and is full of concrete, specific examples to get folks thinking about possibilities. Also, every main chapter concludes with Key Leadership Behaviors and Support Structures. If you order it, let me know what you think!]

Excerpt 03

We love the journey that Skyline High has traveled because it’s a story of school turnaround success, student redemption, and hope. Heidi told us during our visit:

People thought we would shut down. You know, we just weren’t known for anything that was really good. And we’ve completely turned around the culture of our building. We’ve completely turned around the impression of our community about Skyline High School. But we’re still serving all of the same kids. We’re still serving our underrepresented populations, our free and reduced lunch kids, our second language learners.

The general impression of Skyline over the last twelve years has completely changed. Realtors were literally telling people not to move into our area. Because you didn’t want to go to that high school and those feeder schools. And now realtors are saying, “You should go there because of the programs. And you should stay in your area because of this.” Fewer kids are choosing to open enroll out. They’re starting to stay here in our home area. We’re back to being the biggest high school in the district. So people want to stay here, but we’re also serving our community.

Parents are grateful. They’re excited about what’s going on at Skyline. I think for the most part they really trust us to do what’s best for their kids. I talk to parents at open houses that say, “Hey, my kid’s coming here but when they were six, there was no way I was going to send them to your school.” And now they say, “I’m really excited for my kid to come here.”

Every student and family deserves a chance to authentically say, “I’m really excited to come here every day.” At the schools that we profile in this book, educators are doing everything that they can to fulfill this promise to their families and communities.

Leadership for Deeper Learning, Chapter 3

[To celebrate our upcoming book, Leadership for Deeper Learning, I am publishing an excerpt each day for a week before its release. We interviewed leaders at 30 different ‘deeper learning’ schools around the world in 2019 and 2020. We then followed up those interviews with site visits, observations, on-site photographs and videos, and additional conversations. Our goal was to try and parse out What do leaders at innovative schools do that is different from their counterparts in more traditional schools? As you might imagine, we saw some fantastic leading, teaching, and learning. We describe what we saw in detail in the new book and, in Chapter 7, articulate a Profile of a Deeper Learning Leader that’s based on empirical research, not just anecdotes. We think that this book makes a unique contribution to what we know about leadership in deeper learning schools. The book is written for a practitioner audience and is full of concrete, specific examples to get folks thinking about possibilities. Also, every main chapter concludes with Key Leadership Behaviors and Support Structures. If you order it, let me know what you think!]

Excerpt 02

Innovation is iterative, of course. Leaders and schools don’t just launch new initiatives and then coast. One Stone is a prime example of iterative innovation, where each subsequent cycle broke away from the previous norm just a little bit more. One Stone started as an after-school, experiential service program that was serving around 200 students from 15 different schools. The leaders realized that kids were leaving school, coming to One Stone, and staying up until 10:00pm every night working on projects. During those early years, students would say things like, “Why can’t we just do this all day?” and “Why can’t this be learning? I do more learning here than I do at school.”

In true student-driven form, the leaders of One Stone kicked off a 24-hour ‘think challenge’ at an indoor arena at Boise State University. The event drew 150 students and also included a number of professionals from the worlds of education, research, and business entrepreneurship. The group spent 24 hours together focusing on how education could be reimagined. Smaller think tanks within the group each worked on the concept of “How might we reimagine education?” Through this process, everyone came to realize that the education students experienced in more traditional schools was not relevant to them, both in the present and in regard to where they wanted to go. Students struggled to connect their learning at their local high schools with what they needed out in the real world.

This notion of creating a new school based on relevance and purpose led to One Stone’s guiding principles, which the school affectionately calls ‘the Blob,’ or Bold Learning OBjectives. When discussing One Stone’s curriculum, the leaders described how they don’t necessarily have one. What they do have, however, are learning objectives that focus on mindset, creativity, knowledge, and skills. A crucial aspect of the Blob is the idea of failing forward. Chad, the director of research and design, talked to us about how getting students to fail forward is a huge challenge because students have been in the performance zone for the first eight or so years of their lives: “Everything students do [in traditional schools] counts as a score. Students are constantly being evaluated. Students are not necessarily challenged to take risks intellectually, academically, whatever it might be.”

Leadership for Deeper Learning, Chapter 2