Camden Boren
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Innovating While Stabilizing Today’s Educational Environment
If you have been engaging in the virtual learning series hosted by CEN over the past few months featuring Dr. Bill Daggett, you should have heard two common themes:
- GPT3 (and 4, 5….) will result in a tremendous shift in technology’s impact on education and life in general.
- Savvy district leaders must strike a balance between stabilizing the education system and innovating processes to address the needs of our students, communities, and the US…not an easy task.
What does Chat.OpenAI (GPT3) say when asked about this challenge?
According to Assistant (2023), stabilizing an organization while also innovating to address internal and external changes can be a challenging task for a leader. Here are some steps that a leader can take to effectively navigate this situation:
- Assess the current situation: It’s important to understand the current state of the organization and identify any areas that need to be stabilized. This might involve gathering data, conducting interviews, or seeking input from employees.
- Develop a plan: Based on the assessment, the leader should develop a plan to address the issues that need to be stabilized. This plan should include specific goals, tasks, and deadlines.
- Communicate the plan: Once the plan is developed, it’s important to clearly communicate it to the rest of the organization. This helps to ensure that everyone is on the same page and working towards the same goals.
- Focus on innovation: While stabilizing the organization, it’s important not to lose sight of the need to innovate. This might involve identifying new opportunities, testing new ideas, or implementing new technologies.
- Foster a culture of continuous improvement: Encourage a culture of continuous improvement within the organization. This helps to ensure that the organization is always looking for ways to improve and adapt to changing circumstances.
- Review and revise the plan as needed: As the organization continues to evolve, it may be necessary to review and revise the plan to ensure that it remains relevant and effective.
By following these steps, a leader can effectively stabilize the organization while also fostering innovation and continuous improvement.
For districts engaging in the P-20 System Redesign Work, leaders (superintendents, boards, district and campus administrators) must assess their current situation: Are you satisfied with what is happening to your students when they graduate? If your least successful student defined the district’s success rate, is that a standard with which you are happy? What areas of your current operation must be stabilized? Staffing? Academics? In the business world, this is called a SWOT analysis that focuses on internal strengths and weaknesses and external threats and opportunities. Based on a SWOT analysis, districts should develop a plan to address areas within their control or mitigate impacts from areas outside of their control. Annually, CEN works with districts to develop a project plan designed to focus on innovation and stabilization efforts in pursuit of a redesign to a P-20 System. As the plan is developed and is being implemented, intentional two-way communication is essential. Communication is as important as other on-going school systems including attendance, grading, and sport schedules! By focusing on innovation (in the planning, communicating, and implementing of the plan), the opportunities and threats outside of the organization can be strategically (and proactively) addressed rather resulting in a reaction that might not lead to the best outcomes. A culture of continuous improvement in a P-20 System Redesign comes in the work that is sometimes easily overlooked in importance. Advisory committees, instructional rounds, age-appropriate research, leadership professional development and culture surveys are examples of important activities leading towards continuous improvement.
A final thought which Chat.OpenAI did not mention…this type of stabilizing and innovating change takes time. The Rural Redesign Process is a marathon and not a quick sprint. The long-term nature of the redesign when implemented effectively leads to systemic change. Boards, superintendents, district and campus administrators, teachers, and other stakeholders must keep their focus on the intended and desired outcomes in order to truly do what is best for all students.
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DoingPower
We all learn, every day, in millions of ways.
We learn when we read, when we observe, when we consider, when we discuss, when we listen, when we attend, when we ……….
However, nothing matches the learning efficacy of when we DO something. There is sticking power when we actually remodel that room, assemble that tool, plant and grow that garden, train for that competition, speak those sentences in another language, calculate the area under the curve, etc. John Dewey was on to something in the 1920s and 1930s when he was advocating for experiential learning.
The late Dr. Phil Schlechty often reminded us that, “Students don’t learn from work students don’t do.” Indeed. What PS didn’t specifically note in that assertion is that “students” come in all ages. His assertion holds, regardless of age. We learn best when we actually DO something.
Applying ourselves to a worthy task/skill requires a lot of and from us, namely effort.
Those investments of effort – the doing – always pay powerful dividends – LEARNING!
*If you’d like to read more of nc’s blatherings, go to www.nelsonwcoulter.com.
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Influenced-er
Influence is an interesting dynamic. We can think of it as the act of impacting some sort of outcome through unobvious and often indirect means.
The Earth is a physical body, yet it influences weather patterns, seasonal changes, celestial bodies beyond itself. The Sun is similar. While it is a finite physical body (in one sense), it’s power, reach, impact, INFLUENCEcan be felt well beyond the confines of its physicalness. It commands attention and it emanates significant influence across millions of other celestial bodies, across light years of time. And, the Sun’s influence does not just stop at the surface of the Earth; it penetrates to its very core, to and through all the life forms that live here.
I am increasingly aware of the power of influence among and between humans. We, too, emanate signals(?), fields(?), influence(?) – SOMETHING – that reaches beyond our physical bodies, and across time.
What is not in question is that you and I have some impact on the thinking and behavior of others, well beyond the physicalness of our bodies.
What IS in question, however, is the nature of that influence, and whether or not we are intentional in what we are emanating.
We are at once the influenced, and the influencers.
A question most worthy of our deepest consideration: “What am I emanating in the way of influence?”
*If you’d like to read more of nc’s blatherings, go to www.nelsonwcoulter.com.
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Rocket Science
Problems are not hard to find. They present themselves to us, every day, in a million ways. Identifying problems is not rocket science. The challenge is always in figuring out how to address them in some meaningful and sustainable way.
Dr. Kim Alexander, as school superintendent in the rural community in which he was raised (Roscoe, Texas), saw a problem:
Systemic generational poverty
- which led to low aspirations,
- which led to low expectations,
- which led to terrible educational, social and economic outcomes,
- which led to more generational poverty,
- which led to…………
- An Endless Cycle of More of the Same…………
Dr. Alexander decided to do something about it. He began engaging with members of his rural community and with external stakeholders, inviting them to explore ideas for breaking that cycle of generational poverty, with its subsequent negative outcomes.
Step by step, brick by brick, idea by idea, the concept of the P20 educational model began to take form and gain traction. That P20 assumes EVERY student in the community will have both opportunity and the needed support systems to move ever upward in degree attainment and/or the adding of industry-valued certifications.
The pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place. The evidence of impact became quite compelling. If it could work in Roscoe, Texas, then why not in other rural communities? Eventually, Collegiate Edu-Nation (CEN) was conceived and formed as the vehicle to share the P20 model with other rural servant leaders who have also decided to create better futures for their children and communities.
The perpetual downward cycle of educational, social, and economic deflation in rural America need not persist. That cycle can – and has been – be reversed in demonstrable ways.
CEN and the P20 Model are built on the foundation of three very lofty goals:
College and Career Focus – for ALLstudents, through school transformation processes.
Educational Attainment – systems and support for degree attainment and industry certifications.
Transformative Educator Development – embedded, innovative, and ongoing professional development.No, it’s not rocket science. It’s hard work. Very hard work. (Definitely not work for the faint of heart.) But well worth it if creating better futures for our rural students, schools, and communities is what we desire.
Interested in building a “rocket” for your rural community? Start HERE.
