The results of this process, when massaged and streamlined, will represent not only a core definition of modern learning in your context but a community agreement that addresses both the Why change? question and the essence of a Change to what? vision. A simple technique for achieving clarity and consolidation involves the use of an if—then prompt: “If this is true, then the implications for learning are …” We’ve paraphrased this approach in figure 1.5. In other words, if our collective research and understanding that A, B, and C are true about the future for our students, then our focus should be on X, Y, and Z. Note that these statements are not one to one. Multiple If observations can combine into a single Then statement.
Figure 1.5: Sample output of developing an informed view of the future.
Because these are not assumptions (they are based in research and current thinking about the future), your leadership group should properly support and reference (cite) the insights and understandings derived from the inquiry process. One of the goals of this process is to emerge with a clear set of shared understandings and parameters for deciding on your highest learning needs and goals. This is the basis on which all future work will proceed. We very deliberately differentiate this visioning and goal-setting phase from deciding on the details of how we might achieve these goals. Too often, we have seen schools and districts rush to develop action plans for implementation before they have truly and clearly established the goals and principles (the vision) for such a selection. The result is often a set of potentially disruptive and disjointed programmatic implementations ungrounded in and unaccountable to clear articulations of the whys and whats.
Clarity and brevity are key elements of this stage. You do not need reams of documents to capture the essence of what you have learned and understood through this inquiry process. What you do need is a solid and succinct basis for shared understanding. One practical and valuable output from this process is to generate a Portrait of a Graduate, “a collective vision that articulates the community’s aspirations for all students” (Battelle for Kids, n.d.). The following are two examples from a public-school district and an independent school, respectively. The first is from the Catalina Foothills school district in Tucson, Arizona (Catalina Foothills School District, n.d.):
The Catalina Foothills School District (CFSD) is committed to building knowledge and skills that prepare students for college and career pathways. In addition to mastering essential academic content, CFSD is also focused on building a set of proficiencies that we believe students must learn in order to apply and transfer knowledge to problems or situations in the classroom and beyond the PreK–12 educational setting.
The site goes on to name specific deep learning proficiencies that include: citizenship, creativity and innovation, critical thinking and problem solving, communication, collaboration, and systems thinking (Catalina Foothills School District, n.d.).
The second such Portrait of a Graduate is from the Alexandria Country Day School in Alexandria, Virginia (Alexandria Country Day School, n.d.):
We seek to ensure that at the conclusion of their eighth grade year ACDS graduates are:
Independent Learners: The ACDS Graduate actively engages in the acquisition of academic, athletic, and artistic skills. He or she seeks opportunities to learn and exhibits the abilities, knowledge, confidence, and creativity to complete a given task independently….
Effective Communicators: The ACDS Graduate effectively exchanges ideas, experiences, and knowledge confidently and appropriately in person and using a variety of media….
Community Minded: The ACDS Graduate demonstrates an awareness of his or her impact on the community, values diversity, and has the skills to understand, cooperate, and empathize with others. The ACDS Graduate exhibits moral courage and takes an active role in the betterment of the greater community….
Balanced: The ACDS Graduate demonstrates a healthy understanding of the work/life balance, attends to his or her physical and mental health, and is willing to take prudent risks in pursuit of his or her goals.
Having a portrait like these enables you to communicate something more concrete that illustrates the type of student you want to collectively create. It is accessible and compelling to the broader community while establishing a focal point for directing ensuing decisions and actions.
If you’d like to learn more, EdLeader21 is a leading organization promoting the cultivation of 21st century skills and the new basics of modern education (Kay & Greenhill, 2013). The organization hosts an excellent website that offers many examples of graduate profiles along with a detailed protocol that districts and schools can use to engage stakeholders in developing their own Portrait of a Graduate (https://portraitofagraduate.org).
Communicating Futures Research With Key Stakeholders
You need to clearly communicate the understandings and implications of your futures research, along with the resulting Portrait of a Graduate, to the parents, students, community connections, and educators within the broader community. A variety of communication channels exist, including print and online newsletters, articles in local papers, district and school-based websites, social media like Facebook and Twitter, and informational videos posted on YouTube. We also recommend offering in-person sessions, such as information meetings, workshops, and informal coffees where people can actively explore and discuss. You cannot simply tell people that your leadership group’s interpretations are true; you need to help them to arrive at similar conclusions and understand your responses to those conclusions. The importance of building a collective understanding is crucial to gaining the support necessary for the acceptance of subsequent work and the challenges of change. Failure to plan and execute an effective communication plan can hinder subsequent efforts that arise from your desire to do better for your students.
Notes From the Field
The process of transforming a learning community toward meaningful modern learning is a long one, comparable to a relay race. It is not a race, per se, but it is a long and complex process that needs proper staging. To build the proper conditions for success at the next stage, effective change leaders must recognize that various stages of the race require various participants to be involved. The validity of this process is earned through the trust that it is both representative of the community and focused on what is best for our students (not the adults or the organization). Accordingly, community involvement and voice are essential. The word we must echo through everything.
Moving From Vision to Mission
When you have a vision, the next question to ask is: “How do we concretize our vision for modern learning into an actionable mission?”
By acting on the ideas presented in this chapter, you have collaboratively developed an informed, futures-oriented vision for your educational organization. You may also have imagined or created other components, such as a Portrait of a Graduate, to support communication and understanding. In this next stage, you move to transform your vision into a clearly articulated and actionable mission to guide the work at any level—district, school, or department.
A vision is aspirational; it is a projection of what a district, school, or department wants to become. Think of the mission as the organization’s core business; that is, what it is committed to achieving for its clients—the students it serves. An educational mission should thus serve to operationalize your vision in terms of the main outcomes of student learning based on the school’s vision of its desired future.
Unfortunately, schools do not always properly