Innovation is the ability to see change as an opportunity, not a threat
-Steve Jobs
Strong Leadership
Innovative schools share one thing in common, which is strong leadership.
The leaders are deeply committed to exploring all possibilities and bridging the gap between students’ current lives and the future they’ll graduate into. Their vision creates an impact and molds the school community and the school culture. They articulate their vision in simpler terms so that everyone in the community can support it. They set measurable goals to identify progress, celebrate success, and consistently innovate.
Foundation for innovation
Developing the six Elements of Leadership promotes intentional, sustainable, whole-school change and builds the foundation for innovation. The first step is to understand and develop strategies for each Leadership element – Vision, Culture, Capacity, Team, Community, Measure.
Leadership Elements
Leadership Meeting
The journey of innovation, begins with o meeting between our team and the Leadership team of the institution. During this meeting, we train the leadership team at your school, to plan the elements which help you drive and shape innovation in your school. During the first six months of the deployment we support leadership team through our training and consultation, to set the foundations of an innovative school.
Step 1 -
Insight into the leadership elements
The primary step deals with understanding the Leadership Elements, getting an insight into their importance in progress towards innovation. Further, it helps you understand the current stage of each element at your school – Define, Develop or Sustain. We help you to progress from the current stage and move towards innovation.
Step 2 - identify changes to be brought about for each element
Our team provides you with guiding questions and a deck of Leadership Cards that will help you rethink the current approaches followed, the possibilities that technology can bring in, and identify areas that need to be changed, in order to progress towards innovation.
Step 3 - Develop a plan
Our team helps you plan the entire journey towards innovation. The schedule for steps to be taken like Setting up of the environment, Professional learning for teachers, Skilling of students will be arrived at, during the discussion. The lead persons and the team responsible for each element will progress in a phased manner as per the schedule planned.
Planning Each Leadership Element
Vision
With professional learning and instructional design with technology, schools are able to raise the bar for what’s possible in classrooms and beyond. Innovative schools create technology-rich environments that support fundamental learning and teaching needs. During the leadership meeting, the priorities for learning, teaching and environment are discussed, the tech vision is defined as well as measurable goals that will help in defining and achieving the vision are documented. The lead person and the team from the Leadership team for developing this element, will be noted. Further, steps to develop this element will be discussed and listed out.
Learning
The Approaches to Learning that are followed, Student Skills addressed currently, newer approaches and skills that the Leadership team envisions, are documented.
Teaching
During the Leadership Meeting, the priorities for Approaches to teaching and timeline for Professional Learning is documented.
Environment
During the Leadership Meeting, the current environment at school is discussed and the priorities for additional infrastructure is documented. Timeline for the workflow is also documented.
OUTCOMES OF THE LEADERSHIP MEETING ON Vision
- Documentation of the priorities for learning, teaching and Environment
- Articulation of the tech vision in a way that everyone in your community can understand and support
- Documentation of Measurable goals that will help in defining and achieving the vision.
- Identification of the lead person and the team for developing the envisioned culture
- Documentation of further steps to develop this Principle Leadership element - Vision
Culture
Culture impacts every aspect of teaching , learning and environment of the school. It depicts the values, ethos, attitudes, norms, traditions and beliefs of the staff and students. It outlines the way the teachers, student, parents interact, the manner and schedule of these interactions, and also the design of the hallway We help you to capture a snapshot of your school’s culture.
Capturing a cultural snapshot
During the Leadership Meeting, we provide you with guiding questions that lead to understanding the culture of your school, identify new initiatives that supports the vision, enhanced community engagement, and anticipate reaction from community to change. With the guiding questions, we help you compile an insight into the existing culture and the changes needed to proceed towards innovation. It helps in documenting the driving force behind the culture of learning, the culture of teaching, aspects that motivate the teachers, essential aspects of your culture, and ways of nurturing them.
OUTCOMES OF THE LEADERSHIP MEETING ON CULTURE
- Capture a snapshot of your current culture in the domains of learning, teaching and environment
- Determine the gap between the current and envisioned culture
- Articulate the envisioned culture in a way that everyone in your community can understand and support
- Identify the lead person and the team for developing the envisioned culture
- Document further steps to develop this Leadership element - Culture
Capacity
Capacity building of an Institution involves understanding various aspects of the institution, including people, programs, and systems. Further steps include understanding the current capacity that can support change and what might still be needed. Effective capacity building needs change in all the spheres of Learning, Teaching, and the Environment. During the Leadership Meeting, we help you identify the current status, areas that require growth, and the processes to be incorporated to accomplish growth.
Building CAPACITY
The Leadership meeting proceeds to capture the details about the current Capacity of the institution. We help you with guiding questions that provide an insight into the leadership commitment to start and sustain the effort towards innovation, ways of skilling the faculty members, and the capacity of the current faculty programs, etc. From an exhaustive set of parameters required for Capacity Building, we help you identify the areas that fall into the following Categories – What you Have, What you need, and Where you can grow.
OUTCOMES OF THE LEADERSHIP MEETING ON Capacity
- Documenting the current initiatives, technical capacities, and infrastructure
- Identifying the parameters required for Capacity Building
- Articulate your approach to building capacity in a way that everyone in your community can understand and support
- Identify the lead person and the team for building the capacity of the institution
- Document further steps to build the capacity
Team
The spark for innovation from the Leadership Team has to be spread to the minds of all stakeholders so that the progress towards innovation is sustainable. This can be accomplished with a team that shares responsibility, plan, implement, inspire and keep the community engaged. During the Leadership meeting, we help you identify the lead person and the team members who could lead the planning around each Leadership element.
Drafting the Innovation Team
With the guiding questions, we help you document the key stakeholders in your community, identify people who could lead the planning around each element, and the role of students in the planning and decision-making. When forming the team, include stakeholders who have expertise and interest in each element so they can lead the work. Some members who influence your community can be included too.
OUTCOMES OF THE LEADERSHIP MEETING ON Team
- Identifying and documenting the lead person and the team for catalysing the innovation
- Describe your team and their goals in a way that everyone in your community can understand and support.
- Document further steps in developing this element
Community
When families and community members are involved in student learning, students improve their academic performance and gain advocates that promote their success, helping them feel more confident at school and in taking on more rigorous classwork. The benefits of community engagement in schools create a snowball effect, influencing all aspects of student and school achievement. During the Leadership Meeting, we provide you with guiding questions that lead to identifying the community groups that are most invested in the success of your students and your school, ways to improve the communication with them using technology, and opportunities for your students and teachers to address community challenges with local organizations.
Community Engagement Strategy
Stakeholders in the community would be interested in knowing about the progress towards innovation, concerning learning, teaching, and environment. Understanding what each category of stakeholder would like to know, exploring new communication methods that could be established and sustained, using technology is a part of this strategy.
OUTCOMES OF THE LEADERSHIP MEETING ON Community
- Document the stakeholders of the school community
- Define new ways of communicating with stakeholders using technology
- Articulate your community engagement strategy for various categories of stakeholders in a way that everyone in your community can understand and support
- Identify the lead person and the people on the community engagement team
- Document further steps to enhance community engagement
Measure
Innovation impacts every aspect of learning, teaching and environment.Tracking the progress in each of these aspects requires setting up goals and new ways of measurement. Measuring a range of practices will help to track the progress and support continuous innovation. During the Leadership Meeting, we will help you choose and order the priorities of your institution and determine ways you could measure progress in relation to your vision.
Measurement Strategy
“What to measure” and “How to measure them” are the prime areas of discussion in this phase of Leadership discussion. The inclusion of technology in the school will empower the students and teachers with various skills. Teamwork, Communication and creation skills, Personalisation of Learning, Critical Thinking, Real – World Engagement, College and Career Readiness, Coding skills, Mind and Body Wellness, Global Citizenship, Entrepreneurship may be some of the parameters chosen for measurement.Ways of measurement may be through Focus Group, Class Observation, Global Readiness, Formative Assessments, Grade Data, Lesson Plan Review, Portfolios, Badges, and School Data. Documenting them would be the goal of this phase.
OUTCOMES OF THE LEADERSHIP MEETING ON Measure
- Define the changes you want to see, and how might you measure them
- Define what you want learning to look like with technology with a timeline.
- Define what are to be measured and ways of measuring them
- Articulate your measurement strategy for learning, teaching, and environment in a way that everyone in your community can understand and support
- Identify the lead person and the people on the measurement team
- Document further steps to measure the progress
