We need a common framework for understanding the change work that we do. The framework must be grounded in the system that we seek to change: public education. For the last several years, NIUSI has used the Systemic Change Framework to guide its practice in schools. It helps out district, school, family and practitioner partners understand what part of the system a particular strategy may target. It reminds us all that the core of our work must be successful learning results for students. The framework reminds us that school systems are products of the communities and the families that live there. In the framework, family and community involvement are embedded actions at the district, school and professional levels.

Each element of the framework defines the arenas in which leadership needs to emerge at that level. For instance, districts need to ensure that policies are developed and implemented that help individual schools make the best use of all the resources in a particular building. Schools need to be organized in ways that create space for teachers to have time to plan and learn together. Professionals need to understand and implement robust processes for assessing and teaching their students. Different types of activities and different roles people play are highlighted in each of the levels of the framework. Such complex contexts require that strategies are differentiated, complementary, and coherent in order to leverage continuous change and improvement.Standard ↔ Leading. Benchmarks were established based upon evidence from NIUSI’s network of schools. The Benchmarks provide a yardstick for measuring your improvement efforts.

Professional Effort

• Learning Standards

  Learning standards are critical to the learning environment and support student effort in providing students with the knowledge of “what it is we need to know and be able to do” in the classroom and in schools.

• Learning Assessment

  Learning assessment helps teachers understand the knowledge and skills of each student while defining goals for learning.

• Teaching Design and Practices

  Practitioners thrive and are better able to innovate, support student effort and outcomes when their organization supports and encourages their creativity and professionalism.

• Group Practice and Professional Development

  The literature on effective and inclusive schools, in addition to identifying specific educator practices, also highlights the need for collaboration among and between general and special educators. School professionals need support, training, and coaching in order to implement high quality, inclusionary practices effectively.

School Effort

• School/Community Relations

  Close school/community relationships are at the heart of successful, comprehensive, and inclusive urban schools.

• Resource Development and Allocation

  In a transformed, inclusive urban school learning and other educational supports are organized to meet the needs of all students rather than historical conventions or the way the rooms are arranged in the building.

• Structure and Use of Time

  Without time during the work day to meet, discuss, and challenge one another’s ideas and activities, it is difficult to imagine many educators achieving the quality of dialogue and inquiry necessary for sustained, whole school improvement.

• Governance and Leadership

  The most challenging students require the combined expertise of many individuals including administrators, teachers, mental health personnel, community advocates, an students themselves. The use of building-level leadership teams creates the opportunity for shared decision-making resulting in important benefits to student with and without disabilities.

• Physical Environment and Facilities

  By using the space and equipment thoughtfully, school professionals can reduce the amount of talking they do to manage the group and so increase the time students spend learning the explicit curriculum.

• Culture of Change and Improvement

  A school must provide the intellectual and emotional climate to support sustained improvement of practice. Teachers and other practitioners must use the information that students provide about their learning progress to inform curriculum and teaching decisions.

District Effort

• Systemic Infrastructure and Organizational Support

  The functions of central administration must be organized in such a way that efficiency and individualization are accommodated. Thoughtful supports provide coherent, continuous opportunities for improved practices.

• Resource Development and Allocation

  Districts strategically and flexibly develop and allocate resources to support the work of schools.

• Student Services

  A range of services are available to students and families that involve practitioners other than teachers that are designed to realize all students’ potential.

• District/Community Partnership

  For many of the same reasons individual schools need to partner with families and communities, districts need to partner with their local judicial, social, recreational, health and government agencies to ensure that students are able to attend school ready to learn.

• Culture of Renewal and Improvement

  Through professional development schools, the research values of teacher educators are combined with the primary concern of schools to find solutions to practical problems. Risk-taking and failure are seen as opportunities for growth.

• Inquiry on School and Schooling

  Educators, families, and students are engaged in ongoing reflection and practiced-based inquiry in classrooms and schools.