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Schools Can Change
A Step-by-Step Change Creation System for Building Innovative Schools and Increasing Student Learning

  • Dale W. Lick - Florida State University Learning Systems Institute and Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies
  • Karl H. Clauset - National Whole-Faculty Study Groups Center
  • Carlene U. Murphy - National Whole-Faculty Study Groups Center

Foreword by Carlene U. Murphy

Additional resources:

November 2012 | 256 pages | Corwin

Build a dynamic system for change!

From No Child Left Behind to Common Core standards, we are inundated with directives for improving our schools. How can we really create lasting change? By applying the Change Creation system!
The Change Creation system produces a creative, collaborative, nurturing school environment—and you can make it happen. The authors use what they have learned over two decades of working with schools implementing Whole Faculty Study Groups to make improvements and refinements that create a more streamlined and effective grass-roots system for measurable and sustainable student growth.

Learning community pioneers Dale Lick, Karl Clauset, and Carlene Murphy show teachers, principals, and schools how to:

  • Develop the right vision, relationships, and culture to create and sustain change
  • Create communication networks for sharing that work
  • Model learning-inquiry cycles for action teams for success
  • Build loyalty, trust, and responsibility within your teams and across the school

With a free, comprehensive online collection of practical resources including templates, checklists and action team assessment forms, Schools Can Change will become your keystone for school innovation and improved student learning.

"Far too many good initiatives fall short due to lack of planning and exclusion of important stakeholders. The authors tell us how to build a sustainable culture over time. They don't pretend that it is easy, but give the educator confidence that it can be done."
—Eddie Ingram, Superintendent
Franklin County Schools, Louisburg, NC

"This is the most comprehensive book on the topic of school change ever written. The suggested practices and strategies at various stages create a comprehensive, meaningful text. This book helps us gain practical wisdom at all levels in our districts and schools."
—Lyne Ssebikindu, Assistant Principal
Crump Elementary School, Cordova, TN


 
List of Figures and Tables
 
Online Resources
 
Foreword
 
Preface
Purpose and Need

 
Who Should Read and Use This Book?

 
Organization and Contents

 
 
Acknowledgments
 
About the Authors
 
1. The Change Creation System
School Improvement

 
School Reforms

 
The Roots of the Change Creation System

 
No Silver Bullet, One Brick at a Time

 
Standards for Professional Learning and Practice

 
The Change Creation System

 
Summary

 
 
Part I. Fundamentals of Effectiveness
 
2. Fundamentals of Effectiveness for School Improvement
Understanding the Culture

 
Culture of Discipline

 
Culture of Change Creation

 
Culture of Relationships and Collaboration

 
Culture of Transformational Leadership

 
Cultural Change

 
Summary

 
 
3. Fundamentals of Vision and Successful Change
Vision

 
Change

 
Success and Failure of Change

 
Effective Sponsorship in Schools

 
Change and Resistance in Schools

 
Universal Change Principle for Schools

 
Summary

 
 
4. Fundamentals for Creating Learning Teams and Professional Learning Communities
Collaboration and Teamwork

 
Action Teams and Professional Learning Communities

 
Authentic Teams and Synergy

 
Comentoring Teams

 
Learning Teams

 
Professional Learning Communities

 
Summary

 
 
Part II. The Process of the Change Creation System
 
5. Introducing the Decision-Making Cycle
Action Teams Decision-Making Cycle

 
Preparing to Start the Decision-Making Cycle

 
Summary

 
 
6. Identifying Student Learning Needs and Forming Action Teams
Student Learning Needs That Action Teams Address

 
How to Identify Student Learning Needs

 
Form Action Teams and Select Student Needs to Address

 
Selecting Student Needs to Address

 
Support for Identifying Student Needs and Forming Action Teams

 
Summary

 
 
7. Introducing Action Teams
Action Teams in the Change Creation System

 
The Work of Action Teams

 
Purposes of Action Teams

 
Action Team Principles

 
Action Team Process Guidelines

 
Effective Action Team Meetings

 
Action Teams as a Bundle of Changes

 
Summary

 
 
8. Support for Action Teams
Keep the Focus on Student Learning

 
Protect Time for Action Team Meetings

 
Establish Routines

 
Provide Regular, Frequent, and Constructive Feedback to Action Teams

 
Understand the Developmental Stages of Action Teams

 
Help Struggling Teams Move Forward

 
Develop Communication Networks and Strategies to Share Action Teams' Work and Results

 
Form Administrator Action Teams

 
Summary

 
 
9. Creating Team Action Plans
Team Action Plan

 
Creating Team Action Plans

 
Support for Action Teams on Their Team Action Plans and Logs

 
Summary

 
 
10. Implementing Learning and Inquiry Cycles for Innovation and Improving Student Learning: Parts 1 and 2
Implementing Learning and Inquiry Cycles

 
Supporting Learning and Inquiry Cycles for Innovation and Student Learning

 
Summary

 
 
11. Implementing Learning and Inquiry Cycles for Innovation and Improving Student Learning: Parts 3 and 4
Implementing Learning and Inquiry Cycles

 
Supporting Learning and Inquiry Cycles for Innovation and Student Learning

 
Summary

 
 
12. Assessing the Impact of Action Teams and Sharing Results and Best Practices
Assessing the Impact of Action Teams on Teacher Practice and Student Learning

 
Sharing Results and Best Practices and Applying Lessons Learned

 
Repeating the Decision-Making Cycle Each Year

 
Supporting Assessing the Impact of Action Teams and Sharing Results and Best Practices

 
Summary

 
 
Epilogue
 
References
 
Index

Supplements

"The Change Creation System is an empowerment of professional educators who want to meet the learning needs of their students and inform their own practice. Finally, a call to reform by a collaboration of school professionals who develop best practice for the students in their own schools. This is an informed work that provides a step by step process for school wide renewal and individual professional development as it appeals to the best that is within us and students."

Sherry Markel, Professor, Teacher Education
Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ

"This book will become an essential resource to school districts as they continue to develop capacity to lead students and staff to greater levels of effectiveness. This book will take all of us from where we are and move us to make greater differences for our students."

Claudia Thompson, Academic Officer, Learning and Teaching
Peninsula School District, Gig Harbor, WA

"In a changing world, our schools must change, but far too often administrators do not know how to make the changes necessary to keep up with the rapidly developing world. This book offers a wealth of resources, practical experience and a direct model for how to change to meet the needs of learners. This book is a "must read" for any administrator who wants to make a long-lasting impact on the learning outcomes in his or her school."

Renee Peoples, Teacher
Swain West Elementary, Bryson City, NC

"This is the most comprehensive book on the topic of school change ever written. The suggested practices and strategies at various stages create a comprehensive, meaningful text. This book helps us gain practical wisdom at all levels in our districts and schools."

Lyne Ssebikindu, Assistant Principal
Crump Elementary School, Cordova, TN

"If school communities are looking for a comprehensive road map for school improvement, they will not find anything more comprehensive. The authors not only set out a plan on how to get to where you need to go, but they identify every small pothole that you will encounter, and which can sometimes derail school improvement. This book in two words—comprehensive, authentic."

Neil MacNeill, Headmaster
Ellenbrook Independent Primary School, Ellenbrook, WA Australia

"This text should be required reading for all future principals and found on the desk of all current school leaders. Promoting school improvement in teaching, learning and student performance is the leaders mantra today. The process of change in schools is complex, however this step-by-step manual provides leaders with the tools they need to improve academic performance. It is comprehensive and rich in detail but more importantly, it provides the roadmap and details for success."

Harriet Gould, Adjunct Professor
Concordia University, Lincoln, NE

"The authors' work with the change creation system is significant. Far too many good initiatives fall short or are abandoned due to lack of planning and exclusion of important stakeholders. Lick, Clauset and Murphy, in a very matter of fact style, tell us of the consequences of change, the time involved, and how to build a sustainable culture over time. They don’t pretend that it is easy, but give the educator confidence that it can be done."

Eddie Ingram, Superintendent
Franklin County Schools, Louisburg, NC

"Our school has used the Whole Faculty Study Groups for the past decade, and this book updates the model with relevance to the current changes happening in public education. For schools or districts looking to improve their current delivery of professional development, Schools Can Change is a proven system that works!"

David Wilm, Principal
Matthews Middle School, Island Lake, IL

"Schools Can Change is like a good novel that you can’t put down, one in which you want to go over the key parts again and again. It is full of sound advice and a very good cross section of proven practices on educational change. We look forward to using a number of the suggested strategies with our staffs in the years to come."

Don Boyd and Jessica Antosz, Principals
Ballenas Secondary School and Nanoose Bay Elementary School, British Columbia
Key features
1. Built around step-by-step practical 'change creation' approach, beyond anything available today, to build systems with learning teams to generate improvement innovations and to change the culture appropriately for sustaining school successes and student learning achievements.

2. Based on more than two decades of success with the Whole Faculty Study Group approach to professional learning.

3. Free access to a valuable online collection of accompanying practical resources including templates, checklists,action team assessment forms, and an action team rubric.

Sample Materials & Chapters

Chapter 1: The Change Creation System

Preface


For instructors

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