Inside PLCs at Work

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PLCs AT W O R K®

“Inside PLCs at Work is both practical and authentic. If you hope to create a school where teachers love to work, and where students are treated respectfully each and every day, this is the book for you.”

—Bob Sornson Author; Founder, Early Learning Foundation, Brighton, Michigan

“This book is packed with powerful examples of the possibilities inherent in the work of PLCs. By describing the what and how of PLCs, this text will help educators discover, or in some cases, rediscover, their why.”

—Jeffery L. Williams President, Reading Recovery Council of North America; K–12 Literacy Coach and Reading Recovery Teacher Leader, Solon City Schools, Ohio

—Bob Wright

K–12 teachers and administrators will: • Develop a thorough understanding of the PLC process by exploring its foundational concepts and qualities • Learn about the successful implementation at Sheridan County School District 2

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PLCs AT W O R K ®

Your Guided Tour Through One District’s Successes, Challenges, and Celebrations

• Understand how to implement the PLC process in their own schools in a nuanced and meaningful fashion • Utilize real-world examples to garner further insight into the PLC process • Gain helpful tools to guide their work during the PLC journey Visit go.SolutionTree.com/PLCbooks to download the free reproducibles in this book.

Developer, Math Recovery ®

SolutionTree.com

ISBN 978-1-947604-42-1 90000

9 781947 604421

Dougherty • Reason

“An inspiring book that reflects significant depths of knowledge, experience, and capability in the field of PLCs. I thoroughly recommend this book.”

In Inside PLCs at Work®: Your Guided Tour Through One District’s Successes, Challenges, and Celebrations, authors Craig Dougherty and Casey Reason take the reader on a journey to Sheridan County School District 2, a school district that has implemented the Professional Learning Community at Work (PLC at Work) process to great success, to provide an in-depth view of the vast benefits successful implementation can have.

I N S I D E P L C s A T W O R K®

I

Craig Dougherty Casey Reason

Copyright © 2019 by Solution Tree Press Materials appearing here are copyrighted. With one exception, all rights are reserved.

Readers may reproduce only those pages marked “Reproducible.” Otherwise, no part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission of the publisher.

555 North Morton Street Bloomington, IN 47404 800.733.6786 (toll free) / 812.336.7700 FAX: 812.336.7790 email: info@SolutionTree.com SolutionTree.com Visit go.SolutionTree.com/PLCbooks to download the free reproducibles in this book.

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Reason, Casey S., author. | Dougherty, Craig, 1957- author.

Title: Inside PLCs at work : your guided tour through one district’s successes, challenges, and celebrations / Casey Reason and Craig Dougherty.

Description: Bloomington, IN : Solution Tree Press, 2019. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2018040013 | ISBN 9781947604421 (perfect bound) Subjects: LCSH: Professional learning communities--Wyoming--Sheridan County. | School improvement programs--Wyoming--Sheridan County. | Educational change--Wyoming--Sheridan County.

Classification: LCC LB1731 .R347 2019 | DDC 370.71/10978732--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018040013 Solution Tree Jeffrey C. Jones, CEO Edmund M. Ackerman, President Solution Tree Press President and Publisher: Douglas M. Rife Editorial Director: Sarah Payne-Mills Art Director: Rian Anderson Managing Production Editor: Kendra Slayton Senior Production Editor: Suzanne Kraszewski Senior Editor: Amy Rubenstein Copy Editor: Jessi Finn Proofreader: Miranda Addonizio Text and Cover Designer: Abigail Bowen Editorial Assistant: Sarah Ludwig

Table of Contents Reproducible pages are in italics.

About the Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi INTRODUCTION

A Tour Worth Taking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 The Tour. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Your Tour Guides. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 The Setting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 The Hunger. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 The Solution. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 A Continuing Journey. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 Chapter Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

CHAPTER 1

The Big Ideas in PLCs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 What Is a PLC?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 What Are the Three Big Ideas? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 A Focus on Learning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 A Collaborative Culture and Collective Responsibility. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 A Results Orientation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

CHAPTER 2

Teams in PLCs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Collaborative Teams. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

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v i i i • I N S I D E P LC s AT W O R K ® Grade-Level or Subject-Area Teams. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 Vertical Teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Special-Topics Teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Teams in PLCs Versus Teams in Traditional Schools. . . . . . 40 Consistent and Ongoing Meetings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 Mission, Vision, Values, and Goals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 Reliance on Collective Commitments and Group Norms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Commitment to Data Sharing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 Reciprocal Accountability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

CHAPTER 3

Inquiry in PLCs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51 How Do Teams Address the Four Critical Questions? . . . . 53 What Do Students Need to Know and Be Able to Do?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53 How Will We Know When They Have Learned It? . . . 58 What Will We Do When They Haven’t Learned It?. . . 59 What Will We Do When They Already Know It?. . . . . 61 Do the Four Critical Questions Increase Rigor? . . . . . . . . . 63 What Inquiry Strategies Have Led to Team Success at SCSD2?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 Administrative Team Meetings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 Stop Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 Does Your School Have an Ownership Mentality? . . . . . . . 69 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

CHAPTER 4

Collaborative Culture in PLCs . . . . . . . . . . 73 The Meaning of a Collaborative Culture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 What a School Culture Looks Like. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 What Can Go Wrong With a School Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . 76 Isolation and the Lack of Cultural Control. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 School Habits Worth Breaking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Table of Contents • i x Habits That Support a Collaborative Culture. . . . . . . . . . . . 82 Reject Talk and Embrace Action. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 Take Action Steps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 Culture and Team Conflict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91 Conflict as a Signal of Growth. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91 Processes for Managing Conflict. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

CHAPTER 5

Intervention, Extension, and Innovation in PLCs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97 Education and the Game of Jenga . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98 Intervention and Extension. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 The System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99 The Spirit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102 Innovation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103 Loose and Tight Leadership. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

EPILOGUE

A Look Back and Ahead . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113 APPENDIX

Reproducibles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115 Additional PLC Resources. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116 Common Assessment Data-Analysis Protocol. . . . . . . . . . . 117 Calibration of Common Assessment Protocol. . . . . . . . . . . 118

References and Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123

About the Authors

Craig Dougherty, MA, has served as superintendent of Sheridan County School District 2 in Sheridan, Wyoming, since 2000. Craig has been an educator since 1983, serving as a teacher, principal, and assistant superintendent before becoming a superintendent. During his tenure in Sheridan, test scores have risen dramatically; students, schools, and educators have won numerous awards; and teachers have received among the highest teacher salaries in the state, while administrative costs have ranked among the state’s lowest. These accomplishments stem from rigorous implementation of the professional learning community (PLC) process. In 1995, Craig brought Reading Recovery to Wyoming, and he has served as president of the Reading Recovery Council of North America. His experiences teaching in Eskimo villages and on Indian reservations inspired him to begin work on the First People’s Center for Education in 1999.

Craig’s mission in education is to ensure teachers work collaboratively and systematically to drive student learning. He actively fosters opportunities to extend his work outside Sheridan County.

His current focus areas include developing a statewide PLC principal academy, a clinical PLC teacher college, and a PLC framework that can improve education in all Wyoming schools, as well as exploring how to apply artificial intelligence to innovative education practices.

Craig’s next transition will move him from K–12 education to social entrepreneurship, where he will look for opportunities to impact xi

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student learning across the United States. His pursuits will involve a radical redesign of teacher and principal preparation through public and private partnerships with the goal of transforming K–12 education. Craig’s future work will also explore how artificial intelligence can have a greater impact on students who struggle with reading and mathematics.

Craig received a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Arizona State University and a master of arts in teaching from the University of Alaska Fairbanks. He also completed principal and superintendent endorsement programs at the University of Wyoming and Montana State University.

Visit www.fpcfe.org to learn more about Craig’s work to improve learning for America’s First People.

Casey Reason, PhD, is an expert in leadership, school improvement, virtual learning, and the PLC process. Casey’s mission is to help support sustainable reform in education by using PLCs in conjunction with modernday applications of technology and emerging brain science. A former urban high school principal and central office administrator, he has worked with school leaders all over the world to improve the academic achievement of the learners they serve.

Casey has published numerous books, and his publications have been endorsed by best-selling authors Ken Blanchard and Charlotte Danielson. In 2015, he coauthored Professional Learning Communities at Work® and Virtual Collaboration with transformational thought leader Richard DuFour.

Casey is also a distance-learning designer and strategist, winning the 2010 Blackboard International Course Designer of the Year

About the Authors • x i i i

award, a recognition featured on Forbes.com. He also works with Solution Tree’s online digital courses and is the developer of the BEST digital leadership solution, a one-of-a-kind leadership and school-improvement digital network serving school leaders from all over the world. He and his twin sons, Brice and Kiah, live in Scottsdale, Arizona.

To learn more about Casey’s work, visit www.caseyreason .com or www.facebook.com/CaseyReasonCompanies, or follow @CaseyReason on Twitter.

To book Craig Dougherty or Casey Reason for professional development, contact pd@SolutionTree.com.

INTRODUCTION

A Tour Worth Taking When a student struggles in a Sheridan County School District 2 (SCSD2) school, the response might just blow your mind. In one room, a teacher might work one on one with the student through a guided reading framework. At the same time in another room, a group of colleagues—including grade-level team members, specialists, the building’s literacy coach, and the school principal—gather in front of a screen to watch three images of the lesson in progress with full audio. They parse the student’s learning behaviors, as well as the decisions made by the teacher moment to moment. After the lesson, the teacher joins the collaborative group for a frank and intricate discussion of both the student and her teaching. The outcomes of these virtual problem-solving sessions are inspirational, to put it mildly. Each professional leaves the room with targeted strategies on how to advance the student’s learning over the coming weeks. And all of these individuals have learned important lessons and techniques that they can apply to other students they work with on a daily basis.

This brief look into problem solving and student support in SCSD2 begins to paint a picture as to why the district is one of the most celebrated professional learning communities (PLCs) in the world. All the schools in the district have deeply embraced the PLC process as articulated by Richard DuFour and Robert Eaker, 1

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architects of the model, and PLC visionary Rebecca DuFour.

SCSD2 schools have received many recognitions due to their deep and substantive PLC implementation.

The U.S. Department of Education identifies six SCSD2 schools as National Blue Ribbon Schools (U.S. Department of Education, 2019).

1. Henry A. Coffeen Elementary School 2. Highland Park Elementary School 3. Meadowlark Elementary School 4. Sagebrush Elementary School 5. Woodland Park Elementary School 6. Sheridan Junior High School SCSD2 has been recognized as a National Model PLC. Six district schools have recieved the distinction of National Model PLC School.

1. Highland Park Elementary School 2. Meadowlark Elementary School 3. Sagebrush Elementary School 4. Woodland Park Elementary School 5. Sheridan Junior High School 6. Sheridan High School And the National ESEA Distinguished Schools Program recognizes these three as National Distinguished Title I Schools (ESEA Network, n.d.).

1. Sagebrush Elementary School 2. Woodland Park Elementary School 3. Sheridan Junior High School Additionally, Business Insider identifies SCSD2 as Best School District in Wyoming in 2018 (Loudenbeck, 2018). The district was

Introduction • 3

listed on the College Board AP District Honor Roll in 2017 (one of 433 districts in the United States; College Board, n.d.). Niche. com (2019) identified it as the Number One Best School District in Wyoming in 2017 and 2018, and Number Two Best School District for 2019.

The district achieved the highest Wyoming district aggregate performance on state assessments in reading, mathematics, and science at all grades tested in 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 (data come from the Wyoming Department of Education data reporting site; https://edu.wyoming.gov/data).

Sheridan High School has received the following accolades.

• Listed in the 100 Best Public High Schools in the United States (TheBestSchools.org, 2018) • Awarded the US News & World Report (2019) Best High Schools Silver Award in 2013, 2015, 2016, and 2017 • Identified in the Washington Post (Mathews, 2016, 2017) America’s Most Challenging High Schools in 2016 and 2017 Sheridan High School has also experienced the following distinctions in student achievement.

• National Merit Scholars: Sixty-seven finalists and eighty semifinalists since 2000 • Advanced placement (AP) scholars: Forty-seven scholars, seven with honor, twenty with distinction, and five national in 2018 • ACT district composite averages: Highest in Wyoming (using Wyoming Department of Education data) in 2016 (22.6) and 2018 (21.8), and highest among Wyoming 4A districts in 2017 (21.5) • We the People Wyoming state champions: 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 (Sheridan Media, 2018)

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• Wyoming all-state music: Largest number of student qualifiers of any Wyoming district (Wyoming High School Activities Association, n.d.)

• 2018 AP exam pass rate: 72.7 percent (Wyoming, 55.5 percent; global, 61.3 percent) (College Board, 2018) SCSD2 has had nothing short of outstanding outcomes due to its educators’ passion for student learning, continuous improvement of its utilization of the PLC process, and a mindset that drives it to engage in ongoing cycles of reflection and improvement in the classroom.

With this book, we wish to do two things. First, we highlight the elements that make the PLC process work. This information offers you either an important review or an introduction, depending on your stage of PLC implementation. Second, we take you under the hood of SCSD2’s high-functioning PLC and share its real-life applications of the PLC process so you can see how a typical public school district has successfully articulated and implemented this process. We want you to come away from this book feeling like you are a member of the SCSD2 family. And we want you to feel prepared to build your school or district’s living history of excellence with your own PLC journey.

As you learn about SCSD2, we hope you see your own school’s potential as a PLC. However, if your school is in a dramatically different place, or you find your story radically different than SCSD2’s, don’t lose faith! While the example we provide takes you inside a PLC, the true emergence of any PLC comes from one place—the heart. Schools of all kinds are using the PLC process, and when educators make that mental and emotional shift—a change of heart— everything else, including improved student results, will follow. So no matter what kind of school you work in, the examples, strategies, and approaches we provide in this book will serve to ignite your imagination, fill your heart, and nourish your mind.

Introduction • 5

Throughout this introduction, you will learn more about SCSD2 and how the PLC process helped dramatically reshape both the outcomes that the district achieves and the climate and culture that serve its students. If you’re already on the PLC journey, this book will help illuminate your path. If you are considering the PLC process or are just beginning your journey, you’ve picked the perfect place to start.

Either way, we look forward to taking this tour with you!

The Tour As the book’s title suggests, we intend to take you on a tour inside a real district’s PLC transformation. When implementing the PLC process, you will see your school or district change at the cellular level—in its basic structure and function. Deeply embracing the PLC process means forever altering a school’s inner workings.

Committing to the PLC process and implementing it with fidelity will positively impact every stakeholder. The intricate and difficult work of PLC transformation and implementation is well worth the effort; it will yield incredible outcomes in student learning. We also know that the more we work in the PLC framework, the more complex the work becomes. SCSD2 has truly embraced this reality for the sake of its students.

One of the most valuable elements within the PLC process is that it helps educators discover, or in some cases rediscover, their why. In every profession there is a tendency to get caught up in the internal machinations of daily work—the ever-present constraints and the pressures. However, by consistently executing the elements of the PLC process, educators are drawn back to the basics of what it means to be an educator.

Throughout this book, as we explore the various elements of the PLC process, we take you inside SCSD2’s successes, challenges, and celebrations during the PLC journey. We look at the three big ideas of a PLC and the four critical questions (DuFour, DuFour,

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Eaker, Many, & Mattos, 2016), and we explore how SCSD2 schools embody the foundational elements of a PLC. We discuss how collaboration and intervention are different in PLCs and traditional schools, and we reveal what inquiry strategies have led to SCSD2’s success as a PLC, as well as what can go wrong along the way.

We hope this book gives you a clear sense of the system and spirit of SCSD2.

Before this tour begins, we will introduce your tour guides and the setting of the tour. We will share the hunger that prompted SCSD2 to change, the solution the district found in the PLC process, its continuing PLC journey, and the sense of fulfillment that PLC implementation gives to its educators.

Your Tour Guides We will be your tour guides on this PLC journey. Casey is a former urban high school principal and city assistant superintendent who utilized the PLC process to drive a dramatic turnaround in each of the schools he worked with. In addition, he has served virtual PLCs, consulting with online schools who use the PLC process. He met Craig several years ago as a consultant while he was working with SCSD2 during its ongoing journey toward improvement. Craig is the long-standing superintendent of SCSD2. He spent four years as an assistant superintendent and has served as the superintendent since 2000.

The districts we have served as practitioners are quite different from each other: urban areas in Toledo, Ohio, and Detroit, Michigan, versus the western landscape of northern Wyoming. Our multiple and diverse experiences in education have shaped our vision for this book, and the differing experiences we bring to the table will help to inform your experience as a reader.

Despite our differing experiences, both of us have a relentless passion for the education profession—for results and for students and

Introduction • 7

the educators who serve them—and have bullish opinions on the profession’s future. We both passionately pursue best practices and believe schools that want to achieve better results than ever before should use the PLC process as articulated by Richard DuFour, Robert Eaker, and Rebecca DuFour as the foundation for getting things done. And finally, we are both relentlessly dedicated to telling it like it is. While we hope our writing inspires you, we likewise aim for clarity about what you need to strive for to make the PLC process come alive, starting today. We will be straightforward, writing both straight to and straight from the heart.

The Setting The setting for this rich case study is Sheridan, Wyoming, a picturesque town of twenty thousand people at the foot of the Bighorn Mountains. The community has easy access to badlands, national forests, and any number of outdoor activities. It also has a longrunning affinity for the cowboy culture. Even if you’ve never gone fly fishing, eaten buffalo, or attended a rodeo, you could find all three with relative ease in this eleven-square-mile town.

Cowboys and charm notwithstanding, SCSD2 is an altogether common school district. Historically, it has faced huge internal challenges in trying to meet the needs of economically diverse students with extraordinarily different and often difficult learning needs.

Principals and teachers in the district had developed extremely low expectations of students who live in poverty, as well as students who struggled academically. With ten schools (six receiving Title I funding), roughly 3,500 students, and three hundred teachers, there was indeed a great deal of work needed to overcome these and other internal challenges. SCSD2 responded to these challenges in nothing short of an amazing way—and its responsiveness to these challenges lies at the heart of this book.

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The Hunger In 2005, educators in SCSD2 got hungry. Proficiency levels as low as 25 percent in some schools suggested that the district’s staff weren’t necessarily helping students reach their potential, and the data gave staff an overarching sense that they could do so much more. Perhaps even more important, and key to the ascent of a PLC culture, SCSD2 staff were willing to challenge their assumptions and to do things differently. They didn’t know what they didn’t know, and had never heard of PLCs. But they knew that moderate, vanilla changes around the edges would probably not satisfy their hunger for real student improvement.

While this book spends quite a bit of time on technical elements of the PLC process, one shouldn’t overlook the impact of personal commitment. Ensuring leaders and teachers are coming to the table hungry, ready to change and innovate, is essential. This foundational element of creative innovation represents a formidable introduction to any reform process. And in this case, the hungry hearts at SCSD2 had no idea about the feast ahead; they just knew that it was time for a change.

The Solution To satisfy this hunger for change and innovation, SCSD2 pursued with interest two very different innovative possibilities: (1) merit pay and (2) PLC implementation. These two approaches to school reform couldn’t have been more different. Suffice it to say, the PLC approach was more effective and more popular among staff. As we briefly explore both options, we do not necessarily intend to debate them.

We simply hope to illustrate that a school’s approach to improvement will most certainly impact that school’s eventual outcomes.

SCSD2 had two schools, Meadowlark Elementary and Highland Park Elementary, that wanted to serve as pilot settings for districtwide school reform. This decision to start small with just two

Introduction • 9

schools speaks to the district’s commitment to careful consideration before jumping into a districtwide solution.

Merit Pay

The first choice focused on installing a merit-pay system that offered a financial reward for individual teachers who could show growth in their students’ achievement. The merit-pay system, known as the Teacher Advancement Program (TAP), was fairly simple. TAP provided a performance metric that was measured before and after student learning data and then calculated compensation based on a merit-pay formula.

This system had a rather interesting impact. Indeed, motivated and innovative teachers outperformed some of their colleagues.

However, this approach unintentionally established a new level of secrecy about innovative approaches. Instead of sharing creative ideas that worked for students, teachers actually had a financial incentive to keep those innovations cloistered, only to roll them out for their own students in hopes of attaining the merit pay. For example, a teacher who had developed a detailed and effective system for collecting and representing student learning data, and for using these data to drive daily instruction, felt pressure from the TAP model to keep the system to herself. (As a side note, we recognize that merit pay has many permutations that allow districts to roll it out differently. However, the outcome we describe here is the real impact that merit pay had in this case.)

SCSD2’s merit-pay system rewarded individual teachers, encouraged more isolated professional practice, and offered a systemic disincentive to work together. With each translation of the data points, educators drifted further away from the essence of their work—the students and the observable results.

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PLC Implementation

Spoiler alert: SCSD2’s successful piloting of the PLC process forever shifted the focus of the district’s work. It started, however, with a handful of educators leading one pilot school. These educators studied the PLC concept DuFour, Eaker, and DuFour outline (see DuFour et al., 2016); attended PLC events; and truly invested in learning about what it meant to be a high-functioning PLC. For the purpose of this discussion, we want to reflect on the relative differences between the two reform choices the district considered.

PLC implementation meant using structures designed to operationalize teaching and learning in a very different way. The PLC process itself establishes mandatory sharing of professional practice (DuFour et al., 2016). It largely supplants individual rewards in favor of team rewards. Rather than bifurcating students into groups and carefully evaluating which teacher served which group, the district sees all students as the responsibility of every adult in the building. Without really knowing it, SCSD2 picked two very different approaches to school reform. PLC was more impactful for student results. Implementing the PLC process set the district on the journey that brought out its students’ outstanding districtwide performance levels. Consider the following data.

• From 2002 to 2015, Sheridan elementary schools increased fourth-grade proficiency from 48 percent to 84 percent in reading and fourth-grade mathematics proficiency from 59 percent to 85 percent.

• Meadowlark Elementary School, the first PLC adopter, increased mathematics proficiency among fourth graders by 264 percent between 2001 and 2017.

• At Sheridan Junior High, eighth-grade reading proficiency grew from 48 percent in 2001 to 75 percent in 2015; mathematics proficiency increased from 41 percent to 69 percent during this same time frame.

Introduction • 1 1

..INSIDE SCSD2..

Scott Cleland, Principal, Highland Park Elementary Highland Park Elementary had been utilizing a merit-pay model for two years, beginning in 2006. Within two years, morale in the school was at an all-time low; teachers routinely shut their doors, creating a feeling of isolation; and academic scores were plummeting. Change was needed. Our staff were ready to begin a journey to meet the needs of every student and grow as professionals. One of the necessary components for the successful implementation of the PLC process is to have widespread commitment to the idea. Highland Park’s staff were so hungry for change and unity that the decision to embrace the PLC process was the obvious choice if we were going to collectively impact student learning.

During the summer of 2009, a large portion of our staff attended a PLC institute to gain a deeper understanding of the process and create an attitude of buy-in. The difference in our school culture was incredible. The collective work we were doing was not coming from administration; it was organically grown from within our teacher teams. Our school went from an underachieving school with very low morale and trust among staff to a National Blue Ribbon School of Excellence in 2014. PLC impacts student success every day, and we truly live our fundamental purpose of ensuring high levels of learning for every student, every day. (S. Cleland, personal communication, June 12, 2018)

Over the years, we’ve observed the difficulty that leaders face in figuring out how forcefully they need to implement the PLC process. Or, put another way, they ask if they can dictate the PLC process. In sharing how SCSD2 got started and continues to evolve with excellence, we hope to illustrate that the answer to that question is pretty clear: in order for the PLC process to succeed, it must have widespread support. In SCSD2, implementation of the PLC model took a grassroots effort. Simply executing steps in teams’ work within a PLC isn’t enough. You can dictate team time, team protocols, the establishment of essential learning, and a shared common

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formative assessment as described by DuFour, Eaker, and DuFour.

All those steps are necessary. However, to truly change the building’s culture and ultimately shape results in a meaningful way, all staff must wholeheartedly embrace the PLC framework and believe that this process works and can transform the building’s culture (DuFour et al., 2016).

The PLC implementation process has the potential to engage teachers in a very different way, putting them in leadership positions like never before. The focus turns to student learning as the primary motivating factor for the work of teachers and teams. PLC transformation takes schools on an imprecise journey that no one can totally predict. It ebbs and flows, even for the most successful schools. We suggest that schools truly engage staff in considering the deep innovations that can occur when the PLC process becomes a way of life, and the best way to engage staff is through learning by doing— taking action to make necessary changes a reality. Certainly, there comes a time when the debating must stop. A school needs to commit to the PLC process and all the steps that come along with it. To that end, schools must make tight commitments that move beyond the establishment of grassroots, emotional connections. More on all of this as we go.

..ADDITIONAL PLC RESOURCES TO CONSIDER..

While many authors have written extensively on the PLC concept, as practitioners, we have based our thoughtful application of this process on the seminal work of PLC architects Richard DuFour and Robert Eaker and PLC visionary Rebecca DuFour. Throughout this book, we reference books that build on these authors’ original seminal works, which undergird every recommendation and philosophy we present. The appendix, page 115, contains a list of helpful books that can assist you in your journey of PLC transformation. We encourage you to become familiar with these foundational works.

Introduction • 1 3

A Continuing Journey If you were to observe SCSD2’s collaborative teams in action to obtain perspective on what it’s like to experience a fully functioning PLC, you would likely make the following observations.

Wow—They Work Hard, With Happiness

Although working together undoubtedly lightens the load, the educators at SCSD2 work really hard every day. They do so because they have become so adroit at identifying what they hope to accomplish—providing intervention and improving their students’ learning. With systems for collaboration in place, they have shed the traditional paradigm of teachers working in isolation and formed a no-excuses mentality. If a student is struggling, everyone has to get busy making sure that the student meets the required learning expectation. No excuses. No failure.

And the educators at SCSD2 work hard with happiness. The four pillars of a PLC—mission, vision, values, and collective commitments (goals; DuFour et al., 2016)—shape daily actions at SCSD2.

Systematic collaboration has resulted in a shift in mindset among educators in the district who embrace the increased complexity and demands of their work because the rewards of student learning are highly motivating. Much like the old adage no pain, no gain, teachers in this district embrace hard work with vigor, urgency, and joy.

They Really Depend on Each Other

When observing teams in SCSD2, you would see a generous amount of professional sharing. Certain teachers have wellformulated levels of expertise in areas that their entire team could benefit from. Unlike in so many systems, which seem to always keep people’s weaknesses under wraps, SCSD2 team members eagerly acknowledge strengths and weaknesses, encouraging the strong to take the lead when the time is right and openly admitting a lack of knowledge and the ability to learn from one another.

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How much trust does a community of practice require to share this openly? Perhaps Socrates’s declaration, “The more I know, the more I realize I know nothing,” speaks to what happens to an informed team member in a PLC; team members realize that the more they learn together, the more they have left to learn, do, and become.

They Have a Culture That Embraces Mistakes for Both Teachers and Students

An observer would also realize that the SCSD2 staff aren’t afraid of making mistakes or receiving feedback. In fact, staff members have come to realize that mistakes are the genesis of innovation.

For example, colleagues and educators from other districts routinely observe SCSD2 staff members in the classroom. This practice has helped staff become more comfortable with the possibility of making their mistakes public. They realize that feedback leads to improvement, and they pass this mindset on to students who openly discuss their levels of mastery against priority standards among classmates and adults visiting the classroom. In order to exercise creativity and develop new competencies, you have to be willing to take risks, not get it exactly right, and then learn more in the process.

As you read about the sense of fulfillment that PLC implementation brings to educators, you may feel skeptical. Perhaps to you this sounds like a hard sell. To assuage your fears or skepticism, let’s think about where this sense of fulfillment comes from. First, we are, without question, a tribal species. Simply put, this means we tend to prosper much more when we learn to get along with one another and depend on one another’s capacities. In fact, psychologists argue that the psychological impulse for human attachment goes right back to our need to survive; if you can get along with other people, that might make people more likely to share food and shelter with you. And who knows? That might even make them willing to partner with you in passing on your genetic code (Waelti, Dickinson, & Schultz, 2001). We have basic human rewards built into our systems

Introduction • 1 5

that encourage us to work together and to succeed in our families or in teams or groups. For example, our brains release endorphins when we happily engage in group celebrations (Waelti et al., 2001).

Our brains release endorphins to saturate us with good feelings that encourage us to go back to those behaviors that will most likely help us survive.

So, if you are a forward-thinking optimist who believes in the magic of human connection, you may recognize that dedication to the PLC process gives you the formative elements to make that magic show up more often. If you are perhaps a skeptic, just know that our human condition generally rewards working together in an organized and disciplined fashion, and evidence shows that consistently working on a team will make you feel good and stimulate your brain in a way that working alone can’t (DuFour et al., 2016; DuFour & Reason, 2015; Pfeffer & Sutton, 2000; Reason, 2010).

Either way, we’ve observed that those who do the work to implement the PLC process become the thankful recipients of deep and sustained levels of joy and fulfillment. For that reason alone, PLCs make a lot of sense, don’t they?

Chapter Overview We begin our tour of PLC implementation in chapter 1 by looking at what it means to be a PLC, including the three big ideas of a PLC that drive improvement (DuFour et al., 2016). Real examples from SCSD2, often presented in the words of school leaders and educators from the district, accompany these basics. In this chapter, we also provide definitions of key PLC terms and concepts. In chapter 2, we look at teams in a PLC, including types of teams and how teams in PLCs differ from teams in traditional schools. In chapter 3, we examine the four critical questions of a PLC (DuFour et al., 2016), using experiences and examples from SCSD2 to illustrate how these questions shape outcomes and change a school or district’s

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culture. In chapter 4, we get real about conflict. We talk about strategies for building a dynamic and innovative collaborative culture and managing conflict, again guiding you with real examples from SCSD2. In chapter 5, we address the all-important job of making the PLC process the system and the spirit behind ongoing intervention, extension, and innovation in your school or district. We believe that schools haven’t adequately explored their power to innovate.

The book ends with a look ahead as we passionately evaluate the PLC process’s future in SCSD2, in your school, and everywhere in between. In the appendix, we offer tools that can help guide your work during your PLC journey, including a PLC resource list (page 116). Visit go.SolutionTree.com/PLCbooks to download the free reproducibles in this book.

Conclusion In this introduction, we shared the beginnings and continuing results of one school district’s truly remarkable PLC journey. With this district’s example, we intend to show that the PLC process is more than a straight series of steps toward school improvement.

Rather, it looks more like a curving mountain road that leads to transformation and includes successes, challenges, and celebrations along the way. While you go on this tour with us, we ask that you refrain from playing it safe. Don’t keep your hands inside the vehicle.

Reach out and learn. As you learn things, push yourself to get out there and try them. This may be a guided tour, and we will get you through it safely, but you’ll learn a whole lot more if you stay on the edge of your seat and embrace the twists and turns.

CHAPTER 1

Clarity precedes competence.

—Mike Schmoker

As we were writing this book, we considered whether you, the reader, require a review of the big ideas of the PLC process. After all, don’t we already know what PLCs are by now? In reflecting on the wisdom of revisiting these foundational elements, Casey recalled an experience from his youth involving NBA legend Larry Bird. It occurred before a preseason game late in Larry’s career when his team, the Boston Celtics, was playing the Detroit Pistons. The game took place in Toledo, Ohio, Casey’s hometown. The Pistons used to play in Toledo during the preseason in hopes of keeping fans interested in the team just to the north of them in Michigan.

Casey arrived at the University of Toledo stadium an hour early, hoping to get a glimpse of several all-time-great players before the game. But he did not get his hopes up, thinking that these basketball legends might not care much about a preseason game against a rather mediocre opponent (at the time). Plus, they were playing in a midsize college stadium in a small town a long way from Detroit.

Upon looking at the court, Casey noticed from a distance that one player was shooting baskets all by himself. As he descended the stairs toward the court, he realized it was his basketball hero, Larry 17

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

The Big Ideas in PLCs

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Bird. At the time, Larry was arguably the best shooter in the NBA. Although he wasn’t the best athlete in the league, he certainly had some of the best basketball skills.

In recalling that story, we realized that SCSD2 operates an awful lot like Larry Bird in his precious moments of routine. Each and every year, SCSD2 begins by revisiting with great precision what it means to be a PLC. According to an SCSD2 district administrator: The process begins early each summer, right after the school year finishes, with principals reflecting on their goals from the previous year.

They work together to process and refine their plans for the coming school year. Even though these principals have been doing and leading PLC work for years, we still spend focused time each summer to reflect on and set new targets.

(M. Craft, personal communication, June 13, 2018)

Each school in the district reviews its purpose and evaluates its mission, vision, values, and goals (which we will cover in chapter 2, page 35). Collaborative teacher teams revisit and recommit to their norms and evaluate their intervention strategies, gearing up for new levels of excellence in interpretation and application.

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

Casey slowly got closer, trying not to miss a moment of his hero’s warm-up. He noticed that Larry clearly had a very disciplined practice routine. He had a set of shots he took from different angles and different places on the court. Although the crowd hadn’t gathered yet, noises and distractions surrounded him. Larry just continued to shoot and didn’t seem to notice the noises or voices. Casey remembers quite vividly Larry’s dedication in that moment. He was the best shooter on the planet, playing in a town that didn’t even have a professional basketball team. And before what was ostensibly a meaningless game, he remained dedicated to revisiting the fundamentals with a simple routine, making him an even better competitor.

The Big Ideas in PLCs • 1 9

In this chapter, we offer a succinct review of what it means to be a PLC and the three big ideas of a PLC. This review will help give you the clarity you need to build and sustain momentum whether you’ve already begun your PLC journey or you are just beginning. Focusing on these fundamentals is important because in far too many schools we’ve worked with, leaders and staff have only a casual understanding of what a PLC is all about. Or, to quote Rick DuFour, they tend to embrace “PLC lite” (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 1). Those schools that engage in PLC lite find themselves picking and choosing the elements of implementation they want to embrace. As a result, they often do not make significant progress because they lack commitment to key elements of implementation.

To help accomplish this review, we explore PLC concepts in the context of SCSD2’s journey.

What Is a PLC? A PLC “is an ongoing process in which educators work collaboratively in recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results for the students they serve” (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 10). The architects of the PLC process designed this definition with great care and precision. Reflect for a moment on what it means to be a PLC. Every word of the definition relates back to the steps you will take as a practitioner to bring the PLC process to life in your school. As a result, we will break down this

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

We began this chapter with a quote from Mike Schmoker (2004): “Clarity precedes competence” (p. 85). This is a sage insight, indeed.

People gain momentum when they have great clarity about their exact goals. This applies to leaders as they decide what action to take next. It also applies collectively to teams in a PLC or an entire staff.

Schools that make the greatest progress in PLC implementation have clarity about their goals and understand that challenges and opportunities lie ahead.

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definition and offer some specific insights that we know will assist you as we reflect on the experiences of SCSD2’s deep and sustained PLC implementation.

• “In which educators work collaboratively”: Being a team member in a PLC requires different work than being a team member in a traditional school. In a PLC, team members commit to collaborating at a high level on a continuous basis. At the heart of a PLC lies the notion that staff who work together are more effective and create better outcomes than staff who work in isolation. Team members in PLCs find that working together feels good; however, they collaborate for much deeper reasons than this. In almost every profession that relies on innovation and intellect, professionals generally agree that staff absolutely must work together in a strategic, collaborative manner to explore the deepest and most impactful innovations (Blanchard, 2003). The most innovative companies and the most successful schools have this in common. They make collaboration a creative, innovationdriving non-negotiable by systematizing collaboration, innovation, and creative problem solving.

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

• “An ongoing process”: Schools that implement the PLC process must commit to a way of doing business, or a process for working in school. This process includes many elements. But to have the most success, schools must embrace the notion that becoming and maintaining a PLC is an ongoing endeavor that focuses on establishing a fluid system with defined tasks and disciplined points of process. As Rick DuFour was known to acknowledge, PLC is not a destination; rather, it is an ongoing journey of transformation.

The Big Ideas in PLCs • 2 1

• “To achieve better results for the students they serve”: In a PLC, your best results are never enough. Teams expect that all students will achieve agreed-on results, and as soon as students reach those results, the team agrees on a set of even more challenging goals, articulating the strategies to achieve those goals. This commitment creates truly dynamic schools that constantly grow and innovate.

Bringing the PLC concept to life is a complex endeavor; shifts in educator thinking are essential to successful implementation.

Creating buy-in for such a monumental departure from the traditional model of education was not easy for SCSD2 schools.

Principals and leaders worked deliberately to break the work of implementation down into digestible chunks by introducing the model to educators gradually over the course of years. Leaders were also transparent in communicating that PLC is not a program with a start and finish; rather, it’s a journey, a way of life in our school that is both challenging and rewarding. SCSD2 leaders emphasized learning by doing—learning while experiencing the work of a PLC—which convinced many educators to get on board because they felt empowered. Others were convinced by the upswing in

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

• “In recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action research”: This part of the definition requires members to have ongoing, dynamic conversations in which they collectively ask themselves tough questions, and it requires them to commit to studying results. Educators must shift from the philosophical gamesmanship wherein they argue about what’s best and instead collectively put their money where their mouths are to impact learning, measure results, and share successes and failures with one another. This moves individuals away from thoughtful but unproductive debate and into an arena of continuous performance, evaluation, adjustment, and growth.

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While these efforts certainly created buy-in among the vast majority of SCSD2 teachers, the district has never quite achieved 100 percent commitment. Over the years, some teachers were asked to leave, while others decided they would rather teach in other schools and districts that were not asking staff to engage in the PLC process. This is to be expected, and is not a failure of the PLC process, though leaders can minimize the amount of staff members who don’t buy in by taking care to build a strong PLC foundation. This foundation begins with three big ideas that drive the PLC process in a powerful way.

What Are the Three Big Ideas?

As DuFour et al. (2016) explain, “The progress a district or school experiences on the PLC journey will be largely dependent on the extent to which [the three big ideas] are considered, understood, and ultimately embraced by its members” (p. 11). The three big ideas are: 1. A focus on learning 2. A collaborative culture and collective responsibility 3. A results orientation As you consider these three big ideas, you may think that they make a lot of sense and are intuitive; however, we have learned that it is a mistake to assume that teachers—and even education leaders—will understand these focus areas. Leaders must constantly convey the big ideas in words and actions and actively monitor staff understanding through the work of individuals and teams and in student outcomes.

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

student learning results on local and state testing. Dynamic principals with the skills to motivate and persuade veteran staff also played a key role by convincing educators to suspend their judgment and give the new model a try.

The Big Ideas in PLCs • 2 3

A Focus on Learning

Although this focus on learning may sound intuitive, think about how easily schools can get it wrong. Due to the lasting impact of No Child Left Behind, schools commonly define student learning based wholly on test results. As a result, schools may find themselves focusing more on how their students compare to other students in their district, state, or province, rather than on whether students learn what they should know and be able to do. The true problem with state-mandated standardized testing is that these assessments don’t provide teachers with timely, actionable data that guide their teaching on a daily basis.

A focus on learning means committing to the dynamic process of learning. In a PLC, staff see learning as the main focus not only for students but also for adults in the school—teachers, support staff, and other educators. Educators in a PLC can measure learning collectively in addition to individually. For example, they can measure the effect of adult learning by examining student learning data from common assessments and identifying which teacher’s students mastered certain standards, while simultaneously considering specific strategies the successful teacher employed to achieve those results.

This same logic can be applied schoolwide as teams set student learning goals and monitor progress toward meeting them.

At SCSD2, educators focus on three types of learning: (1) student learning, (2) adult learning, and (3) team learning.

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

The first of the three big ideas states that “the fundamental purpose of the school is to ensure that all students learn at high levels” (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 11). DuFour et al. (2016) identify this commitment to every student’s learning as the essence of a professional learning community.

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Student Learning

We both have been present in schools where educators show more concern over a student’s tardiness or sagging pants than whether the student can read or succeed in life after graduation. This is not to say that educators do not need to teach students to arrive on time and dress appropriately. However, for deep PLC implementation to occur, educators must refocus their sense of urgency with learning as the top priority. SCSD2 educators have developed a sense of urgency focused on learning for all the students they serve. First, they ensure students’ capacity to learn. Then they tell them to get to class on time.

To focus efforts solely on student learning, each school developed a student-centered mission and shared commitments. Sheridan Junior High School’s first ever PLC staff meeting, for example, resulted in the following simple but powerful mission statement: “The fundamental purpose of Sheridan Junior High School is to ENSURE that ALL students LEARN.” Arriving at this statement, however, was no easy task. Many staff members advocated for missions that offered students the opportunity to learn if they were willing or if

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

You might wonder how schools could exist that don’t have student learning as a primary commitment. On their mission poster, these schools might claim to hold student learning as their number-one priority, but an examination of their habits and priorities reveals the true story. For example, in some schools, staff think nothing of interrupting learning time to hold assemblies, screen movies, announce library fines, or take care of a myriad of administrative priorities.

Such schools demonstrate that these administrative functions are more important than the exchange of learning between teachers and students. Other schools reveal their priorities when staff spend more energy on addressing objectives not strongly associated with student learning, such as dress-code violations or failure to meet minor behavior standards, rather than determining why students who struggle fall further behind every year.

The Big Ideas in PLCs • 2 5

Similar scenarios played out at all SCSD2 schools through the early years of PLC implementation, setting the stage for a shift in thinking where each student’s learning takes center stage. Principals then had the tough and seemingly endless job of addressing adult behaviors that ran contrary to school missions and commitments.

Over the long haul, due to the relentless focus on student-centered missions and commitments, SCSD2 was able to create buy-in among a vast majority of staff members and reculture schools around student learning.

Adult Learning

Individually, every member of every collaborative team in a PLC should learn more because of his or her commitment to the PLC. In other words, PLCs create the framework in which learning thrives; educators develop the capacity to tackle and perfect new skills and competencies that ultimately help them respond to challenging situations. The four critical questions of a PLC, which we discuss in chapter 3 (page 51), also make it necessary for educators to dig deep and develop their competencies in response to student learning data.

Adults in a PLC must consistently set high standards for student learning and for their own learning. Educators can more readily take advantage of professional learning opportunities because of the support that colleagues and administrators give them in the PLC. Through team book studies, lesson observations, and detailed analysis of student work, for example, PLCs provide teachers with many opportunities to learn and grow that are not typically available in traditional schools.

Š 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

students gave their best effort or had highly engaged parents. The focus of school leaders in this moment was to provide direction to staff members, reminding them that their role, their very purpose, was, in fact, to ensure that all students learn at high levels, no matter their effort or background. This shift in mission was a turning point for the school.

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Team Learning

Collaborating in teams is one of the big ideas of a PLC that we discuss further in the following section of this chapter. Here, we focus on how high-performing teams in a PLC collectively develop new knowledge and skills that allow members to respond to their most difficult challenges. In PLCs, teams work in a cycle of continuous improvement to collect knowledge, implement strategies based on that knowledge, and look at the results to determine what, if any, adjustments they need to make. Teams do not continue to produce what they have always produced regardless of the outcome.

This would be counterintuitive in a PLC, where a team’s collective ability to learn new things drives student learning, adult learning, and innovation.

At SCSD2, teams have developed reputations for certain competencies. For example, the mathematics department has demonstrated the ability to align its essential learning vertically (from grade level to grade level) in a way that has resulted in amazing growth in the number of students who take high-level mathematics throughout their SCSD2 career. Other educators in the district recognize the department’s unique capacity to look at learning opportunities from a vertical perspective, and they seek the mathematics team members’ counsel when they need assistance. For example, the sixth-grade

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

SCSD2 has normalized adult learning as an essential component of the PLC culture. For example, many principals embed book studies—usually a chapter at a time—into their weekly PLC agendas, while others schedule separate sessions for collaboration around professional texts. The district also ties successful completion of book studies to the teacher salary schedule; with each book study, the participant has the potential to earn one graduate credit, which he or she can apply toward the fifteen credits needed for movement on the salary scale. Numerous SCSD2 teachers have achieved a raise in pay due to their dedication to adult learning and improving their craft through collaborative book studies.

The Big Ideas in PLCs • 2 7

..INSIDE SCSD2..

Katie Medill, Teacher and Instructional Facilitator, Sheridan Junior High In the collaborative teams of which I am a part, teachers tend to drive each other to seek answers to questions and solutions to problems with a sense of increased urgency and accountability. Within this professional structure, we challenge the status quo and work with the belief that in order to improve student learning, we must increase our own.

Additionally, the PLC approach allows for teachers to expand the curriculum beyond their own individual perspective, drawing on the knowledge, experience, and ideas of every teacher in the collaborative group. Our collective pursuit of knowledge in best practice accelerates our individual learning curve, and we see the payoff in increased student learning.

(K. Medill, personal communication, March 23, 2018)

A Collaborative Culture and Collective Responsibility The second big idea of a PLC states that “in order to ensure all students learn at high levels, educators must work collaboratively and take collective responsibility for the success of each student” (DuFour et al., 2016, p. 11). A school culture includes the “assumptions, beliefs, expectations, and habits that constitute the norm for a school and guide the work of the educators within it” (DuFour et

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

mathematics team from Sheridan Junior High visited Sagebrush Elementary to meet with and observe the fifth-grade mathematics teacher and then participate in a fifth-grade data discussion following a district formative mathematics assessment. The outcome of these activities was improvement to vertical alignment and an increase in cognitive demand of mathematics tasks at the sixth-grade level. In SCSD2, the focus on team learning isn’t just a mechanism to encourage collegiality; it is a quantifiable strategy that contributes to all students learning at high levels.

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As DuFour et al. (2016) explain, “The fundamental structure of a PLC is the collaborative teams of educators whose members work interdependently to achieve common goals for which members are mutually accountable” (p. 12). Taking collective responsibility means moving away from seeing students and the challenges they face as existing in individual teachers’ isolated purview (DuFour & Reason, 2015). Educators who don’t embrace the notion of collective responsibility refer to my students and your students, while those who embrace collective responsibility see all students as our students and all challenges as our challenges.

In a PLC, teams can’t just make collaborative culture and collective responsibility a slogan or a passing ideal. They have to make it part of the daily experience of every adult in the school. In our work in schools, we have often observed principals receiving far too much blame (or credit) for the school culture. Granted, the power that administrators have over the allocation of time and space and decision making can have a significant impact on the culture; however, in a PLC, teams of educators have autonomy to collaboratively make decisions and implement their learning. In successful PLCs, educators agree that collaboration is far too important to execute only when administrators remind them to do so, or at a point of crisis. Educators make collaborative activities and collaborative decision making a way of life in the school—they do not reserve them for team-building exercises. Thus, teacher teams across SCSD2 design

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

al., 2016, p. 22). Regardless of what the mission statement might proclaim or what school leaders might say, the school culture reflects day-to-day life for adults and students alike. In a PLC, the culture should reflect a commitment to collaboration (DuFour et al., 2016; DuFour & Reason, 2015). This means that the adults in the school commit to continuously connecting with one another and learning and growing from that ongoing collaboration. When collaboration becomes part of the culture, it becomes permanent—the school always conducts business this way.

The Big Ideas in PLCs • 2 9

Functioning as a PLC does not, however, guarantee that teams in a school will always collaborate perfectly. In fact, quite the contrary.

In committing to a collaborative culture, a school doesn’t commit to collaborating perfectly; it commits to the concept of collaboration and to always doing its very best to collaborate with fidelity, focus, and the best possible intentions.

..INSIDE SCSD2..

Mitch Craft, Assistant Superintendent, SCSD2 In the beginning of our journey at Sheridan Junior High, we focused solely on collaboration and deliberately did not use the term PLC for several years. We wanted to avoid initiative fatigue and instead help our teachers focus on the right work, including collaboration, learning, and results. My mentor principal, Scott Stults, and I agreed that it is easier for teachers to rally around collaboration and collective efficacy than an unfamiliar acronym (PLC). (M. Craft, personal communication, March 17, 2018)

It is essential to note that the biggest factor in building a collaborative culture in SCSD2 was the deliberate decision from district leadership to let teacher teams work within the PLC framework to build the system themselves, top to bottom. At no point did the principal from Meadowlark Elementary purchase writing outcomes, curriculum, or assessments and foist them on his teachers. Instead, Principal Hillman led teachers in the development of their own customized materials. Leaders consistently applied this approach at all SCSD2 schools, with teachers learning to interpret and prioritize standards, and develop common success criteria and assessments.

While processes and terminology related to this work have changed

Š 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

all common formative assessments, and each team sets their own SMART goals through a collaborative process. Indeed, to commit to a collaborative culture means to consistently rely on collaboration as a key element in day-to-day work.

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in the district since initial implementation, the focus on teamcreated curriculum and assessments remains the heart and soul of the district’s collaborative culture.

When discussing the best methodologies for serving students, educators commonly evaluate their options based on their feelings about specific instructional strategies or techniques. For example, a traditional school may implement an intervention protocol because students love it and teachers love to execute it. In executing the intervention, the adults in the school may feel that the intervention puts them on the right track and is worth the effort. While feelings are important, and we cannot deny that emotion is a critical element of learning, educators would be wise to foster a results orientation that places the instructional needs of students above the feelings or preferences of adults. A results orientation allows educators to closely examine the achieved results and what those results mean in terms of strategic next steps.

In PLCs with a results orientation, educators focus less on feelings and more on data (DuFour et al., 2016). While a particular strategy or approach may feel good, what do the results tell the educators? To assess effectiveness, members of a PLC focus on evidence of student learning. As DuFour et al. (2016) explain, “They then use that evidence of learning to inform and improve their professional practice and respond to individual students who need intervention or enrichment” (p. 12). At the end of the day, members of PLCs become excellent at choosing the right strategies and make more robust progress by remembering to focus on data and results rather than on feelings.

If your school has yet to embrace the PLC process, and you already feel the familiar pressure to pursue certain predetermined results (perhaps from district, state or provincial, and even national assessment standards that loom large over your building), you may think

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

A Results Orientation

The Big Ideas in PLCs • 3 1

..INSIDE SCSD2..

Mitch Craft, Assistant Superintendent, SCSD2 At Henry A. Coffeen Elementary, the readers-to-watch system allowed the entire instructional team to collect data, analyze them, and take action on results. In 2007, the school dedicated itself to improving the reading levels of all students in grades K–5. To achieve this, teachers record a variety of important data in the readers-to-watch spreadsheets and spend time each week checking on each student. Most impressive was the growth in results across the grades. As a schoolwide Title I program, Coffeen Elementary might see as many as 30 percent of kindergarten students struggling with reading. But by the time these students reach fifth grade, things changed.

Our district assessments and the readers-to-watch data showed significant improvement in the number of students reading at grade level. This is the impact of maintaining a healthy, sustained focus on the right results. (M. Craft, personal communication, March 17, 2018)

Š 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

you have little need to emphasize a results orientation even more. In digging deeper, however, it becomes clear that teams in a PLC pursue results in a highly localized way. While teams certainly determine their essential learning objectives with district, state or provincial, and national standards in mind, team members believe that ensuring clarity at a local level creates ownership of the learning process and ultimately enhances progress. This is important because political changes constantly shift learning targets in education. As these targets shift, publishers struggle to come up with assessments to match the moving targets, and schools are left struggling to respond with shifts in curriculum. This can leave schools and districts feeling more than a bit discombobulated about exactly how they should respond.

Schools that adopt a results orientation recognize that, first and foremost, educators must focus efforts on collecting day-to-day learning data from classrooms and taking action on those data the following day. This approach brings the target under the control of the teacher team, not politicians or state departments of education. This is the only way to stop the moving targets.

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..INSIDE SCSD2..

Paige Sanders, Principal, Woodland Park Elementary As Woodland Park developed systems for teachers to monitor and track student learning, we quickly realized that students are an essential part of this process. Woodland students learn to track their own learning data using checklists and graphs. They even set individual SMART goals for learning and attendance. Bringing students into the process helps build their confidence and engagement as learners. Along with our amazing teachers, student involvement is a big reason for Woodland’s ongoing success. (P. Sanders, personal communication, June 15, 2018)

In the traditional system of schooling, educators often tell students that success is possible but not guaranteed. They tell students to pay attention, to arrive to class on time, and to do their homework. If students fail to reach proficiency in a particular area, in most cases, teachers speedily move on and hope students will mature and somehow master enough learning to advance to the next level. This may sound like a rather harsh condemnation of how schools have traditionally done business. We do recognize that even school districts

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

At SCSD2, it has become evident that a results orientation impacts the emergence of confident learners. This aspect of a results orientation probably doesn’t get enough attention. We all want confident learners in our schools, and we hope that students achieve success and believe in themselves enough to keep growing when they leave our classrooms. Interestingly, deep and substantive PLC implementation at SCSD2 has influenced an underlying, undeniable growth in students’ confidence. This comes from the staff’s unfaltering commitment to pulling out every stop and turning over every stone to ensure that every student achieves the agreed-on levels of proficiency.

The Big Ideas in PLCs • 3 3

Perhaps SCSD2 students exude so much confidence partly because they know that they go to a school where all the students achieve at the recognized levels of proficiency and failure isn’t an option. When students hear that they will succeed no matter what, they receive a clear message that the school staff care for them and that their success matters. Wouldn’t you want your children to experience this type of school environment? Wouldn’t you like to feel such support at work?

..INSIDE SCSD2..

Craig Dougherty, Superintendent, SCSD2 SCSD2 holds what it calls PLC work sessions for the board of trustees. Teachers and principals provide the trustees with student learning data and stories regarding the entire PLC journey. Their sharing includes examples of how schools are addressing the four critical questions of a PLC delivered in a way that noneducators can digest. Through presentations to the board, teachers illustrate the logistical complexities of maintaining a focus on student learning. As trustees have become more versed in the PLC process, they expect board reports to occur more regularly. Their understanding of the PLC process, and strong buy-in due to board education, has raised expectations for PLC implementation in all schools. The tide kept rising for everyone, lifting all boats. We continue to provide quarterly education sessions to board members, along with an annual refresher course in the PLC philosophy and framework.

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

that don’t utilize the PLC process have made advancements to avoid such a situation. Non-PLC districts may implement proven instructional frameworks (such as Balanced Literacy, Reading Recovery, and Math Recovery) that focus on the individual learner and help to ensure higher levels of student success than in traditional models. Despite these changes, the tradition of measuring progress by time spent teaching, rather than by achieving required student proficiency, remains much a part of traditional schools.

3 4 • I N S I D E P LC s AT W O R K ®

Conclusion

© 2019 by Solution Tree Press. All rights reserved.

We hope that this chapter has brought to life the big ideas that drive the PLC process. Our goal throughout this book is to help you not only understand what foundational elements of the PLC process mean—like the three big ideas—but also see how substantively embracing those philosophies can shape your school. In the next chapter, we cover the work that different collaborative teams do in a PLC and how the work looks in SCSD2, a district that deeply embraces the PLC concept.

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PLCs AT W O R K®

“Inside PLCs at Work is both practical and authentic. If you hope to create a school where teachers love to work, and where students are treated respectfully each and every day, this is the book for you.”

—Bob Sornson Author; Founder, Early Learning Foundation, Brighton, Michigan

“This book is packed with powerful examples of the possibilities inherent in the work of PLCs. By describing the what and how of PLCs, this text will help educators discover, or in some cases, rediscover, their why.”

—Jeffery L. Williams President, Reading Recovery Council of North America; K–12 Literacy Coach and Reading Recovery Teacher Leader, Solon City Schools, Ohio

—Bob Wright

K–12 teachers and administrators will: • Develop a thorough understanding of the PLC process by exploring its foundational concepts and qualities • Learn about the successful implementation at Sheridan County School District 2

I N S I D E

PLCs AT W O R K ®

Your Guided Tour Through One District’s Successes, Challenges, and Celebrations

• Understand how to implement the PLC process in their own schools in a nuanced and meaningful fashion • Utilize real-world examples to garner further insight into the PLC process • Gain helpful tools to guide their work during the PLC journey Visit go.SolutionTree.com/PLCbooks to download the free reproducibles in this book.

Developer, Math Recovery ®

SolutionTree.com

ISBN 978-1-947604-42-1 90000

9 781947 604421

Dougherty • Reason

“An inspiring book that reflects significant depths of knowledge, experience, and capability in the field of PLCs. I thoroughly recommend this book.”

In Inside PLCs at Work®: Your Guided Tour Through One District’s Successes, Challenges, and Celebrations, authors Craig Dougherty and Casey Reason take the reader on a journey to Sheridan County School District 2, a school district that has implemented the Professional Learning Community at Work (PLC at Work) process to great success, to provide an in-depth view of the vast benefits successful implementation can have.

I N S I D E P L C s A T W O R K®

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Craig Dougherty Casey Reason