The Power of Us Part 1: The Us, In the Power of Us

NTN Leadership Conference - February 20, 2019

I will never forget meeting Jennifer and Eric. It was Feb 20, 2019 and Rachel and I entered the NTN Leadership Conference. We were divided into rooms based on how long we had been New Tech schools. So here we were, both 8 years in and both of our schools had teachers attending this conference as the Leaders of their schools. The other part that drew us to one another is that we were located 3.5 hours from one another. While not just around the corner, we knew it was possible to connect. Rachel and I spent our time at the Leadership conference reviewing how we wanted to organize the Professional Development for our school over the next year. Jennifer and Eric were organizing their goal of embarking on the practice of Team Instructional Rounds. We overheard their conversation and remarked “Instructional rounds were a practice we once did with our first coach with NTN and we really miss it. What a great goal.” We laughingly said, “It would be really cool if our schools could work on this together.” Then, as Rachel and I looked at our PD plan for the year, we realized that this was actually possible and we spent the rest of the time in Napa mapping out getting approval from our district to take our team to their school. 

The Award - December 14, 2019

In September I got an email from NTN and saw the call for The Power of Us Award. It was as though this award was written for us. My district had given us approval to attend Central Coast High School, but in chatting with them, they told us it would never be possible for them to come to us. They just didn’t have the budget. My goal in applying for this award was to share it with Central Coast so that they could plan a visit to our school to continue our future collaborations. On December 14th we received the email. We got the Power of Us Award! I never even told Central Coast I was applying. I never wanted to get their hopes up. So when I wrote to them in December about the award, it was a complete surprise. This was the spark we needed and it inspired our schools to dream big about what we could and will do.

Prep/Planning 

We began talking multiple times a month and had sessions with NTN leaders to help support our journey. Jennifer began to map out the day at her school- looking at logistics and organization of the instructional rounds. Then we began to talk about the real questions:

What do we want our teams to get out of the day and how can we help to support these goals?

How can this day be the basis for something bigger?

Working with Sara Johnson, Jim May, Lindsey Risner, and Andrew Biros helped us find our focus. They filled in the gaps in our agenda with protocoled discussions and helped us find our own answers by asking the right questions. It was a process that mirrored what we hoped would happen with our own staff.

Our teams really seemed to balance one another. While LG has strength in finding funding and ensuring the day can come together, Jennifer is a visionary. Her ability to map out the details of a day for 30 people proved to be just the organizational lens we needed and then we could all contribute to this vision. It was partnership and true collaboration in action.

The Visit - January 26 

As our visit approached, it was hard to believe that this day was actually here. We had been looking forward to this visit for an entire year. The Los Gatos High School team of teachers embarked on our drive on Sunday, Jan 26. 

We met up with Central Coast New Tech Teachers at Biddle Ranch Vineyard. It was the perfect way to connect causally before our full day the next morning. It set the right tone for our work together.

The Visit - January 27, 2020

We walked into Central Coast High School and we were immediately greeted with warm welcomes. We felt at home. Together, we arranged the room for the day and made it our space. 

We began the day with an icebreaker to connect us, sharing stories of how and why we became NT teachers. Conversations naturally flowed and teachers were excited to find others who taught the same subject or shared similar interests. We told the staff about the “video closet” like a confessional on The Real World where we could all go film our own reflections throughout the day. This came out of necessity. We didn’t want to ask students to document because we wanted to be able to go on rounds and observe but we also wanted to capture the moments, so we set up a self run space where staff could go in throughout the day individually or in groups and record their thoughts about the experience. 

We spent much of our morning understanding Instructional Rounds, the definition, the purpose, and what we wanted to get out of the experience. We came to understand that we wanted to have a focus as we walked into rooms that would help guide what we would focus on for our notes. Jennifer provided us with options for notes, each team picked their method and we were on our way.

Our rounds were enlightening. In 27 minute periods, the Los Gatos team who are used to 90 minute classes were astounded with how much learning and content was able to take place in those 27 minute Mondays. We witnessed Socratic Seminars, Project Reflections and Debriefs, Students providing feedback on class projects, and the set up of the classroom. We observed how each of the practices really allowed for student learning. 

Returning to debrief helped us understand how valuable the two hours of instructional rounds had been. But it didn’t end there. We needed to debrief the experience in order to actually process our takeaways.  

At the end of the day, we talked about the next steps. Overwhelmingly, both teams wanted to do this again and the CCNTH staff wanted to be able to come visit Los Gatos High School. In addition, there is a hope to plan projects together that we can implement at both schools and do collective feedback. 

We left and headed home. The day felt like it ended too quickly and we couldn’t wait to do it again.

Thoughts from our Teams

A week later, we participated in another hangout between our teams to talk about next steps. Here is what they shared when asked what stuck with them from the experience:

Great to connect and share learning with another network school of similar style and “age”. We are going through the same kinds of initiatives/challenges/foci.

The individual conversations I was able to have with the team from Los Gatos have stuck with me, also hearing people debrief after rounds.

Loved observing in classrooms - Miss having the time to do that and it was amazing to share the experience with visiting teachers, which helped get me out of our schoolwide mindset and really look at it with a new lens.

I have a thought partner now who is teaching the same standards as me, PBL style, but in completely different ways. We shared our Biology folders with each other and now I have so many new resources that have been tried and tested! 

Great to know there are other schools out there who are approaching teaching like we are.

Spending time with another like school with like mission and vision is always worth the energy.

First time I’ve ever shared a project with someone outside my school.

Doing the “work” together is a meaningful and transferable activity. 

Feel positive to know that there are others on a similar journey who are not far away. We are not alone. There is also a vulnerability and at the same time a safety to share between schools. It might help us take bigger leaps and try something bigger than I could imagine on my own.

It was AMAZING to connect in person with another teacher that teaches the same discipline as me. Great to share similar success and struggles. It also shined the link on a lot of really powerful and great things we do here at CCNTH. 

The ability to learn as teachers was very exciting, and welcomed. We just need funding and time and flexibility! 

Next Steps

We are using our Power of Us Award to bring Central Coast NTH to Los Gatos to build on our previous experience. We have decided to bring a portion of the CCNTH staff to Los Gatos, complete instructional rounds, and work to create some shared curricular experiences. Our additional hope is to do a student exchange with students who can document experiences at both schools. Los Gatos has organized the logistics of potential rounds and we are going to do a first round before Central Coast visits to ensure we have the timing of the day worked out. It is shifting the practice of our school for the better and we are so grateful for this connection that has pushed our growth.

Thank You NTN!

Thank you New Tech Network for not just supporting this shared vision but really ensuring our success. We know this is the first of many connected experiences between our two schools. We now know we are not alone, we are in this together, and we continue to focus on practices that will grow our staffs for the betterment of our students.