Improving America’s Schools Together: How District-University Partnerships and Continuous Improvement Can Transform Education includes stories, examples, and tools from 11 district-university partnerships using improvement science as a shared method to advance local priorities for students and educators.

Improving America’s Schools Together: How District-University Partnerships and Continuous Improvement Can Transform Education is the first definitive text on continuous improvement in school district-university partnerships, covering improvement methods, theory, research, and real cases across the United States with practical improvement tools that can be adapted to any setting. Through an array of in-depth stories, this book demonstrates how improvement science—as a shared method—can help universities, districts, and schools foster leaders and educators and enhance students’ learning and opportunities.

Among other topics, readers will benefit from reading about how these partnerships developed programs and courses for aspiring school leaders centered on local problems; strengthened improvement capabilities within districts and schools; leveraged improvement science to transform how teachers are professionally supported; and spanned institutional boundaries through shared tools, frameworks, and practices. Through rich stories and detailed artifacts, including protocols, MOUs, and other practical tools, the authors provide insight and guidance on the mechanics of place-based, problem-focused, and improvement-minded district-university partnerships. Readers can assess their readiness and ability to establish continuous improvement partnerships; identify the enabling conditions in their locales; and recognize the kinds of resources and strategies that allow for mutually beneficial collaborations.

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This casebook and discussion guide is designed for improvement coaches, individually and in groups, to learn through reflecting on and analyzing instances of coaching practice. The guide includes categories of coaching dilemmas, a discussion protocol, and coaching considerations. Watch the related video for an introduction to the categories and the protocol.

This casebook and discussion guide is a resource to support improvement coaches to reflect on and discuss their practice in ways that enable them to learn and to refine their skillsets. It includes scenarios drawn from the practice of real coaches working with improvement teams and networks in the education space.

The scenarios speak to different challenges that improvement teams encounter related to specific methods of improvement, the work of organizing and leading social learning activity, and navigating the context in which an improvement effort sits.

A discussion protocol and related reflection sheet guide participants through different considerations that may inform how a coach responds when working with an improvement team or members of that team. Those considerations include identifying the kinds of issues the improvers may be navigating, aligned to four categories of improvement coaching challenges that emerged from interviews with improvement coaches.

The coaching considerations and protocol can be used with the written scenarios of practice offered in the casebook as a way for a group of coaches to discuss practice. In addition, the protocol can structure a discussion among coaches about a situation that a coach is actively navigating in their work, as a way to gather input and to explore possible coaching paths.

Download the Improvement Coaching Casebook and Discussion Guide (PDF)

Watch this recorded session from the Summit on Improvement in Education in 2024 to learn more about the categories of coaching dilemmas and coaching considerations:

Network hub teams can use this self-assessment tool to identify strengths and areas for growth as they support the development of a NIC as a scientific-professional learning community. The tool describes seven domains of effort that are essential for operating a developing networked improvement community through its first 1-3 years after launch.

A network hub plays an essential role in supporting the development of a networked improvement community into a thriving, learning organization focused on achieving a shared aim. Drawing on a theory of network development described in [The Social Structure of Networked Improvement Communities: Cultivating the Emergence of a Scientific-Professional Learning Community]  by Jennifer Russell et al., this self assessment tool enables hub teams to reflect on their capacity across seven domains, including both technical improvement and social learning activities.

While it is not necessary to score at the highest levels in each domain to lead a successful NIC, this tool can help hub teams to identify opportunities to grow and develop, key expertise that may not yet be represented among members, and strengths that can be leveraged on behalf of the network.

Download the Self-Assessment (PDF)

This session, presented at the 2020 Summit on Improvement in Education, explains how change packages are developed and how they can be used to scale effective ideas.

Change packages are knowledge artifacts that can be developed by systems, organizations, or teams that are intentionally pursuing improvement of outcomes relevant to them and their stakeholders. This session explores the various elements that comprise change packages, examples of published packages, and methods by which they are used to accelerate change across systems.

Access resources from this session:

• Slides from session
• Change Package Example – Handout

The Developmental Progressions Framework describes aspects of a partnership between a school district and university that can be used to set goals and identify next actions to deepen and strengthen the collaborative relationship.

Co-constructed in early 2018 with members of the Improvement Leadership Education and Development (iLEAD) network and consisting of rubrics, the Developmental Progressions Framework identifies 24 areas of work critical to the effectiveness, reach, and sustainability of partnerships. These include areas specific to postsecondary institutions (e.g., faculty development and promotion); K-12 districts and schools (e.g., district leadership engagement); and to the partnership itself (e.g., partnership relationships). The Developmental Progressions framework affords higher education institutions and their district K-12 partners a common way to communicate with one another, organize joint work, and monitor progress over time.

Developmental Progressions (pdf)

This session, presented by Community Design Partners at the 2021 Summit on Improvement in Education, introduces empathy interviews as a tool for understanding the perspective of others when doing improvement work. The session introduces approaches and mindsets for conducting empathy research as a core practice in human-centered continuous improvement.

One of the six core principles of improvement is to “make the work problem-specific and user-centered.” The empathy interview done right provides an opportunity for understanding the user perspective and operationalizing an equity lens. In practice, however, empathy interviews often get the same results as traditional interviews—opinions and feedback on narrow topics—instead of uncovering the real needs and perspectives of the user. In this session, participants will understand the importance of defining a clear purpose for empathy interviews and will learn how to select diverse interviewees, structure and conduct empathy interviews, and effectively analyze and use the interview data to inform improvement work. Presenters will introduce key mindsets and beliefs central to the use of empathy interviews as an anti-racist practice and will give participants ample time to practice, reflect, and discuss the use of empathy as a core component of human-centered continuous improvement.

In this simulation activity, participants explore the complexities of undertaking measurement to inform improvement activities and the infrastructure (roles, processes, and tools) needed to ensure that data can be effectively collected and acted upon. These materials for instructors or facilitators can be used after participants have been introduced to measurement for improvement and different types of data that can support learning about a theory of improvement.

Data infrastructure is made up of the roles, processes, and tools that allow an organization to collect, manage, analyze, and act on data. This infrastructure is needed to support networked improvement and to enable a community to act quickly on what they are learning through their improvement efforts.

This set of resources for facilitators includes the following materials:

• Data Infrastructure Activity: Facilitator’s Guide – Outlines the activity structure and objectives, highlighting key facilitator moves
• Data Infrastructure Activity: Introductory Slides – Provides an overview of the different elements of data infrastructure, framing for the activity, and a summary of key takeaways
• Participant Handouts – Includes a process map template and a task card for each role in the simulation activity – summarizing each person’s expertise, goals, and constraints related to the improvement project

This activity begins with a brief overview of the technical and social processes related to data infrastructures commonly found in educational settings (see introductory slides below). Next, participants engage in a small-group activity where each person is given a role as a member of a cross-functional improvement team (teacher, principal, data analyst, etc.) focused on improving 6th grade math proficiency. As a group, participants will design a process by which a short survey can be completed by students in 6th grade math classes, the data managed and analyzed, and the information reported out to teachers. 

Through this activity participants will consider the importance of providing data rapidly in an improvement project and the different stakeholders that need to be involved to ensure that data can be effectively collected, managed, analyzed and acted upon.

Download Data Infrastructure Activity: Facilitator’s Guide (PDF)

Download Introductory Slides

Download Participant Handouts (PDF)

This blog post summarizes five areas of activity for an initiation team launching an improvement effort. Synthesizing ideas presented in “A Framework for the Initiation of Networked Improvement Communities” (Russell et al, 2017), it describes each of the five areas and offers a related example.

Five Essential Building Blocks for a Successful Networked Improvement Community

May 4, 2017 | By Sarah McKay

The Networked Improvement Community (NIC) model is a promising way to address complex educational problems. NICs bring diverse expertise to bear on specific problems of practice, and what’s learned in one part of the network can be quickly spread to and tested in other contexts. But building a strong and enduring improvement community requires….  Read the full post here.

This site offers definitions, guidance, examples, and technical briefs related to leveraging practical measures for continuous improvement. Designed to help the user get started with practical measurement, the site includes a path from getting started through identifying and testing a measure as well as a resource library.

Practical measures are used to identify improvement goals and to learn continuously whether the changes that are introduced are, in fact, leading to improvement.

Visit the Practical Measurement for Improvement site to explore definitions and insights related to leveraging practical measures. Follow a pathway for the development and use of a practical measure, or investigate the blogs, technical papers, and research briefs in the resource library.

Visit the [Practical Measurement for Improvement site]

This glossary organizes a selection of key terms used in the book, Learning to Improve: How America’s Schools Can Get Better at Getting Better, that have formal meaning.

This glossary organizes a selection of key terms used in the book, Learning to Improve: How America’s Schools Can Get Better at Getting Better, that have formal meaning.

Access the Glossary