Dr. Julie Carter, Co-Founder and CEO, and Rob Dickson, Co-Founder and President, GreyEd Solutions — Friday, March 20, 2015
The quality of implementation is one of the most critical components to the success of any rollout. With the increase of personalized learning initiatives often involving device rollouts around the country, it has become increasingly apparent that the quality of the implementation is a predictor of success.
The implementation process can be cumbersome to navigate because it involves a variety of stakeholders and no longer is led by a single person or department. Oftentimes the process is less than linear with multiple points of execution happening simultaneously. This can lead to frustration or a drawn-out implementation taking too long to get off the ground, especially if you try and execute only one piece at a time.
Having experienced implementations firsthand from both the school side and the vendor side, there are clear commonalities as we review successful rollouts. The components most evident in these successful implementations include:
*Establishing a vision embedded in teaching and learning
*Starting small and going slow to go fast
*Building your supports—expanding your kitchen
*Leveraging your connections—not reinventing the wheel
*Telling your story
Creating a vision embedded in teaching and learning is the grounding activity for any implementation. It is the reason you are creating an implementation plan in the first place and should be the catalyst for all points of discussion and processes in your rollout. What is it that you are trying to accomplish? What student skills, abilities, and outcomes are you aiming for with your implementation? Being clear about your vision defines both your starting point and your target destination.
There are two obstacles we often see districts struggle with at this point:
1. Putting the cart before the horse
2. Being paralyzed by perfection
Putting the cart before the horse is the unfortunate situation some districts find themselves in when under pressure to implement devices for all students. When the technology comes first rather than the teaching and learning, the implementation has little momentum and is difficult to get off the ground. Leading with the focus on students and the desire for what skills and abilities we are looking to enhance and strengthen in our students allows the teaching and learning to drive the initiative. At this point, it can be the “horse” that pulls the cart, where the cart is merely the technology coming behind as a vehicle of support.
Being paralyzed by perfection is a stopping point for some districts that cannot move beyond the wordsmithing of the perfect vision statement for their implementation. Identifying your vision can be as simple as brainstorming your goals, bulleting your specific outcomes, or diagramming your thoughts. Identifying your direction and destination does not have to be in a perfect newspaper headline just yet; define your work but don’t let it stifle your momentum as you begin moving forward.
We love to think of this part as a sampling or a taste test for the larger rollout. Think about making a new recipe for a very large and well-publicized event. Would you dream of serving something new without first trying a few batches in your own kitchen to make any needed recipe adjustments with feedback from some taste testers?
Granted, the stakes are much smaller in this case, but the idea resonates. Trying a smaller group or a portion of the population with your new implementation can give you not only feedback on needed corrections or modification to your plan but also confirmation and validation to components as well.
Going slow to go fast really speaks to the ability to make corrections and modifications on a smaller scale much easier and quicker than on a larger scale. Steering the smaller ship is always easier and more responsive than the larger one and can get you moving faster toward your destination with less lag time in between.
This part of the process is where we look to multiple departments and stakeholders to work together, often simultaneously, to support the end result. This requires districts to expand their kitchen and bring in multiple cooks—we need to build supports not in isolation but intertwined with one another. The days of a single leader spearheading these large initiatives are behind us, not as a lack of ownership or responsibility for these projects but in recognition that it takes a village, or in this case a lot of cooks, to do it right.
This includes your professional development, your infrastructure, your curriculum, your leadership teams, and the myriad number of other places in the organization touched by these implementations. This is not to slight the aforementioned areas, as the professional development and infrastructure are absolutely critical components to the scaffolding of your project, which will fold without these supports properly in place.
There is great power in observing and learning from what others have done before you. It is not stealing or cheating to look at the playbooks of other districts; it is wise and responsible to do your homework and learn from others. However, this does not mean that replication is advised. Learn from what others have tried and their experience and apply it to your own situation. Just as we ask students to apply their knowledge in new ways, we must do the same. Apply what you learn from conversations with colleagues, visits to other schools, and reading and research on the brave districts who have told their stories and published their findings. Interpret this information through the lens of your district, not reinventing the wheel but refining it to adapt to the culture of your environment.
Don’t forget that vendors can be a major connection for you to leverage. The days of “sale and bail” approaches to ed tech products should be forced behind us. The success of your implementation should be just as important to any vendors involved in your initiatives as it is for you. Ask for support, ask for best practices, and ask for a case study on your district implementation to measure the effectiveness. Leverage vendors’ interest in your success for a mutual win.
We believe the most exciting part of any initiative is telling your story. This is your moment to share how you are impacting the teaching and learning experiences of your students. If you measure what you treasure along the way and embed the human aspect of anecdotes and qualitative reflections along with the data, you will have a story worth telling. Don’t underestimate the power of telling your story. This communicates not only to your stakeholders but also to the ed tech community at-large the power of sharing our experiences toward the common goal of improving the student learning experience.
Julie has a passion for impacting the classroom through effective implementations of technology. Her background in education began as a classroom teacher and media specialist before becoming the Executive Director of Technology for Minnetonka Public Schools. There she oversaw one of the best 1:1 computing efforts in the country, being recognized by the Apple Distinguished Educator Program and the National School Boards Association. She was named as Tech & Learning’s Leader of the Year in 2010 for her innovative use of technology and as one of “20 to Watch” by the National School Boards Association in 2010. Dr. Carter brings several years of successful consulting in both K-12 and the ed tech industry to GreyEd Solutions. julie@greyedsolutions.com
Rob Dickson’s technical understanding of how technology should support student learning contributed to his previous district’s ranking among the “top ten” digital districts in the nation four of the past five years. Among Dickson’s accomplishments are leading the first VBlock cloud data center installation in K-12 education and advising many schools across the country with their technology planning and integration. Dickson was recently named 2014’s “20 to Watch” from NSBA for innovation and technology integration work. Dickson currently directs the instructional technology program and all of the technology infrastructure work for Omaha Public Schools as the Executive Director of Information Management Systems. rob@greyedsolutions.com