Strategic planning: How to pivot after classes start

Other than Christmas morning and the Super Bowl, few things excite so many people at the same time as the start of a new school year. The arrival of students on the first day is a hubbub of activity, energy and excitement. Opening day is the culmination of strategic planning you and your team began months ago.

Once the energy of the first day smooths out, a solid after-action review, conducted during the first month of school, will help you make early mid-course corrections, shift resources to cover unanticipated needs, support principals and improve next year’s planning.

Most importantly, a thorough review ensures that your strong start leads to an even stronger finish.

‘Talking Out of School’ podcast: Why media literacy now matters so much

In the District Administration Leadership Institute’s Navigating Tomorrow program, we cover all the base with the ‘SCIP’ framework: systems, culture, instruction and people.

To guide your after-action review, here are the important questions to ask about each SCIP component:

Systems: Managing day-to-day operations effectively

1. How are students, families and employees getting log-in information for tech platforms and portals, particularly if the user or the platform is new this year? How are those with language or other challenges supported in using these platforms?
2. How are new school start times or new parent drop-off/ pick-up procedures working?
3. What challenges are being presented by a shortage of bus drivers or buses? What could be improved with changed routing practices?
4. How up-to-date and easy to navigate are the district and school websites, especially on mobile devices?
5. If summer capital projects or maintenance projects have been delayed or caused operational changes how are these being managed and communicated?
6. How confident are you that every critical vendor (e.g., food distributors, fuel) or provider (e.g., transportation, substitute teachers, special education related services) will be able to meet their obligations for the full year without increased, unbudgeted costs? How might you mitigate that risk?

Culture: Classroom and school conditions that support student success

• How clearly (and redundantly) have you communicated a ‘reset’ message for the new year—strategic initiatives, new programs, changes in resources, notable challenges—with each stakeholder group, including board members, community groups and the press?
• Who is responsible for ongoing outreach and engagement across social media, newsletters, events and communication platforms? What expectations have you set for them and how are you tracking engagement?
• How easy is it for families to find calendars, parent conferences, family nights and other event information so they can plan?
• How are you assessing whether family engagement opportunities are welcoming and equitable?
• How easy is it for any stakeholder to find the right staff member to contact about a concern, question or idea?
• If you have culture and climate survey data from last year, how are you building on your successes and addressing gaps? How are you letting people know that you are using the survey data in effective ways?
• If you have tools for school visits, such as a walkthrough instrument or instructional review protocols, how are users calibrated and how do they share their data with others?

Instruction: the quality of teaching and student engagement

1. If you have adopted a new curriculum or program this year, did all the materials arrive on time for training and implementation? If not, how are principals and teacher leaders addressing these gaps?
2. How will you engage teachers, students and families about the new curricula so you can build family support, refine future professional development for staff and celebrate progress?
3. If you have adopted new essential curricula (such as science of reading), structures (such as PBIS or PLCs) or practices (such as student discipline or attendance) in the past few years, how have you trained and level-set teachers and administrators who are new this fall?
4. How clear are principals and teachers about which instructional expectations are “tight” (such as specific curriculum) and which may be “loose?” What systems are in place across the district to ensure fidelity across schools with ‘tight’ expectations?
5. How effective and equitable are out-of-school time offerings? How closely connected are they to student learning goals? How are the programs staffed and how well is the staff trained? How are you scaling the most effective programs?
6. How have all teacher evaluators been trained and calibrated and how have new teachers been introduced to the formal evaluation process and rubric?

People: How you attract, develop and retain a strong workforce

• Have there been school-level enrollment or student demographic changes (e.g., English language learners, homeless) that require shifting staffing allocations or hiring for unanticipated specialist roles?
• Where are the teacher and paraprofessional vacancies? Which of these vacancies can be realistically filled within 30 days, and which will require some type of ‘Plan B’?
• Who are the under-prepared or unlicensed teachers and what plans are in place to provide them with classroom management training and other instructional support?
• How are novice teachers and principals—those with 0 to 3 years of experience — receiving differentiated support and who is monitoring its effectiveness?
• What internal processes and pathways are in place to identify, encourage and support high-potential paraprofessionals, substitutes, hourly staff and volunteers to become teachers?
• Where are there routinely gaps in coverage for teacher absences and what are some creative ways to ensure that students have a qualified teacher each day or class period?

Strategic planning: A launch trajectory

Two of the meanings of “launch” are “to celebrate” and “to send off.” Working through an after-action review protocol such as this with your senior leadership team—asking them to meet with school leaders and department managers and report back—will, no doubt, lead to plenty of celebration.

It will also help you and your team identify early warning signs that will need a response over the first 30 to 60 days until you can be confident that a trajectory of success is in place.