Published by KQED News

Pivot Learning’s work with Monterey Peninsula Unified School District to develop a culture of adult learning was recently featured in KQED’s Mindshift. Harvard researchers have been studying the impact of what they call a “growth culture” on the effectiveness and productivity of companies. Now, they’re expanding that work into schools as a way to create powerful learning environments for students.

“The key thing is how do we make sure this connects with the mission critical work the schools are already doing? This can’t be extra,” said Robert Curtis, vice president of education programs at Pivot Learning.

Curtis understands that teachers and schools already have too many demands on their time. For a growth culture to take hold and actually change how adult learning in the district happens, it can’t be extra work. Instead, Curtis and others encouraged the four schools and one district department who volunteered to participate in the study to consider this a way to move forward on the issues that are already central to them.

“We’re trying to build the internal capacity for them to learn together and create a safe space for leaders to try things out,” Curtis said.

Pivot Learning chose Monterey for this study because it’s superintendent PK Diffenbaugh went through the Harvard leadership training and already believes in the power of growth culture. He was looking for ways to better support his staff to continue their learning journey, convinced by research that shows higher teacher satisfaction, retention and success when a school has a strong adult learning culture.

Read the full article.

Published by National Association of School Superintendents

Monica Ng, Pivot Learning’s Director, Education Programs, recently shared details of Pivot Learning’s collaboration with Monterey Peninsula Unified School District (Monterey, CA),  Lancaster School District (Lancaster, CA) to pilot an innovative peer-to-peer learning model. Leadership teams from these two districts were provided the opportunity to learn strategies for leveraging multi-tiered systems of support (MTSS) models to address the needs of at-risk student populations from educators in Sanger Unified School District (Sanger. CA), a national leader in the use of MTSS.

In many cases, school districts look to outside providers to offer support for the implementation of new initiatives. Through a generous grant from the Stuart Foundation, Pivot Learning was able to work with two California districts, Monterey Peninsula Unified School District (Monterey) and Lancaster School District (Lancaster), to pilot an innovative peer-to-peer learning model. 

Monterey and Lancaster are high-poverty, high-need school districts with large numbers of foster and homeless youth. These students often “fell through the cracks” academically and behaviorally. Nationally, many school districts have sought to address the needs of at-risk student populations with multi-tiered systems of support (MTSS) models that provide timely academic and behavior supports.  

Sanger Unified School District (Sanger), in California’s Central Valley, has garnered statewide and national acclaim for their MTSS system. Sanger was an early adopter of Response to Intervention (RtI), which it successfully used to reduce its inappropriate identification for special education and provide early interventions that showed in the district’s student level outcomes. Like every district, Sanger experiences the introduction of new initiatives and priorities. The district’s mindset has shifted to the idea of building an MTSS initiative and moving onto the next project, to using MTSS as a framework for all of their work.

Pivot Learning partnered with Sanger to provide peer support to Monterey and Lancaster. We developed an MOU with Sanger and purchased the time of two key leaders of its MTSS initiative. Monterey and Lancaster sent leadership teams to Sanger to learn more about Sanger’s work, and the three districts met as a community of practice. Additionally, Sanger provided virtual coaching and professional learning to the Monterey and Lancaster teams. 

At Pivot Learning, we use the user-centered design model for developing solutions to districts’ greatest challenges in achieving educational justice. This starts with the process of discovery and learning how the current system treats end-users — in this case, homeless and foster youth. It also starts with learning about best practices and the work of high-functioning systems like Sanger. Through closely examining data, conducting empathy interviews and focus groups, and considering research, each district built and tested MTSS prototypes focused on the needs of their most vulnerable students. They then received ongoing feedback from Sanger, and from each other, that they then used to refine prototypes before scaling them. 

We see the potential of these types of practitioner partnerships in many other areas of the work we do at Pivot Learning. There is tremendous expertise both inside and outside school districts that can and should be leveraged to accelerate efforts to improve student outcomes and close achievement gaps. We are excited to incorporate this peer-to-peer learning model into future projects and to continue looking for other district partners to work alongside us in building systemic solutions to our school system’s biggest challenges in achieving educational justice. Pivot Learning is a non-profit organization whose mission is to partner with educators to design and implement solutions to their greatest challenges in achieving educational justice. For more information, please contact Monica Ng at mng@pivotlearning.org.

At one time when a student acted out in class, that student would often be punished for their behavior and possibly excluded from the classroom. The student would bear all the blame.

Recent research, however, suggests at least part of the problem lies not with the student, but with the school’s culture.

Educational research shows that encouraging students to learn from their mistakes through a “growth mindset” can help a student go from believing they can’t succeed in school because they aren’t good enough, to knowing they can achieve their goals by applying themselves through hard work.

“But if your teachers don’t have that mindset,” says Joe Ashby, principal at Monte Vista Elementary in Monterey, “there is no hope that it will work in your students.”

In collaboration with Oakland-based nonprofit Pivot Learning, MPUSD principals, teachers and administrators participated in a series of surveys, focus groups and workshops to improve the “growth culture” throughout the district.

For PK Diffenbaugh, superintendent of MPUSD, growth culture is about “creating the conditions where people bring their best self to the work.” For staff, that means focusing on personal development that helps each person align with the community’s goal of helping students succeed.

“Studies have shown that if you improve adult culture and learning, you improve student outcomes,” says Robert Curtis, vice president of education programs at Pivot Learning, who oversaw the pilot project. “So if the district wants to help its students, it first has to teach its educators and staff how to develop their own growth mindsets.”

Using tools developed by researchers at Harvard University, Pivot Learning and Cambridge-based partner Way to Grow worked on professional development with adult employees of MPUSD, which serves more than 10,000 students spanning 11 elementary, three middle, three comprehensive high schools, one alternative high school, and an independent charter school in Del Rey Oaks, Marina, Monterey, Sand City and Seaside.

While 13 schools and departments in the district participated in surveys that assessed their current growth culture, five sites chose to take it further.

Representatives from three elementary schools, one middle school, and the Human Resources Department met for day-long workshops over the course of a year where they learned activities “that helped people get to a high level of purpose, connection, and vulnerability to communicate within the group,” says Ashby, who participated in the pilot. This included protocols that allowed participants to share their mistakes and express their goals for self-improvement while also providing a space to provide each other with constructive feedback. “These skills apply directly to working with students, so we got to bring them back to our schools right away.”

Though the immediate goal of the pilot was to help MPUSD staff develop their growth culture, the long term goal is to address “teacher morale, teacher retention, and student outcomes,” says Curtis.

“The pilot is very much in line with what I’ve laid out from day one, which is that we are all going to learn,” says Diffenbaugh. “There’s a common misconception that once you become an adult, you’re done learning and growing. That’s not true.”

Since being appointed as superintendent of MPUSD in June 2014, Diffenbaugh has spearheaded a number of changes in the district that have resulted in positive student outcomes. For example, the eligibility of high school students to enter the UC and CSU systems has increased from 35 to 80% in the past five years.

The results of the pilot study show that not only did the five target teams significantly improve their growth culture through the program, there was also a “ripple effect” throughout the district, says Curtis.

Diffenbaugh plans to continue work with Pivot Learning moving forward, particularly with regards to high school education and student success.

Though Diffenbaugh says it may be too soon to see the pilot study’s impact on students, the superintendent is hopeful for the future. “We have a long way to go. But we’ve taken not only the first step, but also the most difficult step of changing our culture. Now all of us are working together toward a common vision.”

With the new school year well underway, Diffenbaugh and his team are paying close attention to see how things have changed for students.

Even though the study has ended, Ashby continues to implement initiatives in his school to promote growth culture for both students and staff. “It was one of the most impactful professional development programs of my whole 25-year career.”

Article originally published by the Monterey Herald on October 7, 2019