Crafting the Plan

STAKEHOLDER INVOLVEMENT, RATIONALE, and CRAFTING of the PLAN

1. Our Design Advisory Team (involving key staff/teacher stakeholders/ parents/ community members) met in the spring, summer, and fall of 2016 to brainstorm our “best possible outcomes” for the transformation of our learning spaces with the innovation guiding principles driving our thinking and our decisions.

2. The DAT engaged the full staff for feedback each step along the way. This included the brainstorming of wants and needs and new pedagogical thinking around the Innovation Guiding Principles.

3. During the fall of 2016, the DAT Teacher leadership took a half day (ie: subs provided) to tour newly created Phase 1 schools to glean ideas about space, furniture, and ways to support the students in transitioning their behaviors and ways of being in these new learning spaces.

4. We all used this tour to create a new collective statement on our beliefs about spaces, furniture, and learning. Following this, the entire staff was again engaged in working specifically with the BVSD Innovation Guiding Principles and thinking about their own spaces that were going to shift and change. The work of Prakash Nair in Blueprint for Tomorrow was also included in Design Team conversations.

5. Moving toward the specific implementation in the spring of 2017, a large amount of our Innovation Funds went to new furniture across the school. Teachers had the opportunity to choose the layout for their new furniture, identify seating options, and choose movable seating for classrooms. The entire staff entered their choices in a Google Doc and the information was then compiled.

6. A grant was written and awarded to Aspen Creek for the Outdoor Classroom; a team of students was involved in the initial grant proposal and design of this space.

Our goal for this work was to inspire and enhance the innovative instructional shifts for everyone involved.