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Equity &
Equitable School Improvement
Equitable School Improvement
Our book is a survey of the big ideas and constructs related to making in change in service of equity with real people who have their own dreams, ideas, mental models, skills, dispositions, biases, and defenses. There is a technical side to school improvement and we think technical knowledge and skills are crucial; but this is not that book. We want leaders, improvers, and equity advocates to pay more attention to the psychology of change and the conditions that enable improvement for equity. There are chapters on:
The rationale for employing improvement science to pursue equity;
The dispositions of an equity-focused leader;
The adjacent possible;
Centering student experience;
Power;
Rethinking data;
The human side of change;
Conversations in support of equity.
What we do
What we do
We work for Partners for Educational Leadership in Hartford, Connecticut. Our work is to help schools and districts become better at improving learning for all students by focusing on the principles and practices of equity, improvement science, and coaching. We help schools and districts create strategic plans that reflect that goal, and we help individual leaders draw from coaching and other mindful practices to lead conversations about organizational change.
Our session at the Carnegie Summit
Our session at the Carnegie Summit
Our session is called "Lowering the barrier to entry: De-mystifying, de-colonizing, and democratizing improvement science in service of equity". You can read the proposal here.
Our premise is that equity and improvement science have more in common than generally realized. The purpose is to:
demonstrate the shared interests of equity and improvement science;
change the focus of the work from technical and clinical to conversational and relational; and
provide participants with some activities and experiences that they can take back to their home schools and districts.
On this page, you can find:
The video we recorded to accompany our in person session. Since the workshop consists of a series of conversations among the participants about the big ideas behind the workshop, we couldn't see a way to replicate that in a video with just the two of us. And we definitely didn't want to do a PowerPoint presentation, as we see PowerPoint as part of the problem! So instead we recorded an informal, unscripted conversation between the two of us.
A transcript of the "fireside chat".
A slide deck containing the quotations we refer to in the video, plus some additional slides related to the presentation; although we are not actually using the slides during the presentation, they are a useful resource.
Our facilitation plan for the in person session, with the conversations we ask participants to have.
Information about our summer workshop, Coaching for Leaders, if you want to know more about how we teach leaders to have coaching conversations.
Who we are
Who we are
Rydell Harrison joined Partners for Educational Leadership in 2021. Prior to working with Partners, Rydell served as the Superintendent of Schools in Easton-Redding-Region 9 and Watertown, both in Connecticut, and before that he was the Assistant Superintendent of Instructional Services for Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools (CHCCS). Rydell began his career as a music teacher in New Jersey, and has 22 years in education, working across all three levels. In CHCCS, Rydell also served as Executive Director of Professional Development. In 2016, Rydell received the Award for Excellence in Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools District Administration. Prior to working in the district office, Rydell served as an elementary and middle school principal and assistant principal in Guilford County Schools and was the principal at Phillips Middle School in CHCCS. Throughout his career, Rydell has worked to develop equity-focused initiatives designed to personalize learning, build teacher capacity and eliminate racial disparities in student outcomes. He holds a Bachelor of Music Education from Rutgers University and a Master of Divinity from Duke University. He also holds a Master of School Administration, Specialist in Education and Doctor of Education in School Leadership from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.
(336) 549-2491
Isobel Stevenson has been a program coordinator at Partners for Educational Leadership since 2013. Prior to coming to Connecticut, Isobel was Chief Academic Officer for a Denver metro area district, a principal; a curriculum coordinator, and taught high school special education and social studies. Isobel has taught in three different principal preparation programs: University of Denver, San Jose State University, and UConn. Isobel holds a BA from Oxford University, a Masters in Special Education from the University of Texas at Austin, where she also obtained her principal’s license. She has a PhD in human and organizational systems from Fielding Graduate University, and is a Professional Certified Coach. Isobel’s work involves equity, leadership coaching and training coaches; strategic planning and improvement; and supporting instructional improvement. Isobel is the co-author of The Strategy Playbook for Educational Leaders: Principles and Processes (Routledge, 2021), Making Coaching Matter: Leading Continuous Improvement in Schools (Teachers College Press, 2023), and several articles on leadership and coaching. Isobel also writes a newsletter for educational leaders and coaches, The Coaching Letter, which you can sign up to receive in your inbox.
istevenson@partnersforel.org
(860) 576-9410
The dandelion flower head can change into a white, globular seed head overnight. Each seed has a tiny parachute that allows it to spread far and wide in the wind. The entire plant has medicinal properties. Dandelions are often mistakenly identified as weeds, aggressively removed, but are hard to uproot; the top is pulled but the long taproot remains. Resilience. Resistance. Regeneration. Decentralization.
adrienne maree brown
Emergent Strategy
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