NEASC ACE accreditation @EMS
EMS Defintion of learning:
Learning is a life-long process of developing knowledge and building understanding. Learners engage with and reflect on new information and experiences, to make meaning and connections to the world around them.
An Introduction to Transformative Accreditation
Our concept of ‘learning’ – what ‘it looks like’, how it is nurtured or hindered, where and how it occurs, and what it means to be a learning-focused organization – has significantly changed thanks to social, economic, and technological shifts and dramatic new insights and understandings provided by brain research.
ACE Learning introduces a fundamentally different approach to accreditation:
ACE aims to transform rather than ‘improve’ schools and reshapes accreditation into an instrument to enable systemic change. ACE challenges the familiar language and ‘grammar’ of schooling and encourages ‘schools’ to become learning communities guided by a razor-sharp vision of learning in our times. And because a rich and growing “Bank of Representative Practice” underpins its rubrics, ACE serves as a portal to a global network of learning communities.
ACE asks learning communities to reflect on learner impacts rather than outputs and to identify the evidence required to validate the desired Impact. ACE aims to change the place called ‘school’ into an “interactive museum of learning opportunities” (Yong Zhao), envisioned and sustained by a community that shares and acts upon a common, explicit understanding of learning. Someone said: “All learning begins with and depends on a provocation.” ACE intends to be such a ‘provocation’.
ACE “meets schools where they are”; ACE serves, recognizes, and supports schools no matter where they may be on the “transformational learning continuum.” ACE invites all schools to reflect on how learning should illuminate the path to a better world for the next generation.
EMS is currently doing Internal Reflection as part of the accreditation process
Learning principles:
1 Learning Purposes
Learning builds understandings, competencies, knowledge, and dispositions that can be applied across different situations. Learners become responsible and successful global citizens by actively engaging with complex real-world issues.
2 Dimensions of Learning (EMS Focus #1)
Learners grow through regular engagement in creative, ethical, interpersonal, technological, environmental, physical, and entrepreneurial experiences. Learners explore ideas and develop solutions that may have impact beyond themselves.
3 Evidence of Learning (EMS Focus #2)
Learners engage with feedback that promotes self-awareness, improvement, and mastery. Learners demonstrate growth and development in a variety of forms.
4 Learning Perspectives
Learners face complex problems, challenges, and issues that promote deep learning. Learners consider multiple perspectives and take informed risks in the pursuit of knowledge.
5 Learner Autonomy and Engagement (EMS Focus #3)
Learners have age-appropriate, goal-oriented autonomy over their learning and make informed choices supported by guidance within and beyond the classroom.
6 Research, Reflection, and Action
The learning community applies current research, connects with other learning communities, and uses future-oriented thinking to improve learning for all. The learning community evaluates the results of its actions and pursues questions about future innovations that prepare learners to shape their present and future. Likewise, learners analyze the results of their efforts and collaborate with peers to improve and extend their learning.
7 Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Belonging
The learning community exhibits a culture of inclusiveness that enables the diverse needs, identities, and interests of all learners and community members to be acknowledged, actively celebrated, and proactively addressed. Differing viewpoints and opinions are invited in pursuit of an informed and welcoming community.
8 Governance and Leadership for Learning
The roles of leadership and governance are aligned with the school’s learning goals, unified through a common mission, and organized through well-aligned structures that allow informed analysis, communication, and decision-making in support of learners.
9 Learning Space and Time
The learning community optimizes physical environments, virtual opportunities, and time to support learning and wellbeing for all.
10 Learning Community Wellbeing
The learning community is a healthy environment where all members thrive. Respectful, healthy, ethical, and honest relationships create a true sense of community. Community values are clearly stated, actively lived, and define a distinct, sustained identity.