Understand Roots of the Challenge

Once a team has identified patterns of variation that point toward a problem, its work turns toward pursuing a full understanding about why and how  those differences may be occurring. 

To understand problems, teams must seek to ask questions that move beyond a theoretical, national or even state-wide view; instead, teams should strive to know why and how they occur in the context of their own local district and school. 

Conducting a root cause analysis helps teams to achieve a deep, context-sensitive understanding of the problem(s) they have identified. Searching for root causes involves adopting a systems mindset that reveals the organizational features that give rise to/maintain the problem and investigating the lived experiences of students, educators, support staff, and parents within their local systems.

In this subsection, you will find resources that help your teams to: