WIN (What I Need) and the case for dynamic school systems

As I think back on my 15 years in education, I really can’t complain. I’ve met terrific people and developed invaluable friendships. I have gotten to work with amazing young people, and I have seen first hand that our future is truly in good hands–arguably in better hands than we are in currently.

But my time in education has also made me very cynical. This morning I had an idea for a cartoon where a personified School says to a personified Earth: “Wait, you’re not flat?”

I think for a lot of us who have spent time in public education the ridiculousness of it all becomes overwhelming. Look at the way we talk about “being on the front lines” or “living in the trenches.” It would seem the only way to communicate the chaos in which we exist is to make it analogous to war. And while I understand and appreciate the comparison, there is also a part of me that wonders why we feel this way.

To begin with, I think, the comparison stems from an often unspoken understanding that as structured as public school is, there is really very little in the way of systemic thought. Systems, by nature, need to be responsive; otherwise, they are no longer systems, resembling something more like an assembly line. In schools, we tend to favor these static structures because progress is easy to see. Students move up a grade each year in the same way that an elevator moves up through a building. It’s neat. It’s clear. But it’s not a system.

Systems require evaluation and response. They function more like a furnace. When a household thermostat determines that the house is too cold, it calls for heat. When it determines the level of heat is appropriate, it turns off. There is evaluation and response. More importantly it’s a dynamic process, occurring regularly and exacting the response required in the moment.

I have spent some time this year experimenting with a more dynamic system of intervention and now I’m helping other districts do the same. We call it What I Need (WIN), but the name matters less than the idea.

WIN is based on the dynamic system approach that I outlined above. Students are periodically assessed using a universal screener, but they also go through a series of micro screenings to evaluate their competency on specific standards across disciplines. So for instance, we might evaluate a student’s ability to comprehend informational texts in Social Studies or Science class–and periodically in Math. The point is to check on whether students are able to move flexibly through an academic setting and transfer their skills. Reading, after all, is not isolated to ELA.

The data collected from these assessments is then analyzed and students are grouped based on their specific needs in order to achieve growth in the standard. These groups are then provided instruction at their level for a period of 4–6 weeks, or until they demonstrate competence in a particular skill. And when they do, the system begins again, like a thermostat maintaining the temperature of a house.

I’m simplifying this model deliberately to accentuate the dynamic nature of this process. It’s not easy, it takes a big district commitment, and it certainly is not without flaws, but at its core WIN is a dynamic process that is a prototype for the type of systems we need to embed in schools. If we don’t then I think our teachers will continue to feel defeated by the demands of the job and by the lack of real progress, and I think our schools will continue to fail due to our own lack of systems thinking.

I know…it’s shocking…but the Earth is not flat!