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INTRODUCTION A Tour Worth Taking

When a student struggles in a Sheridan County School District 2 (SCSD2) school, the response might just blow your mind. In one room, a teacher might work one on one with the student through a guided reading framework. At the same time in another room, a group of colleagues—including grade-level team members, specialists, the building’s literacy coach, and the school principal—gather in front of a screen to watch three images of the lesson in progress with full audio. They parse the student’s learning behaviors, as well as the decisions made by the teacher moment to moment. After the lesson, the teacher joins the collaborative group for a frank and intricate discussion of both the student and her teaching. The outcomes of these virtual problem-solving sessions are inspirational, to put it mildly. Each professional leaves the room with targeted strategies on how to advance the student’s learning over the coming weeks. And all of these individuals have learned important lessons and techniques that they can apply to other students they work with on a daily basis.

This brief look into problem solving and student support in SCSD2 begins to paint a picture as to why the district is one of the most celebrated professional learning communities (PLCs) in the world. All the schools in the district have deeply embraced the PLC process as articulated by Richard DuFour and Robert Eaker, architects of the model, and PLC visionary Rebecca DuFour. SCSD2 schools have received many recognitions due to their deep and substantive PLC implementation.

The U.S. Department of Education identifies six SCSD2 schools as National Blue Ribbon Schools (U.S. Department of Education, 2019).

1. Henry A. Coffeen Elementary School

2. Highland Park Elementary School

3. Meadowlark Elementary School

4. Sagebrush Elementary School

5. Woodland Park Elementary School

6. Sheridan Junior High School

SCSD2 has been recognized as a National Model PLC. Six district schools have recieved the distinction of National Model PLC School.

1. Highland Park Elementary School

2. Meadowlark Elementary School

3. Sagebrush Elementary School

4. Woodland Park Elementary School

5. Sheridan Junior High School

6. Sheridan High School

And the National ESEA Distinguished Schools Program recognizes these three as National Distinguished Title I Schools (ESEA Network, n.d.).

1. Sagebrush Elementary School

2. Woodland Park Elementary School

3. Sheridan Junior High School

Additionally, Business Insider identifies SCSD2 as Best School District in Wyoming in 2018 (Loudenbeck, 2018). The district was listed on the College Board AP District Honor Roll in 2017 (one of 433 districts in the United States; College Board, n.d.). Niche.com (2019) identified it as the Number One Best School District in Wyoming in 2017 and 2018, and Number Two Best School District for 2019.

The district achieved the highest Wyoming district aggregate performance on state assessments in reading, mathematics, and science at all grades tested in 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 (data come from the Wyoming Department of Education data reporting site; https://edu.wyoming.gov/data).

Sheridan High School has received the following accolades.

• Listed in the 100 Best Public High Schools in the United States (TheBestSchools.org, 2018)

• Awarded the US News & World Report (2019) Best High Schools Silver Award in 2013, 2015, 2016, and 2017

• Identified in the Washington Post (Mathews, 2016, 2017) America’s Most Challenging High Schools in 2016 and 2017

Sheridan High School has also experienced the following distinctions in student achievement.

• National Merit Scholars: Sixty-seven finalists and eighty semifinalists since 2000

• Advanced placement (AP) scholars: Forty-seven scholars, seven with honor, twenty with distinction, and five national in 2018

• ACT district composite averages: Highest in Wyoming (using Wyoming Department of Education data) in 2016 (22.6) and 2018 (21.8), and highest among Wyoming 4A districts in 2017 (21.5)

• We the People Wyoming state champions: 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 (Sheridan Media, 2018)

• Wyoming all-state music: Largest number of student qualifiers of any Wyoming district (Wyoming High School Activities Association, n.d.)

• 2018 AP exam pass rate: 72.7 percent (Wyoming, 55.5 percent; global, 61.3 percent) (College Board, 2018)

SCSD2 has had nothing short of outstanding outcomes due to its educators’ passion for student learning, continuous improvement of its utilization of the PLC process, and a mindset that drives it to engage in ongoing cycles of reflection and improvement in the classroom.

With this book, we wish to do two things. First, we highlight the elements that make the PLC process work. This information offers you either an important review or an introduction, depending on your stage of PLC implementation. Second, we take you under the hood of SCSD2’s high-functioning PLC and share its real-life applications of the PLC process so you can see how a typical public school district has successfully articulated and implemented this process. We want you to come away from this book feeling like you are a member of the SCSD2 family. And we want you to feel prepared to build your school or district’s living history of excellence with your own PLC journey.

As you learn about SCSD2, we hope you see your own school’s potential as a PLC. However, if your school is in a dramatically different place, or you find your story radically different than SCSD2’s, don’t lose faith! While the example we provide takes you inside a PLC, the true emergence of any PLC comes from one place—the heart. Schools of all kinds are using the PLC process, and when educators make that mental and emotional shift—a change of heart—everything else, including improved student results, will follow. So no matter what kind of school you work in, the examples, strategies, and approaches we provide in this book will serve to ignite your imagination, fill your heart, and nourish your mind.

Throughout this introduction, you will learn more about SCSD2 and how the PLC process helped dramatically reshape both the outcomes that the district achieves and the climate and culture that serve its students. If you’re already on the PLC journey, this book will help illuminate your path. If you are considering the PLC process or are just beginning your journey, you’ve picked the perfect place to start. Either way, we look forward to taking this tour with you!

The Tour

As the book’s title suggests, we intend to take you on a tour inside a real district’s PLC transformation. When implementing the PLC process, you will see your school or district change at the cellular level—in its basic structure and function. Deeply embracing the PLC process means forever altering a school’s inner workings. Committing to the PLC process and implementing it with fidelity will positively impact every stakeholder. The intricate and difficult work of PLC transformation and implementation is well worth the effort; it will yield incredible outcomes in student learning. We also know that the more we work in the PLC framework, the more complex the work becomes. SCSD2 has truly embraced this reality for the sake of its students.

One of the most valuable elements within the PLC process is that it helps educators discover, or in some cases rediscover, their why. In every profession there is a tendency to get caught up in the internal machinations of daily work—the ever-present constraints and the pressures. However, by consistently executing the elements of the PLC process, educators are drawn back to the basics of what it means to be an educator.

Throughout this book, as we explore the various elements of the PLC process, we take you inside SCSD2’s successes, challenges, and celebrations during the PLC journey. We look at the three big ideas of a PLC and the four critical questions (DuFour, DuFour, Eaker, Many, & Mattos, 2016), and we explore how SCSD2 schools embody the foundational elements of a PLC. We discuss how collaboration and intervention are different in PLCs and traditional schools, and we reveal what inquiry strategies have led to SCSD2’s success as a PLC, as well as what can go wrong along the way. We hope this book gives you a clear sense of the system and spirit of SCSD2.

Before this tour begins, we will introduce your tour guides and the setting of the tour. We will share the hunger that prompted SCSD2 to change, the solution the district found in the PLC process, its continuing PLC journey, and the sense of fulfillment that PLC implementation gives to its educators.

Your Tour Guides

We will be your tour guides on this PLC journey. Casey is a former urban high school principal and city assistant superintendent who utilized the PLC process to drive a dramatic turnaround in each of the schools he worked with. In addition, he has served virtual PLCs, consulting with online schools who use the PLC process. He met Craig several years ago as a consultant while he was working with SCSD2 during its ongoing journey toward improvement. Craig is the long-standing superintendent of SCSD2. He spent four years as an assistant superintendent and has served as the superintendent since 2000.

The districts we have served as practitioners are quite different from each other: urban areas in Toledo, Ohio, and Detroit, Michigan, versus the western landscape of northern Wyoming. Our multiple and diverse experiences in education have shaped our vision for this book, and the differing experiences we bring to the table will help to inform your experience as a reader.

Despite our differing experiences, both of us have a relentless passion for the education profession—for results and for students and the educators who serve them—and have bullish opinions on the profession’s future. We both passionately pursue best practices and believe schools that want to achieve better results than ever before should use the PLC process as articulated by Richard DuFour, Robert Eaker, and Rebecca DuFour as the foundation for getting things done. And finally, we are both relentlessly dedicated to telling it like it is. While we hope our writing inspires you, we likewise aim for clarity about what you need to strive for to make the PLC process come alive, starting today. We will be straightforward, writing both straight to and straight from the heart.

The Setting

The setting for this rich case study is Sheridan, Wyoming, a picturesque town of twenty thousand people at the foot of the Bighorn Mountains. The community has easy access to badlands, national forests, and any number of outdoor activities. It also has a long-running affinity for the cowboy culture. Even if you’ve never gone fly fishing, eaten buffalo, or attended a rodeo, you could find all three with relative ease in this eleven-square-mile town.

Cowboys and charm notwithstanding, SCSD2 is an altogether common school district. Historically, it has faced huge internal challenges in trying to meet the needs of economically diverse students with extraordinarily different and often difficult learning needs. Principals and teachers in the district had developed extremely low expectations of students who live in poverty, as well as students who struggled academically. With ten schools (six receiving Title I funding), roughly 3,500 students, and three hundred teachers, there was indeed a great deal of work needed to overcome these and other internal challenges. SCSD2 responded to these challenges in nothing short of an amazing way—and its responsiveness to these challenges lies at the heart of this book.

The Hunger

In 2005, educators in SCSD2 got hungry. Proficiency levels as low as 25 percent in some schools suggested that the district’s staff weren’t necessarily helping students reach their potential, and the data gave staff an overarching sense that they could do so much more. Perhaps even more important, and key to the ascent of a PLC culture, SCSD2 staff were willing to challenge their assumptions and to do things differently. They didn’t know what they didn’t know, and had never heard of PLCs. But they knew that moderate, vanilla changes around the edges would probably not satisfy their hunger for real student improvement.

While this book spends quite a bit of time on technical elements of the PLC process, one shouldn’t overlook the impact of personal commitment. Ensuring leaders and teachers are coming to the table hungry, ready to change and innovate, is essential. This foundational element of creative innovation represents a formidable introduction to any reform process. And in this case, the hungry hearts at SCSD2 had no idea about the feast ahead; they just knew that it was time for a change.

The Solution

To satisfy this hunger for change and innovation, SCSD2 pursued with interest two very different innovative possibilities: (1) merit pay and (2) PLC implementation. These two approaches to school reform couldn’t have been more different. Suffice it to say, the PLC approach was more effective and more popular among staff. As we briefly explore both options, we do not necessarily intend to debate them. We simply hope to illustrate that a school’s approach to improvement will most certainly impact that school’s eventual outcomes.

SCSD2 had two schools, Meadowlark Elementary and Highland Park Elementary, that wanted to serve as pilot settings for districtwide school reform. This decision to start small with just two schools speaks to the district’s commitment to careful consideration before jumping into a districtwide solution.

Merit Pay

The first choice focused on installing a merit-pay system that offered a financial reward for individual teachers who could show growth in their students’ achievement. The merit-pay system, known as the Teacher Advancement Program (TAP), was fairly simple. TAP provided a performance metric that was measured before and after student learning data and then calculated compensation based on a merit-pay formula.

This system had a rather interesting impact. Indeed, motivated and innovative teachers outperformed some of their colleagues. However, this approach unintentionally established a new level of secrecy about innovative approaches. Instead of sharing creative ideas that worked for students, teachers actually had a financial incentive to keep those innovations cloistered, only to roll them out for their own students in hopes of attaining the merit pay. For example, a teacher who had developed a detailed and effective system for collecting and representing student learning data, and for using these data to drive daily instruction, felt pressure from the TAP model to keep the system to herself. (As a side note, we recognize that merit pay has many permutations that allow districts to roll it out differently. However, the outcome we describe here is the real impact that merit pay had in this case.)

SCSD2’s merit-pay system rewarded individual teachers, encouraged more isolated professional practice, and offered a systemic disincentive to work together. With each translation of the data points, educators drifted further away from the essence of their work—the students and the observable results.

PLC Implementation

Spoiler alert: SCSD2’s successful piloting of the PLC process forever shifted the focus of the district’s work. It started, however, with a handful of educators leading one pilot school. These educators studied the PLC concept DuFour, Eaker, and DuFour outline (see DuFour et al., 2016); attended PLC events; and truly invested in learning about what it meant to be a high-functioning PLC. For the purpose of this discussion, we want to reflect on the relative differences between the two reform choices the district considered.

PLC implementation meant using structures designed to operationalize teaching and learning in a very different way. The PLC process itself establishes mandatory sharing of professional practice (DuFour et al., 2016). It largely supplants individual rewards in favor of team rewards. Rather than bifurcating students into groups and carefully evaluating which teacher served which group, the district sees all students as the responsibility of every adult in the building. Without really knowing it, SCSD2 picked two very different approaches to school reform. PLC was more impactful for student results. Implementing the PLC process set the district on the journey that brought out its students’ outstanding districtwide performance levels. Consider the following data.

• From 2002 to 2015, Sheridan elementary schools increased fourth-grade proficiency from 48 percent to 84 percent in reading and fourth-grade mathematics proficiency from 59 percent to 85 percent.

• Meadowlark Elementary School, the first PLC adopter, increased mathematics proficiency among fourth graders by 264 percent between 2001 and 2017.

• At Sheridan Junior High, eighth-grade reading proficiency grew from 48 percent in 2001 to 75 percent in 2015; mathematics proficiency increased from 41 percent to 69 percent during this same time frame.

INSIDE SCSD2

Scott Cleland, Principal, Highland Park Elementary

Highland Park Elementary had been utilizing a merit-pay model for two years, beginning in 2006. Within two years, morale in the school was at an all-time low; teachers routinely shut their doors, creating a feeling of isolation; and academic scores were plummeting. Change was needed. Our staff were ready to begin a journey to meet the needs of every student and grow as professionals. One of the necessary components for the successful implementation of the PLC process is to have widespread commitment to the idea. Highland Park’s staff were so hungry for change and unity that the decision to embrace the PLC process was the obvious choice if we were going to collectively impact student learning.

During the summer of 2009, a large portion of our staff attended a PLC institute to gain a deeper understanding of the process and create an attitude of buy-in. The difference in our school culture was incredible. The collective work we were doing was not coming from administration; it was organically grown from within our teacher teams. Our school went from an underachieving school with very low morale and trust among staff to a National Blue Ribbon School of Excellence in 2014. PLC impacts student success every day, and we truly live our fundamental purpose of ensuring high levels of learning for every student, every day. (S. Cleland, personal communication, June 12, 2018)

Over the years, we’ve observed the difficulty that leaders face in figuring out how forcefully they need to implement the PLC process. Or, put another way, they ask if they can dictate the PLC process. In sharing how SCSD2 got started and continues to evolve with excellence, we hope to illustrate that the answer to that question is pretty clear: in order for the PLC process to succeed, it must have widespread support. In SCSD2, implementation of the PLC model took a grassroots effort. Simply executing steps in teams’ work within a PLC isn’t enough. You can dictate team time, team protocols, the establishment of essential learning, and a shared common formative assessment as described by DuFour, Eaker, and DuFour. All those steps are necessary. However, to truly change the building’s culture and ultimately shape results in a meaningful way, all staff must wholeheartedly embrace the PLC framework and believe that this process works and can transform the building’s culture (DuFour et al., 2016).

The PLC implementation process has the potential to engage teachers in a very different way, putting them in leadership positions like never before. The focus turns to student learning as the primary motivating factor for the work of teachers and teams. PLC transformation takes schools on an imprecise journey that no one can totally predict. It ebbs and flows, even for the most successful schools. We suggest that schools truly engage staff in considering the deep innovations that can occur when the PLC process becomes a way of life, and the best way to engage staff is through learning by doing—taking action to make necessary changes a reality. Certainly, there comes a time when the debating must stop. A school needs to commit to the PLC process and all the steps that come along with it. To that end, schools must make tight commitments that move beyond the establishment of grassroots, emotional connections. More on all of this as we go.

ADDITIONAL PLC RESOURCES TO CONSIDER

While many authors have written extensively on the PLC concept, as practitioners, we have based our thoughtful application of this process on the seminal work of PLC architects Richard DuFour and Robert Eaker and PLC visionary Rebecca DuFour. Throughout this book, we reference books that build on these authors’ original seminal works, which undergird every recommendation and philosophy we present. The appendix, page 115, contains a list of helpful books that can assist you in your journey of PLC transformation. We encourage you to become familiar with these foundational works.

A Continuing Journey

If you were to observe SCSD2’s collaborative teams in action to obtain perspective on what it’s like to experience a fully functioning PLC, you would likely make the following observations.

Wow—They Work Hard, With Happiness

Although working together undoubtedly lightens the load, the educators at SCSD2 work really hard every day. They do so because they have become so adroit at identifying what they hope to accomplish—providing intervention and improving their students’ learning. With systems for collaboration in place, they have shed the traditional paradigm of teachers working in isolation and formed a no-excuses mentality. If a student is struggling, everyone has to get busy making sure that the student meets the required learning expectation. No excuses. No failure.

And the educators at SCSD2 work hard with happiness. The four pillars of a PLC—mission, vision, values, and collective commitments (goals; DuFour et al., 2016)—shape daily actions at SCSD2. Systematic collaboration has resulted in a shift in mindset among educators in the district who embrace the increased complexity and demands of their work because the rewards of student learning are highly motivating. Much like the old adage no pain, no gain, teachers in this district embrace hard work with vigor, urgency, and joy.

They Really Depend on Each Other

When observing teams in SCSD2, you would see a generous amount of professional sharing. Certain teachers have well-formulated levels of expertise in areas that their entire team could benefit from. Unlike in so many systems, which seem to always keep people’s weaknesses under wraps, SCSD2 team members eagerly acknowledge strengths and weaknesses, encouraging the strong to take the lead when the time is right and openly admitting a lack of knowledge and the ability to learn from one another. How much trust does a community of practice require to share this openly? Perhaps Socrates’s declaration, “The more I know, the more I realize I know nothing,” speaks to what happens to an informed team member in a PLC; team members realize that the more they learn together, the more they have left to learn, do, and become.

They Have a Culture That Embraces Mistakes for Both Teachers and Students

An observer would also realize that the SCSD2 staff aren’t afraid of making mistakes or receiving feedback. In fact, staff members have come to realize that mistakes are the genesis of innovation. For example, colleagues and educators from other districts routinely observe SCSD2 staff members in the classroom. This practice has helped staff become more comfortable with the possibility of making their mistakes public. They realize that feedback leads to improvement, and they pass this mindset on to students who openly discuss their levels of mastery against priority standards among classmates and adults visiting the classroom. In order to exercise creativity and develop new competencies, you have to be willing to take risks, not get it exactly right, and then learn more in the process.

As you read about the sense of fulfillment that PLC implementation brings to educators, you may feel skeptical. Perhaps to you this sounds like a hard sell. To assuage your fears or skepticism, let’s think about where this sense of fulfillment comes from. First, we are, without question, a tribal species. Simply put, this means we tend to prosper much more when we learn to get along with one another and depend on one another’s capacities. In fact, psychologists argue that the psychological impulse for human attachment goes right back to our need to survive; if you can get along with other people, that might make people more likely to share food and shelter with you. And who knows? That might even make them willing to partner with you in passing on your genetic code (Waelti, Dickinson, & Schultz, 2001). We have basic human rewards built into our systems that encourage us to work together and to succeed in our families or in teams or groups. For example, our brains release endorphins when we happily engage in group celebrations (Waelti et al., 2001). Our brains release endorphins to saturate us with good feelings that encourage us to go back to those behaviors that will most likely help us survive.

So, if you are a forward-thinking optimist who believes in the magic of human connection, you may recognize that dedication to the PLC process gives you the formative elements to make that magic show up more often. If you are perhaps a skeptic, just know that our human condition generally rewards working together in an organized and disciplined fashion, and evidence shows that consistently working on a team will make you feel good and stimulate your brain in a way that working alone can’t (DuFour et al., 2016; DuFour & Reason, 2015; Pfeffer & Sutton, 2000; Reason, 2010). Either way, we’ve observed that those who do the work to implement the PLC process become the thankful recipients of deep and sustained levels of joy and fulfillment. For that reason alone, PLCs make a lot of sense, don’t they?

Chapter Overview

We begin our tour of PLC implementation in chapter 1 by looking at what it means to be a PLC, including the three big ideas of a PLC that drive improvement (DuFour et al., 2016). Real examples from SCSD2, often presented in the words of school leaders and educators from the district, accompany these basics. In this chapter, we also provide definitions of key PLC terms and concepts. In chapter 2, we look at teams in a PLC, including types of teams and how teams in PLCs differ from teams in traditional schools. In chapter 3, we examine the four critical questions of a PLC (DuFour et al., 2016), using experiences and examples from SCSD2 to illustrate how these questions shape outcomes and change a school or district’s culture. In chapter 4, we get real about conflict. We talk about strategies for building a dynamic and innovative collaborative culture and managing conflict, again guiding you with real examples from SCSD2. In chapter 5, we address the all-important job of making the PLC process the system and the spirit behind ongoing intervention, extension, and innovation in your school or district. We believe that schools haven’t adequately explored their power to innovate. The book ends with a look ahead as we passionately evaluate the PLC process’s future in SCSD2, in your school, and everywhere in between. In the appendix, we offer tools that can help guide your work during your PLC journey, including a PLC resource list (page 116). Visit go.SolutionTree.com/PLCbooks to download the free reproducibles in this book.

Conclusion

In this introduction, we shared the beginnings and continuing results of one school district’s truly remarkable PLC journey. With this district’s example, we intend to show that the PLC process is more than a straight series of steps toward school improvement. Rather, it looks more like a curving mountain road that leads to transformation and includes successes, challenges, and celebrations along the way. While you go on this tour with us, we ask that you refrain from playing it safe. Don’t keep your hands inside the vehicle. Reach out and learn. As you learn things, push yourself to get out there and try them. This may be a guided tour, and we will get you through it safely, but you’ll learn a whole lot more if you stay on the edge of your seat and embrace the twists and turns.