Walmart is always looking at ways to reduce expenses, to find that fraction of a penny of cost reduction that will translate into millions of dollars of worldwide savings. They looked at how macaroni and cheese is packaged and challenged their principal suppliers to reduce the size of the cardboard box. The principal cost savings [...]
This week I am highlighting reasons to come to the Martin Institute for Teaching Excellence Summer Conference in June. The Martin is leaping to the front of authentic educator professional development with a by-invitation-only line-up of national and international teaching leaders and rich, two-hour blocks of active learning…the death knell of sit-and-get conferences. Here are [...]
As I have posted before, the Martin Institute for Teaching Excellence is leaping to the front of authentic educator professional development this June with a by-invitation-only line-up of national and international teaching leaders and rich, two-hour blocks of active learning…the death knell of sit-and-get conferences. Here are a few reasons you will want to register: [...]
Tell me again why strategic planning takes a year, costs tens of thousands of dollars in consultant fees, and produces inside the box ideas? Another way? Read on! Yesterday I was happy to work with a group of faculty, staff, and trustees at Poughkeepsie Day School who are generating the schools updated strategic plan. On [...]
Moon-set at dawn from "my" porch. Every time I am in a new place of quiet beauty I thank God for waking early in the morning when the world is new, when the mist is still rising off the lake, two paddling loons trail V-ripple wakes across the shimmering reflection of the setting [...]
This very short post is why we can stop worrying about exactly what "it" is, that place where every great educator knows that real learning is taking place or about to take place or has the future potential to take place. This is what we work for. This from a friend who has taken her [...]
So many models of problem solving start at the end! The creators of this thinking have never looked at the roots of the issue. Solid buildings require foundations; sure they are not pretty and no one sees them and they are hard to dig, but it is the foundation that supports all else. Problem solving [...]
Sun Tzu says: Act after having made assessments. The one who first knows the measures of far and near wins—this is the rule of armed struggle. Yesterday I shared some of Bo Adam’s wisdom about the importance of systems in school transformation. It is so easy to check the box, to say “let’s go through [...]
Yesterday I virtually attended a talk by Bo Adams of Atlanta-based transformational design thinking firm Unboundary, hosted by the Southern Association of Independent Schools. Bo was talking about his visionary Pedagogical Master Planning template that they are starting to beta test at schools. Here are some kernels I Tweeted out during the session; most of [...]
First moral of this story: don’t book your travel with me. If I were a sailor, the crew would have thrown me overboard by now. Last Sunday: watched Denzel Washington crash land a plane in “Flight”. Last Wednesday, Dallas to Richmond. Emergency landing in Nashville, no real explanation. Fly to Atlanta with a connection to [...]