“Innovation” is often treated like a shiny new thing. And I fear that some organizations, some constituents, or maybe even some school leaders may consider themselves innovative just because they’ve added another shiny new thing to the school repertoire—e.g., a new makerspace, a STEM lab, digital studio, or some additive program.
I’m not saying that a new program or initiative cannot serve a defined need. Of course they can have value—and are often necessary. A true innovative spirit, however, entails a culture of thinking and doing outside the box; it is not a contest to add the latest good idea to the school. But since we are all tempted to reach for these new and shiny things in a quest to be perceived as innovative, I find myself reflecting on two questions when provoked to think about innovation:
- Innovation for what reason?
- Innovation at what cost?
For What Reason?
Why are we adding this new program or new initiative? Perhaps the addition is due to an authentic fit or need, or maybe it could be partially driven by a desire to keep up with the other independent schools in the area, to excite an enthusiastic donor, to assuage a group of persistent parents, or to fix a particular situation. I am suspicious of some of these innovative efforts that might be undertaken for less-than-ideal reasons.At What Cost?
It is also important to ask and reflect upon the possible costs of adding one more thing to already full plates. If we are adding a program or new initiative, what are we removing—what are we taking off the plates of school leaders, faculty, students, and families? There is a finite amount of time, resources, and energy for every stakeholder in a school. When a new and shiny initiative is not carefully assessed for its impact on the whole organism, it can stretch our leaders, our faculty, and our students too thin. In his book The Hurried Child: Growing Up Too Fast Too Soon, psychologist David Elkind cautions us to not pressure young students by overbooking them with expectations and constant change. I think the same holds true for the adults in our schools.Not all innovation is negative and not all new programs are a problem. In fact, I think controlled innovations are critical to any independent school’s continued success. But to innovate well—to innovate mindfully, deeply, and healthily—schools need to think carefully about both of the above questions. We need to organizationally and intellectually give the innovation the space and time it requires to organically emerge and manifest its affordances and constraints.
Prerequisites: Making Space and Listening
For 20 years, I have worked at The College School, a P–8 school in St. Louis. For 53 years, we have been an experiential, project-based school. We have block scheduling, three faculty-driven school buses, and empowered faculty who lead outdoor learning and overnight experiences around St. Louis and throughout the country. We believe in listening deeply to children and families; we believe in the Reggio-Emilia philosophy of development; and we believe in a constructivist approach to learning—and to innovation.We are proud of our many achievements and reputation, of course, but our school community also struggles with spreading itself too thin and with honestly answering the above questions. Yet we are committed to the idea that true learning takes space, takes time, and takes active listening. I think the same is true for innovation.
Our school’s mission is “to explore the world through authentic experiences, empowering students to engage deeply and be ready for what is next.” To meet this mission, we need to make space for such learning to happen. Our school loves Ron Berger’s work—especially An Ethic of Excellence—and believes in his craftsmanship and his less-is-more approach to projects. We love David Sobel’s work on place-based education. We believe in Sobel’s focus on keeping projects and learning connected to the core of where you are. Our learning projects emerge from student and faculty interest and needs. We keep our schedule flexible; our teachers are empowered to craft their curricula; and we always keep our three school buses fueled up and ready for an unexpected learning adventure. We try to be mindful to protect the sacred space that learning requires. Similarly, we try to protect the space that innovation requires. And often staff can creatively integrate new ideas and concepts without redoing curriculum and space by shifting dialogic engagement and going deeper with the same materials.
There are three innovative projects in which our school is presently engaged and for which we have been thinking through the two questions above.
- Outdoor learning center: Six years ago we purchased 29 acres of wilderness near our campus and constructed a new learning center on the property. We already travel to local, state, and national parks for our integrated learning, but there are certain things we can do better and more consistently when it is on our own property. The learning center itself—the Jan Phillips Learning Center—meets the Living Building Challenge requirements, which involve even more rigorous environmental standards than the LEED building requirements.
- Digital learning studio: For video and audio projects, we often found ourselves telling students in hallways to be quiet, or we’d hide a recording group in the boiler room for quiet recording space. A recent acquisition of a house adjacent to our campus allowed us last fall to construct a digital recording studio for student and/or faculty projects.
- Outdoor playscapes: We love to play outside. Last year, we renovated an outdoor playscape or studio learning space for our kindergarten, and this spring we are finishing play spaces for our elementary students who used to find their fun on our track or kickball field. Now they can climb a 40-foot-long dragon, swing together in a basket swing, or work collaboratively on our 80-foot-long, hand-pumped simulated river with 500 gallons of recalculated water.
In thinking about at what cost?, the essence of each of these projects was already underway to some degree as outgrowths of practice and pedagogy. So our innovation was less about the specifics of the projects and more about the process of thinking differently about what we were already doing and diving deeply into the question of what might be possible. We had to challenge ourselves to figure out how to grow or expand existing programs in new and authentic ways.
I won’t pretend these innovations have been without challenge. Building costs spiraled higher than anticipated with the Living Building Challenge; not every community member thought each of these projects was the best way to spend our finite resources; and we are not the best at taking something off our plates when we add something new. Even though each of these three innovations connected well with something already happening in our curriculum, they also represented some degree of “more.” I remember a session with Rob Evans, psychologist and author of The Human Side of School Change: Reform, Resistance, and the Real-Life Problems of Innovation, in which he encouraged schools to hold a “hand grenade session with their calendars.” The concept has merit for all schools, I think. For overly busy schools today, less really might be more.
Mitigating the escalation of new shiny things and being honest about confronting the question of cost mean taking care of our human sustainability. One relatively accessible tool in our toolbox is to schedule paid days for faculty to investigate and work on projects. And we recently changed our schedule to afford better opportunities related to these projects and other needs. We try daily to practice less is more. We try to remember that just because we do something once doesn’t make it a tradition. Maybe some opportunities should be offered only every other year or just during one semester. Above all, we try to listen honestly, openly, and transparently to each other to negotiate intentional, reflective innovations.
Innovation can be a good thing. It is necessary for our institutional survival. But before taking on new programs or initiatives, remember to view any new project in light of your core mission and to consider both the financial and human costs. True and sustainable innovation needs more than passion and excitement. It needs space to grow and emerge, it takes deep listening and reflection, and it needs explicit connections to our missions and curricula.
Remember, too, that more is not necessarily better. Our goal must always be to have an engaged, dynamic, sustainable learning community that works for adults and students.