Building Capacity in Cornerstone Schools:
What Does it Mean and How is it Done?

I recently received an ASCD publication entitled What Works in Schools: Translating Research into Action written by Robert Marzano and wasn't three pages into my reading when I stumbled into a paragraph about the importance of "building capacity" in America's schools. I chuckled, wondering how the thousands of readers whose eyes pass over those words, will define the term "building capacity". I can even recall, I believe, a book with the term in the title. Presumably that author had a clear idea of what it means to "build capacity" in a school. I wondered as I read if I really know what it means.

From the beginning, Cornerstone's mission has included intent to build capacity in the schools and districts it serves. Often, when I feel I only understand a concept superficially, I take the time to write about it in the hope that I'll come to understand its various facets more deeply. Thus, I want to use this month's Ellin's Corner to explore, for my own thinking as well as yours, this notion of building capacity. I hope that my musings will shed a bit of light on this ubiquitous, but elusive notion.

I began by posing a series of questions I discussed with my colleagues and revise here for your consideration. We have added these questions to the Tool Kit on line in section 4.4 and I'll write a bit about each here to provoke conversation in your school about the degree to which your leadership team is building capacity.

In our school and/or district, how

  • are new faculty and staff oriented to Cornerstone program goals, teaching practices and use of the Cornerstone Literacy Framework;
     
    In considering this question, I wonder about the perceptions of newly hired teachers in Cornerstone schools. It must seem terribly overwhelming to be confronted with asset maps, school reviews, the Framework and the role of a coach or critical friend and the flurry of Cornerstone visitors. I wonder what plans each of our schools have in place to not only welcome newcomers and orient them to the tools, terminology and people of Cornerstone, but to engage them in the energy, commitment and passion you have for the work. I wonder how all of us communicate, not only the processes we use to learn together, but the joy we find in doing so.
     
  • are reluctant faculty members engaged more fully in the work and shown its promise;
     
    We've devoted so much of our time, in leadership team meetings and informally, puzzling through this dilemma with our colleagues at summer institutes and regional meetings. Let's consider this question through a different lens. Instead of sorting out how we might convince reluctant faculty members to engage in this work, side-by-side with us, perhaps we might ask them for their views about improving literacy learning; we might invite them to tell us what worries them most about the children they serve; we might inquire directly why they use practices we abandoned; we might engage person-to-person before we move forward as professionals. Certainly, in the end, principals must make the ultimate decisions about each faculty member's fitness to serve children in your setting, and it is best for some to move on, but I hope all of us see our colleagues as people of good intent and listen accordingly. Is that building capacity? Perhaps gentleness of spirit doesn't show up in professional literature when building capacity is being discussed. Perhaps it should.
     
  • can your leadership team ensure that leadership for instruction lives, not only in the principals' office, but among faculty members;
     
    When I consider this question, I'm reminded of a wonderful teaching assistant who has worked for many years in the school district in which I taught south of Denver. Randi is an indomitable spirit who took it upon herself to attend professional development sessions designed for teachers, to offer to assist with registration at conferences in order to get in to hear the best thinkers in the country in literacy and to keep her own writer's notebook to share with children in between making thousands of copies and recess duty. In time, Randi's principal recognized her extraordinary commitment and knowledge and, working creatively with a lean budget, found a way to have Randi work with children in classrooms during the literacy block for four of her seven hours each day. Teachers were invited to meet with Randi, teacher-to-teacher, to determine ways in which she might share her rich, colorful insights about literacy with children. I wonder how many Randis there are in Cornerstone schools - assistants who have strong teaching skills, parents who have unique insights about the progress the school is making, teachers who have professional development ideas, school secretaries who love children's literature. I have to wonder, how well we know all the characters (Randi is certainly a character!) in our schools. How willing are we to forego a bit of control in order to watch a leader rise?
     
  • does your school and district build advocacy for Cornerstone with teachers, other principals, parents, special interest groups, other education groups;
     
    It seems we have plenty on our plates as it is. Why request and submit a proposal to present your innovative ideas to the local affiliate of the International Reading Association? Why risk getting on a Board of Education agenda to share the Cornerstone philosophy? Why speak to the monthly meeting of the Title One staff to share a particular set of practices that have led to improvement in students' learning? Why edge your way onto principals' meeting agenda in your district? I would like to propose that, as those fortunate enough to work in a network of other committed professionals, we have a responsibility, not only to our own students, classrooms and schools, but to the field of education. A definition for building capacity for continual improvement of schools in this country must surely include recognition that those who have grown, those who have changed their policies and practices owe their insights to others, particularly those who serve children in poverty. We don't approach this task as if we have all the answers; we merely present ourselves as people who are pursuing answers to some very complex questions. We assume responsibility for professionals and children we'll never know.
     
  • do you inform and influence district policy decisions that support intra-district knowledge about and growth for Cornerstone;
     
    During a recent visit to a Cornerstone district, a group of coaches, principals and district officials discussed the recent adoption of a basal series in the district. I was struck, as I have been in other districts, by how effective it was when principals and coaches asked the district strategy manager exactly what their obligation was in implementing the basal series exactly as the publisher proposed. Apparently, there was a perception that the district expected the schools to work through every lesson in order, using all the supplementary material as specified in the manual. When asked directly and professionally, the district strategy manager was clear that there was a great deal of latitude in the use of the basal materials. The stories could be used, skipped or excerpted, and the worksheets and workbooks could be shelved altogether. I recall that discussion, not only because it provided some much needed instructional freedom for teachers, but because it undoubtedly provided insight for the district strategy manager. Has the districts' flexibility been communicated adequately? Do teachers know they can pick and choose from the materials, exercising their professional discretion? And, how refreshing it must have been for the district strategy manager to hear from teachers and principals who actually want to work harder to provide for their students in a more individualized and relevant way. Just about the time we decide that our hands are tied by district policy, a short, professional discussion can prove us wrong!
     
  • does your leadership team continually consider teachers' needs and promote ongoing professional learning through study groups, coaching each other, observing and feeding back for one another;
     
    When the Cornerstone staff gathers for its monthly meetings, we have extensive discussions about the ways in which we can best support the goals you have defined in your Literacy Action Plans. That's our job. But, in considering the question of capacity building we have another, perhaps more important job - to make ourselves obsolete. We seek to inform, facilitate and challenge each school in Cornerstone, but certainly not to direct your efforts. In fact building capacity, to us, means gradually, from the first day of your involvement, releasing responsibility to you to provide the most relevant and engaging professional learning opportunities for your staff. I had a note from a dearly loved colleague recently lamenting that, in the third year of the project, she felt a bit lonely for Cornerstone colleagues. I gulped, but had to acknowledge that, rather than abandoning her school, we had rightly relinquished the responsibility for providing professional development to the very capable staff. I miss her too, but what a superior job they are doing - considering teachers' needs and responding to them.
     
  • can your leadership team create a system that will permit you to manage new state and district mandates, without negative impact on your Cornerstone initiative;
     
    Unless you've been happily residing in a cave for the last eighteen months, you've heard about new federal and local initiatives designed to direct your literacy improvement efforts. Forgive my directness at speaking to the directive and prescriptive nature of many of these efforts, but as I mentioned above, Cornerstone seeks to facilitate, inform and challenge, but not direct your professional learning efforts. Cornerstone's definition of building capacity would have to include building the knowledge base, grounded in research, for all teachers to make thoughtful, focused decisions about the teaching strategies they will use to meet their students' needs. We are here to provide a research base for both the content (the framework) and the instructional strategies known to be effective in literacy learning, but the rest is a matter for your professional judgment and experience. It's harder to make one's own decisions based on knowledge and experience, but Cornerstone is not about making this work easier. Those whose initiatives and published programs purport to make it easier for teachers direct their daily practices and rob us of the intellectual challenge and academic freedom on which public education in this country is based. Collectively, we seek to teach children to think critically, but to do so we must retain the right to think critically ourselves. I hope that leadership teams will have honest conversations in the very near term about how to stay the course in the face of extraordinary pressure to conform to the directives you'll receive. It is a time for the courage of our convictions, and that may be the clearest definition for "building capacity" of all.
     
  • are parent and community groups introduced to Cornerstone and how will their interest in Cornerstone will be sustained;
     
    Perhaps I worry least about building capacity in this area. Our colleague Sara Schwabacher has provided extraordinary leadership and guidance for your schools and there is no limit, it seems, to your creativity in engaging parents in the work of your schools. I do have to wonder, however, once the read-with-your-jammies-on night is over, once the cultural feasts have been consumed and reading 100 zillion books contests are complete, what remains of our efforts to engage parents and the larger communities? Do we have a plan for lasting, sustained interest and support for Cornerstone literacy practices? Have we truly capitalized on our community's abilities to influence others; have we really learned what parents can tell us about their children that will make a difference in our approach to them; have we been influenced by their culture and their beliefs about educating children? And, perhaps most simply and most importantly, have we communicated that the single greatest gift a parent can give for her child's literacy learning is the gift of reading to that child every single day of their elementary lives? Do our communities understand this so that they, too, can direct their efforts toward having an adult read to each child each day? Have we done all we can to remove obstacles to that one simple act? Have we communicated the central importance of that daily ritual?
     
  • can teachers be encouraged to elaborate upon, improve upon, be innovative with ideas Cornerstone has shared;
     
    I had an email recently from a teacher in New Hampshire who attended a workshop I gave in December. He wrote apologetically about an adaptation he had made to an idea I presented in Mosaic of Thought. He wrote that he found that his students responded better if he taught two rather than one strategy at a time as I proposed in Mosaic. He wrote that he hoped I "was alright" with that amendment and that, if I had objections, I should write back. I did write back immediately, but it certainly wasn't to express objections. I told him I rarely received a greater compliment than that he had sent. I told him that, for me, the pinnacle of professional success comes when teachers adapt practices to better meet their students' needs. He had, in my opinion, dramatically exceeded the success other teachers have had when they simply lift ideas out of Mosaic (or any other text) and put them in place in their classrooms. But, to tell you the truth, his email troubled me. Have I given the impression that the ideas I share from my research and experience are to be left alone - that there is to be some ultimate fidelity to the practice as I wrote or spoke about it? Have we, in Cornerstone schools, celebrated the innovations, adaptations, revisions and amendments teachers have made? Have we recognized that to revise is to own an idea? If there is anything to this "building capacity" business, it must be to encourage a culture of revision in each of our schools.
     
  • can your school continue to tap Cornerstone resources to help teachers and the principal assume new levels of challenge and scholarly inquiry;
     
    As I reflect on the schools that began this journey with us three years ago, I have to comment on some successes we never imagined at that time. Several of the schools that have been most successful - by any measure - are those who have been the most strategic in using (and abusing?) their Cornerstone colleagues. I recall, for example, Janet Cumbee's plea for me to come to Talladega to launch writers' notebooks in several classrooms. I did and what that school has done to capitalize on that half day of demonstrations is legendary. I remember sitting down with my Bridgeport colleagues in a school in London, engaging in an intense conversation about maximizing time as coaches in classrooms. I recall an email conversation with Janice Ford, critical friend in Greenwood, about leveling children's books. I'm certain my Cornerstone colleagues could recall hundreds of examples of productive interactions with Cornerstone colleagues. What's the common element in all of them? The coaches, Critical Friends, principals and district strategy managers who called upon us knew us well enough to know to whom they could turn for productive conversation or action on a very precise need or goal. It is our job to deploy resources to best meet your needs, indeed, but the most successful school leadership teams huddle together to figure exactly how to squeeze the last drop of expertise, energy and experience out of each of us. It's a two-way street, isn't it; and I'm grateful that so many of you aren't waiting for us to guess what your needs are. You're coming to us. Wouldn't the same thing be true in your own districts? Might it be productive to talk with the faculty about the best ways to maximize your district and community's resources - how to squeeze every drop of support not only from us but from those closest to you.
     
  • can your leadership team promote continued engagement among faculty members in studying research and understanding complex ideas.
     
    I will embarrass my colleagues from Cleveland by telling this story, but I'm willing to live with their wrath! During a recent visit to Cleveland, I sat at a tiny table with all four coaches at the end of a long session and asked them what they intended to do to challenge themselves more. I spoke extensively (until they were squirming, actually) about the exemplary nature of their work as coaches and the successes in each school that were obvious to me. Just about the time they hoped I'd change the subject, I asked them what scholarly efforts and new challenges they intended to pursue. I have a colleague who regularly puts me on the spot in a similar way and it is one of her greatest gifts to me. I wonder, are we putting each other on the spot? When we recognize brilliance in our colleagues, do we acknowledge it but also go the next step and ask them what complex problem they intend to tackle next? Is building capacity fighting complacency? I would suggest that as hard as we work, as much as we manage, one of the most lasting contributions we can make to our children, our schools and the field of education is to tackle new challenges, to take on the problems that today seem insurmountable. The need to challenge ourselves also falls into our roles as leaders. Do we challenge our colleagues? We will retain the finest professionals in our schools as long as those people are intellectually stimulated and working in a collegial environment. Are we doing what we can to make our colleagues and ourselves just a little bit uncomfortable?
I've mused enough on the topic of building capacity in schools and may have only confused the issue further. My goal is to spark conversation among your colleagues and to invite your additions, revisions and deletions to the ideas I've presented. Email me and we'll continue the conversation until we have this one sorted out and then we'll write our own book about it - something like Building Capacity the Cornerstone Way. Okay, maybe in the spirit of revision, you can find a better title!