Chapter 7: Learning To Lead: Improvement Communities as a Scaffold for Teachers’ Leadership

Networked Improvement Communities (NIC) create new social organizations in school systems that catalyze the ability of practitioners, policymakers, and researchers to authentically collaborate, innovate, and improve service to students (Bryk at al., 2015). As a form of research-practice partnership, NICs disrupt traditional approaches to educational research and development (Coburn, Penuel, &Geil, 2013) using improvement science methods initially created in manufacturing (Deming, 1994) and later adapted in healthcare (Cohen-Vogel et al., 2015). Such methods have gained traction in education, not only because of the scientific rigor they afford, but also because the core tenet of “making the work problem-specific and user-centered” (Bryk et al., 2015, p. 21) creates the opportunity for student and community liberation, meaning that education becomes centered on the community’s values and needs.