Chapter 3: Perspectives of Teachers about Design Thinking as a Lever for Change in a School

It is frequent that schools encounter issues within their walls which need to be addressed. Traditionally this role of problem-solving has gone to the administration, however, more recently teachers have had the opportunity to participate in problem-solving and decision-making through distributed leadership. Yet, questions remain concerning how this shift from administrators to teachers to address school issues works. What do the teachers experience as they seek to initiate change in their schools using problem-solving strategies? What goes well and what does not?

This study aims to enlighten this area of research by taking a closer look at how teachers in a large urban secondary school approached a specific issue that had been haunting their school for years, the daily class schedule. They used the design-thinking method, which emphasizes empathy with the end-user, to dream up a new way of coordinating students’ class schedules. While their end product was innovative, the focus here is on how the teacher’s experienced using design-thinking as a lever for change in their school.