Chapter 9: Building Capacity for all Learners at all Levels Through Inclusive Educational Practices

This chapter describes Mad River Local Schools’ experience with work to increase teachers’ use of inclusive instructional practices. It discusses the challenges associated with making a shift from a “fixed” to “growth” mindset; and it demonstrates the importance of pushing educators to embrace collaborative teams, committees, and communities. Throughout, the discussion highlights the importance of providing a deeper, more focused educational experience for students, with an emphasis on skills relevant to the 21st century workplace.

Mad River’s adoption of an inclusive educational mindset began several years ago, following Ohio’s shift from state standards to the Common Core standards for reading and math. To move beyond Malcolm Baldrige’s “cookie cutter” improvement model—the approach used by Ohio at the time (Banister, 2001)—we engaged in district-level discussions about our purpose. These discussions pointed to the fact that leadership teams across the district had lost their focus. The district leadership team’s (DLT’s) data walks and conversations had become routine and revealed little, and our building leadership teams’ (BLTs’) focus rarely moved beyond data recorded on compliance checklists, even though BLT members recognized that what they were doing did not align with district goals. Furthermore, our teacher-based teams (TBTs) complained about the lack of resources for teaching the Common Core and insisted on purchasing “canned” programs to meet their needs. Buildings functioned in isolation, teachers did not collaborate, and staff generally were unable to engage in wholesale reform. Rather, they tended to apply “band-aid” solutions to structural problems. In short, it became easier to hide from the Common Core than to engage with it.