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My work

 

 

 

As a thought partner, I work one-on-one, with leadership teams and professional learning communities, and in whole group settings from from 5 to 500.  

 

My clients sometimes opt for existing modules - developed after hundreds of hours with innovative educators addressing similar challenges.   Some prefer to customize content, processes, and structures to ensure an exact fit to their system.

 

Although my approach to improvement needs is developed collaboratively, my work generally falls within four categories.

"

Harriette’ s work with my teachers to reflect on instructional practice has been a culture shift for our district. Our teachers love the chance to work with her and it has changed their beliefs about sharing and collaborating with each other. They are truly open to looking at actual teaching moves in the classrooms, including their own. 

 

Kevin Chase, Superintendent

Grandview School District, WA

Leadership Development

Leadership does not mean fixing things.  It does mean reading the waters and constantly adjusting.  It does mean knowing when to put that stake in the ground and how to do it so that people will mobilize around the work ahead.

 

I tend toward what is often termed adaptive leadership, essential to leading the complexity that now characterizes education systems. Adaptive leadership is less about answers and more about learning, creating a culture in which people take ownership for challenges, direction, and progress.   

 

 

 

Typical Outcomes:

  • Progress on difficult issues

  • Enhanced repertoire of leadership practices

  • Capacity for internal systems-level learning

  • Ability to learn from failure

 

Tools in Use:

  • Case Study and Case-in-Point 

  • Cycles of Inquiry

  • Collaborative Classroom Observation

  • Executive Coaching

  • Peer Consultancy

  • Text Study

 

 

Collaborative
Classroom Observation

The value of collaborative practice is immense, working with peers to consider and resolve some of education's most presssing challenges. The power of collaborative classroom observation is unprecedented in its ability to drive changes in leadership and classroom practice.

 

My role is to teach the foundations of the instructional rounds process: collection of classroom-based evidence and collective analysis around a strategic area of improvement, be it district, school, or classroom-based. This becomes the space for essential conversations around teaching and learning to reach the goals you seek through this process..  

 

Typical Outcomes:

  • Capacity for data-based conversations around professional practice

  • Skills in observing, collecting, and analyzing nonjudgmental data

  • Common language and calibrated understanding of instructional framework and rigor

  • Culture of adult learning and public practice

 

Tools in Use:


 

Organizational Effectiveness
Community Engagement

I approach organizations as systems and your system is perfectly  designed to get the results you're getting.  To change your results, you must change your system.  

 

Systems can do anything - but they can't do everything.  The key to effective organizations is clarity within boundaries that allow for innovation and flexibility as the environment shifts.   Utimately your system should be one of continuous feedback, able to learn from itself.  My role is to help you see your system.  Only then can we consider and make adjustments that will deliver high performance for all students.

 

Typical Outcomes:

  • Accountable professional learning communities

  • School or district culture of adult learning able to support innovation

  • Enhanced board/superintendent relationships

  • System-wide focus on the instructional core

  • Organizational coherence 

  • Incremental and steady improvement 

 

Tools in Use:

 

 

Engaged communities support students, authorize leaders, and create priceless momentum that can feel almost magical in its power.  

 

My work engages external communities (parents, business, social service, faith-based) along with internal stakeholders (administrators, teachers, staff).  Each stakeholder group is critical to a moving vision, an inspirational mission, and a set of coherent strategies that will deliver the intended results.

 

 

 

Typical Outcomes:

  • Establishment of strategic priorities and strategic plan

  • Communities of engaged stakeholders united around a common purpose

  • Increased parental and community involvement

  • Stronger home/school relationships

  • Community clarity around school improvement needs and practices

 

Tools in Use:

  • Focus Groups for Data and Development

  • Whole-Scale Change Technology

  • Parental Involvement

    Development for Teachers

  • Vision, Mission, and Values Creation

  • Strategy Development/Strategic Planning

  • Collective Impact Initiatvies 

 

new modules

INSTRUCTIONAL ROUNDS  ROUND 2

LEADING INTO THE UNKNOWN

INSTRUCTIONAL COHERENCE  THE NEXT FRONTIER

 

 

From leadership development to collaborative classroom observation to organizational effectiveness, Harriette coaches clients to explore creative opportunities and develop new innovations to drive continuous learning and transformative change.  Working in partnership with her clients, Harriette uses her research skill, proven analytical process and deep understanding of human behaviors and attitudes to develop customized guidance and sustainable initiatives.  She is a natural facilitator of authentic community engagement and systems change.  

 

Gene Sharratt, Executive Director

Washington Student Achievement Council

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