At Springpoint, we are fortunate to work with a variety of dedicated and experienced practitioners to support their work to reimagine high school. The Barr Foundation’s Engage New England initiative, which invests in the design and launch of new school models for students who are off-track toward graduation, recently welcomed its second cohort of grantees.

We are thrilled to support this group of school designers in their school design journey. To kick off our work together, we hosted a launch event earlier this month. We invited school designers from the first cohort of partners to participate in a StorySLAM, asking them to share a story that unearths an insight, lesson learned, or poignant experience about new school design. Students, leaders, and practitioners graciously shared their experiences. Ron Schmidt, the design lead and principal of Chelsea Opportunity Academy, structured his story into five lessons he learned in the process of new school design.

Be careful about how much you think you know.
Ron found that as new designers dive into the process of designing new school models, there is not only a lot to learn, but a lot to unlearn as well. The process challenged some of Ron’s notions about school, including things he had firmly believed were good ideas. At Springpoint, we work to push our partners to think broadly about the purpose of school and to design for and with the students they will serve. A mindset shift—paired with a structured design process, customized coaching and support, and exposure to new ideas and national best practices—can make room for inventive thinking and act as fertile ground for insightful innovation.

Be careful what you think you know about students.
Ron shared that, through his team’s design process, he recognized more clearly than ever that students cannot be minimized to data points. Designing a new school model pushed him to see students as whole humans with circumstances and considerations that might affect their school experience. The initial phase of school design—what we call the Understand phase—is devoted to understanding the students a school will serve. As Ron and his team gathered information through focus groups and surveys, they made sure to ask their own current and former students about their experiences in school and why some of them chose to leave school. This specifically helped challenge Ron’s own assumptions, allowing him to gain an authentic understanding of his students, their realities, their challenges, and their ambitions.

There’s much to learn from what others are doing.
Springpoint regularly organizes learning tours, in which partners have an opportunity to see innovation in action. These multi-day events include school visits, structured debrief time, and facilitated working sessions. Ron shared that, as a seasoned educator, he initially went into these visits with a fair amount of skepticism. However, in partnership with his team and Springpoint, he ultimately engaged in an open and thoughtful way, guided by curiosity and unbounded by assumptions. As a result, he learned a lot from these learning tours and from the students and educators that graciously invited us into their schools. Ron specifically found deep value in observing the practices, strategies, and ideas of the schools we visited. He and his team were able to explore innovative approaches to doing school differently and witness unique practices, such as how educators tracked data, highlighted student voice, and provided student-driven learning opportunities. It wasn’t just a single school that proved useful to him and his team—it was seeing multiple schools and having many conversations with students and teachers that helped his team to form new ideas and find inspiration.

Don’t try to do this work alone.
Despite a preference for working independently, Ron found the deep value in working closely with a wider community of learners, educators, and designers. He cited the “relentless support” of the Engage New England network and the partner organizations that have supported his team’s design work over the past year. This community’s support and shared knowledge were invaluable in challenging his thinking and holding him accountable to process and quality.

Constantly ask how the design work will meet the needs of students.
Student-centered design must truly serve as the basis for all design decisions. Ron challenged the new school designers at the launch event to really ask what student-centered means to them and others in their organizations. Through their process, Ron and his team learned how to build relationships and culture through the lens of what students need. He left these excited new designers with simple question they should consistently ask themselves as a way to guide their work: How is what we’re doing meeting the needs of our students?