Giving Compass' Take:

• Aurora Hills Middle School partnered with School By Design to modify schedules/policies to meet educator needs. The key to its success: including teachers in the redesign process. 

• How would student input also be useful in redesigning schools? 

• Read about where classroom design meets design thinking. 

This is the story of what happened when teachers and administrators in Aurora, Colorado, worked side by side to redesign a middle school.

Together, we were able to innovate, plan and produce a flexible school model aimed at improving student performance, engagement and equity.

Aurora Hills Middle School is the first school in the Aurora Public Schools district to pilot the model. Our new learning design and schedule allow us to differentiate and accelerate instruction, offer new learning opportunities in both STEM subjects and the humanities, and increase the amount of time available for teacher planning and professional development

We were inspired to make these changes to our program following our district’s close collaboration with School by Design, a software and services company founded by education leaders that partners with technology experts.

School by Design provides the insights and options that enable districts to solve difficult resource challenges and design schools that best meet student and teacher needs — without spending more money.

To take our school in a new direction, it was essential that teachers were not only engaged, but also helping to steer the process themselves.

Together with my leadership team, we introduced the staff to what we were trying to achieve in large groups, small groups and through individual conversations. We began with some open-ended questions and learned that they shared our desire to improve how we were allocating our time and resources. When we told them we had an opportunity to play around with some alternative scheduling ideas, they were eager to be part of the process. Indeed, we quickly had a high level of buy-in and enthusiasm.

Read the full article about including teachers in school redesign by Marcella Garcia at The Hechinger Report