& Building the Capacity of Leaders in High Needs Schools Welcome and introduce our lovely selves Building the Capacity of Leaders in High Needs Schools Kelly Heineke, Larianne Polk, Kim Snyder

Agenda Welcome Your Context Background: ELLC, ESSA, NDE, and ESUs The NLLN: Learning Paths The NLLN: Today LP: Welcome everyone Your context is an activity where we ground the session in equity. We’ll ask them to turn and talk about: Your equity commitments, Partners with whom you engage and how you are Utilizing intermediate agencies Then we’ll give a brief background on how all the groups have worked together to build the NLLN Next we’ll talk about where we landed (2 learning paths) and update them on where we are as far as roll out.

Leadership Development: Your Context Your equity commitments Partners with whom you engage Utilizing intermediate agencies LP: Ground the session in Equity. Ask them to turn and talk to a partner about how this looks in their districts/state

NLLN Background: ELLC, ESSA, NDE, and ESUs Past/present principal development in high needs schools in Nebraska Original plan of the Nebraska Leadership and Learning Network (NLLN) ESU role LP: Where we started- Past/present principal development in high needs schools in Nebraska. Principal support is spotty across the state with ESUs, NDE and higher education doing different things. ELLC and the original thoughts and ideas about what the NLLN would be (this will segue into Kim’s and my slides about where we ended up vs. this plan) How the ESUs fit into the original plan (again a segue into where we are now which we’ll talk about in a bit)

The NLLN: Grounded in Equity Core Equity Commitments: College, Career, and Civic Readiness: The NDE commits to equity of opportunity by ensuring all Nebraskans are college, career, and civic ready Academic Progress: The Nebraska Department of Education commits to equity of achievement by measuring and tracking academic progress. Educator Effectiveness: The NDE commits to equity of access by leading and supporting educator effectiveness. Quality Instructional Materials: The NDE commits to equity of access by supporting quality instructional materials. Engaging Nebraskans: The NDE commits to equity of access and opportunity by engaging Nebraskans. KH: Before we get into what the NLLN looks like now, we want to address how the work is grounded in equity. Under our ESSA plan the NLLN will align to the recently adopted state equity commitments broadly, and working directly will leaders will align most closely with (read the two bolded commitments). Turn and Talk: How has your district/state infused a commitment to equity into the work you are doing? Segue into next slide- after stepping back, doing some planning and thinking about how to best engage our partners and utilize our resources we landed on a plan.

Nebraska Leadership and Learning Network Two paths for participants Path one: Building equity-driven leadership capacity Engages in conversations and activities Plans for their context Path two: Design team Builds a system of support for themselves to then scale statewide Develops ownership of the process KH: Pick up from Larianne’s background thoughts. After much planning and deliberation this is where we are headed. The NDE has the capacity in the first year of the NLLN to carry the lift of developing and facilitating the learning, but, as mentioned before, we know we’re going to need support from our partners after year one. With this in mind we developed two parallel learning paths for the principals and their supervisors. Path one: In year one, leaders and supervisors will come together in a series of face-to-face and Zoom meetings (most likely once a month). During these convenings, leaders and their supervisors will engage in conversations and activities designed to build equity-driven leadership capacity around issues they are facing in their schools and districts. Because this work involves change management, leaders will be engaging in ways to use research on best practices, as well as design thinking methodologies, to affect change at the school and district level. During the convenings principals will have opportunities to learn from and share with their peers, as will principal supervisors, who will support principals in strengthening their practice, and deepen their impact on the principals they supervise. Path two: Concurrent with path one, principals and principals supervisors will be part of a design team. This team will be using design thinking strategies (specific to school leadership) to develop a system of support for themselves that will be scaled to support all needs improvement schools, and eventually all schools, statewide. This system of support will be created, by the design team members during the convenings, and will evolve as the participants design the system, based on their needs, and the anticipated needs, of other principals and supervisors within the state. Within one year, it is the goal that principals and principal supervisors, will have a support network consisting of their peers within the design team, as well as the NDE, ESUs and various partners (NDE, NRCSA, NCSA, higher education, and districts across the states) who have been at the table along with the participants. Having leaders develop the system of support ensures it is tailored to meet their needs as well as help to build ownership over the process.

Partners Interdependency with ESUs, NCSA, NRCSA, Higher Education, and Community Groups Engagement plan KS Plan is to engage stakeholders as learners. This type of multi-group engagement has not have been done previously, in a sustainable way. Our aim is to bring these groups to the table to ensure work continues and is sustainable statewide. Partners will participate in the activities just like the school leaders in path one. Path two they will be listeners and learners as the leaders create the system of support. The win here for the partners, and the NDE: We’ll be listening to these leaders grapple with real world problems from their contexts as well as the kind of supports they’ll identify as necessary to their success We’ll be able to align our supports to avoid duplication of effort and provide a more seamless experience for ALL leaders We’ll develop a shared language around best practices in equity-driven leadership capacity building Engagement plan: we know that all groups can’t participate, due to capacity issues, but we want to ensure that all voices are heard.

NLLN Today Communicating with stakeholders Secured participants and partners Scheduled convening one Building the learning experience Kim Briefly describe where we are today.

Challenges and Opportunities Please provide us with some feedback as we move ahead with the NLLN. KH. LP. KS We know that there will be challenges as we move ahead. We’d like to hear your feedback to consider as we move forward.