School Improvement Consulting Framework: Commitment to Results

Ceri DeanSchool Improvement Consultant

Commitment to Results

Martina Navratilova once said, “The difference between involvement and commitment is like ham and eggs. The chicken is involved; the pig is committed.” Consultants and clients involved in school improvement don’t need to be as invested as the pig (giving all for the cause), but they do need a deep sense of responsibility and dedication — a commitment — to achieving results.

The School Improvement Consulting Framework we use at Marzano Research recognizes the importance of commitment to results and defines it as a set of attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors that enable clients to pursue and achieve their priority aims.

A right-slanted rhombus in a color gradient, fading from blue at the bottom to orange at the top. The outside left is labeled

There are four aspects to a commitment to results:

Emphasize student learning
Set goals
Maintain focus
Exercise ownership and agency

The primary responsibility for commitment to results rests with the client, but school improvement consultants have a role to play in helping clients develop this commitment.

1. Emphasize student learning

When leaders and school staff emphasize student learning, everything the school does and strives to achieve is geared toward ensuring students acquire the knowledge, skills, and competencies they need to succeed in their personal and professional lives and contribute meaningfully to society.

Staff have a growth mindset and believe that all students can succeed.

Leaders allocate resources to maximize student learning opportunities and there is a press for student academic achievement in a physically and psychologically safe environment that challenges, supports, and engages students in meaningful ways.

School improvement consultants can coach school leaders and staff so that they develop and consistently apply systematic processes in all areas that support student learning.

2. Setting clearly defined goals

Setting clearly defined goals focused on student learning helps stakeholders understand what they are committing to and provides a reason for participating in improvement efforts. As schools engage in setting goals, school improvement consultants help them analyze data, prioritize needs, align goals to state and district priorities, and ensure goals are specific, measurable, attainable, and focused on desired student outcomes rather than adult activities, such as professional learning sessions.

3. Maintaining focus

Maintaining focus means treating the achievement of goals as a priority and not being distracted by new challenges or opportunities that move the school away from achieving the desired results.

School improvement consultants help schools maintain focus by modeling an inquiry mindset – asking questions that help the client examine if and how their decisions (a) relate to the priority goals, (b) create or remove obstacles to goal pursuit, and (c) affect stakeholder investment in or ability to implement improvement efforts. Staff’s sense of hope and optimism helps them maintain their focus on pursuing goals for student learning.

4. Exercise ownership and agency

Commitment to the results of improvement efforts grows out of being able to exercise ownership and agency for achieving the defined goals.

Ownership of results requires meaningful involvement in the goal setting process so that stakeholders understand why it is important to achieve the goals and what it takes to achieve them.

Agency is the ability of individuals to make choices and to act on those choices in ways that make a difference (Martin, 2004). To exercise agency, everyone needs to have a clear sense of what part they play in achieving results and opportunities and support to carry out their roles.

A sense of ownership and agency enables staff to accept responsibility and accountability for achieving results and the actions necessary to achieve them.

School improvement consultants can help schools develop and carry out processes for involving stakeholders in goal setting, identifying roles and responsibilities for taking action, monitoring implementation, and reflecting on results.

Commitment to results is key to success

Being motivated to improve usually is not the reason that schools fail to improve. The problem is that the motivation that propels beginning improvement efforts isn’t sufficient for success. Without a commitment to results, schools often fail to achieve the goals they set.

School improvement consultants can coach commitment to results by working with schools to enact processes and policies that emphasize student learning, set and maintain focus on goals for student learning, and support ownership and agency regarding goal achievement.