Advance

Sustainable improvement happens when individuals change their educational practices.

Actively working with peers to observe and reflect on quality teaching and learning can lead participants to expect more of themselves and their colleagues. Often participants share positive experiences and innovative ideas that grow out of the process.

The creating quality process also builds advocacy for new strategies and practices that can reach administrators, school and institutional boards, and even local governments.

Read more to use what you've learned through this process to make meaningful changes for students.

These video stories reflect how and why people create professional development opportunities, refine programming and share success stories.

Featured Resources

Creative Learning: People and Pathways
A report on the first three years of the Thriving Minds initiative in Dallas reveals six major findings, including creative youth’s success and active choices, the importance of support for creativity, the necessity of relevant creative opportunities, and the need for quality instruction to achieve true equity.

More Than Measuring: Program Evaluation as an Opportunity to Build the Capacity of Communities
This book offers a case study of a collaborative evaluation. Conducted over five years, this longitudinal study used design principals that built the capacity of the Dallas community to design and improve programs for children and youth.

City Schools: How Districts and Communities Can Create Smart Education Systems
This case study outlines how to build a smart education system through cross-sector collaboration, collection and use of evidence of program effectiveness, and a shared system of opportunity.

“I’m using the six dimensions of quality to help these people who grew up in this neighborhood and have come back to be instructors how to share their passions.”