MAK Mitchell Keynote Address
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Dr. MAK Mitchell New York City Public Schools / Consensus NOW! June 2012 Finding Ground Truth in Data: Consensus Rules!
description
MAK MItchell keynote address at Fusion 2012, the NWEA summer conference in Portland, Oregon. "Finding Ground Truth in Data: Consensus Rules!" MAK leads a consensus governance model for 900 principals of public schools and charters co-located on 380 campuses in New York City. In this keynote, she will tell the story of how her powerful learnings from campus consensus work became the source of a unique consensus turnaround model. After detailing best practice consensus strategies from her governance work with campus principals, she poses the question: Can consensus become a lever for producing achievement results that last? MAK will be offering a workshop session later in the agenda that unpacks the turnaround consensus model in greater detail for those who are interested in implementation. MAK Mitchell is the Executive Director of School Governance for the New York City Public Schools and President of ARMAK Associates. Previously, MAK served in Washington State as a professor and consultant of organizational change, superintendent and founder of numerous small high schools in Alaska. MAK earned both her master’s and doctoral degrees from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and is a founding member of the Society for Organizational Learning.
Transcript of MAK Mitchell Keynote Address
Dr. MAK Mitchell
New York City Public Schools / Consensus NOW!
June 2012
Finding Ground Truth in Data:Consensus Rules!
The Consensus Culture We Are Creating
Can consensus become a lever for producing achievement results that last? There is growing evidence that schools on campuses improve when principals change their solo behaviors into campus consensus teams that learn…
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TECHNICAL
CULTURAL
FootprintSolo leadership
LEARNING THE WORK
Autonomy & collaboration
(simultaneously )
USING THE WORK TO CHANGE THE
CULTURE
Distributed Leadership
Shared Campus
Vision
Consistent Practice
LETTING THE CULTURE DRIVE THE
WORK
Campus Development
CAMPUS: Pre and Post Consensus
Defensive routines
Solo advocacy
Self interest MM
Accusations based on high inference
Data as basis for winning the argument
Autonomy justifies behavior
Trust routines
Balanced inquiry
Group interest MM
Understandings based on mutual alternatives
Data as basis for shared ground truth
Shared mental model justifies behavior
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Consensus Rules!
Ground Truth Data
+
Consensus
=
Shared Vision(based on changed mental models)
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# # #
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In US military slang, "ground truth" is used to describe the reality of a tactical situation on the
ground as opposed to what intelligence reports and mission plans assert the reality to be.
Typically derived from a number of converging evidential sources close to the action, as opposed
to a solo or remote source of evidence.
What is GROUND TRUTH DATA?
What is CONSENSUS?Consensus is a process for group decision making, a method
whereby an entire group of people who own the issue come to an agreement.
The input, evidence and ideas of all participants are gathered and synthesized to arrive at a final decision acceptable to all.
Consensus does not mean that everyone thinks that the decision made is necessarily the best one possible, or even that they are sure it will work. Everyone feels their data was given a fair hearing, and collective intelligence prevails
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What does Consensus Look Like?
During the dialogue process, people learn how
to think together—not just in the sense of
analyzing a shared problem or creating new
pieces of shared knowledge but in the sense of
occupying a collective sensibility, in which the
thoughts, emotions and resulting actions
belong not to one individual, but all of them
together. David Bohm
Consensual ground truth is essentialto enact a shared vision
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Turn and Talk
Video: How does Denise’s campus story reflect the perspective levels ?
G:\
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The Instruction Culture We Are Creating
There is growing evidence that student performance improves when teachers change their solo behaviors into consensus teams that learn…
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TECHNICAL
CULTURAL
Solo teaching
(ground truth)
Student data
LEARNING THE WORK
Autonomy & collaboration
(consensus
instructional change)
Research and Best practice
USING THE WORK TO CHANGE THE
CULTURE
Distributed Leadership
(changedmental models)
Shared Team
Alternatives
LETTING THE CULTURE DRIVE THE
WORKInstructional Team Development:
Consensus Rules!
Ground Truth Data
+
Instructional Consensus
=
Shared Vision(based on changed mental models)
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# # #
Turn and Talk
From your own experience, how are ground truth data and consensus related to your process of instructional or organizational decisions?
Synchronicity: Two Consensus Stories
LEVELS CAMPUS CONSENSUS INSTRUCTIONAL CHANGE CONSENSUS
Vision Shared vision for campus Shared vision for instructional results
Mental Models
Common team purpose: Serve all students on campus
Common team purpose: Get all students to mastery
SystemicMethods
Consensus decisions:• Breaking defensive routines• Balancing advocacy with inquiry
(flow, patterns, contiguous space)• Generating mutual alternatives• New mental models
Consensus collaborations:• Breaking solo routines• Balance advocacy with inquiry (research and best practice)• Generating mutual alternatives• New mental models
Patterns over Time
Footprint data=ground truth Student data=ground truth
Events Solo advocacy Isolated classrooms, students
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Research Question
Analyze
Turnaround Plan
Analyze Ground Truth Data
Colleague Survey
CONSENSUS TURNAROUND CYCLE
CONSENSUS TURNAROUND
Systemic Methods: Defensive Routines
Habitual ways of interacting that protect us and others from threat or embarrassment, but which also prevent us from learning.
> Maintaining isolation, solo behaviors> Avoidance, preference for status quo> Faced with conflict, smooth over differences> Speak out in a no holds barred, winner take all way> Speaking in a guarded way, not transparent about data
• Suspend assumptions
• Examine multiple points of view
• Reveal the incoherence of thought (become an observer of your own/others’ thinking)
• Hold the context of the dialogue; avoid distractions
• Avoid focusing down consensus, seek opening it up to more options
Systemic Methods: Unlocking Defensive Routines
Systemic Methods: Generating Alternatives
• Have each person describe the problem in their own words
• State the shared best outcome they are seeking and verify by consensus check
• Identify perceived resources: time, money, space, people
• Brainstorm possible trade-offs and new or combined resources
• Declare best alternatives and adopt
Systemic Methods: Advocating and Inquiring Productively
Inquiry Ask others how
they arrived at their views
Check out your assessment of their views with them.
Be genuinely curious.
Advocacy Make your own
reasoning explicit. Share your data
and its source Invite others to
inquire into your thinking, mindset, worldview ,etc.
Conclusion: “It’s In Every One of Us”
http://www.personalgrowthcourses.net/video/every_one_of_us
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Dr. MAK MitchellConsensus NOW!
