Frameworks and Outcomes
 of the Ball Design

The framework of principles of organizational learning and change puts the seven principles in the context of grounding fields of knowledge, beliefs, implications for design and practice, and conditions that support organizational learning and change.

The framework of competencies for professional practice identifies practices (in six areas) that researchers, literacy experts, and practitioners have found to promote high levels of literacy for students of different abilities and backgrounds.

In its partnerships, Education Initiatives works to create three overarching organizational outcomes: transfer, ownership, and connectedness. If these are achieved, then professional practices will improve. Improved practices, in turn, will have a positive impact on student achievement.

 

Principles of Organizational Learning and Change Areas of Professional Practice Organizational Outcomes
  • Build shared purpose
  • Create adaptive solutions
  • Build on assets
  • Access the capacity of stakeholders
  • Use inquiry to guide practice
  • Attend to content and process
  • Work in systemic ways
  • Effective, research-based literacy practices
  • Continuous professional learning
  • Collaboration to support literacy learning
  • Engaging families to support student literacy learning
  • Using data for instruction and organizational improvement
  • Building and acting on shared purpose for advancing student literacy
  • Transfer: Applying professional learning in one's practice
  • Ownership: Taking agency and responsibility for the work
  • Connectedness: Connecting to people, knowledge, and resources throughout the district

See below for more.

Organizational Ouctomes

The three organizational outcomes are defined in the table below [PDF version for download].

Outcome Tagline Key Ideas
Transfer Applying professional learning in one's practice

Actions that move learning into practice

Conditions that support moving professional learning into practice
Ownership Taking agency and responsibility for the work

Initiative taken, not power given

Mutual work/connecting one’s work to the shared purpose of the district/organization
Connectedness Connecting to people, knowledge, and resources throughout the district/organization Relationships – connecting people and knowledge throughout the district/organization

Transfer refers to moving knowledge into practice. This outcome is about the actions of people in the district—actions that move learning into practice or actions that create conditions that support moving professional learning into practice. By practice, EI means patterns of individual and collective actions toward achieving a purpose. The Ball Design focuses on three dimensions of educational practice: instructional practice (actions of teachers), leadership practice (actions of those in formal leadership roles and all members of the school district) and organizational practice (development and enactment of processes, structures, communication and resource allocation).

Ownership refers to taking agency and demonstrating responsibility in one’s work. By agency, EI means actions in the sense of taking initiative, or empowerment, as a right and responsibility one possesses as an organizational citizen. This outcome is about actions that people in a district take in their respective roles. When people take initiative—instead of waiting for power to be given to them—and connect their work to the shared purpose of the district, they are taking ownership

Connectedness refers to building organizational coherence to achieve organizational goals. High achievement for every student depends on the coherence of a district’s instructional, leadership, and organizational practices. The interdependence of these practices make it necessary for people to build relationships that allow them to be connected to other people, knowledge, and resources throughout the district. Furthermore, when people are highly connected, a district has access to a more diverse set of perspectives that will improve its ability to reach its goals.

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