Welcome! We are delighted that you will be joining us for the Kentucky Learning Excursion!

Please review the information provided in each tab of this website and then select "Register Now" to reserve your space. Please register by Monday, September 9th.

We look forward to seeing you soon!
 

Overview
The Innovative Schools Learning Excursion to Kentucky is run by the national nonprofit Next Generation Learning Challenges (NGLC), with funding from the Barr Foundation. We designed it for teams of educators, students, and key partners that are based in New England. All participating teams, like yours, are interested in redesigning the high school experience and are ready to work together to apply new strategies in their own schools.

Seeing is believing. The Innovative Schools Learning Excursions are more than a school tour, they are a learning experience. Facilitators will help every participant learn with and from the host sites. The excursions are designed to deepen participants’ knowledge of “next generation learning” (see below) approaches in use at the host sites and will provide teams a foundation for applying what they learn to their own vision for teaching and learning in their school/district.

Next generation learning. Learning approaches that develop students in well-rounded ways share some common characteristics: They respond to the strengths, needs, and cultural backgrounds of each individual student. They make sure students successfully acquire skills and knowledge before moving on. They connect academic knowledge and skills to on-the-job work experiences and real problems in our communities, adapted for even our youngest learners. They use the most advanced tools available in our society, including technology but also what is known in education as “learning science.” Educators often refer to these learning approaches as student-centered, personalized, competency-based, equitable, experiential, authentic, and/or technology-enabled. At NGLC, we use the term next generation learning to capture all of these learning approaches.

Inclusive community engagement. A key takeaway from NGLC’s work with schools and districts that have had success in transforming teaching and learning is this: “If young people are going to graduate from U.S. public schools with the skills and mindsets needed to address 21st century challenges, we who serve them—and the schools and organizations we are a part of—must develop and use those same skills and mindsets ourselves.” Most importantly, the change process should be owned by educators, students, parents, and community members, with care taken to be inclusive and equitable. A diverse team of partners doing work that matters for their community and for their students is truly transformational. It’s exactly what needs to happen for real and lasting change to take root. It’s what all our students deserve. (For more, see our research at www.transformation-design.org.)

Learning Goals and Activities
Innovative Schools Learning Excursions are first and foremost learning experiences for participants and their teams. The experiences are designed to support your team’s vision for transformed learning and shared purpose for the excursion—this shared purpose is expressed as a “Brave Question.” Your team will begin to identify these guiding ideas in your application and clarify them through use of a learning log. The learning log is our primary tool to organize and support your team’s learning.

Goals

• See high schools in the midst of transforming learning, focusing on next gen learning approaches. 
• Notice the school culture, the ways that adults and youth work together, and school and district policies; explore how these conditions support innovative teaching and learning.
• Connect with others in similar roles—educator, student, parent, community partner—to understand how each role is involved in the work of transforming learning at the host school(s) and consider ways your role can be involved in redesigning the high school experience in your own community.
• Develop strategies for applying what you learn during the learning excursion to your school/district and create an artifact to share what you learn with a wider group of colleagues and partners in your school/district community.

Activities 

• Before the trip: To develop team goals for the learning excursion based on a shared vision for teaching and learning, attend a virtual session with NGLC, the host schools, and other participating teams; complete sections of your team learning log; go on a “learning walk” to observe learning in one of your own high schools; join a virtual team coaching session with an NGLC facilitator; and independently review the materials and resources we provide in advance.
• During the trip: Tour the host schools to observe their approach to next gen learning; meet with students, teachers, and administrators to discuss their high school learning redesign; meet with partners who have been involved in the learning redesign; participate in team work sessions; participate in work and social sessions with other teams attending the learning excursion and the host schools; and create an artifact of your team’s experience to share with a wider group of partners in your school and community.
• After the trip: To make the team’s learning visible to your school community, to inspire action to redesign the high school learning experience, and to apply what you learn from this program, finalize a set of ideas or actions to try and complete your learning log, join a virtual team coaching session with an NGLC facilitator, and share your experience with partners in your school/district community.

NGLC will organize and share the agenda, materials to prepare for the event, and other essential information via email. All participants will be able to access all information and materials, including your team’s learning log, from a participant agenda available as a Google doc. Participants are invited to access learning logs from other teams as well. This is one way to live out a shared commitment to making learning visible.