Becoming the Change: What One Organization Working To Transform Educational Systems Learned About Team Learning and Change

What would it take for every child to achieve high levels of literacy? What would it take to develop schools where each child actualizes his or her unique potential? And why do so many schools, filled with hard-working, well-intentioned people, fail to meet the learning needs of their students, especially students of color and English language learners? In Becoming the Change, authors Rex Babiera and Hallie Preskill explore the intersection of school reform and organizational development. They present a living history of the Ball Foundation's Education Initiatives team, a small group of people helping school districts become learning organizations in service to literacy achievement for every student. In order to transform educational systems, the Education Initiatives team itself had to become a learning team. This is a book about learning, change, and public schooling in the United States. But it is also a book about people, specifically, members of the Education Initiatives team and the educators with whom they worked from 2006-2008. How they worked together and what they learned along the way illustrates and deepens the ideas presented. Their story reveals what people really experience as they go through the sometimes difficult and ambiguous process of change. By reading this book, you will learn that everyone who works for change in organizations must first change themselves. Whether or not you work in public education, we hope this book will guide and inspire you as you make the journey toward transformational change.