Tools for Change

Below you will find free articles, case studies, and position papers to help you think about, understand, and articulate the need for change in your community. We offer many useful tools to school and district leaders; however, we know that leadership, more than our tools, is the key to transforming schools. Until leaders use the tools we provide and encourage others to use them, these tools have little meaning. Here we provide free access to some of our tools and encourage you to share and discuss them with others interested in school change.

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Membership is free! Registration on our site gives you access to more free tools and the opportunity to participate in discussions with school and district leaders from across the country—even with Schlechty Center staff. In addition, your profile information will be saved so that registering for conferences or purchasing tools will be quick and easy.

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Available Tools

Name Topic Access
Study Guide: Leading for Learning

Created by the Schlechty Center, this study guide for Leading for Learning aids readers in connecting the content of each chapter with their unique experiences and district context.

Transforming Organizations Download PDF
Schlechty Center on Change

This document outlines the Schlechty Center's framework for the transformation of schools from organizations in which the core business is producing compliance and attendance to organizations in which the core business is nurturing attention and commitment.

Transforming Organizations Download PDF
Transforming Roles and Relationships: One District's Choice to Pursue Greatness.

Today, Orange Schools' values, its commitments to students and staff, its sense of purpose and focus, as well as the relationships between teachers and principals, between students and the adults in the district, between staff and the school board, and between the superintendent and other leaders across the district, are markedly different than what they were in 1997. The Schlechty Center tells the story of this northeastern Ohio school district's transformation in this case study.

Transforming Organizations Download PDF
Changing the Quality of Student Experiences: The Fife Way

Fife Public Schools, outside of Tacoma, Washington, has over the past 10 years realized dramatic changes from the classroom to the boardroom. In this case study, the Schlechty Center chronicles the nature of these changes with special attention to how all changes are connected to students and the experiences the district provides them.

Transforming Organizations Download PDF
Schlechty Center on Engagement

This document explores the Schlechty Center's concept of engagement, examining both five levels of student engagement and the Design Qualities teachers may attend to in order to increase the likelihood of students' being engaged.

Increasing Engagement Download PDF
Schlechty Center on Design

This document from the Schlechty Center focuses attention on ways schools can utilize design to provide engaging learning experiences for students and on ways districts can use design to transform themselves from bureaucracies into learning organizations.

Increasing Engagement Download PDF
Building 21st Century Schools Requires Top-to-Bottom School District Support

This article highlights Trussville City Schools' effort to develop a teacher force committed to student-centered, technology-infused learning. Trussville City Schools is a member of the Schlechty Center's Standard-Bearer School District Network, and Suzanne Freeman, the district's superintendent, is also a member of our Superintendents Leadership Network.

Transforming Organizations External Link
Selective Lessons From Business

This article was published in April 2008 in The School Administrator. Learning how to learn from the tales and tragedies of business can better position school district leaders.

Transforming Organizations External Link
No Community Left Behind

This article was published in April 2008 in Phi Delta Kappan. If control of the local schools were returned to their communities, Dr. Schlechty believes, the results would be twofold. Communities would unite around the common cause of setting expectations for the schools, and the schools would improve to meet those expectations.

Transforming Organizations External Link
A Discussion on School Improvement with Dr. Phillip C. Schlechty

The Professional Association of Georgia Educators (PAGE) published this interview with Dr. Schlechty in their bi-monthly magazine, PAGE ONE, January/February 2009.

Increasing Engagement Download PDF

Premium Tools

We understand that making the conscious choice to transform districts into learning organizations will require not only vision and courage but also support and tools. It is for this reason that the Schlechty Center has developed a suite of tools to aid school leaders through the redefinition of key leadership roles. In addition, the major Schlechty Center ideas, frameworks, and tools developed over the years are brought together and organized in a single document, A Strategy for District Transformation, to give leaders a comprehensive view of the work of transformation, including guidance in charting their district's progress on the journey.

Contact Diane Chambers at 502.895.1942 or info@schlechtycenter.org to purchase our premium tools.

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