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What About Everyone Else? Theories of Scale in Districts Using Design-Based Methods

Mon, April 16, 4:05 to 6:05pm, New York Hilton Midtown, Floor: Fourth Floor, East Suite

Abstract

Given longstanding challenges to traditional modes of reform, a number of districts have turned recently to a range of bottom-up, design-based approaches. These new approaches – including Data Wise, Networked Improvement Communities, and Design-Based Implementation Research – operate as organizational meta-routines, or routines for changing routines, in order to improve practice at scale. We call these methods “human-centered systems design” (HCSD). This paper presents preliminary findings from three districts’ HCSD reforms and their different theories of scale: their beliefs about how, when, and under what conditions practice spreads. Specifically, we describe how districts try to match their theory of scale to their desired degree of change and we note key intended and unintended consequences of their approaches.

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