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Building a Positive, Creative Learning Environment: Barrington Elementary

Client Organization:

Barrington Elementary is an 11 year-old public school in growing suburban St. Louis, Missouri. It has a diverse student population with 49% Black, 46% White and 5% Asian and Hispanic students. Special Education students are mainstreamed into regular education classrooms. For example, playing basketball in PE, the children in wheel chairs score with 4’ basketball hoops while playing with (and against) other students scoring with regulation height basketball hoops. Barrington sets high standards for every student – helping each child reach “their” fullest potential. Their overall goal is to provide a nurturing environment, a strong academic and social foundation, the tools to communicate ideas effectively, and the skills to make responsible choices.

Unique Challenge:

Due to personnel changes many of Barrington’s faculty and staff are brand new to both teaching and to the school. Others have been at Barrington since its inception and bring with them a strong history and solid traditions. The challenge was to bring the entire team together to share, learn from each other, and build a unified environment where everyone supports each other to provide the best education for the children of Barrington.

Client Objectives:

Accelerate the development of all educators and administrative staff into a supportive and high performing team.
Explore and build on a successful foundation to create a positive learning environment. An environment where every student, faculty and staff member feels supported and is able to excel.

What Was Done:

After initial consultation with the Principal and Instructional Specialist, one-on-one “winning teamwork” interviews were conducted with a core leadership team comprised of ten educators. These educators represented a diverse staff by levels of teaching experience, gender, and race. Once completed, interview training was provided to this group and they interviewed all remaining faculty & staff members (approximately sixty). Interview data was collected and the information debriefed to pull out common themes and areas of possible innovations.

A one day workshop was designed and planned collaboratively with the core leadership team and the AI consultants. Each person contributed ideas and took responsibility for follow-through. Because of time limitations, the workshop was only one day long. Participants engaged in a structured process of facilitated dialogue, inquiry, storytelling, strategic visioning, and action planning. The team was able to begin building deeper relationships and working together by proposing concrete ideas and projects that would help them create the positive, supportive learning environment they collectively envisioned.

Outcomes:

As a result of this project, there is a stronger sense of “team” at Barrington. Sixteen initiatives were explored that enhance the learning community; most are in the process of being implemented. Examples include:

A teacher’s resource of “success stories” to describe high-points in education at Barrington
After-school aerobics for faculty/staff
Teacher-initiated appreciative interviews of students as a way to help design next year’s curricula
Principal-initiated appreciative to introduce discussions in regular staff meetings