The future of Big Picture Learning: a strategy to spread student-centered personalized education

Abstract

Big Picture Learning (BPL) has developed a uniquely innovative and effective approach to education. While the United States public school system overall has struggled to innovate in response to the rapid changes in technological, cultural, demographic and socioeconomic realities of the 21st century, BPL has proven its ability to provide students with an excellent education, and prepare them to be successful adults. Over the past 18 years, BPL has focused on developing its approach to learning and teaching, and expanding its network of schools. Currently, the network is large and diverse enough to prove that the approach is viable in a variety of contexts. The network is also vibrant, stable, and sustainable enough to be used as a platform for developing and testing new ideas. In short, BPL is ready to do more. This capstone describes work on three key challenges that will shape the future of the organization. 1) A leadership succession plan; 2) Development of a future-focused strategy to guide BPL in advancing and adapting its mission to a highly dynamic environment and ecosystem of the education sector; and 3) Organizational capacity building. The co-founders of BPL, Dennis Littky and Elliot Washor, have been the co-directors since its inception in 1995. This capstone describes the planning for a phased leadership succession process that will culminate during the 20th anniversary celebration in 2015, when I, and Carlos Moreno (a close friend and long-time colleague) will be transitioning into co-leadership of the organization. In addition, this capstone describes the development and initial implementation of strategy for the more widespread dissemination of BPL’s approach to educators, leaders, and policymakers beyond the already established BPL network, while ensuring that the already established schools continue to improve and deliver an excellent education. Finally, this capstone discusses the need to bolster organizational capacity through targeted investment aimed at retaining key core capabilities while also allowing the organization to emerge from the leadership succession process poised to advance with a new orientation, modified business model, and strategy for sustained public value creation.