Learning Teams: Creating What's Next

An Action Agenda

We have an unprecedented opportunity to prepare today’s students for 21st century college, work, and civic engagement.  

Millions of Baby Boomers will soon become the most accomplished generation of retirees we have ever had.  They are determined to use their expertise and experience in encore careers that make a difference for others.   

Education is their encore career of choice.   Recent surveys have found that fifty percent of the 78 million Boomers intend to engage in work that improves their communities after retirement, and nearly half of them are seeking opportunities to work in schools or youth programs.   

To fully utilize their knowledge and experience, NCTAF will mobilize an army of Boomers, who will be deployed in 21st century learning teams composed of accomplished teachers, teaching apprentices, K-12 students, encore retirees, adjunct industry and government experts, and community members. 

Learning is no longer preparation for a job – it is the job.  Our children are becoming members of a “Learning-Age” culture, in which they will continually invent and reinvent their work, create and recreate their communities, master emerging technologies, and acquire new skills.   Learning and innovation will be central to their lives.

To meet the needs of Learning-Age students we need transform our schools from teaching organizations into learning organizations.  A legion of Baby Boomers stands ready to meet this challenge.

Twenty-first century learning teams will work in project-based learning studios located in school and afterschool programs, as well as in museums, libraries, theaters, and community centers.  This network of learning organizations will be augmented by online learning studios that will greatly expand the capacity and reach of 21st century learning teams.

To maintain our competitive position in a global economy we must ensure that every Learning-Age child is genuinely prepared to participate in college, work, and community affairs.  Every child must have an opportunity to develop a full range of 21st Century competencies.  

Cross-generational teams will give students access to the knowledge, skills, and professional resources they need to become the next generation of entrepreneurs, scientists, artists, and community leaders. 

Boomers in encore careers, along with adjunct team members from industry and government, will further their personal and professional growth in collaboration with Millennial-Age teachers and Digital-Age students who are proficient users of new media for innovative learning and problem solving.  Teams working in networked studios that blend face-to-face and online environments will have access to the most powerful learning tools and resources available.  Every team member will be able to engage in a participatory learning culture anytime and anywhere. 

Initial examples of 21st century learning teams that might be developed include:

• NASA Learning Teams.  To prepare students for college and workforce success in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), NASA engineers and earth scientists will become adjunct members of project-based learning teams composed of accomplished teachers and students.  Project teams will work in learning studios that engage students in deep, extended science inquiry.  These learning teams will provide teachers with continuous embedded professional development as they work shoulder-to-shoulder with scientists and engineers.  Accomplished teachers, some of whom may themselves be retired educators in encore careers, will lead each learning team.  NASA scientists and engineers working in encore careers will use their science expertise to make significant contributions to student learning without necessarily becoming teachers themselves. Recognizing that it is essential to build a stronger STEM teaching profession, selected learning studios will function as Teaching Residencies that are similar to health-care residencies.  In these residencies teacher candidates will work alongside accomplished teachers and NASA scientists in one-year apprenticeships as they pursue their teacher certification.  These residencies will give beginning teachers a strong start and they will create new pathways into teaching for careers changers and encore retirees who seek a full-time role in education. The NASA employees who built the space program are ready for an encore challenge.  We are calling on them to join Learning Teams that will develop a new generation of scientists and engineers who will create what’s next.

• Big Thought Learning Teams.   Big Thought is a community arts and culture organization in Dallas Texas that is committed to making imagination a part of everyday learning.  Big Thought integrates creative and performing arts into school and afterschool programs to boost cognitive development, improve literacy skills, and keep children engaged in learning.  Big Thought places a high value on family and community involvement in student learning.  Through its partnerships across schools, community agencies, libraries, theaters, design studios, and corporations it could create a network of  learning studios staffed by cross-generational learning teams composed of accomplished educators, youth service providers and experts from the performing arts and the design industry who are eager to serve as adjunct team members or pursue encore careers in the arts.   With objectives that are similar to those developed for the NASA and Intel initiatives, these teams would work in learning studios that would become design, performance, and exhibit centers for creative young people.  They would create new pathways into teaching and youth development for young people and hundreds of placement possibilities for retirees in encore careers.        
  

We have a Once in a Century Opportunity to Reinvent American Education

Transforming our schools from teaching organizations into learning organizations calls for nothing less than reinventing American education.  This is an ambitious goal, but we have met challenges of this magnitude before.  The achievements of WPA programs during the 1930s and the race to the moon during the 1960s demonstrate that when we join forces we can develop powerful learning teams that can overcome great odds.  We can do it again.  We have and urgent need to meet this challenge, and we have the people and the resources to do it.

Federal stimulus funding and massive appropriation increases for federal programs will create a once-in-a-century opportunity to re-imagine American education.  The nation's leaders could lay the groundwork for transformational change in education if they make strategic use of their stimulus investments and new program funding from federal agencies. 

NCTAF has just released a policy brief Learning Teams Creating What’s Next detailing the possibilities (enclosed).   The report (supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the MetLife Foundation) is receiving wide media coverage (see: attached summary).  We are receiving an enthusiastic response from education leaders, teachers, and Boomers seeking encore careers.  NCTAF will build on this momentum by leveraging federal stimulus funds, along with federal Race to the Top funds and Innovation grants from the U.S. Department of Education the Corporation for National Service.   

NCTAF has developed and distributed a short video to raise awareness and sound a call to action, and will soon launch a “21st Century Learning Teams digital white paper at: www.learningteams.org.   We are actively working with our network of 27 state partnerships and preparing to convene leadership retreats focused on adopting policies and practices that will develop a 21st century education workforce.   We are also developing a network of potential learning studio pilot sites where we can develop and demonstrate 21st century learning teams.