In a World Business Forum dominated by discussions about how to innovate in the context of health care, it was refreshing to see Wendy Kopp on stage discussing her twenty year quest to find innovative solutions to educational inequality in the lives of low-income students.
Wendy is the founder and president of Teach for America. The founding principle of this organization is the recruitment of recent college graduates and professionals. Each recruit is asked to commit two years of their lives to teach in low-income communities in the United States.
This program has grown to the point where 35,000 applications were received for 4,100 advertised positions (2009). Wendy pointed out that in 2010 less than ten percent of applicants will be accepted into the available positions.
Kopp spent a good deal of time discussing the reasons for the growth of the program; these insights can be applied to any innovative effort within a corporation.
The heart of their work is to "enlist the energies of our society's most promising leaders", and that these leaders must "deeply care about the kids". By recruiting professionals into this program it may become possible to bring some of the attributes of high-performing corporations into the classroom.
Perhaps her most insightful comment was her observation that teachers work directly with the students (and their families) to plot student performance against aggressive and challenging goals that the students may not otherwise achieve.
Wendy's idea (asking professionals and high-achieving college grads to enter the classroom) to solve a problem (educational inequity in low-income areas) is 99.9% perspiration in the following areas:
- Communicate an inspiring challenge (solve educational inequity)
- Recruit "co-workers" that are passionate about the cause
- Set a clear goal or "end-state" for individuals
- Plot the progress towards that goal.
- Hard work and dedication on the part of the teachers, students, and families.
Steve
http://stevetodd.typepad.com
Twitter: @SteveTodd
