OWL's Position: Improvement Science & NICs

Owner: Director of Orgazational Strategy & Learning (DOSL) – with input from all Directors Audience: All OWL staff, partners, and stakeholders

Why NICs Now?

Schools are not short on ideas. They are drowning in initiatives.

What’s usually missing is a way to learn, together, from what we try - so that good ideas become reliable practices instead of one more thing on the pile. Improvement Science offers that sort of disciplined learning process; Networked Improvement Communities (NICs) give it a home. Together, they help schools and districts “get better at getting better,” not just run the next program (Reference: Learning to Improve, Bryk, et al)

At Open Way Learning (OWL), we see NICs and Improvement Science as the engine under the hood of learner-centered innovation. They are how we help partners move from isolated experiments to coherent, equity-centered change that holds up under real-world conditions.

Whether we are working with a regional initiative like the Western North Carolina Resilience Project (WNCRP), an alternative schools network such as Together We Learn (TWL), or CAPS-style career pathways, our goal is the same: create living systems for learning where teams can test, adapt, and spread practices that work - especially for students furthest from opportunity.

What We Mean by NICs & Improvement Science

We borrow heavily from the Carnegie Foundation’s framing:

• Improvement Science is a structured way to answer three deceptively simple questions:

  • What are we trying to accomplish?

  • How will we know that a change is an improvement?

  • What change can we make that will result in improvement? (Reference: A Focus on Improvement Science in the Pacific Region, REL)

• It treats every problem as part of a system, focuses on variation (who is and isn’t being well served), and uses rapid Plan–Do–Study–Act (PDSA) cycles to “learn fast to implement well.” In practice, that means we assume the system is perfectly designed to produce the outcomes it currently produces — especially for students who have been historically marginalized. Our work with partners is to see that system more clearly, then continuously adjust it in ways that increase dignity, belonging, and opportunity for those students first. (Reference: Carnegie Foundation Summit on Improvement in Education)

• A Networked Improvement Community (NIC) is a group of teams who:

  • Share a clearly defined aim around a high-leverage problem,

  • Use common measures and tools, and

  • Learn together across contexts, so that what works in one place can be adapted - not cloned - somewhere else. (Reference: Why a NIC?, Paul LeMahieu)

OWL leans on a core set of Improvement Science moves, informed by resources like the NIC Playbook:

• Define problems from the perspective of students and families experiencing them.

• Craft equity-centered AIM statements that specify what, for whom, by how much, and by when.

• Build working theories of improvement using driver diagrams that connect the big goal to the levers within the system.

• Develop practical measurement systems (outcome, process, driver, and balancing measures) that let teams see if changes are actually improvements.

• Run small, rapid PDSA cycles to test change ideas, learn from variation, and refine before spreading.

We treat all of this not as another compliance framework, but as a liberating structure that lets educators be systematic about what they already care deeply about: better experiences and outcomes for students.

Core Principles That Guide OWL’s NIC & Improvement Work

OWL’s approach is grounded in the six core principles of Improvement Science and tuned to our open, learner-centered culture. (Reference: Six Core Principles of Improvement, Carnegie Foundation).

1. Start with the people most affected

We begin by asking, “What specifically is the problem we are trying to solve, and for whom?” We work with educators, students, families, and community partners closest to the challenge to name the problem, surface lived experience, and co-define success.

This shows up in empathy interviews, empathy mapping, and data stories that highlight how current systems land on students furthest from opportunity - not just averages.

2. Make inequity visible by looking at variation

We focus on variation rather than just overall performance: who is thriving, who is surviving, and who is being left out entirely. That lens keeps equity at the center and prevents “improvement” that only benefits students who were already well served.

Teams disaggregate data, look at patterns across subgroups and sites, and ask hard questions about why the system behaves differently for different students.

3. See the system that produces current outcomes

Every stubborn problem lives inside a system of policies, practices, beliefs, and routines. Our work surfaces those system dynamics using tools like process maps, fishbone diagrams, 5 Whys, and driver diagrams.

We help teams distinguish problems of innovation, implementation, improvement, and scale, so they’re not trying to “spread” something they haven’t actually made work reliably yet.

4. Learn by doing, in small bets

Rather than “implement fast and learn slow,” we favor small, disciplined tests of change. Teams co-design “skateboard-first” versions of change ideas, run PDSA cycles, study what happened (especially for the target students), and iterate.

This aligns with OWL’s broader change philosophy: Start small, learn quickly, make the learning visible, then decide what to grow, adapt, or stop.

5. Measure what matters (and keep it practical)

We help teams build measurement trees that connect the AIM to leading indicators and process measures that are actually collectible in real time:

• Outcome measures: Are we moving the big needle?

• Driver measures: Are the key levers changing the way we expect?

• Process measures: Are we doing what we said we’d do, with quality and consistency?

• Balancing measures: What might be getting worse as something gets better?

The goal is sense-making, not data hoarding.

6. Learn in networks, not isolation

Finally, we believe the real power comes when teams don’t just improve alone - they learn together, in public. NICs allow multiple sites to:

• Share change ideas and bright spots,

• Compare patterns in data, and

• Co-create practical, context-rich knowledge about what works, for whom, and under what conditions.

This is how we move from “heroic one-off” stories to distributed, durable capacity across a region or system.

What This Looks Like in Practice

While each project is unique, OWL-supported NIC and Improvement Science work tends to follow a recognizable arc:

1. Co-define the problem and AIM

   • Partners identify a shared, equity-centered challenge (e.g., resilience and recovery learning after disruption, student belonging in alternative schools, or equitable access to future-ready pathways).

   • Mixed-role teams co-author clear problem statements and SMART AIMs, using tools like data decks, empathy maps, and example/non-example Aims.

2. Build a living theory of improvement

   • Teams construct driver diagrams that articulate their best current thinking about what needs to change to reach the AIM.

   • Drivers and change ideas are treated as hypotheses, not foregone conclusions.

3. Prototype change ideas through PDSA cycles

   • Schools run small, time-bound tests in classrooms, advisory structures, ExL units, credentialing pilots, or SEL / mental health supports.

   • They collect quick, meaningful data: student work artifacts, short surveys or exit tickets, observation notes, simple checklists, and narrative reflections.

4. Study, adapt, and document learning

   • Teams examine data together, with attention to variation and equity.

   • They refine change ideas, adjust the driver diagram, and decide what to adopt, adapt, or abandon.

5. Spread & scale with integrity

   • As patterns of success emerge, teams document change ideas, context, and conditions, contributing to open-source playbooks and exemplars.

   • Spread is approached as a design challenge, not a copy-paste job - what worked in one middle school may need different supports in a rural high school.

Across initiatives such as WNCRP, TWL, and CAPS-aligned work, this pattern helps districts move from “interesting pilots” to aligned, system-level shifts in practice and culture. In many initiatives, this arc is supported by a modular improvement playbook — a set of adaptable tools, templates, and routines that walk teams from “naming the problem” through driver diagrams, PDSA cycles, and spread planning. We keep these resources open and remixable so local teams can make them their own instead of conforming to a one-size-fits-all process.

How NICs & Improvement Science Connect to OWL’s Other Positions

NICs and Improvement Science are not a separate “thing” we do. They are the learning infrastructure underneath OWL’s other positions:

• Experiential Learning (ExL): ExL thrives when teachers can prototype new experiences, get feedback from students, and refine over time. Improvement Science gives ExL teams a way to run small ExL “skateboard” tests, study the impact on engagement and learning, and grow toward schoolwide “jeep-level” models without burning out staff or students.

• Competency-Based Education (CBE): Shifting to competency-based pathways requires careful attention to variation, equity, and reliability - exactly what Improvement Science is built to handle. Teams can test grading shifts, new credentialing pathways, or performance assessment systems in a few courses or schools before expanding.

• Open Source & Networks: Our open design stance means we freely share tools, templates, and stories so others can remix them. NICs are one way we organize that openness: they create the routines and relationships needed for educators to move from “downloading” resources to co-producing and improving them over time.

• Design Thinking: Many of our projects start with empathy-driven design sprints that surface root causes and generate promising change ideas with students, families, and educators. Improvement Science then gives those ideas a backbone — turning them into testable hypotheses, PDSA cycles, and NIC routines that help teams learn what works, for whom, and under what conditions.

In short: Improvement Science is how we operationalize our values - joy, equity, collaboration, and transparency - so they show up in daily practice, not just in mission statements.

OWL’s Commitments When We Support NICs & Improvement Work

When OWL partners with schools, districts, or networks to launch or deepen NIC/Improvement Science work, we commit to:

1. Centering equity and empathy: We ensure that problem statements, AIMs, and measures foreground students historically furthest from opportunity and are informed by their voices and experiences.

2. Co-design, not compliance: We don’t drop in a pre-packaged process. We adapt tools like problem statements, driver diagrams, and PDSA templates to fit local language, structures, and constraints, and we build in an opt-in, “go slow to go fast” approach to change.

3. Making the work visible and learnable: We help teams document their learning in accessible ways - Innovation Blueprints, PDSA logs, Bright Spot profiles, proof points, and open-source resources that others can build on.

4. Building local capacity: Our aim is not to be permanently “in the middle” of the work. We coach local leaders, teachers, students, and community partners to facilitate improvement routines themselves so that the NIC can continue to thrive long after our formal role ends.

5. Honoring human limits: Improvement Science is not about squeezing more work into already full plates. It’s about redirecting effort toward the things that matter most and letting go of activities that aren’t delivering for students. We design with partners to keep the work sustainable and humane.

A Closing Note

Networked Improvement Communities and Improvement Science are, at their best, tools for hope with a backbone. They give educators a way to move beyond “trying harder” toward learning together, on purpose, in service of every learner’s dignity, agency, and future.

This is the “open way” in Open Way Learning: not a single model to buy into, but a shared, evolving practice of noticing what’s not working, designing better experiences with those most affected, and openly sharing and spreading what we learn across classrooms, schools, and communities.