Project Playbook Module 1: Change Ideas

Drafting a Shared Aim: From Empathy to Early Ideas

Owner: Director of Program Impact & Visibility (DPIV) – with input from other project stakeholders Audience: All current and potential participants in the WNC Resilience Project.

Module Purpose

This module captures the core onboarding session activities and serves as the foundation of your Strand Team’s Innovation Blueprint. During this session, teams synthesize empathy-driven insights to create a shared draft Aim Statement and generate initial Change Ideas. These early outputs will serve as the launching point for your first Driver Diagram and future PDSA cycles.

This is where we move from listening and reflecting on the experience of students and stakeholders to naming what success looks like—and then begin imagining how we might achieve it.

This module builds directly on the observations and reflections captured during Module 0 (optional pre-work).

Important Grounding & Reminder: The onboarding process is not just a check-the-box training step—it is how we ensure that our improvement efforts are anchored in the lived reality of students and communities. This is what we use to verify that our change ideas are worthy of their hopes and needs.

Step 1: Start with Empathy

Begin with a Student Empathy Map, grounded in lived experience. Choose a real or composite student, ideally one who sits at the edge of the system—emotionally, academically, socially, etc. In design terms what we might call the “extreme user.”

Student Empathy Map Prompts:

• What does the student say, think, do, and feel?

• What barriers or patterns are visible?

Pro Tip: Use real quotes, stories, or data where possible to inform your empathy map. Avoid jumping to assumptions and solutions at the expense of the lived experience of students and stakeholders.

Step 2: Synthesize Insights

Use the Insight Carousel Protocol to analyze the empathy maps:

Part A – Gallery Walk:

• Rotate through maps in mixed groups.

• Discuss and leave 2+ observations/comments per map based on this question: What stands out as a key student need or challenge?

Part B – Return to Your Map:

• What themes or tensions emerged?

• What student needs are most urgent?

• What’s the core challenge to address (without naming the solution)?

Reminder: Focus on defining the current state—NOT the fix. Avoid "solutionitis."

Step 3: Draft your AIM Statement

What’s an AIM Statement?

A clear, shared outcome goal that:

• Is student-centered and rooted in empathy data

• Reflects the voices of those most affected

• Names the desired measurable improvement

• Is time-bound (target of this project = June 2028)

AIM Statement Template:

Our aim is to [verb] [who] [what] so that [measurable student impact] by July 2028.

Use the Litmus Test for your AIM Statement. Is it…

• Outcome-Focused

• Measurable

• Time-Dependent

OWL Facilitators will help your team post, review, and refine your AIM using group consensus.

Important: You are naming the “North Star” that will anchor your innovation efforts throughout this work.

Step 4: Ideate Change Ideas

Using your draft AIM as a springboard, brainstorm ways you might begin addressing the challenge.

Prompt Categories:

• Tomorrow: Easy-to-implement ideas that move quickly

• Tough: High-leverage, systemic ideas that may take longer

• Transformational: Bold ideas that could redefine what’s possible

Use Affinity Mapping to cluster and name themes across your brainstormed ideas.

Pro tip: Capture quantity first, then sort and synthesize.

Step 5: Prototype a Driver Diagram Sketch

Use the emerging AIM and change ideas to begin drafting your initial Driver Diagram.

Start with:

• Aim Statement → What is our desired outcome?

• Primary Drivers → What must change to reach the aim (use the project strands you and your team wants to focus on for these)?

• Secondary Drivers → What local systems/practices shape those drivers?

• Change Ideas → What could we test first?

Reminder: This is a prototype, not a finished product. You’ll revisit and refine it in future modules.

Next Steps:

Between now and your first school meeting with project partners, you’ll work through Module 2 to validate your AIM and Current State (Problem Definition) with student, peer, and stakeholder input. You’ll also refine your Driver Diagram and prepare for small-scale testing. The onboarding module you just completed sets the tone. Now the work gets real—and local.