Change is inevitable in education as it is in the general world at large, and our schools’ successes will be defined by how we respond to change.  As our world’s economy, political and social environment, our nation’s role, our technological capabilities, and many other factors continue to change, our educational system will need to change in order to ensure our students’ ability to succeed in this new environment.  Further, pressure on school districts to demonstrate accountability and continuous academic improvement has been heightened by the No Child Left Behind Act.

According to Reigeluth and Duffy in Trends and Issues in P-12 Educational Change “piecemeal change is inadequate” in meeting the needs of our districts to meet the challenges that they face.  Changing one component of a system while leaving the rest of the structure alone is unlikely to effect the necessary improvements.  Additionally, it is possible that such piecemeal changes might be incompatible with the system as a whole, causing disfunction and a likely reversion to the previous state of affairs.

The kind of systemic change that Reigeluth and Duffy advocate most strongly for is “ecological” systemic change.  This model argues that there is a larger systemic environment in which a hierarchy of subsystems operate, and which all must be aligned toward a common goal from the top down.  They go on to describe methods for effecting such change.

I found it particularly interesting to note in this chapter that my district, Chula Vista Elementary School District, is listed among those on the learningfirst website as having effected such a redesign.  The system change, having occurred before my employment in the district, and after my time as a student in the district, escaped my detection until I learned of it in this chapter.  I do, however, see some of its legacy still in effect, including a focus on professional development, and teacher support.  The site-based decision making touted by the article as part of CVESD’s model, I am sad to say, seems to have fallen by the wayside.  Perhaps my district has failed in its upkeep of the systemic change model, including use of the feedback loop depicted in figure 21.2 of the Trends chapter.