Educators are innovators.
I launched Innovation Box in 2017 with the goal of improving the way we design, test, and scale ideas to improve our schools. I was frustrated with the reality that most of the ideas that were coming our schools from the outside were failing to have a positive impact. I set out to develop a generalizable approach to problem-solving that can be broadly applied to most of the problems we face in schools. I wasn’t interested in a new sweeping vision for how we would save our schools from themselves. Instead, my driving force became to create a process that empowered teachers and leaders to come up with solutions to local problems and spread what they learned.
Teachers and principals are closest to the everyday problems and potential in K-12 education. And, because they are closest to the problem, teachers and principals also have insights into the potential solutions that no one else has. Unfortunately, when it is time to solve problems, teachers and principals are often left out of the process and lack a process and the support necessary to be innovators. Innovation Box was built on the simple notion that educators should be trusted, supported, and relied upon to generate solutions and become engines of innovation in K-12 education. Trust and support are the organizational conditions that allow for individuals to initiate and sustain the activities that will overcome the challenges preventing better outcomes. Trust and support are necessary for educators to innovate. Trust and support is what Innovation Box work.
Innovation is not only a new way of doing things, but it must create get results for the stakeholders that matter most, students. Saul Kaplan (Business Innovation Factory) defines innovation in this way, “innovation is a better way to deliver value.” Innovation must solve an important, real-world problem. As such, Innovation Box is about solving problems, not promoting a new reform initiative or the latest fad from Silicon Valley.
Our vision for Innovation Box is educators collaborating to frame problems, prototype solutions, and test these ideas at a small scale. Innovation Box, when implemented as an innovation incubator, can accelerate the testing and adoption of new ideas. Innovation Box is a step-by-step process that encourages creativity and experimentation.
Trust Teachers to Design and Test Solutions
Innovation Box guides you from from framing a problem to validating a solution on a small scale.
The four-step process is based on innovation knowledge from business people, designers, educators, and entrepreneurs.
What is Innovation Box?
Innovation Box is a generalizable approach to problem-solving that can be broadly applied to all kinds of problems in schools. Innovation Box is designed to empower schools and the people in the school community to solve their own problems by providing processes, tools, and supports that are necessary to take on big challenges. Whether it’s a teaching and learning problem that has been vexing the school, or a related challenge in the broader school community that has been waiting to be solved, Innovation Box provides what you need to get started designing and testing local solutions to local problems.
The inspiration for putting everything in a cardboard box comes from the Adobe’s internal innovation incubator Kickbox (relaunched as a global innovation movement in June 2019). The idea is that by handing teachers a box that includes tools, processes, and support that they need to start innovating, school leaders are granting permission and showing that they trust the people closest to the problem to lead the change.
If you want to see exactly what is in the Teacher Innovation Box checkout this video.
Innovation Box Tools
In the past year we have added some new tools to support Teacher Innovation Box (brown box). Innovation is designed s a supporte intrapreneur program with professional development to launch the innovation program, ongoing coaching, a digital platform for collaboration, and various reports summarizing the work.
In January 2020 we launched Incubator in a Box (white box) which is a everything a school leader needs to launch their own local incibator program. Incubator in a Box includes a step by step manual, method mats, Innovation Deck, assessment tools, digital support tools, two hours of launh support, and other supplies to get your local incubator off the ground. Incubator in a Bx is desgned for those leaders that need field-tested tools and processes, but minimal ongoing support to stimulate innovation in their school.
Classroom Innovation Cards (small white box) is a deck of 60+ innovation methods adapted from design thinking and other innovation processes to be used by teachers when engaging students in real-world problem solving. Classroom Innovation Cards are essential for the teacher that needs to quickly find a method for framing a problem (e.g. Probem Tree), brainstorming a solution (e.g. Lotus Blossom), running an experiment (Red Team Blue Team), or wants a dsign challenge for their students (e.g. increasing hand washing in schools).
Student Innovation Box we have designed a version of Innovation Box for use with students. Student Innovation Box includes student-friendy processes (e.g. Classroom Innovation Cards), a step by step manual for teachers, and unique tools (e.g. Scenes by SAP). Student Innovation Box is for classrooms that want to inspire student-led innovation in solving real-world problems.
Innovation Box App is a beta version of a mobile app that contains 60+ innovatin methods. The mobile app is continuously being updated with new methods and tools.
Why use Innovation Box?
The reality is that general solutions that are designed outside our local schools and intended to be applied to lots of schools from widely differing contexts routinely fail…and cost a lot of money when they do.
Instead of buying from these outside providers, Innovation Box is designed to empower teachers and leverage their expertise to create solutions to local problems. By deliberately implementing the Innovation Box process teachers are formally testing the ideas they come up with based on their local experience. School systems gain insight and save time and money by trusting and empowering teachers.
Imagine being able to jump into the future to see whether an idea is going to work before investing tons of money in an outside company. By empowering local teachers using a formal pross we can avoid the huge financial outlay and reduce the guesswork.