Connecticut Rise Network Inc

Programs: As an organization, rise facilitates networks for school improvement by bringing together educators from different contexts to pursue innovative solutions, solve shared challenges, and dramatically improve student outcomes. As a networked improvement community, rise represents a partnership between teachers, counselors, school leaders, and district administrators. While we partner with public school districts, we collaborate directly with high schools in those districts. Our specific focus is around high school-age youth and advancing three shared goals: promoting successful transitions to high school; increasing college and career readiness, access, and success; and strengthening data systems and practices. Through deep and embedded collaboration with and across rise high schools, we form authentic learning partnerships to test and refine evidence-based hypotheses, scale effective strategies, and create proof points for success. We are currently in our third year facilitating our first cohort or network for school improvement, which consists of four districts, five high schools, and approximately 6,000 students in connecticut. Rise began as a pilot endeavor incubated by new visions for public schools, and after seeing early traction and results, rise spun out as an independent connecticut-based 501(c)(3) organization in 2017. We deeply believe that rise high schools will achieve breakthrough results for all students if we: (1) empower educators with tools that automatically transform data into insights for every student; (2) support educators in developing effective habits to use data tools to inform their decision-making and improve their craft; and (3) create the systems and structures to produce sustainable practices and improvements. Four core principles guide our work and comprise the rise acronym: resources, innovation, systems, and empowerment. As a network, we leverage the collective passions and ideas of hundreds of educators, and in so doing, we mobilize resources through targeted investments and collaboration. Rise partners use improvement science principles and methods to promote data-driven inquiry and innovation in response to shared, complex challenges. And through our efforts to test new ideas, iterate, and expand what works, we strive to improve systems and structures to achieve scalable and sustained impact. We empower educators to drive improvements through peer learning and collective responsibility. Ultimately, our goal is to create a platform where educators can come together to pilot new ideas, solve problems, and advance outcomes for every student.