Fuse MA: Empowering Educator Leaders Across TEC Districts
Too often, the best ideas and strategies for personalization can get stuck behind the closed doors of classrooms, schools, or districts. The Fuse MA program, a partnership between TEC and Highlander Institute, strives to share, implement, evaluate, and scale best practices by convening educators who are passionate about this work and committed to breaking down silos. The name Fuse captures how the experience both “ignites” a movement within schools and districts, and intentionally brings together like-minded educators to collaborate and grow.
Participating Fuse MA Districts:
How Does Fuse MA Work?
Fuse MA is an 18 month program. Participants include:
Fuse MA Fellows: incredible educators eager to participate in a professional development experience (the Fuse MA Fellowship) that grows their own practice as well as their leadership and coaching skills.
A School or District Point Person and Design Team: ready to lead a shift toward personalization by crafting a vision and implementation pathway, supporting fellows and pilot teachers, collecting an analyzing data and meeting to check in on progress.
Pilot Teachers from the above school/district - teachers with the mindset and flexibility to implement new strategies that shift learning and open their classroom to share what they've learned.
Fuse Fellows provide high-quality embedded thought-partnering to pilot teachers in a district outside of their own, growing that district’s internal capacity and creating a network of teachers, Fellows, coaches, and administrators who support and push each other both during and after the Fellowship.
Since its inception in Rhode Island in 2014, the Fuse Fellowship has focused largely on blended learning as a vehicle to tackle the challenge of personalization. Based on a recent analysis of our field work as well as the study of corresponding research, our organizational thinking has evolved to center personalization efforts on culturally responsive and sustaining pedagogy. Core beliefs in the areas of awareness, community building, relationships, high expectations, and rigor underpin our definition of personalization, our Priority Practices Tool, professional learning opportunities, and our Pathway to Personalization framework for supporting school-based change.
