Posts by Nate McClennen
Future of Learning

One Map, Every Framework: The Shared Architecture Behind School Transformation

Nate McClennen, Rebecca Midles

If your teams have ever spent valuable meeting time translating between frameworks instead of moving learning forward, this piece is for you. Nate McClennen and Rebecca Midles analyzed 16 leading school-design frameworks and 7 change models and found something remarkable: beneath every different vocabulary, the same seven questions keep emerging. Their Learning Innovation Wayfinder offers a common map, not to replace the frameworks your system trusts, but to help every partner finally see they have been working toward the same destination all along.
Ed Policy

How to Rethink School Finance Models Before the Funding Cliff Hits

Nate McClennen

Public schools are navigating a perfect storm: declining enrollment, expiring ESSER funds, and expanding school choice mechanisms are reshaping the financial ground beneath district leaders. Nate McClennen's latest piece on Getting Smart breaks down traditional and emerging school finance models, from weighted student funding to student-run enterprises, and offers concrete action steps for leaders ready to think creatively about sustainability. If your district is feeling the pressure, this is a timely and practical read.
Leadership

When to Innovate, When to Implement, and When to Improve: A Framework for Strategic Schools

Nate McClennen, Rebecca Midles

Not every school challenge calls for the same solution, but most systems are only fluent in one approach. In this new piece, Nate McClennen and Rebecca Midles unpack the critical differences between implementation science, innovation, and improvement science, and show leaders how to build the organizational fluency to use all three. If your system defaults to implementation for every problem, or chases innovation without the structures to scale it, this framework offers a clearer, more strategic path forward.
Ed Policy

Beyond the Shiny Object: How to Assess Your System’s True Innovation Readiness

Nate McClennen, Rebecca Midles

Too many districts launch the next big initiative before their systems are ready to sustain it. In this new piece, Getting Smart contributors Nate McClennen and Rebecca Midles introduce the 5 C's of R&D Readiness and 8 Archetypes of System Transformation, a practical framework for honestly diagnosing where your school or district stands before committing to wide-scale change. Whether your system is a Vanguard or a Frozen System, this tool helps leaders move from reactive initiative-chasing to intentional, coherent redesign.
Leadership

Coalition Before Consensus: How Trust and Shared Ownership Sustain Transformation

Rebecca Midles, Nate McClennen

System transformation rarely fails because of a bad strategy. It fails because the relationships needed to sustain it were never built. In this piece, Rebecca Midles and Nate McClennen draw on real district leaders to show what coalition-building actually looks like when the messy middle arrives. From a rural Michigan superintendent who started with the willing to a Kansas City microschool that put students in the design seat, this is a practical and deeply human look at what makes change last.