Active Learning Consultants, Richard Bernato Ed.D.

Oak Trees and Oxford!

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Systems Thinking Workshop Provides Strategies for Success
(Posted on August 10, 2006 on ES BOCES website)
This workshop provided an in-depth exploration of the collaborative planning process...

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The story below is not an original one. It was overheard at a conference in Albany at the State Education Bureau there for Comprehensive Planning:

Oxford University is one of the oldest colleges in all of Europe, dating back to the 1500's. One of its most prized locales is a great hall whose high and towering ceiling was held by huge oaken beams. A few years ago the Oxford dons noticed that the beams were rotting and that the ceiling was in need of repair. Where, they wondered would they find oaken beams as strong and as huge as those they needed to replace? Oxford is such a large institution that it actually has an official forester! When one of the Oxford administrators lamented their need to him, he merely said, " We were waiting for this you know. Back in the corner of our northeast forest is a stand of oak trees that the Royal Forester of the time had planted for such a day as this!"

Now if that isn't Strategic Planning I don't know what is.

Active Learning Consultants embraces the premise of training groups to think strategically and operationally. This means that an organization's planners must be trained to weave the sister-concepts of shared decision making and data analysis in order to develop long range (strategic) and short range (operational) plans that are properly designed to encompass all aspects of the organization's goals.

Thus, the Oxford Royal Forester's "strategic plan " might have looked like this:

Goal	Strategy	Resources Needed	Timetable	Persons Responsible	Criteria for Success
Preserve the oaken ceiling in the Great Hall	Plant a stand of Oak trees	Acorns, land, forester	1500-2000	Royal Forester	Timber ready for harvesting in 500 years.

Thus, using the High Involvement Model ALC will engage the stakeholders of your school or district-based, non-profit, or business organization to shape meaningful mission, vision and beliefs, to determine SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Targeted) goals that will guide your organization over the short and the long term.

For more information, contact us at rbernato@gmail.com or call 631.848.0316