60 ADELMAN AND TAYLOR
lems tend to (a) attribute cause to factors within the individual, and (b) fo-
cus intervention on changing the individual. This shapes how problems
are described and labeled and plays down the causal role of environmental
factors, such as social policies, and the characteristics of community, home,
work, and school settings. It also underemphasizes environmental factors
as a primary focus in correcting the problem.
Sophistication, breadth, consistency, bias—all must be considered and
can be judged appropriately only if an underlying rationale is explicitly
stated. Generally speaking, all efforts to understand, improve, and diffuse
successful intervention activity are hampered by the absence of explicitly
stated underlying rationales. As Rossi and his colleagues (1979) cautioned,
if the parties involved in program development and implementation fail (or
refuse) to apply themselves to unraveling and specifying the assumptions
and principles underlying the program, there is no basis for understanding
what they are doing, why they are doing it, or for judging whether or not
they are doing what they intend to do. (p. 19)
Resources
Operationalizing and implementing a vision for systemic change requires
first and foremost a focus on ensuring adequate resources (e.g., dollars,
real estate space, equipment, human and social capital, etc.). Pursuing ma-
jor systemic changes in an era of sparse resources generally means rede-
ploying and weaving together some of the system’s available resources to
underwrite the change process. If enough resources cannot be devoted to
essential change processes, it is likely that substantive school improve-
ment will not be achieved.
Of particular importance in identifying resources for systemic change is
a “big picture” awareness of prevailing and pending policies, institutional
priorities, and allocation of resources. Such understanding provides an es-
sential foundation for formulating sound recommendations about how re-
sources might be redeployed to underwrite desired systemic changes.
Resources that might be redeployed include those expended for
nonproductive programs or ones that are addressing low priority needs. In
addition, federal law (e.g., provisions in the No Child Left Behind Act of
2001) allows districts to redeploy some federal dollars for systemic im-
provements (e.g., changes that enhance how student supports are co-
alesced). Moreover, increasing concern for sustainability and scale-up
makes it feasible to use facets of some project funding from government
agencies and foundations to pursue systemic changes.
SYSTEM CHANGE 61
Functions, Tasks, Activities, and Phases
Given that an initiative has been designed with the intent of sustaining and
replicating it throughout a school district, the general functions, major
tasks, activities, and phases related to systemic change are determined by
what is required to effectively plan and implement a sustainable initiative
and take it to scale. This section highlights key facets related to the four
phases of change involved in prototype implementation and eventual
scale-up: creating readiness, initial implementation, institutionalization,
and ongoing evaluation. Each phase warrants extensive discussion, but for
our purposes here, it will suffice to highlight a few matters (readers can re-
fer to Adelman & Taylor, 2003, for a more extensive discussion of the
phases).
Nature and scope of focus. School improvement may encompass in-
troducing one or more interventions, developing a demonstration at a spe-
cific site, or replicating a prototype on a large scale. The nature and scope of
focus raises such questions as:
• What specific functions will be implemented and sustained?
• Will one or more sites/organizations be involved?
• Is the intent to make systemwide changes?
The answers to these questions set the boundaries for all subsequent ef-
forts to sustain an initiative. For example, the broader the scope, the higher
the costs; the narrower the scope, the less the importance to a district’s
overall mission and policy making. Both high costs and low valuing can
work against sustainability.
Phases of the change process. Whether the focus is on establishing a
prototype at one site or replicating it at many, the systemic changes can be
conceived in terms of four overlapping phases: (a) creating readiness—in-
creasing a climate/culture for change through enhancing the motivation
and capability of a critical mass of stakeholders; (b) initial implementation—
carrying out change in stages using a well-designed infrastructure to pro-
vide guidance and support; (c) institutionalization—ensuring there is an in-
frastructure to maintain and enhance productive changes; and (4) ongoing
evolution and creative renewal—using mechanisms to improve quality and
provide continuing support in ways that enable stakeholders to become a
community of learners who creatively pursue renewal.
Sustainability and scale-up processes must address each of the major
phases of systemic change as outlined. Figure 2 highlights a set of parallel
