Effective coaches influence teaching, student learning, and school culture. Learning Forward is the leader in developing school- and district-based coach expertise around the critical skills of building relationships, leading professional learning, and providing effective coaching to individuals and teams.

Learning Forward’s Coaches Academies help school- and district-based coaches apply their knowledge, skills, dispositions, and practices to increase student success through effective instruction, collective responsibility, personal and professional efficacy, and continuous improvement. We help coaches understand their roles as change agents in their schools and drivers of equitable outcomes for students, and ensure their work directly impacts teaching and learning.  

Using strategies from Taking the Lead: New Roles for Teachers and School-Based Coaches and Coaching Matters, Learning Forward’s Coaches Academy provides comprehensive learning and ongoing support for coaches across a system.

Participants in the Coaches Academy:

• Explore a coaching framework grounded in the Standards for professional Learning and focused on the three building blocks of coaching (content, pedagogy, and relationships), and apply it to their work with teachers;
• Apply a coaching theory of change that develops teachers’ instructional efficacy and effectiveness, and increases student learning;
• Assess their own strengths and opportunities for growth based on the characteristics of effective coaches;
• Describe the impact of coaches’ work and conditions that support coaching effectiveness; 
• Explore the functions, responsibilities, knowledge, skills, and challenges associated with 10 essential roles of coaches;
• Develop partnership agreements with principals and teachers to ensure their work focuses on essential coach roles;
• Understand the change process, apply a KASAB model to drive changes in teacher practice, and understand the coach’s role as a catalyst for change in schools;
• Apply a coaching cycle of planning, demonstration teaching, observation, and reflection;
• Develop tools for collecting data about teaching and student learning to use as evidence during planning and reflection conversations and support data-informed instruction;
• Deepen their presentation and facilitation skills for work with individuals and teams of teachers;
• Acquire and apply essential communication skills to support strong coaching relationships.

We offer the Coaches Academy program as both a face-to-face and virtual learning experience. The Coaches Academy includes:

• Six onsite sessions or 10-12 virtual sessions with a coach facilitator;
• Ongoing virtual support and collaboration through Learning Forward’s BrightSpace learning platform; 
• Virtual support for individuals or small teams of coaches between live sessions (additional cost);
• Sessions for school and system leaders to provide support for effective implementation of a coaching program and ensure conditions are in place for coaches to be effective;
• Copies of Taking the Lead (2nd ed.), Coaching Matters (2nd ed.) and the Standards for Professional Learning for all participants.

Learn more about how we can help your coaches be learning leaders in your system.