How They Were Introduced To LINC
The leadership team at Evergreen United Elementary School District saw the writing on the wall.
The COVID-19 pandemic had presented never-before-seen challenges for educators, parents, and students. But with the pandemic soon to be in the rearview, they knew they were going to be presented with an entirely new set of unique and difficult challenges.
They wanted to get in front of the problems before they arose.
Assistant Superintendent at Evergreen, Nancy Veatch, and her team knew they needed to attend to highly differentiated student learning in a big way. Accomplishing this meant educators needed to grow and develop new skills.
After turning to their McGraw-Hill representative for recommendations, they were introduced to LINC and the LINCspring platform.
What Their LINC Experience Was Like
Nancy and her team may have predicted the need to support student learning post-pandemic, but they did not predict the many new opportunities LINCspring would bring – far beyond what they had approached LINC for initially.
The situation was perhaps a blessing in disguise.
In LINCspring, they had a product that supports each teacher’s individual needs. It has given educators strategies they want to learn, as well as things they need to learn.
“Being in a small rural district, we don’t always have the time to support our educators as much as we’d like. But knowing our staff have LINC experts they can lean on is phenomenal. We see this as a great expansion of our coaching that we are able to provide for our teachers.”
Nancy Veatch, Assistant Superintendent
Even though they have teachers with diverse needs, from pre-school to high school, they found that their needs were met within the more than 120 cycles within LINCspring.
This allowed all educators from all grade levels to grow as individual professionals, as grade-level teams, and as looping teams.
The LINCspring Impact
After more than a year of distance learning and the challenges it presented, educators needed support.
The school district and its staff had to adapt to students being back in the classroom. This meant they needed to focus on creating personalized learning experiences that were rigorous and authentic.
LINCspring was the tool Evergreen leaders needed to show educators that it’s okay to make learning fun, exciting, and engaging.
“Just by completing our very first cycle, we are already seeing shifts in teaching which is going to create shifts in learning, and we’re very excited about where we’re headed next.”
Nancy Veatch, Assistant Superintendent
District leaders noticed a shift in teaching just after completing the very first cycle– a cycle dedicated to building a PAACC mindset– a cycle which all staff completed together.
After jointly completing the first cycle, educators at Evergreen are now engaging in the platform as individuals. They are exploring cycles on their own and completing cycles they are personally interested in.
Their use of LINCspring transformed the learning environment. It has led to students having more personalization, agency, and authenticity in their learning.
LINCspring has allowed faculty and students at Evergreen to not just survive the shift in learning but thrive because of it.