Transforming a Statewide Vision for Education

When a newly appointed State Commissioner stepped into her role, she inherited not just a department, but a moment of possibility. The agency was eager for clarity—a shared vision that could unify staff, leadership, and partners across the state. But first, someone needed to help them listen to one another, synthesize what they heard, and shape it into something powerful enough to rally around.

We partnered with the Commissioner and her emerging executive team to guide this transformation. Through deep engagement with internal teams and external stakeholders across the state, we gathered the insights, hopes, and long-standing challenges that would eventually shape a new Theory of Change.

We convened the Cabinet, facilitated department-wide touchpoints, and designed iterative sprints that challenged leaders to refine, question, and reimagine what the state’s education system could become. As the vision took shape, we built a strategic rollout plan rooted in change-management principles—ensuring that everyone from the State Board of Education to district superintendents to internal staff understood the “why” behind the work and felt invited into the future it imagined.

The resulting Theory of Change was unanimously adopted by the State Board of Education and became the foundation for a statewide strategic planning process—energizing stakeholders and aligning the agency around a shared, actionable vision for student success.