MAP as a Strategy to Identify and Address Priorities

Finding yourself busy doing good things, but struggling to get to the important work of coaching teachers and improving instruction? This MAP strategy can help. 

In this recent Edutopia article, Principal Matt Novak discusses the daily challenges he faced as a new principal-- “emails piling up, teachers stopping by with quick questions, parents calling, and unexpected new deadlines that [he] didn’t see coming.” He reflects on the fact he was doing good work, but not getting to the practices that have the greatest impact on changes in teaching and learning. 

In response, he developed a process he calls MAP--meeting of alignment and priorities. 

The One-hour Weekly 5-Step MAP Process:

1. Reground in purpose -- vision, mission, and strategic priorities (Think Building School Improvement Plan (SIP)) (5 minutes) 

Ask yourself and your team:

• What is the work that truly matters right now?
• How does it connect to our vision, mission, strategic goals or building SIP?

Grounding reminds you of your purpose and sets your direction for the week.

2. Reflect on last week (5-10 minutes). 

• What had the most impact on student learning?
• What worked? What didn’t?
• What patterns are surfacing? 
• What are the implications for my approach?

3. Capture everything on your plate (even the things falling off😆) (5-10 minutes).

Use this time to generate a list of all that you have coming up this week--meetings, calls, projects, evaluations, appointments--everything! When you can see everything in one place, you save cognitive energy and create clarity for the next step--prioritization.

4. Use the Eisenhower Matrix to prioritize the items generated in Step 3 (10-15 minutes).
   

   	Urgent	Not Urgent
   Important	Do First -- (e.g. safety incident)	Schedule and Protect-- (e.g. strategic priorities/building goals)
   Not Important	Delegate -- (e.g. coordinate routine operational tasks--schedule staff evaluations)	Delete -- (e.g. non-essential meetings that don’t align with your building priorities)

    

5. Assign ownership and track (5-10 minutes). 

   Whose role and responsibility is this task? Does it belong to you? Just because you can do it, does not mean you’re the one who should. For the tasks that belong to you, set a date by when you’ll get them done.

   Novak has valued how MAP has changed how he approaches leadership. It has helped him bring clarity and intentionality to his work. It’s a process that can also be used as an administrative team.
   

   Read the full article HERE.