Jessica Law, Elementary Vice Principal at Ingenuity Prep Public Charter School and SLC 2021 alumna, shares the power of collective impact as a new school leader.Jessica never imagined she wanted to be a school leader. “If you had asked me about school leadership in my early years of teaching, I would have said, ‘Absolutely not, never. I don’t want to lead adults.’ But that wasn’t the whole truth. The reality was that I didn’t feel equipped to lead adults.”
After eight years in the classroom, Jessica finally started to consider leadership. She knew what it felt like to be burned out in the classroom and wanted to feel part of the solution by accepting a position as Elementary Vice Principal at Ingenuity Prep.
“As I transitioned into the school administrator role I asked myself, ‘What additional support might I need?’ I participated in a School Leader Lab program as a teacher leader and found it very beneficial. It offered a lot of support, particularly around self-reflection, giving and receiving honest and direct feedback, and anchoring work in anti-racism. As I contemplated the next step in my leadership journey, I felt that School Leader Lab’s School Leader Cohort (SLC) was the right program to help me develop both technical skills and a clear vision of the leader I wanted to become.”
For Jessica, the sense of belonging and community of like-minded leaders in the SLC 2021 Co-Fam was central to her success as a new Vice Principal. “As a Vice Principal, you’re not the most senior person in your organization, yet you’re tasked with leading and supporting those doing the most impactful work. School Leader Cohort was incredibly valuable in shaping both my reflection and communication as I navigated many challenging situations.” The cohort also provided opportunities to tackle practice-related problems and receive feedback from diverse perspectives.
“Being part of School Leader Lab’s alumni network feels like we all attended the same high school, but graduated in different years. Many leaders at Ingenuity Prep have completed School Leader Cohort, and this shared experience helps us solve problems more effectively because we have a common language from the program. I often hear Ben, our Chief Academic Officer, or Kate, my principal, or Brittany and Natalie, my co-vice principals, reference something they learned in their cohort, saying things like, ‘I think someone in my cohort did XYZ, or they’re trying this at their school.’ This collective experience means our impact extends beyond our smaller leadership group at Ingenuity Prep. With connections to various leaders, we’ve effectively multiplied the intellectual bank available to us.”
That collective impact is now yielding tangible results. “My big goal for myself in this third year was to refine my data analysis practice and clarify how I guide teachers through their own process, building them towards independence. I frequently reflect on the work I did leading data meetings in the School Leader Cohort. I ask myself questions like: What were the key steps we took to reach our conclusions? How does this align with the standards? How can we distill it into a prioritized list of key skills that students need? And how can we use this list to analyze student work and pinpoint the exact gaps we need to address?”
This intentional practice became a protocol in Jessica’s intellectual prep meetings with teachers, and she even sees teachers independently applying these methods. This approach has led to significant gains in third-grade math, with over 65% of students meeting the goal on internal benchmarks, far surpassing the original target of 30%.
Jessica still views herself as a relatively new school leader. But she has a vision and a path forward. “You just have to continue to build your muscle on how you refine your response, refine your approach. I do not say we always get it right. But I do think we keep getting better each time.”
“Being part of School Leader Lab’s alumni network feels like we all attended the same high school, but graduated in different years. Many leaders at Ingenuity Prep have completed SLC, and this shared experience helps us solve problems more effectively because we have a common language from the program.”