Networks Grant

Since 2015, the Trump Foundation has placed a growing emphasis on creating networks and convening partners in order to increase coherence, collaboration and effectiveness between programs, and to encourage sustainability of the foundation’s strategy among its partners. Our strategic roadmap describes convening as an “amplifying activity” to our strategic programs and in response to feedback and expectations expressed by grantees and partners in our Grantee Perception reports of 2014 and 2016, we have continued to facilitate mutual learning and cooperation between different foundation programs at different levels.

Over the past 18 months, we set out to increase the volume and scope of convening activities, and create more opportunities for peer-led learning, observations, and case studies in the field; to encourage members to exercise ownership and responsibility for their networks; and become more involved and committed. We aimed to diversify the affinity groups to include different professionals in grantee organizations and their leadership; and worked to improve effectiveness of internal operations, including performance and financial monitoring, team communications and mastering the craft of convening.

We initially planned 28 convening events over the course of 2017 for 765 participants. In reality, we have executed 31 meetings and events for over 680 participants over 18 months. They included 21 cluster meetings, 4 exchange events and 8 affinity group workshops, of which most took place in the foundation offices and a few in outside facilities. One of the cluster networks hosted a two-day residential seminar, to enable deeper learning, and other network activities have included conferences, study trips abroad (funded by a separate grant), visits to other network members, workshops days and seminars.

Over the past year, we have learned that some networks are ready to become independent and we need to help them achieve this in the best possible way. We have seen that the most effective way to ensure that members exercise ownership and responsibility for their networks is to involve them and their organizations in designing the network goals, and planning its content so that it meets their needs. Convening networks is a complex craft, and some of the networks require more professional facilitation than our team can provide.

Until now, we have catalyzed the creation of five cluster networks:

1. Professional Learning Communities (PLCs). This network of mostly academic institutions that lead PLC programs has made significant progress. Its members conducted a study visit to the US to meet with experts and practitioners, and develop shared standards. These standards set the basis for a new government policy, which recognizes and funds the ongoing operations of PLCs across the country. The network members continue to meet, now under the umbrella of the Mofet Institute, and hopefully in the future at the Institute for Advanced Teaching.
2. Teacher Residency Training. The network members conducted a study visit abroad, convened an international conference in Israel and defined shared standards. In the past year, they have been helpful in creating an umbrella organization to manage the ‘hi-tech to teaching’ movement, which is planned at the Mofet Institute. Since then they moved their ongoing meetings to Mofet, where they will maintain their shared learning.
3. Local Authorities. This growing network conducts an annual two-day residency seminar alongside its ongoing meetings. A special course for the leaders of the municipal programs has sprung from the network, and its meetings are based in part on the collective wisdom of the network’s members. The course includes joint site visits to see best practices in leading municipalities. The upcoming creation of a Forum for Cities of Excellence at the Tel Aviv University, may turn into the place where the network will sustain itself over the longer term.
4. School Networks. This group of five school networks meet regularly and went on a study visit to meet with similar charter networks in New York and New Jersey. Recently the members organized a special cross-network workshop for 100 teachers, focusing on creating school-based communities for teachers. Next year they plan to engage their school principals together to encourage them to develop support networks for effective teaching of advanced-level mathematics and the sciences.
5. Diagnostic-Based Teaching. This network, comprising developers of diagnostic assignments in programs at universities across the country, was not a success. Members felt there were no shared standards that bind them together, nor were they were interested in advancing shared learning. Therefore, we decided to discontinue the network meetings.

We are proposing another year of convening activity as we have seen that it is an essential component of the foundation’s work, which goes far beyond improving individual programs, to create connectivity and alignment. These connections between individuals and their organizations make advances towards ensuring the suitability of the foundation’s strategy in the future.

This year, we are planning to form three additional cluster networks, in line with the development of our philanthropic strategy:

6. School-based PLCs. To date, the foundation has approved four programs for middle school PLCs, led by department heads. Now we wish to cast a wider net and connect a broader network, that will include not only heads of foundation programs, but also teachers, department heads, representatives of the Ministry of Education, and organizations that have similar programs that are not funded by the foundation. Approximately 30 members will be invited to join the network, which will collaborate to establish a common language around school-based communities and learn about successful models of school communities.7.       Growth Mindset. The goal is to share knowledge between the research and development programs, to surface mutual obstacles and dilemmas. The focus of this network will be to identify the necessary elements in combing the psychological methods with the unique circumstances of teaching and learning mathematics and physics at the advanced 5-unit level, with special emphasis on the social periphery. 8.       Organizing Schools to Support Excellence. Currently we have in our portfolio three intervention programs that assist schools in the social periphery to implement support structures for excellence in teaching and learning of mathematics and the sciences. They will meet to share insights and practices, and visit each other’s programs.

In addition, we intend to host a number of convening activities for our practitioner affinity groups including:  CEOs, a knowledge forum with participants from other foundations, as well as instructional coaches, principals, and supervisors across the foundation’s programs. We will convene our annual Exchange Fair, “Shuk 5”, a “market” for operators and developers to meet, network, and present their programs and processes to one another, for the 5^th time.

* The text presented above shows the grant as approved by the Foundation Board / Grant 280