I received the following email recently about the challenge of dealing with resistant or challenging people in workshops:

I serve schools as a math and data coach throughout the State.  I am writing you looking for some ideas. I generally work with low-achieving schools and often a staple of the school culture in these schools is that the adults have a victim-like mentality.  I hear some of the same negative statements over and over again that are personally frustrating and disappointing for me to hear as a person and a fellow educator.

I am writing you looking some guidance on how you would respond to some or all of the following statements that I'm sure you have heard before, some examples:

• "The teachers here are great, we just need better students"
• "The state uses voodoo math to determine which schools are struggling, our school is fine; it's the state that needs to make changes"

These are just a few examples, I'm sure you hear the same 5 to 10 statements from educational holdouts that uses these excuses as a reason not to change their educational practices. Is there anything you might say to these educators that could perhaps cause a shift in their thinking?

Here was my response, expanded for this post:

Yes, such fatalistic attitudes are all too common. In fact, it is not just struggling schools: No matter where you go - good school or bad, public or private, urban or rural - you hear these kinds of comments over and over again.

Let’s assume for the moment that the schools are in need of change, and that some staff members are simply not facing up to issues at hand. (In some cases, there isn't credible and compelling case that such change is needed; it's just the new administration's urge to make a mark). What, then, can be done by outsiders – if anything – to help the insiders face the challenges?

First, I would posit the following as an informal theory of change:

1. The case for change cannot be made in words merely by either consultants or insiders. The case for change has to be made by credible prima facie evidence, such as student work and behavior, that is simply not acceptable to teachers, given their goals. Data is insufficient, too, because it is typically too indirect – and in the case of current tests and VAM, arcane and lacking in some credibility. Change occurs, therefore when there are clear 'owned' goals as well as credible evidence that reveals gaps between the desired and the actual as viewed by staff.

2. ...

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