“This idea started keeping me up at night,” Monica told me. “In education, we’re always taught that building relationships of trust and connection with students has a huge impact on their performance. Everything we want to happen, happens, when students feel seen and significant—higher attendance, faster learning, better test scores, you name it. But we’ve always struggled with the how. How can teachers build those relationships? What are the building blocks? What are the tools? There’s a piece missing from teacher training. This isn’t something they’re taught—and yet they’re told it’s critical to the outcomes we’re aiming for.”

Some teachers, she explained to me, just have it. “But we can’t just leave it up to chance that a teacher is going to naturally understand how to do it. We need a system. We need a framework and a methodology that teachers can use, repeatably, reliably, with every kid, no matter what’s happening in the classroom or in their life.”

"When Monica asked me to run the Spark Leadership Accelerator for her entire Elevate leadership team, including the principals and assistant principals at her many schools, I was optimistic (as you’ll learn throughout this book, that tends to be my default state)—but also a little trepidatious. Would this really work for educators?
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The Accelerator was intense, but Monica’s team showed up. They dug deep, leaned into the discomfort, and started seeing results. Quickly.
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Monica wasn’t just satisfied; she was lit up by the results she was seeing. She had co-founded Elevate in 2019 after becoming increasingly frustrated by the outcomes and opportunities for at-risk kids in the traditional public schools where she held leadership positions. The improvements in student success were immediately apparent, and with Spark, she was seeing a way to accelerate those positive outcomes even more. Even just between staff, administrators, and teachers, Spark was a game changer."

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"When the research results from the Spark pilot program came back, they stopped us in our tracks.

The data wasn’t just good; it was transformative. The outcomes were so significant they felt almost surreal, like we had stumbled onto something much bigger than we’d anticipated. The missing piece! 

‍The results from the pilot were undeniable. The same principles that transformed Monica’s leadership team were having a profound effect on the students. Engagement levels shot up. Behavioral issues declined. Even the teachers reported feeling more connected and empowered; their burnout went down as student attendance and test scores went up. We quickly realized the potential impact of Spark—and that it needed structure, scalability, and a plan to reach more teachers.

Spark wasn’t just a one-time experiment. It was a movement in the making."