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Watch videos of 2011 Action Collabs' final presentations of their prototypes.
ISKME’s Action Collabs are dynamic workshops that use the design-thinking framework to innovate new ideas with actionable next steps. Collaboration and ideation happen in four steps: identify opportunity, design, prototype, and scale and spread. Throughout the experience, participants engage in improv activities (the improvisational method of achieving cooperation) to accelerate meaningful collaboration that results in tangible action plans.
Action Collabs access groups' collective brainpower by focusing creativity and structuring brainstorming in a unique method that leads to new thinking and solutions. An Action Collab can focus on detailed projects such as lesson and curriculum creation or on larger systems thinking applied to school and districts.
Action Collabs are an innovative way to:
• Tackle a familiar challenge from a new angle.
• Spark strategic thinking around a new initiative.
• Discover partnerships waiting to happen.
At Big Ideas Fest, Action Collabs are facilitated in small-groups made of a diverse mix of education stakeholders. Big Ideas Fest 2011 Design Challenges will delve into:
• How might we achieve universal competency in basic literacy and math skills?
• How might we leverage open (content, data, and research) to transform teaching and learning?
• How might we create ways to assess learning geared to making tangible progress toward meaningful goals?
Identify Opportunity
During Identify Opportunity, participants gather real-world insights by interviewing people directly affected by the Design Challenge.
Design
The group brainstorms new methods, tools, processes, ideas that answer the Design Challenge and serve research interviewees' needs.
Prototype
The Design idea is broken into components and prototyped to see how they'd each work. Failure is encouraged as models are continually refined.
Feedback
Groups receive expert feedback on Prototypes and incorporate ideas into Scale and Spread thinking.
Scale and Spread
Scale and Spread expands the group’s idea into the world by deciding how it fits within a larger scope and then develops details of how the idea is dispersed.
Present
Each group presents their idea to Big Ideas Fest at-large and continues their collaboration and building in an ISKME-created, cooperative online space.
Learn more about ISKME Action Collabs.
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| Design Team |
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Combining acumen in educational research and practices with global design expertise and the transformative power of improv, the Action Collab Design Team creates dynamic experiences in thought and action.
If you'd like to bring the creative and results-driven Action Collabs to your organization, please email
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Lisa Petrides is president and founder of the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education (ISKME), an independent non-profit educational research institute. Her research seeks to inform and improve the ways in which those in formal and informal education foster the creation and sharing of information, apply it to well-defined problems, and create knowledge-driven environments focused on improved learning and organizational success.
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 Jonah Houston is a senior project leader at IDEO in Palo Alto. He works on a wide variety of projects ranging from medical devices, office furniture, consumer electronics, food and beverage, and large-scale systems design. |
 Chris Miller has been performing and teaching improv for almost 20 years. He co-founded LifePlays, which brings the powerfully transformative and connective skills of improv to communities and innovative workplaces, such as Google, Genentech, Microsoft, and Whole Foods. |
 Samantha Wayne is the director of training & design at ISKME. She loves contributing to the growth, creativity, and collaboration of communities. Her background includes facilitating group therapy, teaching college courses, training unemployed adults on the importance of networking, and managing after school art programs. |
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| Lab Facilitators |
 Maggie Barber, professor
Barber is a faculty member in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy at the University of Utah where her teaching and research focuses on the design, delivery, and evaluation of leadership development programs for school leaders leading change, particularly in high-need communities.
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 Greg Brown, teacher, designer
Brown is Director of Education at Resource Area for Teaching (RAFT), Greg develops engaging hands-on STEM activities using creatively-repurposed materials. Greg has facilitated high-energy brainstorming sessions worldwide, and enjoys nurturing every new idea that comes his way.
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 Rich Cox, improviser, performer, coach, consultant, author
Cox is a communication and acting coach who brings creativity, collaboration, and presentation from theater to organizations and businesses. Cox teaches performance improv acting to students in the Bay Area.
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 Elizabeth Doty, organizational learning consultant, coach, author of "The Compromise Trap"
Since 1993, Doty’s firm, WorkLore, has focused on diagnosing breakdowns and dysfunctions in large, complex organizations, helping clients such as Intuit, Hewlett-Packard, and Archstone-Smith capitalize on hidden opportunities to improve performance. |
 Francine Gordon, consultant, facilitator, executive coach
Gordon helps organizations become more innovative by working through the people- focusing on creativity, collaboration/teamwork, leadership, and corporate culture. She teaches Teaming for Innovation at Stanford Continuing Studies and has organized & facilitated several seminars on innovation for Fulbright scholars. |
 Tara Martin-Milius, facilitator, teacher, community leader
Martin-Milius supports the development of communities through collaboration, contribution, and celebration. An organic gardener, she is committed to sustainability in environment, fiscal practices, transportation and land use. Her current business focuses on helping groups achieve their goals and teaching management ‘soft skills’ topics. |
 Erin O'Connell, professor
O’Connell teaches Classics and Comparative Literature at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. Her scholarly interests include ancient and modern comparisons of literature, performance, and philosophy, and she is committed to making education relevant to today’s students.
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 Megan Simmons, teacher, trainer, environmental educator
Simmons supports the development of education programs, workshops, and training activities for the OER Commons project at ISKME. She is particularly passionate about providing environmental education and art programs to underserved communities nationally and internationally. |
Samantha Wayne, program design & facilitation
Wayne loves contributing to the growth, creativity, and collaboration of communities at ISKME. Her background includes facilitating group therapy, teaching college courses, training unemployed adults on the importance of networking, and managing after school art programs.
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2011 Big Ideas Fest 
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