WAB is a NEASC-accredited international school, following the ACE Learning Protocol. From 2022 onwards, WAB will take part in the new IB-NEASC Collaborative Learning Protocol, using the IB 2020 Standards & Practices and the new ACE Learning Ecosystem 2.0.
These pages outline our approaches and evidence for the following Learning Principles:
Parent-Student Handbooks & WAB Parent Portal
WAB's Parent-Student Handbooks are open-access and available here: ES - MS - HS
Additionally, we have an extensive Parent Portal, including Policies, Handbooks and more information. The visiting team will be provided with a login to use.
WAB's IB Programme Development Plan (PDP)Connecting NEASC's ACE 2.0 Learning Principles with the IB's 2020 Standards & Practices is the Programme Development Plan (PDP). This is a school-wide exploration of learning principles in the context of our PYP-MYP-DP Continuum of learning. WAB's PDP is centred on the concept of Learning Communities, in their various forms, across the continuum. This focus has connections with all five of the Learning Principles above. Examples of Learning Communities at WAB include:
Our Definition of Learning (developed 2014-15), serves as our Shared Understanding of High-Quality Learning):
Learning at WAB is a transformative process which is intentional and iterative, challenging and joyful, and serves an authentic purpose.
A Shared Understanding of High-Quality Learning can improve learning and teaching:
• when it is influenced by the ACE Learning Principles and other relevant research and thinking in education;
• when it is co-created and well understood by the stakeholders in the community;
• when it is observable in everyday learning and teaching;
• when it promotes collaboration among faculty and school leadership in service of HighQuality Learning;
• when teachers feel empowered and safe to try new ways of teaching to meet the expectations of the school’s understanding of High-Quality Learning;
• when it creates a vision of learning that people feel inspired by;
• when it becomes the central focus of teacher development and appraisal; and
• when it is used as a hiring tool for new faculty and staff
WAB Faculty: Click to download PDF guide to the ACE 2.0 Learning Ecosystem from Teams.
WAB began the CLP process by confirming the pathway in the 2021-22 school year. We then confirmed the CIS Deep Dive Pathway 2 (Global Citizenship & Intercultural Learning). Our virtual NEASC prep visit took place in September 2022, with the selection of our chosen Learning Principles. Throughout the process, we have had significant challenges with Covid-19 restrictions, campus closures and adjustments to timelines, but we have been able to continue. In Feb 2023, restrictions were eased and WAB was back in full force, with a large commitment to community events, workshops, learning experiences and reconnecting.
The overall process of CLP was managed by the Director of Innovation in Learning & Teaching & SELT team, along with a large group of school-wide accreditation-enthusiastic volunteers.
Through the process of the CLP, using the IB's Standards & Practices and NEASC's ACE 2.0 Learning Principles, we have begun our journey towards focusing on the Impact of learning innovations and developments at WAB. This first cycle of the CLP has given us the opportunity to reflect on our developments since our last evaluation visit, and consider Impact in future designs for learning and wellbeing. WAB has long been an innovative school, and a focus on Impact will help refine our approaches to change in our school.
In 2022-23, our school-wide approach to development and professional learning centred on a structure called "Impact Projects", designed to allow teams to plan, reflect or take action on innovations important to them and their learners. Although this process was interrupted by challenges through the year, we were able to make some headway, including providing time in a spring PD day, faculty meetings and a whole-school 'Celebration of Impact' in Spring 2023. This approach also helped align our work across the CLP and the parallel CIS Deep Dive into Global Citizenship and Intercultural Learning.
Moving forwards, we intend to maintain a focus on Impact in our work, and seek external support in developing this further with opportunities for educational research at WAB.
Conceptual UnderstandingConceptual understanding of ACE Learning begins with being able to explain the meaning of each Learning Principle and Impact. To be effective, however, this understanding must then extend to the ability to transfer the meaning of each ACE Learning Principle to new situations, to apply it to new contexts, and to be able to describe what the Learning Principles and Impacts look like in a transformed, student-centered learning experience. Definitional understanding is required to begin the journey, but deep conceptual understanding is a prerequisite for the transformation of learning.
Commitment is a measure of determination to proceed on the pathway framed by the ACE Learning Principles and Impacts and described in the school’s Shared Understanding of High-Quality Learning. It is premised on an understanding that ACE Learning depends on student-centered learning and teaching and is grounded in a 21st century context. Additionally, it requires the learning community to recognize the gap between where it is today and where it is headed. Once the gap is identified, the community must be willing to take on the realignment and disruption of current patterns and the creation of the new systems and practices that may be needed to change the trajectory of learning and bend it toward the vision contained in the school’s foundational documents.
Commitment to the transformational journey is most powerful when it exists in all parts of the organization and among all stakeholders, but it often begins with a smaller group that has both the influence and opportunity to bring the learning community along on the journey.
Commitment is visible when learning communities are thoughtfully reflecting on how systems and patterns need to be changed to achieve the Learning Principles and desired Impacts and there is evidence of processes and behaviors that have been adjusted to create those realities. This might not mean immediate changes in performance, but rather indications of action – overcoming the status quo and engagement in purposeful movement.
Capacity is the ability and willingness of a learning community to commit resources (financial, personnel, institutional) to support the ACE Learning journey. Added resources such as increased budgets and new positions may be needed, but capacity does not necessarily mean adding resources. It often means reallocation of resources to focus them away from the systems that represent the status quo to critical changes that must be made to enhance the school’s ACE Learning journey. Capacity also means that the Governing Body understands the community’s direction and is willing to shape the organization’s Strategic Plans, including the school’s Major Learning Plans, operating budgets, facilities plans, and other capital improvements to align with ACE Learning.
Competence is the presence of the individual and institutional abilities required to convert Conceptual Understanding into action and progress toward the Shared Understanding of High-Quality Learning and the community’s Major Learning Plans. Competence is built through sustained opportunities for educators to engage in learning that builds their capacity to transform learning. Competence exists in learning communities that possess a growth mindset characterized by a focus on effort, learning from mistakes, and embracing challenges
From NEASC's ACE 2.0 Learning Ecosystem Guide.
WAB is following the Collaborative Learning Protocol between NEASC and the IB, using NEASC's new ACE 2.0 Learning Ecosystem. The ACE 2.0 Learning Principles are below. For our current accreditation and community reflection, we are focusing on LP's 2, 3, 5, 9, 10.
1. Learning Purposes --> Connected to CIS Deep Dive Project 5: Profile of WAB Alumni
Learning builds understandings, competencies, knowledge, and dispositions that can be applied across different situations. Learners become responsible and successful global citizens by actively engaging with complex real-world issues.
Learners grow through regular engagement in creative, ethical, interpersonal, technological, environmental, physical, and entrepreneurial experiences. Learners explore ideas and develop solutions that may have impact beyond themselves.
Learners engage with feedback that promotes self-awareness, improvement, and mastery. Learners demonstrate growth and development in a variety of forms.
4. Learning Perspectives
Learners face complex problems, challenges, and issues that promote deep learning. Learners consider multiple perspectives and take informed risks in the pursuit of knowledge.
5. Learner Autonomy & Engagement
Learners have age-appropriate, goal-oriented autonomy over their learning and make informed choices supported by guidance within and beyond the classroom.
6. Research, Reflection & Action
The learning community applies current research, connects with other learning communities, and uses future-oriented thinking to improve learning for all. The learning community evaluates the results of its actions and pursues questions about future innovations that prepare learners to shape their present and future. Likewise, learners analyze the results of their efforts and collaborate with peers to improve and extend their learning.
7. Inclusion, Diversity, Equity & Belonging --> Connected to CIS Deep Dive Pathway 2 & Strategy 2022+ I-DEAS
The learning community exhibits a culture of inclusiveness that enables the diverse needs, identities, and interests of all learners and community members to be acknowledged, actively celebrated, and proactively addressed. Differing viewpoints and opinions are invited in pursuit of an informed and welcoming community
8. Governance & Leadership for Learning
The roles of leadership and governance are aligned with the school’s learning goals, unified through a common mission, and organized through well-aligned structures that allow informed analysis, communication, and decision-making in support of learners.
The learning community optimizes physical environments, virtual opportunities, and time to support learning and wellbeing for all.
10. Learning Community Wellbeing
The learning community is a healthy environment where all members thrive. Respectful, healthy, ethical, and honest relationships create a true sense of community. Community values are clearly stated, actively lived, and define a distinct, sustained identity.