How statewide partnerships can expand access, strengthen connection, and create scalable professional learning that stays rooted in empathy.
Key Takeaways
- Scalable systems stay human by prioritizing empathy, adaptability, and reflection.
- Continuous improvement cycles ensure professional learning evolves with educator needs.
- AI literacy, microcredentialing, and communities of practice are shaping the next generation of scalable learning.
- Listening first and designing second keeps systems grounded in purpose.
Designing Scalable Professional Learning Systems That Grow With Educators
The next phase of professional learning in K-12 education is about creating systems that evolve alongside the people they serve. Scalability and connection can coexist when design begins with empathy, adaptability, and trust.
When statewide partnerships focus on evolution and purpose, they expand access while keeping learning relevant. The partnership between Advanced Learning Partnerships (ALP) and the Regional Educational Media Center Association of Michigan (REMC) shows what happens when structure meets empathy. It’s a statewide model that reaches thousands of educators while preserving connection and purpose.
As ALP’s Rachel Fruin explains, “Everything we offer comes from listening first.” That principle drives every professional learning course, cohort, and community of practice. Each new offering begins not with a tool, but with a conversation about what educators need most.
Human-Centered Professional Learning Starts With Listening
Human-centered professional learning begins with empathy and awareness. It starts with understanding what educators truly need, not just what systems can deliver. Listening drives relevance, and relevance drives engagement.
ALP and REMC approach every initiative by listening first—to educators, school leaders, and regional partners. Once needs are clear, they co-design programs that are flexible enough to evolve. As Amos Fodchuk, ALP’s President, explains:
“A point of unity in our partnership is that we begin with learning outcomes and incorporate technology accordingly. We’ve never started with the tool and worked backward into classrooms.”
That mindset shapes everything from statewide virtual courses to AI literacy cohorts and communities of practice. The result is a professional learning system that adapts alongside the educators it serves—one that mirrors the curiosity and reflection teachers hope to cultivate in their students.
The Building Blocks of Scalable Professional Learning Systems
Scaling professional learning requires thoughtful design and ongoing reflection. Through regular improvement cycles, typically every three years, REMC and ALP assess what is working and explore new opportunities. This reflection keeps professional learning aligned with educator needs, emerging technologies, and statewide goals.
Core elements of their scalable learning model include:
- AI literacy and digital badging that help educators engage responsibly with new technologies.
- Microcredential frameworks that recognize learning through competency-based professional learning and classroom integration.
- Communities of practice that connect teachers and leaders across districts.
Each network is intentionally personal in feel, even when it serves educators across the entire state. As Rachel shares, “The goal is for every educator to see themselves in the system—to feel known, heard, and supported.”
Scaling Professional Learning Without Losing Connection
Scaling professional learning is often seen as a question of infrastructure or reach, but its real foundation is relational. True scale depends on connection that allows educators to learn, share, and grow together across schools and regions. For Amos, the challenge and the opportunity are the same: balancing structure with humanity.
“When educators learn in community,” he says, “they move from isolation to connection. That’s how systems truly scale—through people.”
This principle extends far beyond Michigan. ALP applies the same frameworks with districts and state agencies across the U.S. and Canada, adapting to local contexts while maintaining one constant: scalable systems grow through human connection.
The partnership’s ability to evolve rests on the foundation of mutual trust, open communication, and the courage to challenge ideas in pursuit of better outcomes. These qualities turn collaboration into sustained impact.
We are better when we’re together. Education can feel isolating, but community helps educators see what’s possible beyond their own walls.
How to Build Human-Centered Systems That Scale
Building scalable professional learning systems requires an intentional balance between vision, structure, and care. Lessons from ALP and REMC’s work can guide any district or state partnership:
- Build trust, inspiration, and a clear, measurable shared vision to guide building strategy and systems that achieve it.
- Pilot smaller evidence-based approaches, reflect often, and scale what works. Growth happens through iteration, refinement, and continuous improvement.
- Design for adaptability. Systems that flex stay relevant as needs evolve.
- Empower local leaders and subject-matter experts as co-designers. Sustainable change begins within communities.
- Keep the human in the loop. Technology and data should enhance connection, momentum, and support collaborative reflection and decision-making.
When empathy and structure align, scale becomes sustainable and learning systems become capable of growth, not just maintenance.
A crucial component of the REMC-ALP partnership is the sustained structure for reinvestment provided by Dell Technologies and Michigan-based reseller People Driven Technologies who work together to provide competitive pricing to REMC. This allows Michigan districts to purchase laptops and other hardware and software services. Professional learning (PL) days are accumulated on the basis of these purchases, and the corresponding PL days become the property of REMC and are used strategically to support Michigan educators. The goal for all is to meet educators’ needs.
The Future of Scalable Professional Learning
In a time of rapid change, the most successful systems are those that continue to learn. The ALP–REMC partnership shows that reflection, collaboration, and empathy can exist alongside process, data, and reach.
Scalability is about resonance. Systems that listen, learn, and adapt will always sustain progress. As Amos Fodchuk says, “We are better when we’re together. Education can feel isolating, but community helps educators see what’s possible beyond their own walls.”
This story completes a three-part exploration of what makes professional learning work at every level—from building enduring partnerships grounded in trust, to designing learning experiences that stick, to scaling human-centered systems that grow with educators.
This blog is part of a three-part series exploring lessons from a statewide professional learning partnership. Read the other stories on Building Partnerships That Last and How to Design Professional Learning That Sticks. All three draw from the case study Scaling Meaningful Professional Learning for Educators Across Michigan.
