Innovation Cohorts

Affton School District serves a diverse population of 2500 learners in South Saint Louis, Missouri. It focuses on innovation, rich curriculum, and continuous improvement to meet the needs of its unique population of working class families from a wide variety of countries including Bosnia, Serbia, and Albania.

The Challenge

Over the past 10-15 years, the schools and community of Affton had come to expect good schools with good results, and this expectations stalled progress and growth. This culture resulted in a variety of systems from curriculum, instruction, assessment, and technology to slow its growth to a point that it was becoming a liability to the districts responsibility to cultivate students that were college, career, and citizen ready.

The Solution

Affton embarked on a mission to not only move its systems to be on par with others around them, but to become a leader in integrating technology throughout the country. This lead to both boosting and redesigning infrastructure, shifting to a first class culture of service surrounding its support of instructors in the area of training, repairs, and cultivating ideas. Affton built partnerships with edtech companies in the area and beyond, and started to host learning sessions for other teachers and leaders throughout the area. Affton has continued its journey of innovation by building innovation cohorts that support each other with risk-taking, idea sharing, and support. In addition, the district is focusing on how learning space design can enhance technology integration and student engagement. Affton has found a recipe for success, and it continues to layer the solutions for students.

From the U.S. Department of Education:

• Future Ready Schools: Building Technology Infrastructure for Learning

District Point of Contact

Affton School District
Dr. Robert Dillon
Director of Innovation
Phone: 314-638-8770
Email: rdillon@afftonschools.net