Uncovering What’s Broken

Task: How might we uncover recruitment issues?

The Office of Teacher Recruitment and Quality in NYC Public Schools launched an innovative teacher training initiative that positioned schools as incubators, using a co-teaching model to develop new educators alongside experienced mentors. This approach aimed to fill teaching vacancies with highly prepared educators - but it wasn’t reaching its full potential. The challenge: 43% of schools weren’t signing up.

Despite its promise, the initiative struggled to recruit schools as training sites, limiting its ability to scale impact. To bridge this gap, leaders needed a clearer understanding of:

Gaps in their outreach strategy - Why weren’t schools opting in?
The motivations and barriers of potential partners - What would drive engagement?

SOLUTION

Through a targeted research process, I uncovered two key issues preventing school participation. These insights became the foundation for a strategic marketing roadmap, co-designed with initiative leaders, that included:

Refined messaging to resonate with school leaders' priorities
Targeted outreach strategies to increase engagement
A resource tool to address identified barriers and drive sign-ups

By aligning marketing efforts with real-world behaviors and needs, this work positioned the initiative to expand its reach and strengthen the pipeline of quality educators in New York City.

MY ROLE: User Researcher, Service Designer, Facilitator

DURATION: 5 months, full-time

ORGANIZATION: New York City Public School’s Office Of Teacher Recruitment And Quality

TOOLS: Desk research, research protocol and user interviews, evaluation matrix, user journey mapping

RESEARCH AND IDEATING

The initiative aimed to transform schools into incubators for new educators, but participation remained low. To address this challenge, I led a research effort using the Double Diamond model, which took place in four stages.

DISCOVERY PHASE 1: MAPPING THE CURRENT OUTREACH PROCESS

To pinpoint the breakdown, I began with desk research, analyzing the initiative’s existing outreach materials and recruitment process. By mapping out each touchpoint, I was later able to identify gaps and friction points in how schools were being engaged.

DISCOVERY PHASE 2: HYPOTHESIZING OUTREACH CHALLENGES

Recognizing that initiative leaders work closely with schools, I conducted listening sessions to surface their perspectives on recruitment challenges. Their insights shaped early hypotheses about school hesitancy, which I used to refine my research approach.

DISCOVERY PHASE 3: CONDUCTING INTERVIEWS TO SURFACE ATTITUDES

To test these hypotheses, I designed and conducted interviews with two key groups:

School leaders who joined the initiative – to identify which outreach strategies worked and what features resonated
School leaders who declined participation – to uncover communication gaps, hesitations, and unmet needs

Through these interviews, I surfaced two key barriers that discouraged participation. By mapping these concerns onto the user journey, I provided an evidence-based roadmap for improving outreach and recruitment.

DEFINE

DEVELOP

With user insights in hand, I worked with my team to brainstorm solutions that directly addressed school leaders’ hesitations. To ensure feasibility, we evaluated each idea against different levels of effort using an evaluation matrix, prioritizing solutions that were both high-impact and actionable.

I presented our findings and proposed solutions to initiative leadership, facilitating a strategic discussion to determine the most effective next steps. Through this process, we aligned on a targeted outreach strategy designed to reduce hesitancy and increase school participation.

DELIVERY

In the end, I created two outputs to strengthen engagement:

Updated Marketing Roadmap – A refined strategy to better engage schools and streamline recruitment
FAQ Resource for School Leaders – Instead of high-level marketing materials, I created a concise, question-based resource that directly addressed the real concerns school leaders had. By structuring it around the questions they were asking, I made it easier for them to evaluate the initiative’s value and determine if it was the right fit - ultimately strengthening their decision-making and buy-in.

These resources provided support to 287 schools, reinforcing an upward trend in school participation and expanding the pipeline for teacher training sites. Additionally, our team’s success secured a returning client for future engagement, demonstrating the lasting value of our approach.

REFLECTION

Don’t rush to design, rush to understand. This service was almost a hit, with participants applauding its design and outputs. However, the scale of its impact was compromised by its limited understanding of the actors involved and the full range of their motivations and needs. This dead angle limited its effectiveness and reinforced a critical lesson: before designing solutions, invest in understanding the ecosystem you’re trying to change.

In general, my approach to service design and improvement makes sure to start with this step - Check our understanding:

How is the system designed?
How is it performing?
What changes need to be made?
Do we have a shared, accurate understanding of the problem?

Spending time building our collective understanding of the system provides initiatives like this with the foundation to accurately design and support the full range of needs that are part of its system, and ensure that their solutions are intentionally and accurately designed to deliver their intended results.

You can take a look at one of the outputs by clicking on the link below.

Teaching Academy Write-up - 06-03-2020 - Final Draft.pdf

FAQ Resource for School Leaders

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