First, a fairytale story...

Once upon a time, a young designer entered a meeting about teachers enrolled in the Educate! program. And the Good Program Manager from the North said, "Here here! I know how to motivate the teachers, give them more money!". And all the coordinators and officers cheered! And off the designer went to design a program in which the teachers were given more money.

The designer made a beautiful plan to pay teachers per practical lesson s/he would deliver to students. And off the plan went to the printer! Then suddenly a cold wind blew through the office, and the Wicked Program Manager from the West appeared saying, "I curse you designer! From this day forth no amount of money will ever be enough!". The young designer laughed and laughed, saying, "There is no such thing as a curse. You wait and see these teachers will teach!".

One long term went by, and then another and then another, but the teachers were not teaching the practical lessons. Money was spent and the directors grew angry at the results. The young designer called for another meeting and asked, "What's wrong? Why aren't the teachers teaching?". And the Program Manager from the North replied, "Some have said the money must be increased. They are so busy; we must make it worth it!". "No, we can't do that," replied the young designer remembering the terrible curse. "We can do anything but give them more money!" said the young designer.

"Let's give them t-shirts instead!" offered a young officer. And off the t-shirts went to the printer. But still the lessons were not taught.

"Let's give them more training!" And off the training manuals went to the printer. And still the lessons were not taught.

The distraught young designer finally went to the Wicked Program Manager from the West and begged, "Please please lift this terrible curse". And the Wicked Program Manager laughed, "Silly fool, I have no magic powers. You cursed yourself!".

Hopefully, you learned a little something about "Impact Drivers". Impact drivers are the parts of your program that really motivate people to create impact. A classic example of an impact driver is the National Business Club Competition. Every year every school in the Educate! program start up business club projects. Some years are better than others. But what never fails every year, is in the last few weeks before the competition, all of a sudden once dormant clubs come to life making products and calling meetings. The "club" is an important program component and activity for learners, but the "competition" is an impact driver within the Club.

So, the fairytale tells one of the saddest truths about Teacher Programs, while providing money and resources is important, unfortunately money is not an impact driver and, in fact, can seriously backfire. This is not only true for Teachers. Imagine a world where Educate! pays students to become leaders and entrepreneurs...would it work? Well, you don't have to imagine it because many organizations have tried to do just that before, and they failed!

But why?

Creating impact requires both that activities happen and that the quality of those activities are high. Managing activities is the easy part. You count Yes/No if a lesson was taught. Yes is good. No is bad. It is simple. However, in practice, that lesson may have been a 40 minute lecture, or 15 minutes of the teacher yelling at students, or even an expertly designed 80 minute session on a totally unrelated, irrelevant topic. Quality drives impact. And, unfortunately, direct money payment is really only good at getting activities to happen and cannot guarantee quality, and even with payment, it only drives activities happening if the money is "enough".

Take the example of the business club competition. Some clubs do not need a competition to motivate them to make high quality projects. Some clubs work all year calling meetings and making products. Those clubs would do that whether or not Educate! gives them money. Then, there are other clubs who are not as motivated and it is in the last hour before competitions that they "cook up" projects to showcase. These clubs would also do that whether or not E! gives them money. In fact, if you gave these clubs money, they would most likely eat it or have it stolen. So, competitions are an impact driver because they reward those clubs who would be motivated anyway so they stay motivated and they pressurize those clubs who did nothing all year to at least do something. And all the clubs in between these two extreme groups also have a motivation, a clear purpose to talk about and work towards. Giving capital to everyone at the beginning would not drive impact in the same way.

If not money, what drives impact?

I will give you one guess. Go on. Guess. What do you think? Well...the answer is People. People like you are the #1 biggest impact drivers within education programs. People are the ones who hype up the business club competition so all the schools care about it and feel they have a chance to win. People are the ones making classrooms come alive with excitement. People are the ones setting goals and challenging each other. In education, people drive impact.

But, we don't always get to work with the best people. And people don't always live up to the best version of themselves. So what do we do?

We design learning environments, activities, and opportunities to engage other people in powerful ways.

See the list below for an impact framework based on what we have seen in Educate!'s work with teachers. You will notice money is listed as "incentives".

Read this article here if you don't know what an "early adopter" is and how to use it to drive impact!