The Journey to Mastery: Define. Align. Refine.
Most schools on this path are not stuck on the same problem. One is still naming what mastery means. Another has a portrait or a competency set and cannot get the rest of the building to move with it. A third is already running the model and needs a tighter loop between evidence and the next change.
Mastery.org, Headrush Learning, and the Korda Institute for Teaching are hosting a three-hour working session the morning before FullScale. The room is small on purpose: fifty school leaders, sitting with people at the same stage, working on a problem they brought with them.
Define what matters. Align the work. Refine the practice.
Find your place
Define
You are naming the destination: the learner profile, the competencies, and the shared language for what mastery means at your school.
Align
The destination is named. Now the learning experiences, assessments, evidence, workflows, and the people around the student have to point at the same thing.
Refine
The model is in motion. You are using evidence and faculty practice to improve it — tightening what works, dropping what does not, and making the next iteration clearer for learners.
How the morning will work
9:00 AM | Breakfast and welcome
Meet the other people in the room and name the question that brought you.
9:20 AM | Locate your school
A short guided reflection so you can place yourself in Define, Align, or Refine before the cohorts begin.
9:45 AM | Working cohorts
Sit with peers at a similar stage. Talk tools, workflows, and the implementation problem you are actually stuck on.
10:45 AM | Coffee
Compare notes across tables.
11:00 AM | Cross-cohort exchange
Hear what schools further along wish they had decided sooner, and what schools earlier in the work can still see clearly.
11:35 AM | One next move
Leave with a specific step, the people who have to be in it, and the evidence that will tell you it is working.
12:00 PM | Close
Practical details
Thursday, October 8, 2026
9:00 AM–12:00 PM ET
Indianapolis Convention Center
Breakfast and coffee are included.
The session is free and capped at 50. We review registrations so the room has a useful mix of schools and stages.
This sits immediately before the FullScale Symposium. A FullScale ticket is not required.