Continuous Improvement in the AI Era

Michael Conner: [00:00:00] Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, and welcome to another episode of Voices for Excellence. I'm your host, Dr. Michael Conner, CEO and founder of the Agile Evolutionary Group and co-founder of AEG Systems. And today's guest is a personal friend I have known for years, and when I'm talking about years, we're going back to, I believe it was, Dr.

Michael Conner: Welch, 2016, two thou- um, yeah, 2016, 2017, where Dr. Welch and I, Dr. Tommy Welch and I attended the AASA Howard University Urban Supes Academy. I will always say this, Dr. Welch, this is when we were wet behind the ears in education. We tryna, you know, we have these theoretical battles, these intellectual battles within the group, but, you know, above all, it was a great cohort.

Michael Conner: And obviously, as you can see, [00:01:00] everlasting friendship, everlasting partnership and collaboration in education. But Dr. Tommy Welch is the deputy superintendent of school improvement and strategic initiatives for the Richmond County Schools in Georgia, just outside or is two hours from Atlanta and Augusta.

Michael Conner: Also, numerous accolades and awards was, I believe it was, was it the national superintendent, excuse me, national principal of the year? That ring a bell? 

Tommy Welch: Yeah. Yeah, national princi- 

Michael Conner: Yep. Yep, National Principal of the Year runner-up, State Principal of the Year. Has accelerated in this leadership trajectory in education since I have known him for now over, yeah, 10, 10 years now, Dr.

Michael Conner: Welch. And of course, you know I gotta add this, he is a part of the oldest, coldest, the best, and this is not subjective, this is objective, best fraternity out there, Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Incorporated, like 1906. But Dr. Tommy [00:02:00] Welch, I'm so glad to have him on Voices for Excellence. My good brother, fraternal love, educational love, how you doing today, doc?

Tommy Welch: Doing well. Thank you so much for having me today. I really appreciate it. This has been a, this has been a great opportunity, and been wonderful knowing you throughout the years and watching the work grow. Been very, very, very excited about the work that you're doing, especially the work that you're doing in the space of moving education forward, um, getting us to be- begin to think about what education can be and should be for our students.

Tommy Welch: So I thank you for adding to the body of work. 

Michael Conner: Absolutely. Dr. Welch, I'll tell you this, I've been a big fan of your work over the course of the years. I've literally, and I can say this, I have seen you risen at every single tier in the education ecosystem, and the impact that you continuously to have no matter where you're at, whether you were in Gwinnett County, where we're gonna talk about to now being in the Richmond County Schools, you still have that vitality of impact.

Michael Conner: And thank you [00:03:00] for everything that you're doing, and also thank you for just being a, a good friend, good brother of mine. But there's a lot of people out there, Dr. Welch, that do not know who you are. And of course, in the education ecosystem, a lot of people know who you are, but to my audience who don't know you, when leaders in Georgia or even beyond, nationally or internationally, engage with Dr.

Michael Conner: Tommy Welch, what song, uh, I can't wait to hear this, but what song defines your leadership signature for impact in the education ecosystem? 

Tommy Welch: Oh. Oh, oh, no, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. DJ Khaled, All I Do Is Win. All I do is win. All I do is win 

Michael Conner: From a true alpha man.

Michael Conner: All I do is win. Please elaborate. 

Tommy Welch: All I do is win. You know, and you know, I think winning is relative though, you know, when you think about it as well. Because there are lessons to be learned and [00:04:00] obstacles and challenges as well. So, you know, when I think about all I do is win, you know, it's a, it's a mindset.

Tommy Welch: It's a mindset of learning from experiences and growing. It's a growth mindset. It is an opportunity to realize that you can get better and better each day as long as you learn from the prior day that was put before you. And I think that's also something that, you know, we try to instill in all of our children.

Tommy Welch: So, you know, when, when I, when I have the opportunity to lead other school districts, whether it's employees or whether it's students, whether it's families, is to try to instill that, you know, that winning mindset. That we're always trying to get better each and every day. And as long as we get better each and every day, we will reach our goal.

Tommy Welch: Of course, some of us need to accelerate that growth, and that's okay. But as long as we're working to get better each and every day- You know, success will come, but we have to be consistent with it. So when, when I say all I do is win, of course, if you have that winner's mindset, the wins will come. [00:05:00] But you also have to accept those challenges when they arise and learn from them and get better.

Tommy Welch: So the continuous improvement is something that I, I live by wherever I go. You know, some people call it school improvement, some people call it turn- whatever you wanna call it, it's just continuous improvement, trying to get better each and every day, and making sure those systems are in place. You know, Kobe Bryant used to call it the Mamba mentality.

Tommy Welch: Uh, you know, I used, I use the DJ Khaled song, All I Do Is Win, but it's really a mindset. A winner's mindset, even when they fail, they still say they won 'cause they, they learned a lesson. So it's just something, you know, that I try to instill in all of the, the employees and leadership style, but also in teaching as well.

Tommy Welch: Wanna teach the students the growth mindset. The, the ability of the, you know, uh, productive growth is just as important over getting an A. So you'll learn through that struggle, and through that struggle you'll, you know, you will build a certain type of resilience that will allow you to persevere when things get tough, that, you [00:06:00] know, if, if someone just automatically got that win, they would not have that, that perseverance that's necessary to really move through hard times.

Tommy Welch: So that, I unpacked that probably a little bit more than you wanted, but that's, that's, that's was all I can, all I do is win. 

Michael Conner: Doc- Dr. Welch, you, you talking to me, uh, the, the king of unpacking. But Dr. Welch, you know, I, I love how you contextualized it, a winning mindset. You know, in education when you talk about, you know, having that productive growth, your answer just reminds me of John Kotter's work in Leading Change, and one of his steps within Leading Change, I believe it's the fifth or sixth step.

Michael Conner: Don't quote me. I know my audience will fact check me on this, but I believe it's the fifth or sixth step regarding transformation, is that we have to celebrate short-term wins, right? And those short-term wins is, or those short-term wins are equivalent to [00:07:00] exactly what you contextualize with this productive growth, this winning mindset, right?

Michael Conner: You alluded to Kobe Bryant. One of his famous quotes that I love, and I say it to my son pretty much every single day, is that all you have to do is be 1% better every day 1% better every day. That equivalent to productive growth, that equivalent to capturing the short-term wins. So yeah, just, you know, underpinning and unpacking a winning mindset through your staff, through your students, through your leaders, your community, your board, that is establishing a winning culture, a winning mental model within that organization.

Michael Conner: But Dr. Welch, knowing you, brother, specifically a great alpha man, all you definitely do is win.

Michael Conner: But, but Dr. Welch, man, again, just how I know all you do is win is because you have, right? We're not talking about [00:08:00] this in more of subjective manner or just kind of theoretical, but you have that all I win, all I do is win mindset is because of the proven lineage in education and impact that is duly noted nationally.

Michael Conner: Once named the Georgia Principal, I'm gonna brag about you, okay? Humble brag about you. Once named the Georgia Principal of the Year, then you were named the national finalist for the award. Runner up. I'm biased, you should've won, but runner up. And then moving seamlessly into the chief equity officer role within the Gwinnett County Public Schools, regional superintendent for Boston Public Schools, and now the deputy superintendent of school improvement and strategic initiatives for the Richmond County School System in Augusta, Georgia.

Michael Conner: But what I want you to do, because I want my audience to experience your expertise, you alluded to it in the first response, is you were talking about systems, you were talking about school improvement, you were talking about continuous improvement, you were talking about turnaround, [00:09:00] transformation. All those are very abstract words, but I wanna unpack your position within the Richmond County School System.

Michael Conner: What does school improvement and strategic initiatives look like in the context of preparing our students, Generation Alpha and Beta, for this 22nd century readiness that you and I had many conversations about? And then when you think about school improvement and strategic initiatives, what shifts are you underpinning with leaders, teachers, the systems that you're designing, and resources to be aligned to those systems so that now you're preparing our students for this new demand in our economy?

Tommy Welch: Yeah. No, I think it was very wise of our superintendent to put those two together, school improvement and strategic initiatives, because in order to move forward successful school improvement or just improvement in general, it's usually done by a strategic initiative. [00:10:00] So whomever, whomever's moving forward that strategic initiative obviously then f- then has the leverage to move forward the system.

Tommy Welch: So with the strategic initiatives, you know, putting things in place systemically from a, a system level to where, uh, it creates change throughout the organization. And in order to do that, when we're, we're in a large school system. We're about 30,000 students total. We have about over 4,000 special education students.

Tommy Welch: We have 53 schools that we serve. Um, we are in Augusta, Georgia, but we serve Richmond County, which is, which is a pretty large square footage that we, that we serve. We do have a high free reduced lunch population. We are a full Title I school system. So in our poverty level is one of the, uh, highest in the state of Georgia.

Tommy Welch: So there's a lot of complexities that we have in, in providing the service to our students that we [00:11:00] have. You know, we, we have extreme wealth in our community, but we also have extreme poverty as well So with that comes the need for strategic initiatives in how we move forward student achievement, and those have come in multiple ways.

Tommy Welch: You know, we have IB programs, we have magnet programs, we have full school choice throughout the whole system. And how is that, how is that being redesigned for the 22nd century learner? AI is coming in, and a lot of our CTAE pathways, college technology, agricultural education, a, a lot of those pathways are being redesigned as a result of the infusion of technology and how AI is changing how, how we operate in those pathways.

Tommy Welch: Students are asked to be users and no longer asked to be doers sometimes, or vice versa. Uh, you no longer have to create the program. You are the one who has to implement the program and make sure that it's being done with fidelity. So the [00:12:00] higher order level of thinking is necessary, which means that the strategic initiatives not only has to be in the curriculum, but then also in the instructional piece, which is a paradigm shift for education.

Tommy Welch: Also wanna touch on the things of, you know, strategic initiatives when you think about right-sizing schools or creating school communities. As we know across the nation, our systems are being challenged with the decreased student population. And whenever you talk about improving instruction, you have to make sure that the resources are there.

Tommy Welch: So how, you know, as a, as moving forward school improvement, how am I strategically ensuring that we're creating a, uh, a long-term plan of right-sizing schools, how redesigning our schools to ensure that this supports the learning environment, not that we currently have, but we want to create for the future, but ensuring that our community is a part of the process.

Tommy Welch: So that's the strategic initiatives part. The school improvement part, which I, I, I am in [00:13:00] the process of kind of rebranding that because when you, when people think school improvement, a lot of people think of, well, something has to be broken in order for it to improve. But th- that's not the mindset that we wanna move forward as a, you know, we started this conversation with all I do is win mindset.

Tommy Welch: So if you have a winning mindset, you realize that you're always trying to improve. So, you know, we're beginning to rebrand that to just continuous improvement. So whether you're the best school, school in the, in the system, or whether you're the lowest performing or underperforming school in the system, we all are involved in that continuous improvement process.

Tommy Welch: So that, that work is embedded into a system from our strategic plan all the way down to our school improvement plans, and what I'm beginning to do is to operationalize those. Some people are familiar with operation management plans of, of how you systemize or how you systemically move [00:14:00] forward your KPIs for the organization And that's a lot of the work that I'm beginning to do.

Tommy Welch: But that's gonna take time because, you know, a continuous improvement mindset i- is one that has to be done with care because data is meant to move us forward, not to condemn individuals. And sometimes in the system of education, you know, data is used to other individuals or to, uh, try to, um, m- maybe move them out of the system.

Tommy Welch: Whereas with the growth mindset and thinking of continuous improvement We want an organization that takes a, a good employee, makes them average, takes an average employee, makes them great, takes a great employee, makes them excellent, and takes an excellent employee and makes them world-class. So if our organization can have a system that creates that type of continuous improvement, we will [00:15:00] in- we will attract employees who say, "I wanna go there because that's a place where I can get better.

Tommy Welch: That is a place where I can shine." And that, that's the type of environment we wanna create. So through those two titles and opportunities, I've been given the honor of leading that for Richmond County and for the community. So I take that with great pride, but also I know it's a great responsibility.

Michael Conner: Yeah. And Dr. Welch, we use Voices for Excellence as an asynchronous professional learning tool, self-directed learning for leaders, teachers, uh, cabinet level members, ed tech founders, CEOs of companies, so that they can go back and take specific segments of our guests so that they can employ them within their practices.

Michael Conner: And to my audience, Dr. Welch just provided pretty much, I would say, first to fourth floor [00:16:00] hybrid explanation of how to create alignment with school improvement rebranded to continuous improvement, where now the strategic initiatives are a part of the underscoring of the actual new design of the model.

Michael Conner: What I loved about Dr. Welch's answer, and Dr. Welch, you highlighted it, is that these complexities within a large district where you have extreme poverty versus, you know, high influence, you know, how do you now create that? And then what i- is a great essential question is how do you create that equilibrium, modernizing the model when you have each at the polar ends or the polar opposites of the actual continuum of that?

Michael Conner: I think that, A, the recognition of those complexities would actually start being the guideposts to this continuous improvement effort that you highlighted. And you talked about AI, right? And when [00:17:00] we think about AI, we're gonna go more into this, and here are some key facts for you. 86% of Generation Alpha is already using some type of generative AI or some type of intelligence system in their life.

Michael Conner: When we move into that, right, and here's the stark data point that, Dr. Welch, I think you would find interesting, is that I was reviewing the ISTE survey of 2025, and 43% of teachers have stated that they haven't received Enough or meaningful professional development in the area of artificial intelligence, where now when we have to think about this from a broader continuous improvement effort, AI has to be overlaid or in as an embedded layer to the actual modernization of the model.

Michael Conner: But more importantly, by 2035, we'll get into this, AI is gonna be standardized in education where it's just gonna be ubiquitous. We're not gonna have to say AI [00:18:00] with everything, it's just gonna be a part of our natural life and our design in education, which I think that you, Dr. Welch, is moving from, or y- the common practice of adoption AI versus now when we think about it, arrival AI.

Michael Conner: Exactly what you're doing with your continuous improvement and strategic initiatives, reciprocity, and alignment with one another. Very, very well ar- articulated and stated. Dr. Welch, as you know, you simplify it, and I bring the complexity of, you know, the response to that. But amazing work. I, I wrote down one phrase, strategic implementation, right?

Michael Conner: Strategic implementation, where you said it's over time. People don't realize continuous improvement is cycles, multiple cycles, multiple iterations and experimentation over time, but you're creating the culture, i.e. all you do is win. But Dr. Welch, from a 21st century lens, we, [00:19:00] we've had, you know, some really, really good conversations about the difference between 21st century design versus 22nd century design, and when you think about all of those stark data metrics, I only just gave a few, you know, we still have learning organization, and this is nobody at fault, and I always blame is the construct of how the model is designed in education, where you're intentionally creating those systems to be able to disrupt it for meaningful transformation, digital transformation as an embedded overlay.

Michael Conner: But from this 21st century lens, we're seeing a lot of organizations, districts still underscoring strategic plans and instructional frameworks that has the design for 21st century model, right? But few have made that intentional shift around where we have to be, what I like to say, an adaptive learning organization for the 22nd century.[00:20:00] 

Michael Conner: So this being, you know, adaptive in real time as you were talking about running through the cycles, acknowledging the complexities of the design, and having this experimentation mindset, winning mindset, what cultural, operational, and in- instructional structures, Dr. Welch, must change so learning organizations can become agile in lieu of being static with these 21st century structures and systems embedded in it?

Tommy Welch: Yeah, y- y- you know, I think that the first thing that I, I will admit that I, I, I was not a part of, it was part of the thing that attracted me here, was they started to address how the grade, the grading structure. You know, ensuring that the... And this is something that I know a lot of school districts have tried to address and, you know, the truth in grading of that an, an A, a B, a C is not based off of, uh, [00:21:00] task completion, but of mastery of skills, and that no matter how much work is created or how little work is created, if the student can show that they've mastered the skill, that they should receive the, they should receive the grade.

Tommy Welch: So in doing that, it set the, it set the table for the thought that if no matter how a child gets to mastering that skill, that as long as they can demonstrate it That's okay. So I don't h- I don't need to do five projects to get an A. You know, if I'm able to do one strong project or do it in another form or do it in another way and show that I can master that skill, it can happen.

Tommy Welch: So what that did is when we begin to introduce AI or talk about the concept, let's, let's honor the process to get to the skill. The how you got there was now in the [00:22:00] hands of the student. Could be in the hands of the student as long as the teacher is willing to say, "There's multiple avenues of how you can get to accomplish this skill."

Tommy Welch: I.e., when you implement what AI comes about, it doesn't matter how Johnny learned how to solve this fraction. If Johnny can sol- can show that he has the skill to solve this fraction, whether they use an AI tool to help them study or whether they use your study tool, or whether they did the workbook that you gave them, or the handouts that you gave them, or whether they were learning it through a video that was created through AI, it doesn't matter.

Tommy Welch: The fact is that they know how to do it. So all of those tasks along the way, as long as they met your benchmarks of skill, skill development, then everything should be okay. That was a, that was something systemically and structurally that I think really is helping evolve the conversation. Another thing that is really helping evolve the conversation [00:23:00] and as a part of the culture that we're working on, conversation with parents about that the world that w- the students are going into and live right now i- is, is completely different.

Tommy Welch: And I know that that conversation has happened all, you know, even when I was in school, but the how the children are learning is what I think the parents are really beginning to pay attention to. And what I mean by that is that they have the, the... We as the adults no longer are seen as the, the people who hold all the information.

Tommy Welch: They can get the information. They need to find out from us how to use it, and the, the way they can process and get information is extremely quick, so we have to help them with beginning to sort that information and what to do with it. So that conversation is happening and it's e- it is changing our curriculum scope Because we ha- the curriculums can't exist in [00:24:00] silos anymore.

Tommy Welch: So th- that structurally is changing the way we're starting to design some of our schools. So w- when it talked about the strategic initiatives and the redesign, you know, what does it look like, the schools that we create? I was fortunate to be a part of, uh, the beginning of the design of the first AI cluster in Gwinnett County.

Tommy Welch: So the whole cluster, K through 12, was designed to teach students about artificial intelligence, the ethics behind it, the implementation of it. So I knew that there was curriculum that, uh, that was engaged, but the main thing that I learned about that, that we're implementing here is that the pathways have to be embedded inside of the academic core.

Tommy Welch: You know, it can't be separate. So the, the doing part of the work, the creation part of the work can't be separate from the learning. So that's what we're beginning to do here and [00:25:00] embed those pieces there. One structural change that we made is our CTA department was separate from our teaching and learning department, and we made sure that we, we just last year put those together.

Tommy Welch: So, so now they, they're at the table with math, science, social studies. They're not s- it's not separate. Some other structural things that we've done is we're beginning to build out those the same way we build out a science lab, we're gonna build out a STEM lab, maker lab, maker space lab, information technology lab space for cybersecurity, as well as for AI development inside of the school, not a separate school.

Tommy Welch: It, it is just as much as a language, Spanish as French is a part of the language structure Those are some systemic things that we're, we're, we're starting to do that I think are necessary and the structure piece that's necessary. The other piece obviously that I [00:26:00] think most school districts are starting to do is making sure that there's a board policy around artificial intelligence, ensuring that it's not one that creates restrictions, but allows it to be a part of the ecosystem that we have.

Tommy Welch: Um, we're also beginning to, uh, we, we already have, but now we're beginning to enhance our instructional framework to make sure that artificial intelligence is a part of this, the lesson plan structure. Teachers know when to implement it, how to implement it, students know how to use it as a tool and how to create, inform, and assess using, using AI.

Tommy Welch: Uh, so those are some things that we're beginning, beginning to work with, um, structurally. Uh, but those are some great opportunities that we're learning from. You know, I will say, you know, I know we're talking about instruction, but the structural part that I'm noticing as well is the executive leadership [00:27:00] use of AI.

Tommy Welch: There's some superintendents that I sat with, and we talked about budget development and strategic plans and things of that sort. Um, you know, you can put those into artificial intelligence, and it can begin to analyze it a lot quicker than you may have. And you can give your team prompts to say, "Okay, I, I need you to look at it this way, and I need you, you create prompts from your, your perspective and s- let- let's, let's let AI be a part of the team."

Tommy Welch: Um, you know, so it, the, the, the... It's not just at the student level, but the executive leadership training is happening as well. So I think that the system of education, us as a whole, is going to move a lot quicker if, if we allow it to so we can move to the twenty-second century learning for our students, but we can begin to transform [00:28:00] education as a whole of what it looks like and the possibility.

Tommy Welch: Dual enrollment is something that has changed because of AI, I believe because, you know, higher education institutions are offering things that we, we don't have. So we're leaning more on that dual, dual enrollment opportunity, and students are moving through the curriculum a lot quicker because they have access to the knowledge.

Tommy Welch: Uh, so you're seeing a lot more students graduate with associates, associate degrees. So, you know, we really need to start to think about when you talk about that twenty-second century learning of w- what does twelfth grade really mean now? Right? And then what does higher education really mean, and are the lines beginning to blur?

Tommy Welch: You know, every state education system, you know, we have our K through 12 organizations, and then we have our K through, then we have our higher education institutions. You know, do we need to now kind of start to talk more about, [00:29:00] you know, can they be seamless? Can we have strategic partnerships where, you know, a, a child may not know whether they're a one or the other, but the point is that they got a degree, and they, and they received a diploma at the same time from the state of Georgia, and they can move forward however they'd like to.

Tommy Welch: There's, the 22nd century is gonna look a lot different, I think systemically and structurally in education, funding, how we plan, what the degrees and diplomas mean. Uh, you know, micro-credentialing, the certificates, the things that, you know, at this point, certificate can be worth more than your actual diploma So these are things we need to take into consideration, and will systems begin to qu- codify those and create, you know, could we create a, a Richmond certificate in conjunction with our area colleges and universities?

Tommy Welch: It's, it's possible. 

Michael Conner: [00:30:00] Absolutely, and well-stated, Dr. Welch. And I, I'll say this because, you know, the, when you talk about executive leadership and the utility of artificial intelligence, that was the w- that was one of the major, one of the major things of why I designed or created the agile diagnostic and AI platform because I know how arduous continuous improvement change management, specifically when we think about the multitude of complexities that are embedded within a redesign or, or large scale map road transformation effort to the 22nd century.

Michael Conner: That's why I brought in or created for executive leaders, for principals, was the agile diagnostic and AI platform so that now they can be able to systematize these workflows or these work streams, implementation steps that leads to this level of [00:31:00] codifying around the bigger vision of that. So thank you for giving, in- inadvertently giving me some kudos about the agile diagnostic and AI platform with advanced analytics and AI.

Michael Conner: I wanna use that. I never talk about it, but since you mentioned executive leadership and AI, I'm gonna throw it in there. But you really, I loved how you brought in this shift of really simplified explanation from a shifting of the 21st century to the 22nd century. At the outset, when you started talking about grade structures, one of the indicators within the 22nd century systems learner framework, specifically around the systems domain, is moving from graded progress to staged progress.

Michael Conner: And every example that you provided within your answer Articulates what stage progress look like, [00:32:00] including building what I like to say the AI literacy in students so that now they can ethically utilize it to be a part of their academic programming. A great question. I always ask the same thing, w- what is 12th grade now in a 22nd century lens?

Michael Conner: You know, what is, and, you know, uh, I'm sorry to my people in higher education, what is a bachelor's or a master's when you see students that go through a two-year program or a certificate micro-credentialing program, and they walk out 18 years old, Dr. Welch, with $119,000 salary? Now, you and I, we did it the traditional way.

Michael Conner: We graduated college. Our first teaching job was at 25, $30,000 with $250,000 in debt. Our, our kids are very smart these days, but you're right. And what I loved about it [00:33:00] too is that part of the 22nd century design is eliminating, I like to say, operational silos, i.e. these isolated departments, to what I'm calling flat structures around collective learning, right?

Michael Conner: I always like to say we have this research and development aspects of it. Now we have collective learning and development by eliminating the, quote unquote, "teaching and learning department," special education department, science department, and we're bringing them together around this, I like to say, conciliation of the vision to achieve it.

Michael Conner: Well stated, Dr. Welch. Well stated. I got a plethora of notes, you know, from this, but I wanna expand on what you were talking about from an AI standpoint, because that's kind of like the explicit and implicit node within the 22nd century education model because, again, by 2035, I always say that we have to close these operational gaps [00:34:00] by 2035, and, you know, I go in depth with that.

Michael Conner: But one of the operational gaps that we have to close is how do we integrate AI strategically from this arrival standpoint? Because when we think about, you know, how we're looking at AI and adopting AI is there's two distinct notions, arrival AI and adoption AI. Right now we're just kind of adopting specific tools, but have, as you alluded to it, arrival AI is the strategic disruption of embedding artificial intelligence, identifying specific intelligence systems that are in alignment to the variables of the operating model as you eloquently put it.

Michael Conner: But- How are you building AI literacy to level set an arrival AI approach to now move away from what we're seeing, which is more of an adoption AI approach, [00:35:00] where that creates what I like to say incongruence in learning organizations in schools today? So how are you building intentionally that AI literacy within Richmond County School System?

Tommy Welch: So a, a wonderful thing that we have, we had a, a wonderful business partnership that allowed us to be a, you know, a- ahead of the curve on this. So there are obviously closed AI programs that you can, you can purchase, and they allowed us the opportunity to purchase a closed AI system, which allowed our school system to begin, and all of our teachers to have access to, to create lesson plans, to create assessments, right?

Tommy Welch: To create very specific tutors for their classes. So they begin to play with it, and as they begin to adapt it, they begin to realize that there is, this is so much more than just, you know, a resource. This is a new way of doing business. [00:36:00] So how do we begin to educate our students on when is the appropriate time to use it?

Tommy Welch: How do, how do you use this tool? So they begin to bu-build guidelines and ask for guidelines inside of the lesson plan structure. So systemically and structurally, what we begin to realize is that we, we had an instructional technology department, and we needed to infuse that in instructional technology and move the instructional technology department inside of our curriculum and instruction.

Tommy Welch: So that is now a part of the instructional framework. It, it's not a s- it's not a set aside anymore of it's a tool. It is how, how are we embedding it in our pre-teaching, our activating learning, our focused instruction, our guided instruction, our collaborative learning, you know, the independent learning?

Tommy Welch: How does it show up? How could you use it? You know, the closure piece. Is AI used in closing? Is it appropriate to use [00:37:00] in closing? Uh, and if you do use it, how do you use it? So, you know, it's really embedded in everything that we do, but it's a part of teaching and learning now. It's not an addition to. It is, it is a part of the acceleration of the learning process.

Tommy Welch: So the students are beginning to use it as ways to create study tools for themselves, to show their mastery of learning, to check their learning. They're doing, they're using it as, teachers are using it as ways to, to, for students to have them when they're not physically with them. So they're training the bot to answer questions as if it was them So when the student is not physically in the classroom, they can still ask the bot and get the answer as if the teacher would give it, because everything that they fed to the bot is their own work.

Tommy Welch: So they don't have to worry about it. Are, are they getting it off of the internet? Is the bot being fed by something else? It's [00:38:00] an internal, it's an internal mechanism that they're beginning to use, so it, it's becoming something that is just a part of the work. The teachers are being trained on the, the ethics of it.

Tommy Welch: Students are being trained of the ethics of it, but it's not a separate ... It, it started off as a separate Tool and, and when you taught them the ethics so that it seemed as if they were just being taught of, you know, I don't know if you remember when they would teach us how to research and they would say, "When you research, you wanna make sure that you cite work appropriately and things of that sort."

Tommy Welch: We're beyond that now. We're, we're talking about this is a part of the work, here's, here's how you use it. Of course, you wanna make sure that the work of, is your own, but let's talk about how you train this bot to become a tool that is working for you to allow you to work a lot faster. Which is a different mind shift from where we were when I first joined the [00:39:00] team.

Tommy Welch: Um, we are now talking about how do we use this technology to work for us and duplicate and help us move faster, not to do the work for us, if that makes sense. There's, there's a, th- th- there's a difference between you trying to get the bot to create something for you that you just say is your work, but you didn't really do it, whereas you're taking the information you know that you need, feeding it to the bot, asking it to accelerate it and accelerate your learning and your creativity, which is, which is where we are right now in the use of, in the use of that.

Tommy Welch: So teachers are asking it, how does, how do, how does this enhance the learning? How do you take this from a DOK one to a DOK five? So these, these are the types of things that, you know, we're beginning to do with that. We have AI training built into our professional development, the same as you have literacy [00:40:00] training built into it.

Tommy Welch: It's a part of our pre-planning approach. Our, our, our RESA, which is a regional approach to, uh, professional development, they're providing AI training for our, our executives as well as our principals and as well as our teachers, and not just the exposure to AI, but from the instructional standpoint of how, how is AI inside of the teacher responsibility and student responsibility enhancing what we're doing.

Michael Conner: Dr. Welch, very intentional. And what, why I like your approach with this is because, and befo- I, I, and you know I do a, a ton of AI work domestically here, internationally, unpacking the 22nd century education model, and I always say before we can get to the pedagogical approach with AI, we have to create the foundations of the culture, right?

Michael Conner: The collective mental [00:41:00] model, the collective Ideation around what this looks like, culture before strategy. And you intentionally, what I like to say, you intentionally unpacked my AI-centric framework, AI-centric cultural framework, which unpacks three elements, AI mindset, AI literacy, and AI fluency. The triangulation of those three elements you just eloquently contextualized or unpacked, where now it leads synergistically into the instructional framework and the pedagogical, the, the, the pedagogical frame that you've created in Richmond.

Michael Conner: Very, very intentional. But I wanna go back to that culture piece, and with, around the AI-centric cultural framework that I developed, AI mindset, AI literacy, and AI fluency. When I think about AI mindset, [00:42:00] how did you create those sustaining coalitions, those guiding coalitions to now sustain the work from a micro and macro level?

Tommy Welch: Yeah. You know, I wanna say, you know, it first starts with the leader. So, you know, our superintendent is not afraid of AI. She leaned into it and she said, "We have, this is the future, and our students are learning for the future, so let's lean into this." Now, I will admit, in some situations, in some, some, some systems, they are afraid of it.

Tommy Welch: They're trying to, you know, put barriers, and the policies are really to restrict it and not grow it. And that, the, the leader here did not do that. Um, she, she said, "Let's, let's really allow our children. They're using it. Let's see and work with them on how we can develop this to become a part of what we're doing."

Tommy Welch: Um, so I will say that I think that that culture and the systems, it [00:43:00] starts first with the leader's ability to be agile and work, work with not just the organization, but the AI system as it changes every day, to be agile enough to say, you know, this, this is a, this is not something that's stagnant, so we can't be stagnant with it.

Tommy Welch: Um, to allow that flexibility was there. So as, as we begin to introduce AI superintendent was not afraid to be agile with it and say, "It's, it's okay. So students are using it, so how can we teach our students to use it to accelerate learning?" Rather than saying they can't use it, rather than saying the teachers can't use it or they can only use it up to a certain point, the s- the system was very agile in addressing and meeting the teachers' needs instead of saying no.

Tommy Welch: 'Cause we could [00:44:00] easily, through our structure, you know, as any school system can, say that no s- no school system device can access any AI platform. We can easily do that. We can easily do that and say that if you're on our internet, you can't access it. Um, but our, our leader did not do that. Uh, she wanted to make sure that we had access to it.

Tommy Welch: Microsoft Pilot, we, we have it, it's accessible. It, you know, it's something that she encourages the use of. So it's a, it became a part of our culture, I think, because the leader allowed it to, did not shy away from it when we would recognize things that were created with AI. We didn't, we didn't shame someone for using AI We say, you know, "Tell us how you got to this point.

Tommy Welch: This looks like you used, it look like, it looks like AI might have been used to help create this. Talk to us more about how you used AI to develop this. How did you make sure it was your true voice? [00:45:00] How do you ensure it's your true..." So we, we, it's, we're a learning organization. That culture was created, you know, through allowing AI to be a part, uh, at the table.

Tommy Welch: I think that's necessary in order for this growth to happen. Because as we're sitting here today, tomorrow there'll be something else introduced through the platforms or through something that someone else creates just through feeding it, you know. And, and we have to be willing to say, "Never thought about using it that way."

Tommy Welch: How will we introduce that into our structure? You know, you talked a lot about change, but I like to think a lot about with, in the change structure that Kotter has, they also talk about the innovation structures, how you introduce innovation into systems and structures that already exist. And a part of the change structure is that you have to be a ambidextrous, uh, organization to allow those things to happen.

Tommy Welch: So these systems and structures that are in place that we [00:46:00] know we hold dear, near and dear to our heart, that we know have to be in place in order for the organization to function, you have to hold that at the same time, but at the same time you have to hold innovation right next to it. So as the systems and structures are moving vertically and horizontally up and down, sometimes innovation kind of moves like a, you know, some people see as like a cycle, some people might say it's a kind of like a tornado.

Tommy Welch: Like it's, but as it's moving, and it's moving and you find those synergy pieces where you're like, "Hey, that can work," they're moving side by side. But when, as they're moving side by side, this is the things that are structures, this is the innovation. You have to allow the, the, the, the synergy of the innovation to now come into the structures.

Tommy Welch: And, and that's what's happening right now. As the synergy is happening with the innovation of AI, allowing it to move into the, the, the structures that we have to change how we do business. [00:47:00] A- and that doesn't happen overnight, and I can't tell you it's perfect, but being able to be nimble Is allowing us to, to maneuver through those pieces, and I think is creating the success.

Tommy Welch: You know, we've had a record, record, uh, graduation rate, 81% last year. It's, it's projected to be definitely about three or four percentage points higher. Our student growth is continuously to happen through every s- every student group that we're having. And, and that's not an accident. It's because that, that synergy and the use of the, the resources and being agile is creating innovation, not just from a s- a school leader level.

Tommy Welch: It's all the way down to the student level, which is great. 

Michael Conner: Dr. Welch, I'll tell you this, right? I just love hearing you speak. A, I'm biased because you're an alpha man, and you are just l- you are just dropping, dropping the nuggets in [00:48:00] that last answer. To my audience, this is another answer you wanna play back because, you know, a part of what I call the operational gap of AC 2035, I'm using that benchmark where AI, digital transformation, digital incorporation, model adaptiveness will have to be standardized by then.

Michael Conner: And a part of the operational gap that I talk about is exactly, Dr. Welch, what you've articulated, right? System stagnation. I literally have that, where there's that level of s- the reason why we're not reaching this 22nd century education model is because there's system stagnation around rapid innovation and experimentation.

Michael Conner: You articulated nicely what you guys are doing. That's why you're seeing this acceleration in the Richmond County School system, is because you're very intentional [00:49:00] of how you're moving away or shifting away from this level of system stagnation. You provided the example. Instead of say, "Hey, what are you doing?"

Michael Conner: to the teacher, with AI, you're like, "Oh, what, what are you, what are you unpacking? What can I learn from this approach with this?" I love how you referenced Kotter's work. Look at you dropping Kotter. You know, just, just dropping that, the change structures vertically and horizontally. And you talked about being ambidextrous, and then I automatically go to when I think about ambidextrous systems, one of my former professors, Harvard, Michael Tushman, shout out to Professor Tushman.

Michael Conner: Tushman talks about that in leading change, where we have to create this level, as he stated, being ambidexterity. That's how we put it. Ambidexterity in the context of our practices and the systems, and then I wanna under- underscore it with another one that you talked about with Kotter's change structures.

Michael Conner: For change structures and to have that agile [00:50:00] architecture, as you stated so eloquently, we have to start applying this level of systems to thinking, Daniel Kahneman's work. But Dr. Welch, this is the last question, and I, I, a- again, it's hard to contain an alpha man, especially, you know, high level 9.0, 10.0 intellect as yourself to three words.

Michael Conner: But Dr. Welch, it never works, but I'm gonna try, specifically with you. What three words do you want today's audience to leave our podcast today with regards to impact and influence for leadership preparation within learning organizations to be AC 2035 ready? 

Tommy Welch: Empower every learner. 

Michael Conner: Empower every learner.

Michael Conner: Are you gonna stick to that? I, I, [00:51:00] I, go ahead, go ahead, go ahead. Uh, uh 

Tommy Welch: Empower every learner every day. That's what I'll sell. 

Michael Conner: Empower 

Tommy Welch: every- That's five, I think 

Michael Conner: That's five. Wait a minute. One, two, three, four, five. That's probably- 

Tommy Welch: And I can unpack that, but I'm not 

Michael Conner: Oh, you're not, you're just gonna... Okay, you're just gonna drop the mic.

Michael Conner: Okay. 

Tommy Welch: Yeah. Empower every learner every day. If you do that, if you do that, 

Michael Conner: then 

Tommy Welch: you will get there. 

Michael Conner: Dr. Welch is a rule follower, so but he didn't technically, he didn't follow the rules. He provided five, that was his elaboration. Three plus two. Empower every learner every day. I love it. Dr. Tommy Welch, it has been an absolute honor having you on Voices for Excellence.

Michael Conner: Dr. Welch, you dropped many, many nuggets. To my audience, if they wanna continue a conversation or if they wanna have a conversation and continue to elaborate on some of your responses, how would they be able to get in touch with you? [00:52:00] 

Tommy Welch: My email address is W-E-L-C-H-T-O@B-O-E.richmond.K12.ga.us.

Tommy Welch: I'll make sure that, uh, I'll put, I'll try to share it as much as possible, but when I share out this, this podcast, I'll make sure I put it in the, the comments as well. 

Michael Conner: Absolutely. Dr. Welch, it's just been an absolute honor. I know I'm gonna be seeing you sometime in the fall coming up. I wanna wish you and the Richmond County School system all the best in the '26, '27 academic year.

Michael Conner: You have an absolute strong framework to prepare students for this 22nd century economy. Your, your learning organization and your school community is very, very, very lucky to have leadership like you, your superintendent, and your executive team. Thank you, Dr. Welch, for coming on VFE. 

Tommy Welch: Thank you so much. It has been an honor.

Tommy Welch: Thank you, sir. 

Michael Conner: Absolutely. And on that note, onward and upward, [00:53:00] everybody. Have a great evening