Reeths-Puffer School District administrators complete Lean trainings

The Reeths-Puffer School District in Muskegon, Mich., had nine more administrators complete the Lean Thinking for Schools Training, and eight complete the new Lean Thinking for Schools Train the Trainer Program, offered by the Oakland University Pawley Lean Institute.

Both sessions started in November and ended in January and were taught by Dr. Shannon Flumerfelt, director of Lean Thinking for Schools at the Pawley Lean Institute.

The Lean Thinking for Schools Training consisted of five full-day sessions and focused on creating understanding basic concepts of being a Lean champion, and then developing and implementing projects into the school district.

“We help them with the planning of the projects, and we provide them with what’s called just-in-time support while they’re implementing,” Flumerfelt said. “Just-in-time support simply means that I’m here to assist them when they need it.”

The Train the Trainer program consisted of three sessions and focused on three specific Lean tools and concepts.

Participants learned about Lean tools such as the 5 Why’s, value stream mapping and A3. Concepts covered included overproduction, learning to see and Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) thinking.

Flumerfelt pointed out that an interesting fact about training the Reeths-Puffer team is that the group has taken on a strategy for the training. Reeths-Puffer worked with the Pawley Lean Institute on how to maximize training in the school district to make sure the attendees get as much out of it as possible.

“At the Pawley Institute, we support the idea of strategic training, if possible,” Flumerfelt said. She added that strategic thinking is part of the Lean approach.
“Lean makes us look at what adds value,” said Steve Edwards, assistant superintendent for Curriculum, Professional Development and Technology at Reeths-Puffer. “Knowing that we have very difficult decisions to make, Lean will help us identify those redundancies and gaps that we have.”

According to Edwards, the biggest result of the Lean training is a change in thinking and level of intentionality with decisions.

“With that intentionality, we’ve made better decisions,” he said. Edwards added that the Lean tools allow the district to make intentional, deliberate decisions about how to allocate resources, such as time and money.

Lean Thinking for Schools trainings are nationally available to school systems. For more information, visit www.oakland.edu/leanschools.