Journal of K-12 Educational Research 29 those supports as continuing throughout the life of the school. National conferences, leadership conferences, rubrics, protocols, and school coaching were just some of the resources that principals named specifically. Some principals noted that some of those items are more or less important as a school ages, but all principals believed these resources were important to the success of the schools. Conclusions The New Tech Network innovative model schools in the current study have shown relative resiliency in terms of their School Connectedness and Learning Experience scores regardless of what age the school is in the innovative model. This reaffirmation of the mission through fidelity to key elements of the model, is in line with Gooding’s (2012) study of non-profit organizations as they negotiate, but ultimately reaffirm their mission over time. While Gooding’s model applied to organizations in general, the current study is the first to find evidence of mission adherence between innovative model schools and the mission of the model. The current study provides several hints as to why innovative model schools are able to maintain their success with their mission over time. While it was found in the interviews that there are times where principals may be misaligned to the mission and cause turmoil at their schools, it was also found that districts seem to correct for these flaws by hiring successors who return to the mission and are already aligned to either the district itself or the innovative model and its practices in particular. No specific conclusions can be drawn from the variety of hiring practices used to select principals for innovative model schools however, there was a reaffirmation of the importance of using a principal pipeline within districts that can prepare individuals for leadership as a potential solution (Gates et al., 2019; National Association of Secondary School Principals, 2007; Wallace Foundation, 2017). The strength of the innovative model at providing ongoing support to schools through its national organization is a phenomenon that seems to have considerable strength for the schools studied here. Networked improvement communities have been shown in various arenas to provide considerable support to organizations as they scale in size and across communities by providing the resources and support to test and learn across the organization (Bryk et al., 2016; Hernandez et al., 2019). Unique to the current study is the enumeration of the many different ways that innovative model schools and their principals receive support from their networked community, like learning from coaches, conferences, and interactions with other schools or principals in the organization to help them in their leadership. student collaboration. Table 1 summarizes some of the key terms. Table 1 Terms Used by Principals to Describe Maintenance of Innovative Model Pillars Culture that Empowers Outcomes That Matter Teaching That Engages Culture over content Whole child Student voice and choice Work hard, play hard More than curriculum Authenticity Culture week Specific references to innovative model outcomes PBL protocols Relationships Students make the rules Shared leadership Agency Celebrations Outside evaluators Critical Friend Protocol The national organization, and all of the resources that were associated with it, were seen by principals as one of the earliest levels of support they received when they became innovative model principals and they see those supports as continuing throughout the life of the school. National conferences, leadership confer nces, rubrics, prot cols, and school coaching were just some of the resources that principals named specifically. Some principals noted that some of those items are more or less important as a school
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