The Instructional Core, Explained in 3-ish Slides

Literacy. Problem-based learning. Experiential learning. High-quality instructional materials. Career- and technical- education. AI preparedness. Algebra. Career-connected learning. Many organizations across the education ecosystem are working hard to strengthen outcomes for students.

At a time when the economy is evolving rapidly and expectations for what schools should prepare students to do are expanding just as quickly, there is no shortage of priorities competing for the attention of education leaders.

Yet despite the urgency behind many of these efforts, meaningful changes in teaching and learning often prove difficult to achieve.

More than 20 years ago, Richard Elmore offered a useful explanation for why that is.

He argued that improving student learning ultimately depends on strengthening three interdependent relationships. In practice, however, many reform efforts—despite the best of intentions—tend to focus on only one of them.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, the instructional core offers a helpful way to think about how meaningful improvements in education actually occur—and why so many well-intentioned reforms struggle to produce the results they hope for.

This idea has shaped how I approach much of my work. Whether advising philanthropic leaders on catalytic investments, supporting nonprofits building partnerships, or helping education agencies develop strategy, I look for ways to connect the work back to the instructional core—even when the organizations I’m working with operate outside schools.

The critical question becomes: how is your organization channeling its unique strengths—no matter how far removed from classrooms—to shape the work students are actually asked to do? When philanthropy, ed-tech, nonprofits, and other partners make that connection explicit, the likelihood that their efforts improve learning grows considerably.

The reason is simple: if an initiative does not ultimately influence what happens between teachers and students around content, its impact on learning will be limited.

As new technologies and initiatives flood into education, the organizations most likely to make a lasting difference will be those that continually ask a simple question:

How does this change the work students are doing and the support teachers have to guide that work well?

This is where we know learning actually happens.