Maya's team did the hard part. They committed to a real five-year direction. Our job was to make that direction survive contact with a Tuesday: what gets done this quarter, who owns it, and which numbers tell the truth about whether it is working.
In June 2025, the board of Maya Angelou Schools and See Forever Foundation approved Thriving: Our Journey to 2030, a five-year strategic plan spanning instruction, well-being, scholar transitions, professional practice, and national leadership. The organization has served opportunity and justice-involved youth in Washington, DC since 1997. Staff showed strong alignment to the vision and real pride in Maya's national standing, alongside much lower confidence that current tools and systems could carry the plan into daily practice.
The approved plan set direction across five strategic domains but did not define what had to happen in the first twelve months, who owned each commitment, or how progress would be judged.
Leadership scorecards captured a long list of tactics rather than a small number of quantifiable driving goals, creating a risk of reporting inputs while accountability goals went unmet.
As the organization expanded in size and complexity, staffing models, reporting lines, and cross-functional communication had not caught up with the 2030 ambition.
Reviewed the approved plan and board feedback, ran a network-wide staff survey, and conducted one-on-one leadership interviews, synthesized into a discovery memo with a SWOT analysis, named risks and misalignments, a resource gap analysis, and a staff capacity-to-strategy alignment matrix.
Standard proficiency metrics undercount scholars who arrive credit deficient, court involved, or re-engaging after gaps in schooling. The framework pairs growth and participation measures with proficiency, sets year one targets at verified baselines, and steps targets forward through SY 2029 to 2030.
Each KPI carries a named owner, either the CEO or a vertical chief, with an annual review calendar timed to the OSSE STAR release cycle, a defined process for mid-course recalibration with written rationale, and explicit board asks to anchor future reporting.
Maya Angelou Schools and See Forever Foundation has served opportunity and justice-involved youth in Washington, DC since 1997, across youth, adult, detention, and community settings. A five-year vision is only as strong as the first year of work behind it and the handful of numbers that tell you whether it is holding, and that structure is what lets a scholar population that standard metrics too often miss get counted, and served, accurately.
Our unique population of scholars often falls outside standard measures for student success. Regular reporting made our schools' progress either invisible or appear less than adequate. Our new framework reflects who we actually serve. It also helps us more effectively convey the value that Maya Angelou brings to the public education sector here in D.C. by speaking the District's language.
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