MMTIC® at Combs Elementary | Year 3 Summative Brief
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Acknowledgements
This summative implementation and impact brief highlight key activities from the Murphy-Meisgeier Type Indicator for Children (MMTIC®) Initiative at A.B. Combs Leadership Magnet Elementary (Combs) during the 2020-21 school year. Given the context of the COVID-19 global pandemic and the shift to virtual and hybrid learning, this brief will outline implementation successes and continued challenges as well as the impact of the program on teachers and students. The brief concludes with three lessons learned for future implementation sites.
Background
An RPP Approach to Type Awareness
Since 2018, the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation (FI), Center for Applications of Psychological Type (CAPT) and the Myers & Briggs Foundation, and A.B. Combs Leadership Magnet Elementary School (Combs) have engaged in a research-practice partnership (RPP) to create a new model for application of the MMTIC® instrument (Murphy-Meisgeier Type Indicator for Children®) to improve instruction and student’s social, emotional and academic decision-making in public schools in Wake County, North Carolina. RPPs are enduring reciprocal collaborations between practitioners and researchers that are designed to investigate shared problems of practice and solutions for improving outcomes over time (Coburn, Penuel, & Geil, 2013). Key tenets of RPPs include acknowledgement of each collaborator (i.e., researchers, administrators and teachers) as an equal contributor to the process and iterative engagement between all collaborators to refine data collection, analysis and interpretation (Tseng, Easton, & Supplee, 2017).
The Partners
Within this RPP, the FI and CAPT both serve as the research partners, and Combs is the practitioner partner. The relationship between the organizations is as follows:
- CAPT, a not-for-profit organization, extends and teaches the accurate understanding of the ethical and practical applications of C.G. Jung’s theory of psychological types. CAPT is the exclusive worldwide publisher of the MMTIC® instrument as well as related support materials and provides professional development sessions, coaching and resource support for Combs teachers and administrators to learn about type and how to incorporate type awareness into their school community.
- Led by Principal Muriel Summers, Combs is an elementary school in Wake County, North Carolina, that served over 767 students in grades K-5 during the 2020-21 school year. Combs serves as the implementation site for the MMTIC® Initiative in this partnership. The Combs principal, assistant principal, magnet coordinator, six third grade teachers and five fourth grade teachers were directly involved in this initiative. The magnet coordinator, who is certified to administer the MMTIC®, handles scheduling matters, delivers all type feedback sessions to students and serves as a liaison to the FI.
- The FI is a research institute of the North Carolina State University College of Education. FI researchers collect data to measure strategies employed in the initiative and resulting outcomes.
In 2018, the three partners collectively drafted a logic model to illustrate the key strategies, expected outcomes and ultimate goal of the initiative. This model was updated in 2019-20, and the most current version is available in Appendix A.
Previous Work
In year one of the initiative (2018-2019), third grade students completed the MMTIC® and learned about the type preferences. Simultaneously, third grade teachers modified their instruction to promote type awareness by using the Z-model for problem-solving, revising assignments and assessments, offering students choices and using language respecting type differences. In the first year implementation, data demonstrated several positive outcomes for teachers and students. Teachers reported developing type awareness, understanding and connecting with their students, working as a team and seeing new possibilities for assessing student learning. Likewise, students exhibited seven interrelated outcomes: developing type awareness, enhancing their self awareness, advocating for their choices, challenging themselves to improve their stretches, improving classroom community, enhancing their self-management and promoting motivation and engagement. There were few opportunities for parents to engage in the initiative in year one; still, some reported positive impacts, such as gaining a better understanding of how their children learn. Moreover, many parents articulated a desire for deeper involvement with the initiative.
Inspired by the promising initial results of this initiative, the Combs community decided to continue it into the 2019-20 school year. To begin to scale the program and provide continuity for the students, the initiative was expanded to include fourth grade teachers and students. A mentorship program was also developed where returning third grade teachers served as mentors to the fourth grade teachers as they learned about type and began integrating type awareness into their classrooms.
View Resource
PDF Authors and Contributors
Dr Callie Womble Edwards 
Sara Stegemoller
Related Resources
FI Education Brief – MMTIC® at Combs Elementary l Lessons Learned
This brief highlights lessons learned from the MMTIC® Initiative at Combs during the 2020-21 school year, based on the information found in the MMTIC® at Combs Elementary Year 3 Summative Brief.
Teams
Program Evaluation and Education Research (PEER) Group
Projects
Since 2018, the Friday Institute for Educational Innovation, Center for Applications of Psychological Type and the Myers & Briggs Foundation, and A.B. Combs Leadership Magnet Elementary School have engaged in a research-practice partnership to create a new model for application of the MMTIC® instrument to improve instruction and student’s social, emotional and academic decision-making in public schools in Wake County, North Carolina.
Published
July 9, 2021
Resource Type
Report
Published By
Friday Institute for Educational Innovation
Suggested Citation
Edwards, C.W., and Stegemoller, S. (2021). MMTIC® at Combs Elementary | Year 3 Summative Brief. Raleigh, NC. Friday Institute for Educational Innovation at the NC State University College of Education. [friday.institute/9233]