Apply to Join Coaching Commons

Leading change is easier in good company, and we'd love for you to join this year's cohort. We call this an application, but think of it as the start of the conversation. Your answers help us understand the project you're bringing, build cohorts that work across time zones, and show up ready to support you from session one.

Coaching Commons is open to educators at GOA member schools. Application deadline: October 23, 2026. We'll be in touch with next steps ahead of our first session on November 4.

ABOUT YOU

Name

A sentence is plenty. A department? A grade level? A group of teachers you support informally? We’re looking for leaders who take work back to colleagues, not just to their own classroom.

THE WORK YOU’D BRING

This is the most important question on the form. Tell us about the actual, in-progress piece of work you want the group to help you think through — a summative assessment you’re rebuilding, a feedback practice you’re trying to shift department-wide, an assessment policy you’ve been asked to rewrite, a question you can’t yet answer about what AI has done to your discipline’s assessments. It does not need to be about AI. Assessment and feedback were always the core work; AI has changed how schools approach them. If your project sits adjacent to that and you’re thinking “this actually aligns with what I’m doing” ... you’re in the right place.

WHERE DOES THIS WORK STAND RIGHT NOW? 

The knot, the tradeoff, the thing you’d want ten smart colleagues from ten other schools to poke at. If you already knew the answer you wouldn’t need the cohort.

THE COHORT

You’ll spend most of your months in this cohort coaching, not presenting. What’s the experience, perspective, or hard-won lesson you’d offer someone else wrestling with theirs? It does not need to be formal or about AI.

Optional. Helps us know what you’re actually here for.

LOGISTICS AND COMMITMENT

City and country, plus your UTC offset if you know it. GOA spans about fourteen time zones. We’ll do our best to accommodate everyone.

COMMITMENT 

Please check each one. This group runs on the assumption that the same people are in the room each month.

OPTIONAL END-OF-YEAR RECOGNITION

Members who want it can present a short artifact or presentation of practice in the spring and earn a certificate and PD hours. It’s opt-in, and you don’t have to decide now.

If so, who? Many of our members are nominated by their PL lead, and we like to close the loop with them.

Applications close October 23, 2026.