Mark and Nicole didn’t plan on having this conversation.

It was one of those “we only have an hour” kinds of meetings — wedged into a week that already felt too heavy. The kind of week where you can feel the tension in the building before you even walk through the doors.

For Mark, it was exam week at the high school. And it was his first time teaching the new curriculum he’d spent the previous year coaching and implementing across the district. His first time watching students respond to these lessons in real time. His first time seeing frustration land on their faces when they were asked to actually understand — not mimic, not memorize, but understand. That shift doesn’t come quietly.

But Mark wasn’t just feeling the pressure as a classroom teacher. He was feeling it as a leader.

This year, the district had shifted his role. He wasn’t coaching full-time anymore. Now he was split — part-time in the classroom, part-time holding the system together.

Nicole’s world looked different, but the weight was the same.

Nicole had been coaching and coordinating long enough to know that real change rarely shows up quickly on the scoreboard. She’d spent years building systems, supporting teachers, and trying to move the work forward in their small Michigan district.

And in a small district, that work matters even more — because there aren’t layers of support and endless capacity to fall back on.

They were the capacity.

And right now, they were both holding the same uncomfortable truth that almost every K–12 math coordinator has felt at some point:

They had adopted a high-quality instructional resource. And it wasn’t changing things the way they hoped it would.

The conversation every district is having

On paper, Mark and Nicole’s district had done everything right.

They adopted a strong curriculum — Connected Math 4. They committed to doing the work. Mark believed it plainly: it was a really strong curriculum.

But inside the day-to-day reality of classrooms? It didn’t feel like a transformation. It felt like a grind.

Teachers were frustrated. Pacing was the constant complaint. They felt behind. They felt like they couldn’t get through the material. And the same conversation kept circling:

“We need more time.” “We need to slow down.” “We need to reteach.” “We can’t move on until they get it.”

And if you’ve ever led math improvement work in a district, you know what happens next.

The whispers start growing louder:

Maybe the resource isn’t the right fit. Maybe we chose wrong. Maybe we need something different.

It’s a familiar storyline. A district invests heavily in year one, hopeful that the new curriculum will fix what’s been broken for years. By year two, momentum wobbles. Funding gets tight. Patience runs thin. And if scores don’t rise quickly enough, the conclusion comes fast:

“This isn’t working. We need to switch.”

Pause here.

If you’re a K–12 math coordinator reading this, I want you to stop at this exact moment.

Because this is where districts make the most expensive mistake in math improvement.

Not financially expensive — although that happens too.

The kind of expensive that costs you years of progress.

The mistake is this: confusing implementation struggle with curriculum failure.

Research backs this up clearly. Districts often see little to no improvement from new curriculum in the early years — not because the materials are weak, but because teachers aren’t being supported to use them with fidelity. When curriculum change is paired with sustained coaching, professional learning, and aligned leadership, outcomes improve. When it isn’t, switching materials simply resets the clock (Blazar et al., 2019).

A high-quality instructional resource will not change outcomes simply because it was purchased.

A new curriculum is not a strategy. It’s a tool. And tools only work when people know how to use them.

Why the first year almost always feels worse

When a district adopts HQIM, it’s incredibly common for things to feel harder before they feel better.

Not because the curriculum is wrong. Because the old system doesn’t disappear just because new materials show up.

The old habits still show up. The old pacing decisions still show up. The old beliefs about “coverage” still show up. And teachers do what humans do when something feels unfamiliar: they reach for what’s comfortable.

That’s why you see things like pre-teaching skills upfront before students ever touch the task. Stalling instead of moving forward. Skipping the “activate learning” portion because there’s not enough time. Modifying lessons before anyone has actually learned them — because “my students won’t be able to do that.”

These aren’t signs of a bad curriculum. They’re signs of a system that hasn’t yet built the capacity to support a better one.

Research confirms this pattern. In large-scale studies of curriculum implementation, teachers using more rigorous materials reported watering down lessons when they believed the content was too demanding — not out of indifference, but as a response to discomfort, time pressure, and a lack of sustained support (Blazar et al., 2019). And those decisions compound. TNTP’s The Opportunity Myth found that students end up spending more than 500 hours per year on work below grade level, particularly in schools serving students from low-income communities (TNTP, 2018).

None of that means the curriculum is broken.

It means the system is still learning how to use it.

Here’s what most districts expect after adopting HQIM: “Now instruction will improve.”

Here’s what actually happens: “Now we’ve exposed every weakness in our support system.”

HQIM doesn’t hide your gaps. It reveals them.And that’s why it feels like it “isn’t working.” Because it’s forcing the real question: Are we willing to change our practice… or are we only willing to change our materials?

Why switching is so tempting — and why it’s usually the wrong move

Switching feels productive. It feels decisive. It gives people hope and leaders something to announce. It gives staff something new to believe in — or something new to blame.

But most importantly, switching allows a district to avoid the hardest part of the work: staying in the messy middle long enough to build teacher capacity.

When teachers are uncomfortable, they don’t need a new resource. They need support.

When pacing is falling apart, they don’t need a new program. They need coaching around decision-making and lesson design.

When students are struggling, they don’t need another adoption cycle. They need adults who are getting better at facilitating thinking.

If you’ve ever been in the seat Mark and Nicole are sitting in, you already know this:

You don’t implement a curriculum. You build capacity in people.

So what do you actually do instead?

If your district is in the “this isn’t working” phase, don’t rush to replace the resource. Do this first.

Find out what’s actually happening in classrooms. Not what teachers say is happening. Not what the pacing guide says should be happening. What’s actually happening. Because pacing problems are often masking something deeper: teachers stuck in routines that steal instructional time, summaries getting skipped so learning doesn’t consolidate, lessons being improvised without anyone internalizing the purpose, cognitive demand being quietly lowered to regain control.

Stop trying to support everyone equally. This is the leadership trap for coordinators. You want to be fair. You want to show up everywhere. But when you spread support too thin, nobody gets enough — and when nobody gets enough, nothing changes enough to matter.

Build a pocket of success and let it become proof. Instead of dragging the whole system forward at once, build one strong example. One grade-level team. One building. One cluster of teachers who are getting real, sustained support to implement the curriculum with integrity. Not because you’re giving up on everyone else — but because you’re creating evidence. You’re building belief. You’re showing what’s possible when the materials are actually supported.

Research on instructional change confirms this instinct. The greatest gains in curriculum implementation tend to occur where teachers receive deep, sustained support — particularly among early adopters who model what high-quality implementation looks like in practice (Elmore, 2004; Kane et al., 2016). Those classrooms become reference points for the rest of the system.

Once you have that pocket of proof, you have a story your district can’t ignore. And you’ll know exactly which conditions — which coaching moves, which PLC focuses, which leadership signals — made the difference.

Back to Mark and Nicole

While the temptation to switch was sitting right there in the room, Mark and Nicole were holding something bigger than curriculum frustration.

They were holding the pressure to prove change quickly… in a system that doesn’t change quickly.

The reality that in a small district — or even a large one — you don’t get unlimited chances. You get one window. And if that window closes too soon, the coaching disappears, the initiative fades, and the story becomes: “We tried [curriculum]. It didn’t work.”

What Mark and Nicole were beginning to understand is the same thing research makes clear: curriculum adoption is not the finish line. It’s the starting point. High-quality materials create opportunity — but only systems that invest in coaching, leadership clarity, and sustained learning convert that opportunity into results.The moment they were living through is the moment most districts misunderstand. When implementation feels heavy, the instinct is to blame the materials. But the materials are usually just revealing the real issue: the system around teachers isn’t yet strong enough to carry the shift.

LAUNCH: A pathway from purchase to practice

If HQIM is going to become a lever for instructional change — not just a new set of books — leaders need a repeatable way to wrap professional learning structures around the materials. That’s what the LAUNCH framework is designed to do.

L — Learn the Why. Before teachers ever open the teacher manual, they need to understand the purpose behind the curriculum choice. Why this resource? What problem is it designed to solve? What kind of student experience should it create? Without that clarity, adoption defaults to compliance — and teachers fill the gaps with their own interpretations. The move here is simple: host a rollout session where leaders, coaches, and teachers explore the rationale together.

A — Activate Instructional Leadership. Principals and coaches are the linchpins of curriculum success. Equip them before you ask teachers to implement. Train them in the curriculum’s design. Clarify what to look for during walkthroughs. Align coaching cycles to upcoming units. When leaders share a common mental model of the instructional shifts the curriculum demands, they protect coaching time, align feedback, and resist competing priorities.

U — Understand Through Experience. Reading about a lesson is not the same as doing the math yourself. Teachers need to grapple with the same problems their students will face — anticipate where thinking will break down, practice facilitation moves, feel what the curriculum is actually asking of learners. This work belongs inside PLCs. That’s where it’s most sustainable and most connected to the classroom.

N — Normalize Early Struggles. If the expectation is perfection from day one, teachers will retreat to old habits. Early implementation is supposed to feel mechanical. It’s supposed to feel awkward. Leaders and coaches need to say this out loud — in PLCs, in coaching conversations, in walkthroughs — and mean it. Celebrate productive mistakes. Share challenges alongside wins. Clarify that fidelity means honoring the intent of the curriculum, not following scripts blindly.

C — Coach with Purpose. This is where coaching functions as the engine, not the add-on. Coaching should target the instructional shifts the curriculum actually demands — not just logistics around scheduling and materials. Student work and lesson planning are the entry points. When coaching stays connected to what the curriculum is designed to make possible, it becomes the structure that holds everything else in place.H — Highlight and Scale What’s Working. Momentum grows when success is visible. Showcase effective lessons. Host teacher-led lesson studies. Share student work and outcomes publicly. By making bright spots visible, leaders create pull rather than pressure — and the system starts to spread improvement through belief, not mandate.

Where are you right now? A quick reflection

LAUNCH gives you the pathway. But the real challenge is knowing which step is your next step. Some systems need to rebuild the “why” so teachers understand what the curriculum is designed to make possible. Others need leadership clarity so principals stop unintentionally pulling coaching time away from instruction. Others need to normalize early struggles so teachers don’t abandon the materials the first time pacing gets tight.

Use this quick reflection to find your starting point. For each area, honestly ask yourself where your district or school currently sits:

Learn the Why — Have we clearly communicated why we chose this curriculum, and do teachers understand it beyond “the district adopted it”?

Activate Instructional Leadership — Are principals and coaches equipped with specific tools and look-fors, or are they observing without a shared lens?

Understand Through Experience — Are teachers doing the math themselves and anticipating student thinking before they teach it, or are they left to figure it out alone?

Normalize Early Struggles — Do teachers feel safe to try, stumble, and learn — or is there pressure to get it right immediately?

Coach with Purpose — Is coaching tied to the instructional shifts the curriculum demands, or is it general and disconnected from what’s actually happening in lessons?

Highlight and Scale What’s Working — Are bright spots being surfaced and shared, or are wins staying invisible beyond individual classrooms?

You don’t need to score perfectly on any of these. You just need to know where coherence is strong, where it’s fragile, and where one system-level move will unlock momentum. Pick the area that feels most urgent — and align your PLCs, coaching, PD, and leadership routines around that single focus for the next six to eight weeks.

The bottom line

Curriculum adoption is not the finish line. It’s the starting point.

If HQIM is revealing struggles right now, that’s not evidence it was the wrong choice. It’s evidence that the system around it is still building the capacity to make it work.

Don’t switch. Don’t panic. Don’t spread yourself thin trying to fix everything at once.

Pick one lever. Stay with it. Build one pocket of proof. And trust that the work — when it’s supported — compounds.

That’s what Mark and Nicole were learning. And it’s what every district that sustains math improvement eventually figures out:

You don’t implement a curriculum. You build capacity in people. The curriculum just gives you something worth building around.

Want to get ahead of the rollout curve?

Start by using our Math Curriculum Readiness Reflection Tool to assess whether your current support systems are setting teachers up for success. You’ll walk away with clarity on where the biggest gaps are—and which piece of the LAUNCH framework to activate first.

👉 [Click here to get the free reflection tool]

👉 If your district is navigating curriculum implementation and you want support designing a system that carries the work forward, learn more about the District Improvement Program.