In my seven years as a traditional public school principal, I often wondered what I could accomplish if my school’s strategy was set by me and my team rather than by central administrators.

I started to answer this question in 2014 when I was accepted to The Mind Trust’s Education Entrepreneur Fellowship. The program provides education entrepreneurs with the time and resources they need to develop and launch transformative non-profits and schools in Indianapolis. As a fellow, I was lucky to travel the country, learning from leaders in education and developing my vision for Global Preparatory Academy, a dual-language elementary school, from scratch.

Here are three lessons I learned over the course of my fellowship:

1. Get to know your community.

Building relationships and getting members of your community on board with your vision at the start will save time and help you to avoid missteps. During the two years that I was planning Global Prep, I worked with community hubs like Flanner House and the Riverside Civic League to learn the contours of the community. These relationships helped me see things through a different lens and gave me a perspective that I might have not been privy to finding if I had only spoken with educators. Their thoughts and guidance throughout the process and still to this day are invaluable.

2. Your team matters.

Find teammates who are committed to solving the problem you are trying to fix and who are able to provide you with insights that allow you to constantly reimagine and improve your practice. When I traveled to San Francisco and Oakland, California, as an education entrepreneur fellow, I met with school leaders who shared their personal experience launching innovation school models from the ground up. We had candid conversations about how community resources and assets helped inform their work and the importance of building a team that would fit best for our school and our community. At Global Prep, our teachers realized early on that many of our students were facing challenges that were beyond what we had initially expected. That required our team to come together and reorganize to create an extension room where students who need additional support can start their day and complete their work in the presence of a caring, nurturing adult. This would have been impossible without the right team.

3. Keep an open mind.

Any new endeavor, and certainly a new school, requires patience and hard work. Your first answer isn’t usually your best answer. Keep trying — and listen to your community, your team and others. I knew I wanted to create a bilingual school and was fortunate enough through the fellowship program to spend six weeks in Mexico, which helped me to pivot my thinking about how to teach students and really authenticate our school model. Building a network of advisors, asking many questions, taking copious notes, and genuinely listening is fundamentally important.

This past August, we opened Global Preparatory Academy. We teach students all core material in both English and Spanish — exposing underserved children to the cultural richness that is usually reserved for kids whose families have money for extra enrichment.

The fellowship I had — and the lessons I learned along the way — have put my school on solid footing from our first day. I can’t wait to see what my team, our students and our entire community accomplish.