Designing dream schools

Principals are described as lead designers of  "a dream school house"  in a presentation Superintendent Heath Morrison made to the school board Tuesday. He talked about the growing  competition from charter, private, online and magnet schools,  which can pull students away from traditional neighborhood schools.

"The iceberg is straight ahead,"  says one slide,  illustrated with a graphic of the Titanic.  "Do we continue on our same path with the same result?"


Plans handed down from central offices are part of the old path,  Morrison said.  "I believe that transformation and reform happens best when it happens at the schoolhouse."
 
Morrison talked a lot about finding ways to make each school  "a school of choice" that offers high-quality teaching, programs and schedules that suit the needs of the community.  Board member Ericka Ellis-Stewart suggested he consider a different label,  given the baggage that "choice" carries in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools  (the post-desegregation assignment plan that debuted in 2002 was called "the choice plan.")

There aren't a lot of specifics yet.  Morrison said he and principals will be hashing those out during the summer leadership institute and in the coming school year.  But there was some interesting discussion of the strategy.

A couple of board members asked how far the district would go in backing up a principal with a bold vision for change.  Morrison waved a caution flag.  If the vision is only the principal's,  he said,  it's going to fall apart when that principal leaves.  Any plan for change needs to come from the whole school community, he said.  And that means reaching beyond the handful of parents who may be regulars at the PTA meetings:  "It can't be a neighborhood school of choice if you haven't involved the neighborhood."

Any plan that's based on reports of success elsewhere will require in-depth research to make sure that model really works,  he added.  "I want to reward boldness,"  he said,  "but it's a calculated boldness.  You have to do your homework."

Morrison talked about helping each school market itself,  but added that  "I don't want our principals to be used car salesmen."

Also at Tuesday's meeting,  the school board approved this $36 million plan for Title I spending in 2013-14  (read more about the plan here).  It calls for supporting 1,800 Bright Beginnings prekindergarten students,  well under the current total of 3,000.  Deputy Superintendent Ann Clark says that's not a cutback;  it's just because Title I money only pays for part of the program.

References to FOCUS schools may also prove confusing.  In this context,  it's a state label for schools with weaknesses in test scores or graduation rates,  which qualifies those schools for help from academic coaching teams.   The CMS  "FOCUS school"  program,  which provided extra money and supplies to high poverty schools,  has been phased out,  officials said.

The list of Title I schools targeted for special aid also notes that Sterling,  Windsor Park and Allenbrook elementary schools have been named  "reward schools," a state designation based on high performance or growth.  I asked Clark what kind of reward they get.

If you have any familiarity with the way these things work,  you won't be surprised at the answer:  None.

High-poverty schools shortchanged?

The U.S. Department of Education announced Wednesday that more than 40 percent of the nation's high-poverty schools are getting short shrift on local and state education money.

As many blog readers know,  Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools spends significantly more per student at schools with the highest levels of student poverty,  in part because the federal Title I program pumps in millions of dollars in aid.  The Ed Department set out to see whether school districts are using that money to supplant state and local spending,  shifting money to wealthier schools.  They pulled federal money out of the equation and recalculated 2008-09 per-pupil spending for schools in more than 13,000 districts.

According to the news release,  more than 40 percent of Title I schools spent less state and local money on teachers and other personnel than more affluent schools in the same district.

“Educators across the country understand that low-income students need extra support and resources to succeed,  but in far too many places policies for assigning teachers and allocating resources are perpetuating the problem rather than solving it,”  U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan says in the release.  “The good news in this report is that it is feasible for districts to address this problem and it will have a significant impact on educational opportunities for our nation’s poorest children.”

I downloaded their data from CMS (go here for the raw data),  and it doesn't look like high-poverty schools are coming up short,  even without the federal aid factored in.  Not surprisingly,  size and need seem to be the biggest factors in high per-pupil spending;  at very small schools,  administrative,  support and building costs are divided among fewer students.  Small alternative schools had the highest state and local totals,  led by $15,545 at Derita,  which served students with severe behavioral problems.

Garinger High was the highest regular school at $7,462.   At that time,  no CMS high schools had hit the 75 percent poverty mark that CMS uses to distribute Title I aid,  but it's a high-poverty neighborhood school getting lots of extra support from CMS.  In general,  the high-spending list was dominated by small high-poverty elementary schools,  such as Shamrock Gardens and Thomasboro,  and small magnets such as the Montessori schools,  Davis Military/Leadership and Davidson IB.

The lowest per-pupil state and local spending was at large suburban schools with low poverty levels,  according to the federal tally.  Alexander Graham Middle was lowest at $2,907,  followed by Community House Middle at $3,039.  Wilson Middle,  which closed this year,  was the Title I school that landed lowest on the spending list,  95th of 167 schools.