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.

Stop waiting for Superman?

You don't know if school transformation has taken root until the third principal.

That's one of the intriguing statements Eric Guckian,  executive director of Charlotte's New Leaders office,  tossed out when he filled me in on the group's latest thinking.  He was quoting Jennifer Henry from the national office,  and the comment represents a shift in strategy for a group that was founded to recruit principals for urban schools.

We all know the  "heroic principal"  scenario, which is a staple of the reform movement:  A charismatic leader charges in to turn around a failing school.  Sometimes that person founders quickly and quietly departs.  But sometimes,  when all goes well,  that leader energizes the staff,  inspires the students and creates a  "beat the odds"  school.

Then,  inevitably,  the successful leader is promoted or moves on to a new job outside the system.  And almost as inevitably,  the school slips back toward mediocrity or worse.

Guckian

That's why Guckian says his group is shifting from what he calls  "the insurgent model"  --  an individual jumping in to shake up the school  --  to an approach based on  "flooding the zone" with a team of like-minded leaders committed to a long-term change. The Emerging Leaders program offers two years of leadership preparation for teachers who may go on to become principal interns,  academic facilitators or informal school leaders,  part of a school team designed to carry on a vision even if the principal departs.  Developing talent from within is now emphasized over finding stars from outside.

"We believe that the unit of change is the school,"  Guckian said.

Principals remain important to New Leaders' work with Project LIFT and other high-poverty Charlotte-Mecklenburg schools. But there's a growing acknowledgement that they can't do the work alone,  and that life-changing results don't come quickly.

CMS features prominently in a recent Wallace Foundation report on cultivating the kind of principals that urban schools need.  Much of the report reinforces the notion that there's more to the task than hiring an outstanding individual.  It outlines efforts in CMS and elsewhere to evaluate, coach and support principals.

"In successful schools, leadership and authority don’t reside in any single person or position," the report concludes.  "The most enduring improvements occur through the consistent, shared exercise
of leadership by many in the school community and the district central office."

But the Wallace Foundation report also uses bad information to support the "principal as savior" model,  citing an article that CMS Deputy Superintendent Ann Clark wrote on the CMS strategic staffing plan for the August School Administrator journal  --  a cover story illustrated by an image of principals literally parachuting in to save schools.  The Wallace report quotes Clark on the importance of a great leader,  and sums up strategic staffing: "The results so far: Nearly all 24 of the participating schools have been successfully turned around, with single-year state test scores up as much as 20 points."

It's just not true to say all,  or even most,  strategic staffing schools have been successfully transformed by the principals then-Superintendent Peter Gorman brought in for three-year turnaround efforts.  As I reported in August,  actual results are mixed and often discouraging.  Early gains have  proven tough to sustain,  especially after principals move on.

Three years seemed like a long time to wait when Gorman rolled out strategic staffing.  Now that he has left CMS and most of the original principals have moved on,  it's starting to look like the "three principals" standard might be the real test.