As I wrote in my May 20th newsletter, for at least half the children in our urban schools, the playing field is never level. They enter kindergarten far behind and remain far behind.
Who should we blame?
As the saying goes, “The buck stops here.” Over the course of my career, I have participated in thousands of meetings – senior cabinet meetings, principal meetings, school board meetings, public hearings, superintendent and school board retreats, and advisory, committee, and community meetings. In every meeting where goals were discussed, increasing reading achievement was always at the top of the list. Yet, reading test scores never increased more than one or two percentage points and the gains were never sustained over time.
Of course, if you are the superintendent, everything is your responsibility.
The buck stops with you.
Over forty years, I worked for twenty superintendents including a few who stood out as exemplary leaders.
Here are just a few of the things they did well.
1. They built strong leadership teams – individuals the superintendent could trust to carry out the responsibilities delegated to them.
2. They only made major changes after thoughtful consideration. Usually, this meant months of discussions, preparation, and a detailed written plan.
3. They hired strong, committed principals.
4. They were smart, well-informed, and had “good judgment.” Typically, they carefully weighed different points of view and chose sound courses of action.
5. Most devoted considerable time to reviewing district data. They were data-savvy and ensured important information was promptly and correctly reported to the public.
6. They were not afraid to oppose politicians and community “leaders” (and, in one case, a four-star general) who they felt were not working in the best interests of the district’s children.
7. Although often reluctant to make personnel changes, they were willing to make the difficult decisions to remove or move people when it was clear they were not performing well (and not improving).
So, given all their positive characteristics, hard work, and commitment, why have even the “best” urban superintendents been unable to ensure that the majority of their students achieve at or near grade level in reading and math?
Amazingly, the answer is fairly simple.
1. First, and perhaps the most shocking (and important) truth about our urban public schools, is that early literacy and numeracy are not urban superintendents’ first priorities. Literacy and numeracy goals are frequently discussed and are prominent in virtually every strategic plan but, in reality, little attention and few resources are dedicated to early literacy and numeracy. Simply put, there has been no sense of urgency.
2. Relatedly, none of the senior teams I served with included a strong advocate to ensure early literacy and numeracy were at the top of the district’s (i.e., superintendent’s) agenda. Several of the superintendents were strong advocates for universal pre-kg and increasing pre-kg enrollments, but they rarely got involved in instructional details or planning.
Superintendents (apparently) see the instructional leadership of the district as someone else’s responsibility. However, that view is totally unacceptable when only 20% of your third and fifth graders are scoring at the “proficient” level in reading (and math) and more than 50% are performing at the lowest level, “below basic.”
3. While there were Title I schools in almost every district I served in that were “beating the odds,” the administrations did not learn from or “scale-up” the successful schools’ strategies and systems. (See the December 8, 2022 and January 26, 2023 newsletters for detailed discussions of the reasons for this failure.)
[“Beating the odds” schools are Title I schools with large percentages (i.e., >90%) of children who qualify for free or reduced price meals and are “predicted” to perform poorly on the state’s summative assessments – based on their demographics and prior histories of low test scores. However, contrary to the statistical predictions, the “beating the odds” schools performed as well as (or better than) the schools in the most affluent neighborhoods and were consistently ranked among the top schools in the district in reading and math achievement.]
4. These concerns, of course, bring me back to the question of “judgment.” Why don’t otherwise great superintendents demand that their teams develop and implement more powerful literacy and numeracy strategies… and why are more resources not allocated to these crucial areas?
A couple of possibilities come to mind – although I find them all to be unbelievable. First, is it possible our district leaders really think that kids from poor communities can’t learn to read? Similarly, do they really think it is too hard for children from poor communities to learn the 1000 most common words in the English language – words we use every day in conversation such as you, me, good, better, more, less, above, below, there, where, when, how, and so on? Or, do they simply think that early literacy and numeracy are not that important?
5. Finally, it is important to understand where superintendents should (and shouldn’t) look for help. I know a number of very smart, capable, and successful consultants and there are many well-known, even famous, national “experts.” They are specialists in curriculum development or professional learning communities or formative assessment or RTI, SEL, restorative justice, special education, or some other very important area.
However, only a (very) small number have ever “turned-around” a failing school.
Those are the experts superintendents must look to – experts who know how to create successful “systems” so that all of the students learn to read, write, do basic math, and apply those skills to solve problems.
Since leaving the Atlanta Public Schools, I have been fortunate to work with a small group of these experts – to identify the key differences between the “beating the odds” schools and the perpetually failing Title I schools. I have written about these issues a number of times before, including in the last newsletter, so I won’t repeat the findings here.
Here, I will only add that superintendents do not need to wait 3 or 4 years to know if they have the right plan or if their plan is working. The right partner can help a district develop powerful literacy and numeracy plans, train principals, and monitor the implementation and progress.
As I said in the last newsletter, the science of reading “revolution” sweeping across the country is a great step in the right direction… but, it is just one step. Before significant long-term gains can be achieved, superintendents must commit to making early literacy and numeracy their districts’ number one, no-excuses-accepted, priority. In other words, urban superintendents must become their districts’ true instructional leaders. That role must not be delegated to anyone… and superintendents (and school boards) must no longer accept failure as the norm.
BE THE FIRST to level the playing field… a field where all of your fifth graders can read, write, spell, and explain the 1000 most common words in the English language and all of your third and fifth graders perform at or near grade level in both reading and math.
Capital Schools Consulting (CSC)
CSC is different. We are only interested in working with district leaders on their most critical challenges. We certainly have experience and expertise in many other areas but we are only interested in devoting our time to those initiatives that can dramatically change children’s lives.
By carefully studying schools that are “beating the odds” we have been able to discover the “secrets” of great schools. Great principals and teachers don’t have supernatural powers that are impossible to replicate. Great principals and teachers simply behave differently.
Capital Schools Consulting (CSC)
https://www.capitalschoolsconsultinggroup.com/
Planning and monitoring district reforms
Major program implementation audits
Evaluate critical priorities
Data analysis and reporting
Executive coaching
Board training – data analytics, planning, and goal setting
Support for new superintendents’ transition teams
Dear Subscribers,
I hope you find the information and ideas in my newsletters compelling and useful. They are informed by over 40 years of experience working with twenty superintendents, dozens of future superintendents, hundreds of senior administrators, and thousands of principals. On almost a daily basis, I listened to their hopes, doubts, complaints, excuses, and promises… and discussed and debated priorities, philosophies, theories, programs, and plans. (A short Bio is provided below.)
If you find the newsletters valuable, please share them with friends and colleagues. Only by informing school board members, educators, parents, and community leaders can we finally create the great schools every child and family deserves. If you have questions or comments, those are also very welcome.
Best Regards!
Bill Caritj
President and CEO
Capital Schools Consulting (CSC)
billcaritj@gmail.com
https://www.capitalschoolsconsultinggroup.com/
Links to recent newsletters:
Practice Makes Perfect
https://williamcaritj.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-our-city-schools-182 (May 20, 2023)
Mental Health, Safety, and School Culture
Part 2: Part 2: Keeping kids in school… at all costs!
https://williamcaritj.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-our-city-schools-db0 (April 13, 2023)
Mental Health, Safety, and School Culture
Part 1: The New Normal
https://williamcaritj.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-our-city-schools-2a0 (April 6, 2023)
“Practical” turn-around strategies
https://williamcaritj.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-our-city-schools-9bb (March 6, 2023)
The Most Important Things I learned in 2022
https://williamcaritj.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-our-city-schools-bd6 (January 26, 2023)
Keep Your Eyes on the Prize!
https://williamcaritj.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-our-city-schools-439 (December 27, 2022)
The Answer is… In Your Own Backyard!
https://williamcaritj.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-our-city-schools-d9c (December 8, 2022)
Where is the Outrage?
https://williamcaritj.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-our-city-schools-061 (November 8, 2022)
Bio/Introduction
For forty years, I was fortunate to lead the assessment, evaluation, and accountability departments of nine public school districts, including six of the largest in the nation – Washington, DC, Baltimore, St. Louis, Austin, Atlanta, and the Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA). In almost every instance, my position was relatively independent of the internal and external “politics.” As a result, I am not biased toward or against any particular specialty, theory, philosophy, or program. My only bias is to results.
Over the years, I have had a wide range of responsibilities including state and local test development, accountability, research and evaluation, standards alignment, school improvement, information technology, and instructional technology. From 2014-2021, I supervised the Atlanta Public Schools (APS) Information Technology, Instructional Technology, Assessment, Research, Evaluation, and Data and Information divisions. Over that period, our teams were credited with restoring the integrity and public trust in the district’s assessment, accountability, and data and information systems after the cheating scandal of 2008. During the COVID pandemic, these outstanding teams also did amazing work to enable and support (and, in many cases, develop) the high-quality virtual programs provided each day to over 50,000 students who were forced to receive their daily instruction at home.
Since “retiring” from the Atlanta Public Schools, I’ve been very busy – working on a book, How to Fix Our City Schools, publishing a monthly newsletter (of the same name), and launching the Capital Schools Consulting Group (CSCG). CSCG services include executive coaching, training, evaluation, and data analytic services to district leaders and school boards. How to Fix Our City Schools is a brief how-to handbook and while I am happy to have completing a final draft, the process has made me even more acutely aware of the disappointment I feel about the missed opportunities and failures of the last forty years and my fear that they will continue indefinitely for future generations of poor and disadvantaged children. As a result, I have set the book aside for now and am totally focused on helping school district improve.