How to Fix Our City Schools
Keep Your Eyes on the Prize!
According to the National School Board Association, the job of school boards is to “establish the vision and goals for the public schools in their district, and set standards for the performance of schools and superintendents.”[1]
Not long ago, I was asked to provide data and analysis to assist the Atlanta Board of Education in setting performance goals for their new superintendent. As is often the case, the lengthy discussion among the board members vacillated between recommendations to establish “realistic” annual targets and challenges for “more ambitious” goals. A few school board members even expressed the view that 100% of the students should be expected to achieve proficiency. Astutely, one board member asked, “What if the number of students achieving proficiency doubles in the next three years but we don’t reach 100%? Are we going to fire the superintendent or are we going to celebrate the amazing gains?”
There is no objective standard for setting goals and, as this example demonstrates, agreeing on ambitious, yet realistic goals is not an easy problem.
Many years ago, when I worked for the St. Louis Public Schools, the students “achieved” small gains each year for three years in a row. Grudgingly, the St. Louis Post Dispatch ran an article praising the administration – concluding that while the gains were small, they were the first gains the city’s students had achieved in many years. In other words, small gains were better than nothing.
Today, there is a similar situation in Mississippi where many have praised the state’s significant gains on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) 4th grade reading test. Some have credited the governor for increasing funding for teacher training. Some have pointed to the increased emphasis on the “science of reading” and others have debated whether the gains were only the result of increased retention rates. However, while important, the reasons for the gains are not the focus here. Here, the focus is on expectations.
In Mississippi, the percentage of 4th graders scoring at or above the “proficient” level increased from 21% in 2013 to 32% in 2019. Given the fact that, nationally, NAEP reading scores have been stagnant for many years, an 11 percentage point increase in six years certainly seems impressive. If we extrapolate to an “average” 4th grade Mississippi classroom, about four children (21%) per class scored at or above the “proficient” level in 2013. By 2019, on average, that number had increased to about six children (32%) per 4th grade classroom. In other words, in 2019, two more children per classroom scored at or above the “proficient” level in reading than six years earlier.
If we look at the NAEP results by student group, again, the results are impressive. In 2013, only 11% of the black 4th graders in Mississippi scored at or above the “proficient” level in reading while 62% scored at the lowest level, “below basic.” By 2019, the percentage of the black 4th graders in Mississippi scoring at or above the “proficient” level had increased significantly to 19% and the percentage scoring at the “below basic” level had decreased dramatically to 47%.
But, here is the dilemma. On the one hand, I want to be optimistic that Mississippi educators are on the right track and, as I have written before, I strongly support increased teacher training and efforts to fully implement a “science of reading” approach to literacy. On the other hand, while the percentage of black 4th graders scoring at or above the “proficient” level has increased, it took six years for the percentage to increase by only eight points. If we “extrapolate” again to an “average” Mississippi classroom where all the students are black, the gains would be equivalent to the “proficiency” rate increasing from about two students per class to about four students per class – in six years – while almost half the students in the class would still be scoring at the lowest level, “below basic.” Some may say that the data show there has been progress – and, perhaps, that is true – but I think the data also show something very different.
Unfortunately, the 2019 NAEP percentages for black students in Mississippi are very similar to what we find today for almost every large urban school district in the United States – where about 20% of the black students score at the “proficient” level in reading while about half of the black students score at the “below basic” level. As a result, I cannot help but come back to a critical question: Do educators and school board members believe that most children who live in poor communities simply cannot learn to read and do basic math?
As the astute Atlanta board member observed, if the number of students reading at the “proficient” level doubled in three years (or six), everyone would loudly celebrate. In Atlanta, for example, such a gain would mean that the number of black 4th grade students scoring at or above the “proficient” level on the NAEP reading assessment would increase from about three (16%) students per classroom to about six (32%) students per classroom.[2]
Regrettably, however, no urban district in the United States have ever achieved anything close to that degree of success. Large gains have been achieved by individual city schools over short periods of time but not districtwide. In past newsletters, I have given specific reasons for these failures and strategies for transforming failing schools into great ones. I have also noted that in almost every district I have served in, there were at least one or two Title I schools that were “beating the odds” – where students from poor communities were achieving at levels comparable to – or even higher than – students from the most affluent communities. Shockingly, however, in none of those cases were the districts successful at exporting the key “game-changing” strategies from the successful schools to any of their other Title I schools. (The reasons for these failures were outlined in the December 8th newsletter.)
As I have written before, I strongly believe that the truth is that urban districts have failed to teach their young children to read – not because the children can’t learn to read – but because the districts have failed to dedicate the necessary resources. Instead, school districts have tried to do a million things at the same time and failed to focus on the one thing that matters the most – early literacy and numeracy.
Where do district superintendents focus their attention? Here are just a few examples of the priorities typical of large urban administrations today: initiatives to try to recover the lost instructional time caused by the COVID pandemic; equity and social justice initiatives; reducing budgets and headquarter staff; facilities master planning; passing bonds; rezoning; external partnerships; increasing the number of students enrolled in advanced courses; implementing virtual schools; social emotional learning (SEL); STEM/STEAM; formative assessments; new data and accountability systems; and on and on.
Of course, most of these are important “priorities.” But, here is the million dollar question. Are any of these initiatives focused directly on guaranteeing that every child in the district can read at or near grade level by the end of 3rd grade? The answer, unfortunately, is no.
How is early literacy not the #1 equity issue? School boards must stay laser focused on the most critical goals – early literacy and numeracy. But, writing “aspirational” goals is not enough. School boards must set ambitious targets and hold the administration accountable. When superintendents fail to meet the district targets – which they almost certainly will – school boards must demand to know what additional resources they need to be successful and demand to see a detailed plan - centered on daily classroom instruction - to guarantee that all children learn to read at or near grade level by the end of 3rd grade. As a hugely successful principal of a Title I elementary school once told me, “This is not rocket science. It’s elementary school!”
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Dear Readers,
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 complaints, hopes, doubts, excuses, and promises and discussed and debated priorities, philosophies, theories, programs, and plans. 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 please share those as well.
Best Regards!
Bill Caritj
President and CEO
Capital Schools Consulting Group
925 S. Prospect Street
Burlington, VT 05401
Links to recent newsletters:
(December 8, 2022)
(November 4, 2022)
(October 19, 2022)
(September 16, 2022)
(September 3, 2022)
(August 8, 2022)
(July 22, 2022)
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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 theory, philosophy, or program. My only loyalty is to results.
Since “retiring” from the Atlanta Public Schools in 2021,[3] I’ve been busy working on a book, How to Fix Our City Schools, publishing this “monthly” newsletter, and launching the Capital Schools Consulting Group (CSCG). The book is part memoir and part handbook and while I am very excited about finally completing a “good” working draft, the process has made me even more acutely aware of the disappointment I feel about the failures of the last forty years and my fear that they will continue indefinitely for future generations of poor and disadvantaged children.
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CSCG Services
· Data analysis and reporting
· Board training – data analytics, planning, and goal setting
· Executive coaching for new school board members
· Executive coaching and support for new superintendents’ transition teams
· Planning and monitoring district reforms
· Logic model and strategy map development
· Major program implementation audits
[1] https://www.nsba.org/About/About-School-Board-and-Local-Governance, March 2, 2022.
[2] Source: 2019 NAEP 4th grade reading snapshot for the Atlanta Public Schools.
[3] https://www.ajc.com/news/atlanta-news/accountability-chief-hired-after-atlanta-cheating-scandal-to-retire/GQSBWP445RGCNGPVHDYINEXC6Q/