How to Fix Our City Schools
Six First Steps (Starting with Early Literacy)
Everyone knows what great schools look like. Unfortunately, no one seems to know how to create them. As I argued in previous editions, I believe the reason is that urban district leaders have underestimated the importance of the “fundamentals” of the classroom.
Why do I think that? Because, over 40 years, I worked with twenty different superintendents, dozens of future superintendents, hundreds of senior administrators, and thousands of principals and I have heard their debates, complaints, concerns, hopes, doubts, excuses, plans, priorities, theories, and promises.
In an earlier newsletter, I argued that to create great city schools, educators must recognize that while they champion differentiation and tiered supports for students, those practices are barely implemented in most urban schools. Instead, teachers feel pressure to keep moving to ‘cover’ the curriculum even though many of their students lack the prior knowledge or even the basic language or numeracy skills needed to participate in it.
I also noted that, for many children, skill “gaps” develop long before they enter kindergarten. Regrettably, it is apparent from national data that most early literacy programs today are not powerful enough to reduce the gaps. Once the curriculum is introduced, these skill gaps quickly create “achievement” gaps (although the skill gaps remain).
In the last newsletter, I cited programs at two Blue Ribbon Schools in Austin, Texas that were very successful at closing the skills gaps using what the principals called “stop-gap” programs. In math, the focus was on basic skills. In literacy, the focus was on the 1,000 most commonly used English words. According to the principals, eliminating the literacy and numeracy gaps immediately gave students access to the on-grade-level curriculum. While both schools were Title I schools with large ELL populations, the students’ reading, math, science, and social scores were among the highest in the district year after year.
To be clear, I am not advocating for any particular program. In fact, it is likely there are currently computer software applications ideally suited, as center rotations, to address these basic skills deficits. However, it does seem self-evident that students who lack the basic language and math skills will have great difficulty participating in the core curriculum and, as a result, they will fall further and further behind each year. (Imagine trying to participate in a first grade reading group, or just trying to follow the teacher’s directions, if you knew half as many basic words as the rest of the class.)
So, with that background, let’s recap what we know (or, at least, what I think I know) about how to transform failing urban schools into great ones.
First, it will be impossible to turn around our failing urban schools unless school districts finally figure out how to teach all or, at least, most of their children to read. Unless the children in our city schools “graduate” the fifth grade with a sound foundation, they will continue to struggle throughout middle and high schools, many will continue to “graduate” high school with few marketable skills, more than 20% will continue to drop out, and less than 20% will continue to graduate from college.
Critics will say that many urban districts already have identified early literacy as their top priority and that is no doubt true. But, merely declaring early literacy as a goal has clearly not produced results. Urban districts have dozens of competing priorities and year after year reading test scores remain dismally low, practices don’t change, and no one is held accountable.
Children in our urban schools will become “proficient” readers when districts make the necessary investments in science-based reading programs and training for their teachers and administrators. To accelerate this transition, however, I believe it is necessary, at least in the short run, for districts to fund additional primary teachers for the lowest performing schools to dramatically reduce the number and size of instructional groups and increase the time teachers have with individual students. In many schools, that will mean two teachers working together in the same classroom (since the majority of schools do not have excess classrooms to accommodate that many additional teachers). A “paired” teaching model would also provide rich opportunities for job-embedded professional development.
[How to fund extra teachers and/or smaller classes will be the subject of a future newsletter. Here, I will simply note that over the last twenty years, I have participated in many budget discussions concerning new initiatives – ranging from modest $1-2 million proposals to proposals costing $10-15 million annually – and I do not recall one instance where the senior team failed to find a way to fund any initiative “requested” by the superintendent – regardless of the cost. In fact, during my seven years in Atlanta, the district funded over $30 million annually for four new programs. At the time, for a school to add 12 teachers would have cost approximately $1.1 million annually (for salaries and benefits). In most Atlanta schools, that would double the number of teachers in kindergarten through 2nd grade.]
Second, the “word fluency” gap that children bring with them to kindergarten must be eliminated by the end of 2nd grade. Without eliminating the basic skills gaps, it is hard to imagine how students will ever read at or near grade level or be able to access the on-grade-level curriculum.
This is not an expensive proposition or a difficult one. It is only a matter of organization and training. According to the AISD principals, their “system” was completely funded within their schools’ Title I allocations, was intentionally simple so it could be easily implemented by novice teachers, well-trained volunteers, and other staff, required only 10 minutes per day, and was equally effective with both native English speakers and the schools’ large ELL populations. As noted above, the “word fluency” program consisted of the 1,000 most commonly used English sight words, and the number of required words varied by grade level beginning with five words per week for children in kindergarten.[1]
Third, while expert “actionable” training embedded in classroom practices is extremely important, for the training to be effective at the elementary level, the debates about phonics, whole language, balanced literacy, and the “science of reading” must finally be put to rest. Given the recent admissions by literacy “guru” Lucy Calkins, it should now (finally) be clear that every district should employ a truly balanced literacy[2] program that emphasizes basic skills (i.e., phonics and phonemic awareness), vocabulary development, and reading extended text (daily) to improve “text fluency” and comprehension (i.e., all the components of reading/literacy).
Fourth, great schools cannot be limited to only those led by “superstars.” Great schools must be led by strong principals but built on great “systems.”
Over the years, I have been dismayed on a number of occasions when I asked principals of schools that had just made significant test score “gains” to explain their “success.” Amazingly, it always seemed clear that they really had no idea. They seemed to have no specific program, theory, or philosophy to which they were committed that was driving their work, no consistent routines or organizational structures they could articulate, and, therefore, nothing they could share with others.
In contrast, the aforementioned Blue Ribbon School principals could articulate exactly what they were doing and why they were doing it. Their success was system-driven, not personality-driven. For example, the “word fluency” and numeracy programs described above (and in earlier newsletters) were conducted for 10 minutes first thing every morning. Of course, many schools teach the Dolch sight words or other word lists. The difference was that the Austin principals were consistent (i.e., relentless) in assessing and reteaching until every student learned every word (see footnote).[3] However, the “stop-gap” program was just a small part of the daily schedule that was carefully delineated (and differentiated) to maximize instructional time, particularly in the lower grades where the goal was to ensure that as many students as possible were, at least, achieving at grade level by the end of 3rd grade. As a previously skeptical colleague once told me, “It was the most organized school I have ever visited.”
To create effective “systems,” the first tasks are to develop a schedule of consistent daily instructional practices (including routine monitoring and accountability procedures) and to train the administrators, teachers, specialists, and other staff on any new program components (e.g., new reading software or “stop gap” skills assessment and tutoring programs). In the schools cited above, the teachers were given wide latitude regarding implementation of the core curriculum but the implementation of the “stop-gap” program, the daily application and problem solving sessions (“bridge resources”), and daily reading activities (including daily reading homework) were closely monitored by the principals.
Fifth, creating great urban schools will require even more from principals than is expected of them today. Of course, the critical importance of the principal’s role is not news. However, while educators frequently say (like a mantra) that the principals are the instructional leaders of their schools, it often isn’t true. More often than not, urban school principals today seem to be largely managers and administrators.
In his book, Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell suggests there are three types of influencers: connectors, salesmen, and mavens.[4] Mavens, according to Gladwell, are "information specialists – people we rely upon to connect us with new information." Gladwell offered an example of a man he said was "almost pathologically helpful… sharing and trading what he knows." Even more than being “connectors” and “salesmen” (or saleswomen), modern principals must be “information specialists,” the instructional experts of their school. And, for principals to play that role, they must be “pathologically” well trained.
In the AISD examples, as I said earlier, the “stop-gap,” “bridge resources,” and daily reading components of their system were mandated and overseen personally by the principals every day. They were experts in those components and their consistent implementation was something close to an obsession. Why? Because the school leaders believed the programs were “game changers” for their kids.
For a “system” to be implemented consistently, the principals must be committed to it and expertly trained so they are able to teach and promote the system and, to ensure quality and consistency, they must be actively engaged in its implementation every day.
Obviously, there is much more to say about the critical importance of the school leaders and there are certainly other important components of great schools (e.g., well-trained teachers and quality curriculum). However, for now, I will only briefly mention one additional necessary component.
Sixth, school turn-around is not possible without a smart, experienced, dedicated, hard-working superintendent who is first and foremost focused on teaching and learning. Ron Chernow, in his excellent book on Alexander Hamilton, argued that one of George Washington’s greatest gifts was good judgment. According to Chernow, Washington could listen to the disparate views of Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, Adams, and other leaders of the American Revolution and somehow deduce or divine the right course of action.
Like presidents, superintendents are bombarded with many competing ideas, opinions, theories, and philosophies. And, like presidents, superintendents must have keen judgment. In addition, while they have subordinates who manage school operations, supervise principals, and develop programs and curriculum, superintendents must be willing to devote considerable time to ensuring the academic programs (particularly the early literacy programs) are on the right track. Further, in the face of often loud and contentious dissent – to create great schools – district leaders must have the character to take risks, admit mistakes, and persevere regardless of the distractions, demands, obstacles, crises, and naysayers.
The six recommendations above do not address every component of great schools but they do represent critical and necessary first steps. The goal of these newsletters is to help district leaders clarify what is necessary and sufficient to create great schools and to make clear what districts should continue, discard, adjust, expand, or do differently. In future newsletters, I will have more to say about the critical importance of the schools’ instructional leaders, the characteristics of great superintendents, the cost and potential of smaller primary classes, how to improve teacher training, and many other topics.
If you find the information compelling and useful, please share the newsletters with friends and colleagues. 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:
(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, in general, 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, I’ve been busy working on a book, How to Fix Our City Schools, initiating this “monthly” newsletter, and launching the Capital Schools Consulting Group (which specializes in helping schools improve). 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.
[1] As noted in the last newsletter, if you learn the 1,000 most commonly used English words, you know approximately 90% of the words in 3rd grade level tests and books. These are sight words, not vocabulary words. For example, the first 100 sight words included “a, about, after, again, all, an, and, any, are, as, at… his, him, how… said, see, she… work, would, you, and your.”
[2] While “balanced literacy” is a term often associated with the “Units of Study” program employed in the NYC public schools for many years and championed by Lucy Calkins, many educators (including me) use the term generically to indicate programs that include all five components of reading – a phonics, phonemic awareness, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension.
[3] As I have said before, I am generally not biased toward or against any particular theory, philosophy, or program. My only loyalty is to results. In regard to the “stop-gap” programs, there were certainly skeptics within the district. A common argument was that the “stop-gap” word fluency approach would only produce short-term results. However, what the skeptics could not explain was, if the word-fluency approach was flawed, why the schools’ third, fourth, and fifth grade reading comprehension scores were among the highest in the district year after year? Isn’t reading comprehension the holy grail of a literacy program? Is comprehension a “skill” you can forget?
[4] Malcolm Gladwell, Tipping Point (2000).