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DOCUMENT RESUME. ED 438 359 UD 033 324 AUTHOR Bryk, Anthony S.; Hill, Paul; Shipps, Dorothy TITLE Improving School-Community Connections: Moving toward a System of Community Schools. INSTITUTION Annie E. Casey Foundation, Baltimore, MD. PUB DATE 1999-07-00 NOTE 50p.; Written in association with Michael J. Murphy, David Menefee-Libey, and Albert L. Bennett. Paper is drawn from or based on "Decentralization in Practice: Toward a System of Schools, A Final Report to the Annie E. Casey Foundation. AVAILABLE FROM Annie E. Casey Foundation, 701 St. Paul Street, Baltimore, MD 21202 (free) Tel: 410-223-2890 or 410-547-6600; Fax: 410-547-6624. For full text: http://www.aecf.org. PUB TYPE Guides Non-Classroom (055) EDRS PRICE MF01/PCO2 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Accountability; Administrator Role; Change Strategies; *Community Schools; *Decentralization; Educational Change; Elementary Secondary Education; Parent School Relationship; Parents; *Partnerships in Education; Principals; *School Community Relationship; Teacher Role; Teachers ABSTRACT This paper helps community partners envision a system of community schools and understand the changes needed to make it a reality. Information in the paper is adapted from a study by the Consortium on Chicago School Research at the University of Chicago and the Center for Reinventing Public Education at the University of Washington. The study examined efforts to decentralize school systems in six major cities nationwide. Part 1 of this paper describes the basis for recent education reforms aimed at decentralizing authority and strengthening school and community connections. It also explains the contexts that shape community-linked school systems. Part 2 presents important features shared by various models for increasing school-level autonomy and school-community linkages. It describes the early experiences of six cities that adopted decentralized school systems. Part 3 shares lessons learned about the scope, depth, and characteristics of school reforms that build school-level responsibility for education. It also presents strategies for connecting schools with parents and communities and describes conflicts that can surface during efforts to create community schools. Part 4 explores challenges and implications for moving from an understanding of community schools to action. Part 5 identifies sources of more information. Contains 11 references. (SM) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document.

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Page 1: Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can … · EDRS PRICE MF01/PCO2 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Accountability; Administrator Role; Change Strategies; *Community Schools;

DOCUMENT RESUME.

ED 438 359 UD 033 324

AUTHOR Bryk, Anthony S.; Hill, Paul; Shipps, Dorothy

TITLE Improving School-Community Connections: Moving toward aSystem of Community Schools.

INSTITUTION Annie E. Casey Foundation, Baltimore, MD.PUB DATE 1999-07-00NOTE 50p.; Written in association with Michael J. Murphy, David

Menefee-Libey, and Albert L. Bennett. Paper is drawn from orbased on "Decentralization in Practice: Toward a System ofSchools, A Final Report to the Annie E. Casey Foundation.

AVAILABLE FROM Annie E. Casey Foundation, 701 St. Paul Street, Baltimore,MD 21202 (free) Tel: 410-223-2890 or 410-547-6600; Fax:410-547-6624. For full text: http://www.aecf.org.

PUB TYPE Guides Non-Classroom (055)

EDRS PRICE MF01/PCO2 Plus Postage.DESCRIPTORS Accountability; Administrator Role; Change Strategies;

*Community Schools; *Decentralization; Educational Change;Elementary Secondary Education; Parent School Relationship;Parents; *Partnerships in Education; Principals; *SchoolCommunity Relationship; Teacher Role; Teachers

ABSTRACTThis paper helps community partners envision a system of

community schools and understand the changes needed to make it a reality.Information in the paper is adapted from a study by the Consortium on ChicagoSchool Research at the University of Chicago and the Center for ReinventingPublic Education at the University of Washington. The study examined effortsto decentralize school systems in six major cities nationwide. Part 1 of thispaper describes the basis for recent education reforms aimed atdecentralizing authority and strengthening school and community connections.It also explains the contexts that shape community-linked school systems.Part 2 presents important features shared by various models for increasingschool-level autonomy and school-community linkages. It describes the earlyexperiences of six cities that adopted decentralized school systems. Part 3shares lessons learned about the scope, depth, and characteristics of schoolreforms that build school-level responsibility for education. It alsopresents strategies for connecting schools with parents and communities anddescribes conflicts that can surface during efforts to create communityschools. Part 4 explores challenges and implications for moving from anunderstanding of community schools to action. Part 5 identifies sources ofmore information. Contains 11 references. (SM)

Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be madefrom the original document.

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Co

1

PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE ANDDISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS

BEEN GRANTED BY

W3 Rus4Annie F

TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCESINFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)

CONNECTIONS

MOVING TOWARD A SYSTEM

OF COMMUNITY SCHOOLS

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATIONOffice of Educational Research and Improvement

EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATIONCENTER (ERIC)

/This document has been reproduced asreceived from the person or organizationoriginating it.Minor changes have been made toimprove reproduction quality.

Points of view or opinions stated in thisdocument do not necessarily representofficial OERI position or policy.

2

The Annie E. Casey Foundation

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CO

IMPROVING

EST COPY AVAILA

ONNECTIONS

MOVING TOWARD A SYSTEM

OF COMMUNITY SCHOOLS

LE

Written by

Anthony S. Bryk, Paul Hill,

and Dorothy Shipps in association

with Michael J. Murphy,

David Menefee-Libey, and

Albert L. Bennett

Editorial assistance provided by

Leila Fiester

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Acknowledgements

Much of the text for this paper is drawn from or based on Decentralization in Practice: Toward aSystem of Schools, a Final Report to the Annie E. Casey Foundation, which was written by Anthony S.Bryk, University of Chicago; Paul Hill, University of Washington; and Dorothy Shipps, Consortium onChicago School Research, in association with Michael J. Murphy, University of Colorado at Denver;David Menefee-Libey, Pomona College; and Albert L. Bennett, Roosevelt University. The structure ofthis paper, which was developed by Leila Fiester of Policy Studies Associates, differs substantiallyfrom the final report. Editorial guidance was provided at the Annie E. Casey Foundation by BrunoManno and Connie Dykstra.

For additional free copies, contact:The Annie E. Casey Foundation701 St. Paul StreetBaltimore, MD 21202410-223-2890 Publications Order Line410-547-6600 Phone410-547-6624 Faxwww.aecf.org

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Contents

Foreword i

Introduction 1

Why Now? The Context for Linking Schools with Families and Communities 3

What Are the Characteristics of Decentralized, Community-Linked School Systems?Six Examples 6

Typical Features of Models for Increasing School-Level Autonomy 6Examples of Decentralized Community-Linked School Systems 11

Charlotte-Mecklenburg, North Carolina 12

Chicago, Illinois 14Cincinnati, Ohio 16Denver, Colorado 18

Los Angeles, California 20Seattle, Washington 23

What Works? Lessons Learned About Decentralization and Community Schools 25The Scope and Depth of Reforms 25Characteristics of Decentralized Systems of Community Schools . 26

School-level Autonomy and Leadership 26New Roles and Responsibilities for the Central Office and Educators 27External Support for Schools 29Accountability 29

Strategies for Connecting Schools with Parents and Communities 30Conflicts Raised by Creating Community Schools 32

How Do We Get There from Here? Moving from Understanding to Action 34

Challenges to Building Decentralized Systems of Community Schools 34Implications for School Reform 35Moving Toward a Decentralized System of Community Schools 39

Conclusions 42

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Foreword

The Annie E. Casey Foundation has been working to improve the well being of disadvantagedkids for the last 50 years. Today, this mission includes a focus on building better futures formillions of American's poor children who are experiencing poor educational outcomes,especially those youngsters in urban areas.

For sure, there are today in many large cities some exceptionally effective public schoolswhere youngsters are learning and being adequately prepared for the worlds of work, family,and citizenship. But in many urban areasdespite the best intentions of educators and othersin the communitythe outcomes for most students are abysmal. A large number of theseschools are, in the words of U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley, places that "shouldnever be called schools at all."

Who are the young people attending urban public schools? One out of four U.S. schoolchildren-11 million youngstersattend them. Thirty-five percent of those children are frompoor families; 43 percent are from minority groups.

What are these young people learning? In a massive survey of urban education, EducationWeek concluded that "most 4th graders who live in U.S. cities can't read and understand asimple children's book, and most 8th graders can't use arithmetic to solve a practicalproblem." Slightly more than half of big-city students don't graduate from high school infour years.

On the urban school governance front, a desire to shake up the status quo has spurred somestate and local officials to undertake seemingly drastic actions. These initiatives includedistrict-led reconstitutions of failed schools (e.g., San Francisco); state takeovers of troubleddistricts (e.g., Cleveland, Newark, Patterson, Jersey City); placing school systems under thecontrol of specially created boards (e.g., District of Columbia, Baltimore) or under the controlof mayors (e.g., Cleveland, Chicago); and hiring non-educators to manage the school system(e.g., Seattle).

Other strategies rely on changing the system through market-based principles of competitionand choice. These include charter schoolsindependent, self-governing public schools ofchoice that are freed from many bureaucratic requirements in exchange for being heldaccountable for their results; contracting with for-profit and non-profit providers to offerdifferent school and after-school services, including such well-known firms as Chris Whittle'sEdison Project; and public and private vouchers (or scholarship) programsthe mostcontroversial of these reform efforts.

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This publicationoriginally prepared as a report to the Casey Foundation onDecentralization in Practice: Toward a System of Schools by Anthony Bryk, Paul Hill,Dorothy Shipps and their colleaguesexamines many of the policy issues underlying theeffort to create more effective schools for our most disadvantaged youngsters, especiallythose in urban areas. It is the view of the Casey Foundation that a key element of this effortshould include transforming our schools into "family-strengthening" institutions that drawupon a variety of community resources to support and nurture the work of the school.

Creating "family-strengthening" schools is consistent with a set of strategies that the CaseyFoundation is supporting and that is directed to meeting the challenges facing families intough neighborhoodsan initiative called Neighborhood Transformation/FamilyDevelopment. This initiative is based on the conviction that it is possible to improveoutcomes for childrenincluding educational outcomesby strengthening their families.

It is our hope that the issues discussed in this publication will challenge policymakers at alllevels to rethink their assumptions, views, and practices about the relationships betweendistrict offices, schools, communities, and families. We also hope that it will helppolicymakers begin to imagine what an alternative system of decentralized public schools thatstrengthens families might look like.

Bruno V. MannoSenior Fellow in EducationThe Annie E. Casey FoundationJuly, 1999

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Introduction:Strong Schools, Families, and Communities Create Strong Children

A child shouldn't have to be a hero just tosucceed in life. But it often does take heroiceffort for children in our most vulnerablecommunities to beat the odds. Many urbanneighborhoods have lost the businesses, socialinstitutions, health and human services, educationopportunities, and recreational facilities that canhelp children thrive. In these neighborhoods,poverty and lack of opportunity isolate familiesfrom vital resources, relationships, andaspirations.

Without strong neighborhoods to bolsterthemneighborhoods that offer education, asense of community, social networks, accessibleservices and supports, and economicopportunitiesfamilies falter in their pursuit ofthe American dream. And without strongfamilies to draw on, children face an uphillstruggle to become healthy, happy, well-educated, and productive citizens.

It is possible to improve children's chances bystrengthening their families and neighborhoods,and schools play a crucial role in thistransformation. Given the right opportunitiesand support, schools can forge strong ties withparents and neighborhood partners, establish site-based decision making and accountability, anddevelop leadership and professional skills amongteachers and community members. Theseactions prepare everyone to help children reachtheir greatest potential.

Approaches for linking schools withneighborhoods include the community schoolsmodel, charter schools, and contract schools.These and other models represent a move awayfrom education controlled by school boards andcentral offices toward greater influence (andresponsibility) by parents and school-basededucators. These approaches can be thought ofas "systems of community schools"systems inwhich each school has its own staff, mission, and

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approach to instruction but all are working toimprove education and other outcomes forchildren, parents, and neighborhoods.

This paper helps community partners envision asystem of community schools and understand thechanges needed to make it a reality. It is writtenfor a broad audience of policy makers andpractitioners, including community leaders,directors of nonprofit organizations, local grantmakers, directors of school accountability,principals and teachers who serve as instructionalleaders, mayors and council members, andbusiness partners involved in education. It can beused in sections or in its entiretyto stimulatediscussions about change, to focus strategicplanning, or to explore issuesdepending on theneeds and circumstances of each community.

The information in this paper is adapted from astudy by the Consortium on Chicago SchoolResearch at the University of Chicago and theCenter for Reinventing Public Education at theUniversity of Washington. The study, conductedfor the Annie E. Casey Foundation in 1993-96 andcompleted in 1998, examined efforts todecentralize school systems in six major cities:Charlotte-Mecklenburg, Chicago, Cincinnati,Denver, Los Angeles, and Seattle.

Decentralization is a very specific educationreform that extends far beyond linking schoolswith communities. However, decentralization'semphasis on school-level autonomy for operationsand finances, accountability for results, and site-based leadership and governance has importantlessons for other attempts to unite schools,families, and communities around improvingchildren's chances.

Part 1 of this paper describes the basis for recenteducation reforms aimed at decentralizingauthority and strengthening school and

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community connections. It also explains thecontexts that shape community-linked schoolsystems. Part 2 presents some importantfeatures shared by various models for increasingschool-level autonomy and school-communitylinkages. It describes the early experiences ofsix cities that adopted decentralized schoolsystems. Part 3 shares lessons learned about thescope, depth, and characteristics of schoolreforms that build school-level responsibility foreducation. It also presents strategies forconnecting schools with parents and communitiesand describes conflicts that can surface duringefforts to create community schools. Part 4explores challenges and implications for movingfrom an understanding of community schools toaction. Part 5 identifies sources of moreinformation, including publications by AnthonyBryk and Paul Hill that provide detailedinformation on the research used to develop thispaper.

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Why Now?The Context for Linking Schools with Families and Communities

Current Education ReformEmphasizes School-Level Authorityand Responsibility

An urge to transform public education spreadacross the United States in the 1980s as parentsand community leaders lost confidence in theirschool systems. Despite decades of efforts toimprove learning opportunities, especially forpoor and minority students, results had fallen farshort of goals. High expectations for studentswere undermined by low school performance,administrative waste, and fiscal or labor crises.Parents were disillusioned with the solutions thatschool districts had tried and suspected thateducators couldn'tor wouldn't improveschool performance. Communities werefrustrated when the centralized bureaucraciesthat controlled schools did not seem to respect orrespond to unique neighborhood concerns.

Education reformers reasoned that individualschools needed more authority and responsibilityin order to become effective agents for students,parents, and neighborhoods. Efforts todecentralize school systemsto shift authorityfrom district bureaucracies to the school leveland to make schools more responsive to thefamilies and communities they serve, amongother changeswere based on three beliefs:

Effective schools are not standardized,driven by regulation, or micromanagedby a bureaucracy. Educators in theseschools take action because it will helpstudents learn, not merely to complywith regulations or contract provisions.

The future of urban education dependson finding different ways to organize,govern, motivate, and support schools tomake them effective and efficient in their

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Terms Used in This Paper

Decentralization: The process of shiftingcontrol of public education from a centralizedbureaucracy to the school level. Keyelements include:

New roles for central office staff,principals, teachers, superintendents, schoolboards, and other players

School-level control of staffing,curriculum development, professionaltraining, and resource allocation

School accountability for results

Family and community participation inschool decisions; school responsiveness tofamily and community needs

Community schools: Schools that encompassand serve a community. A community maybe a collection of like-minded individuals, agroup of people who live in a specificneighborhood, or people who share consensuson education priorities.

A decentralized system of communityschools: A district-wide education system inwhich each school has primary authority forits own mission, governance, staffing, andapproach to instruction but all schools areworking to improve education and otheroutcomes for children, parents, andneighborhoods. In such a system, the centraloffice's primary function is to hold schoolsaccountable for advancing studentachievement and to provide the resources andassistance needed to improve student learning.

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use of resources; responsive and caringto students, parents, and communities;and publicly accountable.

Weak public schools contribute toworsening social conditions andrepresent lost opportunities forcommunity development. Increasingschool-level authority for education re-engages civic and business leaders inshaping this essential resource.

Decentralization alone cannot transform teachingand learning. District and state agencies stillhave a role in helping to develop overallstandards for education, comprehensive plans fordistrict-wide improvement, and support systemsthat enable schools to meet these goals. But,increasingly, individual schools have takencharge of setting their own goals and governingefforts to reach them.

In the process, many of these schools arebecoming "community schools"schools thatencompass and serve a community. Acommunity may be a collection of like-mindedindividuals, a group of people who happen to livein a specific neighborhood, or people who havereached consensus on education priorities. (Thispaper shares the concept of community schoolsproposed by Paul Hill and Christine Campbell intheir Resource Guide for Community-BasedSchools, prepared for the Annie E. CaseyFoundation in April 1999, which suggests that noform of community necessarily provides a betterbasis for a school than any other form.)Although community schools are intended toserve whole neighborhoods, some residents maynot share the goals of a particular communityschool. A system that gives several schools theauthority and capacity to serve a neighborhood,and allows students to choose among theseschools, does the best job of serving families andcommunities.

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Social and Political Contexts ShapeSchool Improvement

Public school systems were targets of criticismlong before the movement to create systems ofdecentralized schools. Urban students learnedtoo little, on average; standards for performancewere too low; and American students knew lessthan their peers in other countries. Schoolsystems seemed to be remote, bureaucraticagencies that had lost their connections tofamilies and communities.

People criticized their school systems as top-heavy, unduly expensive, and dominated bypolitical concerns. Many administrators andunion leaders seemed more concerned withpreserving adults' jobs than with raising studentachievement or preparing students for acompetitive job market. Long-standingapproaches to school administration, collectivebargaining, state oversight, and funding seemedto embody problems so severe that theyjeopardized the future of public education.

At the same time, growing proportions of black,Latino, immigrant, and poor students began tofill urban schools. The new mix of studentsstrained districts' capacity to fund and implementcompensatory programs designed to help thesestudents compete with their more advantagedpeers, including bilingual instruction,supplementary education, affirmative actionhiring, and busing to achieve integration.

The demand for compensatory services fromrapidly expanding minority groups made urbaneducation increasingly expensive. But by the late1980s, a time when tax reduction was a politicalpriority, critics were challenging the logic ofproviding these programs. The services did notappear to curb bigotryin fact, racial and ethnicdiscrimination showed signs of renewed vitalityin some cities. Economic disparities grewinstead of diminishing, as middle-class familiesfled to the suburbs and cities lost a portion of thetax base that paid for education.

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These social and political factors created anenvironment ripe for changes that would makeschools more self-sufficient, more responsive tofamilies and communities, and better able tomeet student needs and improve performance.Some cities reduced the size of their centraleducation office; by reducing the number ofpeople authorized to direct schools from above,they stimulated school-level responsibility fordecisions. Cities also gave school councilspartial authority over budgets, spending, andhiring and gave teachers' unions greaterresponsibility for teacher training andperformance improvement. In some cities,superintendents negotiated performance goals,school district assistance, and school freedomswith principals and replaced principals who couldnot fulfill their agreements.

What Prompts School Systemsto Decentralize?

The combination of three factors tipped thescales for districts in the six-city study: (1) asubstantial fiscal or labor crisis; (2) costly andseemingly intractable performance problems,in a system operating on discredited solutions;and (3) a new conception of urban publiceducation, promoted by powerful localplayers in the public and corporate sectors.

For example, in Denver, Chicago, and LosAngeles, a strike or strike threat waspreceded or followed by a financial shortfall.In Charlotte-Mecklenburg, Cincinnati, andSeattle, a revenue deficit was caused byvoters' unwillingness to increase school taxes.

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What Are the Characteristics ofDecentralized, Community-linked School Systems? Six Examples

A system of community schools can encompass many different education goals and strategies. This sectionhighlights some important features shared by various models for increasing school-level autonomy. It alsodescribes the early experiences of six cities that adopted decentralized school systems and began to connectschools with communities, drawn from a three-year study of decentralization in practice.

Typical Features of Models forIncreasing School-Level Autonomy

There is no single model for converting acentralized school administration into a system ofautonomous, community-linked schools.Typically, reform plans start simply and growmore complex over time, as collaborators learnfrom experience and as new options becomeavailable. The fundamental elements of thesenew systems may include:

Waivers that exempt schools fromcertain regulations in exchange forincreased accountability

Downsizing of the school system'scentral office

Redefined roles for central office staffand principals

Mandatory site councils that havedecision-making authority for schoolpersonnel and budgeting

A plan to improve instruction andclassroom performance, although thisfocus may not be included in the initialstages of school and systemtransformation

Provisions for privately fundedtraining and services to address thechallenges of implementing a newsystem and to sustain momentum for

reform among educators, policy makers,business partners, and grant makers

How Does School-Level Autonomy ImproveSchools?

By shifting authority and responsibility to theschool level, education reformers hope toprovide new resources and incentives that willunite the efforts of all adults in a schoolcommunity around improving school operations,teaching, and learning. Ultimately, peopleexpect these changes to improve students'academic experiences and achievement.

The researchers who studied decentralization inCharlotte-Mecklenburg, Chicago, Cincinnati,Denver, Los Angeles, and Seattle identified fourimplicit theories about how the changes mightimprove schools. Each theory assumes thatindividual schools need (1) authority for actionand responsibility for consequences and (2)external help to develop new ways of teachingand to coordinate the efforts of all partners.However, there is no evidence that any of thetheories alone is successful in linkingdecentralization efforts with broad-based schoolimprovement. The theories can be described asfollows:

1. Providing high-quality professionaldevelopment and removing regulatoryburdens will enable teachers to set andmaintain high standards ofperformance.

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According to this theory, teachers and principalshave or can develop the knowledge, skills,judgment, and motivation required to developinnovative methods of instruction if they receivetraining and mentoring and are relieved ofconstraints.

The focus on improving teachers' skillsrecognizes the importance of "teaching forunderstanding"not merely helping studentsattain basic levels of mastery but helping themreach more challenging standards. To do this,teachers need to develop a deep knowledge ofsubject matter, an awareness of individuallearning styles, and sensitivity to the family andcommunity contexts in which students live.

School systems that adopt this theory make majorcommitments to teacher development, includingpre-service training, induction programs, andcontinuing professional development. They alsomust make working conditions attractive toschool professionals by switching from a systembased on controlling staff to one that buildsteacher commitment. In this environment,teachers are viewed as problem-solvingprofessionals rather than simply laborers who areaccountable to their superiors.

2. Schools need site-level governanceprocedures to ensure that reforms arecoordinated and connected with familyand community needs.

Placing school oversight and resource allocationin the hands of diverse, school-level governanceboards can: (1) make schools more responsive tofamily and neighborhood concerns and createlinks with parents and community resources; (2)increase local investment in the education andwelfare of children; and (3) foster trust betweenparents and teachers, making their collaborationon behalf of students more effective.

School-Level Governance In Action

In Chicago, the creation of Local SchoolCouncils (LSCs) fostered interaction betweenneighborhood residents and school leaders.The councils gave parents a chance to seewhether principals appeared concerned abouttheir community and childrenan importantobservation, since the LSCs have authority tohire and fire principals. As principals beganturning to the community and to school stafffor guidance and approval, they spent moretime engaging residents in schoolimprovement and expanding connections toother neighborhood institutions. Parents andlocal professionals now collaborate activelyon school improvement in about one-third ofChicago elementary schools.

In Charlotte-Mecklenburg, parentsatisfaction surveys are part of the annualaccountability system for evaluatingprincipals. This process was intended toredirect principals' attention to local concernsand the needs of parents. Because thesuperintendent retains the power to hire andfire principals, however, the extent of parentand community influence remains unknown.

3. Clarifying standards-based goals, andrewarding results, will help schools andeducators focus on achieving outcomesrather than on merely monitoring theeducation process or enforcingregulations.

When education systems spell out expectationsfor students and for learning environments ashigh-quality standards, and hold schoolsaccountable for meeting the standards, educatorsand community members are more likely topursue school improvement aggressively. Andwhen schools have extra flexibility in choosingstrategies for organizing and delivering

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instruction, teachers and principals are motivatedto collaborate on effective teaching and learning.

4. Stimulating market-style competitionamong schools and the providers theyuse, and allowing families to chooseamong schools, creates incentives toimprove teaching and learning andmakes schools more responsive to theneighborhoods they serve.

This theory relies on parent and educatorpreferences, rather than external standards, toguide teaching and learning. It suggests thatallowing schools to choose the providers ofinstructional approaches that best meet theirneeds, rather than imposing a single program,will let schools tailor education to the studentsthey serve. If parents can choose amongschools, schools will have an incentive toimprove their performance. Successful schoolswill attract more students, and other schools willwant to adopt their strategies.

Which Theory is Most Effective?

In the six-city study, most decentralizationefforts became hybrids of the four theoriesover time. Seattle's early reforms relied onhigh-quality professional development and theremoval of regulatory burdens for teachers,but they grew to include elements ofstandards-based accountability, school-levelexternal governance, and market-stylecompetition. Chicago began to embraceexternal performance standards for eachschool and stepped up outsourcing and theprivatization of school services. Theenactment of charter school laws inCalifornia, Colorado, Ohio, and Illinoisintroduced elements of market-stylecompetition to the cities in those states.

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Who is Involved in Creating School-LevelAuthority for Education?

Key players in education reforms that promoteschool-level authority and link schools withcommunities include:

Business leaders

Political leaders

Local foundations

Policy experts

Community groups

Educators

Teachers' unions and professionaldevelopment providers

Business leaders introduce education systems toeconomic models for organizing services andcorporate standards for performance.

Business groups and other economic leadersfrequently help initiate efforts to decentralizeschool systems. In fact, in four of the six citiesin the decentralization study, the businesscommunity had more influence over reform andmore resources to invest than any othercollaborator.

Business leaders who view education as anengine for economic development have a self-interest in improving learning. They also haveaccess to important resources, including:

First-hand experience with the activitiesthat accompany reform, includingrestructuring, downsizing, andrebuilding workplace cultures

An understanding of concepts such asmarketplace competition, customersatisfaction, quality management, andrelationships between front-line workers

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and managersconcepts that help definestandards for efficiency, productivity,and performance

Access to state and local politicalleaders, which enables them to attracttop-level support

Access to corporate wealth

Links with other organizations, whichcan help focus public attention on theconnection between education andeconomic development

Political leaders can promote schoolimprovement as a means of revitalizing citiesand neighborhoods.

Although many politicians fear the political risksof becoming involved in school affairs, somebelieve that the danger of a flawed school systemoutweigh the danger of losing an election.Politicians, like business leaders, envision high-quality schools as an essential piece of theireffort to foster stable, middle-class communitiesand attract corporate investment.

Local foundations provide support for strategicplanning, advocacy, training, progressmonitoring, and organizations that facilitatechange. For example:

In Denver, the Piton Foundation helpedestablish Citizens for Quality Schools(CQS), a group with participants fromthe public and private sectors. Membersincluded the governor's and mayor'seducation aides, two members of theCity Council, business leaders, anduniversity representatives.

In Cincinnati, a grant from the ManuelD. and Rhoda Mayerson Foundationestablished the Mayerson HumanResource Development Academy tofoster new skills in educators.

How do Business LeadersBecome Involved in

Creating Community School Systems?

Some business groups that advocate school-level authority have historical and institutionalconnections to city hall and to the publicschools; school policy is a natural extensionof their civic interests. In Chicago, close tiesbetween the highly centralized citygovernment and the well-organized businesscommunity encouraged mayors HaroldWashington and Richard Daley to take up theissue of school reform. In other cities,business groups, such as the Seattle Alliance,were created specifically to tackle schoolsystem redesign. In Denver, Gov. RoyRomer engaged local businesses in schoolreform by arguing that high-quality educationwas essential to a healthy economy.

What Role do Business Leaders PlayIn Transforming School Systems?

In Charlotte-Mecklenburg and Los Angeles,the movement to shift authority to schools andcommunities began when corporate leadersvoiced concerns about education. Thebusiness community in Cincinnati helpeddevelop a reform plan and remained active bysupporting pro-reform candidates for schoolboard elections, raising schools' awarenessabout the plan, and funding teacher training.Although the business community did notinitiate school improvement in Denver andSeattle, business leaders in these citiesbecame involved as soon as system-widereform was on the local policy agenda.

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Corporate foundations in Los Angeleswere deeply involved in designing adistrict-wide plan for school-levelautonomy, incentives for accountability,and training for staff to take on newroles. The Los Angeles EducationalPartnership, an operating foundation,

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played a pivotal role in supporting avariety of school reform initiatives.

The Joyce Foundation, the John D. andCatherine T. MacArthur Foundation, theChicago Community Trust, and otherlocal foundations promoted reform inChicago by funding education advocacygroups, which developed alternativegovernance ideas and organized schoolcouncil elections. The foundations alsohelped monitor the progress of schoolimprovement and invigorated reformersby sharing new ideas.

Policy advisors help collaborators developsolutions and devise strategies for gainingpublic support.

Education policy expertsstaff advisors topoliticians and officials, community advocates,independent consultants, university faculty, andleaders of local business and civicorganizationsshape school improvementthrough the advice they dispense and thelegislation they write. When community groupsand other critics identify flaws in a schoolsystem, policy advisors can promote specificsolutions to business and political leaders and inthe news media.

Community groups contribute expertise onspecial topics and represent diverse constituents.

Community groups typically have fewerresources than business, foundation, and politicalleaders, so they focus their efforts on specificissues that affect their constituents. They mayseek representation for special-interest groups onschool councils or within the new school system,and they often participate in the summits, rallies,public hearings, and other forums that precedeschool improvement plans.

Teachers' unions promote the role of teachersas decision makers and emphasize theimportance of professional development insupporting school improvement.

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School-Level Authority CanComplement the Union Agenda

Teachers' unions seek to improve teachers'professional status, capacities, and influenceover decision makinggoals that can befacilitated by school- and community-basedresponsibility for education. For example:

+ The Cincinnati Federation of Teachersjoined with the Cincinnati BusinessCommittee to promote professionalization ofteachers.

United Teachers of Los Angeles joinedbusiness and community activists in theLEARN coalition, which called for incentivesfor good teachers, remediation of weakteachers, and an academy to developteachers' skills.

+ In 1995, the Seattle Education Associationwas considered central enough to the reformmovement that its director was a leadingcandidate for superintendent.

Typically, teachers' unions broaden the reformagenda by including teacher involvement andprofessional development in plans for change.By engaging teachers in reforms such as site-based management, induction programs for newteachers, or peer review processes, union leadershelp move decentralization reforms intoclassrooms. They also ensure that teachers'representatives will be at the policy table forlater reforms.

However, teachers' unions also face obstacles.Because they depend on long-standing bargainingarrangements for their power, union leaders mayresist changes that alter those arrangements.Even when union leaders embrace reforms,teachers may not follow their lead.

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Educators, school administrators, andtraditional school governance entities may notbe deeply involved in establishing school-levelauthority for education.

A decentralized education system reduces thepower of school boards and bureaucracies, so itisn't surprising that these types of school reformsare more likely to engage partners at city halland the state capitol than within the traditionalschool governance structure.

The six-city study of decentralization found thatschool administrators participated hesitantly andsporadicallyif at allin the early stages ofschool reform. Superintendents and districtofficials often treated the effort as just anotherproject that could coexist with long-standingprocedures. Some viewed the changes as athreat to reward structures that had served themwell, while others doubted that "outsiders" couldhave a sustained impact. Those superintendentswho embraced school change did so because theywere hired expressly to implement a reformmandate after it had been established in statelaw, contract language, or board policy.

To some extent, principals were caught betweenthe management responsibilities traditionallyimposed on them and their roles as schoolleaders. In addition, some principals'associations resisted the structural changes thatschool leaders would have to accommodateespecially because decentralization often meantgiving new responsibilities to principals withoutgranting all of the resources and authority neededto meet them. Teachers were generallyambivalent about the changes.

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Six Examples of Decentralized,Community-Linked School Systems

In a three-year study funded by the Annie E.Casey Foundation, researchers' examined schooldecentralization in six cities: Charlotte-Mecklenburg, Chicago, Cincinnati, Denver, LosAngeles, and Seattle. Their goals were tounderstand and explain how these cities initiated,developed, supported, and sustained their schoolreform strategies, and how the reforms affectedteachers, principals, school administrators,parents, and community residents. This sectionoutlines the characteristics and highlights of eachcity's plan for improving its education system.

The researchers examined decentralization fromseveral angles. They investigated whether itcould: strengthen connections between schools,families, and communities; improve theknowledge and working conditions of teachersand other staff; promote teacher commitment andcollective responsibility for student learning; andstrengthen leadership and management at theschool level.

Much has changed in the six cities since thestudy ended, although the researchers'conclusions about decentralization remain thesame. Not one superintendent who was in officewhen the study began remains in place; in somecities, the superintendent has changed two orthree times. All of the cities have moved beyondthe stage of reform described in this paper. Theexamples included here are intended to describethe foundations of the reforms that existtodaynot to provide comprehensive profiles ofcurrent activities.

When the study began, each school district waseither contemplating decentralization as astrategy for system-wide reform or had started to

'Anthony S. Bryk, Paul Hill, and DorothyShipps, in association with Michael J. Murphy, DavidMenefee-Libey, and Albert L. Bennett

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shift authority and responsibility to the schoollevel. The reforms were driven by three forces:

Community advocates and other criticsof bureaucratic school systems, whoenvisioned a new system in whichschools are more responsive to the needsof their communities and more active inbuilding community resources andcapacity

Union leaders and other reformers, whocalled for a system in which theeducators with primary responsibility forteaching and learning also have asignificant role in governing schools

Corporate executives and politicalleaders, who advocated a school systemthat supports economic development bybuilding "human capital" andinfrastructure

The shape of reform in each city depended oneach city's political and civic stakeholders,resources, and circumstances. Most systemimprovement started with a focus on increasingschool autonomy but with only vague ideas abouthow this would cause schools to improve.Downsized central offices tried to perform all oftheir old regulatory functions, creatingadministrative bottlenecks. Schools had to sortthrough the array of commercially availableprograms, materials, and training alternatives tofind their own sources of assistance.

As the reforms matured, their leaders discoveredthat greater school autonomy creates new rolesand responsibilities for individuals and newprofessional norms. Leaders also learned thatschool authority for resources and decisionmaking creates opportunities for change but doesnot guarantee that instruction and learning willimprove. School improvement also requiresstrong leadership, supportive ties to parents andthe community, teacher knowledge andcooperation, and access to new ideas andexpertise outside the school environment.

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Example 1:Charlotte-Mecklenburg. North Carolina

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, consensusgrew in Charlotte-Mecklenburg that the schoolsneeded major improvements. Business leadersviewed the low-quality education system as athreat to economic development. The schoolboard wanted to decrease mandatory busing fordesegregation. Residents were dissatisfied withstudent performanceespecially the gap inachievement between black and white students.

In 1991, the school board chose a newsuperintendent, John Murphy, with theunderstanding that he would radically change thedistrict. Murphy, who had successfullyaddressed similar concerns in Prince George'sCounty, Maryland, began by gathering supportfor reform. He invited 10 prominent nationaleducation leaders to Charlotte-Mecklenburg threetimes over six months to help design a betterschool system. He also held public forums withthese experts and school staff, communitymembers, and business and civic leaders.

Explicit roles and goals helped defineexpectations.

The core of Murphy's plan was a set ofperformance standards for each grade level. Thestandards were benchmarked against the state'smandated end-of-grade exams for elementarystudents and its end-of-course exams for highschool students. Criterion-referenced testshelped teachers determine student progresstoward these benchmark goals.

The plan included goals for the district, for everyschool, and for every grade level within eachschool. The district identified nine broadoutcome goals, including readiness for the nextgrade, decreased absences, improvedperformance on state subject tests, decreaseddropout rates, and increased enrollment in high-level courses. Each goal had correspondingannual and long-term targets.

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School- and grade-level goals corresponded tothe district goals. Central office staff establishedgoals for individual grade levels annually, basedon the previous year's test results in each school.The district set separate goals for white and blackstudents in an attempt to reduce the performancegap between these groups. Schools that metmost of their annual goals received cash bonuses.

New governance procedures improved schoolleadership.

The plan gave principals more control over theirschools, including increased authority for budgetand staffing decisions. Although some principalsestablished site councils, they were notmandatory.

Principals began reporting directly to thesuperintendent. The superintendent evaluatedeach principal annually, based on (1) schoolachievement and/or progress toward goals; (2)surveys of teachers, parents, and students; and(3) reports on facility operations andmanagement. The district pooled its state-mandated pay raises for principals and used thefunds to give principals who received goodevaluations salary increases of up to 10 percent.By mid-1995, when principal tenure ended, 75percent of principals had been replaced orreassigned.

The central office's role changed to bettersupport school accountability.

In exchange for greater school-level authority foreducationand greater responsibility forresultsthe central office relinquished otheroversight activities. The central office's rolebecame to help schools reach their goals, andschools were allowed to decide how they couldbest accomplish this. The central office madefunds available to schools that selected assistanceproviders to help them meet specific needs, but itdid not provide centralized curriculum orprofessional development. The school boardretained authority over setting standards andjudging school performance.

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Making information on school performancepublic, and allowing parents to choose theirchildren's schools, connected schools withfamilies and neighborhoods.

During the early years of the reform, theCharlotte Observer annually publishedperformance measures for each school and listedschools that met their goals. This helpedcommunity members learn about their schools.Parents who were dissatisfied with aneighborhood school could send their child toone of the district's magnet schoolsan optionthat became easier when reform leadersincreased the number of magnet schools ratherthan continuing forced busing.

The new accountability and incentive system,combined with increased school-level budgetand staffing discretion, pushed teachers-toimprove instruction and learning in theclassroom.

Some pressure came from principals who wereeager to win high marks for their schoolsandhigher pay raisesunder the new accountabilitysystem. Teachers also put pressure on eachother, driven by the knowledge that high-performing schools would receive cash bonusesand low-performing ones public scrutiny.Principals also had the power to remove teacherswho resisted school improvement.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg's emphasis on achievingmeasurable outcomes produced results.

In the 1994-95 school year, the majority ofschools achieved most of their benchmarkgoalsa substantial increase over base year1992-93. The district exceeded some of its long-term goals but missed others by significantmargins. For example, the gap between blackand non-black student achievement shrank, butnot as much as reformers wanted. The electionof a new school board in 1995 raised concernsthat the school system was again becomingsegregated, suggesting the need for greaterscrutiny of performance gaps in the future.

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Murphy left Charlotte-Mecklenburg in themiddle of the 1995-96 school year, after votersrejected a school tax levy he supported andelected a school board that showed less supportfor his leadership. Although much of Murphy'splan remains in place, some has changed underhis successor, Eric Smith.

Example 2:Chicago. Illinois

The crisis in the Chicago school system began in1979, when bankers from the Commercial Clubof Chicago agreed to bail out the system inexchange for financial oversight authority. Thenext decade brought little improvement:

The Chicago Tribune described theChicago public school system asorganized for failure. Students, parents,and neighborhood schools wereportrayed as victims of self-interestedcareer bureaucrats in the central office,politicians in the city council and statelegislature, and a teachers' unionfocused on protecting the jobs andbenefits of its aging membership.

The Chicago Panel on School Policyfound that school-level staffing hadincreased only 2 percent between 1981and 1988compared with a 29 percentbuildup of administrative staff.

The panel found that nearly half of thechildren who entered the city's 18 mosteconomically disadvantaged high schoolsin 1984 dropped out before graduation.Among those who did graduate, morethan half read below a ninth-grade level.

Broad-based community and school reformbegan in 1987, following a contentious teachers'strike. Mayor Harold Washington gatheredbusiness leaders and 50 representatives ofcommunity organizations and charged them withreforming the entire school system. The

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collaborators eventually formed a coalition thatlobbied for a new Chicago school law, whichwas enacted in December 1988.

Limited central office authority placedresponsibility for improving student achievementin the hands of parents, community members,and educators.

Chicago reform leaders believed that givingparents and community members some .

responsibility for governing their schools wouldrenew school-community ties and unite thestrengths of all who care about children'seducation.

The new law mandated that every school electLocal School Councils (LSCs) consisting of sixparents, two community members, two teachers,and the principal. The councils had the power tohire or fire the principal, approve an annualschool improvement plan, and allocate the largestproportion of state anti-poverty funds, which by1994 averaged about $500,000 per elementaryschool and $800,000 per high school.Teachers were expected to advise principals oninstructional matters through a ProfessionalPersonnel Advisory Committee. Principals, wholost tenure under the reform, gained authority tobudget discretionary funds and to select and hirenew teachers without regard for seniority.

Funds from local foundations and corporationssupported implementation of the new governanceprocedures, and community and business groupsprovided training for LSC members.

New roles for key players shifted oversight ofschool system improvement from the schoolboard to an external agency.

The School Finance Authority (SFA), an entitycreated during the earlier fiscal bailout of theschool system, gained responsibility forapproving plans for downsizing and restructuringthe school system. The sitting school boardmembers and superintendent were dismissed.An interim board, selected by the mayor, began

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restructuring the system, negotiating a newteachers' contract, and selecting a newsuperintendent. A new commission was createdto screen permanent candidates for the centralboarda responsibility that previously had beenthe mayor's.

Chaos and inaction marred initial efforts toimprove the school system.

The district's financial problems and threats of ateachers' strike plagued Chicago's early reformefforts. Chronic financial difficulties lead tonear-yearly fiscal crises. A multi-yearagreement on teachers' salaries, negotiated bythe interim school board, was rescinded by thepermanent board.

The School Finance Authority refused to approvethe board's decentralization and restructuringplansthree years in a row. The SFA finallywrote its own restructuring plan and demandedthat the board implement it. The new schoolsuperintendent, Ted Kimbrough, drew criticismfor weak efforts at system restructuring.Frequent downsizing eroded the central office'scapacity to respond to routine requests fromschools, and Local School Councils mistrustedthe information they did receive.

Changes in the principal's role, coupled with anattractive early retirement incentive, broughtmajor changes in school leadership.

Three years into reform, 43 percent of schoolshad new principals. The number of female,minority, and young principals increaseddramatically.

The 1988 reform failed to produce broadinstitutional change, although it did sparkaction in many elementary schools.

Four years into the reform, research revealedthat about one-third of elementary schools hadbegun to collaborate with parents andneighborhood residents to strengthen school-community ties and to improve teaching and

learning. Another third of the schools seemed tobe moving in that direction. The remainingschools appeared unchanged by reform andunlikely to improve if left to their own resources.These results suggested that many schools neededextra help to make significant improvements.

Political changes at the state level launched asecond stage of reform in 1995, bringingcorporate-style leadership, new fundingstructures, and more shifts in authority.

After Republicans gained control of the statelegislature in early 1995, new reform leadersdecided to make the following changes:

Replace the member school board with afive-member Reform Board of Trustees

Give the mayor authority to directlyappoint the school board

Create a corporate-style managementteam, headed by a Chief ExecutiveOfficer, with members appointed by themayor

Consolidate separate streams of statefunding into two block grants andsuspend the authority of the SFA

Eliminate barriers to the privatization ofschool and district functions, includingmost teacher work rules

Forbid teachers to strike for 18 months

Give principals greater authority overbuilding hours and service staff workingin the schools

Accountability structures created by the secondstage of reform replaced many of the goals ofthe original reform effort by returning authorityto the central office.

Although the governance structure of LocalSchool Councils was not substantively altered,

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the district's new CEO had authority to imposeremediation, probation, or reconstitution onschools where academic performance did notimprove. The most drastic of theseoptionsreconstitutionallowed the CEO todismiss the Local School Council, fire the entirestaff, and bring in teachers and other personnelworking on one-year contracts.

The new system used norm-referenced,standardized tests to measure students' ability toprogress from one grade to the next. Studentswho tested well below grade level were requiredto attend summer school, and those whose testscores did not improve had to repeat the grade.These rules affected dozens of schools andthousands of students. After the first year, 109schools were put on academic probation,including nearly half of the high schools. Otherschools were put on remediation status andencouraged to adopt a back-to-basics curriculum.

By 1996, the district and many individualschools demonstrated significant improvementsthat could be traced to the original reform.

District-wide gains in student learning appearedat almost every grade level in elementary readingand mathematics achievement. Althoughprogress was slower than many would like, theresults indicated that the 1988 effort to buildschool-level authority ultimately did improvestudent learning in some elementary schools.However, no similar improvements wereapparent in high schools.

The changes in central office roles andresponsibilities were just beginning as the six-citystudy ended.

Example 3:Cincinnati. Ohio

Dissatisfied with rising education costs, disciplineproblems, and falling test scores, Cincinnativoters defeated a $7.2 million tax levy in 1990.The school superintendent, facing bankruptcy

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and major budget cuts in the school system,appealed to the business community for help.

The Cincinnati Business Committee (CBC)formed a task force on public schools, chaired bybanker Clement L. Buenger. In 1991, theBuenger Commission concluded that the schoolsystem was "an organization plagued withproblems: political discord, inefficientmanagement, antiquated systems, and anadministrative structure that has the tendency tomaintain the status quo."

A new superintendent, Michael J. Brandt,accepted the Buenger Commission report as atemplate for school improvementin exchangefor union, business, and community support of atax increase. The Cincinnati Federation ofTeachers (CFT) linked a pay raise for teachers tothe levy, the cost of which was partially offset bycuts in the districts' administration.

Streamlining the central office, combined withschool-based management and an incentive paysystem, empowered principals and teachers.

The Buenger Commission recommended makingthe central office smaller and less intrusive totransform the system from "a top-down pyramidinto an organization focused on individualschools and administered by professionalmanagers who are given the incentives and theresponsibility to produce superior educationalperformance."

The plan also called for (1) upgrading the schoolsystem's infrastructure; (2) creating a pilot"mini-district" to serve as a catalyst forinnovation; (3) ending the practice of promotingstudents simply because, of their age; and (4)establishing targets for graduation, dropout rates,and other indicators of performance.

The new structure eliminated all of the associatesuperintendent positions, the entire Departmentof Administration, Curriculum, and Instruction,and 60 percent of central office jobs. Thedistrict's 80 schools were reorganized into nine

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mini-districts, one of which was to function as asystem-wide research laboratory.

A major commitment to staff developmenthelped teachers and principals developleadership skills.

Before the reform began, the CincinnatiFederation of Teachers won approval for teacherpeer-review and a career ladder. Designatedlead teachers mentored new teachers and helpeddetermine which teachers should receivecontracts. The CFT leader also gained supportfor teacher-administration panels that wouldincrease the union's voice in decisions aboutinstruction.

The Mayerson Human Resource DevelopmentAcademy, created in 1991 with funds from localfoundations and corporations, expanded theseefforts. The Mayerson Academy worked undercontract with the district to train administratorsand teachers. The academy played a significantrole in developing capacity for leadership bytraining principals, lead teachers, and otherschool staff as needed. However, it didrelatively little whole-school training.

Linking school performance withadministrators' salaries and school bonusesincreased school accountability for results.

Cincinnati tied salaries for principals and othereducation administrators to school performance.School performance measures included students'results on standardized and state proficiencytests; rates of promotion, graduation, anddropping out; and the percentage of students whoreceive passing grades. Schools that met theirgoals received bonuses. Sanctions for low-performing schools remained weak, however.

New roles for principals were intended toimprove communication between schools,communities, and the central office.

Each mini-district identified a lead principal toact as a liaison between principals and the central

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office. Teachers reported directly to principals,who reported to the superintendent or hisdesignee. The Buenger Commission expectedlead principals to funnel information fromschools and communities to the superintendent.

Because all principals reported to thesuperintendent, however, the new role of leadprincipal was unclear. Despite the training theyreceived at Mayerson Academy, lead principalsstruggled with this ambiguity. In 1995, thedistrict abolished those positions and the mini-district structure and reinstated a morehierarchical management system with fourregional administrators.

Reforms focused on academic improvement aswell as restructuring.

Cincinnati's school reform got a much-neededboost when the National Science Foundationawarded the district a $15 million grant for asystemic math, science, and technologyeducation program. This marked a shift fromthe structural changes of the BuengerCommission's plan to a direct focus on academicimprovement. The district also forged anagreement with the New American SchoolsDevelopment Corporation to bring new schooldesigns to at least 14 Cincinnati schools in 1996.

School-level authority for decision makingbegan slowly but grew.

During the first year of reform, lead principalsgained authority over schools in their mini-districts and teachers gained a voice in the hiringand firing of other teachers throughrepresentation on a school hiring board andthrough the peer review process. Lead teachersgradually received more responsibility forcurriculum and instruction.

Instructional Leadership Teams (ILTs) began tomake school decisions. Each team consisted oflead teachers, the principal, parents, a specialeducation teacher, and staff representatives.With guidance from their ILTs, schools used

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discretionary funds to hire specialized staff andtraded in existing staff slots to free up funds forspecial purposes.

Cincinnati's second stage of reform hoped to fillgaps in site-based management andaccountability, school-wide improvement, andstudent achievement of high standards.

A five-year plan for restructuring the schoolsystem, adopted in 1996, required all non-magnet schools to adopt a model of whole-schoolchangepreferably one of the New AmericanSchools designs. Every school was to set annualgoals for test scores and other measures ofstudent achievement. In return, the district gaveeach school an unrestricted, lump-sum annualbudget.

Although the new plan did not mandate specificinstructional strategies, it required the followingchanges:

Schools were to use teaching teams andmulti-age student grouping for all gradelevels except eleventh and twelfth grade.

Junior high and middle schools were tobe eliminated, and students inkindergarten through eighth grade wereto attend the same schools.

Teachers were to remain with the samestudents for more than one year and beresponsible for ensuring that the studentsmet performance goals.

These changes created the first rift in thereformers' relationship with teachers' unionssince the Buenger Commission report. When thethree-year decentralization study ended, it wasunclear whether union opposition to teamteaching, multi-age grouping, the loss of juniorhigh schools, and incentive pay for teacherswould undermine these key components of thereform.

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Example 4:Denver, Colorado

In 1990, the Colorado legislature mandated openenrollment within school districts, and Gov. RoyRomer mandated decentralization of the Denverschool system. The specific form that thesechanges were to take caused friction between theteachers' union and school board, however.

The board advocated greater principal authorityover teacher hiring, a longer work day forteachers, and authority to remove the issue ofstudent discipline from the teaching contract.The Denver Classroom Teachers Associationsought shared decision-making councils andcharacterized the board's efforts as top-downmanagement. When the union and the boardcame to an impasse in contract negotiations, andthe union voted to strike, Gov. Romerwho wasthen chairman of the National Education GoalsPanelstepped in.

During six public hearings, beginning in January1991, the governor invited testimony from schooladministrators, teachers, and district residents onhow the needs of teachers and administratorsmight be accommodated while improving thequality of children's education. The resultinglabor contract contained some traditional teacherprotections in exchange for much greaterdecision-making authority at the school level.

Collaborative Decision Making committees(CDMs) in each of the city's 115 schools wereintended to help schools and communitiesdevelop diverse programs and services to meetthe unique needs of their students.

Individual schools gained authority forscheduling teachers; selecting new faculty; anddetermining strategies for instruction, budgetallocation, instructional support, curriculumstructure and implementation, school climate,building safety and maintenance, and communityrelations. The school board retained controlover the school calendar, collective bargaining,the overall curriculum framework and-desired

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outcomes, evaluation, food services,transportation, and court-ordered desegregation.

The CDMs were composed of the schoolprincipal, four teachers elected by the faculty,one classified employee chosen by his or hercolleagues, three parents, and a representativefrom the business community. Group decisionsrequired consensus; if the group could not reacha consensus, the principal determined theschool's position. Committee members couldappeal a principal's decision to one of four new,district-wide improvement councils, which alsoprovided technical assistance and training incollaborative decision making.

Each collaborative committee created asubcommittee to recommend candidates forvacant positions within the school. Although thecentral office made final decisions, it wasexpected to confer with the subcommittees whenhiring teachers and principals.

Cash rewards for schools that made effectiveimprovements spurred innovation andleadership.

The reform plan required the district tocontribute $100,000 annually to an incentivefund. The district also was expected to conductannual evaluations of the level and effectivenessof support for reform among central officeadministrators and principals.

Battles over decision-making authority pitted thecentral administration against schools andlimited school's authority to act.

The central office interpreted reform provisionsnarrowly. For instance, when CDM leaders infive schools petitioned to eliminate standardizedtesting in favor of more authentic assessments,the board blocked their efforts. Citizens' groupswho supported school autonomysuch asDenver's newly created research and advisorygroup, Citizens for Quality Schoolsreactedagainst what they perceived as a power grab bythe central office.

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Denver schools remained locked in battles overdecision-making authority between 1990 and1996. Some schools succeeded in adoptingalternative performance assessments, and someCDMs received waivers from district policy thatpermitted them to develop programs responsiveto student and community concerns. But the re-introduction of district-wide teacher workingconditions in 1994 represented a retreat from theeffort to promote decentralization.

Failure to provide funding for specific schoolsystem improvements left the reforms vulnerableto other political priorities.

Denver's reforms created a need for additionalfunds at the very time that the district was losingrevenue. In the second year of the neweducation plan, the reforms faced challengesfrom state ballot initiatives that would havepushed decentralization in differentdirectionstoward vouchers, a tax spendinglimit, and a governor-supported tax increase.Passage of the limits on tax spending created a$28 million deficit in the city's budget. By 1993-94, the shortfall had doubled, leaving littlemoney for key elements of the education plan.

Inadequate training for school-level decisionmakers weakened the collaborative school-community groups.

Teachers and parents who served onCollaborative Decision Making committeesreceived training on building consensus andmaking decisions, but they received little or notraining about education or school operations.Even with training, committee members found ithard to reach consensus, and the time and energyrequired to collaborate discouraged manyparticipants. A study by Citizens for QualitySchools found particularly high turnover amongbusiness representatives on the CDMs: Twenty-five percent left within the first year.

Community dissatisfaction with minorityeducation and teachers' responsibilitiescontinued to complicate reforms.

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In 1994, soon after the district hired newsuperintendent Iry Moskowitz, Denver'sHispanic community called for a boycott ofclasses to protest slow progress in hiringHispanic educators and bilingual teachers. In1995, the courts released Denver schools frommandated busing; state law forbade districts toengage in voluntary busing. Efforts to improveeducation in schools with high concentrations ofminority students stumbled again in late 1995,when voters defeated a tax levy for this purpose.

The teacher's union approved a strike in 1994over salary and reform concerns. The unionwanted to end principals' authority to vetodecisions made by the CDM committees and toput teachers' working conditions back into thecollective bargaining contract, thus removingthem from CDM discretion. Gov. Romerarranged the following compromises:

Inclusion of teacher working conditionsin the contractincluding planning timeand limits on class sizein exchange forextra parent representation on the CDMs

Creation of an additional appeals processto override principal vetoes

Success remained elusive, and long-termbenefits from Denver's reform may depend onthe community's ability to sustain strong civicinterest in improving beleaguered schools.

A comparison of 1990-95 scores on the IowaTest of Basic Skills in the fifth, eighth, andeleventh grades showed that only the junior highlevel had significantly more schools improvingthan declining. Elementary and high schoolsshowed no evidence of whole-school progress,with as many schools declining as improving.

Example 5:Los Angeles. California

The Los Angeles Unified School District(LAUSD) has undergone many attempts to shift

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authority for education from the central office toschool communities. The earliest reforms beganin 1989, as part of a compromise to end a bitter11-day teachers' strike.

Leadership councils and school-basedmanagement gave schools authority for decisionmaking.

A 1989 agreement endorsed leadership councilsat each of the system's schools. The councilshad between six and 16 elected members; halfwere teachers and the rest were parents,community residents, other school staff, and theprincipal. The councils had power to make somedecisions about staff development, studentdiscipline, scheduling school activities, and theuse of some state lottery money.

The 1989 contract also created a school-basedmanagement (SBM) process. Schools that couldstate their education goals, describe how thegoals would enhance student performance, andpropose a method for evaluating success receivedmore latitude for shared decision making.School-level plans for improvement had to beapproved by the principal, the school's unionrepresentative, a parent or community member,and two-thirds of the teachers in the school.They also had to be submitted to a newly createdSBM central oversight committee.

Initial results of the SBM process weredisappointing. A first-year report on shareddecision-making councils criticized the systemfor weakening principals' authority, providingtoo little training for council members, andunder-funding the effort. Of more than 650schools in the system, only 84 ever received fullSBM status. In 1992, Superintendent WilliamAnton eliminated all district support for SBM inthe wake of continuing budget shortages.

Broad coalitions of community groups helpedsupport school change.

Several community groups entered the schoolimprovement process with plans of their own.

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The five-year-old Los Angeles EducationalPartnership (LAEP), a business-led publiceducation fund, contributed $10,000 in grants forrestructuring and arranged corporatemanagement consulting for 26 schools. Fourneighborhood groups joined forces in 1990around issues of school safety and quality.Known as Kids 1st, this grassroots coalitionrepresented Hispanic, black, Jewish, and otherethnic neighborhoods. Kids 1st held rallies anddrafted principles for school improvement;businessman (and later mayor) Richard Riordanco-chaired the group.

By February 1992, Kids 1st and LAEP hadforged an uneasy alliance with United Teachersof Los Angeles and the district superintendent.The new, bipartisan coalition was called the LosAngeles Educational Alliance for RestructuringNow (LEARN). A former state legislatorbecame LEARN's president, and the chiefexecutive of Atlantic Richfield Corporation waschairman.

LEARN organized 500 people into seven taskforces to draft plans for governance,accountability, school facilities management,assessment, professional development, theintegration social services with education, andstudent preparation for careers. The task forcesdrew on the resources of corporate consultingfirms and university faculties, and the schoolboard accepted their plan in March 1993.

The LEARN plan featured school-levelautonomy, incentives for accountability, andtraining for school staff to take on new roles.

LEARN leaders wanted schools to become semi-autonomous sites responsible for their ownbudgets, staff selection, and teaching methods.The reformers envisioned principals as theprimary decision makers who, in consultationwith school teams, would develop plans forschool improvement based on district standards.Although principals would continue to be hiredby the central office, they would be selected with

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community input, placed on three-year contracts,and subject to removal for cause.

The plan rewarded high-quality teaching withadvancement on a career ladder, to be developedin consultation with the union. Weak teacherswere to be transferred or given remedialassistance. Parents, students, teachers, and otherstaff at high schools would receive annualsurveys so they could register their satisfactionor dissatisfaction with the school's progress.Principals who did not receive satisfactoryratings would be transferred.

To help school professionals prepare for theirnew roles, the plan established a trainingacademy. Corporations and foundations pledgedto provide first-year funding of about $3 million.

The plan also sought: (1) per-pupil funding forschools, rather than staff allotments; (2) theinclusion of school-based social services; (3)waivers of legislative requirements to enableover-crowded schools to rent unused office spacerather than building new facilities; and (4) a newstudent assessment system linked to districtperformance standards, including goals forworkforce preparation.

The LEARN plan was to be phased in over fiveyears, beginning in three clusters of high schoolsand the schools that fed into them. Before anyschool could adopt the plan, 75 percent of theteachers in the school had to vote to support it,and a waiver of any union provisions requiredassent from at least two-thirds of the teachers.No high school could muster this level of teachersupport, so the reform began as a pilot programin 35 elementary schools.

Budget problems at the beginning of the reformput the union and LEARN on a collisioncourse.

The LEARN plan began in the midst of a 12percent shortfall in the district's $3.9 billioneducation budget, when the teachers' union andschool board were locked in acrimonious debate

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over how to spend the available funds. Inexchange for salary cuts, a new contract gaveteachers control over professional developmentand allowed elementary teachers to choose thegrade they would teach.

Union representatives voted not to support theLEARN plan by a 2-1 margin. The unionpresident, Helen Bernstein, succeeded inreversing the vote, but the union members'mistrust and skepticism remained.

For two years, the district's corporate andfoundation partners kept their pledge to fundtraining for principals and lead teachers, as theprogram added 54 schools. By 1995, LEARNadded 103 more schools and the price of trainingreached $7 million. When corporate fundersdecided that they did not want to be the solesupporter of training, LEARN created a privatetraining institute, using $2 million in districtfunds and $5 million from an Annenberg grant.The institute provided training to 105 newLEARN schools in 1996.

Conflicting agendas among business andeducation partners pulled the reform in manydirections.

Early on, LEARN ran into competing reformgoals. One segment of the business communityjoined a grassroots movement to supportvouchers as an alternative to any system-widereform. That movement sponsored anunsuccessful voucher initiative on the Californiaballot in 1993. That same year, newsuperintendent Sid Thompson announced a planto reorganize the district into 25 self-governingclusters. A move to divide the district intoseveral smaller districts remains a popularoption, and the school-based leadership councilsoccasionally challenge decisions made byteachers and the principal under LEARNgovernance arrangements.

Despite these problems, several other initiativesreinforced LEARN's focus on school-levelauthority. For example:

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A management audit by ArthurAnderson in 1992 called for downsizingthe central office and restructuring it toreflect effective business practices.

Also in 1992, the school board settled sixyears of legal debate over inherentinequities in the seniority system forteacher assignments. The consentdecree in Rodriguez vs. LAUSD gave theboard five years to allocate all funding toschools on a more equitable per-pupilbasis, beginning in 1994.

The Los Angeles Metropolitan Project(LAMP), a county-wide projectsupported by $50 million in AnnenbergChallenge Grant funds, built on theLEARN plan for reform. The LAMPboard included LEARN partners.

Los Angeles' decentralization initiatives havebecome increasingly comprehensive but lessuniversally applied, and it is difficult to attributespecific education achievements to LEARN.

Many schools had competing versions of shareddecision-making, and the district had no system-wide policy for reconciling these procedures withLEARN. Nor had the school system resolvedconflicting language in the union contract. Thedistrict made only limited progress in bringing allschools into the reform in accordance with theoriginal five-year plan.

Even so, a 1996 study of children whoparticipated in 29 of the LEARN pilot schoolsshowed positive results. The Evaluation andTraining Institute reported that half of theseschools increased the percentage of fourth-graders who scored above average in reading,math, or language arts on the ComprehensiveTest of Basic Skills. These schools also reportedincreased attendance. Although no comparabledata on student achievement were reported fornon-LEARN schools, reformers considered theresults encouraging.

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Example 6:Seattle. Washington

Seattle was ripe for school improvement in the1990s. The city had lost half of its studentpopulation during the previous two decades,mostly because of the departure of whitestudents. Asian and Latino students had movedinto the district, and the special needs of studentswith limited English proficiency taxed thesystem. Average scores on standardized testswere stuck near the 50th percentile, and apersistent gap between the performance of whiteand minority students troubled communityleaders. School buildings badly needed repairs.And controversy had simmered for years overplans to desegregate schools through controlledchoice rather than busing.

In 1990, newly elected Mayor Norman Riceconvened neighborhood meetings and a city-widesummit to identify new education goals.Residents identified five broad, system-widegoals: stronger ties between schools andcommunities, increased spending on education,creation of a better learning environment, childhealth and safety, and cultural diversity.

The state legislature released a study of Seattle'sschool system in 1990, criticizing the centraloffice and school board for failing to serve theincreasingly diverse student population. Thereport also recommended eliminating thedistrict's geographic zones. In response, thesuperintendent drafted a plan that phased outbusing and emphasized improving schoolfacilities and making better use of technology.

A new teachers' contract in 1992 includedlanguage promoting school-based management.Also that year, Roger Erskine left the NationalEducation Association to head the SeattleEducation Association. Erskine brought withhim a mandate from the national association tomake Seattle a model of union-sponsored schoolreform. A proponent of decentralized authority,Erskine worked closely with the superintendenton plans for restructuring the system. The

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Seattle Alliance, a business group, beganmonitoring the changes and encouraging effortsto reduce the size of the central administration.

Early efforts to build school autonomyproceeded fitfully through administrativedownsizing, restructuring, and the developmentof school advisory councilsbut the reformslacked comprehensive planning and acommitment to decentralization as an over-arching goal.

Before 1996, Seattle adopted popular elements ofother cities' decentralization reforms but did notalways implement them. Abandoned plansincluded school-based control of discretionaryfunds and Vanguard Schools, a group of 10schools slated to receive their entire budgets inlump-sum form.

Two changes were implemented. In 1994, thedistrict eliminated 20 percent of central officejobs, including three of the five administratorswho previously reported to the superintendent.As a result, principals began reporting directly tothe superintendent. By the end of 1995, abouthalf of the schools had established local advisorycouncils. The councils' role was limited,however, and the school board sometimesoverturned council decisions.

When Seattle's long-serving superintendentagreed not to seek reappointment in 1995, theschool board hired John Stanford, the city's firstblack superintendent and a retired U.S. Armygeneral who had previously served as countymanager in Fulton County, Georgia. Stanfordhad a reputation for good customer service andefficient operations. He also was committed toturning principals into chief executive officers oftheir schoolsleaders who were accountable forschool performance and empowered to improveteaching and learning

Reform elements included new roles forteachers in setting working conditions andleading instructional initiatives, lump-sum

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funding for schools to increase their autonomy,and leadership training for principals.

In mid-1996, Stanford and Erskine negotiated anagreement that gave teachers great latitude incollaborating with principals to set workingconditions and classroom initiatives. Stanfordand Erskine jointly supported an effort to re-program the district's expenditures so that mostfunds reached schools in an unencumbered lumpsum. Stanford and the business coalition also setout to develop a principals' training centermodeled after Cincinnati's Mayerson Academy.

Intervention with weak principals and schoolsimproved leadership and accountability.

Stanford transferred and reassigned more thanhalf the district's principals before the beginningof the 1996-97 school year. He alsoreconstituted low-performing schools. Incollaboration with the Seattle Alliance and theunion, the district defined a new mission forthese schools, replaced the principals, opened allteaching jobs to competitive applications, andsought voluntary student enrollment.

Failed bond issues and levies, court battles overdesegregation, and initiatives for charterschools and vouchers pushed schooldecentralization from the center of publicconcerns. However, recent state and localefforts may enliven interest in school reform.

In 1996, the school board resolved to phase outbusing in favor of a system of neighborhoodschools. The board promised to allocate extraresources to schools with high proportions ofdisadvantaged students. A state systemic reforminitiative was passed in 1993, leading to thedevelopment of new state standards in education.The legislature approved the accountabilitysystem in 1999, and new state tests for fourth-,seventh-, and tenth-graders will be mandatorybeginning in 1999-2000. Current and futureactivities include additions to the state standardsand development of a high school exit exam.

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Has Decentralization Worked?

Although each of the six cities made someprogress over the course of the three-yearstudy, no city fully met the fundamentalchallenge of creating a system in whichschools are publicly funded and accountablefor results yet have the independence theyneed to reach diverse students andcommunities. In particular:

The amount of resources and authorityactually devolved to schools remainedmodest.

It was unclear whether powers newlydevolved to schools would stay under schoolcontrol.

Many teachers, principals, and parentsremained cautious and assumed thatlike somany previous reformsthe effort totransform the school system would not last.

Most changes occurred in elementaryschools, while high schools saw much lessimprovement.

The best evidence of improvement came fromCharlotte-Mecklenburg, where some schoolsreported rapidly increased test scores,especially for minority students. Positivetrends in test scores emerged in Chicago,where all elementary grades reportedsubstantial improvements in standardizedreading and mathematics scores for the firsttime in 1996.

In addition, Chicago and Denverinstitutionalized school leadership and builtties with communities. Cincinnati, Chicago,and Denver strengthened professionaldevelopment for teachers and principals.

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What Works?Lessons Learned About Decentralization and Community Schools

The six-city study revealed valuable lessons about: the scope and depth of reforms that build school-levelresponsibility for education, key characteristics of community-linked school systems, strategies forconnecting schools with parents and communities, and conflicts that can surface during efforts to createdecentralized community schools.

Lessons on the Scope and Depth ofReforms

1. There is no single model fordecentralized school systems, althoughthere are certain common features.

The only feature that all approaches shared wasthe schools' ability to request waivers fromdistrict policy. Most reforms also called forcentral office downsizing; changes in the role ofschool principals; and engagement of the privatesector, especially in providing training for schoolleaders.

As school reforms mature, they begin toresemble each other more. Most of theinitiatives in the six-city study grew to includemandatory school leadership councils; a new,limited role for the central office; greater school-level authority over teacher selection andretention; and new procedures to hold schoolsaccountable for student performance.

2. Decentralization requires system-widechanges for which some people may notbe prepared.

School-level responsibility for education createsnew responsibilities for teachers, principals, andsometimes parents to engage in curriculumdevelopment, program design, and strategicanalysis. Although school staff might expressenthusiasm for these tasks, they rarely have theexperience needed to immediately assume newroles. When reforms cut central office

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expenditures, they often fail to leave funding forlocal training and preparation.

3. Senior business, civic, and politicalleaders provide much of the energy andmany of the ideas central to schoolsystem reform.

Although community organizations play majorroles in advancing school-level authority andimplementing it on a day-to-day basis, municipalleaders remain key players. System reform isexpensive, politically threatening, and timeconsuming. It requires knowledge, expertise,and political will far beyond the level that mostbusiness and civic leaders have devoted to publiceducation in the past.

Partners Outside the Education SystemAre Vital to Success

The drive for school system reform oftenemerges from outside the conventionalstructure of school boards and professionaleducation bureaucracies. Researchers in thesix-city study found little evidence ofcooperation among teachers, principals, anddistrict staff to construct their own ideas forchange. Insteadeven where union leadersor a new superintendent played a role ininitiating improvementdistricts relied onbusinessmen, local policy leaders, andfoundation directors for ideas and activism.

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4. Effective systems of decentralizedcommunity schools require long-termvision and commitment.

In particular, reforms need comprehensiverestructuring plans, stable leadership, andsustained political activity to guide efforts untilthe changes are institutionalized. Collaboratorsmust assemble and maintain an unwieldycoalition of business and community leaders,school board members, union leaders, schooladministrators, and educators. They mustcontinuously press for changes that people mayfind unfamiliar and threatening.

5. A shift from a centrally controlledsystem of schools to a system based onschool-level autonomy seems tostimulate major changes in elementaryschools more easily than in secondaryschools.

Because secondary schools are organized aroundsemi-autonomous departments, teachers in theseschools tend to be more involved with specificsubject matter than with larger organizationalconcerns. The complex, anonymousenvironment of many high schools also mayprevent them from engaging the passion,creativity, and commitment of key partners inschool change.

Lessons on the Characteristics ofDecentralized Systems ofCommunity Schools

An effective approach to decentralized,community-linked education requires:

A comprehensive restructuring plan

The political will needed to engagediverse partners in long-termcollaboration

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Time for challenging improvements totake root

Adequate resources

Access to specialized knowledge andtraining needed to build local capacity

Shared motivation and a willingness toimprove

A good plan for a system of autonomouscommunity schools also clarifies four aspects ofthe relationship between schools, communities,and the central office: (1) school-level autonomyand leadership, (2) new roles and responsibilitiesfor participants, (3) external supports for schoolsengaged in improvement, and (4) accountabilityprovisions.

School-level Autonomy and Leadership

I. To have freedom of action, individualschools must control real-dollarresources.

Having authority over resources allows schoolsto pursue their own priorities, attract high-qualitystaff who appreciate the school's mission, andselect programs that build on the school'sspecific strengths and needs. The ability tonegotiate salaries and benefits for principals alsogives schools a way to keep good leaders longenough to institutionalize change.

2. To be fully responsible for their ownperformance, individual schools mustcontrol key decisions about employees.

This includes decisions about hiring,compensating, evaluating, and firing teachersand administrators.

In order to undertake education approaches thatbuild family and neighborhood strengthsforexample, becoming a truly bilingual school toserve an immigrant communityschools need

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the power to hire and maintain staff whose skillsand habits match the mission. Schools also needto be able to remove teachers who resist theimprovements that are needed.

Control over hiring also allows schools toinvigorate their faculties. Chicago, Cincinnati,and Seattle each set aside their seniority systemsso schools could choose new staff members whosupported improvement goals.

3. To allow schools to pursue distinctivestrategies for instruction, parents mustbe able to choose the school whoseapproaches they understand andsupport.

A school cannot build or maintain a coherentapproach to instruction if parents and teachersdisagree about what children should learn andwhat types of learning experiences are mosteffective. Forcing parents to send their childrento a school whose pedagogies do not suit theirneeds and preferences can seriously underminethe school-community connection. On the otherhand, allowing parents who do not accept theirneighborhood school's approach to chooseanother school can strengthen both theneighborhood and school communities.

4. Each school must have a systemicagenda for change.

The plan should identify the school's core goals,the philosophy and strategies that will driveteaching and learning, the professionaldevelopment programs that can help move stafftoward the goals, and the incentives andsanctions needed to encourage improvement.

5. School autonomy creates a need forstrong leadership.

More than any other person in a school,principals have the power to create, lead, andsustain improvement and to foster connectionswith families and neighborhoods. Conversely, aprincipal with poor leadership skills can

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undermine the efforts of an entire school andcommunity.

The reforms in Charlotte-Mecklenburg,Cincinnati, Chicago, and Denver dramaticallyaltered the resources and authority available toprincipals and created new sanctions andincentives for school leadership. As a result,most principals became entrepreneurs of goals,ideas, and resources. Their leadership now ispublicly endorsed and valued.

New Roles for Principals VaryAcross Districts and Over Time

Chicago's principals initially lost tenure,and their positions changed from a reward forcareer administrators to an appointed post inwhich fresh ideas about school change carriedmore weight than prior service. This broughtmore minorities, women, and youngprofessionals into school leadership roles.Principals retained their responsibilities to thelocal school councils that hired them but alsowere required to meet new job qualifications.The central office monitored principals'performance on operational issues, and aprincipal could be immediately dismissed bythe district's CEO if a school was found to befailing its students.

In Charlotte-Mecklenburg, principalsbecame directly accountable to thesuperintendent, who had sole authority to hireand fire them.

New Roles and Responsibilities for the CentralOffice and Educators

1. The new governance system mustclearly outline the powers of the centraloffice and the legal terms under whichindividual schools operate.

Agreements between a school and school boardshould define the school's mission, guarantee

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public funding, and specify grounds foraccountability. In effect, the school boardbecomes the trustee of a portfolio ofschoolssupporting those struggling to improve,causing new schools to be organized in place offailed ones, expanding the number of successfulschools, and terminating agreements with schoolsthat do not improve.

Principals Benefit fromLeadership Programs

The Mayerson Academy in Cincinnati,and a similar organization being considered inSeattle, focuses on developing of principals'skills and addresses the new behaviorsrequired of principals under decentralizedaccountability arrangements.

In Chicago, the principals' association iscollaborating with the district and businessgroups to create an induction program fornew principals and a two-year professionaldevelopment program for senior principals.

Denver's School Leadership Academyhelps train all principals in the district.

+ Los Angeles' LEARN program has amanagement training component forprincipals that focuses on leadershipdevelopment and operates in collaborationwith local universities.

By the end of the three-year study, onlyCincinnati and Charlotte-Mecklenburg hadbegun to deal with the fiscal incentives anddisincentives embedded in their systems forrecruiting and compensating principals.These cities' principals and otheradministrators participated in slowlydeveloping pay-for-performance programs.However, because principals as a group tendto be politically weak when it comes tocollective bargaining, their remuneration mayactually decline relative to teachers indecentralized school systems.

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2. New roles and responsibilities arerequired for staff and administrators atthe school and district levels and forteachers' unions, service providers, andcommunity organizations.

In particular, a system of community schoolsrequires:

A superintendent who suggestsappropriate standards and performancemeasures, interprets evaluation resultsfor the school board, and recommendswhether the board should continue tofund a particular school

A teachers' union that serves as aprofessional organization, helping todevelop good practitioners and practicesand matching teachers with schools onthe basis of skills, instructionalapproaches, and working styles

Teachers who have opportunities forprofessional development, collaborationwith colleagues, and influence overschool decisions

Private, fee-charging service providersthat compete with one another and thecentral office staff to assist schools

Charitable organizations, supported bybusinesses and foundations, that providefunds for research and development toexpand the intellectual resources andtools available to schools

Principals who do not merely enforcecentral office requirements but stimulateinnovation within their schools, betweenschools, and with the community

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How do Districts Redefine Roles?

Chicago's reform created a parent-ledcouncil at every school. These groups hadauthority to hire and fire principals. Teachersgained influence over curriculum, staffdevelopment, and new programs.

Cincinnati dramatically reduced the size ofits central office and enhanced the role ofprincipals and teachers in school districtmanagement. A teacher development processand career ladder facilitated teacherrecruitment, induction, and mentoring.

External Support for Schools

1. Schools need outside help to developcapacity for local leadership.

In a system of community schools, individualschools must envision their own futures and charttheir own path through issues involvingcurriculum, staff development, assessment,budgeting, planning, and evaluation. However,school staff may not have the expertise,resources, or experience they need to preparethem for these tasks. They need help to gatherand maintain support for improvement, tostimulate initiative in failing schools, and toexpand the educational opportunities available forchildren and families.

2. At a minimum, schools need thefollowing types of external support:

Connections with assistanceorganizations and mutual-help networks

Information about the strengths,weaknesses, and effectiveness of localassistance providers

Links to local foundations or othersources of funds for school improvement

Accountability

Shifting the responsibility for education from acentralized office to the school level altersexpectations for how schools will answer to theirconstituents. For example, whose confidenceand support must a school earn to retain itsauthority to operate? On what basis does aschool demonstrate its fitness and competence?

1. If schools have authority to act on theirown goalsand access to the resourcesneeded to support their actionsthenthey should be accountable to parents,students, and community members.

A rigorous approach to school-levelaccountability holds schools responsible for:

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Fulfilling promises to the school boardabout instructional methods andapproach

Fulfilling the community's educationgoals, especially those outlined in localstandards for student achievement orexpressed by local site councils and otherneighborhood groups

Student achievement gains and otherobjective indicators of schoolperformance

Generating support from families,including the parents' choice to sendtheir children to the school

Generating support from teachers,including teachers' willingness to workat the school

Meeting professional standards forteaching, as internalized by teachers andprincipals, evidenced in curriculum andinstruction, and judged by accreditors

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Strategies for Connecting Schoolswith Parents and Communities

Effective education systems recognize andrespond to the needs and strengths of familiesliving in disadvantaged urban neighborhoods.Students in these families are more likely thantheir counterparts in the general population to bepoor, to live in single-parent households, and tobe members of racial or ethnic minorities. As aresult, these students and their families oftenneed help meeting basic needssuch as healthcare, shelter, and employmentbefore they canconcentrate on education. These families alsomay possess skills and knowledge that gountapped.

Increasing school-level responsibility foreducation encourages teachers, administrators,and other school staff to look to theircommunitiesinstead of the school systembureaucracyfor guidance and feedback. In theprocess, community involvement can strengthenschools and bring local resources to bear onstudents' education.

It isn't easy to establish decentralized schoolsystems that link schools with families andcommunities, however. Simply eliminatingdistrict control of schools does not guarantee thatparents will connect with schools or form bondswith teachers, that schools will immediatelybecome responsive to family and neighborhoodneeds, or that educators will know how torespond to families and communities. Thesechanges do not happen quickly, and they mayrequire several attempts.

How can an emerging system of communityschools help schools forge connections withparents and neighborhoods? The six-city studyidentified two important strategies: changingexpectations and opportunities for teachers anddeveloping educators' leadership skills andcommitment to improvement.

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Changing Expectations and Opportunities forTeachers

1. Teachers need help learning how tocollaborate and solve problems.

These vital skills help teachers provide thelearning experiences that meet parents'expectations and respond effectively tocommunity concerns. The Mayerson Academyin Cincinnati, for example, provided training forlead and mentor teachers and, ultimately, otherschool staff. The academy offered courses on arange of topics including outreach to parents andcommunities.

2. Routine professional development is notenough; teachers need to learn how totake responsibility and make decisions.

Teachers' unions in Chicago, Seattle, and LosAngeles sponsored programs to prepare teachersto assume more professional responsibilities andimprove classroom performance. In Denver,training emphasized the skills needed forcollaborative decision making and conflictresolutionskills that facilitate interactions withparents and communities as well as professionalcolleaguesin addition to the development ofinstructional plans. There were few examples ofsustained, whole-school instructionalimprovement in the six cities studied, however.

3. The kind of professional developmentneeded to support decentralization andschool-community connections is rarelyavailable.

The overall level of district and school fundingfor staff development in the six cities studiedremained very modest. Although schools inChicago and other cities with school-basedresources appeared quite ready to invest in morepeople, programs, and materials, they were lesswilling to spend resources to help current staffwork together more efficiently and effectively.Nor did any of the six cities focus on improvingpre-service education for teachers or providing

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induction programs for new teachers.Cincinnati's decentralization plan did include aunion-negotiated process in which lead teachersmentored new teachers; a similar policy initiativerecently surfaced in Chicago.

Districts are becoming aware of these gaps inprofessional development. However, even ifdistricts can commit adequate resources toteacher training, many still lack the infrastructureneeded to deliver the services.

Professional Communities Can Flourish inAutonomous Schools

In the best of these schools, teachers regularlycommunicate with parents, discuss schoolpractice, observe each other's teaching,design improvements, and engage incollaborative work. For example:

In Charlotte-Mecklenburg, an incentivesystem stimulated faculty cooperation. Staffreceive rewards if the school meets its goals,so teachers work together to help strugglingcolleagues so that all can achieve the goals.

About half of the teachers in Chicagoindicated that a professional community wasemerging in their schools, citing a clearerfocus on standards for student learning, moreopportunities for reflective conversations, andcollaborative teaching in the classroom.

Developing Educators' Leadership Capacityand Commitment to Improvement

1. Schools are complex organizations, andit takes skill and commitment forteachers and administrators to improvethe way they work and to become moreresponsive to families and communities.Yet the reality faced by many urbanteachers discourages their commitmentto school change.

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The school reforms of the 1970s and 1980sbrought many changes for teachers: newcurricula; state and federal programs targetingvarious categories of students; local educationinitiatives, many of which contradicted previousapproaches and foundered duringimplementation; and regulations that wereintended to ensure equitable opportunities forstudents but also limited school autonomy andencouraged compliant behavior. Years ofdeferred maintenance left school buildingsdilapidated. Budget deficits made basicinstructional materials scarce. And as theeconomic and social conditions of urbanneighborhoods declined, teachers could no longerassume that their students would come to schoolready to learn. In this context, it isunderstandable if educators are not sure whethertheir efforts can make a difference.

2. Teachers' wariness about engaging inyet another reform initiative can beameliorated only by steadfast, top-levelleadership and consistent communitysupport.

Superintendents and school boards frequentlypromote top-down reform initiatives, only to befollowed a few years later by a newadministration with different goals. This patterncan be broken only if the change in leadershipdoes not inevitably bring a different mandate forreform. The long-term success of decentralizededucation depends on the ability of school systemleaders to keep a consistent course.

3. When schools become accountable forresults, and have authority to selecttheir own staff, their faculties candevelop personal responsibility foreducation, a sense of effectiveness, anda willingness to spearhead schoolimprovement.

Comprehensive efforts to decentralize schoolauthority can spur teachers to engage in theirown professional growth and in the collectivetask of school improvement. For example:

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In a 1994 survey, Chicago andCincinnati teachers reserved some oftheir most positive remarks about reformfor its impact on their commitment totheir current school.

Although it is less clear that teachers inSeattle and Los Angeles share theseviews, union leaders in these districtscommitted to a collective bargainingstrategy that emphasized school unityand professional satisfaction overtraditional wage-and-benefit issues.

4. School-level authority to hire staffmembers who support school reformand school-communityconnectionsand to remove teacherswho do not share improvement goalsisan important factor in building capacityand commitment for change.

Although school autonomy motivates manyteachers, some still sit on the sidelines or impedethe efforts of their colleagues. Their reluctanceis a major problem for principals who aredirectly accountable for school performance.Principals who have the right to select motivatedstaff without regard for seniority, as they do inCharlotte-Mecklenburg, Chicago, Cincinnati,and Denver, have a greater chance of improvingtheir schools.

Reformers have been less successful at removingincompetent teachers and redistributing teacherswho do not share the school community's goalsfor change. One exception is Charlotte-Mecklenburg, where collective bargaining rightsfor teachers are not guaranteed in state law.Several schools replaced a substantial portion oftheir faculty quickly to jump-start reform. (Thefact that the district was expanding and hiringnew teachers made these reassignments relativelyeasy to accomplish.)

Conflicts Raised by CreatingCommunity Schools

Decentralized systems of community schools arenot created easily or without conflict. Resistancefrom within the education system, tensionsbetween collaborators, and other factors cancause conflicts among reformers.

1. Educators, administrators, policymakers, and other collaboratorsstruggle with competing interests: thedesire to improve and a reluctance tochange the status quo. This makes ithard to reach consensus, maintaincoalitions, and keep partners movingtoward an achievable goal.

School administrators, while publicly espousingsupport, often resist decentralization in subtleways. School board politics can result in newregulations that weaken the reforms. Teachers'unions may help lead initial efforts to gainschool-level authority for education, but they arehandicapped by their need to protect jobs.Politicians may lose interest when they refocuson their election prospects. The news media,driven by the quest for breaking stories, willjump to the next passing crisis.

The same dynamics that make educatorsskeptical about school reform ensure that as soonas schools adopt one change, critics will promotea contradictory idea, often by challenging theassumptions of the first reform or by calling forevaluation of results not yet realized. Teachersand principals may suspect that school-levelauthority is only a temporary phase, after whichthe central office will resume control with avengeance. Or they may fear that their schoolboard and superintendentlike some of thecorporate leaders they emulatewill punishpeople who responded too zealously to theinvitation to initiate change. Many school boardsreinforce these perceptions by hedging on theircommitments to school autonomy.

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2. Decentralization draws a mixedresponse from minority groups: It caneliminate hard-won jobs in the centraladministration, but it also can improveminority representation in school-leveldecision making.

Redefined roles for teachers, and cuts in centraladministrative positions, are designed tostrengthen the schools that poor and non-whitechildren attend. But these changes also threatenjobs, many of which are held by members ofracial or ethnic minorities.

In particular, the six-city study found that blackcommunity organizations were divided in theirviews about school decentralization. Urbanblacks had gravitated to civil service jobs whenthe market for industrial and defense workerseroded, and they had been the principlebeneficiaries of affirmative action anddesegregation decisions. By the late 1980s,many urban school districts had experiencedlarge increases in the numbers of black teachers,principals, and school administrators. Thecentral office downsizing that accompanied amove toward school-level authority jeopardizedmany of these jobs.

In Los Angeles and Chicago, however, Hispanicgroups supported reforms that would move somedecision making from the central office, whereHispanics had little representation, to schoolswhere Hispanic students were the fastest-growingsegment of the population. The number ofHispanic principals in Chicago grew by 152percent in the first year of reform, and thenumber of Hispanic teachers in Los Angelesincreased 34 percent in the four years after 1991.

3. Decentralization relies on communityresources, rather than compensatoryprograms, to meet students' needs;community members disagree overwhether this jeopardizes or improvesequity in education.

Urban blacks living in poverty were among thefirst recipients of need-based education programsin the 1960s, and many parents and educatorswho belong to minority populations still favorexpanding these services. As authority foreducation shifts from the central office toschools, accompanied by a growing reliance onlocal resources rather than compensatoryeducation, these parents fear that their childrenwill be trapped in poor neighborhoods with weakschools.

Some black and Hispanic community leadersargue that real equity cannot exist withouteffective schools, however. These peoplebelieve that compensatory education, even whendriven by concerns for minority rights, actuallylowers expectations for people of color andstigmatizes them.

4. Decentralization in urban schooldistricts can exacerbate concerns aboutdesegregation strategies.

School-level control over enrollment and theflow of students has implications for racial andethnic desegregation. Some people believe thatwhen schools have authority to make their owndecisions, guided by school councils thatadequately represent the community,desegregation strategies such as forced busingand magnet schools are no longer necessary.Traditional desegregation efforts came under firein Charlotte-Mecklenburg, Cincinnati, andSeattle while the school systems were involved indecentralization, and a judge in Denver endedforced busing after four years of the schoolreform. Other community members vehementlydefend the traditional practices.

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How Do We Get There from Here?Moving from Understanding to Action

The experiences of Charlotte-Mecklenburg, Chicago, Cincinnati, Denver, Los Angeles, and Seattle showthat schools can be responsible for making effective decisions about education and can form beneficial tieswith their communitiesand that these actions can produce better outcomes for children and families. Butwhat does it take to make these changes happen? Researchers who studied the six cities identified severalchallenges and implications for school reforms that promote decentralization and community ties. Theyalso recommended a process for creating a system of community schools.

Challenges to BuildingDecentralized Systems ofCommunity Schools

1. Be realistic about the results thatcommunity-based school improvementcan accomplish under actualcircumstances and time constraints.

Political rhetoric helps reformers generatesupport for change, but it is no substitute for acritical, evidence-based assessment of what canbe achieved. It is unlikely that any system-wideschool reformregardless of its specificfeaturescan produce results as quickly andthoroughly as the rhetoric promises. It takestime for people to learn new roles, to changetheir expectations, and to build the skills theyneed to improve teaching and learning.

2. Maintain civic, community, political,business, and school-level support forreform over time and despite changes inlocal leadership.

It takes sustained effort by civic, community,business, and political players to improve anentire school system. Leaders must staycommitted to decentralization until it is trulyinstitutionalized. Leaders frequently change inurban districts, and reforms driven bycharismatic, individual leadersasuperintendent, board member, or union leader,

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for exampleoften do not survive after theleader moves on.

3. Obtain the resources, autonomy, andtraining needed to make deep changes.

If schools do not receive the resources andauthority needed to act on their choices, theymay find it hard to keep their new decision-making powersand teachers, principals, andparents may lose their faith in the reform.

External assistance, especially professionaldevelopment for educators, is especiallyimportant. School-level authority for educationplaces important functions in the hands ofteachers and principals, including curriculumdevelopment, program design, and strategicanalysis. Although they may enjoy these newresponsibilities, many educators have littlerelevant training or experience to draw on.

4. Implement rigorous, school-basedaccountability systems that match localimprovement goals.

School-level authority for decision making has aprice: greater accountability. Schools mustdemonstrate that their improvements produceresults, their strategies and practices support highbut attainable standards, and their programsrespond to student strengths and weaknesses.Tests and other assessments must yield valid,school-level measures of student progress andachievement. Standards for achievement must

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reflect realistic expectations. And performanceassessments must be linked to consequences forschools that fail to achieve that fail to meet theirgoals.

5. Achieve improvements in high schools.

It is much harder to achieve broad-basedimprovement in high schools than in elementaryschools, partly because reformers don't clearlyunderstand the process, resources, and capacitiesneeded to transform weak secondary schools intostrong ones. We do know that many studentsenter high school without basic skills in languagearts and mathematics, making it difficult forteachers to use a traditional curriculum, let alonean innovative one. Many students also areunprepared for the transition from a small,intimate elementary school to the relative chaosof secondary schools, and high schools oftencannot help these students before they flounderand drop out.

Implications for School Reform

What do these challenges mean for improvementplans that promote school-level authority andcommunity ties? Above all, they emphasize theimportance of three school-level factors:autonomy, external support for change, andaccountability.

Autonomy Requires Changes in Funding.Hiring, Enrollment Policies. and theRelationship Between Schools and the District

A school cannot act freely if its resources andstaff members are chosen by people who do notunderstand the school's needs, goals, andinstructional strategies. A school cannot beaccountable for performance if its teachers haveno incentive to cooperate. And a school cannotdevelop or maintain a coherent approach toinstruction if it must cope with deep differencesof values or opinions among teachers, parents,and district administrators.

School-level control of expenditures implies thatschools will be financed as organizations, notthrough centralized purchasing programs.

Traditionally, districts have relied on centraloffices to select and pay for everything thatmatters in schoolsstaff salaries and benefits,equipment, supplies and books, buildingmaintenance, in-service training, and advisoryservices. Few public schools control even 1percent of the funds that their students generatefrom state and local sources. (Chicago is anextreme exception. Its schools control as muchas one-fifth of their funds.)

Shifting funds to the school level implies that:

Federal, state, and district revenues willfollow students to individual schools.

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Every student will bring to his or herschool the same base amount of money,with extra funds available for studentswho do not speak English, havehandicapping conditions, or are at risk ofeducation failure because of poverty.

Schools will receive cash budgets basedon enrollment, with few or no stringsattached.

School budget allocations will include alloperating costs.

All publicly funded schools will haveequal access to public resources,including assistance organizations andrestructuring networks.

Schools will use the funds they control toprocure resources for technicalassistance, faculty development, andstart-up activities.

The school system will eliminatecontrary arrangements for controllingfunds and will reduce expenditures forcentral office functions and staffing.

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School control of staffing implies that basicrelationships among teachers, schools, unions,and school systems will be redefined.

Teachers currently are district employees. Theyare assigned to specific schools on the basis ofdistrict-wide rules or rights based on civil servicerulesnot because they fit the school'sinstructional philosophy and staffing needs. Inmany districts, senior teachers can choose theirassignments; when the district reduces itsworkforce, every school feels the fallout assenior teachers "bump" junior ones in ascramble for the best jobs.

Giving schools the power to hire staff protectsthem from these problems but it also implies theneed to:

Change collective bargaining laws topermit school-level hiring and teacherevaluation

Replace guaranteed jobs withemployment contingent on teachers'contributions to an individual school

Work with union leaders to ensure thatteachers are treated as professionals,with pay and tenure contingent onperformance

Attract new teachers to replace thosewho leave the profession rather than taketheir chances in a performance-basedsystem

Revise teacher licensing laws so schoolshave a wider pool of potential staffmembers

Eliminate contrary arrangements forhiring and assigning teachers

Giving parents the right to choose theirchildren's schools implies that schools will bemore responsive to families and communities.In particular, school systems will need to:

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Encourage schools to use pedagogies thatsuit the needs and preferences of mostparents in the neighborhood

Encourage development of new schoolsthat expand the options available toparents; assure that these schools havefair access to qualified staff and fundsfor planning and staff training

Maintain open enrollment policies thatpermit families to enroll in schoolsoutside their neighborhood

Publicize information about schools soparents can make informed decisions

Adopt policies and practices to ensurethat over-subscribed schools give everyapplicant a fair chance of admission

Eliminate or modify policies andpractices that conflict with parentalchoice, such as racial quotas, assignmenton the basis of residence, and somedesegregation programsbut withouteliminating protections that ensure equalaccess to good schools for all children

The potential for conflicts of interest betweenschool improvement partners implies thatdistricts must develop constitutional orcontractual agreements with each school toguarantee school autonomy.

Central office staff and teachers' unions havestrong incentives to water down changes intendedto increase school autonomy. Without protectiveagreements, districts can permit schools tochoose new teachers but not to rejectunproductive teachers with site tenure. Or theycan create site-controlled budgets that exclude allof the important items, such as teacher salariesand funds for staff training.

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High Expectations for DecentralizedCommunity Schools Create a Need forExternal Assistance

School professionals don't always know how touse their new-found freedom to achieve highstandards, and they often are too busy teaching tofind the answers on their own. They need hands-on help sustaining cooperation within the school,connecting with parents and communitymembers, building teams, managing conflict andchange, nurturing the development of high-performance work groups, and mediatingbreakdowns in the decision-making process.

Schools will need a greater array of competentassistance providers to choose from in order tomeet challenging expectations.

A system that relies on various independentproviders has the best chance of meeting diverseneeds in all of a district's schools. A singleassistance provider, such as a state or localeducation agency, might push all schools in thesame direction, which would defeat the goals ofschool autonomy. A single agency assisting allschools also would be spread too thin to beeffective.

Few existing assistance providers can help aschool through the entire improvement process.Even fewer can claim to have indexed theirmethods against newly developed "world-class"student performance standards. These aremostly national organizations, funded byfoundations and associated with well-knowneducation innovators or sponsored by the NewAmerican Schools Development Corporation.Some are voluntary networks of schools thatcollaborate to develop new curricula, teachertraining programs, and assessment methods.

The demand for whole-school assistanceproviders will grow as more education systemsadopt decentralization and school-communitylinkages. Although new assistance providersultimately should be supported by fees paid fromschools' discretionary budgets, start-up and

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expansion costs will require investment by statesand the private sector.

Various partners could develop new assistanceservices, including colleges, universities, non-profit organizations, think tanks, capable districtcentral offices, and teachers' unions. Those thatreach across state lines could help increase therange of alternatives available to schools in allstates.

Schools need better information to help themidentify high-quality sources of assistance.

Few existing assistance networks can providereliable information on the conditions in whichtheir programs lead to higher studentachievement. More and better evaluations ofassistance providers will leave schools betterequipped to make informed decisions.

Struggling schools need extra help to improve.

Some schools need temporary funding to engagea new assistance provider, retrain administratorsto manage funds and staff, help current teachersdevelop new skills, or recruit new teachers.Other schools demonstrate so little capacity toimprove that the only option is to close the schooland pay the up-front costs of creating a new one.

School systems typically reserve very littlefunding for emergency investments. Improvededucation systems must keep enough resourceson hand to help schools in crisis.

Failing schools should be closed and replacedwith new staffs, bolstered by capable assistanceproviders.

Districts involved in decentralization have aninterest in replacing consistently low-performingschools with new, higher-achieving ones. Newschools expand the choices available to parentsand motivate weak schools to improve.

Developing a new school is a complex process.It requires investment in planning, selecting and

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training staff, and monitoring schoolperformance. Local or state school boards canhelp link new schools with appropriate assistanceproviders and ensure that the new schools'approaches meet community needs. To keepfrom scaring other schools off the improvementagenda, districts should establish clearexpectations for school performance and targetremedial actions to specific schools.

School-level Accountability Systems RefineExpectations for Results

School-level authority for education implies twoprofound changes in accountability. It replacesthe current practice of holding separate schoolleaders accountable for separate functions withshared, school-wide accountability for studentachievement and professional standards. And ittransforms accountability from a bureaucraticprocess of reporting upward within a narrowadministrative hierarchy into a system in whichschools are accountable to families,neighborhoods, and the broader community .each of which has its own distinct aspirations forchildren's education.

Useful accountability systems for autonomousschools rely on a combination of measures.

These include:

The school's fulfillment of agreementswith the school board regarding schoolprograms and student achievement gains;these agreements should set high butattainable expectations that reflect thebest experience of real schools

Parental support, as registered in thedecision to send a child to the school

Teacher support, as indicated byteachers' willingness to work at theschool

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The school's fidelity to professionalstandards, as internalized by teachersand principals and judged by inspectors

The school's fulfillment of communityaspirations, as reflected by the actions ofrepresentative groups such as local sitecouncils

Testing programs that give valid, school-specific measures of student growth,measure all students against highstandards, and do not deter schools fromserving students who achieve below age-appropriate standards

Consequences for schools that fail tohelp children learn

How Deeply Has School System ReformAffected Accountability?

None of the communities in the six-city studycreated the balanced accountability systemenvisioned by researchers, although severalhave a few elements in place. Charlotte-Mecklenburg created explicit schoolperformance agreements, and Seattle alsomoved toward using them. Seattle, Chicago,and Charlotte-Mecklenburg allow familychoice in a fairly broad range of situations.Chicago is developing a combination ofperformance indicators and school reviewsbut has not yet used them for accountabilitypurposes. Chicago, Denver, and Los Angelescreated active local site councils.

The only accountability mechanism notrepresented in any of the six districts wasteacher choice. None of the districts allowedteachers to move freely among schools orschools to choose freely among teachers.

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Moving Toward a DecentralizedSystem of Community Schools

Saving big-city schools is too big a job foreducators alone. Real improvementbetterlearning opportunities for all children, especiallythose who are at risk of failing or droppingoutrequires sustained effort by every memberof the school community, including schoolboards, superintendents, teachers' unions,principals, teachers, parents, business leaders,policy makers, and community groups. It takesthe courage to think boldly and to take risks.And it takes financial investment by foundations,local businesses, and government.

How can collaborators create a system ofcommunity schools, each with its own decision-making authority and accountability but allpursuing the same goals for improving children'schances of success? The suggestions outlinedbelow provide a starting point for schools,communities, and districts that want to move inthis direction.

What Does the System Look Like?

A system of community schools has thefollowing features:

Schools are not excessively regulated,but they have a constitutional relationshipwith an overarching public authority.

The central education office has clearlydefined, limited powers.

The terms under which schools operateare clearly stated and agreed upon byschools and the district-wide boards thatgovern them.

Each school operates under anagreement between itself and the schoolboard. This agreement denies theschool's mission, guarantees publicfunding, and establishes accountability

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provisions. It also ensures the school'sright to provide a focused and distinctiveinstructional program and to freelyorganize its efforts toward this end.

Each school draws on the skills andresources of community members andmakes it a priority to strengthen familiesand neighborhoods.

In this system, each school is a semi-independentorganization with its own staff, mission, andapproach to instruction. The school board andcentral office serve essentially as investors andportfolio managers. They authorize schools toreceive public funds, support struggling schoolsand replace those that fail, expand successfulschools, and help students whose schools havefailed them find better alternatives.

The central office helps set district-wide goalsfor student and school performance but lacks theauthority or capacity to micromanage schools orto compete with school staff for control ofinstructional methods, curricula, professionaldevelopment, or teacher selection and evaluation.

What Role Does Each Collaborator Play?

The school board is responsible for (1)establishing agreements with each school that,collectively, provide a range of programs andservices to meet children's needs and (2)ensuring that all children receive a high-qualityeducation.

The school board needs to:

Determine the needs and strengths ofstudents, families, and schools

Maintain a portfolio of diverse schoolsable to meet those needs and to drawappropriately on community strengths

Evaluate schools and publicizeinformation about their performance

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Close and replace schools thatconsistently fail their students or do nothonor their agreements; require schoolsto make substantial changes when theirperformance falls below standard

Hire and fire the superintendent

The superintendent is responsible for long-range planning, evaluation, and analysis.

If the school board is similar to a portfoliomanager, the superintendent can be compared tothe chief executive officer of a highly diversifiedorganization. His or her role is to:

Analyze the match between communityneeds and school services

Advise the school board about standardsand performance measures

Evaluate individual schools, interpretevaluation results, and publish accurateinformation about all schools' programsand performance

Recommend continued funding ortermination for specific schools

Supervise central-office staff whonegotiate agreements with individualschools; advise the school board onwhether to approve proposed agreements

Keep financial accounts and makepayments to schools on the basis of theirenrollments

Oversee a lottery-based admissionsprocess for over-subscribed schools

The central office's focus changes fromadministration to assistance.

The central office becomes smaller as schoolstake on more responsibility for curriculum

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design, professional development, andaccountability. The role of central office staff isto:

Help schools find sources of help

Provide some services to schools, suchas building maintenance, food service,accounting, legal representation, andnegotiation with insurance and annuityproviderson a fee basis and at thediscretion of individual schools

Join other assistance providers inoffering technical advice and training

Teachers' unions serve as professionalassociations rather than labor negotiators.

If schools can choose their own teachers, ifteachers and school administrators can choosetheir workplaces, and if educators' salaries aredetermined less by collective bargaining than bymarket-driven competition for good teachers andincentives for high performance, the role of theteachers' union changes substantially. In asystem of decentralized community schools, theunion is responsible for:

Articulating best standards for teachingand encouraging schools and districts toadopt them

Arranging insurance and other fringebenefits for teachers

Offering training for current andprospective teachers

Serving as a hiring pool or guild fromwhich schools can select teachers

Independent organizations, funded byfoundations and businesses, provide essentialresources and guidance for schoolimprovement.

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Few school districts have enough money to helpall of the schools that need assistance or toconduct the research, program development, andevaluation that yield real improvements. This isunlikely to change just because schools havegreater autonomy and control over resources.The pressure to add new programs in schools orto reduce class size virtually guarantees thatlimited funds will go to direct services forstudents and salaries for teachers, rather than tolong-term investments.

Independent organizations can help fill the gap.Their role is to:

Help fund some of the peripheral costsof school improvement, such as trainingstaff, sharing information about bestpractices, and reporting findings toschools and communities

Monitor and assess the progress of theoverall reform initiative

Identify and address deficiencies in theschool improvement effort

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Conclusion:Connecting Schools, Communities, and Families to get

Better Outcomes for Children

It isn't easy to transform the goalsand structure of school systems sothat they do a better job of educatingstudents and connecting withcommunities. It takes hard work andcollaboration. It shakes up long-heldassumptions about how schools,districts, and neighborhoods shouldrelate to each other. It eliminatessome jobs and redefines others. Itrequires the courage and commitmentto do what's right for children.

The results of these efforts often arenot immediate or complete. None ofthe districts in the six-city studyachieved the dramatic, large-scaleimprovements in student achievementthat reformers promised. Manyelementary schools and most highschools in some cities remaineduntouched by the change. None ofthe districts developed all of thenecessary arrangements for autonomyand accountability.

But this is a task worth doing. Citiesthat build school-level responsibilityfor education and link schools withcommunities do make progress,especially at the elementary schoollevel. Charlotte-Mecklenburg sawearly improvement in studentachievement; Chicago postedsubstantial gains in test scores. Andthe creation of new school-levelresponsibilitiesfor decision making,program development, teachertraining, and accountabilitypreparescollaborators in all cities for theultimate challenge of educatingchildren, developing families, andtransforming neighborhoods.

Resources for More Information

Bryk, A.S., Sebring, P.B., Kerbow, D., Rol low, S., andEaston, J.Q. (1998). Charting Chicago School Reform:Democratic Localism as a Lever for Change. Boulder, CO:Westview Press.

Hanushek, E.A. (1994). Making Schools Work: ImprovingPerformance and Controlling Costs. Washington, DC: TheBrookings Institution.

Hess, F.M. (1999). Spinning Wheels: The Politics of UrbanSchool Reform. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution.

Hill, P.T. (1999). "Supplying effective public schools in bigcities." In Ravitch, D., ed. Brookings Papers on EducationPolicy: 1999. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution.

Hill, P.T. and Celio, M.B. (1998). Fixing Urban Schools.Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution.

Hill, P.T., Pierce, L.C., and Guthrie, J.W. (1997).Reinventing Public Education: How Contracting can TransformAmerica's Schools. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Kerchner, C.T., and Koppich, J.E., eds. (1993). A Union ofProfessionals: Labor Relations and Educational Reform. NewYork: Teachers College Press.

Kerchner, C.T., Koppich, J.E., and Weener, J.G. (1997).United Mind Workers: Unions and Teaching in the KnowledgeSociety. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Peterson, P.E., and Hassel, B.C., eds. (1998). Learningfrom School Choice. Washington, DC: The BrookingsInstitution.

Ravitch, D., and Vitteritti, J.P., eds. (1997). New Schoolsfor a New Century: The Redesign of Urban Education. NewHaven: Princeton University Press.

Shipps, D., and Menefee-Libey, D. (1997). The New Politicsof Decentralization. Paper delivered at the annual meeting ofthe American Educational Research Association, Chicago.

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The Annie E. Casey Foundation

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701 St. Paul Street

Baltimore, Maryland 21202

Phone: 410.547.6600

Fax: 410.547.6624

www.aecf.org

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