McREL Blog

The American tradeoff: More teachers, lower salaries

According to a recent analysis, compared to an average teacher, a good teacher (in the 84th percentile) generates as much as $400,000 in increased future earnings for her class of 20 students. So if we define the benefits of teachers in financial terms alone, it would appear that paying six figures to attract and retain great teachers in the classroom might be defensible given the three- to four-fold return on that investment for society. 

So why don’t we pay teachers more? 

One might assume it’s because we invest too little in public education. The reality, though, is quite the opposite. As I note in my latest column in Educational Leadership, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development reports that in the last 40 years the United States has more than doubled its spending on K–12 education and now outspends almost every other country in the world—devoting 4 percent of GDP to K–12 education compared with, for example, Japan’s 2.6 percent. 

Strangely, though, while more dollars were funneled to education, average teacher salaries actually declined about 2 percent per year since 1970 when calculated in terms of per capita GDP. U.S. teacher salaries now rank fourth from the bottom among 34 competitor countries in terms of teachers’ relative spending power. 

It’s probably no coincidence that this decline in salaries occurred at the same time that U.S. schools went on a hiring spree. Between 1980 and 2007, the number of teachers increased by 46 percent, more than twice the rate of student enrollment growth (21 percent). As a result, teacher-student ratios fell from 18.7 to 15.7. However, had they remained constant and funding increases had been funneled into teacher salaries, the average teacher would now make $78,574, instead of $52,578. 

Class-size reduction initiatives have been one of the driving forces in creating our uniquely American teaching corps of low-salaried classroom teachers teaching smaller classes amid a supporting cast of higher-paid specialists. Yet as John Hattie notes in Visible Learning, reducing class sizes—from say, 25 to 15 students—still has only a small effect on student achievement. And even that small benefit assumes that teacher quality remains constant as districts scramble to fill vacancies for teachers. 

Certainly, smaller classes make managing behavior and grading papers less burdensome for teachers. But when given the choice between having a few more students and making a few thousand dollars more per year, most rank-and-file teachers would gladly accept the larger classes and paychecks. As Marquerite Roza, a researcher at the University of Washington, reports in her book Educational Economics, a study in Washington State asked teachers if they preferred a $5,000 raise, class size reduction, a teacher’s aide, or increased preparation time (four investments of roughly equal value). Fully 83 percent of teachers said they preferred a raise over class-size reduction, 88 percent preferred a raise to a teacher’s aide, and 69 percent preferred the raise to increased preparation time. 

While no one goes into teaching to get rich, it’s clear that great teachers are worth a great deal more than most are currently paid. So perhaps it’s time we re-think our approach to smaller classes (and smaller teacher salaries) so that we can find and reward great teachers with salaries that reflect their real benefit to students and society.

Easy antidote to grade inflation?

As I wrote recently in Educational Leadership, grade inflation appears to be a real phenomenon with costly consequences for students. From 1992–2006, the percentage of American high school students who reported earning an A or A-minus average nearly doubled (from 18.3%–32.8%). An analysis of student work in Oregon concluded that most high school students receiving Bs (and many receiving As) are not doing work on par with college expectations for entry-level students. Perhaps as a result, more than 30 percent of freshmen drop out of college each year, costing taxpayers in excess of $1 billion per year in wasted grants and state appropriations to colleges.

Is there any way to stop grade inflation? One solution, some offer, is to open up the “black box” of teacher grades, which can be as carefully guarded as secret recipes, making it difficult to determine what actually goes into a student grade. As a result, one teachers’ A can be another’s C grade.

More than 20 years ago, in Spain’s Basque Country, a small high school stumbled onto what appears to be a simple antidote to grade inflation. In 1990, a small school in the Gipuzkoa province purchased new software that began automatically placing on report cards, with little apparent forethought from school officials, information about where students stood relative to the average grade in their class. Immediately, student grades shot up 5 percent (an increase, according to researchers who later analyzed the school’s data, on par with lowering class sizes from 22 to 15). Presumably, as students and their parents began to understand that a grade of say, an 85, wasn’t all that special compared to other students in the class, they began to work harder. And as a whole, the entire school began to perform better on Spain’s national exam.

Incidentally, this sort of value-neutral information about students’ relative performance is exactly the kind of feedback that motivation researcher Edward Deci has noted strikes the perfect balance between providing information to guide performance while not diminishing motivation by coming across as coercing, such as saying to a student, “You shouldwork harder in my class.” Reporting how students are doing relative to their peers seems to be a simple way to open up the black box of grades while inspiring students to work harder. It encourages a student to think, “If the average grade in my class is 85, surely I can do at least that well … if not better.” 

For the school in Spain, though, there was one problem.

After just one year, parents and teachers complained that the information was creating too much competition among students. Average class grades were removed from report cards and student performance swiftly sank back to prior levels.

What do you think? Should revealing where students stand relative to their peers be encouraged … or shunned? 

 

Killing with kindness?

For as long as letter grades have been around, so too, have fears of grade inflation. As far back as the 1890s, Harvard University professors were wringing their hands about students earning “sham” grades that would “seriously cheapen” the university’s reputation if the outside world were to learn of them.

That so many people could worry about the same phenomenon for so long begs the question of whether such concerns are merely successive generations of curmudgeons grumbling about the declining standards of youth or grounded in reality.

As I write in my latest column in Educational Leadership, recent data suggests that such concerns today may be indeed have some basis in fact. Here are but two data points:

• Nearly twice as many high school students reported earning an A or A-minus average in 2006 than in 1992 (32.8 percent versus 18.3 percent).
• In 2007, two federal reports found that the performance of U.S. high school students on the reading portion of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) had declined between 1992 and 2005, even as average student GPA rose from 2.68 to 2.98.

Some critics dismiss these data because they rely on student self-reports of their grades, which, itself could suggest an equally troubling conclusion: that today’s students are more “truth challenged” than in the past. Test companies which collect these data, however, say their analyses suggest that self-reports are sufficiently reliable to use for research purposes.

The real question, though, may well be whether today’s grades accurately assess student learning. Here, too, the data are troubling.

In Oregon, reviewers analyzed the in-class work of 2,200 high school students against university professors’ standards for college-entry work and found that most B students and some A students were not doing work on par with entry-level college standards.

If we accept, as many researchers do, that grade inflation is a real phenomenon, we might ask why it occurs. Here are two possible explanations:

1. Many teachers (as many as half by one estimate) base class grades on factors such as effort, behavior, and attitude that are only indirectly related to learning. In low-performing schools, in particular, grades seem to have as much to do with managing behavior as assessing learning.
2. Educators may inflate grades out of sympathy for students who are underprepared for success: feeling caught between a rock and a hard place of either inflating grades or flunk large numbers of students, they opt for inflating grades.  

But do inflated grades help anyone? Nationwide, 30 percent of students at four-year colleges drop out after just one year of school, incurring enormous personal costs and racking up more than $1 billion per year in wasted state appropriations and student grants. How many of these students received unrealistically high marks in high school, only to discover in college that their high schools might have actually been killing them with kindness? 

Bryan Goodwin is vice president of communications at McREL. He is the author of Simply Better: What Matters Most to Change the Odds for Student Success (ASCD, 2011).

Saying no to fads—in dieting and education reform

In a new documentary film, Joe Cross, an affable Aussie, who after tipping the scales at 310 pounds and contracting a rare auto-immune disorder, decides to spend 60 days drinking only fruit and vegetable juices. The film follows Cross as he traverses America, Johnny Appleseed style, to inform patrons of truck stops and small town diners about the wonders of an all-juice diet.

At first, Cross seems to be hocking yet another fad diet (unsuccessfully, judging by the puckered faces of juice drinkers) that’s based, like many fad diets, on a reductio ad absurdum: fruits and vegetables are good, so cut everything else from your diet. Other diets, of course, proclaim that protein is good, so eat as much meat as you want, just cut out carbs. Some food producers would have us believe that fat is the enemy, so eat what you want, as long as it’s fat-free (Voila! Guiltless cookies!).

The truth, we know, lies somewhere between: with a balanced diet and exercise. 

Like the diet industry, education has had its fair share of fads, past and present, which similarly, have taken good ideas to their illogical extremes. Here are but a few:

• Too much lecturing is bad; therefore, no lecturing is good.
• Self-guided learning is good; therefore, classrooms should be completely open—free of uniform curricula, grade-level expectations, doors, and even walls.  
• Good teachers help most kids learn more, so better teachers alone will ensure all kids succeed. 

Simply Better: What Matters Most to Change the Odds for Student Success offers not a new “fad diet” for education, but rather the education reform equivalent of a “healthy lifestyle”—those things that decades of research says are most likely to have a big effect on student achievement. At the core of the book is the What Matters Most framework (a sort of “food pyramid” for education), which comprises five components that research shows matter most for improving student outcomes.

Guarantee challenging, engaging, and intentional instruction. The first key to student success is a teacher who challenges students, develops a positive relationship with them, and is intentional in his or her use of a broad repertoire of teaching strategies.

Ensure curricular pathways to success. Students benefit most from a curriculum that provides both challenging and personalized learning experiences to prepare them for life success.

Provide whole-child student supports. Good teaching and curriculum alone won’t help all students succeed; many need cognitive, emotional, and learning supports to address factors such as home environment, background knowledge, and motivation that are vital to learning.

Create high-performance school cultures. Great schools can help to overcome the effects of poverty by ensuring high-quality learning experiences in every classroom and providing a school-wide culture of high expectations for learning and behavior.

Develop data-driven, high-reliability district systems. To ensure consistency in student learning experiences, districts need to put data systems and standard operating procedures in place to provide real-time responses to student struggles.

One might look at these five components and see nothing remarkable or new about them. After all, haven’t we known the importance of something like good instruction for decades? What is remarkable, though, is the powerful effect that getting these five areas right could have for students. 

Cross’ documentary ultimately clarifies that juice alone is not the key to good health: a balanced diet with plenty of exercise is. His interviewees all seem to understand this. What’s missing for them, though, is a belief that they can change their behaviors, stick to a better diet, and be happy. The most redeeming feature of Cross’ film lies in showing ordinary people who have changed their lifestyles and are happier now without all the funnel cakes, hot dogs, and stuffed-crust pizzas.

Like losing weight, when it comes to raising student achievement, the answer is not a magic pill or quick fix. Rather, it’s staying focused on simply doing better what we know must be done. The hopeful news, as illustrated in Simply Better, is that ordinary schools nationwide have stayed focused on what matters most, doing it well, and creating extra-ordinary results for students.

How well is your school addressing the components of the What Matters Most framework? Take McREL's free, online survey to find your bright spots and biggest opportunities for improvement.

New review of McREL's The Future of Schooling

Dave Orphal, over at the Learning 2030 blog, offers this nice review of McREL's latest book, The Future of Schooling, available from Solution Tree Press.

In his review, Orphal praises the book for its timeliness. He notes, for example, that one of the critical uncertainties identified in the book---whether the outcomes of education will be standardized or differentiated---is currently playing out in the "movement to national common core standards" being countered by critiques from "Sir Ken Robinson and Daniel Pink who argue that standardization is exactly the wrong direction to go."

Orphal also praises the book for its balanced view on these issues, noting that the authors take "great pains to not reveal where they stand in some of the hottest educational debates raging the country." He adds, "Neither pro-Rhee nor pro-union; neither pro-testing nor pro-authentic assessment; neither pro-charter nor anti-charter, there is plenty in this book to anger every side of our overly partisan educational reform circles."

Our intent is not to anger anyone. Rather, it's to provoke thinking about what the future may hold, to move people out of their comfort zones so that they can begin to prepare themselves for what may lie ahead. As we write in the book, "Some of these potential futures may capitvate and energize you; others may dishearten and frigthen you. Some may do all of the above. That's the point." 

Read Orphal's entire review here.

Teacher evaluation wars: How North Carolina gave peace a chance

As a growing number of cash-strapped districts face staffing cuts, district leaders are pondering the potentially negative impact of “first in, first out” rules for layoffs. The concern, of course, as highlighted in a recent study by Dan Goldhaber at the Center for Education Data and Research is that letting teachers go based solely on seniority will likely result in some good teachers losing their jobs while less effective ones remain in the classroom. And as Marguerite Roza at the Center on Reinventing Public Education has determined, laying off teachers at the bottom of the pay scale requires larger job cuts to balance budgets. The impact on students of letting go the newest teachers instead of lowest-performing ones, according to Goldhaber, could be an estimated 2.5 to 3.5 months of learning per year.

So why don’t districts take teacher performance into account when making difficult reduction-in-force decisions?

One reason is collective bargaining rules—those hundred page documents that dictate all sorts of rules and procedures about hiring and firing teachers. Another is that many districts, even if they could dismiss ineffective teachers, often don’t know who they are.

For starters, as The New Teacher Project has noted, many teachers are not evaluated every year. On top of that, when teachers are evaluated, a sort of “grade inflation” exists with many current teacher performance evaluations. An examination of teacher evaluations in Colorado, found for example, that nearly 100 percent of teachers receive favorable ratings on their performance reviews.

To cut through the confusion, many reformers (as well as the federal Race to the Top program) have called for teacher evaluations to be based on actual student test results. Using just the right combination of data and statistics, the thinking goes, would allow us to create a “quarterback rating” of teachers, so we would let us know which ones are great, which ones need improvement, and which ones should be shown the door.

However, using this approach is fraught with all sorts of design challenges—for example, how do you measure the performance of an art teacher, a guidance counselor, or an eighth grade social studies teacher, when there are often no standardized exams in those subjects? Moreover, in New York City, Los Angeles, and elsewhere, serious concerns have emerged over the accuracy of the student data and whether teachers are even being tied to their own students. 

In addition—and this is no small obstacle—calls for tying teacher evaluation to student achievement quickly become mired in contentious debate, with battle lines being drawn between teacher groups, leaders, and reformers.

It doesn’t have to be so difficult, though.

A few years ago, officials in the state of North Carolina took a different approach. From the start, they brought everyone together—teachers, school leaders, academics and researchers. They started with a premise on which everyone could agree: the challenges of the 21st century require everyone to rethink teaching and learning, and, as a result, teachers must develop new skills to prepare all children for the future. In other words, North Carolina did not base its reform efforts on a punitive notion of ridding the state of bad teachers, but rather, on a positive vision that by working together, teachers, administrators, and policymakers could transform education for the state’s children.

Working together, North Carolina defined new, rigorous standards based on research about good teaching. Then they designed an evaluation system that aligned to those standards. The result is a set of “stretch” goals for teachers with clear a roadmap for how to get there. Leaders of the states’ teachers association and school leaders agree that the system, while ambitious, is also reasonable and fair. Read more about the efforts here and here.

The North Carolina experience demonstrates that states and districts are likely to get farther, faster if they base conversations about teacher evaluation on three basic assumptions on which, I think, we can all agree:

1. Every child deserves a great teacher.
2. No one becomes a great teacher overnight; it takes practice, clear guidance, and coaching.
3. And as with any profession, not everyone has what it takes to be a great teacher. 

Bottom line: Teacher evaluations should be as much about developing teachers as they are about grading them. If we start from these premises, the North Carolina experience suggest that as John Lennon once sang, we can give peace a chance, and more important, give our teachers the support they need, and our kids the teachers they deserve.

Bryan Goodwin is McREL's Vice President of Communications and Marketing.

The real lesson from NYC small schools

Smaller isn’t better; personalized is better

An MDRC study that came out in June reporting on the impact of New York City’s small schools of choice initiative has recently appeared in the spotlight again, thanks to a September 27 commentary in Education Week from Michelle Cahill of the Carnegie Corporation and Robert Hughes of New Visions, a public education network affiliate in New York City. It was also picked up in this morning’s Public Education Network newsletter.

The title of the Ed Week commentary, “Small Schools, Big Difference,” may raise some eyebrows, though, especially for those who remember the Gates Foundation’s $1 billion misadventure with small schools.

The disappointing results of this effort eventually prompted then-director of the Foundation’s education programs, Tom Vander Ark, to tell Education Week that, “I visited 100 great schools and made the observation that they were all small, autonomous, and assumed that was a path to school improvement. It turns out that giving a failing school autonomy is a bad idea.”

Yes, the small schools in New York City are showing promise—their students (the vast majority of whom are poor and minority) have a 6.8 percent higher graduation rate than a similar group of students in the city’s mostly large, comprehensive high schools.

All of that is good news and worthy of further examination and, probably, replication.

The headline given to Cahill and Hughes’ Ed Week commentary, however, is only partially correct. The authors of the MDRC report actually caution against concluding simply that small schools are better. They write,

Students enrolled in SSCs [small schools of choice] did not just attend schools that were small. SSC enrollees attended schools that were purposefully organized around smaller, personalized units of adults and students, where students had a better chance of being known and noticed, and teachers had a better chance of knowing enough about their charges to provide appropriate academic and socioemotional supports.

In other words, saying that smaller schools lead to higher achievement is sort of like saying wearing sneakers leads to weight loss. What’s more important is what you do in the schools (or your sneakers). (In fairness to Cahill and Hughes, their commentary is more nuanced than the headline given to it).

The real takeaway of the MDRC report is that creating learning environments where students know their teachers and pursue studies that interest them (most of the small schools are designed around career themes) is what has shown promise, not the size of their student population.

Indeed, the same could be said of the Gates’ small schools initiative; as David Marshak, a professor of education at Western Washington University, observed in a February 19, 2010 commentary in Education Week, many of the small schools funded by the Gates Foundation did show gains in student achievement; the key to their success was “a culture of personalized education.”

Incidentally, this finding mirrors a key conclusion of the McREL report, Changing the Odds for Student Success: What Matters Most, in which we observe that a key principle for curriculum design is to provide students with multiple, intrinsically motivating, pathways to college and career readiness.

Bryan Goodwin is McREL’s Vice President of Communications.

Can we predict the future of education?

“It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” ~ Yogi Berra.

Clearly, change is in the air these days in education, whether we’re Waiting for Superman, racing to the top, dotting our three i’s, or wondering how tea party politics may change the face of Washington.

In light of all these changes and uncertainties, the question on many minds is likely, where is it all leading?

The most truthful answer anyone can give to that question is this one: nobody knows for sure.

It’s simply not possible to predict how all of these various trends will come together to shape a new future. That doesn’t mean, though, that we can’t prepare ourselves for it. The trick is to consider multiple, alternative futures and begin to envision how we—or our districts, schools, or students—might flourish in each.

In a new book from McREL to be released this month by Solution Tree Press, we analyze current and emerging trends in a wide array of areas, including politics, the economy, technology, and society. After analyzing these trends, we offer, not a prediction of the future, but four, very different scenarios for what the future may hold.

The scenarios in the book, titled The Future of Schooling: Educating America in 2020, are designed to provoke readers to ponder many “what if,” questions, including:

• What if the current, multibillion-dollar federal investment in education succeeds in identifying and scaling up numerous innovations that transform schooling as we know it?
• What if, on the other hand, investing billions of new dollars fails to create dramatic improvements in education? Will the public continue to support public schools as we know them?
• What if online learning becomes as commonplace in the schools of tomorrow as chalkboards were in the schools of yesterday?
• What if technology allows students to proceed at their own pace along individualized pathways, measuring their progress in real time at each step of the way?
• What if the world’s best teachers are able to broadcast their lessons to thousands of students each day?

The reality is that the world of education is changing rapidly. While we don’t know exactly what lies ahead, it’s nearly impossible to imagine the world standing still and education in 10 years looking exactly the same as it does today.

The good news is that when confronted with this uncertainty, we don’t have to throw up our hands in hopeless desperation (or stick our heads in the sand). Rather, we can begin preparing today for what tomorrow may bring.

Learn more or purchase a copy of the book on the Solution Tree website here: http://www.solution-tree.com/Public/Media.aspx?ShowDetail=true&ProductID=BKF433

Bryan Goodwin is McREL's Vice President of Communications and Marketing.

Summit School District finds "secret" to narrowing achievement gaps

In the popular mind, Summit County, Colorado, in the heart of Colorado ski country, might seem worlds apart from the usual challenges many other school districts face—a place where perhaps privileged, ski sweater-clad youngsters gather ’round roaring fireplaces to sing John Denver songs.

The reality, however, is until recently, Summit School District had one of the largest achievement gaps in the state—with the English language learning children of the county’s influx of immigrant workers achieving at much lower rates than its nonminority students.

Over the past two years, McREL has worked extensively with teachers and administrators in the district to help them narrow their achievement gaps while increasing overall student performance.

So what’s the secret to these initial successes? A bold new program? A whiz bang technology? A new silver bullet?

Nope.

The “secret” has simply been to focus on delivering consistent, high-quality instruction in every classroom.

Teachers across the distict have been working hard to adapt the effective instructional practices they already know to the needs of English language learners. In keeping with some of the key ideas of McREL’s Changing the Odds for Student Success: What Matters Most report, they've been adopting “growth mindsets” for students, delivering challenging instruction, and providing students with the support they need to meet high expectations.

In the words of Superintendent Millie Hamner, the district has been simply “focusing on keeping best instructional practices and student learning first on our minds, in our agendas, and in our hearts.”

Read the entire Summit School District story here.

Download the free Changing the Odds report here.

Bryan Goodwin is McREL's Vice President of Communications & Marketing.

Should educators let boys be boys?

As the father of three daughters, I sometimes forget how little boys play. My girls spend their free time acting out complex dramas, pretending to be strict teachers (with hearts of gold), exasperated mothers, cousins inheriting mansions from long-lost aunts, insolent children being sent to boarding school—their playtime has all of the dizzying social complexities of a 19th century Russian novel.

Every once in a while, though, when exchanges between neighbor boys playing in their backyards drift in through the open windows of my home, my own youth comes rushing back to me.

“Bang! You’re dead! I shot you.”

“No, you didn’t. You missed me.”

“Bang! Bang! Bang! Now I shot you.”

“Nuh uh. You’re out of bullets.”

Many educators are unnerved by this sort of play. They fear that boys who play cops and robbers when they’re young will grow up to be violent and aggressive, exhibiting anti-social, if not, criminal, behavior. To curtail boys’ more aggressive and violent play (read: to make them play more like girls), many schools have banished violent play from classrooms and playgrounds. 

Yet, as reported in a recent article in LiveScience.com, educators may need to learn to “work with, rather than against” boys’ aggressive tendencies.

The article cites the work McREL Principal Researcher Elena Bodrova, whose research on early childhood education calls out the importance of dramatic play on children’s social and intellectual development. Through sophisticated forms of imaginative play (including games like cops and robbers), children learn to delay gratification (by remaining, for example, in the “role” of policeman even when they want to play a robber), consider the perspective of others (e.g., by playing jailer one day and prisoner the next), and control their impulses.  

Letting boys work through their natural aggressive urges can help them learn to set limits on their own behavior—learning to draw a line, for example, between pretend and real violence, like biting, hair pulling, or hitting. In addition, boys’ play, which often involves "bad guys," may also help them to work on their impulse control, according to Mary Ellin Logue, a researcher at the University of Maine quoted in the article. Boys, says Logue, “are trying really hard to be good, but it’s really hard to be good. These bad guys give them a way to externalize that part of them that they are trying to conquer.”

Read the LiveScience article, "Battling the Boys: Educators Grapple with Violent Play," here.

Learn more about Bodrova’s work and McREL’s approach to early childhood development here.

Bryan Goodwin is McREL's Vice President of Communications and Marketing.

How to make staff development stick

Educators have probably all grown wary of drive-by staff development—the one- or two-day workshop that momentarily energizes staff, getting everyone excited about doing something new, but then, like a photograph left too long in the sun, fades over time. 

So who are we to blame when this happens? Teachers? Is it their fault when guidance from a workshop doesn't take root in classrooms?

Not so fast, according to McREL staff members Jane Hill and Anne Lundquist in an article that’s now online at the Education.com site. 

School leaders actually hold the keys to making staff development stick.

Hill and Lundquist lay out several strategies that they have used effectively in the English Language Learner Instructional Leadership Academies they have led in Colorado, Nebraska, Virginia, Iowa and other states to turn drive-by workshops into something lasting in schools.

These strategies include identifying, up front, a leadership team, consisting of school administrators, district staff, and teachers, who take responsibility for helping teachers to implement what they learn in staff development sessions in their classrooms.

Leaders also need to recognize that any change worth making is difficult and takes people out of their comfort zones. To loosen folded arms or “this too shall pass attitudes,” leaders must work on getting everyone on the same page (something at McREL we call creating a “purposeful community”) so they see the need for change and believe doing something different will make a difference. They also need to take steps to overcome the anxiety and pushback that comes with any difficult, meaningful change (which we call “second order” change).

Hill and Lundquist's article offers practical steps for how leadership teams can accomplish both of these objectives. While their article focuses on staff development related to improving the achievement of English language learners, their practical tips and advice for making professional development stick translates well to all kinds of teacher learning.

Read the entire article online.

Bryan Goodwin is McREL's Vice President of Communications.

A more measured approach to measuring school performance

By Bryan Goodwin

In an op-ed piece appearing in the August 25 issue of Education Week, Douglas Reeves, chairman of The Leadership and Learning Center, and McREL President and CEO Tim Waters liken current education accountability efforts to judging a person’s health based solely on weight.

“For almost a decade, the complex enterprise of education has been reduced to box scores,” they write. “Good schools have high scores, bad schools have low scores."

Had Michelle Obama’s campaign to fight obesity taken a similarly superficial approach, she might have just called for an annual weigh-in of every child, shaming and blaming those who tipped the scales to unacceptable levels. That would certainly cause kids to shed a few pounds—but also create a new generation of eating disorders and diet pill abusers. Fortunately, the first lady called for a more thoughtful path, calling for Americans to help their children to eat healthier food, exercise more regularly, and monitor their health more frequently.

Yet in education, we continue to operate under a “testing=learning” formula, which Reeves and Waters note, “is as superficial as the formula that ‘health=weight.’”

“If we want to avoid the educational equivalent of anorexia and pill-popping—teaching focused only on test content and test-taking strategy—then the accountability equation must include causes, not merely effects,” they write. “The accountability equation should be ‘learning=teaching+leadership.’ And an effective accountability system would measure all three elements of that equation.”

With Congress set to take up the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (the key piece of federal education funding legislation) this year or next, education accountability appears to be at a crossroads, write Reeves and Waters. We have the opportunity to either move forward with more thoughtful and sophisticated systems of monitoring progress or cling to outdated, simplistic, and harmful approaches.
Read the entire article— which offers several considerations for policymakers—here (Ed Week subscription required).

Bryan Goodwin is McREL’s vice president of communications and marketing.

Lest We Forget The Administrators!

It was recently reported in a November 3^rd, 2009 ASCD Blog that presenter Ann Nkiruka Ifekwunigwe  posed the question at her ASCD Fall Conference session, “Preparing Successful Teacher Leaders: What Have We Learned?” Following that question she shared her research about why leadership is such an important concern.

Ifekwunigwe pointed out:

·         Many teachers who continue teaching beyond their fifth year fall into traditional routines and experience a reduced interest in teaching (Huberman, 1989).

·         Successful teachers may leave teaching because they become dissatisfied with the established career path, one that provides little opportunity for advancement unless one moves into school administration (Towery, Salim, & Hom, 2009).

·         When teachers pursue leadership roles that provide greater influence in curriculum and instruction, they may not feel the need to become an administrator to grow professionally (Ackerman & Mackenzie, 2007).

Throughout this ASCD session, educators were provided the opportunity to share their perspectives on teacher and administrative leadership. The overwhelming majority voiced their opinion that it is essential that we provide teachers with far more opportunities than those which presently exist. This statement was fueled by the participants’ perception that today’s administrators are “overwhelmed and can’t do it all.”

Coupled with those premises, we are faced with the sobering fact there is an even greater urgency which exists within this realm. We have reached a crucial “tipping point” in education, where there is a need for not only additional administrators….but for quality administrators who are prepared to meet the increased challenges of shrinking budgets, coupled with the intense pressure to increase student achievement.

Our preparatory programs need to do a far better job in designing and implementing curriculums that meet the ‘real” needs of these future leaders. Our professional development programs must continue to reach out and provide the necessary tools to give those committed individuals a fighting chance to achieve success.

There is just no more time to waste in this regard. The clock is ticking and it’s nearly midnight.

We vs. Me: A collaborative approach to school district leadership

The more you give the more you receive….

I have heard it said many times, but have rarely seen it in practice in public schools and school districts. In my work with educational leaders, I meet many school and district level leaders who are tasked with the difficult job of improving schools and school systems that are under-performing. Under these circumstances, timelines are tight and it is difficult for a leader to be patient in order to spend the time and energy necessary to build the relationships necessary to sustain long-term positive improvements.

Today, I share with you one example of a superintendent who exemplifies the concept of sharing leadership and building a collaborative culture within his school district. While an exceptional leader, this man is also very humble, and therefore does not want to be featured by name in this blog. His story, however, is worth sharing:

What I can tell you about this leader is that he is a superintendent of a mid-sized district in the United States and that he does not fit the mold of most superintendents. The power of what this superintendent does lies in what is often unspoken. He is visible, approachable, engaging, and can lead a school board meeting effectively one day and blend into a staff development meeting as a participant the next.

My first-hand account of this superintendent’s leadership follows: I began working with his school district over a year ago as a consultant training principals and school-level leaders to use the Power Walkthrough software as a tool for monitoring instructional strategies. This training consists of one day of rigorous direct instruction and a second day of application of the learning by conducting walkthroughs in actual classrooms and debriefing each walkthrough. I didn’t realize the superintendent was even in my training as a participant until the second day when one of the principals told me. The entire time, this man, who is the chief executive for an entire school system was so unassuming and truly was engaged the entire time of my presentation as a learner, that I never would have guessed he was the superintendent. The school level leaders in the training were also very accustomed to having their boss work side-by-side with them. I was amazed to see the level of importance placed on staff development and professional learning being modeled by this superintendent.

The experience became even richer on the second day of Power Walkthrough training when we began doing classroom walkthroughs in an elementary school. Again, the superintendent was with the principals working side-by-side to learn more about instructional strategies. When I asked others in the group to facilitate conversations about instruction, it was obvious again that we were among equals. This superintendent could lead discussions, participate in them, and even make mistakes while learning with total support and acceptance from those who work for him. What made this experience even more amazing was watching how comfortable the superintendent was visiting classrooms and schools. He knew the teachers and they knew him on a first-name basis – and even more amazing to me was the fact that he also knew the students and they knew him.

At the conclusion of the two-day training, I had the opportunity to talk with this amazing district leader and I had to ask him how he was able to pull it all off…. How could a superintendent fill so many different roles and still be respected as the leader of a school district? He said it was really fairly simple, in his humble way of speaking. He told me that by sharing leadership you will become a stronger leader and that we should always approach problems as opportunities to learn. When you build a system-wide culture of learning and leading, everyone in that system is responsible and accountable for success. You can only do this by thinking about “we” instead of “me”.

What We Need Are More Mr. Tibbs

Not that I was shocked when I read the article, but on October 10^th, The Greeley Tribune published an Associated Press report that “only about 2 percent of teachers nationwide are African-American men. But experts say that needs to change if educators expect to reduce minority achievement gaps and dropout rates.”

The article went on to report that “American teachers are overwhelmingly white (87percent) and female (77 percent), despite minority student populations of about 44 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.”

I am a product of the School District of Philadelphia, a graduate of Temple University, and earned my Masters in Ed. Administration from Rider University in New Jersey. Although much time has passed since my classroom days, it is still strikingly clear that the number of minorities who attended classes with me could be counted on two hands. Forget about the feet.

Not much has changed over the years, at least not in the area of teacher and administrator education. The numbers, as indicated above, are far too few to generate the necessary impact to increase minority student achievement.

Greg Johnson, a policy analyst for the National Education Association stated that increasing the number of minority teachers is important because of “the role model factor.”

“These students need to see successful adults of color in front of them,” Johnson added.

One program which is trying to fill that void is the Call me MISTER teaching program. MISTER is both an acronym – Mentors Instructing Students Toward Effective Role Models – and a reference to the 1967 film “In the Heat of the Night,” in which Sidney Poitier’s character demands respect with the line, “They call me MISTER Tibbs!”

This initiative, which is designed to put more minority men at the head of the classroom, offers scholarships in exchange for teaching in public schools. And six years after the first MISTER cohort graduated in 2004, although there has been some progress, there has not been nearly enough.

The Associated Press reports that in order to improve the national percentage of black male teachers to even 3 percent, another 45,000 would need to enroll.

The reality of these statistics is that we can no longer sit back and take a wait and see approach to increasing minority leadership in the classroom and in school administration. A pro-active approach must be taken by universities along with, federal, state and local governments to combine forces to design programs which forward this cause.

With each passing day, we fall further and further behind in this effort, while the needs of minority students, increases at an alarming rate.

Mr. Tibbs is out there. We need to support his way to the classroom!

 

 

Would the "Instructional Rounds" Concept Work in Your School District?

Recently, as I have traveled to several school districts in the United States, I have been invited into some conversations about the concept of “instructional rounds”.  As I have listened, I have learned about the application of using the concept of “rounds” in the educational setting, which is quite similar to what is used to develop new interns and residents in the medical profession.

Since I work with leaders at all levels in school systems, I began to wonder how a school district would implement the instructional rounds model, so I did some investigating. I came across a new book by City, Elmore, Fiarman, and Teitel (2009) that is dedicated solely to this concept. The book, titled Instructional Rounds in Education:  A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning provides a thorough view of the concept, and the authors make some recommendations that potentially could transform some systems.

Essentially, the premise of instructional rounds assumes that educators usually do not have a common set of shared practices that are effective - meaning that educators ranging from teachers to superintendents do not have a core set of shared practices. This distinguishes education from other professions. Instructional rounds are a process for bringing effective shared practices to the forefront of a school system:

“The basic idea is to put all educators – principals and central office administrators as well as teachers – into common practice disciplined by protocols and routines and organized around the core functions of schooling in order to create common language, ways of seeing, and a shared practice of improvement (City, Elmore, Fiarman, and Teitel 2009).”

The authors of Instructional Rounds in Education (2009) have tested this concept in several school systems in the United States and have found it to be successful.

My questions to the educational leadership blogosphere are:

1.       Does the concept of “instructional rounds” have the potential to be implemented into your school system? What would it take to do so?

2.       Do you think this idea will bring about successful practices if implemented?

3.       What systemic changes would cause the “rounds” concept to succeed?

4.       What systemic barriers would cause the “rounds” concept to fail?

 

 

Are we doing everything we can?

by Mel Sussman

Earlier this week, President Obama gave a speech to students throughout the nation, urging them to “set your own goals for your education---and to do everything you can to meet them.” He spoke to the teacher’s responsibility of inspiring students and pushing them to learn and closed his speech by remarking that “your teachers and I are doing everything we can to make sure you have education you need.”

Strong words and straightforward advice from this nation’s leader.

But not necessarily all true.

A former colleague, who is now an instructional coach in a school district which will remain nameless, told me recently that while some teachers embrace professional learning, too many (even one is too much) still resist the idea of using coaching or professional development to improve their teaching methods.

While I'm not astounded by this finding, I find it extremely disappointing that we are in the business of helping kids and increasing student achievement and yet there teachers out there who would rather settle for the status quo.

I'm left wondering: Are we truly doing everything we can to help students get the education they need?

Mel Sussman, a former school principal, is a principal consultant at McREL.

How did President Obama’s Speech to School Children Affect Your School?

Last week, as news of the President’s plan to address students today began to circulate, many Americans voiced support for, and concerns about, his planned speech. To be certain, this issue brought to the surface some of the deep political divisions in our country.

I’m sure the nightly news, the Internet, and tomorrow’s newspapers will be filled with stories about the broadcast, but I’m interested to hear, first-hand from educators, their perspectives on the address. For example, I’d like to know:

• How did you handle the broadcast of the President’s message in your school?
• What did you do after the broadcast? Did you prepare a lesson plan related to the broadcast? (Was  this a  “teachable moment” in your view?)
• How did students (and their parents) respond to the message?
• How did you view the message? Was it a welcome “pep talk” from the President… or an unwanted distraction?

Please post responses to these questions directly to this blog. Thank you.

Timing Is Sometimes Everything!!!

By Mel Sussman

Holding environments are where you find them! One day last week our team of leadership consultants took a rare opportunity to escape the confines of our offices and go to lunch. While I can’t deny that I thoroughly enjoyed the hot pastrami sandwich, which I wolfed down with zest, I equally enjoyed the opportunity to share in a variety of important conversations with my fellow consultants and good friends.

We rarely have the opportunity to sit as a group and relate stories of our recent travels, triumphs and faux pas, along with sharing ideas about future work and how to improve our presentations. This was a golden opportunity in which we all equally participated. This was a holding environment in its purest form…unplanned, with no required agenda. Instead, it was a chance to gain valuable insights from one another.

But holding environments come packaged in a variety of formats.

I just recently returned from a professional development in a far- away place. The two-day event went extremely well. I was well received and the administrators who attended walked away with what seemed to be a great number of ideas which they could put to use in their own school.
However, it was the third day of consultation which turned out to be the most worthwhile for all parties. On this day, principals were offered the opportunity to meet with me and engage in open-discussions about initiatives and situations upon which they were about to embark in the coming semester.

Principals and their leadership teams were each given an hour to meet in a private location, where they could talk openly and honestly about their particular situations. In each session the emotions ran high as teams expressed their anxieties, frustrations and nervous anticipation about what was waiting for them in the coming year. This office had evolved into a think tank of the highest order.
And it wasn’t just negativity being expressed in these sessions. Both young and seasoned administrators proudly offered details of exciting new ventures, which were now only in the design stage. As much as they wanted answers from me, they were equally as satisfied just to have me listen.

It was as if I had taken the lid off the pot, allowing their thoughts, dreams, and concerns to rise to the top, just like the steam which rises from that giant pot of vegetable soup. Not that they were ever denied this opportunity…but rather that the setting, timing and cast of characters had never before come together.

Talk about the sheer power of a “holding environment,” or “safe place,” where staff members feel free to talk about what is going on in the organization; where they can express themselves, debate issues and clarify assumptions without fear of repercussion. This was certainly it.

At the conclusion of that 8 hour marathon, I walked away both exhausted and at the same time exhilarated.  Sometimes the best teaching we can do is when we provide the opportunity for people to learn together and from each other.

Why don't people and systems change -- even when the writing is on the wall?

I recently read a book that has caused me to look deeper at the actions of some educators I have come into contact with over the past few years in multiple contexts – both as a McREL consultant and a parent. The book is called Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior, Ori and Rom Brafman (2008) and as the title indicates, it focuses on looking deeply at the “why” of irrational human behavior. Now, before you start to characterize me as somebody who views the glass as being half empty, please know that I see much more that is positive in my roles, but I am still troubled by this notion of rational and intelligent people engaging in irrational decisions.

Here is a real-life example I will apply to the concepts in the book. For obvious reasons, this has to be anonymous since I am highlighting irrational behavior:
Over the past three years, I have watched a school district fall from being one of the best district’s in a particular state to one that is now below average as measured by student achievement, property values, community support, employee satisfaction, and compensation. I know what you are thinking now is probably the usual “suspects” that we often believe as educators cause such rapid declines in school systems – demographic changes, budget cuts, mass teacher turnover or retirements, etc. This example, however, does not include these “suspects” except for the economic downturn that is currently affecting all school systems in the US. This example follows the characteristics illustrated in Sway:

1. Loss Aversion – some of us are so afraid of loss that we simply will do anything necessary to keep things the same. In the school district example, the school board, superintendent, principals, teachers, and parents were not able to understand that “losses” were necessary in order to stay current and relevant. This district continued to build schools and new facilities, even when enrollment projections were in decline. Rather than close or re-utilize schools that were under-enrolled, this district built more schools and continued to expand capacity in the face of declining enrollment.

2. Commitment – this characteristic goes closely with the first one. When we are afraid of loss and so committed to one way of doing business, we cannot let go or see the writing on the wall when changes need to be made. In the district example, once a commitment was made to expansion and building more schools, it was almost etched in stone. This made perfect sense in a different time when there was exponential growth and a robust tax base. This district was not able or willing to look long-term at the reality of over-building, nor were they able to sustain it. They were so “committed to their commitment” that changing the focus in light of leading indicators was not an option. This led to a reaction that was quite predictable – closing and consolidating schools to save money and more effectively use facilities which led to upheaval in the community.

3. Value Attribution – by placing value on certain ideas or ways of doing business, we can be blinded by the amount of value we place on a single idea or group of ideas. In the district example, building and maintaining new schools was truly a core value of the district culture. The entire community came to know this district largely because of their shiny and new school facilities and the fact that schools were minimally populated or utilized by students. This was largely touted as a characteristic that set the district apart from others in the area and used widely by realtors, city council, businesses, and others to draw homebuyers and new residents  to this geographic area.

4. Diagnosis Bias – in concept, bias exists when we view our world through a certain lens and close our minds to other explanations. A good example of this is the emergency room doctor who spends his day diagnosing and treating a relatively predictable array of injuries and ailments including flesh wounds, broken bones, heart attacks, stomach flu, etc. Not to be taken lightly for certain, these diagnoses become so common that the ER doctor (or any doctor) can easily mis-diagnose a patient by incorrectly focusing on the most obvious symptom. On the rare occasion that a patient shows up with an atypical ailment, the doctor is likely to mis-diagnose if the symptoms are similar to common ailments because of Diagnosis Bias. Now to the school district example where Diagnosis Bias is found in a history where funds are spent to build new schools on a priority basis. In this example, the diagnosis is incorrect – new schools with small student populations are needed to effectively educate students in this community. While this diagnosis may have never been correct, it is a core value of the community and very difficult to challenge or change. It has become an expectation.

5. Procedural Justice and Fairness – as a culture, Americans value justice, fairness, and procedures that ensure fair treatment. This value is found at the core of our justice system and is embedded in modern society – actually nested in the concept of the “American Dream”. The problem occurs when procedures and protocols based on the idea of fairness cloud perceptions. In the district example, we have a community that values new school facilities with few students enrolled. The question becomes: How does this cycle get broken when money gets tight? The expectation of fairness means that an older school building with a large student population would not fit in this district. In the interest of fairness, it is easier to stick with an old value that is not economically feasible or sustainable and not think long term about what happens when resources are limited.

How does this story end? It is difficult to tell currently, but based on this model, we can be fairly sure that the district will continue to suffer through many of the phases of a difficult change process as they grieve for inevitable losses. Blame will be placed on many and school board and staff turnover has already begun, but it will be hard to see this problem through any other realistic lenses. The school board and leadership, whether new in the district or veteran will have to look at the obvious problem with few solutions to keep the status quo. Schools will have to be closed, consolidated, and re-utilized in order to stay within budget. The community will be forced to shift their value system out of economic necessity.

"Holding Environments” Can Be Truly Electric!

Last week, I co-facilitated a series of Balanced Leadership sessions for school leaders here at our offices in Denver. As is our practice, we provided participants with opportunities to speak freely with one another, sharing challenges and concerns. I was struck by the fact that despite coming from all over the country (and even the Bahamas) many participants shared a common concern: a perceived disconnect between their schools and districts in which they operate.

At first, school leaders (whom I imagine are normally outspoken back at home) were reticent to engage in a discussion of this issue. But when we engaged them in a “holding environment” activity, called the World Café, which provided a forum for groups to engage in meaningful conversations, an enthusiasm for sharing and deeper discussion began to evolve among the group.

In our work with leaders, we often preach the power of creating a “holding environment” in schools, a figurative “safe place” where all staff members can share concerns, talk about what is going on in the organization, offer strategies, debate, clarify assumptions, or simply dream about initiatives, without fear of repercussion or verbal assault by others who might embrace an opposing point of view.

Too often, school leaders fail to create these “holding environments.” Mistrust and fear prevent teachers and other stakeholders from acting as true professionals, sharing ideas, and committing to a common purpose. But when then “safe zones” exist, they can be truly electric, tapping the power and collective wisdom of everyone in the school.

As you head back to your buildings in a few weeks, ask yourself: does my school have a “holding environment”? Do people in my building believe they can speak freely, even contradicting school administrators, if necessary? Are our faculty meetings a “safe place” to share ideas, challenge assumptions, and grow together as professionals?

School Leadership that "Sticks"

Last week I spoke to a principal who shared an interesting dilemma with me – actually a good news/bad news type of scenario. This principal had just learned by way of an e-mail message from the district office that her high school was to be the recipient of a grant for innovative instructional practices that incorporate technology. Her largest problem was the fact that she never was aware this grant was written by her district, so obviously she was surprised by this news.

Digging further into the requirements of the grant, the principal learned the grant would provide hundreds of thousands of dollars for the purchase of technology, which was desperately needed in her school. Her biggest problem was her concern that her staff lacked the capacity necessary to effectively implement and utilize the technology that was to be provided including Smart Boards, ceiling mounted and integrated projectors, new laptop computers for every teacher, wiring the school for high-speed Wi-Fi, and the purchase of 250 student wireless laptops to be utilized in all subject areas.

This principal asked me to help her brainstorm about how to best roll out this information to her staff. In advising her, I relied on a resource that I have found useful in finding strategies for making messages simple and memorable. Knowing that it will be critical for this principal to approach this situation armed with information about the grant and a firm understanding of the needs of her staff, I advised her to use the SUCCESs model presented in Chip and Dan Heath’s book, Made to Stick (2008). The model uses the acronym SUCCESs to outline the key components. Messages that are “sticky” are: Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, and illustrate points through Stories. At the school level, leaders can enhance their success in leading difficult change initiatives by using this model.

Let’s apply this model to the dilemma of utilizing the technology grant and gaining support for this from the teaching staff:

• Simple – We have an opportunity to be on the cutting edge of technology integration for high schools and can serve as a model for many others.

• Unexpected – We have just been awarded a large amount of money that will bring our school into the 21^st Century.

• Concrete – We will be receiving a great deal of high-tech equipment that will enhance our instruction including: Smart Boards, ceiling mounted and integrated projectors, new laptop computers for every teacher, wiring the school for high-speed Wi-Fi, and the purchase of 250 student wireless laptops to be utilized in all subject areas. Shortly, I will have a specific plan for you that shows a building map and timeline and schedule for installation of the new equipment.

• Credible – This allocation of money from the grant is based on a solid research base and the district entered into this application with the support of the school board, state department of education, and the grant is sourced from federal funds for the specific purpose of enhancing technology in high schools.

• Emotional – I know this is a lot of information, and this message is unexpected, and as the principal I have mixed feelings about this unexpected change as well. I am however, very excited at this opportunity that has been given to our school and will do everything I can to support the integration of technology into our school for the benefit of our students.

• Stories – After learning of this opportunity, I did some investigating regarding other high schools who have been awarded this grant and was fortunate to make contact with a high school principal who received this grant and implemented this initiative two years ago. According to him, it was difficult at first for the school to scale-up to meet the needs of technology integration, but through working as a team and supporting one another, the school is now very successful and a national model for this grant. We can do this too by working together and supporting each other.

Using the SUCCESs model, and framing her message in a way that is thoughtful and specific, this principal is more likely to build a cohesive and connected school culture that has the capacity to sustain efforts through difficult challenges.

Change or Die - A principal's dilemma

In my travels to many school locations throughout the United States, I often find myself working with principals of schools that are struggling with issues related to making the organizational changes necessary to improve student achievement. A few weeks ago, I spent some time with a small group of principals in a Midwestern town. One principal’s comments have resonated in my mind ever since. This particular principal, who would like to remain anonymous, shared her struggles over the past three years as she has worked to turn around her school, as student achievement has declined.

For the sake of this blog, we will call this principal Mrs. Jones. Principal Jones described to me a familiar scenario in regards to making instructional improvements in her elementary school. I asked her what she had done up to this point in reaction to her test scores declining and she explained a scenario that brings to mind a book I recently read called Change or Die (Deutschman, 2008). Mrs. Jones story, as you will see in the following paragraphs closely aligned with Deutschman’s “old” change paradigm. In this change paradigm, which is widely used in many fields, the leader of an organization uses Facts, Fear, and Force to bring about changes within the organization. Using Mrs. Jones’ example, she presents the Facts to the staff. Next, the principal uses Fear as leverage, and follows up with Force by letting the staff know that compliance will be expected and consequences will result for lack of compliance.

Let’s expand on Facts, Fear, and Force using Mrs. Jones example:

Consider Mrs. Jones’ dilemma when she learns that her school has not met the Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) goals for the third school year in a row and has been labeled by the state as a school that “Needs Improvement”, which is a decline in status from “Acceptable” in previous years. Based on this designation, Mrs. Jones rightfully decides that immediate action is necessary. She shares the Facts of the situation with her staff by letting them know that student achievement has lapsed and gives specific details. Next, she uses Fear by telling the staff that if improvements are not made, the potential exists that jobs may be lost and the school may lose accreditation or even be closed. She then uses Force as she lays out the mandatory new multi-year requirements for all teachers -- requiring compliance with utilizing new classroom strategies and eliminating some extracurricular activities for students. Mrs. Jones uses this model as a way to bring about rapid results in student achievement.

While Mrs. Jones did see short-term improvements on interim assessments at her school using the Facts, Fear, and Force model, she did not see sustainable results by using this strategy alone and end of year state test scores still continued to decline over a three year period. Facts, Fear, and Force tends to create a lack of trust among staff and can lead to resentment among the ranks of teachers which hurts the school culture and staff morale.

Let’s fast forward three years into the future:

Mrs. Jones has another option to use as she moves into a new school year. Deutschman’s “new” change paradigm also suggests three components. Mrs. Jones could Relate, Repeat, and Reframe instead of using the Facts, Fear, and Force model. Using Relate, Repeat, and Reframe, she is able to build staff capacity, buy-in, and trust.

Using this model, Mrs. Jones approaches her problem in a different way. She first Relates to her staff in a way that shows support and mutual understanding of the problem at hand. She does this by sharing in the responsibility for increasing student achievement, making the priority universal for all school staff – including herself. Next, Mrs. Jones employs the idea of Repeating by making sure that her approach to the problem is shared and practiced by everyone in the school. Repetition makes the new strategies for improving student achievement part of the daily routine through intensive practice, in turn changing the school culture. In order to Reframe Mrs. Jones needs to help her staff see issues and problems through a different lens. This involves a cultural shift at the school because the staff is required to view students and instructional practices differently and may have to give up old practices. Eventually, the staff embraces the new way of doing business, which leads to student success that is sustainable.