Articles in the American School Board Journal category

Oklahoma State School Boards Association helps tornado-torn district recover

Tornados are a fact of life in Oklahoma. That’s especially true in the central and western portions of the state, which form part a region encompassing parts of nine states and dubbed “Tornado Alley.” Shaped, fittingly, like a cylinder, it stretches north from Texas to South Dakota and is the area of the country where tornados are among the most numerous and severe.

The town of Moore, south of Oklahoma City, is in the heart of Tornado Alley. Its residents are familiar with the storms and the damage they can cause. But nothing could prepare residents for two major tornados that hit the town in 14 years: the first in May of 1999; the second, this past Monday.

The May 3, 1999, tornado killed 36 people. In mid-afternoon on Monday, May 20, another tornado killed 24 people and destroyed 13,000 structures, including the district headquarters of the Moore Public Schools and two of its elementary school buildings. At Plaza Towers Elementary School, where teachers herded student into hallways and bathrooms, seven children died.

Right after the most recent storm, the Oklahoma State School Boards Association (OSSBA) began accepting gifts of school supplies at its Oklahoma City headquarters, as well as monetary gifts for the stricken district, said Jeff B. Mills, a former superintendent and OSSBA’s executive director. Mills spoke with ASBJ Senior Editor Lawrence Hardy on May 22, two days after the most recent storm hit.

How is OSSBA helping?

[We’re] just trying to be a resource for them. Many of their phone lines and cell phone services are down. They can’t get their e-mail, either. Just offering support, prayers — anything they need.

How is the district coping?

Their administration building was destroyed. Their records, fortunately, are off site; but when you’ve got your computer down, you feel helpless. But if you have your whole administration building down, it’s very difficult. It’s definitely a struggle. They’re trying to move on. They’re going to go ahead with their graduation this weekend. And they’ll deal with the losses that they have and start rebuilding.

What’s been the response to the drop off site for school supplies?

There’s been an unbelievable outpouring. We’ve got a truck coming from Nebraska tomorrow. We’ve got a couple of trailers that have been loaded up down around Florida coming this way, and just from all over the country. People just are hurting for Moore and wanting to do something, and we wanted to make sure we were able be an outlet for them.

We’re working with Feed the Children here in Oklahoma City to help distribute immediate needs like water and Gatorade bottles, diapers, hand sanitizers, gloves — those types of things we get in. But the school supplies we’ll store for the district and then hold back until they’re ready to receive them, because the last thing they need is us showing up with a truckload of pens and pencils right now. But they’ll need them in the fall.

Have you been to Moore since the tornado?

No. You can’t unless you’re a state official or a first responder — or actually live there.

As a former Oklahoma superintendent, have you ever dealt with anything like this?

No, I never did. Of course we had storm issues — we always do in Oklahoma. Nothing like this. When it hit [Moore] in ’99, the schools weren’t in session; they were already out for the day. It destroyed some schools, and they had to be rebuilt. Basically, [the most recent storm] traveled the same path. The big thing that’s happened in Moore since ’99 is just a huge growth spurt, not only in housing but in retail. The area that it came through, it followed that same path — there’s been a lot of lot of expansion in retail, highway frontage, building activity that is basically gone.

What are some of the challenges facing school board member in the coming months?

I think just the overwhelming idea that, “I’ve got to deal with all of this.” It’s not just one area, one issue. And then the things that will linger once the kids come back and classmates are gone or staff members are gone. They’ll be, I’m sure, a lot of counseling hours, and then just rebuilding. It’ll be a challenge, but they are a very strong board. The members are very dedicated and focused on what they need for the children.

How will the state respond in the long term?

We’ve faced things like this before in Oklahoma, just like other states deal with tragedy.  And we’ve always come out of it in a positive way. We’ll rebuild and start over. People are very resilient here, and they’re going to focus on what they can do for their kids. And we’re going to be there to support the schools and their board, and anything we can do to make that happen we’re going to do.

For information on how to contribute to OSSBA’s efforts for Moore, go here.

ASBJ has compiled an anthology of articles on disaster recovery for school districts, available in hard copy or as a downloadable PDF. Purchasing information is available here.

Lawrence Hardy|May 24th, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, Crisis Management, School Boards, School Buildings, State School Boards Associations|Tags: , , |

ASBJ bonus article on how a district turned renovation into motivation

There’s no such thing as a free lunch – you’ve heard that, surely. You’ve also heard that you can’t get something for nothing.

Those statements are true, most of the time. But for our online readers of ASBJ, we offer something for nothing in the form of bonus articles found only on our website. This week, the superintendent of Caroline County Public Schools in Bowling Green, Va., Gregory N. Killough details how one of his elementary schools made educational lemonade out of lemons in the form of renovation construction.

The Junior Foreman program involved second-graders, hard hats, blueprints, and forklifts. Read the article to find out how the program worked.

And while you’re on ASBJ.com, remember to take this month’s Adviser poll and check out our archive of other bonus articles designed to help school board members do their jobs.

Kathleen Vail|May 22nd, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, School Buildings|Tags: |

NSBA Director writes about “Debunking the ‘reform’ agenda’” for ASBJ

In the June issue of American School Board Journal, National School Boards Association Executive Director Thomas J. Gentzel writes about the importance of a strong public education system and the forces that make false promises  through “reforms” such as vouchers. Read his “Last Word” column here:

No human enterprise is perfect, and we all are capable of improving. That’s especially true when an institution faces continuing challenges and new demands. Such is the case with public education, which has undergone many

Thomas J. Gentzel

transformations since it was established — from its early agrarian roots, through the Industrial Revolution, two world wars, the cold war, and the Technology Revolution.

We often forget that during most of our nation’s history, public schools were expected to provide basic instruction to all students while preparing some to move on to higher education and the professions. This system of sorting worked well when family-supporting jobs in factories and mills were plentiful. Today, lower skill jobs are hard to find, let alone capable of sustaining a middle class existence.

Now, public schools are expected to do something never asked of them before: educate all students to a very high level. This, of course, is a good and necessary development if our nation is to remain competitive in the global marketplace. Remarkably, America’s public education system has responded to these heightened expectations in ways that once would have seemed nearly impossible. Our commitment to educating every child is unparalleled, as is our effort to help each one reach his or her potential. No other country in the world even pretends to do what Americans demand of our education system. Perhaps not surprisingly, we spend more time focusing on what remains to be done and less on what already has been accomplished. That’s not altogether a bad thing, since it has the effect of pushing educators to continue to improve. Yet, it has had some serious negative consequences, too.

Some critics of public education have relentlessly assailed the institution for failing to educate all children at the levels now expected. Here, we must pause to acknowledge that, despite dramatic gains in student achievement we have witnessed in most places, some schools have not performed nearly as well as they should. These pockets of deficiency are a source of real concern, since they often exist in communities with the greatest challenges, generally. This is a major problem; in fact, it is one that must be addressed in order to ensure all children are prepared to become contributing members of society.

We should have a candid conversation about how to address these issues, and we must work to ensure that every public school in America, regardless of zip code, is an excellent school. We should do these things but, instead, in the current education policy debate, children in these struggling schools have become pawns in a larger effort coordinated by some well-funded interests with an agenda of their own. Many of these “reformers” have pushed hard – and, often, effectively – for solutions that are either untested or have demonstrated only limited success.

How else to explain the drive to create as many charter schools as possible, despite clear evidence that most do not outperform traditional public schools (and in fact, many fare much worse)? Although advocates of tuition vouchers and tax credits argue these measures could provide options for children “trapped” in poorly performing schools, they acknowledge their proposals would help only a small percentage of such students, and they have virtually nothing to say about what should be done for the many who would remain in those schools.

I believe some proponents of the school choice agenda are sincere in their belief that competition will help all schools to be better. Unfortunately, those people are not driving this debate. To be blunt, certain interests that stand to make a lot of money are the ones most actively promoting the privatization agenda. If they were sincerely interested in ensuring that every child in America had access to a great public school where they live, they would be supporting early childhood education, mentoring programs for new teachers, and other investments that have been demonstrated to be effective. That they so steadfastly refuse to do so speaks volumes about what they really want – and that has a lot more to do with them and their own bottom lines than it does with children receiving a great education.

Joetta Sack-Min|May 17th, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, Federal Advocacy, Legislative advocacy, NSBA Opinions and Analysis, NSBA Publications, School Boards, School Reform, School Vouchers|Tags: , , , |

Bonus online article answers the question: What do superintendents want?

Holiday bonus, bonus coupons, bonus items –a bonus is a gift, a little extra something that doesn’t cost you anything.

American School Board Journal offers a bonus, too – online articles on topics that help school board members and other school leaders do their jobs.

You can read these articles on our website even if you are not a subscriber to ASBJ.

You’ll find a treasure trove of information on school governance available online only. We’ve just posted “Educational Ecosystems: Identifying the Next Generation of Superintendents,” by Brian A. Sheehan, an instructional leader with Massachusetts’ Malden Public Schools.

In candid interviews, five Massachusetts superintendents talk to Sheehan about how well they were prepared – or not prepared – for their current jobs as school leaders. Their remarks will give you insight into how to hire and manage your superintendent, as well as some of the challenges facing the profession.

Kathleen Vail|May 8th, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, Leadership, NSBA Publications, Professional Development|

New in ASBJ.com: Fighting and winning the war of public school perception

Are school boards and school districts losing the war of public perception? In the May issue of American School Board Journal, online now at www.asbj.com, Senior Editor Lawrence Hardy writes of how groups and individuals who stand to gain financially from school privatization have been leading the charge in persuading the American public that our schools are failing. Find out how school boards can help win hearts and minds for public education.

Also in the May issue, we are featuring two school boards in our Agents of Change series. A Tennessee leadership team shows that stability doesn’t mean defending the status quo, and an Illinois board and superintendent team was able to avoid drastic cuts and layoffs through a innovative solution.

While you’re at asbj.com, vote in this month’s Adviser question on the home page and check out the 2013 Magna Award winners at www.asbj.com/magna.

Kathleen Vail|May 2nd, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal|

Futurist looks at Generation Z’s impact on teaching and learning

They have many names – Generation M for multitaskers, Generation C for connected, Generation S for screen, and Generation Z (even though they’re not the last)—but one thing is for sure: They are already in your classrooms and they’ll be changing the way you educate them.

This group of children, born between 2001 and 2020, was the subject of Margaret Regan’s presentation at the Best Practices for School Leaders Luncheon on Saturday at NSBA’s annual conference.

“They have hypertext minds that leap around,” she said. “Their cognitive structures are parallel, not sequential.”

Regan, the president and CEO of The FutureWork Institute, a global consulting firm that translates future trends, pointed out some telling numbers about Generation Z: 69 percent of 11- to 14-year-olds have cell phones; 86 percent play video games online and 53 percent create media online; and 92 percent engage with at least two devices at the same time.

Tellingly, 75 percent of these children participate in social networking; while only 15 percent of teachers see value in social networks. “Look at the gap,” said Regan.

Children of Generation Z are used to being connected all the time, and they will expect to be connected at school as well. As a result of having so much screen time for much of their lives, they are extremely visual

Regan had a guest speaking with her: Nico the Robot, who came out and asked questions alongside her. She pointed out that schools of the future will likely feature android or robot teachers for students who will work with the human teachers. “We may return to the one-room schoolhouse with students learning in immersive environments,” said Regan. “We may see the end of teaching as we know it.”

Regan gave luncheon attendees a look a little farther into the future, telling them the trend of designer babies will develop into human singularity, the merging of humans and technology. Bioengineering will allow us to enhance our mental and physical abilities with implanted technology and other manipulations.

“Are you ready to create the future for our students?” she asked the audience.

The luncheon, sponsored by Sodexo, also honored the winners of the 2013 Magna Awards (www.asbj.com/magna). The NSBA awards program recognizes excellence in school board governance. Three grand prize winners, 15 regular winners, and 15 honorable mentions in three enrollment categories received awards at the luncheon.

Steve Dunmore, president of Schools for Sodexo, congratulated the award winners at the luncheon. “Student achievement is dependent on a number of factors ranging from clean classrooms, safe playgrounds, healthy meals, community programs, strong support systems, and of course, great teachers, which all impact a student’s ability to learn,” he said.

Kathleen Vail|April 13th, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, NSBA Annual Conference 2013|

2013 Magna Award honors school districts for outstanding programs

Pennsylvania’s Derry Township School District, Virginia’s Albemarle County Public Schools, and California’s Fontana Unified School District have been named the grand prize winners in the 19th annual Magna Awards program sponsored by the National School Boards Association’s (NSBA) American School Board Journal (ASBJ).

The Magna Awards, supported by Sodexo, recognize districts across the country for outstanding programs that advance student learning and encourage community involvement in schools. This year’s three grand prize, 15 first place, and 15 honorable mention winners were selected from three enrollment categories: under 5,000 students, 5,000 to 20,000 students, and over 20,000 students. Each of the grand prize winning school districts will receive a $4,000 contribution from Sodexo on April 14, during Sunday’s General Session at NSBA’s 73rd Annual Conference in San Diego.

“The Magna Awards showcase the great work going on in local school districts across the country to increase student achievement and success,” said Thomas J. Gentzel, Executive Director of NSBA. “This year’s Magna Awards recipients are national models that school leaders can learn from. NSBA commends Sodexo for its continuing support of this program and its goal of highlighting outstanding public school achievements.”

“Just like the school districts recognized in the annual Magna Awards program, Sodexo supports student achievement,” said Steve Dunmore, President of Sodexo Education-Schools. “As a partner in education, Sodexo realizes that it is vitally important to call attention to and support school districts that go above and beyond to enrich the learning environment for its students.  Therefore, we are proud to sponsor the Magna Awards again this year.”

Here is information on the grand prize winners:

  • The Derry Township School District, in Hershey, Pa., earned the grand prize in the under 5,000 enrollment category for its COCOA Principles program which aims to prepare students to be global

    Derry Township School District

    citizens. COCOA Principles, which stands for Community Opportunity Citizenship Ownership Academics, has encouraged the entire community, not just students, to be more inclusive, respectful, and responsible citizens. Students seen reflecting the program’s principles are nominated for awards, and high school graduation projects must identify the COCOA principle the student is modeling.

 

  • Albemarle County Public Schools, in Charlottesville, Va., is being honored as the grand prize winner in the 5,000 to 20,000 enrollment category for M-Cubed: Math, Men and Mission, a program developed to improve the academic achievement of African-American male students and encourage them to enroll in higher level high school math classes. The program starts with a two-week summer academy for upper elementary and middle school students but extends year-round with mentoring and academic support from the 100 Black Men of Central Virginia, a community group.

    Albemarle County Public Schools

 

  • In the over 20,000 enrollment category, the Fontana Unified School District, in Fontana, Calif., is the grand prize winner. The Fontana Leadership Intervention Program (FLIP) focuses on keeping middle and high school students in school and out of the juvenile justice system. FLIP, which is run and funded by a non-profit corporation, offers students classes covering topics such as violence prevention, drug and alcohol resistance, and ethics. Students referred to the program also participate in community projects and their parents must take parenting classes. Since the program’s inception there has been a significant decline in behavior issues, including truancy and alcohol and drugs incidents, at a high school, and bullying incidents at a middle school.

    Fontana Unified School District

ASBJ initiated the Magna Awards in 1995 to recognize school boards for taking bold and innovative steps to improve their educational programs. An independent panel of school board members, administrators, and other educators selected the winners from nearly 300 submissions.

The 2013 winners are highlighted in a special section in the May issue of ASBJ and will be formally recognized on Saturday, April 13, at the Best Practices for School Leaders Luncheon, which is part of NSBA’s 73rd Annual Conference.

In addition to the ASBJ special section, the districts’ winning entries will be posted on the Magna Awards website and added to the program’s searchable best practices database. Both can be found at www.asbj.com/magna.

2013 Magna Award Winners:

Grand prize winners:

Derry Township School District, Hershey, Pa. – less than 5,000 students,

Albemarle County Public Schools, Charlottesville, Va. – 5,000 to 20,000 students

Fontana Unified School District, Fontana, Calif. – more than 20,000 students

First place winners – under 5,000 students

Bergenfield Public Schools, Bergenfield, N.J.

Eminence Independent Schools, Eminence, Ky.

Northwest Arctic Borough School District, Kotzebue, Alaska

Richmond Community Schools, Richmond, Ind.

Upper St. Clair School District, Upper St. Clair, Pa.

First place winners – 5,000 to 20,000 students

Granville County Schools, Oxford, N.C.

Kearney Public Schools, Kearney, Neb.

Livingston Public Schools, Livingston, N.J.

Roanoke City Public Schools, Roanoke, Va.

Tuscaloosa City Schools, Tuscaloosa, Ala.

First place winners – over 20,000 students

Alamance-Burlington School System, Burlington, N.C. – 2 programs

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, Charlotte, N.C.

Fulton County School System, Atlanta, Ga.

McAllen Independent School District, McAllen, Texas

Honorable mentions – under 5,000 students

Columbia Heights Public Schools, Columbia Heights, Minn.

Gilford School District, Gilford, N.H.

Jenkins Independent School District, Jenkins, Ky.

Monadnock Regional School District, Supervisory Administrative Unit 93, Swanzey, N.H.

Taylor County School District, Campbellsville, Ky.

Honorable mentions – 5,000 to 20,000 students

Cave Creek Unified School District #93, Cave Creek, Ariz.

Creighton School District #14, Phoenix, Ariz.

Hanover County Public Schools, Ashland, Va.

Kenton County School District, Fort Wright, Ky.

Township High School District 214, Arlington Heights, Ill.

Honorable mentions – over 20,000 students

Arlington Public Schools, Arlington, Va.

Brevard Public Schools, Viera, Fla.

Cypress-Fairbanks Independent School District, Houston, Texas

Houston Independent School District, Houston, Texas

Richardson Independent School District, Richardson, Texas

Joetta Sack-Min|April 3rd, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, Announcements|Tags: , |

District inequities and school safety post-Newtown in the April issue of ASBJ

Uneven funding among affluent and poor school districts is well-documented, but you may not realize that it often occurs among schools in the same district, as well. Senior Editor Del Stover looks at how school leaders are uncovering these funding inequities and how they are fighting the often-difficult political battle to remedy the situation in his April American School Board Journal article, online now.

Also in April, national school safety expert Ronald Stephens weighs in on sensible and commonsense ways that school boards can and should react in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings last December.

Our school board success story series, Agents of Change, continues with a Massachusetts school board and superintendent who made a controversial decision to bring its special education program in-house.

Make sure to post your opinion to this month’s Adviser poll, also online at ASBJ’s website.

 

Kathleen Vail|April 2nd, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, Board governance, Budgeting, Diversity, Leadership, School Security, Special Education|Tags: |

Interview with NSBA Conference speaker Diane Ravitch: ‘Schools belong to the people and not to corporations’

From 1991 to 1993, Diane Ravitch served as Assistant Secretary of Education in President George H.W. Bush’s administration. Today, the author and education historian says the institution she served at the federal level is under an unprecedented threat from powerful interests intent on privatizing public schools.

In 2010, Ravitch published The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Undermine Education. A keynote speaker at the 2013 NSBA Annual Conference in San Diego, she recently talked with ASBJ Senior Editor Lawrence Hardy.

Why is this a dangerous time for the public schools?

I see the trends intensifying, and there is now a full-blown privatization movement. At the time I wrote my last book, I thought there was some kind of an accidental convergence between, on the one hand, the testing movement associated with No Child Left Behind, and a growing, nascent privatization movement. I now have concluded that these are not an accidental convergence, and that one feeds into the other: The testing is being used as part of a larger narrative about the alleged failure of American education.

Charter schools — especially for-profit ones — are a challenge to public schools, but they still serve only a small fraction of students. Why are they such a big threat?

We’re going to cross a threshold. The charter movement began with the idea that educators were so incompetent that if you could just turn over the schools to private managers, whether they were educators or not, they would do a better job, and that they would perform miracles. It began with this rhetoric of saving minority kids from failing schools — that’s sort of standard lingo. And so there are many cities now where charters are not an inconsequential part of the education spectrum.

Proponents of vouchers and privately run charter schools say they want to give parents more choice. Isn’t that a positive message?

They use all the progressive language to do things that, distinctly, are not progressive. When you close down public education, that’s not progressive. If the American public understood what was really happening, there would be this huge outcry, but it’s always bathed in the rhetoric of, “We want to help minority kids, save them from failing schools.”

And public education’s response?

We don’t have all that wonderful messaging. Instead, we’re constantly playing a game of saying, “Stop saying these things. You’re wrong.” It makes you sound very defensive. And they say, if you don’t agree with them — this is one of their favorite lines — you’re a defender of the status quo.

So if you believe in public education, if you believe in democratic control of local schools, if you believe in local school boards and state school boards, if you believe the people who are members of the community should have some say in what happens to the schools their children attend, you’re a defender of the status quo. If you believe that teachers should have a professional preparation and that they should be committed to the classroom, you’re a defender of the status quo. If you believe teachers should have some academic freedom and some protection for their freedom of speech and their right to teach, then you’re a defender of the status quo.

How should supporters of public education respond?

First of all to call it what it is, to recognize that what’s going on is a conscious effort to privatize American public education — and the public doesn’t want that. I think it helps to show that, even by the “reformers’” own measures, privatization does not produce better education. It leads to terrible consequences.

You say charters are already weeding out disabled children, who cost more to educate and tend to bring test scores down. What are some other consequences?

We now have many studies showing that charter schools are more segregated than public schools, even in districts that already have a high degree of segregation. This is something that under Brown v. Board of Education shouldn’t be permitted. And yet it’s going on. The UCLA Civil Rights Project has done studies showing that charters are more segregated, both for black and Hispanic kids. We’re rolling back some of the most important gains in our history.

What’s the role of school board members in confronting all this?

We have to reclaim the democratic aspect of public education: Schools belong to the people and not to corporations.

Lawrence Hardy|March 14th, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, Board governance, Charter Schools, Leadership, No Child Left Behind, NSBA Annual Conference 2013, Privatization, School Boards, School Reform, School Vouchers|Tags: |

Common Core tests and school board success stories in the March issue of ASBJ

The Common Core State Standards are coming, and they will have a huge impact on how teachers are expected to teach, students are taught to think, and how both students and teachers are evaluated. In this month’s issue of American School Board Journal, online now, Senior Editor Lawrence Hardy looks at how schools around the country will now be facing not only common standards but also common tests.

Also in March:

A Michigan superintendent and two board members describe how they used test scores and other data to refocus and turn their district around.

In our continuing series of school board success stories, we feature an Arizona school board and superintendent team using a new approach to boost reading and math scores.

Also, make sure to vote on this month’s Adviser poll to see where your opinion on a sticky situation stacks up.

Kathleen Vail|March 5th, 2013|Categories: American School Board Journal, Assessment, National Standards, School Boards, School Reform, Student Achievement, Teachers|Tags: , , , |
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