Credit where it is Due, and Responsibilty, too
The status quo forces in D11 took offense when we reformers pointed out that there was steady growth in D11’s performance over the past two years. They claim that it was the hard work of staff that resulted in this improvement. I agree.
It was the paid teachers and administrators in the buildings that caused the growth in the academic measurements of D11. How could the board have had anything to do with that growth if the staff was performing the work? For the first time in the history of D11, beginning in November 2003, some of us on the board focused on academic performance during board meetings. The administration realized that the board was finally serious about ensuring that the district actually performed its primary mission, which is educating children. While past boards under weak leaders such as Lyman Kaiser sat around and developed talking points for why D11 could never possibly be a high achieving district, we demanded answers as to how we could improve. High paid D11 administrators would certainly never have pressured subordinates for improvement without pressure from the board. With pressure from above, staff worked hard in the buildings, so they own the improved results.
To complete the “ownership of results” equation, in addition to owning the successes of the district, paid staff members also own the failures of the district. I have detailed dismal math, reading and graduation statistics in earlier posts. Instead of working overtime to develop solutions to these problems, the administration typically develops talking points and excuses to explain these problems away. The most common source of blame for poor performance is the parents. Parents fork over ½ billion dollars annually to D11 to educate their children, and then they are blamed for all the failures of the district.
If administrators and teachers want credit for the good, which they should, then they need to be held accountable for the bad, which they are not. It is much easier for a school staff to blame the board, or to blame central admin, or to blame the parents for problems rather than to develop a game plan for improvement.
An example of a school that has bucked the “pass the buck” trend is Bates Elementary. That staff decided that they were going to serve their community, not their central admin masters. They worked together to pick the best curriculum and teaching techniques to serve their students. In the process, Bates leadership has refused the advice of central administrators on different occasions because they knew what to do to improve their school. That type of perseverance and focus on their student population has resulted in a school that has shown dramatic and sustained improvement over the past several years. The kids were the winners. That type of ownership of school performance is what site based management is all about.
Another example of ownership of results by staff is the Doherty and Doherty feeder schools reaction to our first math town hall in February 2004. Math leaders from Doherty and Jenkins immediately moved to adopt proven math text books after that town hall. Their willingness to move quickly without waiting for orders from above is exactly what ownership is al about. They did not like their results, and they did something about them.
Will D11 staff take responsibility for the many areas that need to improve in the district, or will they once again hide those weaknesses like they did prior to November 2003? With a new board whose members each have publicly shown no desire for improvement, it is hard to imagine anyone being held accountable for anything. As long as the new board gets along, student achievement can once again become a passing thought.
It was the paid teachers and administrators in the buildings that caused the growth in the academic measurements of D11. How could the board have had anything to do with that growth if the staff was performing the work? For the first time in the history of D11, beginning in November 2003, some of us on the board focused on academic performance during board meetings. The administration realized that the board was finally serious about ensuring that the district actually performed its primary mission, which is educating children. While past boards under weak leaders such as Lyman Kaiser sat around and developed talking points for why D11 could never possibly be a high achieving district, we demanded answers as to how we could improve. High paid D11 administrators would certainly never have pressured subordinates for improvement without pressure from the board. With pressure from above, staff worked hard in the buildings, so they own the improved results.
To complete the “ownership of results” equation, in addition to owning the successes of the district, paid staff members also own the failures of the district. I have detailed dismal math, reading and graduation statistics in earlier posts. Instead of working overtime to develop solutions to these problems, the administration typically develops talking points and excuses to explain these problems away. The most common source of blame for poor performance is the parents. Parents fork over ½ billion dollars annually to D11 to educate their children, and then they are blamed for all the failures of the district.
If administrators and teachers want credit for the good, which they should, then they need to be held accountable for the bad, which they are not. It is much easier for a school staff to blame the board, or to blame central admin, or to blame the parents for problems rather than to develop a game plan for improvement.
An example of a school that has bucked the “pass the buck” trend is Bates Elementary. That staff decided that they were going to serve their community, not their central admin masters. They worked together to pick the best curriculum and teaching techniques to serve their students. In the process, Bates leadership has refused the advice of central administrators on different occasions because they knew what to do to improve their school. That type of perseverance and focus on their student population has resulted in a school that has shown dramatic and sustained improvement over the past several years. The kids were the winners. That type of ownership of school performance is what site based management is all about.
Another example of ownership of results by staff is the Doherty and Doherty feeder schools reaction to our first math town hall in February 2004. Math leaders from Doherty and Jenkins immediately moved to adopt proven math text books after that town hall. Their willingness to move quickly without waiting for orders from above is exactly what ownership is al about. They did not like their results, and they did something about them.
Will D11 staff take responsibility for the many areas that need to improve in the district, or will they once again hide those weaknesses like they did prior to November 2003? With a new board whose members each have publicly shown no desire for improvement, it is hard to imagine anyone being held accountable for anything. As long as the new board gets along, student achievement can once again become a passing thought.
posted by Craig Cox | 11:16 PM
2 Comments:
I think that the "responsibility" piece is totally missing in this and many other districts. I never hear teachers or administrators saying, "You know, we just haven't got it right over here. We are doing X or Y to fix the problem." I think these guys must have loved keeping the spotlight on your board over these past couple of years. Now that they have successfully retaken the board, who are they going to blame for their poor performance issues? They lost their boogeymen now. Who, besides parents, will get the blame now?
Willie will obviously take the hits. Somehow they will convince people that he single-handedly prevented them from doing all of these wonderful things that they really wanted to do. Really, really wanted to do.
They have lost their boogeyman, but they now have own a board where at least 5 board members believe that they exist to protect staff from the taxpaying public. They have no idea that they serve to represent the public. These board members will dutifully obey the orders of their union and status quo handlers and, in fact, they will become the lead excuse makers for mediocrity.
Read through this or any other blog and you will see that none of these vitriolic anti-improvement posters has ever mentioned one single thing that their chosen board members will do to improve D11. Literally not a single thing. With responsibilty comes accountability. You will have many happy people who now know that the threat of accountability is gone.
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