A Good Day for Education

It's a good day for education. No, not because of anything our North Carolina General Assembly has done, what with the starvation diet on which it has put public schools, rather it is a good day for education because of the official launch of the High Point University Educational Leadership Studio with which I have been working for nearly a year. As one participating superintendent asserted today, "The Studio has a lot of promise." I agree.

I have written about the Studio before but only in the context of the Design Team's work. Today the twinkle in the Team's eye was consummated by the Educational Leadership Doctoral Advisory Committee. Convened at the HPU Plato Wilson Ballroom, the purpose of the meeting was both to inform and create ownership for the Education Studio, a working place and a laboratory where public-school problems of practice are crowd-sourced, face-to-face and virtually, such that K-21 education professionals learn from and with each other. 

Present were superintendents of four NC Piedmont public school districts, central-service professionals, principals, university representatives, and Design Team members, including Dr. MJ Hall, founder of the Studio, and yours truly, consultant and thought partner to the initiative.

Although Design Team members were affirmed by the Committee's embrace of the Studio, it was clear to me that the heavy lifting lies ahead. In fact, it was de ja vu all over again. As readers of this blog know, I was co-founder and ultimately executive director of Triangle Leadership Academy, a public-private partnership of districts focused on leadership development and succession planning. We closed shop one year ago in July.

Certainly, the financial hurricane that blew in as a result of the recession was mainly responsible for our demise. In hindsight, however, there were deeper, more disturbing and intractable issues, some of which played out today in activities we facilitated for the Advisory Committee.

For example, we assembled Committee members in cross-district, cross-functional teams to consider and write one idea per sticky note things they thought their organization did well. After a brief working period involving independent writing, team conversation, and posting of notes to chart paper, we asked for a representative to report out.

It was hard not to notice that the superintendents posted and reported their good works in district-by-district fashion in ostensible disregard of their colleagues standing right beside them. One group stacked its sticky notes on chart paper chimney style, with as much space as possible between stacks. Not only that, each superintendent insisted on representing him or herself in the report out.

But why would we expect anything different? Our world is perfectly organized to create the behavior we are currently experiencing. The political reality is that every superintendent runs his or her own shop. In fact, one of them publicly lamented the limited opportunities superintendents even in neighboring districts have to share information, much less solve problems of practice.

Folks, it's not about ego; it's about culture, a culture of insularity that, in my opinion, weakens the greater system of public education. Our problems are neither created in isolation nor will they be solved in isolation. We are in this together or we are in this to fail. We need boundary-spanning leadership now more than ever.

The HPU Educational Leadership Studio is designed to strengthen the education system by connecting, convening, communicating, and co-designing in context. In the summer of 2013, the Studio will convene 100 professionals from Murphy to Manteo, classroom to boardroom, schoolhouse to statehouse. As we speak, the Studio has a web presence at http://educationstudio.highpoint.edu Check it out.

Given the assembled talent and committed professionals, I think it's a pretty cool dream that has a better-than-even chance of coming true. Today was a good day for education.

A Letter to the Board of Education

Looking back on it, I could have been fired. The letter that, as a young hotshot high school band director disgruntled by a proposed change proffered by the new district superintendent, I wrote and hand-delivered to board of education members during a board meeting may not have been protected by the constitutional right to free speech.

At minimum, my impertinence could have given the district pause to grant me tenure. Like many teachers then and now, however, tenure was not for me a reason to do or not do as I was already doing, which is to say, the very best I could.

As students of education law know, under certain circumstances, restrictions on constitutional freedoms may be justified by governmental interests. Such circumstances include when a teacher's behavior compromises teaching effectiveness, relations with principals and other administrators, or the operation of school generally.

So what did I write in that letter? First, it is important to know that I did not attend the board of education meeting in question. Unbelievably, the superintendent himself, unaware of its contents, distributed copies of my letter to each board member, several of whom had children in my band.

In retrospect, I do not know whether his confidence in me was born more of trust or ignorance. Inasmuch as this was his first superintendency, I suspect more the latter than the former. Yet, his not asking me about the letter's contents or my motive seems to this day incredible. No more incredible, I suppose, than was my brashness.

Sealed in separate envelops, my letter stated, point by point, my opposition to perceived damages to the band program due to the loss of teaching time in moving from a junior high school to a middle school model. Without remembering exactly the words I wrote, my intent was to derail the superintendent's plans, as if I were just anyone in the community.

But I was not just anyone in the community. As an employee of the district, I owed to my administrators my support even in the face of personal reservations about the proposed changes. Instead, I jumped over my superiors' heads and took my case straight to board members. This is one story I tell myself. The other story is that I had done all I could do to get the superintendent's attention, but my entreaty was falling on deaf ears.

When the superintendent found out what my letter said, it certainly got his attention. Within 24 hours, I found myself standing before him receiving a lesson in humility. He wanted, as he said, not to fire me but "to set the boat aright." Those were his words.

I was humbled, but only a little bit. Within a year, the new superintendent was himself fired. Did I contribute to his removal? I will never know. How close was I to removal myself? You tell me.

Up For a Fight

We all need a vacation. So it has been with me for nearly six weeks. In many respects, however, my web silence has been more a reflection of the near-paralyzing body blows recently inflicted by critics of public education. That they throw their punches from Jones Street is almost too much to bear. I said “almost.” I’m now on my feet, up for a fight.

Gratefully, I have professional sparring partners with whom to test my moves. Good moves get used. Bad ones get discarded. I have found that my Gardner-Webb University Master of Executive Leadership in Schools students are among the best sparring partners a learning leader like me could wish for. The blog this week is their story.

So 10 days ago, we reconvened for our course in school financing and education law. As a reflective activity at the end of the first class, they were to respond in writing to this “ripped from the headlines” prompt that they turned in as a kind of exit ticket:

“There are many proposals before the current NC State Legislature, including cutting budgets for local positions, increased accountability for teachers, and elimination of teacher tenure. Write personally about how you feel about the proposals for public education in North Carolina.”

Concerned citizens know these ideas, and a cornucopia of others whose collective intent is to improve public education, are contained in Senate Bill 795. The Senate passed the bill. The House is now debating it. Given its relevance to our course content, my students and I will be following the bill’s progress over the course of the semester. With their permission, here is some of what my students wrote, with my captions supplied after the fact. Their comments may surprise you.

Tenure

“I believe the tenure process has been abused . . . Good teachers will continue to work and be successful without the safety net of tenure.”

“To me, tenure seems unnecessary because, I feel if you are doing your job then there should be no issues.”

“Eliminating tenure would require all teachers to perform the very best in order to keep their job. The school could also go to merit pay and give more money to the most productive educators.”

“As far as tenure, there are teachers who are teaching and should not be. There are also wonderful teachers who should be protected by tenure so they will not lose their jobs.”

“Personally, I feel that the elimination of teacher tenure and placing more standards on teachers is ineffective in helping students in our public schools.”

“Lost job security or the ability to think out of the box for fear of not being in line will drive many teachers out of the profession and possibly into private sector or other jobs.”

“I can see both sides here, but I’m not sure how the elimination of tenure will have on teacher retention. People look for stability and don’t want to go through each year fearful about having a job the next year, but it could be an effective way to get rid of teachers that are consistently under-performing.”

Funding

“I feel it is costing me more each year to stay in the profession that I’ve already spent so much money on. I’m almost to the point where I can’t afford to continue in education unless something changes with the state budget regarding teacher salaries.”

“The current budget for education isn’t a fair trade-off when you compare it with the economic constraints of living conditions, mental and physical constraints on individuals that try to make an honest living.”

“Someone with a masters degree and six years teaching experience should not be struggling to pay bills and work two part-time jobs.”

“Current funding in education . . . needs to include the people who are at the bottom of the totem pole, monies should be allocated for raises for steps and longevity.”

“I feel that the current funding proposals in North Carolina are not focusing on the main stakeholders—students and teachers . . . At present, the moral is low among teachers.”

“I think overall, ‘funding’ for schools is broken.” 

Accountability

“I agree that teachers need to be held accountable to high standards, but this bill only shows teachers how undervalued some feel our job is.”

“I do believe there should be a system in place that supports increased accountability for teachers in North Carolina.”

“When are we going to say ‘enough is enough’ and trust the universities for quality education and rely on administrative observations to determine if a teacher is doing her job?”

“I understand wanting increased accountability, but it is adding more tests for students. I saw how hurt students were this year with field testing, benchmark testing, Case 21 testing, and now EOGs.”

Performance Pay

“Teachers have no incentive to teach both harder and smarter when they are not valued for their efforts. Great teachers are looking to get out of the classroom because of this (just look at our cohort) and less experienced teachers just happy to have a job out of college are teaching children that need the support of more experience.”

“Performance pay and tenure are low on my scale because I feel I am a good teacher. However, I’m not sure that the measures that would be used would reflect that.”

“A teacher could be the best or worst in his or her building and that distinction may not be reflected at all in the teacher’s paycheck or level of career achievement.”

Politics and Policy

“I feel the current plan is not addressing the most important problems in NC. Talking about taking away tenure for teachers and cutting positions is irrelevant to fixing the education system.”

“The current funding is not what I am as concerned about. It is the fever to the disease of disrespect towards schools and school employees.”

“Proposals before legislatures involving teacher tenure and budget cuts are complex. Making changes today is likely to be as ineffective as the current policies as lag-time for the well-equipped teachers to step into tenure-less roles is nonexistent.” 

“I feel that our legislators are very pro-private schools and they have very little regard for public education in our state . . . I feel that the quality of life in our state will decline if these people [current legislators] stay in power.”

Of course, each cited comment was part of an extended narrative. I did my best to avoid misrepresenting the writer despite the loss of context of his or her words. You should also know that any one student could be, and often was, cited under more than one caption.

As you can see, my students and I have lots to talk about. And we will do it using facts and feelings. As with our legislators, not everyone is in agreement about every issue. Beyond the hope that my students learn, however, what I most want is for the teachers’ voice to be heard and respected by our elected officials. Is that too much to ask?