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Quolke's Corner 10/29/09

QUOLKE’S CORNER #46
TRANSFORMATION
 
Last Thursday we had our Leadership Conference for all of our Building Chairs. While there I spoke of the topic I am now writing about and I promised the Chairs that I would get this information out to everybody this week. What I spoke about the most on Thursday were the reports from The Boston Consulting Group and Education First both of which focus on transforming the District. Sunday in the Forum section of the Plain Dealer, Sharon Broussard wrote an article entitled “Sanders, City Schools Face Pivotal Moment”, a link to that editorial is at the end of this Q Corner. 
 
This Q Corner will focus on the facts, background, and some of my predictions. This week a new issue of the Critique will be in all buildings and it will have an article that expresses some of my frustrations surrounding the transformation process. 
 
Three reports were commissioned by and paid for by the Cleveland Foundation. These reports were written by the Boston Consulting Group, Education First, and Council for Great City Schools. The primary components of these reports are to offer suggestions to “right size” the district and make recommendations for transforming the District. These reports are loaded with recommendations and criticism. The reports are available at the CMSD website. Right sizing the District is a politically correct way of saying close schools. A rubric has been created to help make decisions as to what schools should be closed. This rubric takes many factors under consideration including: enrollment trends, attendance (teacher and student), school learning conditions survey, PI history, and (weighted the most) academic achievement. There is no doubt in my mind that schools will be recommended for closure this year. 
 
The reports also call for transforming the District. These reports recommend reconstituting schools, closing schools and reopening as charter schools, and creating more innovative schools under separate MOUs. Additionally these reports are critical of all adults that work with children from the classroom to management. More on that in my next update that is mailed home.
 
Dr. Sanders and the Boston Consulting Group held a series of Community Forums where the rubric for closing schools and the background and research that lead to the school closing rubric were explained to the public. These forums were sparsely attended and sometimes over taken by other issues and not the results of the reports. Now that the forums are over, recommendations will be presented to the school board. The anticipation is these recommendations will be made to the board (and thus made public) in January.
 
While the district seems committed to keeping the CTU in the dark until they release the report, a scenario seems to be unfolding. The recommendations parallel much of what is incorporated in the federal “Race to the Top Grant {$4 billion}” and “School Improvement Grants {$3.5 billion}”. These are stimulus dollars earmarked with specific criteria. 
 
Race to the Top absolute criterion indicates “The State does not have any legal, statutory, or regulatory barriers to linking data on student achievement or student growth to teachers and principals for the purpose of teacher and principal evaluation.” 
 
School Improvement Grants indicate: Eligible districts are those that agree to implement, and demonstrate the capacity to implement fully and effectively, one of the four models in each school that LEA (Local Education Agency…CMSD) commits to serve:
 
Turnaround model
Restart Model
School Closure
Transformation model
 
It looks pretty convincing that the BCG was more of a report generated to match where the federal government was targeting dollars and less of genuine report. It’s almost as if the report was delayed until August so those writing the report had the wording and verbiage contained in the federal guidelines and now can present this to the Cleveland community as their “transformation” dialog. 
 
This process is just beginning and is something that every one of us needs to be knowledgeable of and follow very closely.   I will continue to up date you through Q Corners, presidential updates, and the Critique.
 
In Union,
 
David
 
 
Link to Sunday’s PD Forum Article:

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