The Cinderella Story of Low Performing Schools

“Because we know that about 12% of America’s schools produce 50% of America’s dropouts, we’re going to focus on helping states and school districts turn around their 5,000 lowest-performing schools in the next five years,” President Obama said this week.

Turning around the nation’s 5,000 lowest-performing schools, Secretary Duncan has said, is “part of our overall strategy for dramatically reducing the drop-out rate, improving high school graduation rates and increasing the number of students who graduate prepared for success in college and the workplace.”

The Obama administration is making an historic commitment to support state and local education leaders in turning around the nation’s lowest-achieving schools.

The U.S. Department of Education is providing $4 billion for this effort. To qualify for this funding under the Title I School Improvement Grant program, states must identify their lowest-performing schools in economically challenged communities and transform those schools using one of the four following intervention models:

Turnaround model: Replace the principal and rehire no more than 50% of the staff, and grant the principal sufficient operational flexibility (including in staffing, calendars/time and budgeting) to fully implement a comprehensive approach to substantially improve student outcomes.

Restart model: Convert a school or close and reopen it under a charter school operator, a charter management organization, or an education management organization that has been selected through a rigorous review process.

School closure: Close a school and enroll the students who attended that school in other schools in the district that are higher achieving.

Transformation model: Implement each of the following strategies:

(1) replace the principal and take steps to increase teacher and school leader effectiveness;

(2) institute comprehensive instructional reforms;

(3) increase learning time and create community-oriented schools; and

(4) provide operational flexibility and sustained support.

As Secretary Duncan has said repeatedly, this is difficult work—he took it on as CEO of Chicago’s public schools. No matter which model is used, turning around a chronically low-performing school requires hard work from our best teachers and school leaders.

State and local leaders around the country have taken on the challenge, with encouraging results.

In Chicago, Harvard School of Excellence, operated by the Academy for Urban School Leadership (AUSL), is an example of the turnaround model. Before 2007, it ranked among the 10 worst elementary schools in all of Illinois. Now, three years later, it has key components of the turnaround model: a new principal; highly trained and effective teachers; a curriculum based on high expectations and frequent assessments; and a culture of intellectual curiosity and personal respect.

The Academy for Urban School Leadership is a Chicago-based non-profit organization that partners with Chicago Public Schools to manage several chronically under-performing elementary and high schools.

AUSL’s stated mission is to “turn around” Chicago’s most underperforming schools by improving student performance and achievement through a disciplined transformation process that is built on a foundation of specially trained teachers.

AUSL was founded in 2001 by Martin J. Koldyke, a venture capitalist and founder of the Golden Apple Foundation. In founding AUSL, Koldyke engaged a group of business and community leaders to design a school management program built on the the belief that well-prepared teachers are the key to transforming high-poverty, poorly-performing schools into places where students can succeed.

As of the 2009-2010 school year, AUSL is managing 14 Chicago Public Schools (11 elementary schools and 3 high schools) with plans to add more schools to its network in coming years.

In just two years, the number of Harvard students meeting or exceeding state testing standards has increased 25%. And AUSL is applying its turnaround model to more struggling schools in Chicago.

Additional Reading: The Limits of Sanctions in Low-Performing Schools

“The article reports on a study of 11 schools that were labeled as low-performing by the state accountability systems of Maryland and Kentucky, nationally known for complex performance-based assessments. The study shows that putting schools on probation only weakly motivated teachers because the assessments were largely perceived as unfair, invalid, and unrealistic.

Administrators responded with control strategies that rigidified organizations, forestalling dialog and learning processes. Instructional reform developed only feebly. On the other hand, some schools remedied inefficiencies and were able to “harvest the low-hanging fruit.” The schools struggled with severe problems of teacher commitment.”

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