A 100 Week 7

1. A 100 Week 7

2. Short Topic: What can we learn from Gawande’s Better?

3. What can we learn from Better?

4. What we can learn from Better? • We should evaluate ideas by their effect on practice rather than their appeal in theory • Better requires examination of practice, diagnosis of failings, action, evaluation, rinse, repeat • Against utopianism, but also despair • Pragmatism – tomorrow one step better than today • We should all be striving to get better • We each have a piece and a role to play • Against either/or questions, in favor of “better” questions • Either/or: Are leaders “made” or “born”? • Better: How do we develop better leaders?

5. Is “better” a strategy for improving schools at scale? Yes No

6. Is “better” a strategy for improving schools at scale? Yes • In decentralized system, everyone has to get better • Given that success has come from people closest to kids exhibiting “ideas/hope/vision/energy” we need them to be better No • It asks too much from people; people are just not this good • It relies on individuals rather than systems

7. Better Systems or Better People? “If we want to make thousands of schools much better, we have to make the work of effective schooling more doable, less mystifying, and less reliant on superhuman commitment. In most sectors, if a job is so hard that most people can’t do it well, then you change the job. Or split up the job until you can reliably find people who are good at the component jobs. Or you provide better tools that help do parts of the job way more efficiently or effectively. My guess is that all of this is going to matter at least as much as all of your innovations in recruiting.” -- Greg Gunn, Wireless Generation, Future of School Reform Pre-Writing, September 09 Agree or disagree?

8. What we can learn from Better? • We should evaluate ideas by their effect on practice rather than their appeal in theory • Better requires examination of practice, diagnosis of failings, action, evaluation, rinse, repeat • Against utopianism, but also despair • Pragmatism – tomorrow one step better than today • We should all be striving to get better • We each have a piece and a role to play • Against either/or questions, in favor of “better” questions • Better can be at the level of the system as well as the individual

9. Improving Schooling at Scale:Better Systems and Better People System Account- ability Federal Knowledge r &d Human Capital (Week 11) Org process in schools Ontario and Victoria (Week 9) NCLB Week 8 States Replace the system or reform through outside pressure (Week 12) Districts Use the systems’ levers for improvement (Week 13) Charter networks (Week 10) Schools

10. New Topic: Effective Schools, 101, 201, 301

11. From the Coleman Report to Effective schools • Coleman report (1960s) • Family background and school peers most important factors • Measurable resources not important for variation in outcomes • Large-scale statistical co-variation study • Effective schools (1970s) • Intensive qualitative studies of schools that worked(Larry Lezotte, Ron Edmonds, MSU) • Similar sets of characteristics in these school • Catholic schools (1980s) and charter schools (90s and 00s) • Again, mission, coherence, critical • Schools That Work video

12. See Mass Insight – Setting District Level Conditions for School Turnarounds, pages 5-7 http://www.agi.harvard.edu/presentations/2008Conference/Calkins.pdf

13. Effective Schools 101 • Key characteristics of effective schools: • Order and discipline • High expectations • Coherent culture • Use of data • Focus on improving instruction

14. Effective Schools 201 • Key intangibles of effective schools: • Relentless energy and urgency • Problem-solving ethos • Hope as opposed to fatalism • Entrepreneurial leadership See Elizabeth City, Resourceful Leadership.

15. Effective Schools 301: Change processes Ron Ferguson: How 15 Schools Became Exemplary Stage 1: Set goals, create urgency, mobilize stakeholders “Core groups of leaders took public responsibility for leading the charge to raise achievement. Stakeholders crafted mission statements that later helped keep them on track; planned carefully, sometimes with outside assistance, for how they would organize learning experiences for teachers; clearly defined criteria for high quality teaching and student work; and implemented in ways that engaged their whole faculties. As they implemented their plans, these schools carefully monitored both student and teacher work in order to continuously refine their approaches.” http://www.agi.harvard.edu/events/2009Conference/2009AGIConferenceReport6-30-2010web.pdf

16. Effective Schools 301: Change processes Stage 2: Keep focus, build trust, study literature, be respectful but demanding “ Leadership teams succeeded initially because they used their positional authority effectively to jump-start the change process. Then they built trust. More specifically, they demonstrated commitment through hard work and long hours; they studied research-based literature to expand their knowledge and competence; they persevered to follow through on the promises they made; and they found ways to remain respectful of peers, even when asking them to improve their performance.

17. Effective Schools 301: Change processes Stage 3: Push to next level of work, create processes for sustainability “In these ways, leadership teams earned the respect of their colleagues and the authority to push people outside their comfort zones. With cultivated competence and earned authority, they were able to help their colleagues overcome the types of fear and resistance that so often prevent effective reforms in American high schools. All these schools remain works in progress, but they are not typical. Their stories convey critically important principles, processes, and practices that can help high schools across the nation raise achievement and close gaps.”

18. Beyond Effective Schools (401):The Nature of Good Schooling • Effective schools literature almost exclusively focused on test scores • Next generation of work will likely think more about values and purposes, and how they relate to practices • Not just “what works” but “what kinds of mini societies are we trying to create.” • And how does this map to the kinds of citizens we want, and the kind of world they are likely to be entering? • See Sara Lawrence Lightfoot, The Good High School

19. What Can We Learn from Effective Schools? What are the limits of this way of thinking? What Do They Demonstrate What Are the Limits?

20. What Can We Learn from Effective Schools? What Do They Demonstrate • That it is possible to create good schools in high poverty areas • That there are certain characteristics that consistently matter: • Mission coherence • Trust and relationships • Attention to individual student progress/use of data • Hope, energy, vision, ideas, and trust • Internal accountability • That good policy needs to foster more of these qualities • Conversely, that policy does not increase these qualities is likely bad policy What

21. What are the limits of what we can learn from the effective schools literature? What Do They Not Speak To: • How to get to scale • How to create sustainable excellence

22. So, that’s your job! Task for section: If you were a state policymaker, how would you create more effective schools?

23. Teacher From the School to the System:3 Frameworks for Instructional Improvement Elmore: Instructional triangle Teacher Student Curriculum

24. Teacher From the School to the System:3 Frameworks for Instructional Improvement Bryk: Five supports Teacher Student Curriculum

25. From the School to the System:3 Frameworks for Instructional Improvement

26. New Topic: From either/or to better + From the inside/out

27. The answer to the first part of the class is:All of the above States Poverty, inequality, residential segregation, lack of political will Markets Professions Union influence, power of status quo, deregulating entry to teaching Need to professionalizing teaching, instructional rounds, peer assistance and review

28. A Puzzle With Many Pieces

29. A Problem With Many Pieces State Market Profession • Combating poverty • Visiting nurses • Early childhood programs • After-school programs • Extended learning time • HCZ • Improving incentives • Better human resource policies (hiring and firing) • Greater flexibility in return for accountability • Expanded opportunities for good charters • Massively streamlining bureaucracy • Inverting pyramid (NYC) • Increasing knowledge • Better training and induction of new teachers • Instructional rounds to improve practice • Coaching • Individual, team and organizational learning • New systems of R & D

30. Good Solutions (Wherever They Come From) Generally Integrate the Pieces State Market Profession • Combating poverty • Visiting nurses • Early childhood programs • After-school programs • Extended learning time • HCZ • Improving incentives • Better human resource policies (hiring and firing) • Greater flexibility in return for accountability • Expanded opportunities for good charters • Massively streamlining bureaucracy • Inverting pyramid (NYC) • Increasing knowledge • Better training and induction of new teachers • Instructional rounds to improve practice • Coaching • Individual, team and organizational learning • New systems of R & D

31. What Can We Learn from Effective Schools? What Do They Demonstrate • That it is possible to create good schools in high poverty areas (go to next slide) • That there are certain characteristics that consistently matter: • Mission coherence • Trust and relationships • Attention to individual student progress/use of data • Hope, energy, vision, ideas, and trust • Internal accountability • That good policy needs to foster more of these qualities • Conversely, that policy does not increase these qualities is likely bad policy What

32. An example of moving from Either/Or to Better:Top Down and Bottom Up Ways that top-down and bottom up can be in tension: • assertions about competency at either end – the “other” • top-down edicts suck the life out of initiative and creatiivity • autonomy versus bureaucracy – david and goliath • the what and the how may be in conflict (such as: “use more data in your schools”; Examples of policies that integrate the two: • accreditation models can be used to integrate top and bottom priorities • expanded learning time initiative for example • charter schools can create their own standard operating procedures

33. An example of moving from Either/Or to Better:Top Down and Bottom Up Ways that top-down and bottom up can be in tension: • Battles over control – who gets to decide • Regulatory policies that create constraints at the school level • NCLB Examples of policies that integrate the two: • Milbrey McLaughlin: “We can’t mandate what matters.” • Think comparative advantage: who is good at what • Districts, states, and feds can provide, for example: • Human capital pipeline Coaching • Curriculum Closing failing schools

34. Layers of Thinking About Improving Schooling at Scale Components of reform System Account- ability Federal Knowledge r &d Human capital Org process in schools States Districts Qualities of Effective schools Schools

35. Layers of Thinking About Improving Schooling at Scale System Account- ability Federal Knowledge r &d Human Capital (Week 11) Org process in schools Ontario and Victoria (Week 8) NCLB Week 9 States Districts Charter networks (Week 10) Schools

36. Layers of Thinking About Improving Schooling at Scale Adding in politics System Account- ability Federal Knowledge r &d Human capital Org process in schools States Use the systems’ levers for improvement (Week 13) Districts Replace the system or reform through outside pressure (Week 12) Schools