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The Journey

The Journey. t o School Transformation Teachers Leading the Way. A long and winding road. Why did we start this journey? . Why couldn’t teachers lead the way in education? Why couldn’t they be in charge of their profession like doctors, lawyers, architects, and many others?

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The Journey

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  1. The Journey to School Transformation Teachers Leading the Way

  2. A long and winding road

  3. Why did we start this journey? • Why couldn’t teachers lead the way in education? • Why couldn’t they be in charge of their profession like doctors, lawyers, architects, and many others? • Why couldn’t they be considered the experts in their field? • Why couldn’t they be partners in the school system along with students, parents, the community AND administration? • Why were we waiting for permission?

  4. Breaking down “road” barriers and creating new pathways • The Minneapolis Federation of Teachers has spent the last 20 years searching for and creating new pathways – starting with ourselves: • Peer Assistance and Review • Achievement of Tenure • Standards of Effective Instruction • Mentoring Program/Peer Coaching • Labor – Management Collaboration • Residency Programs; Grow Your Own; Recruitment Models

  5. Starting our “own” schools • Chiron - partnerships with downtown businesses • Bethune Public School Academy – class sizes of 14, parent involvement, student can stay if moves • School of Extended Learning - Annual Calendar Cycle: Students: 9 weeks of school, 3 weeks off (repeated) Teachers: 9 weeks of teaching, 1 week of PD, 2 weeks off

  6. More roadside attractions • Henry High School Professional Practice School and Residency Program • Saturn School in St. Paul • Bravo Middle School in Bloomington

  7. Crash and burn – dust on the side of the road • Chiron, Bethune PSA, SOEL and BRAVO only last 5 years. • Henry’s successful Residency Program declines after 20 years when new principal shuts it down. PPS also declines. • Saturn School runs out of gas • The weight of the bureaucracy, the inability to think or move outside of the box, and the fear of loss of power that kept the system from embracing these innovations. All new ideas got pushed back to business as usual – even though there were great gains made.

  8. Taking a new road…new tactics Self-Governed Schools • Team approach: MN Business Partnership, Union, Community/Parents, District partnership to create schools that govern themselves. Create agreements together, work on them together. • Legislation created (Ed Evolving leadership and assistance) • Grant $$$ from Minnesota Department of Education • RESULTS: • Met for 10 years with no outcomes; District continuously put up barriers; members grew weary • District opened up Office of New Schools (ONS) and took over

  9. Ten years later… • First internal district Self-Governed School opens fall 2012 (after MPS district had opened several charter schools in a one year time period under ONS without collaboration with anyone). Eight teams of teachers stepped forward with ideas for innovative schools. All but one were rejected by School Board. Pierre Bottineau French Immersion – after approved: unreasonable hoop jumps, had to raise money prior to okay, phone book thick application – AND only this teacher led SGS had to do that much work…none of the the district schools or district charters had to do the same.

  10. Bulldozing a new road • Frustration on the road to transformation – getting blocked, backed up, and hitting too many potholes. • Enough! Finding our own road was critical. • Needed to move out of the system to create change • MFT applied for and became a Single Purpose Charter School Authorizer – first union local in the nation to become one. • Wide open road – freedom (with responsibility) • Keeping true education, teacher leadership, our profession and our organization alive.

  11. Where do we go from here? • Organize current charter schools. • Create schools of the future that work – real learning is kept at the core; tests are not the gods of learning – students are. • Teacher led schools as labs of research and innovation that is disseminated like medical research is. • No dependency on the larger (broken) school district. • Systems change – alternative structures to learning – less sit and get; more move and do. • Teacher and learner voices; teachers and learners as deciders.

  12. If not now, when? • We have hit the tipping point – after years of a slow climb. • Is your local ready to empower teachers to lead? • This is a time of leading the way or being led. • The results will be dramatically different if we are led than if we lead – we already see it now. From policy to the classroom – with community, parents, politicians • Getting from here to there will take a lot of hard work, organizing and courage…MN Guild, Avalon, Finland and other pioneers are showing us how.

  13. New horizons and enlightened pathways are ours if we believe.

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