Believing in Ourselves: Urban Middle School Reform

Believing in Ourselves

Part II - Chapter 10

TURNING THE INSIDE OUT

Outside investments in urban school reform, like the Clark project, hope to be much more than a sparkler that dazzles briefly, then fades out. That might have been accepted as inevitable not too long ago, but within the foundation community, at least, long-term results and even institutionalization of successful efforts have become part of the bargain foundations make with school districts. Not only are the staffs of many major foundations actively involved in reshaping programs as they go along, but they are much more aggressive about evaluation of the programs.

For some of the Clark districts, such involvement was unexpected. They were not prepared for an ongoing relationship with foundation officials or for the implied objective that the reforms would become part of a district's mission. On the other hand, Clark staff also were on a learning curve, finding out where to draw the line between infusion and intrusion. Out of the tension came some basic understandings.

School officials and outside funders need to cooperate on planning and evaluation of change initiatives with the goal of developing internal support for successful initiatives after outside support ends.

The Clark Foundation was not immediately aware of how limited were the capacities of most of the network schools to make significant changes. Its strategy at the beginning infused all sorts of opportunities for school staff to select from curriculum improvement and student support programs, along with technical assistance for each. For many schools, this was overload.

As one Louisville teacher recalled, "We were all starving for something, and we just jumped at everything we could, thinking this is what we needed. It really took a toll on us...."

Gradually -- and in some places the evolution took two or more years -- most of the schools began to use the new resources to drive what they wanted instead of the reverse. They began to combine the Clark resources with Title I plans, or direct Clark money to priorities set by the staff after significant discussions about where they were going. Their own assessments of the programs they adopted, such as student advisories or Writing to Learn, helped provide more focus.

Some schools rejected programs such as Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) because its computer costs were too steep; others made the investment and were pleased with the decision. Both HOTS and the Algebra Project require extensive teacher development; when enthusiastic supporters of individual programs such as these moved on to other schools, some Clark schools decided to use the resources elsewhere. They made modifications. For example, King Estates Junior High School in Oakland, very supportive of the Algebra Project, decided to work with a feeder elementary school to introduce it in the sixth grade.

OUTSIDE AND INSIDE TOGETHER

While Clark provided funding for student support activities, its major investment and lasting impact was among teachers and administrators. Again, a Louisville teacher noted three years into the project, "I think we have come a long way in getting to the root of the problem, which was our attitude...."

Through networks, meetings, and most of all consistent opportunities to learn from the changes they made in classrooms, a large number of teachers in many Clark schools gradually accepted the idea that all students could learn at much higher levels. All schools have a core of teachers who will not change their attitudes, but the momentum in more than half of the Clark schools became directed at changing teacher behaviors and skills as much, or more, than changing those of students.

A Louisville teacher noted three years into the project,
"I think we have come a long way in getting to the root of the problem, which was our attitude...."

Yet, the schools most able to coalesce around priorities and missions had help from their districts. Both San Diego and Louisville school districts accepted the ongoing relationship with foundation officials, the emphasis upon data collection, and the need to modify plans and ideas based on what the evaluations said. Not that there wasn't grumbling on both sides at times, but district and foundation policies and practices were going in the same direction.

By contrast, Baltimore district officials performed well on paper, drawing up elaborate plans that put the Clark Foundation on the periphery, except for funding. The assistant superintendent in charge preferred other outside consultants. Meanwhile, the district ignored its leadership responsibility toward the two schools in the network, despite foundation evaluations that documented problems. In March 1995, a state review team visiting Calverton Middle School as part of the reconstitution process found no staff development structure. The only effort teachers recalled from the Clark initiative was its support of a relationship the school already had with The Johns Hopkins University.

The foundation's expectations created tension in Oakland and Milwaukee also, though not as overtly as in Baltimore. None of these three districts began the Clark initiative with plans to continue the effort. Thus, the long-range goals of the foundation conflicted with the districts' short-range perspectives on what to expect from their involvement.

Prepared staff development programs that meet the needs of all school districts are hard to find, but when staff development can be modified to fit what teachers and schools need, ownership is created.

For Beverly Bimes-Michalak, developer of Writing to Learn, the clue to permanent adoption of programs that lead to systemic change is teacher ownership of them. Prepared staff development programs that meet the needs of all school districts are hard to find, she says, but when staff development can be modified to fit what teachers and schools need, ownership is created. Writing to Learn, she points out, "recognizes the fact that teachers are best prepared to teach their colleagues," and, if this is institutionalized, it creates a rolling, energized system of staff development.

Some districts developed statements adopted by their school boards that expressed a vision for the middle grades; at the most, these provided official sanctions of the efforts. San Diego became data-driven, say officials, because of the Clark initiative. Louisville's experience with professional development during the funding years provided a base for going districtwide on middle grades reform. Also, that city's Coalition of Middle Schools created a stable structure for enlisting community support behind the needs of middle grades students.

Oakland drew up a new middle grades reform plan calling for conversion to a grades 6p;8 structure throughout the district and equal offerings at all schools. The former action has been postponed; the latter is underway. Involvement with Clark, says Yolanda Peeks, was a "powerful learning experience" for the district. If the efforts had been confined to just the three schools, she adds, it would have remained a small project, "but we learned that the schools could not make reforms unless the district itself made major changes." Still, there is some wariness among parents and advocacy groups about a new Middles Grades Education Council. The district proposed it to be advisory; others want it to have authority to force change.

Fund-raising consultants provided by the Clark Foundation to advise two of the districts found their capabilities for obtaining sustained support for reform to be almost nil. The districts had no personnel and few structures or contacts that would make outside support possible. Nor had they thought strategically about how to keep reforms going once the Clark Foundation's money was gone.

THE FOUNDATION'S HOMEWORK

Over the years, the foundation also moved toward more focus, less of the try-everything mode. It had all along divided its interests between individual schools in the program and the district, but began to realize how very important district reform and focus were.

"If the central office is not playing a constructive role in the dynamics of school reform, the whole venture may be stillborn," Hayes Mizell, director of the Clark middle grades program, told teachers and administrators from the participating districts toward the end of the project. Many students, he said, do not have the luxury of waiting for reforms to happen school by school.

Another lesson the foundation learned is that although schools are "about" a lot of things, the ultimate result of reforms must be improvement of student performance.

Another lesson the foundation learned is that although schools are "about" a lot of things, the ultimate result of reforms must be improvement of student performance. After pushing this goal through the structure of the project, the Clark Foundation, in March 1994, changed the name of its effort -- from the Program for Disadvantaged Youth to the Program for Student Achievement. This made it absolutely clear that middle school reform is linked to academic standards.

The foundation's future plans to work with system-wide reforms in a new set of school districts are predicated on the commitment to students' demonstration of high levels of performance by the end of the eighth grade.

BUT THERE ARE LIMITS

While not officially discussed in any of its annual reports or other communications about the initiative, another lesson learned from the Clark project and its relationships with the school districts surely must be the limits of outside support for reform. There is a point at which outside funding is the wrong solution.

Urban school districts cannot abdicate their responsibility for seriously troubled schools.

During the five years of the Clark project, three or four schools out of the 12 became even worse-performing environments for students and teachers than they were when the effort began. They started as very troubled, dysfunctional schools, chosen, no doubt, by the districts as places that needed a boost. The districts may have analyzed their problems correctly, but they underestimated the efforts that would be needed to change them.

Discretionary, outside money could not rescue these schools. Technical assistance, professional development, curriculum ideas -- they all fell into deep wells. Once selected, the schools were almost ignored by the districts, as if they were saying the schools' problems were now up to the foundation to solve. Toward the end of the project, one school had been identified by the state as failing (though it had never before been cited by the district); another had been singled out by the superintendent as deserving to be closed; and another's future was shaky, primarily because many parents exercised the only control they know and refused to send their children to the school.

Except for small projects, these schools did not have the capacity to take advantage of incentives for reform. They needed massive help in gaining control and then in reshaping their curriculum, support, and teacher capabilities to be very different places for students. Not until that reshaping was on firm ground could they have been expected to take the risks asked of them in the Clark initiative.
Even if districts provided such help, it would be only fingers in the dike.

The schools in the Clark network that struggled and stumbled the most over reforms certainly held low expectations for most students and had done so for a long time. Previous reports about the Clark initiative pointed this out. The fact that students in other schools, who also were minority, poor, and accustomed to failure, demonstrated they could perform at higher levels makes one angry at and scornful of the schools where students did not have opportunities to succeed.

However, as the context for reform became clearer toward the end of the Clark initiative, it also became more obvious that the anger should be directed at systems as much or more than at schools. The reasons for student failure in these schools does not begin when students enter. It begins with the selection and preparation of teachers and principals for urban schools with predominantly minority and low-income enrollments. It continues when no institution -- higher education, unions, or the district itself -- provides teachers with the knowledge and experience that challenge attitudes and behaviors which hold back students of color.

Most of these teachers have good professional skills;
few are bigots. Yet, many were unable to look at disadvantaged, young adolescents and see in them
future intellectually lively adults.

Despite what they had in common, the teachers and principals attending meetings of the Clark network varied considerably in their capacity to delve deeply into professional concerns and intrinsically believe their students were capable of challenging work. This was a reflection more of the systems where the teachers and principals work than of their own potential to be excellent teachers for all students. Most of these teachers have good professional skills; few are bigots. Yet, many were unable to look at disadvantaged, young adolescents and see in them future intellectually lively adults. Nor could the teachers picture themselves as being essential to making sure their students become such adults.

The real, unexamined problem is that teachers and principals who had difficulty in stretching their professionalism labored in systems that lacked professionalism, too. It is not just a problem of bureaucratic agendas superceding reform ones. It is one of a lack of quality ideas, stimulating discussions around student learning, and a commitment to high standards for minority students. Following one plan after another with tired, superficial reasoning and proposals is no way to stimulate school or teacher enthusiasm for reform.

It should be no surprise to the educators in these districts that alternatives to the systems as they now exist threaten the status quo. Whether parents and policymakers support charter schools, vouchers, or private contracts to run schools -- all of which are being tried in one or more of the Clark districts -- they are really speaking out against systems that fail to put student achievement above all else. Everyone is culpable in not believing in the capacity of their students, but the low expectations and inappropriate instruction given minority and low-income students cannot be overcome school by school. It is a critical systemic problem.

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from Believing in Ourselves: Progress and Struggle in Middle School Reform. By Anne C. Lewis. Published in 1995 by the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation.