Looking for school reform leaders

Remarks of Hayes Mizell at "The Reform Connection," a conference of over 370 representatives of states, school systems, schools and national and state organizations involved in middle school reform. Many of the conference participants were grantees of the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation. The conference was held on November 1, 1995 in New Orleans, LA preliminary to the 22nd Annual conference of the National Middle School Association. Mizell is Director of the Program for Student Achievement at the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation.

Looking for Leaders

The other day, I overheard my wife telling our son about an article she had read in the newspaper. The piece described a group of blind young children who each Monday fly from a New York city suburb to a residential school in upstate New York, and then fly back home each Friday. When my son asked what these children do at the school, my wife explained that one of the activities was teaching the students to walk with confidence and use a cane. "Sometimes," she said, "people whose vision is impaired have difficulty keeping their balance."

That casual remark says a lot about why you are here at The Reform Connection. In one way or another, all of you are seeking to reform middle schools. You want them to do more than just go through the motions of providing educational services for students. It is your vision that middle schools can become places where students achieve at high levels. Yet, the daily stresses and demands you face often impair your vision. In spite of your best intentions, it is difficult to overcome the inertia that causes your schools to keep doing what they have always been doing, even when the result is that students keep performing at unacceptably low levels.

Your vision is impaired by communities that expect too little of schools, and by a culture that values activity and glitz more than the development and demonstration of knowledge and skills. It seems that no matter how hard you try to keep focused on what is really important for the education of young adolescents, there are forces at work in your schools, your school systems, and in your cities that impair your vision. No wonder you lose your balance, pulled in this direction and that, blinded by tedious daily responsibilities and demands that too often have little to do with teaching and learning.

We are here at The Reform Connection, then, to restore our vision and regain our balance. Here you will find colleagues who share your values, and who are also struggling to keep focused on reforming their schools to increase student achievement. You will find teachers, administrators, central office staff, representatives of community organizations, and researchers who are seeking answers to confounding education dilemmas. Fortunately, some of these people have begun to yield positive results because they have dared to experiment and risked stepping into the unknown. They are here to share their experiences and what they have learned. They are not here to sell you anything, or to gloss over the frustrations and disappointments of their efforts, because each year at The Reform Connection we try to create a culture of honesty, integrity, and mutual support.

Tell them there are educators here who are taking the initiative to find staff development experiences that will increase their knowledge of the content they teach.

If your school system or school or project has made changes that have caused students to perform at higher levels, we want to know about it. If, on the other hand, your reforms have fallen short of your hopes, this is the place you can acknowledge it, and share what you have learned from it, because these lessons of disappointment and even failure can be just as instructive as the descriptions of success.

For each of the past six years, The Reform Connection has slowly grown, both in size and in substance. Yet, by the standards of many other conferences, our numbers are small. We have not tried to promote the conference to attract many more school systems, because our primary interest is in reaching out to urban educators who are very serious about middle school reform. Of course, there are many others who could be here but are not attending. I hope each of you will consider yourself a representative of the educators who are not here. Because they are not here, you have an opportunity and obligation to share with them what you learn, and enlist them in your efforts to put it to use.

You represent some people who are simply too uncertain or afraid to take the risks that reform requires. Go home and tell them about the educators you met here who are moving their schools and school systems forward only because they have abandoned practices that keep yielding poor results. Go home and tell them that these educators are not only alive and well, but their students are beginning to respond positively.

You represent other educators, many other educators, who want to improve but keep waiting for someone else to create the context and support for their improvement. Go home and tell them that teachers and administrators here are not waiting for a directive from the superintendent, or permission from the principal or for the site-based leadership team to organize a new staff development program. Tell them there are educators here who are organizing their own study groups, and taking the initiative to find staff development experiences that will increase their knowledge of the content they teach, and enhance their skills to engage students in learning that content.

You also represent educators who are weary, defeated, and even argumentative. Go home and tell them that you met some of their alumni here. Tell them that you talked with educators who have found new energy and enthusiasm for their work not by doing less but by doing more. And finally, you are here representing teachers and administrators who share your values and commitments, but who believe that they are almost alone in their efforts to reform their schools and classrooms. I hope you will go home and tell them that you found hundreds of their peers who are building a national movement for results-oriented middle school reform.

You are here, then, not only as representatives but as leaders. So many people in your school systems and communities are looking for the leadership you can provide. Students are looking for leaders among their teachers. They find that leadership when teachers focus their instruction so students will be able to learn and apply the knowledge and skills set forth in the school system's content standards.

It should not surprise us that students' reactions to formal learning are not much different than if we, as adults, also had to experience their boring routine. This is why students are so hungry for teachers who lead.

In spite of what many people think, students want their teachers to challenge and engage them, but to do so in ways that recognize and respect the students' native intelligence and curiosity. Tapping into students' intelligence is hard work that requires careful preparation, high energy, and creativity. Students are smart enough to know when their teachers are not prepared, or when they don't feel comfortable with the subject matter they teach, or when teachers don't devote the effort to making content meaningful for students.

Yes, too many students are passive, unmotivated, uncooperative and even angry. It should not surprise us that their reactions to formal learning are not much different than if we, as adults, also had to experience their boring routine. This is why students are so hungry for teachers who lead, not teachers who "order" or "direct" or "control," but teachers who lead.

Teachers who lead know they have to change what they teach and how they teach it, and that their schools have to change to make it possible for them to do so. They don't just know these things, they act to make them happen. Teachers who lead do not wait for families, or communities, or society as a whole to change so students become open receptacles for instruction, but they act in concert with their peers to reform their teaching, reform their classrooms, and reform their schools to draw students into high content learning almost before the students realize it.

Teachers may not acknowledge it, but they are looking for leaders too

Of course, teachers are also looking for leaders. On some level, all teachers, like those of us in other professions, would like to be left alone. Yet, they know that their school is a community, and a community without leadership lacks direction and order. This does describe too many schools where there is someone or some entity that is "in charge" but who fails to lead.

Teachers want principals or building leadership teams who have a vision for their schools, and mobilize faculties to achieve it. They want schools to provide the support and security teachers and their students need, but they also know this requires principals and site-based management teams who act to reform schools for these purposes. Teachers know that building-level leaders have to walk the tightrope that sways between teachers on one side who want to close their classroom doors and be left alone and teachers on the other side who are eager for reform, but they want principals who keep moving forward rather than stand still, teetering from side to side.

Teachers know building-level leaders have to walk the tightrope that sways between teachers on one side who want to close their classroom doors and be left alone and teachers on the other side who are eager for reform.

Teachers want principals who lead them in confronting difficult issues of instructional ineffectiveness, and who help them get the help they need to improve. Teachers are looking for leaders among their principals because they know that in spite of the movement for site-based management, reforms in school governance rarely result in improvements in student learning.

Principals who get and keep good teachers for their schools, principals who rid their schools of persistently ineffective teachers and programs, principals who tirelessly seek to build collaboration and consensus among the faculty, principals who consistently engage their faculties in analysis and discussions about student learning, and principals who demand and support improvements in teachers' pedagogy - these are the leaders teachers are seeking.

Perhaps it will surprise you that even principals are looking for leaders. Principals, you know, can be an ornery bunch. They are inclined to take the position that if the school system just gives them the resources and leaves them alone, they will get the job done. But what is the job? It is not just opening the schoolhouse doors, or keeping the halls and bathrooms clean, or making sure the school is safe and students are orderly, or preparing master schedules, or soothing disgruntled teachers and parents.

These are the fundamentals of the job, and if principals ignore them, they do not last long, but the responsibilities of principals leading middle school reform are much more demanding. So let us put aside this myth that principals are all-knowing, stand-alone administrators with all the answers if only their faculties will listen to them.

Reforming middle schools need effective principals, but effective principals need strong leadership and support from the central office staff. Principals are looking for leaders not only among teachers and other principals, but in the central office. They want leaders there who are focused on mobilizing and efficiently provide school system resources to the school. They want leaders who make the effort to coordinate and streamline central office programs and projects so schools are able to use them to advance the reform process, rather than having to struggle to make them fit the schools' needs. Principals wish for school boards and superintendents who have a vision for middle school education and what it should accomplish, and who understand why and how middle schools must reform if students are going to achieve at higher levels.

I regret that this leadership is in such a short supply in so many urban school systems, with the notable exception of a few such leaders whose school systems you represent. But even if your school board or superintendent is not engaged in middle school reform to the extent you would like, that does not relieve other central office staff of the responsibility or deny them the opportunity to provide the leadership so many middle school principals are seeking. Whether you are a middle school coordinator, or work in the office of curriculum and instruction, or are responsible for staff development, or externally funded projects, or assessment, you can provide the leadership middle school principals need.

Reforming middle schools need effective principals,
but effective principals need strong leadership and support from the central office staff.

You can make sure principals know that you are serious about their schools using standards, curricula, staff development, special programs, and assessment to increase student achievement. One way to communicate how serious you are is to not waste the principals' time. If you are going to send a memo, make it a memo worth reading. If you are going to ask for information, make sure it is information that relates more to student achievement than school system operations. Above all, demonstrate your leadership by providing quality support to the principals, support that challenges and assists them to lead the reform of their schools, and support that means value added to student achievement.

Yes, we are all looking for leaders, but urban middle school reform will remain little more than a dream unless those of you here today provide leadership. Wherever you are, whatever role you play in your school system, begin now to provide the leadership others are seeking. If you are a teacher, provide the leadership your students want and need by believing in them and by reforming your professional practice so they will believe in you. If you are a principal or a member of a site-based governance team, demonstrate the leadership your teachers want and need by changing the school to put better teaching and better learning first.

If you are a central office staff person, fill the leadership vacuum by not merely servicing schools, but insisting that principals make effective use of the services to foster reform and student achievement. You may be looking for leaders, it is only natural for you to do so, but your students and colleagues back home are looking to you for leadership. I urge you to use this conference as the springboard for providing that leadership that so many people need.

We know you face tremendous obstacles, and the more serious you are about reform, the greater the obstacles. When you establish challenging content and performance standards, you confront the problem of students whose literacy and computational skills are so low teachers despair of using the standards. When you try to implement reforms that increase time for student learning, or restructure the school to increase teachers' contacts with students, you risk the ire of the teachers' union. Any time you raise the possibility of changing adult rules, practices, or behavior to benefit student learning, you threaten the power of adults who place their interests above those of the children.

Any time you raise the possibility of changing
adult rules, practices, or behavior to benefit student learning, you threaten the power of adults who place their interests above those of the children.

We have no easy answers to these and other difficult issues that emerge when you seriously pursue middle school reform. However, we are convinced of two things: (a) students are not well served when you refuse to acknowledge or address the dilemmas of reform because they are too uncomfortable and hard, and (b) you have the good will and experience to find answers to such problems. If you do not, no one does.

As we have said so often before, middle school reform is not for the faint-hearted. It is very, very hard to, on the one hand, have confidence in your own abilities, but on the other hand to stare into the mirror, take a cold look at your shortcomings, and then act to do something about them. Many of your schools are improving, but they are reforming too slowly for the students who are there just a few years before they move on to high school. Many of your schools are somewhere on the continuum of reform, but the academic performance of too many students continues to languish.

To your credit, you keep pushing ahead, searching for better ways to educate your students, perhaps edging ever closer to the kind of deep, fundamental reforms that are necessary if your schools and your students are to survive. You can take heart in the progress you have made because many of you are now focused on academic achievement. Now, for the first time, you are struggling with how to truly engage all students in learning, and how to understand more about how much they are really learning.

Learning. Learning that empowers and transforms. That is The Reform Connection's vision for you and your students. It is what this conference is all about. We hope you will use this day to restore your vision and regain your balance, and go forth to lead the reform of your schools.

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