Community Meeting Notes: Public education
As part of its strategic planning process WPF held twelve facilitated
meetings, involving nearly 150 civic leaders, practitioners, public
officials, and subject-matter experts in areas related to our
grantmaking.
The following are notes taken at a meeting held on October 14, 2011 to discuss WPF's future grantmaking in public education.
Individuals participated with the understanding that
they were speaking without attribution, so their names are intentionally
omitted from these notes.
Over the last
decade, the Foundation has made substantial investments in the School District
of Philadelphia, particularly in the areas of teacher quality and efforts to
pilot programs for the District to bring to scale. We supported advocacy efforts to hold the
District accountable. The District faces
leadership and governance challenges. There are budgetary constraints at the
local, state, and federal levels. At the
same time, the charter movement has grown considerably.
The Foundation has
two other significant investments: improving the adequacy and equity of state
funding for public education and Project U Turn - the dropout prevention and
re-engagement program. Both are directly linked to major systemic problems
facing the District: a structural deficit driven in part by state underfunding
and a high student dropout rate.
We invited
representatives of nonprofits, advocacy organizations, and education providers
to discuss the following questions:
What role should we
play in pushing or developing innovative approaches to education, both in terms
of models and governance? Are there “breakthrough” ideas in education here that
we could help scale or are there other breakthrough ideas in other places that
we could help bring to the city that could accelerate the improvement of
schools? What can we reasonably do given the high poverty rate in the city, and
the lack of strong leadership guiding or managing the system? Does an
inside/outside strategy still make sense (i.e., investing in both District
projects and external advocacy)? If so, how could we strengthen our approach? Given
all the ideas we've discussed, how do the Foundation's two other major
education investment areas (e.g., Statewide School Funding Reform and Project U
Turn) align with them? Are there adjustments we should make?
A focus on results, using value-added assessment in teacher
evaluation, will accelerate school quality.
Master teachers need to be included in school innovation.
The move from calculating credits by “seat time” to student’s
skill-based proficiency on a set of skills will require huge changes in how
education is organized and delivered.
Money needs to be invested in program and people who produce
results.
Need a mechanism to spread successful school models and
practices across silos/providers.
Decentralize the district; move toward school-based
budgeting.
Consider a market-based approach to public education that
addresses standards, equality, and access to information.
A good management team at the school level is the real driver
of positive change.
Invest in the many good ideas/models that are out there
rather than go for the next new idea.
Implementation is the real issue/stumbling block to school
improvement.
Need to instill a “learning culture” in the District.
Technology could be a powerful tool in supporting more
personalized education at an affordable cost.
State and federal policy can and do provide significant
leverage for change efforts to reach scale.
Establish a strong public sector capacity to create standards
for growing successful schools and turning over low-performing schools.
Continue the focus on outcomes for children.
Take a leadership
role. Rally business, community, education leaders around a strong vision for
the Philadelphia public education system.
Hold the civic leaders accountable to advance an action plan
that addresses funding, oversight, and policy issues.
Develop an understanding of the portfolio school concept
among District stakeholders. This approach focuses attention on each school as
the unit of change, not the system per se.
This approach would invest only in school/providers that have proven to
be effective. This model supports
investments in innovation.
Build the District’s capacity to become a learning
organization able to identify steps to protect and foster practices, teachers,
principals who demonstrate success; integrate the lessons learned from charter,
public, and private schools; and support the value and influence of effective
leaders/managers who are able to operate schools that are effective.
Address the
professional development of new and experienced teachers - recognizing the
multiple skills that effective teachers need to work with youth today. This
will require a re-tooling/rethinking of professional development programs.
Address the skill and readiness gap facing teachers coming
into the system w/BA degrees from accredited institutions.
Explore new teacher
pipelines that are lead by organizations outside of academia.
Create a vehicle (Boot
Camp) to prepare and support the development of school leadership skills.
Propose public policies that address a variety
of key factors that support or hinder an effective education system.