District Administration - August 2009 - (Page 24)

Tell It to the Mayor school governance bill will be passed, which may or may not include specific modifications, including more consultation for parents and more review for the Panel for Education Policy, which is a 13-member body designated as the Board of Education, according to Dawn Walker, a spokeswoman in the mayor’s office. Since taking over in 2002, Klein—a former antitrust head at the U.S. Justice Department—has instituted a core curriculum in reading and math, closed numerous underperforming schools, and opened more than 400 new, smaller ones—including 100 charter schools. Bloomberg could a year,” notes Klein, whose office reports that while the graduation rate in 2005 (the last class to begin high school before mayoral control was instituted) stood at 46.5 percent, it had increased to 52.2 percent by 2007. And in June, figures showed that the graduation rate rose for the seventh straight year to nearly 61 percent in 2008, the highest since at least 1986, according to Bloomberg’s office. Joseph Viteritti, a public policy professor at Hunter College in New York, served as executive director of the Commission on School Governance, created by the city’s public advocate to examine the while the Commission on School Governance recommended that mayoral control continue, Viteritti says there is considerable room for improvement, especially when it comes to transparency and responsiveness to parents and other members of the community. “We heard it continuously, people saying, ‘This is good, but people need to ask questions and hear answers from the mayor in a public forum,’” says Viteritti. “You have to hear from the constituencies in the schools, and I think that part has been lost. The school system is not a business—it’s a form of government.” “They liked the fact that someone was accountable and could exercise leadership in a school system that was difficult to change.” not be reached for comment but has regularly referred to the period before mayoral control as a “disaster,” adding that none of the major initiatives in the past seven years could have succeeded under the previous system of school governance. Klein also changed “school administration as usual,” giving greater autonomy to school principals in return for being accountable for student achievement. And those principals are emerging from unlikely places, including the private and nonprofit sectors, and even directly from the classroom, says Chief Schools Officer Eric Nadelstern. “Historically, the assumption was that you had to be a teacher for 10 years and an assistant principal for another 10,” he says. “Now we’re accepting principals from the ranks of the most effective teachers.” Klein insists that rising test scores and high school graduation rates on his watch speak for themselves. For instance, the reading scores announced in May show 69 percent of fourth-graders and 57 percent of eighth-graders meeting the state standard, up from nearly 47 percent and 30 percent, respectively, in 2002. “Our graduation rates have been up more than two points 24 August 2009 A Decade of Improvement In May’s Democratic mayoral primary in Harrisburg, Pa., meanwhile, incumbent Stephen Reed, —Joseph Viteritti, public policy professor, Hunter College who had established control over the Harrisburg School District in 2000, lost to City Council Presiimpact of mayoral control. “Most people felt that mayoral control was an improve- dent Linda Thompson, who has vowed to ment,” Viteritti says. “They liked the fact lobby the state legislature to reinstitute an that someone was accountable and could elected school board. Whether or not Thompson succeeds exercise leadership in a school system that in November’s election or in her lobbying was difficult to change.” attempts, Superintendent of Schools Gerald Kohn maintains that mayoral control The Critics Respond Over the past year, as Klein and his surro- has enabled him to remake the 9,000-stugates made the rounds of public forums on dent school system for the better. When the reauthorization of mayoral control, they mayoral control began under Reed, the got an earful from critics. Leonie Haimson, class of 2001 (which numbered about 750 executive director of Class Size Matters, in freshman year) had 204 students incarsays that her advocacy group is concerned cerated and only 176 graduating, he says. with much more than its namesake. She Only 58 were accepted at colleges, and 25 warns, “There are a lot of damaging poli- were accepted to four-year institutions. Harrisburg ranked dead last—and by cies coming down the pike: overcrowding, creating test-prep factories, putting charter a considerable distance, Kohn adds—out schools in communities that don’t want of Pennsylvania’s 501 school districts. The them and can’t control them, and using student population also had shrunk from data in a sleight-of-hand way to close down 10,000 in 1990 to 7,000 in 2000 and was projected to decline up to 2010, as families schools instead of improving them.” Prominent educational historian and continued to flee the city. Instead, enrollNew York University professor Diane Rav- ment has increased steadily, according to itch, meanwhile, has challenged the dis- school officials. “We did a 350-page study trict’s reliance on state test scores, instead of business practices, and the mayor tasked of on the National Assessment of Educa- us with correcting everything all at once,” tional Progress (NAEP) results, which do Kohn says. When Reed found that the district not show the same positive outcome. And District Administration

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of District Administration - August 2009

District Administration - August 2009
Contents
From the Editor
Letters
News Update
Standards & Assessment
Stimulus Monitor
Admin Profile
District Profile
Tell It to the Mayor
Fighting Fraud in Schools
Recovery High Schools
Keeping the Community in the Know
How Well Does This Web Site Work?
Problem Solution
Tech Disruptions
New Products
Product Focus
Professional Opinion

District Administration - August 2009

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