Improving Public Schools

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Transformers: Creative Solutions Improving Public Schools (Room C202)
This workshop will highlight creative and effective methods of initiating and executing public school reform in communities of color and how they can be replicated.

Susan Sandler, William Romero, Valentina Velez-Rocha, Lisa Gray-Garcia, Justice Matters
Steve Phillips, PowerPAC.org

Notes:
Workshop Recap:

Workshop aims to explore what issues challenge the improvement of public schools and presents creative ways to overcome them. Participants presented with scenario of a largely student of color school district where the superintendent has two choices structuring English Language Arts in the following year. One promotes western values whereas the other values the cultures of the students of color in the school districts.

• Plan 1: Use district monies for an external consultant, recommend and adopt state-approved textbook (tool) which: mirrors standardized tests, is primarily multiple choice with periodic assessments, with book excerpts from primarily white authors in excerpts of the novels. The expected outcome is an increase in text scores are in 1 year.

• Plan 2: Use district monies for parent liaison and paid time for teacher feedback, get parent and teacher input on how the children learn English which would yield: students assigned novels relating to their lives, take longer to increase test scores, but students are engaged!

What would the Superintendent decide? Plan (1) would maintain a western educational paradigm with a focus on white scholars, would offer a public relations package in the consultant product, and provide a text in line with the testing metrics to ensure the increase in text scores. This plan lacks educational benefits for students of color. Plan (2) would engage a parent liaison and a teacher for input on how the children learn, provide texts that are relevant to the students’ cultures and would produce engaged learning in the student body over a longer period of time and yet may not necessarily affect testing levels immediately. This plan is less attractive to a high-stake testing driven district.

Participants acknowledged power and import of Plan (2) for students of color, and recognized efforts toward this end in rare occasions while exposing potential external concerns governing the decision such as on-going resources, whether or not the deliberation is public knowledge, the strength of the teacher’s union, parent/teacher buy in, etc.

The Justice Matters approach exposes racist and classist ideologies informing public school districts. Accountability – currently applies to institutions and drives testing as opposed to applying to parents, teachers, students, and entire communities to drive learning; Decision Makers - bringing parents, elders, etc. as experts on student learning into the classroom is critical. Culture - schools need a departure from western knowledge promoting competitiveness in testing as opposed to student interdependence. Needed more is a culture that caters to parents, students and fosters relationships that support student of color learning. Shifts in these principles can lead to racially just school districts that value communities.

Interactive group activity of policy review of four states revealed strategies to creating effective policy for transformation to racially just public schools. Community input and leadership is crucial to the process and dialogue is necessary in the language of the community in a way that is more holistic. Community principles must be aligned with policies. The importance of following legislation through to the end stressed as policy changes through each level of the legislative process. Finally, the need for complete community buy-in for educational policy stressed to move, mobilize and enact transformation.

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