11/10/8 - Argument for Breaking Up DISD into Smaller Independent School Districts

Council Districts = School Districts

Concept: a model for expanding choice and opportunity in the Dallas public school system by imposing and supporting a structure based on the principle of local sovereignty.

 ?A Nation or civilization that continues to produce soft minded men purchases it?s own spiritual death on the installment plan?.  Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

 Speaking of Choice

Too often, the discussion of school choice begins and ends with the fight over vouchers and the insistence that ? like in the present system ?  the ability of families to choose their school will leave many poor children behind. In actuality, the scope of ?choice? methodology doesn?t stop there.

 The idea that one should be able to excel based on one?s performance ? as rated against rational and measurable standards ? is rooted in the American ethos. Amazingly, we have settled for and even tacitly embraced this city?s failed educational system; this is a path that we can no longer afford to take.

It?s time for change.

Real Change = Real Choice

The following is a straight-forward approach that I submit will yield positive results, will reverse truancy trends and will impose meaningful mandates and standards on students, teachers, administrators and elected officials.

The major focus of this re-engineering initiative is the implementation of small, manageable units of schools that can be directed, changed, and otherwise form-fitted to the needs of the population being served. What I propose is the re-engineering of the existing Dallas school district into a new school system of 14 separate districts in line with the present city council district boundaries.

The local Councilmen would be the ?elected? chairmen of the school board; other members would be the parents, businessmen and alumni who live and work in that district. This board would have both responsibility and authority to hire and fire its superintendent, principals, teachers, counselors and support staff, to guarantee full accountability within the ranks.

The core academic and behavioral standards of the present system would remain throughout as a common foundation to start with; eventually the will of the district taxpayers will guide and optimize the focus, curriculum, discipline and vision for the schools in each unique community.

Standards and accountability.

I submit that the standards will remain, but there is a caveat to that assertion: the rules of the school, its grading policies, its truancy, fighting, unexcused absences, and its general discipline, will ultimately be measured, enforced and executed at the discretion of the local district ? accountable to the key stakeholders there in the district. Under a system of focused accountability and real-time feedback from the stakeholders, there will be strong incentives to optimize structure, function, staffing and methodology to serve the supported population.

The worst districts will be compelled by the stakeholders to either innovate or to follow the lead of the recognized best-practices in the Metroplex. The district and school administrators will be judged on their ability to serve the immediate community ? becoming, in effect, as upwardly-mobile (or, conversely, as disposable) as our teachers are under the present. Administrators that succeed will be sought out proportional to their demonstrated success. It is my contention that no small district will want, nor long stand for, the distinction of being the worst district ? and will take logical action accordingly to replace key leaders in their district when their elected officials fail to measure up.

Benchmarking the best.

One does not need to imagine the innovations, creative adjustments and resultant great students who will be emerge from an environment that operates on the principle of fierce competition for donor dollars, state funding, and self-interested parental involvement;  Models like the one I propose already work in neighborhoods like Highland Park. These small districts do not have to contend with poor leaders, absentee parents, and mandates set by board members that are totally out of touch with the needs of the immediate community. They succeed because of the core principles of manageable size, total accountability, close visibility and competition.

Part of this new initiative will be the need to reach out to our friends who have successfully implemented community-based public schools. Small districts will have to look at, examine and implement the best practices established in the great districts surrounding Dallas. Competition and the desire for achievement are powerful motivators ? this already works to our advantage in football. It will work as well (or better) in the larger areas of school performance.  

Consider the advantages that highly-desired sports programs have over general school concepts now: in a council model, each competitive district would be able to demand a direct connection to the parents and families of their students (the way coaches have with their players). In the district model, each school must live under the very real possibility that a student could be eliminated from the team as a direct result of misbehavior ? dismissed to an alternative program paid for by the parents of the recalcitrant student. No longer would there be room for fighting, dating, skipping school, refusal to complete home work, etc. in a small unit of schools competing with others districts, visible and accountable to the taxpayers of that district. In a competitive confederacy of small and swiftly-evolving community schools, both parents and students have a vested interest in curtailing their own counterproductive behavior, because misbehavior results directly in being ?thrown out of the team.?

Whose role is it anyway?

None of these small schools in the mini district will want to be a smaller version of what we know today as the Dallas ISD. The new model districts will have both the right and the authority to make it clear to the public that the school, the teachers and the state are not parents. The school is an agency that is created, funded and operated with a defined, specific purpose. As such, it is not the agency?s duty or responsibility to raise society?s children.

This is one major weight that must be taken off our schools. We can no longer expect the government (the school, in this case) to raise our children. Small, competitive, and accountable city schools, run by professional educators, will do an excellent job of teaching children. We can teach philosophy and ethics and law and sociology; we cannot ? should not ? attempt to impart, imprint or correct a child?s fundamental values. A focused school will operate strictly within its chartered scope: a football coach might impart great wisdom and teach lasting life-lessons, for example, but he doesn?t raise your child for you. Neither should the principal, the English teacher, or the plumber ? that?s the parents? exclusive role, and one that must not be usurped.

Foundational of Accountability

American families must take ownership in their children?s education and be given the equal opportunity to thoughtfully pick and support teachers, schools and curricula that will best serve the needs of that particular family. This position hinges on the belief that no one structure, pace or methodology of instruction is equally optimal for all children, regardless of race, language, culture, environment, ability or ambition. Humans are inherently complex, and we have an obligation to build a structure that can flex, maneuver and evolve to accommodate our current and future complex students.

Our current system gives every child the legal right to a free education; while admirable in the abstract, no one has ultimate responsibility in the current system for the success or failure of the institutions tasked to meet those ends. Likewise, we do not hold the parents responsible for establishing and maintaining the foundation circumstances that make it possible to pursue an education (e.g., ensuring that the children come to school each day prepared to learn. Currently, the ethic of equality trumps the desire for quality; the struggle for excellence and reward for achievement is supplanted by the necessity for everyone to pass through the system together as a mass of mediocre minimalists.

Under a competitive, accountable council system, the days of graduating students just for showing up will come to an end. Similarly, the competitive district will have no tolerance for those archaic business processes that promote children by default as a path of least resistance (i.e., the soft bigotry of low expectations). As a logical extension, the stakeholders in such a district will have no tolerance for those who profit from such non-confrontational systems.

Countering the Detractors

Proponents of the status quo will resist any plan that stresses real accountability; while no rational person can defend an argument that they shouldn?t be judged fairly on their actions, those players in the current system that appreciate how much they stand to lose in a fair open system will likely attempt to sow fear, uncertainty and doubt. Scared administrators and parents alike will levy vague (but frightening) allegations based on race and socio-economic standing. This is the natural reaction of a frightened person. Setting aside the inevitable unsubstantial histrionics, our only real objections to contend with are those that deal with making a hard choice: do we take deliberate and traumatic action to pursue success, or do we remain on this inexorable path to failure and irrelevance?

The largest plausible problem most likely voiced by the opposition is that any mechanism that offers choice to students would cause a mass exodus of those who can afford better schools. As the wealthy migrate away from lower-performing schools to higher-performing ones, the abandoned schools fall further behind while the sought-out schools rise in prominence. Effectively, the district becomes polarized: high-performance (at significant cost) and low-performance (for those that can?t afford to escape). A model of this polarization can be seen in the flight of well-off families out of the public school system to private and religious institutions.

Taking the idea a step further, the self-segregation line of argument suggests that it?s better to ?trap? the high performing students in ragged, inner city schools so as to allow the keepers of the trust to claim some higher average rating ? at the ?good students?? expense. This kind of thinking smacks of Soviet-style conscription, and strikes fear into the hearts of families living in a failing school district.

The reality is that in DISD, the few good secondary schools must willingly accept students from poorer performing schools ? they have no ability to deny access to a devout and dedicated miscreant. This forced-assimilation principle poisons all schools.

Under the proposed new system, the autonomous districts would accept students based on its own criteria, in keeping with the mission of the district.  The phenomenon of transferring problem students to unsuspecting system schools and innocent student bodies simply ceases to be an option. In a district that sets and maintains clear and unambiguous standards for both entry and continued participation, problem students revert to being the problem of their parents or of the legal system, not of the school. At its heart, the competitive district has and retains the ability to oversee, adjust and hold stakeholders accountable, exactly as those stakeholders hold the schools and staff accountable. It?s a relationship cemented in balanced reciprocity. 

Structure and Function.

This model would involve small schools, (say, of 500-1000 students, depending on the grade levels) that are able to adjust and service particular needs of students on very short notice.  These locally-run districts would decide the size of their schools, and would retain the ability to expand, contract or reconfigure based on stakeholder requirements.

Financial competitiveness is a critical characteristic of this model; schools with a balanced and pragmatic view of resource allocation would require the ability to retain, reject or consolidate sports programs and other extra-curricular activities based on community input, fund-raising and available facilities. If a community wants a particular program ? as demonstrated by the stakeholders? involvement and action ? then the school can pursue it, commensurate and proportional to the stakeholders? level of commitment.

This speaks to the core philosophy of the competitive district model: resources go to those willing to creatively fight for them. If a district chooses to settle for the minimum in a given area, it will be because that minimum standard is the choice made by that community. The school will reflect the desires and needs of the people it serves.

In a competitive district, the school board will demand that children, the parents and the school be constantly vigilant for adherence to norms and community rules. Where this active identification and communication of shared standards and values reveals an incompatibility, a student has the inalienable right to move (or be moved!) based on the student?s compatibility with school, the specified curriculum, with discipline and/or the family?s deliberate choices. The small size, renewed sense of ownership and community pride engendered by this plan would effectively mitigate tardiness, excessive absences and truancy as relevant issues. 

Goals and Objectives

More than anything else, this proposal is about the freedom and opportunity to win or lose.

First and foremost, the era of the megalithic school district has run its course. The logical and practical way out of our current crisis is to re-engineer our educational system towards small, independent school districts, featuring their own boards and leadership staff, that are, in turn, answerable to the local community. This concept reflects the successful business principle of centralized planning with decentralized execution.

State standards notwithstanding, each small district will set many of its own standards with the knowledge that the ultimate goal is for the children to compete nationally for post-secondary slots or to compete locally for careers in trades or vocations of varying types. To be clear: a particular district?s goal my not be college readiness for all, but full employment for its students in the local community. No one knows the needs of the community better than the key stakeholders who live there.  

The schools in this system will not simply be placed in rank order based on high SAT scores, but judged pragmatically by counting the number of students who launched successful small businesses after graduation. They?ll be judged by the number of students who proceed to work in trades capable of lifting themselves and their families from the precipice of poverty to sustainable growth. These schools will be considered an investment, not just a necessary public utility. Properly resourced and motivated competitive districts that resonate to the community zeitgeist will allow every child the opportunity to become both useful and necessary to the larger society. 

This is the quintessential state ? the level playing field ? that we claim we strive for in modern America. Much of this new model is based squarely on our collective values: the inherent advantage of the free market capitalist ethic, and the very human desire to reward, and be rewarded for effort, excellence and (most importantly) for results. Our beliefs and our practices are currently in opposition, and dysfunction is the inevitable product.

I submit that this is the first step towards making the Dallas public school system the preferred choice for our brother and sisters that make Texas an industrial and economic powerhouse. Just because we?ve always run our schools this way, doesn?t mean that we have to keep wasting time, money and effort on an obsolete and counterproductive business model.

We have the ability, the will and the community spirit to change this.

John M. Yourse
MYOURSE@MSN.COM
Dallas, TX 75214