Some Georgia public schools with persistently low graduation rates and poor test performance are sharing $51 million in federal grant money to adopt improvement strategies.
Included are eight schools in metro Atlanta -- three in the Atlanta Public School system, three in DeKalb County and one each in Henry and Douglas counties -- who are receiving federal School Improvement Grants (SIG) worth a total of $9.2 million.
The money comes with strings. A district that accepts an SIC might have to replace its principal or fire half the school’s teachers, moves some district administrators said remains too difficult to carry out quickly. Converting to a charter school or hiring a management company to oversee the school’s operations are other options tied to the money.
The Georgia Education Department has embraced the grants. But mandates to replace teachers and principals, critics say, unfairly and simplistically blames educators for complicated learning challenges that are often beyond their ability to solve.
“School Improvement Grants are a great idea gone seriously awry,” wrote Craig Waddell, an eighth-grade math teacher in Missouri and an adjunct professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis who studies education policy. “The [U.S.] Department of Education needs to close the book on the current incarnation and then turnaround, restart, and transform their approach.”
It’s too soon to measure whether the changes will help on student performance on state tests. In metro Atlanta, the money is mainly being used to help teachers become better instructors.
Georgia has historically struggled with improving the quality of its teachers. A 2011 Atlanta Journal-Constitution investigation into teacher quality found the state had cut funding for professional development by more than a third. And once that money made it to local districts, another 30 percent had been diverted to other school needs.
At a time when school budgets have been ravaged by a recession, professional development is viewed as a luxury.
Schools in Georgia are eligible to apply for an SIG grant if they have a graduation rate lower than 60 percent and have ranked in the lowest 5 percent of schools on state tests in English, language arts and math for the past three years, said Sylvia Hooker, the Georgia Department of Education’s director of school improvement.
That those schools are getting this help when education funding is under pressure is a plus for Georgia.
“We really feel there are some positive things happening with the SIG program,” Hooker said.
Zachary Kirk is an example.
Kirk, an 11th-grade English teacher at Atlanta’s Douglass High, is an instructional coach. He doesn’t just tell teachers how to do their jobs better, he shows them.
Kirk coaches teachers on becoming more effective communicators and gives them a variety of strategies to reach struggling students. His classroom is a model for the type of efficiency that Douglass, a school that struggles academically, needs.
Kirk was hired through an SIG grant. He said teachers at Douglass, like those he has worked with elsewhere, are eager for tips that can help them be more effective.
“Teachers want to be better, and when you give them the tools to be better, they embrace that,” he said.
When Georgia received its waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind Act it committed to seeking other methods to help struggling schools, including assistance from the SIG program.
Most of the schools in Georgia that have received SIG funds agreed to adopt the what’s called the transformation model. It means a school agrees to replace its principal, then spends grant money to reform the curriculum, offer professional development and extended learning time.
SIG backers argue that teachers and the principal at consistently struggling schools need to be held accountable for the poor performance of their students.
But Gail Connelly, executive director of the National Association of Elementary School Principals, said the requirement that principals be replaced is “blatantly unfair.”
“Automatic replacement of the principal won’t automatically improve performance,” Connelly said.
At Douglass, which is receiving a $788,579 grant, the current principal, Thomas Glanton, is the school’s third principal in four years.
“We needed to create a climate that would lead to student achievement,” Glanton said.
Douglass has been using grant money since fall 2011, and Glanton said things are beginning to turn around.
But uears of testing data has to be collected before Douglass or other schools know whether the reforms are developing lasting change.
There is reason, so far, to be optimistic. Preliminary data shows that end-of-course test scores, one of the measurements state and federal officials are using to determine progress at schools that are receiving SIG funds, are on the rise at Douglass. Glanton said scores have improved in English, math and science.
LaSchunn Gonsalves, a parent who will soon have her second child graduate from Douglass, said she knows the school has struggled. But she said she sees improvement.
“There have been gains,” she said. “There has been an increase in test scores. That says to me some things are working. It might not be working as fast as people want, but it is working.”
Waddell said progress at schools receiving SIG funds can’t always be tied to the program, which he argues is too restrictive.
Arne Duncan, secretary of the U.S. Department of Education, has said bold solutions are needed to tackle the difficult challenges some schools face.
“Educators and schools leaders cannot give up on making far-reaching improvements in student learning in our lowest-performing schools,” he wrote in a response to a study showing gains at schools receiving SIG funds. “Children only get one shot at a good education.”
School Improvement Grants in metro Atlanta
Crim High School $1.16 million
Douglass High School $788,579
Henry County High School $1.4 million
Clarkston High School $876,027
McNair High School $868,746
Therrell School of Law, Government and Public Policy $748,810
Towers High School $1.38 million
Lithia Springs Comprehensive $1.99 million
Three reform models
To get SIG money, the school must agree to adopt one of three reform models. They are:
A “turnaround” school, where the principal and no less than half the school staff is replaced. A new governance structure is put in place, more professional development is offered and learning time is extended.
A “restart” school, which is converted to either a charter school or operated under an education management organization.
A “transformation” school, where, again, the principal is replaced, the curriculum is reformed, more professional development is offered and learning time is extended.
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