The Rochester school board is grappling with a new state education law involving receivership for failing and persistently failing schools. According to the Regents’ EngageNY website, the intent of receivership is to address the barriers that have prevented some school leaders from turning around failing schools.
The barriers include: governance, school leadership, teachers, union contracts, and so on. Certainly the case could be made that barriers do indeed exist in a large bureaucracy like the Rochester school district.
But you have to ask, did lawmakers create a law that essentially undermines the democratic process and silences the same parent voices they claim they want to hear?
A quick recap of school receivership: In a failing school, the superintendent, as the receiver, is given two years to improve student achievement. In a persistently failing school, the superintendent is given one year.
Rochester schools Superintendent Bolgen Vargas, as the receiver, has the power to review and make changes to the school budget, create or change school programs and curriculum, require all school staff to reapply for their jobs, and even convert the school to a charter school or a community school.
But most unusual is the ability to supersede a decision by the school board — what the law calls “supersession.”
Vargas says that he will not make staff reapply for their positions or make any dramatic changes to staffing.
But a key component of any receiver’s state-approved school intervention plan is parent and community engagement. And as school board member Mary Adams pointed out at yesterday’s monthly business meeting, engagement must be more than notification of a public hearing. Any intervention plan must go beyond merely notifying parents and the community that the school is in receivership. According to the law, stakeholder input must be part of the intervention plan.
But if democratically elected voices for parents and the community have been undermined and dis-empowered, as Adams put it, is there a risk that community engagement is minimized and even overridden? Despite the good intentions of lawmakers in Albany, it now becomes even more important for board members to speak out and raise questions, because the community may not know that its input isn’t optional. It’s required.
This article appears in Jul 29 – Aug 4, 2015.
It is all ridiculous in many ways and this new power won’t change a thing. Two main points that prove this.
First, the superintendent has always had the power to create new models. The school board has not been holding him back. He has simply chosen to tweak rather than dismantle. He is either afraid to create really innovative programs or morel likely, he does not know how. His statement about not making staff reapply or make dramatic changes to staffing prove this. Both of these thing must be part of any real change. Just look at what the U of R is doing at East High School. They intentionally made changing staff a priority and yet superintendent Vargas openly says he won’t consider similar essentials. That shows how little he knows about what drives change in schools. It is staffing-all all levels.
Secondly, it is silly to suggest that parents or the community would some how be left out of any major school restructuring. History has shown that parents may not be overly engaged on a day-to-day basis but when someone suggests closing a school or making major changes-they speak out. There is no reason to think that just because the superintendent has additional power that parents will be neglected. That sounds more like board member insecurity than reality. Many parents feel neglected and powerless now and little is being done about this. How much worse can it be? The bottom line is that supersession won’t matter. This is all just more of the same. Death by Inches.
Failing schools,…..what does that really mean? if you are going to stick to this “failing school” belief, consider the following. There are no, none, zero, zip, failing schools in the suburbs. Why don’t we “pick” that apart. It might give us some answers. Actually it will give us answers we are aware of and have been aware of for quite sometime.
It is not really difficult to come up with a conclusion,…..a solution is also available to us. Not that difficult either. We know what works in the suburbs and what we need to do is provide the missing items that plague the educational failing, not the failing schools.
Folks, the urban and suburban schools do not reside on a level playing field. It has to do with a whole lot of issues, from culture to family support and everything in between. We need to level the playing field. How? We need to provide that which is missing in the urban setting. We need to adjust the delivery of the education. We need to provide relevant education, we need to quit boring kids to the point of drop out, we need to create a “wow, that education thing is cool”, we need to think outside the box, use some ingenuity and creativity.
If you make a presentation to the incoming 9th graders and tell them what will be expected from them in advance, tell them while pointing to a stack of books three foot high, that they will have to read those books and be tested on the content and then they will graduate,…..just how many will not come back the next day and more over time? Get your high school diploma,…get your high school diploma is the constant cry. Would you sign up for that? Apparently well over half of the students agree with me.
You keep the interest high by showing them the what, where and how that is associated with the academics (that stack of books) and you simultaneously present academics with opportunities through live demonstrations. They will gain interest in one of those presentations/demonstrations that is aligned with their academics (books) and realize the importance through the 5 senses. Why in the world would you keep that visual etc. from them? Are you that insecure as an educational institution that providing relevancy in conjunction with your academics will interfere with your art of teaching? Provide a full spectrum of education as opposed to the current one dimensional approach.
To top it off, when you open up this education to a full spectrum approach, you will provide a relevant education, a clear pathway to a profession/career and that will result in opportunity for a living wage without the government dependency. I believe that is called solving poverty, which is a direct and immediate byproduct of education.
Sorry it went so long, but I am tired of the “failure to educate”. Get er done!
Thanks for at least attempting to open the discussion about receivership. The media coverage of this new law has been terribly lacking. The law REQUIRES community engagement. Dr. Vargas has already violated the law by making drastic changes at School #9 before the Community Engagement Team is even formed.
This law was written with the thought that a superintendent would put helping a school to improve above ego. This law was written with the understanding that the community will support what they create. Having the school community develop a plan for a school gives them ownership and responsibility to make sure the plan succeeds.
Dr. Vargas is determined to implement his agenda despite the advise of the School #9 community. He insists that he knows best how to help the school improve. His plan to move the 7th and 8th grade students from The Boys Academy, one of the most successful programs in the district, to be part of the Young Mens Leadership at Charlotte clearly demonstrates that his reasoning has nothing to do with school improvement. Students in this program have some of the highest attendance in the district. Attendance has been his key talking point for years and yet he wants to dismantle a program that meets one of his key goals. He has made a point of sharing only the negative data regarding these boys – – – dismissing any evidence of their success. He told some recent 8th grade graduates from the program that the fact that they earned some Regents high school credits doesn’t count. Only the scores on the NYS Math and ELA tests count in making decisions. 9 out of 11 eighth grade boys in The Boys Academy passed the Regents Algebra I exam. He says that’s good but. . .
These are the boys who came up with the creative idea to produce a video to get the superintendent’s attention about not having a Spanish teacher. It worked! These are the students who Van White selected to represent our district in a national symposium. They made a video detailing their research into historical discrimination, from the antebellum South to the 1960s. Their character and leadership skills were developed over the years of being in the Boys Academy. It wasn’t a one or two year growth plan.
Lastly, I invite the media, school board commissioners and community to read up on the Receivership Law and not just believe what you hear from RCSD Central Office. This law gives power like never before to the community. Our school board and regents commissioners must hold Dr. Vargas and his inner circle accountable for obeying the law and not using this new authority as a bully pulpit.
Since when did current Board members represent the “voices for [the majority of] parents and the community?” When it comes to the overwhelming majority of RCSD students, and parents in particular — the current Board is one of the most disconnected in the entire history of the RCSD. She ought to be ashamed for even making this type of thoroughly rhetorical, dogmatic, and demagogic statement.
It’s not necessarily thee most disconnected RCSB, It is just simply disconnected. The lack of understanding regarding what is needed to reinvigorate the urban education mission, lies somewhere between disappointment and criminal. Sad, because we have some real talent that is just not getting the opportunity to emerge.
Ms. Fink your comment is awesome. I wasn’t aware of school 9’s achievements and Mr. Van White’s encouragement of those creative young boys. The media is extremely biased when it comes to Vargas. We never hear of the programs that are working and they don’t get media props. Parents have to become CSI agents to find what decent schools to send their children to. Please keep informing the public. If anyone knows of any local blogs that are brave enough to display stories like Ms. Finks let us know.