Tough Love Needed

William Roberti, the a managing director at Alvarez & Marsal, describes the results of his corporate turn around firm’s unprecedented private contract to stabilize the St. Louis school district. Some highlights:

Faced with a financial crisis of enormous proportions and failing to deliver an adequate education to thousands of children, the St. Louis Public School System in 2003 made history, becoming the first known district to hire corporate restructuring consultants to implement a plan for reform that would save the system. As courageous as it was controversial, their decision has resulted in progress that once seemed unimaginable and serves as a beacon to school districts around the country still struggling to provide quality education to their children.

Last year, the St. Louis Public Schools were on the brink of bankruptcy, facing an astonishing $75 million year-end deficit and a near-term $99 million cash shortfall. The district was spending more than $11,000 every year for each of its approximately 40,000 students - out of a total budget of $450 million. While the district had the highest rate of per-student spending in the state, just over $6,000 per student actually found its way to the classroom.
Tens of thousands of dollars were squandered to insure vehicles the school district no longer owned. Money went toward maintaining buildings and facilities that had long been abandoned. Books and supplies were ordered, but then sat in warehouses, while teachers reported scrounging at yard sales for used books.

A year ago, textbooks and supplies sat in disheveled warehouses instead of classrooms. The district had no idea how many books it had or what titles were in circulation. Today, the district can account for every book and has consolidated warehouses into one modern facility. Unnecessary books are being "bought-back." By the start of the 2004-2005 academic year, the district will have spent $2.1 million on new or refurbished textbooks - money that would not have been available but for the financial overhaul that has taken place.

In total, more than 40 unused and unnecessary facilities, including a greenhouse, were closed and put up for sale. A software system - purchased years ago, but never installed - is now used to make school bus routes more efficient, so that the district isn't wasting money by running large numbers of partly empty buses.

We negotiated labor agreements that saved a total of $24 million. We saved another $27.5 million by outsourcing functions like payroll processing, benefits administration, the operations of the supply warehouse, and construction and maintenance of school district properties.
In all, the district has succeeded in reducing expenses by an astounding $79 million. It has a balanced budget for FY 04-05 - the first in recent memory.

If only every urban school district could be subjected to the tough love of the corporate turn-around process.

Where's the Outrage?

More than 12 million children are stuck in low-performing public schools nationally as the new academic year gets under way.

As the nation's 48.5 million schoolchildren began returning for the 2004-05 academic year, federal education officials say state reports show that at least 24,000 public schools — a quarter of the 96,500 nationwide — failed to meet "adequate yearly progress" (AYP) last year, based on student reading, mathematics test results and other factors.

Those schools predominantly served minority and economically disadvantaged students.
As a few highly publicized charter schools are shut down for academic or financial failure, thousands of public schools endure and attract billions in federal and state resources to continue their failing school practices.

Competition anyone?

Competition between public and privately managed schools in Philadelphia over the past two years has allowed all public school students to benefit from best practices and has led to overall achievement gains for Philadelphia students that are dramatically above the state average.

The average test-score gain in Pennsylvania on the 2004 Pennsylvania System of Schools Assessment (PSSA) was 5 points in reading and 6 points in math, according to data released by the state Department of Education on August 24. The School District of Philadelphia exceeded those rates, posting average gains of 10 in reading and 10 in math.

The gain rates achieved in Philadelphia are among the highest of any of the nation's largest school districts, according to the Council of Great City Schools.

Moreover, the gains in student achievement occurred in both contracted "partner" schools and in traditional public schools, providing the first substantial evidence that the city's public-private school management experiment -- to turn around the district's lowest performing schools -- is working.

Send them back to the classroom!

Miami Superintendent Rudy Crew reassigns more than 130 teachers working in administrative offices to teach in struggling schools.

The reassignments come from a pool of roughly 500 teachers who are on special assignment to outside-the-classroom jobs, such as teacher development, curriculum planning and student assessments.

This is why urban school districts do not have any money. Imagine a charter school or a private school with this kind of certified staff in nonclassroom roles. Large districts have hundreds of teachers on the payroll (not to mention other certified staff) that never interact with a single student.

Of course the article does note that:

"Some have not taught students in decades."

And guess which schools get these unprepared reassignments?

"Almost all are being sent to the Superintendent's School Improvement Zone, a group of 39 low-performing schools."

Just another day in the life of a child in a low-performing school.