Education Week: Start Over - The Diigo Meta page

• 15 Jun 09
  

  Doug Noon

  duncan: I’m calling on the existing network of turnaround specialists to be ready, and I’m urging charter school groups, unions, districts, and states to get in this business of turning around our lowest-performing schools.

  arne_duncan

  • First, states need to adopt rigorous K-12 standards that prepare students for success in college and the workforce. Second, they should create data systems that will track from year to year whether students are making the progress they need to graduate from high school ready to succeed in college or the workforce; these systems also will provide the information to determine whether a teacher is effective in improving student performance. Third, the states need plans to find effective teachers and make sure those teachers are working in classrooms where they will have the greatest impact on the students who need the most help. Finally, states must have plans to turn around their lowest-performing schools.
  • In Chicago, the most successful interventions we implemented when I led that city’s school system were complete turnarounds. We moved the adults out of the building, kept the children there, and brought in new adults. It was the best and fastest way to create a new school culture, one in which student achievement was the primary goal. All of the school’s decisions—the length of the school day and school year, the choice of curriculum, the discipline code—revolved around that goal.

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