A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

HOPE FOR URBAN EDUCATION
A Study of Nine High-Performing, High-Poverty,
Urban Elementary Schools

Executive Summary

This report is about nine urban elementary schools that served children of color in poor communities and achieved impressive academic results. These schools have attained higher levels of achievement than most schools in their states or most schools in the nation. They have achieved results in reading and mathematics beyond that achieved in some suburban schools. This report tells the stories of these schools and attempts to explain how these schools changed themselves into high-achieving schools.

All nine of the schools used federal Title I dollars to create Title I schoolwide programs. These schools are a powerful affirmation of the power of Title I to support comprehensive school improvement efforts. In these schools, many important change efforts were enhanced through the use of federal education resources. On the other hand, although Title I supported the change efforts, Title I was not the catalyst of the change effort. The true catalyst was the strong desire of educators to ensure the academic success of the children they served.

Each of the nine public elementary schools selected had the following characteristics:

• The majority of their students met low-income criteria (i.e., they qualified for free or reduced-price lunch). In seven of the schools, at least 80 percent of the students met low-income criteria.

• The school was located in an urban area and did not have selective admission policies.

• Student achievement in mathematics and reading was higher than the average of all schools in the state (or higher than the 50^th percentile if a nationally-normed assessment was used). At least three years of assessment data were available to gauge the school?s progress.

• There was not evidence that the school exempted large percentages of students from participation in the assessment program because of language proficiency or disabilities.

• The school and district leaders consented to participation in the study in a timely manner.

The high-performing, urban schools selected were Harriet A. Baldwin School, Boston, Mass.; Baskin Elementary School, San Antonio, Texas; Burgess Elementary School, Atlanta, Ga.; Centerville Elementary School, East St. Louis, Ill.; Goodale Elementary School, Detroit, Mich.; Hawley Environmental Elementary School, Milwaukee, Wis.; Lora B. Peck Elementary School, Houston, Texas; Gladys Noon Spellman Elementary School, Cheverly, Md. (in metropolitan Washington, D.C.); and James Ward Elementary School, Chicago, Ill.

Teams of researchers conducted two-day visits to all nine schools. During the visits, the researchers interviewed campus and district administrators, teachers, parents, and other school personnel. They observed classrooms, hallways, playgrounds, and various meetings. Also, they reviewed various school documents and achievement data. From these data, case studies were written for each of the nine schools.

The nine schools were different in important ways. These differences suggest that many urban elementary schools serving poor communities can achieve high levels of student achievement. Also, the differences suggest that schools may be able to achieve academic successes through different means. Some of the differences observed included the following:

• Among the nine schools, there were schools with small and large enrollments. Enrollments ranged from 283 students at Baldwin Elementary to 1,171 students at Goodale Elementary.

• Although all of the schools served elementary grades, they had different grade level configurations, starting as early as pre-kindergarten at Hawley, Peck, and Ward and ending as late as grade eight at Ward.

• Student demographics varied. At six of the nine schools, most students were African American. At one school, most students were Hispanic, and at another most were Asian American.

• Only two of the schools used nationally-known comprehensive school reform models. One used the Accelerated School Program and another used Success for All.

• Even though none of the schools would have been considered high-performing based on achievement data from five years ago, some of the schools made dramatic improvement over a three or four-year period, whereas others took five years or longer before experiencing dramatic gains in student achievement.

• In a few cases, the district office played a major role in the school?s improvement efforts. In contrast, there were other cases where the district played a modest role in the improvement process.

• A few of the schools managed to make dramatic improvements without great turnover in teaching personnel. In contrast, some schools experienced substantial teacher turnover during the reform process.

Beyond these differences, there were important similarities in the strategies used to improve academic achievement. The following strategies were used by many of the nine schools:

• School leaders identified and pursued an important, visible, yet attainable first goal. They focused on the attainment of this first goal, achieved success, and then used their success to move toward more ambitious goals.

• School leaders redirected time and energy that was being spent on conflicts between adults in the school toward service to children. Leaders appealed to teachers, support staff, and parents to put aside their own interests and focus on serving children well.

• Educators fostered in students a sense of responsibility for appropriate behavior and they created an environment in which students were likely to behave well. Discipline problems became rare as the schools implemented multi-faceted approaches for helping students learn responsibility for their own behavior.

• School leaders created a collective sense of responsibility for school improvement. The shared sense of responsibility was nurtured by joint planning processes and reinforced by efforts to involve everyone in key components of the school?s work.

• The quantity and quality of time spent on instructional leadership activities increased. Principals spent more time helping teachers attend to instructional issues and decreased the time teachers spent on distractions that diverted attention away from teaching and learning. Also, principals put other educators in positions that allowed them to provide instructional leadership. School leaders constantly challenged teachers and students to higher levels of academic attainment. They used data to identify, acknowledge, and celebrate strengths and to focus attention and resources on areas of need.

• Educators aligned instruction to the standards and assessments required by the state or the school district. Teachers and administrators worked together to understand precisely what students were expected to know and be able to do. Then, they planned instruction to ensure that students would have an excellent chance to learn what was expected of them.

• School leaders got the resources and training that teachers perceived they needed to get their students to achieve at high levels. In particular, school leaders made sure that teachers felt like they had adequate materials, equipment, and professional development.

• School leaders created opportunities for teachers to work, plan, and learn together around instructional issues. Time was structured to ensure that collaboration around instructional issues became an important part of the school day and the school week.

• Educators made efforts to win the confidence and respect of parents, primarily by improving the achievement of students. Then educators built strong partnerships with parents in support of student achievement.

• School leaders created additional time for instruction. In some cases, efforts focused on creating additional time for attention to critical instructional issues during the school day. In other cases, efforts focused on creating additional time beyond the regular school day.

• Educators persisted through difficulties, setbacks, and failures. In spite of challenges and frustrations, school leaders did not stop trying to improve their schools.

These findings suggest the following recommendations:

• Build the capacity of principals to provide instructional leadership. Federal, state, and local education agencies should promote efforts to build the capacity of principals to provide the quality of instructional leadership demonstrated by the principals in the nine schools studied.

• Channel resources in ways that provide additional instructional leadership to schools. Federal, state, and local education agencies should consider other ways to increase the quantity of instructional leadership available to schools, such as the development of instructional facilitator or specialist positions within schools.

• Create clear, measurable, and rigorous school accountability provisions. The federal government should continue to encourage states and districts to frame rigorous school accountability requirements. However, a focus on adequate yearly progress is insufficient. Many educators will be motivated to higher levels of performance if state and district policies define exemplary academic achievement.

• Ensure that accountability provisions are accompanied by adequate strategies to build capacity and provide support. In considering requirements for adequate yearly progress, states and districts should set ambitious requirements but also provide high levels of support. One of the most important supports is time for school personnel to engage in processes that align instruction to standards and assessments.

• Along with accountability, provide schools adequate flexibility and support to use that flexibility well. Federal, state, and local education agencies should ensure that accountability provisions are coupled with adequate resources for schools and reasonable flexibility in the use of those resources. Principals and school decision-making committees need high quality training that helps them use data to focus resources on critical areas of instructional need.

• Infuse the tenets of comprehensive school reform into other federal education programs. The federal government?s focus on comprehensive school reform should be expanded and infused into other federal education programs. However, emphasis does not need to be placed on the adoption of models of reform as much as upon the principles of reform, as defined in the Comprehensive School Reform Demonstration Program legislation.

• Use legislation, policy, and technical assistance to help educators create regular opportunities for true professional development. Professional development needs to be completely rethought in a way that results in more effective teaching and improved student achievement. State and federal resources should support the costs associated with the provision of high-quality, school-based professional development that increases the amount of time educators spend working with and learning from each other.

• Provide resources for increasing the quantity of time made available for instruction. State and federal resources should support efforts to increase the quantity of time made available for instruction. After-school programs, "Saturday Schools," and extended-year programs are important vehicles for ensuring that students meet challenging standards.

• Strengthen legislation and provide technical assistance to encourage schools to build the capacity of teachers and parents for increasing parental involvement at school. Paper compliance with existing federal parental involvement requirements is inadequate to improve schools. The capacity of educators to work with parents must be broadened. Also, educators must work to build the capacity of parents to support the education of their children.

• Research is needed to better understand how school districts can better support the improvement of teaching and learning in high-poverty schools. Districts can play important roles in supporting school change efforts. Unfortunately, there has been little research directed to understanding the role of districts in supporting high-performing, high-poverty schools.

[Acknowledgments]

[Introduction]