New Report: America’s School Districts Need to Change

Posted by on July 14, 2006

[posted from Public Education Network newsblast]

AMERICA’S PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM NEEDS DRAMATIC CHANGE

A new report argues that educators don’t know how to educate the millions of poor and immigrant children concentrated in big city schools. While there are scattered examples of successful schools, districts haven’t been able to imitate or reproduce them. This is because school districts are built for stability, not problem solving. Districts control inputs — how money is used, who is hired, how teachers work, how schools use their students’ time — and assume that results will follow. But when results don’t follow, districts and schools can’t experiment with new ideas or move people and money from ineffective programs to ineffective ones. A new report calls for a radical change in the role of America’s school boards who would now operate districts using a portfolio model. Unlike the existing system the proposed portfolio management system would put effective instruction first. Boards would manage a diverse array of schools, some run by the school district and others by independent organizations, each designed to meet the different needs of students.

http://www.ppionline.org/documents/Portfolio_Districts021006.pdf