The SFUSD Desegregation Consent Decree
San Francisco NAACP v. SFUSD et al, No. C-78 1445 WHO
Paragraph
44 Independent Review (Report #17)
THE REPORT OF THE CONSENT DECREE MONITORING TEAM
Submitted to the U.S. District Court, Northern
District of California
July 27, 2000
Consent Decree Monitor
for the State of California
LOW
PERFORMING SCHOOLS – FROM RECONSTITUTION TO II/USP
From Report #17: Pages 162-173
In recent years, SFUSD has shifted gears several times as it seeks to address the issue of low performing schools under the terms and conditions of the Consent Decree. Highlights of these efforts in the 1990's include a refinement of the original reconstitution process[216] via the Comprehensive Schools Improvement Program (CSIP) that was implemented in 1993, negotiations seeking to establish a new "School Accountability Process" (1997-1999), and the decision to end those negotiations and work under California's new Immediate Intervention/Underperforming Schools Program (II/USP) in the Fall of 1999.
As documented at great length in previous reports, the Comprehensive Schools Improvement Program (CSIP) and the accompanying reconstitution process for schools that did not improve were at the center of an explicit SFUSD plan to improve academic achievement in the 1990's.[217] Under this process, low performing schools were placed on a CSIP list and targeted for close monitoring and additional reform efforts. Most "graduated" from the list after two years, but 9 were reconstituted from 1994 through 1997…with district officials bringing in new administrators and substantially new staffs to replace existing personnel.[218] In addition, during this same time period, three new Consent Decree schools were established, and one other low performing school was disestablished. These actions brought the total of dramatic changes for the entire fifteen-year reconstitution period (1983-1997) to 15 schools reconstituted, five new Consent Decree schools established,[219] and one high school disestablished.[220]
After the Spring of 1997, CSIP/Reconstitution was put on hold, as district officials and teachers union officials sought to work out a modification of the process for addressing low performing schools. The new "School Accountability Process" envisioned by the negotiating teams would have established a common framework and criteria to guide reform. As contemplated, it would have identified clearly defined roles and responsibilities for individuals, schools, and central offices. The key to the process would have been its emphasis on site-based management, site plan critiques, and school portfolios. Members of the negotiating teams sought to develop a range of indicators, building on but not necessarily matching the district's recent portfolio assessment.[221]
Negotiations between the district and the teachers on the School Accountability Process were unofficially terminated in the Fall of 1999...as SFUSD officials chose instead to buy into California's new Immediate Intervention/ Underperforming Schools Program (II/USP). These shifts of direction initially resulted in an additional level of tension between the district and the teachers union, but by the end of the 1999-2000 academic year a Labor Management Community Advisory Committee had begun work toward developing a process that would hopefully lead to improved II/USP collaboration.
1.
The Immediate Intervention/ Underperforming Schools Program (II/USP):
The Public School Accountability Act (PSAA), signed into law in April 1999, is a statewide effort to measure school performance, improve underperforming schools, and reward high achieving schools. The new law includes two components directly related to low performing schools. First, it institutes a new system for measuring and reporting school achievement called the Academic Performance Index (API). Second, it offers a reform process, provides financial support, and threatens potential interventions through the Immediate Intervention/Underperforming Schools Program (II/USP).
The API, the centerpiece of the PSAA, is used to measure the performance of schools and significant ethnic and socio-economically disadvantaged subgroups within schools. The legislation requires that the index consist of a variety of indicators, including the Stanford 9,[223] attendance rates, and graduation rates. However, graduation and attendance rates are not to be incorporated until the Superintendent of Public Instruction determines that they are accurate. The PSAA also states that other tests, when found "valid and reliable," will also be incorporated into the API.[224] Thus, the current reality is that the API only consists of one indicator: the Stanford 9.
By using the results from the 1999 administration of the Stanford 9 Test, the 1999 API measured the schools on a scale of 200 to 1000 and ranked the schools in 10 categories of equal size (deciles). Each school was ranked from 1 (lowest) to 10 (highest) compared to schools statewide and to schools with similar demographic characteristics.[225] The PSAA also sets forth a target for each school that contemplates either a minimum five-percent annual API growth target or the statewide API performance target of 800 for 1999.[226] The API growth data will be available in the fall of 2000.[227]
If schools fail to meet their growth target, they may be identified for the II/USP. However, for the 1999-2000 school year, the legislation mandated that the 430 schools be selected from schools in the bottom five deciles in both 1998 and 1999. The legislation provided $96 million initial planning support for that first group, which translated into a $50,000 planning grant per school. As per the legislation, the Superintendent of Public Instruction developed a list of external evaluators to assist schools in the planning phase. In conjunction with school site and community teams, the external evaluator created action plans that identified barriers to improvement, developed strategies for removing the barriers, and detailed expenditures for those strategies.
If the State Board of Education approves an action plan, then the school receives an implementation grant for the next year of up to $168/pupil. But the schools must match those funds from a new or existing source of funding. If a school fails to meet its growth targets after one year of implementation, then it is subject to local intervention. That is, the local school board must choose from a range of interventions, including reassignment of personnel and negotiation of site-specific assignments.
If a school fails to meet its growth targets or show significant growth after two years of implementation, then it is subject to state sanctions and deemed a low performing school. Then the Superintendent of Public Instruction shall reassign the principal and assume all the governing powers related to that school. Finally, the Superintendent of Public Instruction must do at least one of the following: revise attendance options, allow parents to establish a charter school, assign management the school to a third party, reassign certificated employees, renegotiate a new collective bargaining agreement, reorganize the school, or close the school. We note that several of these outcomes are embodied in the old CSIP/Reconstitution process that has since been placed on hold in SFUSD.
2.
District Implementation of II/USP
In San Francisco, thirty-nine SFUSD schools were originally identified as qualifying for II/USP based on the fact that their test scores fell below the state average each of the previous two years. Out of these thirty-nine, the California Department of Education (CDE) selected fourteen.
1999-2000 II/USP schools include: Cleveland, Bret Harte, Malcolm X, McKinley, Muir, John Swett, Webster, Franklin MS, Gloria R. Davis MS, King MS, Galileo HS, Thurgood Marshall HS, Mission HS, and Burton HS. It should be noted that these fourteen schools are not necessarily the lowest performing schools in the district. The legislation mandates that the Superintendent of Public Instruction select participants from the eligible schools. Consequently, while schools like Mission and Gloria R. Davis are among the lowest performing schools in the district, selected schools McKinley and Thurgood Marshall scored above average within the district. Each one of the schools received a planning grant of $50,00 to hire an external evaluator and prepare an II/USP action plan.
After the evaluators completed their recommendations, each school created an action plan and submitted it to the CDE for approval. In addition, as part of this process, SFUSD officials in the central office also identified district-wide barriers... and strategies for removing those barriers.
The district itself also identified district-wide barriers, and strategies for removing those barriers. Relevant to the first goal of the Consent Decree, District Barrier #4 is a "disproportionate number of targeted students (African American, Latino, English Language Learners, high poverty) concentrated in a small percentage of schools." The district also identified three solutions to eliminate Barrier #4:
Solution 1: The Student Assignment Plan will use the concept of the Diversity
Index to limit concentrations of targeted students in II/USP schools.
Solution 2: Eliminate inter-school disciplinary transfers of targeted students to
II/USP schools.
Solution 3: Provide assistance to II/USP schools to "market" the schools,
highlighting positive aspects of schools to attract more diverse student
populations.
Each of the five barriers includes several such solutions and actions for specific departments to take to achieve those solutions.
As
mentioned above, various stakeholders established the aforementioned Labor
Management Community Advisory Committee with the support of a Ford grant. According to Kent Mitchell, President of
UESF, this new body brings together diverse stakeholders to improve
collaboration through II/USP.[228] Still in its early stages, the group's
current goal is to identify and to share a model collaborative approach for
creating II/USP action plans.[229]
For some, the hope is that the
different stakeholders will also eventually help to identify and remove
district barriers to school improvement.
After
the completion of the first year planning grants, district officials have both
hope and concern for II/USP. Ritu
Khanna of the SFUSD Research, Planning, and Evaluation Department, for example,
praises the site leadership planning process and the outside perspectives of
the external evaluators. Still, she
also has some concerns. Perhaps the
most frustrating element of the new reform process is that, unlike CSIP, II/USP
only uses one indicator. On the other
hand, it does provide three years for reform as well as additional financial
support.[230] The parameters of this financial support are
set forth in Appendix IV.
3.
Planning Participant Profile: Malcolm X Academy Elementary School
Malcolm X Academy is a former Phase I elementary school currently participating in the II/USP. The school has scored well below state average on the SAT-9 for the last two years, earning a 2 on the 1999 API. However, reading test scores have improved somewhat in every grade level over the past two years. Grades 4-5 math scores have remained stagnant, but Grade 3 scores jumped 40 points from 1998 to 1999. African American students performed significantly better than the other disaggregated groups, while Samoan students performed poorly overall.[231]
After being selected to participate in II/USP, the school worked with an external evaluator that spent an equivalent of five to seven days gathering and analyzing information. According to the report of findings, the external evaluator was guided by a study entitled Dispelling the Myth: High Poverty Schools Exceeding Expectations, a report of the Education Trust. The external evaluator's findings followed the six criteria and standards established in the II/USP regulations...including governing board policies, curriculum management, fiscal management, parental and community involvement, personnel management, and facilities management. In each of the above areas, the report delineated findings and recommendations for both the school and the district. The school then used that information to identify barriers to student success.
The school identified three barriers to low performance: (1) lack of a documented integrated reading, writing, and language arts program, (2) lack of writing in the classroom, and (3) lack of strong parent support. These concerns were echoed by Principal Karen Frison,[232] who noted that given the school's ranking within the district -- 64th out of 65 elementary schools in SAT-9 reading scores-- this emphasis on reading and writing seems appropriate. Specifically, some school objectives are based on improving test scores -- such as increasing by 5% the gap between the baseline year and the state target as measured by the API, and increasing by 20% the number of 4th graders receiving a passing score on the Individual Writing Assessment (IWA). The Action Plan also include less measurable objectives like having students demonstrate increased enthusiasm in school with hands-on activities.
According to the Action Plan, the school has planned and budgeted several new and continuing efforts to address the school's objectives. For example, the faculty compared several writing programs, and then decided that the Bay Area Writing Project was most appropriate program to address the school's reading needs and philosophy. The program stresses writing across the curriculum, publishing student writing, writing with computers, writing assessments, and new teacher support. The total cost of the program includes consultant fees, instructional materials, and thirty hours of staff development. The II/USP will fund $24,364 of the $31,011/year budget of the Bay Area Writing Project.
To address the reading concerns, the school has decided to hire a .5 FTE Literacy Coordinator and to train ten additional teachers in the Results reading program. The school has budgeted $34,000 in II/USP funding which includes the .5 FTE Literacy Coordinator, extended hours for certificated staff and substitutes, and paraprofessional training.
To facilitate interdisciplinary teaching, the school has elected to use $69,720 of its own funds to implement an interdisciplinary afternoon block, in which teachers will be trained in interdisciplinary thematic/multicultural teaching. The school will also use $10,000 of the II/USP funds to budget for substitute teacher salaries so that teachers can plan interdisciplinary teaching strategies.
Finally, the school intends to increase parent and community involvement by hiring a parent liaison and a family outreach worker. These staff members will conduct home visits, coordinate education workshops to help parents improve their children's literacy skills, and hold a family literacy night and young author's fair. The school will use its own funds to implement the parent/community activities, and $25,000 of the II/USP funds will be used for the salaries of the two positions, extended hour salaries for certificated staff, and necessary materials for parent workshops. The total annual budget for the II/USP reform effort is $69,000.
Constrained by time and resources, the II/USP Action Plan does not identify every barrier or need at Malcolm X Academy. For example, Principal Frison emphasized that it is difficult to recruit and retain qualified teachers to work at the school, and indicated that just this past year the school lost two teachers who proved to be ineffective in this school setting. While the school did not include this problem within the II/USP process, the district has identified the high percentage of non-credentialed, inexperienced teachers assigned to II/USP schools as a district-wide barrier. With this in mind, the school and district both may have acknowledged that the district has a greater ability to impact that barrier. Another concern not addressed by II/USP is school safety. There have been several gang-related incidents in and around campus, including older gang members with guns running through one of the school yards.
We present this information regarding Malcolm X as an example of the steps that are being taken under the new II/USP process. The Malcolm X Action Team Members -- including teachers, parents, a community liaison, and the principal -- have certified their involvement in the development of the school's Action Plan. However, many personnel and community members at Malcolm X have felt that the II/USP experience this past year was demoralizing and dehumanizing. Some Malcolm X teachers even stated that it made them feel like bad teachers.[233] At the June 29, 2000 Labor Management Community Advisory Committee meeting, many expressed similarly negative views, indicating that instead of feeling that they were part of a collaborative process they felt as if they were simply being judged.[234] But district officials emphasize the value of the additional resources,[235] and everyone hopes that the Labor Management group can facilitate more collaborative efforts in this regard down the road.
As of now, of course, it is too soon to tell. Only one year has gone by -- the year that is funded for planning. It will be followed by two years of implementation…and possibly even a third additional year. In addition, a new group of schools will be identified in the coming year to begin a second, concurrent II/USP process. We will continue monitoring this area very closely, and will seek to determine whether and to what extent both the goals and the implementation are consistent with the terms and conditions of the Consent Decree. Thus far, we have found no inconsistencies.
*****
In past reports, we have found that the two most successful reform efforts targeting low performing schools over the entire 17-year period of the Consent Decree have been the Phase One reforms of 1983-1985 and the CSIP/Reconstitution program of 1993-1997. Although the more recent efforts were not uniformly successful, most of the schools that participated in CSIP did indeed improve. Yet not every one of the schools that did improve has been able to sustain the momentum, and some have given up their original gains.
It must be emphasized that there is no magic formula in the world of education reform. No one silver bullet has yet been found in this context. Research has shown that turning around a low performing school requires -- among other things -- the right combination of people, interpersonal communication, programs, funding, and relationships. It requires a great deal of hard, day-to-day work over time...establishing partnerships between and among the district's educators, the school's students, and the local community. Such efforts -- even if successful -- do not continue automatically. People change, students change, circumstances change, and new relationships must be built. Turning around a low performing school is thus an ongoing process, not a one-time operation that can then be expected to last indefinitely.
In this regard, we urge all the relevant stakeholders to look closely at both why certain Consent Decree reforms initially worked in SFUSD and why they were not always sustained. Such an analysis can hopefully inform district efforts to work toward the interrelated goals of maximizing equal educational opportunity under a new student assignment plan and improving academic achievement today at certain persistently low performing schools.
[216] The first schools to be
targeted at the beginning of the Consent Decree (1983-1985) continue to be
called 'Phase One' schools. They
include George Washington Carver, Charles Drew, and Malcolm X (formerly Sir
Francis Drake) elementary schools, Martin Luther King and Horace Mann middle
schools, and Phillip & Sala Burton High.
King and Burton were brand-new schools, created by the Consent
Decree. The other four were reconstituted.
[217] For a more detailed description of the reconstitution process and CSIP, see supra, note 7, note 93.
[218] The following schools have
been reconstituted since the beginning of the Consent Decree: Phase One: G.W. Carver, C. Drew, S.F. Drake
(Malcolm X), H. Mann; 1988: J. Muir, J.
Lick; 1994: B. Harte, Visitacion
Valley; 1995: Edison, R. Parks; 1996: Aptos, Balboa, Starr King; 1997: Golden Gate, Mission. The schools reconstituted in the 1990's were
originally part of a larger group that had been placed on the CSIP list.
[219] The new schools,
established with Consent Decree money, were
Burton HS (Phase One), King Middle School (Phase One), 21st
Century (K-8) (1993), Thurgood Marshall HS (1994), and Gloria R. Davis Middle
School (1995).
[220] Wilson High School was
dismantled in 1994.
[221] The district's portfolio
assessment was actually implemented for the first time in 1997-1998, and all
SFUSD schools were required to assemble portfolios documenting their progress
towards district standards. Results of
the 1999 assessment were set forth by the monitoring team in Appendix I of
Report #16.
[222] We are grateful for the
work of Jason Snyder, who conducted extensive on-site interviews and met with a
significant number of district officials -- both formally and informally -- to
obtain this detailed information about SFUSD's most recent reform efforts for
low performing schools.
[223] See Ed Code 60640 (The Stanford 9 is a nationally-normed test that is administered annually to California public school students in grades 2 through 11 as part of the Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) program. The score is based on the performance of individual students on STAR content area tests as measured through national percentile rankings (NPRs)).
[224] Id. Future indicators include the assessment of the applied academic skills matrix test, the nationally normed test as augmented (augmented STAR), and the high school exit examination.
[225] See Reporting the Academic Performance Index for 1999 to Staff and Parents, Communications Assistance Packet, January 2000, at 15. (similar demographic characteristics include student mobility, student ethnicity, student socioeconomic status, percent fully credentialed teachers, percent teachers with emergency credentials, percent of English Language Learners, average class size per grade level, and multi-track year-round school).
[226] For 1999-2000, the individual school growth target was calculated by taking five percent of the distance between the school's 1999 API score and the interim statewide performance target of 800. If a school had 800 or more , then it must maintain an API of at least 800.
[227] Relevant to the goals of
the Consent Decree, the PSAA requires that schools show "comparable
improvement" for "numerically significant" ethnic and socio-economically
disadvantaged subgroups within schools.
The State Board of Education subsequently defined "comparable
improvement" as a significant subgroup meeting or exceeding 80 percent of
the school-wide growth target. The
legislation defines a "significant" subgroup as one that constitutes
at least 15 percent of a school's total student population and at least
30 students within the school. See CA
Educ. Code Section 52052. The State Board of Education adopted an additional
criterion. It allows for an ethnic or
socioeconomic group that constitutes at least 100 students, even if it does not
constitute the 15 percent, to be identified as "numerically
significant." See Explanatory
Notes for the 1999 Academic Performance Index Report, California Department of
Education, Office of Planning and Evaluation, at 5.
[228] Kent Mitchell, Labor
Management Community Advisory Meeting, June 14, 2000.
[229] Labor Management Community
Advisory Meeting, June 14, 2000.
[230]Interview with Ritu Khanna, June 13, 2000.
[231] II/USP External Evaluator Recommendations, Malcolm X Academy, Education Partners, December 15, 1999.
[232] Interview with Karen Frison, Principal, Malcolm X Academy, May 31, 2000.
[233] Interview with Diane Talarico, July, 2000.
[234] Labor/Management/Community Committee meeting at Malcolm X, June 29, 2000.
[235] Interview with John Quinn, July 21, 2000.