A SMART START STRATEGY FOR SCHOOL REFORM

No democratic responsibility is more sacred than the care of the young. The nurturing, protection, and education of our youth has been advocated for by every notable American thinker from Thomas Jefferson to Frederick Douglas, Horace Mann to W.E.B. Dubois, John Dewey to Mary McLeod Bethune, and from John Gardner to James Nabrit. Those who fought in the civil rights movement agreed that better education for all American children was the key to a better American future. When I sought the chairmanship of the DC City Council Education Committee, I did so because I knew that we had betrayed the ideals of those who struggled for that restored American future. By visiting schools and broadening my understanding of the realities of public education, I was led to one stark conclusion: our current system is not just dysfunctional, it is utterly broken. Yes, many parts of the structure excel, and many of its teachers and professionals are deeply committed. But as a system, public education is not working in America.

How did this happen? Incredibly, for a century and a half, there has been little substantive change in public education. In America's public classrooms, the classic approach remains essentially the same as it was years ago: a one-size-fits-all core curriculum with subjects presented to each student in the same manner. This has yielded a system ill equipped to address the diverse needs of today's students, especially within the context of today's social dynamics.

The best way for public education to correct itself is to allow innovation and creativity to flourish. Children and parents deserve the classroom strength and educational tools that far too few students are receiving in today's system. Giving parents a choice is a critical factor in the future success of public education. Parental school choice allows each parent to find the right educational fit for their child. Selection like this is also important because it forces the traditional public education system to keep pace with private and alternative school models that have proven successful. Unfortunately, this reform won't be ignited internally, it never is with a monopoly. True reform will only occur via external pressure. And the most effective form of external pressure comes by way of parental choice.

Charter schools, in particular, provide a model for reform that offers hope. These schools are, in fact, public schools, they receive public funding, are open to any students, and are overseen by a public agency, one that holds them accountable to the academic and fiscal management goals outlined in their charter. Although they enjoy greater flexibility than traditional public schools, charter schools are highly accountable to both the public that chooses them and the sponsors who approve their charters. As of late, the best charters foster the coordination of desperately needed services into one central location for students, parents, and community members alike. Charters are providing a system malleable enough to respond to children's needs and are, in short, filling a void left by the traditional public school system.

A review of the best practices found in successful charters and traditional schools suggest that eight core components should be applied forcefully and consistently as guiding principles for sustained, systemic education reform.

1. Provide child learning at a much earlier age.

A core challenge we face is providing early learning opportunities for our children from age three. This is where we should all start. If we can begin on this premise, this notion that learning must be integral to a child's life from an early age, every goal we have for our youth, our economy, and our culture will be fulfilled.

The latest scientific research on how the brain works informs us that a child's brain is at its most active stage of growth from birth to age three. For example, a child learns a language by age two and an adult's potential vocabulary is shaped by words learned before the age of five. The neurological foundations for later-stage learning of math and logic are set before age four. Moreover, a child's first two years of life experience largely determine how his brain will develop into adulthood, along with his overall level of emotional stability. Waiting until age five to introduce formal learning is a dinosaur-like practice, one whose elimination can be supported by scientific evidence. With this in mind, we must focus on providing a sound foundation in the early years of life.

To succeed, we will have to get up early and drive slowly, but we will get there safely and on time. All families, particularly those with limited incomes, must have access to this early public learning opportunity. From an economic perspective, this early start will decrease the cost of successfully educating a student, since the recurring costs for failure would be eliminated. We spend millions of dollars on remediation, compensatory education, security, special education, retaining students, summer school, and incarcerating those who enter the juvenile justice system. Funding early learning will cost taxpayers far less than funding the incarceration of so may of these children in later years.

2. Provide more time to learn: longer school day, longer school year

The current school day does not match the nine-to-five workforce realities faced by most parents, who now often work from home for longer hours. Most juvenile crimes are committed between the hours of 3:00 and 6:00 p.m. The phenomenon of the "latchkey kid" is a reality that requires us to rethink the time of day our public education system operates. In the information age, learning is not limited to the schoolhouse walls, the time of day, or the season traditionally designated as the "school year". Simply put, our children need more time in school.

By way of illustration, the school year in the District of Columbia is 180 days long. In Europe and Japan, students spend as much as 220 to 240 days in school per year. When our students are shortchanged by up to 33 percent of the "time to learn" in their school year, they will suffer during their entire life trying to meet international standards of performance. (I RECOMMEND PUTTING COMPARATIVE PERFOMANCE STATISTICS HERE SHOWING THAT THE LONGER SCHOOL YEAR IN EUROPE AND JAPAN YIELDS BETTER ACADEMIC RESULTS.)

3. Implement a rigorous curriculum at elementary levels

Public school students can achieve at significantly higher levels if the curriculum content provided to them were of a higher level, taught by teachers who know the subject matter and know how engage students in active learning. This higher-level content shouldn't be reserved for highschool education, rather, it must be taught in the elementary grades, too. For example, many public school students in the District begin the study of geometry in the 10th grade, after completing a course in algebra in the 9th grade. However, geometry in most American private schools and more successful public ones, geometry is taught in the 6th grade. A similar curriculum is considered standard for elementary students in Japan and Europe. When the opportunity to engage in higher-level content is denied in early grades, we place limitations on a student's ability to learn.

In essence, America's public schools must become flexible enough to implement a stringent elementary curriculum, particularly in the areas of math and science.

4. Implement rigorous curriculum for all high school students

The imbalance in our public education system is threatening the ability of our next generation to compete effectively in a global economy. That disparity becomes tragic in high schools where the curriculum taught is far more advanced than the knowledge and skills needed. This imbalance is highlighted when comparing the level of excellence our children achieve and the level of excellence achieved regularly by students in other industrialized nations. Only six percent of America's high school students study calculus. In Germany, that figure is 40 percent. In Japan, its 90 percent! When our students have the opportunity to compete in advanced public and private schools, they excel. It is in our collective self-interest to give every American child such an opportunity.

I propose we build a high school education structure that is competitive with the best national education institutes, in content and quality. The goal is to encourage higher education, yet every student is not on the trajectory to complete four years of college. Today's high-tech job market requires training and excellence, but not necessarily a four-year degree. Our school system must match the career opportunities that are emerging with the students best suited to fulfill them. Every elite technology center in America is accompanied by a sustained commitment to creating education excellence at the grade school, high school, technical training, and college education levels. North Carolina's Research Triangle, California's Silicon Valley, Massachusetts' Route 128 Corridor, Maryland's 270 Corridor, and Fairfax County's Dulles Complex are all the result of serious and continued public investments in quality education.

If we are to participate in the world-class economy growing at our doorsteps, we must do what others have done. We must demand, pay for, and manage a sweeping reconstruction of our public school system. It is not a matter of running our current system more efficiently, it is about turning it on its heels. Immediate actions should include the implementation of a solid core curriculum that all students must complete by 16 years old. These high school curriculums must be designed to offer more support in math, science, and the arts. The curriculum must also provide compatibility with the best school to career practices.

5. Create smaller schools

All school districts should consider disposing of school properties until plans for smaller schools are finalized. Construction cannot lead instruction. The trend toward building larger school buildings has been determined by architects, not educators. Large construction does not provide real economies of scale. Dollars that are saved by constructing large school buildings are almost immediately lost through additional staffing for administration, security, and the academic and social failure that is often the result of the isolation and impersonal atmosphere brought on by large schools. Appropriate capital funding must be controlled and must remain consistently directed toward the construction of smaller school buildings. Notably, the recent trend toward creating smaller schools within schools is a step in the right direction.

Students are alienated and anonymous in large schools, they are lost in a detached setting where very few adults, if any, know their name. A sense of ownership or belonging is not fostered in a school of 1,000 or more students. At these institutions, students do not know their own classmates, and teachers do not know their own students. Appropriate sized schools and the pupils within them are more likely to become key elements of their neighborhoods and communities. Parents, employers, and other stakeholders can become players in the school's support network, providing tangible contributions and visible models and mentors for students.

Where possible, smaller schools should be designed and constructed across the country.

6. Manage special education for positive results.

Special education has become a sinkhole for tax money and troubled children. Spending has skyrocketed while the number of students served remains the same. The entire concept of student re-entry from special education back into mainstream learning has been lost in the shuffle. Management of special education for the seriously impaired is a weighted challenge for the public school system. Children seriously inhibited by learning disabilities should receive appropriate guidance from teachers or counselors. Too many children with advanced levels of difficulty are in expensive and stigmatized care because our system's ability to deal with problem children is poor.

Rebuilding our school system must include focused professional training on how to spot and deal with troubled children, how to engage in timely contact and utilize referral services with parents, and strong, consistent collaboration with community resources, including those that are faith-based. This effort cannot occur without addressing the backlog of children awaiting professional evaluation. A reliance on regular system staffing for assessments will never resolve this problem.

I strongly support authorizing payment to assessment resources outside the system, using a competitive case rate by any qualified professional. State governments pay for an enormous amount of specialized education services, including separate classrooms, private schools, and residential facilities out of the city. Lack of appropriate management, outdated legal mandates, and a failure to coordinate information and care between child service agencies has led to exorbitant costs and poor outcomes.

Appropriate and effective care for troubled children can only occur by accepting a system-view of public and private services and resources. Child resources must be brought under a coordinated philosophy and strategy, one that centers around collaboration with public and private stakeholders in child, youth, and family services. The goal here is to produce a seamless and caring service delivery system for our troubled children. Such collaboration includes managing special education dollars to ensure appropriate care, the elimination of waste and duplication, as well as instituting fixed rate assessment payments to private sector professionals for children who are at risk for learning disabilities.

7. Respect, train and reward professional teachers

If the job of teaching is to be more than providing custodial care for children, educators must be helped to educate themselves and to create communities of professionals. With that said, incentives must be implemented to encourage accountability, professionalism, and performance.

Performance measurements that simply measure inputs, such as time clocks, demean professionalism and do not ensure better outcomes. Businesses that succeed in "high labor" industries facing global competition must pay well, invest heavily in continuing professional development, and make sure working environments enhance entrepreneurial attitudes and performance.

Following this model means we must increase spending on professional development for teachers. Personnel costs represent hundreds of millions of dollars, which may be a wasted expenditure if we do not continually invest in the renewal of this human capital. Professional development must be viewed as mandatory, necessary for protecting our investments paid out in the form of teacher salaries. Our schools must demand excellence, from both students and educators, and school leaders must rid the system of unqualified teachers. More importantly, all school districts should provide ongoing professional development for teachers and facilitate the development of in-school professional communities.

8. Collaborate across agency lines to reduce truancy, drug abuse, crime and violence.

It is a sad reality that school-aged children use alcohol and illicit drugs. This truth impacts their ability and willingness to learn and leads to higher levels of crime and violence among juveniles. There is, however, a relationship between a student's school experience and his or her involvement in drugs, alcohol, and crime. Students who are not successful in school are more likely to cut class, become truant, or drop out all together. Students who are not successfully engaged in school are at greater risk for illicit drug use, crime, and violence. Similarly, young women who are not academically challenged and engaged in schools are more likely to become teenage mothers and/or enter the juvenile justice system.

Eighty to 90 percent of our incarcerated juveniles did not have a positive school experience, and most dropped out of school. Students are in our schools for most of the day, and we will have to address their needs during the time that they are with us. It serves no useful purpose to blame parents, blame society, or blame anyone else, while continuing to maintain the obsolete practices now offered in our public schools.

Public education must join forces and collaborate with local and national agencies as well as community-based organizations to address the problem of illicit drug use by children. Dollars must be put into re-engineering schools so that they become places where young people want to be, where they can develop and become productive citizens.

Re-engineering our schools is essential. But we must go further. We must fit school services into a community. School is the largest piece of life for a growing child, but it cannot be all of life. We must integrate our work with the work of parents, churches, businesses, and community organizations. We must also collaborate proactively with all agencies charged with responsibilities toward children.

Schools must link with the police, parole officers, youth, health, housing, employment, and welfare agencies to see this effort through. These connections will substantially reduce oversight, reduce long-term costs, and rescue countless young people.

In spite of all the problems found in the American public education system, hope does spring eternal for one primary reason, the resiliency of our children. I have run into a myriad of children who come from dysfunctional home settings and who have received limited, if any, nurturing along the way.  Still, they have an inner drive to excel and succeed. These children demonstrate an indomitable spirit that guides them through hardships. Oftentimes the determining factor about their eventual ability to succeed or fail is reduced to one or more positive influences in their life.

Our traditional public education system must recognize that the new realities of our society dictate a dynamic, diversified approach to the way children are taught and treated in our schools. One approach no longer works with children. Just as diversity of population is one of the greatest strengths of this country, diversity of education and experience will help start meaningful change in public education.

Once education reform is truly de-politicalized and policymakers become open to change, all of America and its children will benefit.

Kevin P. Chavous