Deja Vu? Education Experts to Review the Madison School District

The Madison School District:

Superintendent's Teaching and Learning Transition Team to Begin Work This Week

A group of national and local education experts will support Superintendent Jennifer Cheatham's entry plan work, the district announced today. The Superintendent's Teaching and Learning Transition Team will begin work this week.

"Instruction and leadership are critical components of systemic improvement," Superintendent Cheatham said. "This team of local and national practitioners will join district and school staff in assessing and analyzing strengths, areas of opportunities and priorities for improving teaching and learning in Madison schools."

The eight member team brings together education experts from Harvard University and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, as well as educational practitioners from other urban school districts.

"We are fortunate to have access to national experts with a wide range of expertise from standards based instruction and leadership development, to bilingual and special education, to family and community involvement," Cheatham said. "This team will help to deepen and strengthen my ongoing understanding of the strengths and challenges of our district. Their national perspective, coupled with the local perspective shared by principals, staff, parents and community members, will support us in narrowing our focus to only the most high leverage strategies for ensuring every student is college and career ready."

The team, which was selected by the superintendent and will be funded through community and private foundations, will be chaired by Dr. Robert Peterkin, Professor Emeritus of the Harvard Graduate School of Education and includes: Maree Sneed, partner at Hogan and Lovells US LLC; John Diamond, sociologist of education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education; Sheila Brown, Co-Director at the Aspen Institute's Education and Society Program; Allan Odden, Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis at the University of Wisconsin-Madison; John Peterburs, Executive Director of Quarles & Brady; Wilma Valero, Coordinator for English Language Learner Programs in Elgin, Il; and Gloria Ladson-Billings, Professor of Urban Education at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

As Superintendent Cheatham continues the listening and learning phase of her entry plan, the Teaching and Learning Transition Team will also meet with central office leaders, conduct focus groups with teachers, principals, and parents as needed, and review a variety of relevant data.

At the end of their work, the team will present the superintendent with a report of what they have learned and recommendations for moving forward systemically with best practices. That report will be used, along with data collected by the superintendent in school visits and other entry plan activities, to refine the district's goals and strategic priorities.

Related:

• FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
  THURSDAY, MARCH 1, 2001 (additional background here)
  Updated Strategic Plan Results in Priority Action Teams

  Five Strategic Priority Action Teams, centered around the most critical challenges facing the Madison Metropolitan School District, are among the outcomes of the recently-completed strategic plan.

  "The immediate and emerging challenges facing the district are addressed in our revitalized strategic plan," said Superintendent Art Rainwater, "and the Action Teams are focused on five important priorities for us."

  The five strategic priorities are:

  Instructional Excellence - improving student achievement; offering challenging, diverse and contemporary curriculum and instruction
  Student Support - assuring a safe, respectful and welcoming learning environment
  Staff Effectiveness - recruiting, developing and retaining a highly competent workforce that reflects the diversity of our students
  Home and Community Partnerships - strengthening community and family partnerships and communication
  Fiscal Responsibility - using resources efficiently and strategically

  The five Strategic Priority Action Teams, one for each of the five priorities, are taking on the responsibility for continuous improvement toward "their" priority.

  The Action Teams, which will have both staff members and non-staff members, will be responsible for existing initiatives. In addition they will identify and recommend benchmarks to use in assessing school district performance.

  "We have a huge number of initiatives," said Rainwater. "This strategic plan gives us a systemic approach to change, so that every initiative, everything we do, leads us to these established goals. I believe it is critical to our district's success that we follow this strategic plan and use it as a decision filter against which we measure our activities."

  Two other outcomes from the updated strategic plan are:

  a set of beliefs about children, families, enhanced learning, and the quality of life and learning, all of which are integrated with an identified District vision and mission.
  improved cost efficiency and effectiveness of many central office functions, which are being addressed on an ongoing basis.

  Madison Schools' initial strategic plan came about in 1991, and provided direction until this update.

  "As a result of this project," said Rainwater, "all of us who are stakeholders -- parents, students, teachers and staff, administrators and community members -- will share a renewed sense of clarity, while seeing an ever-more efficient deployment of resources."

  You can see the complete strategic plan on the district's Web site: http://www.mmsd.org.

• Teachers Dispute District Standards: Superintendent Cheryl Wilhoyte's Biggest Goals have become caught up in the contract battle with Madison Teachers.:

  Amid the picket signs Madison teachers carried at a rally last month protesting slow-moving contract talks, some teachers also carried a bright purple flier.

  On one side was written the heading ``standards and benchmarks.'' On the other, ``Dimensions of Learning.'' Beneath each, and filling the entire page, was one uninterrupted string of text: ``Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah. . . .''

  While hardly erudite -- some would call it juvenile -- the flier expressed the sentiment many teachers have toward two of Superintendent Cheryl Wilhoyte's biggest initiatives: the effort to create districtwide academic standards, and the teacher-training program that goes along with it.

  Neither issue is a subject of bargaining. But the programs have become a sort of catch-all target for teachers who blame Wilhoyte for everything from the poor state of labor-management relations to the current contract impasse.

  Wilhoyte, who was hired in part to implement the district's 1991 strategic plan, including establishing rigorous standards, says carrying out that plan is central to the compact she has with the ...
  

• The 2009 update to Madison's "Strategic Planning Process".
• Madison's 2012-2013 $392,000,000 budget (just under $15k per student)
• Madison's long term disastrous reading results
• The Madison school district's recent "achievement gap and accountability plan".
• The Capital Times (9.21.1992):

  Wilhoyte, on the other hand, has demonstrated that she is a tough, hands-on administrator in her role as assistant superintendent for instruction and school administration in Anne Arundel County, Maryland. And even those who have tangled with her praise her philosophy, which is to put kids first.

  She has been a leader in Maryland in shaking up the educational status quo, of moving it forward to meeat the needs of the children, even while juggling new programs with budget cuts. The big question remaining about her: She has never been a superintendent. How would she handle the top job?

• Retiring Ripon Superintendent Richard Zimman's 2009 speech to the Madison Rotary club.
• Madison Teachers, Inc. on the Madison Schools 2000 "Participatory Management"
• Notes and links on recent Madison Superintendent hires"

Matthew DeFour summarizes and collects some feedback on the District's press release here. It would be useful to dig into the archives and review the various strategic plans and initiatives over the years and compare the words and spending with results.

Deja vu.

Posted by Jim Zellmer at April 18, 2013 4:47 AM
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