Two Types of Superintendent

[tonysam]

Diane Ravitch hits it on the head, as usual:

On one hand is the traditional superintendent, who believes that he is responsible for the schools and students in his care. He visits the schools often and consults frequently with mid-level superintendents to make sure that the schools get the resources they need. When a school is in trouble, he sends in a team of experienced educators to assess its needs and devise a plan to help the staff. If the school continues to struggle, he works harder to try to solve the problems. He may decide to remove the principal and shake up the staff. He is relentless in trying to get the school to function well. This superintendent believes that he will be judged by his efforts to help the neediest of the students and schools.

On the other hand is the new breed of reform superintendent. Whether he (or she) was a business executive, an education entrepreneur, or a lawyer, he is steeped in a business mindset. He wants results. He surrounds himself with business school graduates, lawyers, marketing consultants, and public relations staff. He focuses on management, organization, budgeting, and data-driven decision-making. He shows little or no interest in curriculum and instruction, about which he knows very little. He is certain that the way to reform the schools is to "incent" the workforce. He believes that accountability, with rewards and sanctions, makes the world go round. He plans to "drive" change through the system by being a tough manager, awarding merit pay to teachers and principals, closing struggling schools, and opening new schools and charter schools, all the while using data as his guide. He believes that the schools he oversees are like a stock portfolio; it is his job not to fix them but to pick winners and losers. The winners get extra money, and the losers are thrown out of the portfolio. When addressing the business community, he speaks proudly of his plan to give maximum autonomy to school principals, thus absolving himself of any responsibility for the performance of the schools, and then sits back to manage his portfolio. If a school fails, he is fast to close it. The failure is not his fault, but the fault of the principal and the teachers.

You can see why the reform superintendent would love the Race to the Top. It incorporates all the principles that he loves. Charter schools, accountability, merit pay, school closings, data-driven decision-making. It is the same mindset, the same belief in rewards and sanctions that we have seen in NCLB, taken to a higher level with a pot of gold containing almost $5 billion at the end of the rainbow. (I read a blog a few days ago, forget which one, that refers to RTTT as "dash to the cash.")

Now, the problem with the reform superintendent is that he usually knows very little about schooling and education. He focuses on organization and strategic planning and so on, but is in the dark about what happens in the classroom. This is why he relies so much on data. Numbers don't lie, do they?

More

School districts are full of these "reform" superintendents such as the Eli Broad "Superintendents Academy" graduates. They are wrecking public education.

[Warpy]

1. You should see what MBAs have done to health care

They've practiced on hospitals, insurance companies, nursing agencies, and all other facets of health care for decades. They're just getting to you guys.

[tonysam]

2. It's a mess. Eli Broad is specifically recruiting for MBAs

as superintendents, and of course they don't know anything.

There is even talk about recruiting MBAs as principals, which is nothing short of insane.

[tonysam]

3. By the way, there is no point unrec'ing this thread

Ravitch's column is absolutely true. The last thing we need are these idiots like the Eli Broad types running public school districts.

They are poison.

[Catshrink]

4. Indeed, they are poison.

How do these MBA sups and principals handle angry parents? Bet they give in every time without asking the teacher about the situation. All of my admins came from the ranks of teachers, one is from a family of teachers. I consider myself lucky...for now. Things are changing rapidly.

:hi: