Mar 9, 2020

Chapter Fifty-Five >>>>> Strategic Plan: Acceleration 2020 of the Minneapolis Public Schools: A Sorry Exercise in Goal Setting Unsupported by a Viable Plan of Action

Shortly after Ed Graff arrived to take the position of superintendent of the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS), he took stock of the prevailing Strategic Plan:  Acceleration 2020 and determined that this could not work as a plan of action for guiding the academic program of the district.  As he looked toward 2020, he began consideration of a Minneapolis Public Schools Comprehensive Design that was to take the place of the strategic plan in place upon his arrival.  The MPS Comprehensive District Design will not work either, for reasons that I will detail in a succeeding chapter, but Strategic Plan:  Acceleration 2020 was a particularly unrealistic exercise in goal setting lacking any force of action capable of achieving the stated goals.

 

A close look at Strategic Plan:  Acceleration 2020 of the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) reveals the document’s stark deficiencies as a guide for excellence in K-12 education.

 

This document was approved at a September 2014 meeting of the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education.  Via the program advocated in the pages of the work overseen by then Superintendent Bernadeia Johnson and Chief Executive Officer Michael Goar, the public schools of Minneapolis were to advance educational excellence and equity for all students enrolled in the district.

 

Six high-level goals were given in the document:  1) Improved Student Outcomes;  2) Equity;  3)  Family and Community Partnership;  4) Effective Teachers, School Leaders, and Staff;  5) Stewardship;  and 6) Resources for Students and Schools.

 

Goals offered in what was termed the “big, bold spirit of the 5-8-10 plan” included the following, to be attained in the run-up to year 2020:

 

>>>>>    5 percent annual increase in students overall meeting or exceeding state standards in reading

and math;

 

 >>>>>   8 percent annual increase in students meeting or exceeding state standards in reading

and math for MPS’s lowest performing students;

 

 >>>>>   10 percent annual increase in the four-year graduation rate

 

Officials at MPS declared that

 

Our targets are intentionally high to reignite a sense of urgency in the system and ensure that everyone is operating with growth mindset. Meeting these targets is absolutely possible.  Under this plan, we will achieve our vision of every child graduating college and career ready.”

 

The enormous amount of jargon and generality contained in Strategic Plan:  Acceleration 2020 is instructive for the similarity to the verbiage encountered in the new Minneapolis Public Schools Comprehensive District Design.

 

Toward the achievement of Goal Number One, Improved Student Outcomes, officials at MPS stressed that teachers at Grades Pre-K through Grade 3 should have routines in place for development of student reading and language skills;  that teachers at Grade 4 through Grade 12 and for adult learners should abet the development of such skills via guided academic conversations and “close reading”;  and that  teachers at Grade 6 through Grade 12 and for adult learners develop students’ math and science vocabulary and content knowledge using “literacy strategies.”  Also stressed were core instruction for all categories of learners;  personalized learning opportunities;  readiness at key points of transition from one major age grouping to another;  behavioral interventions that minimize suspensions;  and the availability of ethnic studies courses in high school.

 

Toward the achievement of Goal Number Two, Equity, officials at MPS emphasized the use of student data as examined and then acted upon by Professional Learning Communities of teachers at each site, problem-based learning and critical thinking;  multiple pathways to graduation via dual enrollment, Post-Secondary Options (PSEO), credit recovery, community-based GED and literacy programs, and online learning;  and availability of world languages.  Associate Superintendents were to monitor progress toward the goal of equity and the given sub-goals;  and staff at all schools are to be given proper supports, with enhanced supports at High Priority Schools and Focus Schools.

 

Toward the achievement of Goal Number Three, Family and Community Partnership, officials at MPS underscored the importance of engagement with families of students, with appropriate language translation and interpreting services, with training for teachers in communication with families, and with great effort made to provide accessible locations and temporally flexible times for familial participation.  They also stressed increases in corporate support, grant funding, and volunteers---  with ongoing monitoring of community partnerships for effectiveness.

 

Toward the achievement of Goal Number Four, Effective Teachers, School Leaders, and Staff, officials at MPS emphasized the need for diversity in hiring, identification and placement of individuals particularly suited for teaching and staff roles to meet the needs of students at certain schools, and the provision of training and supports for staff in performing to expectation.  There was also emphasis placed on providing leadership training and career advancement opportunities;  and on implementing Quality Compensation (Q-Comp) to promote staff retention and career development.   

 

Toward the achievement of Goal Number Five, Stewardship, officials at MPS stressed accountability on the part of administrators at all levels for the implementation of Strategic Plan:  Acceleration 2020 via ongoing assessment of effectiveness and adjustment of strategies as necessary; use of the Baldrige Criteria for Education Organizations as a guide to ongoing staff training in planning, management, decision-making and data collection and utilization;  and central office adjustments to abet increased school autonomy.

 

Toward the achievement of Goal Number Six, Resources for Students and Schools, officials at the district MPS emphasized “zero-based budgeting” to assure that funds are used where they are truly needed, with allocations prioritized for the classroom, and with attention to services pertinent to transportation, food security, instructional technology, school environment, and athletics that have a direct impact on students’ lives.

 

All of these goals were to be attained in the context of an inclination toward school autonomy and upon the conviction that the individual site---  the school---  is the meaningful unit of change and that school staff members should have flexibility to meet the needs of their particular student population. 

 

………………………………………………………………….

 

Stating that the school is the unit of change, with attention to the needs of particular populations, is one of those expressions that can float into the ears of people without giving offense and even seeming favorable---  but actually may be harmful, depending on those devils called details. 

 

In reality, in the United States the locally centralized district itself must be the unit of change.  At that level, we must specify a knowledge-rich curriculum for implementation throughout the schools of MPS, for impartation by knowledgeable teachers trained by the school district itself.  With the definition of an excellent education, the identification of a knowledge-rich curriculum, and the training of knowledgeable teachers accomplished, then most functions of the central bureaucracy could be moved out to the individual sites, with principals and teachers given responsibility for implementation.  With the central bureaucracy having acted meaningfully as the original unit of change, the sites will then become subsidiary units of change. 

 

Remember that an

 

excellent education is a matter of excellent teachers imparting a knowledge-intensive, logically seqauenced curriculum in the liberal (mathematics, natural science, history, economics, literature, fine arts), technological, and industrial arts to students of all demographic descriptors throughout the K-12 years.

 

And remember that

 

an excellent teacher is a professional of deep and broad knowledge with the pedagogical ability to impart that knowledge to all students.

                                                                                                                                                                          

Remember also that the

 

purpose of an excellent K-12 education in the liberal, technological, and industrial arts is to provide maximum probability that students will graduate with the likelihood of going forth to lives of cultural enrichment, civic participation, and professional satisfaction.   

 

With those succinct definitions and observations, I have provided more detail in my vision of an excellent education than officials at the Minneapolis Public Schools have given in their entire Strategic Plan:  Acceleration 2020 document---  or that they give in the projected academic program in the Minneapolis Public Schools Comprehensive District Design

 

In the Strategic Plan:  Acceleration 2020, the most specific statements were those pertinent to goals for student achievement;  and those identifying the school as the unit of change.  But those statements seem to assume that annual increases in math and reading skills (5% annually for the general student population,  8% for previously lowest-performing students),  and 10% annual increases in the four-year graduation rate;  can be attained without highly specific approaches for achieving results.  And MPS officials focus measurable goals on basic skills, while relying on site-based school innovation, multiple pathways, and linguistic and advanced course opportunities to forge a path to excellence.  

 

Relying on site-base innovation is a “Hail Mary” approach that the  Minneapolis Public Schools Comprehensive District Design seems to counter with a properly centralized plan auguring consistency and continuity from school to school.  But, lamentably, the jargon-infested generality of the Design will still find officials yelling, “Hail Mary”---  hoping for the best in a program wherein curriculum remains weak, teachers ill-trained, and the academic and life struggles of students with familial challenges of poverty and functionality go unaddressed.  

 

We will achieve educational excellence for all of our precious children when we specify a knowledge-rich curriculum for implementation in grade by grade sequence throughout the K-12 years.  Teachers of such an information-heavy curriculum must have a much stronger knowledge base than they have now. 

 

As I have detailed in other chapters, the knowledge base of our K-5 teachers is particularly wretched and must be rectified via mandatory acquisition of a challenging Masters of Liberal Arts degree for knowledge mastery in math, natural science, history, economics, literature, English usage, and the fine arts---  with a required master’s thesis and a full year of internship served under the guidance of the best teacher available;  this Masters of Liberal Arts degree must be superintended at the central school district (MPS) level, with instruction provided by professors and other experts in their fields of instruction.    

 

Secondary (Grade 6 through Grade 12) teachers should possess an academic master’s degree (granted in legitimate disciplines, not from faculty composed of education professors) and serve the same full year of internship as given for K-5 teachers.

 

This level of specificity for achieving excellent education, detailed in part Three, Philosophy, is what was missing from the  Strategic Plan:  Acceleration 2020 document of MPS, and from the Minneapolis Public Schools Comprehensive District Design.

 

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