Yesterday brought the release of a three-year study on the eight earliest Denver innovation schools — including Bruce Randolph, Cole, Manual and Montclair. One key, hopeful finding? Successful innovation schools exhibit “positive cultures,” which contributes to steady, effective principal leadership.

Still, the two news stories on the study make similar points. The Denver Post highlights that innovation status is simply a tool, not a magic bullet. Meanwhile, Ed News Colorado’s headline trumpets the major (and not terribly surprising) finding that the “innovation law doesn’t spark major change.” One point in the study touched on in the latter story did cause me to roll my eyes a bit:

In particular, according to the report, principals, teachers and parents cited as positives greater control over how and when they hire, the ability to opt out of direct teacher placements by the district and the use of one-year contracts to ensure new hires are a good fit with the school’s mission.

Still, the findings on innovation schools’ staff were acknowledged as a concern by some, including Carolyn Crowder, executive director of the Denver teachers’ union. The report noted teachers at the eight schools were less experienced – by about three years – and less likely to have master’s degrees than teachers in five comparison schools.

For anyone primarily concerned about what innovation status means for improved student learning, the only response is: So what??? Every shred of research shows no connection between teacher master degrees and student learning. Nearly all research shows that teacher effectiveness plateaus after three to five years of acquired experience.

And guess what? The study’s detailed findings reveal that average teacher experience in innovation schools is about 6 years, as opposed to 9 years in non-innovation schools. Of all the findings to be concerned about in the report, this one should hardly cause more than a yawn.

I still have some hope for innovation schools — some will succeed. Though in the end charters are a more promising option. But the new report certainly leaves some food for thought about the ambiguities that remain unresolved, as well as some questions about which schools will fulfill their potential effectiveness.

Expanding to the 100 largest districts, as Biddle urges, would include some of Colorado’s own. I’m pretty sure Denver Public Schools would do well on the ECCI, given the commitment to expanding charter and innovation school options. Interestingly, the Denver Post featured a piece yesterday about how DPS schools are increasing their efforts to market themselves to parents.

For those paying attention, it’s not the first time the local media has brought attention to this trend of a more active, consumer-oriented approach going on in Denver schools. Which means it’s not the first time I get to tell you about the important role our fabulous School Choice for Kids website has to play in arming parents with some key information.

Of course, the site covers not only Denver but all of Colorado. Which makes me wonder how Douglas County — with its one-of-a-kind local board-initiated voucher program (not to mention a healthy charter sector) — would fare on the ECCI. An index worth its salt would have to relate Jefferson County and Cherry Creek lower. So I guess for now, little ol’ me will just have to content myself with wondering what an expanded version of the Brookings educational choice index would look like.

Four years ago Education Policy Center director Pam Benigno wrote an article suggesting that online learning technologies were pushing school district boundaries into irrelevance. Of all places, the article was published in the Colorado Association of School Boards’ (now defunct) Prism magazine. (Sadly, no link is available.)

Finn fleshes out the increasing policy and governance dilemmas as online and blended learning begin to skyrocket in popularity:

But which government would write the ground rules for cyber-schooling and hold its vendors to account for their results? Who would set distance learning’s academic requirements and assessments? And who would pay for kids to attend them or — in an even more complicated scenario — to take separate courses from several of them, in order to assemble a curriculum tailored to each student? Districts? States? The federal government? Encumbered by the old LEA model, we have no governance mechanism well suited to answering these questions — certainly not local school boards with geographically bounded jurisdictions.

In a thoughtful follow-up, fellow Fordham-ite (and local school board member) Peter Meyer concedes that the “Beyond the School District” argument “makes sense.” His perspective is crucial, as he explains how he has seen firsthand the “tangled web” of bureaucratic dysfunction that afflicts many boards. I almost can envision many heads nodding as they read Meyer’s piece.

Unlike many other areas of education reform, this is one in which Colorado would not figure to be a leader. Why? Finn himself points out that Colorado is in a small, select group in which school districts “are enshrined in the state constitutions.” And with that comes some measure of more power to effect positive, effective change within each of our state’s 178 school districts. That might help explain why Douglas County is such a shining light in the area of choice-friendly policies.

On the other hand, the Centennial State not only has a strong and growing charter school sector but also pioneered the Innovation Schools Act that expanded the sphere of autonomous school-level leadership. It’s not about wishing away school boards to strengthen the hand of state or federal agencies but to bring the decision-making to an even more local level.

That’s exactly Finn’s point: School districts and boards are likely to fade away not because we need less local control but because we need more of it. Move beyond the segregated local property tax bases, and attach dollars to students based on need to choose their school (aka “weighted student funding”):

And it is with taxpayers and parents that the responsibility for educating our children should ultimately lie. The original principle behind our local governance system was that the people who had the most invested in their schools and the most to gain from them — as well as the best, most direct knowledge of whom those schools needed to serve and what services they needed to provide — should govern them. Over the past century and a half, we have drifted far away from that original aim — to the detriment of America’s students. For their benefit, and for the nation’s, we must now endeavor to make education local again.

It’s hard to get more local than the student and the parent.

“It’s really catching fire,’’ said Paul Reville, the state’s education secretary. “I would predict innovation schools in a relatively short period of time could surpass the number of charter schools in the state if the growth continues at the rate we’ve seen recently.’’ …

Innovation schools and the state’s 56 independently run charter schools are similar in that decisions about curriculum, staffing, and budgeting are made by a school-based governing board with the goal of crafting programs that meet the specific needs of their students.

But unlike charter schools, which report directly to the state, innovation schools must negotiate the extent of the freedom to make their own decisions with the superintendent and School Committee, and are bound by most provisions of the district’s teachers union contract.

Now I’ll be honest with you. Other than sharing the same name and some of the basic features as provided in this article, I don’t know precisely how Massachusetts innovation school policy compares with its Colorado counterpart.

But the timing of the article was perfect, given a thoughtful new Ed News Colorado blog piece by Peter Huidekoper. The author makes a strong case that our state’s Innovation Schools Act has not fulfilled its promise. Huidekoper’s posting is based on his recent interview with Rob Stein, former principal of Denver’s Manual High School, one of the state’s first “innovation schools.” Among the real and possible problems identified that may limit the law’s effectiveness:

• A reticent K-12 education culture that has embraced the innovation school process somewhat in Denver, but very little around the state;
• Conversely, an application process that may make it too easy to obtain innovation status;
• Innovation school principals remain employees of the district, bringing more confusion than clarity to the school’s mission and direction; and, on a related note,
• Ambiguities concerning who is in charge of the school, leading to tensions in Denver that still remain unresolved more than a year after I brought the topic to your attention. (“[Stein] now says that the lack of clarity on how much authority the school and principal have with the Innovation status makes ‘charters a better model. They have worked out the kinks.’”)

Let me be clear: I believe there is still a place for the Innovation Schools Act. But 1) it may be time for lawmakers to look seriously at how the rough edges of the law can be fixed and improved, and 2) it should never, NEVER be seen as a tool to supplant charter schools. In which case, the Massachusetts’ education secretary’s quote you read at the beginning of this post could be seen as a red flag warning.

Huidekoper’s piece offers some great reminders: Do all our education reform ideas come to fruition as we planned them? Are we content to compare our education reform plans with the status quo, or are we at all interested in looking for ways to make them better? The challenge lives on.

In one key cost-saving move, the District 49 board further streamlined bureaucracy by consolidating positions and converting two key administrative posts from employees into contract jobs. Then yesterday the Gazette reported that leaders were floating the idea of opening a military academy, among the many innovations being considered and implemented.

All this while an apparently misguided effort to recall one of the key school board members moves forward. Though that particular development is hardly surprising. Significant change toward productivity and innovation, in the political sphere of public K-12 education, is almost certain to generate some resistance and backlash. I hope that this activity doesn’t thwart, slow down or throw off course the landmark innovation efforts underway in Falcon.

Need more context? Here’s a look back at some other items I’ve written this year on District 49:

• January 13: Landmark Day for Colorado K-12 Productivity and Innovation?
• Innovation and Autonomy Tie DeGrow’s New Op-Ed to State of the Union Address
• Staff, Parents Discuss Falcon Innovation: Ideas Emerging as Promise Remains Strong
• Falcon 49 School Bus Capital Photo-Op: Serious About Tough Decisions Ahead?
• Falcon 49 Takes Another Noteworthy Bold Step in Following Innovative Path

Stay tuned to the Gazette and this blog for more as the year unfolds, and District 49 moves closer to its formal Innovation Schools Act proposal.

A staffing plan that eliminates 143 jobs, including teaching positions, in Falcon School District 49 was approved Wednesday by the school board.

Board members also voted to reinstate the Transportation Department as fee-for-service operation with no budget other than the money necessary to bus special education students. That vote caused the crowd at Falcon High School to erupt in applause.

After that cheerful moment, Chief Education Officer Becky Carter delivered her staffing plan, which was approved but not released Wednesday. It eliminated 108 positions in schools; 16 in learning and pupil services; 10 in special education; six in facility maintenance, and three 3 in other/administration.

Of course, Falcon 49 is the 15,000-student school district in the Pikes Peak region that’s pursuing innovation district status. The school board set the budget parameters for each of the four zones of innovation and left specific decisions on staffing positions (except for proposed cuts at the shrinking central administration level) up to the building principals and zone leaders.

Using admittedly year-old Colorado Department of Education data, the result looks like about an 8 percent reduction in the workforce — or moving from roughly 1 staff member per 8 students closer to a ratio of 1:9. Much of the downsizing will be achieved through attrition, but school- and zone-level proposals to change programs will also impact some existing support staff, paraprofessionals, and non-probationary teachers who end up applying unsuccessfully for other positions within the district.

Falcon 49 is reducing 2011-12 spending by $10.5 million – $11 million, a result of federal ARRA stimulus dollars drying up; required contribution increases to PERA, Colorado’s public employee pension system; pressing capital and technology needs; and uncertainty about state K-12 spending. Board treasurer Andy Holloman told the Education Policy Center’s Ben DeGrow that plans were made based on the originally proposed $332 million cut to K-12 rather than lesser reductions that have been promised in the current iteration of the School Finance Act.

“As much as we want to believe in the state, they often will come back and pull [some money] out later in the middle of the year,” Holloman said. “We decided to make deeper cuts now rather than later, so we hope to be better prepared for that.”

As the Gazette article explains, the Falcon 49 Board also opted against cutting the district’s transportation services, but required the department to self-fund. That likely means fees will be put into effect. Still, the big story in Falcon remains the district’s forward-thinking innovation plan. “We believe we will come out of this not just more efficient but more effective, too,” said Holloman.

Key to that success is increasing parental involvement, as well as empowering individual teachers. “If there were problems in the classroom, the central office was blamed,” he said. “We took that excuse away.”

Tough decisions are being made, as Falcon pursues a bold and innovative path. A lot of interested eyes will continue to watch and see just how this leads to better results for students.

“Trigger?” I hear you say. “Whoaaaa, horsey!” (Some of you old-timers might get that one.)

Calm down. Don’t get your saddle in a bunch. The bill doesn’t have anything to do with guns or Second Amendment issues, or you might see the Independence Institute’s Dave Kopel writing about this rather than yours truly. The good folks at the Heartland Institute, who have widely promoted the parent trigger concept, explain it well:

The Parent Trigger is an innovation in education reform recently passed into law in California. Briefly put, if half the parents whose children attend a failing public school sign a petition requesting reform of the school, the school must either shut down, become a charter school, or undergo one of two other types of reform.

While telling you five weeks ago about our own upcoming legislative session, I brought attention to one new state representative who was considering introducing a similar version of the proposal here in Colorado (as reported in Ed News Colorado):

Freshman Rep. Don Beezley, R-Broomfield, said, “You’ll find me pretty focused on charter schools and parent empowerment. I’m looking at a couple of charter-related bills.” Specifics remain to be fleshed out; “We’re working on it.”

Beezley said he’s interested in the “parent trigger” idea, referring to a California law that allows organized parents to take over a failing school and have it turned in to a charter, its teachers and principals replaced.

So even as I read about the idea gaining traction in Georgia, I was reminded of Rep. Beezley’s comments. Word on the street is that the specifics are being fleshed out and that an official bill should be introduced soon. Charter and innovation school options should both be on the table. Empowers parents of students in a poorly-performing school to choose a high-quality reform option? The idea can’t come soon enough for me (but then again, I’m 5 years old and have very little patience).

Well, as then-candidate and now-governor John Hickenlooper made famous last year, let’s hope Colorado’s own version of the “parent trigger” is ready to Giddy Up!

I doubt the proposal will breeze through, and some details may need to be worked out. As reported in Ed News Colorado, Kit Carson’s superintendent caught some preliminary pushback from one State Board member:

Angelika Schroeder, D-2nd District, said, “I haven’t heard the innovation” in the plan. She suggested Kit Carson should help pilot implementation of SB 10-191.

A challenge for Keefe will be exactly that: justifying the need for the innovation proposal so shortly after the passage of a nationally hailed piece of legislation to reform Colorado’s teacher tenure and evaluation system. The 109-student Kit Carson R-1 seeks to include student academic growth as a smaller share of evaluations than prescribed by SB 191. The district also seeks to extend the probationary period for earning tenure from 3 years to 5 years — with periodic reviews thereafter — but without SB 191’s requirement of proving an educator’s effectiveness first. On another note, they also propose to waive licensure requirements so non-traditional experts could be allowed into a classroom to teach.

What do I know? Kit Carson got 100% support from staff and board members for its innovation proposal, and Superintendent Keefe knowledgeably and confidently asserts that it’s right for his rural district. From a policy perspective, some aspects of the proposal are clear improvements on the status quo, while some appear more mixed. But that may only matter as it ties to the lingering question in this discussion:

To what extent will Kit Carson’s proposed actions be seen just as a good step for its district and to what extent will they be seen as forging a template for other districts (especially rural ones) who might seek innovation status?

Overall, I feel confident about Kit Carson taking a flexible approach to SB 191 — much more than with most medium- or large-sized districts who need improvement in this area. (The waiver from teacher licensure is a different matter altogether.) But even that could be determined on a case-by-case basis, which means the State Board has an important role to play in deciding exactly how to handle Kit Carson’s proposal.

Phew! File that all away in the back of your mind. Kit Carson’s innovation proposal is slated to be formally heard and voted on by the State Board at its March meeting. For now, I’ll leave you with this lighthearted note from the Ed News Colorado story:

Keefe pointed out the absurdity of applying SB 10-191’s requirement that principal evaluations be based 50 percent on student growth. Noting that he’s both superintendent and principal, Keefe asked, “What’s the school board going to do, fire half of me?”

I honestly never thought of it that way before.

A couple weeks ago I told you about what’s going on in Falcon School District 49 near Colorado Springs, and the beginnings of their creative attempt to restructure the school district. Well, the Falcon board voted to move forward with the innovation plan — a decision Ben lauds and highlights in his Gazette op-ed.

You can find out more about Falcon’s innovation plan by listening to an iVoices podcast with school board member Chris Wright, or by visiting a new page created on the district’s website. A main tenet of the plan is moving greater autonomy from the central administrative office to the schools in the different innovation zones. To get there, the district plans to request Innovation status from the State Board of Education — a step empowered by the creation of Colorado’s 2008 Innovation Schools Act.

But what was the genesis of the groundbreaking piece of legislation? A high-need school with a bold principal (Kristin Waters, now helping to lead DPS superintendent Tom Boasberg’s efforts on innovation and reform) and dedicated teachers seeking freedom from state and local regulations to serve their students more effectively. Yes, I’m talking about the Bruce Randolph School — a 6th-to-12th grade school that President Obama highlighted by name as a success story during last night’s State of the Union address.

In December 2007, back in the Dark Ages before I started blogging, Bruce Randolph’s quest for freedom and autonomy broke as a big story in Denver. One good way to get up to speed is to listen to this iVoices podcast from the archives with Alan Gottlieb, publisher of Education News Colorado. He and Ben DeGrow (who also penned a 2008 op-ed on the topic) discussed among other things the great story of how many groups and individuals came together to send congratulatory floral bouquets to Bruce Randolph School. When angry Denver teachers union officials saw that the Independence Institute was among those sending flowers, they ridiculously accused the fellow flower-sending Public Education and Business Coalition of being “anti-public education.” Ah, memories.

Anyway, in his edu-analysis of the President’s big speech, Eduwonk brings attention to Bruce Randolph and asks:

Overlooked story angle? A black swan? How many schools in CO have subsequently done this?

To answer briefly, the first two schools to follow Bruce Randolph in achieving greater autonomy by gaining approval under the Innovation Schools Act were Manual High School and Montclair Elementary in March 2009. Five months later came the Cole Arts and Science Academy. Another Denver school, Valdez Elementary, followed suit in June 2010. Two months later Wasson High School in Colorado Springs spread the trend outside the state’s largest city. And that doesn’t include the far northeast Denver zone of innovation, which is a whole other story. (So is the district-innovation schools conflict over implementation that was still being hashed out as recently as last fall.)

Now, to come full circle, the Falcon School District has innovation status in its sights. But it probably won’t become the first district to achieve the status. Tiny, rural Kit Carson School District on the Eastern Plains looks like it will be in line for that designation. (But that’s a story for another day.)

A couple observations, first about the school districts. As Ed News Colorado’s Nancy Mitchell explains and breaks down, there are five levels of rating districts can earn from the state’s Department of Education. Only 14 of 178 earned the highest (“Accredited with Distinction”), while 7 districts received the lowest (“Accredited with Turnaround”). Most districts fall somewhere in between.

Many times we’ve heard during the discussion about Douglas County’s groundbreaking private school choice proposals (which passed on to the superintendent in resolution form on Tuesday night) that the district doesn’t need choice because it’s the highest-performing district in the state. But a careful look at the list shows Douglas County isn’t anywhere in the top 14 “with distinction.” Maybe — just maybe — a whole slate of expanded choices and options for families will help the district compete and rise to the top. Hmmmm.

With the governor’s blessing today, the Colorado Department of Education also recognized 32 schools as “Centers of Excellence” for demonstrating the highest rates of student academic growth while serving at-risk student populations (75 percent or more). Included on the list are a number of Denver schools I have highlighted to you before, such as:

• Beach Court Elementary (neighborhood school)
• Cole Arts and Science Academy (K-8 innovation school)
• KIPP Sunshine Peak Academy (K-8 charter school)
• West Denver Prep — Federal campus (6-8 charter school)
• West Denver Prep — Harvey Park campus (6-8 charter school)

Congratulations to all 32 schools and 14 districts that received these highest honors. Now onward and upward to even greater things for Colorado students!