Give Every School Site Key to Its Own Reform

It was disturbing, but not surprising, that a recent Times’ poll found that the majority of parents in the Los Angeles Unified School District have a dismally low opinion of their public schools. These views, however, are in striking contrast to those of parents whose children attend schools where grass-roots reform is taking place. Parents with children on these campuses show a higher level of confidence in the schools.

The Times reported earlier this month that 70% of district residents believe the LAUSD is doing a poor job. By contrast, surveys conducted for the Los Angeles Educational Alliance for Restructuring Now of schools that follow the reform principles espoused by LEARN and the Los Angeles Annenberg Metropolitan Project, LAAMP, indicate that parents of children attending these schools are much more positive about their children’s educational experience.

In the annual LEARN Stakeholders’ Satisfaction Survey for the 1998-99 school year, 80% of parents of children at the 377 LEARN campuses said they are satisfied with their child’s school. The survey found that teachers, principals, support staff and students also are more satisfied. Included among the LEARN schools are about 125 campuses that receive additional support for their reform programs from LAAMP.

What do these differences tell us? Intensive, school-based reform works. Students at schools instituting LEARN and other reform programs outperform students at schools with no reforms in place. And along with this encouraging academic progress comes subsequent improvement in parent satisfaction and support for local schools.

The Times’ poll also indicated that, while most parents have a dismal opinion of the schools, a large majority--83%--still believe the district can improve. The success of LEARN, LAAMP and other reform efforts, which foster a “can-do” culture of excellence, strongly suggests that this belief is warranted--but only if the district commits itself to reform in individual schools.

The new school board and the district’s top management are moving ahead quickly with a plan to restructure and streamline a top-heavy bureaucracy that for decades has doomed the district’s 710,000 students to academic mediocrity. The plan, which also calls for creating 11 local districts with 50,000 to 77,000 students each, represents a good first step toward pushing decision-making authority to the school site level.

LAAMP and LEARN, which recently formed the LAAMP/LEARN Regional School Reform Alliance, have insisted for nearly a decade that placing more budget and decision-making autonomy and accountability at the local school site level is critical to improving academic performance and generating greater parental involvement and support.

Although reorganization of the LAUSD will move the district toward the goal of local autonomy and accountability, the most challenging task--to fundamentally change the district’s command-and-control culture--still lies ahead. For one thing, schools must have more flexibility in curriculum. And the district must leverage the experience of LAAMP, LEARN and other reform efforts by extending their “best practices” to all campuses.

Above all, the new general superintendent being sought by the district, as well as the 11 new district superintendents, should be chosen based on their proven ability to improve student learning within a decentralized system in which decisions are shared and everyone is accountable.

So far, the word from district headquarters has been encouraging. Interim Supt. Ramon C. Cortines has repeatedly said the district will remain open-minded and flexible in implementing its restructuring program. Yet, we must remain vigilant. We urge everyone in the community, especially parents, to seize this opportunity to learn more about these issues and to express their views by communicating directly with the school board, Cortines and their local school principals.

The LAUSD is at a crossroads. Ten years of experience with LEARN, LAAMP and other reform programs make it abundantly clear which path will ensure the success of the district’s new plan: the path that leads to control and accountability within each school in the district.