Important school bond issue coming in November!

In August, the Dallas ISD Board of Trustees voted to bring a $1.6 billion bond proposal to the citizens of Dallas on November 3. The proposal is based on the recommendations of the Future Facilities Task Force, commissioned last fall by the superintendent and comprised of community members appointed by the Board of Trustees to represent each of their districts.

  The proposed bond for Dallas ISD is anticipated to fund new schools, expanded academic programs, and facility improvements at almost every district school.

The Hub contains an interactive online map that details the proposed projects that are currently anticipated to be funded with bond proceeds. Click here to view the map and learn more.

If you need additional information, please visit www.dallasisd.org/bond2015. Should you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at pblackmon@dallasisd.org.

Thank you, Paula C. Blackmon
Senior Executive Director Intergovernmental Affairs and Community Relations
Dallas Independent School District
 

Parents' investment in enrichment

Gap on enrichment expenditures reflected below.

Reckon money matters to children and their ability to learn?

Red state, blue state. . .the children

Gerald Britt, VP with CitySquare speaks up. . .

To hear Rev. Gerald Britt, CitySquare VP of Public Policy and Workforce Development, respond to calls for the firing of Dallas Independent School District Superintendent, Mike Miles click here.

Facts about public education in Dallas County

• Dallas County has roughly 2.5 million residents and over 800,000 students involved in early childhood, public K-12 and higher education.
• They are educated by 1500+ early childhood providers, 15 ISDs, 80 different charter schools and numerous 2-year and 4-year all operating in an independent manner with insufficient sharing of data, best practices or coordination of strategic plans.
• About 70% of students in Dallas Count public schools are eligible for free and reduced lunch.
• Every year almost 5,000 students who started 9th grade at the same time in a Dallas County public school fail to graduate from high school.
• The average college graduate earns roughly $1 million in their lifetime that a high school dropout.
• The cost to the Dallas region for each 9th grade cohort's subsequent failure to send 100% of students to some type of post-secondary education is over $5 billion!
• By 2040, if current educational attainment trends persist, Texans will experience the following:  $15 billion delcine in state tax revenue; 15% increase in number of households living in poverty; increase of 100,000 in prison population and additional $1.5 billion per year in incarceration costs. 

(Data drawn from materials published by Commit in Dallas, Texas)



More on CitySquare's 17th Annual Urban Ministries Prayer Breakfast!

One of the reasons that this year's prayer breakfast promises to be among the best we've ever hosted at CitySquare is our participants' list! 

The morning will be fast-paced and filled with experts and important leaders. 

Our own Rev. Gerald Britt will make an opening statement as he introduces Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings, a champion of public education and a leader with a heart for renewal and reform for the sake of every DISD student. 

Following the Mayor's remarks, he and Gerald will join a distingished panel that includes representatives from Commit!, Educate Dallas and the United Way of Metropolitan Dallas.

Be sure and read my post from yesterday.  Whatever you do, don't miss our special morning on April 12!

Just Ahead: 17th Annual Urban Ministries Prayer Breakfast

Each year the CitySquare Urban Ministries Prayer Breakfast turns out to be one of the highlight public events shared in Dallas. This year may be our most important one to date, especially in terms of content, message and challenge.

Public education in our city must improve. With a national search underway to identify the next leader of the Dallas Independent School District and with challenge upon challenge facing our students, the public forum we've organized will be extremely relevant and important.

If you care about Dallas and the children of the city, you won't want to miss this special event.

If I were the next Superintendent of the Dallas Public Schools

Can you imagine the enormity of such a challenge?  To move into our school district, so riddled by poverty, economic and educational disparity, high drop out rates and very low outcomes on producing college-ready graduates--talk about a challenge.

I agree with those who identify poverty as the biggest challenge facing our district, its students and our next district leader. 

What would I do if I were the next superintendent of DISD?  Here's my short list of action items to plant in the school culture over the first 5 years.

1.  Identify "master teachers" already at work in the schools.  Every school has them.  Everyone knows who they are.  But how do we leverage their success to benefit other faculty members, as well as students who will never benefit from the experience of their classrooms?  There is a way to infiltrate and inject the attitude, methods and commitment of master teachers through and into the rest of the teaching team.  Call leading teachers into the leadership mix of each campus.  Then, keep track of outcomes.

2.  Establish an on-the-ground, at-the-campus, working relationship with the Texas Department of Health and Human Services, as well as other public agencies.  In short, move the offices of public benefits to the schools, or at least establish certification or enrollment days for parents from low income families to be able to register for various benefits that can help stabilize poor families for the benefits of students.  Make things easier to access and more customer friendly.  If poverty is our biggest challenge, then let's decide together to attack it systematically!  Why  should eligible parents have to go to an office located somewhere else, to deal with strangers regarding CHIP registration, or Food Stamp enrollment, or assistance with childcare, or housing, or EITC filings?  Those at the top benefit from financial counselors.  Why shouldn't those at the bottom enjoy similar services from benefits counselors.  The key to this campus transformation would be to let parents know that enrollment in benefits is not only for them and their children, but also for the entire school and its success. 

3.  Position principals to function as campus leaders with clear expectations linked to individual student improvement and progress, rather than to the next standardized test.  Each student learns at a different pace and in a different way.  Measure student improvement and index school leaders' performance to the creation of a culture of excellence that encourages students to grow and excel in their own styles over a longer course of evaluation.

4.  Don't shortchange the extra-curricular.  One of the reasons low-income students don't achieve more readily has to do with what I call "experience disparity" when compared to more affluent students.  Learning must take place outside the classroom, as well as inside.  Vocabulary is developed in a process of discovering life both in books and in the laboratory that is our world.  Poor kids need more experienced-based educational opportunities. Let's provide them what they need.  Then, let's tie what is discovered "out there" to what we are doing "in here." Restore music, art, theater and PE in every school no matter what it takes to fund excellence in these important developmental areas of study, expression, performance and curiosity.

5.  Incentivize learning performance and parent involvement with some sort of value added benefit.  Parent involvement with PTA or volunteering at school should be rewarded with something of immediate value, like discount coupons to local stores or gift cards that can be used to buy books, groceries or school clothes.  We make a grave error if we take our eye off the wicked curve ball called poverty.  Reward performance by returning something of real value.

6.  Form a closer working relationship with the City of Dallas, Dallas County, surrounding ISDs, businesses, corporations and universities.  Find ways to engage these other, huge institutions for the immediate benefit of our students today. 

7.  Develop a clear communications strategy for challenging students again and again regarding the importance DISD's mission and vision.  Repeatedly invite every student into the battle.  Rehearse and re-imagine the success that awaits us all if we learn to work together.

8.  Initiate a comprehensive evaluation of middle level administrators to the end that more resources find their way to the classrooms, the teachers and the students.  Schools should not settle for being a job factory for adults.  Streamlining away ineffective efforts, programs and departments should be top of the list for any new leader.  This means our new leader must be tough, proven and ready for battle!

9. Partner with community based non-profits like Avance and The Concilio here in Dallas to organize, train and equip parents to become the primary advocates for their children and for the education of their children.  Community organizing to ensure quality public education should never be considered a threat, but rather an expression of partnership and cooperation.  Getting parents and other community leaders involved will be a key component of any successful administration. 

I suppose my ideas are too simple.  And, I admit I enjoy the luxury of not being in the position of leadership.  But, I care about these children, and I understand the powerful negative impact of poverty on families and school systems.

DISD and poverty

Several years ago, a candidate for the Dallas School board dropped by my office to chat about his campaign efforts.  In the course of our conversation he asked me, "Larry, what do you consider the greatest challenge facing the DISD?"

I remember exactly what I told him:  "That is easy to answer and very, very difficult to overcome.  In a word, the biggest challenge facing our public schools is poverty." 

I'm not sure he liked my answer or agreed with my assessment, but I believe I was right then, and things have only grown more difficult.  So, I read with gratitude the editorial page comment from The Dallas Morning News on Sunday, February 12, 2012.  What follows is one part in the paper's series dubbed "Tactics for Turnaround project" dealing wtih the important enormous work that faces everyone who cares about urban, public education here in Dallas.  I hope you'll take the time to read the entire essay. 

Editorial: Poverty’s role in DISD reform

There’s no way to sugarcoat the serious challenges ahead for DISD’s next superintendent. One of the biggest is that Dallas public schools are overwhelmed by a worsening cycle of poverty. Less than a decade ago, 73 percent of students qualified for free or reduced-price lunches at school. Last year, that number had grown to 88 percent, and the trend shows no sign of reversing.

Poverty is by no means a pathway to failure. In fact, despite the growing number of poor children in DISD, dropout rates are declining, four-year graduation rates are up and some standardized test scores are improving. Poverty doesn’t have to be the insurmountable obstacle to success that some might assume.

Still, students living in poverty are far less likely to get the shot at success that all kids deserve. Studies show that, from birth through high school, children growing up in poor households tend to lack crucial developmental skills, proper health and nutrition, and the crucial component of parental involvement in their academic pursuits.

Even before they enter school, kids in poverty are more likely to have stunted vocabularies and be on track to develop debilitating health problems such as obesity. By kindergarten, if a child hasn’t developed a vocabulary of roughly 2,200 words, he or she is already behind, both in literacy and speaking ability. The problem is even worse for those children who don’t speak English; nearly 70 percent of the Dallas district’s student population is Hispanic.

To read the entire opinion click here.

COMMIT!

What follows describes Commit!, a new coalition of Dallas County stakeholders interested in improving public education in our community. Well worth your time to have a look. CitySquare is proud to be a supporter and involved.


Commit!

Our Mission

Commit! is a partnership of Dallas area stakeholders highly committed to the transformative power of education who are working together to ensure that all students graduate and succeed in college and/or the global work force.

The Need

Dallas County currently educates over 550,000 children in Grades K-12 across 16 different public school districts and 80 different public charter schools.

There are another 200,000+ children from ages 0-5 who receive a broad variety of early childhood services, ranging from an excellent Pre-K education to none at all.

Dallas County also houses numerous two-year and four-year higher education institutions, both public and private, which provide post-secondary education to over 100,000 students annually.

These 850,000 students, of which almost 70% are economically disadvantaged, are further supported by 300+ separate non-profits focused on a variety of areas, including but not limited to in-school, after school and summer school programs, mentoring, tutoring, literacy and college access. Each organization has their own strategic plan and often their own unique way of measuring success.

Commit!’s purpose is simple but ambitious….to help coordinate and align the various strategic plans found at each of these institutions toward a set of common, measurable goals adopted by the community as vitally important.

• Kindergarten readiness.
• Graduation from high school with 21st century skills.
• College and/or work force success.

The challenge is urgent. The need is great. Won’t you commit to join us?

“It’s amazing how much can be accomplished if no one cares who gets the credit.”

Visit Commit! website here.  Join the movement today!

Public education's obvious, dark secret

"Root cause of achievement gap is poverty. Test scores on SAT, ACT, state tests, NAEP, show a tight correlation. No surprise."

Diane Ravitch

Education gap. . .corporate response

Trisha Cunningham of Texas Instruments presented what follows at the Dallas Social Venture Partners' latest "Big Bang" conference here in Dallas.

Interesting in view of current challenges across the nation.


Trisha Cunningham, Texas Instruments from DallasSVP on Vimeo.

Detroit Renewal: Good jobs linked to education

Recently, The New York Times ran a great story about the renewal of downtown Detroit, Michigan. 

You can read it here.

Very encouraging stuff.

However, the poor will be left out and behind again unless access to training and motivation to engage such opportunties are found and found fast. 

Not different from Dallas in that regard, but the landscape change in Detroit is amazing!

Now, back to public education in the inner city. . . .

People or places?

Too many officials in troubled cities wrongly imagine that they can lead their city back to its former glories with some massive construction project--a new stadium or light rail system, a convention center, or a housing project.  With very few exceptions, no public policy can stem the tidal forces of urban change.  We mustn't ignore the needs of the poor people who live in the Rust Belt, but public policy should help poor people, not poor places.

Shiny new real estate may dress up a declining city, but it doesnt' solve its underlying problems.  The hallmark of declining cities is that they have too much housing and infrastructure relative to the strength of their economies.  With all that supply of structure and so little demand, it makes no sense to use public money to build more supply.  The folly of building-centric urban renewal reminds us that cities aren't structures; cities are people.

After Hurricane Katrina, the building boosters wanted to spend hundreds of billions rebuilding New Orleans, but if $200 billion has been given to the people who lived there, each of them would have gotten $400,000 to pay for moving or education or better housing somewhere else.  Even before the flood, New Orleans had done a mediocre job caring for its poor.  Did it really make sense to spend billions on the city's infrastructure, when money was so badly needed to help educate the children of New Orleans?  New Orleans' greatness always came from its people, not from its buildings.  Wouldn't it have made more sense to ask how federal spending could have done the most for the lives of Katrina's victims, even if they moved somewhere else? 

Ultimately, the job of urban government isn't to fund buildings or rail lines that can't possibly cover their costs, but to care for the city's citizens.  A mayor who can better educate a city's children so that they can find opportunity on the other side of the globe is succeeding, even if his city is getting smaller.

Edward Glaeser

Triumph of the City, page 9

____________________________________

I'm enjoying the thought of Edward Glaeser. 

At the same time, I'm wondering how his theories may fit in addressing the continuing challenge of bringing renewal, life, health and opportunity to a "geography" like that of the Southern Sector, a huge section of undeveloped and underdeveloped land here in Dallas, Texas?

For starters, this particular area of our city is not monolithic, or homogenious in any respect, save that of its basically depressed eoconomic vitality.  That said, there are regions of the sector that are severely depressed, as compared to others parts of the area that appear to present more hopeful possibilites. 

Glaeser is right about education.  For sure it presents the greatest, seemingly intractable challenge facing the southern part of our urban area.  Until public education in Dallas is "fixed," nothing of much significance will move forward or change in any substantive, positive manner, especially to the south.  The education problem in Dallas strangles progress, paralyzes the economy and dashes whatever hope might remain or be created along the way to "more of the same." 

As public education goes--in reality and in perception--so goes the housing and retail markets along with jobs and eoncomic vitality.  Our city has seen the flight of middle class families of all complexions from the city to the suburbs on the outside in search of better educational options for their children. 

While building programs, rail lines and infrastructure improvements will not answer the call to renovate public education (shoot, no one's thinking of building anything much to the south of Dallas anyway) some combination of vision, investment, community restructuring and focused attention seem in order. 

What if. . .

. . .Dallas developed a program for educaiton reform equivalent to some of the incentivized economic development vehicles that are in place Downtown and around the community (i. e. enterprise zones, TIFs, etc.)?  Why not block out a target area for special consideration with real attention given to managing entire "feeder patterns" where schools historically under-perform?

. . .Dallas overlaid such target areas with existing economic development tools and a real long-term commitment to public investment?

. . .Dallas courted area and national corporations to relocate to the south to build new, positive, planned developed, "company towns" where new, healthy economies could be built alongside renewing schools.  In exchange for tax abatements, companies would agree to train and employ a % of low-income wage workers alongside middle class wage earners. Such special enclaves would be defined by their commitment to great public schools, no exceptions, no excuses.

. . .the City of Dallas petitioned the state for some measure of involvement/control in managing the public schools in these special, target areas?  Many have argued that the DISD is too large.  By peeling off a portion of the responsibility, the city might contribute to the improvement of the entire system.  I know it's a radical idea, but, in my view, we are in need of a complete overhaul.

. . .principals were held accountable like other CEOs in the community on the basis of clear and meaningful metrics around student improvement, performance and university readiness? 

. . .every new "big project," like those Glaeser mentions, was vetted first for its role in improving the quality of life for these new, planned "excellence in education communities"?  Could we actually plan housing development and variety, community spaces, convention centers, and highway/transportation infrastructure around educational attainment goals and current "low-performing" areas?

. . .Sustainability, quality of life, communication, grassroots democracy and public health measures became first rate community priorities? 

Sorry, but I just wonder.

Cast a Vote in Pepsi Refresh Everything contest: Help DC Middle School!

My friend, Matt Worthington teachs at MacFarland Middle School in Washington, DC.  Read what he sent me recetnly and then go here to vote for his project via the Pepsi Refresh Everything contest.  Or, look just above at the voting widget to cast your ballot of support!

I'm emailing you asking for your blog support. My middle school, MacFarland Middle School in DC Public Schools (Waiting For Superman) is currently in the running to win $50,000 for an Apple Mobile Learning Lab through the Pepsi Refresh Everything contest. To be truthful, we're broke and with the nearly $800,000 we had to cut from our budget, we have absolutely no money for new technology in our building because the priority is maintaining staff. It's not the District's fault either, because I know they're working hard to get schools more money, but it's just not happening. So we enrolled in Pepsi's contest and now our project is live!

But we need votes. We're currently ranked 24 (down from 21) out 258 contestants, but in order to get the grant we have to rank top 10. I'm emailing you to ask for your advocacy during the month of June to ask your followers to vote for MacFarland at www.refresheverything.com/macfarlandmobile.

Here's three ways MacFarland Friends and Family can vote everyday:

1. Register to Vote & Vote Here Everyday

2. Text "107022" to 73774 (NO REGISTRATION REQUIRED)

3. POWER VOTING DAILY at our profile page using 10-digit codes found under Pepsi Bottle Caps and other Pepsi Products.

All in all, people can vote potentially 12 times a day, with a minimum of 52 votes cast per person everyday and a maximum 1002 votes using Pepsi's POWER VOTES.

Also, if you're able to do embed widgets on your blog, our profile page has some HTML code that you can plug right into a HTML widget and it'll have a little badge on your blog you can use for the month of June.

Let me know if you can support. We'd desperately appreciate it.

-Matt Worthington

Plan for Public Education by Mayoral Candidate Mike Rawlings

Dallas mayoral candidate, Mike Rawlings is out with his plan for how the City of Dallas can help improve the Dallas Independent School District. 

Read the plan here. 

One interesting aspect of the Rawlings plan involves recruiting a volunteer army of senior citizens to assist in the schools. . .Rawlings says up to 300,000! 

One thing you can say for Mike, he dreams big. 

My experience working with him when he was homeless czar for Dallas confirmed that he puts his money and his effort where his mouth is. 

Interesting race at t his point.

Thoughts?

Number 1 problem for public education and growing: poverty

[The following article by Katha Pollitt, "It Takes a Village, Not a Tiger," appeared in the February 28, 2011 edition of The Nation.]

Are you a tiger mother, a soccer mom, a helicopter parent, an attachment mom, a permissive free spirit who just wants your child to be herself?

Congratulations.

Your kids have a good chance of turning out reasonably well. Not because you are a parenting genius who has hit on the perfect method but because you have the time and energy and cultural capital to give your child what he needs to be successful in today’s world no matter what child-raising method you choose.

You are probably not, for example, poor, homeless, functionally illiterate, socially isolated, an addict, in prison, living in substandard housing, working three low-paid jobs—or unemployed for life.

You have books in your house, and probably a computer too.

You know enough to help your child with homework—and if not, you have the money or networks to find a tutor.

You feel comfortable volunteering at your child’s school, being in the PTA, calling the principal, going to parent-teacher conferences.

You can afford to take your child to the doctor and the dentist for regular care.

If your child should happen to get arrested, as quite a few do—if he’s caught with pot, say, or spray-paints graffiti, or jumps a turnstile—there’s a good chance that the charges can be made to go away, or at least not become part of his permanent record.

Your ex may have run off with your best friend, your apartment may be too small, you may hate your job—but you are still a white-collar, college-educated, middle-class person. And that makes all the difference for your children.

The biggest barrier to educational achievement today is not any of the things the media talk endlessly about: poorly prepared teachers, badly run schools, too many tests, low standards.

It’s child poverty—which, like poverty in general, has just dropped out of the discourse.

The Democrats don’t talk about it, except to wag the finger at deadbeat dads and teen moms, and the media don’t talk about it except in the context of crime or individual triumph. In fact, from the coverage you’d think our current crisis chiefly affected the middle classes—office managers, newly minted lawyers, college grads who have to move back in with their parents—when actually the unemployment rate for people with college degrees is 4.2 percent, which is where it was for all Americans before the recession.

By contrast, for those with only a high school diploma unemployment is 9.4 percent; for high school dropouts it’s 14.2 percent. And those figures measure only those actively looking for work, not the millions who’ve given up or have never held a job (some 16.5 percent of black men over 20). All those women pushed off welfare, called success stories because they got a job as a receptionist or a security guard or a clerk, with supposedly the hope of something better to come? Forget them.

Inconveniently, though, the poor and near poor, whom we don’t care about, come attached to children, for whom we supposedly have some concern. So how are the kids doing?

To read the entire essay click here.

Principal for a day. . .

On Tuesday I enjoyed the privilege of serving as "Principal-for-a-day" at Rufus C. Burleson Elementary School, a DISD school located in Pleasant Grove. 

While it may be true that there are poor schools, bad principals, unruly children and rotten teachers, I certainly did not see anything remotely resembling those characterizations during my day at "Burleson," as the students refer to the school. 

The building is old, but immaculately maintained and cared for. 

The atmosphere conveyed a sense of calm, quiet order. 

Students were well-behaved, teachers well-prepared. 

I visited classes from Pre-K to 6th grade (E. B. Comstock, the middle school in the feeder pattern is too crowded to accept this oldest class at Burleson).  In every setting the students were attentive, actively engaged in their learning activities and very respectful of their teachers and one another.

I sat in on band practice. 

I visited a great computer learning classroom where students worked hard on math skills. 

The PE class was fun. 

The art teacher a real creative sort. 

As I left the building, I ran into Yolanda Knight, the real Principal of the school.  She was walking the property with DISD planning officials who were evaluating the property for improvements.  Ms. Knight was lobbying hard for her kids. 

"Give this lady anything she wants," I counseled as I left.  "She knows what she's doing if what I just saw is any indication of her effectiveness."

What a great experience. . .except for one defining reality with which every one of these students must struggle:  poverty. 

Burleson's atmosphere couldn't be better.  Tweaked maybe, but not made substantially different or better.  The school reminded me of my elementary school experience.  Caring teachers.  Attentive students.  All of it. 

Then, I took a moment to look at their test scores. 

On the TAKS scale of "met minimum requirements," the older students seem to have improved slightly over the past three years, likely a tribute to the Principal and her team. 

The younger children who continue to use the Iowa Test of Basic Skills (I took that test!) and, in terms of performing at grade level, under-perform badly in math and only 61% read at grade level. 

Among older students (3-6 grades) 43% are college ready in math; 34% in reading; 40% in science and 65% in writing skills.  In terms of involvement, 93% attend classes 90% of the time.  Only half of the 5th graders are on track for middle school. 

What's going on here?  I had to ask myself that question. 

I think I know.

It's not the school. 

It's not the kids.

I don't think it's the parents or families, though I know popular wisdom would lay blame at their feet almost exclusively.  While parents must share in any blame game scorecard, they too are trapped in the same web of enduring difficulty. 

It's the entirety of the social milieu, the oppressive fabric of life lived in a complex community of urban poverty that stands behind the test scores, the limited expectations, the shortened personal possibility horizons and the realistic prospects for change. 

The parents of these children work very hard to keep their families housed, clothed and fed.  Most don't really make it, always playing catch up to keep things moving.  Burleson serves breakfast and lunch to its students, an indicator of both the income levels of their households and their persistent struggle with "making ends meet." 

I saw bright-eyed children in very worn clothing. 

Several years ago a candidate of DISD School Board asked me what I thought was the number one issue facing Dallas schools. 

My one-word reply surprised him.  "That one is easy:   poverty." 

My experience as a principal reconfirmed my idea. 

To improve public schools we'd better get serious about eliminating poverty. 

And, our ideas need to be larger than the enormity of the challenges we face in this regard. 

Much larger. 

Who's up for the battle?

Waiting for Superman: a film to see

Poverty and education

Eric Jensen has something to say about education and low-income children.  Jensen outlines his learning and approach in his book, Teaching with Poverty in Mind: What Being Poor Does to Kids' Brains and What Schools Can Do About It. 

Jensen really "gets it" when it comes to understanding the very real, day-to-day dynamics assoicated with poverty.  Children and families face challenges and difficulties that most of us simply do not understand.  Jensen's research and experience provide enlightenment and insight for anyone interested in really understanding the world of the poor.  Every urban public school teacher or leader needs to listen to Jensen. 

Jensen's understanding leads to hope, not dispair. 

He speaks to "changing brains for the better."  He outlines "upside potential" for children from poor families. 

If you care about public education, you need to spend some time with Eric Jensen. 

To meet Jensen and to listen to his ideas click .