On Your Side
Improving Struggling Schools--In Spite of the Law

Pennsylvania NEA members grapple with a state school 'improvement' law that mirrors ESEA. The lessons: take risks, but take care of your rights.

Under Act 16--ironically labeled the Education Empowerment Act--Pennsylvania state officials can cite struggling public school systems for their "history of poor test performance," place them under external control, send them minimal improvement grants, and then subject them to every painful penalty from "reconstitution" to partial privatization.

Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA) officials say that Act 16, passed in 2000, strongly resembles the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) through its narrow focus on standardized testing, its escalating penalties for failure to raise test scores, and its underfunding of a very worthy objective: improved academic achievement for all students.

Act 16 and ESEA differ in one key aspect: the former focuses on whole districts, the latter on individual schools. That aside, charges PSEA staffer Bob Brown, the two laws are "punitive and so close to being the same it's scary."

While history will judge if ESEA meets its promise of "no child left behind," the recent history of Act 16 offers NEA and its state affiliates strong reasons to negotiate strong educator and student protections in ESEA implementation.

Here's how two PSEA affiliates are grappling with this difficult state law:

Chester Upland: Edison Schools Make a Mess. In 2000, an appointed Act 16 "control board" running the struggling Chester Upland district contracted with a private firm, Edison Schools, to run 9 of 10 schools, right down to the level of assistant principal.

While expressing misgivings over privatization, the 491-member Chester Upland Education Association (CUEA) negotiated employee and union security rights with the district and initially supported the Edison experiment as the schools' best immediate hope for improvement.

But today, CUEA members are waging a community-wide campaign to end the annual Edison contract because state scores--ESEA's quality gauge--in the nine Edison-run schools actually declined from October 2001 to April 2002.

Under Edison management, "we believe that the environment for teaching and learning has deteriorated," says CUEA President Gloria Zoranksi. The company, she charges, has "underdelivered" on many promises, from professional development to computers, while eliminating non-teaching support positions and closing Chester Upland's alternative school--returning disruptive students to the classroom, some directly from incarceration.

"Suspensions, truancy, and other problems related to discipline have skyrocketed," says Zoranski, "while students who want to learn are frustrated."

Harrisburg: Cooperation Makes a Difference. Despite the challenges of Act 16, the 650-member Harrisburg Education Association (HEA) is proving that a struggling district can make progress under an ESEA-type law. The right formula, says elementary music teacher and HEA President Rich Askey, is "a balance of labor-management cooperation and protection of teacher rights."

Harrisburg, the state's lowest-scoring district when it was "designated" by Act 16 for state takeover, has had some lucky breaks. The state placed the system under the direct control of Mayor Stephen Reed, a strong supporter of teacher-administrator cooperation and a rallier of business and community support for the city's schools.

Initial results: Student retention is up, the high school has seen a 20 percent enrollment increase, facilities are improving, and business and foundation grants are flowing into the district.

Reed ensured that HEA members had a voice in the hiring process for a new superintendent. As a result, Harrisburg schools are now led by Gerald Kohn, an advocate of labor-management harmony who, like the mayor, publicly declares that teachers should be "honored" and supported, not blamed for schools' troubles.

In one short year, Kohn and his teacher partners have put Harrisburg on the path to real improvement.

The district has a new K-3 literacy campaign, a unique preschool program that pairs district teachers with Head Start staffers, two effective district truancy centers, and professional development that is relevant to teacher and program needs--including a graduate course in literacy now taught to K-3 teachers (on paid early-release time) by the University of Pennsylvania.

"When I walk around the buildings, I sense a better teacher attitude and see more things going on in the classroom," reports Askey with deep pride.

The high school's enrollment is up because "students communicate to parents this change in attitude," points out Superintendent Kohn. "Teachers are supported and now have hope rather than despair."

Askey stresses that the cooperation is bolstered by a collective bargaining agreement that includes strong language on teacher transfers and professional development and guarantees union representation and discipline only for "just cause."

"We've got a good contract, we're not afraid to defend that contract, and we're not afraid to file grievances if needed and to quickly bring about resolutions of concerns," Askey says. "We've also got a good [Association] Rep Council. We teach and support our reps, to ensure our contract is kept strong."

HEA "represents teachers in the best way--what's best for children and teachers together," says Kohn. "I must credit the HEA president and executive committee for taking a leap of faith [to work with me]. It's paid off for all."

Now there's no place for Harrisburg to go but up. It takes awhile to change a culture, Askey says, but genuine school improvement can happen through "teamwork, effort, caring about kids, and money--don't forget the money."

--Dave Winans

For more, contact HEA President Rich Askey at rwaskey@comcast.net.

ESEA: Another Reason To Expand Bargaining Rights

If there's a lesson to be learned from Pennsylvania NEA members' experience with Act 16, an ESEA-type school improvement law, it's that "the time to be concerned about preserving educators' rights and voice is now, not a couple of years down the road, when the first wave of struggling, resource-starved schools are labeled as 'low performing,'" says Don Morabito, a staffer in NEA's Collective Bargaining and Member Advocacy unit.

While each state will set its own bar for what constitutes "adequate yearly progress" under ESEA, many NEA affiliates aren't waiting for adverse consequences. Driven by its grueling experience with Act 16 penalties in struggling districts--everything from extended work schedules to charter school conversions--the Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA) is advising local affiliates to bargain over the "impact" of these actions on pay, hours, and working conditions.

And NEA is advising all affiliates to negotiate through either collective bargaining or "other processes of bilateral decision making" over a broad array of ESEA-related issues, such as "just cause" for discipline, educator accountability, professional development, transfers, outside service providers, paraeducator duties, school calendars and overtime protections, mentoring, and public disclosure of teacher qualifications.

Granted, basic education policy issues are still non-negotiable in many, many districts, due to court or arbitration decisions or weak or non-existent state bargaining laws. But because of ESEA, "the question of expansion of the legal scope of bargaining will become ever more critical," stresses Morabito.

ESEA may open up more opportunities for collaborative bargaining, over issues such as accountability, testing, and teacher quality. "In this kind of process, legal 'scope' is never an issue--the parties just raise an issue and ask, 'How do we solve this?'" says Tim Fitzgerald, an NEA bargaining consultant.

Whatever the path to joint decision making, "we need to talk about who else is responsible for test scores," concludes PSEA staffer Bob Brown. "We need to ensure that parents, the community, and school districts share responsibility with teachers and education support professionals for student achievement. Parents need to provide a nice place for their kids to do homework, and there needs to be a reason for students to want to come to school and take those tests!"

--D.W.

[Your Dues Did It]
An NEA Conference Hastens Change in Harrisburg

Labor-management cooperation in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, got a jump start last spring when a team of teachers and administrators attended NEA's 2002 Challenge of Change Conference.

This unique gathering, held annually in Colorado Springs, brings together teams of school stakeholders--such as Association members and staff, school board members, administrators, and community folks--to examine "how to change by doing things differently," says NEA Training and Organizational Development staffer Sarah Root.

The key to this conference: lots of team time to work together. Team members work together on a specific question or a project they bring along. Some teams have attended for a number of years. This is their retreat time.

"This event was instrumental in creating the strong relationship we now have between teachers and administrators," says Harrisburg Education Association President Rich Askey. "NEA accorded us the support, the time, and the environment to have in-depth, real conversations and to meld as a team."

So strong is this relationship that joint Harrisburg teams now attend NEA's annual Priority Schools Conference, focused on turning around struggling schools.

The next NEA Challenge of Change Conference will be held on March 21-25. The deadline for team registrations is January 30.

For more information, contact Dan Hand at 202/822-7107 or at dhand@nea.org.