State Board Approves ISD
Operator for Southside Ashpole Elementary
The State Board
of Education voted earlier this month to approve Achievement for All Children (AAC)
to manage Southside Ashpole Elementary School in Robeson County under the
Innovative School District. Eight members voted in favor of the Forest City-based
not-for-profit school operator; four members opposed the choice.
Under the
Innovative School District, a maximum of five low-performing schools will be
taken over by operators, which could include for-profit charter or education
management organizations. The schools will no longer be run by their
traditional school districts during the five years they are under ISD
authority. Southside Ashpole is the first school to be included in the
statewide initiative starting in the fall.
AAC is
contracting with TeamCFA as its curriculum partner for programming in language
arts, history and geography, mathematics, science, art, and music.
Eric Hall, ISD
superintendent, said in a news release that he was pleased with the board’s
vote. He recommended AAC as one of two operators under consideration.
“I am grateful
to have AAC on board to partner with the ISD,” Hall said. “It’s been an arduous
process to get to this point; that was intentional. We had to make very sure
that we had the right fit for the school, students and community.
“Besides AAC's
strengths in the areas of instruction and capabilities to address the specific
needs of the school,” Hall said, “their team has demonstrated throughout this
process that they are highly committed to engaging with the local community,
building effective relationships with a broad network of stakeholders and being
effective and responsive partners with the ISD as we work toward a common goal."
Some board
members expressed concern about AAC’s lack of a track record and TeamCFAs’
mixed results in helping struggling students make gains in academic
performance. The four members opposing the recommendation were Eric Davis,
Wayne McDevitt, Becky Taylor, and Patricia Willoughby.
At the request
of the board, Hall said the organization will have 10 days to address the
concerns that arose from an independent evaluation of AAC. He is also asking
AAC to clarify its relationship with TeamCFA, provide a current financial
audit, and provide continuing monthly reports, including data and activities
AAC is undertaking as an ISD operator.
AAC will partner with the
ISD to select and hire a school leader/principal; provide a proven curriculum
and instructional model; deliver coaching and talent development to school
leadership and staff; align resources to support all school transformation efforts;
and engage a broad network of community stakeholders. The ISD will employ the
teachers and support staff at the school; monitor, assess and provide oversight
of the operator to ensure compliance and progress towards school improvement;
and continue to partner with the local community to ensure a high level of
customer satisfaction with the students, parents and local community.
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Board Hears Report on
Chronic Absenteeism Among Teachers
About one-fifth
of the state’s nearly 100,000 teachers were considered “chronically absent”
last school year – having used at least 10 non-consecutive sick days during the
year, according to a report presented to the board this month during a session
focusing on the issue of teacher absenteeism.
Tom Tomberlin,
DPI’s director of district human resources, told the board that teachers’ use
of the leave time is related both to state policy governing all leave time
available to teachers and to the career objectives of teachers, particularly
newer ones.
Since the use of
annual leave is restricted largely to student vacations and personal leave days
are very few, Tomberlin explained, sick leave “is a large resource for teachers
when school is in session. This is a resource that’s available.”
He explained
that teachers who expect a long teaching career will realize a benefit from
unused sick leave in their retirement plans; younger teachers may see
themselves changing jobs or careers, so they might have a different view of
sick leave.
“In the short
term,” Tomberlin said, “sick leave has no monetary value – only long term, in
terms of retirement.”
“What we’re
experiencing as a nation is a generation of employees who don’t view employment
as a 30-year, long-term investment,” Tomberlin said. “They view it as a series
of events during their working years. This is what we need to think about in
terms of leave policy. We will continue to see a number of teachers who feel
they must use this resource to garner any value from it.
“The way we
structure our benefits policies may be focused on a 30-year trajectory and
incent that kind of behavior.”
Board member
Olivia Oxendine, who helped lead planning for the report, stressed to the board
that it was not meant to be critical of teachers’ use of sick leave.
“This
presentation is not intended to imply or suggest that we have a problem with
excessive absences among classroom teachers in North Carolina,” Oxendine said.
“It’s not to infer that classroom teachers should not miss school or that
classroom teachers have healthy children or that classroom teachers should not
be sick.”
Instead, she
said the report was designed to help the board understand the data and to help
define the issue of chronic teacher absenteeism.
Other board members
and advisers also cautioned against reading too much into the data.
Board member Amy
White raised a question of a possible mixed message in considering the use of
sick leave.
"What we
have here is a system that says it’s OK to take that day once a month,” White
said, “and then we’re going to turn around and say, ‘You’re doing that because
it’s allowed and now we’re going to label you chronically absent. That’s not
really fair.”
Economic Mobility is
“Defining Issue of Our Time,” UNC’s Spellings Tells Board
UNC President
Margaret Spellings addressed the State Board earlier this month to outline the
purpose and goals of the My Future NC commission, launched last fall to create
a statewide goal to get more North Carolinians better educated.
Spellings said
that the issue of economic mobility is one of three big issues “that keep me up
at night” and one that the South, as a region, and North Carolina in particular,
must work to improve through a sharper focus on education at all levels.
“Children born
into poverty in the South have strikingly low odds of bettering their lives,”
Spellings said. “In North Carolina, our metropolitan areas rank among the worst
in the nation for upward mobility. Raleigh, Charlotte, Greensboro and
Fayetteville are all in the bottom 10 percent of American metropolitan areas.”
Postsecondary
education – but not necessarily a four-year degree – is the solution to that
problem, she said.
“Higher
education is a proven route to economic mobility,” Spellings said. “This is an
access issue. Earning a place in college must not depend on the color of your
skin, the income of your family or the zip code where you grew up.”
But the solution
to the lack of economic mobility also depends on the success of individual
students.
“Your odds of
graduating should depend on work ethic and academic performance, not on your
parent’s resources,” she said.
Spellings said
that persistent achievement gaps and other disparities evident in college don’t
start at age 18.
“That’s why we
have formed the My Future NC Commission [of which State Superintendent Mark
Johnson is a member] to take a hard look at how North Carolina can harness the
entire education continuum,” she said, noting that North Carolina is one of
just five states that lack a statewide goal for how many of its citizens need
education beyond high school.
She said that by
the end of the year, the commission expects to recommend a target percentage of
individuals who need some form of education beyond high school and also
benchmark targets for such indicators as third-grade literacy, eighth-grade
proficiency in reading and math and college readiness. The commission will also
recommend policy reforms and initiatives it considers necessary to achieving
those goals and targets.
“I’m not a
believer in college for all,” Spellings said, “but I am a believer in education
and training beyond high school for everyone. We must have a system that works
better for every student. We must build a college-going culture.”
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