March 3, 2005

"Rigor, Relevance And Relationships"

Recommendations By Commission On Secondary School Reform

The Commission on Secondary School Reform today proposed transforming high schools in Denver by increasing the degree of rigor in the coursework, making the learning experience relevant to students’ lives, interests and future plans, and building "safe, respectful and caring" learning environments in which relationships are improved at all levels.

The 27-member Commission presented its recommendations to the Denver Board of Education at a special meeting held at the Denver School of the Arts. The Commission is co-chaired by Board member Lucia Guzman and Dorothy Horrell, president of the Bonfils-Stanton Foundation.

The report, titled "Not a Moment to Lose! A Call to Action for Transforming Denver’s High Schools," calls for dramatic reform including changes in organizational structure, how students and teachers spend their time, how the needs of individual students are met, what is taught and how it is taught, how resources are allocated and what constitutes effective leadership at the school level. According to the report, the role of the district must change to create a culture and capacity that supports the continuous improvement of each school.

A complete copy of the report is posted on the district’s main web page, http://www.dpsk12.org (look under "Updates" on the main page) and on the Commission’s website, http://dcssr.dpsk12.org.

"Today’s high school structure does not consistently support student learning," the report states. "In fact, it hampers students and staff from achieving their goals. Class schedules move students from one subject to another with little connection between them or time for rigorous, meaningful learning. Teachers have limited opportunities to work and plan together or give students individual attention."

The report describes a series of strategies and recommendations – which the Commission urged be adopted as a "package" of reform, not as a menu from which to choose – to effect the changes it envisions. Those strategies include:

Treat students as individual learners.
Make every high school a quality high school.
Empower principals with authority, responsibility and accountability for student success.
Engage teachers as full partners in achieving educational excellence and hold them accountable for student achievement.
Offer families and students a choice among high-quality high schools that reflect students’ learning styles and interests.
Create a new role for the district and reshape its relationship with schools and the community.

"There must be a systematic revitalization and redesign of the high school experience and learning opportunities we provide to young people," the report states.

The Commission urged the district to undergo "dramatic and thoughtful change" and said it is "imperative" that all district guidelines and policies, in addition to the Denver Classroom Teachers Association agreement, be reconsidered to support the reform.

The Commission was established by the Denver Board of Education in April 2004 and has its seeds in the November 2003 mill levy election, which included in its $20 million package of district-wide reforms a $2 million effort to improve secondary education.

The Commission found that "Denver’s public high schools are failing" and the report cites statistics that reflect overall poor achievement levels and significant gaps between results posted by Latino and African-American students in comparison to results posted by white students.

"To ensure success, the Superintendent must be the face and champion of reform, accountable to the Board and the community for its success. At the same time, the process must engage all stakeholders within the schools and the community," the report states.

Getting Started

The Commission recommends that the Board and Superintendent:

Create a template outlining standards and benchmarks for assessing student success and school quality based on the principles of rigor, relevance and relationships. Standards should include quantitative indicators, such as performance on state and local assessments and the Colorado ACT and graduation rates, and qualitative indicators, outlined in the full report, defining attributes of a high quality high school.
Design a process to assess how well each existing high school meets the standards and benchmarks, and consider starting new schools based on successful models.
Require and support each high school in developing a plan for its future in concert with students, parents and community members – encouraging schools to innovate and enabling them to seek outside assistance to support their efforts.
Empower principals. High-quality schools must be led by high-quality leaders who have the capacity to lead change, create a clear focused vision and assume responsibility for improving student achievement. Over time and with training and support, principals should assume responsibility for the budget, hiring, firing, scheduling, professional development and educational design for their schools.
Assess the capacity of each high school principal to lead change and assume increasing responsibility for his/her school’s performance. Identify, recruit, develop and compensate principals for their new roles. Create performance contracts between the district and principals to ensure accountability.
Engage teachers as full partners in achieving educational excellence, creating strong and talented teacher leaders. Ensure that district policies and the DPS/Denver Classroom Teachers Association Agreement support these recommendations and focus on improving student achievement.
Join with key public and private stakeholders to create a "Denver Compact for High Performing High Schools." This would stimulate community involvement in the reform process, establish ongoing forums for community dialogue and provide valuable assistance to the district and principals.

Board Of Education Draws Budget Roadmap For 2005-2006

During a work session February 23 the Denver Board of Education established budget priorities for the 2005-2006 school year. Facing an $11.6 million gap between anticipated expenses and available revenues, the Board of Education supported staff recommendations for balancing the budget and urged closing more small-enrollment schools as a savings device.

The Board generally adopted recommendations from staff to balance next year’s spending plan.

The plan leaves untouched, with one exception, the formulas that determine how much money each school receives. The exception is the teacher-to-student ratio for English Language Acquisition classrooms.

The formula, known as the RAM or Resource Allocation Methodology, uses the school’s enrollment and a series of factors, including the number of special education students and the number of English Language learners, among others, to determine its precise funding level. Chief Financial Officer Velma Rose said schools will receive that key "RAM" information March 11 to begin their planning for the 2005-2006 school year.

On the district-level budget picture, the Board of Education endorsed a series of staff proposals to cut expenses. Those ideas included:

Reducing central office administration, saving $4 million. (That figure represents 6.7 percent of current spending in that category. Last year, 13.3 percent was reduced from central administration.)
Delaying maintenance expenses, saving $3 million. (Current 2003 general obligation bond projects support many maintenance projects at schools.)
Shifting the purchase of a new Student Information System from the general fund to the bond program, saving $1 million.
Increasing the staffing ratio in English Language Acquisition classrooms, saving $900,000. This is the second year of a two-year plan to close the gap with the staffing ratio in regular classrooms.
Reducing the work year by three days for employees other than teachers and transportation workers, saving $1 million. (Teachers and transportation workers had their work years reduced in prior years.)

The Board also supported the pending closure of Gove Middle School, which would generate a savings of $500,000. But Board members also asked staff to return with a plan to generate another $1 million through additional closings. (See this week’s regular edition of Board News for updates on school closure proposals.)

Richard Allen, Assistant Superintendent for Budget and Finance, told the Board that on average closing one elementary school would save about $300,000 in annual operating costs and closing one middle school would save about $500,000 in annual operating costs. (Any proceeds from the sale of a closed building are by law placed in the Capital Reserve Fund and are unavailable for general operating costs. Any re-use of the closed school by the district would offset projected savings.)

With the Board of Education’s guidance in place, schools soon will receive planning documents for next school year, using enrollment projections and the funds they will receive through the "Resource Allocation Methodology" (or RAM) used to provide level funding across schools.

In shifting a focus to small-enrollment schools, the Board shelved a staff proposal to assess a per-pupil reduction of $20.74 in allocations to schools. That per-pupil reduction for all projected students next year (kindergarten through 12th grade) would have equated to a .49 percent reduction in general fund support to schools.

Denver Public Schools officials have been notified by the state that the Consumer Price Index for last year – a key figure in setting funding for schools – was .1 percent. That will generate an additional $740,000 in revenue to Denver Public Schools. Amendment 23, however, requires the state to add 1 percent to school funding, generating an additional $4.4 million to DPS.

That increased income, however, is offset by increased expenses. Among those items:

$4.5 million in salary schedule expenses for all employees – steps (years of experience), educational increments (additional college level coursework and degrees) and longevity.
$1.3 million in increased utility expenses.
$3.4 million in increased charter school enrollment and projected smaller enrollment in district schools.
$4.3 million in such compensation changes as pension contribution (including a required $3.3 million increase to the pension fund).
$350,000 in start-up costs for three new K-8 schools projected to open for the 2006-2007 school year.

Superintendent Jerry Wartgow recommended – and the Board of Education supported – finding an additional $4 million to boost teacher pay, a recommendation made recently by the Joint Market Compensation Task Force, which issued its findings in late January. The task force is a joint effort of the district and the Denver Classroom Teachers Association and was born out of last year’s contract negotiations.

The task force was charged with assessing the district’s current position in the market, identifying areas of strengths and weakness in the traditional compensation system, and evaluating whether the district’s compensation system allows the district to attract and retain high quality teachers. The task force emerged with short-term and long-term recommendations to make the district’s pay for teacher salaries more competitive. The recommendations carried an estimated price tag of $4 million to make the needed salary improvements for 2005-2006.

Superintendent Wartgow announced that the discussions around generating the $4 million would take place within the ongoing negotiations with the Denver Classroom Teachers Association.

The $11.6 million gap between revenues and expenses represents about 2.2 percent of the $514 million operating budget anticipated for the 2005-2006 school year.