By Ramona E. Bishop
Across the nation, educational leaders, teachers, parents, students and community leaders are having conversations about the achievement gap. In a speech delivered at the National Center for Urban Transformation Symposium, Douglas Reeves reviewed academic data for students in Wayne Township School District in Indianapolis.
He highlighted the fact that students of color who have fallen into predictable patterns of underachievement had actually performed well before the seventh grade. He believes that “something” happens, and some of the students who performed at grade level in elementary school start regressing below the mean at the secondary level.
The question is, what is the “something”? Why is it that African American and Latino American youth are dropping out of school at disproportionate rates, and if they stay in school, perform at rates that are just above those of special education students and English language learners? What can we do to ensure that in our schools and school districts, the conversations stop and the actions begin? The answers to the questions about the cause of the achievement gap are so complex that many school districts have been confused into inaction. Others have begun a comprehensive analysis of the causes, and are developing action plans to address the issues.
For those who believe that the cause is institutional racism, the conversations can become confrontational, stifling and sometimes disempowering. For those who believe that the cause is a lack of student and/or parent caring and aptitude, the conversations are filled with negative assumptions and blame. For those who point their finger at school and district staff members, the conversations tend to focus on those who are not doing the job rather than highlight the accomplishments of those who are.
Those who have no belief — the ones who think this focus on the achievement gap is a waste of time — simply wait for NCLB to go away.
How does one move from conference to action on this important issue? How can staff members and parents be truly engaged in the needs assessment, planning and program evaluation processes? There must be a comprehensive plan to involve stakeholders, and then use their input for strategic planning right away. It took our Equity, Access and Achievement (EAA) team two full years to come up with an action plan that met the needs of the district.
A team effort for Sacramento City USD
As one of the appointed leaders of the EAA team in the Sacramento City Unified School District, I and other members assisted a group of dedicated teachers, administrators and classified staff members as they combed through six years of data gathered in our school district.
We found that though there had been a steady trend of improvement, national trends of underachievement for African American and Latino students were evident at the local level. We also found similar trends of underachievement with our Southeast Asian youth, particularly our Hmong, Mien and Lao students.
The group became very passionate about implementing action steps to ensure that the predictable patterns of underachievement among certain students were interrupted.
Shortly after the formation of the EAA team, Maggie Mejia, superintendent of Sacramento City Unified School District, convened a group of community members to propose solutions to the issue of disproportionate underachievement levels of African American, Latino, Hmong, Mien, and Lao American students in our schools.
The Blue Ribbon Commission, with representatives from the EAA team leadership, Sacramento State University, Area Congregations Together, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the California School Boards Association, the Sacramento Chamber of Commerce and others, worked for more than a year identifying the issues, reading the research, meeting in small groups and, finally, making recommendations to the Sacramento City Unified School District Board of Education.
The EAA team was then directed to merge the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission with the recommendations they had formulated into an action plan, and began to get input from stakeholders throughout the community.
We learned that for many years, we had been confused into inaction. We found that in Sacramento, one of the most diverse cities in the nation, the thought of race being a determining factor for success in school was too much for some to take. We would start the conversation, stop when it got too controversial, wait for a year, and then start the conversation again.
To ensure a continuous effort, we spent several months hearing the perspectives of the various stakeholder groups and incorporating their ideas. After bringing our draft plan before all bargaining units, parent leadership groups and site and district administrators for input, we felt we were finally ready. After two years of planning, we were ready to implement our comprehensive plan for eliminating the achievement gap.
What we did (in summary)
• We convened an Equity, Access, and Achievement task force, comprising teachers, administrators and classified employees of the district.
• The EAA reviewed data, action plans and task force notes from the various stakeholder groups (parents, Latino Advisory, African American Advisory, Hmong/Mien/Lao Task Force and others) in SCUSD, and began to incorporate the ideas into an action plan.
• While working on the action plan, the EAA began to make recommendations to the district for trainers that would help teachers and classified members who were ready to begin the work immediately.
• The EAA sent representatives to the Blue Ribbon Task Force meetings, convened by the superintendent, eventually incorporating the findings of the Blue Ribbon Task Force into the action plan.
• The superintendent’s cabinet incorporated action steps and language into the strategic plan, based on the recommendations of the EAA team.
Once the action plan was devised, we interviewed students and staff members in our high schools to make sure that our plan addressed the real issues. Staff members were clear about the things they were doing that led to increased student achievement in targeted groups. They felt that given more resources, especially full funding of No Child Left Behind, they could accelerate student achievement for under-performing groups.
Many staff members, however, wanted more training on how to reach the students that were not performing at grade level, particularly African American, Latino and Southeast Asian students.
Programs to keep students motivated
One trend was that staff members were proud of programs in which staff or community members from the targeted community implemented extracurricular after-school programs to keep students motivated.
Miss Sunday Girls is a program at Burbank High School facilitated by African American teachers and community leaders in which students learn etiquette, learn about their history and culture, and participate in a culminating ball to show off their accomplishments over the year.
The Moral Values Program is a program at McClatchy High School facilitated by Latino teachers in which students set goals, learn about their history and culture, and receive support for increased performance in school.
The Hmong Women’s Circle is a program run by Hmong Women’s Heritage Association in which community members work with Hmong students and their families to ensure success in school.
Administrators and teachers from all races want to know more about how to be successful when working with the very students who are succeeding in these programs. How can we, as educators, improve our practice to ensure that our general program is more responsive to all the students we serve?
Though students were able to cite many positive things that were occurring in their schools, they became very passionate when they discussed the challenges, which included, but were not limited to: low expectations from some staff members, poor teacher attendance, the absence of rigor in some courses, tracking of some students into less rigorous courses, lack of engaging teaching strategies (too many lectures), lack of culturally responsive instruction, lack of caring on the part of some staff members, and lack of a home-school connection.
Why should students have to wait until after school for rich and engaging educational experiences? What can we learn from our colleagues who are implementing programs that work for the very students that have failed, historically, in our educational system? Once these questions are answered, the system should have enough information to devise an action plan.
In Sacramento City Unified, we hired trainers to help us learn about addressing different learning styles and give us the historical information we needed to make our schools and classrooms more responsive to the needs of all students. We heard from presenters such as Sharroky Hollie, Carlos Barron, Mary Bacon, Elinor Rodriguez and Russlyn Ali. Comments from participants stressed the need for continuous training, coaching and support for teachers as they implement new instructional paradigms in their classrooms.
Culturally responsive model classrooms
This year, based on the recommendations of the EAA team, culturally responsive model classrooms are being implemented districtwide. Though the EAA team made several recommendations, the model classrooms should have the most significant impact on student achievement. Culturally responsive model classroom teacher leaders are receiving advanced training, and then will become a resource for other teachers. They will open their classrooms for visitations, facilitate workshops on culturally responsive pedagogy and meet with school and district leaders.
We believe that this approach, combined with other districtwide accountability efforts, will help eliminate the achievement gap in Sacramento City Unified School District.
Recruitment and training
Other recommendations from the EAA include, but are not limited to:
• Recruit and retain highly qualified staff members of color;
• Recruit and retain highly qualified bilingual staff members;
• Establish a mentor program;
• Provide professional development offerings on courageous conversations and culturally and linguistically responsive pedagogy; and
• Implement a parent training program to ensure that parents can participate as active partners.
In order to ensure that the work continues, the district turned the Multilingual office into the Multilingual/Multicultural Equity, Access, and Achievement office. The department is responsible for providing support to schools as they eliminate the achievement gap, and it is also charged with implementing the action plan. Though I am no longer director of the Multilingual/Multicultural Department, I look forward to seeing the plan come to fruition.
Copies of the “Plan for Closing the Achievement Gap in Sacramento City Unified School District” are available on the district Web site, www.scusd.edu.
Ramona E. Bishop is superintendent of Del Paso Heights School District. She was formerly the director, Multilingual/Multicultural Equity, Access, and Achievement, for Sacramento City Unified School District.