The Houston Chronicle is running a story about turnover among principals in the Houston school district under the headline, “HISD principal turnover disrupts at least 59 schools since Miles took over: 'It felt like a prison.'”
OMG, right? Under the new reform superintendent imposed last summer by the state, the whole place is going to hell in a handbasket. Right?
Maybe not so much.
The number I kept looking for in the story and couldn’t find was 274. That’s the total number of schools in the district. The headline says that turnover of principals has “disrupted” 59 campuses since reform superintendent Mike Miles took over last summer, but the story never tells me that that is out of 274 campuses.
What’s also missing from this description of widespread disruption is any evidence that the disruption is widespread or that it is all disruption. Under this new regime, which came in declaring radical change, 59 changes of leadership at 274 schools feels fairly modest.
It doesn’t really count as disruption, does it, if the outgoing principal was no good? I think that’s just ruption, which, according to my Compact Edition of the Oxford English Dictionary, means simply a break with the past.
And, look. Why is any of this happening? This school district fell so far out of compliance with minimum state requirements over so many years that a Texas law authored by a Houston legislator required the state to come in and take it over. Where does anybody in Houston get off complaining about disruption?
If we were this far down the road -- halfway through the first school year of the takeover -- and only 20 principals had left their positions, wouldn’t we take Miles for a lackluster blowhard do-nothing? Shouldn’t we be looking for, expecting and even applauding signs of serious change?
The story says this:
Of the 58 principals who have left their campuses since June, at least 14 did so after the school year started on Aug. 28. At least 16 principals have resigned or retired since Miles took over, and at least eight have been shuffled to other schools or promoted to central office positions.
Just trying to keep up here. If at least 14 of the principals who have vacated their former posts did so after the school year started, then we could surmise that the rest of them did so before the school year started.
Before the year started, Miles went to great lengths to make sure everybody knew what to expect. He told anyone who would listen to look for a radical departure from the old way of doing business.
The Chronicle has beaten up on him a lot for spending too much money on efforts last summer at orientation and explanation, but everybody ought to be able to agree now that he did explain exactly what lay ahead. He was diligent – the Chronicle would say diligent to a fault -- in making sure everybody knew precisely how different things were going to be under his aegis.
We can assume that some number of the 45 or so principals who left their positions before the school year started did so under their own steam. Looked at it, thought about it, sized it up, sized up Miles and said no. It’s a free country. You can’t make somebody be a principal against his will.
If all that money Miles spent making sure everybody knew what lay ahead resulted in some people deciding it wasn’t for them, then the money was well spent. But we don’t know how many left of their own free will and how many were pushed out, because the story doesn’t tell us.
Let’s look at the more interesting group – 14 principals out of 274 campuses who left their positions after the school year was underway. The story tells us that eight principals moved to other schools or advanced to headquarters jobs, but it doesn’t tell us how many of those eight did so last summer versus how many did it after the school year started.
If all eight of the promoted and transferred principals were among the 14 principals who left their schools during the school year, then that would leave us with six who may have been straight-up cashiered or demoted.
In the story, I counted four former principals who spoke to the Chronicle expressing unhappiness about the changes. Maybe the reporter couldn’t find the other two. I do find myself coming back to that other number. A total of four unhappy people out of 274 seems like an amazingly happy picture.
Of course, this is not a happy picture. We are talking about the lives and destinies of almost 200,000 students. Maybe a useful metaphor would be trying to imagine the failure of the Houston Independent School District as if it were a public health crisis instead of an educational one. Let’s imagine we were talking about an epidemic of tuberculosis among Houston children with major blame assigned to an incompetent county health department (just imagining, no insult intended to actual county health department).
If the state sent in a reform health director and if heads began to roll, if things got shaken up and everything seemed radically different, would we not applaud? Wouldn’t there be all kinds of laudatory coverage in The Houston Chronicle? “NEW HEALTH BOSS SWEEPS CLEAN. Says nothing will stop her from beating kids TB.”
How is this different? Why is it different? The education of children in the 21st century is every bit as central to their ultimate destiny as their physical health.
I keep smelling something else in the coverage by the Chronicle and a lot of the Houston media (not The Houston Press). If all change at the school district is mere chaos, if it’s all just a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, then I guess the way things were before must have been pretty damned acceptable.
Sorry, but I think there is something very suspect in that sense of acceptability.
I work for a firm that contracts work with HISD to help Special Ed students mainstreamed into the classrooms . I’ve witnessed teachers going through the curriculum set up by the district on the smart board . Teachers are trained to continue the lesson in spite of distractions. There are students who mimic the right answers and will be tutored at a later session . One can already foresee students getting behind and lacking the creativity to do genuine thinking to solve problems . It is quite evident that students are being taught to be able to eliminate wrong answers . The writing skills are lacking as a consequence of robotic instruction . The deep appreciation for literary works is also lagging . One hopes that someone with the wisdom of a child will awaken the educational system to the true values of an inspiring curriculum . This world will not be saved by people all thinking the same way.It appears that those who aspire to be different are expelled from the system . With all the wisdom and intellect in the world , why have people subjected themselves to follow what they know is not right ? Well, one knows it is the instinct to survive . Sadly, only those exposed to the true values of education will prevail . Hopefully , there will be instructors who will dare to do the right thing for the children .
I just finished the Walter Isaacson biography of Elon Musk. I wonder how the Houston Chronicle would like his approach to solving problems and getting things done.