Its record mixed, DPS pulled both ways on reform

Denver Public Schools’ record of dramatic changes to improve its lowest-performing schools has produced mixed results, though district leaders report hundreds of students are scoring higher on state tests.

Since 2005, DPS has closed nine schools, sending students to what district leaders promised would be better schools, and redesigned ten, typically replacing the principal and most teachers. Another two schools are being phased out.

Friday, DPS Superintendent Tom Boasberg said one in five of the students who had attended the nine closed schools did not return to a district school the following year.

Of those who did, however, and who also completed state reading, writing and math exams, their overall proficiency rates were better.

And, for the smaller number of students in the formerly closed schools who had completed enough years’ of state tests to produce growth ratings, those were better as well.

“We did see striking improvement,” Boasberg told members of the A+ Denver citizens’ advisory panel.

For example, students from the closed schools had a growth rating of 54 percent in math in 2008-09, while attending their new schools. Their growth rating the previous year, in the closed schools, was 46 percent.  The state average growth rating is 50 percent.

But the averages mask some declines.

Consider that students at the now-closed Remington Elementary in northwest Denver were achieving a growth rating of 63.5 percent in math.

A year later, the Remington students who attended the district’s chosen replacement school, Trevista at Horace Mann, were achieving a growth rating of 46 percent in math.

And the fact that 20 percent of students did not return to DPS after the closures in 2007-08 troubled A+ Denver member Lonnie McCabe, who asked, “Where did they go?”

“We have that data for many of our students, for some we don’t,” Boasberg said. “We can certainly try and look up those students.”

The district’s retention rate for all students in grades K-12 from 2007-08 to 2008-09 was 79 percent, he pointed out, the same as that of the closed schools.

But on Tuesday, in response to EdNews’ request, the district released data showing the retention rate for all DPS students in grades K-8, or the same grades of the closed schools, was 84 percent. So the retention rate of students in the closed schools was actually five points lower than their comparable peer group.

“We have a lot of students and a lot of families who move into and out of the district every year,” Boasberg said. “It’s one of our challenges to make sure we’re retaining our families.”

Tracking students, school changes

Members of A+ Denver, in advising DPS on its school closure plan, said students displaced by the closures must be provided a better educational opportunity.

“The results so far indicate that, in most cases, the kids did in fact do better, which is terrific,” said A+ Denver chair and former mayor Federico Peña.

But Friday’s results measure the progress of less than a third of the displaced students.

Nearly 2,600 students attended the nine closed schools: Fallis, Hallett, Mitchell, Remington, Smedley, Whiteman and Wyman elementary schools and Horace Mann and Place middle schools.

Of those, only about 800 had state test results in 2007-08 and 2008-09, partly because students in grades K-2 do not take state exams and partly because some students left DPS.

And, of the 800 students, only about 500 students produced growth ratings. Students must have taken the state tests two consecutive years in their closed school to produce a growth rating, then a third year to produce a growth rating in their new school for comparison purposes.

Tracking the progress of DPS’ redesigned schools also shows mixed success.

Of the ten, only one school – the closed Place Middle School re-opened as Place Bridge Academy – is “meeting expectations” in the district’s school rating system.

Other redesigned schools – Brown Elementary, Bruce Randolph School and Manual High – were cited Friday as successes by Boasberg and are close to that “meeting expectations” designation.

But they and four others – Martin Luther King Jr. Early College, Johnson Elementary, Garden Place Elementary and Cole Arts & Science Academy – still are rated as “on watch,” the third rung down on DPS’ four-tiered rating system.

And two of the ten redesigned schools – Trevista at Horace Mann, entering its second year in its new form, and North High School, entering its third – bear the district’s lowest rating of “on probation.”

One lesson learned seems clear, however. DPS is phasing out two schools – traditional middle school programs at Rishel and Kunsmiller – as new programs phase in. Students staying in those traditional programs posted strong gains.

Tapping federal turnaround dollars

DPS leaders are preparing to recommend dramatic changes at six more of the district’s lowest-performing schools.

On Nov. 9, Boasberg is expected to reveal plans for three traditional district schools, Greenlee K-8, Philips Elementary and Lake Middle School, and three charter schools, Northeast Academy, P.S. 1 and Skyland Community High School.

The district is working with the Colorado Department of Education in hopes of securing at least $500,000 per year per school in federal grants for the next three years.

To be eligible for the money, DPS has to use one of the four school reform strategies outlined in preliminary federal guidelines issued Aug. 26:

  • Transformation – Requires a school to address four key areas, including improved teacher effectiveness, comprehensive instructional reform, extended learning time and operating flexibility. Principal and staff could remain.
  • Turnaround or redesign – Requires the replacing of the principal and at least half of the staff, an increase in instructional time for students, and implementing a new or revised instructional program.
  • Restart – Requires the existing school to close and to re-open under the management of a charter management organization or an educational management organization.
  • Closure – DPS would close the school and enroll its students in another high-achieving school or schools.

“Closure is an option for the charter schools,” Boasberg said. “But for the three district schools, closure of the facilities is not an option at this point.”

Federal officials have announced $3.5 billion in school “turnaround” dollars will be awarded nationally to chronically low-performing, high-poverty schools.

It’s part of U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s goal of improving the bottom five percent of schools in the country in the next five years.

Preliminary estimates show nearly $40 million would go to Colorado, where between 10 and 13 schools would likely share $12 million per year, said Jeanette Cornier, CDE assistant commissioner.

The CDE will administer the funds and hold districts accountable for “taking these bold actions,” she said.

“These are schools that haven’t gotten a change in their outcomes even though the assumption is they’ve all been trying to improve,” Cornier said. “What they’ve done so far hasn’t worked …

“It’s clear the U.S. Department of Education is saying, our normal school improvement processes are not what’s called for here,” she said. “It’s focused on taking dramatic actions to turn around schools.”

Unease in Northwest Denver

Proposing dramatic changes at a school can provoke dramatic changes from its community.

In Northwest Denver, hundreds of parents, teachers and community members turned out for a recent Saturday morning meeting to urge DPS to delay its recommendation on the future of Lake Middle.

Boasberg pushed back the recommendation by a week. The DPS board will vote on the changes Nov. 30.

“We’d prefer a month and the district gives you a week,” said Arturo Jimenez, the DPS board member who represents the area. “Whether it’s sufficient – I think it can be sufficient if all the questions are answered in that time.”

Lake supporters have started a “Save Lake” blog and are asking questions such as, “Why did the federal government get involved?” and “How did we get to this point without being informed sooner?”

Northwest Denver has the most vacant seats of any area of DPS – 30 percent of classroom seats are empty. It also is home to more of DPS’ lowest-performing schools than any other region.

Jimenez said his concern stems largely from a history of less-than-wildly-successful reform efforts there.

For example, in 2007, DPS mandated a redesign of North High School, replacing a principal and teachers who had been working on their own reform plan. That spring, 23 percent of North 10th-graders were reading at grade level and 5 percent were proficient in math.

In spring 2009, under another new principal, 34 percent of North 10th-graders were reading at grade level – a jump of 11 points – but only 3 percent were proficient in math – a decline of two points.

North places just above Lake, Greenlee and Philips – or fourth from the bottom – on the district’s school rating system.

“The turnaround strategies – the question is, will they be successful?” Jimenez said. “But the answer is, we don’t know … We don’t have the data to back up these turnaround strategies.”

Others, though, are pushing Boasberg to target an increasing number of schools for change.

Peña, the former mayor, noted 70 of DPS’ 140 schools are failing to meet expectations on the DPS rating system.

“We’re dealing with six,” Peña said Friday to Boasberg. “One simply has to do the math and say, if we only do six a year, we’re going to be at this for a very long time …

“The hard question is why don’t you do 20 schools, this year or next year? Why are we simply doing six at a time?”

Nancy Mitchell can be reached at nmitchell@pebc.org or 303-478-4573.

Click here to see DPS’ presentation to A+ Denver and here to visit the A+Denver web site.

Click here to read DPS’ frequently asked questions about turnaround strategies.