Detroit plan targets failing schools

Detroit -- A coalition of education leaders and foundations will unveil today a sweeping academic reform agenda that targets failing schools, calls for 70 new programs and launches a national effort to recruit principals.

The $200 million plan also aims to build community support this year to eliminate the Detroit Board of Education and make the mayor accountable for Detroit Public Schools.

Called Excellent Schools Detroit, the initiative will be introduced at the Detroit-based Skillman Foundation, which built the coalition of 15 organizations. Leaders of the groups said since Detroit's schoolchildren are so far behind academically, the city must improve the school offerings for children faster than any other city has done.

One significant aspect is the support the plan has from Detroit Public Schools officials and those running charter schools in the city. Both have been traditional competitors for students and funding, but Wednesday said they're working together for healthy competition and to offer choices to parents.

"What we like about the plan is that it's child-focused, it's not focused on whether or not the child is in a DPS school or a charter school," DPS Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb said. He added that he's open to chartering DPS schools, selling buildings to charter school operators and turning schools over to charter operators. "It has a very strong market-driven component to it."

The initiative's goal is to become by 2020 the first major city in the nation in which 90 percent of its students graduate from high school, 90 percent enroll in post-secondary education and 90 percent succeed in college without remediation.

"This is a historical moment in the city of Detroit," said Carol Goss, president and CEO of the Skillman Foundation.

It also calls for 70 new schools within the decade, from new school buildings to new operators in existing schools, that could be governed by charters, DPS and independent schools. Half the schools would be opened though Michigan Future Schools, a program of the Ann Arbor think tank Michigan Future Inc. to bring 35 college prep schools to the area. The effort, dubbed the High School Accelerator, already has netted $13 million in support to open the first seven schools within three years.

Detroit Edison Public School Academy, a K-8 charter school near Eastern Market, earned the first $850,000 grant and will expand to a high school this fall, said Michigan Future Inc. president Lou Glazer.

DPS also received a $50,000 planning grant to explore opening a science and medicine high school. One hurdle for DPS: to qualify the union must agree to outside hiring, to toss out seniority and to eliminate work rules at the school, Glazer said.

"The accelerator is the most important initiative in the city since the charter and public school of choice laws were passed 15 years ago," Glazer said. "This allows us to use those laws to a scale that will make a huge difference."

Other initiatives include the effort from the Detroit Federation of Teachers, which did not sign off on the plan but was engaged in the talks to develop it, to open its own school, as well as Doug Ross' movement called More Good Schools to bring nationally recognized charter school operators to Detroit. Also cited was the United Way's partnership with DPS that turned Cody and Osborn High Schools into nine new small schools on the same campus.

"This is a plan that hopes DPS succeeds but it can succeed even if DPS doesn't," said Ross, who founded University Preparatory Academy and who will open another charter school under the plan in the fall, called University Yes Academy.

Accountability is focus

Tantamount to the plan will be a new independent standards and accountability commission that will establish academic standards for schools throughout the city. The citywide commission will issue report cards on all schools to give parents clear information on what schools are making their marks.

While the commission won't have the authority to close schools that fail, it will pressure DPS, charters and private school operators to shut them down immediately rather than wait years for reform efforts to take shape.

Bobb is expected to announce 40 school closures next week as part of his long-term plan to reshape the district. "There will always be a place for a DPS ... though it may be a smaller system," Bobb said.

Other backers of the plan include Cornerstone Schools, Detroit Edison Public School Academy, Detroit Parent Network, Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce, Kresge Foundation, McGregor Fund, Michigan Future Inc., New Detroit, Think Detroit PAL, United Way for Southeastern Michigan and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

They've been meeting since 2009, spurred by the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) test schools that showed a sample of Detroit Public School students had posted the worst scores ever in the history of the national test and remarks by Education Secretary Arne Duncan that education in Detroit is a "national disgrace."

"We have to move quickly and more boldly than any other place in the county because we are so far behind," said Tonya Allen, vice president of the Skillman Foundation.

Effort to push recruiting

The coalition also will launch a recruiting effort to encourage the best educators to come here as well as develop a Detroit Leadership Academy to help educators launch schools.

"Parents have said many times they are fed up with the status quo," said Sharlonda Buckman, executive director of the Detroit Parent Network. "They want to see good schools for all kids and that hasn't happened yet. There's a lot of frustration out there on that and there's more mobilization."

Goss said for this plan to succeed the district needs one single point of accountability from the mayor's office.

"The mayor has indicated he would assume a role of sole accountability for the school system, with input from the citizens," said Edward Cardenas, spokesman for Mayor Dave Bing, who signed off on the plan. "He does, however, support a quality education for all students of all schools."

School board president Otis Mathis said data show the district was more successful before and after the last takeover from 1999 to 2005.

"No mayoral control has been successful anywhere," Mathis said. "Why would they want to take a failing concept and put it in Detroit Public Schools?"

Chris White, a DPS parent and co-chair of the Coalition to Restore Hope to DPS, said it's inappropriate to ask the mayor to take control over schools when the city is grappling with its own financial crisis.

"We're asking a surgeon to fix a car," said White. "The mayor can't run the city now and this has been a problem for quite some time."

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