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Fife
Schools - A Standard Bearer Network Member
What is Standard Bearer?
 In
1988, Dr. Phillip C. Schlechty launched the Center for Leadership
in School Reform as a means to provide high-quality and responsive
support to those who are leading school reform efforts across the
nation. A private nonprofit corporation with headquarters in Louisville,
Kentucky, the Schlechty Center, works with public school districts
and their leaders to transform the existing system of rules, roles,
and relationships that govern the way resources are used in schools
to a system that is focused on the quality of work provided to students.
Over ten years ago, Dr.
Schlechty and his staff developed a set of system standards which
provide a framework for school districts to work on school reform
and the work asked of students. The Standard Bearer Network consists
of school districts who have committed to improvement through the
use of these standards.
What
Beliefs and Assumptions Underlie Standard-Bearer Work?
The Schlechty Center staff has formulated a set of premises about
the core business of schools; the need for change in public schools;
the primary customers of schools; the roles, rules, and relationships
between and among those who work in school systems; the means for
making results-based decisions; the need for leadership; and the
relationship of capacity to performance. Districts that engage in
Standard-Bearer work commit to these premises, as they provide both
a discipline and a point of view for making changes and for building
system capacity.
The following are the
bedrock beliefs that unite the Network districts:
The Core Business
of Schools is to ensure that every student, every day,
is provided challenging, interesting, and satisfying work. Schlechty
Center associates contend there is a direct linkage between the
caliber of work students are provided and the willingness of students
to engage in schoolwork. When students engage in and persist with
their work, they are much more likely to learn that which schools,
parents, and the community deem important. School systems must provide
direction and support for the work of teachers with that which teachers
can control - the work they design for students.
There Is a Need for Dramatic Improvement in the
performance of public school students and public school systems.
This is a belief that the Schlechty Center and Network districts
share. It requires a change in what we believe and how we are structured.
The System Standards provide a means for dealing with cultural as
well as structural change. This work is not for the timid, or for
those who like procedural change or change that only scratches the
surface.
The Primary Customers of Schools are the students.
Students are volunteers - in the sense that their willingness to
give or withhold commitment conditions the extent to which they
invest effort in schoolwork. While we can command student attendance,
we must earn student commitment through the schoolwork we provide
and the support we offer.
A Changed Core Business Requires Changed Roles
involving everyone in the district. Teachers must be seen as designers
of work and leaders of students - causing students to engage in
and produce high-quality work. Principals must be seen as “leaders
of leaders” who ensure that teachers have the resources, flexibility,
and support required to design engaging work for students. Central
office administrators must be seen as system capacity builders who
focus their efforts on supporting the work at schoolhouses rather
than on running programs. The superintendent must be seen as the
chief educational leader in the community, one who ensures that
the entire community comes to understand the emerging and changing
needs of students and the kinds of support needed if students are
to commit to and produce quality work. Members of the board of education
must be seen as leaders who inform the community about the schools
and who support those within the system to take actions to support
students and their families so that students can succeed in their
schoolwork. Support personnel - instructional aides, custodians,
bus drivers, cafeteria workers - must all be seen in the context
of ensuring support for teachers who design quality work and for
students who engage in it. Everyone has a role; the roles interrelate
throughout the district to create a system where everyone is focused
on students and the work provided to students.
Beliefs, Vision, and Results Define the System,
and in an effective system, compelling beliefs and vision give focus
and direction, desired results are clear, and everyone knows that
decisions are made in accord with the beliefs, vision, and results
to be achieved. A district's beliefs, vision, and results provide
the context both for the overall system to function effectively
and for its schoolhouses to be responsive to the unique needs and
interests of their students. Such a district becomes a school system
- not merely a system of schools.
Leadership Is Everyone's Business, for school systems
do not need just a few more strong leaders. They need more leadership
at all levels in the system, and the development of leadership qualities
and expectations should be a primary concern of system operations.
Capacity Building Is the Key and involves putting
the values, structures, and resources in place to initiate and to
sustain change over the long haul. All systems use performance benchmarks
as important indicators of how the organization is doing, but the
most effective systems use System Standards to focus everyone's
attention on building the capacity for improvement of performance.
Without capacity, significant improvement in performance is impossible.
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