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How Did Margie Answer Questions Posed by Stand for Children?
1. How would you describe the quality of education that NPS provides? Has the quality changed?
Newton has prided itself in being among the top school systems in the country. Our teaching quality remains quite good, however financial and structural challenges are preventing our school system from meeting its full potential. As a policy/management professional, I know how cost and quality go hand-in-hand. Newton will retain its reputation for high quality education by ensuring its programs are fiscally sustainable and can demonstrate excellence to Newton’s diverse stakeholders.
The world around us has
changed; so must we improve the way we assess and achieve quality. We need to evaluate how students will meet the resultant
challenges that require new 21st century skills. Further, we must determine how to serve our increasingly diverse
student body that varies in their culture, language, socioeconomic status, and learning abilities. Identifying new measures
of success will enable our district to invest in critical services, and ensure all students receive a “high quality”
and well-rounded education.
2. If elected,
what would you do to improve the quality of education?
I believe all students need to be challenged and supported to perform to the best of their ability—no matter where they appear on the learning continuum. To accomplish this, we must facilitate innovation and provide teachers with professional development and the necessary educational tools so they can best tailor their instructional practices.
Novel approaches, such as technology integration (e.g. use of
SmartBoards), can help teachers to better assess children’s needs, focus lessons and evaluate progress. I would also
encourage policies that facilitate differentiated instruction to give teachers the flexibility to group children and focus
on areas of need, such as providing greater challenge or review.
Finally, we need to measure our progress annually, establishing new benchmarks
that set the stage for continuous quality improvement. As a member of the School Committee, I would support a citywide assessment,
replicating effective practices across the district to support a joy of learning and ensurethe highest level of quality
for all.
3. How will you address equity across
the school system?
Newton, like all public districts
across the Commonwealth, upholds an equity policy that aims to provide the same level of educational services to all students.
However, equity does not always mean equality. Addressing the student diversity that exists within our schools (in
number and type) means ensuring essential services and resources are allocated appropriately. While some schools have supplemented
resources through fundraising efforts, additional sources of revenue (e.g. grants and public-private partnerships) must
be identified to offset disparities across schools.
The
School Committee must institute a means of upholding equity while promoting pilot programs and fostering innovation to provide
a sustainable model for continuous improvement. I will support a needs assessment and development of a plan for achieving
equity and equality in educational programs based on a number of factors, including data on student performance, student
demographics, program quality, use of resources, distribution of services, and parent, teacher and student satisfaction.
4. How would you communicate with all of Newton's
citizens about the state of the Newton Schools and the actions of the School Committee? How will you bring the
community together to see that the school system is a community-wide resource and should be a primary shared investment?
A strong proponent of public participation and transparency in policymaking, I will work to create a new standard of communication that will enable the School Committee to engage our parents and community members in two-way conversation about our schools and our children. Beyond newsletters and public hearings, we should support venues that make information and School Committee members more accessible to our community.
The creation of “town hall-style” forums throughout the City could help
educate our community about the issues our schools face and provide a venue for input into solutions and broad community
discussion. We could also incorporate interactive website tools to promote information sharing, such as online surveys.
Additionally, we could create collaborative in-person and on-line “communities of learning” that integrate young
and older members of the community. My experience with implementing such programs and systems in multi-national companies
has shown these approaches work to strengthen community buy-in and facilitate joint problem-solving.
5. What recommendations from the CAG's school cost structure report would you implement?
According to the CAG, Newton needs a “game-changer” to address its structural deficit that is expected to grow to $50 million by 2015. While on School Committee, I will leverage my 20 years as a Board leader and business executive in strategic planning, operations improvement, and change management to explore more innovative and sustainable ways to deliver education services. There are many options to explore including the following CAG recommendations:
- Improve communications—facilitate open public engagement and a two-way dialogue to build an improved and financial sound model of learning for our children.
- Evaluate Newton’s special education program whose rate of increase exceeds revenues---consider expanding pilots such as integrated classrooms that combine special education and regular education, leading to cost savings and improved education for all students.
- Reduce the rate of increase of health benefits costs--explore a new health plan benefits design or join the Group Insurance Commission (GIC).
6. How should the city plan to pay for ongoing maintenance and improvement of our school buildings?
Newton is nearing a short term crisis; school buildings are in need of repairs and maintenance, yet we have a financial short fall to fund critical improvements. We must therefore engage in near-term and long range priority planning that considers safety, environmental, health, cost, and personnel issues. Our School Committee should consider traditional and non-traditional approaches to address these financial challenges, including creative maintenance agreements, revised municipal contracts, and private philanthropic support for public buildings. We can also explore creative revenue generation plans, such as facility rentals to outside groups that creates a more substantial and ongoing revenue stream. It is important to engage parents and community members as volunteers in action to ensure our buildings are safe, accessible to all, and create a productive environment conducive to creative teaching and learning.
7. What
do you think about raising fees that directly shift education costs to families?
Without a new cost structure to support educational services, the School Committee will need
to either find ways to raise additional revenue or continue to cut critical educational programs or personnel. Student fees
are one way to bridge the revenue gap; however they are a short term and limited solution; sometimes even “nominal
fees” present unintended consequences of barriers to enrollment and discourage participation in programs. As the CAG
report points out, we need to engage the public to define and prioritize what is “essential” versus “desirable”
and begin to rethink how we structure and finance Newton’s educational model.
We should strongly consider innovative options
for programs that increase revenues and identify efficiencies rather than just shift costs. Expanding our partnerships with
private organizations such as colleges, universities and local businesses can result in new resources and cost-offsets in
programs formerly outsourced (e.g. professional development, student teaching, advanced coursework, and grants for new technology).
8. What top three qualities will you look for in a new Superintendent?
Our Superintendent must bring our schools into a new global, competitive, and advanced technological era. The candidate must bring a vision and passion for excellence, the fortitude to explore and take risks, and an ability to both provide and take direction. In addition:
1. Strong credentials: expertise in secondary or higher education and a track record of excellence in administration, leadership and management of complex budgets, programs and people, adoption of best practices, and able to promote new way of thinking.
2. Proven organizational and visionary leadership: experience with organizational development, finance and change management to promote and catalyze innovation throughout the schools, and do more with less, while providing continuity and support to Principals, teachers and students.
3. Collaboration and communication: Our Superintendent must have strong communications and team building skills and will work effectively with the School Committee, staff and the community, whose input I will seek in making this hiring decision.
9. If you were to attain office, how would you involve and communicate with Newton grassroots organizations like Stand for Children of Newton?
While I would bring my professional expertise and commitment to Newton students to my School Committee role, I have much to learn from local organizations such as Stand for Children. I will surround myself with multiple experts to tap their expertise and engage in a thoughtful analysis of our community strengths and challenges related to students and families.
Relationships with grassroots organizations will allow the School Committee to garner community support and mobilize parents and families to get involved in critical educational discussions. In addition to public forums, it could provide focused briefings on topics of interest in the community and could help to secure needed funds and grassroots buy-in. I look forward to collaborative relationships to which I could bring multiple voices to the table to design realistic solutions; organizations like Stand can help inform the School Committee as we all work to improve education for our children.
What did Margie have to say at Candidates Night on May 17, 2009 in Newton Corner?
Question 1: What would you do in selecting a new superintendent? Look for someone like Jeff Young or not?
Question 2: What expertise or types of background would you look for in a superintendent?
The
School Committee voted to hire an interim Superintendant which will enable the newly elected Committee to conduct a thorough,
national search for a permanent Superintendent. The best candidate will be responsible for leading our schools
into the global, competitive, advanced technological era. The ideal candidate will have expertise in secondary
or higher education (such as a college, university, public/private school) and have a demonstrated track record of excellence
in administration including staff leadership and management of complex budgets.
According to the Citizens Advisory Group (CAG), we need to determine
a new model of education delivery, and our new Superintendant will need to have strong vision and experience with organizational
development, finance and change management in order to catalyze innovation throughout the schools while ensuring continuity
and support for our teachers. Strong communications and team building skills are a must as is a demonstrated capability
to work effectively with their Board (e.g. School Committee), providing effective support and leadership to Principals and
teachers, and interacting closely with parents and students in our community.
It will be critical to get public input into this important
hire, and I would lead a process to ensure we create the right expectations, incentives and rewards to keep our new leader
motivated and accountable for our Schools achievements.
Question 3: What do you think is key in negotiating teacher’s contracts, mindful of fiscal constraints?
The most critical
part of a successful negotiation is to begin to reengage the teachers and the union in a productive discussion about priorities
and choices. This dialogue needs to happen in advance, before we enter collective bargaining.
I have met independently with our Teacher’s
Union and various teachers and learned a lot about the current contract and their willingness to collaborate. I look forward
to the opportunity to explore cost-effective and creative ways to give teachers more time to teach, greater opportunities
for training, remove barriers to innovation, and identify solutions to improve the teacher-student ratios. We can design
a win-win approach if we work on solutions together.
Question 4: Gentleman asked about building maintenance. Should the operations be taken out of the school committee arena?
We
need to take a more comprehensive view of how we manage building maintenance. On the one hand, the Schools know best what
improvements are needed and how space needs to be managed. On the other, we need to evaluate whether the expertise exists
in the Schools and whether there is adequate control over outcomes. For instance, we need to better coordinate maintenance
and capital improvements with the City to ensure critical functions do not slip through the cracks. This is an area that
should be addressed more in depth.
Question 5: What is the (magic) number of children that should be in an elementary school?
I am not wed to a number, but my
sense is that Countryside is too large (475) as it did not account for safety, utilities and maintenance to accommodate
such a census.
I
would like to evaluate population projections, village and neighborhood needs, and adequate staffing for schools of varying
sizes. As we explore renovations of our schools in greatest need, we may want to explore ideas such as flexible space
that can accommodate fluctuations in enrollment while serving as community swing space (e.g. community education) when not
in use. There will be years where the enrollment numbers are lower, and the space can be used for the other programs again.
For example, if our middle schools are facing strain, we might also consider expanding some elementary schools to accommodate
sixth grade. Regardless, we need to engage in an open dialogue with our community to assess our priorities and proposed
solutions.
Question 6: Other than shifting the health care to the GIC, can you please name three ideas to reduce
the budget?
This is where I hope to make an impact on our schools. I believe we need to take a more comprehensive look at our
budget, and need to find ways to both increase new sources of revenue while further reducing expense in the short and longer
term. The following are some preliminary ideas:
- Among our largest expenditures is for our personnel. Joining the GIC is only one way to control the rate of increase of health benefits. We need to identify ways to retain our best teachers (especially those early in their career), thereby reducing the overall cost of hiring and retraining new teachers.
- There are pilots under way regarding integrated classrooms that are enabling cost savings while improving education for all students. These classrooms are taught by two dual-certified teachers in regular and special education, and reduce reliance on individual aides. We need to evaluate and replicate these programs if they meet cost and performance criteria.
- We can expand our partnerships with private organizations such as colleges, universities and local business. Early discussions suggest that our collaboration can result in cost-offsets in programs formerly outsourced. Two examples include professional development and student teaching.
Where does
Margie stand on the questions posed at the June 2 School Committee Forum at the Brown Middle School?
1. What is your opinion on early release days?
Extensive early release days pose a disproportionate burden on students and families and are among the system wide issues that I would like to reexamine. We can and should find creative ways to provide teachers with professional development and shared planning time (including BRIM, Breaking Ranks in the Middle) while reducing reliance on early dismissal.
When on School Committee I will help assess and pilot innovative scheduling programs to examine more productive and cost-effective approaches to optimize teaching excellence and student learning (during school hours). As teacher schedules are contractual, we will need to work with our teachers union to collaboratively design solutions that can be brought to the table in collective bargaining.
To inform this process, we should explore and evaluate multiple options with teachers and leaders from within and outside of Newton on how to best deliver. Some ideas to address this issue that are worth exploring include:
- Coordinate teacher schedules to enable flexible coverage and staffing while students participate in learning groups or other productive activities.
- When we do have early release days, provide constructive academic activities for students during after school professional development sessions, such as through partnerships with colleges/universities or other collaborative partnerships.
- Embed professional development into the school day.
2. Do you support academic ability grouping, even if it means groups of students may move through the curriculum at different speeds?
I am a strong proponent of differentiated instruction—that is, providing flexible ways to ensure that every child is continually challenged, no matter where they are on the learning continuum. Academic ability grouping is one of several shared learning approaches, and we should work with our teachers to help design effective and sustainable programs that group students along individual needs, and enable children to learn at a pace that is not unnecessarily constrained.
When on the School Committee, I will explore multiple approaches to facilitate adoption of differentiated instruction and leverage team-based approaches to learning (a key 21st century skill). We should consider supporting teacher requests to pilot flexible programs such as those that group children along shared academic needs (such as math); we already provide grouping based on shared interests (such as music instruction). It will also be important to preserve the integrity and diversity of our classrooms and provide opportunities for all children to learn from one another regardless of academic ability.
In addition, advanced technologies (such as use of SmartBoards) are important tools that can help children grasp key concepts and take a self- and team-motivated approach to learning. I am committed to championing these kinds of solutions and will learn from Newton’s leaders and teachers and other communities about how to best support effective implementation.
3. Have you read the Citizen Advisory Group's (CAG) School Cost Structure Report? If so, how would you see School Leaders and the School Committee creating "a blue print that clearly outlines what is essential to maintaining a high quality educational system"? According to the CAG this blue print would require leaders to "make difficult decisions about the desirable and the essential."* Would you support student user fees to maintain access to "desirable" school services?
I have read the CAG reports and have participated in their public engagement process which delivered a powerful
message about the state of our Schools. According to CAG, the bottom line is that until Newton fixes its structural deficit,
a funding gap of $2.5 million next year (growing to $20 million by 2015).
Without a new cost structure, the School Committee will need
to either find ways to raise additional revenue or continue to cut critical educational programs or personnel. Student fees
are one way to bridge the revenue gap; however they are a short term and limited solution. As the CAG points out, we need
to engage the public about defining and prioritizing what is “essential” versus “desirable” and
begin to rethink how we structure and finance Newton’s educational model. Please visit my website, www.margierossdecter.com, to learn more about my ideas.