When charter-run schools were started they were viewed as potential laboratories of innovation. Where lessons learned would be replicated in the district-run schools. This promise has gone largely undeveloped for a host of reasons. But if we look at Oakland data, and review some research there is a gem to be found. One of the…
Small schools
What Has Worked in Oakland– Small Schools
I think it was Nietzsche who said that “every revolutionary tide eventually recedes, leaving only the sludge of a new bureaucracy”. In Oakland he is wrong. I had a chance to reminisce with some of the architects and builders in Oakland’s New Small Autonomous School and early charter movements this week (Superintendent Chacones, Laura Flaxman…
The Real Challenges of District Reform
Changing District behavior is really hard. I learned this first hand working with OUSD to reduce restrictions on schools and implement so called “site based decision-making” as part of its broader New Small Autonomous Schools Policy. And it was often not bad actors or bad intentions, but just an inertia that kept the district hurtling…