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February 2008
Teachers sound off about state of the schools
Posted Wednesday, February 27, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — Supt. Donnie Evans got an earful yesterday. School buildings are falling apart. There aren’t enough books and supplies. Layoff notices leave teachers feeling helpless. Changes are made without consulting the classroom teacher.
But Evans wasn’t put off by what he heard from nearly two dozen teachers yesterday. He was glad. Last month, Evans revived the long-dormant Teachers’ Council to get honest answers about how teachers are feeling about their jobs and what can be done to improve teacher morale, which has been buffeted by deep budget cuts, layoffs and protracted contract negotiations.
The council, which has representatives from every public school in the city, met with Evans for the second time yesterday at the Providence Academy of International Studies, on Thurbers Avenue. Evans asked teachers to identify some of the biggest hurdles that prevent them from doing their jobs.
He might have gotten more than he bargained for.
Colleen Driscoll, a teacher at Alan Shawn Feinstein Elementary School on Broad Street, found out during a party that she had been assigned to teach another grade level.
As Driscoll said, “It was really unprofessional.”
Bumping, the process by which teachers with more seniority displace those with less, generated a lot of complaints. One teacher retained her job because her number was picked out of a hat. In her case, three teachers were hired on the same date. All of them held the same certifications and had comparable evaluations. In a process called a tie-breaker, each teacher was assigned a number and the number that was selected got the job.
Teachers said they are extremely frustrated because they have no control over their futures. Even senior teachers are losing their classrooms this year. In some cases, a fourth grade teacher is assigned to teach first grade because the certification is the same. That teacher, however, might love fourth grade and have little interest in teaching 6-year-olds. In other cases, teachers are bumped from schools where they have worked for years because of the bumping process.
Not only is the teacher’s life disrupted, but, if enough teachers are transferred, the entire teaching culture is undermined.
“This is not in the best interest of the School Department or the teachers,” said Tracy Carcamo from Lima Annex Elementary School. “Now, you’re looking at teachers who have to do something they don’t want to do. We have to find a better way of doing this.”
“Talk about morale,” said Thomas Morra, a science teacher at Mount Pleasant High School. “How can you keep quality people if every year you keep laying them off? There is no continuity.”
Evans said he was as frustrated by the system as the teachers.
“I agree that the process stinks,” he said. “We are seeking to do things differently.”
Teachers also said that new programs and curricula are imposed on them from above without input from the rank and file. In one school, the faculty spent weeks working on its School Improvement Plan, only to have the district re-work the entire plan over the summer. In the future, one teacher said, faculty will be reluctant to volunteer because they fear that their efforts will be wasted.
Hope High School is a case in point. Teachers have spent a couple of years developing a portfolio system to collect students’ work over time. A few weeks ago, however, the faculty heard that the district was abandoning portfolios in favor of senior projects because students are so mobile that keeping records of their work is next to impossible.
“Why does it always have to be one way or another?” a Hope teacher said. “This shows a real lack of respect for faculty.”
The condition of school buildings also struck a chord among the council. At Gilbert Stuart Middle School, students plastered the lockers with eggs in September. Six months later, the mess remains and the teachers are ready to file a grievance.
At Roger Williams Middle School, a student needed medical help after punching out a window, but the phone system was so antiquated that she couldn’t get through to the main office, even when she used her own cell phone. “This was a real safety issue,” she said.
Other schools don’t have soap because the maintenance staff is afraid that students will make a mess, teachers said.
Supplies are another chronic problem. Barbara Ashby, a school librarian, said she is fortunate to get $200 a year toward the purchase of new books. She said that it’s been 10 years since she has any significant funding at all. At another school, teachers sent back all of their computers because they no longer worked. They expected to get new ones that did work. They didn’t.
At the end of the meeting, Evans wanted to talk about solutions to these problems, but the council first wants to conduct a citywide survey of teachers about these issues
Evans goes to Greene for direct input
Posted Tuesday, February 26, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — Supt. Donnie Evans yesterday walked into a seventh-grade class at Nathanael Greene Middle School and asked the students point blank: Do you feel safe here?
Several students said yes, a few said maybe, and one student said no.
“Who said no?” Evans asked, a big smile on his face to show that there was no right or wrong answer.
One girl raised her hand: “How can you be safe with the gangs?”
Evans asked if she had been harassed by gang members and she said no.
“Any other problems?” he said.
“We have food fights and stuff,” one boy said.
“The cafeteria ceiling is falling apart.”
“The rooms are either too cold or too hot.”
“Any other problems?” Evans asked.
The room was silent.
Evans was at Nathanael Greene after complaints by some teachers there that students were acting out because of a lack of continuity in the school’s leadership. Over the past three months, the school has gone through four principals and six assistant principals, a turnover that several teachers claim has been disruptive to students and staff.
The district’s largest middle school and home to the city’s only advanced academic program, Greene has experienced three major food fights and a couple of afterschool fights since principal Nicole Mathias Thomas went out on sick leave before Thanksgiving.
After a series of principals cycled in and out of the building, retired administrator Joseph Maguire, who once led Gilbert Stuart Middle School, was appointed acting principal about a month ago.
Yesterday, Evans announced that Maguire will stay until late April, when Thomas has said that she will return. Evans said he spoke with Thomas last week to confirm her plans.
The principal turnover has been compounded by the loss of an assistant principal, who is also on sick leave. To provide more stability at the top, Evans has appointed Regina Winkfield to serve as an assistant principal until the end of the school year. Meanwhile, Edward Halpin, an administrator who is well-known by teachers and students, will remain as an assistant principal at Greene.
In an informal conversation with Evans yesterday, Maguire stressed that the school was under control, and said that he was surprised by the level of concern expressed by teachers during a recent School Improvement Team meeting, when members called for a stricter set of rules to crack down on misbehavior.
“Absolutely,” Maguire said, “I think that the kids feel safe.”
Last week, a couple of teachers, including the vice president of the Providence Teachers Union, said there has been evidence of gang activity, including some tagging or graffiti on school walls. Yesterday, Maguire confirmed that there has been some gang tagging and colors as well as two incidents where outsiders came into the building at dismissal.
“Students here are in gangs,” Maguire said, adding that one student was caught selling a product containing a gang insignia. The principal said that he might ask a member of the Police Department’s gang squad to speak to students and possibly meet with members of the Parent Teacher Organization at their next meeting.
“We want parents to be informed,” Maguire said.
Several teachers and parents have also said that Greene is receiving more than its fair share of students with discipline problems, claiming that the school received six such children during a recent two-week period.
But School Department spokeswoman Christina O’Reilly said those numbers are overblown. During a three-week period, three students with discipline issues were sent to Greene. Another child transferred to Greene for safety reasons and two newcomers to the district were enrolled during the same time period.
“I have a huge problem with this,” Evans said, referring to the practice of moving a troublemaker from one school to another. “We need more alternative school offerings. Why would anyone think that a child who is a discipline problem at one school would do any better at another?”
Because of the turnover in leadership, teachers also complained that it’s taking too long for students to be disciplined, which renders the punishment meaningless and undermines the authority of staff and principals alike.
Since he has arrived, however, Maguire said that it rarely takes more than 48 hours between the time an offense is reported to his office and the consequence is imposed. He also said that punishment isn’t the only solution to inappropriate behavior.
“I’ve been here a lot of times and the students are happy,” said Evans, who previously visited Greene on Feb. 8. “They love being here.”
If Greene is in good shape, however, then why are some teachers complaining about the lack of order in the hallways and the growing disrespect on the part of students?
Evans thinks that two things are going on: First, Thomas is a strong principal whose very presence makes people feel secure. Her absence, Evans said, creates a tremendous amount of insecurity in the same way that a parent’s absence sparks anxiety in his or her children. The second element, he said, is that certain individuals have “another agenda,” one that may be motivated by best intentions rather than malicious intent. He didn’t elaborate.
Evans acknowledged that the district has to do a better job of growing its own cadre of leaders, adding that the pool of administrative talent in Providence isn’t very deep. One possibility involves tapping teachers who have administrative certification to fill voids created when a principal leaves.
During his tour yesterday, Evans spoke with PTU Vice President Mary Beth Calabro. She was candid with the superintendent about what she perceives as a loss of order in the building. The day before school vacation, Calabro said, a handful of teachers volunteered to monitor the exterior doorways because there had been problems with intruders sneaking into the building. She also said that there has been little consistency in the way discipline is meted out.
“Has there been an increase in discipline problems?” Evans said.
“Yes,” Calabro said. “Kids test boundaries. They are showing more defiance and disrespect.”
Calabro said that she would love to serve as an assistant principal, adding that she did it briefly this winter when one of the assistants was out sick.
“I know a lot of these kids,” she said. “I know when they need a break. The kids respond when they see a familiar face.”
School superintendent speaks up
Posted Thursday, February 21, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — Supt. Donnie Evans has received quite a beating over the past two months. Members of the City Council have called for his dismissal. The Providence Teachers Union is voting next week on whether to issue a vote of no confidence. But Evans, in a wide-ranging interview yesterday, said he has no plans to start job-hunting.
“I’ve given a lot of thought to that,” he said, adding that job postings cross his desk all the time. “But I’ve never worked in a system where I didn’t finish what I started.
“There were people who discouraged me from coming to Providence,” he said. “They said that it was impossible to be successful here. Well, I’ve survived two and a half years. I have a lot of bullet wounds. There are a lot of people who wish I wasn’t here. I like challenges.”
Evans is at a critical point during his tenure as the leader of the 26,000-student district. The School Board will decide next month whether it will renew his contract, which will expire Sept. 19.
Evans’ leadership has been assailed on all fronts: from parents who were dismayed that their children were stuck on school buses during the Dec. 13 snowstorm to neighborhood activists who objected to the closing of West Broadway Elementary School.
Yesterday, Evans said that some of the criticism is typical when someone new tries to shake up an entrenched system. Some of the dissension in the ranks, he said, is triggered by the protracted labor negotiations, which Evans had hoped to wrap up by Christmas.
Evans agrees that communication with staff and parents continues to be a challenge but he promised to announce some significant initiatives in the next few weeks to address that problem, a persistent one during his superintendency. In the meantime, Evans said he is trying to find less formal ways to reach out to teachers and the public.
Evans recently convened a teachers’ council, which will give him informal feedback on what’s going on in the schools. He has organized a districtwide Parent Teacher Organization to do the same thing, and next month, he will launch a Saturday morning breakfast with school principals. His office also plans on holding two more public forums to hear from the community.
“I need to be hearing from parents, teachers and principals in a less formal way,” Evans said. “People are right when they say that I and my staff need to communicate more directly with the public.”
At a recent meeting of the High School Steering Committee, Evans and one of his top administrators suggested that there might be a shift away from small, theme-based high schools, which gained currency under Supt. Diana Lam and her successor, Melody Johnson. At that meeting, Evans said that research has challenged the effectiveness of site-based schools in high-poverty urban districts.
Yesterday, however, Evans said that he had no intention of abandoning site-based schools such as the Cooley Health & Science Technology Academy. In fact, he said that he would like these schools to exercise more autonomy, especially in the area of schedules and after-school programs.
“It’s clear that we, as a large urban district, have to have consistency in our curriculum,” he said. “A child sitting in algebra I in one high school should be getting the same content as a child in another school. We don’t have that now.”
Small schools such as E{+3} will continue to have the authority to hire their teachers and will continue to have greater flexibility in the way the school day is organized. But what is taught must be seamless across the district’s 11 high schools.
While student performance has continued to improve at the elementary and even the middle school level, high school performance stubbornly resists change. Even at Hope High School, the district’s poster child for high school reform, academic performance has not budged as much as school leaders would like.
Under a state order to break up into smaller learning communities, Hope High School created three theme-based schools, each with its own principal. Every teacher was asked to sign an agreement that spelled out certain commitments, and faculty members can’t be assigned to other schools when there are layoffs, a process called bumping.
Hope also received a sizeable infusion of cash to train teachers, reform curriculum and create individual learning plans for each student.
Is Hope a model for the district’s other high schools?
“You can change school culture,” Evans said, “but we could not do what Hope did without additional resources.”
Evans said there are other models that can produce similar results. In one case, the district hires a second tier of assistant principals who are responsible for discipline, freeing the first tier of assistant principals to focus on curriculum and administration.
“What we do know,” Evans said, “is that the current high school model is not getting us where we want to be.”
Evans said he is proud of the progress that his administration has made on the academic front: steady gains in student performance, including a 25-percent increase in reading scores; the fact that two high schools are accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges and the remaining schools are on the way; and the introduction of new math and literacy curricula designed to raise basic skills of struggling students.
He also said that his effective schools model, which is all about creating schools where students are respected, parents are welcome and teachers are committed to high standards, is starting to take hold, especially in the elementary schools.
Asked to name his biggest challenge, Evans mentioned a better working relationship with the teachers union:
“We have to sit down person-to-person and find common ground,” he said. “We have to put the past behind us and say, ‘We’re here for the kids.’
“If I were to leave everything on my shoulders, I’d be a miserable person,” Evans said. “A lot of wrong has been done to me, growing up in the South during the ’50s and ’60s. If I held onto that, I’d never get anything done.”
Lack of leadership cited for lack of discipline at Greene
Posted Wednesday, February 20, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — Nathanael Greene Middle School has been through four principals and six assistant principals during the past four months and several teachers say the rapid-fire change in leaders has been disruptive to students and staff.
The school, the site of the district’s only gifted program for middle school students, has suffered from constant turnover at the top, which began when Principal Nicole Mathis Thomas went out on sick leave before Thanksgiving. Greene went without a principal for one month and then a series of acting principals cycled through the building. Approximately three weeks ago, Joseph Maguire, a retired administrator, was appointed as acting principal until the end of the school year.
Students at Nathanael Greene, the district’s largest middle school with 820 pupils, are feeling the effects of the so-called leadership vacuum. Since Thomas left, there have been three major food fights, during which apples and milk cartons were hurled across the cafeteria, and a couple of fights after school, one of which was videotaped and posted on a popular social networking site, according to Mary Beth Calabro, a special education teacher and vice president of the Providence Teachers Union.
Another teacher, Kathleen McDonough, said that signs of student unrest are everywhere. Students are disrespectful to staff; they refuse to put away cell phones and follow orders. Several teachers say the hallways have become chaotic.
According to Calabro and McDonough, there is evidence of gang activity, with students wearing gang colors and writing graffiti on the walls. At the beginning of school, some children were so afraid they spent their lunch period in the library. Two parents who belong to the Parent Teacher Organization, however, said the climate at Greene isn’t as chaotic as some teachers say. PTO President Michelle McKenzie said it would do a disservice to Greene to say that the school is chaotic or out of control.
“There is no question,” she said, “that there has been a strain, but I’m not willing to say that it’s deteriorated into chaos.”
A recent meeting of the School Improvement Team drew more than 60 teachers, who repeatedly complained about the growing lack of order in the building. McDonough said morale is at an all-time low, adding that teachers feel stymied by what they perceive as a lack of support from central administration.
“We’re all frustrated,” said Anna Sacoccio, who chairs the School Improvement Team. “What’s missing? Leadership.”
One of the reasons there has been so much instability at Greene is that no one knows when Thomas will return to work. According to Supt. Donnie Evans, Thomas told the central office that she would be back in a couple of months. Since then, Thomas has extended her sick leave. Adding to the instability, one of the assistant principals is also out on sick leave.
“My goal is to stabilize that school,” Evans said Monday. “I’ll call Mrs. Thomas myself. Part of my job is to talk to her and see what’s happening.”
To provide some consistency, Evans said he asked Edward Halpin, a well-respected assistant principal at Greene, to take over the helm but Halpin declined. “He was my first choice,” Evans said.
Compounding the problem, retired administrators can work only a maximum of 90 days, and Deputy Supt. Tomas Hanna said many of the district’s retirees don’t want to commit to working fulltime.
“Mrs. Thomas is assigned to this position,” Hanna said Monday. “We’re aware that the staff is pleased with her and we’re hoping she can come back and bring folks back together.”
Because of the turnover at the top, teachers say it has been difficult to impose consequences for misbehavior. Sometimes, they said, the punishment doesn’t take place until days after the behavior occurred, rendering it meaningless. Calabro and members of the PTO also complained that Nathanael Greene has become a “dumping ground” for students who have been removed from other schools because of disciplinary issues. Greene, they said, received six such children during a recent two-week period.
Renee Baskerville, who has two children at Greene, is vice president of the Parent Teacher Organization and spends nearly every day at the school as a volunteer. Students, she said, are acting out because they feel that the adults aren’t able to keep them safe.
“The children are taking over,” she said. “We have kids who are getting in from the outside, from other schools. Yesterday, some intruders came in looking for one of our students. I’m concerned.”
According to Baskersville, students are asking, “When is Miss Thomas coming back?” and, “What happens if someone gets in here?”
Last week, the principal canceled the Valentine’s Day dance because another food fight disrupted the lunch room, teachers said.
Several parents, including Lee Kossin, the PTO secretary, said the biggest issue isn’t violence but the breakdown in communication between the school and parents and between central administration and the school. No one, she said, ever informed parents about Thomas’ medical leave or the steady stream of administrators who have taken her place.
“There is absolutely no communication,” she said. “Dr. Evans talks about communication but he is the worst communicator in the world.”
Kossin said the Parent Teacher Organization is holding a meeting on Tuesday to bring parents up to date about the leadership at Greene and to air some of the issues around communication and school discipline.
Meanwhile, the school has begun to take specific measures to return order to Nathanael Greene. Following a Feb. 8 meeting, the School Improvement Team asked faculty to insist on hallway passes, confiscate cell phones and other electrical devices and eliminate the practice of lining up students outside the classroom. Instead, teachers are asked to allow students to enter the classroom as soon as they arrive.
In a memo to faculty, the team made the following comments: “There has been an increase in disruptive, defiant, potentially dangerous behavior by students at Greene … An increase in gang activities has been noted. Discipline assemblies are needed ASAP.”
The School Improvement Team sent a copy of the memo to Evans and he has agreed to come to their next meeting, on Feb. 28.
Feinstein School receiving national attention
Posted Friday, February 15, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings is coming to the Alan Shawn Feinstein Elementary School on Broad Street today, and when she does, the fifth graders will explain why they did so well on the New England Common Assessment Program.
“We kicked butt,” said Blanco Colato, one of a half-dozen fifth graders who composed a welcoming letter to Spellings.
Feinstein, a turn-of-the-century brick schoolhouse in Washington Park, showed the greatest rate of improvement in Providence on the latest round of NECAP tests, which measure student proficiency in English, writing and math. The tests are given every year in grades 3 through 8 and again in grade 11.
•In reading, only 37 percent of students in grades 3 through 5 were proficient in 2006. A year later, that number has jumped to 50 percent.
•In math, only 27 percent of the students tested were performing at grade level in 2006; in 2007, 42 percent were.
•In writing, student performance doubled in one year, from 30 percent in 2006 to 60 percent in 2007.
Feinstein, a kindergarten through grade 5 school, didn’t add any instructional bells and whistles to produce these strong gains in student performance. According to Principal Christine Riley, teachers made a concerted effort to use the test data to pinpoint student weaknesses at every grade level and, for every student.
At Feinstein, common planning time is carved out of the school day. Once a week, teachers from each grade meet to analyze test data and fine-tune instruction to address gaps in knowledge. As a team, teachers decide on a goal and set a timetable, typically six weeks, to see if the new approach is working. If it isn’t, the staff tries something else.
This is something that effective schools have in common: they use test data to pinpoint weaknesses in math or reading, then try fresh instruction methods to address those areas.
According to Riley, a federal program called Reading First has trained teachers in early literacy skills. Children who don’t understand what they are reading will also have trouble understanding related subjects, such as word problems in math. Reading First trains elementary school teachers to be teachers of reading, something that isn’t always taught in schools of education. Eleven schools in Providence participate in this voluntary program.
With the NECAP, one of the biggest challenges is persuading students to take the tests seriously, because the assessments don’t count toward a grade, nor do students receive credit if they reach proficiency. Savvy schools like Feinstein, however, come up with a host of creative strategies to get students to pay attention.
This fall, Feinstein held pep rallies before school began and the fifth graders came up with their own chant, which sounds like this:
“Hey students, can you do it?’
“Do what?”
“The NECAP?”
“No way.”
“Beat the NECAP!”
“OK”
Using model questions, teachers drilled students on the material they would encounter on the test, however Riley emphasized, the practice tests were incorporated into regular classroom instruction. In other words, teachers weren’t simply teaching to the test, a common criticism of the recent national emphasis on testing.
Students were also trained how to prepare for the test. Teachers explained testing strategy: for example, if you reach a question you don’t understand, move on and go back to it. Or, as one fifth grader said yesterday, “Take time to reflect on the question.”
Students were given homework assignments, including fill-in-the-bubble tests and their parents received worksheets to help their children become familiar with the questions. Signs posted around the school advised students to “Relax and count to ten,” and “Get a good night’s sleep.”
Even the younger students were brought into the act. Faculty members urged students in first and second grade to be kind to their older classmates and to walk quietly when the testing was taking place.
As Riley said, “It was a total team effort.”
When the scores came in, Riley made sure there was a schoolwide celebration. Children who performed well received certificates from the principal during an assembly and the one class that had 100 percent attendance, Room 303, got a pizza party.
“This wouldn’t have happened without the teachers,” Riley said. “They are so committed. They’re here before school and after school.”
Yesterday, Riley asked a handful of fifth graders why the NECAP is important:
“It shows what we’ve learned over the years,” said one student.
“Most of us were at the bottom and now we’re almost achieving a perfect score.”
“It shows what we need to work on.”
Students expressed a mixture of excitement and curiosity about Spellings’ arrival. The secretary of education will be joined by Governor Carcieri, Sen. Jack Reed, Mayor David N. Cicilline, Supt. Donnie Evans and others.
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to meet the secretary of education,” said Luis Molina, 11.
“It’s astounding that we get to meet her in real life,” Michael Jimenez said. “She runs No Child Left Behind.”
Hope High still in transition
Posted Wednesday, February 13, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — No one disputes the fact that Hope High School has made tremendous progress since state Education Commissioner Peter McWalters intervened four years ago. Now the question is whether the district has the ability to sustain the improvement.
“There is no disagreement about the excellent work done here,” McWalters said. “We have something here that we need to both support and replicate, but, at the same time, we have to support the core mission of the district.”
The dilemma is this: How do you balance the district’s need to ratchet up the quality of all high schools without sacrificing Hope in the process?
That tension was evident during yesterday’s show-cause hearing on whether Hope High School should remain under the authority of McWalters’ intervention order or whether the school should be returned to the district’s control.
While many of yesterday’s speakers cloaked their true feelings about the potential loss of state oversight, Providence Teachers’ Union President Steve Smith didn’t mince words. Unless the district is held accountable, he said, Hope will regress and the progress made to date will be in vain.
“We need your help,” he told McWalters. “Your office must maintain a level of support and oversight that will force the Providence School Board and the administration to keep its promises. To do otherwise would be a mistake of monumental proportions.”
But Supt. Donnie Evans asked McWalters to weigh the needs of one school against the needs of many. He also noted that the climate has changed dramatically since the intervention order was issued. In 2004, only one school, Hope, was classified by the state as being in corrective action. Now, the entire district is eligible for state intervention under state and federal law.
“One of the issues,” McWalters said, “is the degree to which the district can support Hope at a time when the district is trying to move the entire system.”
Evans made it clear that his mission was to create a common core of standards across the district’s 11 high schools. He said that the district needs to create a uniform curriculum and set of graduation standards before it can fully support the work of site-based schools — smaller, theme-based schools that operate with much more autonomy than larger comprehensive high schools such as Classical and Mount Pleasant.
But McWalters, on more than one occasion, said he was reluctant to turn his attention away from Hope, even though the district’s other high schools are in serious need of a similar intervention. And he acknowledged that Hope High School benefited from additional financial support, resources that neither the state nor the district has to devote to the city’s other highs schools.
Other individuals spoke of the important role that the state played in getting Hope to where it is today. It was McWalters who insisted on a new leadership team, who ordered the school to break into three smaller learning communities and who demanded that the school forge meaningful relationships with students, parents and community partners.
During the past three years, Hope has undergone a transformation from chaos to order, from a school where students felt lost to a school where they feel respected. Hope has created student advisories to promote stronger ties between student and faculty, created individual learning plans that spell out each student’s academic, social and career goals and forged vital partnerships with several area colleges, including the Rhode Island School of Design, Rhode Island College and Johnson & Wales University.
The school’s faculty has revamped its curricula, created teacher-led study groups and begun to build stronger relationships with parents where there once was none.
Last spring, Hope High School was removed from the warning list and received full accreditation from the prestigious New England Association of Schools and Colleges. At the time, only one other Providence high school, Classical, had the same accreditation.
Yesterday, principals and teachers argued that the high school was able to turn itself around precisely because of the state’s intervention order. One of the reasons why Hope has been so successful, they said, is because the faculty has remained untouched by the annual round of layoffs, which can wreak havoc with school culture.
Some slippage has already occurred, according to some faculty. Because Hope was over-enrolled this summer, the school had to abandon its plan to create separate schedules for each learning academy, which undermined efforts to create three distinct high schools for arts, technology and leadership.
Because Hope has been given the authority to create its own schedule, teachers meet regularly to discuss student work and the entire school meets once a week to talk about global issues, a rarity in the district’s large high schools. Becky Coustan, the school’s head coach, wondered whether common planning time would continue without the state’s intervention order.
Hope has devoted considerable resources to develop portfolios of student work as part of the state’s new graduation requirements. Now, that work may be undermined because the district has decided to adopt a senior project, a new graduation requirement for all of the high schools.
According to Mary Ann Davidson, the school’s director of guidance, “If Hope is no longer under a state order, I’m afraid that advisories would disappear.”
“Is Hope a site-based school or not?” said Paul Sproll, the director of teacher education at RISD and a longtime partner. “The school believes that it is. But it needs a clear direction from the district. This ambiguity needs to come to a halt.”
At the end of the three-hour hearing, McWalters praised principals, teachers and students for undertaking a Herculean task.
“There are wonderful, wonderful things going on here,” he said. “But we’ve got to resolve this issue: What do I do to position the district to expand on what’s happening here? These kinds of schools are hard to grow.”
McWalters concluded by saying that the issues raised in the hearing are more challenging than those raised four years ago when the state was trying to figure out if it should take over the failing school.
“This is much harder,’ he said. “There is much more at stake now.”
600 teachers get pink slips; most will be rehired
Posted Tuesday, February 12, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — More than 600 teachers received pink slips in the mail last week, although the vast majority will be rehired in the spring, after the School Department works through the labyrinthine seniority system known as bumping.
In fact, only 66 teaching positions will be eliminated, more than half from the middle schools, where there has been a decline in student enrollment, according to Tomas Hanna, deputy superintendent of operations. Approximately 12 positions will be cut at the elementary level and 17 will be taken from the high schools.
At the elementary level, the staff cuts will be made by consolidating several English as a Second Language and bilingual education classes, which have only 8 to 10 students per class. At the high school level, the department will eliminate double periods of literacy and math at Central and Mount Pleasant, Hanna said.
At last night’s School Board meeting, a couple of members asked how the elimination of 66 jobs leads to 621 layoff notices, an unpleasant rite of passage that occurs every year as Providence tries to balance enrollments with adequate staffing. Last year, almost 700 teachers received pink slips before the March 1 notification deadline set by state law.
Although the pink slips are demoralizing, school officials say that their hands are tied. If the district doesn’t send out enough layoff notices, it can’t, by law, cut those positions later in the school year. Some of the layoffs are pink slips in name only. Approximately 113 are athletic coaches who traditionally have one-year contracts. The same is true of long-term substitutes.
What complicates matters is a seniority system that requires the most senior teacher to displace or bump someone with less seniority. In the past, small site-based high schools, those with the supposed authority to hire their own teaching staff, have lost a third or more of their teachers because of seniority. That experience can wreak havoc with a school leader’s attempt to build school culture.
But it doesn’t stop there. This year, 40 teachers have resigned and their positions were filled by substitute teachers. Now those positions have to be filled with permanent staff.
Seventeen teachers took unpaid leaves; now that they are returning, the district has to provide them with permanent jobs, which will displace the teachers currently in those positions, which leads to further bumping and so on down the line.
Hanna gave the following example of how bumping works: the district has to let go six English teachers. To reach that end, the department would actually have to give layoff notices to 42 teachers.
Supt. Donnie Evans last night said he doesn’t like letting go of one-third of the district’s teachers any more than the union does. Union members turned out in force last night to express their discontent with the leadership of the superintendent and School Board President Mary McClure.
“It’s an archaic exercise,” he said. “And the sooner we can remove that practice, the better. We are engaged in conversations [with the teachers’ union] that will lead to the end of that practice.”
Although the department hopes to return most of the 600 teachers to the schools in which they currently teach, in the past, bumping has often resulted in significant disruptions to teachers and their students.
Teachers set up picket line, call for change in leadership
Posted Tuesday, February 12, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
Members of the executive board of the Providence Teachers Union and teachers hold informational picketing in front of the School Administration Building to demonstrate their unhappiness with the leadership of Supt. Donnie Evans and School Board President Mary McClure yesterday afternoon.
The Providence Journal / Kris Craig
PROVIDENCE — Carrying signs that said, “A Blizzard of Blunders” and “Stop the Nightmare,” nearly 50 members of the Providence Teachers Union, picketed the School Administration Building yesterday afternoon.
“Enough is enough,” said PTU President Steven Smith. “This is about two years of ineffective leadership.”
Smith said that the union’s executive board voted last week to hold a series of informational pickets, beginning with last night’s emergency School Board meeting, which was scheduled to begin as the picketing ended. Teachers will also be asked to take a vote of no confidence in the leadership of Supt. Donnie Evans and School Board President Mary McClure on or about March 13. The union, however, does not plan to ask teachers to work to rule, a condition under which faculty only fulfill the letter of the law when it comes to their jobs.
The union action comes as no surprise. Teachers and principals have been expressing their dissatisfaction with Evans’ leadership for the past two years, citing poor communication, a lack of support and no clear sense of direction. Those issues were compounded by two recent events: the Dec. 13 snowstorm, which left 60 busloads of students stranded for hours, and the W-2 mistake, in which the School Department failed to take out enough Social Security and Medicare taxes from teachers’ paychecks. The department made good on the total amount of the deductions owed the government and will be reimbursed by taking more from employee paychecks over the next few months.
“This is global,” said Bethany Beretta, a first-grade teacher at Nathanael Greene Middle School, which went without a principal for two months this winter. “There has been a lack of leadership, a lack of direction and a lack of accountability.”
Evans, in a prepared statement, said that he values the dedication and hard work of each teacher, but he said that the district must focus on improving student performance.
“In order to accomplish this goal, we must do things differently,” he said. “The old ways of doing business in this district are simply not working.”
Evans also said that he and the board remain committed to negotiating a “forward-looking” teachers contact that will put children first.
According to Smith, Evans and McClure have made a number of missteps during the superintendent’s first three years in office, from the surprise decision to close the popular West Broadway Elementary School to the decision to increase the size of special education classes last summer to close the budget gap. Teachers and parents felt they were blindsided by these decisions and complained that neither was made in the best interest of students.
Yesterday, several teachers from Carl G. Lauro Elementary School on Kenyon Street in Federal Hill complained that their classrooms were frigid, with temperatures in the upper-40s. How, they asked, can we work under these conditions? Another teacher complained that Evans seems unapproachable, adding that his colleagues feel adrift in a sea of new and sometimes conflicting mandates.
“We want to see issues that are important to students and teachers at the forefront: discipline, school safety, the condition of the buildings, the restoration of art and music,” Smith said.
Smith said that the picketing has nothing to do with the fact that the teachers union is still without a contract, six months after the original agreement expired. The teachers are currently working under the terms of their previous contract.
“Teachers feel that these things are not going to get better,” he said, “and they want their voices to be heard collectively.”
The teachers aren’t the only group unhappy with Evans’ leadership. In the wake of the school bus transportation problem in December, five members of the City Council signed a resolution asking for Evans’ dismissal but later backed down after a strong lobbying effort by Mayor David N. Cicilline. Meanwhile, the School Board has until Feb. 19 to let Evans know whether he will receive a new contract this year.
Letter to Dr. Evans - Incorrect W-2 Forms
Posted Thursday, February 7, 2008
February 6, 2008
Dr. Donnie W. Evans, Ed.d
Superintendent
Providence School Department
797 Westminster Street
Providence, RI 02903
Dear Dr. Evans:
The Providence Teachers Union’s office has received numerous phone calls and visits from teachers who have questions regarding their revised W-2 forms. We have been able to assist to a certain degree; however, there are many questions which can only be answered by a person with a school department business background.
Therefore, I am requesting that you designate a particular individual(s) who would be available from 3:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m. on specific days in order to help those teachers who have unanswered questions about their W-2 and/or their revised paycheck.
Please give this request your immediate attention.
Sincerely,
Steven F. Smith
President
SFS/mmf
c: PTU Membership
School workers get unpleasant news with W-2 forms
Posted Tuesday, February 5, 2008
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — More than 2,200 teachers and administrators got a shock when they received their W-2 forms last week. The School Department had failed to deduct the full amount of FICA payments for the previous year.
The department plans to send to the Internal Revenue Service the amount needed to cover the miscalculation and then be repaid by collecting from each affected employee over several months.
According to Providence Teachers Union President Stephen Smith, the average teacher will have to repay between $300 and $400, while the average administrator will have to return approximately $700. Smith said this is just one more reason why teachers are losing faith in the administration of Supt. Donnie Evans. FICA stands for Federal Insurance Contributions Act, which finances Social Security and Medicare.
School Department spokeswoman Christina O’Reilly attributed the miscalculation to a computer or programming glitch in the human resources system, which was discovered when the W-2s were sent out at the beginning of last week. She said that the School Department on Wednesday sent out a computerized phone message to teachers and administrators notifying them of the problem.
The department sent out a letter on Friday that explains how much money each employee owes and how it will be paid back. The money will be taken out of each person’s paycheck over the remainder of the year.
According to O’Reilly, a teacher who earns $50,000 a year owes $363 in back taxes, which translates into a bi-monthly deduction of $17.30. Only those School Department employees who pay into the state retirement plan are affected by this error, O’Reilly said
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