Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Principals put to the test
Program allows leader to make school rules
What would happen if school principals, who know their teachers and students better than the bureaucrats, had the freedom to make their own decisions?
They could determine how much time their kids need to spend on math. They could hire extra fourthgrade teachers, or buy a new reading program not yet approved by the school district. They could even plant a garden or squeeze in an extra playground break without asking school district permission.
Starting next year, it will happen in some struggling Broward and Palm Beach County schools.
The schools, mostly rated D or F, will get extra money from the state and will be exempt from many laws and policies in areas such as textbooks, curriculum and staffing.
Not all rules will be eliminated: Participating schools still will have to meet state limits on how many children are in a classroom, and follow all collective bargaining requirements for teacher staffing. And students still will have to take state-required tests.
The state Legislature, believing principals were hamstrung by layers of bureaucracy, created the new rules for certain schools in 2016. The Principal Autonomy Program allows leaders of low-performing schools in seven districts, including Broward and Palm Beach, to be given more freedom to alter the direction of their struggling campuses.
The program limits each district to three autonomy schools for the next three years. Broward has not chosen
its schools yet, although the district began a similar program on its own last year with two failing elementary schools, Park Ridge in Deerfield Beach and Walker in Fort Lauderdale, both rated F for the past two years.
Mark Narkier, who supervises the principals, said he has seen how a principal’s individual style can influence a school’s path.
Principals at the two schools were able to choose a curriculum focus they thought would work for their students. At Park Ridge, Principal Joseph Balchunas chose scienceoriented lessons through Discovery Education, connected with the Discovery Channel.
At Walker, Principal Philip Bullock converted the school into a performing arts magnet with a debate program and laptops for the older kids. Walker allows older students to choose major and minor areas of arts study, such as band or drama, giving students a sense of pride, camaraderie and investment in their selected field.
“The principals have complete autonomy on curriculum. We give them freedom to progress at different paces and use their own skill set,” Narkier said. “What’s been interesting to me is each went about it in his own unique way.”
Each started his teaching staff from scratch with a balance of new and veteran teachers, Narkier said. Both schools are showing dramatic improvements in attendance, discipline problems and first-grade readiness for kindergartners, he said.
Researchers say principals are one of the most important drivers of school improvement. A Wallace Foundation study showed after classroom instruction, school leadership was the most important factor in determining how well a student performs at school.
In Palm Beach County, administrators chose three schools and their principals for the program: Drated Lincoln Elementary (formerly West Riviera Elementary) in Riviera Beach, C-rated Lake Shore Middle in Belle Glade, and D-rated Orchard View Elementary in Delray Beach.
But it’s unclear whether Lincoln will participate after Principal Tonja Lindsey-Latson’s arrest in January for pawning a school computer.
Principal Lisa Lee is in her first year at Orchard View Elementary, a school surrounded by upscale subdivisions. But many parents instead send their children to magnet programs or elsewhere, resulting in a 92 percent school poverty rate.
Lee said she will use the extra money she gets next year to create programs to attract families that have stayed away. She plans to start music lessons with string instruments, such as violin and cello. She also will open a program for gifted students, starting with kindergarten next year.
She is most excited about an academic crosstraining program called “project-based learning,” in which students select a topic, such as climate change, and learn about it through math, science, reading and arts. She said this learning style will free the school from the requirement that students study a single subject in strict 45-minute segments.
Teachers say they like this idea.
“This will allow the kids to make connections to their own lives. They can take a theme like transportation and not be limited to a 45-minute block,” said Vera Boettcher, who teaches students whose second language is English. “It will give us so much more freedom.”
Teacher Jill Oginski said she wants to revive spelling tests, which fell out of favor as schools emphasized phonics.
“This autonomy will reach down to teachers and trickle down to kids,” Oginski said.
Lee wants to put colorful flags on the main street in front of the school telling the neighborhood about the new programs.
“They are trusting me to think out of the box,” Lee said. “We are going to make this a school everyone wants to come to in the neighborhood.”
The hope for principal autonomy programs is to maintain the success even if a principal moves on to another assignment, Narkier said.
“The bigger picture is that it has to be sustainable beyond the principal,” Narkier said. “The principal has to leave processes in place so schools that are chronically failing don’t fall back into low achievement if the principal leaves.”