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The First Six Months of Children First Initiative
By Noreen Connell

Though never articulated in public, the Children First initiative seems to be heavily influenced by Harvard Professor Richard Elmore’s effort at constructing a new paradigm for public school administrators. He observes that in America the real role of principals and even the highest education officials has traditionally been one of mediating relationships, that is, buffering educators from the demands of parents and politicians. In order for public schools to survive and improve, especially for high poverty children, administrators from top to bottom have to become managers of instruction, with a chain of command and clear performance expectations similar to those of other institutions. They can’t just hope for “better” teachers, they have to create them.
It is an impressive analysis—as long as you don’t notice that Elmore comes from an environment where professors may be drowning in committee meetings but are not generally managed with a heavy hand. University presidents, pretty much relegated to fund raising, are buffering and mediating 100 percentof the time. Talent for each academic discipline is recruited, not necessarily shaped by the department head. And yet for the most part, despite this lax—some would say non existent—management of instruction, learning somehow takes place. Sometimes what is sauce for the gander is not sauce for the goose. Children First, more than anything else, is an attempt to actualize Elmore’s prescription to manage instruction. Before this initiative was implemented, EPP made the suggestion that a new administrative position be added to each school to help principals deal with an added administrative workload that would come form the elimination of community school district staff. We had not an inkling that every school would get an additional part-time principal, called Local Instructional Superintendents (LIS’s), who patrol the school hallways with eagle-eyes for the sloppy bulletin board. We also never imagined that the staff development coaches would report to the Local Instructional Superintendent, not the principal.
Anyone slightly familiar with the history of the profound impact of Frederick Winslow Taylor’s Principals of Scientific Management on American industry at the beginning of the 20th century (he gave us the beginning of the modern assembly line) should take another look at Children First. Numbed by the churning of education initiatives in New York City, some perceive it as just another slogan or a pretext for dismantling community school districts or a platform for the re election of the Mayor. Any of these interpretations might be right. My bet is that it’s something more interesting. If so, the tensions with the teacher’s union won’t go away when a collective bargaining agreement is signed. There will be a continuing clash between different models of relationships at the school level, the UFT’s “teacher professionalism” versus “management of instruction.” It’s not just a Mayor and a Chancellor from business backgrounds trying to curb the power of a union that has had a major role in fashioning education policy. It’s an attempt to manage teaching in a way that has not been tried before, way beyond the “follow the rules” dictates of the early Board of Education bureaucracy.

Will it work?
Of course, given the old institutional culture of the Board of Education, Elmore’s high ideals could degenerate into just a messy pile of “follow the rules” dictates. So far, the unanswered phone calls and e-mails by staff at the Regional Operating Centers (they’re not called rocks for nothing) do not indicate any keen management skills on the part of the managers. But after a few stumbles and corrections, a new structure could work, ultimately. I’m conflicted about this possibility. EPP’s two studies of how low-performing schools turned around concluded on the note that schools serving very high-poverty communities had to create an instructional environment that was far superior to those serving middle class communities. This is a difficult task.More is needed than just more resources, smaller schools, and smaller classes, though they are preconditions for improvement. Managing instruction might the way. Or it might not. There could be a reason why the best learning communities since antiquity have been collegial and participatory.

Mediation might be important
One last rumination on this bold Children First experiment. The shedding of mediating and buffering functions might not be such a cost -free aspect of Elmore’s prescription, especially in this town. The New York City board and bureaucracy’s various permutations in structure were geared to navigating, co-opting, and smothering all the various ethnic, racial, and class conflicts that emerged. In the past there was competition for appointments of community superintendents among Irish, Italian and Jewish men. New, less rigorous balance was created between African Americans, Latinos, and women. Every board member had a constituency that was more than geographic.
Board members and top administrators not only “represented” their constituency, many of them also “influenced” their constituency. Though advocates were opposed to grade retention when Mayor Giuliani imposed this policy on Chancellor Crew, no firestorm erupted. Board members did not want to “embarrass the Chancellor.” Only one voted to oppose grade retention. Advocates meekly testified at the obligatory Board of Education hearing. It was a done deal.
In contrast, when Mayor Bloomberg proposed yet another grade retention policy, only a few large Department of Education contractors could be trotted out to support it. The mediators were gone. What this portends for the future is uncertain. •

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