Can Public Schools Have a Legacy Culture?

One of the disadvantages that public schools have compared to private companies is that they are governed by an elected board. These school boards can have significant changes in philosophical leanings as a result of a popular election. If a group of citizens decide to take a district in a new direction there is very little appointed school leaders can do about it. But, creating a Legacy Culture is not impossible.

Although the task is arduous, education leaders can create a culture that has a very good chance of surviving school board upheavals. The mistake that too many educators make is that they do not engage their community until they need something. When this is the approach used, many people in the community feel that they are poorly informed and that the schools are constantly taking advantage of them. This can result in community members banding together to make sure their voice is heard. This can lead to “rogue candidates” for the school board who may not have an accurate view of what really goes on in the schools but have a strong opinion about what needs to happen. Historically, school board elections do not get very large voter turnouts. As a result, a motivated few can have a significant impact. In this environment, the old adage of an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure should become the order of the day.

Let me offer a few examples of school leaders that I believe are embracing the principles of Legacy Leadership. I’ll offer an example of a rural, suburban, and an urban superintendent. Each of these leaders has learned an important lesson about school effectiveness. That lesson, you can only go so far without the support of your community and if you’re being evaluated based on the achievement of all your students, only going that far will never be enough.

The first school leader I want to highlight is from a small district in a small county in one of the poorest areas the state. The superintendent has only been in her position for a little over 3 years but what she has done has been quite remarkable. The district has had a fairly rough go of it for more than 30 years. Declining enrollment, mediocre student performance, and fairly high teacher turnover rates have been the trend for most of those 30+ years. What this superintendent did in her first few days on the job set the tone for the next 3 years.

This rural superintendent began her time in the job by inviting community members to meet with her to help her understand what was really important to them. Based on what she learned from numerous meetings, she acquired an understanding of what community members really valued. She learned that community members wanted an open relationship with the schools and that they felt like they had been shut out of it for way too long. The only time they ever heard from the schools was when they needed more money or volunteers. In the words of one senior community member, “if the only time I hear from you is when you need me to cough up more money, my answer will always be no.”

She also learned that the community really cared about the kids and wanted them all to succeed but felt like the schools had shown favoritism in the past. Several people pointed to examples of athletes that got special treatment while their music students were wearing the same band uniform they had worn when they attended the high school 20 years ago.

A third important lesson was that community members and parents didn’t want to be treated like idiots. Just because they weren’t as educated didn’t mean they didn’t know anything. Most educators don’t think they treat parents like idiots but I can tell you, with 35+ years of experience in education, we unintentionally do. We talk education talk and don’t translate it into parent talk. And parents feel like we do it intentionally to make them feel dumb. By having more regular conversations, not just parent-teacher conferences, teachers learn how to better communicate with parents and parents learn how to better communicate with teachers.

As a result of her meetings with community members, this superintendent learned that the community valued open and honest communication, fairness and equity, and treating each other with dignity and respect. These values became the cornerstone of her administration and all employees were involved in developing strategies to make sure everyone was treated accordingly. Furthermore, every decision is now being weighed against those principles. The outcomes have been moving in the right direction and the mood of the district has become much more positive. The culture isn’t quite there yet but it has moved way down the road towards a Legacy Culture.

The second superintendent serves a suburban school district in a wealthy, highly educated midwestern suburb. I say he serves the district because that’s what he has said to me. He thinks of himself more as a servant than he does a boss. He feels he serves at the pleasure of the school board, parents, students, and community. If he doesn’t know what they need, he can’t serve them. So, his number one job is to always know what his district needs. In some cases the needs are bigger than education. In those situations, rather than saying that’s the job of city government or the courts or business, he says what can your schools do to help. For this superintendent, the most important value is collaboration. His motto has been “working together works!”

He wasn’t always like this. He was a very traditional educator and had the belief that all those graduate classes in school administration had to have prepared him for the role of school administrator. He knew what needed to be done, so all those amateurs should just leave him alone and let him do what he was trained to do. But an experience with a troubled girl when he was a high school principal profoundly effected him and made him rethink his approach to administration. That young lady was talented at baiting her teachers into a confrontation that usually led to her being referred to the office for disciplinary action. The first couple of times he dealt with her he assigned her to in school suspension. And then he required her mother to come to school to either get her daughter to behave or she would have to have her at home for a week of out of school suspension. When the mom came in, she was in tears and told him she didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know where to go for help. She explained that their home was in turmoil since her husband left them 18 months before. Her husband and her daughter were very close and now he’s gone and she can’t understand. She blamed her mom for everything and She didn’t know what to do. This principal immediately knew, sending the girl home would not help the situation, so he called the girl’s counselor and asked her to come to his office. Together, the mom, the counselor, and the principal worked out a plan for moving forward. A meeting was held including all the girl’s teachers, the counselor, the principal, and the mom. The situation was reviewed with the entire team and this group of 9 adults went to work to try to make the world a better place for this girl.

Things didn’t get much better at first but at least everyone understood what was going on. They decided that the teacher who had the fewest problems with the girl would start acting as the team manager. That was her English teacher. That teacher took the time to really listen to the girl. She began to open up and share. In a few weeks the teacher asked her if she’d like to share her problems with her counselor but the girl said no, she didn’t trust the counselor. So, the principal called a community member he knew, who worked as a counselor for troubled youth at a local nonprofit organization, to see if they could help out. That counselor said absolutely, that is exactly what we do. The principal shared that news with the English teacher and she asked the girl if she would consider meeting with that counselor and she said yes. She had heard about the organization from a friend and thought they were okay. So, the first cross organizational collaboration was started. It wasn’t the school all by itself trying to push kids into shapes defined by preexisting holes. It was now teams of adults all working to help every kid succeed. And that meant a whole new paradigm regarding how to get the job done. Eventually, every major issue was handled through collaborative arrangements with multiple agencies and the schools. The principal became the superintendent and the district, from the school board to the teachers, administration, parents, and community all adopted the motto “working together works.” This district is highly successful and well regarded in the world of education. More districts could learn from their example.

The last superintendent I will mention is the superintendent of an urban school district that truly broke the mold of the typical urban school superintendent. Statistically, urban superintendents last less than 4 years in a position. This superintendent will retire after 17 years at the helm of this district and after spending her entire career in the same district, she will have devoted more than 40 years to the children of her community. When most urban superintendents come into cities from the outside, being a homegrown superintendent is a novelty. But, being homegrown offers advantages that all the other experiences can never provide. Having an intimate knowledge of your community, it’s businesses, organizations and its families allows a superintendent to have insights about how things work that would be difficult for an outsider to have. The opposite, however, is also true. When you are in the same district for so long, everyone knows just about everything there is to know about you as well. To survive for so long in one district and to be recognized as one of the best there is; you cannot bluff your way through. You must be a person of great integrity that has an amazing capacity to build trusting relationships.

Working from a foundation of values and principles allows a superintendent to build something very few can, a Legacy Culture. This superintendent’s district states the following core values:

Core Values

We value:

• Student achievement as the heart of our work.
• Equity in educational opportunities.
• The diversity and uniqueness of our district and community.
• The accountability of the school board, the administration, employees and teaching professionals.
• Open and honest communication with our community, parents, and students.
• Partnerships with business, governmental, and community agencies.
• Our community’s support, sacrifice, and contributions.
• The ability to change and meet all challenges.
• Facilities that are clean, safe, and well-maintained.

This district also has just three goals that are directly related to those values. Those goals are:

Goal I: Achieve and Maintain Academic Excellence: Eliminate the achievement gap among all groups of students by maximizing the achievement of all.

Goal II: Engage Parents and the Community: Engage all segments of the community to support the education of young people.

Goal III: Operate effectively with integrity and fiscal responsibility.
Demonstrate effective and efficient use of taxpayer dollars by using best management practices and systematic long range planning.

This superintendent is retiring at the end of 2019-20 school year. In many districts, if they have a beloved superintendent with a great track record, finding a new superintendent that can continue to move the district in the right direction is critical and very difficult. In this urban district, the quality of the next superintendent is not guaranteed but they have dramatically increased the probability of finding another great one. Having those core values and using them as their benchmark is an excellent first step. Making sure that every finalist for the honor of serving measures up is the next step. And then continuing to operate by those values and principles in the final piece of the puzzle.

These three superintendents are exceptional. Too many school districts keep jumping on the flavor of the month bandwagon. Finding a district’s true north and sticking to it is the only way to achieve excellence. We can all learn from these superintendents. I haven’t named these three because I’m writing about them based on my observations and I have not asked for their permission. If they read this blog and want to be identified, I’ll gladly reveal their names. They deserve the recognition but that’s their call!