November 8, 2015
Irony can be cruel.
This weekend, in a Bloomington, MN hotel, the state conference for English as a Second Language teachers was held. At the conference, I am told, several of the breakout sessions highlighted the work of Jana Hilleren.
Ouch.
Hilleren, until very recently, was the director of the Minneapolis Public Schools Multilingual Department. She became head of the department five years ago, and was tasked with managing both the World Languages division, for foreign language teachers, and the ELL side, which provides English language programming to district students.
Those familiar with Hilleren’s work say it has brought about measurable, worthwhile structure and progress to MPS’s once floundering ELL department.
But just two weeks ago, Minneapolis’ Interim Superintendent, Michael Goar, announced to Davis Center staff that Hilleren was being removed from her position. Sources say she has also been pushed out of the district altogether Why? To make room for a new “Global Education” department, and a new boss: Elia Bruggeman.
After almost two weeks, a message about this was finally sent to staff, on behalf of Bruggeman:
To staff:
In order to gain efficiency and better align programs for students, Interim Superintendent Michael Goar is moving the Multilingual Department of Minneapolis Public Schools under the Office of the Deputy Education Officer. This move includes the elimination of the position of Multilingual Department executive director.
The email goes on to list “some exciting initiatives and events,” and states that the “mission of the Multilingual Department is to empower educators and leaders to develop language-rich learning environments that raise the achievement of English Learners, making it a natural fit for the Office of the Deputy Education Officer.” That would be Bruggeman, of course.
But frustration on the ground is boiling over, with district EL staff expressing dismay and anger over Hilleren’s ouster. Why? Because they say that Hilleren is the one who should be credited for turning the Multilingual Department from chaos to the “language-rich learning environment” it is becoming.
To avoid participating in unnecessary hagiography, I have asked for specifics regarding Hilleren’s work. In response, I received a deluge of detailed answers. Here, an experienced MPS teacher, who asked not to be named, expounds on Hilleren’s legacy:
Before Jana became director, ELs were nearly invisible to district leadership (and most administrators). Jana came into the district to respond to an Office of Civil Rights complaint. We weren’t exiting students who were ready to be exited. We weren’t providing service to dual eligible (special ed students are also ELs) students). There were other compliance issues as well. Jana developed systems to bring us into compliance.
Student placement for ELs still isn’t perfect, but in recent years, many of the issues have been ironed out, such as assessing students so the school knows what type of service they need. There are now around 215 ESL teachers in MPS. Over half were hired in the past 5 years since Jana took leadership. She’s made a huge investment to ensure there is programming at nearly every school and much more adequate staffing to ensure all ELs are getting service.
In the area of EL service, under Jana’s leadership the district developed a program framework, defining what service students at each grade level, at each level of proficiency, receives. She worked with HR to ensure that each school was adequately staffed to provide service to each and every EL.Many schools such as Green Central have seen steady gains in test scores due to investment in the co-teaching model, which benefits all students. And, the co-teaching model has been implemented as a way to develop academic language for students who aren’t new-to country but still have gaps.
With the EL staff often doubling at most schools in recent years, a Lead Teacher structure has also been established, so there can be a point person at each site to handle the Title III compliance, and to ensure that all ELs are getting the proper level of service. The Lead Teachers also sit on the Instructional Leadership Team at their school, and keep their principal up to speed about EL issues.
Jana worked with the communications department to get Language Line into the district. Now any staff at any school can communicate with parents in any language (no need for an interpreter).
There has been a lot of work of the past 5 years,and it’s been exciting to be part of the change and implementation. Meaningful change does not happen overnight. We still have a long way to go. ELs are still invisible at most of the high schools. Goar thinks it is politically prudent to act with impatience over MCA scores being lower for ELs….but people don’t get that if they were proficient on the MCA, they would not be ELs!
Take a look at the district Multilingual website. None of this was in place before Jana took over. http://multilingual.mpls.k12.mn.us/.
…Speaking of outcomes, our English learners exceed the state target for progress in academic language and proficiency rates each and every year the ACCESS results come out.
Another point this teacher wanted to make: EL graduation rates were up 8% last year.
Perhaps these are the points of success and progress that were discussed at this weekend’s state ESL conference. How long will it be until another district snaps Hilleren up?
Ongoing end note: With reader input, here is a list of MPS departments that have been shut down, reformed, or destroyed–depending upon one’s point of view–in recent memory:
- Student Support Services
- Special Education
- Office of Equity and Diversity
- IT
- Human Resources
- Communications
- Curriculum and Instruction
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MPS superintendent level leadership has always liked to have weak leadership in the ELL/Multilingual department because it suited their purpose of barely meeting compliance for ELLs and allowed them to focus more energy and resources on dealing with the Northside and African American achievement gap. Whenever there has been a strong leader in place, truly skilled, knowledgeable advocates for ELLs such as Jana Hilleren and Terri Siguenza there has been friction. The leaders who should
really be held accountable for this 15 + year tragic legacy are all still in place in MPS except for Bernadeia whose legacy finally caught up with her. When will MPS finally get it right and invest in the ELL program as a priority? Look at the Council of Great City Schools 2009 report on ELL programming and you’ll get a sense of what works and all the things MPS superintendent-level leadership has been undermining for years.
Since when has MPS ever put ANY energy and resources into dealing with the North side and African American achievement gap?
I’m not saying they were successful, or even had noticeable results. I just know there was a lot of talk and energy focused on trying to address those areas of concerns. Ineffective leadership in MPS has focused a lot of resources on the “crisis of the month” approach and generally gotten nowhere as they switched strategies, leaders, programs and resources around.
So glad about this move. Excited for the opportunities this presents.
Might it occur to you that maybe, just maybe Hilleren being let go was more about some internal stuff than her work? That’s going to stay private I’m sure because that’d violate her and others’ privacy.
I’m interested in knowing what “opportunities” you think will result from this change.
I’m intrigued. You have left several anonymous messages on this blog, calling yourself MPS “Student.” I’d love to know how a student has his or her pulse on the “internal stuff” that caused Hilleren to be “let go.” Please, tell us more.
Thanks, Sarah. Apparently “Student” knows more details about this whole story. I’m going to go out on a limb and guess it has to do with part of the letter that you mentioned in an earlier post that talked about the shortcomings of the Multilingual Department:
“There is no senior leadership at MPS that is Latino, Somali or Hmong. MPS has made minimal or no effort to empower Latino, Hmong or Somali staff, and to ensure that our communities have equitable representation at the leadership level.”
I’m sure there will be “exciting opportunities” within the new department.
I am guessing that any internal reason is a politically and racially diven farce that cannot survive the scrutiny of the legal system. Also willing to bet it is connected to Sen Torres Raye. By the way she has a D ethics rating. I think we will find out about a lot of racism involved in this decision. More than we know about Goar. I think Goar has been investigated by the FBI for mismanagement in Boston just Google.
Urban school districts all over the U.S. are being dismantled. Raw greed and corrupt politics reign at the expense of students, families, and teachers. The complete lack of interest in implementing help at the classroom level by reducing burden on teachers or lowering class size is alarming. The scorn for parents and teachers by the District and elite “reformers” is palpable.
MPS will be soon asking for a referendum. Unless this continued racketeering and intentional churn at MPS is called out by the school board, I won’t be voting for it.
I’m sure Ms. Lahm sure could use an army of investigative journalists to help her uncover much, much more. Hats off to her.
The cynic in me cannot help but think the “magical” $5 million came through Torres Ray, but with a stipulation that Bruggeman would have to manage it. This seems to be the way our district is doing its business. The Davis Center elite are off out of state on their junkets, or walking away on their treadmill desks, while many of our students are going to school in squalor (in old buildings with out-dated technology and an extreme lack of basic supplies). It is sad, disheartening, and disillusioning. This whole situation with Hilleren has left me with a bad feeling, especially in regard to the direction our district is heading. I’m not sure how much more of this I can take.
But the problem is that you “don’t like change”.
Torres Ray’s assistant is a former MPS student. Might it occur to you Sarah that the MPS student commenting in favor of this is actually a former MPS student? Maybe this is a job requirement for her?
Well if it’s part of the job requirement, then she should be transparent and identify herself by name and not allude to facts that she may know. That is the entire problem with this issue.
There are more than two sides to every story. Hilleren was not liked universally and there are many prominent leaders and teachers that did not support her. You might want to explore all sides to the story. While I don’t agree with the way in which she was pushed out of the district, you don’t know everything. True, there were politics at play here. Look deeper. There is more to this story.
I’m happy to share other sides of the story; I have no vested interest in either “side.” Feel free to email me, if you prefer.