March 26, 2020

What is it like to run a large public school district in a time of crisis? That’s a good question for Minneapolis Public Schools superintendent Ed Graff.

Here’s another question for Graff. What is it like to push a major district redesign plan through in the middle of a global pandemic?

Regarding the first question, Graff received high marks from the nine-member Minneapolis school board during a special business meeting on March 26. The virtual meeting began with board members offering their praise for Graff’s leadership during the Covid-19 shutdown of the Minneapolis Public Schools.

In particular, Graff and his team were acknowledged for quickly pulling together school nutrition and enrichment packet options for families suddenly cast adrift from their school communities.

Graff in turn announced further plans for meal packets to be distributed at various sites over the next few weeks. (Check the district’s website for details, including a distance learning plan that will be made public on March 27.)

During the March 26 meeting, Graff was also granted special powers that will last through the Covid-19 emergency. With the board’s approval, he can now make budgetary decisions, and so on, that relate explicitly to the coronavirus situation–without the board’s approval.

A second resolution also passed, authorizing the board to hold virtual meetings, if necessary, during this crisis. Public comment will still be gathered, but not in person. (Kerry Jo Felder was the lone no vote on this item.)

The how/when’where of this has yet to be fully explained or considered, according to school board chair Kim Ellison.

Here’s why that matters: the district is still planning to vote on its controversial redesign plan, known as the CDD, on April 28–come hell or the Covid-19 shutdown.

That meeting and vote will apparently still be held, whether or not the public can attend an open meeting and engage directly with board members. Feedback and input will still be collected, in a to-be-determined manner, but it will lack the impact (or chaos, perhaps) of recent face-to-face interactions between and among the public and the board.

And so the CDD is likely to become a reality, with board members Ali, Arneson, Caprini, Ellison, Inz and Pauly expected to vote in favor of it. Representatives Felder, Jourdain, and Walser are likely no votes.

Final CDD Available March 27

The long-awaited final version of the CDD will be released to the public on March 27, although the board and some members of the media have had a copy of it since at least March 24.

I have reviewed the document (thanks to a public data request) and will say that it doesn’t stray too far from the five-option model released by MPS in January, although it does contain major boundary changes for many district schools.

There is also very little financial information contained within it, except for a projected five year capital improvement plan worth somewhere north of $224 million.

The Career and Technical Education (CTE) pathways outlined in February, for example, are the same. Programming will be concentrated at North, Edison, and Roosevelt high schools, including an agriculture program at Edison.

K-8s On the Chopping Block

Other hot-button issues include K-8s and dual-immersion programming, and those in defense of both models may not be very pleased with the final CDD proposal.

Popular K-8 magnet programming at Hmong International Academy, Marcy Open School, Seward Montessori School, and Barton Open School will be eliminated, with each of these schools reverting to a K-5 model. (Hmong International is more of a community school with a Hmong language and culture focus; that emphasis will not change under the CDD.)

Folwell Performing Arts, another K-8 magnet now, will also become a community K-5 site.

There will be two new citywide K-8 magnet schools created–one at Jefferson near Uptown and another at Sullivan school in Seward. Jefferson’s Global Studies and Humanities focus sounds (on paper anyway) as if it will be similar to the popular IB programming that is eliminated in the CDD.

Sullivan will have a STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Math) emphasis. Franklin Middle School will also be a citywide STEAM magnet. There are no K-8 community schools in the CDD proposal.

Green Central Community School will become a K-5 Spanish dual-immersion magnet, while Windom (currently an immersion program) is slated to become a community K-5 site.

No Separate Immersion Middle School

Immersion advocates hoping for a standalone middle school option–which MPS indicated could be housed at Jefferson–will instead have to be content with a 6-8 immersion strand program placed within Andersen Community Middle School in south Minneapolis.

Sheridan and Emerson schools will retain their K-5 immersion school focus, while no programming of this type appears to be headed to north Minneapolis, despite board member Kerry Jo Felder’s frequent requests for a northside location.

Bethune and Hall–two elementary schools in north Minneapolis–will be K-5 magnets, for art and STEM (STEAM without the art) respectively. Seward will be the district’s only Montessori option, with a K-5 citywide magnet model.

There is no clear indication as to how all of these new citywide magnets will be handled, from an enrollment, recruitment or transportation perspective.

Got Time to Propose a Specialty School?

A provision for “specialty schools” remains, although the timeline spelled out in the CDD will likely raise a few eyebrows. Global pandemic be damned, any school community wishing to become a specialty school (sort of a magnet school, sans any extra funding or transportation) will need to submit a final proposal by November of this year.

There will be much more to pore over, from March 27 until the scheduled board vote on April 28. Many will find much to admire about the CDD, including the bolstering of North High School with students from an expanded attendance zone that stretches into Kenwood and Uptown.

There is also a lot of language about capstone projects for STEAM school attendees, for example, as well as an admirable–and desperately needed–emphasis on recruiting and retaining more teachers of color.

These positive steps or goals may be weighed down by the sheer level of disruption the CDD promises to deliver, however, which one can guess at despite the lack of enrollment numbers included in the presentation.

There is the promise of a bunch of new schools being created all at once, alongside a major overhaul of MPS student placement and HR policies.

Many communities, in all corners of the city, may be surprised at the level of upheaval they will be asked to endure along the way to securing a “well-rounded” education for their kids.

Super Chickens Don’t Succeed

When the document becomes public, pay close attention to how teachers are discussed. The CDD in fact closely echoes the market-based education reform narrative around “high quality teachers,” as if they are chess pieces rather than human beings. (What makes someone a high quality teacher? Who should define this?)

Strong teachers are attracted to, and help build and maintain, strong schools. They are drawn to and inspired by schools with healthy climates and inspirational leaders. They thrive when they are allowed to be vulnerable without fear of retribution.

This is about culture and community, not the myth of the super chicken (look it up!).

MPS is about to embark on an incredibly ambitious mission. It is one that the CDD’s lead author, MPS administrator Eric Moore, referred to recently as being rooted in a theory of disruption and deconstruction, with the goal of rebuilding a more equitable system from the ground up.

It is a theory, he acknowledged, that has “never worked” yet.

Will it now?