June, July and August traditionally are down time for scho0ls. Summer vacation! “Schools out! Schools out! Teachers let the monkeys out.” Traditionally, classrooms go dark in the summer and teachers either assume summertime, non-school employment or settle into “kicked back vacation mode.” Summer for children means daycare, playing at home, and, for older children, summer jobs. But, in 2014, any school that does not take advantage of summer as “school’s second season” is telling its children, parents, teachers and staff, and community “This school is not doing all that it can to cause all children to learn.”

The historic school calendar that limits public education to nine months with a three-month summer vacation is as out of date as believing a “Dick and Jane” reading program will meet today’s reading standards. School programming based upon the needs, requirements and calendar of the last century are not adequate. In fact, the concept of adequacy itself is defunct because adequacy connotes a static condition. Adequate for what? The goal of education is the “perfect school year” in which all children successfully learn their annual curriculum. In a parallel setting, baseball sets the goal of a “perfect game” in which the opposing team has no hits, no runs and no one left on base; 27 batters and 27 outs. In the 135 years of major league baseball’s recordkeeping, there have been only 23 perfect games. Yet, the idea of improving pitching and team defense to achieve a perfect game is always present. So it is with school programming; the idea of all children achieving their annual learning targets is always out there. This is why a school’s practices should be aimed at a “perfect school year.” That is why a school’s second season, summer, is so important.

The second season for a school is a summer session designed specifically for children who did not complete their annual learning goals in the regular, nine-month school year; the first season. The second season begins on the first Monday after the close of the first season and lasts until the Friday before next regular year begins in August of September. The goal of the second season, to continue the baseball analogy, is for every child to score and to leave no children stranded on the base paths of incomplete learning.

The structure of the second season is to provide additional time and instruction to move more and more children toward the goal of a “perfect school year.” The upside of a second season is that teachers work with fewer children. Children who met their annual learning goals are excused from the second season. Their absence clearly narrows and redirects teaching from the span of all children to the needs of fewer children who require specific assistance and help over increased time. As a deficit model, second season instruction targets only what a child did not achieve in the regular season. Second season teaching is not constrained to usual, school year instruction often aimed at the whole group. Instead, second season teaching is ultra-clinical and aimed at correcting the child’s learning errors and building and reinforcing new and correct learning. That’s it; no field trips, no enrichment, no extra credits. Teaching and time on task are directly focused on student performance.

An additional upside to the second season is that a child is excused from the summer session when achievement targets are reached. Vacation from school is earned when learning goals are accomplished. Vacation is not just a function of a date in June; it is paired with successful learning. Within the same model, assessment of learning is based upon the teacher’s confidence that the child’s new learning is strong enough to prepare the student for the next school year’s learning goals.

Another upside derived from the second season is that more children are ready to tackle their learning goals in the next school year. Past practices that promoted children with incomplete annual learning assured that these children’s teachers needed to begin their next school year in a remedial mode. A child entering second grade without mastering single digit addition and subtraction in first grade requires teaching time and effort to remediate this problem. A child who does understand or compute math problems involving fractions in elementary school faces a perpetual learning impediment in high school algebra and advanced math. A child with incomplete decoding skills usually achieved in the primary grade faces constant reading problems throughout school and adult life. Quality control in manufacturing looks for mistakes and errors early and consistently throughout the building process. Think of a second season classroom as a high quality processing center with inspection procedures addressing unacceptable skills or reasoning in the line of daily instruction so that only acceptable skills and reasoning are created. Education, unlike manufacturing, cannot discard its mistakes and errors; it must teach and reteach until all children are successful learners.

There are downsides. Achieving a perfect school year, like a perfect game in baseball, is very difficult. There are variables beyond the school and teacher’s control that get in the way of success. The most significant uncontrolled variable is child non-attendance and a lack of home commitment to the goals of a second season. The absent child cannot be taught. Success in the second season requires both a child’s commitment to personal success and a parent or guardian’s commitment to the child’s educational success. For the adult, this often means making adjustments to usual summer schedules, helping or supporting the child with second season home work, and staying the course until the child completes her annual learning goals. The second season can be very trying at home.

Downsides to a second season also exist inside the school. Just as a second season requires home commitment, a school’s second season requires school board support. The major impediment to board support is additional school expenses. In times when state aid for education is controversial and most legislators work to decrease state support, funding summer school is seen as an extra cost and receives little support. School boards, without additional state funding, must incorporate second season costs inside their annual school budgets. Or, school boards must levy locally for increased tax revenue. Levying for summer school is unpopular. But, promoting children with incomplete learning should be even more unpopular.

And, a second season requires teachers to change their perception of teaching from nine months to a full-year job. Summer vacation has been part of a teacher’s tradition just as it has been for children and families. Using verified learning to excuse a child from her second season of schooling may mean that some children will require teaching well into August. This is a significant change in lifestyles for many teachers. Yet, there are many teachers who believe that year-round work would benefit the public image of teaching as a profession. A second season will be good for teaching as it is for learning.

Achieving a “perfect school year” is very difficult. Its difficulty, however, is what makes a second season, a summer session, so important. It is probable that no school or school district has ever accomplished a “perfect school year.” It is time that every school moved closer and closer to a year in which every child successfully learned their annual curriculum. Finally, a school’s use of the second season confirms to every constituent of the school that “this school is doing all that it can to help all children be successful.”

The shade of influence cast by the person at the top of the school district’s organizational chart is wide and deep. It does not matter if the organization is an immense urban school district or a compact rural district. The style and values of the superintendent convey an ethos and way of doing business that must be understood and incorporated by any person engaging in the work of the school district. Those who are able to identify and work within the proclivities of the organizational leader can make significant contributions to the productive work of the schools. Those who cannot or do not understand their leader’s style and priorities face unavoidable frustration and dissatisfaction.

This article is written to assist school personnel to adapt and adopt to a new superintendent. The applications also apply to creating working relations with a new school principal. This is a true statement: During your career your school district will employ almost a dozen different superintendents. Your long term success can depend upon your ability to adapt and adopt when leadership changes.

Every year school districts seek and find new school superintendents. The average tenure for school executives in the same position was 3.6 years in 2010. Generally, superintendents are hired, work their leadership for several school years, and then they move or are moved on. Tenure for other central office administrators, principals and teachers is much longer than that of a superintendent. This turnover rate makes it imperative that school leaders below the superintendent become adept in working with different leadership styles.

I have watched with interest the drama surrounding the musical chair that is the Milwaukee (WI) Public Schools superintendency. The current occupant, Gregory Thornton, is moving his career to Baltimore at the end of this month. Thornton is the 6th person in the MPS superintendent’s chair during the past 20 years. In July 1, Darriene Driver, Chief Innovation Officer for MPS, will become the interim superintendent. For the past half year, the in-district and community conversations have ebbed around the generally very favorable effects of the Thornton era and how his personality and organizational leadership achieved these outcomes. This is the act of reviewing leadership. At the same time, those previewing the next leader want to know the extent to which Driver’s leadership values and skills will be different and how those differences will impact the school district.

I also am paying attention this summer to the leadership replacement efforts of small school districts. The dramas in large and small organizations are very similar in professional processes and legalities, but are very different in their everyday dimensions. The MPS Board of Education seeks a person who figuratively is in charge of the schools. When Thornton leaves Milwaukee, MPS loses its figurehead. Smaller school boards seek a person who literally is the school(s). When a small schools superintendent leaves, the district literally loses their head. It is the concept of “headship” that each school district seeks to replace.

Beginning with the Board of Education’s (BOE) naming of a new superintendent, every person engaging with the district has the opportunity and need to understand “how” the new superintendent lives and works professionally. In Meredith Willson’s Music Man, the traveling salesmen on the train to River City, IA, sang, “… you have to know the territory…” if you want to succeed in River City. Knowing how the superintendent leads and exerts leadership is the territory that enhances or obstructs a subordinate’s success in a school district.

One can be clinical about this. A Google of educational leadership styles will report that leadership has been a topic for the ages. There is a wealth of literature. Short of a dissertation, I offer four personal actions that will provide you with a quick understanding of your new superintendent and how to successfully adjust to his leadership.

1.  Understand and adopt the new credo. Successful superintendents develop a professional credo or set of philosophic tenets upon which they base their leadership. Often their credo is encapsulated in a slogan or motto. Their motto may read like one of these.

Equality of learning opportunities for all children

Assuring that all children are college or career ready

One year’s growth in learning for each year in school

Safe and secure schools for everyone

Closing all achievement gaps

A 21st century education for all children

Caring and nurturing schools

Cost effective schools

Every child a graduate

You can bet that the BOE knows their new hire’s credo and motto. So should you. Take the new super’s motto and apply it to your work. It may seem like sucking up, but, in reality, adopting the new super’s motto assures that your work is aligned with his.

2.  Adopt new accountability systems. A change of leadership often brings new metrics for measuring school success. Using new measurements devices does not change current realities, but it does allow the new superintendent to declare, “Beginning now….” New metrics are all about accountability systems. Understand and adopt the language of these new metrics. Make them a part of your professional conversation. This allows you to see your work in the framework of the new superintendent’s leadership and know that your work can be seen and valued by those doing the measuring.

3.  Adapt with patience, acceptance and resilience (PAR). New leadership can be traumatic to school organizations, especially if the Board expects the new superintendent to “change things.” Knowing that people are not always opposed to change, but are usually opposed to being changed, PAR gives you resources most others are not able to grasp during times of organizational trauma. Be patient in order to understand the big picture of your district’s new leadership. Knee jerk responses to every small detail only exacerbate the trauma. Let the new regime unfold. Patience allows you time to analyze, evaluate and make a judgment about the efficacy of the new changes. Be accepting that the BOE and new superintendent are on the same page related to these changes and that employees who cannot adapt to the changes may become unemployed. Most of the changes arising from new leadership will have a thread of consistency so look for those threads. Be resilient. Change theory says that any introduction of a new variable into an organization always causes conflict and a level of opposition. There will be a point in every leadership transition when one or more elements of change seem just plain wrong. Pick your battles wisely and do battle where and when it really matters. Questioning and offering a counter argument are necessary for big picture clarity. In doing so, know that all conflicts leave wounds. Be resilient and heal thyself. Success will come to those who understand the new leadership, accept the authority of the new direction, and are able to weather any conflict that arises.

4.  Adopt new organizational navigation skills. Each new superintendent will create his own vanguard. These are the persons and leaders who are at the forefront of the superintendent’s new organizational structure. Some within the vanguard may be new faces and others will be district veterans. Know who is responsible for what. Know how to access members of the leadership team in order to obtain the resources you need to succeed in your work. Often the new vanguard is viewed as a buffer between the superintendent and everyone else in the schools. The quicker you learn to navigate and connect with the district’s new leadership team, the more efficient and effective you will become in achieving your professional goals.

Navigation skills include an understanding of the new superintendent’s use of accessibility. In contrast, some supers use an “open door” system and anyone can approach the superintendent when the door is open. An open door superintendent typically is comfortable with spontaneity and ad libbed decisions. Other superintendents rely upon intermediaries to screen their accessibility. “By appointment only” allows the superintendent to foresee and prepare for potential decisions. Closed doors mean closed to less accessible superintendents. Quickly learn how the superintendent prefers to be accessed and adapt to this preference.

Each time a new superintendent is hired, all eyes in the school and community immediately go to that person. It is a new day! When this happens, use these adopting and adapting skills to assure your future success. Don’t get caught staring and wondering “What am I supposed to do now?”

I like James Durbin’s commentary on a life’s many turns. “It is what it is. It is what you make it.” Durbin is a singer-song writer living and succeeding with Tourette syndrome.

A bad public image is what it is. Bad is not good! However, it also can be what you make it. Once we accept that “what is” must be changed, the only real question is “What are we prepared to do to improve the public image of teaching?” The crux of the matter goes beyond problem recognition which has been pointed out over time. The crux of the matter is creating a resolve to overcome the dead weight of historic inertia and cause necessary changes that will result in a vibrant and sustainable new image for the professional teacher.

Several dozen re-readings of the following Education Week article excerpt and the National Online Survey of College Students findings only reconfirms that the analysts got it right. As a profession, teaching suffers from bad public imaging and, sadly, has not found ways to correct its lack of professional status or prevent its continuing self-denigration as a profession. I emphasize self-denigration.

“The teaching profession has a major image problem,” Third Way analysts Tamara Hiler and Lanae Erickson Hatalsky write in their analysis of the National Online Survey of College Students – Education Attitudes. “Unfortunately, this perception of mediocrity has negatively affected the national reputation of teaching, initiating a cycle of undesirable outcomes that can be felt throughout the profession.”

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/teacherbeat/2014/04/poll_college_students_dont_fin.html?qs=top+college+students+see

In the past week, the Vergara v. California decision from the Superior Court of the State of California could only reinforce a public opinion that teachers are a labor union and not a profession. The immediate “professional” response to the court’s decision by our two national organizations, the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, defended the very problem that the court pointed to – the right of tenured teachers to job security despite the quality of their teaching. The response was to protect the jobs of teachers of lesser quality over the employment of teachers of higher quality. Our professional unions showed what they are – unions that protect the employment of teachers and not professional organizations that improve teaching. Ouch!

http://studentsmatter.org/our-case/vergara-v-california-case-summary/

A headline related to Vergara read “American Federation Of Teachers Vows To Force Crappy Teachers On Poor Kids”. A quick read of the article indicates an anti-teacher bias in the reporting, but most readers don’t read to understand journalistic point of view. The headline in bold type caught the reader’s attention and reinforced a pre-existing opinion.

A week later another report put a second dope slap on the teaching profession. The National Council on Teacher Quality issued its “2014 Teacher Prep Review.” The Daily Caller reported it this way.

“The group’s 2014 Teacher Prep Review ranked the nation’s hundreds of teacher certification programs by factoring their admissions standards, academic rigor, syllabuses, and other factors, rating them from Level I to Level IV. Those ranked Level IV were considered top-ranked, while those at Level I were decidedly subpar or even failing.

At the elementary level, out of 788 evaluated programs, just 26 managed to hit Level IV, while a whopping 529 were stuck at Level I. Secondary programs fare somewhat better; out of 824 programs, 81 were Level IV and 319 were at Level I. Seventeen states and the District of Columbia have no Level IV programs at all.

A major reason for the low scores, the group said, is that schools continue to fail at training prospective teachers in scientific approaches to student learning, and fail to ensure teachers have mastered all of the content they will teach. While the vast majority of programs do ensure teachers have studied reading and composition, about half of all programs evaluated don’t have sufficient requirements in place to make sure teachers have mastered elementary math and science to the levels expected of teachers in nations with high-performing schools.

About three quarters of programs don’t even meet the ‘modest academic standard’ of requiring admitted students to be in the top half of their college class, the report said. A scant 5 percent have all the components the group views as useful for a strong educational training program.”

http://dailycaller.com/2014/06/17/report-most-us-teacher-training-programs-are-still-awful/#ixzz34w2hOSK5

So, what would James Durbin mean when he said, “Life is what you make it”?

The NCTQ laid out a set of recommendations. When taken at face value, each or all of these begins to make a difference by addressing a component of teaching that contributes to its bad public image. The findings go one step further and cite places where these recommendations are being enacted and are making a difference in teaching and learning.

http://www.nctq.org/teacherPrep/review2014/findings/nationalPolicies.jsp

• Make it tougher to get into a teacher preparation program. Some institutions set lower admission standards for entry into teaching than they do for their athletes to qualify for competition. Institutions need to admit only college students who are in the top half of their class.

Where it’s being done: In Delaware, teacher candidates must have a minimum GPA of 3.0 or a GPA in the top half of their college-attending class. Delaware also requires teacher candidates to pass a test “normed to the general college-bound population.” Rhode Island also requires an average cohort GPA of 3.0, and beginning in 2016, the cohort mean score on nationally-normed tests such as the ACT, SAT or GRE must be in the top 50th percentile. In 2020, the requirement for the mean test score will increase from the top half to the top third.

• Make it tougher to be recommended for licensure. States need to choose the right licensing tests — tests that will assess each and every subject a teacher could be assigned to teach — and make sure that the cut-scores are set high enough to ensure that new teachers really know their stuff.

Where it’s being done: Massachusetts sets high expectations for what elementary teachers need to know across the board and uses top-notch tests for reading instruction and elementary mathematics. Only Tennessee, Indiana, and Missouri ensure that their secondary teachers have thorough knowledge of each subject they may teach, eliminating any loopholes.

• Hold programs accountable for the effectiveness of their graduates by using data on novice teacher effectiveness.

Where it’s being done: Florida, Louisiana, North Carolina, Ohio and Tennessee have taken the lead in employing value-added analysis of student test scores to identify programs producing the most effective graduates. Louisiana is the only state to take a first step in using this data for program accountability, for a time prohibiting its lowest performing institution from accepting new students. A more promising alternative to value-added will be the use of aggregated results from the next generation of teacher evaluation instruments (which include measures of student growth), capable of yielding data on more teachers and more programs.

• Make program approval — and re-approval — contingent on passing rigorous on-site inspections.

Where it’s being done: Almost all states either conduct site visits of teacher preparation programs themselves or outsource site visits to accreditors, but these visits have not proven to be of much value. States should take a page from the experience of the United Kingdom, which has used professional inspectors in concert with other policy measures to drive up substantially the quality of its teacher preparation programs. Based on the UK model, NCTQ has served as an incubator for an inspectorate that is now run independently by TPI-US in partnership with the UK Tribal Group that deploys professionally trained and managed inspectors drawn from the ranks of PK-12 principals and teachers who carefully scrutinize all aspects of teacher preparation programs including program coursework and candidate teaching. Programs in Texas and New Mexico have participated in pilot inspections.

• Make the student teaching requirement meaningful. States should only allow student teachers to be placed with classroom teachers who have been found effective. Furthermore, districts could limit the number of student teachers they accept to correspond with their own capacity and needs.

Where it’s being done: Florida, Rhode Island and Tennessee require that only teachers who have demonstrated evidence of effectiveness as measured by student learning can qualify as cooperating teachers. However, no district we know of currently places limits on the number of teachers it accepts, and districts are clearly devoting precious resources to the training of teachers whom they will never hire. In the Chicago area, for example, teacher prep programs are producing three times as many elementary student teachers as there are effective and available cooperating teachers in the Chicago school district.

• Base state funding on the quality of teacher preparation provided by institutions.

Where it’s being done: Nine states — Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Michigan, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Washington — base at least some funding to public IHEs on meeting key goals (e.g., on-time graduation) as opposed to enrollment; Tennessee bases 100 percent of its higher education funding on this model. Another five states — Arkansas, Colorado, Missouri, South Dakota and Virginia — are transitioning to such a system. While none of these states specifically addresses teacher preparation, there is no reason that they could not do so.

• Set a fixed limit on the number of licenses in each teaching area that will be issued each year.

Where it’s being done: Despite the fact that teacher preparation programs collectively produce more than twice as many new teachers as are hired, no state has attempted to cap licenses. The United Kingdom, however, estimates how many teachers are needed and allocates enrollment slots to programs based on their quality. Combined with inspection, this has significantly reduced production at low quality preparation programs. Ontario, Canada recently halved the number of enrollment slots it allocates to teacher colleges to address significant oversupply of new teachers.

• Lower tuition for high need areas such as special education and STEM preparation programs.

Where it’s being done: Florida is considering lowering tuition for academic majors that are in short supply (e.g., engineering and physics). With college costs imposing an increasingly heavy burden, this tool has real promise to encourage aspiring teachers to go into the areas where school districts face significant shortages.

• Enforce existing teacher prep standards through the program approval process. Every teacher preparation program has to win and maintain state approval in order to be in business. States should use this process to ensure that programs meet existing standards.

Where it’s being done: Michigan ordered Lake Superior State University and Olivet College to stop enrolling candidates in most of their secondary programs because of low licensure test pass rates. Afterward, the president of Western Michigan University, whose programs were deemed “at-risk,” promptly announced that he would work to make his school of education to be among the best in the state in three years.

Several of these recommendations may be tough to implement. However, when taken as a whole, they make sense. Additionally, tough changes are in order when the purpose is to correct a degenerative problem. A good way to conceptualize recommendations such as these is to chunk them – chain them together so that together the chained effect creates the greatest improvement

First, more rigorous admission requirements to teacher preparation programs links with demonstrated subject-area mastery and this links with capping the number of teacher licenses issued annually. For too long, a teacher prep program was the default for collegian who wanted to major in a subject area, like history or literature or political science or science, but could not foresee a post-graduate opportunities. Their answer to a parent’s inquiry of “What will you do with a major in anthropology?” was to convert their study into a social studies teaching certification. Also, there were too many jocks who did not move beyond college athletics yet wanted to remain in athletics. Teaching so that they could coach became their fall-back employment. Making admission to a teacher prep program more rigorous assures that those who are admitted have the right academic credentials and a more potent academic record.

In the past, school districts did the sorting of all teacher candidates. Hundreds of candidates applied for a dozen jobs and included in the hundreds were very highly qualified and very poorly qualified teachers. Local administrators tried their best to identify and recruit what they thought were the best. There is very good reason for teacher preparation programs to limit their admissions and for teacher licensing authorities to cap the annual number of licenses granted. Tightening the so-called spigot of teachers into the educational job market can assure that only the best candidates for teacher preparation are prepared and only the best of those become licensed. Matching the number of licenses issued annually to recent projections of employment needs then allows schools to access a well-trained candidate pool of future teachers.

A second chunk of recommendations that makes sense is chaining together the accreditation of teacher preparation programs and the creditability of student teacher or practicum experiences within teacher prep programs. The proliferation of teacher prep programs, especially by online and for-profit institutions stretches the imagination when considering the rigorous support of teacher preparation. Access and accountability are two entirely separate values for aspiring teachers. Candidates want the first; the profession must demand the second. Coupled with strict inspection of preparation programs must be even stricter approval and support of teacher practicum experiences. Practicum students should be matched only with the best of instructional practitioners for an excessively clinical practicum. The clinical element is essential for aspirants to truly hone their instructional repertoire not just be allowed to “try things out.”

Concomitant to these two recommendations is the valid inspection and certification of programs. Over the past three decades, internal supervision of program vitality and direction has become the norm and fewer states and school districts have used the services of external, expert certification. As a sad result, programs teacher preparation programs have acquiesced to budget reductions (no external inspection costs) and non-critical analysis of program integrity. A return to external, expert certification based upon performance and data is necessary to rebuild both professional and public confidence in teacher preparation.

Almost every problem related to current and future conditions in our world includes, in a discussion of what be done, a process of education. Education is vital to every aspect of future life. If teachers are to play a role in this essential work, the public confidence in teachers must be changed. It is time to get a grip on the problem that many people hold the teaching profession in low esteem. We must repair what is wrong, commit with integrity to significant institutional changes, and teach the public once again the importance of the teaching profession.

Right now, discard everything you have been told about why a school calendar is nine months long. Forget being told that the school calendar is matched to an agrarian lifestyle when children were needed as farm labor in the summer months. Hooey! Whatever reasoning was used in the 1800s to set the length of the school year needs to remain in the 1800s. The real reason for a nine month school year is understood using the words of “Deep Throat” in All The President’s Men. “Follow the money!”

The nation’s school children no longer are needed to labor during the summer months on the family farm. The 2013-14 school year was nine months in length because that is as much school as state governments, school boards and taxpayers are willing to fund. Changing something that is as fixed in our culture as a nine month school year and a three month summer vacation is not only difficult to conceptualize, it is difficult to fund. A calendar that is any longer than nine months requires a significant increase in tax revenue. For example, if the annual school budget is $10,000,000, adding one additional month would require approximately a one-ninth or 11% increase in the annual school budget. An additional $1,111,000 for one month of school is a hard sell for state legislators and school board members who want to cut costs not increase them. We probably shouldn’t think about a year round school calendar requiring a 30 percent increase in school costs. $3,333,000! Hence, the 2013-14 school year started around Labor Day and ended shortly after Memorial Day. And, the 2013-14 school budgets, spent or encumbered, were just about zeroed out at the end of the school year. This it has been each school year across the distant past and may well be for the foreseeable future.

More school year requires more money. Time is money.

It is interesting that when student academic achievement is criticized as falling short of the national and state political and economic interests, time is non-negotiable. Children must learn in 180 days or fail. The current scheme looks like this.

Every child must achieve one grade level’s growth in reading and mathematics or successfully complete specific course outcomes by the end of 180 school days. The teaching resources are provided within the approved budget. You have nine months. Go. And, at the end of nine months the clock stops and the budget will have been spent. But, child achievement will be spread along a continuum ranging from “not close” to “almost” to “just made it” to “successfully completed in April or May.”

In a better educational world, educational outcomes would be fixed and time and resources would be the variables of interest. The scheme could look like this.

We will start educating all children on the first Monday in September. Most children will need approximately nine months to complete the stated educational outcomes. Some children will require more time. We need all children to be ready for the next set of annual outcomes by this time next year; education for those outcomes will begin next September. Use as much of this calendar year as is required for all children to achieve this year’s outcomes. Use adequate educational resources to assure that all children learn.

The school calendar should be flexible to assure enough time for all children to achieve their annual educational outcomes. There is no reason why June, July and August are not available for the continued education of children whose achievement is not yet secure in June. Additional time would be required only for children who need additional time. It is probable that the long term cost of underachieving high school graduates over their adult life span is much greater than the cost of funding annual achievement for all children now.

Franchise teachers? They exist, but I cannot ever recall a public conversation about a franchise teacher. We accept that professional sports, high powered businesses, and medical and tech enterprises have franchise employees. The Green Bay Packers win or lose on Aaron Rogers’ throwing arm. Businesses have “movers and shakers” who are recognized and highly rewarded for their capacity to generate product excitement and financial growth. Hospitals and clinics draw patients from around the country for the medical specialties of their physicians. Every tech company start up is the “brain child” of its resident geeks. Teachers, however, are always talked about in the aggregate or as “the school staff.” We are uncomfortable singling out the talents of individual teachers. It’s time to get over this self-imposed and damaging modesty. Schools have franchise teachers and we need to talk about their exceptional contribution to a school and to the education of children.

A franchise player is considered the cornerstone of his or her organization. As a cornerstone, the presence of this player consistently increases the capacity of the team or group to perform at an exemplary level. With its cornerstone, the identity of the team is golden; without its cornerstone, team identify wilts. It’s Miami Heat’s LeBron James, Apple’s Steve Jobs, and Talk Radio’s Rush Limbaugh. The presence of a key player, the inspirational person, or the “voice” of the enterprise gives an immediate recognition and valuing that would not happen without the franchise player.

The naming and valuing of a franchise player is a concept developed in professional athletics in the era of free agency when a top player could be offered a more lucrative contract by another team. Franchise player designation allows a team to protect and retain its cornerstone member(s). These are the names in the sports pages and on the faces on TV every week.

Interestingly, a franchise player may not be the team’s best player in terms of playing skills. Most often, it is a combination of skills and personality, mature experience and dynamic energy, and self-confidence with self-effacing team work that elevates an expert player to franchise status.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/67825-who-are-basketballs-true-franchise-players

http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post/_/id/36615/who-will-be-2013s-30-franchise-players

It is not difficult to extrapolate the concept of “franchise player” beyond sports to other enterprises. Consider the Rolling Stones and Mick Jagger, U2 and Bono, or Wheel of Fortune and Vanna White (the quiet face of the game show for 32 years). Consider the Fed and Janet Yellen, the Today Show and Matt Lauer, or Facebook and Mark Zuckerburg. Franchise players are present and recognizable in every significant enterprise.

Can we say the same about our local school? Not so much. Teachers, like Garrison Keillor’s Norwegian Lutheran residents of Lake Woebegon, shun the spotlight. They believe that being allowed to be a teacher is reward enough for their exceptional work. Teachers are expected to be modest public servants working in the backdrop of public education. But, if we pay attention to the dynamics of how our local school or school district operates, we can identify individual teachers who provide a charisma, inspiration, creativity, and voice that are even more remarkable than anyone in pro sports, on television, or in the tech world. Athletic glory is limited to several years, business and tech gurus last until the next guru makes a splash, and the personality on TV or radio often lasts as long as the attention of their audience. Except Vanna. Teachers, on the other hand, impact generations of children. Good teaching forms a mind and mindful thinking lasts a lifetime.

Franchise teachers come in a variety of flavors. Volcanic energy. Forceful personality. Expertise. Classy. Each flavor has the capacity to affect the nature and flow of a school for a generation or more and touch the lives of teachers, children and parents. Interestingly, most franchise teachers don’t recognize the impact they have on others, because they are just being what they are: super teachers. It is best to name and describe several examples of these franchise teachers. Describing them in the abstract does not do justice to their work.

Charlie Eckhardt is an example of the maestro franchise teacher. Charlie is the band director in a small, rural school district in northeast Wisconsin. The school’s instrumental program begins in 6th grade when kids “pick” their instrument. Children sing and dance in elementary school before they become Charlie’s. By the time these musicians graduate, they will have joined a unique fraternity of Gibraltar School band members. Charlie’s band performs in the school auditorium, local churches and town halls, marches in parades and travels to the corners of our country. Band members win regional and state honors and earn college scholarships. His musicians are versatile. They play in the pep band, symphonic band, jazz band and perform as solos and ensembles. From their first day until they graduate, Charlie commits to each student’s musical education with a constancy and fervor that “lights the kid up.” And, the biggest kid in the room is Charlie. Charlie teaches kids to love music and to play music. He teaches kids to enjoy and grow from working with other kids. He teaches kids to be a part of their school.

Charlie also is the biggest kid among his faculty peers. In any meeting, one can expect him to say something that is “one click off target but eye opening because it refocuses the conversation.” He heats up the conversation, pouts when decisions go a different direction than his, but always engages in the work of the school. When he dons his 1970s, boiled wool marching band jacket with its braid and chenille, Charlie exemplifies why every teacher in his school wants to teach there. He is a franchise player.

The late Tom Bromley was a tour de force franchise teacher. Tom taught physics in an affluent, suburban high school near Milwaukee. I can still see Tom standing halfway down the middle aisle of desks in his classroom with his feet spread wide apart asking, while his arms windmill, “What just happened? Explain it using math and physics.” And, hands would fly as kids wanted to be first. First, however, was only the start of being “Bromley.” “Add to that!” “And?” “So, what? Why is that important?” “Are you sure? Prove it to me.” Tom was an inspired, intuitive, natural teacher whose fire for teaching burned hot and bright every day. He turned kids on to science and thinking like a scientist.

Tom also was the advisor to the Student Council at a time when Council officers were the elected nobility of a high school. These kids ran the student life of the high school that led the state in ACT and AP test achievement, racked up state championships in sports, and sent its orchestra and choir to Europe every year. The graduates of Whitefish Bay became the “Who’s Who?” of their college campuses. As the Council Advisor, he honed members’ ability to organize campaigns, think like executives, and finesse and charm like US Senators. Tom was a franchise player and the heartbeat of his school. Sadly this was proved at the time of his premature death.

Dave Griffin was a drum beating franchise teacher. Dave was a late-comer to education. He knocked about in early jobs, painted houses, but hung around the school district until, well into his 40s, he completed his baccalaureate with a teaching degree in social studies. Dave stammered and often had to rethink whether his subject and predicates jived. But, Dave was a natural-born teacher. He was gifted in his capacity to capture every student’s attention with the hook of curiosity and intrigue that made every child want to know and do more. Before problem-based learning was vogue, Dave was creating scenarios of engagement in meaty, real-world issues. “If we teach just to have kids memorize dry facts, why bother,” he would say to his colleagues. As a result, Dave’s students were incited to march the Denfeld High School halls when studying civil rights, organize a student union when learning about labor movements in the US, and campaign like the “died in the wool” at election time. Dave knew what made kids tick and consistently ticked them to learn.

Dave also was a natural staff developer. Teaching was not the career of his youth; as the career of his maturity, it was his passion. He thrived in discussions of “teaching tools”, dove headlong into seminars and workshops on pedagogy, and was the school leader in “trying things out.” He did not foolishly or naively engage in every school house fad, but sorted and delved into those that connected sound theory with practice. Dave was not the classiest teacher on the faculty nor was he the brightest. But, he was, without question, the sparkplug that moved the faculty and school from point A to point B. He provided leadership by doing and excitement with a punch. He was a franchise teacher.

Some franchise teachers are the heart of their school. In the neighboring school district, a franchise teacher will retire this year and it will be interesting to see how the school reacts to her absence. For more than thirty years, Cassie’s sweat and energy were the lifeblood of the school. She made the success of academically- and socially-troubled high school boys her professional challenge and she won. Their graduations were her triumphs.

She has been the constant fountain of school action. If a local family suffered, she organized a school response. When school funding dipped, she organized fund raisers. When faculty spirit and camaraderie waned, she led a team-building experience. When the School Board needed information, she was consulted. When the administration needed a “front” person, she stepped up. A school’s heart is developed over time and is demonstrated by caring. Someone, though, must be the organ of that heart and that is a franchise teacher.

Lauren Bremer, Wendy Relich and Dick Hubacek stand out from their colleagues in almost every regard. They are classy. They are the Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers (Google these names if you must) of teaching. They are classy, because they are expert teachers. They are classy, because they are well educated. They are classy in the way they care about each of their students’ learning. They are classy without intending to be and would not necessarily understand if you told them they were classy.

Each earned graduate degrees in education for the purpose of expanding their skills as teachers. Each is widely read and traveled and this allows them to connect a student with graphic examples that makes learning something difficult much easier. They transport student minds. Each is an eloquent speaker and writer. They make listening and responding to their teaching easy. Each makes her or his students want to succeed, because learning for learning’s sake is a good thing.

I worked with Lauren and Wendy and was Dick’s student. On any day, if asked to describe a classy teacher, these three wonderful and powerful teachers stand out because they define the term.

If schools were for-profit organizations, Charlie, Tom, Dave, Cassie, Lauren, Wendy and Dick would be paid handsomely and given annual bonuses for their “franchise” work. If super success was rewarded, each of these teachers would be wealthy. If super success meant public recognition, their names would be proudly displayed in the school’s organizational literature. They would be known beyond their school walls. But, schools are not for-profit organizations. A franchise teacher’s salary occupies a cell on the School Board’s salary schedule just like a good, but average teacher. And, there are no bonuses paid in public ed. There is no agreement between Board members and rank and file on pay for performance.

If teachers were esteemed professionals, franchise teachers would be the upper echelon of the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers. But, the emphasis of teaching’s professional organizations is political and economic and not the furtherance of teaching. So, franchise teachers are not recognized within their professional community. Lauren Mittermann was the 1999 Teacher of the Year in Wisconsin. This recognition was for the body of her work not just a single season or solitary accomplishment. The criteria that gained her Teacher of the Year have been present every year across a thirty year career. Yet, Lauren completes her final year in the classroom this month and retires quietly.

It is left to local schools and school communities to recognize and honor their franchise teachers. And, to do more and better than they have done. This is a brief prescription for how to do right by your franchise teachers.

1. Discern and recognize the franchise teacher. This is not to denigrate the solid, average or above average teacher. Instead, discernment means looking more deeply into the effects a teacher’s work has on children and the school and labeling that work. It is past the time when a school should identify its maestros, its tours de force, its drum beaters, its heart beats, and its classy teachers. Name your franchise teachers.

2. Celebrate the people connected with events. When the Board approves a significant initiative, there is an expectation of achievement. When the achievement is reached, acclaim the persons responsible. Attach a face and name to school success just as if your school was in the major leagues. Tell people who moved and shook the school, who inspired children, who beat the drum of success. And, celebrate publicly.

3. Attach financial meaning to the goals of the school. Across the board and identical treatment is a nemesis for the teaching profession. At the end of the day, every teacher in the school knows who put in a solid day or year of teaching. They know who “just showed up and did their usual” and they know who “rocked the school.” This is no secret. Create an annual bonus for exceptional annual teaching and school leadership. Create a new salary category for many years of exceptional teaching and school leadership.

4. Pay attention to your franchise teachers or they will leave teaching. Many maestros don’t know they are a maestro; they are just being themselves. But, achievement needs recognition or the achiever is never certain if the work is above or below their mark. Many franchise teachers are starved for what motivates them the most, a heart-felt, fully engaged professional conversation. Spend time and commit personal support to your franchise teacher and she or he will, like the Energizer Rabbit, give you years of exceptional teaching.