At The District Management Council (DMC), we feel an incredible sense of urgency to support our membership. The current economic crisis places even greater pressure on district leaders and managers already confronting a myriad of challenges. To better support our membership, we are pleased to be expanding our services and membership plan options. We now offer an Individual Membership option, which enables members to access DMC’s Best Practices Network and to access other DMC members. We are also continue to expand the depth of coverage within The District Management Journal, a thrice-yearly publication that provides actionable insights on how to better lead and manage your school district.
Wednesday, 18 August 2010 07:45
As most are aware at this point, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and a team of peer reviewers picked 18 states and the District of Columbia to advance to the final round of the Race to the Top competition, where grants totaling $3.4 billion will be awarded in September to applicants the administration believes have the best plans for addressing the “four assurances” of adopting rigorous standards; recruiting and retaining effective teachers; turning around chronically low-performing schools; and building data systems to track student achievement and teacher effectiveness.
As a nation, our pursuit of improved teaching and learning has shifted in response to research findings and outcomes data: the pursuit of “highly qualified teachers” has transitioned to a pursuit of “teacher effectiveness.” Race to the Top (and the ESEA Blueprint as well) asks states and school districts to establish definitions of teacher effectiveness “that are based in significant part on student growth and also include other measures, such as classroom observations of practice.”
From a research perspective, most teacher characteristics and qualifications have been shown to have little predictive effect on student achievement outcomes is often counterintuitive in nature. Reform emphasis is now on robust evaluation systems that tie objective and subjective measures of effectiveness together, generating a source of rich insights to improve the management of related systems including recruiting and professional development, among others.
From a leadership and management perspective, the picture for district leaders may be even more complex and difficult to navigate. Most districts struggle with the complexity and myriad efforts that are needed to 1) reform core evaluation systems and 2) tie the rich information generated through the evaluation process to drive improvements proactively in other functions related to teacher effectiveness, including professional development and recruiting.
DMC’s fall 2010 Leadership Development Meeting will chart a process demonstrating how districts can pursue systemic management approaches to connect cutting edge evaluation systems to broader teacher effectiveness efforts. Our focus will be on aligning diverse functions, systems and data to improve overall management and coordination of teacher effectiveness components. Participants will discuss best practices of both what to do and how to do it, using DMC tools and techniques and case study discussions.
Participants will address such topics as:
Monday, 19 July 2010 10:06
You’ve probably been reading about the controversy brewing in Congress over education funding. The House of Representatives this month passed the Education Jobs Fund authorizing an additional $10 billion to help save teachers’ jobs. To pay for this, the House legislation plans to cut $800 million from the federal stimulus funds designed to encourage strategic and innovative thinking in education. Specifically, the House bill calls for a $500 million reduction in the Race to the Top program, along with a $200 million reduction in the Teacher Incentive Fund and a $100 million decrease in charter school funds. President Obama and Secretary Duncan, while supportive of the goal of preventing teacher layoffs, oppose funding the Education Jobs Fund through offsets in the Department of Education’s key initiatives, and have threatened to veto such a bill.
The issue will ultimately get worked out when the Senate reconvenes this month. In the meantime, however, we at DMC worry about the message this funding battle conveys. By sacrificing strategy and innovation to save jobs, the House of Representatives is creating a false dichotomy between economic hardship on one hand and long-term thinking on the other. Districts have a need and an opportunity to make tradeoffs to prioritize the drivers of student achievement, financial savings, and operational efficiency. We at DMC believe that building a great organization does not have to give way to fiscal crisis and innovative leaders are taking a more strategic posture.
DMC has developed an extensive set of case studies, tools, and techniques to help districts use resources more strategically. Check out the case study of Fairfax County’s budget rationalization for an example of a district that used the reality of recession to clarify its most important pursuits. The presentation on turning fiscal crisis into management focus offers a variety of methods to maintain a strategic agenda. Finally, the article on scenario planning elaborates on one of the most useful tools to approach fiscal crisis in a structured and strategic way.
Also stay tuned for the August issue of The District Management Journal, which features the theme of developing a coherent strategy and increasing the management capacity to support it. By continuing to build a strategic toolkit, a district can avoid blanket cuts and look beyond simply balancing the budget.
Tuesday, 15 June 2010 00:00
School districts across the country are struggling to preserve student achievement and school operations in the face of unprecedented reduction in resources. It is also clear, as evidenced by almost daily news reports, that the world as we knew it will not return soon. Can innovation provide a way out of this crisis? The District Management Council (DMC) thinks of innovation as a process that makes something better, faster, or cheaper?
Read more: Innovation – Answer to School District Budget Woes?
Tuesday, 08 June 2010 12:27
As the school year winds down, many districts have endured one of the most difficult budget periods in their history – some are still in the midst of significant layoffs. The forecast for next year’s fiscal planning period does not look much brighter. However, even as most of the attention is being paid to reducing costs and staff, school districts still need to pay close attention and even invest in the most significant resource of the district: their people.
The District Management Council (DMC) defines human capital strategy as the development and implementation of workforce management approaches that result in higher district performance. A major emphasis is to develop and retain high-performing and high-potential talent.We encourage school districts to not forget about their people in light of budget concerns, but to instead focus efforts on managing your “human capital” to be even more effective and efficient.
During such uncertain times, it is crucial to take a systemic approach to making the people you have work even better. How can you motivate teachers and staff? How can you grow the skill sets of central office personnel to take on more responsibilities? Consider the following steps to better manage your district’s human capital:
For more information on human capital strategy, please read these DMC thought pieces:
Wednesday, 19 May 2010 11:55
In these uncertain times, maximizing talent and contributions is an important practice for all school district employees and is particularly crucial for key leaders. Succession planning is not just about filling open boxes on an org chart, but rather about proactive leadership development to build the “bench strength” of an organization. To help school districts cultivate emerging and existing leaders, DMC has introduced an eight-step process that takes school districts from design through implementation of systemic succession planning. Be sure to register for our 3-part webinar series on succession planning beginning May 26th.
Read more: Succession Planning: Growing the Right Kind of Leadership
Monday, 10 May 2010 09:36
How do you accomplish your goals? Do you have a particular goal-setting strategy? DMC encourages school districts to build Essential Management Skills to Turn Strategy into Performance. See the results you have long desired in your district by setting SMART goals, or rather, goals that are Specific, Measurable, Aggressive, yet Actionable, Relevant, and Time-bound.
Not SMART |
SMART |
"I will make my transportation department more efficient." |
"I will increase on-time bus arrivals from 93% to 98% in five weeks." |
Tuesday, 27 April 2010 12:51
Recently, The New York Times published an article on expected school budget cuts in the upcoming year that includes unprecedented teacher and staff layoffs, school closings, and elimination of programs. District budget planning for this past year and for the upcoming fiscal year has made it very clear that financial resources – local, state, and federal – will to be reduced significantly. In fact, given the economic severity of the recession, it is likely this financial fallout will last for many years, coinciding with steadily increased accountability measures and the potential for an implementation of national standards. In order to meet their goals, school districts will need to be even more strategic and smart in the way that budget reductions and resource allocations are being made for the long run. We at DMC have devoted a great deal of time over the past two years developing strategic approaches to long-term strategic resource allocation that can help districts significantly reduce their cost structure while maintaining – even improving – student outcomes in these uncertain times.
Monday, 19 April 2010 14:01
Recently, DMC developed a factbase of current and historic trends for Career and Technical Education (CTE) to learn about alternative pathways for driving student achievement and bridging the growing unemployment gap in many states. In addition to our research, we are curious about where school districts in general, and DMC member districts in particular, stand with this area of their education repertoire. How do you regard your school district's CTE program? How has your district integrated CTE programs with the rest of your offerings?
Read more: How Does Career and Technical Education Fit Into Your Agenda?
Monday, 15 March 2010 16:20
In light of the current enduring fiscal crisis, producing results with decreasing or flat resources has been the focus for much of DMC’s work over the past year. Increasing the use of “outcomes-based” management strategies, which push organizations to consider actual performance results rather than activities while executing strategies, has been a popular approach within our membership. DMC leaders can help you discern the best way to create actionable goals for your district, as well as work planning tools that will help deliver quality results and change.
Read more: Essential Management Skills to Turn Strategy into Performance
Friday, 12 February 2010 09:36
DMC has long promoted strategic innovation as a means to pursue our three goals of increasing student achievement while improving operational efficiency and reducing or maintaining costs. Our recent Superintendents’ Strategy Summit on Innovation captured this approach and highlighted several ways that districts such as Houston ISD and Aurora Public Schools in Colorado were putting this into practice. As we look forward to the Investing in Innovation (i3) grant process slated to begin in the next few months, we are excited to know that innovation will continue to be in the spotlight for some time.
Our seventh Superintendent Strategy Summit: Innovation in Education: Developing and Scaling Effective Strategies was held in New York City on January 20-22, 2009. The key takeaway was that innovation is a process that can be managed and not an innate skill. The meeting offered an opportunity for some of the country’s leading superintendents to participate in an intimate, structured dialogue and share best practices that can address the challenges of today and tomorrow.
Monday, 14 December 2009 17:22
With calendar year 2009 coming to a close and the budget season for school year 2010-2011 in full swing, most districts are faced with the financial reality that districts will have less money next year than they had this year. In my conversations with dozens of superintendents during the past month, many DMC member districts are looking for innovative ways to meet this challenge. At its core, we believe that innovative ideas will allow districts to do as much or even more with less.
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Pay-for-Performance Programs: Strategies, Structures, and Funding
By Nicholas P. Morgan & Daniel Schiff
