Turnaround or Not?!

The Washington Post recently came out with some hard hitting results on turnaround schools which were provided with funds as they were among the poorest schools in America. None other than the U.S. Dept. of Education's own research arm said that the $3 billion provided to 1,500 schools was pretty much a wash if not a failure of sorts.

The findings saw 1/3 of the turnaround schools performing better, 1/3 performing the same as prior to the infusion of federal money and 1/3 performing worse. Not exactly a resounding success.

The question that many will ask is why? Those schools responding to the follow up survey regarding the failure of the poorest performing schools to get turned around had some stark reminders relative to the difficulty of turning around. The three biggest obstacles were a lack of staffing, technology difficulties and a lack of expertise.

To those who toil in schools and who follow the plight of poor communities and struggling students, the news is nothing new. Without the proper resources, aside from funding, nothing will improve in schools. Chalk this up to the Dept. of Education not getting it right from the get go.

Dick