The Pinellas County School District appears poised to pursue a robust effort to turn around five St. Petersburg elementary schools that are among the most troubled in the state. Newly hired turnaround leader Antonio Burt plans to open up a toolbox that includes enabling teachers at the struggling schools to make up to $25,000 more next year, extending the school day by an hour and using classroom tests with real-time feedback so teachers can immediately address shortcomings. While the district already has made some important improvements, this is the sort of initiative in scope and financial commitment required to meet a challenge of such magnitude.
Substantially raising teacher compensation, lengthening the school day and better student assessments are not new approaches to turning around low-performing schools and poor minority neighborhoods. But they have the potential to make a real difference at the Campbell Park, Fairmount Park, Lakewood, Maximo and Melrose elementaries in St. Petersburg. There are plenty of details to work out, but the School Board should be prepared to find the money and resources to make this ambitious effort work when it considers the plan on April 12.
A yearlong Tampa Bay Times investigation of the five schools, a series called "Failure Factories," documented how the School Board abandoned integration efforts in 2007, failed to provide necessary resources and let the elementaries decline into some of the worst in the state. Veteran teachers fled the schools en masse only to be replaced by newcomers with little or no experience. More than 100 teachers with 10 or more years of experience left the schools after 2008.
A good school environment — notably, a principal whose leadership creates one — is more important to most teachers than salary alone. But a pay rise of $25,000 — a combination of bonuses and extra pay for professional days and longer school days — is enough money to matter. The teachers at those schools would have to reapply for their jobs, and the best ones should be encouraged to stay.
A randomized study by Mathematica Policy Research of 10 school districts in seven states showed that bonuses of this magnitude were enough to attract and keep successful veteran teachers at high-poverty schools. The gains made by their students in the federally financed Talent Transfer Initiative were impressive — the equivalent of moving up each elementary student by 4 to 10 percentage points in math and reading relative to all students in their state. And the study showed that the quality of the teacher mattered most at the elementary level, when students are in their formative years and still have a fair shot at getting back on track.
It's worth pointing out that the teachers in the national study were 42 years old, on average, and had 12 years of teaching experience. Compared with a control group, more of them were African-American, had earned a master's and owned homes. In sum, they were solid citizens with community ties.
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Explore all your optionsThe combination of good, stable school leadership and incentive pay that attracts proven veteran teachers can be far more potent than either alone. A big pay bump might initially attract great teachers, but only a schoolwide environment conducive to learning will keep them. Putting the two together might finally bring more top teachers to the underperforming schools where they are needed most.
After being left to languish for years, these five schools and their students deserve a better chance at success. These young students don't have time to wait for a bureaucracy to catch up with their need to learn. They require the help of great teachers and great principals — and the full support of the district and the broader community — now. This ambitious proposal reflects the urgency required to meet the challenge.