Interesting, but incomplete analysis of Turnaround

Interesting article out of National Education Policy Center, a critique of school turn around efforts.

First - I think it's great that this type of brief is out there - it is thoughtful and reflective and reflects a solid knowledge of the current context. That being said, I think it overstates the focus of school turnaround and doesn't fully acknowledge some of the reasons for the four turnaround models.

- The authors' portrayal of turnaround as a market-based movement is too simplistic and doesn't reflect the complexity of school improvement efforts (and failures) over the past 30 years. My impression is that Title I (and the use of the SIG supplemental funds) has slowly integrated three related movements - the standards movement with its focus on accountability (not markets - but accountability); the choice movement (markets and charters and SES); with Title I's original focus on improving opportunity. Turnaround is definitely more choice/market oriented, but on a continuum. It's not as if Turnaround = Markets. 

- I think that the authors missed an opportunity to discuss the connection of SIG with previous efforts, mainly Comprehensive School Reform. Personally, I think that this is the really interesting story. To that point:

- Among all the reasons that CSR wasn't successful, it's clear to me that the inability of states/districts/schools to fully change the operating conditions (yes, tied to unions) was the real reason for CSR's inability to have success at scale. My impression of Mass Insight's contribution to the emergence of Turnaround (the concept and policy) is that it correctly identified that dramatically CHANGING CONDITIONS was essential/necessary for the successful implementation of whole school reform models. While SIG focused more on changing conditions (and seemingly ignored CSR models and the focus on research), what SIG did do was make sure that districts/schools couldn't make excuses for the failure of turnaround/improvement efforts. I spent a good 8 years studying CSR in multiple states, and it is clear to me that institutionalized state and district policies, in combination with intractable collective bargaining agreements, were the real reason that many hard working leaders and teachers burned out in trying to improve schools. In other words, the point of Turnaround is to guarantee that there are no structural obstacles to the implementation of dramatic improvement efforts (whether they be whole school or a collection of interventions).

Anyway - I really like the brief and I think we need even more of this type of analysis.

And on a final note - I am working with Massachusetts on all things SIG and turnaround, and I would say that MA is definitely implementing the recommendations that you pose at the end of the report. So there are states already addressing the community and social-emotional aspects of school improvement.

Brett