But theteachers, both the Milwaukee Teachers’ Education Association (MTEA) and theWisconsin Education Association Council (WEAC), have presented their MilwaukeeOpportunity Plan, a comprehensive reform package that encompasses changingleadership at the top of the administration to making changes in the classroom.
The purposeof the plan is to add to the debate on how to improve MPS’s student achievementand teacher performance, and to provide innovative ideas for the state’sapplication for federal “Race to the Top” funds.
Instead ofhaving the mayor appoint the superintendent, the unions suggest splitting thatposition into two: a CEO that manages operations and a chief academic officerfocused on student learning.
MTEAPresident Mike Langyel said it’s difficult to find qualified superintendentcandidates for the soon-to-be-vacant position (current Superintendent WilliamAndrekopoulos is retiring in 2010).
“When youneed someone with a skill set who can run a $1.2 billion operation like MPS,they probably would be in some corporation making 10 times as much as asuperintendent of a public school district,” Langyel said.
The unionshave presented their plans to state legislators, who will be deciding MPS’sfate in the coming weeks.
Contrary toDoyle and Barrett, though, the unions do not support a mayoral takeover of thedistrict.
“We believethat what is necessary is a democratically elected school board that appoints anew superintendent and has adequate funding for programs like this MilwaukeeOpportunity Plan,” Langyel said.
OpportunityCenters Modeled on Affluent Schools
Other reformsuggestions in the Milwaukee Opportunity Plan include:
n Create 20 Opportunity Centers at strugglingschools. Langyel said resources and support should be channeled into theschools that are most in need. These centers would have smaller class sizes,art, music and physical education, plus support for teachers.
“We want toreplicate the resources and support that would exist in a more well-to-do partof the metropolitan area,” Langyel said. “We thought the real irony was thatstudents that come to school with a lot of challenges have even less resourcesand support in their schools than students that possibly don’t have those samechallenges, and come from a more well-to-do background.”
n Decrease class sizes for 4-year-oldkindergarten (4K). While thestate’s SAGE program holds the student-to-teacher ratio at 15 to 1 fromkindergarten through third grade, it doesn’t apply to 4K. The plan calls forSAGE-level class size for 4K.
n Decrease class sizes for the ninth grade. Langyel called the ninth grade a “make it orbreak it year” for students, since those who find success in that grade aremore likely to graduate from high school.
n Standardize the curriculum. Combine MPS’s high mobility rate with aninconsistent curriculum around the district, and it’s easy to see why studentsare struggling. The teachers would like to streamline the curriculum,especially in core subjects, so kids who switch schools mid-year don’t get leftbehind.
n Get chronically disruptive students out ofthe classroom. The teachersadvocate re-establishing alternative schools for students with disciplinaryproblems. “We used to have those many years ago,” Langyel said. “We’readvocating that we go back and start up a few of these alternative placements.”
n Increase intensive mentoring for newteachers. Langyel said thissuggestion was modeled on residencies for medical students. This would allownew teachers to “team teach” with more experienced instructors for one year.
n End the residency requirement for teachers. MPS’s city-residents-only policy has led tohundreds of positions being filled by teachers who are not fully qualified.Ending this policy “would allow the district to fill teaching positions thatright now are being staffed by teachers who are not fully licensed,” Langyelsaid.
n Create an alternative compensation system. While Secretary of Education Arne Duncan isencouraging districts to pay teachers for performancefor example, by tying ateacher’s pay to his or her students’ test resultsLangyel said that notion isn’tuniversally accepted by educators. Instead, the Milwaukee Opportunity Planwould compensate teachers for working longer hours, during a longer schoolyear, or for doing extracurricular work.
