Tulsa World: TPS teacher improvement plan not dead, Ballard says

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TPS teacher improvement plan not dead, Ballard says
The Gates Foundation will still provide $1.5 million in funding, and more is sought.

HAS PLAN
Keith Ballard: The district did well to make it to the Gates Foundation's final 10, he says.

By ANDREA EGER World Staff Writer
Published: 9/10/2009 2:20 AM
Last Modified: 9/10/2009 4:15 AM

More than two weeks after Tulsa Public Schools was passed over for a $55.6 million partnership with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Superintendent Keith Ballard said the district's plan to improve teacher effectiveness through new evaluations and performance pay is not dead.

Administrators have created a $4.3 million proposal to keep the plan on track for 2009-10, but they can't go on without outside help.

"If we get this funding, we will be able to do exactly what the proposal called for TPS to do this year," Ballard said in an exclusive interview with the Tulsa World. "We would be right on track with where we would be if we had gotten the Gates grant. We came up with a transformational proposal. It galvanized the community like nothing else has, and Gates has not abandoned us."

The Gates Foundation, which was established by the Microsoft co-founder and his wife, has pledged $1.5 million to help Tulsa Public Schools advance its Teacher Effectiveness Initiative, even though the foundation selected five other urban school districts from a field of 10 finalists for much more lucrative partnerships.

Ballard has been meeting with local philanthropic and corporate leaders in hopes of adding an additional $2 million to help the district foot the bill.

"A question we are commonly asked is, 'What happened?' We had 10 highly qualified school districts competing for this prize. It is remarkable that we made it into the final 10," he said. "The only area of improvement we were suggested by Gates is they did have some concern about whether we had the capacity to truly carry out the work. We need to put ourselves in the position to do the heart of the matter, which is teacher evaluations and performance pay."

The Gates partnership proposal called for Tulsa Public Schools to raise its starting teacher salary to $36,000, offer incentives of as much as $24,000 and, beginning in spring 2011, to dismiss teachers who do not reach minimum standards and fail to improve.

Ballard's plan for 2009-10 is to:

Create a program management office to serve as a gatekeeper in researching new programs and measuring existing ones because "one of the issues we have at TPS is too many programs."

Build a performance-based culture by using routine surveys of employees and patrons to chart the effectiveness of the district's school support services, most of which are based at the Education Service Center, 3027 S. New Haven Ave.

Reduce internal costs by $5 million to $10 million to help pay for performance pay.

Expand internships to help develop more quality school leaders and expand tuition reimbursement from the University of Oklahoma doctorate program to also include a master's degree program for potential leaders.

Train employees in performance-based management strategies.

Update the district's data systems so leaders can track surveys and other performance indicators.

Work with a nationally recognized consultant in redesigning

Tulsa Public Schools'

human relations department as a human capital department.

Although Ballard has received no funding commitments yet from local sources, he said he remains hopeful about those prospects — and the possibility that Tulsa Public Schools could attract the support of other national foundations that work to improve public education.

"We are not just building capacity in our organization because it's the right thing, we're building capacity to position ourselves to compete for funds to carry out the work of new teacher evaluations and performance pay," he said. "The sustainability to do that work will cost us about $15 million a year.

"We can't stop. It is very important that we continue this work."

Andrea Eger 581-8470
andrea.eger@tulsaworld.com By ANDREA EGER World Staff Writer

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Some reader comments for this story were copied from "TPS Superintendent says district still plans to improve teacher effectiveness ," which was published on 9/9/2009.

	Report Comment NASA Apollo13, Houston We Have A Problem (9/9/2009 5:34:45 PM) If I had the financial means I would be glad to support this. Let's hope someone who has the means will step forward.
	Report Comment Mar, Tulsa (9/9/2009 6:19:00 PM) Sounds like a plan, Dr. Ballard. Way to go!! You mediocre teachers need to shape up or get shipped out. Parents you need to get your act together, your children need to come first.
	Report Comment SC, (9/10/2009 7:07:26 AM) We did not get the Gates grant because of being top heavy at the ESC. I find it interesting that TPS and the school board has just approved $99,000 salaries for people who are incompetent at the the school level-FUMU. This sends the message that all you have to do in order to move up in TPS is to be incompetent. ESC clean up your house first and provide real leadership. Get rid of the 99,000 salaries, and you will have the money to give pay raises to excellent teachers.
	Report Comment Centrist, the burbs (9/12/2009 3:43:03 AM) They fail to mention a very important aspect of student learning. You can have the best teachers in the world but if you do not have parents involved in their childs education and social training at home seeing they get to school, on time, prepared, has done their homework, studied or read their book chapters, behave in school,and everything else that is required then you should not be punishing the teachers. You can't put it all on teachers. It starts at home and continues at home. Any teacher will tell you it is a joy to teach a student that meets these responsibilites but it takes good parenting for teachers to have these type of students.

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