Experts discuss TAC's design

BY ANDREA EGER World Staff Writer
Thursday, March 27, 2008
3/27/08 at 6:22 AM

Alternative education leaders note differences in the operation of the Tulsa center and other school models.

Alternative education experts who have been following news reports about the Tulsa Academic Center have noted obvious differences between it and research-based strategies for success.

Two local juvenile justice officials are questioning whether the school, which is slated for an overhaul after only seven months in operation, is worth saving. And school board members Matt Livingood and Brian Hunt have raised concerns about whether a referral to the school should be used as punishment.

The leaders of the Oklahoma Technical Assistance Center, which serves alternative schools across Oklahoma, said disciplinary or punitive schools have been found to have far less success in reducing dropouts than alternative schools that offer students a less-traditional environment.

Denise Riley, assistant director of the center and a board member of the National Alternative Education Association, said the differences between the two models are most evident in their goals.

"In one, you change the environment; in the other, you try very hard to change the child," Riley said.

That change in environment is critical for reaching students who have not been successful in traditional schools, she said.

It entails class sizes of no more than 15 students so teachers have a greater opportunity to connect with them; long-term, not short-term stays for students, and a special breed of teacher.

"You have to have teachers who care and who are flexible, yet have high standards," Riley said. "We always tell them that the education (at an alternative school) shouldn't be anything less than they would get in a traditional school -- just something that's different."

Based in Cushing, OTAC has one of the largest research databases for alternative education in the country, she said.

Prevailing research also has shown that alternative schools are most successful when students choose to be there.

"If we're just providing a house for them and they sit there, there is no 'buy-in' be tween the people there. It shouldn't be a holding pen or a place we send people," Riley said. "In many cases, the very reason kids are misbehaving is that they're in a huge school and they're not connected to anybody."

Riley said Oklahoma statutes include a recommended model for alternative schools that includes 17 research-based components.

She noted that Richard Palazzo, director of alternative programs for Tulsa Public Schools, helped create the model in the 1990s.

"They have all that knowledge in Tulsa. He is an excellent resource," she said.

Kathy McKean, director of OTAC, also has recommended the national award-winning programs at Tulsa's Street School, and the Union Alternative Center, as models.

Beth Wonson, another board member for the national association, said she heard about the Tulsa school's problems while presenting at a statewide conference this week in Oklahoma City.

Wonson works for a nonprofit group in Covington, Ga., that operates a variety of alternative education programs, including one for students who have been suspended.

She said she e-mailed Tulsa Superintendent Michael Zolkoski to offer the benefit of her experience with Project Adventure Kids.

Wonson said it appears that the Tulsa program is lacking a strong counseling component to address students' social and emotional growth and development, and sufficient support for the faculty and staff.

She noted that Zolkoski introduced the Boystown model for teaching youths social skills. She said she helped a school in New York improve its delivery of that model.

"It is extremely effective when implemented in small group settings, but it appears they're attempting to serve too many kids in their environment," Wonson said of Tulsa Public Schools. "It is also critical for people new to education and counseling to have a lot of training, along with a lot of follow-up professional development, in that model."

Tami Marler, director of public information for TPS, said Zolkoski referred all questions about the Tulsa Academic Center's program design to Herb Thayer.

Thayer is the current director in Lafayette, La., of a boot camp which Zolkoski founded when he served as superintendent there in the 1990s.

Marler said a group of Tulsa administrators were dispatched in 2007 to study the Lafayette Alternative Program for Students, or LAPS, and a similar program that Zolkoski founded in Brownsville, Texas.

"There were not intended to be major differences. The TAC model was supposed to closely model the Lafayette (one)," she said.

But the Lafayette program that Thayer describes includes several differences from the program that has materialized as the Tulsa Academic Center.

"(Zolkoski) sent a team down here for two days," Thayer said upfront. "I don't know how they implemented it. I know the program we have, and we are saving some children."

He declined to estimate his program's success rate, but said it only accepts a total of 90 middle and high school students at any given time, and very few seniors.

LAPS boasts a student-teacher ratio of 15:1, and a highly structured environment.

"There is not a lot of free time. We work on self-esteem and character education, and physical training. The idea is if they feel better and look better, physically, it helps their self-esteem," Thayer said

LAPS also is open for 30 days during the summer to give students additional opportunities to earn course credits.

Comparatively, the Tulsa Academic Center had a student enrollment that had swelled to 300-400 by March 14.

Teachers who spoke to the Tulsa World on condition of anonymity said they have as many as 30 students attend each of their class periods with another 10 to 20 on the rolls for each.

They said the sheer volume and ever-changing student body, as well as frequent violence, at the school have made its character education and physical training programs impossible.

Another notable difference between the Tulsa and Lafayette programs is how students end up there.

In Tulsa, students have no due-process rights to appeal their referral to the school for discipline infractions.

But students who have gone through the Lafayette school district's disciplinary due process hearing and are expelled can apply to LAPS as a last chance, Thayer said.

"Some choose not to apply," he said. "I personally think if they want to continue, then they'll give it a shot. If you force them to come there and they can't possibly pass, what incentive for them is there?"

Web site: www.tulsaworld.com/otac

Andrea Eger 581-8470
andrea.eger@tulsaworld.com

Alternative education model

1. Student-teacher ratios conducive to effective learning for at-risk students.

2. Appropriate structure, curriculum, interaction, and reinforcement strategies for effective instruction.

3. Intake and screening process to determine student eligibility.

4. Appropriately certified teaching faculty.

5. Faculty with experiences or personal traits that qualify them for successful work with at-risk students.

6. Collaboration with state and local agencies.

7. Courses that meet state curriculum standards, as well as remedial courses.

8. Individualized instruction.

9. Clear and measurable program goals and objectives.

10. Counseling and social service components.

11. Graduation plan for each student.

12. Life skills instruction.

13. Opportunities for arts education.

14. A proposed annual budget.

15. An evaluation component including an annual written self-evaluation.

16. Service to students in grades 6 through 12 who are most at risk of not completing high school for reasons other than disability.

17. Opportunities for student participation in vocational programs and extracurricular activities.

Source: Oklahoma State Department of Education

Tulsa Academic Center

2740 E. 41st St. North

Founded by Superintendent Michael Zolkoski in August, the school offers two programs to which middle and high school students could be referred.

The Term Academic Program, which is being phased out, allowed students to serve suspensions of up to 30 days in the school, while the most troubled students will continue to be referred to the Performance Training Program, or PTP. Students have to earn points to be released from PTP, which Zolkoski has said can take anywhere from two weeks to two years to accomplish.