Empowerment gives schools the ability to put students first

This commentary was submitted by 27 educators who recently visited four school systems on the mainland and Canada; they included school board members, state-office administrators, complex-area superintendents, teachers, principals, union representatives and parent advocates. The trip was arranged by the Education Institute of Hawaii and funded by the Mamoru and Aiko Takitani Foundation.

The Education Institute of Hawaii arranged for us to visit four very different school systems, and asked only that we keep an open mind about what practices and organizational structures might be worth emulating or avoiding, and then to share our opinions upon returning home.

Board of Education chairman Don Horner and schools Superintendent Kathy Matayoshi suggested the names of some members of the delegation, and provided time to DOE staff to be a part of the traveling group.

Members of the delegation had discussed "school empowerment" in pre-trip meetings, but at that time, lacked a common understanding of what the term can mean. If someone had asked us then about the need for major reform to Hawaii’s Department of Education, our responses would have varied considerably. As explained below, that has changed.

The trip, during Hawaii’s fall school break, consisted of wall-to-wall meetings with district officials and school personnel daily, then debriefing sessions each evening. We ate all meals together and grumbled together about the grueling travel schedule.

Yet the 27 of us returned home feeling exhilarated, inspired and empowered by the experience. We have seen, heard and been touched by school empowerment and know that it works to create and support classrooms where students thrive in the empowered learning environment.

A school empowerment system requires a philosophical shift. There becomes only two categories of workers: those who work directly with the students, and those who support the efforts of those who work directly with students.

In short, everyone’s primary job is to ensure a quality education for every child.

School empowerment recognizes the uniqueness of each school community and understands that one size rarely fits all.

For each principal, school empowerment means more than just greater control over financial and staffing decisions. It also means engaging the entire school community — teachers, parents, librarians, cafeteria workers, custodians, everyone who see the students daily — in meaningful discussions about spending, staffing, and curricular and instructional decisions.

Empowered schools model shared values such as collaboration, transparency, integrity, equity and life-long learning. They embrace clarity of responsibility and accountability for their decisions, especially those that focus on student achievement.

Statewide policies and standards continue to be necessary, and support services continue to be provided by support staff outside the schools when that promotes effectiveness and efficiency. There also must be a systemwide commitment to capacity-building for both instructional and non-instructional leadership.

Work in the state DOE continues to be critically important in providing the high-quality education deserved by every student.

But because the schools are where teachers and students interact on a daily basis, we support a carefully thought-out process giving school-level personnel more power than they currently have over resource allocation and instructional decisions, along with mechanisms to ensure accountability.

Empowerment and accountability must go hand-in-hand and be properly aligned. For example, it would not be fair (or effective) to hold school-level personnel accountable for results without first empowering them to achieve the desired results.

The timing for school empowerment is good. Each of Hawaii’s four gubernatorial candidates has talked favorably about it, and the new governor will fill vacancies on the school board as they occur.

School empowerment is multifaceted and nuanced, but we are pleased that the next governor is on record as wanting to see the existing system move in the direction that we have described generally in this commentary. We, and many others, stand ready to actively engage in this positive process for our children’s sake.

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Randy Roth, chairperson of the Education Institute of Hawaii, and Darrel Galera, executive director, submitted this on behalf of the delegation (participants listed online). A fuller report will be presented in a public School Empowerment Conference Nov. 28-29; see http://www.edthinktankhawaii.org/conference/ for upcoming details.