Way back in 2004, Chicago’s then-superintendent Arne Duncan announced a bold initiative that he called “Renaissance 2010.” He closed 80 public schools and opened 100 charter schools. He implemented a disruptive strategy called “turnaround,” in which schools were closed and handed over to charter operators, most or all of the teachers fired. When he was appointed Secretary of Education by President Obama, the president saluted him for his courage in closing down “failing” schools. Not long after, some of the turnaround schools failed and were closed.
And now the Chicago Board of Education voted unanimously to put an end to the turnaround strategy. “Reform,” as defined by No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top, has failed.
Chalkbeat reports:
Chicago’s Board of Education voted unanimously Wednesday to end its largest school turnaround program and phase 31 campuses managed by the Academy for Urban School Leadership back into the district fold across the next three years.
The district will continue to pay the nonprofit organization to manage a key teacher residency program at a cost of $9.6 million over the next three years.
Before voting to curtail the group’s school oversight after 15 years, board members said the recommendation illustrated a broader philosophical shift in Chicago toward sending new resources to neighborhood schools and their existing staffs as opposed to strategies like “turnarounds” that relied on disrupting practice by requiring school staffs to reapply for their jobs.
“Turnaound is a relic of a previous era of school reform,” said Elizabeth Todd-Breland, a history professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and member of the school board.
Board members acknowledged the symbolism of the vote, which came in the same meeting as a discussion over the potentially negative enrollment impact of relocating a charter high school campus (the relocation was not recommended by district leadership).
Interesting turn of phrase: “Turnaround is a relic of a previous era of school reform.” Professor Todd-Breland is correct,
The Bush-Obama-Trump disruptive “reforms” failed. They are relics. It’s past time to invest in improving our public schools, where most students are enrolled, and supporting our teachers.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Is this the same turnabout method that Infante Greene is doing to the Providence schools takeover?
On Thu, Jun 3, 2021 at 10:05 AM Diane Ravitch’s blog wrote:
> dianeravitch posted: ” Way back in 2004, Chicago’s then-superintendent > Arne Duncan announced a bold initiative that he called “Renaissance 2010.” > He closed 80 public schools and opened 100 charter schools. He implemented > a disruptive strategy called “turnaround,” in which sch” >
yes, it is the same method now being applied in Providence that failed in Chicago.
A new study in Rhode Island said that there should be more charter schools because half of charter schools outperform public schools. They dismissed the fact that half the charter schools were inferior to the public schools.
About time. When I was teaching I got so sick of the word “disruption.” Why dud it take so long to end these policies that hurt children?
Many of the agents of disruption have failed upward, however. They’re still around, working for bad idea factories funded by billionaires and their spouses. You know—the folks who are “deeply concerned” about public schools yet send their kids to privates.
Is there an Arne Duncan policy that could not be labeled “failed”? Embracing Mr. Duncan was President Obama’s biggest failure.
Is there a term for planned failure?
“Planned adolescence” might be apt in Arne Duncan’s case.
Only an adolescent could say and do things as dumb as Arne.
The crazy part to me is public schools still hire and pay these folks as “consultants”
I can assure you charter schools and private schools are not hiring people who oppose their schools and work politically AGAINST their schools as “consultants”. Why do public schools?
You’re really not obligated to hire and pay people who oppose the existence of public schools and work against your schools and students. That’s not a requirement. Public schools are actually permitted to hire people who support their schools and students.
Hiring full time professional public school critics who spend most of their working hours promoting charters and vouchers is not “serving public school students”. For goodness sakes don’t PAY them for it. Just like any charter would do, public schools are permitted to ask ed reformers if they actually value public schools and will work on their behalf. If they don’t you probably shouldn’t be expending public school funding to hire them.
You don’t have to apologize for NOT being a charter or private school and you don’t have to hire and pay people who insist you do. Your schools and students have value. Hire people who recognize that and will add to it.
yes, craziest and most vicious word: STILL
It’s the brash looting of public money that’s appalling when boards of education pay ed reform “consultants.” There’s is a wealth of teacher knowledge in the district that wouldn’t cost them a penny. And can someone explain why they need to continue outsourcing the teacher residency program? Doesn’t IL have universities that prepare teachers?
It is interesting how the word “disruptors” is used in so many of these articles, demonizing g Charger schools and vouchers. I’m reminded of the term “wreckers” that the Marxists used in the USSR when their five year plans failed. Meanwhile the “great” public schools continue to fail to teach students how to read. The genie is out of the bottle, and we aren’t going to let our kids be purposely dumbed down in the government schools.
Then maybe return your stimulus check? No need for “government” money right?
Charter schools get “government” money to function and private/religious schools would get “government” money via vouchers. The “government” schools of NJ (the real public schools) are amongst the highest rated in the nation, always in the top tier of schools in the country.
So you think that the Chicago school board made a big mistake in closing down the turnaround network? Why would they want to stifle success? Why did they think it was a failure? Yes, the Marxist efforts to reinvent society failed, as did their five-year plans. That reminds me of Arne Duncan’s effort to reinvent the Chicago schools and his six-year plan, called Renaissance 2010. Didn’t work out so well.
What is a “Charger” school?
The kind Wilma and Betty graduated from.
Of course!
Disruption is a business theory popularized by Clayton Christensen. It’s pretend meaning is “innovation” but in reality it means destroying an institution & wiping out institutional memory.
Whenever I hear these guys say “disruption” I think of Paul Bremmer’s year of destruction in Iraq. The result was chaos & civil war.
Disruption and turn around were never intended to improve education. they were intended to undermine public schools and public educators. It was an attack on tenure, professionalism in education and unions. So-called reform was intended to transfer lots of public money out of public schools, deprofessionalize teaching, promote gentrification and enable more segregation. Based on these objectives, the deformers have done considerable damage to public schools, particularly in urban areas. There is a shortage of professional teachers. Some public schools are teetering on the verge of collapse, School buildings remain in the permanent state of disrepair, and the curriculum has been narrowed from years of test and punish syndrome.
I wonder if the failure of so-called reform has taught us anything. One lesson that we should learn is that we must follow evidence, not hype and spin. Students should always be at the center of decisions in education, not corporations or billionaires. Billionaires are not qualified to insert themselves into public education policy. We must not allow them to use our young people as lab rats for a billionaire agenda. Public schools are a key element of democracy and local governance. We must defend and protect them.
Another hard lesson learned is that most red states are being led by radical, right wingers that do not believe in the common good. They have little regard for their public schools, and the students that live in these states will continue to pay for the narrow-minded bias of their policymakers.
I believe many reformers sincerely believed they could turn around public schools. What they didn’t understand was the real reason schools were “failing”. 36% of my seventh graders failed my history class this year. I’m embarrassed to say how easy the work was. Why did they fail? They made no effort. They didn’t submit any work or take any of the easy, short online quizzes. In short, they failed to act like students. This is a widespread problem that no one wants to talk about: bad habits and poor discipline. I called home many times—the situation didn’t improve. If parents don’t provide the discipline, I think schools should, but they lack the wherewithal and the will.
I agree it was really about undermining and that should have been the term used, not “disrupt”.
In the early days I do think many reformers believed they could do good things. But as soon as the movement was taken over by those looking to personally benefit, who were careerists first, and children came second or third, those early reformers who had integrity left. The ones that stayed sold their integrity. They could have stayed and spoken out to make things better — which a few did and suffered the consequences. But most knew that to keep what they had they had to remain silent and complicit. They told themselves their silence was “for the kids” (meaning the few kids they helped) but it was always about putting themselves first. They were fine with the movement being taken over by corporate billionaires and their lackeys as long as their own generously compensated positions in ed reform thrived.
Privatization was sold as innovation and cooperation. Instead, it morphed into competition, the vilification of teachers, unions and public schools, as well as test and punish policies to forward the destruction of the common good.
“Reform” was supposed to be a “mom and pop” operation in response to a community need. Instead, charters became politicking behemoths of waste, fraud, embezzling and funneling ever increasing amounts of public funds into private companies at the expense of public schools and their students.
perfectly said: Privatization was sold as innovation
Privatization was sold by Clinton-Bush-Obama-Trump as a cure-all because the American people have bought the lie that the private sector is always better than the public sector, that any private school is better than any public school. What they forget is that the private sector has built-in instability. Remember Braniff Airways? Eastern? Pan Am? Large numbers of brands and businesses come and go. Large numbers of charter schools close every year.
retired teacher,
Yes, thank you for the excellent sum up. I know it’s a waste of time to think of the “what might have beens”, but I can’t help mourning an alternate timeline where the teacher-run charters thrived (in NYC, I think of schools like Central Park East and Brooklyn New School) and became alternate choices with public schools picking up some of their new practices, but not existing in competition with them. Charters wouldn’t use public schools as their dumping grounds while they cherry picked the most motivated students, but instead charters – as part of the community school system – would see their mission as welcoming the most troubled, difficult to manage students from public schools and trying alternative ways of reaching them.
Teaching motivated students ready to learn with active and involved parents when those students have no serious learning or behavioral issues? That’s something public schools know how to do.
If the second wave charter movement had stated honestly that their intention was to show public schools new models to teach motivated students who have no serious learning or behavioral issues who have active and involved adults at home committed to doing anything asked to help their child do well in schools, those charters would have been laughed out of society. The NYT reporters and editors would not have fawned over these supposedly dedicated, heroic and miracle-working charter operators who are willing to take on the “impossible task” of teaching only the most motivated students with no serious learning or behavioral issues who have active and involved adults at home who have committed to jump through hoops to insure their child does everything required by the charter.
It should be hilarious to read NYT education reporters or Chalkbeat education reporters or the Chalkbeat CEO fawning over charters that teach only the most motivated children whose committed parents promise to jump through hoops and do anything asked of them to insure their child is learning — as long as that child doesn’t have a learning or behavioral issue in which case they are not welcome in the charter no matter how dedicated their parents are.
It should be hilarious because they should all be the laughingstocks of journalism. Instead it is sad. Truly sad.
Rahm should team up with Elon Musk. They could have a real neocon “ego fest” as Musk appoints Rahm to be the first ambassador to Mars.
“They were fine with the movement being taken over by corporate billionaires”. This and they really are stupid enough to believe the hype & ignore the damage being done to generations of children.
I confess one of the most enjoyable political events of the last couple of years was watching the good people of Chicago send Emmanuel packing.
This agenda was so unpopular it couldn’t get a well-connected, clout-heavy Democratic incumbent re-elected in Chicago. Now THAT’S a rejection.
I read he’s off to Japan, because nothing says “deserves a new job” like failing at your old one. Maybe Japan can fire him too.
Agree that Rahm does not deserve any job, period.
On the other hand, he’s in a job where he can do little harm since Japan doesn’t care what Rahm thinks about policy. I think that is intentional – Rahm was chief of staff in the Obama Administration and I suspect his influence was the source of many bad policy choices Obama made. In the Biden administration, the job of chief of staff is a man who Bernie Sanders likes. I have no doubt that is why the Biden administration in 4 months has already proven itself to be closer to the progressive government we thought we would get with Obama in 2009.
Rahm belongs in Micronesia, not Japan, which is a global power.
I think that the fact that Japan is a global power is why Rahm Emanuel and whatever idiot ideas he pushes — like privatizing public education — can do little harm. A country that isn’t a global power might actually feel pressured to listen to Rahm.
I have several students who come from Micronesia to study. They certainly don’t need Rahm Emmanuel. They have enough to worry about.
Rahm is such a star, he belongs in the sky among the constellations. He should be the ambassador to not Japan or Micronesia, but to Neptune. NASA should make a special rocket for him and blast him into space. They should use the following materials to build the rocket: rocket fuel, ignition system, cardboard. Arne Duncan should ride along. Those two would make a great team if their mission was atop a mountain of explosive and flammable materials.
There has been some discussion here lately about whether it is appropriate to be hardline intolerant of neoliberals like Clinton and Obama. I appreciate that they are Democrats and that even neoliberal Democrats are better than 21st century Republicans. But as a teacher, I can never forgive anyone who went along with Duncan. They all viciously attacked everything I care about. They afflicted me personally with too much pain. They never apologized. I want them all on a rocket with a one way ticket to the sky.
Never were there sweeter sounding words than, “Turnaround is a relic of a previous era of school reform.”
Phew. Some good news for a change.
Board members acknowledged the symbolism of the vote, which came in the same meeting as a discussion over the potentially negative enrollment impact of relocating a charter high school campus (the relocation was not recommended by district leadership).
How dare they consider the effect on students in the public school! Everyone knows proper “disruptive” ed reform policy requires completely ignoring public school students and what happens to their schools.
A bolder reformer would have just destroyed the existing school to promote the charter, while insisting they work for the students who attend the public school. Maybe Chicago finally got wise to that nonsense.
You will never, ever hear anyone in the ed reform echo chamber describe any public school this way:
“I have never heard a charter-school leader describe his or her school as a “miracle school” or claim to have found the silver bullet for ending educational inequity. The truth is that great charter schools are restless institutions, committed to continuous improvement. They are demanding yet caring institutions. And they are filled with a sense of urgency about the challenges that remain in boosting achievement and preparing students to succeed in life.”
That’s Arne Duncan, working hard to promote and market the only schools he supports.
All charter commentary is 100% positive and all public school commentary is 100% negative – that’s “science” in ed reform.
I don’t mind that this is all these people do- obviously they’re wholly committed to the market based ideology and many of them are actually paid to promote charters and vouchers, so I wouldn’t expect different, but I would suggest we think about hiring at least a couple of people who work for public schools and public school students. It’s really not fair to public school students to have the entire elite education apparatus work against their schools.
If you read within the echo chamber about one of the cities or districts they have “reimagined” (exclusively by privatizing) you’ll see something really pernicious.
They attribute any success in the PUBLIC schools TO the charter schools. The ed reform narrative goes like this “we opened charter schools and then public school improved”
They can’t even credit public schools with improving. Any success of any public school is due to 1. ed reform engineering, or 2. charter schools.
Public schools cannot win this competition. All public education failures are solely the fault of public schools and all public education successes are attributable to charter schools. Some of these cities and districts are now HALF charters or private school vouchers- STILL, all public education failures are wholly the responsibility of public schools. The whole echo chamber just blithely disregard the 50% of the system they privatized and continue to insist that it’s all public schools. It’s now removed from observable reality.
Sometimes they’ll write promotional material celebrating their success in privatizing half the schools and in the same article bemoan that the scores are low because of the “public school monopoly”. What?
Cleveland is something like 40% charters and private school vouchers. How long is blaming public schools going to fly? Until they abolish the last public school?
When you read ed reform commentary on public schools it becomes amusing after a while:
“Tennessee’s approach is very much in line with Fordham’s model recovery plan, The Acceleration Imperative”
Tennessee gets kudos from the echo chamber because – surprise!- they’re doing exactly what the echo chamber told them to do.
It’s pretty easy to get the seal of approval, really. Just do exactly what they say 🙂
Perhaps this explains the USDOEd’s reticence to investigate and enforce the statutes against felony financial fraud (US FCA – False Claims Act) when students at US universities file complaints against university officials for attempting to coerce them (the students) into filing fraudulent Stafford loan applications.
I did so when SUNY (State Uni of NY) officials threatened me with expulsion for refusing to ‘collaborate’ in a scheme to defraud the USDOEd ‘Student Aid’ program.
This SUNY college was enrolling 50 students (per year) into an academic program which could accommodate only 23 students in a mandatory ‘OJT’ class – ‘Clinical Training’ in a hospital Radiology department. The remaining students left behind were forced to enrol in any other class which could accommodate them – such as Physical Education classes in jogging which explains the large number of students seen jogging/walking around the campus.
Students who required financing to pay for their college enrollment applied for Student Aid through the federal FAFSA program. When those students file a ‘claim’ for federal funds to pay for these ‘alternate’ classes (not in their original ‘academic program’) without any ‘intent’ to complete those studies – they commit a felony crime – as do the college officials who ‘coerce’ them into this course of action.
Both parties know the the students have no real ‘intent’ to enter the workforce as ‘Gym Instructors’ and that the only real reason for enrolling in 12 identical classes of ‘Physical Education’ per semester is to remain legally ‘enrolled’ as ‘part-timers’ so they can delay beginning repayment of their loans and remain eligible for re-entry into their originally desired ‘course of study’ – Radiology, Nursing or Physical Therapy Assistant – all 2 year Healthcare courses requiring ‘clinical’ training.
Students who refused to collaborate in this scheme found their academic records altered – with Grade Point Averages severely reduced to make them ineligible for further Govt financial aid through the college officials’ fraudulent application of the federal ‘SAP’ statute (Satisfactory Academic Progress). A complaint by any said student to the USDOEd fell on deaf ears as public colleges are apparently exempted from compliance with the same statutes applied to ‘private for-profit’ schools due to some ‘quid pro quo’ relationship between state and federal civil service employees.Not even the US Attorney or FBI will investigate this theft of public funds!
When a student filed a complaint with the USDOEd’s own OIG (Office of Inspector General) the OIG rebuffed the complaint – deferring the student back to the USDOEd Student Aid staff – rather than address the issue per OIG’s mandate.
When all else failed – the student mailed his complaint to the Secretary (Arne Duncan) via USPS ‘Certified Mail’ only to have the letter intercepted and diverted to the same USDOEd staff who rebuffed the original complaint! Accompanying the student’s letter was a warning from the USDOEd staff that any such issues would NOT be addressed by the Secretary but rather by the staff.- them!
A second letter was sent – this time to the President (Obama) but again the letter was intercepted and ANOTHER warning was sent to the student.
Clearly the USDOEd staff were more concerned with covering-up the criminal practices of their fellow civil service employees than in enforcement of federal laws and disclosure of corrupt practices within the US higher education system.
About freaking time.
BTW, there was a LOT of argument on these pages about the safety of confining people to classrooms during a pandemic. Here, a definitive statement about one of the many reasons why this was a really, really bad idea:
https://www.wired.com/story/the-teeny-tiny-scientific-screwup-that-helped-covid-kill/
Thanks. Great article highlighting the difficulty of adjusting what is considered scientific fact. This reality is the underlayment of anti-science attitudes in humans who are not involved in science: it all seems arbitrary to those who want life in dualistic distinctions.
There is a lot of irresponsible journalism on scientific topics, and this was REALLY the case with COVID, when journalists were repeating bs from the Trumpy, highly politicized version of the CDC.
Great point. And one that suggests an important theme to be stressed in high-school science classes.
Amazing article.
A true scientific mystery solved by forensic document researchers! An amazing story. I understand now why there was such foot-dragging on using the terms airborne and aerosol, and advice on air-filtering belated and under-emphasized.
A truly great story