Executive Director's Report: Baldrige process helps district focus on achievement

By Anne L. Bryant

01/06/04 -- As those of you who are conscientious School Board News readers learned in the last issue, Community Consolidated School District 15 in Palatine, Ill., beat out hundreds of other organizations to win a prestigious Baldrige National Quality Award. The award recognizes District 15's pursuit of continuous improvement to become a top-quality organization.

When I wrote with great excitement about two other Baldrige-winning school districts two years ago -- Chugach, Alaska, and Pearl River, N.Y. -- I knew they would not be the last. And I'm pleased to say I was right.

Why was I not surprised to see District 15 win a Baldrige Award this year? I've been following District 15 for as long as I've been at NSBA. District 15 has been involved with NSBA longer than I have; it became a National Affiliate in 1971 and joined the Technology Leadership Network (TLN) in 1994.

These programs reflect a striving for quality. TLN districts are committed to integrating technology in everything they do. And by joining the National Affiliate program, districts demonstrate that they want the best research and the best materials and they want to be the best advocates for students in America.

District 15 also was a leading district in NSBA's student achievement seminar held at Northwestern University several years ago. The district brought a team of faculty members and administrators, and they used the four-day seminar to advance their own strategic planning work.

What is it about this school system that makes it a Baldrige winner? It has an extraordinary strategic plan with very clear benchmark goals. It measures everything. It compares itself to others globally by participating in world-class tests for math and problem solving. Its students excelled in tests that compare U.S. schools to those in the United Kingdom, Australia, Hong Kong, and New Zealand.

District 15 is a strong advocate for the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards and went from having two nationally certified teachers in 1994 to 48 in 2003.

All this is happening in a district where about one-third of the student population is minority and one-third is low income. Seventy-two different languages are spoken in students' homes. The district enrolls 12,390 students in kindergarten through eighth grade and has 14 K-6 schools, three junior high schools, and one alternative school.

Clearly, the district tracks its progress by taking measures in every category. But what is striking about this district is that it is focused on much more than data.

The true focus is, in fact, student achievement in the broadest sense of the word, including student enthusiasm for learning and staff satisfaction.

With the Baldrige program, you don't just ask people if they are happy, or learning, or performing well -- you measure it. And that's one of the strengths of the program.

When asked by School Board News about winning the Baldrige, board President Louis A. Sands said, "It's a tremendous honor." But, he added, the district's goal was not to win the award but to achieve continuous quality improvement.

Baldrige is a mind set and a process. But this district knows that if students are going to perform well over time, they have to be excited about learning. They have to recognize that learning means more than just passing a test.

Two wonderful examples of that are the district's use of a converted school bus as a "space shuttle" with mission control simulations to teach science and a discovery learning center for earth science and geology which has gotten students involved in actual space shuttle missions.

Since 1996, junior high students with learning disabilities have participated in a week-long competition at the NASA Space Camp in Huntsville, Ala., against non-disabled and gifted students from throughout the nation. During these seven years, District 15 students have finished first in at least one of the four competition areas.

All of these projects exemplify a school district leadership and faculty that understands that excitement about learning will lead to even greater competencies and skills.

One of the things that struck me as I read about District 15's strategic vision, goals, core values, student performance targets, and one-page plan scorecards for each department was that all of these processes and benchmarks are centered around student performance.

In fact, even such areas as transportation, technology infrastructure, and maintenance are aligned to student performance targets.

The managers of these areas collect student and stakeholder data through formal and informal means to improve their own efficiency. And they're always asking: How can we contribute to a student's learning?

So this focus on student learning, this commitment to excellence and quality, this overwhelming sense of striving to get better every year, to work on making the faculty and other staff more proficient leads to a much higher realm in terms of not only performance but philosophically what schooling is all about.

It is interesting that as you read through the documents about District 15, you do not see any references to the No Child Left Behind Act, except once -- that 100 percent of the district's teachers are highly qualified according to the standards of NCLB. That's the only reference. In fact, it's almost as if NCLB is a non-issue.

While many educators across the United States are worrying extensively about NCLB -- and an equal number are probably seizing the opportunity to focus on improving student achievement -- the angst level among some seems to imply that's all they're focused on. That misses the point.

What District 15 has basically said, I think, is, "well, of course, we're going to measure our students' performance in reading, math, and science. Of course, all of our students have to become proficient over time. Of course, our staff and faculty must be highly qualified." That's just an assumption, and they move on from there.

Now, I am not underplaying the hardships districts are facing regarding NCLB implementation problems and challenges. But I am saying that when a district is setting its sights for the gold, the baseline -- or bottom line -- of NCLB simply becomes one more measurement and one more process.

The board of education, the superintendent, the faculty, and staff of District 15 deserve a round of applause because they have shown us the way to get beyond the mundane and to reach for the stars.