Dallas Public Schools: Mike Miles’ Job in Jeopardy, School Board Votes Tomorrow
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Photo: Dallas ISD
Bill Rojas. Mike Moses. Michael Hinojosa. Mike Miles.
That’s a list of the four people who have been Dallas ISD superintendent in the past 15 years. And if some on the current board of trustees have their way tomorrow at 4 p.m., Dallas public schools will be looking at a fifth superintendent in 15 years. In fact, someone pointed out to me earlier (and then I went back and did the math) that in 20 years, only one DISD superintendent has been here long enough to see a freshman class graduate.
Some on the school board wish to fire Mike Miles. They’ve made no bones about it for quite some time. And tomorrow, they intend to do so.
I have never made a secret of my irritation at some of Miles’ missteps in the beginning, like the hiring of the overpaid communications director, for one. But the man has a vision and is a reformer. And reform we do need. In a district with a poverty rate of 90 percent, and a student homeless population of over 4,000, we need reform. When we have students who can’t read at grade level or above, we need reform. When schools fail to perform up to expectations, we need reform.
But we don’t like it. Reform means change, and change is painful and nobody likes pain. But we don’t like the school-to-prison pipeline we’ve got, either. We don’t like that it’s a tooth-and-nail fight to get the middle class in the city to see their neighborhood schools for the gems they are, but also to see that even gems need polishing.
So we have to decide, right now, today, if we want stability and the chance at real reform, or if we really are content to let yet another superintendent walk the plank. We need to decide if our children need to be in a place where all the programs just starting to get a foothold will be scrapped because of yet another new administration. We have to decide today, and then we have to tell our school board our desires (even if you disagree with me and think he should be fired). Send them Facebook messages. Email them. Call them.
Because here’s the deal: I do not know if Mike Miles’ reforms will work. And I do know that there have been some bumps – some significant – in his administration (like the HR management issue). But I do know that if he isn’t given the latitude to do his job, these reforms will indeed fail. And if we fire one more superintendent, we will have had potentially 5 in 15 years (Rojas, Moses, Hinojosa, Miles, and whoever they can rope into accepting the helm after him). That’s not stability. An average of three-four years per super is not enough time to implement real changes.
Miles shows signs of promise so far. The district is in the best financial health it has been in years. For every five teachers I meet, four tell me they are excited and energized by the potential of earning more money, getting better coaching and better direction. Energized, enthusiastic teachers mean energized, enthusiastic learners, which in turn mean better schools. Principals go through more rigorous coaching and evaluations before they even become principals. There is a renewed focus on concrete early childhood education, where we get the most bang for our buck and where the interventions happen that mean kids are more likely to read at grade level by third grade – which means that test scores will eventually go up. All of this happened on Miles’ watch.
And who, really, would want this job if our board fires yet another superintendent? No real reformer is going to want a job that has a very real danger of ending before it really had a chance to begin. We have the appearance of a nasty habit of firing or running off superintendents just as they’ve begun to roll their sleeves up and work. Will this attract top talent to the district? Does our school board exacerbate the challenges of an urban district so much that our challenging district becomes an impossible one?
I don’t know the answers to those questions, by the way. But I do know that what DISD needs is time, and a school board that will recognize it and allow it.
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I don’t live there, but from what I have read this is really too bad. If DISD has an elected school board you should vote them all out as their terms expire. Seems like the Board is the problem if this is constantly happening.
Just as when Jerry Jones fires another incumbent coach, the Dallas ISD Board of Trustees should consider the question of whom with one iota of competence would even consider taking that hot seat job should they can
Mike Miles.
As configured, the Dallas ISD is probably unmanageable.
Absolutely! And agree. Dormand, what should they do –split it up?
Part of DISD used to be two districts (Wilmer-Hutchins). What Dallas deals with, TBH, is no different from what most large urban districts face. High poverty, high ESL, etc.
One of the biggest problems is that it is difficult to have a steady benchmark when the state legislature changes the test every 3-5 years. The STAAR test has not been in action that long, and yet the lege is asking for it to be reviewed already. Before the STAAR, there was TAKS, before that TAAS, and before that TEAMS.
We don’t just keep moving the goal post, we keep changing the matter it is made of, and the shape, and how we talk about it and what exactly we want to consider the goal post to mean.
Which means it’s very hard to really compare. So we have folks like ERG and Children at Risk (more on them later) who look at those test scores, and also factor in things like poverty rates and come up with a rating that snapshots how a district is doing both in teaching and overcoming the hurdles placed before it. IF you look at “big picture” metrics like that, DISD is doing very well.
I do like some of Anchia’s ideas in his bill (which is scheduled for public hearing May 5), like having a student trustee (a non-voting position) to help “ground” the board and give real-world data. I like the idea of requiring a super majority to fire a superintendent. I also like a lot of the ideas (more on that) that were proffered tonight by Lew Blackburn and others, like creating an exit interview conducted by a third party HR firm to get a better handle on why teachers and principals leave and having workshops with the board and staff to better explain new data and programs. If we can hire some of the open “chief” positions, I think the board will also get the clarity it’s been asking for, perhaps.