Has Business Been Bold Enough?

1
Has Business Been Bold Enough?

• Frederick M. Hess
• American Enterprise Institute
• www.aei.org/hess

2
What Business Has Done The Clark Kent Approach

• Encouragement and support
• Genteel philanthropy
• Tutoring
• Student scholarships
• Mild policy advocacy

3
Comparatively, We Spend a Lot
Source OECD 2005
4
Even More Than You May Think
(Source Howell West in Education Next, 2008)
5
More Teachers, Smaller Classes
(Source Loeb Reininger, 2004 and NCES)
6
Teachers Are Relatively Well-Paid
(Source Podgursky in Education Next, 2003)
7
With Factory-Style Benefits
(Source Vigdor In Education Next, 2008)
8
Great Teachers Are Hard to Predict
(Source Goldhaber in Education Next, 2002)
9
Tests Can Be Misleading
(Source Finn Meier in Education Next, 2009)
10
The Problem with Adequate Yearly Progress
(Source Peterson West in Education Next, 2006 )
11
Limited NCLB Impact So Far
(Source Ravitch Chubb in Education Next, 2009)
12
What Business Should DoTime to Hit the Phone
Booth

• Help schools manage smart
• Invest in the supply side
• Do what innovators cant
• Get firm with education leaders
• Lead with experience and credibility

13
Help Schools Manage Smart

• Promote data and MIS systems
• Support performance evaluations
• Invest in HR and IT
• Watch out for The New Stupid

14
Invest in the Supply Side

• Tool Builders
• Wireless Generation
• SchoolNet
• SMARTHINKING

• Human Capital
• Teach For America
• New Leaders for New Schools
• The New Teacher Project

• Investors
• NewSchools Venture Fund
• Charter School Growth Fund
• Knowledge Investment Partners

• School Builders
• KIPP Schools
• Green Dot Public Schools
• Achievement First

• Infrastructure
• The Mind Trust
• New Schools for New Orleans
• High Tech High Ed School

15
Do What Innovators Cant

• Remember why Google is no champion of free speech
  in China
• Few reform venues
• Small scale of successful ventures

16
Get Firm with Education Leaders

• Cages of their own design?
• Collective bargainingless restrictive than
  advertised
• Inattention to cost-effectiveness

N 50 The Leadership Limbo (Fordham Foundation
2008)
(Source Hess Loup, 2008)
17
Lead with Experience and Credibility

• Talk sense about accountability and
  compensation
• NCLB
• Merit pay
• Shoot down bad ideas
• 65 solution
• Class size reduction

18
Leaders in Action

• Joel Klein, New York City Public Schools
• Teacher Performance Units, experienced attorneys
  who advise principals and litigate incompetence
  cases against ineffective, tenured teachers

• John Deasy, Prince Georges County Public Schools
• Transferred hundreds of the districts 10,800
  teachers to new schools
• Initiated a voluntary pay-for-performance system

• Michelle Rhee, Chancellor of DC Public Schools
• Unused law providing for 90 day termination
• Side-stepping contract on middle school pilot

19
Has Business Been Bold Enough?

• Frederick M. Hess
• American Enterprise Institute
• www.aei.org/hess