1 SMHC Project Overview Jim Kelly and Allan Odden Co-Directors July 21, 2008

2 SMHC Project Goal: Dramatically improve student performance, focusing initially on urban districts: –Meaning to double student performance and reduce achievement gap as measured by state or local tests –For example, increase percent at or above proficient from 40 to 80 percent, or increase percent at advanced levels from 30 to 60 percent, or get all averages and sub-group scores above the 90 percent level

3 SMHC Project An action project of the Consortium for Policy Research in Education (CPRE) based at the University of Wisconsin- Madison Funded with an anchor grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York with generous additional funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Current funding for two years; project might last up to 5 years

4 SMHC Project Our focus for accomplishing the goal: Strategic Management of Human Capital (SMHC) SMHC includes Two Basic Strategies: –Recruiting and retaining top teacher, principal and central office talent, which are key to tackling the complex educational challenges of big, urban districts –Managing that talent around the knowledge, skills and expertise to make every teacher effective – produce large student learning gains

5 SMHC Project SMHC is arguing that: –Large urban districts can acquire top teacher and principal talent –Talent management systems – recruitment, induction, mentoring, professional development, evaluation, pay, and career progression – should be aligned and anchored in the instructional expertise needed to produce large student learning gains

6 SMHC Project Producing these significant and fundamental SMHC changes is complex and requires change in deep seated HR practices in big cities –It may require significant turnover in teacher, principal and central office staff –It will require restructuring of most HR operations –It will require broad political support from mayors, governors, legislators as well as school boards

7 SMHC Project Five key strategies: 1. Define SMHC 2. Document leading SMHC practices 3. Explain key actions and leadership tasks 4. Mobilize SMHC reformers 5. Promote SMHC reforms in large districts and at the state level

8 Six Key SMHC Activities 1. National Task Force –2-3 meetings a year –Next meeting is Nov , 2008, noon to noon 2. National Conference – November –Will invite teams from the 100 largest districts in the country –Will focus on our case studies – Boston, Chicago, Fairfax County, Long Beach, Minneapolis, New York City, TFA, TNTP, New Leaders, and Minnesota Q Comp

9 SMHC Project 3. Develop an SMHC Reform Network –Task Force members –Superintendents, HR leaders, curriculum and professional development directors, teacher leaders from the largest urban districts Broad HR network –Local, state and federal policy makers and analysts –Thought leaders

10 SMHC Project 4.Conduct case studies of leading edge SMHC reforms 5.Develop a Web 2.0 site that can become a digital meeting and discussion place for the SMHC reform community: 6.Communicate as widely as possible SMHC reforms, impacts and possibilities (Latter two assisted by Widmeyer Communications)

11 Related Materials Odden and Kelly paper on What is SMHC? Lawler paper on Strategic Talent Management. CPRE Policy Briefs on past 15 years of work on school finance, standards-based teacher evaluations and performance pay for teachers New series of six papers on teacher compensation –An overview, teacher salary levels, new salary structures, performance pay, costs and funding, and one on a possible federal funding role Heneman and Milanowski monograph HR Alignment Odden and Archibald book on Doubling Student Performance and Finding the Resources to Do It Odden and Wallace Compensation handbook and Compensation book (

12 Task Force Member Expectations 1.Create and implement SMHC actions in your district, state or organization 2.Be a visible local, state and national leader for SMHC reform 3.Be an active member of the SMHC reform network 4.Personally and with your staff become engaged in the SMHC web site 5.Work to put SMHC on the agendas of key local, state and national organizations

13 What is SMHC? Allan Odden and Jim Kelly July 21, 2008

14 What is SMHC? Core ideas: A project to boost urban district student achievement – the toughest educational challenge in US Tough educational challenges – like those in urban districts – deserve/require top talent Need a powerful education improvement strategy Need top talent to implement the strategy, and Need to manage that talent around the instructional expertise needed to boost student learning

15 What is SMHC? To be strategic, human capital management strategies must: –Devolve from the system’s educational improvement strategies –Be structured around the expertise – largely instructional expertise – needed to implement the improvement plan Not sufficient to find talent and set it loose Must equip teacher and principal talent with the instructional expertise needed to produce large improvements in student performance

16 What is SMHC? Problems of dysfunctional HR systems : –Lack of a cohesive HR system – paper records, late/inaccurate salary checks, hiring in late August, each HR unit disconnected from the other, etc. –Difficulty in staffing high need schools –High teacher turnover –Shortages of math, science teachers –Difficulty in attracting the best and brightest –Large expenditures on PD with no impact –Pay system unaligned with strategic goals

17 What is SMHC? Glimmers of new action: –Boston, Chicago, Fairfax, NYC, TFA, TNTP, New Leaders –Long Beach, Atlanta and others on aligned HR programs around instructional expertise –Minnesota Q Comp and multiple district efforts to redesign how teachers are paid –PD fiscal and program audits  restructuring in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, etc. –Other individual HR initiatives

18 What is SMHC? What is needed? –A nationwide effort to put the talent and human capital issues at the top of the national education reform agenda –To address the people side of education reform in a holistic and strategic way –Thus, SMHC – hoping to shape the crest of the wave of human capital issues that is breaking over the country’s education system

19 What is SMHC? Accept urgent need to improve student performance and reduce the achievement gap Create a powerful strategy to address those achievement challenges Identify key roles for implementing that strategy –teachers of core subjects, instructional coaches, principals, HR leaders, performance oriented superintendents Identify the competencies needed for each of those key roles

20 What is SMHC? Develop and execute strategies for talent acquisition, talent development and talent retention –Recruitment, selection/placement, induction, mentoring, professional development, performance management including evaluation, compensation and career progression All of the above the focus of SMHC

21 What is SMHC? SMHC starts with two issues: –Need to create a strategy to recruit, develop and retain top talent –Understanding of the core competencies – instructional knowledge and skills – that are needed to be deployed in all classrooms as the route to producing large gains in student performance This set of core competencies is not exhaustive but it is the core around which the HC system will be aligned and developed

22 What is SMHC? SMHC in practice – talent recruitment –Moving away from old pipelines and developing new pipelines –Districts such as Boston, Chicago, Fairfax, New York City –New talent pipeline organizations such as TFA, TNTP, New Leaders, etc. –Grow your own programs – Boston teacher residency, many other districts –“Solving” the talent problem

23 What is SMHC? SMHC in practice – talent recruitment –Sometimes talent enhancement begins with significant school and district reconstitution –NYC Community District #2 removed 2/3rds of principals and 50% of teachers –Washington, DC is replacing significant central office and school staff –Many doubling performance schools and district have talent overhaul as part of the story This part of the Chattanooga reforms tends not to be told – see Chenoweth (2007)

24 What is SMHC? SMHC in practice – talent recruitment –Many of the new talent recruitment strategies seek individuals after they have earned a BA Thus, most need Post BA certification programs – could be MA cert programs or alternative cert programs Can raise legitimate issues about training, etc. What is the role of schools of education and state funding in these new efforts

25 What is SMHC? SMHC in practice – talent development such as induction, mentoring, professional development, evaluation and performance management, tenure –Need to be aligned around instruction and curriculum –All can be anchored in a set of teaching standards and performance rubrics Danielson Framework, TFA Teaching as Leadership, Connecticut BEST, TAP, TEC, National Board, etc. –These measure multiple levels of teacher performance around which to align and manage induction, PD, evaluation, compensation, career progression, and even tenure

26 What is SMHC? SMHC in practice – retention –Roles of induction and mentoring to retain the most effective in the early years –Ongoing professional development to continuously expand expertise –Compensation to initially attract, provide sufficient long term pay, and reward for individual performance and impacts on student performance

27 What is SMHC? SMHC and school leaders, mainly principals –Balance of focus on: Principal as instructional leader versus Principal as human capital manager at the school: recruiting, screening, selecting, developing and performance managing teacher talent

28 What is SMHC? SMHC and contextual issues: –Relationship with teacher union –Labor/management structure –Requirements of contract – seniority bumping, evaluation, etc. –Governance – school board, mayoral control –State requirements – licensure, tenure, dismissal, etc.

29 What is SMHC? An action project to boost student performance, focusing on urban districts –Stimulate recruitment of top teacher, principal and teacher talent in the country’s top 100 districts drawing strategically on the pipelines that deliver this talent –Encourage those districts to align/manage the principal and teacher talent around a core set of effective instructional strategies that anchor recruitment, selection, placement, professional development, evaluation, compensation and career progression –Identify the key district and state policies and practices that can support these actions

30 SMHC in 2009

31 SMHC in 2009 SMHC Reform Network gathering the week of March 23 SMHC Task Force meetings about the same time in July and November SMHC Annual Conference to follow the November 2009 Task Force meeting Odden and Kelly to present at numerous organizational meetings