A ROAD MAP FOR RENEWAL

The Dallas Morning News

Sunday, April 18, 2004

Page 13W

As go the schools, so goes the city. Good schools translate into a better-educated workforce, more desirable jobs, more stable neighborhoods, higher property values. So other cities are working hard outside the classroom to bolster their schools. Dallas needs remedial work.

Kirk. With that kind of change, there is no long-term planning. Dr. Moses, in turn, sees a relationship with City Hall that has grown closer since his early days, when there were some outstretched hands, I think to say, How can we help you? The strongest signs of cooperation have come recently. The city is spending nearly $5 million to build a library on the campus of Arcadia Park Elementary in Oak Cliff. During the day, the library will be staffed with district librarians serving the nearly 600 students in kindergarten through sixth grade. After school, the library will be open to the public and will have city librarians. The city also puts on an annual Back-to-School Fair. About 22,000 children received supplies, immunizations and other necessities to get them ready for this school year. But dual-use libraries and No. 2 pencils, however valuable in themselves, dont constitute a citywide education strategy with measurable goals. Booz Allen offered three broad areas of city-school engagement with the mayor as the person in city government who would be accountable for results: The mayor should be the voice of improving public education inside the city and ensuring [that] areas that most affect public education are supportive. The citys school-friendly initiatives need to become part of a strategic plan to support the schools and the education process. Traditional city activities such as zoning and park spending should be guided by the goal of strengthening schools. o o o SO IF THE DISDS DIFFICULTIES are well known, why hasnt a broad cross section of community leaders met the crisis head-on?

Some civic leaders say thats happening. Mr. Kirk said Dallas private sector rallied to the cause of improving the school system during his administration. I challenged the business community to clean house, he said. The business community more than met that challenge. Its tragically ironic that right now the school board is operating perhaps more efficiently and civilly than the City Council. Others in Dallas see a continuing gap between an Anglo-led business and political establishment and a school district that is overwhelmingly minority. The city and the schools truly began their hands-off relationship when the city leadership stopped thinking the district was educating their kids, said Betsy Julian, a prominent Dallas civil rights lawyer. Schools in the Richardson district, where more than half of the students live in Dallas, averaged 18.7 volunteer hours per student in 2002. The DISD schools averaged three hours. If the much-wealthier RISD has demographic advantages in terms of nonworking parents, its also true that the DISDs needs are greater. The idea of a broader Dallas-DISD partnership such as those found in the citys peers can be a touchy subject in many circles. Interviews with city officials and more than two dozen business leaders found strong concern about the DISDs performance but scant interest in seeing a closer city-schools relationship. Some at City Hall and elsewhere have played down the idea that the Dallas school district even needs substantial improvement. The schools are good enough now to attract mainstream middle-class families, Assistant City Manager Ryan Evans said in an interview last fall. Mr. Evans heads the citys economic devel-

opment department. Bill Sproull, vice president for economic development of the Greater Dallas Chamber, dismissed the idea that schools figure into corporate-relocation prospects. DISD doesnt come up very much, he said in the same interview. Whatever their reservations about seeing City Hall play a more active role in schools, Dallas business leaders dont share the perspective of Mr. Sproull or Mr. Evans. Developer Ross Perot Jr. rates schools as a top priority when he considers a new project. Another business executive, speaking on condition of anonymity, was more blunt. Although bullish on Dallas, this executive said DISD is a sore spot for the citys efforts to recruit top-tier talent: Thats one of the top things that people ask about from out of town. People say, I have to have private schools? Thats a huge issue. Booz Allens warning was stern: The long-term success of the city and its quality of life will depend on the quality of the schools. Otherwise, poor schools will neutralize Dallas other attributes. Consider the recent comments of newly installed Dallas Convention & Visitors Bureau president and chief executive Phillip Jones, whose job it is to sell Dallas. In an interview, he enthusiastically praised the citys overall prospects. But the DISD, he said, is a personal dealbreaker. Im looking at relocating my family from Louisiana to Dallas, and were looking in the suburbs because of the public education system, Mr. Jones said. Id love to live somewhere in the downtown area, but Im not going to put my children at risk.
E-mail ashah@dallasnews.com

Of cities and schools

Mayors and city council members are essential partners in improving public schools, and they can play key roles even when they have no direct authority over local school districts, says the NLC Institute for Youth, Education and Families an arm of the National League of Cities.

To improve schools, municipal leaders should:

I Start by studying. City officials need to learn about the critical core issues in improving public education, then stay focused on them. I Dig into the data. Get a full picture of students performance, as well as other key indicators. I Build a community team. Mayors and council members are perhaps the only local leaders who can bring disparate groups together to discuss key priorities and concerns. I Focus on funding. City leaders should support school district spending plans that are tied to well-conceived school improvement strategies. Speak up for bond issues. Seek outside aid. Lobby for state school aid for needy districts. I Think outside the classroom. City leaders can support school-readiness programs, enhance school safety, assist in teacher recruitment, address students social-service needs and expand learning opportunities for the hours when children are not in school. I Reach out to educators. Strong city-school partnerships begin with a willingness to share information and resources.

Dallas school geography

Texas overlapping municipal and school-district boundaries complicate the task of creating education policy for a city. For a city with a variety of school districts, which priority takes precedence? I The DISD is the largest school district in Dallas, and most of its 160,000-plus students live in the city. But other districts include part of Dallas, too from high performers such as Highland Park, Plano and Richardson to less-well-off districts such as Wilmer-Hutchins. I The DISD takes in not only most of Dallas, but also parts of cities such as Garland and Seagoville. I That can weaken the grass-roots connection between Dallas City Hall and the DISD. Some City Council members have significant numbers of constituents attending non-DISD public schools and pay taxes in those districts. I Dallas has an informal relationship with its second-largest district, the better-performing Richardson schools. Mayor Laura Miller says that when given a choice of promoting education issues, she focuses her efforts on Dallas schools.
SOURCES: National League of Cities; Dallas Morning News research

LESSONS
Because education is so central to the Citys economic future, City Hall is responsible to its stakeholders for building an active, results-oriented partnership with Dallas Independent School District. We fully appreciate the city government does not control the quality of education. This does not mean, however, that it has no role (or bears no responsibility) for improving it.

City Hall has no systematic approach for bolstering neighborhood schools by improving the
physical environment and fostering community involvement.

Alone among most of its peers, Dallas

Many cities have found ways to improve public education in ways that have little to do directly with what goes on inside the classroom.
SOURCE: Booz Allen Hamilton