11 has been suddenly and jarringly thrust upon us as educators. We know something of the process of teaching and learning, we know something of school organization and administration, but to be suddenly put in the high position of remaking a social order immediately finds us unprepared, illstaffed and poorly trained for the job. Unready as we are however, there is no other agency of government as appropriate as the school for this new charge. One of the responsible leaders of the civil rights movement in the schools stated to me that the schools are the city's soft underbelly in the matter of civil rights, and we are just that. Soft, sensitive, visible, white, luminous, responsive, tender, compassionate, vulnerable, the white belly the soft, vulnerable white belly of civil rights. What is a racially balanced school and how does it stay balanced. We have arranged for open enrollment in Pittsburgh and provide transportation. But, in some classes, we now have more transferred Negro children than white. Do we halt the transfer policy while there is still available space? Do we establish a quota at 40%, 50% or 60%? The law forbids quotas in housing. The Negro properly hates quotas. Does the school become resegregated as a product of our very act to integrate? In 1950 there were eight Pittsburgh schools with 80% or more Negro children; in 1955 there were nine; in 1960 there were 13; now there are 23. The rate is accelerating and we don't know how to stop it. Populations do not arrange themselves into nearly balanced patterns in our big cities. Good teaching is individualized whatever the school may be. If it is not completely individualized, it is performed in small homogeneous groups. Is it useful to integrate a school building and then immediately segregate the children by present ability, according to sound teaching techniques? Or do we make some pretext of artificial integration irrespective of good teaching? This is a basic and sober question for the teachers. We are now at the end of two years of detailed planning of what we will call the great high schools of Pittsburgh. We now have 22 high schools, and we are going to wipe them out as high schools. We'll create four or five high schools enrolling up to 6,000 or more children. These schools will be big enough, excellent enough, comprehensive enough to leap across the boundaries and differences that have segregated parts of our cities, and all the reasons that held people apart. Railroad tracks, rivers, ravines and gullies, forests, parks and ridges will no longer be excuses. This will be a rational and reasonable and logical approach to integration. We hold that first of all there must be such excellence of educational quality in the institution that everyone will want to go there. There must be a reversal of the trend for the very reason of education in the city being better. A fair share of the favored white will choose to stay in the city or return, on the basis of education opportunities available. During the next three years, our entire city will go through a major revolution. The people have indicated their support through the largest possible bond issue we could raise, and it was supported three to one. These will be schools for the use of thousands, they will be concerned with excellence, they will be concerned with individuality, they will be comprehensive for the whole span, from the slowest to the swiftest. No matter what boards of education may do in terms of finding solutions for racial equality, we should not expect gratitude from the Negro community. We should not expect someone to come around wringing his hands and saying "thanks." This is compensation long due. I would say the racial problem in our cities was more serious when it was silent, when we could pretend that there was no problem. But now that the issue cries for an answer and that men stand on the barricades demanding help, the problem is in the process of solution. The times were never so good, in spite of the frustrations, the opportunities were never so large for the people's voice, the boards of education in companionship with administrators, to bring greatness to our big cities. Sidney P. Marland, Jr. Winnetka: The History and Significance of an 172 Winnetka and Marland ever may be good in Winnetka education; it is emphasized here that if this book appears to pass over the years between C. W.'s time and mine, it is because I must limit myself to the things I know. Teachers and "the Administration" There were other influences in Winnetka beyond C. W.'s lingering image that produced contradictions. One derived from my first interview with a faculty committee before I had been invited to the post. I had asked the committee, which had been elected by the faculty to share in interviews of candidates for the superintendency, what they were looking for primarily in the new superintendent. With one voice they had declared, "leadership." It is no secret that leadership means different things to different people. But the corporate faculty, strongly and proudly organized in the Winnetka Teachers' Council, seemed wary of this newcomer, leadership notwithstanding. Reduced to the simplest terms, the Board of Education was looking to the new superintendent to bring about change; the corporate faculty (as distinguished from individuals) was uneasy lest the superintendent attempt to bring about too much change too soon. The wariness in the Teachers' Council was normal, and could be expected to prevail in some degree in any good school system upon the induction of a new superintendent. In this case the teachers seemed to be mindful of the frequently changing superintendents they had known for 13 years. Correspondingly they seemed to be guarded in their initial acceptance of anything that might suggest another change. Their loyalitics to a nominal leader had, perhaps, been too often dislodged to permit quick and easy transfer. Indeed, a quick and easy transfer would have been unworthy of this faculty. I am sure that I added unwittingly to the uneasiness by making noises like a new superintendent during those first weeks. But I had not come to Winnetka to be a ballot counter for the teachers' association. Nor had I come to brandish my authority as the "senior officer present." I knew well that anything good that might lie in the future of the Winnetka Schools would be the result of heavy faculty involvement and consensus. Changes in a school system, if they 12 C. W. AND I 173 are to be forward-moving and enduring changes, must be the product of hard work by all concerned, especially classroom teachers. Superintendents may help teachers move forward, but the moving is done by the faculty. It became important to me to demonstrate my belief in this principle lest the friendly wariness in the Teachers' Council change to coolness. My purpose in noting here what to me was an unfamiliar watchfulness between the organized faculty and the administration is to point up the possible relevance to education leadership at large. My message, therefore, to faculties and boards of education is to be mindful of this circumstance as changes in leadership occur. Loyalty to the symbol (not the person) expressed by the Superintendent of Schools is highly important to an effective school system. Communication, unity of purpose, security, efficiency and corresponding morale hinge crucially on the genuine acceptance of the nominal leader, but this acceptance must be eamed by performance. Not long after taking office, I resolved that one of my first and most important trials would be to make a happy partnership between the Teachers' Council and the superintendent, without diminishing the strength and dignity of the Council. I knew that I could not be successful in Winnetka as long as any defensiveness or anxiety prevailed between the organization of the teachers (again distinguishing between individuals and the corporate faculty) and my office. I had long felt that a strong professional teachers' organization was essential to a good school system. I wanted the Winnetka Teachers' Council to flourish, and I wanted to be a useful and constructive part of it. For one thing, I knew that a strong professional organization with conventional state and national affiliation was the most certain safeguard against teacher unionism. I knew that teacher unionism and I would be uncasy partners. But, more important, I knew that in a strong Teachers' Council there would be established channels, organization and procedures with which I felt I could relate systematically in doing my job. This was much to be preferred over a listless or non-existent organization having no paths I might follow or doors at which I might knock. The chapter following will deal in some detail with the processes we employed in finding a constructive partnership. 13 Industry and Education: A New Partnership A Conference. The Harvard Club, New York December 4, 1968 bai lood ofaw Sas heated) woud 1 its Tenoiten has od I mainan dol 20, 11ી badala od bloow Institute for Educational Development American Telephone & Telegraph Company fun getiva noifer Superintendents and school board members from many of the largest cities in the country came to the Industry-Education Conference to talk across the table with executives from many of the nation's largest corporations. They talked candidly about the troubles of urban school systems and about whether and how, and sometimes when and where, they might help each other. Leaders from labor, foundations, and professional organizations in education were invited also in order to gain their experience and points-ofview for the discussions. At the opening of the meeting Dr. Sidney Marland (IED) declared that there would be no speeches and described what was happening as a "non-conference.” No reports from committees were heard and no resolutions were adopted. What could these people hope to accomplish in one day of discussion? What kinds of "partnership" attracted their interest and brought them together? The sense of what they said to each other will be For years, fragmentary accounts in the press have described joint projects of corporations and urban school systems. Often small in scale and experimental, usually inspired by the energy and faith of a handful of local businessmen and educators, these attempts seem to promise a very broad basis for cooperation. Some of them augur radical improvements for education in the cities. General Electric in Cleveland; Eastman Kodak in Rochester; Michigan Bell Telephone in Detroit; Winchester Division of Olin-Mathieson in New Haven; Kaiser Aluminum in Oakland: the partnership projects indicate a national pattern of mutual concern and willingness to cooperate. But more should be known by those who are trying to understand and expedite partnerships between industry and the schools. Hence, in stating purposes for the meeting, the A Beginning shown in quotation in the body of this report. At the close of the day Dr. Marland spoke briefly from his own recent experience as a big-city school superintendent in Pittsburgh. He stated the chief conclusions of the sponsors of the meeting: that the "new partnership" probably will not take the form of a national organization of institutions and people; and that, instead, the concept of local control in American education will lead to local partnerships based upon local Urban Coalitions, Chambers of Commerce, schools committees, or upon whatever local arrangements the partners choose. That theme was underlined in a closing reminder by Elinor K. Wolf (USOE), “We hope the conversations today will help you start conversations between industry and the schools in your own cities. If you have already started, then I hope you go on to the regular, trusting, and informative communications of real partners, and then move forward together into action programs in urban education." Partners and Purposes sponsors urged participants to avoid the temptation to seek final solutions. Instead, it was hoped they could use this meeting for exploratory conversations on the meaning of their own experiences and the possibilities for their own future — as partners in urban education. The purposes of the meeting therefore were said to be exploratory, rather than oracular, or explanatory. These were initial conversations on this subject for some of the participants. The many unknowns in industry-education cooperation justified prospecting, supposition, and speculation. And, of course, decision-makers from these dissimilar worlds needed to explore each other, as persons, thinkers, and doers. First conversations somewhat similar to these may be necessary in the beginning of every local partnership. 155 |