Ex-Oakland superintendent to head Illinois schools amid Chicago controversy

YouTube

Old Oakland schools Superintendent Tony Smith has been named Illinois superintendent of education.

YouTube

Erstwhile Oakland schools Superintendent Tony Smith has been named Illinois superintendent of pedagogy.

This report was updated at 3 p.m. on April 24 at 3 p.k.

Former Oakland school superintendent Tony Smith will become state superintendent of education in Illinois on May one, at a time of fiscal and political crisis for the Chicago public schools.

Smith, who was appointed to the position by the Illinois Board of Pedagogy on April xv, resigned unexpectedly from the Oakland Unified School District in April 2022 and left his mail service two months afterwards. He said he was moving to Chicago considering of his begetter-in-law'south sick health. Once there, he became president of the W. Clement and Jessie V. Stone Foundation, a philanthropic foundation with a focus on early on education.

Smith, 48, was nominated to the Illinois schools main position by Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner, a Republican, who took office in January. The Illinois State Board of Pedagogy, the majority of whom are appointed by Rauner, confirmed Smith's date to the post in mid-April.

In Illinois, Smith will aid coordinate state policy affecting nearly 900 districts. With just over 2 meg students, Illinois ranks 5th among states in total enrollment.

A spokesperson for Rauner described Smith as "a transformational leader who has a proven rails tape of increasing student accomplishment, while successfully addressing fiscal and structural issues at the local district level," a reference to his tenure as school principal in Oakland and his work in other Bay Area school districts.Smith served on Rauner'southward transition team later he won the governor's post in November.

In an interview with EdSource,  Smith said his experience in California will assistance inform his work in Illinois, especially Oakland's participation as part of the consortium of 10 CORE districts.  He said the work of Canadian educator Michael Fullan, who is working with districts and California Department of Education on school reform in California, volition exist specially instructive, including concepts such every bit a "leadership from the middle,"  "peer-to-peer accountability" and "professional person majuscule."   He said he has already reached out to Fullan to meet how he could help in Illinois, and was "desperate to motion equally apace equally possible" to promote a collaborative culture in the state forth the lines articulated by Fullan.

For a definition of "professional person capital letter"  get here.

Smith said that he would expect at ways land agencies tin can be more than supportive of local districts. "Information technology tin exist easy just to say 'do this,'" he said. "But it is difficult to run a public system well, and superintendents need support and help doing that."

Smith will be paid an almanac salary of $225,000. The superintendent of pedagogy in Illinois is an appointed position, unlike California'southward country superintendent of public instruction, which is a statewide elected mail. But their responsibilities are similar. In Illinois, Smith will aid coordinate country policy affecting near 900 districts. With merely over two million students, Illinois ranks fifth amid states in total enrollment. California ranks first, with more than 6 million students.

Smith will take his position confronting a backdrop of cracking controversy in Chicago that has implications for the country equally well.

Barbara Byrd-Bennett, the superintendent of the Chicago Public Schools, took a paid get out of absence last week in the face of a federal investigation into the commune's awarding of a no-bid contract worth more than than $20 million for main and school leadership training to SUPES University, a for-profit firm Byrd-Bennett had previously worked for every bit a consultant.

In addition, the Chicago schools face a $1.1 billion budget shortfall for the coming school year, largely triggered by massive increases in pension obligations – with no articulate path for how to close the gap.

Byrd-Bennett, who has not been charged with any wrong doing, was appointed to her postal service by Mayor Rahm Emanuel in 2022 and was a fundamental ally in implementing explosive policies, including the decision to shut 47 schools serving 12,000 students.  Subpoenas were issued to three senior schoolhouse commune officials to appear earlier a federal thou jury  in regards to the contract barely a calendar week after Emanuel was returned to function afterward a heated runoff election — fifty-fifty though the reporting system Goad Chicago has been reporting on the issue for almost two years.

1 issue that Smith will nearly certainly find himself in the middle of is the extent to which the state will assist Chicago in climbing out of its budget hole, or whether it will be left to the district to do so on its own. Rauner terminal week went so far as to suggest that the school district might need to declare bankruptcy. "The taxpayers of Illinois are not going to bail out the city of Chicago, that ain't happening," he said.

Smith's appointment has itself non been without controversy.He was the only candidate considered by the board, in contrast to at least some previous appointments that were the results of a national search.

He was the merely candidate considered past the board, in contrast to at least some previous appointments that were the results of a national search.  Rauner is a self-described free market bourgeois and wealthy businessman who worked for the private investment firm GTCR for 30 years and retired equally its chairman in 2012. This week, in a speech to the Pedagogy Writers Association in Chicago, he said a major priority of his was to ensure that all students are prepared for careers — which could include bringing back vocational tracking in the schools.

Smith has non been linked to the SUPES Academy flap. Still, questions take been raised in the printing and elsewhere almost the role of the Chicago Public Education Fund, a private foundation whose board comprises some of the city'south and land's nigh prominent business concern and civic leaders, including Gov. Rauner. Many are close to Emanuel.  Smith joined the lath of the fund last year.

However, according to a statement from its primary executive officer, Heather Anichini, the fund provided a grant to the SUPES Academy in 2022 – before Smith joined the fund's lath – simply since and then has non made whatever grants to the firm.

While in Oakland, Smith helped steer the district through the extreme budget cutting era brought on past the recession. He led a comprehensive commune-broad community schools initiative to expand the function of all schools in the lives non only of their students merely likewise the larger community, and hefounded a focused division in the district to boost accomplishment of African-American male students.

At the aforementioned time, he generated considerable community opposition – which included a nearly three-week sit-in at now-shuttered Lakeview Unproblematic School – when the school board voted to close five schools that had suffered from declining enrollments.

There were also tensions with the teachers union on a number of bug, including requiring teachers at three struggling schools to reapply for new 11-month positions and attempting to change seniority positions to give principals more flexibility in hiring.

Now Smith will exist tackling some of these issues, including immense upkeep challenges, intense union conflicts, and heated state vs. local battles, on a far larger scale and a more prominent canvas than he did when he was in Oakland, or when he was a deputy superintendent in San Francisco, and superintendent of the tiny Emery Unified School before that.

Smith said the number 1 issue on his agenda will be working to achieve is "funding equity"  in the country. "It is hard to depict how broken the system is in terms of equitably funding didactics in Illinois," he said. "That will be a huge focus for me."  He said that he had learned "extraordinary lessons in California," including implementing "ideas that might seem radical" like Oakland'southward African America Male Achievement Academy.  "We can actually effigy out means to increase equity for kids that seem least likely to succeed," he said.

To get more reports similar this i, click here to sign up for EdSource's no-cost daily e-mail on latest developments in education.

kindredharroverty.blogspot.com

Source: https://edsource.org/2015/ex-oakland-supe-to-head-illinois-schools-amid-chicago-controversy/78512