Four years after Houston ISD pulled the plug on a controversial campus improvement program that replaced dozens of principals and teachers, new Superintendent Richard Carranza announced his own turnaround plan that targets 32 schools across Houston.

The $24 million "Achieve 180" turnaround plan is centered on strengthening six main pillars: school leadership, teaching, instruction, school design, social and emotional supports for students and relationships with families and communities.

Many of the ideas have been staples of Carranza's speeches since arriving in Houston in September and were part of the turnaround Carranza oversaw as superintendent of the San Francisco Unified School District.

"I know this can work, and I think that it's different from perhaps what was done in the past," Carranza said. "Research shows this kind of an approach has been successful in other urban districts."

Robin Lake, director of the Center on Reinventing Public Education at the University of Washington, said it's rare for successful turnaround programs to target so many schools at once and to be forced by the district, rather than the actual campus.

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"Nationally, what we're seeing in more and more districts is that the school really has to own the solution and buy into it and have plans that are really customized to that school," Lake said. "If this is a one-size-fits-all solution for all the schools, I would have my doubts about whether it'll be successful."

Many of the changes in Houston - such as curriculum, intervention programs, professional development and incentives - will be formulated by the district's central office.

Carranza's precedent

When Carranza served as deputy superintendent for instruction and ultimately as superintendent in San Francisco, the district received a $45 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education to improve its 10 most struggling schools. While research showed that many of the districts awarded the grants showed little improvement, San Francisco was an exception. A University of Washington study found a narrowing of the gap between the performance of the 10 schools and the rest of the district and an increase in student achievement in math and English.

Carranza hopes to implement similar ideas on a larger scale in Houston.

San Francisco model

Each of the schools in Achieve 180 is saddled with "improvement-required" status by the state based on low scores on the State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness. The schools face take over by a state conservator and could eventually be shut down if they don't improve.

Among the backbones of San Francisco's plan were increasing support for teachers as well as getting - and keeping - some of the district's best teachers in the 10 high-needs schools.

HISD plans to increase professional development and teacher training at the 32 schools, as well as lengthen work days. Stipends will be paid for teachers' extra time.

Part of each day will be dedicated to teacher collaboration, and instructional coaches will sit in on classes to offer pointers to teachers trying to get students up to grade level.

Lake said attracting and keeping the best teachers at such low-performing schools is a surefire path to improvement, but says additional money may not do the trick.

"They want the opportunity to create their dream school that will take kids who would otherwise be in low-paying jobs or drop-out and get those kids to college so they can become entrepreneurs and leaders of the future," Lake said. "Usually, real autonomy and real trust in their ability to solve problems is what they're after. And being told by the central office every thing they're supposed to do probably won't attract many of them."

Carranza said improving students' reading and writing abilities will help them in other subjects, including social studies, science and math. To that end, Houston ISD will continue to create and implement districtwide programs, such as the Literacy by 3 and Literacy in the Middle, he said.

Assessments aimed at tracking student progress will be standardized to better analyze changes, but Carranza said that will not lead to additional tests.

One of the biggest shifts will be Achieve 180's focus on hiring and funding more nurses and social workers, as well as partnering with community agencies to provide services to struggling families. It's part of trend in education to focus on students' emotional and social wellbeing, rather than just academics.

The idea is that students cannot learn well if they're hungry, suffering from medical issues or exposed to domestic violence. Carranza said such "wrap-around services" will allow students to focus on academics by helping improve their families' circumstances.

Zeph Capo, president of the Houston Teachers Federation, said educators have long asked for more community resources and staff to help students with out-of-school struggles. He's also in favor of the district taking a more centralized approach with curriculum and other changes, but hopes HISD staff meets with teachers and leaders at the 32 schools to avoid implementation issues.

"Basically every time a superintendent turns over, everything gets thrown out and we start over with something new," Capo said. "Now imagine that in a district 300 times over every time a principal leaves. That's exactly what we've been dealing with - unintended consequences of being decentralized. But there are absolutely ways to have more centralized decisions and have more feedback so it's not so top-to-bottom."

Clear procedures about the extended work day and daily collaboration sessions will also be necessary to ensure a decent rollout, Capo said, as well as taking time to make decisions that fit each campus rather than rushing to implement a cure-all.

Drastic measures

The last school improvement plan implemented by HISD, the Apollo 20 program, was considered a moonshot to improve long-struggling schools when it was unveiled but proved controversial. Of the 20 schools targeted by intervention, 19 saw principals replaced and all targeted schools fired some teachers deemed "ineffective" by the district.

Among the old plan's hallmarks were daily math tutoring for all sixth- and ninth-graders and an extra math or reading class for students below grade level. It also lengthened the school year at selected campuses by five days and extended the school day by one hour.

A new plan

The Apollo program cost about $20 million a year, or $60 million over its three-year lifespan. Most of that funding came from federal and state grants and about $18 million in the form of private donations over the years, but some complained that it funneled too much money into too few schools.

Ultimately, the program's results were a mixed bag. While some campuses shook their "improvement required" label, others did not. Math scores improved during the program's tenure and dipped when it came to an end, but reading scores remained consistently low.

Carranza said his plan is "180 degrees different" than Apollo 20 and insisted that staff will not be removed wholesale.

"We'll have one-on-one conversations with each principal, saying, 'This is what it will take to implement a turnaround in your school, are you up for it?' If they say 'No, I don't have time' - no harm, no foul," Carranza said. "Same with teachers."

But some of the broader goals of Achieve 180 and Apollo 20 overlap, including improving principal and teacher performance, using data to drive decision-making and creating a culture of high expectations.

Capo worried about what would happen if the district hires a large number of new principals after two or three years of subpar hiring practices.

"I don't see a need to do extensive turnover for sake getting someone new," Capo said. "Clearly at the principal level, they need to provide necessary supports to make sure they're able to reach staff, parents and students. If the principal can't do that, yeah, maybe they should go elsewhere, but I really hope the district errs on bringing some stability back to the schools."

Carranza said he understands the concerns. He said Apollo was much more experimental and leaned perhaps too heavily on Harvard University researchers and consultants, out-of-towners unfamiliar with some of Houston's unique struggles.

"What you're going to see that you maybe did not see in Apollo 20 is high-quality professional development for teachers, coaching coming in not to necessarily intervene with students but to provide supports for teachers, implementing grade-level curriculum, creating essential support positions that aren't something schools will have to budget," Carranza said. "This is a grounded approach."

Herculean efforts

Many of the changes proposed in Achieve 180, including staffing, curriculum implementation and working to better engage families, do not require HISD board approval. But the board must approve the $24 million funding allocation, which will pay for new positions, staffing incentives, teacher coaching, data tracking and other expenses.

Carranza and district staff will update its Achieve 180 budget recommendation to the board on Thursday, and a vote could come in late May or early June.

"These are our most historically underserved schools," Carranza said. "We need to ask: How are we as a system going to help them improve? Not demonize, not replace, but how to we figure out what changes we need to make?"

It often takes years and Herculean efforts to see concrete improvements bloom from such turnaround plans, but Carranza is confident that mimicking his successes in San Francisco will lead to promising results in Houston.

"Overall, turnaround is one of the hardest things for school districts to do," Lake said. "If you look at the results of national school improvement grants, it's been pretty disappointing with some exceptions, including (Carranza's past efforts in) San Francisco."