LOCAL & STATE
John Neal
Photo. Adobe Images
Tulsa Public Schools Superintendent Ebony Johnson is pulling out all the stops to improve the academic achievement scores of Tulsa students in the state testing that is scheduled to take place in April. In February, the Oklahoma State Board of Education formally adopted new rules setting minimum standards for student test performance. The board’s apparent objective is to sanction the TPS school district if it fails.
Johnson told both OSBE and Tulsa Public Schools Board of Education in late February and March meetings that based on internal testing measures student test scores have been “mostly flat” over the last few months. Her current forecast is that at least 700 Tulsa students must improve their scores to “Basic or above” in English Language Arts (reading) tests to comply with State “board orders” issued in November.
Following OSBE’s meeting last month, Superintendent Johnson said TPS was “not there yet,” and she could not give the local district board additional encouragement on student progress. She reported that internal testing of economically disadvantaged students in grades 3-5, from fall to winter, had increased less than a percentage point and fell well short of expectations.
“I’m just going to call that out and say that gave us pause,” Johnson told the TPS board, referring to the state-mandated testing goals.
At a TPS Board meeting on March 4, 2024, Johnson requested spending an additional $1.5 million “to ensure TPS is receiving every available resource as it prepares for state testing in the spring.” The board approved the request. The funding will allow the deployment of up to 125 “advanced” certified teachers with premium overtime pay to instruct or help others teach English Language Arts. Fifty percent of students in grades 3 through 8 and 11 must test basic or above in the Oklahoma State Testing Program (OSTP) beginning Apil 15, or TPS will receive an “academic deficiency” under the new state rule.
In separate interviews with The Oklahoma Eagle, David Blatt, director of Research and Strategic Impact for Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice, and Darryl Bright, founder of Citizens United for a Better Education System (CUBES), said they consider the rule flawed and the Oklahoma state board’s expectations unreasonable. In their view, Tulsa Public Schools faces impossible odds to avoid further disciplinary action, including the possibility of state takeover of the local school district.
TPS efforts
And yet, TPS Superintendent Johnson has deployed a wide array of programs and efforts to meet student testing mandates and other requirements imposed uniquely on Tulsa schools in November. Johnson recently told the local board that the district is focusing on the grades that will be tested in April and that “the work has never been more urgent.”
Here are a few of the efforts Johnson has launched:
- Changes in district and school administrative staff, and movement of teachers and district office professionals to poor-performing schools.
- Special student and teacher digital training modules, augmented with high dosage tutoring programs for students and Science of Learning training for teachers and administrators.
- Realigning district goals and testing to match State Board mandates better.
- Development of Individual Achievement Plans for students.
- Professional Learning Academy for teachers.
- Family outreach programs.
Among the obstacles TPS faces are the following:
- Chronic student absenteeism exceeds 40 percent of all students.
- Large numbers and continued influx of English language learners.
- Teachers with emergency certificates, novice teachers, and teachers with absences.
- Enrollment of newcomers, 80-100 a week, who typically test poorly.
- A high percentage of economically disadvantaged whose conditions of poverty are highly correlated with poor academic achievement.
Blatt told the Oklahoma State Department of Education (OSDE) and The Oklahoma Eagle that basing accreditation standards on student assessment data “is myopic, harmful and misguided.” He formally challenged the new rule in person and in written commentary in February on behalf of the Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice. The Oklahoma Eagle conducted its interview with Blatt on March 7.
In his testimony, Blatt asserted the success of a school cannot be measured on reliance on any single type of indicator. Even the state grade card uses multiple measurements. Blatt also told The Oklahoma Eagle the rule was “not rooted” in any science-based information but rather a “round number they [OSDE] think people will swallow.” He added, “Ryan Walters is pushing us back into a trap that distorts the education system.”
An Oklahoma Appleseed analysis found 62 Oklahoma school districts that would be subject to academic deficiencies based on 2023 student test scores. The average low-performing district had 78% of its students being economically disadvantaged. These districts included TPS, which has a nearly identical number of low-income, poverty-level students.
Blatt contends Walters’ threats to “shake up the status quo” with district penalties will not help struggling schools succeed. Instead, as Blatt told The Oklahoma Eagle, “State education leaders should focus on supporting districts and act to make serious investments in education.”
Darryl Bright, education advocate
North Tulsa’s Darryl Bright had a similar perspective. “Ryan Walters is no clown. He knows exactly what he is doing.”
As founder of CUBES, Bright has chronicled Tulsa Public School’s education system for over three decades. He and fellow CUBES members developed a 300-page tract setting forth reforms for TPS based on the “African-American Child’s Academic Experience.”
Bright lauds Superintendent Johnson for her efforts, particularly after Walters said following Johnson’s first presentation to the State Board, “TPS’s efforts had not been good enough.” He sees Walters’ effort as part of a broader right-wing idealogue attack on public education. Bright cites motives to get rid of the “woke” culture, dismantle Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs, and move the racist PragerU curriculum to the mainstream.
More specifically, Bright criticizes standards imposed on TPS to accomplish in “three to four months, which require three to four years.” Bright believes Walters’ “undemocratic” goals include ultimately taking over the Tulsa local school district, similar to what happened in Houston. He cites Walters’ and the State Board’s need for more resolve to tackle the state’s poor ratings.
In conclusion, he said: “What is he (Walters) doing to address these? Where have they been? They have no vision.”
