Radical (17 page)

“No way I can agree to that,” I said. “None.”

An hour into the negotiating session, Weingarten announced that she had to leave to give a speech. All of us were shocked, including Schmoke. After she left, I spoke my mind to the dean.

“The bottom line is we don't need this contract to move forward,” I said. “I can evaluate teachers under the new process that we just established to get poor teachers out. When our budgets are cut, we also have the ability to lay teachers off based on quality instead of seniority. Agreeing on a contract would be great, but I have these authorities, regardless.

“However, we don't want to enact these evaluation systems without an upside for effective teachers, too. That's of critical importance. We want to give them bonuses and recognize them for the amazing work they're doing!”

Kurt Schmoke listened. I wasn't sure what he was thinking.

T
HE
2008–2009
SCHOOL YEAR
showed more measurable improvements.

Scores rose again in reading and math, though the increases were not as dramatic as those of the previous year. Still, D.C. was no longer the worst-performing urban school district in the nation. That's a low bar, but we had to come up from the bottom. In our first two years D.C. was the only major city school district to show double-digit growth in both math and reading at the secondary level.

We also started to get a vote of confidence from students and parents. The number of students in D.C. schools had been dropping since 1969. We stabilized enrollments after one year and in 2010, my third year, we reversed a forty-one-year decrease in enrollment and finally grew our student population.

Why?

We could trace the rise in scores and enrollment to specific initiatives. Our D.C. Collaborative paired principals from successful schools with schools that had been struggling. The cross-pollination allowed them to share talent, instructional methods, and professional development. The best example was Scott Cartland. He had been a great success at Janney Elementary in a wealthy, white community, but he requested a transfer to Webb/Wheatley, a low-performing elementary across town in the troubled Trinidad neighborhood. In one year he had changed the school's teaching and culture.

When I had taught in Harlem Park I used data to track every student. By my second year as chancellor we had started to put in place a similar system to measure every student's progress. If a student was not operating at grade level, what intervention must we put in place? What math intervention? What on reading? And if a student was not performing at grade level, he had to stay after school for what we called an “academic power hour.”

For the first time in D.C., we opened schools on the weekends and offered Saturday Academies.

We aggressively added seats for three-year-olds. We increased enrollment at prekindergarten and brought families into the system early. We actively worked to keep students and families in the school system as they entered middle and high school. Parents who might have enrolled their children in private schools or moved out of the city were staying in the public schools.

None of these positive changes came by accident.

K
URT
S
CHMOKE WAS A
patient man, but he was becoming impatient with the lack of progress in our contract talks. He could see that Weingarten and I did not work well together. Through the spring, it looked as though we might have to declare an impasse.

So he put us in separate rooms and started holding marathon sessions where he would shuttle back and forth instead of having us battle it out across the table. It turned out to be a more effective strategy, though it was frustrating to us. Jason; Kaya; our general counsel, Jim Sandman; and I would spend hours in the room together often just waiting. We were clear about what we were willing to give on and what we weren't. We'd rather walk away than sign a contract that we felt compromised children. So we often sat, and sat, and sat. . . .

The long hours took their toll. Often both sides were so frustrated that it led to heated discussions. One in particular was when Randi was arguing about a point, noting that teachers would never go for it.

“I disagree,” said Jason. “I think there is a big disconnect between what teachers think on this issue and what the union leadership believes.”

“What do
you
know, Jason?” Weingarten said, dragging out
Jaayyson
in her most dismissive tone. “Teachers are union, and union is teachers. There is no difference.” As she said it, she was clearly questioning Jason's ability to comment on the subject. Never mind that Jason had not only taught successfully for a decade, but that as the National Teacher of the Year, he spent an entire year engaged in conversations with teachers. He certainly had a right to express his thoughts and was a credible voice in the debate, but not to Randi. To her, he was a nuisance.

On June 10, 2009, we met in the AFT offices at five thirty in the afternoon. Schmoke put us in different rooms and refused to let us out until we had made progress, even if it meant staying up all night. He ran back and forth. After midnight the union gave up ground on mutual consent. Both sides agreed that principals could choose to accept or reject teachers who had lost their positions. The union held fast on seniority but showed signs of compromise. We took a break.

At 2 a.m., we came back together and started talking dollars and cents.

“We want across-the-board raises of twenty-four percent,” Weingarten said.

“Are you on crack?” I asked.

Weingarten stormed out.

“I'm done negotiating,” I said.

George Parker begged me to stay. Schmoke separated us. They came down to 22 percent; I stayed firm at 20. We decided to call it a night.

Parker called the next day at noon and agreed to an across-the-board pay increase of 20 percent, but we left open the question of the performance pay system. Could we reward the best teachers? Weingarten seemed unalterably opposed. We still couldn't close the deal.

A few weeks later I met Weingarten for a drink at Bistro Bis, a fine-dining restaurant down the street from her office. The union had gone back on some of the agreements I thought we had reached. I wasn't seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.

“Let's call it a day,” I said. “No one can say we didn't try hard. We both did our part. We just couldn't pull it off. Let's accept that we've reached a point where it's clearly not working.”

I felt like I was breaking up with her. She said we were close and spent an hour trying to convince me to attend one more meeting.

“I'm sure we can get there,” she said.

“I'm done,” I said. “Really done. I am ready to call an impasse.”

She asked for a couple of days before I announced anything.

At noon the next day Kurt Schmoke phoned to say the union was willing to agree to the terms I thought we had worked out during our marathon session.

“Fine,” I said. “What about performance pay? I'm not doing it unless there's an upside for great teachers.”

“I'm working on it,” he said. “But I think we can make it happen.”

E
ARLIER IN THE SPRING
of 2009, during one of our marathon negotiating sessions, Schmoke had come up with an idea that I thought was a stroke of genius.

“I actually think we can come to resolution on everything else,” he said to both sides at the time. “Having listened to you all for a long time now, I think the major issue is individual performance pay. The problem is that this is a nonstarter for Randi, but Michelle has to have it in the contract. It's a nonnegotiable for her. So here's what I think . . .”

We were all waiting with bated breath.

“We aren't going to come to agreement on this, so my proposal is that we not continue trying,” he said.

As I was about to jump up, he gave me the look.

“I think we can give you both what you need, though,” he said. I paused, intrigued. He pulled out his pad, where he had written some very carefully crafted language.

“I propose we insert the following language: ‘DCPS will implement an individual pay-for-performance program, the details to be shared upon implementation. The union will neither endorse nor block the initiative.' ”

It was brilliant. I could implement pay for performance, but because it wasn't going to be defined specifically in the contract, the union was free to rebuke it, since it had not actually agreed to it. No one said a word, but we all knew it would work.

I
WAS ELATED AS
I headed to California for a long weekend getaway. It seemed as if the end was in sight. I was going to meet Kevin Johnson, my longtime friend and adviser who was becoming much more important to me. When I had to resign from his charter school board in 2007 to take the chancellor job, he came out to testify on my behalf at the city council nomination hearings. In 2008 he decided to run for mayor of Sacramento and asked if I could help him craft his education platform. I worked closely with him. During the campaign our relationship changed from the politics of education to the intricacies of romance.

KMJ and I were driving to Santa Barbara from Los Angeles.

“What's going on? You are excited, I can tell. Spill it!” he said.

Over the course of the drive and a stop at In-N-Out Burger, I laid out where we were and what Schmoke had done.

“That brother is the real deal,” he said. “Seriously. Brilliant.”

After I finished telling him the story he conceded, “Dang, baby. I think we might actually pull this thing off! We're close! I can feel it. It's going to happen.”

A
N UNEXPECTED AND UNSETTLING
chain of events was about to drive the negotiations either off the rails or toward the final destination.

The Great Recession had depressed revenue in governments across the country, compressed budgets, and forced the firings of teachers from San Francisco to Philadelphia. Washington, D.C., was relatively immune thanks to the federal government as the city's engine of revenue. But D.C.'s 2010 budget was coming up short, and I was forced to cut $43.9 million from the schools.

Cutting budgets is never easy, but in education, where a disproportionately large percentage of expenditures is in personnel, it often means cutting jobs. We would have to balance the budget by cutting teachers. Never a good thing, never easy.

For decades D.C. had followed the path taken by most districts, which was to lay off teachers based on seniority. What few people knew was that we actually had the authority to make the decisions based on quality rather than years in the classroom. I suppose most previous administrations had resisted using this discretion because it would anger the unions. But my priority wasn't to keep the adults happy. I wanted to minimize the impact the cuts had on students. The way to do that was by shedding ineffective teachers when possible. Some schools had just reorganized with a brand-new faculty. In those schools, new, unproven teachers might have to be let go. But in other cases, principals were able to lay off low performers and keep less senior but more effective teachers. There was no doubt that it was the right move if we were focused on kids.

In order to ensure that the process was not arbitrary, we created guidelines that required principals to show evidence of teacher effectiveness to accompany their layoff recommendations. Among the teachers that would be fired were some who had used corporal punishment, had had sexual relations with a student, or had missed seventy-eight or more days of school.

My staff reviewed each recommendation and then approved the final list of 266 teachers to be cut. Seniority would not be the deciding factor.

No more LIFO: last in, first out.

We briefed Mayor Fenty at a senior staff meeting. Fenty's reelection was a year away. His staff members worried that we would get slaughtered in the media, and Fenty would suffer.

“I am okay if you want to rethink this,” I told Fenty.

“Are we laying off the people who are adding the least to the classroom?” he asked. “If that's the case, it's the right thing to do.”

Some voiced concerns about the political repercussions.

“We haven't made any decisions based on politics yet,” he said. “The minute we start doing that, it's a slippery slope. We can't go back.”

With the mayor's blessing, we proceeded with the layoffs. Notices went out on October 2. Except for an unfortunate incident at McKinley High, where police had to escort some teachers out, the layoffs went smoothly.

The reaction was not as placid.

A week later the unions rallied on Freedom Plaza, a broad expanse across Pennsylvania Avenue from the Wilson Building. They came in force from across the city and the country. They set up port-a-potties and rented a stage with lights. My favorite sign: “This is not Rheezistan.” Another read: “Sweep Her Out.”

Richard Trumka, who had just been elected president of the AFL-CIO, accused me of union-busting and said to the crowd: “The labor movement is right here with you. We'll stand shoulder to shoulder with you for as long as it takes.”

Randi Weingarten took the microphone to say, “We are not getting any real, valid, truthful information from DCPS.”

That was not quite true. We had briefed union leadership.

The day before the rally, the union had taken the city to court to enjoin it from executing the layoffs. The union argued that the layoffs were a deliberate effort to get rid of veteran teachers, since we had hired more than nine hundred new teachers over the summer—before we learned of the budget cuts. The lawyers argued their cases in early November. We prevailed when we showed the data that undeniably proved that we'd laid off teachers of different years of experience, race, and age. The differentiating factor was their effectiveness compared with the others at their school.

On Tuesday, November 24, Superior Court judge Judith Bartnoff denied the union's claims. We received the decision at 10:45 a.m. I knew Kurt Schmoke was meeting with union negotiators at noon. We let him know about the decision.