Turning Around Schools in North Carolina via “Scaffolded Craftsmanship”

• In Event: School-Wide Improvement

Abstract

From 2010 through 2014, a portion of North Carolina’s $400 million Race to the Top grant is enabling the state’s Department of Public Instruction (NCDPI) to intervene in an effort to improve performance in the lowest-achieving five percent of schools–some 118 elementary, middle, and high schools. When intervention by NCDPI and other partners was matched by energetic school leadership and district support, teachers took responsibility for student learning, overcame the challenges, and raised student performance, sometimes to striking degrees. To learn how change took place in the schools that did improve and what frustrated change in those that continued to perform poorly, we selected 12 high schools, 9 middle schools, and 9 elementary schools to study in depth.

Authors

• Kathleen M. Brown, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill

• Charles L. Thompson, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill

• LaTricia Walker Townsend, North Carolina State University