Rescuing Detroit's public schools Robert Bobb

1-12-10 Time Magazine p48 Cleanup Artist
http://time.com/detroit_kids

• To cleanup the Detroit school system's financial crisis due to widespread corruption
• Saging enrollments due to emerging charter school and exodus to the subu
• Budget deficit,and erosion of revenuesBobb's self perception of mission-to improve miserable academic performance of the system.Detroit's graduation rate is 58%.
• abandonment of Detroit's schools. Tax base nearly gone.Poverty and unemployment pervasive.


• Bobb arrived last spring and found the following: the district could not afford new books.The district met payroll by borrowing money. Bobb had a reputation of restoring fiscal sanity to city governments and school districts.
• Denial of budget deficits though Bobb showed a deficit of 303 million. Closed 29 of the district's 194 schools and trimmed payroll of 14000 to 13000.Hired outside firms to restructure 17 schools
• Bobb's unconventional war- 1.born New Orleans and grew up on a sugarcane plantation 2.During summers he worked in the sulphur pits,3.to cover tuition to Grambling State University,he buffed floors,4. had a series of city management jobs mentioned in next bulleted post.,,,
• Kalamazoo MI Oakland CA Wash DC's mayor hired him as City Manager and deputy mayor managing a 48 billion dollar budget (annual) and 20000 employees.Three years later President of DC's board of education,


• Why save Detroit's public schools? .."I wanted to go to an urban school district,the roughest and the toughest.Why? Because I understand the dynamics ,the grit,the opportunities,that are prevalent in urban America.
• Cost shaving -High school classrooms look like lecture halls - Clashes of student from rival schools likely.Neighborhoods suddenly thrown under same roof137 guidance counselors cut and hired back. Cuts: "Is this good for the kids?" Barbara Byrd Bennett former CEO of Cleveland public schools.
• Broad academic reforms. 1. system wide standards for prerequisite classes; extension of school day; shuffling of principals; percentage of 4th and 8th graders who perform at grade level in math and reading, wants significant gains in achievement and numbers;
• By 2015 he wants 90% of all students to complete at least one Advanced Placement course before graduating. "Ambitious goals,he admits." Politics may hinder the attainment of these goals. The elected board states he is overstepping his financial portfolio.He must relinquish academic control to the acting superintendent. Ambitious project to build or renovate 18 schools approved by the voters last November. "We cannot be afraid to win or fail". "Change is painful."