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Part I: Building an Alliance EIGHT YEARS AGO, MANY SCHOOLS IN TEXAS LIKE THIS ONE WERE
PLAUGED BY GANGS, TRUANCY, AND POOR ACADEMIC RESULTS. TEACHERS WERE READY TO TRY SOMETHING NEW.ENTER ERNIE CORTES, A COMMUNITY ORGANIZER WHO WAS ALSO DISTURBED BY SEEING KIDS TURNED OFF AT SCHOOL. CORTES: What happened -- what was happening before is kids would enter schools with all kinds of energy, all kinds of curiosity, all kinds of hope for the future and by the time we finished with them, they
were -- they were dull, they were uninteresting, okay, they were disconnected, they were distracted. TO TAP THAT STUDENT POTENTIAL CORTES FORMED AN ALLIANCE SCHOOLS INITIATIVE TO
SHAKE UP PUBLIC SCHOOLS IN WORKING CLASS DISTRICTS.THE CORTES STRATEGY IS TO WORK WITH CHURCHES AND COMMUNITY ACTIVISTS TO BREAK DOWN OLD HIERARCHIES . TO EXCITE AND EMPOWER TEACHERS...AND TO RECONNECT SCHOOLS TO
THEIR COMMUNITIES. I SPOKE WITH ERNIE CORTES OUTSIDE OF ALAMO MIDDLE SCHOOL IN THE RIO GRANDE VALLEY OF TEXAS. SMITH: Tell me about your movement, how big is it, how many
schools?CORTES: There are approximately 129 alliance schools in Texas. There's a number of schools in Arizona and New Mexico that are also in the process of developing this kind of initiative. So it's hard to -- for
me to quantify the exact numbers. The average school is in and around 500 kids. So you'd have to do the arithmetic for me to figure out exact numbers. It's involved in cities like El Paso, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston,
Rio Grande Valley, which we're here. We're beginning those initiatives in -- in places like Lubbock, Midland, Odessa, Tyler, East Texas, Phoenix, Tucson, Albuquerque.
SMITH: What does it mean to be an alliance school? CORTES: Well, three things.One is to create a powerful constituency which is -- which understands educational reform and
supports public education and is really committed to making public schools work effectively for 21st Century economy in the world. Two, to change the culture of schools from one which is bureaucratic, hierarchical, to
one which is much more collaborative -- relational -- move from a model of -- of training kids to be factory workers to one where you develop kids to learn at high levels, develop their cognitive skills or capacity
through -- to learn from each other, to create new knowledge. Three, to integrate the culture of the school with that of the community. To create civil, culture, social -- what people like Robert Putnam call social
capital -- by getting institutions, congregations, settlement houses, housing, housing associations connected to local schools, to recreate that kind of civic capacity which was so important to public education, to the
concept of the common schools. SMITH: You're talking about lifting a whole cut of American society, what are the stakes for them?
CORTES: Well, for the kids everything.The critical question is are the kids that we care about, the kids that we are right now committed to -- to really working with and advocating for -- are they going to be able to
not only survive, but be able to do well and make their contribution to a 21st Century economy. Education is -- is everything for this kind of post industrial, post information kind of technology that we're moving
into -- an economy that we're moving into, an economy which is now based upon based upon manufact -- which is moving from manufacturing to one which is service and information technology, which requires higher order
thinking skills. Unfortunately, a lot of schools in Texas are still -- and then -- in the Southwest -- are still focussed on producing kids for a factory based economy, where kids don't really have to have these kind
of creative abilities. We think it's real important now that we show that all kids can be taught the same way we used to teach gifted and talented kids. And that's -- for us, it's whether or not kids are able to
really make a contribution and enjoy the -- you know, the potential prosperity of a 21st Century economy. Well, to be sure, our focus has been on schools, which have been, you know, at the bottom. Zavala was the worst
performing elementary school in Austin, Texas. Roosevelt high school was the worst performing high school in Dallas, Texas. It was going to be shut down, because it was considered by the Commissioner of Education a
prison, not a high school. There's no question in Houston and other places like that, that these are schools which have been very low performing, which everybody said, you know, these kids just can't learn at high
levels. These kids are going to be -- are going to be relegated to -- to you know -- hewers of water and choppers of wood. These kids are going to be the bottom -- bottom 40 percent of the labor force. Now, we've
demonstrated that these kids can learn at high levels. We've demonstrated that they can -- they can be effective. But not only the -- the kids can be effective but the schools can be effective, the institutions can be
effective. SMITH: You've gotten a lot of support from the state. How important is that? CORTES: Well, we've got a number of significant
things from the state of Texas. I'd be -- I’d be less than candid if I told you we've got everything I think we ought to have from the state of Texas and, so that's why I paused a bit before. And I'm going to choose my
words carefully here.The Commissioner of Education, Commissioner Moses, is very supportive of the alliance schools -- has spoken eloquently to the Appropriations Committee of both the House and the Senate about the
effectiveness of this program. He's been supportive of the waivers process which is deregulating the schools so -- to give teachers the power and the creativity and the space to be innovative and creative, to give
principals that kind of capacity. So, in terms of resources and in terms of -- of allowing the latitude, the state has been really helpful. But I -- the reason why I paused is because Texas does not do nearly enough
-- what it ought to be doing -- in terms of adequacy in support of public education. We support -- we put in around five thousand dollars per kid. I don't think that's going to do in a 21st Century economy. I think it
needs to be more like nine - ten thousand dollars per child, at least, if we're going to compete with states like Massachusetts, much less France and Germany and -- and some of the countries in -- in the European
economic community or Japan, et cetera. We're going to have to spend a lot more time in -- in raising teachers salaries -- energy in raising teachers salaries we’re going to have to think harder about giving teachers
the capacity and the latitude to learn from each other, to do in-service training, to teach differently. Notwithstanding that, you know, given the parameters of where we are in Texas and given the kind of state that
we are and historically the lack of support for public education that we've seen, I think we're getting a significant support and backing and recognition from the State of Texas.
SMITH: You get waivers from the state. Why is a waiver important? CORTES: Well, because there was an approach to public education in Texas which was to micro-manage the school
and the classroom. I mean, some people had this notion of, you know, we want to make Texas kind of like France, okay, where the Commissioner of Education could -- could know on October the 15th what was being taught in
every single classroom at ten o'clock in the -- in the morning and what was being taught -- and how it was being taught, what method, what approach, okay.And he could go -- and there was that kind of uniformity. I
don't think that works. I think that you have to -- teachers are professionals, the best teachers are the professionals, they're committed to kids. They need to be -- and the kids are different. They -- kids learn in
different ways and I'm committed to that notion that kids learn in different ways. So, therefore, teachers have got to have the space to be creative, to be energetic, to try different approaches, you know, to try
different ways of learning and -- and different approaches to teaching for different kids. And, so, the waivers give teachers that kind of latitude, that kind of capacity to experiment, to try things out.
SMITH: What does that mean to a school? CORTES: Well, in Zavala, for example, we've been able to do things like field trips, do things like bring
in speakers, do things like tutoring programs. Here in -- in the Rio Grande Valley schools like Sam Houston elementary have been able to do tutoring classes for kids.And, so the kids can learn -- so that we recognize
-- you know, there's a standard that we have to re -- achieve out there. We recognize that not every kid's going to learn as fast as you or I might learn. Or learn the same way that you or I might learn or I might learn
-- I might learn it more thoroughly, okay, than you do.. will, but I'm going to learn it slower. And we give teachers that kind of latitude, so as long as we adhere to the standard, okay, as long as we -- standard of
excellence -- that kids gotta adhere -- we give them all kinds of latitude in terms of how they do it, the approaches -- they do it -- whether it's field trips, whether it's, you know, you know, connecting mathematical
understanding to things like chess, okay, whether it's connecting cooking -- uh -- to measurements -- things like cooking -- whether it's connecting geometry to things like sewing. Let the teacher make those kind of
decisions. Give her that kind of capacity. That's what we've been doing with alliance schools. Part II: Raising Expectations SMITH: You're really a bear on high academic standards, why? CORTES: I think you do a disservice to a kid when you tell them that when you don't challenge them, when
you don't hold them accountable to standards of excellence. I'm not for norm reference testing, which a bugaboo for public educators, okay. But I am -- I am really committed to kids learning at high levels.And I
think it's important for kids to learn -- I want my child to learn not just to read, but to understand, okay, I want my my child to understand the classics. I want my child to understand his own history and his own
identity, but I want him also to understand Shakespeare and James Joyce as well, you know, Octavio Paz, as well as, you know, Carlos Fuentes, et cetera. And, so, I think that it's important for kids at Alamo, okay, to
be able to read and understand to be able to communicate with kids from Boston, Massachusetts, and from Paris, France, and I think they need to have that kind of in depth understanding of mathematics, of literature, of
history. Because that's going to be rec -- necessary for them to be able to be effective citizens in a 21st Century world, okay. I think it's important for them to know their local situation, their local history,
their local geography. But that does not -- that does not diminish the need for them to have these high order thinking skills, this capacity to do logic, to understand. And we're seeing that happen here at Alamo, in
Pharr, we're seeing that happen in Sam Houston, in McAllen. We're seeing kids being held accountable to standards. At the same time, they're beginning to learn ways which are enjoyable and fun, because teachers are
thinking hard about what -- what's in the best interest of those particular children. SMITH: What you're really talking about is raising expectations? CORTES: Yeah, I guess that's really the more -- more comfortable language for me, if you will. We think there are three sets of expectations -- are real important.The expectations of -- of the parents, the
expectations of the teachers and the expectations of the kids -- but also the expectations of the larger community. I mean, we have -- we -- we are about the business of challenging McAllen, Pharr, San Juan, Alamo, to
think differently about what kids ought to learn We are about the business of -- of challenging how they think they ought to learn, okay.
SMITH: Do we set our expectations too low? CORTES: Way too low. I mean -- SMITH: Are you suggesting that at least philosophically every
kid can be on a fast track and by setting standards and expectations too low, we've diminished their chances? CORTES: I think we underestimate the -- the capacity of kids --
okay, to understand difficult material, what we consider difficult material, conceptual ideas -- ideas, big ideas.Alfred North Whitehead in his Essay on the Age of Education, used to say we ought to teach difficult
subjects early. We ought to be teaching kids, you know, German and Russian and Latin and -- and Greek and Algebra at an early age. I know from my own son's experience that he learned in elementary school -- because he
went to a Montessori school, okay, he learned algebra, okay. And because of that grounding in algebra, he's now doing well in high school. Well, I'm crazy enough to think that would be good for kids at Alamo and kids
here in Canales and kids in -- in Sam Houston -- if they could understand Irish literature and understand when they read James -- learn about Joyce or when they learn about Faulkner, about the South, but they're also
learning about themselves. That they don't have to just read a Mexican to understand Mexican history and culture. That there are -- that there are universals. And that you don't have to, you know, teach some sort of
kind of -- kind of -- package edition of, you know, chicano literature to understand what it means to be a Chicano, that you could read the Iliad and understand what it means to be a Mexican, okay. SMITH: Why is the connection between schools and parents so important? CORTES: We make a big effort to teach parents how to think differently about what their kids
ought to understand, whether it's in El Paso, Texas, in a colonia -- El Paso -- or colonial -- colonia in McAllen or a city in Brownsville.We want parents to think differently about what their kids need to
understand. Their kids need to understand the scientific method, that their kids need to understand measurement and proportion. And that the only way that their kids are really going to understand them -- if they
understand some of these ideas, because they've got to be able to have conversations with teachers about some of these notions. So, we spent a lot of time trying to teach parents how to think about what a good school
is, what kids ought to be taught, how they should be taught and what role that they have to play in making sure that kids learn whether it's Shakespeare, whether it's American history, whether it's calc -- whatever it
is. SMITH: So, what is it that you want to get across to parents about their schools? CORTES: We want to teach parents to understand as
profoundly as we possibly can, indetail as we can -- that it's up to them to understand what their kids need to learn. They have to understand what good teaching is. They have to understand that their kids can learn in
all kinds of different ways.They have to understand the importance of measurement, of proportion. They have understand the importance of conceptual thinking. They have to understand geometry and algebra. At least
they have to have some rudimentary way of working with their kids and working with their kids' teachers. We have to develop their literacy, because if we don't develop a parental understanding, a parental capacity,
then they can't hold the schools accountable. They can’t generate the kind of appropriate expectations for their kids. And we've seen time after time that parents which -- everyone else kind of dismissed is illiterate
-- being able to ask hard and tough questions. Howard Gardner came down to a house meeting in one of our -- one of our projects and listened to the parents ask tough sophisticated questions about appraisal and felt
they were -- they were the kinds of questions that he wish he got in some graduate classes at Harvard. And that came after a lot of training and mentoring of parents. We think that if you can -- we know we've seen
parents begin to really be collaborators with teachers and principals in making schools excel and making schools develop a capacity to be really fine schools. We ask -- hard question of every school. How is what you
are doing going to help those kids go to Yale or to Harvard or to Brown or the University of Texas, that's the question I ask of my kids' teachers and principals and counsellors. How is what this -- how is this
program going to help my kid get into a school where they can really learn and really develop some in depth understanding of the classics, of history, of literature, of poetry, of themselves. How is it going to
develop their understanding of mathematics, of probability, of science and how -- not so that they can perform -- you know, so they can do multiple choice tests -- or not so they can perform on some objective test, but
so they can perform for the rest of their life, so they can learn for the rest of their life. Part III: Changing the Culture of Education
SMITH: Tick off the three or four things that are most important to change the culture of a school. CORTES: Well, you got to find somebody like --
like Rosie Ruiz, okay. Someone who -- a school principal, okay, who's collaborative, who's relational, who recognizes that she has or he has some things to learn, okay, that they need the parents, that they need the
community, that's important -- that they need the teachers.You've got to find a group of teachers who are interested, who are really committed to kids. Claudia SantoMaria or whomever, okay, -- in Alamo or Sam Houston
-- you got to find a -- a coterie of teachers that are willing to work with that principal. And then you got to find pastors like Bart Flap or Father Alphonso, who are willing to work so that you begin -- the
organizer then begins to create this team of principals and teachers and parents and community leaders. And those people then got to understand they got to be trained and constantly agitated and challenged to think of
themselves not as gate keepers, not as another board of directors, but see themselves as responsible to go out and organize -- and by organize we mean, identify, test out and train other leaders and parents and teachers.
So that we then begin to create a constituency of parents, teachers and community leaders who are willing to learn themselves and go to school -- on what a school is all about, but then create this powerful
constituency which is committed to school reform. That's the number one. Creating that -- we call that -- that team, that collective team, that collaborative team. Then you've got to be willing to mentor and guide and
teach think about issues of curriculum, how to think about issues of, you know, safety. How to think about a whole range -- to look strategically at what is a school all about, what is the mission of that school. What
is it's purpose, okay, and then look at the threats and the opportunities to that particular mission and purpose. SMITH: You’re talking about shaking up a whole system, a whole
power structure in schools. CORTES: We see all organizing as constant disorganizing and reorganizing. So, if you're going to change the culture of a school, you've got to, first
of all, break up the existing patterns, because they're locked into -- unfortunately, a lot of schools are locked into a dysfunctional culture.You got a lot of committed teachers, committed principals, parents who
deeply care, a school custodial help who care about kids. But the culture works against them, so you got to bust up those power relationships. You got to bust up that model of command and control, which may have
worked for a factory system, but doesn't work for the kind of schools we need for the 21st Century. You got to develop a different kind of collaborative relationship, you got to create what we call a community of
learners. That means people who are committed to a spirit of inquiry, a spirit of expectation, of experimentation, okay, and you're willing to kind of -- to -- to really experiment, trying new approaches, okay, to kids
-- to teaching and learning. SMITH: Where do these concepts like team teaching or block scheduling come from? CORTES: Our experience is
that team teaching, block scheduling, peer training, after school enrichment programs, all these things emerge out of this culture of conversation that we create between parents and teachers, between principals and
teachers.That's why we try to get them together systematically and regularly and ask over and over what are we learning about learning. What are we learning about what works in this -- in this particular experience.
What is the context, okay, so that people don't just try things inappropriately, so they -- so they try -- so that what they do fits the particular situation and so that we reflect and connect the experience of team
teaching, of block scheduling to other ideas about how kids learn and how -- what's a good way to teach. And, so, that we kind of develop further, okay, a deeper understanding of what the purpose of the school is so
that we can of create the kind of schools that are appropriate for the challenges that these kids are going to have to face. So that we don't impose a system which was developed for kids in a different environment, a
different situation on kids who live in the valley, in Brownsville, McAllen and et cetera. But we don't want them to ever think that this just about task and project, okay. We've got a -- in America -- Americans are
real pragmatic people. We get into tasks a lot, okay. And that's fine. We get into problem solving a lot and that's also fine. But when we get into task and problem solving, we forget about the larger questions. We
forget about asking the hard tough questions, what are we learning about learning. What are the developmentally appropriate stages a kid's got to go through, okay. What are some -- how do we need to think about the
kind of relationships we ought to have, what are the cultural questions we got to -- we don't -- we don't do the hard, tough reflection, okay, that we need to learn to -- because otherwise what tends to happen -- we
just get into project-itis and we just kind of -- and you get schools which are just loaded down with projects, but haven't really thought through very carefully what is the purpose of -- of that school.
You get schools which got all kinds of -- SMITH : How do you -- how do you keep the pot boiling? CORTES: Well, you have to have somebody
who's constantly stirring the water, kind of stirring the imagination, stirring the curiosity. Schools need the equivalent of a gadfly, they need an agitator, they need somebody who raises -- who does the work of that
agitator in that old fashioned washing machine, constantly stirs.Well, that's, frankly, what we do. That's what I try to teach and frankly what I'm trying to do is to get principals to think of themselves as -- not
to be compliance officers, but to see themselves as agitators -- of, of, of educational vision. To see themselves as people whose job it is to mentor and to stir the curiosity. Tiery Williams in his book Lincoln As
General said that Lincoln understood early on that the way to really learn about what's going on is to stay out of his office, to get into other peoples' office, to find out what's how they see the world, how they see
different situations. Show me a principal who stays out of his or her office ok. And I'll show you a principal who's a potential agitator. Who likes to go in other peoples' classrooms, who likes to ask a lot of
questions. Who wants to find out you know the different backgrounds and histories and stories of their teachers, who wants to find out the situations that the parents are living under, the, who wants to know a little
bit about the kids. Because no two people can raise a kid by themselves -- and, so -- to put it on a particular adult or a particular -- I think is inappropriate, because they're -- they're needs to be -- whole bunch
of adults involved in raising kids. I told you before when I grew up, my mother had eight brothers and four sisters, my father had six brothers and four sisters, that was our -- literally 150 adults who were organized
against me, who thought it was their responsibility to make sure that I grew up well, that I learned well that I was -- so I would try to get out -- I got out of town as fast as I could and went to college, okay.
SMITH: I want to go back to the agitation. Okay. You're talking all the time about agitating. Who's agitating whom, teachers or parents?
CORTES: Well, what we like to talk about is -- we’re trying to create a culture of mutual agitation, where the school agitates the congregation, the church, the synagog, but the church, the synagog also agitates the
school. The pastor, the rabbi agitates the principal, the principal agitates the rabbi, we agitate both, they agitate us.We create this culture of calculated vulnerability. I agitate you, you agitate me. Parents
agitate teacher by creating expectations -- a different set of expectations. Teachers say, okay, you want your kid to do well, fine, what are you going to do about it, okay. And, so there's this ne -- negotiating
process, it goes on ideally between parents and teachers and principals about mutual responsibility, how we're going to cover one another, how we're going to make sure that that kid learns. SMITH: How do you feel when you walk into a school like Alamo? CORTES: I feel mixed, I feel exhilarated and -- and I feel good about the fact that we're in this kind
of relationship. I feel challenged by the fact that we got so far to go, okay. Because we're not reaching nearly enough kids and we aren't changing the schools as nearly as fast as I want to see them change.Kids are
not learning enough great ideas. They're not learning enough about themselves. They're not developing in ways which I think are but at the same time, I see some -- I see significant improvement and I feel good about
that. And I feel good about people like Rosie Ruiz and I feel good about, you know, all the.. Mr. Flores, I feel good about the Valley Interfaith leaders and what they're learning. SMITH: What do you see in the kids, what -- what are the changes you see in the kids -- --CORTES: [interrupts] I see energy, I see curiosity, I see -- I see kids who enter school curious, committed,
energetic, full of hope. I -- I see them -- continuing that. I don't see -- because, see, look, what happens -- what happens -- what was happening before is kids would enter
schools with all kinds of energy, all kinds of curiosity, all kinds of hope for the future and by the time we finished with them, they were -- they were dull, they were uninteresting, okay, they were disconnected, they
were distracted.I see -- I see kids leaving school now with possible -- hopeful, thinking that they've got some energy, having some intellectual curiosity, being able to ask questions -- I mean, to me that's --
getting kids to feel good about asking questions in a classroom to me suggests that they have a love of learning. That's what I really want to see in kids. A love of learning.
SMITH: Now you're talking about a whole cut of American society that was in the process of being left out. When I akded you what the stakes are -- what are the stakes for this cut of American society? CORTES: I think we made some unconsciously, we've made some very ugly decisions to really just to kind of dismiss at least 40, maybe 50 percent of the population.I think those decisions are not
irrevocable. I think they can be -- I think we can -- we can challenge those decisions. And I'm hoping that that's one of the things we're doing with this whole alliance school process is saying to the rest of us -- the
rest of America -- you need these folks. They're important. They're important for your well-being. You got to be concerned about these kids, not because -- not because it's noblesse oblige, not because it's -- it's a
good thing to do, a moral thing to do -- and it is a moral thing to do -- but it's in your interest Because they're going to be productive, useful, loyal, dedicated and capable people. It's in your interest. It's in
your interest if you want to collect that social security check. It's in your interest if you don't want to have to spend money for prisons. It's in your interest if you want the kind of economy which is productive and
vibrant and is going to produce the kinds of technology and goods and services that are going to be beneficial to you. And if -- if for no other reason, these kids are important to you. Now, I think we got to find
other reasons why, too. There's a it is in the best tradition of this country, it is in the best -- tradition of American democracy that -- that these folks are important and they can make a contribution to the -- to
the -- to the American civic culture. [Back to top] |
