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Tackling Underperformance

Posted on: Wednesday, 15 February 2006, 06:00 CST

By Mathews, Jay

MEL RIDDILE * 2006 PRINCIPAL OF THE YEAR

Collaboration, creative problem solving, and an emphasis on results are the hallmarks of Mel Riddile's approach to the principalship.

When Mel Riddile, a former University of North Carolina football linebacker, became principal of J. E. B. Stuart High school in Fairfax County, VA, in 1997, special education department chair Pam Jones was not happy about the change. Riddile had never been a principal before. He was new to the school, and it was unclear how he was going to handle Stuart's increasing load of low-income students from immigrant families who did not read very well and often did not show up often enough for the faculty to help them.

"I was uncertain about Mel's vision for our students," Jones said. "As a matter of fact, I wasn't even certain that I wanted to remain at J. E. B. Stuart." It was at that point that Riddile, recently named the national high school principal of the year by NASSP and MetLife, revealed the personal touch and commitment to teamwork that has helped turn Stuart into one of the highest- performing low-income schools in the country: he went to see her and sought her views on what needed to be done. He also made it clear that he was going to be focused on how well students did, not on how good he looked to the superintendent. "This," Jones said, "led to a relationship built on trust."

Finding Solutions

When Riddile arrived at Stuart, the average annual days of absence per student was nearly 23. It is now only 6. Seventy-six percent of the students were reading at least two years below grade level. Now, at least among those who have spent two years at the school, the below-grade-level percentage is negligible.

Although 54% of the students have family incomes low enough to qualify for federal lunch subsidies, 44% of the students-including many in the low-income group-are enrolled in the most challenging program in U.S. secondary education, the International Baccaulaureate (IB). Stuart placed in the top 2% nationally on Newsweek's list of the most challenging public high schools.

Daniel Domenech, a senior vice president of McGrawHiIl Education, was superintendent of the Fairfax County schools during most of Riddile's time at Stuart, and he marvels at what Riddile has accomplished. "He has been able to demonstrate that a multiethnic student population with high percentages of English language learners and students from low socioeconomic backgrounds can achieve when placed in an environment where diversity is celebrated and students are given every opportunity to learn," Domenech said.

Kathleen McBride, the president of Stuart's parentteacher- student association, said that Riddile collected reams of data on each problem he faced and then encouraged different and sometimes daring solutions from staff members, who came to realize that he was going to listen to them and back them up. For example, the autodialing program that had been used to inform parents about school events was turned into a wake-up call system for students who were persistently absent or tardy. Each morning at 6 a.m., the telephone rings in the homes of those students and a recorded voice says, "Good morning. This is Stuart High School. Breakfast starts at 7:05 and school begins at 7:20."

Some central office administrators balked when Riddile insisted on testing the reading abilities of all his incoming ninth graders, but the appalling results were necessary to persuade everyone that all students who were below grade level had to take a reading course their freshman year. Different methods were used for different students, and those who needed extra help had mandatory after- school tutoring and weren't able to participate in sports and other afterschool activities until the tutoring was done.

Empowering the Staff

Riddile calls his management philosophy "collaborative." He said, "My administrators used to get frustrated. They would ask me something, and the first questions I would ask were, 'Have you talked to so-and-so? Have we asked so-and-so?' Because I found out a long time ago I should use the Japanese model of change: longer planning and short implementation. We want to make sure when we do something, we do it right, so we don't have to keep redoing things. That is particularly important for a new principal developing credibility."

Stuart Singer, the math department chairman and a 38-year veteran of the school's faculty, said one of Riddile's most significant changes "was the manner in which he elevated die school's department chairs to the role of educational leaders. This concept is given lip service in many schools, but at J. E. B. Stuart High School, it is a reality." Department chairs hire teachers, set schedules, and arrange professional development, but Riddile and the other administrators are consulted. "We don't delegate that away," he said.

Pam Jones, who had her doubts about the new principal eight years ago, has become an assistant principal, a change in her life that Riddile eagerly encouraged, telling her that the kind of questions she asked when he first arrived were just the kind of questions that would help the school get even better. "I have appreciated his readiness to speak with me informally and on short notice when I have concerns," Jones said.

The focus has been on looking for new ways to solve problems and having the patience to stick with them while teachers and students become accustomed to the change. Stuart has been designated one of the NASSP Breakthrough High Schools and profiled in Creating a Culture of Literacy (NASSP, 2005), which acknowledged that Riddile's strong new focus on reading did not immediately catch fire:

The greatest resistance was among the teaching staff. First, teachers could not understand how they could cover course content and teach literacy strategies. second, the teachers had no training in teaching literacy strategies. However, the data became key to convincing the staff that there was a need to make a dramatic change from the traditional way of teaching to a more explicit form of teaching to meet the learning needs of students, (p. 28)

This meant, among other things, training social studies, science, and even math teachers to embed literacy exercises in their teaching for students who were having trouble reading the material as well as creating the new reading courses:

To turn teacher thinking around, initial professional development began with a 15-session college credit course. Three sessions, two hours each, were totally dedicated to literacy immersion strategies at the secondary level.... The process involved the literacy coach modeling the strategy; peer observations, feedback, and follow-up; and additional coaching and support if required. (NASSP, 2005, p. 29)

Meeting Students' Needs

Riddile, 55, grew up near Pittsburgh. Western Pennsylvania has long been known for producing great football players, and Riddile, a ??-letter athlete at Burgettstown High School, was good enough on the gridiron to be recruited by Penn State, Ohio State, and Nebraska. He played for a University of North Carolina team that won the Adantic Coast Conference championship his senior year. Fortunately, he also listened to his high school coach, who told him that a teaching certificate would come in handy. He found a job coaching and teaching social studies at Lee High School in Fairfax County right out of college, then was recruited to be an administrator three years later. He worked at three high schools, as well as serving as a substance abuse prevention coordinator at district headquarters, before becoming the principal at Stuart.

At the beginning of his career as an administrator, Riddile thought he would miss the daily contact with students in the classroom, but he grew to love the fact that he was now responsible for helping solve the most difficult problems in the school. "When you are an administrator, you are dealing with the kids who need you most," he said.

To meet the needs of the school's most ambitious and capable students, Riddile and his staff members encourage students to take advantage of Stuart's IB program. The program, a tightly integrated course of study that ends with exhausting five-hour exams and required 4,000-word essays, has grown at a pace unheard of in most schools that adopt it. Stuart, which has one of the highest poverty levels in Fairfax County (VA) Public Schools (FCPS), was one of the first schools in the district to adopt the IB curriculum. It was difficult to get started. The year before Riddile arrived at the school, only 165 IB exams were given at Stuart. Riddile said he wanted to increase participation, rather than worry about the scores on the exams, because once students were in the classes, faculty members would have a chance to build students' skills. At the end of his first year, there were 263 IB exams. In 2005, there were 410, and the percentage of exams scored by the independent IB graders at a passing level was over 80%. Forty-four percent of Stuart llth and 12th graders take at least one IB course. The average IB students takes three courses.

"I use the model of change that goes from forming to storming to norming to performing," Riddile said. (Forming is laying the groundwork for chan\ge, storming is making the change, norming is solidifying the change, and performing is using the change to reach new heights of achievement.) "And we are at the performing stage. One of the teachers last year asked me, 'If the kids are late, why don't we lock the classroom doors and send them to the cafeteria?" I said, 'That's what a phase one school does. We're phase four. All we have to do is do certain things and talk to the kids, and they will get to school on time."

Other educators who have worked with Riddile remark at his unerring, and sometime unnerving, focus on student achievement. "One day I was told he was on the roof of the school fixing the air conditioning system," said Paul Rgnier, the FCPS spokesperson. "When I asked him about it, he said that they could not get a technician to the school until the next day but that he had done so much to get extra instructional time for students that he was not about to let kids be unable to learn algebra for two hours because it was too hot to learn."

Recently, Riddile was standing in the school's cafeteria, looking at a scene quite unlike most high schools at lunchtime. About 600 students, sitting close together at lunch tables, were chattering happily, waiting for the bell to ring. What was surprising was that it was difficult to see even a scrap of trash or leftover food on any of the tables.

Stuart students get only 30 minutes for lunch because there is too much else to get done each day. The habit in the past had been to use lunchtime to blow off steam, which before Riddile's arrival at the school meant food fights. When he joined Stuart, Riddile said there would be no more food fights, and in two years he succeeded in extinguishing the messy tradition. There were reminders and explanations, he said, but the key to the change was just a different way of using trash barrels. Instead of waiting for students to bring their refuse to the barrels, the barrels were put on wheels and janitors push the barrels past each of the tables. "We just pointed out to the janitors that if they move the trash receptacles around, it takes five minutes to do it, and they will save a half hour of work," Riddile said.

Building a Reputation

Riddile said that he is pleased with his principal of the year award, particularly because it has come long after the school has been recognized many times for its achievements, including a visit by President George W. Bush. "When a coach has a good season, he'll get an award," Riddile said, "but in a school you have to have a lot of good years for the principal to get an award." He recalled with pleasure a Stuart teacher who spoke up at a graduate school class to say, "Even though we are getting all these awards, Dr. Riddile has never worked harder, and he is never satisfied."

Riddile collected reams of data on each problem he faced and then encouraged different and sometimes daring solutions from staff members, who came to realize that he was going to listen to them and back them up.

At the beginning of his career as an administrator, Riddile thought he would miss the daily contact with students in the classroom, but he grew to love the fact that he was now responsible for helping solve the most difficult problems in the school.

J. E. B. Stuart High School

Location: Falls Church, VA (Fairfax County Public Schools)

Grades: 9-12

Enrollment: 1,494

Community: Suburban Demographic: 40% Hispanic, 22% Asian, 14% Middle Eastern, 12% White, 12% Black; 54% free and reduced-price lunch; 66% speak English as their second language; 30% mobility rate

Administrative team: 1 principal, 4 assistant principals, 1 director of guidance, 1 director of student activities

Faculty: 130

Staff: 50

Mel Riddile

George Peabody College of Vanderbilt University, Ed.D, Major: Educational Leadership

George Mason University, M.A., Major: Educational Administration

University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill) B.A., Major: Education, History, Political Science

References

NASSP. (2005). Creating a culture of Literacy. Retrieved October 20, 2005, from www.principals.org/literacy

Jay Mathews is a education writer and online columnist for the Washington Post.

Copyright National Association of Secondary School Principals Jan 2006

Source: Principal Leadership; High School ed.

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