Last week, business, education and community leaders heard from one of the world's best-known academics in the field of education reform and school turnaround at the Education 2020 Speaker Series, presented by the Chamber, Mayor Dean and the Lipscomb University College of Education.

Andy Hargreaves, the Thomas More Brennan Chair in the Lynch School of Education at Boston College, provided insights on high-performing school systems using a recent study he authored with Professor Alma Harris. Titled “Performance Beyond Expectations,” the report focuses on high-achieving organizations in three sectors: business, education and sports.

Hargreaves pointed out that nine out of 10 businesses working to turn around in a year or less fail. In researching this topic, the authors were struck not by the differences between organizations that were able to successfully turn around, but the similarities. They found that the criteria for successful turnaround lie in three areas:

1) Perform better than you did;
2) Perform better than your peers; and
3) Perform better than you’d expect.

After examining which characteristics make this kind of performance more likely, the authors came up with 15 common factors that serve as a framework for successful turnaround. Several of these stand out in particular.

First, what Hargreaves referred to as F1: the fantastic dream. The premise is that organizations that perform beyond expectations aspire to an improbable, collectively held dream that is bolder and more challenging than a plan or a vision. In the case of MNPS, that dream is to be the first choice for families in Davidson County. The next factor is F2: the fear. Hargreaves stated that organizations should use fear to energize, not paralyze. The full report can be found at www.andyhargreaves.com.

Hargreaves also emphasized the importance of strong leadership. He said, “It’s easy to lead when you have everything going for you. It’s essential to lead when you don’t.” This statement has strong implications for Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools, where leadership is a critical factor in successful turnaround. As a strong affirmation to Metro Schools, Hargreaves, who was visiting for a couple of days as a member of Dr. Register’s National Advisory Panel, declared that he believes MNPS will be one of the leading flagships of how to move forward in education reform in the next three years. He added that the country will be looking to us as an example. Clearly, we have a lot to do to reach this point, but, as the Chamber’s Education Report Card Committee pointed out in its 2011 report released earlier this week, it is increasingly evident that we have the leadership in place to attain our “improbable dream.”

To view additional photos from this event, please click here.

Margaret Spellings, former U.S. secretary of education and current thought leader on education policy at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, told a Nashville audience of more than 200 last week that it will be up to local communities and states to stay the course on rigorous academic standards and accountability. As Congress gets ready to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) -- or No Child Left Behind (NCLB), as it was known during the last reauthorization -- Spellings said the law should be “clear, transparent and speak to every school and every student.” She said NCLB should be “preserved, strengthened and improved,” but she worried that Washington was headed toward a “new normal” that would excuse continued low performance for groups of students. She praised Tennessee’s reform efforts and encouraged the use of student growth data as an accountability measure in any new federal legislation.

Why should the business community get involved in education? Spellings painted a stark picture:

• Half of U.S. Chamber members reported having trouble finding skilled/knowledgeable workers.
• In 2010, the private sector was forced to spend $50 billion on job training.
• By 2020, there are projected to be 123 million high-skill/high-wage jobs, but only 50 million workers qualified to fill them.

Spellings referenced the work that Nashville’s business community is doing, through the Academies of Nashville and other initiatives, as a model for other cities to emulate. This past summer, the U.S. Chamber released a report, Partnership Is a Two-Way Street, which profiled Nashville’s efforts.

Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce President & CEO Ralph Schulz then moderated a panel to dive into the details of business engagement in education. Steve Turner, co-chair of the Chamber’s CEO Champions, a group that advocates for the Academies of Nashville, reported that there were now 150 businesses and organizations partnered with Metro’s high school academies, and these partners were doing everything from serving as guest speakers, to providing student internships, to working with teachers on curriculum through “teacher externships.”

Mike Edwards, president & CEO of the Knoxville Chamber, told the crowd that philanthropy is important, but it needs to direct results. He urged business leaders to pay attention to policy debates, because education legislation “can affect our bottom line.” Edwards said school districts could lean on the private sector to improve management skills because businesses are used to managing to an outcome.

Darrell Freeman, chairman of SuccessPAC, a political action committee that endorses candidates in Nashville’s school board elections, reminded the audience that “education is a child’s ticket out of poverty.” Leaving no doubt as to his feelings on the urgency around this work, Freeman encouraged systems to remove “nonperformers” quickly.

Kevin Huffman, Tennessee’s commissioner of education, urged businesses to “keep pushing and engage” with school boards and superintendents, always asking “Did it work?” and “How do we know?” Commissioner Huffman said he had heard many excuses for delaying or watering down Tennessee’s ambitious education reforms, but no one had offered insight as to why Kentucky’s poor students were a full grade level ahead of Tennessee’s poor students. “The burden of proof is not on the people who want change,” said Huffman. “The burden of proof is on the people who want the system to remain the same.”

The luncheon, part of the Education 2020 Speaker Series presented by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce, Mayor Karl Dean and Lipscomb University, was a collaborative effort with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Look for details soon about the next speaker series event, to be held Wednesday, December 7, at Lipscomb University.



Margaret Spellings, former secretary of education, visited Nashville to discuss business engagement in public education as part of the Education 2020 Speaker Series presented by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce, Mayor Karl Dean and Lipscomb University.


Panelists Mike Edwards, president & CEO of the Knoxville Chamber; Darrell Freeman, chairman of Zycron; Kevin Huffman, commissioner, Tennessee Department of Education; and Steve Turner, co-chair, CEO Champions, delved into the issues surrounding business engagement in public education. To view additional pictures from the event, click here.

Margaret Spellings, former secretary of education and current president of the U.S. Forum for Policy Innovation, will visit Nashville this Wednesday, Oct. 12, to speak at the Education 2020 Speaker Series.

Spellings, a leading national expert on public policy, also serves as a senior advisor to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. She served as U.S. Secretary of Education from 2005 to 2009. In that role, she oversaw an agency with a nearly $70 billion budget and more than 10,000 employees and contractors. As a cabinet member, she led the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act, a historic national initiative to provide enhanced accountability for the education of 50 million U.S. public school students.

We sat down with Spellings to ask about what role the business community can play in improving public schools.

Q. Why involve the business community in improving public education?
A. Our education system in America is in need of transformative improvement, and business can play a valuable role in retooling our nation’s school systems. Business can provide the leverage, expertise and leadership that will help educators and public officials make tough decisions and take hard steps they may not take on their own.

Q. What can the business community do to improve schools that other organizations and institutions can't?
A. They can do two things: leverage their financial resources and use their expertise. In an effort to be good corporate citizens, business leaders often involve their companies in local schools by partnering with education officials, backing bond issues, arranging for employees to work as mentors, providing money for scholarships, and supplying goods and services to schools. While all of these efforts are admirable and can benefit many students, they don’t create the transformative change required to significantly raise student achievement. Because the business community is a sought after partner by the education community, often because they can bring financial resources to the table, they are in a position to leverage their support for real reform and help school officials tackle tough issues. This is what the U.S. Chamber of Commerce seeks to provide - guidance to business leaders on just how to engage in a substantive way that supports reform focused on student achievement and closing the gaps. In addition, business leaders possess unique skills and resources that can be brought to the table to help solve real problems faced by educators – human resource issues, budgeting, data, management, etc. These are all areas where business has expertise to contribute.

Q: What's the incentive for the business community to get involved?
A: Aside from being leaders in the community as well as parents and grandparents, business leaders are trying to be successful in their fields and to remain competitive in a global economy. In many cases, they are struggling to find the skilled workforce they need. Fifty-three percent of business leaders say they have difficulty hiring non-managerial employees with the right skills, training and education. Even though our national unemployment is more than 9 percent, there are more than 3 million jobs going unfilled in this country today. I attribute that to an education system that is failing on many levels.

Q: Why is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce working to improve public education?
A: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is the world’s largest business federation, representing the interests of more than 3 million businesses of all sizes, sectors and regions. Education is more often than not a priority issue for our state and local chambers across the country. A strong public education system means a steady stream of skilled workers for the companies in the area; it helps attract business to the area, and it’s the foundation for a strong community. As a result, the U.S. Chamber has been involved in education reform efforts for many years.

Q: What, specifically, is the U.S. Chamber doing to help?
A: The U.S. Chamber engages in a variety of ways. As a well-respected trade association in Washington, we can bring our considerable resources to bear on issues of concern for the organization. We advocate for reform at the federal level – reform focused on accountability for results, given the billions of taxpayer dollars for education that the federal government provides. We also seek to engage the business community in education reform efforts in their communities and assist those who are already engaged. Through scholarly research, resources, convenings, publications and communications efforts, we seek to ensure an educated and skilled workforce for our members so that they and our nation remain competitive in this global economy.

Q: What are other cities doing to improve public education? How does Nashville’s business community compare with peers around the country in terms of involvement?
A: While businesspeople in other communities have achieved varying levels of engagement and success in the arena of education reform, there are models for success. Just this past spring, the U.S. Chamber’s Institute for a Competitive Workforce released a report titled Partnership is a Two-Way Street: What it Takes for Business to Help Drive School Reform. The report profiles three locations where the business community has successfully engaged in school reform in their community. Along with Austin, Texas, and the state of Massachusetts, Nashville was held up as an example. Nashville’s approach to high school reform was shown to have produced results, particularly because the business community is a committed partner. The report highlighted Nashville’s 117 business-academy partnerships, as well as six industry-based partnership councils composed of 22 to 25 high-level business leaders. The result: the city’s graduation rate rose from 69 percent in 2006 to 83 percent in 2010, while the suspension rate declined more than 25 percent. The percentage of high schools in “good standing” under No Child Left Behind rose from 41 percent in the 2007–2008 school year to 53 percent in 2009–2010.

Teach For America (TFA) is a national nonprofit organization that recruits college graduates from the most selective universities in the country to teach in high-need, high-poverty K-12 public schools for at least two years. While these TFA corps members often major in areas other than education, the hope is that many of them will choose to remain in the field—continuing as classroom teachers, becoming school leaders, or pursuing careers in education policy or research. The expectation is that all corps members develop a lifelong appreciation, if not advocacy, for high standards and measurable results for all children.

Recruited by Mayor Karl Dean and supported financially by Nashville’s business and philanthropic community, TFA is in its second year in Metro, with 108 corps members teaching in Nashville’s public schools. While these teachers’ salary is paid by Metro Schools, the private dollars support an extensive recruitment and selection process, as well as a summer training session and support throughout the school year. TFA is currently recruiting the next class of 50-60 teachers that will begin work in Nashville in summer 2011.

Already, the program is showing impressive results: Nashville’s corps boasts a 100% retention rate across the two years, and is among the top five TFA sites across the country in corps member job satisfaction. The academic results are even more impressive: According to a recent report of teacher preparation programs in our state, more than 35 percent of TFA algebra I teachers, 40 percent of TFA reading/language arts teachers, 50 percent of TFA biology teachers and 60 percent of TFA science and social studies teachers are above the 80th percentile of all teachers in the state.

Steven Farr, chief knowledge officer of Teach For America, was the featured speaker at the Chamber and Mayor Dean’s Education 2020 Speaker series at the downtown library as part of a national tour to promote his new book, Teaching As Leadership. As he describes it, his job is to study the top-performing TFA corps members in the country and share that work with the rest of the organization. These high-performing teachers, who typically help their students achieve two to three years of academic growth in a single year, tend to have six practices in common: they set ambitious goals at the beginning of the school year; they motivate students and their families; they plan backwards from the ambitious goals; they execute effectively by constantly making adjustments; continuously improve by trying new things; and work relentlessly.


L-R: Steven Farr with TFA Nashville corps members Laura O'Donnell, Jones Paideia Magnet School; Declan Tansey, Cameron Middle School; Natalie Klotz, Cane Ridge High School; Anthony Fowler, New Vision Charter Middle School.

The event concluded with an outstanding panel discussion featuring four Nashville TFA corps members. These impressive young teachers talked about the challenges of differentiating instruction in a classroom with a wide range of abilities and skill levels, but they also talked about the reward of seeing their students make progress. Given that TFA corps members commit to teach for only two years and that about 40% move on to other professions after that time, I asked the panel what it would take to continue teaching in Nashville after their second year. Two of the panel members were in their first semester of teaching and had understandably not given this much thought. But a second-year teacher answered that she was planning to stay for a third or even fourth year and immediately referenced the opportunity to be a team leader at her school, providing further evidence that leadership opportunities should be a key strategy in retaining our best teachers.


Shani Jackson Dowell, executive director, Teach For America Nashville.

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At the Chamber, we believe that having a successful public school system is essential to the long-term prosperity of Nashville and the Middle Tennessee region. In 2008, the Chamber senior staff and our volunteer leadership created a three-year plan, Education 2020, to assure Nashville’s future prosperity by engaging community leadership to transform public education.

The Chamber’s education work leverages our organization’s unique strengths, and, in most cases, fills a need or a gap not being addressed by others. Longstanding Chamber education initiatives such as the Education Report Card Committee, SuccessPAC and our support for charter schools fit perfectly alongside newer initiatives like Friends of Metro Schools, ONE NASHVILLE and our support of the Academies of Nashville.

To carry out this strategic work, the Chamber’s education department has four full-time, committed professionals:

Marc Everett Hill, Chief Education Officer
In late 2006, Chamber leadership created a new leadership position focused on the key priority of improving public education. Marc Hill became the Nashville Chamber’s first chief education officer in April 2007. Marc previously spent seven years in Nashville Mayor Bill Purcell’s administration as director of the Mayor’s Office of Children and Youth and special assistant for education. In the 1990s, Marc spent five years with the Tennessee House of Representatives, both in the Majority Leader’s office and as the research analyst for the Education Committee. Marc is a graduate of Antioch High School, Vanderbilt University and Middle Tennessee State University. When he is not working on education policy, Marc is usually thinking about music and soccer, but not at the same time.

Etta Carson-Bell, Program Manager
A Metro Schools parent, Etta Carson-Bell has been with the Chamber’s education department for six years. She previously worked in higher education at Tennessee State University. In addition to managing the department, Etta leads the Chamber’s work on the Mayor’s First Day Festival and Friends of Metro Schools. Etta is an alumna of Kentucky State University in Frankfort and is renowned for her ability to plan and pull off a multitude of committee meetings, public events, policy summits and baby showers.

Zack Blair, Director of Business Engagement in Education
Following in the footsteps of Chelsea Parker, who now works for Metro Schools, Zack joined the Chamber team in August 2010. Zack is a graduate of Lipscomb University and was previously employed as a technical specialist at his alma mater. Zack leads the Chamber’s work to support the Academies of Nashville, Metro Schools’ effort to reform its 12 zoned high schools into smaller learning communities with a career or thematic focus. He is also quite possibly the best-mannered sports fanatic you will ever meet.

Rita McDonald, Director of Community Engagement in Education
Though Rita McDonald is the newest education department staff member -- having joined in September 2010 in a newly created position to lead the ONE NASHVILLE campaign -- she is the consummate Chamber veteran. Rita has spent 20 years serving in the Chamber’s research and information services division. A graduate of Metro Schools and Middle Tennessee State University, Rita would like you to stop reading this blog post and join onenashville.org right now.


L-R: Marc Hill, Rita McDonald, Etta Carson-Bell and Zack Blair at the launch of the ONE NASHVILLE campaign.