This article is one in a series of reports on how support from the Wallace Foundation is making a difference at Des Moines Public Schools. In June 2014, DMPS was awarded a substantial grant by the Wallace Foundation to improve teaching and learning by improving the work of principals and their supervisors. DMPS is one of six urban school districts from across the country selected to participate in the initiative.
Anyone flying into Des Moines on the crest of the coldest cold wave in decades would have to have a pretty good reason, especially if coming from warmer climes.
A delegation of educators from North Carolina did. They came for an up-close look at ongoing work in DMPS stemming from a major grant from the Wallace Foundation awarded to the district in 2014 aimed at bolstering support of school principals as a means of increasing student achievement.
The North Carolinians aren’t the first seeking to learn from the DMPS example. We’ve reported on similar visits from other parts of the country in the past, including a group of educators from Missouri, Nebraska, Oregon, Tennessee and Virginia; Prince George’s County Public Schools in Maryland; the Cleveland Metropolitan School District; and Broward County Schools in Florida, the nation’s 6th largest school district.
This time, district administrators hosted Sylvia Anthony-McGeachy, representing the Northeast Leadership Academy (NELA), a consortium of 13 school districts, and Douglas Miller, Assistant Superintendent of Northampton County Schools.
“They asked to come after our December UPPI (University Principal Preparation Initiative) meeting in New York,” said Ruth Wright who choreographs all of the comings and goings as the Wallace Grant Project Manager for the DMPS Office of Schools.
The UPPI aspect of the Wallace work was the catalyst for a partnership between DMPS and Drake University. Dean of the School of Education Janet McMahill and Associate Professor Randy Peters represented Drake in Tuesday’s meeting.
The itinerary was to have included site visits at Willard and Jackson Elementary School(s), but the weather dictated an abridged version that kept all parties indoors as much as possible in district offices on Fleur Drive, just down the street from the airport, enabling a getaway from the cold as quick as the district’s UPPI work is innovative.
