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Last night, the school committee discussed its evaluation of the superintendent. While she received an overall grade of 3.59 out of 5, it’s an average of the seven members’ votes and doesn’t adequately reflect my thoughts on her work. (I gave her a 4.04.) Disappointed by the coverage in today’s paper, I offer the following details and correction regarding two of the five priority goals she didn’t make (the ones her $5,000 bonus was tied to): The newspaper accurately reported she got freshmen attendance up so that 78.8% of our students achieved a 90% attendance rate; however, the paper incorrectly reported her goal, which was 80%. She came close to making that goal (one part of three tied to freshmen), but close doesn’t get the bonus nor should it. More importantly for the district, we made strides in improving freshmen attendance—up from 72% last year—an area long identified as difficult to improve. The second goal she didn’t make had to do with progress for struggling readers in grades 3-8. Under her initiative, last year the schools began providing additional, focused reading support (targeted interventions) to students identified as at-risk and reading below grade level. Her goal was to see 80% of those students move out of this category in one academic year. Based on their results on the reading inventory test, 44% of our struggling readers achieved this goal—again not enough for the bonus, but a significant gain for our children. While superintendents across the state and the Merrimack Valley see increasingly higher salaries and benefits, Dr. Baehr is the only school leader who has tied her bonuses to measurable, high stakes goals. So while she did not receive her bonus this year, the results of those efforts continue to make a substantial impact on the quality of education our children receive. I applaud her efforts and willingness to be held accountable. From the top down, her leadership in providing quality instruction is making a difference. For more indicators that Lowell Public Schools are making progress, see here. For specifics on the overall evaluation and a breakdown of how each school committee member scored Dr. Baehr, check: more »

I apologize if you are one of the people experiencing problems with logging on or making comments on this blog. The last few days have been especially difficult. Co-author Margaret and I have had our own share of frustrations. (Imagine writing a post, doing the links, and then not being able to publish it.) Please don’t give up on us, know we are working to address these issues, and try back later if you can’t get on at a certain time. Meanwhile, we will continue working with the human we located at the other end of that cyberspace vacuum (thankfully!) and writing for future posts.