Transforming a Struggling School: A Principal's Journey

Have you ever wondered what it's like to step into a struggling school and turn it around? Drawing on my five-month tenure as the interim acting principal at PSIS 224 in New York City, I share the intricate details of my journey, taking a deep, hard look at the school's narrative and finding ways to effect change. From our bold decision to rebrand the school to "Exploration and Discovery", rallying the staff, students, and the community, to even bringing the Chancellor of New York City public schools for a visit, every step was a learning experience.

While the journey was filled with challenges, it was also one of immense learning. I had the privilege of understanding and leveraging public data and resources to comprehend the history of the school, eventually breathing new life into it. But the responsibility didn’t stop at reviving a school; it extends to supporting fellow school leaders on a similar journey. If you're a school leader, you'll appreciate my tips for setting up effective coaching sessions and reminders on how this work is ultimately about shaping better futures for our children. Time to lace up those sneakers, school leaders, and join this enlightening conversation!

Chapters

• 0:00 Journey of a Sneaker Principal
• 15:33 Rebranding and Challenges of Low-Performing School
• 29:09 Support for School Leaders

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

When they see me. They know that every day, when I'm breathing, it's for us to go farther. You know, every time I speak, I want the truth to come out. You know I'm saying every time I speak I want to shiver. You know I don't want them to be like. They know what I'm gonna say because it's polite. They know what I'm gonna say and even if I get in trouble, you know I'm saying that. Ain't that what we're supposed to do? It's. I'm not saying I'm gonna rule the world or I'm gonna change the world, but I guarantee that I will spark the, the brain that will change the world. And that's our job. It's to spark somebody else watching us. We might not be the ones, but let's not be selfish. And because we're not gonna change the world, let's not talk about how we should change it. I don't know how to change it, but I know, if I keep talking about how dirty it is out here, somebody gonna clean it up. And now he's been promoted his job principal.

Speaker 2: 0:56

Good morning everyone. This is Uchein Joku, sneaker principal, and Welcome to this episode of the snickering snickering the sneaker principal podcast. Listen, my dyslexia is for real. Often the words in my head and what comes out of my mouth are two different things. But, um, it's been a lifelong journey and it has stopped me from being who I am today, so it's all good. So this is the sneaker principal podcast.

Speaker 2: 1:31

So in this episode I'm gonna talk to you about my five month journey, or marathon, at PSIS 224. This is a school that I am currently the interim acting principal at here in New York City, in district 7 in the Bronx, and it's been quite a journey. Last April I've asked you I'd never even heard the school and you know an opportunity came up. I was offered the school, as it was an opportunity to do some good work, and I don't shy away from good work. I have always believed that For me, this journey of being a school leader has required that I go into the most complex of situations, even spaces where my skill sets might not be fully complete, and being able to Walking and do what I do or what I need to do. I've decided that you know why sometimes you guys jump on a bus and build or, better yet, fix the bus as you're driving the bus. And this is what definitely one of those situations To this episode. I'm gonna talk to you About the journey, the beginning, how, what that was like, you know, going through the process of rebranding the school, facing challenges and other things that weren't quite apparent in the beginning.

Speaker 2: 2:58

They became very evident the fight to preserve and keep the history of of the school and to really change the narrative about it. And then what have I learned? What about learn through this process? You know, because one thing is Beautiful about being an educator is that you're always learning something and as well as teaching something. But educators, real educators, those who are really about this craft, learn way more than we ever teach, because, again, that's how it become better teachers you learn, you integrate what you've learned into your practice and you just evolve and you become better at what you do. And anyone who's done, who's been in this profession, can really understand that. So let's get to the beginning my initial observations and the challenges that existed at PSIS 224 when I first I'm finding about it. So One of the first things that I did and I have to be definitely give much gratitude to my superintendent, dr Roberto Padilla was being given the opportunity to do a desk audit of the school.

Speaker 2: 4:17

And I have to be honest with you, I've done miniature desk audits and but this is the first time where I went completely head in and said, okay, I'm going to commit days to just studying the school. So those of you who don't know what desk audit is, this is my definition. This is where you sit down with the data and you literally spend time, work time, really reviewing data, not sitting in a meeting, not sitting, you know, not going to a PD, or I'm doing looking at school data as an exercise, or you're trying to find, like you know, some piece of information to fulfill the report or some compliance piece. I'm talking about saying, okay, here's a school, here's a space I'm going to treat like a mystery. I want to learn as much as I can about this space, this school, and I was looking at the test scores and I was looking at historical data as far as attendance, looking at, you know, the history of occurrences at the school, behavioral discipline, everything, the hiring trends, who's been here for how long, anything I can get my hands on, you know, and we're talking about general information, general public information, and one thing about public schools is that it's out there. There's nothing, it's very little, that you cannot access. If you want to see the past budget, you can find it right online. If you want to know the history of the school who's been, who's led the school, where the school started there are several websites that will give you they provide parents with data about a school.

Speaker 2: 5:58

So I went through all that and I sat in a small office you know coffee and and my laptop and I just was grinding for for about five days. I was grinding for five days looking at data Okay, what is this and that? And whenever I could, you know, I would reach out to people, colleagues and people that had more information and say, hey, what do you know about this, this school, what do you know about this? I read a lot of articles and ISPS 24 had quite a few news reports over the years that were very interesting. So I did did all that because I wanted to make sure I had a very clear understanding.

Speaker 2: 6:35

I was fully immersed in in this school. So when I walked in, I wasn't walking in there blind. I wasn't walking in there not knowing you know or or trying to figure things out on the ground. So it was like, like him, to go into battle. You know you don't go into battle or into a any kind of mission without knowing what is the landscape you're walking into. You know what, you know what is the terrain, what is what has happened in these spaces historically, and that's how I approached it. And then once.

Speaker 2: 7:08

I got in, you know, it was interesting because I there were, no, there were no moments where I was like, oh my God, this is not what I expected. As I said, I expected and as a turnaround school, this is a space that you know. You're walking in there and you know what the mission is. This this school struggle historically, academically, performance wise, attendance wise, and you're walking in there trying to find a way to solve those problems so the school could be back on track, moving forward, closing the achievement gap and really being an amazing space for kids. And, and I'll be honest with you, when I did my, when I did my, my, my audit, what I saw was just more, more, more, more lines of neglect. You know, um, often schools in major cities have a lot of turnaround, you know, and more so recently than in its past. In the past, you can have schools where you might have a school leader who's been there for you know, we're talking about 10, 20 years. That loves stability, especially if the schooling is what they're doing. It puts schools, it puts the school in a good space, good footing, um, but also when you have a space where you know there's been a lot of transition. And not only that, not just transition leadership, but just also transition culture, and things are just not the way they used to be. It impacts school communities and it permeates through the community People just having a harder time maintaining and building culture. And these are things that I saw.

Speaker 2: 8:55

And but a great thing about it, when I walked in, I didn't see a school. That was like crazy. And I've been in spaces where you walked in you were like okay, oh boy, what's gonna happen today? I just saw a space that just needed a bit more love Not to say those who were there hadn't loved it, but intentional. You know where you're building community, where you're bringing together parents and students and teachers to say listen, what do we want here, where do we wanna go? Who do we wanna be? You know, regardless of the narrative you know of, there's been written out there about us. There's no denying. You know, and this is just. This is data that you can find anywhere. You know ISPS 2224 has been considered the lowest performing middle school in district seven in the South Bronx for a very long time, and only that. I found an article that listed, you know, psis 224 as one of the bottom performing schools, middle schools. I mean, I'm so bottom 100 performing schools in New York City and the system that has over 1600 schools, that is not a good look. But again, I couldn't find a thing to say like, oh my God, this is a horrible place.

Speaker 2: 10:08

You know, there was just a space that just needed some re-envisioning, you know, some rebranding, redefining the narrative. So, as I learned, the school community learned, the staff learned, the parents learned the kids. One of the things that popped into my head off the bat was I'm tired of hearing 224 is a problem. I'm tired of hearing the narrative that 224 is a space that is not a good space. So I went head deep, you know, into rebranding. I made that my part-time job, spending time at home looking at the school and thinking about how to redress the school, how to go beyond a fresh paint, a coat, to really changing perceptions about the school. So one of the things that came to me, the kids were not very keen on, the school logo, as well as the staff and the school mascot, and I was like you know, those are low-lying fruits, those are things that you can reach and plug in and make a difference with really quickly. So I had a competition, you know that was done through the art classroom with Miss B and I was like, listen, I need a new school logo and I need a new school mascot, but I want to come from the kids. So this is the art class and the kids. She told the kids and the kids jumped onto it and within two weeks or so, you know, we had a new mascot. We were no longer the cheetahs, we were not the panthers, and this was a hundred percent from the kids. It had nothing to do with the adults, you know. It had nothing to do with me. It was the kids. You know. It came down, I think it came out the lions and panthers, and the kids picked panthers, specifically black panthers, and I thought that was awesome because now there's ownership there, there's been conversation, there's been communication amongst the children and they know like this is what we picked and they know it's a contest for a new logo.

Speaker 2: 12:09

Part of my rebranding was, you know, coming up with new core values, but also being intentional and putting into the universe what we want to see. You know what also, what I want to see. So my thing was, you know, the job is not to just turn the school around but to make the school the best middle school in District seven and in New York City. So that word best, you know. I sat and thought about it and I was like how do I take the word best and make sure it's in our logo? So psychological people would see it and say, whoa, best. But also for those of us in school community we know we would know what it meant beyond just the word best as an adjective. So came up with the core values belief, excel, strive and trust. Because I wanted the school community to believe in itself. I want students that teach you to parents to truly believe in what we're doing. You know.

Speaker 2: 13:06

And then Excel.

Speaker 2: 13:08

I tell students all the time I don't need you to be perfect.

Speaker 2: 13:12

This work that we're doing has done no perfection, as everything do with excellence. I think I love that excellence. Excellence is very personal. You know being your best, pushing beyond your best, striving for excellence. It can only be defined by you. So, so if Excel as to strive, keep moving forward, fall forward, fail forward, but keep striving towards. You know what that thing that we want as a community you know to be, to be, you know, seen as a place where children love to be, seen as a place where children are successful, teachers successful, and we're doing good work towards closing the achievement gap. So strive for the S and then T Trust you have. Trust the system I'm sorry, not trust the system. Trust the process. You have to trust the process, you know. And not only that. Students need to trust teachers. Teachers need to trust students, you know, and parents as well. We need to trust teachers and students and they have to trust the school. The principal Trust has to be at the core of what we're doing.

Speaker 2: 14:19

So took the new core value. You know we had a new mission, a new vision, and the vision was aligned with the district. And then, you know, we aligned our school colors with the school district colors. You know we have a new logo, which was a paw print designed by seventh grader, and we went, we ran with it. You know repainting the classrooms and putting the murals in the hallways.

Speaker 2: 14:45

You know, you know I'm from California, so I put up a Nipsey Hussle quote and I put up a Tupac quote. The Tupac quote directly comes from the words you hear at the beginning of my podcast. You know, you know be. You know about sparking the brain. You know doing something in the community to really change the world. So, and then we have Sotomayor, and we have Nelson Mandela and Ceciárez Sinha Sanchez, and more murals are coming, but I want to create a space where kids walk through.

Speaker 2: 15:18

They were all, but only that the course on the wall eventually was seeping through your minds and and and be part of the blood vein and the and the heartbeat of the school. And so branding has been the thing, and then only that you know we are the science, the science school for explosion discovery. And I said you know we're going to drop the science, the science, and publicly we're going to drop, you know, not officially, but when it works. Drop the science school Of and just be exploration discovery, because, at the end of the day, what is it that we want our kids to do other than explore and discover this world and grow in that process? So now you know my correspondence is our logos are signed. You only see exploration discovery MS 224, not PSIS 224. Public school, public school, intermediary school 224. That's too much. Ms 224, middle school 224. And embracing that, you know, and using using all of this to change the narrative. And yeah, so that's a snippet of the rebranding process.

Speaker 2: 16:28

But now the unseen hurdles.

Speaker 2: 16:32

They were definitely some unseen hurdles. You know, when I did the desk audit, I thought to myself, man, these numbers, the school performance, which at the time was about 24 percent proficiency in mathematics, which for me says the 76 percent of our students are not proficient. Then 5 percent proficiency in math, which means 95 percent of our students are not proficient in math. And I saw these numbers and I was like, wait a minute, this has been the story for some time now. And not only that, the school is in state receivership, and I'm meaning that the school is being it's on the list from the state and it's being given a lot of supports because it's a very low performing school. And I I'm never reading the desk audit saying to myself, man, if we're not careful, the school could be closed at any given time. And then that that became the narrative, not narrative, the reality. You know, not only are we, you know, are we in a space, or am I in a space, of turning up school, around, working with my colleagues and my, you know.

Speaker 2: 17:41

But also now keeping the school open because again, you know one of the schools not doing well and and it becomes a the ongoing theme for a number of years, you know one of the options is to close the school down and rebuild. Put something else new in there. They can serve the community. They can service the community no-transcript, Me being the person that.

Speaker 2: 18:06

I am and falling in love with the school community and the community as a whole, I was like no, no, no, no, no, no. We got to find a way to keep the school open. It's not just about turning around. It's also not about redefining, putting it into existence, something to make it very clear that this school is worthy of continuous service community. One of the things that I constantly say is if you want to destroy a school community, I'm sorry. If you want to destroy a community, get rid of one or three things, or, even worse, to get rid of three things. You get rid of the hospitals, then the community cannot heal itself. They have people who are literally dying because they can't get medical support and service. You get rid of grocery stores, so then what we're putting into our bodies is actually exacerbating and killing us because we can't get fresh vegetables and healthy foods. Then you close schools down. You shouldn't doubt our minds. You're taking the hope away from us. Our ability to dream is diminished because the mind has to grow and school is one of the spaces where you pour into children, you pour into the community. So for me, as a school leader, as a principal, as a teacher, at my core, the thought of school closure was something that I was like no, can't happen, we've got to find a way. But now the story is different. Now it's not just about how do we turn the school around and how do we keep these doors open for a foreseeable future. And I had to rally. I had to rally the staff, I had to rally the community, even talk to the students. That's what we're doing here, and one thing that I saw that gave me extreme hope is the fact that every single person exhibited the same passion that I have. Every single person said, ok, now, what do we do? How do we do this? And there was a collective effort that went to play. It began in the summer. We were under-enrolled by almost 70 children. I had staff who worked over the summer, giving up a lot of valuable vacation time to say, hey, we're going to pound the pavements, we're going to the community and recruit students so that we can meet our enrollment, and 70 kids is a huge gap to fill. But we did it. We did it. We've met our enrollment, we're off, but like one kid. And again, that's a testament to a community that says, no, we're not giving up, we're going to make this happen. So that's been incredible.

Speaker 2: 20:58

This fight to preserve who we are the school. Their teachers in the school have been here for a very long time who are just saying listen, this is the work now, including pushing our kids academically, making sure that they're getting the best possible product that we can provide, and it's a process. One of the things that occurred that I believe had to happen to ensure that we had a fighting chance is to make sure that the world can see what we're doing. I'm a believer that if people don't know what you're doing, then it's not happening. And one of the things that I will share with school leaders is when you're doing good work or when the community is doing great work, you have to make sure that the community, the great community, knows about it, that leadership in the system knows about it. And one of the things that I did do is I campaigned I really did campaign to get the chancellor of the New York City public schools to come visit our school, because I wanted to highlight what we're doing. I knew that if I can get the right eyeballs on our school, that doors would open, there would be support for what we're doing Because, again, if you walked in here May 1st of 2023 and you walked in October 5th of 2023, you would be in shock because it's not the same place.

Speaker 2: 22:43

You know the same kids One grade removed, one grade graduated, another grade came in, but the core of the students were here last year. And the fact that we can say that again, it's all a work in progress, but the fact that we can say we've had consecutive and multiple 90-plus percent days of attendance, that kids have come into school, conflict of minimized students are being kind to each other and wanting to be in the classrooms and teachers are working on their pedagogy and their teaching and we're all learning and growing together. You know, I've had kids who have told, who are telling me I love my school, which to me warms my heart because, again, I couldn't find many kids who said that last year, just five months ago, but now kids have said I love my school, I love being here, and again, this is the work. But again, if no one knows this, then it's for nothing, especially when you're possibly facing closure. So, being able to have the chance to have new or T schools, chance to do the banks come into our school, visit classrooms, and not only that, you know, as God would have it. You know, he was joined by the Bronx Board of President, you know, vanessa L Gibson who came as well, and several people from the CEC, you know, and different entities in the community were all there and walked the hallways and they heard the story and heard my call to action to ask it was. It was dope, you know.

Speaker 2: 24:17

And again, all of a sudden a narrative changed. A narrative change to a space where people are like, wow, this great thing's happening here. And I emphasize, we're still in the embryonic phase, we're still in the beginning phase of this new existence. But, however, this served multiple purposes, because now there is the eyeballs of the things and the shifts and pivots that we've made in the school community. But now there's a higher expectation of me, my students, my staff, my parents, because now the eyeballs are on us. So it's great to be in a position now where, you know, people pay attention, people wanna see when, but and they're watching and that's funny. I know this is gonna be such a cliche, like I keep saying, I feel like we are Colorado, we are please. I am not me on Deion, by any means, I'm not Coach Pran, but however, there's a feeling of like, wow, they're doing that. But then it's also understanding that now the expectation is much higher because everybody wants to see what's happening.

Speaker 2: 25:37

What is, how is this? What is going to be the end result of this? And this is where we are now. You know, we're doubling down on instruction. We're asking ourselves how do we, what is it that we need to do to really make sure that we're building that connective tissue and we're getting stronger and we're getting better at what we're doing? And the ultimate goal of it's no longer keeping the school open, it's no longer about turning the school around, it's about growing. It's about pushing our kids, it's about pushing our teachers and having results to say that this is the best middle school in District 7. But even better yet, in the long haul, this is the best model of what a middle school could look like.

Speaker 2: 26:28

Because, again, there's a lot of schools that are struggling.

Speaker 2: 26:31

There are a lot of schools that are in that space of the commutation, of possible closure. I want, you know, exploration and Discovery MS-224, to be a model for other schools. Those schools can say, hey, this comes. We wanna come see what you did and what you guys are doing so that we can borrow some things, go ahead and steal some things and implementing to our repertoire, into our journey so that we can also, you know, be the best at what we do.

Speaker 2: 27:07

Yeah, so these are some of the things that I've learned in the past five months. It's only been five months, so we got a whole eight months, about eight months or so left in the school year, and I'm hoping that I can come back to you and share results. That blows beyond my imagination. Whatever I'm thinking, whatever the goals were reset, I'm hoping and I know that the end result is gonna be fantastic. All right, so I wanna quickly close out by thanking man, the community of Brook Ave and that 142nd block back at Hohentau, that Hohentau Community District 7, because, again, the community staff, the students, the parents, you know, have been pivotal in the changes that we're experiencing right now and the growth that we're experiencing.

Speaker 2: 28:09

I wanna thank you listeners for giving me space to tell the story and continue to tell the story. Yeah, if I close up, I'm gonna go ahead and do that thing that I always do, that I should be doing asking you to engage. Please leave a comment, tell me about your school journey and ask questions, and I am open book. I'll share with you anything I can share with you about this journey of no longer turning to a school around but keeping a school open. That thing that's powerful. We have turnaround principles and turnaround school leaders and all of a sudden, I feel like I became a keep a school open principle and so that could be a thing. But please engage, share, like, subscribe, stay tuned for more insights on my journey as a leader and also many other topics on this podcast, and I'm gonna put this out there.

Speaker 2: 29:09

If you're a school leader and you're like man, I'm stuck. I need help. Reach out, reach out, send me, leave me a comment, direct message to me. Let's jump on a call. I'm always in support of school leaders and my colleagues, regardless where you are in the country. Set up a coaching session. That sounds good, you know 15, 20, 30 minutes and we'll talk. But again, this work that we're doing is for the betterment of our children, and I wanna be of service to you as well. This should not just be me just talking about what I've done, but also sharing with you, you know, whatever I can to help you in your journey as well. All right, folks, this is Uchein Joku. It's been a privilege. It's been a privilege to be in this space to talk to you, and I look forward to talking to you again. All right, be well and we'll talk soon.