Urban school award provides national model
Published: November 1, 2006
The Award for Urban School Board Excellence, presented by the National School Board Association’s Council of Urban Boards of Education, offers useful lessons for urban school districts in California and elsewhere in the nation, according to JoAnn Yee, a senior director at CSBA who was one of the program’s five judges.
This year’s winner is Norfolk Public Schools of Norfolk, Va., the only district that has been a finalist for the honor in all three years that the award has been given. Yee said Norfolk Public Schools stands out for its consistency of purpose, progress in overcoming the achievement gap and effectiveness in fostering community support, which it earns through a strong partnership with parents and other public organizations.
NSBA Executive Director Anne L. Bryant agreed, noting, “Norfolk has used a steady and deliberate approach to reaching out to its community and to focus on what works best for its students. Over time, this strategy has paid off handsomely in terms of Norfolk’s high student performance and the strong support of its key stakeholders.”
“I have been a judge for the CUBE award for the last three years,” said Yee. “There are more urban districts in California than in any other state in the union, so the lessons learned from the winners of the CUBE Award are valuable for us. We know that if school boards exercise strong leadership, engage the community, and make academic excellence the primary focus of their district, they can significantly improve academic achievement for all students and narrow the achievement gap.”
Finalists in this year’s Award for Urban School Board Excellence were the Houston Independent School District in Texas and Miami-Dade County Public Schools in Florida.
The judges praised Houston in particular for its board monitoring system, which includes a self-evaluation process for each member, and for focusing its preschool programs on student achievement. Miami-Dade was recognized for its community engagement and its progress with student achievement for all children.
Past recipients of CUBE’s showcase award were the School District of Hillsborough, Fla., in 2005 and the Boston School Committee in Massachusetts in 2004.
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