To the editors:
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In Hammond, as your article documents, teachers play a fundamental role in making changes. In Chicago’s reform law, there is only an advisory role for most teachers to play. Thus, teachers will have to assert themselves as leadership agents but will have little codified standing in this regard. In fact, teachers are usually the last to be consulted when suggestions for change are solicited.
The operative phrase in Hammond is “shared decision-making” and the school site is where this process takes place. The consensus process that goes on in the Hammond model would be entirely accidental in Chicago’s schools because of the structure of local councils as designated by law. Chicago’s school councils will be making their decisions as mini-boards, not necessarily as collaborative committees working on specific problems.
Chicago Teachers Union
First, the Hammond design for school-based management does rely on consensus-building techniques to reach decisions. But the process seems less an end in itself than a way to enrich the decisions by involving everybody concerned–the teachers, parents, and administrators–in the consequences.
