OXFORD, Miss. - For years, students in the Holly Springs and Marshall County public schools who needed summer school classes faced a tough choice: take classes at another school system or go without them. Unable to afford travel and tuition costs, many students chose the latter, and failed to advance to the next grade level.
But this summer, 176 students from the two districts received the classes they needed at Holly Springs High School, thanks to the Mississippi Teacher Corps program at the University of Mississippi. The Teacher Corps provided 32 teachers for the effort, allowing both school systems to afford summer school for the first time in 15 years.
"The Teacher Corps program has given Holly Springs a wonderful and unique opportunity to provide a summer school program for our seventh through 12th grade students," said Irene Walton, interim school superintendent. "Since the start of summer school, I've heard nothing but positive comments from students, parents and those in the community. We're already in discussions for continuing the collaboration next year and into the future."
Historically, Teacher Corps trainees generally serve in schools where the majority of students are black. According to Holly Springs School District officials, only eight of this summer's students are Caucasian. Officials also estimated more than 100 students needed courses to be promoted to the next grade level.
"I know that my son certainly wouldn't have been able to pass without it," said Dorothy Buck of Holly Springs.
Other students participated for their own academic enrichment.
"Taking this English II class has really prepared me for this fall," said Crishun Moore, a junior at H.W. Byers High School in Sand Flat. "Mr. (Joel) Hebert taught me several interesting things I hadn't known previously. It was quite fun, actually."
The Mississippi Teacher Corps is a two-year program that recruits college graduates to teach in critical-shortage areas of the Mississippi Delta in exchange for scholarships to earn master's degrees in curriculum and instruction from UM. Founded by Amy Gutman, a Harvard University graduate student, and Andy Mullins, former special assistant to the State Superintendent of Education, the program has trained more than 350 participants, benefiting an estimated 70,000 public school students since its inception in 1989.
"This is the largest class we have ever had," said Ben Guest, program manager of the Corps. "We received over 400 applications for 32 spots." This year's group includes five participants from Williams College, four from Ole Miss, three each from Harvard University and Amherst College and two from Brown University, he added.
In Holly Springs, the teachers are leading classes in biology, math, English, French, Spanish and social studies. Second-year participants serve as mentors for first-year Teacher Corps members.
"This collaboration is a win-win experience for everyone involved," said Germain McConnell, the program's co-director. "Without the Teacher Corps, the Holly Springs and Marshall County schools wouldn't have been able to have summer school due to a lack of certified teachers. Through this effort, the critical needs of these students are being met with excellent instruction, our first-year teachers are being mentored and our second-year teachers are gaining valuable teaching experience as well."
McConnell said the support of administrators, staff and parents has been an important factor in the summer school's success.
"We preach to the teachers that they must establish boundaries that will create an environment conducive to learning," McConnell said. "With everyone buying into that vision, classrooms are quiet and instruction remains consistent."
Local school and Mississippi Department of Education officials are enthusiastic about the program.
"This has been a huge benefit to the students in Marshall County schools," said Jerry Moore, director of Instructional Services for Marshall County Public Schools. "I've seen our students definitely learning and benefiting from what's taking place here. As long as the Teacher Corps is willing to work with us, I'd love to see us have a long-term relationship."
"The Mississippi Teacher Corps has always provided tutors to assist in-house teachers in providing summer school programs when necessary," said Wesley Williams II, director of MDOE's Mississippi Teacher Center, the legislatively created department charged with teacher recruitment and retention for the state's schools.
"What current program participants are doing in Holly Springs is giving them an excellent work experience before they begin their regular assignments in August," Williams added.
A 1996 alumnus of the teacher corps, Williams said the program provides "a wonderful alternative route" to educators desiring certification and placement in Mississippi's schools and in other states.
Joel Hebert, a second-year teacher who taught last year at Simmons High School in Hollandale, agrees.
"This summer has surpassed all of my expectations," Hebert said. "To have six teachers in the same classroom who share a common thread of expectations and procedures is truly a luxury."
A Williams College graduate and Vermont native, Hebert said he was drawn to the Mississippi Teacher Corps as an alternate route to teacher certification.
"I saw there was a need for teachers in the Mississippi Delta, and I wanted to be a part of the solution," Hebert said. "I would tell anyone this is a program for people who have a strong commitment and will see things through."
Elizabeth Savage, another second-year teacher, said she felt "very lucky" to be in Holly Springs this summer.
"This is not a glamorous job, but just making the connection with the kids means so much to me," said Savage, who will return to Gentry High School in Indianola this fall. "Even the smallest interactions can lead to profound changes in students' behaviors. Seeing hope come alive in them as they succeed at things they thought that they couldn't do is so fulfilling."
A native of Portland, Ore., who spent two years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon, Savage said joining the Teacher Corps was "the next logical step" in her desire to continue doing things that are worthwhile. She has plans to remain in the state as a teacher for at least another four years.
Holly Dawson of Birmingham also volunteered with the Peace Corps in the Philippines. Following this summer in Holly Springs, she will spend her first year in the Teacher Corps program at Calloway High School in Jackson.
"Teaching these kids is a wonderful experience for me," she said. "I'm learning as I am being taught and putting theories into practice. The feedback from the more experienced teachers is great."
Landon Pollard of Birmingham recently earned his bachelor's degree in English from Ole Miss. His faculty advisors in the Sally McDonnell Barksdale Honors College recommended that he apply for the Teacher Corps.
"Being in the Teacher Corps has made me realize how noble the teaching profession really is," Pollard said. "I never expected the kids to make such a profound impact upon me, but in the four weeks I've been here teaching, I've already come to love them."
Story by Edwin Smith
Many of the first and second-years have written about their individual summer school experiences in their blogs. I’ll leave the day-to-day challenges and triumphs to the teachers who were actually there, putting in the hard work. Instead let me write about the overall impact.
Every student in every MTC Summer School class was given a pre and post-test to assess the “Teacher Corps impact.” The impact would be measured in one month of schooling equal to four months of regular school as the kids had four classes a day.
Each group of classroom teachers was responsible for creating the pre and post-test. Many simply used the state-tests available on-line. Some devised their own based on the subject and grade level (because we had different teachers creating different tests the final numbers don’t give us a statistically sound measure of the effect of Teacher Corps. Hopefully, next year we will have a validated assessment tool for each class so we can have reportable data.) On the last day we calculated the average percent increase on the post-test for each class and also for the student body as a whole.
In four weeks the impact of Teacher Corps on the student body as a whole was an average 79% increase from the pre-test to the post-test.
79%. In one month.
A few kids did worse, a few did better, but most did much better. One girl made a 0 out of 60 on the biology pre-test and a 30 out of 60 on the post. In my limited understanding of math I believe this indicates an infinite percent increase (to actually calculate her increase we assumed she made a 1 out of 60 on the pre-test, which would have given her a 3000% increase.)
79%. In one month. It blows my mind. What would happen if we had three months?
And that brings me back to Wade’s question: “Why doesn’t Teacher Corps place 25 teachers at one school?”
While it is a good question I think I now have a better one:
Why doesn’t Teacher Corps run our own school?
I want you to imagine something. I want you to imagine 176 middle and high school students who failed. Now I want you to imagine a school filled only with these students. 176 kids, many of whom were a discipline problem, making up the entire student body. What would that school look like? What would it sound like?
Now I want you to imagine the hallways completely empty during instructional time. There are no roamers, no arguments, no fights. In every classroom every single student is working. Every single teacher is teaching. At break time students hustle back to class a full minute before the bell rings. At dismissal 176 kids leave the building in an orderly fashion.
One hundred and seventy-six students, many of whom were targeted as problem students during the school year, having an engaging, positive, school experience. You don’t need to imagine anymore. It’s a reality.
Sure, there were some problems. We ended up sending four kids home. Once that was done it set the tone for the entire school.
Joe Sweeney did a yeoman’s job of stepping up and serving as an MTC administrator, something that he was under no obligation to do. Overall, things ran incredibly well.
The biggest compliment about the MTC Summer School I received was from Mr. Chase, the Holly Springs High School principal. He said that one day during break he was talking to a student who had been a serious discipline problem during the school year. As Mr. Chase asked him how school was going the student said, “Mr. Chase, I’d love to talk to you but I have to get back to class. I don’t want to get a tardy.”
Mr. Chase shook his head while sharing this story, as if he couldn’t believe it. “This is giving me a vision for how normal school can run,” he said. “We’ve never had anything like this…”
In the days leading up to the first day of summer school it looked doubtful that we would get the minimum of 100 students needed. The only hope was that once summer school actually started word-of-mouth would spread and we would have kids registering after the first day or so.
Summer school started on Tuesday, June 6th with about 100 students. By Friday, June 9th (the last day of registration) we had 176 students.
The first two days were a little rocky, especially when we showed up at 7:30 AM on Tuesday, along with about 100 kids, and the class rolls weren’t ready. The students sat in the cafeteria, getting nosier and nosier, while our first-years seemed to get more and more uncomfortable. The tension built as time stretched on.
“As long as a fight doesn’t break out this is prefect,” I said to Joe Sweeney, the MTC alum hired to observe all of the first (and second) years. “Even when it is bad it’s good for us because it’s real.” All of the MTC alumni who have had to keep homeroom for hours on end will know exactly what I mean.
Finally, about 9:30, the rosters were ready and the students were called out by class. The MTC Summer School had finally become a reality. Now all we had to do was uphold our end of the bargain and provide quality instruction…
We were proposing was a four hour summer school broken down into four fifty-minute “periods” with a five minute break in between each lesson. We would have two or three second-years and two or three first-years in each room. One of the second-years would teach one fifty-minute lesson once a day and the rest of the periods would be taught by the first-years (after the first few days, of course.) This solved all of the problems that I previously listed. It was real critical-needs kids in a real school setting with excellent MTC teachers modeling good teaching and providing continuous feedback to the first-years.
I had another meeting with the teachers at the end of April. While they could see all of these potential benefits many were wary of participating. However, we made some concessions that helped ease the wariness. First, we rearranged the schedule so that they could take the computer class as an online course during the summer. This allowed us to keep the second-years from attending Saturday classes in the spring. Two, we arranged with Holly Springs to pay the second-years a small stipend. Three, we said that it was very likely that they would all get laptop computers (which now looks like it, unfortunately, won’t happen.)
Once that fire was put out we turned our attention to the students. To make it work we needed 100 students. The Friday before summer school we were 30 kids short...
It was the end of a long day of classes towards the end of a long school year in early April when I stood in front of the soon to be second-years and excitedly told them of the great change we were making to the program. Instead of taking classes in June, the second-years would teach summer school in Holly Springs and mentor the incoming group of first-years. In my excitement over the past few months of making this idea a reality I had assumed that the teachers would be just as excited as I was. Of course, we all know what happens when you assume.
The next few weeks I received many angry calls and emails and several people threatened to quit the program altogether. Even some of the people who never complain about anything called. A few, most notably Dave Molina who had complained about everything else, sent emails in support of the idea.
The problem, I believe, was this: everyone could see that MTC running our own summer school would be a tremendous benefit both to the teachers in our program and the children of Holly Springs. However, the second-years simply didn’t want the change to start with them, especially after being told in the beginning of the year to never teach summer school.
They had a point. I think some of the second-years still don’t understand how, as a program, we encourage our teachers not to teach summer school and then, later in the year, require them to teach summer school. Let me explain:
Summer school at most Delta schools is an eight-hour day with 30 kids and one teacher in one room. The kids have all failed, most have likely been a discipline problem, and the principal is around even less than usual because it is the summer. Furthermore, the kids’ parents have paid money for summer school and fully expect their children to pass. And in most Delta summer schools all the kids pass. Teaching that type of summer school will take years off of your life. What we were proposing was radically different…
A few weeks later Germain and I set up a meeting with Irene Walton, the interim Superintendent at Holly Springs. After having spent many mornings driving to and from Holly Springs we asked that they travel to Oxford. We felt that the summer school was now a longshot and, if they were really interested, they would make the drive. Not only did the administration from Holly Springs make the drive, they continually reiterated how much they wanted to continue with our proposal.
At this point he big question became, “How many kids will attend?” We had calculated that with the number of first and second-year teachers we would need a minimum of 100.
Several people at the School of Education felt 100 students was unrealistic. I’ve been told many an idea wouldn’t work (a summer intern, an MTC Reunion, 400 applications, to name just a few.) Sometimes it seems that all I do is listen to someone tell my why something won’t work. As all of these ideas did indeed work I did what I always do: put my head down and keep going.
The more immediate problem was convincing the soon to be second-years, who all this time had been expecting to take courses at Ole Miss during June, to buy into the idea of an MTC summer school. The initial meeting I had with them did not go well…
“We’d love to,” said the Holly Springs Superintendent (who shall remain nameless for reasons soon to come), when she heard our idea about MTC basically running summer school with our first and second-year teachers at Holly Springs High. “We’ve been wanting to run a summer school for years but could never get enough teachers.”
After the meeting Germain and I stopped at a gas station near the district office to buy soda pop and congratulate ourselves. It was 10:30 in the morning and there was an inebriated man at the counter buying two more bottles of beer. As we stood there in our suits he turned and looked at us.
“You’re not from around here, are you?” he asked.
We smiled and told him we were from the University of Mississippi.
He said, “Look at y’all, you don’t have any grease on you or anything.”
After we left the gas station Germain and I drove back to Oxford bouncing ideas back and forth. We spent the next few months laying the groundwork for the MTC Summer School. It was slow going, meeting with the Dean and Dr. Mullins, meeting with the various faculty at the School of Education, discussing how to change or shift the second-years' course schedule, getting approval from everyone, and continually meeting with Holly Springs. Finally, on a Wednesday in late March, Germain and I planned to drive up to Holly Springs the next day to officially sign a contract to run summer school. The meeting was abruptly canceled. The next day (the day we were supposed to sign the contract) we found out that the Superintendent had been fired for embezzlement.
All the groundwork was down the drain. And we had no backup plan…
Holly Springs is a critical-needs school district located about 35 miles north of Oxford. In the past five years we have placed six teachers there. Two, Richard Campbell ‘03 and Monica Govan ’04, are still there.
Oxford is home, of course, to the University of Mississippi, where both of our first-year and second-year participants take courses and complete their training as part of the Teacher Corps. In previous summers the second-years took Ed Law and Ed Research while the first-years did their initial teaching at Oxford High School, under the supervision of whatever veteran teacher the MTCer was placed with.
There are a whole host of reasons why this is problematic but I’ll just run through the major ones:
1) Kids from Oxford are nothing like kids from the Delta. Most of the kids in the Oxford school system are middle-class, white, and come from a home with two well-educated parents. Basically, kids from a typical university town.
2) Summer school at Oxford is one long 8-hour block. First-years observe in the mornings, about four hours at a time. It is nothing like real school with bells and periods and students entering and exiting every fifty minutes.
3) The veteran teacher was a question mark. Sometimes it was a kid fresh out of the School of Education who had never taught before. Sometimes it was a grizzled veteran who told our teachers to sit in the back and watch for the entire month. Sometimes it was a lazy teacher collecting a paycheck who shuffled all of the work onto our teachers. Mostly though, you had average teachers who would teach a little bit and then use the two or three MTCers to tutor one-on-one or in small groups. In any event, rarely was it a dynamic teacher with outstanding classroom management skills who modeled good practices to our teachers and then had them teach lessons once a day for fifty minutes.
4) First-years and second-years rarely spent time together. While MTC has almost always had a strong camaraderie within each group there has never been a great first-year/second-year bond.
In November, after kicking the idea around for a while, Germain McConnell and I set up a meeting with the Holly Springs School District. Basically, we said we had an enrichment program they might be interested in. As we drove to Holly Springs in the university van Germain and I had no idea if they would be receptive to what were really going to propose: an MTC Summer School based at Holly Springs…
“Why don’t you place 25 teachers in one school?” Wade Chambers ‘96, MTC Reunion
At the MTC Reunion last July, during one of our open forums for MTC alumni to discuss topics and ask questions, Wade posed the one above. It immediately struck me as both brilliant and impossible. Brilliant because it solves one of the two biggest problems MTC teachers face: the quality of our individual teachers is diluted by the many mediocre teachers the kids have had before and will have after. While there are certainly some outstanding teachers in the Delta (and I worked with several of them) the majority are mediocre, at best (The other biggest problem we have is that our teachers often work for incompetent administrators.)
The idea is probably impossible though (in the way that Wade phrased it) because rarely, if ever, will a school have 25 openings at once. Simmons High School, where I taught, had only about 15 full-time teachers.
But the question nagged me in the weeks after the Reunion, and continues to nag me still. We may have found a solution, or at least the beginnings of one. While placing 25 teachers at the same school will probably never come to pass, this summer we got to see what would happen if, for a month, MTC ran their own school. The results were incredible…
My Groups
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Mississippi Teacher Corps Updated: May 9, 2008
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Peace Corps Updated: Nov 28, 2007
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Mississippi Teacher Corps (host) Updated: May 15, 2007
