Superintendent Covington said changes are going as planned

KANSAS CITY – With the stench of Superintendent John Covington’s school closings fading away, we can now set our sights on the transformation process taking place inside the Kansas City School District.

“No more buildings will be closed — all that’s done,” said an elated Covington during a recent state of the district speech. “Now we can focus on teaching and learning. Now we can make sure we are changing the paradigms in the classroom.”

In the aftermath of scholastic hail, sleet and heavy thunderstorms, the future of Kansas City academics appear to be a little sunnier as a series of new projects are expected to launch soon. On the horizon are: a new student-centered learning system, performance-based incentives for teachers, technological enhancements and distance-learning labs.

There’s also talk of opening an all-male academy in 2012.

Wow! An all-male school? Something in the mold of Oprah Winfrey’s all-female academy in South Africa? I have an idea. Let’s call it ‘Morehouse Midwest.’

“The general community has no idea how far we’ve come,” said Covington. “They don’t have a clue what we’ve done the past two years.” Like many of you, I’m neither a fan or advocate of the school closings. Yet, I wish the district much success because the children are what’s most important here.

When Covington arrived in 2009, he and his cabinet deemed it financially necessary to contract 40% of Kansas City’s schools in a ballsy attempt to slice $68 million from the district’s dwindling budget.

Rather than stick with the traditional system of organizing students by grade level, Covington and company decided to group students together based on the level of academic skills they’ve already proven; leaving open the awkward possibility of an eighth grade student sharing a classroom with a high school senior.

The new strategy was met with fierce opposition from the teacher’s union, disgruntled parents and community leaders. Today, Covington feels somewhat vindicated. “If anyone asks, ‘Can any good thing come out of Kansas City?’” Covington declared, “tell them to come and see.”

There may be some good things coming out of Kansas City.

But the violent, subhuman events taking place inside the Southwest Early College Campus serve as a notable exception. When the students aren’t starting fires they’re beating up teachers. Two principals have already quit within the past year. As of now, Covington’s attempt to convert Southwest from a magnet school to a general high school appears to be a colossal failure.

“Everything went off as planned other than the debacle at Southwest,” Covington said prior to his speech. “Everything else was lost in the conversation.”

True. But the success of Covington’s transformation project hinges squarely on the district’s ability or inability to bring Southwest up to standard. Hell, parents are scared to send their kids there. “There are a lot of questions going into this school year,” said parent Elisha Verge, who has children in Southwest.

“We had a lot of issues over safe schools and principal turnover.”

Teachers are shaking in their boots too.

Many educators are demanding the district do a better job of enforcing its student conduct policy. Last year, the kids were rabid and completely out of control. “We need a year with not so many changes, without the chaos,” said Andrea Flinders, president of the teachers’ union.

“We need to start building the district up again, focus on the kids and regain the confidence of the community. That would be nice.”

And the congregation said: “AMEN!”