No shortcuts to excellent schools

‘And be sure to show your work.”

Remember back in grade school, how you hated it when your teacher said that?

What's the difference how I come up with the solution, you thought, as long as it's right.

Of course, by now you know that in most things it's not enough to stumble across the correct answer. Far more important to know the process - to be able to generate solution after solution, even when the details change.

It comes to mind as two national high school rankings are released this week, including a handful of top Iowa schools in their number.

Eight Iowa schools made Newsweek magazine's list this year of the country's best 1,000 public high schools, including Iowa City West, Iowa City High, Cedar Rapids Washington, Cedar Rapids Kennedy, Cedar Falls, Decorah, Ames and Mid-Prairie in Wellman.

The Washington Post also released its top 1,900 schools this week, which listed Washington, Kennedy, West, Ames and Des Moines Roosevelt.

Both publications generated their lists by crunching data like graduation and college matriculation rates, test scores and Advanced Placement courses.

And while the schools that made the grade deserve a big pat on the back for the recognition, there's a much larger, unanswered question to ask here: How do we replicate their success?

Oh, if it were as easy as memorizing a formula: Qualified teachers + supported and motivated students + plentiful resources = superior schools.

But the truth is not everything that works in Des Moines will fly in North Liberty. Solon won't excel by trying to simply mirror West or Washington. There may be best practices, but there are no more shortcuts to educational excellence for schools than there are for students.

I hope that message comes through, too, at Gov. Terry Branstad's Teacher and Principal Leadership Symposium this summer, intended to “launch a statewide conversation” about how to create stronger shared school leadership in Iowa. Dozens of local and national experts are expected to share their 2 cents.

There's a lot of value in sharing ideas about how to recognize, reward and enhance the ways teachers serve as leaders within their schools. But we need to be careful not to get so caught up looking for the one “right answer” that we forget the bigger picture.

It's not enough to hit upon the solution once or even a dozen times. We have to know how to apply the lessons in a number of different contexts.

We have to show our work.

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jennifer.hemmingsen@sourcemedia.net