Deasy wants to create small, specialty schools

One administrator would oversee all high schools

The new schools would extend through all grades, Deasy said.

‘‘We’re offering a high degree of autonomy for a high degree of accountability,” Deasy said.

The school board would send out requests-for-proposals to organizations that would be able to teach languages or other special skills under Deasy’s plan, White said.

The organizations would work for the school system on a contract basis, according to Deasy and could provide their own teachers under the contract or train teachers already here in the union.

White said it will take about two years to begin implementing Deasy’s plans; provision for the new arrangements will be included in the fiscal 2009 budget.

The plan to reorganize high schools includes putting them under the direction of an assistant superintendent who would be responsible for tracking their performance. That individual would not be tied to a geographic region but oversee the all high schools. Five regional assistant superintendents are on the county’s current organization chart.

White said Deasy’s main concern in the restructuring would be to boost achievement in high schools, where students have struggled to do well on assessment tests in algebra, biology, English and government.

‘‘The high school piece is probably the one with the greatest need,” White said. ‘‘[Deasy] is going to create a high school consortium ... to lead and support those schools.”

The high school initiative could also result in the schools being divided into small learning communities that allow students to get to know faculty and staff better.

‘‘Research has shown that in a school where a child feels known... that child does better,” White said. ‘‘We’re going to establish more intimate learning environments where every student is known by an adult.”

Signature academies and specialty training at every county high school are also a priority in Deasy’s initiative, White said. Those could include several types of academies teaching specialized subjects to students.

Deasy also wants the county vocational high schools to partner with construction businesses and trade unions so the school system can ‘‘do a world class job” at teaching students technical skills.

This piece of the initiative could cut down on overcrowding at schools like Eleanor Roosevelt High School, where there always are students on a waiting list for its science and technology program.

‘‘We shouldn’t have students clamoring to go to one school over another,” White said.