Abstract
This study examines issues encountered during a school’s first year implementing science, technology, engineering, arts, and math (STEAM) curriculum. The school year began with multiple changes in leadership, including the appointment of a School Operations Manager and Teacher on Special Assignment, who took on respective roles of principal and assistant principal. Tension between school and district leadership, a teacher’s arrest, and lack of adequate training for the school’s teachers contributed to the failure of the eighth-grade level’s first-quarter STEAM unit. This study delves into events leading up to—and tensions surrounding—the team’s decision to begin a new unit in the second quarter.
In the weeks leading up to the 2018 to 2019 school year, Estrella Middle School—a Title 1 school located in the southwestern United States—began preparations for its first year as a science, technology, engineering, arts, and math (STEAM) school. District officials hired Dr. Kathryn Covey to fill the role of Director of STEAM Innovation, and Dr. Covey chose four schools to implement the curriculum. Estrella in particular was selected due to its historically poor performance on state mandated testing and for its small size. These factors pushed Estrella to the forefront of Dr. Covey’s mind when picking between the district’s three middle schools. “Not only does Estrella provide an excellent space to showcase the turnaround possible with a STEAM curriculum,” Dr. Covey noted, “but it was the general feeling in the district that curriculum implementation would be more manageable in a smaller school.”
The teacher turnover rate at Estrella had been increasing dramatically over the previous 5 years since it transitioned from an elementary school to a middle school. About a third of the school’s teachers were either in their first year of teaching—nearly 25%—or their first-year teaching at Estrella. The new school year also brought about significant change in administration: The traditional principal and assistant principal positions were eliminated, and the people who filled the roles were let go. A School Operations Manager (SOM), Caroline Turner, and a Teacher on Special Assignment (TOSA), Brenda Ortega, were hired to fill the traditional principal and assistant principal roles, respectively. These positions, in addition to the new STEAM curriculum, were part of the district’s plan to turn Estrella around.
For the most part, Estrella’s veteran teachers—the majority of whom were used to failed reform ideas coming and going—were wary of the new STEAM implementation process and of Dr. Covey. The school had spent the last several years as an arts-focused middle school, a reform that had failed to secure funding after their grant expired. As a result of this, one among many failed school reform efforts Estrella’s veteran teachers had witnessed, the new STEAM curriculum was collectively viewed as a bit of a fad—another hastily implemented idea doomed to fade away with time or the depreciation of funds.
Some veteran teachers also expressed a lack of trust in Dr. Covey. Though Covey had previously worked as a science teacher in a demographically similar district in the same state before getting her doctorate, teachers and staff viewed her as an outsider. As a result of this mistrust, the failure of previous reform efforts, the redesigned administrative positions, and Estrella’s large number of first-year teachers, many of the school’s teachers reacted to the new curriculum with frustration. Some, however, chose to stay on the sidelines, expressing little beyond a shrug of the shoulders. “It’s just another thing,” said eighth grade science teacher Ricardo Jiménez, “they’ll try it out for a couple years then they’ll give up and move on to the next thing. It’s how it goes here.” These factors, combined with the expected school-year tensions that come with life in a Title 1 middle school, served as the foundation of a rocky year for Estrella.
Case Background
Dr. Covey’s vision for a STEAM pipeline did not resonate with all the teachers and staff at Estrella. TOSA Ortega, previously an eighth grade Language Arts teacher at Estrella, expressed concern over Dr. Covey’s vision and the lack of teacher buy-in. “The teachers here were never asked their opinion on becoming a STEAM school, and they know our kids best,” she stated, We also have a lot of older, veteran teachers who are set in their ways . . . how are you going to sell them on a totally new curriculum without asking their opinion in the first place? You can’t do that. They just feel devalued . . . and they’re done [brief laughter] . . . but that’s typical TFA [Teach for America] bullshit. The district brings Dr. Covey in here thinking she’s the s*** and can transform the school by being White and having a Ph.D. and ooooo she taught for five years at Vista Del Mar and boom suddenly we’re an A+ school. It just doesn’t work like that. You have to know the school. You have to be part of the school before change can happen.
Ortega’s sentiments did not go unnoticed by the teachers she maintained close friendships with, and many of them, both new and veteran teachers, agreed with her assessment of both Dr. Covey and STEAM implementation. One seventh-grade teacher, reflecting on Dr. Covey’s discourse about students, confided, “What’s she doing, calling them ‘kiddos?’ Does she know them? Does she care about them? Does she spend time with them? It just rubs me the wrong way. They’re not your kids.” Other teachers derogatively described Covey has having “Ph.D. syndrome”—a term they used to describe the fact that she came into her employment with big ideas from her doctoral work, yet no personal knowledge of or connection to the district community.
Despite high levels of mistrust within various relationships at Estrella—between Ortega and Covey, veteran teachers and Covey, and veteran teachers and new teachers—STEAM training and professional development for Estrella’s teachers began without a hitch in the last week of July. Both Dr. Covey and SOM Turner led the trainings for STEAM development. Most of the trainings involved problem-based learning activities that called upon different groupings of teachers to compete against each other to come up with the best solution to, for example, constructing the tallest “house” out of toilet paper rolls, cotton balls, and rubber bands. The training also incorporated videos of successful STEAM teachers and their lessons, and group brainstorming surrounding problem solving. The final 2 days of STEAM training called for each grade to come together and plan their first STEAM lesson. Dr. Covey and SOM Turner had planned for the final 30 min of each school day to be devoted to a STEAM class, and each teacher would be responsible for guiding their homeroom through the unit. Over the span of 2 days, each grade-level team planned their first STEAM unit with varying degrees of success. Once each grade-level competed their unit plan and it was approved by Dr. Covey, individual teachers were expected to create their lesson plans based on their homeroom’s progress through the unit. An end date for the first unit was set for mid-November, just before parent-teacher conferences and the Thanksgiving break, and the teachers were sent off on their own to create STEAM lessons.
Building Frustration
Over the course of the 2-day planning period, the eighth grade team struggled to come to a consensus regarding how to integrate the arts into their unit on manufacturing soap. This problem led them to mutually agree that while their next unit would incorporate the arts aspect of STEAM, their first unit would be more STEM-focused as they found their footing. Once the school year began, the eighth grade team sat down every Thursday for STEAM planning meetings. These meetings, however, were short and mainly consisted of each teacher debriefing where they were with their lessons and then raising complaints about individual students. Dr. Covey sat in on a team meeting once a month, offering guidance through posing questions to get the team to consider their problems from another perspective.
The first quarter proved difficult for many teachers, particularly the three first-year teachers on the eighth-grade team: Diana James, Sharon Singleton, and Greg Holmes. While other grades moved forward with their plans successfully, the eighth-grade teachers struggled to get their students through the first unit. The three first-year teachers, informed consciously and unconsciously by the mistrust voiced by veteran teachers, were frequently frustrated by what they viewed as Dr. Covey’s unhelpful input in the planning meetings. Both Diana James and Sharon Singleton noted that they felt like they had been thrown into a situation totally unprepared, planning lessons outside of their subject and teacher training wheelhouses, and their requests for substantive help, as opposed to guiding questions, were met with resistance at Dr. Covey’s end. “I just have no idea what I’m doing,” Ms. James said, It’s been over a decade since I’ve had a science class, and whenever I ask for help planning lessons and figuring out objectives, either from Dr. Covey or another teacher who’s been here for a while, I’m basically told to figure it out on my own. So, I know my students aren’t learning.
To complicate Estrella’s environment further, in mid-October one of the eighth grade math teachers was arrested on charges of domestic violence, cause enough for his immediate firing from the school and district. The situation was made more complex by the fact that the charges indicated he had violently assaulted both his wife and his 15-year-old son, an Estrella alum. The teacher had long been considered a beloved and respected member of the Estrella community, and many of Estrella’s teachers had fond memories of his son as a student. Both Ricardo Jiménez, an eighth-grade science teacher, and TOSA Ortega had considered the math teacher to be a close friend, and they were visibly shaken for a number of weeks following the teacher’s arrest. Estrella was forced into the spotlight momentarily, and news vans, cameras, and reporters were regular fixtures outside the school gates for a week. A long-term substitute teacher was found and hired after a 2-week search. The substitute, Matt Long, had no previous teaching experience. As a result of Mr. Long’s inexperience, his lack of STEAM training—which he was never required to complete as a substitute—a general lack cohesion among the eighth-grade team, and the students’ refusal to believe the charges against their former teacher, Mr. Long’s math classroom was in a constant state of disarray. TOSA Ortega, upon hanging up from a call with Mr. Long regarding a student discipline referral, lamented, “I don’t even want to know what’s going on in that classroom.”
By the week before parent-teacher conferences, only one eighth-grade teacher, Mark Whitting, the veteran social studies teacher, had successfully completed the first STEAM unit. The remaining teachers were within varying degrees of completeness. Mr. Jiménez, also a veteran teacher, rushed his class through the final 2 days of the unit to be finished by the deadline, and in the final grade-level meeting he told the other teachers that he knew his students would not retain any of the information he guided them through over the last week. During this meeting the teachers came to a general consensus, with one of the Language Arts teachers expressing dissent, that the unit was considered a failure and that they should “wrap up as best they could by the end of the week.”
By this point, each of the seven teachers had brought forth a proposal for the next STEAM unit, and the case discussed in the next section details the meeting where a final decision was made.
Case Narrative
On the Monday of the week before Thanksgiving, the eighth-grade team sat down during lunch for their final STEAM planning meeting before the break. They met in Mr. Jiménez’s room, with Dr. Covey and TOSA Ortega in attendance, and the main agenda of the day was to decide on the topic for the next unit. Matt Long, the long-term math substitute, was not in attendance. The tensions among the teachers and administrators sitting in the room were clear before the meeting’s start, with the eighth-grade team sitting in a circle and Dr. Covey sitting just outside the circle working on her laptop, clearly indicating her role as an observer. TOSA Ortega sat in the corner behind Covey—outside of the senior administrator’s sightline—and engaged in joking conversation with Ms. James and Mr. Jiménez until the meeting began.
After a prompt from Covey to begin the meeting, Ms. James, the first-year Language Arts teacher, tentatively began discussing a new STEAM unit that she had found through a teaching website. The unit would require students to make an extensive plan for opening a restaurant in their neighborhood. Ms. James’s proposal was initially met with excitement by the other language arts teacher, Marcos Garcia, a second-year teacher, as well as the other two first-year teachers, Ms. Singleton and Mr. Holmes. There were lesson plans for the unit available online, it was designed for seventh to eighth graders, would take a month to complete, and it fulfilled all of the STEAM subject components. All in all, the unit seemed like a good fit for the team. Dr. Covey, who was present in a more observational role, said she thought the plan was a promising idea when asked directly by Ms. James, though she wondered how they would tailor the unit to Estrella’s students.
All the teachers followed along as Ms. James showed them the unit plan online, and when she was finished, Mr. Whitting expressed concern that the curriculum would not be right for the kids. “Our kids can’t do that,” he said, firmly. When Dr. Covey questioned his reasoning, he replied that the lessons would be beyond the students’ scope of understanding, and that they would be required to do math beyond their capabilities. “I don’t want to insult your teaching ability,” he said to math teacher Greg Holmes, but I don’t get the impression these kids are capable of doing basic subtraction and addition, let alone the complex problems devising a food menu and planning a budget will require them to do. Plus, god knows what the heck is going on in Long’s classroom . . . I mean what are they going to want to serve? Hot Cheetos and Takis?
His remarks were met with several seconds of silence, until Mr. Garcia made an attempt to disagree, calling Mr. Whitting’s comments unfair. “Maybe I am being unfair,” he responded, “but where’s your evidence? These kids are behind on everything.”
During this time the rest of the eighth-grade team, including Dr. Covey and TOSA Ortega, sat in silence. When Ms. James looked questioningly at Mr. Jiménez for a bit of help, he shrugged his shoulders and said, “Don’t look at me. If this is what you guys decide you want to do, then I’ll do it.” At that point, Dr. Covey leaned forward in her chair to say, “I think if you guys are going to do this, you need to come together and figure out how to make it happen.” From the corner of the room, TOSA Ortega laughed audibly.
After 15 min of deliberation and back-and-forth among Mr. Whitting, Ms. James, and the three other teachers supporting the restaurant unit, Mr. Whitting begrudgingly agreed to move forward with the unit, stating that he knew he would likely need to walk many of his homeroom students through “some very basic math.” Before they all parted, Mr. Holmes assured the group he would make sure to reinforce some of the math for the unit in his “Do Now” activities, and that he would speak to Mr. Long about a plan for the other math classes. All the teachers left the room, agreeing they would come together after the Thanksgiving break to discuss their individual lesson plans for the first week of the unit. Ms. James and TOSA Ortega stayed behind to chat with Mr. Jiménez. The two veteran Estrella teachers had taken the younger Ms. James under their wing recently, and the three occasionally went to happy hour together on Fridays. Ms. James again expressed concern over the lack of help she was receiving from Dr. Covey regarding STEAM planning, and TOSA Ortega shrugged, saying “it is what it is.” When Ms. James chided Mr. Jiménez for not providing her with more support or backing her up with the group, he laughed and said, I told you I’m not your guy for this. I’ve seen new curriculum and new people come and go and come and go. I’m just riding the tide, not rocking any boats . . . just waiting it all out. I’ll still be here when this is all done and you’re gone off to a different school in a different state.
“Plan with Marcos,” TOSA Ortega suggested, “he likes the unit and you can both come at it from a Language Arts level.” After chatting for a few more minutes, the lunch bell rang and Ms. James and TOSA Ortega made their way back to their room and office.
Reflection and Teaching Notes
A number of factors are at play in this case, all of which have contributed to a serious breakdown in STEAM implementation for the eighth-grade team: (a) The tension felt by teachers and administrators coming from students dealing with the trauma of a beloved teacher’s arrest; (b) The tension between Dr. Covey, TOSA Ortega, and many teachers; (c) The weak foundation of STEAM training combined with little-to-no continuing education; and (d) The lack of clear organization within the school, perhaps the most troubling of the factors.
The roles of SOM Turner, TOSA Ortega, and Dr. Covey are unclear, leaving the many new teachers unsure of who they should rely on for support when it comes to teaching their STEAM lessons. Max Weber’s (1981) famous theory of bureaucracy posits that organizations are systems of power, and a study of Estrella shows us that the power structure in this system is murky at best (Fligstein, Unpublished manuscript). SOM Turner appears to take no responsibility when it comes to the nitty gritty of STEAM planning, and she has not been present at any of the eighth-grade team meetings. It is unclear whether TOSA Ortega or Dr. Covey have informed SOM Turner about the tension and lack of direction among the eighth-grade team. As a result, there is a lack of trust between the teachers and administration at Estrella, and the absence is having a corrosive effect on the vulnerable eighth-grade team (Cosner, 2009).
The arrest of the math teacher in October affected the morale of many of the school’s teachers and seriously impacted the trust Estrella’s students had in their teachers. Not only was their beloved teacher charged with assaulting his wife and son, but their teachers and administrators were explicitly instructed not to discuss the “incident” at all, further damaging the students’ relationships with their teachers. With one school counselor, many of the grieving and confused students did not receive any kind of counseling, and none of the teachers and staff received any trauma training. It is clear that some basic organizational principles—and a discussion of the school as an open system, inextricably tied to and influenced by its environment—might be helpful in considering how to handle traumatic events (Scott & Davis, 2016). In addition, principles of institutional theory, social network analysis, and trust building at a leadership level will all prove useful in a reexamination of what is going wrong in Estrella’s system. (Cosner, 2009; Fligstein, Unpublished manuscript)
Mr. Whitting presents a classic example of the long-term effects of deficit thinking (Valencia, 2010). It is clear from the nature of his comments that he approached the STEAM planning with a deficit mind-set, noting that he did not feel the students at Estrella, 99% of whom come from vastly different background than him, a White, cis-gender male, were capable of completing the material. In addition, many of Estrella’s veteran teachers, such as Mr. Jiménez, were simply waiting out the years until retirement. Teacher turnover rate at schools like Estrella, with high poverty rates and high chronic absenteeism, is usually on the larger size, and Estrella’s is exceptional at 25%.
STEM and STEAM curriculum can no longer be considered by educational practitioners and scholars as passing fads in educational reform. These particular types of reforms, which focus on preparing students for specific educational pathways that feed into growing job markets, have a staying power that is undeniable. The use of these types of curriculum as tools for school turnaround will continue, and Estrella and Dr. Covey present good examples of what happens when school reform efforts become isomorphic (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983). Estrella was considered a failing school, and the district superintendent brought in Dr. Covey, fresh from her doctoral work in Curriculum and Instruction at a local university, to turn the school around. Dr. Covey’s doctoral program is known for graduating STEM and STEAM focused educational leaders, and these leaders go on to work in largely local districts, pushing the curriculum they have been taught to push; this phenomenon is indicative of the institutionalism prevalent in many educational leadership programs (Hanson, 2001). These leadership programs are an important part of the environmental fields that shape schools and school reform efforts (Hanson, 2001). At Estrella, isomorphic change was brought about though both coercive and mimetic means; the change was coercive in that the district felt the pressure from the state education agency to raise the performance of D+ school Estrella on mandated testing, and it was mimetic in that they chose the STEAM model to bring about the sought-after change (DiMaggio & Powell, 1983). This organizational homogenization is seen in schools across the nation adopting the new curriculum or changing their professional development (Hanson, 2001). However, despite Dr. Covey and the district’s efforts to implement a successful STEAM program, it was not considered to be a success. After two years, Dr. Covey was asked to step down and Estrella resumed its normal curriculum. As Mr. Jiménez noted, many teachers at Estrella and demographically similar schools—Title 1 schools in high-poverty areas with majority Black and Brown student populations—are used to quick-fix, band-aid reforms falling flat after a year or two. This can be particularly true if the reform efforts are spearheaded by community outsiders, and if those efforts ignore the many structural inequities that oppress low-income communities of color (Anyon, 1997).
Not all schools implementing a new reform look like Estrella, but many of them share characteristics. A close examination of Estrella’s specific case may give many future educational leaders pause, and grappling with the many questions it raises could illuminate multiple pathways forward.
Discussion Questions for Consideration
What role do you think the principal played in this case? What about Dr. Covey and TOSA Ortega?
What are some programs, policies, or procedures that districts can put into place to help ensure program implementation success?
This case brings together multiple issues that come to a head and result in a failure of reform implementation. What are they, and how do they contribute to the case narrative? What might your action steps be as either a director of program implementation or a school principal/lead-administrator to help identify these issues and work through them with the struggling team?
Exercise: Pretend you are employed in a school much like Estrella. It is a Title 1 middle school located in a city’s urban center. Nearly 100% of the students qualify for free/reduced-priced lunch, and the majority of your school’s students are of color. The district has been warned by the state that they have 3 years to turn around their performance on state-mandated tests. If the majority of the students are not performing at or above grade-level by the end of the 3-year period, the state will take over the school. The district has received a grant to implement a new reform and brings in an outside company to help with these efforts.
As a group, decide what reform the district will be implementing, and then split into smaller groups and assign the following roles to each group: director of reform implementation (outsider), school administrator, teacher representative, and student body representative. As a group, create a narrative for your role. This narrative should include your person’s questions about the reform, their concerns, what they want from the reform, and how they would like to see it come about successfully. Once you have a character profile and a general understanding of how they feel about the reform, select a representative to be your group’s spokesperson. Each of the five spokespersons should sit together in a circle and have a discussion about how the reform will be implemented. Other group members can participate if the spokesperson needs a reprieve. Once the conversation is finished, have whole group reflection wrap-up regarding the exercise.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
