The leadership training model developed by Professor Noel Tichy will be utilized at the Rio Grande Valley Center for Teaching and Leading Excellence.

SAN JUAN, Aug. 16 - It is rare for a charter school, a public school and a non-profit to form an alliance in order to improve teaching standards but that is what has just happened in South Texas.

With a mixture of philanthropic and federal funding, IDEA Public Schools, Pharr-San Juan-Alamo ISD, and Teach for America are going to establish the Rio Grande Valley Center for Teaching and Leading Excellence.

“I am very proud of this new alliance,” PSJA Superintendent Danny King told the Guardian. “It took a lot of hard work by PSJA and IDEA and a lot of outside the box thinking on how to put this together. This is a great opportunity to improve education for students in our district and across the Valley.”

King said the mission statement of the Rio Grande Valley Center for Teaching and Leading Excellence will be to foster best practice strategies for teachers and school leaders, including principals.

“We want to set up a very high quality teacher induction program to train new teachers and develop a good strong pool of potential leaders,” King said. “Teach for America is going to be a partner in this and we will use a lot from their model of training. It can costly to establish but it is very good quality.”

Teach for America is a long-standing partner of both IDEA Public Schools and PSJA ISD.  The group’s collaboration in the Rio Grande Valley Center for Teaching and Leading Excellence will allow both organizations to leverage the proven training and development techniques that have so effectively worked with TFA corps members, King said.

Noel Tichy, director of the Global Leadership Program and professor of management and organizations at the University of Michigan’s Stephen M. Ross School of Business, will help develop the leadership development component, while the Teach for America training model will focus on improving the classroom component, King explained.

“The Tichy model will be used with current principals and instructional leaders and to develop a pool of qualified principal and leadership applicants. It is a proven model and we want to bring it into our setting in the Valley,” King said.

Asked if such a charter school-public school alliance had been formed before, King said: “This has not been done before. In many ways we are different organizations but we are both focusing on educating students. We are working together on a common need.”

Congressman Rubén Hinojosa announced the federal funding component of the new project. He said $4.95 million would be forthcoming in the form of an ‘Investing in Innovation Fund (i3)’ grant from the U.S. Department of Education.

“I am extremely proud of the accomplishments already made by IDEA Public Schools and I am very glad to see that their partnership with PSJA ISD will benefit more students in our area,” Hinojosa said.

“Our South Texas communities have much need for advanced educational professionals and this funding could potentially create a research-based, comprehensive pipeline that would increase teacher recruitment, retention and successful academic structure that would ensure student growth and achievement.”

Over 1,700 school districts from across the country applied for the federal grant money. The IDEA-PSJA application ranked 13th and was one of only 49 to be selected for funding. IDEA/PSJA was the only applicant selected in the state of Texas.

Hinojosa described ‘Investing in Innovation (i3)’ as an historic federal innovation grant program. He said it was open to school districts as well as non-profit organizations and institutions of higher education working in partnership with public schools. Applicants were required to demonstrate their previous success in closing the achievement gaps, improving student progress toward proficiency, increasing graduation rates, or recruiting and retaining high-quality teachers and principals.

In addition to the federal funds, philanthropic groups will chip in about $3.3 million.

IDEA Public Schools was started ten years ago by Tom Torkelson. It celebrated its 10th Anniversary with a party at the McAllen Convention Center last Friday.

Torkelson, CEO of IDEA, said he, too, was proud of the new alliance.

“This is a unique partnership between a school district, a charter and a non-profit,” Torkelson said. “We are excited to partner with Dr. Daniel King, one of the most innovative and visionary leaders in South Texas. We believe our work will have a transformative impact in developing a leadership pipeline with an intense, strategic focus on teacher and leader effectiveness.”
 
Torkelson said IDEA Public Schools was formed in South Texas to prepare students for success in college and citizenship. He said it is committed to developing students with the academic, social, and leadership characteristics needed to succeed in a four-year college or university. He also pointed out that IDEA College Preparatory in Donna was ranked the 13th best school in the nation by U.S. News and World Report.

Editor's Note: This story has been amended from the original one posted on Aug. 16 to reflect new information about the training model Professor Noel Tichy has developed. 

Write Steve Taylor

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