Kids Help Choose Superintendent

A student at the Graduate School of Education (GSE) has spearheaded a program through which she gave Boston middle-school students the opportunity to help pick their new superintendent of schools.

Natasha J. London-Thompson, who plans to earn her degree in education policy and management in June 2006, collaborated with Citizen Schools, a Boston-based organization that manages after-school programs aiming to educate and empower youth.

London-Thompson led a project that videotaped sixth graders at William Barton Rogers Middle School in Hyde Park as they spoke about their ideal superintendent.

The students also learned about school administration issues and eventually interviewed officials at the superintendent’s office—as well as Thomas Payzant, the current superintendent. These interviews—as well as interviews with students—are combined in the video, which will be presented to the selection committee. This spring, the committee will pick the new superintendent, who will replace Payzant after he retires at the end of this school year.

At first, London-Thompson said, the students “didn’t know what a superintendent, was [but] over time they learned to think about what they did and didn’t like about school, and what the district management could do to change it.”

In their discussions with the administration, the students tackled issues ranging from school lunches to school starting times to standardized tests.

London-Thompson said that student involvement should be a significant part of the superintendent decision. She said it is important that the selection committee have “heard the issues on their minds” when Payzant’s successor is announced later this spring.

Director of Marketing and New Initiatives at Citizen Schools Jason A. Cascarino called this particular “apprenticeship” a success, since it showed students “they can be producers as well as consumers.”

One of the students involved in the project, Gabe McLaughlin, 12, said that working as a team and getting involved in the decision-making process was “exciting,” especially when he and his classmates discussed increasing school hours.

McLaughlin said they decided that longer school hours “would be fun and better for the whole school,” as long as athletics and other extracurricular activities were also allowed during that time.

The spokesman for the Boston public school’s superintendent’s office, Jonathan Palumbo, said that student input is just one of the many factors at play in the appointment of the next superintendent

“They [the students] are not more involved than anyone else in the entire city,” Palumbo said.

When asked whether he would expect a thank-you call from the incoming superintendent, McLaughlin said he was realistic.

“You never know, but you hope,” he said.