The landscape of education reform has its twists and turns. With the recent state intervention of HISD, widespread questions about the future of education and how to navigate these changes have proven to be a challenge.
But there are steadfast advocates like AJ Crabill, who stands as a guiding light for school boards and education leaders facing pivotal challenges. He brings to the forefront a wealth of expertise garnered throughout the years of dedicated service.
The school board coach is the author of the thought-provoking book “Great on Their Behalf: Why School Boards Fail, How Yours Can Become Effective.” In it, he addresses the pressing concerns shared by education leaders and advocates alike, particularly in the wake of significant changes within HISD.
Drawing from his extensive experience in guiding school systems towards improvement, his deep understanding of the intricacies of education governance equips him to offer an insightful perspective on the factors that lead to ineffective school boards and the strategies that can foster positive transformations.
With his background as the conservator at DeSoto ISD (TX) and a former deputy commissioner at the Texas Education Agency, Crabill’s influence is well-established within the educational landscape.
Notably, his experience extends beyond Texas. He has also held the role of board chair for Kansas City, Missouri’s public schools. He has collaborated with numerous boards as the national director of governance at the Council of the Great City Schools.
The Defender spoke to Crabill about his book and strategies to improve student outcomes in schools.
Defender: Why did you feel it was the right time to publish the book?
AJ Crabill: This book is a love letter to everybody who’s ever wondered how the school board worked, is thinking about running for the school board, or is currently serving on the school board, and is trying to figure out how to make a difference for the children. I had no idea what I was doing when I joined the school board. So, for folks who find themselves in the position I was in — where there’s a desire to make a difference but there is this gap in my knowledge on how I make a difference in this unique role — this book is for them. Being a school board member is different than being a superintendent, principal, teacher, or parent. I gave people access to what I wish I knew when I joined my school board. That’s what a lot of this book is about for me.
Defender: “School systems don’t exist for adult outcomes; they exist to improve student outcomes.” What does that mean?
Crabill : My aspiration in this work is to accelerate the transition from an adult input-focused world to a student outcome-focused world. I understand how we got here. I understand why we wind up so focused on adults’ interests and desires because that tends to be the more tangible. Talking about the books, buses, meals, and all of these tangible things is much clearer to folks than talking about student outcomes. If we serve children, our orientation must be to know whether or not little AJ is learning. Then, secondarily, what are the things we must now do differently as adults to give little AJ full access to that learning? The other reality is that children don’t vote. We’ve set up a system where schools serve children, but for the most part, those children have no voice or formal authority to speak for themselves or to ask what works for them. If we aren’t intentional as school board members [and] educators to create a system that’s actively listening to the students, then it gets easy to focus on the interests of adults in the system.
Defender: What should the Black communities expect from their school board?
Crabill: Let’s think about leaders in terms of building level and leaders at the district level. At the district level, we have school board members and the superintendent. They need to create a space for the entire community to participate in a conversation around the vision for the school system and around the non-negotiable values that need to be honored. I speak about this extensively in my book, about the obligations of the board and, in partnership with the superintendent, to go out and engage in intentional and fairly extensive listening to harvest the community’s vision.
At the building level, it’s different. Staff should hone in on the micro-community, the group of learners, their families, and the immediate geographic community surrounding the building. They should be proactive and go out and check in with the neighborhood associations, visit with families, and figure out what can be done to bring some of our non-profit partners together to support the families we serve. Schools need to bridge the gap when there are unmet needs for families. It’s still community engagement, but it looks different at each level.
Defender: Are these expectations the same if there is a third-party intervention?
Crabill : The first thing that you’ve got to understand for this to make sense is why school systems exist. School systems don’t exist to employ bus drivers, to have great books, facilities, athletic teams, or to feed children. School systems don’t exist to have balanced budgets. None of these are why the school system exists. It exists for one reason only, and that’s to cause improvements in what our students know and can do. But which students’ outcomes will we focus on, especially in a community as large as ours? The next step is to hire some folks who will carry our vision and values on our behalf. They are the school board. They exist to represent the vision and values of the community. It doesn’t matter if they’re elected at large, single member or dual member districts; it doesn’t matter if the mayor or the governor appoints them. Their place of origin is independent of the fact that their job remains the same: to represent the community’s vision and values. The challenge some people recognize is that how people get into the role often impacts their success in different aspects of the position.
For a board to be effective, they need to have a shared understanding and work as a unit on behalf of the people instead of working as nine individual independent actors going in different directions. What I’m going to describe is a generalization. It’s only sometimes valid, but I’ve worked with elected and appointed boards nationwide. I’ve observed that elected boards tend to have a stronger attunement to listening to the community but a weaker attunement to coming together as a team. Appointed board members tend to have weaker attunement to what is happening in the community but tend to have a stronger sense of cohesion among themselves.
Defender: What are the common factors contributing to school board ineffectiveness, and how do these factors impact student outcomes?
Crabill : A common area of ineffectiveness for appointed boards is not listening to the vision and values of the community. A common area of ineffectiveness for elected board members is not being able to come together to accomplish the vision and values of the community because they can’t get on the same page. So, part of my role as a coach is to meet them where they are and help them identify what things they can do to stand in their strengths and grow in their areas of weaknesses. That’s the function of a school board coach; to lift people in that way.
Defender: What should Houstonians look for as indicators of healthy vs. unhealthy relationships between the board and superintendent?
Crabill: Once we understand the board’s job is to represent the vision and values of the community, that points us in the direction of the superintendent’s job. When nine board members come together, they collectively set priorities that describe the community’s vision and values. The problem is that the board isn’t there daily to manage the school system, so they need to hire somebody for that. That person is the superintendent. The superintendent exists to implement the vision and values of the community as conferred to them by the school board. If the superintendent is in any way engaged in trying to represent the vision and values of the community, they are out of position; their job is to implement, not represent. If the board is in any way trying to lead the implementation of the community’s vision and values, they’re out of their position; they are there to represent the community, not try to implement the district’s day-to-day work. Once you understand these two functions, it helps to identify an appropriate relationship between the school board and the superintendent and what is not.
Defender: What advice would you give to educators and community members interested in promoting effective school board practices and fostering improved student educational experiences?
Crabill: All of us have the stories we have today because, somewhere, public school educators stood up for us in a powerful way. Improvements in student outcomes happen in the classroom. They don’t happen in the boardroom. What happens in the boardrooms can influence student outcomes, but the real impact comes from the classroom. Whatever we can do as advocates to increase the quality and effectiveness of that interaction between the learner and the educator sets them up for success.
In addition to getting involved and advocating for educators in the boardroom, I want our HISD teachers to be heavily represented in the creation of our state standards and state assessments. Many people don’t know that, unlike many other states, Texas teachers write the state standards and state assessments. Another company is paid to administer STAAR, but Texas teachers lead the writing of it. I’d want HISD educators to learn more about what’s involved with serving on the committees that create the TEKS and the committees that create the STAAR. Our teachers and their excellence deserve to be heard, uplifted, and at the table when statewide decisions are made.
One more thing: I encourage teachers to join me in pushing for student-led restorative practices to develop the types of skills in our students that may have been lost from learning on Zoom for two years.
