From a Reviewer's Perspective - Edwin Scott, Senior Reviewer
	From a School's Perspective - Mary Maul, Scranton Elementary, Cleveland, OH

Wish You Were Here!

"Lucky you!" people think. "Two weeks in the Holiday Inn." When I feel guilty about this exotic luxury, I remind myself that I am not the worst. Those who spend one week at the Holiday Inn are even luckier.

In practice, even the most opulent venue would not lower the tension of the review team. We assemble, as many of you already know, in a state of apprehension. Everyone has heard tales about other reviews in which meetings that end at two in the morning are considered normal, allowing plenty of time to finish off the writing before breakfast. Everyone is apprehensive that, come Thursday night, they will be no wiser about the school than they were on Monday morning. Lurking in people's minds is the fear that, if they feel the need to make some criticism, they will manage to find words that arouse loathing and resentment. Lurking in the senior reviewer's mind and wearing an expression of malevolent scepticism is the Ghost of Weekend Yet to Come, during which a report made up of real sentences and based on cohesive thoughts has to be produced. Getting it right is the imperative at the root of this collective neurosis, and that is unlikely to change.

In the first round of reviews, we were all feeling our way and alarmed by the sound of our own footsteps. We knew that the schools had embarked voluntarily on a road with few signposts and, like the reviewers, they were drawing their own maps. We also knew that a shift as fundamental as that proposed by Cornerstone needs resolute commitment over a lengthy period; yet some of the schools were only weeks into the program. So, for most - perhaps all - of us, the problem was to know what it would be reasonable and productive to say in our reports. In all the schools, but especially in those that are new to the program, there is little opportunity to build up a relationship with reviewers in which it can be taken as read that any criticism is intended to point the way forward, not to put the school down.

This last concern still exists, but perhaps to a lesser degree because people working in all the Cornerstone schools are getting to know each other and exchanging views and experiences. It is also true that review teams have always been made up largely of those very same people, and they are now, on average, far more experienced both as reviewers and reviewed. That is not to say that resentments no longer arise, but there is now a much better chance that schools will stand back and look objectively at the issues raised by the reviews.

Several changes lead me to believe that the actual process in the review week is better than before. First, the schedule allows more to be done in the first day, so that the decks are cleared for the main focus of all reviews, which is what happens in the classrooms. Second, the questions were revised for the beginning of 2002 to be simpler and more sharply focused. A future revision may need to look at the overlap of one or two of them with others, and at the total number of questions.

Third, I'm pleased that the shape of the reports, though it is broadly agreed, can be tweaked to suit the circumstances. In some recent reports, the obligation to comment on the responses to the previous review's recommendations has been handled in different ways. It is possible to take them one at a time, or group them, or pick out the main points only. Furthermore, the new recommendations may be many or few. I have come to the view that we need to limit the recommendations to those few that shine some light on the next main step. Otherwise, it is easy to get them out of scale with each other, something like saying of a house that it needs a new coat of paint on the front door and that it needs a whole, new plumbing system. So the householder paints the door and is wading knee-deep in water through the kitchen.

Contributed by Edwin Scott, Cornerstone Senior Reviewer Second-Year Annual School Review

Here are some of the changes as I see them from the Cornerstone Side:

1. The team arrives on Sunday night so there are no more Monday mid-day crisis as to where are they and who did they leave at the airport and how do we get them directions to the school.
2. The expectation as to food for the team was all planned out by the District Manager and Cornerstone so we knew what each one expected.
3. The team's flights out Friday were late enough to permit time for reporting out and a final good bye without the rush that we had last year.

Changes on the part of Scranton's Building were:

1. All of our team had been on at least one review (and some had been on two) so we knew what to expect.
2. Although we had to work at finding a little corner for the team to sit and talk if they needed to, and that is no easy task in an over crowded building, it worked out fine.
3. We knew that they would want to talk to the grade level teams, so we had a schedule of the common plan times available with only a few minor changes.
4. I think just knowing what we needed when we were on other school reviews helped us to anticipate what our visiting team would need and this made it go smoother.

I was able to reassure the staff that the review team is here to help us grow, not to find our flaws. Their purpose is to show us what we do well, and what we might consider changing to make it even better. I think my staff also views it as a time to show off what we were doing with our Cornerstone Initiative at Scranton. We used our past review to set our AAP (Academic Achievement Plan) for this school year. We looked to see if the team recommendations had been put in place in our AAP revisions for next school year and sure enough they were there.

All and all it was a great feeling to come through a review and see the growth that we had made after a year of very hard work. The review process is a reflective and satisfying experience and a celebration of our accomplishments! We can use it as a road map to where we need to head for the coming year.

Contributed by Mary Maul, Principal, Scranton Elementary