Findings (continued)

Finding #7: Schools used federal compensatory education funds to create or adopt, and then sustain, new programs they often could not have considered otherwise. In the hands of instructionally focused, creative educational administrators and teachers, Chapter 1 became the primary engine for reform in otherwise distressed schools.

A schools ability to obtain and sustain sufficient fiscal support was often critical to implementation success. While a few schools obtained a few years of support from private foundations or businesses, and others received special district funding to improve low-achieving schools, the importance of Chapter 1 funds for facilitating reform in schools serving high numbers of financially disadvantaged families could hardly be overstated. In particular, the Chapter 1 schoolwide project option often created an environment in which administrators and teachers firmly believed that long-term support would be provided for their reform efforts.¹¹ The belief that adequate fiscal support would be available was often crucial during the initial choice and implementation phases, and the presence of actual support was often crucial during advanced implementation and refinement.

When funding was for a finite period, even for as long as five years, that was often effectively used by opponents of the reform as "proof" that the reform would not last. In one memorable school, a veteran teacher opined that "all of these reforms are alike: Mastery Learning, Madeline Hunter, the Coalition of Essential Schools." Asked how such seemingly diverse changes resembled each other, the teacher explained, "I was here before the first one [Mastery Learning] arrived, and I'll be here after the last [CES] is gone." Even five years of Re:Learning funding did not dissuade him and several colleagues from believing they could outlast this latest reform effort. In the absence of strong administrative commitment to Coalition principles, and in the presence of "short-term" (e.g., five-year!) funding, CES was effectively "outlived" by the naysayers. By contrast, less-potentially-coherent Chapter 1 schoolwide projects were often sustained, in part because the teachers believed Chapter1 was permanent.

In no school was Chapter 1 close to being the largest source of school funding, but particularly in schools serving very large numbers of economically disadvantaged students, Chapter 1 was typically the largest flexible source of funding.

During the years of Special Strategies observation (fall 1990 through spring 1993), Chapter 1 funding was stable to rising in almost all schools. Local funding, by contrast, often rose and fell from year to year. Fullan and Miles (1992) observed that "Change is resource-hungry" (p. 750). In Special Strategies, when resources were removed as a result of local fiscal problems, or even when resources were repeatedly threatened over several years, the effect was always to permanently hobble or kill the reform effort. During the Special Strategies years, innovative local educators were able to count on Chapter 1 as a steady source of funding for school innovation.
 

   ¹¹ For an example of a school currently suffering from the removal of Chapter 1/Title I funding, see Hirshman (1996).