The 2001 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award in Education: Learning from the Winners

A Forum — April 9, 2002

Annually, since 1988, the President and Secretary of Commerce have presented the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award for excellence and quality achievement. The award, named after the 26th Secretary of Commerce, recognizes U.S. organizations demonstrating excellence in quality and performance. Award categories originally included manufacturing, service, and small business. Beginning in 1999, the categories of education and health care were added. Although 37 applications have been submitted in the education category since it was added in 1999, 2001 was the first year education winners have been named.

All public and private organizations providing educational services in the United States are eligible to apply for the Baldrige Award. Applicants are rigorously evaluated by outside reviewers on their achievements in seven areas: leadership; strategic planning; student, stakeholder, and market focus; information and analysis; faculty and staff focus; process management; and organizational performance results. The Baldrige program is managed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, an agency of the Department of Commerce's Technology Administration, in cooperation with the private sector.

Harry Hertz, Baldrige National Quality Program Director, discussed the development of the Baldrige National Quality Program. Developed in the late 1980's, a time of crisis in the U.S. business community, the Program was an attempt to improve U.S. business quality and competitiveness. The program's purposes are 1) to develop a set of criteria for any organization to adopt an overall systems approach to running an organization, 2) to create an award program to identify role models, and 3) to make those role models available so others can benefit.

The 2001 Baldrige Education Awardees, noted Hertz, have all redesigned their work systems around partnerships. The Pearl River School District developed a partnership with the School Board; the Chugach School District partnered with the community in district redesign; and University of Wisconsin-Stout partnered with local business to prepare students for careers.

Pearl River School District (PRSD), New York, has five schools: three elementary schools (K through 4), one middle school (5-7) and one high school (8-12). The district has about 330 employees and 2,370 students. The percentage of students graduating with a Regents diploma, a key objective, increased from 63 percent in 1996 to 86 percent in 2001. PRSD improved Advanced Placement course performance and increased the percentage of students taking AP courses. Seventy-five percent of PRSD's special education students take the SAT I exam. PRSD student, parent, faculty, and staff satisfaction has increased dramatically in the past four years. PRSD uses curriculum maps to align its entire K-12 curriculum to state and national standards and to align instruction within and across all grade levels.

Frank Auriemma, Assistant Superintendent, explained that PRSD has focused staff on three district goals, which they have kept for years: 1) to improve student performance, 2) to improve the image of the district, and 3) to improve overall cost efficiency. All district staff understand the concept of continuous improvement. Through the Baldrige application process PRSD has learned to use data, creating a data warehouse system that is used constantly for planning. What is more, PRSD staff are empowered to work together to use data to determine what needs to be done to achieve their goals.

What has this meant for PRSD students? While it had a good reputation, students in PRSD were not performing to high academic levels. Now they are. Ninety percent of children in Pearl River attend the public schools, and 100% of PRSD students graduate high school, with 96 percent going on to college. The community votes in favor of the school budget every year. Over the ten-year period that PRSD has been improving its schools, the district has actually cut the per pupil expenditures significantly by streamlining the administration and placing more decision-making power in the hands of the teaching staff.

Chugach School District (CSD), Anchorage, Alaska, has 250 students scattered throughout 22,000 square miles of mostly isolated and remote areas. With 30 faculty and staff, CSD is the smallest organization ever to win a Baldrige Award. CSD uses technology, including the Internet and laptop computers, to enhance and improve student learning and to improve administrative efficiency. CSD's faculty turnover has decreased from about 55 percent during 1975-1994 to about 12 percent starting in 1995. CSD involves all stakeholders- parents, students, community members and businesses- in its strategic planning process.

Superintendent Richard DeLorenzo described CSD's process of transformation. CSD began by setting up community meetings in villages to ask how kids were doing, what was happening when they left the school system, and what CSD should be doing to prepare kids for the 21st Century. Using information from these community meetings, CSD reinvented itself. DeLorenzo explained that "traditionally in educational settings time is a constant and achievement is variable." CSD flipped these around by getting rid of grade levels. The results were dramatic. Chugach students moved from an average of the 25th percentile in the state to the 75th percentile on CAT scores, outscoring higher socioeconomic communities. The percentage of CSD students who take college entrance exams increased from zero to 70 percent since 1998. According to DeLorenzo, "90 percent of Chugach students are placed in some positive outcome upon graduation." All CSD students have a laptop and a personal website. (Students' websites may be viewed at www.chugachschools.com.)

University of Wisconsin-Stout, Menomonie, is one of 13 publicly-supported universities in the University of Wisconsin system. UW-Stout has about 1200 faculty and staff and 7,700 students. UW-Stout's "Mission Driven-Market Smart" focus is aimed at developing students for careers in industry and education and has led to a graduate placement rate at or above 98 percent since 1996. To enhance UW-Stout's ability to deliver and expand educational services and programs, the University has 27 partners, including technical colleges and other universities, professional and trade associations, and businesses. UW-Stout emphasizes "active learning," where traditional instruction is reinforced with extensive technology laboratory work and industry partnerships. Employers have consistently rated 99 percent to 100 percent of Stout graduates as "prepared for work."

Chancellor Charles Sorensen described the data-driven culture in the Wisconsin system. The University of Wisconsin got involved in the Total Quality Management movement of the early 1990's, bringing in experts to help them create teams. Sorensen reported that the strength of the Baldrige National Quality Program is that "it aligns all you do with tight criteria and allows you to stay focused on student services and programs." This allows an organization to be proactive, rather than reactive. The University of Wisconsin-Stout is becoming a digital, wireless campus, so faculty are being retrained for a laptop environment through a one to two week faculty "Web Camp."

American Youth Policy Forum   1836 Jefferson Place NW,  Washington DC 20036
Telephone 202-775-9731      |      Fax 202-775-9733      |     Email aypf@aypf.org