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Examiner.com
Exclusive interview with Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda
By Mark Lerner
Monday, March 22, 2010

I started my conversation with Ariana Quiñones-Miranda, Director of Education and Outreach for FOCUS by asking her how she ended up in her current position. "I came to it inadvertently," she responded. Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda started her career in education policy in the mid 1990s through her work as Deputy Director of the Latino Civil Rights Task Force, a local civil rights advocacy organization. During this period, there were calls for enhanced services to immigrant and English language learner students in the city. Oyster Elementary School had the only bilingual program in D.C. and the D.C. Public School system had no plans to expand or replicate that program.

At that time, charter schools were just coming into existence in other states and then-Superintendent Franklin Smith decided to experiment by allowing the creation of school-within-a-school charters within DCPS. Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda became involved with a group that was interested in starting a bilingual charter school. This led to the creation of the Bilingual International Charter School as a school within a school. This school had a short-lived existence but the experience piqued her interest in public charter schools as a means to serve students who were not being well served by the traditional school system.

In 1996, Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda joined the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), a Washington, D.C. based national Latino civil rights organization. She brought that charter school interest with her and began researching what other states and the federal government were doing on public charter schools. In the 1990s public charter schools were often seen as a conservative-led threat to traditional public education, but after much discussion and debate, NCLR leaders decided that public charter schools could prove to be a powerful reform tool for serving Latino students. They looked at charter schools as a practical issue to improve education for students and not an ideological one and decided to create a charter school initiative.

NCLR was able to secure funding from several national foundations, including Annie E. Casey, Bradley, Bill & Melinda Gates, and the Walton Family Foundation, to support the development of Latino-serving public charter schools across the United States. In the eight years that Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda was employed by NCLR, she and other staff worked to develop a national network of public charter schools. She had come to NCLR in 1996 as an education specialist and by the time she left eight years later she had risen to the position of Deputy Vice-President for Education growing the education department from a staff of four to almost 20 and the annual budget from $400,000 to $7,000,000.

But the birth of her daughter made the travel associated with her job at NCLR difficult. She wanted to continue this work, but with a focus on students and schools in her own hometown. In 2004, Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda accepted the position as the first Executive Director of the newly formed D.C. Association of Chartered Public Schools. She was now transitioning as someone focused on the needs of English language learners to the public policy role of school choice. This being a start-up business, there were many challenges. She spent two years at the Association building the infrastructure and launching key programs and services. After building a solid foundation, she moved on to work for Fight For Children.

At Fight for Children she began to understand and appreciate the role that private school scholarships and vouchers were playing, again not in an ideological way, but as a means to provide quality educational options for low-income students. She was inspired by the work of Joe Robert who was critical to the passage of D.C.'s Opportunity Scholarship Program, the first and only federally funded school voucher program in the country. During her time at time at Fight For Children, Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda helped create the publication "My School Chooser" to help families find a school, whether DCPS, charter, or private or parochial, that is the right fit for their children.

Then a couple of years ago Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda joined FOCUS because she wanted to get back into community activism. She continues to hold this position.

I didn't want my time with Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda to end without asking her for her views on D.C.'s public charter schools. Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda described the movement as "stronger than ever," but she said that the political environment is dicey. She said that with the emphasis on reform of DCPS, charters are seen by some as competitors that will hinder the DCPS reforms. But we now have evidence that even with the growth of the charter school sector, DCPS test scores and enrollments are on the rise.

Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda says the linchpins of the public charter school movement are autonomy and accountability. When both are present and strong, schools can flourish and be successful at closing the achievement gap. She added that politicians and the public often don't understand the importance of autonomy and accountability and there is pressure to make all laws, regulations and policies uniform across all public schools. But it's autonomy, not uniformity, that is leading to academic success. She said that FOCUS is constantly trying to build relationships, spread factual information, and talk about what charter schools have been able to accomplish because of their autonomy and the strong accountability that is provided by the D.C. Public Charter School Board.

Lastly we talked about the facility issue. Mrs. Quiñones-Miranda said that ideally public charter schools should have access to public school space. There are enough closed school buildings to house all of the students attending public charter schools in temporary space, and have enough left over for other community uses and economic development. She lamented on the irony of the fact that the D.C. government is converting closed school buildings into office space for government agencies and then public charter schools must convert offices and warehouses into schools. She would love to see some strategic planning around setting aside closed DCPS schools for charter school use so that the needs of all D.C. students in all parts of the city could be met in line with D.C. law.

The Washington Examiner
First Lady to address Anacostia graduates
By Harry Jaffe
Sunday, March 21, 2010

When Michelle and Barack Obama took up residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in the heart of our fair capital city, they promised to become good neighbors.

They have followed through, especially the first lady. She and her husband have connected with the community the way most parents do: through their children and the school they attend. Michelle and Barack show up at Sidwell Friends to meet with their daughters' teachers and to attend plays and such.

The first couple has made the rounds at a few D.C. schools to read to students.

But the first lady is the face we see most.

Last Friday Mrs. Obama showed up to announce that the District had been awarded $4.9 million in federal "stimulus" funds to help fight addition to tobacco. Cigarettes are bad, and this is good news, but I'm not exactly sure what this will stimulate in the realm of job creation. I suggest we follow the money.

Following the first lady around town later this spring will take you to Anacostia High School. She is scheduled to speak at the graduation in early June.

At first blush I get pretty darn warm and fuzzy over the notion of Michelle Obama crossing the Anacostia River into the badlands of D.C. to speak with the teenagers at the local high school. The kids who go to Anacostia High occupy the dangerous and unruly turf in a cultural war zone. On one side is the ghetto life of illiteracy and drugs. On the other side is education, college and a ticket to another life. Every day they go to the school and wonder whether they will get an education or get knifed.

That's much less the transaction this year, since D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee hired Friendship Public Charter School to manage Anacostia. In a recent visit to the school, students told me the halls were no longer party zones, teachers were teaching, violence was way down.

No question the first lady is the perfect role model for Anacostia's girls. She can relate. When she was coming up on Chicago's rough side, people told her she was "acting white" when she studied hard and got good grades. She gets major cred for bringing that message to kids who don't hear that at home.

But I can't help but wonder why the Obamas won't go all the way and dispatch the president to Anacostia High. It is, after all, the black boys who are most in need of a role model -- a strong African American male who stays married, loves his wife, cuddles his kids, plays hoops and lives in the White House.

I'm still a bit sore that the Obamas decided to send their daughters to private school. I know I am a grind on the subject. But it would salve many wounds if the president would show up at Anacostia High -- or Ballou or McKinley or Spingarn -- to cheer on the graduating class.

Surprise us.

The Washington Post's D.C. Schools Insider
Numbers say charter migration a trickle, not a flood
By Bill Turque
Wednesday, March 17, 2010

The first quarter of the year always brings the same anecdotes. A Ward 6 elementary school principal reported that five children from public charter schools showed up on a recent Monday morning.

"The charter schools are letting their favorite children go," she said.
A parent at a Ward 5 middle school says "a record number of kids have been pushed back on us by charters."

The conventional wisdom is that the District's public charter schools, which operate with more autonomy than traditional public schools, shed themselves of undesirable students with impunity as the year goes on. Many of them end up back at their neighborhood public schools, while the money that the children represent -- a District per-pupil funding level that averages about $9,000 -- stays at the charters, forcing DCPS to serve kids they have not budgeted for.

But school officials on both the public and public charter sides say there is no data supporting the phenomenon of some vast annual migration. According to DCPS, of the 2,529 mid-year admissions during the 2008-09 school year, just 264 (7 percent) were from public charter schools. The rest were kids who were either new to city, who had dropped out and returned, or who came from private and parochial schools.

DCPS spokeswoman Jennifer Calloway also said the 264 figure does not represent a net gain, and that it is offset by students who leave. "DCPS students also transfer to charters mid-year--and the funding doesn't follow them either," she said.

Barnaby Towns, communications director for FOCUS (Friends of Choice in Urban Schools) an advocacy group for D.C. Public Charter Schools, calls the migration "something of an urban myth" for which there is no statistical evidence.

"The reality is that children leave both charter and DCPS schools midyear for a variety of reasons," Towns said. Those include parents moving out of the area, moving their kids to schools with access to playing fields (which tends to be movement from public charter to public), and, yes, expulsion for unacceptable behavior.

Examiner.com
The D.C. charter facility allotment saga continues
By Mark Lerner
Tuesday, March 16, 2010

It is the start of the Mayor's budget season and therefore another opportunity for politicians to play with the charter school facility allotment. To understand the framework for this year's discussion I went directly to the person who knows more about this subject than probably anyone in the country, the recently retired Chairman of the D.C. Public Charter School Board Tom Nida.

As background, remember that in 2009 Mr. Fenty wanted to find a way to tie the facility allotment to the actual needs of schools. A suggestion was made at that time to pay charters what they were currently spending for space plus additional dollars in order to secure future buildings. The Mayor took this idea and tried to reduce it to only the first part of this equation, with the justification that charters were using excess facility funds to augment their per pupil instructional dollars. After loud and contentious feedback from the charter school community the facility allotment was lowered $300 from $3,109 per student to $2,800. There was also a promise by Council Chairman Vincent Gray to bring together a task force to study the matter.

Mr. Nida headed that task force and for the last 12 months has been working on a proposal together with representatives from FOCUS, the city's administrator's office, the deputy mayor's office, and representatives from several public charter schools.

Almost as soon as the task force began meeting a couple of facts became readily apparent. First, it was assumed in the past that the rent charter schools paid was less than the facility allotment, which allowed schools to add this money to what was available for instruction. In reality, for many schools the opposite is the case. Mr. Nida pointed out that as a school becames larger it is necessary to take instructional funds and add them to the facility allotment in order to cover building expenses.

Mr. Nida reviewed some math with me regarding this issue. If we have 280 students in an average charter school and they are provided with 100 square feet per child then the school needs 28,000 square feet for its building. For the 28,000 square feet it receives $784,000 in facility funds, which means it can afford a total rent of $28 per square foot.

While it is extremely difficult to find appropriate space that rents for $28 a square foot in this city the problem is even more difficult than it first appears. This is because charter facility leases are almost always the triple net variety in which 8 dollars of the rent comes right off the top to cover operating costs of the space, such as cleaning, maintenance, and utilities. We are now left with a net amount of only $20 per square feet that a charter can spend on their facility. Compounding all of this financial pressure is that most traditional school systems like DCPS allot 150, 175, or even 190 square feet per child, especially as the child gets older and larger. Financial issues, according to Mr. Nida, are why many charters combine different uses of space into one, such the creation of a multi-purpose room, or why DC public charter schools often forgo space for gymnasiums, auditoriums, and cafeterias as unaffordable.

The other interesting part of the facility issue that the task force noticed, now with access to the DCPS capital budget provided by the City Administrator's staff, is that the amount that DCPS has spent over the past few years on their facilities has been higher than the facilities allowance charters received to spend on theirs. This information wasn't readily available last year during the budget hearings. When Mr. Nida's group reviewed the per pupil amount that DCPS has spent on average over the last 3 years the number comes out to approximately $3,200. The task force quickly came to the conclusion that this is the figure that they should request from the Mayor in order to have equity between the 2 school systems. The task force also recommended a "floor" in the charter school facility allowance of $3,000 annually per student, to provide a level of stability to reassure lenders who finance DC charter school facilities.

However, the final part of the task force recommendation was that if current city budget constraints made the recommended funding difficult, the actual facility funding for both the DC public charter schools and DCPS should be equal.

Robert Cane at FOCUS has hinted that the Mayor will try and keep the charter school facility allotment at $2,800 per pupil.

Go here to hear last week's testimony before the D.C. Council of charter school leaders whose programs are facing difficulties under the present facility allotment.

The Washington Post
D.C. Ward 6 parents seek new options for middle school
By Bill Turque
Friday, March 12, 2010

Capitol Hill parents, who have played a key role in the revival of elementary schools in Ward 6, are asking Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee for a major expansion of middle school choices in the area so that their children can continue in D.C. public schools.

Elementary schools on the Hill, which have seen an influx of young families in recent years, feed into three middle schools: Stuart-Hobson, Eliot-Hine and Jefferson.

Two of the three, Eliot-Hine and Jefferson, have reading and math proficiency rates at or below 50 percent. Although Stuart-Hobson has been more successful -- reading and math proficiency was at 75 percent last year -- parents say the 1927-vintage building is in poor condition and needs major renovations.

As a result, many neighborhood families have looked to nearby public charter schools, such as Two Rivers and Friendship, or entered the lottery for seats at public middle schools such as Deal in Tenleytown or Hardy in Georgetown.

"We want to expand choices for parents," said Suzanne Wells, a parent at Tyler Elementary and leader of the Capitol Hill Public School Parent Organization, a coalition of PTA members from schools in the area.

At the urging of D.C. Council member Tommy Wells (D-Ward 6), who is no relation to Suzanne Wells, the group has developed a three-tiered proposal, unveiled Wednesday night during a meeting at Stuart-Hobson.

A key component is Eliot-Hine's growth into a middle school modeled after Deal, with an enrollment of 850 -- it currently has about 300 students -- and an expansion of academic offerings to include an International Baccalaureate program and Spanish-immersion classes for students coming from a similar program at Tyler.

Parents are also proposing that two elementary schools, Brent and Miner, be expanded through the eighth grade to incorporate relatively small middle schools.

Brent would also add an IB program while expanding its museum magnet program with the Smithsonian Institution. Miner would extend its popular Reggio Emilia program through the eighth grade.

Stuart-Hobson would become a midsize middle school, with a second story built on top of a renovated gymnasium to allow expanded music and art programs. Fifth-grade classes at the school would move to Watkins Elementary.

The group is also calling for expansion of Montessori programs on the Hill, currently at Watkins, which have grown hugely popular, with more than 300 applications for 26 openings this year.

The parents' initiative comes at a time of major change in the face of education in Ward 6. A $76 million reconstruction and academic relaunch of Eastern Senior High School is underway. Details of the program are not settled, but the District has proposed converting the school into specialized "academies" focused on health sciences and pre-law studies and possibly an IB program.

Wells and other District officials see a re-imagined Eastern as the linchpin of a plan to attract and retain more middle- and upper-middle-class families.

The school, which has been under federal mandate to overhaul its academic program because of consistently poor performance, has been closed to new students for the past two years.

Initial plans called for admitting ninth-graders in the fall, when the new building is scheduled to be ready, but Rhee and Mayor Adrian M. Fenty announced Wednesday that they have pushed the relaunch back to 2011 to give the school's new leadership -- which has not been selected -- a year to plan.

Wells and William Wilhoyte, the instructional superintendent for District middle schools, attended the meeting with parents, and they were enthusiastic about the ideas. But they said the ultimate decision belonged to Rhee. They said the chancellor has her own ideas about middle schools in Ward 6, but they did not elaborate. Rhee said in an e-mail Wednesday night that she could not comment because she had not seen the plan.

There are numerous potential obstacles to the parents' proposal. It calls for moving programs that currently have some of their space at Eliot-Hine, including the Youth Engagement Academy for students identified as at risk of dropping out. Miner's expansion would require moving into its adjacent former building, now earmarked for use by D.C. police.

But Wells and Wilhoyte urged parents to engage Rhee.

"I think we need to challenge Chancellor Rhee and say, 'What are you thinking?' " Wells said.

Wells also credited parents with driving what he called "an extraordinary renaissance at the elementary school level" in Ward 6. "There's nowhere I know of in any urban area of America where this many schools have become schools of choice," he said.

The American (The Journal of the American Enterprise Institute)
What Diane Ravitch gets wrong
By Mark Schneider
Thursday, March 11, 2010

Yesterday afternoon, the American Enterprise Institute hosted a lively panel in which well-respected education historian Diane Ravitch discussed her new book, The Death and Life of the Great American School System.

Diane is arguably the best educational historian working today and one of the best the nation has ever produced. Chapter after chapter she confirms what we all know about education policy and practice—it is relentlessly based on fads built on the flimsiest of evidence. Diane shows that good ideas are often taken to scale without any thought about how any of reforms might work in a larger venue. She shows that ideas often become invested with magic properties so that people see them as a silver bullet that will cure all our ills.

But while her analysis is often spot-on, she also makes mistakes. And perhaps her most consistent ones pertain to choice and charter schools.

In contrast to charter schools, Diane exults traditional public schools, which she views as being firmly rooted in strong neighborhoods. Yes, it would be wonderful if neighborhood schools were what Diane wants them to be, but they aren’t. If they were what she wanted, I could understand her antipathy toward charter schools; however, far too many traditional public schools are failure factories that persist year after year after year.

Diane’s critique of charter schools is at the tail end of an analysis of the evolution of choice—hitting the usual notes, Milton Friedman, John Chubb, and Terry Moe, vouchers, and then the displacement of vouchers by charter schools as the preferred vehicle of reform for choice advocates.

She begins by reviewing the empirical evidence concerning the learning gains among voucher students and finds that there were few cases where the gains of voucher students were greater than students who were offered but did not accept vouchers.

This is taken as an indicator of failure—but Milton Friedman actually argued that voucher schools could either produce higher outcomes at the same cost or the same outcomes for a lower cost. Since vouchers, for example, in D.C. carry a price tag that is about 60 percent of what traditional students get, the second condition of Friedman’s hypothesis is actually met—students are doing as well for far less.

The same thing is true of charter schools, which, as Diane notes, produce pretty much the same results as traditional public schools—but charters are funded at around less than 90 percent of the traditional public schools, so from Friedman’s second perspective they are doing better.

Vouchers, as she rightfully notes, have hit a dead end, and charter schools have taken their place as the preferred mechanism for using choice as a mechanism for reform. Diane’s take on charter schools is pretty negative—and much of her criticism has to do with creaming. She writes:

Regular public schools are at a huge disadvantage … because charter schools may attract the most motivated students, may discharge laggards, and may enforce a tough disciplinary code.

This is an interesting argument—but where does it lead us?

On one hand, it is hard to prove. There may be parent/student differences in motivation that distinguish charter school parents from traditional public school ones, but I’m not sure how we can measure them. They are called “non-observables” for a reason.

Setting aside the measurement issue, there are many implications of Diane’s argument that simply don’t work. She worries that the success of charter schools will draw off the most motivated students and parents and create havens for good students, who attend schools for longer hours and more days, who have dedicated teachers, an excellent curriculum, and a culture that emphasizes hard work.

If we took the kids who sought out these charter schools and forced them back into traditional neighborhood schools would the performance of students in those schools really go up?

As a specific example, if we closed the successful Thurgood Marshall Academy in D.C. and sent those 400 students back to the neighborhood high school, what would be the outcome? We would most likely lose most of those 400 students, all of whom are poor black kids now headed to college. Is that a good trade-off?

Diane also notes the differences between “no-excuse schools” like KIPP that emphasize proper behavior and the attitudes needed for success. She notes that far too many public schools stopped expecting civility and proper behavior. But that difference helps explain why parents choose charter schools: they are looking for small, safe schools that often emphasize basics and accept no excuses.

In short, many charter schools come closer in aspiration and often in practice to the image that Diane has of what defines functioning schools. And more importantly, if we close down all the charter schools and wait for neighborhood public schools to improve, who pays the costs? Middle class parents will move to the suburbs or send their kids to private schools, leaving the burden of bad schools to fall on the usual less affluent victims.

The book tells a depressingly familiar story of a field wracked by fads and innovations that have gone off the track. Her diagnosis of where we’ve gone wrong is often brilliant—although as noted she got choice and charter schools wrong.

I, like so many people reading this, have good friends who actually do the incredibly hard work of teaching or running schools. They face real problems day after day. They are looking for help, for a way forward. Can we in good conscience say if we close down charter schools and look to a “shining neighborhood school on the hill” all will be good? I don’t think so.

The Washington Post’s The Reliable Source
First Lady Michelle Obama to deliver commencement speech at Anacostia Senior High School
By Roxanne Roberts and Amy Argetsinger
Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Three lucky schools -- including two in the District-- will get Michelle Obama as their commencement speaker, the White House announced Tuesday.

The first lady will first speak on May 8 at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, a historic black college. On June 11, she'll address the grads at Anacostia Senior High School, which she first visited a year ago as part of her mentoring initiative. And on May 16, she's headed to George Washington University -- but only if the students, faculty and staff first complete 100,000 hours of community service. During a visit to the campus in September, Obama promised to return for graduation if they met her challenge.

So, how's it going? "Ever since then, it's been full steam ahead," said Candace Smith, head of media relations. "We've been racking up the service hours." As of three weeks ago, the official total was 74,000; if GWU's 25,000 students put in about one more hour each, the VIP speaker will honor her end of the bargain.

The Washington Examiner
Seeds of reform grow winners at Anacostia High School
By Harry Jaffe
Friday, March 5, 2010

Melanie McKie lives around the corner from Anacostia High School. When she entered the ninth grade, she had few illusions.

"I expected to get shot and jumped," she tells me.

Her friend, Patrice Haney, chimes in:

"I wanted to go to Dunbar. Anywhere but here. My mother said, 'Prepare for the worst.' "

Corey Rogers was prepared; Anacostia High was infamous. "Everyone was in the halls," he says. "It was a party all the time. We could do anything we wanted. But nobody was learning anything."

Melanie, Patrice and Corey -- three Anacostia juniors -- gave me a glimpse of what Anacostia was and what it could become. Under new management for less than a year, Anacostia High appears to be rising from the ashes of its past as D.C.'s worst and most violent high school. Will it succeed in teaching the city's least teachable? Or will it fail, as so many high schools have in the past?

As a test case for education reform, Anacostia High is ideal. Let's start with the teachers.

"We had teachers who didn't care," Corey says. "They didn't teach us anything. They had the mentality 'I'm still getting paid, whether I teach you or not.' "

Patrice says her algebra teacher was so clueless, she would ask Patrice to explain math problems to her classmates.

One of Melanie's teachers would sleep at her desk. "If she caught anyone standing up near her when she got up," she says, "they would get an F."

Last year Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee put an end to the lassitude. She put Friendship Public Charter Schools in control of Anacostia High. Its Collegiate Academy, not far from Anacostia High, was turning out young scholars. Why not give it a shot at turning around Anacostia?

Just over halfway through the school year, Anacostia is a hybrid. Shanika Hope and Marcus Moore, working for Friendship, manage the school. They hire and can fire the principals. Otherwise, the school is run under the D.C. Public Schools system, subject to its rules and union contract.

Much has changed; much has not.

"Now the teachers care more," Melanie says. Take her Advanced Placement English teacher, Lisa Sterner, who's teaching "Macbeth." "She interacts with the students; she makes you want to learn."

The three students confirmed Michelle Rhee's basic principle: It's the teachers. Hope kept fewer than a dozen of the teachers she inherited; of the 50 she hired, many were rookies from Teach for America.

"We had no clubs and no yearbook," she says. "Now we have a yearbook and a dozen clubs. That comes from the energy of the new teachers. The kids have seen it."

And benefitted. Melanie, Patrice and Corey have been awarded Achievers Scholarships by the Gates Foundation, which pays for college.

I ask Hope what percentage of Anacostia students come with the trio's desire to learn. "About 20 percent," she said.

If the hybrid Anacostia can educate some of the other 80 percent, it will be a game changer. Let's keep an eye on it.

ABC 7
Mrs. Obama to give Anacostia’s graduation address
By Sam Ford
Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Click the following link to view last night’s piece featuring The Academies at Anacostia (formerly Anacostia High School), which is managed by Friendship Public Charter School.

http://www.wjla.com/news/stories/0310/714755_video.html?ref=newsstory

Transcript:

WASHINGTON - First Lady Michelle Obama is going to give this year's graduation address at Anacostia High School in Southeast Washington.

The news has students excited, particularly members of the class of 2010.

"The emotion I have is because she's like the first lady for the United States and the first black lady of the United States," said Jordan Smiley, 12th-grader.

"She could have went to any other school graduation and she decided to come here. I am happy for the 12th graders too," said Markeisha Henderson, 9th-grader.

In the recent past, the high school has had a reputation as one of D.C.'s roughest schools. Five students were taken to a hospital after a fight 18 months ago, in which three students were stabbed with a letter opener.

The school has also suffered academically. Reading proficiency for last year was at 17 percent and math was at 18 percent. Attendance was less than 50 percent and graduation was at 50 percent.

As a result, D.C. School Chancellor Michelle Rhee gave the school to Friendship Charter Schools Chairman Donald Hense to manage and it appears the school is slowly turning around. He thinks that's why the first lady is coming.

"That's a critical part of the president Obama's agenda is turning around failing schools," Hense said.

Three out of four teachers at the school are new this year and come from programs like Teach for America. The current year's test scores have not been released yet, but attendance is starting to rebound with 70 percent of kids reporting to school.

"We can related to the teachers now, because they are not as old and they like can related to us and we love them. They are fresh off their college experience," said Charity Martin, 12th grader.

The school was so happy to get Mrs. Obama, it changed the graduation date to fit her schedule.