America's Educators Look to Long Beach

An alliance of top U.S. education associations reports that the Long Beach Unified School District “has long been recognized as a model urban school system.”  The Learning First Alliance explains LBUSD’s success.

“The district hasn’t achieved this success by flitting from reform to reform or looking for silver bullets.  Rather, it has spent most of the past two decades building on the same educational strategies, and focusing on data, community buy-in and staff development.”

These observations are part of a new article at www.publicschoolinsights.org under the section, “Education Visionaries.”

The article, “The Long Beach Way,” includes an extensive interview with LBUSD Superintendent of Schools Christopher J. Steinhauser, who describes Long Beach’s 18-year effort to reform local schools.

Steinhauser provides perspective on early initiatives such as school uniforms, the Third Grade Reading Initiative, and the Seamless Education partnership with Long Beach City College and Cal State Long Beach.

The superintendent also describes  LBUSD’s evolution as a data-driven organization that cultivates parental and community buy-in to improve student achievement, especially through better use of communications technology.

The Learning First Alliance, which sponsors www.publicschoolinsights.org, is a permanent partnership of 17 leading education associations with more than 10 million members.  Alliance members include the National Education Association, American Federation of Teachers, American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, National PTA, National School Boards Association, and the American Association of School Administrators.