AIMS // Atlantic Institute for Market Studies

Saving
Our
Public Schools

Considered one of the top educators in North America, AIMS Fellow in Public Education Reform Angus McBeath is making a difference in public education. As superintendent of the public schools in Edmonton, Mr. McBeath (pronounced McBeth) lead the ongoing effort to improve student achievement in that city’s public school system.

This is your opportunity to hear first hand how Mr. McBeath and his team transformed the Edmonton public school system. To learn how to arrange a visit from Mr. McBeath to your community, click here.

The AIMS Angus McBeath North American tour is made possible through the generous support of the Earhart Foundation and the Ruth and Lovett Peters Foundation.

Making Schools Work

In his book Making Schools Work: A Revolutionary Plan to Get Your Children the Education They Need, UCLA management professor William Ouchi praises Edmonton’s educators for leading what he calls "a revolution."

 "Mr. Ouchi argues that Edmonton’s system best meets what he outlines as the ‘seven keys to success," wrote Julie Smyth in the Sept. 12, 2003 edition of the National Post. "Entrepreneurial principals, school-controlled budgets, accountability, decentralization, a strong focus on student achievement, school choice and a community approach, meaning there is a consistent set of beliefs among school staff about how to meet students’ needs and use available resources." Every Edmonton school has its own clearly defined educational mission and personality, including military, performing arts, confessional (religious-based) and much more."

Focus on Results

For more than ten years, Focus On Results has been working with schools and districts across the United States and Canada to make measurable, lasting improvements in student performance, school leadership and decision-making, and professional development. It recognizes Mr. McBeath's work in Edmonton among the best on the continent. It includes the Edmonton model on its website (www.focusonresults.net).

Its book, The Power of Focus: Lessons Learned in District and School Improvement details a framework and strategies to help schools and districts make data-driven decisions to improve the learning for all students regardless of race, gender or socio-economics. An examination of the Seven Areas of Focus shares concrete strategies for implementing the framework, suggestions for district support, and hands-on tools for leaders to launch the work in their own schools and districts. A thorough discussion of leadership and district wide improvement suggests that student learning demands improvement at all levels of the system, and provides examples for using student and district data to make improvements based on identified needs. Angus McBeath wrote the foreward to this insightful work.

McBeath in Halifax

In Halifax, Angus McBeath recounted how Edmonton found the formula to revive the spirit, energy, and commitment of people to public education. It has proven that choice, accountability and performance are *not* incompatible with the Canadian public school system, but rather are the key to its renewal and improvement. To read Mr. McBeath remarks in Halifax, click here.

Telling it like it is

Mr. McBeath returned to his native Prince Edward Island in the summer of 2005 as a guest of AIMS to talk to the premier's Task Force on Education. His remarks held nothing back and provided a guide to improve the island's school system.

You could hear a pin drop as Angus McBeath, superintendent of Edmonton Public Schools, shared with the task force members his experience and success making the Edmonton school system one of the best in the country. Click here to read his comments.

To read the resulting newspaper articles, click the headlines below.

• Individual Schools should be given more control over finances.
• Education Superintendent uses hands on assessment.

Joining the Tour

Mr. McBeath became the Fellow in Public Education Reform at the Atlantic Institute for Market Studies (AIMS) on his retirement from the Edmonton public school system in 2005, reserving a portion of his time to travel to think tanks and education-related audiences around the United States and Canada, talking about how Edmonton works and how they achieved these remarkable reforms and enviable results.

To make arrangements for a visit to your community by Mr. McBeath, click here.

The AIMS Angus McBeath North American tour is made possible through
the generous support of
the Earhart Foundation and
the Ruth and Lovett Peters Foundation.

AIMS Education and School Reform

Since its inception, AIMS has made education one of its priorities. Students in Atlantic Canada lag behind the rest of the country in academic achievement. This trend, if not reversed, will reinforce Atlantic Canada’s perennial position as a "have-not" region. It is this simple truth that permeates all of AIMS’ work in the education field and keeps us coming back to the topic despite often heated reaction on the part of the education establishment.

One of our earliest conferences, Choosing Better Schools, highlighted the successes that have been achieved by experimenting with the traditional design of public education and shifting the power relationship within the system to promote innovation and personal responsibility-on the part of students, teachers, parents, and administrators.

Further AIMS research, like our paper "Testing & Accountability," demonstrated that clear, measurable goals and independent assessment tools were critical in developing accountability and promoting a fair system where achievement is recognized and rewarded and expectations are clearly defined-again, for everyone.

And AIMS has not waited for the system to change itself. Our High School Report Card has raised the bar on public accountability in education and increased immeasurably the pressure for more public reporting of what school success looks like and how we can get there.

To read more about AIMS extensive work in education, click here.