The “City of Firsts” Charts a New Path on Turnaround
The Center on Reinventing Public Education’s case study, The “City of Firsts” Charts a New Path on Turnaround, examines the design and early implementation of the Springfield Empowerment Zone Partnership in Springfield, Massachusetts, a district innovation and turnaround effort whose launch Empower Schools supported.
Written by Ashley Jochim, the paper looks at SEZP as both a school turnaround strategy and an Innovation Schools governance model. It highlights how the Empowerment Zone approach gives schools greater autonomy while keeping them connected to the district and accountable for results, describing the arrangement as “a new angle on what it means for districts to ‘steer not row.’”
The case study builds on CRPE’s broader research into state-initiated school turnaround strategies. It shows how Springfield Public Schools used SEZP as part of a coordinated portfolio of approaches tailored to different school and community needs.
In this resource
How districts can use Innovation Schools governance to support turnaround
How school-level autonomy can operate within a public district system
How state, district, and school leaders can coordinate multiple improvement strategies
How Springfield, Massachusetts approached the design of an Empowerment Zone
Best for: district leaders, state education leaders, policymakers, school turnaround teams, and advocates exploring Innovation Schools, Empowerment Zones, or district innovation models.
This third-party case study was published by the Center on Reinventing Public Education.
