November 14, 2023 • 50 mins
Dr. Angela Chapman's journey as a public educator spans
over 25 years, leading to her appointment as the 22nd
Superintendent/CEO of Columbus City Schools. Dr.
Chapman believes providing high-quality education is a civil
right that empowers students and transforms communities.
As a parent with a son who is also part of Columbus City
Schools, she embraces the responsibility of shaping a
brighter future for every student.
over 25 years, leading to her appointment as the 22nd
Superintendent/CEO of Columbus City Schools. Dr.
Chapman believes providing high-quality education is a civil
right that empowers students and transforms communities.
As a parent with a son who is also part of Columbus City
Schools, she embraces the responsibility of shaping a
brighter future for every student.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
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Columbus in Central Ohio have a richhistory of companies being headquartered here, everything
from technology, manufacturing, retail,insurance, and more. But what about
the leaders behind these companies? Whatmakes them tick? How do they get
their start? This is where youget to meet the captain of the ship.
Welcome to CEOs You Should Know andiHeartMedia Columbus Podcast. Welcome back to
(00:20):
another edition of CEOs You Should Know. This is an iHeartMedia Columbus podcast.
I'm your host, boxer and withus this week is doctor Angela Chapman,
who has been a public educator thatspanned over twenty five years and no doubt,
this is my opinion, but probablyhas I would think one of the
most toughest challenging jobs. But shedoes it with a smile. I have
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no doubt about it. She isthe Superintendent CEO of Columbus City Schools and
she has been in that position sincewhat at the beginning of the year,
right, January one? January one, And you're here with us today.
I know you have a super businessschedule, but I appreciate your time.
Welcome to the podcast. Thank you, thank you for having me. So
let's get started a little bit We'regoing to talk about Columbus City Schools,
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the challenges, the positives, butI also want to talk about you,
getting to know you a little bitmore. Are you from central Ohio originally?
I am originally from Cleveland, Ohioarea, so I consider myself a
buck Eye born and raised in theCleveland area. I went to college at
the University of Akron, again withinthe state. I'm my masters at Ashland
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University, and then I transitioned toNashville, Tennessee, where I worked on
my doctorate. I spent eight yearsin Nashville, and then I transitioned to
DC Public Schools Okay, and Ispent five years in DC before transitioning to
my role here in Columbus City Schools. So this has been five years since
I've been in Columbus and certainly proudto make Columbus my home. Well,
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welcome back to Ohio, and welcomehome home to Columbus. Thank you,
glad you hear that were you whenyou were away? And I'm not originally
from here, but I spent enoughtime here that when I got transferred away,
I really missed all things Columbus,all things Ohio. When you were
in Tennessee and in d C.Did you miss some of those things?
The charm of Ohio absolutely, ofcourse, and that's what threw me back
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to the state and certainly my family, my friends, the connections. You
know. This is you know,just home for me, and so being
back home is really just a specialopportunity for me. And having this opportunity
to lead and serve in the cityof Columbus truly is just really a dream
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come true. Doctor Angela Chapman iswith us. She is the Superintendent CEO
of Columbus City Schools, the largestschool district publicly in the state of Ohio.
I have a question growing up,and we'll get a little bit more
of your background. Did was itwhen you are superintendent? Is that something
that you always aspire to be ordo you kind of just fall into it
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and realize one day I'd like tobe a superintendent. That's a great question.
So I think about leadership, right, and so I've known since a
very young age that leadership is importantto me. Certainly there were values that
were instilled in me as an elementaryschool student and taking advantage of leadership opportunities
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and I see, you know,leadership as essential to you know, our
communities, our organization. But I'vealways seen myself as a leader, so
aspiring to be, you know,the girl Scout leader, aspiring to be
the student council leader. And sothat was a trait, at attribute,
a skill that I have been developingsince elementary school. I would say,
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I certainly always wanted to be ateacher, Okay, And in my heart,
I still see myself as a teacher. Right so I'm teaching and working
with adults, teaching and working withmy team members, teaching and working with
the community. I still see myselfas a teacher and looking for those opportunities
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to share teachable moments, whether I'msharing about what's amazing, that's things that
are happening in Columbus City schools,and sharing and educating our community, our
residents, our students about what's possible. So I still see myself as a
teacher. So now I see myselfas the lead teacher of the organization.
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Certainly there's some other duties as asign that comes with the role that I
have now. Certainly, my experiences, my formal training has prepared me for
the role as superintendent. But forme, it was kind of always off
in the distance, but not necessarilythinking that now would be the moment right
now. So I'm just always willingto serve and certainly focusing on the mission
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at hand, as fighting the supportsand resources and being of service to you,
the forty five thousand students who arecounting on us each and every day
to make the best choices and thebest decisions. Because I always say that
our students, whether you're in kindergarten, sixth grade, ninth grade, or
twelfth grade, they only get oneyear to be a sixth grader. So
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as educators we have to rally aroundthem. As community members, we have
to rally around them because they onlyhave one year to be a sixth grader,
one year to be a ninth grader, and we want to make it
the best. By the way,your energy is infectious. I love it.
It's not every guest has the energythat you have, but I think
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you also need that, especially inyour line of work and what you do.
By the way, absolutely holy pressure, Batman, forty five thousand students.
As we mentioned the state's largest schooldistrict. How intense was the interview
process for a job like this?I mean, I can't imagine I mean,
how do you and how do youprepare for that? Well, I
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would say it was really really intense. It was intense for me because at
the same time that I was interviewingfor the role, I was in the
role. And so for me,the pressure was making sure that I was
managing, leading, supporting every dayto make sure that things, you know,
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were run smoothly, right, andso there was a Some would say
maybe that's an advantage, right,but for me, because I wanted everything
to go smoothly. For me,the best evidence was my performance on the
job in the role, so itwas kind of like a you know,
I had to make sure that Iwas delivering every day. So for me,
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while the interview process started maybe inthe end of March and April,
for me, the interview started onday one, January one, when I
was assigned the role as interim superintendent. For me, that's the pressure that
I put on myself. I feltlike that's the day, the first day
of the interview, So it wasevery day, all day for me.
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So it was a long interview period. It's how I how I interpreted it.
But it was really high stakes,right, So you were the there
were several different you know, opportunitiesto show your passion and your commitment to
the work, you know, shareyour skills and expertise. And there was
also lots of opportunities for the communityto share their feedback. And so there
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were community sessions where the community said, you know, these are the attributes
of our future leader that we desire. There were the forums where, you
know, all of the candidates appearedon a whirlwind tour for one day across
the city where we met with lotsof stakeholders. There were business leaders,
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community leaders, faith based leaders,We met with students, we met with
staff, and then that evening culminatedwith a televised or you know, was
streamed live interview with all of thecandidates. So it was pretty intense.
I'm certainly grateful for the journey nowbecause it really provided me with an opportunity
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to show the community through a verytransparent process, how passionate I am about
the work that we're leading in ColumbusCity Schools and that I have the skills
the experience needed to take our districtto the next level. So I didn't
necessarily wasn't so appreciative as I wasgoing through the process. But now on
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the other end of it, I'mcertainly grateful for the journey. I learned
a lot about myself and from thecommunity. Right that feedback that we gather
from the community certainly has helped usand helped me figure out the strategies that
I want to prioritize in the firstyou know, ninety days in the in
the role doctor Angela Chapman is withus, who's the superintendent of Columbus City
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Schools. A position like yours obviouslydoesn't come without criticism, and through the
years you've had some great leadership roles. This is more of a question of
curiosity. But how do you absorband take There's always sharp criticism, but
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with your time now as a leader, how do you how do you absorb
that? How do you take thatwithout either getting offended or you know,
it's as a human nature, it'seasy to want to get defensive, So
how do how do you take that? So there there's a lot in that
question, of course, But sofirst of all, I would like to
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say, as a reflective educator,I've always been reflective, whether I was
a student, a teacher, anassistant principle, a princip and now serving
in the role of Superintendent. WeI truly value feedback, whether it's good,
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bad, flat, and different neutral. I truly value feedback, but
I think of feedback as whether it'spositive or negative, as helpful information for
us to gauge how we are implementingour strategies and what's working and what's not.
So you have to think of itwhen you think of it holistically.
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It's one data point in conjunction withlots of other data and feedback that you're
receiving. So if it's one negativecomment or one negative criticism, couple that
with all the other feedback, andthen it gives you a more balanced perspective
of what's working and how to managethat that feedback. Certainly, you know,
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I am human, right, andso one of the others that's really
important to me is sharing my humanitywith the community. I am not a
robot, right, I am ahuman. I am a mom, I
am a sister, I am adaughter. You know, I have thoughts,
I have feelings, and I justwant our community to know that.
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You know, I bring my wholeself to this work. I am leading
certainly from the heart. Right.I have a student in a child in
the district, So I understand theperspective of parents, and no matter what
voices are sharing and giving us feedback, I want everyone to know that their
feedback, their voice, their opinion, their perspective is valued. We want
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our community members to have a voice. And so as we're working to amplify
the voices of our students, we'realso working to amplify the voices of our
community. And you know, againwe'll put it in perspective right. And
I know, just being an educatorfor over twenty five years, you do
have to have thick skin, right, particularly when you're working with students.
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There's no other group that will giveyou on the spot, unfiltered feedback than
our children. You know, somepeople say from the mouths of babes,
our kids will tell you. They'lltell you what you look like, they'll
tell you what they would you soundlike. They'll tell you if your lesson
isn't the best, if it's notresonating. So as educators, there's a
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certain level of you know, youknow, the quorum that comes with that,
and we get used to hearing thatfeedback. And I don't ever want
to get to a place where I'mnot receptive and willing to listen to feedback
from the community, whether it's goodor bad. So we take it all
in, we process it, weput it in perspective, but certainly we're
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sensitive to it. And I amcertainly sensitive to it. You know,
I want to hear it all.I want to know what's going on,
and I really want to know.I really want to hear from our voices
or community members who those voices areusually not at the table. So even
when we ask for feedback, Ialways ask myself whose voices are not in
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the room? Who did we nothear from? We heard from this group,
but who's missing? Right? Sowe want to make sure that we
are being inclusive and we're providing everyonewith opportunities to give us feech sure,
Doctor Angela Chapmans with a superintendent ofColumbus City Schools, What are some of
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the challenges that and you probably knewabout some of them before you took over,
but what are some of the challengesthat faces Columbus City Schools? So
I would say some of the biggerchallenges really speak to the fact that the
size and scale of our district.Right, So when we think about some
of our challenges as it relates tooperations, certainly transportation. There have been
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a few stories about our transportation system, and I think that, you know,
we have a dedicated team that is, you know, committed to transporting
our students. We have a fleetof probably over eight hundred buses, so
we have we have the resources.The challenge comes in where we are providing
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services to so many students, includingpublic school students and charter and non public
students. So we are responsible fortransporting not only our own students, but
also charter and non public students.Many folks don't know that, right,
think they don't know that we arethe provider and so it's those types of
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complexities that add to the work thatwe're leading and make it a bit more
challenging. So, for example,we are charter non publics, they're on
different scale and so they're not onthe same schedule that we're operating on.
So not only are we providing transportation, but we have to accommodate so many
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different schedules, which adds you know, and you're thinking of logistics, it
adds complications to the schedule and theplans. And then also the fact that
we provide transportation to our students allover the district. So you may be
a student that's enrolled. Your neighborhoodschool is is far east on the borderline
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of Columbus, and let's say CanalWinchester, but you've chosen to go to
a school in far northwest, right, maybe Centennial. We provide the transportation
for those students to go from fareast to far northwest. And you know,
on any given day, how muchtime it would take you driving in
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your car in the morning during trafficto get there. Now you add in
a bus making multiple stops, andhow much time it takes. So we
are providing a service to such abroad area, a large group of students,
and a large number of students thatwe serve, and we have different
schedules. So that just complicates theservice that we are providing. So it
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makes it a little more challenging.Sure, when I talk to my colleagues
across the state, they've certainly madesome changes where they have said, you
know, well we for all ofthose reasons that we just discussed, Well,
we don't provide transportation to our highschool students because that is not required
by the state. And so weare providing a service that's above and beyond
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what the state has required, andso it just adds to the complexity of
the work when you think about someof the other challenges that we're experiencing as
a district. These are challenges thatdistricts across the country are faced with now,
So post pandemic, we are allchallenged the national teacher shortage. Columbus
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is not immune to that. Youknow, we're seeing lower enrollments for college
students going into the teaching profession,perhaps because there are so many options for
them, lower number of students graduatingwith a teaching credential. Again, there's
so many options for them now,and so we really have to start thinking
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about our pipeline earlier, our teacherpipeline. We have to start thinking about
what are we doing when our kidsare in high school to really show them
all the options within education, sothat before they even go to school,
they will go to school kind oflike I did when I was in elementary
school. I knew I wanted tobe a teacher. There wasn't anything that
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anyone could do to deter me.So that was an interest and a passion
that you know, started with mevery very early. And we're working with
all of our teacher pipeline work toreally build those pipelines up sooner, earlier,
so that we can have more robustoptions for candidates. And so those
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are some of the bigger issues thatwe're facing. I would say that post
pandemic, we are also, likedistricts across the country, are really focusing
on academic recovery. And so duringthe pandemic, our students experienced a lot
of disruption. So they were homefor extended period of time, they weren't
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with their peers, they came backto school for maybe two days a week,
they were off than on and sowe've really need to still continue to
work on setting the expectation that schoolis in. School is open every day,
every day counts. So we havebeen focusing on an attendance awareness campaign,
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really trying to stress the importance aboutattendance because post pandemic, more of
our vulnerable students have really gotten intoa bad habit of staying at home.
Some of that was imposed by uswhen we said stay at home, don't
come to school. We reverse thatpattern in those habits of going to school
regularly and more some of our morevulnerable students kind of just it takes more
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effort to get them back into theroutine. And so across the state we've
seen you know, more instances ofstudents not attending school regularly. They come
to school, but they also missso many days, which creates a challenge
for us. It's difficult for usto educate our students and deliver on the
promise when they're not showing up.And so that attendance piece is really really
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huge for us, making sure thatfamilies know the importance of attendance, why
they need to come to school everyday, why every day counts, every
day matters. Taking off a daya month, and there's you know,
ten months in the school year,that's ten days out the whole year,
and now you're chronically app and you'remissing those hours. Add up, you're
missing instructional time that truly cannot bereplaced. I always call our instructional time
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as the X factor. That's thepiece that we cannot you know, sacrifice,
right, it's so precious. Weusually we don't add days to the
calendar. We end up taking daysaway from the calendar for you know a
number of calamity calamity days if it'sa snow day. And so we really
need every student to be in schoolevery day so that we can provide them
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with the education and the supports thatthey need to be successful. I would
say that as a part of thatacademic recovery work, we know that across
the country, student learning and studentachievement has really truly not gotten back to
where it was pre pandemic levels.Columbus is not immune to that, right,
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and so we're still working to closethose gaps and the lost instructional time
that our students miss during the pandemic. And that's for all students, right,
And so again efforts to continue tomake sure that we're providing our students
with the supports that they need,making sure that they get to school every
day, and really just wrapping ourarms around them. While the pandemic,
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the health impacts of the pandemic areover, the long lasting impacts of the
pandemic are not over. We're stillexperiencing that and seeing that every day in
our classrooms in our schools. DoctorAngela Chapman is with us, the Superintendent
ZEO of Columbus City Schools. Angela, and if I'm wrong on this stat
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just you know, you know,crush me. But the things that I've
read with regards to attendance the suburbanschools versus the Columbus City schools. Could
you debunk any myths or I guessI just want people to know the difference
is why there is such a strugglewith attendance at Columbus City schools versus the
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Dublins or New Albany's. And Ijust feel like people are quick to criticize
Columbus City schools on that, butmaybe not understand what it's like to live
maybe as a single parent, orI don't know. Would you touch on
that, yes, And I wouldsay before folks are eager to jump to
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criticism, they should first seek tounderstand why is it that a child of
school age is not attending school regularly. What we have done as a district
is we've made home visits, wemake phone calls. We had a team
that spent the entire summer making callsto families of students who had missed ten
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or more days last year, askingthem this question. And so it's easy
to castones right, but it's harderto truly take the time to understand why
are students missing school? And Iwould argue that there's no parent that gets
up in the morning and say I'mnot going to send you to school today,
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I'm going to keep you at homewith me. I don't think that's
a comment that's common that that happensin households across our city. But what
I do think happens is that whenwe think about the economic disparities that happens
that occur in our community. Whetherit's a student, an older student needs
to stay home for school so thatthey can babysit a younger student because maybe
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they're sick. What happens when afamily is not feeling well and someone the
student who's sick, they need tostay home and that's an excused absence.
But who's going to watch that childif they're underage while the parents have to
go to work so they can earnincome because they don't have sick days to
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stay home. Well, it maybe the case that an older sibling now
has to stay home to watch theyounger sibling because they're sick. Now,
the older student doesn't get a sickday because they're not sick, but there's
supervising a younger student. It maybe the case that for some of our
families that have housing insecurity right theyare. They may have a place to
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stay, but it may not bea stable environment i e. They're staying
with a friend, or they're stayingwith a family member, and there may
be dynamics that are going on inthat home that may prevent the family or
the student from getting to school thatday. There may be issues with transportation,
whether that is you know, theschool district transportation or you know the
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family, maybe the family hasn't signedthe child up for transportation. There may
be a number of reasons that preventa student or family from getting their scholar
to school each day, and sowe just have to be sensitive to it.
There is no, you know,a way to solve for this issue
by a one size fits all approach. It has to be case managed and
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we have to work with each individualstudent and their family to figure out what
are their specific barriers. Because again, school's open, we're inviting everyone to
come to school. We have resourcesfor our families. But the other biggest
issue that we're finding is mental healthissues. So again post pandemic, the
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CDC did a report and found thatthere are higher rates of mental health challenges
that are facing our teenagers right now. Our teenage students post pandemic, and
many of those reasons are due tosome of it due to the disruption that
was caused during the pandemic. Otherreasons are due to social media that are
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causing students to have higher rates ofanxiety, higher feelings or rates of loneliness,
higher rates of depression, higher ratesof suicidal ideation, and so and
then the you know, sometimes studentsget caught up in a social media web
that is somewhat toxic, and there'sbullying, and you know, lots of
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other challenges that happen, and thatcould be whether they're you know, at
home in the evening weekend. Youknow, the kids are with their have
their phones twenty four hours a daynow. But some of those challenges,
those mental health challenges, truly interferewith the student's ability to engage, to
want to come to school regularly,and to feel connected. And so we
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certainly want all of our students tofeel that sense of belonging when they come
to school means I need to getto school because that's where my friends are,
that's where the magic happens, that'swhere my teachers are. We want
them to feel a sense of connectednessto the school. If that sense of
connection, that thread is broken.There's more of a desire for them to
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stay home or be engaged in activitiesoutside of school and not with school.
That's where we start to see thosepatterns of attendance really come into play.
Doctor Angela Chapman is with us sideyour parent. I'm a parent. I
don't know about you, but I'mquick to say, ah, you kids
nowadays, you have it so easy. But if you look at everything and
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some of the things you just touchedon, our children today, do they
have it tougher than what you andI had it? Absolutely? I think
that our students today have so manymore obstacles that they have to navigate every
day, especially like just social media. For example. We didn't have those
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interferences with social media when we weregrowing up. Right, there was your
peer group that was right there withyou, in front of you in school,
and that was it. Yeah,right, And so now our children
are struggling with body images, selfconfidence, how they're perceived based on the
number of likes that they have,the number of life that they have on
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social media, whether many of themdon't use Facebook as much anymore, but
probably Instagram, TikTok, you know, they're looking for the likes, right,
and so that was just a wholenother level of pressure that we didn't
have. And remember, your peergroup when we were younger, was right
in front of you. On socialmedia, your peer group. You could
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be interacting with peers in Montana orCalifornia or another country, and so you're
getting feedback, you're getting comments,and you're interacting with peers across the globe
on social media, and they thosestudents may not have the same values as
youth that you have in your household, and that can easily become a conflict.
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And so I, just as aparent, I encourage you know,
all family members and parents, whetheryou're a grandma raising grandchildren, an aunt,
a godmother, godparent stepping in,be engaged. And parents have the
permission and the right to be allup in their child's business. You should
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know. You should know who yourchild is communicating, even if it's in
a video game. You know,my son likes to play roadblocks. Oh
yeah, right, so I haveto monitor the chat. I have to
make sure that I know who hisfriends are. You can't just communicate with
anyone because those conversations can go aarrivevery quickly, and you know, we
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have to be you know, vigilant. There could be perhaps they're not even
communicating with children their age, perhapsthey're communicating with adults. Well, that's
not okay in my household. Andso as parents, I want us to
make sure that we give ourselves permissionto make sure that we're engaged. We're
leaning in, we're checking, wehave the passwords and accounts to our children's
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accounts, like we need to knowwhat's going on. It would be the
same if the children were in yourliving room, be no different now that
they're on a tablet, a device, a phone, or social media,
and that helps manage what your childrenare being exposed to, what they're dealing
with, you know, you know, just we really have to be engaged.
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And now is the time for familiesto be even more engaged than ever
before because of those dynamics. SoI strongly believe that our kids today,
this generation, they have so manymore barriers rollblocks that they have to navigate
that we never even it was.It was never even a thought for us.
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You know, it was just gooutside, play with the friends in
your neighborhood and have a good time. Yeah, back before the street lights.
I'm all right exactly, doctor Chapman, I love you even more after
that. So with what I wantto ask you, and it could be
a loaded question, but do alot of issues that you see, whether
it's with students or just you know, crime in general, does does it
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all start at home? Like?Could a lot of issues be curbed with
what happens at home? Absolutely?So, you know, we know that
you know, most of our studentsstart at home, right Their parents are
their first teacher. And so asparents, we all hope and aspire to
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give our students our children, raisethem with the values that we believe are
important, and nurture them and guidethem. But certainly we also recognize that
the influence of their peer group isso strong and it's more powerful, particularly
when they get to that teenage agegroup. Our teenagers are so susceptible to
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their peer group, and so whenit's also important for as parents for us
to make sure that we know whoour children are interacting with. That goes
back to our previous conversation about socialmedia. But your friends, we have
to make sure that they have We'rewell aware of who they are socializing with,
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who they look up to. Atthat age who they aspire to be
like, because those are the influencesthat probably have more of oppression on our
teenagers when they get to that teenageage group. Now, I certainly think
that you know, there are lotsof different factors that you know, in
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our that are happening in our communitythat we can't always control for in our
home. So we have to beeven more vigilant as parents, right,
you know, students, our childrencan go online and order anything could be
at their fingertips, regardless of whetheror not it's age appropriate, right,
right, And so with just twoclicks, they could have access to content
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that's inappropriate to you know, thingsthat are inappropriate, whether it's you know,
tobacco, the vape pens. Andyou know, there's a whole market
that's advertising to our children. They'remaking it so that children will be interested
and the be enticed by it.Right. And so again that whole media
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piece around what is marketed towards teenagers, you know, that doesn't start in
the home, that's in our community. So our parents have to be even
more vigilant about what our students aretheir children are exposed to, and how
to make sure they're really checking tomake sure what's going on in their social
network, and also think their peergroup is important because if the friend is
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interested in X, Y, andZ, they're going to turn their other
friends onto that same you know,hobbier interests, even if it's you know,
nonproductive. But I certainly think thatyou know, you know, we
think about gun violence, right,that's plaguing our community. All of those
(34:07):
you know, challenges, they startwith those interactions that our students are having.
Right. Sometimes we've had students thisyear unfortunately that lost their life because
they were playing with the loaded gunand they were doing it for likes on
TikTok, right, So they theythought, you know, if I do
(34:30):
this, I'll get more likes onTikTok, I'll be more popular. You
know, my friends will you know, appreciate and find value in me doing
this. And there was a tragedythat happened earlier this year where two students
they were friends, right, andthey were just hanging out, but they
(34:52):
were playing with a loaded gun,which is never okay, and one of
the students both of their lives werechanged forever. But one of the students
is no longer with us because thegun went off accidentally. That wasn't something
that they intended to do, right, But there's a tragedy that's happened,
(35:12):
and those lives are the families.Their lives are changed forever. I'm changed
forever after hearing about it because itwas so devastating to think that our students
were so interested in gaining likes onTikTok. Again, we cannot as parents
underestimate the influence that social media hason this generation. That is, I've
(35:37):
never seen anything like it before inmy life. And so we have to
be so so vigilant with our students, whether it's during school, after school,
on the weekend, summer. Wejust have to make sure that we're
very, very vigilant because it isa different challenge that our students today face,
Doctor Chapman on the And I knowwe're starting to wrap up on the
(36:00):
heels of what you just said withgun violence tragedy with all of Columbus City
schools. Are we as safe aswe can be right now? Is there
are there any other things you aretrying to implement right now to make sure
the students are safe? Yes,so a couple of things. Certainly,
we know that safety is everyone's responsibility. We have. We work with our
(36:24):
local Law Enforcement Department CPD where thereare folks coming social media on a regular
basis alerting us to any potential threats, conflicts as well, so that we
can be proactive. We want themajority of our efforts and as it relates
to safety and security, to beproactive. Right. We want to make
(36:46):
sure that we're preventing We have thesafeguards in place, we call it layers
of security, and we're making surethat all of that work is happening so
that we don't have to talk aboutwhat do we do after And we have
taken significant steps as a district tomake sure that we have those layers of
safety in place at all of ourschools. And then the other piece that
(37:10):
I think is equally is important.It's psychological safety. So we want to
make sure that we're having conversations withour students about making sure that they feel
safe. Because as adults, wecan put lots of layers in place to
make the school or the environment feelsafe, but at the end of the
day, if the students don't feelsafe, that's a different issue, right,
(37:35):
because we want to make sure thatthe conversation they have healthy relationships within
their classroom amongst their peers. Theyhave healthy relationships with the adults. It's
so important that every student is knownby name. We know who our students
are, and they know that thereis someone or multiple people in the school
that they can come to if theydon't feel safe, and that could be
(38:00):
you know, they don't feel safeat home, they don't feel safe walking
home, they don't feel safe ina classroom, they don't feel safe with
a group of friends. It isvery important that students have someone one adult
in their life, particularly at school, that they have a connection with,
because what will happen is if theyknow of something that's going awry or something's
(38:23):
amiss, they will go to thatadult and they will say, hey,
Ms Chapman, I heard such andsuch. I don't feel safe, or
my friend heard such and such.We need to check. Maybe we need
to check someone's locker, we needto check this something's going down. That's
the type of intel and intelligence andcommunication that is really really so critical to
(38:46):
making sure that we know what's goingon in our school. So we could
talk about all the technical stuff interms of cameras and securities on doors and
detect metal detection systems, and allof that, But for me, what's
most important is that psychological safety andmaking sure that we're checking in with our
students every day and they feel thatsense of safety as a result of all
(39:08):
the other investments. I also wantto talk a little bit about restorative practices.
Restorative practices is a strategy that weare implementing and investing in in the
district to really help give the studentsthe skills that they need to solve their
own conflicts, restore the harm thatwas done in a community, and build
(39:31):
relationships. And so this is wehave five schools that are piloting student led
restorative practices, where the students arebeing trained and they're training their peers.
And so, for example, ifthere's a conflict, a disagreement, whether
it happened on social media or inthe cafeteria, the students come together and
they say, let's talk about this. Let's talk about who was harmed when
(39:57):
Alexia did X. Let's talk abouthow we're going to restore the harm.
So we're building up our sense ofagency and problem solving and conflict resolution so
that that incident doesn't continue to lingerand fester and build and grow into something
even more significant than what it reallyis. I like that, by the
(40:19):
way, So we're giving the studentsthe skills that they need. So whether
they're at school, at a movietheater, in the mall, at an
ice cream shop, the students havethe skills that they need. They're not
relying on the teacher. I e. I'm gonna run and go tell miss
Ms Thomas, no, no,no, you have the skills that you
need to you know, engage withyour peers and meaningful ways to help restore,
(40:46):
rebuild the relationships, restore the harmthat was done. And we're hopeful
that this strategy again that can beused in life, not just in school,
no matter where the kids are.It gives them a greater sense of
confidence and agency over their lives andover their relationships and really just empowers them.
(41:07):
Yeah. No, I love that. Doctor Angela Chapman is with us
and CEOs you should know, andI heart media Columbus Podcast. As I
mentioned earlier, I think you haveprobably one of the toughest jobs with the
largest public school district in the stateof Ohio. I know, last what
was it last month the state reportcards came out. There was criticism of
(41:29):
Columbus City schools. I know you'rean ambitious woman. I want you to
succeed. What kind of game plando you have in place? Or your
thoughts on how do you increase everything? We talked about enrollment and attendance,
I should say, but what aresome of your goals to fix some of
those issues? Yes, so whenwe think about our state report card,
(41:51):
certainly we know that everyone landed onthe score, right, so they focus
all of their attention on the numberof stars. So, first of all,
I want to say that the OhioDepartment of Education transitioned away from letter
grades intentionally, Okay, right,They did not want school districts in school
(42:13):
communities to see the district as justone number. We serve forty five thousand
students across the city. We haveone hundred and thirteen schools. There is
so much more to that score thanone number or one letter. And so
while we certainly know where we arenow, we know that there's lots of
(42:37):
room for improvement. But when youpeel back the layers of the onion or
look at the different components of thescore. Let's take early literacy for example,
we are making progress, our studentsare making progress. Certainly, there's
more room for improvement. One ofthe goals that we have as a board
(42:59):
is on earth early literacy. It'sboard goal number one. Over the past
couple of years, we have madesignificant investments in providing our teachers with the
professional development that they need so thatthey can be better reading teachers. We
have also made investments in curricular resourcesso that all of our students across the
(43:22):
district will have access to grade levelcontent that's aligned to the standards based on
what they will be assessed on inthe spring. That wasn't always the case,
and so prior to these investments,and that's just this is I believe
the third year of those investments.Prior to that, students would be assessed
(43:42):
on content and skills that they didn'tnecessarily they weren't seeing every day in their
classrooms because those resources were not available. And so we want to make sure
that we are providing the structure,the system, and the resources that lays
a strong foundation for learning to happenand for us to continue to make those
(44:05):
improvements. So it's early that we'vemade those investments. Again, these are
areas which you know, we didn'thave the resources that we needed. Now
we do. Recently, the Governorcame out with initiative a strategy where he
wants all districts in Ohio to implementthe science of reading, which basically speaks
(44:28):
to the early literacy strategies that ourteachers will implement because now we know so
much more about how the brain learnsto read process sounds, and so we
are implementing those strategies. Columbus CitySchools is ahead of the game. We
have provided the curricular resources as wellof the as the professional development and training
to all of our teachers to fullyimplement the science of reading with fidelity.
(44:52):
So now we know that we're usingthe evidence based research of how the brain
learns how to read. We havethe curricular resources for our students to access,
we have the training for our teachers, and so now we'll be able
to close those reading gaps sooner andearlier, in starting as early as pre
(45:15):
K, so that our students willhave a strong foundation. When students don't
have that strong foundation, where ingrades K through three, when they're learning
to read grades three and up,they're reading to learn, and if they
don't have the skills to read ongrade level material, they just struggle the
rest of the time. Right,it's everything becomes a struggle, even if
(45:37):
they're in a math class, becausenow math is embedded in word problems,
and so if you're not decoding thetext at your grade level, whether it's
eighth grade, because you didn't havethat strong foundation, then everything becomes a
struggle. So I acknowledge that there'sa lot of unlearning that we need to
(45:58):
do. We need to set thatstrong foundation, but we will start to
see progress over time. It's notgoing to change overnight. We didn't get
here overnight, and we're not workingwith robots. Right, we have forty
five thousand students where we are workingwith them every day to get them the
skills that they need and make surethat they're prepared not only for the content
(46:21):
that they're exposed to today, butalso for tomorrow. I'll also add that
we are very interested in expanding ourearly childhood offerings because it is too late
to intervene when our students come tous in kindergarten. We need to get
to our students earlier. Thinking aboutthe brain research, more more than eighty
(46:44):
percent of the brain is developed beforethe age of five. Well, that's
when our kids come to us whenthey start kindergarten. So we need to
get our students enrolled in school inpre K. Now, I'm certainly pushing
for universal pre K, which meansall children go to school starting at age
four, we change the narrative insteadof waiting until five. But in CCS
(47:07):
we serve probably over a thousand studentsin pre K programs. We have sixty
two pre K classrooms across the city, and all of our pre K classrooms
are rated as four or five star. That means we're doing a really good
job of educating our students in thatpre K space because we get them earlier.
(47:28):
Because again, there are so manyfactors that really before kids even get
to school that are attributing or contributeto their growth and development, and so
we certainly want to intervene earlier sothey'll have a stronger start when they get
to kindergarten. And oh, sorry, doctor Schapman, I was just gonna
ask, when you talk about kindergartenerscoming and being unprepared, are you talking
(47:52):
in terms of reading? Absolutely so, so many we're seeing a rise influx
of kindergarteners that are not prepared forkindergarten. I either come to school on
the first day. They don't knowtheir name, they don't know the letters
of the alphabet. We're seeing morestudents who are coming to school and they're
(48:14):
not even potty trained in kindergarten,and so that those are skills that are
really not a part of the standardsthat we're required to teach and assess,
and so it takes more time thatwe spend on developing those skills that perhaps
should have been acquired or accomplished earlier. And so that just really starts the
(48:37):
clock and the kids are already behindby the time they get to kindergarten,
and so then we have to spendmore time playing ketchup. And that's what
this' that's one of the biggest challengesthat we face, is that we're still
trying to pay ketchup. And sowe'd love to see our students and have
the opportunity to serve them earlier andsooner. That early intervention is key.
(49:00):
That will provide them with a strongerfoundation so they don't have to play catch
up and they're not behind. Ithink about your years as a teacher and
then moving up and do administration superintendent. Now, even after all this time
in your different levels and what you'vedone. It has to be gratifying to
(49:21):
know that you're part of helping developand inspire these kids. These students absolutely,
So that is my why. Thatis why I get up every day
and do the work that we're doing. We know that it is there.
We have our fair share of challenges, but I truly believe in our students.
I believe in what's possible for them. I believe in our community.
(49:45):
I believe that our community wants tosee our students achieve and excel. And
I am just really excited that nowis the time that we are going to
rally together and stack hands as aColumbus community. And I've heard that's the
Columbus way that and we're going todo what's necessary to support our students and
(50:07):
support our schools. So I'm excitedabout the opportunity to serve. That is
my why. That's what inspires me, and I believe in what's possible.
Well, look, we are rootingyou on. I can't thank you enough
for your time and your energy.It's infectious. Who wouldn't want to sign
me up? We have a spotfor you. Yeah, whatever you need,
(50:30):
Superintendent CEO, Doctor Angela Chapman ourguest this week on CEOs You Should
Know and iHeart Media Columbus podcast.Thanks for your time, Thank you,
thank you for having me. CEOsyou Should Know is hosted and produced by
Brandon Boxer, a production of iHeartMediaColumbus
Columbus in Central Ohio have a richhistory of companies being headquartered here, everything
from technology, manufacturing, retail,insurance, and more. But what about
the leaders behind these companies? Whatmakes them tick? How do they get
their start? This is where youget to meet the captain of the ship.
Welcome to CEOs You Should Know andiHeartMedia Columbus Podcast. Welcome back to
(00:20):
another edition of CEOs You Should Know. This is an iHeartMedia Columbus podcast.
I'm your host, boxer and withus this week is doctor Angela Chapman,
who has been a public educator thatspanned over twenty five years and no doubt,
this is my opinion, but probablyhas I would think one of the
most toughest challenging jobs. But shedoes it with a smile. I have
(00:43):
no doubt about it. She isthe Superintendent CEO of Columbus City Schools and
she has been in that position sincewhat at the beginning of the year,
right, January one? January one, And you're here with us today.
I know you have a super businessschedule, but I appreciate your time.
Welcome to the podcast. Thank you, thank you for having me. So
let's get started a little bit We'regoing to talk about Columbus City Schools,
(01:06):
the challenges, the positives, butI also want to talk about you,
getting to know you a little bitmore. Are you from central Ohio originally?
I am originally from Cleveland, Ohioarea, so I consider myself a
buck Eye born and raised in theCleveland area. I went to college at
the University of Akron, again withinthe state. I'm my masters at Ashland
(01:32):
University, and then I transitioned toNashville, Tennessee, where I worked on
my doctorate. I spent eight yearsin Nashville, and then I transitioned to
DC Public Schools Okay, and Ispent five years in DC before transitioning to
my role here in Columbus City Schools. So this has been five years since
I've been in Columbus and certainly proudto make Columbus my home. Well,
(01:57):
welcome back to Ohio, and welcomehome home to Columbus. Thank you,
glad you hear that were you whenyou were away? And I'm not originally
from here, but I spent enoughtime here that when I got transferred away,
I really missed all things Columbus,all things Ohio. When you were
in Tennessee and in d C.Did you miss some of those things?
The charm of Ohio absolutely, ofcourse, and that's what threw me back
(02:20):
to the state and certainly my family, my friends, the connections. You
know. This is you know,just home for me, and so being
back home is really just a specialopportunity for me. And having this opportunity
to lead and serve in the cityof Columbus truly is just really a dream
(02:42):
come true. Doctor Angela Chapman iswith us. She is the Superintendent CEO
of Columbus City Schools, the largestschool district publicly in the state of Ohio.
I have a question growing up,and we'll get a little bit more
of your background. Did was itwhen you are superintendent? Is that something
that you always aspire to be ordo you kind of just fall into it
(03:05):
and realize one day I'd like tobe a superintendent. That's a great question.
So I think about leadership, right, and so I've known since a
very young age that leadership is importantto me. Certainly there were values that
were instilled in me as an elementaryschool student and taking advantage of leadership opportunities
(03:28):
and I see, you know,leadership as essential to you know, our
communities, our organization. But I'vealways seen myself as a leader, so
aspiring to be, you know,the girl Scout leader, aspiring to be
the student council leader. And sothat was a trait, at attribute,
a skill that I have been developingsince elementary school. I would say,
(03:51):
I certainly always wanted to be ateacher, Okay, And in my heart,
I still see myself as a teacher. Right so I'm teaching and working
with adults, teaching and working withmy team members, teaching and working with
the community. I still see myselfas a teacher and looking for those opportunities
(04:12):
to share teachable moments, whether I'msharing about what's amazing, that's things that
are happening in Columbus City schools,and sharing and educating our community, our
residents, our students about what's possible. So I still see myself as a
teacher. So now I see myselfas the lead teacher of the organization.
(04:33):
Certainly there's some other duties as asign that comes with the role that I
have now. Certainly, my experiences, my formal training has prepared me for
the role as superintendent. But forme, it was kind of always off
in the distance, but not necessarilythinking that now would be the moment right
now. So I'm just always willingto serve and certainly focusing on the mission
(04:59):
at hand, as fighting the supportsand resources and being of service to you,
the forty five thousand students who arecounting on us each and every day
to make the best choices and thebest decisions. Because I always say that
our students, whether you're in kindergarten, sixth grade, ninth grade, or
twelfth grade, they only get oneyear to be a sixth grader. So
(05:20):
as educators we have to rally aroundthem. As community members, we have
to rally around them because they onlyhave one year to be a sixth grader,
one year to be a ninth grader, and we want to make it
the best. By the way,your energy is infectious. I love it.
It's not every guest has the energythat you have, but I think
(05:43):
you also need that, especially inyour line of work and what you do.
By the way, absolutely holy pressure, Batman, forty five thousand students.
As we mentioned the state's largest schooldistrict. How intense was the interview
process for a job like this?I mean, I can't imagine I mean,
how do you and how do youprepare for that? Well, I
(06:05):
would say it was really really intense. It was intense for me because at
the same time that I was interviewingfor the role, I was in the
role. And so for me,the pressure was making sure that I was
managing, leading, supporting every dayto make sure that things, you know,
(06:26):
were run smoothly, right, andso there was a Some would say
maybe that's an advantage, right,but for me, because I wanted everything
to go smoothly. For me,the best evidence was my performance on the
job in the role, so itwas kind of like a you know,
I had to make sure that Iwas delivering every day. So for me,
(06:46):
while the interview process started maybe inthe end of March and April,
for me, the interview started onday one, January one, when I
was assigned the role as interim superintendent. For me, that's the pressure that
I put on myself. I feltlike that's the day, the first day
of the interview, So it wasevery day, all day for me.
(07:10):
So it was a long interview period. It's how I how I interpreted it.
But it was really high stakes,right, So you were the there
were several different you know, opportunitiesto show your passion and your commitment to
the work, you know, shareyour skills and expertise. And there was
also lots of opportunities for the communityto share their feedback. And so there
(07:35):
were community sessions where the community said, you know, these are the attributes
of our future leader that we desire. There were the forums where, you
know, all of the candidates appearedon a whirlwind tour for one day across
the city where we met with lotsof stakeholders. There were business leaders,
(07:57):
community leaders, faith based leaders,We met with students, we met with
staff, and then that evening culminatedwith a televised or you know, was
streamed live interview with all of thecandidates. So it was pretty intense.
I'm certainly grateful for the journey nowbecause it really provided me with an opportunity
(08:20):
to show the community through a verytransparent process, how passionate I am about
the work that we're leading in ColumbusCity Schools and that I have the skills
the experience needed to take our districtto the next level. So I didn't
necessarily wasn't so appreciative as I wasgoing through the process. But now on
(08:43):
the other end of it, I'mcertainly grateful for the journey. I learned
a lot about myself and from thecommunity. Right that feedback that we gather
from the community certainly has helped usand helped me figure out the strategies that
I want to prioritize in the firstyou know, ninety days in the in
the role doctor Angela Chapman is withus, who's the superintendent of Columbus City
(09:07):
Schools. A position like yours obviouslydoesn't come without criticism, and through the
years you've had some great leadership roles. This is more of a question of
curiosity. But how do you absorband take There's always sharp criticism, but
(09:28):
with your time now as a leader, how do you how do you absorb
that? How do you take thatwithout either getting offended or you know,
it's as a human nature, it'seasy to want to get defensive, So
how do how do you take that? So there there's a lot in that
question, of course, But sofirst of all, I would like to
(09:48):
say, as a reflective educator,I've always been reflective, whether I was
a student, a teacher, anassistant principle, a princip and now serving
in the role of Superintendent. WeI truly value feedback, whether it's good,
(10:09):
bad, flat, and different neutral. I truly value feedback, but
I think of feedback as whether it'spositive or negative, as helpful information for
us to gauge how we are implementingour strategies and what's working and what's not.
So you have to think of itwhen you think of it holistically.
(10:30):
It's one data point in conjunction withlots of other data and feedback that you're
receiving. So if it's one negativecomment or one negative criticism, couple that
with all the other feedback, andthen it gives you a more balanced perspective
of what's working and how to managethat that feedback. Certainly, you know,
(10:54):
I am human, right, andso one of the others that's really
important to me is sharing my humanitywith the community. I am not a
robot, right, I am ahuman. I am a mom, I
am a sister, I am adaughter. You know, I have thoughts,
I have feelings, and I justwant our community to know that.
(11:18):
You know, I bring my wholeself to this work. I am leading
certainly from the heart. Right.I have a student in a child in
the district, So I understand theperspective of parents, and no matter what
voices are sharing and giving us feedback, I want everyone to know that their
feedback, their voice, their opinion, their perspective is valued. We want
(11:41):
our community members to have a voice. And so as we're working to amplify
the voices of our students, we'realso working to amplify the voices of our
community. And you know, againwe'll put it in perspective right. And
I know, just being an educatorfor over twenty five years, you do
have to have thick skin, right, particularly when you're working with students.
(12:05):
There's no other group that will giveyou on the spot, unfiltered feedback than
our children. You know, somepeople say from the mouths of babes,
our kids will tell you. They'lltell you what you look like, they'll
tell you what they would you soundlike. They'll tell you if your lesson
isn't the best, if it's notresonating. So as educators, there's a
(12:26):
certain level of you know, youknow, the quorum that comes with that,
and we get used to hearing thatfeedback. And I don't ever want
to get to a place where I'mnot receptive and willing to listen to feedback
from the community, whether it's goodor bad. So we take it all
in, we process it, weput it in perspective, but certainly we're
(12:50):
sensitive to it. And I amcertainly sensitive to it. You know,
I want to hear it all.I want to know what's going on,
and I really want to know.I really want to hear from our voices
or community members who those voices areusually not at the table. So even
when we ask for feedback, Ialways ask myself whose voices are not in
(13:15):
the room? Who did we nothear from? We heard from this group,
but who's missing? Right? Sowe want to make sure that we
are being inclusive and we're providing everyonewith opportunities to give us feech sure,
Doctor Angela Chapmans with a superintendent ofColumbus City Schools, What are some of
(13:35):
the challenges that and you probably knewabout some of them before you took over,
but what are some of the challengesthat faces Columbus City Schools? So
I would say some of the biggerchallenges really speak to the fact that the
size and scale of our district.Right, So when we think about some
of our challenges as it relates tooperations, certainly transportation. There have been
(14:00):
a few stories about our transportation system, and I think that, you know,
we have a dedicated team that is, you know, committed to transporting
our students. We have a fleetof probably over eight hundred buses, so
we have we have the resources.The challenge comes in where we are providing
(14:26):
services to so many students, includingpublic school students and charter and non public
students. So we are responsible fortransporting not only our own students, but
also charter and non public students.Many folks don't know that, right,
think they don't know that we arethe provider and so it's those types of
(14:48):
complexities that add to the work thatwe're leading and make it a bit more
challenging. So, for example,we are charter non publics, they're on
different scale and so they're not onthe same schedule that we're operating on.
So not only are we providing transportation, but we have to accommodate so many
(15:09):
different schedules, which adds you know, and you're thinking of logistics, it
adds complications to the schedule and theplans. And then also the fact that
we provide transportation to our students allover the district. So you may be
a student that's enrolled. Your neighborhoodschool is is far east on the borderline
(15:31):
of Columbus, and let's say CanalWinchester, but you've chosen to go to
a school in far northwest, right, maybe Centennial. We provide the transportation
for those students to go from fareast to far northwest. And you know,
on any given day, how muchtime it would take you driving in
(15:52):
your car in the morning during trafficto get there. Now you add in
a bus making multiple stops, andhow much time it takes. So we
are providing a service to such abroad area, a large group of students,
and a large number of students thatwe serve, and we have different
schedules. So that just complicates theservice that we are providing. So it
(16:19):
makes it a little more challenging.Sure, when I talk to my colleagues
across the state, they've certainly madesome changes where they have said, you
know, well we for all ofthose reasons that we just discussed, Well,
we don't provide transportation to our highschool students because that is not required
by the state. And so weare providing a service that's above and beyond
(16:41):
what the state has required, andso it just adds to the complexity of
the work when you think about someof the other challenges that we're experiencing as
a district. These are challenges thatdistricts across the country are faced with now,
So post pandemic, we are allchallenged the national teacher shortage. Columbus
(17:03):
is not immune to that. Youknow, we're seeing lower enrollments for college
students going into the teaching profession,perhaps because there are so many options for
them, lower number of students graduatingwith a teaching credential. Again, there's
so many options for them now,and so we really have to start thinking
(17:23):
about our pipeline earlier, our teacherpipeline. We have to start thinking about
what are we doing when our kidsare in high school to really show them
all the options within education, sothat before they even go to school,
they will go to school kind oflike I did when I was in elementary
school. I knew I wanted tobe a teacher. There wasn't anything that
(17:45):
anyone could do to deter me.So that was an interest and a passion
that you know, started with mevery very early. And we're working with
all of our teacher pipeline work toreally build those pipelines up sooner, earlier,
so that we can have more robustoptions for candidates. And so those
(18:07):
are some of the bigger issues thatwe're facing. I would say that post
pandemic, we are also, likedistricts across the country, are really focusing
on academic recovery. And so duringthe pandemic, our students experienced a lot
of disruption. So they were homefor extended period of time, they weren't
(18:27):
with their peers, they came backto school for maybe two days a week,
they were off than on and sowe've really need to still continue to
work on setting the expectation that schoolis in. School is open every day,
every day counts. So we havebeen focusing on an attendance awareness campaign,
(18:52):
really trying to stress the importance aboutattendance because post pandemic, more of
our vulnerable students have really gotten intoa bad habit of staying at home.
Some of that was imposed by uswhen we said stay at home, don't
come to school. We reverse thatpattern in those habits of going to school
regularly and more some of our morevulnerable students kind of just it takes more
(19:19):
effort to get them back into theroutine. And so across the state we've
seen you know, more instances ofstudents not attending school regularly. They come
to school, but they also missso many days, which creates a challenge
for us. It's difficult for usto educate our students and deliver on the
promise when they're not showing up.And so that attendance piece is really really
(19:42):
huge for us, making sure thatfamilies know the importance of attendance, why
they need to come to school everyday, why every day counts, every
day matters. Taking off a daya month, and there's you know,
ten months in the school year,that's ten days out the whole year,
and now you're chronically app and you'remissing those hours. Add up, you're
missing instructional time that truly cannot bereplaced. I always call our instructional time
(20:07):
as the X factor. That's thepiece that we cannot you know, sacrifice,
right, it's so precious. Weusually we don't add days to the
calendar. We end up taking daysaway from the calendar for you know a
number of calamity calamity days if it'sa snow day. And so we really
need every student to be in schoolevery day so that we can provide them
(20:27):
with the education and the supports thatthey need to be successful. I would
say that as a part of thatacademic recovery work, we know that across
the country, student learning and studentachievement has really truly not gotten back to
where it was pre pandemic levels.Columbus is not immune to that, right,
(20:48):
and so we're still working to closethose gaps and the lost instructional time
that our students miss during the pandemic. And that's for all students, right,
And so again efforts to continue tomake sure that we're providing our students
with the supports that they need,making sure that they get to school every
day, and really just wrapping ourarms around them. While the pandemic,
(21:11):
the health impacts of the pandemic areover, the long lasting impacts of the
pandemic are not over. We're stillexperiencing that and seeing that every day in
our classrooms in our schools. DoctorAngela Chapman is with us, the Superintendent
ZEO of Columbus City Schools. Angela, and if I'm wrong on this stat
(21:32):
just you know, you know,crush me. But the things that I've
read with regards to attendance the suburbanschools versus the Columbus City schools. Could
you debunk any myths or I guessI just want people to know the difference
is why there is such a strugglewith attendance at Columbus City schools versus the
(21:56):
Dublins or New Albany's. And Ijust feel like people are quick to criticize
Columbus City schools on that, butmaybe not understand what it's like to live
maybe as a single parent, orI don't know. Would you touch on
that, yes, And I wouldsay before folks are eager to jump to
(22:18):
criticism, they should first seek tounderstand why is it that a child of
school age is not attending school regularly. What we have done as a district
is we've made home visits, wemake phone calls. We had a team
that spent the entire summer making callsto families of students who had missed ten
(22:38):
or more days last year, askingthem this question. And so it's easy
to castones right, but it's harderto truly take the time to understand why
are students missing school? And Iwould argue that there's no parent that gets
up in the morning and say I'mnot going to send you to school today,
(22:59):
I'm going to keep you at homewith me. I don't think that's
a comment that's common that that happensin households across our city. But what
I do think happens is that whenwe think about the economic disparities that happens
that occur in our community. Whetherit's a student, an older student needs
to stay home for school so thatthey can babysit a younger student because maybe
(23:23):
they're sick. What happens when afamily is not feeling well and someone the
student who's sick, they need tostay home and that's an excused absence.
But who's going to watch that childif they're underage while the parents have to
go to work so they can earnincome because they don't have sick days to
(23:45):
stay home. Well, it maybe the case that an older sibling now
has to stay home to watch theyounger sibling because they're sick. Now,
the older student doesn't get a sickday because they're not sick, but there's
supervising a younger student. It maybe the case that for some of our
families that have housing insecurity right theyare. They may have a place to
(24:11):
stay, but it may not bea stable environment i e. They're staying
with a friend, or they're stayingwith a family member, and there may
be dynamics that are going on inthat home that may prevent the family or
the student from getting to school thatday. There may be issues with transportation,
whether that is you know, theschool district transportation or you know the
(24:36):
family, maybe the family hasn't signedthe child up for transportation. There may
be a number of reasons that preventa student or family from getting their scholar
to school each day, and sowe just have to be sensitive to it.
There is no, you know,a way to solve for this issue
by a one size fits all approach. It has to be case managed and
(25:02):
we have to work with each individualstudent and their family to figure out what
are their specific barriers. Because again, school's open, we're inviting everyone to
come to school. We have resourcesfor our families. But the other biggest
issue that we're finding is mental healthissues. So again post pandemic, the
(25:22):
CDC did a report and found thatthere are higher rates of mental health challenges
that are facing our teenagers right now. Our teenage students post pandemic, and
many of those reasons are due tosome of it due to the disruption that
was caused during the pandemic. Otherreasons are due to social media that are
(25:45):
causing students to have higher rates ofanxiety, higher feelings or rates of loneliness,
higher rates of depression, higher ratesof suicidal ideation, and so and
then the you know, sometimes studentsget caught up in a social media web
that is somewhat toxic, and there'sbullying, and you know, lots of
(26:07):
other challenges that happen, and thatcould be whether they're you know, at
home in the evening weekend. Youknow, the kids are with their have
their phones twenty four hours a daynow. But some of those challenges,
those mental health challenges, truly interferewith the student's ability to engage, to
want to come to school regularly,and to feel connected. And so we
(26:30):
certainly want all of our students tofeel that sense of belonging when they come
to school means I need to getto school because that's where my friends are,
that's where the magic happens, that'swhere my teachers are. We want
them to feel a sense of connectednessto the school. If that sense of
connection, that thread is broken.There's more of a desire for them to
(26:52):
stay home or be engaged in activitiesoutside of school and not with school.
That's where we start to see thosepatterns of attendance really come into play.
Doctor Angela Chapman is with us sideyour parent. I'm a parent. I
don't know about you, but I'mquick to say, ah, you kids
nowadays, you have it so easy. But if you look at everything and
(27:15):
some of the things you just touchedon, our children today, do they
have it tougher than what you andI had it? Absolutely? I think
that our students today have so manymore obstacles that they have to navigate every
day, especially like just social media. For example. We didn't have those
(27:37):
interferences with social media when we weregrowing up. Right, there was your
peer group that was right there withyou, in front of you in school,
and that was it. Yeah,right, And so now our children
are struggling with body images, selfconfidence, how they're perceived based on the
number of likes that they have,the number of life that they have on
(28:00):
social media, whether many of themdon't use Facebook as much anymore, but
probably Instagram, TikTok, you know, they're looking for the likes, right,
and so that was just a wholenother level of pressure that we didn't
have. And remember, your peergroup when we were younger, was right
in front of you. On socialmedia, your peer group. You could
(28:23):
be interacting with peers in Montana orCalifornia or another country, and so you're
getting feedback, you're getting comments,and you're interacting with peers across the globe
on social media, and they thosestudents may not have the same values as
youth that you have in your household, and that can easily become a conflict.
(28:47):
And so I, just as aparent, I encourage you know,
all family members and parents, whetheryou're a grandma raising grandchildren, an aunt,
a godmother, godparent stepping in,be engaged. And parents have the
permission and the right to be allup in their child's business. You should
(29:07):
know. You should know who yourchild is communicating, even if it's in
a video game. You know,my son likes to play roadblocks. Oh
yeah, right, so I haveto monitor the chat. I have to
make sure that I know who hisfriends are. You can't just communicate with
anyone because those conversations can go aarrivevery quickly, and you know, we
(29:30):
have to be you know, vigilant. There could be perhaps they're not even
communicating with children their age, perhapsthey're communicating with adults. Well, that's
not okay in my household. Andso as parents, I want us to
make sure that we give ourselves permissionto make sure that we're engaged. We're
leaning in, we're checking, wehave the passwords and accounts to our children's
(29:52):
accounts, like we need to knowwhat's going on. It would be the
same if the children were in yourliving room, be no different now that
they're on a tablet, a device, a phone, or social media,
and that helps manage what your childrenare being exposed to, what they're dealing
with, you know, you know, just we really have to be engaged.
(30:15):
And now is the time for familiesto be even more engaged than ever
before because of those dynamics. SoI strongly believe that our kids today,
this generation, they have so manymore barriers rollblocks that they have to navigate
that we never even it was.It was never even a thought for us.
(30:37):
You know, it was just gooutside, play with the friends in
your neighborhood and have a good time. Yeah, back before the street lights.
I'm all right exactly, doctor Chapman, I love you even more after
that. So with what I wantto ask you, and it could be
a loaded question, but do alot of issues that you see, whether
it's with students or just you know, crime in general, does does it
(31:02):
all start at home? Like?Could a lot of issues be curbed with
what happens at home? Absolutely?So, you know, we know that
you know, most of our studentsstart at home, right Their parents are
their first teacher. And so asparents, we all hope and aspire to
(31:23):
give our students our children, raisethem with the values that we believe are
important, and nurture them and guidethem. But certainly we also recognize that
the influence of their peer group isso strong and it's more powerful, particularly
when they get to that teenage agegroup. Our teenagers are so susceptible to
(31:49):
their peer group, and so whenit's also important for as parents for us
to make sure that we know whoour children are interacting with. That goes
back to our previous conversation about socialmedia. But your friends, we have
to make sure that they have We'rewell aware of who they are socializing with,
(32:10):
who they look up to. Atthat age who they aspire to be
like, because those are the influencesthat probably have more of oppression on our
teenagers when they get to that teenageage group. Now, I certainly think
that you know, there are lotsof different factors that you know, in
(32:32):
our that are happening in our communitythat we can't always control for in our
home. So we have to beeven more vigilant as parents, right,
you know, students, our childrencan go online and order anything could be
at their fingertips, regardless of whetheror not it's age appropriate, right,
right, And so with just twoclicks, they could have access to content
(32:58):
that's inappropriate to you know, thingsthat are inappropriate, whether it's you know,
tobacco, the vape pens. Andyou know, there's a whole market
that's advertising to our children. They'remaking it so that children will be interested
and the be enticed by it.Right. And so again that whole media
(33:21):
piece around what is marketed towards teenagers, you know, that doesn't start in
the home, that's in our community. So our parents have to be even
more vigilant about what our students aretheir children are exposed to, and how
to make sure they're really checking tomake sure what's going on in their social
network, and also think their peergroup is important because if the friend is
(33:46):
interested in X, Y, andZ, they're going to turn their other
friends onto that same you know,hobbier interests, even if it's you know,
nonproductive. But I certainly think thatyou know, you know, we
think about gun violence, right,that's plaguing our community. All of those
(34:07):
you know, challenges, they startwith those interactions that our students are having.
Right. Sometimes we've had students thisyear unfortunately that lost their life because
they were playing with the loaded gunand they were doing it for likes on
TikTok, right, So they theythought, you know, if I do
(34:30):
this, I'll get more likes onTikTok, I'll be more popular. You
know, my friends will you know, appreciate and find value in me doing
this. And there was a tragedythat happened earlier this year where two students
they were friends, right, andthey were just hanging out, but they
(34:52):
were playing with a loaded gun,which is never okay, and one of
the students both of their lives werechanged forever. But one of the students
is no longer with us because thegun went off accidentally. That wasn't something
that they intended to do, right, But there's a tragedy that's happened,
(35:12):
and those lives are the families.Their lives are changed forever. I'm changed
forever after hearing about it because itwas so devastating to think that our students
were so interested in gaining likes onTikTok. Again, we cannot as parents
underestimate the influence that social media hason this generation. That is, I've
(35:37):
never seen anything like it before inmy life. And so we have to
be so so vigilant with our students, whether it's during school, after school,
on the weekend, summer. Wejust have to make sure that we're
very, very vigilant because it isa different challenge that our students today face,
Doctor Chapman on the And I knowwe're starting to wrap up on the
(36:00):
heels of what you just said withgun violence tragedy with all of Columbus City
schools. Are we as safe aswe can be right now? Is there
are there any other things you aretrying to implement right now to make sure
the students are safe? Yes,so a couple of things. Certainly,
we know that safety is everyone's responsibility. We have. We work with our
(36:24):
local Law Enforcement Department CPD where thereare folks coming social media on a regular
basis alerting us to any potential threats, conflicts as well, so that we
can be proactive. We want themajority of our efforts and as it relates
to safety and security, to beproactive. Right. We want to make
(36:46):
sure that we're preventing We have thesafeguards in place, we call it layers
of security, and we're making surethat all of that work is happening so
that we don't have to talk aboutwhat do we do after And we have
taken significant steps as a district tomake sure that we have those layers of
safety in place at all of ourschools. And then the other piece that
(37:10):
I think is equally is important.It's psychological safety. So we want to
make sure that we're having conversations withour students about making sure that they feel
safe. Because as adults, wecan put lots of layers in place to
make the school or the environment feelsafe, but at the end of the
day, if the students don't feelsafe, that's a different issue, right,
(37:35):
because we want to make sure thatthe conversation they have healthy relationships within
their classroom amongst their peers. Theyhave healthy relationships with the adults. It's
so important that every student is knownby name. We know who our students
are, and they know that thereis someone or multiple people in the school
that they can come to if theydon't feel safe, and that could be
(38:00):
you know, they don't feel safeat home, they don't feel safe walking
home, they don't feel safe ina classroom, they don't feel safe with
a group of friends. It isvery important that students have someone one adult
in their life, particularly at school, that they have a connection with,
because what will happen is if theyknow of something that's going awry or something's
(38:23):
amiss, they will go to thatadult and they will say, hey,
Ms Chapman, I heard such andsuch. I don't feel safe, or
my friend heard such and such.We need to check. Maybe we need
to check someone's locker, we needto check this something's going down. That's
the type of intel and intelligence andcommunication that is really really so critical to
(38:46):
making sure that we know what's goingon in our school. So we could
talk about all the technical stuff interms of cameras and securities on doors and
detect metal detection systems, and allof that, But for me, what's
most important is that psychological safety andmaking sure that we're checking in with our
students every day and they feel thatsense of safety as a result of all
(39:08):
the other investments. I also wantto talk a little bit about restorative practices.
Restorative practices is a strategy that weare implementing and investing in in the
district to really help give the studentsthe skills that they need to solve their
own conflicts, restore the harm thatwas done in a community, and build
(39:31):
relationships. And so this is wehave five schools that are piloting student led
restorative practices, where the students arebeing trained and they're training their peers.
And so, for example, ifthere's a conflict, a disagreement, whether
it happened on social media or inthe cafeteria, the students come together and
they say, let's talk about this. Let's talk about who was harmed when
(39:57):
Alexia did X. Let's talk abouthow we're going to restore the harm.
So we're building up our sense ofagency and problem solving and conflict resolution so
that that incident doesn't continue to lingerand fester and build and grow into something
even more significant than what it reallyis. I like that, by the
(40:19):
way, So we're giving the studentsthe skills that they need. So whether
they're at school, at a movietheater, in the mall, at an
ice cream shop, the students havethe skills that they need. They're not
relying on the teacher. I e. I'm gonna run and go tell miss
Ms Thomas, no, no,no, you have the skills that you
need to you know, engage withyour peers and meaningful ways to help restore,
(40:46):
rebuild the relationships, restore the harmthat was done. And we're hopeful
that this strategy again that can beused in life, not just in school,
no matter where the kids are.It gives them a greater sense of
confidence and agency over their lives andover their relationships and really just empowers them.
(41:07):
Yeah. No, I love that. Doctor Angela Chapman is with us
and CEOs you should know, andI heart media Columbus Podcast. As I
mentioned earlier, I think you haveprobably one of the toughest jobs with the
largest public school district in the stateof Ohio. I know, last what
was it last month the state reportcards came out. There was criticism of
(41:29):
Columbus City schools. I know you'rean ambitious woman. I want you to
succeed. What kind of game plando you have in place? Or your
thoughts on how do you increase everything? We talked about enrollment and attendance,
I should say, but what aresome of your goals to fix some of
those issues? Yes, so whenwe think about our state report card,
(41:51):
certainly we know that everyone landed onthe score, right, so they focus
all of their attention on the numberof stars. So, first of all,
I want to say that the OhioDepartment of Education transitioned away from letter
grades intentionally, Okay, right,They did not want school districts in school
(42:13):
communities to see the district as justone number. We serve forty five thousand
students across the city. We haveone hundred and thirteen schools. There is
so much more to that score thanone number or one letter. And so
while we certainly know where we arenow, we know that there's lots of
(42:37):
room for improvement. But when youpeel back the layers of the onion or
look at the different components of thescore. Let's take early literacy for example,
we are making progress, our studentsare making progress. Certainly, there's
more room for improvement. One ofthe goals that we have as a board
(42:59):
is on earth early literacy. It'sboard goal number one. Over the past
couple of years, we have madesignificant investments in providing our teachers with the
professional development that they need so thatthey can be better reading teachers. We
have also made investments in curricular resourcesso that all of our students across the
(43:22):
district will have access to grade levelcontent that's aligned to the standards based on
what they will be assessed on inthe spring. That wasn't always the case,
and so prior to these investments,and that's just this is I believe
the third year of those investments.Prior to that, students would be assessed
(43:42):
on content and skills that they didn'tnecessarily they weren't seeing every day in their
classrooms because those resources were not available. And so we want to make sure
that we are providing the structure,the system, and the resources that lays
a strong foundation for learning to happenand for us to continue to make those
(44:05):
improvements. So it's early that we'vemade those investments. Again, these are
areas which you know, we didn'thave the resources that we needed. Now
we do. Recently, the Governorcame out with initiative a strategy where he
wants all districts in Ohio to implementthe science of reading, which basically speaks
(44:28):
to the early literacy strategies that ourteachers will implement because now we know so
much more about how the brain learnsto read process sounds, and so we
are implementing those strategies. Columbus CitySchools is ahead of the game. We
have provided the curricular resources as wellof the as the professional development and training
to all of our teachers to fullyimplement the science of reading with fidelity.
(44:52):
So now we know that we're usingthe evidence based research of how the brain
learns how to read. We havethe curricular resources for our students to access,
we have the training for our teachers, and so now we'll be able
to close those reading gaps sooner andearlier, in starting as early as pre
(45:15):
K, so that our students willhave a strong foundation. When students don't
have that strong foundation, where ingrades K through three, when they're learning
to read grades three and up,they're reading to learn, and if they
don't have the skills to read ongrade level material, they just struggle the
rest of the time. Right,it's everything becomes a struggle, even if
(45:37):
they're in a math class, becausenow math is embedded in word problems,
and so if you're not decoding thetext at your grade level, whether it's
eighth grade, because you didn't havethat strong foundation, then everything becomes a
struggle. So I acknowledge that there'sa lot of unlearning that we need to
(45:58):
do. We need to set thatstrong foundation, but we will start to
see progress over time. It's notgoing to change overnight. We didn't get
here overnight, and we're not workingwith robots. Right, we have forty
five thousand students where we are workingwith them every day to get them the
skills that they need and make surethat they're prepared not only for the content
(46:21):
that they're exposed to today, butalso for tomorrow. I'll also add that
we are very interested in expanding ourearly childhood offerings because it is too late
to intervene when our students come tous in kindergarten. We need to get
to our students earlier. Thinking aboutthe brain research, more more than eighty
(46:44):
percent of the brain is developed beforethe age of five. Well, that's
when our kids come to us whenthey start kindergarten. So we need to
get our students enrolled in school inpre K. Now, I'm certainly pushing
for universal pre K, which meansall children go to school starting at age
four, we change the narrative insteadof waiting until five. But in CCS
(47:07):
we serve probably over a thousand studentsin pre K programs. We have sixty
two pre K classrooms across the city, and all of our pre K classrooms
are rated as four or five star. That means we're doing a really good
job of educating our students in thatpre K space because we get them earlier.
(47:28):
Because again, there are so manyfactors that really before kids even get
to school that are attributing or contributeto their growth and development, and so
we certainly want to intervene earlier sothey'll have a stronger start when they get
to kindergarten. And oh, sorry, doctor Schapman, I was just gonna
ask, when you talk about kindergartenerscoming and being unprepared, are you talking
(47:52):
in terms of reading? Absolutely so, so many we're seeing a rise influx
of kindergarteners that are not prepared forkindergarten. I either come to school on
the first day. They don't knowtheir name, they don't know the letters
of the alphabet. We're seeing morestudents who are coming to school and they're
(48:14):
not even potty trained in kindergarten,and so that those are skills that are
really not a part of the standardsthat we're required to teach and assess,
and so it takes more time thatwe spend on developing those skills that perhaps
should have been acquired or accomplished earlier. And so that just really starts the
(48:37):
clock and the kids are already behindby the time they get to kindergarten,
and so then we have to spendmore time playing ketchup. And that's what
this' that's one of the biggest challengesthat we face, is that we're still
trying to pay ketchup. And sowe'd love to see our students and have
the opportunity to serve them earlier andsooner. That early intervention is key.
(49:00):
That will provide them with a strongerfoundation so they don't have to play catch
up and they're not behind. Ithink about your years as a teacher and
then moving up and do administration superintendent. Now, even after all this time
in your different levels and what you'vedone. It has to be gratifying to
(49:21):
know that you're part of helping developand inspire these kids. These students absolutely,
So that is my why. Thatis why I get up every day
and do the work that we're doing. We know that it is there.
We have our fair share of challenges, but I truly believe in our students.
I believe in what's possible for them. I believe in our community.
(49:45):
I believe that our community wants tosee our students achieve and excel. And
I am just really excited that nowis the time that we are going to
rally together and stack hands as aColumbus community. And I've heard that's the
Columbus way that and we're going todo what's necessary to support our students and
(50:07):
support our schools. So I'm excitedabout the opportunity to serve. That is
my why. That's what inspires me, and I believe in what's possible.
Well, look, we are rootingyou on. I can't thank you enough
for your time and your energy.It's infectious. Who wouldn't want to sign
me up? We have a spotfor you. Yeah, whatever you need,
(50:30):
Superintendent CEO, Doctor Angela Chapman ourguest this week on CEOs You Should
Know and iHeart Media Columbus podcast.Thanks for your time, Thank you,
thank you for having me. CEOsyou Should Know is hosted and produced by
Brandon Boxer, a production of iHeartMediaColumbus
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