Latrice Smalls’ first year as principal of South Carolina’s Edith L. Frierson Elementary in 2023 came with a hefty task: improve the school’s unsatisfactory state report card rating, demonstrating the need for leadership programs teaching school administrators to make systemic change.

With roughly 160 students — nearly two-thirds of them low-income — the rural Charleston County school recorded math and reading test scores well below district and state averages. One-third of students were chronically absent, and school climate was ranked low by teachers.

“The school was a failing school, and it had been a failing school for a few years,” Smalls said, regarding her difficult task and the program teaching school administrators to make change.

Smalls’s first year coincided with the school’s acceptance into the University of Virginia Partnership for Leaders in Education, a program that helps improve low-performing schools through administrator training and professional development.

Frierson Elementary is one of three schools that transformed from struggling to succeeding because of the turnaround program. After one year, the school went from an unsatisfactory to excellent rating, the highest performance tier in the state’s report card system.

Since 2004, the partnership has worked with more than 900 schools from 33 states. Roughly half achieve double-digit gains in reading, math or both, within three years of starting the program.

For two to three years, administrators receive professional development at the university and coaches visit their schools to help brainstorm ways to improve academic achievement, attendance and culture. Districts must apply and, if selected, pay roughly $90,000 for program costs.

Leighann Lenti, the program’s chief of partnership, said the key to transforming a low-performing is to work with district and building administrators to make systemic changes that will lead to improved student outcomes.

“They’re given a chance to think about the design and the decisions they’re making in their buildings and in their school district,” Lenti said. “[They] think about their highest priorities and the root cause of what hasn’t worked, so they can solve those problems differently — not just keep doing the same things over and over — and see tangible results for kids.”

Read the full article about teaching administrators to make change by Lauren Wagner at The 74.