[EdTalks] The Elevate Pilot: What Happens When We Go "All In" on Underperforming Schools in Greenville County?

How do you turn a chronically underperforming school into a national example of excellence in just one year? This episode reveals the groundbreaking school transformation model that Greenville County Schools is using to achieve unprecedented results. We pull back the curtain on the Elevate pilot program, an ambitious initiative designed to answer one of public education's most pressing questions: how can we innovate to ensure every student, regardless of their zip code, has access to a world-class education?

Join Catherine Schumacher as she speaks with the leaders on the front lines of this change: Dr. Charlotte McDavid, Assistant Superintendent for Transformation, Dr. Dawn Hooker, Principal of Alexander Elementary, and Towers Rice, Principal of Lakeview Middle. They discuss the radical, systemic changes that are rewriting the future for their students, from strategic faculty overhauls to performance-based financial incentives.

Discover the core components of the Elevate program Greenville County Schools has implemented to engineer this success. Dr. McDavid explains the district's commitment to turning around underperforming schools by investing resources from the district's fund balance into a new, innovative approach. A key pillar of this strategy is strategic teacher recruitment, which involved a nationwide search for top talent and a complete re-staffing of the schools to ensure every team member was aligned with the new vision. This school transformation model goes beyond just hiring, providing nearly 5,000 hours of intensive summer professional development to build a strong, cohesive education leadership and school culture from the ground up.

A significant and controversial part of the Elevate model is the introduction of teacher incentive-based pay. Educators receive a higher base salary, along with bonuses for hitting school-wide growth targets and incentives for valuable skills like being bilingual. This approach helped secure the best talent and motivated the entire school community - from teachers and aides to maintenance staff - to work collaboratively toward a common goal. The results speak for themselves: Alexander Elementary jumped from an "unsatisfactory" state rating to "excellent" in a single year, while Lakeview Middle, a school identified as "at-risk" for over a decade, achieved a "meets expectations" rating for the first time, earning them both the Jeff McCoy Innovation Award. This discussion provides a replicable blueprint for school improvement that is now being shared on a state and national level with organizations like SCASA and ERDI.

Episode Resources:

• Learn more about Greenville County Schools

• Explore the Jeff McCoy Innovation Award

• Information on the Education Research & Development Institute (ERDI)

Introduction to the Elevate Program

Catherine Schumacher: How can our neighborhood public schools innovate to meet the needs of all students so that they have access to the world-class education they all deserve? In 2024, Greenville County Schools launched an ambitious pilot program called Elevate, designed to answer just that question in chronically underperforming schools: Alexander Elementary and Lakeview Middle.

I'm Catherine Schumacher with Public Education Partners, and on today's episode of Simple Civics Ed Talks, I speak with the principals of both schools, Dr. Dawn Hooker of Alexander Elementary and Towers Rice of Lakeview Middle, along with Dr. Charlotte McDavid, Greenville County Schools Assistant Superintendent for Transformation, to hear about the pilot and get an update on some incredible early results.

The Purpose and Strategic Vision

Dawn, Towers, and Charlotte, thank you so much for being here. I'm so excited to talk with you and for our listeners to hear about the Elevate pilot that we're doing here in Greenville County Schools and some early good news that we have about it. So we're going to jump right in. Charlotte, can you start by giving us a basic overview of the purpose behind Elevate and what Greenville County Schools is doing differently at Lakeview Middle and Alexander Elementary?

Dr. Charlotte McDavid: Thank you very much. And thank you for having us today.

Catherine Schumacher: Of course.

Dr. Charlotte McDavid: Greenville County Schools is celebrating reaching new heights. Elevate is a part of that story, a powerful belief that when we lift up our schools that need us the most, we lift up our entire community.

The question is, what would happen if all of our students received the promise of a high-quality education consistently across Greenville County schools? We looked at our schools across the district and where we saw the greatest potential for schools to perform at higher levels.

That is where we began. We began with Alexander Elementary School, which at the time was the lowest performing elementary school in Greenville County. We began at Lakeview Middle School where historically since 2007-2008, Lakeview had been identified by the State Department as at risk and below average.

When we looked at the designation of school improvement from the State Department, there had been two cycles and Lakeview had been identified. We recognized that beyond what anyone else might be able to do, we as a school district needed to do something different and innovative in order to deliver on that promise of our Greenville County vision for all students. That was not met without challenges.

Catherine Schumacher: It was radical.

Dr. Charlotte McDavid: It was radical. It was innovative. It was hard. But we do appreciate the commitment of our Board of Trustees and our leadership in providing all of the supports necessary for our schools to be more successful.

Leading Transformation at Alexander Elementary

Catherine Schumacher: There was money that was approved by the board to put behind this pilot. These were resources from the fund balance, a sort of pot of special money that we had for innovation. It's the value of having a robust fund balance, as you can innovate around things.

Dawn, you were already a principal in Greenville County Schools and had a great reputation as a change agent already. What appealed to you about taking on the opportunity presented at Alexander Elementary, and what made you nervous?

Dr. Dawn Hooker: The first time I heard about it was in a principal's meeting. I thought, wow, that's something right there. That's a big deal when it was explained and the process was laid out. My table was just kind of like, "Oh, that's something new. What are we doing here?"

What made me excited was a new initiative. Radical, just like what you guys just said. For me, it was the challenge of saying, "Okay, I've done it at East North Street Academy and we've been excellent for three years, but this is a different model. Let me see if I'm gifted enough to lead a school like that."

It was a personal challenge and something different in my career. I wanted to create that vision right off in a school culture. As you're interviewing, you are getting people to buy into the vision right then and setting the tone for the work that needed to be done. I believe that was very positive for our school to get it built.

The nervous part was all of it. You question yourself as a leader and as a person. Can you keep up the energy level for what needs to be done? It takes a lot of work to do transformation. You have to have a lot of buy-in from different areas.

I knew the district was going to support, but what does that support look like? What challenges are going to come with these teams that you put together? These are people that don't know each other, are coming into a brand new school, and don't know Greenville. Luckily, it has definitely worked out.

Strategic Model and Recruitment

Catherine Schumacher: So Charlotte, hopping back to you, let's talk about what the model entailed. What were the steps?

Dr. Charlotte McDavid: The steps in this pilot were strategic in that we recognized the importance of our leadership and our teachers in the model. We re-envisioned our faculty and staff and gave everyone an opportunity to recommit.

We selected leaders that we felt confident could bring this to fruition and carry forth that vision. The first step was working with our HR department for a nationwide search for the best of the best. We wanted to recruit high-quality teachers who had experience in a classroom or were new to the field and had the background that we felt would be successful.

That first step was probably the hardest. Finding the leadership teams first, the principals were able to recruit and bring in those teams. From there, they collectively interviewed hundreds of teachers.

With the reselection process, we made sure that all of our existing staff—those that chose to remain and those that were selected to go to other places—were placed and comfortable so that by the time the new year started, everyone had a place to be.

Compensation and Professional Development

Catherine Schumacher: And part of the idea behind Elevate too is something that's being explored in different places statewide, which is the idea of incentive-based pay. All of these educators who are being brought into these two schools were getting a baseline bump in pay. And if you hit those benchmarks, then you get bonuses.

Dr. Charlotte McDavid: Yes. With recruiting them, we sent the message that this was a once-in-a-career opportunity. We did not want to only recruit those who were interested in higher pay. We wanted to recruit teachers and leaders who were interested in this vision.

They did receive a higher base pay along with other incentives. With our higher multilingual populations, there are incentives for being bilingual. That is helpful in working with our parents and students and being able to communicate and relate. They also received incentives for the multilingual endorsement and additional pay for summer professional development.

We started the summer after everyone was hired. There were multiple touch points, but by the second week of July, we held what we call Elevate Week. For the first time, people from across the country and the state came together as a team to learn what it was like to elevate.

That was an experience that our principals crafted along with district leadership and national presenters to outline the expectations and to build a camaraderie that would lead to our students' success.

Between the teams combined, we put in almost 5,000 hours of professional development. That was base pay added, but they had to attend. It was one of the things that our teachers said really contributed to their feeling of confidence and support when they came into the Elevate scenario.

Leadership at Lakeview Middle

Catherine Schumacher: Towers, you came in as an assistant principal in the first year of Elevate. Then you stepped into the leadership role this year. So, first-time principal. What was something that you watched that you brought in from that AP role? What gives you confidence to be in this new position as the principal at Lakeview this year?

Towers Rice: That's a great question. It has felt like a lot of pressure at times, but it feels like such a privilege. I feel so fortunate to have this opportunity. I was a key part of recruiting, hiring, and vetting the staff that we have in place.

To be able to step into this role following on the heels of my longtime mentor, friend, and colleague, Jennifer Couch, who was the first Elevate principal at Lakeview, was such an enormous opportunity and honor.

Being an assistant principal in the building last year, especially in the first year of Elevate, I was part of building those systems and structures. It's a lot like building a school from scratch. Having those relationships with staff, being embedded in the instructional practice, and having led professional development gave me confidence.

I know the students, the families, and the community that we serve at Lakeview. It was clear to me after just a month at that school that there's tremendous opportunity and capacity, particularly amongst our students.

We talk a lot at Lakeview about how we can remove the barriers in front of our students and our faculty. Having a year to identify what those key barriers are has given me a lot of confidence to move forward.

Early Performance Results

Catherine Schumacher: This seems to be working.

Dr. Charlotte McDavid: Lakeview Middle School, after having been underperforming by state metrics over two decades, received its first overall average rating and meets the expectations of the state. They were four points from "good" in the first year.

When Lakeview was identified with the ranking, they were second from the bottom of all middle schools in South Carolina. That designation meant they were in the bottom fifth percentile of the state from 2018 through last year.

In the first year to achieve meeting those expectations with great potential for exiting that state identification list is huge. They were featured most recently at our State Elevate Conference for growth and for continuing that culture with innovative ways of introducing G+ through our language biliteracy program.

Through agriculture and our GTT, we've seen success that is on paper and off paper. Alexander, with that same report card, went from unsatisfactory to excellent in the first year. It is quite unprecedented to have that level of growth in one year, and still there's room for more.

We also saw an "excellent" in student progress on that report card, meaning that the acceleration rate of growing students and meeting those goals was extremely high.

In Elevate, we have a bonus incentive program for teachers to earn additional incentives for school-wide growth and individual goals. At Alexander, the school-wide goal that was set forth in Elevate was met.

We celebrated with a huge celebration for every staff member and every support team member at Alexander. We celebrated the front office staff, all the teachers, instructional aides, maintenance, and transportation. Everyone who worked and supported our students received part of that because they are a part of that. In Greenville County Schools, we recognize that collaborative effort.

The Future of the Elevate Model

Catherine Schumacher: Folks who are listening will probably want to know what's next. So Charlotte, we're in the pilot phase. What's next for the Elevate model here in Greenville County Schools?

Dr. Charlotte McDavid: When our superintendent's award revealed that Lakeview and Alexander had the highest growth among the elementary and middle schools, that was the first step. In innovation, both schools earned the Jeff McCoy Innovation Award.

Others are wondering how that happens. At the district level, folks from elementary, middle, and high schools are coming to visit and asking how we do that. At the state level, we have shared with SCASA and the Title I Association.

There are elements of Elevate that can be embedded in other Title I programs across the state, and we're being invited into the conversation from our Office of School Transformation at the State Department as well.

As part of that Jeff McCoy Award of Innovation, there is the national organization of Education Research & Development Institute that Jeff McCoy is now leading. He has invited our teams to share. At the end of February, we are going to host a special segment on transformation in action.

A lot of people who saw the initial presentation this summer, which Dawn was able to go to Chicago and share, are coming to visit Lakeview and Alexander. They will spend a half day with our district leadership team talking about the systems that are in place.

To make Elevate work, we collaborate with all of the departments in the district: HR, finance, operations, and FANS. There was nothing that we didn't touch in some way in the school, from the front door to the walls, ceilings, and floors.

When they come from the national perspective, we'll be sharing how all of our systems work together alongside academics and our structures for coaching and observation. We are interested in sharing this model to anyone who will listen.

In our Upbeat survey, our two Elevate schools receive some of the highest ratings, with 100% from teachers who say they feel supported and cared for. When the teachers are supported, they can pour that into our students at a greater level.

As one person said, every educator should in a lifetime experience this type of transformation. It's a student success model and a belief in every child. Elevate is Greenville County Schools delivering on the promise.

Catherine Schumacher: I love this so much. I could talk to you guys seriously for another hour. Congratulations and thank you for everything that you do every day for the students at Alexander and Lakeview. On behalf of parents and community partners, we're really proud. Thank you all for being with us today.

Dr. Charlotte McDavid: Thank you.

Towers Rice: Thank you, Catherine.

Dr. Dawn Hooker: Thank you.