District-Managed School Restart Strategy Had Positive Effects in Reading, Math, and Attendance

The Texas Education Agency offers grants for districts to implement school turnaround strategies at low-performing schools. Districts that receive these grants can implement a school turnaround strategy (referred to as a district-managed restart strategy) that includes replacing principals and teachers at schools that the district identifies as struggling and needing additional support. From 2015/16 to 2018/19, 29 schools across four urban and suburban districts in Texas implemented a district-managed restart strategy.  This REL Southwest study used longitudinal administrative data and interviews with district and school leaders to examine implementation of the restart strategy and its effect on teacher and principal mobility, student achievement, and student attendance. Key findings include the following: Nearly 80 percent of the teachers at schools in the year before implementation of the restart strategy left before the beginning of the restart school year. Among teachers employed at restart schools in the year before implementation, 51 percent relocated to a different school within the same district, 15 percent relocated to a different district, and 13 percent were not teaching in a Texas public school the following year.  Educators who arrived at restart schools were more likely to have more than three years of experience and to have an advanced degree than were educators who left or stayed. Seventy percent of principals and teachers who arrived had more than three years of professional experience, compared with 58 percent of those who left and 52 percent of those who stayed. Student achievement and attendance improved after schools implemented the restart strategy. Restart schools had higher student reading and math achievement than matched comparison schools in the first two years of implementing the restart strategy. Restart schools also had higher student attendance in the first year of implementation. Nearly all restart schools met accountability standards within the first three years of implementation.