We’re Here for the Kids: Superintendents in Their Role as Advocates

What’s it take to effectively promote your schools’ needs in front of a federal lawmaker? An AASA insider shares proven tactics

To be an educator is to be an advocate.

As I travel around the country to meet with superintendents and other school district leaders, I often open the conversation with “Please raise your hand if you think of yourself as an advocate.” While many hands go up, not all do. That’s due less because school leaders don’t think of themselves as child advocates but because of a stigma, real or perceived, that being an advocate or lobbyist has a negative connotation.

The reality of being an educator — and even more so for school system leaders — is that being an educator is being an advocate. That decision to modify school start times? That’s a major change someone had to support and promote. A switch to more explicit phonics instruction? That’s another move that someone had to push to completion. A decision to lower student-teacher ratios in classrooms to increase student engagement? A superintendent’s job is full of such decisions to better support school-age children. Pushing forward the work of the school district and promoting one approach over another, selecting one solution over another — all of that amounts to advocacy.

Superintendents are advocates already, so at this point in the conversation, I simply explain I am here to talk about a specific type of advocacy. While superintendents’ day-to-day advocacy is for and about their students, the conversations over revised policies and practices to be made take place with their board members, administrative team, teachers, students and the broader school community.

Natural Progression

The advocacy I typically address in my travels involves conversations with elected officials on the federal level.

There are myriad ways superintendents support public education and the schools and students they serve through their public actions including making a budget, deciding on a curriculum and operating with a governing board. Federal advocacy is not a first step, but it is a natural next step. Decisions made outside of the school setting have a profound impact on schools and the work of educators, and it is public advocacy that helps inform and improve those policies made from afar.

I like to point out to superintendents that while I refer to district leaders as doing the advocacy and lobbying, often you are the ones being lobbied. If you can reflect on what works when you are on the receiving end of feedback from teachers, counselors and parents, sharing those insights can be one of the most powerful and effective ways to build your own advocacy skill set.

How do you respond to someone you only hear from when it’s a complaint? How likely are you to say yes to an ask if you have no relationship or context with the person or their request? When you are working with your school board on a policy change, do you drop all the information on them the night of the vote or do you draw upon existing relationships and ongoing dialogue? One of the easiest, and most comfortable, ways to develop your federal advocacy is to adopt the effective approaches you have experienced as the receiver of requests.

AASA’s Approach

AASA’s members are at the heart of our federal advocacy priorities, which are revised by the AASA Executive Committee and Governing Board at the start of every year. That document is our guiding light on Capitol Hill, and it drives the policies that those of us on the policy team — director of advocacy Sasha Pudelski, public policy analyst Tara Thomas and I — engage in and how we respond to various proposals. How we talk about advocacy with our members boils down to five words: relationships, endurance, logistics, knowledge and communications.

Relationships. Advocacy is about relationships, and relationships take time. Aim to be the steady beacon of light in an increasingly tumultuous, political and partisan discourse about public education and federal policy — someone who weighs in with a letter or a call to say “thanks” to a congressional representative or senator for a favorable vote as readily as you call to express concern over a recent proposal.

Much like superintendents, members of Congress receive a disproportionate amount of feedback about what isn’t working, and one of the easiest ways to break through that noise is with steady, consistent information that provides a holistic view of what’s going on in schools and how congressional work is both supporting and/or complicating that work.

Endurance. Federal education policymaking is a marathon, not a sprint. A great example is the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind, which became the Every Student Succeeds Act. Discussions started in August 2007 and lasted until December 2015. That’s more than eight years of grinding through all levels of federal education policy conversation.

It’s critical to be a resource, whether an ally or an adversary, at all stages. If you’re not at the table, you’re likely to be the patient on the examination table. Advocacy is one of the most effective and powerful ways to ensure the patient’s needs are addressed well. This is where it becomes important to reach out occasionally, even when it seems nothing is moving or when you don’t need something. Weighing in with an opinion matters.

When it comes to endurance in advocacy, showing up can mean more engagement. Your steady engagement is the difference between a boilerplate response and the legislator’s office reaching out to you when a question arises.

Logistics. In Washington, D.C., we quip that you should “never underestimate the power of a young person in a suit” on Capitol Hill. Back in 2015, during the signing of ESSA, many of my fellow advocates and the main education staffers on Capitol Hill were in their late 20s and early 30s. These are the people who wrote the federal law that drives so much of what happens today.

You might have a standing meeting in a hallway with a junior staffer, or you might meet with the member of Congress in her or his office. Treat all as the same opportunity because they are just that — one more chance to deposit into that advocacy relationship account.

Knowledge. This is as much about ensuring you know what you’re talking about in terms of content, as it is knowing your value as a constituent. Superintendent conversations are an exceptionally effective use of time for elected officials. You can talk all day long about your school district, its ups and downs, trends with teachers, needs of students and attendance challenges. You have your thumb on the pulse of the community in a way few do. You are positioned to talk about broader community trends: a significant change in population, a recent health epidemic, an uptick in teen pregnancies, a local employer leaving town.

Especially salient in the current environment, you are on the front line of some of the biggest lightning-rod issues: book bans in school libraries, teaching of America’s racial past and LGBTQ issues. These are flaring up in communities nationwide and may be playing out in your schools. You are uniquely positioned to talk about all of this and to do so through the lens of what it means to your schools and how federal policy can support or complicate these realities.

Communication. Know what you’re asking and know the purpose of the meeting or communication.

Communication is about being confident that you not only said what you needed to say, but your audience understood it as intended. Follow-up can be helpful, and it becomes a natural next step toward building a relationship. Answer any questions that were left open-ended, share any items mentioned in the meeting and invite elected officials to visit your district.

Report out to your administrative team and community on your contact. Advocacy is as natural and essential as educating when you are running a school system, and anything you can do to norm your advocacy effort as an inherent element of your leadership helps eradicate any negative connotation around advocacy.

How do we know this approach works? In the span of less than three months, the AASA advocacy team saw at least four instances of member engagement and advocacy translate into federal policy proposals:

When both the House and Senate introduced their respective IDEA full-funding legislation, AASA’s top federal priority and an important part of our ongoing relationship work protected IDEA funding.

The House introduced the All Children Are Equal Act, a bill that addresses a technical flaw in the Title I formula to more accurately and equitably allocate federal funds.

After more than a year of ongoing conversations with AASA advocacy staff emphasizing the need to both respond to cyber threats and protect E-Rate funds, Federal Communications Chair Jessica Rosenworcel used the AASA advocacy conference to announce her long-awaited proposal to support schools in responding to cyberattacks would not repurpose E-Rate dollars from their connectivity focus.

The House introduced in September the Head Start Expansion and Improvement Act, legislation that would increase the poverty threshold and expand eligibility for the Head Start program, a revision stemming directly from member meetings last January.

Driven by Asking

I’ve been asked how I ended up in a job like this, and I respond, with absolute sincerity, that it’s my mother’s fault. Growing up, one of the ways my parents taught us communication and confidence was the simple lesson “They can’t tell you no until you ask.” So I turned into a professional asker, and my requests and questions are all driven by what superintendents tell us will make the best federal policy in support of their schools.

Let’s agree to move forward together to ask Congress to do more to support and strengthen public education. The worst they can do is say no. But the overwhelming majority of the time, they are trying to find a way to yes. And your advocacy is critical to getting them there because, as the headline over this article suggests, “We’re here for the kids.” n

Noelle Ellerson Ng is associate executive director of advocacy and governance at AASA. Twitter: @Noellerson