Partners in Education makes a difference

WHEN Bob Vasquez, president of the Toledo Board of Education, spoke to Toledo's downtown Rotary Club two weeks ago, he left no doubt about the crisis that confronts the school district.

So intense is his passion for public education, so resolute his determination to confront the challenges faced by Toledo Public Schools, he needed to pause a couple of times to gather his composure.

His message: Please help us. We need your energy, your ideas, your creativity.

The depth of TPS' organizational and financial problems is substantial. Having just dealt with a $39 million deficit, the district faces another $44 million shortfall this school year.

A tax levy failed in May; another levy attempt will come in November. The City League will soon be decimated by departing schools. Libbey High School is closed.

All the while, the student population continues to shrink. A district that was charged with educating nearly 64,000 students in the 1960s had just 26,000 last academic year, and could have as few as 23,000 students this year.

Mr. Vasquez was preaching to the choir, because Rotary helped create, and was the major early underwriter of, a program called Partners In Education. Founded in 1994, PIE is one of the oldest and most successful community partnerships working with TPS.

Perhaps its most important component is tutoring. Every school year, between 600 and 800 community volunteers tutor TPS students one-on-one for an hour or so a week. Reading and math are the most common subjects. Often the students are among the district's most disadvantaged.

For many companies, supplying tutors has become part of the corporate mantra. Brooks Insurance Agency is a prime example. A dozen or more Brooks employees spend time each week - during the workday - with students at Walbridge Elementary School in South Toledo.

Local law firms are among the most generous with their time - Shumaker Loop & Kendrick and Cooper & Walinski, to name two. At holiday time each year, "Shu Loop," as it is called, sends out Christmas cards designed by students tutored by staff lawyers.

But youngsters are not the only ones with mentors. Business leaders provide one-on-one collaboration with school principals. In business, people who excelled as staff members can find themselves in new territory when they win promotions to management and administration.

And so it is with many new principals who have only known the classroom and have little or no practical experience with managing personnel, balancing budgets, and dealing with parents and the public.

When Chad Henderly took over as principal at DeVeaux Middle School on Sylvania Avenue last year, he tapped into the business expertise of Steve Pereus, chief operating officer of Gross Electric, who had signed up with PIE's principal/business mentoring program.

Mr. Henderly came to regard Mr. Pereus as his "personal trainer," someone who could help him with any new administrator's challenge - time management - and instill in him the most basic business principle of all: customer service.

One of PIE's most imaginative partnerships is with United Parcel Service, the people in the brown trucks. PIE and UPS established a program for at-risk students at Scott and Woodward high schools to help prepare them for the challenges that lie ahead when they enter the work force.

Students in the eight-week program learn to identify and articulate their goals and cope with the complexities - and frustrations - that are part of finding a job. That task is simplified for those who complete the program: UPS puts them to work and offers a way to get college tuition help.

Chuck Stocking, a local businessman who was president of the downtown Rotary Club when PIE was created, sees substantial benefits from the undertaking: "We know there is better student performance and fewer disciplinary problems where PIE partnerships are in place."

More than 100 such partnerships exist. It's not uncommon for one school to have several, usually because of the proximity of the businesses donating their time. But PIE Executive Director Eileen Kerner says that several schools - Riverside, Ottawa River, Beverly, Grove Patterson, Harvard, Spring, Lagrange - have none.

It's not always about manpower. Sometimes it's equipment. Mark Rasmus, president of the PIE board of trustees, remembers the time a local school principal was lamenting the lack of computers in his school. By sheer luck, Mr. Rasmus had just learned that a local company was about to discard some 350 computers.

Every classroom got one, and many more went to the homes of parents who'd never had a computer.

Rotary was the primary benefactor of PIE during its first five years. Since then, funding has come from many sources: TPS itself, the Catholic Diocese of Toledo, The Andersons, the Owens-Illinois Foundation - former O-I executive Bill Niehous is co-chairman of PIE's advisory board - and proceeds from the annual Dragon Boat races on the Maumee River.

Partners in Education doesn't have all the answers to the crisis that confronts public education. But Bob Vasquez is happy to have its help. He'd like even more to have yours.

Thomas Walton is retired editor and vice president of The Blade. His column appears every other Monday.

Contact him at:

twalton@theblade.com