Lynchburg Business

February 2012 LB Leader of the Month: Dr. Scott Brabrand

Issue: February 2012 by Lynchburg Business in Inside The Magazine, Leader of the Month

Age: 44

Occupation: Incoming Superintendent, Lynchburg City Schools

Hometown: Newport News, VA

Welcome to Lynchburg, Dr. Brabrand. With your official start date of April 1 as the Superintendent of Lynchburg City Schools, what’s first up on your agenda in your new role?

One of the things I did in the interview process was I presented the school board with an entry plan and I plan to follow the steps of that entry plan. One of the things I’d like to do is get that up and share the steps that I would be taking to learn more about Lynchburg City Schools, what its strengths are and what its challenges are in the months and weeks ahead.

So, a lot of it is really about listening, learning and then leading. But the entry plan is really about reaching out to internal and external stakeholders in the school system and getting their understanding of what the current strengths are in the system, what some of the challenges may be and then narrowing down their ideas on how we can make a good system great.

You are coming to the Hill City from Northern Virginia, where you served as assistant superintendent in Fairfax County, a large and affluent school district. What were some of the challenges you faced there?

One thing I’d like to share is that we have to be careful of the power of images and stereotyping from whatever part of the state we are from, and while I am coming from a school division that certainly is large and considered affluent, the cluster of schools I had, Cluster 4, was in the eastern part of Fairfax County and was 42 percent free or reduced lunch. Yes, that is less than Lynchburg City’s 60 percent free or reduced lunch, but 42 percent is a significant number of students facing economic disadvantage, so some of the very similar challenges that I faced [in Northern Virginia] in my cluster of schools will be some of the same challenges Lynchburg City Schools face—and that’s how to make sure that we get kids ready to learn when they walk in that classroom.

It takes the dedication of teachers to understand best practices in teaching and learning, it takes strong principal leadership and it takes consistent parental involvement in each child’s education. We’ve got to be a team and I think a lot of the challenges I’ve seen in my cluster are the same ones going on in Lynchburg.

The other thing is, the cluster I had—and I shared this with the board—was probably 25 percent African American, 25 percent Hispanic and the rest were white and Asian, so there certainly was a sizeable African American population that I had in Cluster 4, and a lot of the diversity I had there, I think I will see in Lynchburg.

One of the other things in common is the challenge to see the achievement of special education students which, in Fairfax County, is 11 or 12 percent of our cluster’s population. I want to see them achieve at some of the same levels as our other children, and I know that the achievement gap in Lynchburg isn’t just about particular groups of kids, but also are students with disabilities. So, I think that will be a similar challenge as well.

What accomplishments stand out to you from your time in Fairfax County?

I have a cluster of 27 schools and in the last two years, we went from five schools to 12 schools getting 90 percent or better proficiency on the math Standards of Learning. I’m very proud of that. I know mathematics is a huge part of the STEM (Science Technology Engineering Mathematics) education that Region 2000 is looking at. We moved a lot of schools to the highest proficiency levels in a very short time and frankly, mathematics achievement is one of the things in Lynchburg City Schools that seems to be flat and that we really need to take another look at, especially if we are going to prepare our kids for STEM careers.

One of the other things I’m proud of is we started an Opportunity Neighborhood Initiative based on Geoffrey Canada and the Harlem Children’s Zone where we are partnering with the communities, the county and the school division to work closely to offer wraparound services to children and their families. We are just starting it—we are in our first year of it—and the idea is that sometimes a student issue is really a family issue and we’ve been treating the student but not treating the family. Now, we have the opportunity to better partner with our city in Lynchburg and maybe even some nonprofits to make sure we are offering wraparound services that engage the whole family and the whole community and not just the individual kid.

To explain that a little bit further, one of the things they found in Harlem, for example, was attendance was low. Well, some of the kids who weren’t attending had health problems. So, they made sure they got access to the appropriate healthcare they needed. Some of the issues may be around a parent having an employment issue or a childcare issue, where a child is staying home because a younger sibling needs daycare while the parent has to work, so we find services and daycare for that family. If the parent is unemployed, let’s work on job assistance and also maybe job retraining. So that’s the idea behind this opportunity of a neighborhood model. I’m proud to have started it and being a partner in it with our county and schools and I’d like to look for opportunities to closely collaborate with the city and school system to provide additional wraparound services for our students and families in Lynchburg.

I’m also very proud of hiring top quality principals. I hired four principals in my first year and three of the four were nominated as first year Principals of the Year in their communities. And one of them was the eventual first year Principal of the Year for Fairfax County schools. So, I’m very, very proud of having hired an outstanding group of principals because I think, beyond teacher quality, the leadership of the school, the leadership qualities of the principals are a key component of school success.

I had six Title 1 schools in state sanction, these are schools that under No Child Left Behind are not making AYP (Adequate Yearly Progress). Four of the six Title 1 schools that were in state sanctions for reading and math in 2009 were out of state sanctions by 2011, which means some of our lowest performing schools that were in the sanction process got out of it because of improved achievement in language arts and mathematics. And the other two saw gains in SOLs, but just not enough yet, because you have to have two years of proof. So, I was very proud of that. Lynchburg does have some schools in that process and we’ve got to make an assessment of how they are doing, what they are doing well and what areas of growth they have and then work to rapidly address those concerns within the schools.

Before I took this job, I was a high school principal at Fairfax High School and it was a majority minority school and we closed achievement gaps to the single digits in every single subgroup—African Americans, Hispanics, students with disabilities, economically disadvantaged. Bottom line is that in math and language arts, every sub group of child was performing at 90 percent or better.

How did the opportunity for your new role in Lynchburg come about?

There’s always openings and sometimes you get phone calls once you are in these assistant superintendent positions about different things and nothing had caught my eye before. But when I got a call this time about Lynchburg, it was in Virginia, and I’m a native Virginian, born in Newport News, so it caught my interest a little bit more. Frankly, what I did was I loaded up my family one Saturday when soccer practice was cancelled because of rain and drove down to the City and looked around and thought it was a wonderful, wonderful city. And I talked to some folks who knew Lynchburg—my pastor at my church in Fairfax had spent several years as the senior pastor at a church in Lynchburg—so I actually went to him and his wife, who have two kids, who actually went to Lynchburg City Schools and they said it would be a great place to raise a family. So that also caught my interest.

Looking around and seeing the beautiful scenery, a reputation for good schools, amenities that you would want to see in any city, and people saying a great place to raise a family—and I heard that statement several times—those were all the pieces for me. And the challenge that Lynchburg has a good school system but wants to be a great school system and to do that is challenging work because not every school system in this country is a great school system. So, a system that aspires to be great … I want to be surrounded by folks and work with folks and lead with folks that want to have a great system. It’s kind of like the team that wants to go to the Super Bowl—I want to go to the Super Bowl with Lynchburg City Schools.

What are your impressions of Lynchburg City Schools so far?

My impressions so far are that there is a very dedicated group of folks at the board level and on the leadership team level who know that they have a good system but also know that we need a great system so that our kids can continue to be successful here in the 21^st century, because it’s going to take a great school system to do that. I think people are eager to work with me, to share ideas and people are exceedingly polite and friendly and helpful. I think there’s a lot of positive energy in the system and we just need to channel it into the right strategies that will help kids achieve better.

As a native of Newport News and a Virginia Tech graduate, you are likely somewhat familiar with this area. With that said, what about life in Central Virginia is attractive to you?

I love being at the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It’s just a beautiful place. I love the outdoors—I’m an avid runner and to be out among the mountains and hills is just wonderful. I like to work hard and play hard and you really have an amazing outdoor playground right at your doorsteps and it doesn’t take hours and hours to go from work to play like it does in Northern Virginia because of the traffic. I’m excited about participating in my first Virginia 10 Miler!

When I was a high school principal, I spent up to three hours a day in my car. Now, sometimes it’s two hours a day. So, I’m excited to spend more time at work doing the work of the Superintendency but also at home doing the work of being a husband and father and I think life in Central Virginia is going to allow me to spend more quality time in both worlds.

Assuming you are bringing family along with you, how is everyone feeling about the move?

My boys are finishing third grade, they are very excited. They see it as a great adventure—they want to fish and have air rifles—I told them one thing at a time! They’re identical twins so they have a very close relationship with one another, which makes it easier, but they are leaving some classmates behind, which is tough at any age. But we’ve told them that we are only a 3 and a half hour car ride or we could all jump on Amtrak and be up to see friends in a blink of an eye, or have them down to spend the night or the weekend, so they’re excited about that.

My wife is a kindergarten instructional assistant here in Fairfax County schools and she is looking forward to wrapping up her school year and is already very impressed with how friendly and outgoing people are, and are eager to have her come down and get connected to all the great things going on in Lynchburg. I do think it will be a transition period for her, trying to figure out what she would like to do and how she wants to do it, but she’s excited. And she will be closer to her family in Atlanta. So, we really are very excited.

What are you looking forward to the most about your new role as Superintendent?

What I’m looking forward to the most is getting to know the students, the teachers, the staff and the community in Lynchburg City Schools and getting their best thinking about how we can have the best school system in country and then working with them together and making that vision a reality. That’s what I’m excited about. It’s challenging work to have a great school system but I believe it can be done. I believe Lynchburg wants that for its students and I’m excited about being a part of it.