Why haven't we found the silver bullet that will magically, like Jaime Escalante in "Stand and Deliver," come and save our struggling schools? The answer, quite simply, is because there isn't one. While sound bites make good press, they make really bad education policy. What works in McLean, VA may not work in Anacostia, MD. And what works in Pittsford, NY, may not work in Rochester, NY. Real education reform needs to start with management reform. And here's how I propose we do it.

If you are even a light consumer of news, you'll see articles daily which talk about teacher evaluations, teacher (merit and seniority) pay, extended school day, community engagement, building leadership (nee principals), charter schools, standardized curriculum, increased hours on math and science, increased hours for arts and humanities, teacher quality, and, of course, the universal boogeyman, the unions.

Each one of these topics is presented as either the universal fix for the American education system or the universal failing of the American education system. Get rid of the unions, and every child would be above average, right? Of course not. Focus on math and science and we'd create an army of engineers? Nope. Get great leaders in buildings and they'll solve everything? Well... You get the point. Each of these ideas has merit (some more than others), but none of them stand alone.

Yes, there need to be theories of change, and yes, a longer school day or teacher quality can be part of it, but these initiatives must -- if they have any hope of succeeding -- be integrated in with the overall management of the district. You cannot win by saying that teacher effectiveness is now the number one priority, and that we can now forget about smaller class sizes (the big movement before teacher effectiveness). This just breeds short-term thinking and and allows the staff to ignore it (it'll be gone next year anyway).

Similarly, you can't just say that teacher evaluation is the number one priority and but small class sizes are still the number one priority (along with math and science, early literacy, pre-K, extended day, etc.) This forces staff to work 12-hour days on 100s of initiatives and means that nothing will ever really get done. So instead of stasis from unengaged staff, you get stasis from staff that are too punchdrunk to succeed.

But it doesn't have to be this way. Solving these types of problems is what modern management is for. Take Ford Motor Company, as an example. If we go in the wayback machine, and return to the inglorious 80s (at least from an American automobile manufacturer's perspective), Ford had a quality problem. And so they rallied around the idea that "Quality was Job #1." And you know what, they did manage to turn quality around. And they did it without sacrificing safety, performance, etc. How? By carefully managing the enterprise and the various initiatives towards a long term goal. Not by saying that "Robotics will save us" or "we need to keep our employees sober for work" (to use extreme examples).

Back to education. What districts across the country need to do is to take a step back and look at their student population. What does that student population need? And then devise a strategy -- not a 100+ page strategic plan -- about how to deliver on the promise to those students. This strategy will have some "baseline" factors, and some "differentiating" factors (to paraphrase Tracey and Wiersma). But it will not be just one initiative. It will be a portfolio of strategic objectives that together, over time, will define how the district can transform itself.

Staying true to this strategy -- developing metrics that show if you are on track, reviewing it on a regular basis, communicating it to the staff, and changing tactics when necessary, is how strategic change happens. And it takes time. Yes, there can (and should) be early wins. But education reform in the United States will not happen overnight and we cannot punish district leaders who take the long view. Otherwise we will continue (or accelerate) the slow decline of American schools.