Historic grant celebrates partnership of labor and management to turn around Providence schools

At the UP! announcement, (l to r) Providence Mayor Angel Taveras, Providence Teachers Union President Steve Smith, Foundation Grant Programs Officer Denise Jenkins, Interim Superintendent of Providence Schools Susan Lusi, and Foundation President & CEO Neil Steinberg.

On February 7, 2012, the Foundation announced a $100,000 grant to support the creation of United Providence (UP!), a unique labor-management compact between the Providence Public School District and the Providence Teachers Union, AFT Local 958. UP! will officially become an education management organization and will incorporate as a 501(c)(3), to lead intervention efforts at three Providence schools: Carl G. Lauro Elementary School, Gilbert Stuart Middle School and Dr. Jorge Alvarez High School.

Foundation President & CEO Neil Steinberg explained, "Today we are celebrating a groundbreaking grant that marks the beginning of a new partnership between labor and management. Working together, we hope they will prove that one plus one can equal three - their collaboration has the potential to produce tremendous benefits for the students of Providence. The whole can actually be greater than the sum of its parts."

Providence Mayor Angel Taveras noted that thanks to the "extraordinary leadership" of both Providence Teachers Union President Steve Smith and Interim Superintendent of Providence Schools Susan Lusi, "All of us will be better off. We will learn from what works."

The cooperative effort is one of the first such efforts of its kind between labor and management in the country. UP! leadership hopes that it will also become a replicable model for Rhode Island and elsewhere.

"We are so pleased that The Rhode Island Foundation sees the vast potential and vision behind this work, and has decided to fund our start-up efforts," said Lusi. "This is a demanding, exciting, and promising process that we believe will yield great results in the education of our children."

"We welcome the support of The Rhode Island Foundation," said Steven F. Smith, Providence Teachers Union president. "We firmly believe in this model and have long advocated for a strong labor-management partnership. We look forward to the success of United Providence, with the hope of replicating this model throughout the district."