In his recent remarks at the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools Conference, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan focused on chronically underperforming schools. “They’re often unsafe, underfunded, poorly run, crumbling, and challenged in so many ways that the situation can feel hopeless,” he said. And they’re a full 5 percent of our nation’s schools some 5,000 in total. Education reformers offer two strategies for redeeming these schools: turnaround and fresh start. Turnaround strategies keep the same students and site, but change many of the school’s core elements, such as staff, programs, partnerships, and buildings. In contrast, fresh start strategies open a new school from scratch often with new students, staff, and programs. In most cases, fresh start schools are charter schools that is, independent public schools that a state board of education, school district, nonprofit, or other authorizing entity creates. Both turnaround and fresh start strategies assume that the school is the critical unit of change, so both rely heavily on school leaders. Both strategies also require a compelling vision and the ability to make it operational. And both demand substantial initial investment. Because these two strategies have much in common, many school-change organizations EdisonLearning,…