NEW DPS MANAGER
EX-GM EXEC TO LEAD SCHOOLS
Bobb’s replacement ready to work
Gov. Rick Snyder appointed retired General Motors executive Roy S. Roberts to become the next emergency manager for the Detroit Public Schools, ending weeks of rumors and speculation.
Snyder said he wanted a candidate from the Detroit area and called the 72-year-old Bloomfield Hills resident a team builder with perfect qualifications.
“We have someone who blends that best balance — business skills sets, community skills sets and someone so well-respected. So I’m very excited to have Roy on board.”
Roberts made history as the highest-ranking African-American executive at GM before he retired in 2000. He said he agreed to take the job because of the autonomy given under a new state law and his belief in the governor’s genuine commitment to improving education. Roberts will replace Robert Bobb, who took the job in March 2009. He’ll transition out during the next few weeks. DPS has a budget deficit of $327 million, up from $219 million in 2009, and about 1% of graduates are college-ready, compared with 16% statewide. “It’s going to take a hell of a lot work,” Roberts said. “It’s going to take a lot of people to get this done and I want to be at the focal point of making sure we bring the people to the party.”
Roy S. Roberts, 72, made history as the highest-ranking African-American executive at General Motors before retiring in 2000. Now, the Muskegon native is taking on a new challenge as emergency manager of Detroit Public Schools.
‘This is what I want to do’
NEW MANAGER SAYS HIS DESIRE IS TO HELP DPS STUDENTS
The new emergency manager for Detroit Public Schools may be the district’s seventh leader in six years, but he’s the only one named executive of the year by a national magazine and who received the American Success Award, presented to him by President George Bush in the White House Rose Garden.
Roy S. Roberts, a former General Motors executive and Muskegon native, brings obvious reputation and managerial expertise to the job. But those who know him say he possesses a strong belief that education and hard work are key gateways to success for individuals and for cities. He brings a love of Detroit to the new job, he and others said.
And at 72, he doesn’t need the money and he’s not looking for another job. Gov. Rick Snyder’s announcement Wednesday that Roberts will replace outgoing state appointee Robert Bobb ended wide speculation about a string of candidates rumored to take the job. He’ll be paid $250,000 for a one-year contract. The governor could extend the contract when the year is up. Roberts said his official start date will be around May 15. He and the current manager will work on a transition plan. “There are a lot of things I could’ve done. This is what I want to do,” Roberts said. “I don’t think any of us has any ability to sit on the sidelines anymore.” He said he doesn’t come to the job with a plan or a team in place, but a desire to make sure all Detroit children have the same opportunities he had — or better. He said he’ll convene an advisory committee soon and seek the most talented person he can find to fill the role of academic leader for DPS. The standing plan to close 14 schools by 2012 and convert as many as 45 to charter schools will continue until assessments can be made to determine if changes are necessary, Roberts said. By law, Roberts could dismiss the powerless school board and nullify union contracts. But he said he does not have any preconceived plans and must assess the situation. School board President Anthony Adams called Roberts and impressive rags-to-riches story. “He has the tenacity, the intelligence, the desire to solve a very difficult set of problems,” Adams said. “We look forward to the opportunity for new leadership. We have a lot of pressing issues which need immediate decision, and hopefully, this will allow us to work in cooperative fashion to solve the problems in Detroit Public Schools.” Tonya Allen, chief operating officer and vice president of program for the Skillman Foundation, which has poured millions into supporting DPS, said Roberts’ reputation as a team builder is needed in a system that has seen a revolving door of leaders in recent years. “The challenge is not just assembling a team for him, but assembling a leadership team for the district that can stay beyond his tenure, however long that is,” she said. “Institution knowledge in the district is gone. We have to rebuild that, and we need people who are going to stay in the district long-term if we are actually going to turn it around.” Roberts said he knows a lot of people may say he’s crazy for taking the job. DPS has a growing deficit; more than half of the students have left in the past decade; 130 schools have closed since 2005; 70 of the 141 current schools could close in the next two years; the deficit elimination plan calls for high school class sizes of 60 by 2013; there’s no superintendent in place, and the U.S. education secretary has called DPS arguably the worst urban district in the nation. “It’s not about money,” he said. “If people think they can sit on the sidelines and say, ‘Look at that. Isn’t that horrible? Woe is me.’ You can’t do that anymore. … A lot of people in this community, intelligent people who have been achievers, have been cut out of this system, haven’t had a chance to input this system. We’re going to invite them in.” Dan Lijana, Mayor Dave Bing’s spokesman, said the Bing Group was an auto supplier to GM, but the two men have not professionally collaborated before. “I have known Roy for many years, dating back to his days at General Motors,” Bing said in a written statement. “I respect his success as a businessman and look forward to working with him.” Bobb praised Roberts as “a role model for DPS students.” “His position as an icon in the African-American community and in the city of Detroit will be of huge benefit to DPS and also a role model for DPS students,” he said in a written statement. “I am personally excited, and our team is ready to engage fully on the transition to ensure a smooth changeover for parents, students and staff.” At the news conference Wednesday, Roberts pledged to invite parents, teachers, residents, school board members, and anyone who can “add plus value” to be involved in the process of turning around DPS. “I don’t believe for one minute that it’s a one-man show,” he said. “This is about a community saying, ‘I’m tired. I’m not going to take it anymore.’ ” The governor made the announcement at his southeastern Michigan office in the Cadillac Place building in Midtown. The building used to be GM headquarters. Snyder said the district’s $327-million deficit is important, but Roberts’ most pressing task will be to ensure DPS students are college- or career-ready. The DPS graduation rate is 62%, compared with 76% statewide. About 1% of students are college-ready on average, compared with 16% statewide. “It’s time for the next chapter to be made with the Detroit Public Schools,” Snyder said. “We have someone who blends that best balance — business skills set, community skills set and someone so well-respected. So I’m very excited to have Roy on board.” Roberts stands as an example of black success in the corporate worlds of industry and finance. He was the highest-ranking African American in the auto industry as GM vice president for North American sales, service and marketing. The ninth of 10 children, he was raised in western Michigan by his father after his mother died when he was 2. He is a graduate and trustee emeritus at Western Michigan University. He retired from GM in 2000 and started a successful private equity firm, Reliant Equity Investors. He and his wife, Maureen, have four children and six grandchildren. They live in Bloomfield Hills and spend summers in Arizona. • CONTACT CHASTITY PRATT DAWSEY: 313-223-4537 OR CPRATT@FREE PRESS.COM . STAFF WRITERS NAOMI R. PATTON AND LORI HIGGINS CONTRIBUTED TO THIS REPORT.
Roy S. Roberts, newly appointed emergency manager for Detroit Public Schools, shakes hands after the announcement Wednesday at Cadillac Place in Detroit.
Dealing with controversy is nothing new for Roberts
Fittingly, the new emergency manager of Detroit Public Schools is no stranger to controversy, intense pressure, labor unions or news media attention.Roy S. Roberts had all of that, in abundance, during his shooting-star rise to the top ranks at General Motors, culminating as group vice president over North American sales and marketing during a tumultuous period for GM at the turn of the century.
He also was the central figure in a race-tinged controversy in 1994, when he was rejected for membership in the exclusive Bloomfield Hills Country Club, prompting GM’s then-Chairman Jack Smith and Chief Financial Officer Mike Losh to resign from the club in protest. “Roy has seen the good, the bad, the ugly and the really ugly,” Bruce MacDonald, who was GM’s global vice president of communications in 1992-95, said Wednesday. “He’s tough, he’s smart, and when he gets his teeth into something, he’s not going to let go.” Roberts, 72, the second-youngest of 10 children, graduated in 1958 from Muskegon High School, where he starred as a running back, then went to work and to college part-time, eventually earning a degree in industrial management from Western Michigan University. He joined GM in 1977, and by 1981 was a manager of a Grand Rapids plant, where he caught the eye of Skip Le-Fauve, who would later head GM’s Saturn unit. Roberts attained rising-star status at GM a couple of years later as manager of the North Tarrytown, N.Y., assembly plant, “where they had a lot of problems with quality and productivity,” MacDonald said. “He really turned that place around, working with the union and building a team.” In 1987, he was catapulted to a GM vice presidency as head of personnel administration. After a brief departure to head truck operations at Navistar, Roberts rejoined GM in 1990 as manufacturing manager for Cadillac. By the mid-’90s he was head of the GMC Truck division and then Pontiac-GMC. He was promoted into a hornet’s nest of problems in October 1998 as group VP over sales and marketing. GM had suffered a series of crippling local strikes that summer that caused the company’s U.S. market share to fall below 30% for the first time since the 1920s. Roberts held the share steady at 29.4% in 1999, but he also was trying to quiet a revolt of GM dealers triggered by a shake-up and consolidation led by Roberts’ boss Ron Zarrella and CEO Smith. Roberts retired early in 2000, and Zarrella was gone a year later. Amid his rapid career rise and GM’s corporate roller-coaster ride from a boardroom coup in 1992 to a brief comeback during the 1990s SUV craze, Roberts gained more notoriety and news media attention for being excluded from — and later admitted into — the Bloomfield Hills Country Club. Long seen as the top of the social pecking order among metro Detroit’s country club elite, the Bloomfield Hills CC counted among its members such former CEOs as Chrysler’s Lee Iacocca and GM’s Smith, along with notables including the late radio legend J.P. McCarthy. Roberts sought membership in 1994 and was supported by fellow GM executives who were members, but Roberts’ application was rejected. He wasn’t seeking to break the club’s color barrier; Chrysler general counsel Leroy Richie had done that in 1992. In the embarrassing eruption of news media coverage that ensued over the private club’s membership rites, Roberts himself maintained a low public profile, but Smith and Losh, GM’s two highest-ranking executives at the time, resigned from the club in protest. Two years later, Roberts and Aubrey Lee, an African-American banking executive, were admitted to the club. Since leaving GM, Roberts has served on several corporate boards and as a trustee of his alma mater, Western Michigan. He also has been president of the national board of directors of the Boy Scouts of America and was one of the initial investors in the MGM Grand casino in Detroit. • CONTACT TOM WALSH: 313-223-4430 OR TWALSH@FREEPRESS.COM
Former General Motors executive Roy S. Roberts, right, was appointed by Gov. Rick Snyder as the new emergency manager for Detroit Public Schools. In 1994, the Bloomfield Hills Country Club rejected Roberts for membership, which led to fellow GM execs resigning their memberships.
Timely donation
The new man on emergency mission
Roy Roberts must build multiple school solutions
In truth, that system has been gestating awhile. More than 50,000 kids in the city now attend some school outside of DPS, and the district’s schools continue to lose thousands of kids each year. Parents have been voting with their feet, looking for quality elsewhere. But it’s also true that the cluster of charters in Detroit (one of the largest in the country) is badly unregulated and held to no particular standard of excellence. Roberts must act to stabilize a smaller DPS, which will always be necessary for kids who can’t exercise other options and especially for disabled children. And he must work with the state, parents, the nonprofit community and the school board to make all schools in Detroit, whatever their governance, accountable for providing strong educational choices to the city’s kids. He’ll need to work quickly in several different areas: • Finance: DPS is still spending more than it takes in, even though Robert Bobb has been here for two years. Bobb plugged some of the district’s leaky financial holes (identifying waste, renegotiating contracts, stabilizing the district’s accounting practices), but there were far more deficiencies than he could ever have hoped to fix in that time frame without doing damage to classroom instruction. Some things also got worse, as the state continues to up school districts’ pension contributions (DPS is now paying $60 million a year), DPS’ population continued to decline, and efforts to rightsize the district by closing schools went awry. Roberts will need to prioritize the district’s funds straight away. He should do it by first ensuring adequate financial support for the district’s handful of successful schools. That’s the core of what will remain after DPS is deconstructed, and it should form the framework for discussions about what to save and what to jettison. Beyond that, he will need to readdress contracts, especially collective bargaining agreements that still handcuff the district’s flexibility. Roberts will have expanded powers to do so under a new law passed this spring. • Excellence: Academic achievement is still too rare in DPS, and accountability for achievement is still largely nonexistent, as it is elsewhere in Michigan. Roberts has an opportunity, though, against the backdrop of Gov. Rick Snyder’s ambitious statewide education plans, to make a big difference in Detroit. He can build on Bobb’s plan to close, or turn over to charters, about 40 schools that chronically underperform. That could start with getting turnaround plans in place in all of the city’s underperforming schools, and to open up the execution of those plans to operators with proven track records. If the goal is to create schools that operate beyond the scope of just DPS, Roberts will need to help form the basis for evaluating all those schools, and holding them accountable. • Outsiders: Education in Detroit needs help. Badly. Now that the system has really hit rock bottom, it’s time for reformers from around the country to come pitch in. Charter operators that have impressive track records in other cities (like the KIPP schools, or Green Dot out of Los Angeles, or Rocket-ship Education in San Jose) have long eyed Detroit as an inauspicious place to pursue reform. DPS governance has been too shaky, its teachers union viewed as too recalcitrant. Roberts has to reach out forcefully to those groups, recruiting them to be part of the turnaround here. He should also work to expand the presence of Teach for America in Detroit, to start building the kind of reform infrastructure among teachers that is working in cities across the country. It was telling that when Bobb announced intentions to charter 40 schools, few of the high-quality national operators stepped up. Roberts has to change that attitude by actively assuring reformers nationwide that Detroit will be wide open to innovation and change. Gov. Snyder assured me last week that he didn’t intend for the new financial manager to be a caretaker. He wanted someone to bridge DPS from its lowly, precarious state to a thriving part of the educational system in the city. He specifically invoked the idea of creating a system of schools, rather than doggedly protecting the franchise of a public school system. Snyder said Wednesday Roberts is the best person for that job. Everyone in Michigan has to hope he’s right. • STEPHEN HENDERSON IS EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR FOR THE FREE PRESS AND THE HOST OF "AMERICAN BLACK JOURNAL," WHICH AIRS AT 2 P.M. ON SUNDAYS ON WTVS (CHANNEL 56) IN DETROIT. CONTACT HENDERSON AT SHENDERSON600@FREE PRESS.COM , OR AT 313-222-6659.
Newly appointed Detroit Public Schools emergency financial manager Roy Roberts makes his way shaking hands during a press conference held at the governor’s office in Detroit Wednesday.
DIA gift let Roberts speak on education and hard work
Two days before Roy S. Roberts was named the new emergency manager of Detroit Public Schools, he spoke about the gift of at least $1 million he and his wife gave the Detroit Institute of Arts. He focused on the reasons — legacy, setting an example for family and the truism that world-class cities demand world-class arts. As he spoke, he returned again and again to a favorite subject: education. It was as if he was foreshadowing Wednesday’s announcement. “My message to young people is: Get the most education that you can get,” Roberts said. “After that, it’s hard work — there’s no getting around it, and there’s no substitute. And when you get to a point where you can help others, you have to help.” The former General Motors executive and corporate board member also spoke about the economic development power of education — CEOs relocate companies to cities with quality school districts, workers and arts, he said. The Roberts’ gift, which DIA officials identified only as “seven figures,” was the first million-dollar-plus donation to the museum by African Americans. Roberts’ friend Nettie Sea-brooks, executive adviser to the director at the DIA, said the link between his appointment to lead DPS and the donation is Roberts’ commitment to rebuilding Detroit. “I think Roy is so committed to the success of Detroit that even though he genuinely understands what a huge challenge this is, he’s willing to step in and do everything he can to make the Detroit Public Schools all that they should be,” said Seabrooks, who came to know Roberts when both were GM executives. A product of the Muskegon public schools, Roberts punctuated the themes of education and hard work in a speech Tuesday night at a DIA reception honoring him and his wife. Most of his four children and six grandchildren were present. What matters is not where you start, he told the crowd of dignitaries, “but where you finish.” • CONTACT MARK STRYKER: 313-222-6459 OR MSTRYKER@FREEPRESS.COM
Roy S. Roberts sits in his General Motors office in 1998. He and his wife donated at least $1 million to the Detroit Institute of Arts. In speaking of it, Roberts kept returning to the subject of education.
Overheard
“I don’t know whether to offer you congratulations or condolences.”KEITH JOHNSON, president of the Detroit Federation of Teachers, joking after he met Roberts on Wednesday
“Hallelujah! My prayers have been answered! I can’t believe they convinced him to come out of retirement. … To have a corporate person who understands what kinds of students corporations want in today’s competitive society is a bonus for DPS.” IDA BYRD-HILL, a DPS parent who has been a financial manager and alternative school operator “I want this financial manager to deal with the finances and let the curriculum people deal with the curriculum. … My bottom line is … do what you do, but do it for the children. We don’t have time for the ego. It’s about the children. … Meet with the parents and the community. That’s the No. 1 thing. We’re the customers. We’re the stakeholders. See what we would like for our children and then go from there.” CAROL SUMMERS, president of the Local School Community Organization at William Beckham Academy “He has to develop some sort of community-based task force to stabilize enrollment. … And I would freeze the plan to charter all those schools immediately.” CHRIS WHITE, a co-chair of a grassroots group that filed a lawsuit against Robert Bobb, saying he violated laws that called for in-depth financial reporting. He wants Roberts to open the books for the public to see. “We need to figure out how we as a community mobilize behind him to get the right momentum and consistency in the district.” TONYA ALLEN, chief operating officer, Skillman Foundation “I think Roy is so committed to the success of Detroit that even though he genuinely understands what a huge challenge this is, he’s willing to step in and do everything he can to make the Detroit Public Schools all that they should be.” NETTIE SEABROOKS, executive adviser to the director at the Detroit Institute of Arts and a friend of Roberts who came to know him when they were both GM executives “I hope he’s open-minded. And I hope he hires a superintendent. We need someone that is capable of acknowledging academics and seeing what our kids need. We need better administrators.” KIMBERLY BISHOP, whose daughter attends Henry Ford High School
According to Snyder it's not the finances that matter most, but ensuring that all DPS student's get a quality education and that this will be Roberts role. And the change in the law that allows more autonomy in these matters is what motivated Mr. Roberts to take the position. Yet in Roberts narrative I see nothing meaningful that he has done in the educational arena, other than that he had one and attributes it to helping his climb to the top of a major symbol for a dying industry that has failed to innovate. So, while I'm hoping for his success, the whole proposition will need some major blessings indeed!
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