tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-45266599371188167072024-03-13T03:49:30.513-05:00K12 Reformer - Mike RenoThe personal observations of an elected school board trustee who is dedicated to education reform in Michigan.
Email: reno@rcs-reno.comMike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.comBlogger179125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-18697060656133888582011-10-07T11:41:00.003-05:002011-10-07T12:11:36.921-05:00Candidate Ethics<span class="Apple-style-span" >I wrote an article that ran earlier this week:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20111004/OPINION01/110040326">Detroit News: Big money helps teacher unions stack elections (10/04/11)</a><br /><br />For those involved with school board politics, none of this will come as a surprise. But for those unacquainted with the MEA... welcome to the rabbit hole.<br /><br />A reasonable rebuttal to the article will question whether teachers are citizens and taxpayers too, and whether they have the right to advocate for a candidate they support.<br /><br />Yes, as individuals, they most certainly do.<br /><br />The difference is whether the union should get involved. They are the organization responsible for negotiating contracts. I think there is a clear conflict of interest when you help get someone elected, only to sit across the table from them weeks later and bargain a contract.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br />I have posted the article below, in case the link does not work.</span><br /><br /><span id="fullpost"><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" ><br />Last Updated: October 04. 2011 3:32PM<br />Commentary<br /><br />Big money helps teacher unions stack elections<br />by Mike Reno<br /><br />From Wisconsin to Ohio, the pendulum is swinging away from union dominance of government, back to a focus on taxpayers and citizens.<br /><br />But this isn't just a remote national conflict; the struggle is happening in local communities throughout Michigan, and merits attention this November.<br /><br />Look no further than your local school board election to examine union influence in government.<br /><br />Michigan's largest teachers union, the MEA, works diligently to insure it is represented on both sides of the bargaining table. They conduct statewide "Elect Your Boss" rank-and-file training classes, and the MEA-PAC (Political Action Committee) is one of the wealthiest and most powerful lobby committees in Lansing.<br /><br />State campaign finance records show that the MEA-PAC gives generously to school board candidates. Individual teachers and local union PACs contribute money as well. But more importantly, locals furnish boots on the ground.<br /><br />The locals organize phone banks and literature drops, where teachers will contact parents and ask them to support the recommended candidates.<br /><br />This union stranglehold over local school boards </span><span id="fullpost"><span class="Apple-style-span" >has been so effective that our state government has been compelled to intervene, passing new oversight and regulation of our public schools and how they compensate teachers.<br /><br />Consider this example from Rochester.<br /><br />I still have a copy of the "mobilize and motivate" letter widely distributed in the last Rochester school board election, signed by the president of the local MEA unit.<br /><br />In this call to arms, she writes, "We need all bodies at the polls… We believe we can work with the four declared (school board) candidates…"<br /><br />And boy, did they work with them.<br /><br />The newly elected Rochester Board of Education, all seven being union-backed, dealt with the worst economic crisis in our generation by laying off learning consultants and media assistants, while giving salary increases and bonuses to the district teachers. In that same year, they raised the local debt millage by 30 percent.<br /><br />Of course, the trustees will deny that the union support influenced their decisions, and will point to token concessions in the last contract.<br /><br />Yet they remain silent on why they continue to increase salaries and benefits year after year in the face of declining revenue and deficit budgets.<br /><br />Most people are astounded this kind of union and trustee relationship is even legal, but it is, and repeats itself every election cycle.<br /><br />Just recently, the MEA local issued its bi-annual summons for this year's crop of board candidates to appear before them, hat in hand, to seek its "recommendation" and all of the benefits that accompany it.<br /><br />Fortunately, we see signs that the pendulum is swinging. Candidate Jeremy Nielson published a letter in which he politely declined the MEA invitation. Nielson says he "wants to earn the endorsement and respect of each and every teacher based on the merits of his candidacy," but will not seek the approval of an organization that he will ultimately bargain with as a trustee.<br /><br />Contrast this with two of the other candidates, who themselves are members of a teachers union, one of whom actually wrote a book on union involvement in the public sector.<br /><br />Rochester is the example, but this isn't just a Rochester issue. These dramas play out in most of the 500-plus school districts across the state. The voting public remains largely unaware of this union stamp on the ballot box.<br /><br />Given that local school board trustees collectively spend one-third of the state budget — some $15 billion, with 85 percent going to union jobs — the public must face this situation head-on if public education is to remain sustainable for future generations.<br /><br />This will be a watershed election year as union special interests battle for the hearts and minds of voters.<br /><br />Watch these local school board elections, for they will be the canary in the coal mine, and will signal whether union dominance of elections — and tax dollars — is becoming history in Michigan.</span><br /></span></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-64983999459310538792011-07-07T08:24:00.007-05:002011-07-07T09:21:34.376-05:00The Diane Ravitch / Alter / Brooks Debate<span class="Apple-style-span" >Education Historian Diane Ravitch is at the center of a dust-up that has been swirling around for a month now.<br /><br />I've collected a series of articles that can help to give a flavor of the reform debate. For a better taste... follow this on Twitter (I'm on as @K12Reformer).<br /><br />I'm not going to comment on it for now... there is plenty of reading below!<br /><br />This chapter began with a New York Times opinion piece by Diane Ravitch (@DianeRavitch)<br /><br /><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/01/opinion/01ravitch.html">New York Times: Waiting for a School Miracle (05/31/11)</a><br /><br />Jonathan Alter (@JonathanAlter), formerly of Newsweek, and now with Bloomberg, writes:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-06-03/don-t-believe-critics-education-reform-works-jonathan-alter.html">Bloomberg: Don’t Believe Critics, Education Reform Works (06/03/11)</a><br /><br />The debate raged on the blogosphere for a month, and included a blog posting by Matthew Yglesias (@MattyYglesias) that has yet to be answered:<br /><br /><a href="http://thinkprogress.org/yglesias/2011/06/23/252178/what-does-diane-ravitch-think-we-should-do-to-improve-education-in-the-united-states/">ThinkProgress: What Does Diane Ravitch Think We Should Do To Improve Education In The United States? (06/23/11)</a><br /><br />The debate really intensified with this piece by Martin Brooks:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/01/opinion/01brooks.html?_r=1&ref=davidbrooks">New York Times: Smells Like School Spirit (06/30/11)</a><br /><br />Jonathan Chait (@JonathanChait) adds to the discussion:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-chait/91233/david-brooks-slightly-too-nice-diane-ravitch">The New Republic: David Brooks Is Slightly Too Nice To Diane Ravitch (07/02/11)</a><br /><br />Valarie Strauss (@ValerieStrauss) attempts to minimize / neutralize the rebuttals:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/ravitch-rage--cause-symptoms-treatment/2011/07/05/gHQAJnGIzH_blog.html">Washington Post: ‘Ravitch Rage’ — cause, symptoms, treatment (07/05/11)</a><br /><br />(Funny comment made on the Strauss article: "Oh, when I saw "Ravitch Rage" I just assumed it was the case of rabies Ravitch has seemed to develop over the past ten years.")<br /><br />From my perspective, the rebuttals to Ravitch are not an illness, they are the antidote!<br /><br />Anyway, Ravitch goes on to respond here:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/06/opinion/l06dialogue.html">New York Times: Letter to the Editor (07/05/11)</a><br /><br />There are numerous teacher blogs that bash Brooks/Alter/Chait, etc, and numerous "reformer" blogs that comment on Ravitch. If you find'em, post'em in the comment section below.<br /><br />Interesting debate, for sure!<br /><br />==> Mike.</span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-49133999616807300242011-07-07T08:10:00.003-05:002011-07-07T08:24:18.406-05:00Two Steps forward, One Step Back.<span class="Apple-style-span" >Here's a follow up to a post I made in May, 2010, <a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2010/05/trendy-schools-risk-college-scholarship.html">(found here)</a> that addressed my concerns with dropping the Valedictorian / Salutatorian awards. The video tells it all; people comment to the school board, and the board responds in muted silence.<br /><br />The Rochester Community Schools Board of Education eventually created a level of awards that makes sense. Honors are awarded based on GPA, ACT Score, and AP participation. I love it!<br /><br />Two steps forward!<br /><br />But the, then one step back: they took away the award for the very top achievers.<br /><br />I write about that here:<br /><a href="http://www.theoaklandpress.com/articles/2011/06/14/opinion/doc4df804b660b12555312346.txt"><br />Oakland Press: Schools wrong to drop top honor student designations (06/14/11)</a><br /><br /><br />Here is the full text of the article, in case the link does not work:</span><br /><br />-------------------------------------------<br /><br /><span class="Apple-style-span" >Schools wrong to drop top honor student designations<br />Published: Tuesday, June 14, 2011<br />By Mike Reno<br /><br />Tis the season of graduation, and the Oakland University Meadowbrook amphitheater will be filled every night with high school commencement ceremonies.<br /><br />Watch ’em closely this year, so that you can get a glimpse of an endangered species.<br /><br />Many schools are ending the practice of recognizing the valedictorian and salutatorian. In fact, they are not only ending the practice of honoring those top students, they are even eliminating all “relative performance indicators,” such as class rank.<br /><br />This does not just impact those few “eggheads” that earned perfect scores in every class. It’s bigger than that. Consider the message this misguided action sends to our children about drive, self-discipline and achievement.<br /><br />It puts scholarship dollars at risk. But more importantly it speaks to the very core of how your school board views academic achievement — and the message isn’t pretty.<br /><br />Rochester schools just changed </span><span id="fullpost"><span class="Apple-style-span" >its academic recognition policy and will abandon the honors for the highest achievers. They have replaced it with a “grouping” of kids who meet certain criteria such as overall GPA and participation in Advanced Placement Classes.<br /><br />It’s like the honor roll — on steroids.<br /><br />Creating this award is great and students who achieve to these levels absolutely deserve recognition. But these “groups” could’ve been an honor supplement, it didn’t need to replace top honors.<br /><br />Why take away the brass ring? Picture the Olympics, where a “precious metal pin” is awarded to the top three athletes instead of gold, silver and bronze.<br /><br />School boards offer excuses to explain why they have decided to stop honoring the top achievers.<br /><br />To rank high in a class, and be at the “top,” the school must rank the students. Imagine the ego damage to those who are not at the top, or rank near the bottom.<br /><br />Some note that the valedictorian honor has become diluted now that it’s common to have more than one from the class. And some will argue that kids with really good grades may stop taking challenging classes for fear of lowering their GPA and losing their shot at the title. But those concerns can be addressed by giving additional weight to challenging classes. An “A” in an advanced placement class might be worth five points instead of 4. This way, the student who earns a 4.0 taking basket-weaving classes won’t tie with the one who earns a 4.0 in advanced placement courses.<br /><br />Schools recognize their top athletes by awarding them varsity letters. Rather than eliminating winners, they instead construct trophy displays and hang record plaques on the gymnasium wall. Have you seen similar public recognition and celebration of top academic achievement?<br /><br />But this is not just about public recognition. There are scholarships awarded to valedictorians and salutatorians. And class rank matters, too, with scholarships available to those placing in the top 10 percent of their class.<br /><br />So, as you attend graduation ceremonies and graduation parties, be sure to give a sincere hat-tip to vals and sals in the class. They are a dying breed.<br /><br /><i>Mike Reno is a former trustee of the Rochester Board of Education</i>.</span><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-27390335485836458682011-04-07T07:13:00.002-05:002011-04-07T07:18:05.343-05:00Undermining Confidence In SchoolsWhen school boards continue to spew misinformation, it undermines public confidence in the whole system.<br /><br />I write about it here:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20110407/OPINION01/104070342/1008/OPINION01/Local-schools-haven’t-made-cuts-yet">Detroit News: Local schools haven't made cuts (04/07/11)</a><br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br />Here is the whole article in case the link does not work:<br /><br />--------------------------<br /><br />Governor Snyder affirmed his commitment to education by dedicating a full thirty percent of the state budget to education. Snyder’s budget also prudently balances spending with revenue, and necessitates a 4% reduction in education funding; the first substantial cut since this economic crisis began.<br /><br />School administrators now predict our children are doomed. Unions are threatening an illegal strike. School boards are insulting their legislators and the governor, and spinning a deceitful message designed to manipulate the public.<br /><br />Make no mistake: these protests are not selfless concern about the well-being of our children. This is all because the adults in the system don’t want to pay a little towards their health care and retirement benefits, and school boards lack the will or the skill to reform a stale public education system.<br /><br />If ever there was a time for taxpayers to stand up to this greedy special interest… this is it. The long term stability and viability of public education is at stake.<br /><br />The Rochester school board provided a great forum in which <span id="fullpost"><br />we could watch this drama unfold. Within a two-week period, they held a “study session” on the budget, as well as conducted public interviews for a new superintendent. Observers were exposed to the district’s homegrown budget misinformation, and also heard funding sentiments of superintendent candidates who came from other Michigan districts.<br /><br />Rochester claims they are being forced to accept cuts of over $1100 per pupil, even though Snyder’s proposed reduction is only $300 per pupil. The balance of the “cuts” are not really cuts; they are the end of the supplemental federal bailouts – the so-called “stimulus funds” and the “edu-jobs” money.<br /><br />School boards knew full well that those were one-time dollars, and have had two full years to plan for the expiration, but have done nothing whatsoever to prepare.<br /><br />In fact, during that two year period many school boards, including Rochester, committed to expensive employee contracts, even though they knew those federal dollars were set to expire.<br /><br />The Rochester board approved a union contract they label as concessionary. But over its three-year duration the contract was projected to save one-tenth of one percent. With retirement increases this year, it probably saves nothing.<br /><br />Since 2005, the Rochester board voluntarily agreed to allow the cost of its union contract to increase by a total of $950 per pupil.<br /><br />The board goes on to say they’ve cut $28 million since 2001. The budget in 2001 was around $110 million. If they cut $28 million, then it should be around $82 million now, right? Wrong. This year the budget is $158 million.<br /><br />Only in government does that math work.<br /><br />What schools do is cut student programs and layoff their youngest teachers in order to make room for salary and benefit increases for the older ones. They report the cuts, but not the simultaneous increases.<br /><br />And other “cuts” correct the absurd contracts they have been defending for years, such as paying custodians upwards of $60,000 per year in salary and benefits.<br /><br />So what did the superintendent candidates have to say about this?<br /><br />They are all from Michigan, and it was no great surprise that they were all in lockstep.<br /><br />One indicated that if selected, he’d collaborate with the union, and seek support from parents to descend on Lansing and make them understand that “we’re not going to neglect our kids!”<br /><br />Another believes that our legislators and the Governor are simply ignorant and uninformed, and agreed with the school board that Lansing and the public need to be “educated and informed”, presumably by those that got us into this mess.<br /><br />What these candidates – and school boards around the state – fail to recognize is the legislature, the governor, and the public is becoming increasing well-informed about mismanagement of our public school system. <br /><br />Clearly, school boards and superintendents are living in denial, and it’s our job as taxpayers to help them wake up to the reality of today.<br /><br />If local school boards don’t start spending the billions they receive with better care, then it’s our job to un-elect them.<br /><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-60584919333841522292010-11-19T08:37:00.007-05:002010-11-20T13:12:17.938-05:00"Public Education Inc" Software Bugs<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">I know... it's been a while.<br /><br />But after watching the Rochester school board emulate Nancy Pelosi and her "We need to pass the bill first, so that you can see what's in it" approach, I had to allow myself this distraction:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20101119/OPINION01/11190337/1008/Talk-about-teacher-contracts-openly"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The Detroit News: Talk about teacher contracts openly (11/19/10)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />This isn't about the contract, it's about the aristocratic approach of the school board.<br /><br />They'll reveal the contract, immediately vote on it, and THEN "welcome" your comments. Of course, by that point, your views will be irrelevant.<br /><br />I've pasted below the original piece that was submitted to The Detroit News.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br />(P.S. Thanks to Laurie Puscas for tipping me off to the T.A. She runs her own blog, </span><a href="http://www.iepointofview.com/"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">found here</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">.<br /><br /></span>--------------------------------------<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Before Governor-elect Rick Snyder can implement his Michigan 3.0 vision, he must first accept that it’s entirely incompatible with an obsolete Public Education 1.0.<br /><br />PE 1.0 is a school board developed subroutine that, when supercharged with an app called Union 2010, unapologetically consumes one-third of the entire state budget.<br /><br />If Snyder is unable to debug PE 1.0, these rogue apps will just continue to demand more system resources, and overpower his fresh new program.<br /><br />Just look at an all too common story that is happening in Rochester, but could just as easily be in any district around the state.<br /><br />The school board hasn’t passed a balanced budget in at least seven years. This year it’s projecting a $4.9 million dollar deficit.<br /><br />The actual magnitude of their deficit spending has been masked by the massive infusion of federal Obamabucks over several years.<br /><br />They just increased the local tax rate by 30 percent. They are deferring building maintenance and technology updates.<br /><br />Yet the board cannot even honestly face their problems.<br /><br />Rochester claims to have reduced their budget by $13 million over the past three years. Perhaps in government-world, where a cut doesn’t really mean a cut, they have.<br />But in the real world, budget documents from the district website put 2007 spending at $160 million, and 2010 spending at $158 million.<br /><br />Their biggest expense is labor, which consumes over 85 percent of <span id="fullpost">their budget.<br />It’s quite significant then that the board just announced a “tentative” contract with their local teacher union.<br /><br />But unbelievably, the agreement was developed in the proverbial “smoke-filled back room”, and in a move reminiscent of Nancy Pelosi and the health care bill, the board does not want to let the public in on the details until after they pass it.<br /><br />This contract – this secret contract – is undeniably the single biggest determining factor in whether the district will ever balance the budget. It’s one of the biggest decisions the board will make in the near future, and they are making it with the least possible transparency.<br /><br />It will help to determine how much pressure the board will put on Lansing – and specifically Governor-elect Snyder – for education funding.<br /><br />The existing contract – which is more or less identical to contracts in all Michigan districts – is structured so that total compensation will increase by roughly 5 percent per year, regardless of performance and regardless of revenue. Healthcare and retirements costs are not capped in any way whatsoever.<br /><br />The only hope for balancing the budgets and controlling costs is to work out new employee contracts that are reasonable, fair, and affordable.<br /><br />Does this secret new deal change anything, or is it more of the same?<br /><br />Will it save our schools, or instead doom them to more years of cuts to educational programs, increased pay-to-play sports fees, and perhaps even lead to a new sinking fund millage?<br /><br />Will it allow the district to survive on projected state revenues, or will it require the board to pressure Lansing for more money, pleading “for the children”?<br /><br />This agreement will have a profound impact on the district for years to come, and will affect parents, students, homeowners, and taxpayers alike. Therefore, they should have a reasonable opportunity to understand the contract, and provide feedback prior to a binding vote by their so-called representatives.<br /><br />The aristocratic school board refuses.<br /><br />Rochester is not unique. School boards across the state handle their negotiations in the same manner.<br /><br />Snyder needs to find a way to hold school boards accountable for this sort of nonsense, such as requiring a two week public disclosure period before binding union contract votes are made.<br /><br />Otherwise, school boards will continue to hold Lansing hostage, and will all but insure that Snyder’s software upgrades will crash.<br /><br /></span></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-32650687922570372252010-06-30T06:26:00.005-05:002010-06-30T07:06:05.128-05:00Risky Bonds and Lazy School Boards<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Most people don't know that school boards can raise your taxes without a vote of the people.<br /><br />In Michigan, we are protected from large tax increases by the Headlee Ammendment, passed in 1978. But taxpayers have no protection against school boards.<br /><br />Among other things, Headlee limits the total amount of taxes collected by limiting the total increase to the rate of inflation. But there is apparently some loophole that exempts school bonds, and school boards exploit it to the fullest extent of the law.<br /><br />Rochester's risky bond scheme just blew up, and now they are dumping on local taxpayers with a 30% tax increase, from 5.18 mills to 6.7 mills. There is another 15% increase on the horizon, up to 7.7 mills.<br /><br />(Incidentally, they'll now be collecting $27.5 million in bond taxes, which translates into $1850 per pupil! That is IN ADDITION TO the $10,500 or so they receive into their general fund from all sources of revenue.)<br /><br />I wrote about it last week in the Oakland Press:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.theoaklandpress.com/articles/2010/06/24/opinion/doc4c240356bc9d3810953553.txt"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Oakland Press: Poor management leads to school tax hikes (6/24/10)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />What can you do about it? Absolutely nothing.<br /><br />And don't think this is the end of their desire to tax.<br /><br />For years the district as budgeted very little for building maintenance, assuming that they would just call for another bond issue, and fund maintenance out of special bond dollars, rather than consider them normal operating expenses.<br /><br />That scheme has run it's course, and is no longer an option.<br /><br />However, while they were operating this scheme, the board was underfunding budgets for building maintenance, instead funnelling every available penny to salaries and benefits.<br /><br />So, they are no longer in a position to pass more bonds, and they have no money in the general fund for building maintenance.<br /><br />My guess is that the school board will soon be looking for a taxpayer bailout, and they'll call it a "sinking fund."<br /><br />They'll blame the state for "underfunding schools", and plead for this new tax. Taxpayers will be told they can approve this new tax, or instead watch the district's beautiful buildings fall apart.<br /><br />I've pasted the full article below in case the link doesn't work.<br /><br />==> Mike.</span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">-----------------------------------------------------------------</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">GUEST OPINION: Poor management leads to school tax hikes<br />Thursday, June 24, 2010<br /><br />By Mike Reno<br /><br />School bonds are ticking time bombs set to explode this month on unsuspecting taxpayers.<br /><br />They were planted years ago by lackluster school boards.<br /><br />Rather than attempt to disarm them and avoid a tax increase, boards will let them detonate, banking on another taxpayer bailout, with little regard for the collateral damage their hikes may inflict on struggling homeowners.<br /><br />This serves as a lesson to those who ignore school board elections, and ignore the “fine print” when these bonds are promoted.<br /><br />A school board typically markets a bond proposal by communicating the bond value and millage rate. For example, a district might ask for a $64 million bond issue, with a 5.18 mill tax rate.<br /><br />However, the “fine print” reveals the millage figure might be a “low introductory rate,” subject to increases determined by your local school board.<br /><br />This just happened in Rochester, where the 5.18 mill rate </span><span id="fullpost" style="font-family:times new roman;">increased by 30 percent to 6.7 mills. Taxpayers have no say, and most will probably remain unaware of the tax hike until they open their next tax bill.<br /><br />It’s happening in other communities too, such as South Lyon and Royal Oak.<br /><br />On the surface, plummeting home values are to blame. With housing assessments down, the amount collected by the current millage isn’t enough to make scheduled school bond payments.<br /><br />Yet as much as school boards might wish to be seen as helpless victims of economic circumstances, there’s plenty they could be doing to relieve our school tax obligations.<br /><br />Let’s start with the bonds themselves. In Rochester, the repayment schedule is based on the assumption home values would increase 6 percent annually — forever.<br /><br />This is like taking out a home mortgage with monthly payments that increase annually based on the assumption that you’ll get a substantial raise every year — forever.<br /><br />Who came up with this idea? A financial consultant who’s been awarded no-bid contracts since the 1990s and also hired a sitting Rochester school board member.<br /><br />A consultant who now says raising taxes is the only option.<br /><br />Perhaps a tax increase is inevitable. But rather than merely rubber-stamping it, our elected officials should probe everything, leaving no stone unturned in an effort to avert a tax increase.<br /><br />Instead, none questioned a misleading board presentation. This increase is $152 per $100,000 of taxable home value, but the presentation attempts to fool people into thinking the increase will be much less.<br /><br />After the deceptive presentation, and considering how this consulting firm put the district into its present “no option” predicament, the board was urged to go the extra mile on behalf of the taxpayer, and at least seek a second opinion. The board didn’t respond to the suggestion.<br /><br />Someone then pointed out how the benevolent board has kept tax rates constant for the past decade, as if we should expect regular taxes increases and be grateful they’ve held off for so long. And it completely ignores the fact that 10 years ago the district collected $16.7 million in taxes, while next year they’ll levy $27.5 million.<br /><br />In the end, the board made no effort to protect taxpayers, and voted unanimously for a tax increase. And there’s another 15-percent increase projected for next year, to 7.7 mills!<br /><br />The biggest problem isn’t the tax increase; it’s the sloppy way it happened. It’s been a lesson in poor governance, from the risky bond scheme to the conflict-of-interest consultant, to the deceptive presentations, and concluding with the downright lazy decision to skip a second opinion.<br /><br />These school boards are their own worst enemy. Their behavior and mismanagement causes people to doubt their credibility, ultimately making it difficult to find tax dollars for worthwhile projects and justifiable needs.<br /><br /><br /></span><span id="fullpost" style="font-family:times new roman;"></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-20153014340259019232010-06-23T10:58:00.008-05:002010-06-24T07:05:45.239-05:00Sports: The 3rd Rail of School Politics<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />High voltage electricity was once supplied to trains through the “third rail”. Over time, the phrase “third rail” became a metaphor denoting a political subject so highly charged that politicians who dared to discuss the subject – metaphorically touch the rail – would suffer greatly.<br /><br />In school politics, athletics is a third rail, and some local school boards recently tested voltage. Sparks flew... and the boards backed down.<br /><br />I wrote this piece a few weeks ago:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://detnews.com/article/20100603/OPINION01/6030345/Bloated-costs-hurting-schools"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Detroit News: Bloated costs hurting schools (06/03/10)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />As predicted, the school board is going to pull hundreds of thousands of dollars out of savings to subsidize sports.<br /><br />They will spend about $900 per pupil for the 1800 students that play sports, and it comes at the expense of the 13,000 kids who don't play.<br /><br />Meanwhile, they are slashing $1,000,000 out of the already underfunded building maintenance budget.<br /><br />Keep all of this in mind when this board approaches voters in a few years to ask for a sinking fund millage. We'll have leaky roofs, and cracked parking lots, and they'll tell you that there is just no money to fix things. Remember their actions here when they trot out the "we have no choice" excuse.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br />P.S. I've pasted below the article in case the link doesn't work.<br /></span><br />-----------------------------------------------<br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">June 3, 2010 http://detnews.com/article/20100603/OPINION01/6030345<br /><br />Bloated costs hurting schools<br /><br />MIKE RENO<br /><br />For years, irresponsible school board spending set the stage for a financial meltdown. The economic crisis in Michigan accelerated the process, compelling boards to consider tough budget choices.<br /><br />These choices have brought out competing special interest groups, claws extended, defending their turf, trying to push the cuts onto someone else.<br /><br />Employee unions are the 800-pound gorilla in these fights, but the "athletic parent" is proving to be one tough mama grizzly as well. They view after-school sports as an entitlement, and attack anyone who threatens it.<br /><br />This entitlement is being tested in cash-strapped districts, and fur is flying from Rochester to Romeo to Farmington.<br /><br />In Rochester, student athletes </span><span id="fullpost" style="font-family:times new roman;">are assessed a $180 pay-to-play fee, which comes nowhere close to covering athletic spending.<br /><br />Even after these fees, Rochester athletic spending exceeds $1.6 million dollars. That's nearly $890 for each of the 1,800 student athletes. Add together the school expenditures and student fees, and the average cost for after-school sports is $1,070 per participant.<br /><br />Compare school spending to several private intramural football and basketball teams in Rochester. Some are recreational, while others are more competitive. They range in cost from $140 to $250 per child per season; up to 85 percent less than the school.<br /><br />Beyond the annual costs, the district recently installed three artificial turf football fields at $1 million dollars each, as well as two middle school auxiliary gymnasiums "needed" to supplement the main gyms.<br /><br />Ignoring costs, there's no doubt that sports are constructive for some students. Sports can teach leadership and teamwork, and help a child learn to humbly accept victory or graciously concede defeat. For some, athletics are the only motivation to do well in school.<br /><br />But the fact remains that after-school sports aren't part of a school's core curriculum, and the costs come at the expense of the thousands of students who do not play.<br /><br />The $1.6 million dollar athletic expenditure in Rochester is now being examined as the district faces a $14 million dollar deficit. One proposal considers increasing the pay-to-play fee to $450, and athletic boosters are marching on the board with torches and pitchforks.<br /><br />Yet none of them comment on the layoff notices to 30 teachers and dozens of secretaries, or the reductions in library and special education support staffs.<br /><br />Deficit reduction proposals consider maximizing the "contractual staffing formula." This is jargon for increasing class sizes to the absolute contractual limits. There hasn't been a peep out of parents.<br /><br />The board proposes to reduce an already underfunded building maintenance budget, causing speculation they'll soon be begging taxpayers to pass a sinking fund millage. Parents have been silent on this issue.<br /><br />But the board has received hundreds of letters from athletic parents "outraged" at the increased pay-to-play proposal.<br /><br />Parents should be upset, but not at the fee. They should be upset that the school board let the cost of sports become so outrageously expensive. And they should be upset that the board continues to squeeze academic and athletic programs to feed unreasonable union demands.<br /><br />In the end, politicians on the Rochester board -- lacking conviction -- will likely cave to the pressure, pulling more money from the district's rapidly dwindling savings account to subsidize after-school sports.<br /><br />Rochester is the example, but extrapolating these numbers statewide suggest athletic spending might exceed $185 million annually. And sports may be the face of the debate, but other extra-curricular activities such as drama and choir are also at risk.<br /><br />Sadly, no solution is in sight.<br /><br />Rather than deal with economic reality, schools contend this is a "Lansing problem," issuing calls for "stable funding" (more education jargon for a tax increase).<br /><br />A taxpayer bailout of irresponsible school board spenders is not the solution.<br /><br />Schools must acquire the fiscal discipline necessary to get spending in line with reasonable benchmarks set by the private sector, not just in sports, but in all areas of their operation.<br /><br />And boards must develop the communication skills necessary to help us understand why this is the time for shared sacrifice from employee unions, athletic parents, and other special interest groups.<br /><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-48079700238080926502010-05-25T20:43:00.006-05:002010-05-25T21:32:09.446-05:00School Boards to Parents: Talk to the Hand<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The Rochester Community Schools board of education has determined that high school senior class valedictorian and salutatorian honors are no longer fashionable.<br /><br />Moreover, class ranking - a designation which facilitates college admissions and scholarship awards - has also been given the boot by Rochester's school board.<br /><br />Perhaps there's a good reason for their determination to abolish academic<br />ranking districtwide, but none of the current board members has been willing to explain their rationale to this parent. (Despite 2 trips to the podium and two detailed written communications.)<br /><br />The sad fact is that community members who ask questions that challenge the prevailing position of the sitting board are given a stone-faced stare and a "Thank you for your comments" from the assembled dignitaries of Rochester's own "Mt. Rushmore".<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpGHAr0Sqhz5dJnr4_XSepNCd-aFdVrBQ_Nd2oJhX7NXfPBn36G48vQ3k2KXwk9D79KUveEk8UgkNzBnQ6ZexRe94NlQaF7ZV8FctqCWJp-HoTvhlxTMQJLd6BDoGCWjUhSDj-Bu_w1jDu/s1600/435_Mt-Rushmore.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpGHAr0Sqhz5dJnr4_XSepNCd-aFdVrBQ_Nd2oJhX7NXfPBn36G48vQ3k2KXwk9D79KUveEk8UgkNzBnQ6ZexRe94NlQaF7ZV8FctqCWJp-HoTvhlxTMQJLd6BDoGCWjUhSDj-Bu_w1jDu/s400/435_Mt-Rushmore.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5475391573878260690" /></a><br /><br />Mind you, Rochester's "chosen ones" are not unique in this approach. I've attended plenty of board meeting in other districts, and it's the same story.<br /><br />School boards tend to view parents and taxpayers as ATM machines, from which they can make withdrawals at will. Yet they offer nothing in return - certainly not meaningful answers.<br /><br />So long as parents and taxpayers tolerate such dismissive arrogance from<br />public officials, local school boards will continue to practice "school<br />business" as usual.<br /><br /><a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2010/05/trendy-schools-risk-college-scholarship.html">Background on the valedictorian / salutatorian / class ranking issue can be<br />found here</a>.<br /><br />Watch this short 90-second video, then tell me what you believe the<br />Rochester school board is trying to "communicate":<br /><br /><object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/D72N4O9Z-0g&hl=en_US&fs=1&"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/D72N4O9Z-0g&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object><br /><br />School boards claim they want to hear from you.<br /><br />Go ahead.<br /><br />Step right up to the altar and talk to their hand. </span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-40618152544129815822010-05-14T09:37:00.006-05:002010-05-14T16:31:30.532-05:00Trendy Schools Risk College Scholarship Dollars<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><em><span style="color:#ff0000;"><strong>Attention middle school parents: Is your school board making trendy policy changes that could cost Rochester students lost college scholarship opportunities?</strong><br /></span></em><br />There is a good chance that they are.<br /><br />Is there a benefit to the students? Nobody knows.<br /><br />The Rochester Community Schools board is changing the way it honors high-achieving graduates. The proposed changes will improve the recognition system. But ever-conscious of being trendy, the district will also inadvertently take aim at high-achieving students by removing honors and rankings that can undoubtedly help in admissions and scholarships.<br /><br />I have yet to understand why we wouldn’t want to do everything we can to help in the competitive admissions process, and I’m dumbfounded why we would want to put potential scholarship dollars at risk.<br /><br /><br /><strong><span style="font-size:130%;">THE BACKGROUND</span></strong><br /><br />The district currently has no mechanism for weighting grades. As far as GPA is concerned, an “A” in gym or salsa-making is equal in weight to an “A” in AP Calculus. As a result, you’ll have some of the “top scholars” consist of those that really busted their butts with a rigorous schedule, while others “not so much.”<br /><br />So discussions on grade weighting began in 2006. With weighting, the grading scale is expanded; potentially offering extra points to the grades earned in rigorous AP classes. Instead of a 4.0 scale, the tough classes might work on a 4.5 scale. An “A” in AP Calc would be worth 4.5, while an “A” in Diet and Exercise would be worth 4.0. A “B” in AP Calc would be worth 3.5, while a “B” in Diet and Exercise would be worth 3.0. This would reward those students who took the challenging classes, and allow them to stand out. It might also provide an incentive for those who might otherwise shy away from AP classes for fear it would damage their GPA.<br /><br />After several years of committee work, the board was presented with a proposal that looked at a different approach. Instead of adding weight to the grades of tougher classes, they were proposing to lower the grading scale. I wrote about that here in a blog entry entitled, “</span><a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2009/12/come-to-rochester-our-as-are-easier.html"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Come to Rochester, our A’s are easier!</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">”<br /><br /><br /><strong><span style="font-size:130%;">THE SOLUTION</span></strong><br /><br />Fortunately the committee moved away from their “lower the bar” initial proposal. But sadly, they abandoned the whole concept of rewards and incentives for rigorous classes. Ironicially, the "grading committee" did nothing about grades! :-)<br /><br />But they did come back with something pretty good.<br /><br />Rather than the time-honored tradition of summa cum laude, magna cum laude, and cum laude, which is generally based solely on GPA, the district will now implement </span><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">a more expanded set of requirements:<br /><br /><strong>SCHOLARS OF HIGHEST DISTINCTION</strong><br />GPA: 3.9 – 4.0<br />Four AP Courses<br />ACT Composite of 32 or higher<br /><br /><strong>SCHOLARS OF DISTINCTION</strong><br />GPA: 3.8<br />Three AP Courses<br />ACT Composite of 28 or higher<br /><br /><strong>SCHOLARS OF ACHIEVEMENT</strong><br />GPA: 3.5<br />Two AP Courses<br />ACT Composite of 26 or higher<br /><br />It’s got a few warts (like no requirement to take the AP exam), but overall I like this proposal because it will acknowledge those that really applied themselves, and showed measurable success.<br /><br /><br /><strong><span style="font-size:130%;">THE FOOTNOTE</span></strong><br /><br />However, in the process of creating this new proposal, they tossed in a few footnotes. No grade weighting, the elimination of Validictorians, Salutorians, and the elimination of class rank.<br /><br />They did not explain why.<br /><br />At one point while I served on the board there was some talk that class rank (and Val/Sal recognition) served as an excuse for not talking rigorous classes. Kids would not want to risk their GPA or class rank position.<br /><br />This is an unsubstantiated theory. There has not been a meaningful discussion in public on this. And if there were some way to prove it, then one could argue that grade weighting could solve it.<br /><br />I wrote about this a few years back ("</span><a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2007/05/academic-achievement-deserves-more.html"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Academic Achievement Deserves More Recognition, not Less!</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">").<br /><br />To be fair, there are some highly selective, top achieving schools that have eliminated class rank. These are schools where many students are taking rigorous classes, scoring well, only to find themselves barely making the top 25%. That is not the case in Rochester, where less than 40% of the graduates can pass all four ACT College Readiness Benchmarks.<br /><br />On it's website, The College Board states:<br /><br /><em><span style="font-family:times new roman;">According to a March 2006 New York Times article, some college admissions officers disapprove of the trend away from reporting class rank, because, they say, it forces them to "make less informed decisions or overemphasize results on standardized tests."</span><br /><br />They go on to say:<br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Most large state universities, however, still require applicants to report class rank (as do many scholarship programs), and rely on it to help sort through the high volume of applications received.</span><br /></em><br /><br />Eliminating class rank, and vals/sals seems to be a solution in search of a problem.<br /><br /><br /><strong><span style="font-size:130%;">BLOCK THE SCHOLARSHIPS</span></strong><br /><br />By eliminating class rank, and vals/sals, the school board is putting at risk some scholarship money. Scholarships for vals and sals are quite clear in the requirements. No val/sal, no money. And some scholarships specifically incorporate class rank into their formula. No class rank, no money.<br /><br />If we are going ruin the opportunity for some students to earn scholarships, then we must have a good reason, right?<br /><br />I asked that question in a letter to the board. The response: “Thank you. Please provide your home address when corresponding with the board.”<br /><br />So, I waited around for three and half hours at a school board meeting to ask them in person. Check out the robust board discussion in this clip:<br /><br /><object width="500" height="405"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/BkJqe9kS2oc&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&border=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/BkJqe9kS2oc&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0&border=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="500" height="405"></embed></object><br /><br />Is it any wonder people avoid school boards like the plague?<br /><br />I followed-up with yet another letter, and finally received a response. The response did not explain WHY the honors are being eliminated, but does offer a defense that argues our kids will not be negatively impacted because Rochester will join a growing list of high schools that does not report class rank.<br /><br /><br /><strong><span style="font-size:130%;">HALF EMPTY – HALF FULL</span></strong><br /><br />The response was thoughtful, but the arguement was weak. It was quite illustrative of the typical debates that happen all the time in education.<br /><br />For example, one might argue that the trend is moving away from class rankings, and as a result colleges have adjusted their admissions policies to adapt. Therefore, we should follow the trend.<br /><br />The opposing argument would note that over half of the colleges still consider class rank to be considerably or moderately important. Therefore, we should retain class rank to give an extra boost to the high achievers.<br /><br />If you were to ask a college, “Do you value class rank?”, the answer would mostly like be “Yes. It’s helpful”<br /><br />If you ask that same college, “Can you live without it?”, the answer would probably be “Yes. We must, because some schools don’t report.”<br /><br />In the end, if both sides of a debate can site the same reports and sources as support for their argument, then does it even matter?<br /><br />Yes, it does.<br /><br />Schools should be preparing our children to be adults. Competition is part of life. Shielding them from competition is not doing them any good. It spoils them. Pampers them.<br /><br />We’re comfortable ranking them as athletes, but not as scholars? We’re comfortable naming a winner in a race, but not in overall academic achievement? We can line the gym walls with athletic records, but won't honor our scholars in the same manner?<br /><br />Our children are entering a world that is highly competitive. College admissions and scholarship awards are highly competitive. A good class rank, not to mention val/sal designation, is not going to be a deciding factor for a college or a scholarship board. But it would help.<br /><br />We should not be taking away tools that can help.<br /><br />And school boards should welcome discussion about this, not ignore it.<br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-88003893567604484142010-05-07T07:24:00.007-05:002010-05-09T08:01:12.732-05:00Of Bucks and Boards: The MEA extends its tentaclesWitness the power and influence the union can wield during May elections.<br /><br />The MEA's website (<a href="http://www.mea.org/gov/050610_schools_win_at_polls.html">found here</a>) brags about local school election victories -- apparently satisfied the union will reap its rewards during future contract negotiations -- yet ignores the full impact of union interests trumping those of students and taxpayers.<br /><br />The MEA will often funnel money into elections (<a href="http://www.educationactiongroup.org/follow.html">as shown here</a>), but they usually do so quietly. More often they attempt to influence behind the scenes, with the union providing "soft" backing during elections.<br /> <br />The claims they make are nothing short of outrageous. Look at how they connect the dots: Electing pro-union candidates equates to a pro-education mood? Electing pro-union candidates equates to support of "quality of life"? Where was the ballot question on "unstable funding" that voters reportedly recognized?<br /><br />In Warren, they claim to have unseated an incumbent. <a href="http://www.macombcountymi.gov/clerksoffice/ElectionResults/2010/May10/WarrenCon/">Check out the vote results here.</a> 78,042 registered voters. 7,443 bothered to show up. That's 9.53%. Rest assured that a good portion of them are MEA members, family of MEA members, etc.<br /><br />In Durand, the famed epicenter of the "wake-up call... for the working class", had some 800 votes cast. I tried to lookup the vote totals, but I'm not even sure where Durand is located! I found Durand votes in Genesee County (<a href="http://www.co.genesee.mi.us/clerk/images/Election%20results/CurrentElecResults/elecdata/SUMMARY.HTM">found here</a>), where a whopping 7.90% of the registered voters cast ballots.<br /><br />These local board members live in anonymity, yet collectively control one-third of your state budget -- some $13 billion dollars -- as well as billions in local property taxes and billions in federal tax grants.<br /><br />You don't think it's happening in your district? Think again.<br /><br /><br />-------------------------------------<br /><br />Election results: Schools win at the polls<br /><br />Will Lansing get the message?<br /><br />May 6, 2010 - Voters statewide sent a strong message at the polls this week, approving taxes to pay for education and public safety, electing union-backed candidates, and unseating scores of school board incumbents.<br /><br />“It’s about quality of life,” said Jim Ward, a media specialist at Forest Hills Northern High School. “The voters are supportive of activities that they define as quality of life – and that’s public service and public education. This broke the whole ‘cut, cut, cut, don’t talk about taxes’ approach. We need to support essential services.”<br /><br />Hopefully, legislators will get the message: Enough is enough!<br /><br />Voters support their schools – and other vital public services – and recognize that unstable funding hurts students and communities.<br /><br />From St. Joseph to Adrian to Bessemer, voters were in a pro-education mood Tuesday.<br /><br />In Durand, a school custodian whose job was outsourced to a private company in December, won a contested school board election. Paul Mayers, a former union president who now works for the private company, is one of two union-supported candidates who won in Durand.<br /><br />“I hope it’s a wake-up call,” Mayers said. “This is a victory for the working class.”<br /><br />Other election victories included:<br /><ul><br /><li>In Warren, voters unseated incumbents in favor or Sue Jozwik, a job recruiter with MEA support, and Elaine Martin, a retired school secretary.</li><br /><br /><li>The Petoskey News-Review trumpeted election results – the headline was “Big night for millages in Emmet, Charlevoix” – as voters passed several millage proposals in the area.</li><br /><br /><li>Holland voters OK’d $73 million in school bonds to pay for better buildings, computers, and athletic facilities.</li><br /><br /><li>In St. Johns, voters passed a $64.3 million proposal to fund high school improvements, new buses, and technology upgrades. Funding requests were also approved in Stockbridge, Portland, Bath, and Ionia County.</li><br /><br /><li>In Ironwood, two of the three school board races went to candidates recommended by the MEA affiliates there.</li><br /><br /><li>St. Joseph voters approved a $38 million bond issue for renovations, additions, and equipment upgrades including replacing aging computers.</li><br /></ul><br />Despite these positive results, much work remains to secure adequate funding for public education and other necessary services.<br /><br />MEA is part of a coalition – A Better Michigan Future – that advocates a four-point priority plan to help Michigan. If you’d like to learn more about the coalition and its work, go to <a href="http://www.abettermichiganfuture.org/">http://www.abettermichiganfuture.org/</a>.<br /><br />You are also encouraged to take five minutes to contact your legislators and Gov. Jennifer Granholm. Tell them to support efforts to provide adequate, stable and equitable funding for education!<br /><br />And, finally, to learn more about MEA’s “Enough is enough” campaign, a strategic action plan, go to <a href="http://www.mea.org/Enough/index.html">http://www.mea.org/Enough/index.html</a>.<br /><br /><br />April 27, 2010Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-22075816358241980942010-03-11T07:50:00.004-05:002010-03-11T08:26:19.551-05:00End School Board / Union Negotiations<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">It's hard for a conservative like me to believe that government can be the solution, but when it comes to schools, it's even harder to picture it getting any worse.<br /><br />During my five-plus years serving Rochester Schools, the school board did not pass one single budget that was balanced. Every year they approved deficit spending.<br /><br />Of course, there was plenty of hand-wringing, but the facts speak for themselves.<br /><br />Even today, the board is in negotiations with their local teacher's union, and have been for nearly a year. Yet despite losing some $900,000 per month this year -- and projecting a $14 million dollar deficit for next year -- the board continues to plod along with no sense of urgency, passing contract extensions again and again.<br /><br />Rochester is not unique. I know many "rebels" on school boards across the state, and their experiences are nearly identical.<br /><br />The current system fails students and taxpayers alike.<br /><br />Local control is currently "out of control." With local control comes responsibility and accountability. School boards have shown none.<br /><br />I wrote the following editorial proposing a reduction in school board responsibilities, which ran today:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20100311/OPINION01/3110357/1008/opinion01/Let-state-negotiate-teacher-contracts"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Detroit News: Let state negotiate teacher contracts (03/11/10)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />I've pasted below the article in case the link doesn't work.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /></span><br /><br /><span id="fullpost"><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Let state negotiate teacher contracts<br /><br />MIKE RENO<br /><br />Michigan spends more than $13 billion -- roughly one-third of the state budget -- on K-12 education, with an estimated 85 percent going to salaries and benefits.<br /><br />Most of that $11 billion is doled out in piecemeal negotiations between a well-financed and organized Michigan Education Association, the state's largest teachers union, and more than 500 school boards around the state. When school boards square off against the MEA, they are out of their league.<br /><br />Local boards lack financial acumen. I should know; I used to serve on one. At best, they attempt to tweak the nearly identical, outdated contract model governing nearly every district in the state. Even with innovative alternatives, boards lack the resolve or skill to bargain them into practice.<br /><br />This mismatch could be fixed by removing the amateurs and putting state negotiators at the table with the MEA and AFT Michigan to create a single statewide teacher contract.<br /><br />The illusion of "local control" is a fallacy. Union locals get their bargaining script from regional MEA Uniserve directors, who are well-financed, seasoned negotiators with a bargaining vocabulary dominated by "gimme" and "no." School board members are an often-changing group of elected community volunteers.<br /><br />To further taint the process, the teacher union sits on both sides of the bargaining table. It influences local school board elections with a tangled web of state and county political action committees and gets union allies elected. It conducts membership training seminars titled, "Elect your Own Boss."<br /><br />When negotiations stall, mediators and so-called "fact finders" intervene, the result is often the status quo.<br /><br />Even state laws have become meaningless. In 2008, Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Kathleen Macdonald refused to hold striking MEA Wayne-Westland teachers accountable for their illegal actions. Another Wayne County judge let Detroit teachers illegally strike for 11 days before ordering them back to work in 2006. The Detroit school district failed to file a complaint with the state, so the union and rank-and-file members were never fined for their apparent violation of the law.<br /><br />"Local control" is the euphemism that is supposed to make us feel good about this unbalanced contest.<br /><br />The state already sets school funding, retirement plans and tenure laws. They're setting the framework for teacher evaluations. They've tinkered with the school calendar. Why not add labor negotiations?<br /><br />It would be far more productive and honest to pit state negotiators against the MEA. It'd be a complex undertaking, requiring a multi-year, phased-in approach. But it would be more efficient, transparent and more equitable to teachers statewide.<br /><br />Local superintendents and administrators could focus more on education and less on negotiation. More local education dollars could be shifted from negotiators, lawyers and human resources personnel back to the classrooms. Significant savings could be found by consolidating business functions, such as payroll.<br /><br />Perhaps the biggest improvement would come from making the state responsible for establishing affordable commitments to our teachers and then being accountable for funding those promises.<br /><br />The bargaining process needs to change, in part, because educators receive exceptional benefits, including premium health care coverage and a defined-benefit pension plan. A step system contractually guarantees significant annual raises for newer teachers without regard to merit or funding. They receive various stipends, longevity pay and even accrue sick days, which they can cash in at retirement.<br /><br />While there was nothing inherently wrong with offering this level of compensation in the past, these contracts are now unaffordable. Anticipated revenue cannot keep up with the guaranteed cost increases.<br /><br />Health care costs increase 7 percent or more annually. The blended affect of "step system" pay raises increase payroll costs by 4 to 5 percent a year. The generous pension system is funded by a payroll tax on schools, and it just increased from 16.94 percent of payroll to a staggering 19.41 percent.<br /><br />Local school boards don't have what it takes to address a problem of this magnitude. As scary as it sounds, the state may be our best hope for achieving fair and affordable school employee contracts that balance the interests of children, teachers and taxpayers.<br /></span></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com42tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-90156533936273801892009-12-01T08:28:00.008-05:002009-12-02T10:05:05.082-05:00Come to Rochester --- Our A's are Easier!<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Rochester is considering a change in their grading policy for Advanced Placement courses. The idea is to lower the grading scale needed to earn an “A”, with the hope that more students will be more willing to take AP classes.<br /><br />The highly respected Washington Post education reporter Jay Mathews took the Rochester ideas to his national audience:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://voices.washingtonpost.com/class-struggle/2009/11/crushing_a_plot_to_inflate_adv.html"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Washington Post: Should we inflate Advanced Placement grades? (11/27/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />I am quite certain that the idea is proposed with the best of intentions. But I just don't think lowering the bar is the right approach.<br /><br />Be sure to read the comments posted by teachers and students… very insightful.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br />I pasted the article below in case the link doesn't work.<br /></span><br />----------------------------------------------------------------<br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Should we inflate Advanced Placement grades?<br /><br />The Rochester Community public schools in Michigan do a fine job. Their leaders often have great ideas. But according to school board member Mike Reno, they are talking about doing something to their Advanced Placement courses that could be troublesome, even though I once thought it was a good idea. (Some people who know me say that is the very definition of a bad idea.)<br /><br />Here is what Reno revealed in an email to me:<br /><br />"Our district, in an effort to increase AP participation, is proposing to lower the grading scale for AP classes. The idea is based on the notion that kids in Rochester don’t want to take AP classes because they are afraid that the tougher work will lead to a lower grade, and they don’t want to damage their GPA for fear it will harm their college entrance chances. The district’s logic suggests by that lowering the grading scale, students will have a better chance of getting a better grade, and therefore be more willing to take the class.<br /><br />"This is not their brainchild. They claim other districts are doing it. They are calling it internal weighting. They believe this is a better approach than grade weighting, where an A in an AP class would be worth, say, 5.0 instead of 4.0. The district argues that colleges strip off weighted grades, whereas an internal weight benefits the student during college entrance. (I believe grade weighting has value when calculating class ranking, vals, sals, top scholars, etc, but think colleges are free to recalculate anything they’d like). Am a crazy to think this is a bunch of nonsense?"<br /><br />When I first began writing about AP in the 1980s, I saw some sense in AP teachers being somewhat easy on report card grades. You wanted kids to stick with the course. Since they would take an AP exam written and graded by outside experts, they would know eventually how close they were to a college standard. If the student got an A in the course but a 3 (the equivalent of a college C-plus) on the AP exam, that would be a useful wakeup call. I recalled that the AP teacher who inspired me to be an education writer, Jaime Escalante, was livid when another AP teacher gave Fs to a lot of students, leading them to drop the course.<br /><br />But I later realized I had misunderstood what Escalante was doing. He graded his students pretty tough. He wouldn't flunk them because that would be too much of a turn-off, but if they were doing the kind of work that would get them a 3 on the exam, he came them a C, not an A, on their classwork. He understood that they needed to know BEFORE the exam what they were likely to get, so they would be motivated to work harder if they needed to catch up.<br /><br />That is precisely what many AP and International Baccalaureate (the other popular college-level program in U.S. high schools) experts told me when I asked them about the Rochester idea. Roy Sunada, for many years a leading AP teacher and administrator at Marshall Fundamental High School in Pasadena, Calif., said none of his first reactions to undermining AP course grades were printable. "I will stand firm in my belief that artificial measures or grand-sweeping programs are not productive in encouraging students to seek academic rigor," he said.<br /><br />Reno himself had good arguments against the Rochester proposal. "If AP in high school is not the time to introduce the real-life challenges to our youngsters, then when is the right time? Do we allow them to leave our community with high hopes and aspirations--and perhaps a false sense of their skills--only to get crushed in college when they are not prepared?" He also put in a good word for "the kids that really bust their humps and get real A grades and stay on top of the game. Don't they deserve the reward and distinction?"<br /><br />On the other side was Trevor Packer, the College Board vice president </span><span id="fullpost"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">who directs the AP program. He thought the Rochester idea had merit. He called it "another, viable way to weight AP grades in ways that more fairly represent the level of achievement." He and other veteran educators also supported the extra grade point weighting system for AP and IB found in many districts. In Fairfax County, Va., for instance, a student who gets a C in her AP course will see that letter on her report card, but she will get an extra grade point for it, a 3.0 instead of the usual 2.0. That bonus, several teachers say, is important to students who know they are going to struggle in the course.<br /><br />Erin McVadon Albright, the IB coordinator at Annandale High School in Fairfax County, said that was a powerful inducement for one of her most intriguing students. He came from a low-income family that did not even have an Internet connection at home. He wanted to play football, which meant he had to take a government class online over the summer to have time for IB. He was using the computer at the office where his mother was a receptionist, but she was afraid someone would complain. He almost dropped the course until Albright managed to lend him a school laptop which he could take the public library to do his work.<br /><br />Jon Gubera, AP director for the Indiana education department, said "grades are the single most relevant academic currency for students. In my experience, the best way we were able to incent marginal students to take a leap of faith and join an AP course was through providing a weighted grade so as to reassure them that their overall GPAs would not be ruined by earning a C in an AP course."<br /><br />Gubera had little problem with the Rochester idea. It reminded him of what happens on many college campuses--"a 70 percent on a final exam, for example, translates into an A in the course." He also thinks some AP teachers do similar internal weighting on their own, without any guidance from their districts. They will give the student working at the 3 level a representative C in course work leading up to the exam. But when they mark the final report card--weeks after the student has taken the AP exam--they will award extra credit and bump them up to a B.<br /><br />Does that make sense? Grading in American high schools is like cage fighting. There aren't many rules. If there are AP or IB teachers out there with their own special tricks, post a comment here to educate the rest of us.</span><br /><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-44907091895754067432009-11-16T18:04:00.003-05:002009-11-16T18:10:31.703-05:00The MEA is a problem, but your local school board is worse<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Year after year, report after report, Michigan’s education system gets pounded.<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20091116/OPINION01/911160304/1008/opinion01/Editorial--Researchers-from-political-left-and-right-give-Michigan-schools-mediocre-grades"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Detroit News: Researchers from political left and right give Michigan schools mediocre grades (11/16/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />Yet despite this sort of report card, people fail to hold school boards accountable for their failures.<br /><br />This is a great quote from the article: <em>Upon the report's release, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan noted the country's education system is as important an indicator of economic health as the "stock market, the unemployment rate, or the size of the GDP."</em><br /><br />Our schools have smart kids, some great teachers, and wonderful buildings. The state devotes one third of its budget to K-12 education.<br /><br />Yet school boards have allowed expenses to grow in an undisciplined and out-of-control way, they set no meaningful and/or measurable goals, and have no clear or inspiring vision for the future.<br /><br />So, while the editorial is accurate when it points out that the MEA bears some responsibility, I think the lion’s share of blame rests squarely on the shoulders of your local school board.<br /><br />Hold’em accountable!<br /><br />==> Mike.</span><br /><br />----------------------------------------------------<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">November 16, 2009 http://detnews.com/article/20091116/OPINION01/911160304<br /><br /><strong>Editorial: Researchers from political left and right give Michigan schools mediocre grades</strong><br /><br />Michigan's education system is lagging in data collection and accountability, hiring and evaluating teachers and school management, says a new report co-sponsored by researchers on both the nation's left and right, along with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.<br /><br />The "Laggards and Leaders" report, sponsored by the conservative American Enterprise Institute and the liberal Center for American Progress think tanks, reflects the growing realization on both sides of the political aisle of how stagnant and ineffective the U.S. educational system has become.<br /><br />Nationally the report's authors found less than two-thirds of American schools provide access to college-level coursework. Given schools' weak support for rigorous academic preparation, it's no wonder America is lagging behind other industrial countries for college-going and completion.<br /><br />State finance systems are inefficient and undermine innovation, the researchers also found.<br /><br />Other widespread problems include teacher evaluations that are not based on teacher effectiveness. Only four states require evidence of student learning to be a major factor in teacher evaluations.<br /><br />"Without the ability to remove ineffective teachers from the classroom, school leaders cannot build a cohesive school culture, create an environment of accountability, and ensure that all students will learn," the report said.<br /><br />In Michigan, the teachers unions surely have been one of the state's greatest obstacles to recent reforms. The Michigan Education Association has been lobbying fiercely against changes in school data collection and alternative certification pathways for teachers, among other ideas, stalling the state's application to win $600 million in competitive federal Race to the Top funding.<br /><br />The state's higher education system also has been hurting Michigan's Race to the Top chances by resisting the development and use of a long-term data collection system to track Michigan children's growth and progress from pre-kindergarten through college.<br /><br />The report's researchers noticed and gave Michigan a grade "D" for data collection. The state received "C" grades for school management; technology; staff hiring and firing; and removing ineffective teachers.<br /><br />Seventy-five percent of Michigan principals studied said teacher unions or associations are a barrier to the removal of bad teachers, 14 points higher than the national average of 61 percent. Eighty percent of principals also reported tenure is a barrier to removing low-performing educators.<br /><br />Overall Michigan received <span id="fullpost">a mediocre grade. Just two areas, finance and its student pipeline to postsecondary learning, received a "B" grade.<br /><br />Upon the report's release, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan noted the country's education system is as important an indicator of economic health as the "stock market, the unemployment rate, or the size of the GDP."<br /><br />Michigan, failing in economic growth and job creation, must get its schools in order to educate its citizens out of the Great Recession and get them successfully working in the global economy.</span><br /><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-80100267016810823882009-11-08T09:27:00.005-05:002009-11-08T09:56:04.888-05:00Michigan Schools & MEA prefer tax hikes over $600 million in Federal Money.<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Michigan parents are being bombarded with “call your legislator” messages from school boards and superintendents, asking them to pressure the state for more money.<br /><br />Yet for all of the whining about funding, I haven’t seen a single message from any school asking that parents rally behind the federal "Race to the Top" initiative that would allow Michigan schools to potentially receive up to $600 million in federal funds.<br /><br />I haven't seen any "Action Alerts" from the MIchigan Association of School Boards -- the MASB -- suggesting that school boards lobby legislators to advocate for this money.<br /><br />Is it that schools need money, but only want it if there are no strings attached?<br /><br />Here are a few recent articles on the issue:<br /><br /><a href="http://detnews.com/article/20091104/OPINION01/911040316/State-ignores-$600M-for-schools">Detroit News: Embracing promising reforms would leverage federal money to help students (11/4/09)</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009911080310">Detroit News: School sabotage (11/8/09)</a><br /><br />Also note that this is not some new issue. I wrote about his back on August 2, 2009, in a blog entry <a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2009/08/mea-contractual-firewall-blocks.html">found here.</a><br /><br />Here’s an interesting test… next time you see a school board member from your district, ask them if they know ANYTHING about this legislation. My guess is that they can drone on about the need to raise taxes in Michigan, but can't talk with any depth about this Obama/Duncan "Race to the Top" initiative.<br /><br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br /><br />I have posted the articles below, in case the links don't work.</span><br /><br />------------------------------------------<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">State ignores $600M for schools<br /><br />Embracing promising reforms would leverage federal money to help students<br /><br />MICHAEL VAN BEEK<br /><br />Michigan's school funding debate has been cast as a choice between two ideas: Budget cuts or tax hikes. Yet there is a $600 million alternative that has been ignored by key players in the debate.<br /><br />Taxpayers should take note because the failure to explore this option suggests any tax increase for education will be wasted.<br /><br />In the next few months, the U.S. Department of Education will dish out $4.35 billion in "Race to the Top" money to the states. Michigan would be more likely to receive $600 million of this money if it adopted four reforms: Expand the number of charter schools, create a stronger alternative teacher certification program, link student performance data to individual teachers and systematize reform procedures for failing schools.<br /><br />There are good reasons to be skeptical of federal money, which often bureaucratizes the schools and advances a questionable agenda. But such concerns are typically overlooked by the governor and many in the Legislature, who desperately seek a school spending fix. In this case, </span><span id="fullpost"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">the proposed reforms show promise.<br /><br />Consider charter schools. A growing body of evidence indicates that charter schools improve student achievement, and a recent study demonstrates that New York City charter schools have closed achievement gaps at an unprecedented rate.<br /><br />But charter school expansion in Michigan is effectively blocked by a legislative cap on the number of charter schools that can be authorized by state universities, which approve most of the charter schools in Michigan. School employee unions traditionally have fought raising this cap, arguing that there is insufficient evidence that charter schools improve student improvement.<br /><br />As for alternative teacher certification, Michigan law theoretically permits it. But every teacher is still forced to obtain a degree specifically in education -- no other specialty will do.<br /><br />This approach discourages many talented individuals from becoming teachers. Yet research shows teacher quality is key to student performance, and Race to the Top's multiple certification routes would permit accomplished professionals to enter teaching without needing to obtain a new degree.<br /><br />Michigan's student performance measurements, the Michigan Educational Assessment Program and the Michigan Merit Examination are reported school by school. But the results are not linked to teachers to allow teachers' successes to be more easily analyzed. Of course, such an analysis is complex -- many factors go into student achievement -- but the analysis is prohibitively difficult if the raw data is hard to obtain, a point that Race to the Top recognizes.<br /><br />As for the fourth reform, the Legislature is advancing bills to more aggressively reconstitute perennially failing schools. The bill most likely to pass, however, would make it harder to privatize noninstructional services, robbing districts of a major cost-saving tool.<br /><br />So why hasn't Michigan adopted these reforms, especially when the state could land an extra $600 million for schools?<br /><br />The school employee unions view them as threats. They fear more charter schools because the schools are not typically unionized, and reconstituted schools may follow their example. Tracking individual teachers' progress could lead to performance pay and threaten the union's rigid compensation system.<br /><br />Yet such concerns are primarily about union power, not better educational outcomes for kids.<br /><br />If the governor and Legislature refuse to consider constructive change, taxpayers should reject any proposed tax hikes. There's no reason to feed more money into a system that refuses the most moderate reforms.<br /><br />Michael Van Beek is the education policy director of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Midland. E-mail comments to letters@detnews.com">letters@detnews.com.<br /><br />Additional Facts: <br /><br />Among the policies states should adopt for "Race to the Top" grants:<br /><br />Developing and implementing common, high-quality assessments of student performance<br /><br />Using state data to improve instruction<br /><br />Differentiating teacher and principal effectiveness based on performance<br /><br />Increasing the supply of high-quality charter schools<br /><br />Turning around struggling schools<br /><br /><em>Source: U.S. Department of Education</em><br /><br /><br />----------------------------<br /><br /><br /><strong>School sabotage</strong><br /><br />With Michigan schools facing an enormous funding gap, the Michigan Education Association is attempting to sabotage an effort that could bring in more than $600 million in federal education money.<br /><br />State policymakers are working to put together one of the essential pieces of legislation required to win federal "Race to the Top" grant money. President Barack Obama is using the money to give states an incentive to enact long-overdue education reforms.<br /><br />Next month state school Superintendent Mike Flanagan must turn in the application for the competition, now being watched by U.S. foundations for signals about which states are serious about education reform and merit even more funding.<br /><br />But the prospects for Michigan aren't good. The MEA, the state's largest teacher union, is pressuring cowardly lawmakers to block the Race to the Top legislation, which includes provisions making it easier for nonteachers to secure classroom positions, if they have critical skills.<br /><br />This seemingly innocuous change has stirred up intense political fighting, pitting teacher unions against Gov. Jennifer Granholm and others, such as the United Way of Southeastern Michigan, who want the Race to the Top funds for Michigan.<br /><br />Teach for America -- the heralded non-profit that prepares and places highly talented educators in struggling schools -- says it must have an alternative certification pathway for its members to become full-time teachers in Michigan.<br /><br />MEA leaders say they oppose alternative teacher certification because they believe teacher training is essential to properly instruct students.<br /><br />"This is not an union issue," MEA spokesman Doug Pratt says. "This is a fundamental belief ... that teachers who go through a traditional teacher prep process are going to be better for students in the long run."<br /><br />But urban districts are having trouble finding highly qualified math and science teachers, in no small part because of the failure of traditional teacher training programs in the state.<br /><br />That was one of the driving forces behind a Friday announcement by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation that it is investing $16.7 million to establish a new statewide fellowship program to provide 240 teachers for hard-to-staff schools.<br /><br />If the MEA is allowed to sabotage Michigan's Race to the Top effort, it will mean the loss of about $600 million in federal money at a time when every classroom is facing an unprecedented budget cut. Ultimately, that will mean fewer jobs for teachers, hurting the union's own members.<br /><br />It is absolutely essential that Michigan gets this money, and the education reforms that come with it.</span><br /><br /><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com27tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-2652958214481415852009-10-28T07:19:00.007-05:002009-10-28T08:08:22.725-05:00Why do we ignore school spending?<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Everyone seems to have an opinion on government spending at the federal, state, county, and even city level. I don't understand why parents will get involved in the school FUNDING debate, but ignore school SPENDING.<br /><br />Michigan's Governor just announced a shortfall in tax revenue, and the subsequent reduction in school funding. The predictable outcry from schools drove me to write this article:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20091027/OPINION01/910270316/1008/opinion01/Schools-often-don-t-budget-wisely">Detroit News – Schools often don’t budget wisely – (10/27/09)</a><br /><br />It ran the day after Governor Granholm used the Rochester Schools Administration Center for one of the stops on her PR Tour to raise taxes in Michigan. I was told that the by-invitation-only event included superintendents, board presidents, union presidents, and PTA presidents. You really couldn’t tell for sure because most of them snuck in the back door of the building.<br /><br />Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop and House Representative Tom McMillen were also invited. They walked in the front door.<br /><br />You can imagine the conversations that took place… all designed to pressure Bishop and McMillen to raise taxes. Schools pleading poverty, claiming that they have already cut everything that could be cut, threatening that further cuts to schools will directly impact the classroom.<br /><br />That was Monday afternoon.<br /><br />Monday evening, Rochester had a school board meeting.<br /><br />There was not any mention of the Governor’s visit, nor did the board discuss the additional $1.9 million reduction in state funding that had been announced since the last board meeting.<br /><br />What the board did do was approve a $45,000 expenditure for wireless microphones “to be used throughout the district in the three auditoriums for events such as Plays, Musicals and Summer Music Theater.”<br /><br />I’m a “theatre parent”, and agree that wireless microphones certainly enhance the performance. I’d be happy to personally contribute to a fundraising event designed to fund the purchase of these sorts of theatre enhancements.<br /><br />But I don’t think this purchase can be considered a critical and necessary district expenditure after the board approved a deficit budget of $2.5 million. It seem especially excessive after the additional state funding reductions, which will presumably push the deficit to $5 million.<br /><br />It was approved on a 6-1 vote.<br /><br />Its one small example that shows how school boards are oblivious to the situation they’re in.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br /><br /><br />I’ve based the article below in case the link doesn’t work.</span><br /><br />------------------------------------------------------------<br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Schools often don't budget wisely<br /><br />MIKE RENO<br /><br />When Gov. Jennifer Granholm cut $54 million in "hold harmless" education funds, some critics suggested she did so for political reasons. Michigan Republicans should have accepted at face value that Granholm was following the GOP lead in trying to balance the budget without tax increases. But they didn't.<br /><br />And schools are playing on that fact by turning up the heat and hyperbolically suggesting the government is cherry-picking whom they want to punish. Superintendents are bemoaning the cuts, using taxpayer resources to lobby parents and direct them to flood legislator phone lines and e-mail boxes with demands that education remain a priority.<br /><br />No superintendent has acknowledged the fact that the state does value education and already spends one third of its budget -- about $16 billion -- on K-12 education.<br /><br />The missing counterbalance to this outcry is spending oversight. There is an assumption that schools spend prudently, and their budgets can't absorb cuts. Just ask them, and they'll quickly offer meaningless sound bites like "We've already cut muscle, and are now cutting into the bone."<br /><br />Somehow school boards get a free ride on spending accountability. Where is the critical eye on local school spending? School board meetings are sparsely attended with a handful of regulars in the audience and few from the media. School budgets are published in a way that even seasoned certified public accountants can't scrutinize.<br /><br />Yet many parents jump -- without question -- when schools issue a call to action. Schools shamelessly threaten that our child's future will be harmed if we as parents don't jump.<br /><br />This reflexive parental response is perplexing given that <span id="fullpost">whenever the specific warts in a school budget are revealed, taxpayers are appalled. Gold-plated insurance benefits and a generous pension plan are among the best known. Superintendents make more than the governor. School boards approve multiyear contracts with guaranteed increases despite knowing future revenue is at risk. It's irresponsible, yet nobody holds school boards accountable.<br /><br />Even school claims that "we've already cut" go unexamined. They will typically call a reduced spending increase "a cut." And when true cuts are made, they are typically made to preserve other poorly managed programs or contracts.<br /><br />In the most recent round of state reductions, the per-pupil funding is decreased $165 per pupil. Schools are upset because it's coming mid-year after budgets have been established.<br /><br />This is a bogus argument.<br /><br />Schools have known for a year or more of the state's distressed financial condition. Groups like the Michigan School Business Officials monitor state revenues and provide guidance. In January, the School Business Officials group predicted cuts in the range of $100 to $150 per pupil. In Rochester, the school board chose to budget for a revenue cut of $110 per pupil.<br /><br />Any school board that did not budget some sort of cut has no excuse for not doing so.<br /><br />The $54 million line-item veto by Granholm is a different story. But even though it came as a surprise, it still merits examination.<br /><br />The so-called 20j or affluent districts levy additional taxes on their residents and receive a $54 million supplemental payment from the state because they were spending more per-pupil in 1994 than the then-new Proposal A formula allowed. It's this supplement that was vetoed.<br /><br />It's certainly a painful cut, but will it be fatal? Nearly $20 million of the cuts will come from Oakland County districts. Collectively, the 12 districts affected are sitting on nearly $140 million in "rainy day funds."<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8lE_XiYKi_dQOO2UGgWgtRxBboILQNBCzfe2eoRnsYe7tZstKNN8gByKcr1Dpn1Dx7zXYHlD3ug1QFWKu-pW-_yKlqAe1GD6IBznQhu3z4uF6WCfmx3_xv60pXeRC30S3M4rvPr86PnSZ/s1600-h/AffluentDistrictChart.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5397625530385445282" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 400px; CURSOR: hand; HEIGHT: 227px; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8lE_XiYKi_dQOO2UGgWgtRxBboILQNBCzfe2eoRnsYe7tZstKNN8gByKcr1Dpn1Dx7zXYHlD3ug1QFWKu-pW-_yKlqAe1GD6IBznQhu3z4uF6WCfmx3_xv60pXeRC30S3M4rvPr86PnSZ/s400/AffluentDistrictChart.jpg" border="0" /></a><br />The question of whether it's fair for them to shoulder another $20 million in cuts is as subjective as the question of whether it's fair that they've continued to receive an extra $20 million for 10 years.<br /><br />There is no clear right or wrong answer. But it's reasonable to ask -- especially in tough economic times -- whether affluent districts could bring spending more in line with other successful districts. At a minimum, taxpayers should be entitled to understand specifically what would be lost should the cuts be made.<br /><br />But if few are questioning anything, schools are free to continue with business as usual, using our children as funding shields, accountable to no one.<br /><br /></span></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-55679520051683034782009-10-27T06:56:00.004-05:002009-10-27T07:07:37.573-05:00Do school officials reside in charmed neighborhoods?<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Check out this Sunday column by Brian Dickerson:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.freep.com/article/20091025/COL04/910250434/1322/Schools-finally-know-where-they-stand--At-ground-zero"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Detroit Free Press: Schools finally know where they stand: At ground zero (10/25/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />I started reading it, thinking it was just another “schools need more money” rant.<br /><br />But this well-written piece baited me… lured me in… and then WHAM:<br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;"><em>Still, you have to wonder where some of the public educators expressing shock at last week's developments spent their summer. Have they really been living in the same state as the rest of us?<br /><br />Do school officials reside in charmed neighborhoods where jobs have begun to reappear, foreclosures are on the wane, and home prices are picking up? Are their neighbors getting pay raises, replacing large kitchen appliances and eating out more?</em><br /><br /></span>Oh, how I wish the Michigan Association of School Boards – the MASB – would switch to using this sort of material as part of their training program.<br /><br />It takes a twist to the left towards the end, but that's OK because it tempts readers to think about the reality of the situation, and ponder outcomes.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br /><br />I've posted the text of the article below, in case the link doesn't work.<br /><br /></span><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">October 25, 2009<br />Schools finally know where they stand: At ground zero<br /><br />BY BRIAN DICKERSON<br />FREE PRESS COLUMNIST<br /><br />Superintendents of Michigan's richest school districts are apoplectic -- and who can blame them?<br /><br />Just a week ago, their districts were the closest thing our battered state had to sacred cows; now they've been tossed into the meat grinder with everyone else.<br /><br />What happened? Haven't voters identified K-12 education as a top priority in every public opinion poll since the beginning of time? Hasn't there been a bipartisan understanding that, in the event of a biblical flood that covered the Capitol dome, the school aid budget would be the one thing lawmakers snatched up before fleeing for higher ground?<br /><br />School superintendents aren't stupid, you understand. They knew a real flood </span><span id="fullpost"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">was coming, and they say they were prepared for, or at least resigned to, the $165-per-pupil hit that everyone had decided was their fair share of Lansing's end times slash-a-thon.<br /><br />But then $165 per pupil became $292. And for the wealthiest districts -- the ones that weren't already advertising for emergency financial managers and holding bake sales to pay for their music teachers -- that was just the beginning.<br /><br />Suddenly, out of nowhere, the governor who's been the darling of public educators for seven years was coming at them with a flamethrower, vetoing the money the richest school districts had long relied on to keep themselves at the head of the pack.<br /><br />School leaders say they knew that Granholm was frustrated with Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop, and with his Republican Senate's refusal to consider any revenue adjustment that might be construed as a tax increase. But why was she suddenly taking it out on them?<br /><br />And why was the governor insisting the state couldn't afford the per-pupil expenditures legislators had approved, when the school aid budget on her desk reflected revenue estimates that the state's most trusted bean counters had made just last May?<br /><br /><strong>A parallel state?</strong><br /><br />It's easy, as I said, to understand the top-tier superintendents' dismay. Here they are, nearly four months into the fiscal year, and just learning that millions of dollars they've already committed to spend won't be materializing. It's like planning Thanksgiving dinner for 20 people and learning, as you're preheating the oven, that there's no turkey or stuffing available.<br /><br />Still, you have to wonder where some of the public educators expressing shock at last week's developments spent their summer. Have they really been living in the same state as the rest of us?<br /><br />Do school officials reside in charmed neighborhoods where jobs have begun to reappear, foreclosures are on the wane, and home prices are picking up? Are their neighbors getting pay raises, replacing large kitchen appliances and eating out more?<br />And if none of these things is true, as I suspect, why is anyone the least bit surprised that the tax revenues Michigan relies on to support its schools have continued to plummet since May, or that they are likely to keep falling?<br /><br /><strong>A sense of where they've been</strong><br /><br />For the record, I don't imagine for a minute that public school administrators are any more impervious to economic reality than the rest of us. Even the most affluent school districts have witnessed dwindling enrollments, increased demand for free or subsidized lunches, and burgeoning mental health problems. No one has to tell educators theirs is a state in crisis.<br /><br />Still, many educators have remained certain that, especially in communities that have historically prided themselves on superior schools, tradition would somehow trump economic reality.<br /><br />Suburban legislators might look the other way while poor people lost medical care or nursing homes were shuttered, and they might express sympathy for college students who lost tuition grants they'd been promised, even if most young people were too busy to vote.<br /><br />But surely suburbanites would not sit still for massive cuts to their own children's' educational resources. Surely, if forced to choose between funding primary schools and keeping chewing tobacco or bottled water a few pennies cheaper, even the most tax-averse Republicans would choose pragmatism over ideological purity -- wouldn't they?<br /><br />We'll know soon enough.<br /><br />In the meantime, Michigan's richest school districts have belatedly achieved what airline pilots call "situational awareness."<br /><br />Now teachers and school superintendants know what nursing home operators and police dispatchers do: In Michigan, we are all living at ground zero.<br /><br />Contact BRIAN DICKERSON: 313-222-6584 or bdickerson@freepress.com</span><br /><br /><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-56261637548037067832009-09-23T11:06:00.004-05:002009-09-23T11:29:23.226-05:00Make student performance -- not teacher protectionism -- the top priority<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Amber Arellano is an insightful education columnist for the Detroit News. It's purely conincidental that I'm writing two consecutive posts about her work; this post is actually about a rebuttal written to one of her articles.<br /><br />She wrote a great article in early September:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20090908/OPINION03/909080302/1399/OPINION0311"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Detroit News: Unionism needs to get rid of the stupid and get more the smart (09/08/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />Arellano writes about ongoing teacher contract negotiations between Robert Bobb (the State Appointed Emergency Financial Manager assigned to sort out the Detroit Public Schools mess) and the Detroit Federation of Teachers (a unit of the AFT – American Federation of Teachers).<br /><br />Arellano begins by discussing why she believe unions have been – and remain – an important element, and stresses the premise that “together we are stronger than we are individually”.<br /><br />She then goes on to say, <em>“The Bobb administration must get a contract that makes student performance -- not teacher protectionism -- its top priority. Bobb's team needs flexibility to staff classrooms with the best educators available. Poor children who have already fallen behind in school need better or just as good teachers as Birmingham and Ann Arbor have yet so often, research shows, they get the worst.<br /><br />Can anyone, really, defend that morally unacceptable status quo?”</em><br /><br />Keith Johnson, President of the Detroit Federation of Teachers, can and does.<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20090922/OPINION01/909220309/1008/OPINION01/Rebuttal--Don-t-eliminate-teacher-seniority"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Detroit News: Rebuttal: Don't eliminate teacher seniority (09/22/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />I wanted to include this exchange because it shows the tremendous challenges facing anyone who attempts improve schools. I don’t share Arellano’s perspective on unions and their role, but I absolutely believe her piece was respectful and professional, and it covered a topic that merits reasonable discussion.<br /><br />A defensive and bitter Keith Johnson stands in stark contrast.<br /><br />If he is comfortable launching such a virulent public response towards someone offering an opinion, can you imagine what it must be like at negotiating sessions?<br /><br />In his response, Johnson takes aim at the Arellano, jumping from point to point, sniping, without offering a rebuttal of the issues.<br /><br />He appears to acknowledge that <em>“poor proficiency of our students on standardized tests, the exaggerated dropout rate, the less-than-stellar graduation rate and other factors that plague Detroit schools”</em> is a problem. Yet it’s a problem he attributes entirely to parents and the students themselves, with the schools sharing none of the blame.<br /><br />He is disturbed by the comment, <em>“Poor children who have already fallen behind in school need better or just as good teachers as Birmingham and Ann Arbor have yet so often, research shows, they get the worst.”</em><br /><br />Yet Johnson doesn’t question the research on which Arellano based her comment. He doesn’t cite statistics – or any information for that matter – which refutes her statements.<br /><br />Regarding teacher quality, he doesn’t even offer the traditional, dismissive brush-off that “there might be a few bad apples”.<br /><br />And therein lies the problem. I’ve heard the arguments supporting seniority and tenure plenty of times, and they’re generally based on the premise that every teacher is equally great, and every administrator/principal is an idiot.<br /><br />None are better teachers than others, and certainly none are worse.<br /><br />Union supporters argue that they too believe bad teachers should be dismissed, but if they aren’t, then it’s the lazy principal’s fault. Perhaps.<br /><br />But in their effort to ensure “due process”, union contracts and tenure laws go too far. Don’t believe me? </span><a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2008/07/timely-example-of-tenure-absurdity.html"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Check out the blog post I made last year </span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">about a teacher that gave students test answers – BEFORE THE TEST – and the subsequent hoops that district had to jump through, in order to remove the teacher from the classroom.<br /><br />Arellano was not trying to attack teachers in any way whatsoever. Her point is that Detroit – like every school district for that matter – requires greater flexibility in order to assign, hire, and yes even dismiss teachers based on proven skills, in order to best meet children’s instructional needs.<br /><br />Sadly, this is a non-starter for teacher unions, who believe that the number of times a teacher has punched the time clock </span><span id="fullpost"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">is a better criterion for classroom assignments, and is a perfectly acceptable measurement of quality.<br /><br />Johnson adds that seniority is necessary because teachers need protection from racist principals who cannot make competent decisions, nor tolerate reasonable and constructive criticism.<br /><br />Even playing the race-card doesn’t bolster his arguments. Johnson fails to consider the likelihood that Arrellano would probably agree that incompetent, egomaniacal, racist principals should also be weeded-out.<br /><br />Johnson could’ve used this opportunity to make a stronger point about the need to make parents a partner in education. He could’ve found a better way to support the notion that principals must also be held accountable. But by completely dodging the discussion about teacher quality, he shows that he is part of the problem, not part of the solution.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br />I've pasted the articles below, in case the links don't work.</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Unionism needs to get rid of the stupid and get more of the smart<br /><br />AMBER ARELLANO<br /><br />I grew up in an union town where good people understood that they were stronger together than they were as individuals when it came to affecting change in the American political arena and elsewhere.<br /><br />The United Auto Workers gave many in my family, mostly first-generation Mexican-Americans who worked in Pontiac's auto plants, a stake in America, a sense of belonging and a movement through which their aspirations and experiences could be struggled for and heard as a collective voice in Washington, D.C., and elsewhere.<br /><br />Those roots, of which I am proud, make me incredibly grateful for unionism and the progress it's made for so many Americans.<br /><br />But I cannot take any more stupid unionism.<br /><br />When I say stupid, I mean unionism led by fear and selfish interests living in the past.<br /><br />This fall some of Michigan's most powerful unionists have the opportunity to stop practicing stupid unionism.<br /><br />I refer to the Detroit Federation of Teachers union, which is in heated negotiations with the Detroit Public Schools' Emergency Financial Manager Robert Bobb over the future of thousands of underserved Detroit students.<br /><br />Detroit children are some of the poorest, most vulnerable children in North America. It is gut-wrenching to watch as the school district squanders their lives by providing them substandard schools.<br /><br />To be sure, teachers are not the heart of this district's problems. Just take a look at the dysfunctional school board and its predatory practices, and that is clear.<br /><br />However, the teachers are the heart of the district's way forward. Teacher quality is the No. 1 predictor of student achievement. Southeastern Michigan's future is partly tied to Detroit's educational success -- and teachers will lead it or take us down with them and their failing district.<br /><br />That's why no one should underestimate this teacher contract's importance. The Bobb administration must get a contract that makes student performance -- not teacher protectionism -- its top priority.<br /><br />Bobb's team needs flexibility to staff classrooms with the best educators available. Poor children who have already fallen behind in school need better or just as good teachers as Birmingham and Ann Arbor have yet so often, research shows, they get the worst.<br /><br />Can anyone, really, defend that morally unacceptable status quo?<br /><br />Smart unionism<br /><br />Now some will defend all unions. More will attack unions, arguing that the U.S. should kill them off.<br /><br />An America without unions is a scary idea. Just ask anyone whose company is hemorrhaging jobs and whose child is sick and needs health care. The only reason why many Americans still have things such as health insurance, eight-hour work days and unemployment is because of unions. And globalization challenges us to consider these issues anew.<br /><br />Consider a new report, released appropriately on Labor Day, by the Michigan League for Human Services. It found that one in every five Michigan jobs do not pay enough to keep a family of four out of poverty -- about $22,000 a year.<br /><br />Four of the six occupations with the most jobs fall into that category. Those are retail sales, cashiers, waiters and waitresses, and fast food or food prep workers.<br /><br />"We know that many of these jobs are held by breadwinners -- not just students or teen-agers. A parent working full-time, year-round should be able to meet basic needs, but these very common jobs do not allow that," said Sharon Parks, the league's president and CEO.<br /><br />The standard argument -- with which I agree -- is that in a new era of globalization, such lower-wage service workers have to retrain and retool for higher-skilled jobs.<br /><br />There is another, darker side to the globalization story, however: The U.S. isn't creating enough good jobs to replace its faltering middle class. And many of the jobs we do create have lousy wages.<br /><br />For that reason, we need a smart unionism that will help our country enact public policies that rebuild the middle class and people who want to be in it -- and kill off the old unionism that is dragging down so many good workers and school children with it.<br /><br />Amber Arellano is a Detroit News editorial writer who writes a weekly online column. Contact her at aarellano@detnews.com">aarellano@detnews.com<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Rebuttal: Don't eliminate teacher seniority<br /><br /><br />Just as sure as schoolchildren return to class the day after Labor Day, The Detroit News can be counted on to launch an unwarranted attack upon Detroit's teachers and their union, the Detroit Federation of Teachers. In her Sept. 8 column ("Unionism needs to get rid of the stupid and get more of the smart"), Amber Arellano wrote that "Detroit's children should get the best teachers like Ann Arbor and Birmingham, yet research shows they get the worst."<br /><br />It is fashionable to attack the ability and competency of teachers in Detroit because of the poor proficiency of our students on standardized tests, the exaggerated dropout rate, the less-than-stellar graduation rate and other factors that plague Detroit schools.<br /><br />However, it seems to be taboo to hold students responsible for coming to school and parents accountable for getting them there. Why don't people like Arellano speak out against the violence rendered by students against their peers and their teachers? Why isn't there an outcry about the high level of student transiency and truancy and their adverse effect upon student achievement?<br /><br />Instead, Arellano calls Detroit's teachers the worst and criticizes the DFT for protecting the rights (not the jobs) of teachers. She attacks the DFT for protecting the seniority rights of teachers, not knowing or caring why seniority is such a sensitive issue.<br /><br />Perhaps she is not aware that if seniority were eliminated, some teachers would be released because they have the audacity to stand up for children and themselves. They will criticize a principal who does not support the staff on matters of discipline, who plays favorites and misuses valuable district funds, or is never in the building.<br /><br />Teachers who serve as building representatives or who are active with the union are often vilified by administrators as being obstructionists because they won't do a principal's bidding and be subservient.<br /><br />Without seniority protection, some teachers would be eliminated, not because they are not doing the job, but because they are white. Yes, in 2009 we have some black administrators who do not believe white teachers should teach black children. Imagine the uproar if a white principal in Howell didn't believe white students should be taught by black teachers.<br /><br />For Arellano's information, 87 percent of Detroit's teachers have a master's degree or above. Seventy-two percent (more than any other district in the state) have national board certification, and the vast majority of our teachers do more with less and make endless sacrifices on behalf of their students.<br /><br />The DFT has made a commitment to embrace and implement innovative reform initiatives to drive student achievement. We will not, however, lie down and die so our members can be run over and run out.<br /><br />Keith Johnson ,<br />President, Detroit Federation of Teachers </span><br /><br /><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-32204611926650423392009-09-13T08:38:00.004-05:002009-09-13T08:52:22.413-05:00The Myths of a Stubborn Culture are Debunked<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Amber Arellano writes a insightful article about the stubbornness of Michigan’s entrenched educational bureaucrats, and the change-resistant culture that permeates Michigan’s K-12 education<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20090910/OPINION03/909100342/1399/OPINION0311"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Detroit News: Myths undercut efforts to boost Michigan's high school standards (09/10/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />It goes on everywhere. I see it in Rochester.<br /><br />For example, I know that the Rochester Board of Education shows no interest in understanding how many of it’s graduates must take remedial courses – at their own expense – in college, despite the fact that the district receives matriculation reports from some colleges. Individually, I’ve seen the reports that Michigan State University provides to each high school, and have suggested that the board review them, to no avail. This data is notably absent from the district’s so-called strategic plan.<br /><br />The district could also do more to allow advance the concept of allowing more academically rigorous Personal Curriculums, yet submissively yields to needlessly restrictive interpretations, such as expecting kids to investigate summer school before they allow a modification. Rather that challenge the status quo, the board fell right in line.<br /><br />I could go on, but I don’t want to distract from Amber’s excellent article.<br /><br />All of this points to the fundamental flaw in the culture of Michigan educators, which is the myth that our children are simply not up to the challenge.<br /><br />And it leads to perhaps a fifth myth, which is that there is nothing parents can do to take on the system. <a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2009/06/academically-waterboarding-middle.html">I wrote about </a>Rochester parents who last year stood up to the culture of mediocrity and low-expectations by protesting the decision to “round down” students in the advanced math track in middle school. It was a small victory for a small number of children, but it shows that there is hope.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br /><br />I’ve pasted below the article in case the link does not work.<br /></span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">September 10, 2009<br /><br />Myths undercut efforts to boost Michigan's high school standards<br /><br />AMBER ARELLANO<br /><br />This fall at Michigan's colleges, thousands of students are arriving with great expectations -- only to find themselves relegated to paying for high school courses without even receiving college credit. Those courses are called remedial classes, which students have to take because they were so poorly prepared in their K-12 schools.<br /><br />At Michigan State University, the proportion of incoming freshmen who need remedial classes jumped to 28 percent today from 25 percent last year. At Delta College north of Saginaw, 81 percent of incoming students need remedial classes. That number has grown 3 percent in recent years.<br /><br />The growth is a sign, some experts say, that Michigan school districts are not taking seriously the implementation of the new high school curriculum that state leaders adopted in 2006 to better prepare students to succeed in the knowledge economy. And it comes as Gov. Jennifer Granholm and state lawmakers fight over whether the tougher curriculum standards should be lowered to accommodate vocational education students and others.<br /><br />With so much rhetoric, it can be difficult to figure out what is based on proven research and experience, and what isn't. Here are some common myths -- and the real story behind them -- about the high school curriculum.<br /><br />MYTH No. 1: Only Michigan's lowest-performing school districts, such as Detroit and Pontiac, need to upgrade their high school courses.<br /><br />FACT: Well-to-do and middle-class districts are under-preparing their children, too.<br /><br />Take Rockford, the upscale suburban city outside of Grand Rapids</span><span id="fullpost"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">, where most families send their children to four-year universities. What most parents in Rockford don't know: The district's latest state test scores show only 24 percent of its kids are college-ready in all subjects based on ACT indicators, which colleges use for admissions.<br /><br />That suggests most of those students will have to take remedial classes, a predictor of college failure. A majority of students who need remedial classes do not earn either a bachelor's or an associate's degree, according to Education Policy Center experts at Michigan State University.<br /><br />Mike Flanagan, state superintendent for schools, saw the same problem when he was in charge of Farmington Schools, a well-heeled suburban Oakland County district.<br /><br />"People thought our students were doing so well because we sent 90 percent to college," Flanagan says.<br /><br />Then he learned about half of those graduated from college. The knowledge spurred the district to make major changes.<br /><br />"If you're sending students to college needing remedial classes, it means you're setting them up for failure not only in college but in the workplace," Flanagan says.<br /><br />MYTH No. 2: All students have to take the same classes, including Algebra II and other high-level math and science classes, no matter what.<br /><br />FACT: Vocational teachers and the Michigan Education Association union often call the curriculum a "one size fits all" approach. But state law does not require all students take the same specific courses. Rather, high school credits can be packaged into any course. The law allows flexibility for students who focus on the arts or, say, a trade.<br /><br />Many parents don't know they can request a personal curriculum in which courses are specially designed for their teens.<br /><br />Why does this seem to be a secret? Many schools and districts have dragged their feet on implementing the curriculum. Many schools also do not publicize these options.<br /><br />MYTH No. 3: Michigan's dropout rate will go up under the new curriculum.<br /><br />FACT: There's no evidence of that. The opposite has been found true in some states.<br /><br />Arkansas, Arizona, Maryland and Massachusetts are among 25 states that now require Algebra II or equivalent skills learned to graduate, as Michigan does. None of their dropout rates has risen.<br /><br />That fear arose in Michigan after Derrick Fries, an Eastern Michigan University assistant education professor, told reporters that he anticipated a rise in the dropout rate. However, more academic rigor has been found to raise graduation rates, according to the Education Trust and other researchers.<br /><br />How could that be? Because boredom is one of the leading causes of dropping out. By making school more challenging, many students stay longer.<br /><br />MYTH No. 4: Michigan's high school curriculum is one of the nation's toughest.<br /><br />FACT: Other states are leading in school standards and quality. Indiana, Ohio, Maryland, Virginia and Massachusetts are just some of the states that have higher standards and more demanding high school curriculums than Michigan.<br /><br />Indiana requires students take chemistry, physics and trigonometry, and more writing and foreign language than Michigan students do.<br /><br />In Ohio, high-schoolers have to pass a competency test to graduate.<br /><br />"There would be many high school students in Michigan who could not pass it," says Sharif Shakrani, co-director of Michigan State University's Education Policy Center.<br /><br />In Maryland, the new high school standards are far tougher than Michigan's. They are modeled after the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the only nationally representative test that compares American students with one another by state.<br /><br />The Obama administration is calling on states to adopt a common core of standards to make sure the United States better competes in the global economy. It is pushing states to ramp up their schools' curriculums to be modeled after the NAEP.<br /><br />Already the Detroit Public Schools' new leadership team is adopting a curriculum modeled after the NAEP.<br /><br />Barbara Byrd-Bennett, its academic chief and a respected national educational leader, says those who think Michigan's state curriculum is too tough are fooling themselves and shortchanging students.<br /><br />Look at Michigan students' test scores for proof. Only about 30 percent of students are considered proficient under NAEP.<br /><br />MYTH No. 5: The curriculum was designed for college-bound students -- not kids who aim to go into a trade or directly to the workplace.<br /><br />FACT: Young people who attend community colleges, technical schools and other universities are actually more likely to be underprepared to succeed in life -- and need higher-skilled classes to make sure they do.<br /><br />"A lot of people think if your kid is not going to the University of Michigan or Michigan State, then there are no negative consequences for not taking higher-level math and science classes," says Jim Ballard, executive director of the Michigan Association of Secondary School Principals.<br /><br />"This fight about the curriculum is about the students who go to Delta, to Grand Valley, to community colleges," Ballard adds. "They are the ones who need remedial courses, who are dropping out, who are not finding good jobs."<br /><br />Even students going directly to entry-level jobs or entering technical schools need higher-level thinking and math skills, researchers have found across the country.<br /><br />The more math Americans learn, research shows, the more money they earn. Students who take challenging high school courses, especially in math and science, will earn $1 million more than students who do not.<br /><br />Algebra II, in particular, is a predictor of success in college and in getting a good job in the knowledge economy -- more than race, socioeconomic status or family income.<br /><br />The Wacker Chemical plant in Adrian is a case in point. Factory leaders found local high school graduates woefully lacking skills to work there a few years ago. They teamed up with school leaders to change that.<br /><br />"My question to the legislators who want to undermine the math requirements in the state curriculum is: 'What kind of jobs do you want in Michigan? Do you want your children to get good jobs or any job at all? Look at Ohio and see what they're doing,' " MSU's Shakrani says.<br /><br />"Because that's who we're competing with: Ohio and Indiana. And they are out-competing us in school preparation."<br /><br />E-mail Amber Arellano at aarellano@detnews.com">aarellano@detnews.com or send letters to the editor to letters@detnews.com">letters@detnews.com or mail to Letters, Editorial Page, The Detroit News, 615 W. Lafayette, Detroit, MI 48226.<br /></span><br /><br />Additional Facts<br />Importance of education<br />Why Michigan's high school curriculum standards are considered critical:<br /><br /><br />Nine of 10 jobs will require education beyond high school, according to the Michigan Department of Education.<br /><br />An estimated 80,000 jobs go unfilled in Michigan and an additional 30,940 jobs could go unfilled in the near future, according to a 2007 EPIC/MRA future business study. This indicates Michigan's high rate of unemployment has more to do with a lack of necessary education and training among residents than a lack of employment opportunities.<br /><br />The state Department of Education finds that 84 percent of those who hold highly paid professional jobs had taken Algebra II or higher as their last high school math course.<br /><br />The more math you learn, the more money you earn. Students who take challenging high school courses, especially in math and science, will earn more than $1 million more than students receiving a general education, according to the Michigan Department of Education.<br /><br />Studies indicate there is a strong correlation between increases in average test scores and national economic growth. In country after country, a boost in test performance was linked to a distinct rise in annual per capita gross domestic product growth, according to the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education.<br /><br />A study by the Michigan League for Human Services and the Economic Policy Institute forecasts a decline in U.S. per-capita personal income if America doesn't educate "all of our students well."</span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-68437898047313645122009-09-06T08:23:00.011-05:002009-09-07T19:45:23.602-05:00Obama's Back-to-School Speech... Government Required Viewing?<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The Rochester Community Schools district decided not to run President Obama's back-to-school "live", but will instead run it during the high school lunches the next day.<br /><br />The decision aims to minimize school distruption, and was driven out of respect for parental choice. It was not made based on the anticipated content of the speech, nor was it made on the questionable study guides issued by the White House.<br /><br />Now that the decision has been made, it should not cause a round of “high-fives” for conservatives, nor should it drive indignant and angry name-calling by liberals. Both camps, quite frankly, need to put ideology aside and try to think of what’s best for children.<br /><br />And while some argue that the positive message planned for the speech will be lost… that’s simply not true. The address will be widely available, and can still be discussed, even if it’s not viewed “live”. Actually, the fact that it’s not being aired “live” can serve as a teachable moment too, driving discussions about parental rights, civil discourse, protest, and government intervention.<br /><br />I fully intend to watch it with my children, and encourage other parents to do so as well. But I cannot support the notion that children should be forced to watch it.<br /><br /><br />BACKGROUND<br /><br />The school board was informed of the district’s decision and the underlying rationale. A significant number of parents had expressed concern… enough that showing the address would could potentially disrupt the first day of school. Because it was the first day, there was no effective way to create an “opt-in” or “opt-out” process.<br /><br />The district had been put in the unenviable position of either disappointing parents by showing it, or disappointing parents by not showing it.<br /><br />The district – ultimately believing that respect for parental choice trumps everything else – crafted a compromise. The president's address will not interrupt the first day of school, but will be recorded and shown during high school lunch the following day for those students who would like to watch it. And, a link to the address will be posted on the district website.<br /><br />This reasonable compromise does not mandate that children watch the broadcast, yet it provides an option for doing so. <br /><br />The only change I see is that children will not see the address live, but will instead watch it with their families (which is better, in my opinion), or they’ll view it the next day.<br /><br />And for the record… this had nothing to do with political ideology, but was instead based on respect for parents. Let’s be honest here… if it were about ideology alone then it’s most likely that a speech from a liberal president would be shown, regardless of the consequences. Educators and school boards are generally far more liberal than they are conservative, and Rochester is no exception.<br /><br /><br /><strong>THE CONTROVERSY</strong><br /><br />TIME magazine offered an interesting view of the underlying dynamics driving this controversy:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1920703,00.html?iid=tsmodule"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">TIME: Schools to Big Brother Barack: Stay Out! (09/04/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />The heart of the battle -- at least in my mind -- is that the administration arguably erred when they started to make this about the President, and not soley about the value of education. (And it's really a shame, because their "study guides" distracted from a good speech. <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/MediaResources/PreparedSchoolRemarks/">You can read it here.</a>)<br /><br />From the TIME article:<br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;"><em>Thanks in large part to the Administration's ham-handed advance work, the strident conservative anger that erupted this summer over health-care reform has shifted from town halls to school halls. On the surface, Obama's intentions for Tuesday seem nothing more threatening than a presidential pep talk about taking education seriously. But some ill-advised prep material from the Education Department — like suggestions that teachers have students write letters on "how to help the President" and recommendations that those pupils read his books — has left the door ajar (and that's all it seems to take these days) for Republican charges that Obama "wants to indoctrinate our kids," as Clara Dean, GOP chairwoman of Florida's Collier County, puts it.<br /><br />But if there is one conservative criticism that even liberals can relate to, it's that the speech seems part of this President's overexposure. "Every time you turn around, there he is, there he is, there he is," Dean groused. And lately at least, every time Obama turns around, he seems to give conservatives an opening to pounce on him.<br /></em></span><br /><br />Commentator Mark Steyn drew stronger parallels by comparing it to Iraq. Certainly hyperbolic, but I'm including it because it helps to clearly punctuate the concern.<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=505359"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Investors.com: Obama 'Outreach' To School Kids Feels More Like Personality Cult (09/04/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;"><em>In 2003, motoring around western Iraq a few weeks after the regime's fall, when the schoolhouses were hastily taking down the huge portraits of Saddam that had hung on every classroom wall, I visited an elementary-school principal with a huge stack of suddenly empty picture frames piled up on his desk, and nothing to put in them.<br /><br />The education system's standard first-grade reader featured a couple of kids called Hassan and Amal — a kind of Iraqi Dick and Jane — proudly holding up their portraits of the great man and explaining the benefits of an Iraqi education:<br /><br />"O come, Hassan," says Amal. "Let us chant for the homeland and use our pens to write, 'Our beloved Saddam.'"<br /><br />"I come, Amal," says Hassan. "I come in a hurry to chant, 'O, Saddam, our courageous president, we are all soldiers defending the borders for you, carrying weapons and marching to success.'"<br /><br />Pathetic, right?<br /><br />On Friday, Aug. 28, the principal of Eagle Bay Elementary School in Farmington, Utah — in the name of "education" — showed her young charges the "Obama Pledge" video released at the time of the inauguration, in which Ashton Kutcher and various other big-time celebrities, two or three of whom you might even recognize, "pledge to be a servant to our president and to all mankind because together we can, together we are, and together we will be the change that we seek."<br /><br />Altogether now! Let us chant for mankind and use our pens to write, "O beloved Obama, our courageous president, we are all servants defending the hope for you and marching to change."<br /><br />To accompany President Obama's classroom speech this week, the White House and America's "educators" drafted some accompanying study materials. Children would be invited to write letters to themselves saying what they could do to "help the President."<br /></em></span><br /><br />Certainly everyone does not agree with these perspectives, but enough parents are concerned, and took the time to express those concerns to the district.<br /><br />And it’s not that those expressing concerns have “hijacked” the district. Schools have a responsibility and obligation to try to honor the reasonable wishes of the communities they serve. When conflicts arise, the district must do what it can to craft compromises.<br /><br />I don’t believe it’s the school’s job to get itself embroiled in a effort to unconditionally defend the President. Nor do I believe this decision is designed to rebuff or embarrass the President, or “protect” the children from the President. I see this is a non-political attempt to respect diversity and parental choice, and to focus on effectively running schools without disruption.<br /><br /><strong>THE FEEDBACK</strong><br /><br />As is the case with almost anything involving schools, compromise is hard to achieve. I thought I’d share some of arguments I’ve heard on both sides.<br /></span><span id="fullpost"><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><strong>INDOCTRINATION:</strong> Had the district shown the address live, it would’ve been accused of attempting to indoctrinate children. <em>Really? President Obama can be persuasive, and children may not have fully developed critical thinking skills, but I don’t think a 20-minute speech to the nations youth is going to change our form of government.</em><br /><br /><strong>RACISM:</strong> According to some, the only possible reason that the district decided to “censor” the speech is because of hysterical, right-wing, gun-toting bigotry and racism. If the President were white, the address would have been delivered. <em>This is so incredibly unfounded that I’m not sure how to respond. Is this argument going to be dragged out every time someone questions this President?</em><br /><br /><strong>HITLER:</strong> Both sides are dragging out Hitler/fascism accusations. Hitler brainwashed and controlled the German youth, and this address is Obama’s attempt to do the same. Ironically, the opposite is apparently true as well: by not broadcasting the address live, the district is embracing the book-burning, thought-controlling fascism of Nazi Germany.<br /><br /><strong>HISTORICAL LOSS:</strong> Rochester is being accused of denying students a chance to participate in an incredible moment in history. <em>I think the erupting controversy has greatly exaggerated the significance of the address. The President's address to a joint session of Congress the next night is historically significant, but this is not. And while I fully support the ideas and values of hard work and disipline that will reportedly be covered in Obama's back-to-school address, I think the historical significance of this speech is being blown way out of proportion.</em><br /><br /><strong>DISRESPECT:</strong> President Obama is OUR President, and regardless of political beliefs he should be shown respect. By “censoring” or "banning" the speech, the district is being disrespectful. One parent seriously suggested that the district not only mandate the viewing, but the the district "command silence" as it was aired. Opponents counter with the “slippery slope’ argument, which suggests that a precedent is being established for unlimited presidential access to the nations children, thus inviting other politicians -- governors, county executives, or even local mayors -- to expect similar “opportunities” to reach American's youth.<br /><br /><strong>INSPIRATIONAL & UPLIFTING:</strong> Why is the district afraid of an uplifting, motivational speech about working hard and staying in school? <em>Let’s set aside the question of how people know exactly what the President will say, and the presumption that he will indeed be inspirational. The premise of this accusation is that the decision about airing the address live was content-based. It simply wasn’t.</em><br /><br /><strong>UNPRECEDENTED:</strong> In 1988, President Ronald Reagan gave an interactive interview to schoolchildren. In 1991, President Bush (41) made a speech at Alice Deal Junior High School, broadcast live on radio and television, urging students to study hard, focus on math and science, avoid drugs and turn in troublemakers. It's asserted that both did so with out objection, so clearly President Obama is a victim of partisan politics. <em>Again, it was respect for parental choice, and not content or party affiliation that drove the decision. But beyond that, Presidents Reagan and Bush most certainly faced plenty of objections from Democrats. Notably, former Democrat House Majority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) was quoted as saying, "The Department of Education should not be producing paid political advertising for the president, it should be helping us to produce smarter students, and the president should be doing more about education than saying, 'Lights, camera, action.' "</em><br /><br /><strong>INTELLECTUAL COWARDS:</strong> By “censoring” the President, Rochester is showing how it is afraid to expose children to different views. Yet, if the district does broadcast the address live, then it is buying into the President’s “infomercial” that is really designed to increase his popularity. <em>Both are quite a stretch, in my opinion. And again, the decision had nothing to do with the content.</em><br /><br />In the end, the RCS School Board did not make this decision, but I am comfortable defending the compromise. Children can still watch the address.<br /><br />Were the district to have made the opposite choice – to air the address live – I would instead need to be defending what could be a substantial disruption of school, as well as the notion that the school was all but forcing children to listen to their president -- perhaps in "commanded silence". I just can’t go there.<br /><br />==> Mike.</span><br /></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com54tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-72943219661290660452009-09-02T08:51:00.006-05:002009-09-02T09:00:11.440-05:00Keep Parents Empowered!<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Read this article:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.detnews.com/article/20090901/OPINION01/909010316/1008/opinion01/Editorial--Parents--not-teachers--should-make-lifetime-decisions-on-their-kids--future"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The Detroit News: Parents, not teachers, should make lifetime decisions on their kids' future (09/01/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />Then, </span><a href="http://www.senate.michigan.gov/"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">find your Senator</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">, and send them an email telling them to you want higher standards for your children, and do not want your local school district to water down your child’s education. Tell them the Geiss bill should not be adopted without modification.<br /><br />When it comes to providing children with the college-prep skills they need to succeed in college, and ultimately our knowledge-based economy, local school boards were simply not getting the job done.<br /><br />The state legislature created new high school graduation requirements that fill that void.<br /><br />One of the provisions of the new requirements was an “escape clause”. It recognizes that a presumably small number of students might not be able to fulfill the requirements. Students with severe learning disabilities, for example, might struggle.<br /><br />As written, the “Personal Curriculum Modification” allows a parent to approach the school and requires a personal curriculum, essentially opting out of the state requirements. It was intended to be a deliberative process, involving the parent, teachers, counselors, and administrators.<br /><br />While there are good compromise aspects in the legislation, this new Geiss bill would ultimately move the decision making from the parents to the teachers, and that is wrong.<br /><br />It’s not a question of an individual teacher’s ability to evaluate a child. It’s instead about the institutional power. There are undoubtedly teachers who would make a careful and thoughtful decision, but there are also teachers who would not.<br /><br />I’ve personally witnessed too many incidents of educators trying to lower the bar for children. Empowering them to unilaterally establish lower expectations is a lifetime sentence, and is a step backwards.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br />I’ve pasted below the article in case the link doesn’t work.<br /></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Editorial: Parents, not teachers, should make lifetime decisions on their kids' future<br />The Detroit News<br /><br />Michigan teachers and lawmakers have debated for more than two years about the state's new high school curriculum. Now Lansing may have developed a sensible compromise bill, but it goes too far by gutting the rights of parents to make life-altering decisions about their children's futures.<br /><br />The state House passed Rep. Douglas Geiss' bill 4511 last week. It is designed to make it easier for students to obtain permission to take a personal curriculum to graduate from high school. The authors of the original curriculum allowed for any Michigan student to request a personal curriculum out of respect to the diversity of students and their interests.<br /><br />Current law rightly allows only parents or a legal guardian to request a personal curriculum. Policymakers worried, with good reason, that if teachers had the power to determine a student's high school coursework without a parent's consent, some would abuse it. Teachers who did not want to upgrade their skills and adapt to the new curriculum instead could lobby students to take easier classes -- even though that could be at the student's expense.<br /><br />Those concerns have proven to be valid. A small but vocal minority of teachers have remained resistant to adopting the state curriculum. Instead many have fought it, arguing they shouldn't have to change despite the fact that more and more Michigan students are poorly prepared to compete for Knowledge Economy jobs.<br /><br />The Geiss bill, a political compromise, contains some reasonable ideas, including the option of allowing a teacher to help parents develop a personal curriculum for their child.<br /><br />But the bill goes far too far by allowing teachers to make life-altering decisions for students. No one but parents should determine their child's high school curriculum. The consequences are too far-reaching. What coursework a student takes in high school is a predictor for their success in college, most trades classes and their livelihoods later.<br /><br />The Senate should make sure this bill does not gut parents' rights. Any compromise should not compromise the future of Michigan's children. </span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-52494218649047934582009-08-29T09:19:00.005-05:002009-08-30T20:32:44.493-05:00A History of Ignoring Smart Kids<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Take the time to read this. Authors Loveless and Petrilli have contributed so much to the effort of improving schools, and they knock it out of the park with this New York Times piece:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/28/opinion/28petrilli.html?_r=1&emc=eta1"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">The New York Times: Smart Child Left Behind (08/27/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br />It is this very topic that motivated me to become involved in education: I don't believe my public school adequately challenges all children.<br /><br />I have been attempting to fight this shortcoming my entire time on the school board, beginning four years ago with my </span><a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/search/label/Advanced%20Placement%20%28AP%29"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">nationally recognized study on Advanced Placement in Michigan</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">, up to the recent post on </span><a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2009/06/academically-waterboarding-middle.html"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">“Academically Waterboarding Middle School Math Students.”</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"> There are numerous examples of this deficiency chronicled on this blog under the heading RIGOR on the right.<br /><br />As of the time of this writing, Rochester Community Schools still has no district initiatives whatsoever to insure that all children are adequately challenged. I have pushed at every opportunity to spotlight this fact, but unfortunately the best that I’ve been able to achieve is some weakly worded generic language in a list of un-measurable district goals.<br /><br />While the school board is to blame, the ultimate root cause is that parents have not communicated any expectations to their school board, and do not hold them accountable when examples are provided of school board failures.<br /><br />Until parents and other stakeholders take the time to let the school board know that they have high expectations for their children – and refuse to accept generic board answers – we can only expect more of the same. </span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">==> Mike<br /><br />Here is the article in case the link does not work:</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">New York Times<br />Op-Ed Contributors<br />Smart Child Left Behind<br />By TOM LOVELESS and MICHAEL J. PETRILLI<br />AS American children head back to school, the parents of the most academically gifted students may feel a new optimism: according to a recent study, the federal No Child Left Behind law is acting like a miracle drug. Not only is it having its intended effect — bettering the performance of low-achieving students — it is raising test scores for top students too.<br /><br />This comes as quite a surprise, as ever since the law was enacted in 2002, analysts and educators have worried that gifted pupils would be the ones left behind. While the law puts extraordinary pressure on schools to lift the performance of low-achieving students, it includes no incentives to accelerate the progress of high achievers.<br /><br />Yet the new study, by the independent Center on Education Policy, showed that more students are reaching the “advanced” level on state tests now than in 2002. This led the authors to conclude that there is little evidence that high-achieving students have been shortchanged.<br /><br />If only that were so. But like many miracle-drug claims, this conclusion is deeply flawed, for several reasons.<br /><br />First, under the federal law, state tests are supposed to measure whether students are meeting grade-level expectations — whether the average third grader knows the mathematics taught through third grade. But high achievers usually work above grade level, so the state tests are very poor instruments for measuring how well top students are learning.<br /><br />Second, the way the study’s analysts depicted state trends creates a misleading national picture. They calculated “trend lines” </span><span id="fullpost"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">in each state — for example, whether more fourth graders in Georgia reached the “advanced” level in math, whether they made gains in reading and so on for each grade and subject.<br /><br />For their conclusions, they added together all the up, down and sideways trends to give a national snapshot, saying that 83 percent of trend lines showed gains, while 15 percent showed declines. The problem with this system is that it treats all states equally, regardless of size. So a gain among high-performing students in North Dakota has the same weight as one in California, which has more than 60 times as many students.<br /><br />Third, the analysis does not compare today’s students with those of earlier eras. High-achieving students might be making incremental progress — but is this new? If they were making similar gains before 2002, then might recent progress have nothing to do with No Child Left Behind? And how did their progress compare with trends for lower-achieving students?<br /><br />Thankfully, there is a more suitable tool to help answer such questions: the National Assessment of Educational Progress, which tracks achievement changes in 4th, 8th and 12th graders across the country. It found relatively little progress among our highest-achieving students (those in the top 10 percent) from 2000 to 2007, while the bottom 10 percent made phenomenal gains. For example, in eighth-grade math, the lowest-achieving students made 13 points of progress on the national-assessment scale from 2000 to 2007 — roughly the equivalent of a whole grade. Top students, however, gained just five points.<br /><br />We also learned something from the data from the 1990s. For the most part, both high- and low-achievers made tepid annual gains. But there was one exception: In the states that already had accountability systems similar to those that would eventually be required by No Child Left Behind, there were much larger gains at the bottom than at the top.<br /><br />So what does all of this mean? It is clear that No Child Left Behind is helping low-achieving students. But it is also obvious that high-achieving students — who suffer from benign neglect under the law — have been making smaller gains, much as they did before it was enacted. Alas, this drug is producing no miracles.<br /><br />No doubt, some will claim victory: We are closing the achievement gap between our top and bottom students! But is that our only national goal in education? What might happen if federal law encouraged educators to improve the performance of all students? Our analysis of the federal data identified tens of thousands of high achievers who are black, Hispanic or poor. They are excelling at their studies, often against great odds. Shouldn’t we be addressing their educational needs?<br /><br />As we look for ways to improve No Child Left Behind, we must recognize that our top students still have much to learn.<br /><br /><em>Tom Loveless is a fellow at the Brookings Institution and a member of the task force on K-12 education at Stanford’s Hoover Institution. Michael J. Petrilli is the vice president for national programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.</em><br /></span><br /></span><span id="fullpost"></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-62636772056228463262009-08-26T10:15:00.002-05:002009-08-26T10:23:35.955-05:00State of Denial<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Oftentimes it's a sad truth that someone on a self-destructive path never really hits bottom until they experience that one defining moment that makes them wake up to the reality that they alone are the cause of their own problems.<br /><br />School boards live in that state of denial.<br /><br />In Rochester, for example, the school board has not passed a balanced budget in any one of the five years I served on the board. Each year a majority of board members were OK with approving a budget with deficit spending. The board made some cuts this year – half of which came from cutting the pay of bus drivers and custodians by 25% -- but the board was still unable to balance the budget. The district is pondering a $12 million dollar deficit next year.<br /><br />Yet somehow the board is receptive to the idea of paying $10,000 to hang a historical mural in the boardroom.<br /><br />Granted, the $10K isn’t going to materially change the budget picture. But the message it sends is very clear.<br /><br />And it leaves one wondering what other types of non-essential or non-productive spending is going on.<br /><br />Perhaps State Superintendent Mike Flanagan offers a glimmer of hope, now that he finally put his foot down on school board budgeting nonsense. I wonder how the lesson learned here might be able to be applied on a broader basis.<br /><br />The Madison School District in Madison Heights Michigan has apparently been working on a deficit reduction plan since 1994, yet cannot produce a balanced budget.<br /><br />Let’s ignore the fact that it’s a 1500 pupil district, and one of two small districts in this suburban community, and could undoubtedly save money through consolidation (of district operations, not schools).<br /><br />The more illustrative point is that they’ve been unable to solve this problem for 15 years!<br /><br />And amazingly, when the state superintendent finally threatens to hold them accountable, they are able to come up with a plan.<br /><br />But of course, the school board lives in denial, blaming others for their problems.<br /><br />Perhaps the silliest comment came from the district’s attorney, who said, “Lansing doesn’t understand the fallout those (budget cutting) options can have for generations to come. The board is looking a more methodical change over time.”<br /><br />How much time? Since this deficit problem first started, there have now been two or three classes of kids who started out in kindergarten and have since graduated!<br /><br />And talk about “generations”… the education of the children in the district NOW will be impacted because of the failure of the board to address the deficit over the past 15 years.<br /><br />Given the legislative bumbling that goes on at the state level, I’m not convinced that Lansing is the ideal answer. But the current status quo – your local school board – clearly demonstrates time and time again that local control is out of control.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Here are a couple of links on the Madison situation:<br /><br /></span><a href="http://www.freep.com/article/20090818/NEWS03/908180325/1320/Madison-Heights-board-members-face-jail-time"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Detroit Free Press: Deficits have Madison Heights board members facing jail time (8/18/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br /></span><a href="http://de.theoaklandpress.com/Repository/ml.asp?Ref=T0xQLzIwMDkvMDgvMjUjQXIwMDUwMA==&Mode=Gif&Locale=english-skin-custom"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Oakland Press: Madison District Avoids Payless Paydays (8/25/09)</span></a><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;"><br /><br /></span><span id="fullpost"><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Deficits have Madison Heights board members facing jail time<br /><br />BY BILL LAITNER<br />FREE PRESS STAFF WRITER<br /><br />Faced with an unprecedented threat of jail and fines by the state's top educator, school board members of the Madison School District in Madison Heights passed a plan Monday night aimed at averting the penalties.<br /><br />The plan, to offset a $1.35-million deficit, rests on tentative agreements with the district's unions and other workers to accept a 5% overall cut in human resources for the next three years. The savings would come from a combination of pay and benefits cuts, job reassignments and lower head count achieved through retirements and resignation -- without layoffs, board attorney George Butler said.<br /><br />"This will be sent to the Michigan Department of Education," on Tuesday "and will await the response," said district Superintendent Gary Vettori.<br /><br />The district has been operating under a state-approved deficit elimination plan since 1994.<br /><br />Last month, Superintendent of Public Instruction Michael Flanagan sent the board a letter indicating that if the district didn't submit a revised budget by Thursday, "it will be prudent for me to invoke one or more of the penalties" that include jail and fines.<br /><br />If the penalties were imposed, it would have been the first time a school board endured jail and criminal fines allowed under a state law on fiscal responsibility, said state Department of Education spokeswoman Jan Ellis.<br /><br />The state has withheld more than $800,000 in aid from the total of $9 million allocated to the district for 2008-09, Ellis said.<br /><br />Board members, who recently gave up their $30-per-meeting pay, said they were stunned by the threats and doing all they could to keep afloat the district of fewer than 1,500 students.<br /><br />Workers have made repeated concessions and Vettori took a 5% cut to $114,000.<br /><br /></span></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-7033401705416876532009-08-14T15:57:00.003-05:002009-08-14T16:05:29.262-05:00Refocusing Energy!<span style="font-family:verdana;">Five years on a local school board has delivered a lifetime's worth of lessons on what is best & worst about 'local control'.<br /><br />By helping to shape the dialog and direction, I believe I’ve had a positive impact on our schools. My focus at the board table, my personal advocacy efforts with the public, and my voting record clearly demonstrates my commitment to the merits of increased rigor, fiscal responsibility, safety, and transparency.<br /><br />I’m proud of my efforts to make schools accountable to parents, students, and taxpayers, but have concluded that the opportunities to achieve these goals are limited on this local school board.<br /><br />The forces attempting to preserve the status quo are powerful, committed, and far superior in numbers. Actually, school boards mirror the polarizing political climate at the state and national level, where a dominating majority controls the agenda and offers no room for compromise.<br /><br />On Tuesday, I entered my name as a candidate for re-election, hoping that one or more new candidates might emerge that could stand with me in my efforts to reform and improve our schools, and prepare for the challenges ahead.<br /><br />But at this point, with the candidate field now defined, I’ve decided to withdraw my name and refocus my energy. Armed with my knowledge of the system, and freed from the petty politics, I believe I can be more effective in my efforts to increase public awareness of the issues facing schools, while continuing to attempt to introduce ideas to school leaders. </span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com37tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-3572482022105570242009-08-08T18:31:00.006-05:002009-08-08T19:12:09.295-05:00To Rubberstamp or Compromise, that is the question!<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">I had received enough FACEBOOK invitations requests that I finally decided to setup an account. If you haven’t done so, you should! It’s very active, although it can be very distracting. <a href="http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/profile.php?id=1381188100">Mine's here</a>.<br /><br />Anyway, in the process of searching for friends I stumbled across a few fairly recent articles about my friend Melanie Kurdys, a Board Trustee in Portage Michigan.<br /><br /><a href="http://blog.mlive.com/schoolzone/2009/06/portage_school_board_same_song.html">Mlive: Portage school board: Same song, new verse (06/01/09)</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/index.ssf/2009/07/tensions_linked_to_trustee_air.html">Mlive: Tensions linked to trustee aired during Portage school board retreat (07/15/09)</a><br /><br />Melanie is an outstanding trustee, one who works tirelessly to reform an education system that is simply not very effective by any measure. I wrote about her efforts to address the fact that many high school graduates must take remedial math in college. <a href="http://k12reformer.blogspot.com/2007/03/remedial-math.html">The article can be found here</a>.<br /><br />She’s being exposed to the same complaints many reformers face, which is that she should simply sit at the table and vote “AYE”.<br /><br />I posted these two articles because they provide great insight into the ugly world of school politics.<br /><br />The articles are sad because they show a clear divide in the district. You can read the comments posted on the newspaper site, and see there are those who root for the majority, and those who root for the underdog. It should not be a contest, at least not like this.<br /><br />Unless that board majority can learn to compromise, then the community will stay divided and ultimately the children will lose.<br /><br />The articles focus on the tired old debate about whether a trustee should actively understand an issue before voting, or whether they should instead simply rubber stamp whatever is put in front of them.<br /><br />This is exactly the problem we have in Washington right now, where the Obama Administration wants Congress to pass bills without reading them.<br /><br />I fail to understand the logic in the rubber-stamp approach. If the administration’s proposals cannot withstand a little scrutiny, then maybe they shouldn’t advance them.<br /><br />And if a majority of board members don’t want to understand what they are approving, then they are free to change policy so that the administration has more leeway and the board has less oversight. Or, they can conduct offline study sessions or sub-committee meetings, where the administration can make its case to those board members who are interested in understanding the issues before they approve it.<br /><br />But instead, this Portage board whines about Melanie asking reasonable questions. They call it “micromanaging”. They hope to bully Melanie into capitulation.<br /><br />Furthermore, they offer the absurd claim that, “You're holding almost the whole school district hostage." <strong>How is that possible if they have a 6 to 1 majority?</strong> They are free to ignore Melanie, as is done when the autocratic board President Shirley Johnson says, "We're moving on." <em>(That's happened to me several times, where board members have been OK with "Calling the Question", which according to Robert's Rule ends discussion.)</em><br /><br />So why exactly is this an issue for the Portage board?<br /><br />Because Melanie goes against the cultural grain of their "social club", which expects members to not only go along, but go along happily and quietly. <br /><br />Melanie is doing neither. She asks intelligent questions – questions the board cannot ignore – and they resent her for that.<br /><br />But it's more than just petty resentment. The heart of the problem – and I see this whenever you have a reform-minded trustee on a school board – is that the status quo majority doesn’t compromise. Either they don’t know how, or don’t want to.<br /><br />If they don’t want to, well, then that’s the end of the story.<br /><br />But I often wonder whether school board troubles are caused by the fact that trustees don’t know how to compromise.<br /><br />So here are some suggestions for Portage:<br /><span id="fullpost"><br /><br />1) Believe that compromise is important. Board trustees like those in Portage offer an interesting logical conflict. They have the majority, and can do whatever they want. But that is not enough for them. They not only want to have it their way, but they don’t want anyone to complain about it. If they truly want to eliminate the complaints, then they need to forge solutions in which everyone has some skin in the game.<br /><br />2) Stop viewing issues in isolation. If a particular item only has an “either/or” option, then try to couple a few items together. This might allow for a little “give and take”, which is the fundamental ingredient in compromise. You might never get all trustees to support everything, but if each trustee is satisfied that the compromise is in some way advancing an objective they find important, then you are likely to see a substantial reduction in the volume and frequency of objections.<br /><br />3) If it’s clear that there is substantial disagreement on an issue, then consider tabling it for a meeting, in an effort to find some common ground (see suggestion 1 & 2 above!).<br /><br />Many school issues have no “right or wrong” answers, but are instead more a matter of perspective or philosophy. This leads to messy school politics, and that is not likely to change. However, the present practice of the majority exerting absolute rule without regard to compromise is a proven loser.<br /><br />I've pasted below the articles in case the links don't work.<br /><br />==> Mike.<br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;"><strong>Portage school board: Same song, new verse</strong><br /><em>Posted by jmack June 01, 2009 23:04PM</em><br />Are we surprised that things got a bit tense during Monday's Portage school board meeting?<br /><br />No.<br /><br />Are we surprised the squabbling was sparked by whether Melanie Kurdys, in the opinion of her fellow board members, was trying to micromanage?<br /><br />No again.<br /><br />It's a familiar pattern. And, incidentally, another interpretation of the tussle is that Kurdys was asking questions in the interest of accountability and transparency, only to be slapped down by her colleagues.<br /><br />I report. You decide.<br /><br />First, Kurdys asked about the proposed traffic pattern for the new Central High School, which has been repeatedly criticized as unsafe by Portage resident Bob Schafer. Superintendent Marsha Wells and others told Kurdys that state and city officials had signed off on the traffic plan, but Kurdys said she wanted to see the paperwork herself, saying it was possible that state officials had approved the plan while expressing reservations. When Trustee Dale Posthumus suggested, in effect, that Kurdys overstepping her bounds, she said she was willing to file a Freedom of Information Act request if need be.<br /><br />Then came a discussion about the brickwork for the new Central High School. One of the bidders was upset his bid had gotten rejected, and the construction managers said it was because the project called for extra-large bricks and they wanted to go with a firm experienced with making that particular size. Kurdys suggested that perhaps the real problem was the design of the school, and questioned the use of the extra-large bricks, saying her research found those kind of bricks can lead to leakage around windows.<br /><br />The other board members seemed openly exasperated, saying they weren't going to second-guess the administration and the building contractors about the school design at this point. "This is not a board-level decision," Vice President Jennifer Whistler said. "If we get into this, we're opening a can of worms."<br /><br />Then came Round Three, when the board was briefed on a proposal for technology for the new Twelfth Street Elementary. Kurdys said that perhaps installing new technology for teachers at the new school is a big mistake, considering that the staff already will be adjusting to a new building, a new student body and a new districtwide math curriculum. Plus, Kurdys questioned if the new technology would actually improve student outcomes, and how the district would collect data to establish that fact.<br /><br />At that point, the other board members didn't even pretend to hide their annoyance. "To say, 'Why are we doing this?' is to revisit a decision made a year and a half ago," board President Shirley Johnson said. "We're moving on."<br /><br /><br /><strong>Tensions linked to trustee aired during Portage school board retreat</strong><br /><em>Posted by Julie Mack Kalamazoo Gazette July 15, 2009 22:47PM</em><br /><br />KALAMAZOO -- A Portage school-board retreat on Wednesday resembled "Survivor" crossed with C-Span.<br /><br />In the midst of a day spent talking about policy governance, the seven trustees on the Portage Public Schools Board of Education and Superintendent Marsha Wells engaged in a frank airing of grievances and a candid discussion about board tensions.<br />Six trustees, including two who have been on the board for less than eight months, suggested the board was being paralyzed by the actions of the seventh trustee, Melanie Kurdys.<br /><br />"I have to say, in my 36 years of professional life, I've never seen one person so totally dominate an organization," said Trustee John Whyte, who joined the board in December. "This is a nonfunctioning board, and we don't get things done, Melanie, because all of us are too busy trying to satisfy your wants and your needs. ... You're holding almost the whole school district hostage."<br /><br />Kurdys, who was elected in 2007 on a platform of transparency and accountability, considers herself the board watchdog, making frequent requests for information and seeking public input on school-district matters large and small.<br /><br />During the two board meetings in June, for instance, Kurdys questioned the traffic-safety plan and choice of bricks for the new Portage Central High School, the installation of state-of-the art technology in 12th Street Elementary, which is to open next month, and various budget issues.<br /><br />Other trustees said Wednesday that they appreciate her perspective but not her approach. They criticized Kurdys for micromanaging administration; monopolizing board discussions, leaving little time for others to talk; launching surprise attacks at board meetings; and making public comments that undermined fellow trustees and administrators. They also said she often resurrects old disputes, preventing the board from moving forward.<br /><br />For her part, Kurdys said the board has a history of trying to silence dissent. "Individuals who see things differently than the majority either end up quitting or leaving bitter," she said. "It seems like this board spends a lot of time trying to control me."<br /><br />Trustee Randy Borden, who was elected in May, said he ran for office without taking sides but that he already sees why other trustees are displeased with Kurdys.<br />He said he was startled, for instance, that during last month's vote on the district's budget, that Kurdys turned to the audience and said, "No one is accountable for this budget." Borden said the comment left the impression that the administration and board are not to be trusted.<br /><br />"The grandstanding that goes on at meetings is continuous," Vice President Dale Posthumus said to Kurdys. "It seems at every turn you're taking some opportunity to make the school district look bad."<br /><br />Kurdys said she is raising important issues. "Do you really think I'm intentionally trying to find things wrong in the district?" she said. "Why would I do that?"<br />She said, however, that she appreciated the honesty of her fellow board members in addressing the "elephant in the room."<br /><br />"I see the pieces I need to do to be more effective in getting my ideas into the room," she said at the end of the retreat.<br /><br />Prodded by facilitator Mike Washburn, a retired superintendent from Forest Hills, Kurdys and other trustees agreed to several procedures to help ensure board meetings stay focused and respectful. For instance, when a board member brings up issues that others feel are not board-level matters, they agreed they will decide as a group whether to discuss them or move on.<br /><br />At the end of the seven-and-a-half-hour retreat, trustees agreed the meeting was helpful and offered optimism.<br /><br />"I see the change in the atmosphere already," Secretary Deb Polderman said. Then she added, "but we've said that before."<br /></span></span></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4526659937118816707.post-50805425617946447732009-08-02T09:44:00.006-05:002009-08-02T10:04:00.040-05:00MEA contractual “firewall” blocks assessment data<span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">Interesting article from the left coast:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-obama-education25-2009jul25,0,4550811.story">LA Times: Obama chides California for not using test scores to evaluate teachers (07/25/09)</a><br /><br />It spotlights a bizarre and well-entrenched failing of the education system: the reluctance – even resistance – towards the use of data when evaluating teachers.<br /><br />This debate has been escalated by a new federal program called “Race to the Top”, which is described in The Economic Times:<br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;"><em>WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama has announced a race for $4.35 billion in federal grants to improve academic achievement and reverse a decline in American public schools to meet increasing competition from countries like India and China.<br /><br />"In an economy where knowledge is the most valuable commodity a person and a country have to offer, the best jobs will go to the best educated, whether they live in the United States, or India, or China," Obama said announcing the competition Friday.<br /><br />"In a world where countries that out-educate us today will out-compete us tomorrow, the future belongs to the nation that best educates its people," he said in an address at the Department of Education. "We have talked about it for decades but we know that we have not made the progress we need to make."<br /><br />Dubbed the "Race to the Top," the competition aims to ease limits on charter schools, which receive public funding but generally are exempt from some state or local rules and regulations, link teacher pay to student achievement and move toward common US academic standards.</em></span><br /><br />A good discussion can be found in this education trade magazine article:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2009/07/23/37race.h28.html?tkn=MLNFfylmmIZ6m43xt13Belg0vMbL1UE7w1U4">Eduweek: 'Race to Top' Guidelines Stress Use of Test Data (07/23/09)</a><br /><br />The use of data in decision-making is a major component of this effort, and it’s going to be interesting to see how this concept plays. It’s a common sense concept, but one that is counter-culture in education, and is clearly opposed by teacher unions.<br /><br />Some (many?) educators are opposed to the use of data analysis, instead believing the data comparison is not fair because each student is unique. Another common argument is that students may know the material, but simply not be able to demonstrate mastery in a structured test environment.<br /><br />I don’t want to be completely dismissive of those concerns, but they fundamentally suggest that the teacher alone should the sole judge of whether the teacher has been successful, ultimately making them accountable to, well, only themselves.<br /><br />The “Race to the Top” will force discussion of this topic because it includes grant money – the mothers milk in education – and it’s guidelines will likely exclude states like California and New York, which bar the use of data in evaluating teachers.<br /><br />While Michigan (and most other states) don't specifically bar the use of data in evaluations, the real roadblocks are established at the local level.<br /><br />In Rochester, for example, meaningful data is scarce, especially at the secondary level. Teachers don’t use common assessments, meaning that there is no common measuring tool within the district, or even with a building. The effort and achievement required to earn a “B” in one teacher’s class might’ve gotten a student an “A” or a “C” with another teacher. This hardly seems fair, and it inherently prevents effective and objective comparison.<br /><br />There is a district-level effort in Rochester to move towards common assessments, but it’s reportedly meeting strong resistance. Like most things in education, it’s moving at a glacial pace. The progress is not clear, and the outcome is far from inevitable. It calls into question how serious the district really is about the use of data in decision-making.<br /><br />It’s sad news, given the potential benefits.<br /><br />At a minimum, it would insure that achievement in a class would be measured by common standards, and not the unique standards of an individual teacher. An “A” in a particular class would mean the same thing within the district, regardless of which high school or which teacher bestowed it.<br /><br />Furthermore, common assessments would provide building leaders and district leaders with a macro view of curriculum success, and provide insight on where the district should concentrate efforts on improving instructional resources or professional development.<br /><br />Consider an example where six teachers of varying experience levels, in different buildings, administer a common assessment, and most of the students tested fail to demonstrate mastery of a particular concept. Those results </span><span id="fullpost"><span style="font-family:trebuchet ms;">would serve as an indicator that the district curriculum specialists need to better support the teachers by focusing attention on that particular concept.<br /><br />But apparently those benefits are outweighed by the risk that the data might reflect poorly on certain teachers.<br /><br />In that same example, consider if five out of six teachers consistently achieve comparable results, and the remaining teacher consistently performs below far below those other five. This data alone would not suggest that the one teacher is ineffective, but it would certainly serve as a red flag.<br /><br />Having common assessments – and common achievement data – would inherently establish achievement norms for teachers, and is presumably one of the primary reasons it’s unacceptable to teacher unions.<br /><br />Whatever the reason, this common sense use of data goes against the grain of education norms, and opposition to the use of data remains a significant plank in the MEA platform.<br /><br />In Rochester, the union has a built-in “firewall” in the teacher contract designed to “protect” teachers from data. Section 8.21 of the contract states, “If teachers who teach the same course administer common assessments, there shall be no comparisons of classroom assessment results reflected on any teacher’s evaluation.” Furthermore, in a “Memo of Understanding” addendum, the concept is expanded beyond evaluations when it goes on to stipulate, “There shall be no comparison of classroom assessment results reflected on any teacher’s evaluation or provided to any parents.”<br /><br />Unions contend, as summarized by AFT president Randi Weingarten, that student test-score data should be used primarily for informative and instructional purposes. In other words, we want to specifically avoid using measurable data to set expectations and hold teachers accountable.<br /><br />I cannot imagine that philosophy being acceptable in any other profession.<br /><br />Rather than confront this head on, some suggest a more pragmatic approach. They argue that teachers feel threatened by data, and that introduction of data into their evaluations will only strengthen opposition. They maintain that data needs to become integrated into the education psyche in a more natural, evolutionary way.<br /><br />That argument may have some merit, but on the other hand it’s reasonable to wonder if this is simply too much coddling. How long are we supposed to allow for the evolution?<br /><br />Teachers need to realize that this is not some sort of “attack” on their profession, but is instead meant to help instructional leaders and teachers alike identify what is working, and what is not. And yes, it should also help to weed out those teachers who are simply not effective.<br /><br />The current evaluation system is far too subjective and superficial.<br /><br />- Mike.<br /><br />As a side note, the LA Times article cites the Data Quality Campaign, which maintains an interesting site here: <a href="http://dataqualitycampaign.org">http://dataqualitycampaign.org</a>. I could not find any state ranking data, but I did read an interesting piece on the benefits of linking teacher and student data, <a href="http://www.dataqualitycampaign.org/files/publications-benefits_of_and_lessons_learned_from_linking_teacher_and_student_data-120607.pdf">found here</a>. <br /><br /></span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Obama chides California for not using test scores to evaluate teachers<br />At stake are billions in federal stimulus funds to be allocated in 'Race to the Top' grants. Schwarzenegger says state law will be amended if necessary to comply.<br /><br />By Jason Song and Jason Felch<br /><br />July 25, 2009<br /><br />President Obama singled out California on Friday for failing to use education data to distinguish poor teachers from good ones, a situation that his administration said must change for the state to receive competitive, federal school dollars.<br /><br />Obama's comments echo recent criticisms by his Education secretary, Arne Duncan, who warned that states that bar the use of student test scores to evaluate teachers, as California does, are risking those funds. In an announcement Friday at the Education Department in Washington, Obama and Duncan said the "Race to the Top" awards will be allocated to school districts that institute reforms using data-driven analysis, among other things.<br /><br />"You cannot ignore facts," Obama said. "That is why any state that makes it unlawful to link student progress to teacher evaluations will have to change its ways."<br /><br />The remarks escalate a disagreement between the Obama administration and California education leaders. While a 2006 law prohibits the use of student test scores to evaluate teachers on a state level, it does not mention local districts, where state officials say pupil data can be used to judge instructors. A handful of districts currently are doing that; L.A. Unified is not.<br /><br />Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said Friday he would push to amend state law if necessary.<br /><br />"We will seek any reforms or changes to the law deemed necessary, including changes to our data system laws, to ensure California is eligible to compete" for federal funds, Schwarzenegger said in a statement.<br /><br />California's top education officials sent the Obama administration a letter earlier this month saying no changes were needed to state law and that any attempt to modify it could distract from reform efforts, but the administration has not responded.<br /><br />Obama's speech could also mark the beginning of a protracted fight with teachers unions, which have resisted some of the reforms advocated by the administration, including performance pay and data-driven teacher evaluation.<br /><br />The state's teachers unions have already voiced their opposition to such a move. When the 2006 law was drafted, teachers unions insisted that it include an amendment saying: "Data in the system may not be used . . . for purposes of pay, promotion, sanction, or personnel evaluation of an individual teacher or group of teachers, or of any other employment related decisions related to individual teachers."<br /><br />Obama and Duncan made their position clear. "This competition will not be based on politics, ideology, or the preferences of a particular interest group," Obama said. "Instead, it will be based on the simple principle: whether a state is ready to do what works."<br /><br />"Race to the Top" applicants must show progress in four key areas to compete for the $4.35 billion: adopting rigorous academic standards, recruiting and retaining talented educators, turning around chronically low-performing schools, and building data systems to track student and teacher effectiveness. But Obama also pointed out that teachers should not be judged solely on student test scores.<br /><br />Seven states have already lifted restrictions on public charter schools to better compete for the funds, the Associated Press reported Friday. Other states, such as Colorado and Massachusetts, are trumpeting their recent progress on issues like merit pay and higher educational standards, which they believe will give them an inside track to secure the federal dollars.<br /><br />Federal officials have said that California legislators do not have to necessarily revise current law. Instead, the attorney general could certify that the state law is not a barrier to teacher accountability.<br /><br />But some California education officials questioned whether it would be possible to comply with the administration's demands.<br /><br />California ranks 41st among states in collecting and using data to evaluate teachers, according to a 2008 survey by the Data Quality Campaign, a nonprofit based in Austin, Texas.<br /><br />"There is . . . [a] possibility nobody will apply" for the funds, said California Deputy Supt. for Public Instruction Rick Miller, who stressed that state leaders share the Obama administration's goals. "They're asking for fundamental changes in all sorts of areas, and you have to commit to all of it by October. . . . That's a heavy lift."<br /><br />The draft guidelines for the federal funding released Friday are open for public comment for 30 days. States are required to submit applications by October for the first round of grants.<br /><br />The money is a portion of the roughly $100-billion educational stimulus package approved by Congress. But much of that money is expected to be used by districts to make up for state budget cuts.<br /><br />Jason.song@latimes.com<br /><br />Kristina Sherry in the Washington bureau contributed to this story<br /><br /></span></span>Mike Renohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02321695059501190325noreply@blogger.com20