Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Governance/Board Decision Making

Milwaukee Public Schools agree to close, merge, move schools

April 2, 2011 Jim Zellmer

The Milwaukee School Board on Thursday night closed, merged or relocated about seven schools for next year to address space and facility issues in a district facing an upcoming $74 million budget shortfall.
At the same time, board members considered plans to open a handful of public charter schools next year. By late Thursday, they had approved an education management company to restart North Division High School as a charter school, and they had approved a voucher-school operator to open a public K-12 charter school with a residential element for high schoolers.
The board approved a proposal from Milwaukee College Prep, one of the city’s highest-performing charter schools, to lease with an option to buy the vacant Thirty-Eighth Street School building. The deed restriction on the school, which keeps it from being used as a school that would compete with MPS, would be lifted after five years.
Robert Rauh, leader of Milwaukee College Prep, said College Prep proposed expanding into the Thirty-Eighth Street building as an MPS non-unionized charter school for kindergarten through fourth grade. Middle schoolers in grades five through eight would make up the population at Milwaukee College Prep’s main campus in Metcalfe Park.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, History - Madison Schools, School Climate, Student Support

Tests Reveal Madison Schools Wrestle With Achievement Gaps Tests Examined Reading, Math Proficiency

March 31, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Channel3000:

Madison Metropolitan School District officials are beginning to digest new statewide test score results.
The results for Madison are mixed, but district leaders said that they believe they have a lot of work to do to improve.
The tests reveal that Madison is home to some very bright students, but Superintendent Dan Nerad said that schools aren’t doing enough for students who are struggling. He said the test results are proof.
The results showed that, in general, reading levels among students increased across the board while math performance improved only slightly.
District officials said that they also continue to be a “bi-modal” district — meaning there are students who are scoring at the highest level while it also has ones who are scoring at the lowest levels in nearly every grade in math and reading.

The Wisconsin Knowledge & Concepts Examination (WKCE) has long been criticized for its lack of rigor. Wisconsin DPI WKCE data.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

School choice expanding as record fine languishes

March 30, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Associated Press:

A school choice group that pumped millions of dollars into helping get its candidates elected in Ohio, Wisconsin and other states has yet to pay a record $5.2 million fine imposed three years ago by Ohio election officials, according to the state attorney general.
The fine imposed on All Children Matter languishes even as Ohio Gov. John Kasich pushes a $55.5 billion budget proposal that would continue to expand school choice, doubling the number of school vouchers in the state and lifting a cap on community schools.
The Ohio Elections Commission unanimously ruled in 2008 that All Children Matter, headed by former Michigan Republican Chairwoman Betsy DeVos and run out of that state, illegally funneled $870,000 in contributions from its Virginia political action committee to its Ohio affiliate. That violated a $10,000 cap on what Ohio-based political-action committees could accept from any single entity.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

Corbett’s vision for Pennsylvania schools: His plan includes voter approval of budgets.

March 28, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Dan Hardy:

When it comes to changing public education in Pennsylvania, Gov. Corbett’s proposed billion-dollar funding cut to school districts this year could be just the beginning.
The governor also is pushing a legislative agenda that could significantly affect the way children are taught, the teachers who instruct them, and how schools craft their budgets.
One proposal that many suburban school boards fear and many taxpayers relish calls for voter approval of proposed district budgets when tax increases exceed inflation. If this were in effect now, more than 80 percent of the districts in Philadelphia’s suburbs probably would have to vote.
Other Corbett initiatives would:
Give school boards, for the first time, a free hand to lay off teachers to cut costs, with the decider in the furloughs being classroom performance, not seniority.
Create vouchers providing state funding so low-income children in struggling schools could transfer to private ones. The role of charter schools would also be expanded.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

NEA Plan of Attack

March 22, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Mike Antonucci:

“We Are at War” – NEA’s Plan of Attack. With the situation in Wisconsin stabilized, if not settled, there is time to examine the National Education Association’s strategy for its short-term future. Though reasonable arguments can be made that the collective bargaining measures in Wisconsin, Ohio and Idaho aren’t significantly different from the status quo in other states, there should be no mistake about it – NEA sees them as a threat to its very existence.
The reasons are not hard to understand. NEA has enjoyed substantial membership and revenue growth during the decades-long decline of the labor movement. It is now the largest union in America and by far the largest single political campaign spender in the 50 states.
But after some 27 years of increases, NEA membership is down in 43 states. The union faces a $14 million budget shortfall, and the demand for funds from its Ballot Measure/Legislative Crises Fund is certain to exceed its supply. Even the national UniServ grants, which help pay for NEA state affiliate employees, will be reduced this year.
In the past, NEA has routinely faced challenges to its political agenda, mostly in the form of vouchers, charters and tax limitations. But the state legislative and gubernatorial results in the 2010 mid-term elections emboldened Republicans for the first time to systematically target the sources of NEA’s power, which have little to do with education and everything to do with the provisions of each state’s public sector collective bargaining laws.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

‘Insanity,’ ‘stupidity’ drive education reform efforts

March 10, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Susan Troller:

A big crowd packed into the University of Wisconsin’s Memorial Union Theater on Tuesday night to hear education historian Diane Ravitch, considered one of the most influential scholars in the nation on schools.
In her talk, she ripped into Gov. Scott Walker’s budget, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s Race to the Top, the obsession with measuring student progress through high stakes testing, privatization of education through charters and vouchers and No Child Left Behind legislation that is closing schools and punishing teachers.
Her gloomy assessment of the current passion for “fixing” education and vilifying teachers is particularly striking because Ravitch herself is a former proponent of school testing and accountability and an early supporter of the No Child Left Behind legislation.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Events, History - Madison Schools, School Climate

Diane Ravitch Interviews & Madison Appearance 3/8/2011

March 7, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Dave Murray:

The United States is “in an age national stupidity,” with a corporate education reform agenda bent on “demonizing teachers so it can fire them,” national education advocate Diane Ravitch said at a union-backed education reform symposium.
Ravich, a former assistant U.S. secretary of education who had a role in developing No Child Left Behind and the charter school movement, renounced both reforms, saying they’ve given way to a culture of incentives and punishments through testing that does little to help students.
We recently wrote a column for CNN.com that garnered national attention for saying there was a “simmering rage” among teachers who feel they’ve been under attack and made a scapegoat for school and budget problems.

Susan Troller:

Historians are known for studying news, not making it. But Diane Ravitch, a New York University professor of education, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and blogger for Education Week, is not only heralded as the nation’s “most history-minded education expert” (The Wall Street Journal) but is also a newsmaker in her own right.
When Ravitch, assistant secretary of education under President George H. W. Bush and an early proponent of the No Child Left Behind legislation, recanted her former support for school choice and standardized testing in 2010, her turnaround made headlines in all the major media.
Ravitch says applying a business model to schools and classrooms is misguided. She also maintains that many of the most popular notions for restructuring public education, including privatization, high-stakes testing, and charter and voucher schools, have put public education in peril.

Details on Ravitch’s Madison 7-8:30p.m. appearance are here.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, History - Madison Schools, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Wisconsin School choice programs get boost in Walker budget

March 7, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Matthew DeFour:

Gov. Scott Walker’s budget proposal calls for deep cuts in most areas of public education with one notable exception – public school choice programs.
In addition to steep reductions in school district funding, Walker’s budget calls for a 10 percent cut to grants for programs such as bilingual-bicultural education and 4-year-old kindergarten. It also retains current grant funding for special education and low-income students, despite projected growth in those populations.
Meanwhile, Milwaukee’s 20-year-old voucher program would receive $22.5 million more to accommodate 1,300 additional students. The growth would result from Walker’s proposal to remove the program’s income requirements and enrollment caps.
And independent charter schools would receive $18.4 million more over the biennium. Walker is projecting 600 additional students as his proposal would lift the state enrollment cap on virtual charter schools, allow the UW System’s 13 four-year universities to establish charter schools, and allow independent charter schools in any district in the state.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

Wisconsin Budget cuts $834 million from schools

March 3, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Amy Hetzner and Erin Richards:

State and local funding for general Wisconsin public school operations would drop 5.5% in 2011-’12 while Milwaukee’s private-school voucher program could be poised for a massive expansion under Gov. Scott Walker’s budget proposal, one that slashes $834 million in state K-12 education spending over the next two years.
The governor’s 2011-’13 budget proposal would phase out the income requirements of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program, eliminate the enrollment cap on student participation, and allow Milwaukee families to use their publicly funded voucher to attend any private school in Milwaukee County that wished to participate in the program.
Walker also hopes to remove a requirement that students in the choice schools take state tests, possibly scuttling new efforts to gauge whether the private school choice program has meaningful impact on academic achievement.
“We’ve been saying for a month now that the second shoe was going to drop,” said Tom Beebe, executive director of Wisconsin Alliance for Excellent Schools, referring to Walker’s recent push for major concessions on benefits from teachers and other public employees. “It wasn’t just dropped. It was thrown at the head.”

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, History - Madison Schools, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Madison Teachers, Inc. 2011 Candidate Questionnaire

March 1, 2011 Jim Zellmer

1MB PDF, via a kind reader’s email:. Mayoral Candidate Paul Soglin participated and I found this question and response interesting:

What strategies will you introduce to reduce the 6000+ families who move in and out of Madison Public School classrooms each year?
In the last three years more children opted out of the district than all previous years in the history of the district. That contributed to the increase of children from households below the poverty line rising to over 48% of the kids enrolled.
To stabilize our enrollment we need stable families and stable neighborhoods. This will require a collaborate effort between governments, like the city, the county and the school district, as well as the private sector and the non-profits. It means opening Madison’s economy to all families, providing stable housing, and building on the assets of our neighborhoods.
One decades old problem is the significant poverty in the Town of Madison. I would work with town officials, and city of Fitchburg officials to see if we could accelerate the annexation of the town so we could provide better services to area residents.

Ed Hughes and Marj Passman, both running unopposed responded to MTI’s questions via this pdf document.

MTIVOTERS 2011 School Board Election Questionnaire
Please respond to each ofthe following questions. If you wish to add/clarifY your response, please attach a separate sheet and designate your responses with the same number which appears in the questionnaire. Please deliver your responses to MTI Headquarters (821 Williamson Street) by, February 17, 2011.
General:
If the School Board finds it necessary to change school boundaries due to enrollment, what criteria would you, as a Board member, use to make such a judgement?
Ifthe School Board finds it necessary to close a school/schools due to economic reasons, what criteria would you, as a Board member, use to make such a judgement?
If the School Board finds it necessary, due to the State-imposed revenue controls, to make further budget cuts to the 2011-12 budget, what criteria would you, as a Board member, use to make such a judgement?
IdentifY specific MMSD programs and/or policies which you believe should to be modified, re-prioritized, or eliminated, and explain why.
What should the District do to reduce violence/assure that proper discipline and safety (of the learning and working environment) is maintained in our schools?
Do you agree that the health insurance provided to District employees should be mutually selected through collective bargaining?
_ _ YES _ _ NO Explain your concerns/proposed solutions relative to the District’s efforts to reduce the “achievement gap”.
Should planning time for teachers be increased? If yes, how could this be accomplished?
Given that the Wisconsin Association of School Boards rarely supports the interests of the Madison Metropolitan School District, do you support the District withdrawing from the W ASB? Please explain your rationale.
From what sources do you believe that public schools should be funded?
a. Do you support further increasing student fees? _ _ YES _ _ _ NO
Do you support the Wisconsin Alliance for Excellent Schools’ (WAES) initiative to raise sales tax by 1% to help fund schools?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
Do you support class sizes of 15 or less for all primary grades? _ _ YES _ _ NO
Do you support:
a. The use of public funds (vouchers) to enable parents to pay tuition with tax payers’ money for religious and private schools?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
b. The expansion of Charter schools within the Madison Metropolitan School District? _ _ YES _ _ NO
c. The Urban League’s proposed “Madison Preparatory Academy for Young Men” as a charter school which would not be an instrumentality of the District?
_ _ YES _ _ _ NO
Do you agree that the usual and customary work ofteachers, i.e. work ofthose in MTI’s teacher bargaining unit, should not be performed by others (sub-contracted)?
_ _ YES _ _ NO List MMSD staff and Board member(s) from whom you do or would seek advice.
Is your candidacy being promoted by any organization? _ _ YES _ _ NO
If yes, please name such organization(s). Have you ever been employed as a teacher? If yes, please describe why you left the teaching profession.
Do you support the inclusion model for including Title 1, EEN and ESL students in the regular education classroom? Why/why not?
What grouping practices do you advocate for talented and gifted (TAG) students?
Aside from limitations from lack ofadequate financial resources, what problems to you feel exist in meeting TAG students’ needs at present, and how would you propose to solve these problems?
The Board ofEducation has moved from the development ofpolicy to becoming involved in implementation of policy; i.e. matters usually reserved to administration. Some examples are when it:
a. Decided to hear parents’ complaints about a teacher’s tests and grading. b. Decided to modifY the administration’s decision about how a State Statute should be implemented.
Do you believe that the Board should delegate to administrators the implementation of policy which the Board has created?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
Do you believe that the Board should delegate to administrators the implementation of State Statutes? _ _ YES _ _ NO
Do you support the Board exploring further means to make their meetings more efficient? _ _ YES _ _ _ NO
Do you support a merit pay scheme being added to the Collective Bargaining Agreement _ _ YES _ _ _ NO
If yes, based on which performance indicators?
Do/did/will your children attend private or parochial schools during their K-12 years? Ifno, and ifyou have children, what schools have/will they attend(ed)?
_ _ YES _ _ NO If you responded “yes”, please explain why your child/children attended private parochial schools.
Legislation
Will you introduce and vote for a motion which would direct the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to request the introduction and promote the passage oflegislation to eliminate the revenue controls on public schools and return full budgeting authority to the School Board?
_ _ YES _ _ _ NO
Will you introduce and vote for a motion to direct the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to request the introduction and promote the passage oflegislation to prohibit the privatization ofpublic schools via the use oftuition tax credits (vouchers) to pay tuition with taxpayers’ money to private or religious schools?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
Will you introduce and vote for a motion to direct the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to request the introduction and promote the passage of legislation which will maintain or expand the benefit level of the Wisconsin Family and Medical Leave Act?
_ _ YES _ _ _ NO
Will you introduce and vote for a motion to direct the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to request the introduction and promote the passage oflegislation which will increase the retirement formula multiplier from 1.6% to 2% for teachers and general employees, i.e. equal that of protective employees?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
Will you introduce and vote for a motion to direct the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to request the introduction and promote the passage of legislation which will forbid restrictions to free and open collective bargaining for the selection ofinsurance for public employees (under Wis. Stat. 111.70), including the naming ofthe insurance carrier?
_ _ YES
_ _ NO
Will you introduce and vote for a motion to direct the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to request the introduction and promote the passage of legislation which will guarantee free and open collective bargaining regarding the establishment of the school calendar/school year, including when the school year begins?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
Will you introduce and vote for a motion to direct the Wisconsiu Association of School Boards to request the introduction and promote the passage of legislation to forbid the work of employees organized under Wis. Stat. 111.70 (collective bargaining statute) to be subcontracted?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
Will you introduce and vote for a motion to direct the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to seek passage of legislation which will require full State funding of any State-mandated program?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
Will you introduce and vote for a motion to direct the Wisconsin Association of School Boards to seek passage oflegislation which will provide adequate State funding of public education?
_ _ YES _ _ NO
Do you support a specific school finance reform plan (e.g., School Finance Network (SFN), Wisconsin Alliance for Excellent Schools (WAES), Andrews/Matthews Plan)?
Why/why not? Your Campaign:
Are you, or any of your campaign committee members, active in or supportive (past or present) of the “Get Real”, “ACE”, “Vote No for Change” or similar organizations?
Name ofCampaign Committee/Address/Phone #/Treasurer. List the members ofyour campaign committee.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Can parents effectively reclaim duties after funding cuts?

February 27, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

This is a boom time for parental choice in education. Frankly, that’s pretty scary to me.
I’m not talking about the school voucher program or charter schools, or other things like that.
I’m talking about the choices parents make in how they raise their children – how they can do (or not do) things that maximize the chances of their children becoming well-educated, well-balanced, constructive adults.
Since, say, the 1960s, expectations have grown for schools to take care of an increasing range of children’s needs. That goes for academics, of course, but also for social development, recreation, mentoring and, in many cases, providing nutrition, clothing and some basics of health care. That’s especially true for schools serving low-income kids, but you’d be surprised how often it is true in all schools.
I believe that one of the things we are seeing in the continuing chaos in Madison is that the tide is cresting for schools to play such roles. Teachers and staff members are simply going to be unable to do some of the things they’ve done to make up for what parents aren’t doing.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Rhee to lawmakers: Put kids first

February 12, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Nancy Badertscher:

Michelle Rhee, a national voice on education reform, told state lawmakers Thursday that charter schools and vouchers for low-income students have a place in public education, but in a blend with strong traditional schools.
“Vouchers in and of themselves are not the answer. Charters in and of themselves are not the answer,” said Rhee, who last fall stepped down as chancellor of Washington, D.C., schools after three years in which she was both lauded and derided for her overhaul of the school system.
“The answer in my mind is a really strong traditional public school system. That has very specific strategies to turn around failing schools [and incorporates both vouchers and charters].”
Rhee is on a national tour talking about education reform, particularly teacher evaluations and performance.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

NJEA is Not My Public School Teacher, Says N.J.

February 11, 2011 Jim Zellmer

New Jersey Left Behind:

While the majority of New Jerseyans love public school teachers, more than half believe that the NJ Education Association (NJEA) is “playing a negative role in improving public education,” according to a Quinnipiac poll released yesterday.
In addition, reports New Jersey Newsroom, 68% of residents favor implementation of a merit pay system and 62% support tenure reform. We’re more split on school choice; the poll found that by a small margin we oppose school vouchers and charter school expansion. From Maurice Carroll of Quinnipiac:

Board Meeting Archives, Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, History - Madison Schools, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Public School Districts – Return on Educational Investment: Madison Has a “Low ROI”

January 19, 2011 Jim Zellmer 1 Comment

The Center for American Progress, via a kind reader’s email:

The Wisconsin school systems of Oshkosh and Eau Claire are about the same size and serve similar student populations. They also get largely similar results on state exams-but Eau Claire spends an extra $8 million to run its school system
This report is the culmination of a yearlong effort to study the efficiency of the nation’s public education system and includes the first-ever attempt to evaluate the productivity of almost every major school district in the country. In the business world, the notion of productivity describes the benefit received in exchange for effort or money expended. Our project measures the academic achievement a school district produces relative to its educational spending, while controlling for factors outside a district’s control, such as cost of living and students in poverty.
Our nation’s school system has for too long failed to ensure that education funding consistently promotes strong student achievement. After adjusting for inflation, education spending per student has nearly tripled over the past four decades. But while some states and districts have spent their additional dollars wisely–and thus shown significant increases in student outcomes–overall student achievement has largely remained flat. And besides Luxembourg, the United States spends more per student than any of the 65 countries that participated in a recent international reading assessment, and while Estonia and Poland scored at the same level as the United States on the exam, the United States spent roughly $60,000 more to educate each student to age 15 than either nation.
Our aims for this project, then, are threefold. First, we hope to kick-start a national conversation about educational productivity. Second, we want to identify districts that generate higher-than-average achievement per dollar spent, demonstrate how productivity varies widely within states, and encourage efforts to study highly productive districts. Third–and most important–we want to encourage states and districts to embrace approaches that make it easier to create and sustain educational efficiencies.
This report comes at a pivotal time for schools and districts. Sagging revenues have forced more than 30 states to cut education spending since the recession began. The fiscal situation is likely to get worse before it gets better because the full impact of the housing market collapse has yet to hit many state and local budgets. At a time when states are projecting more than $100 billion in budget shortfalls, educators need to be able to show that education dollars produce significant outcomes or taxpayers might begin to see schools as a weak investment. If schools don’t deliver maximum results for the dollar, public trust in education could erode and taxpayers may fund schools less generously.
While some forward-thinking education leaders have taken steps to promote better educational efficiency, most states and districts have not done nearly enough to measure or produce the productivity gains our education system so desperately needs. Some fear that a focus on efficiency might inspire policymakers to reduce already limited education budgets and further increase the inequitable distribution of school dollars. To be sure, our nation’s system of financing schools is unfair. Low-income and minority students are far more likely to attend schools that don’t receive their fair share of federal, state, and local dollars. But while the issue of fairness must be central to any conversation about education finance, efficiency should not be sacrificed on the altar of equity. Our nation must aspire to have a school system that’s both fair and productive.
Our emphasis on productivity does not mean we endorse unfettered market-based reforms, such as vouchers allowing parents to direct public funds to private schools. Nor do we argue that policymakers should spend less on education. Indeed, we believe neither of these approaches can solve the nation’s pressing education challenges. Transforming our schools will demand both real resources and real reform. As Education Secretary Arne Duncan recently said: “It’s time to stop treating the problem of educational productivity as a grinding, eat-your-broccoli exercise. It’s time to start treating it as an opportunity for innovation and accelerating progress.”

Madison’s results can be seen here. I asked Superintendent Dan Nerad what benefits citizens, students and parents received from Madison’s greater per student spending, then, for example, his former Green Bay school district in this recent interview.
Madison spent $15,241 per student according to the 2009-2010 Citizen’s Budget. I’ve not seen a 2010-2011 version.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

Governor Thrusts New Jersey to Fore on Education

January 16, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Winnie Hu:

Gov. Chris Christie’s tough-on-schools approach in a state that has zealously protected its public schools — and its teachers — has already put him at loggerheads with legislative leaders, unions and some parents in New Jersey.
And on Tuesday, the governor, a Republican, used his State of the State address to push his education agenda further by calling for an end to teacher tenure, on top of his support for merit pay for teachers based partly on student achievement and adoption of a voucherlike system that would give students in low-performing schools other options.
The proposals are not new; many have been suggested and tried in other school districts and other states. But with Mr. Christie’s growing national stature and his ability to attract news media and political attention through his blunt — and very public — persona, his latest salvo has placed New Jersey center stage in the increasingly rancorous national debate over education.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

America ignores education funding at our own peril

January 13, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Robert Reich:

Over the long term, the only way we’re going to raise wages, grow the economy and improve American competitiveness is by investing in our people – especially their educations.
Yet we’re falling behind. In a recent survey of 34 advanced nations by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, our kids came in 25th in math, 17th in science and 14th in reading. The average 15-year-old American student can’t answer as many test questions correctly as the average 15-year-old student in Shanghai.
I’m not one of those who believe the only way to fix what’s wrong with American education is to throw more money at it. We also need to do it much better. Teacher performance has to be squarely on the table. We should experiment with vouchers whose worth is inversely related to family income. Universities have to tame their budgets for student amenities that have nothing to do with education.
But considering the increases in our population of young people and their educational needs, and the challenges posed by the new global economy, more resources are surely needed.

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Kids in Milwaukee choice program still 17% more likely to finish, study says

January 12, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Erin Richards:

High school graduation rates increased for both Milwaukee Public Schools students and low-income city children using vouchers to attend private schools in 2008-’09, but voucher students are still more likely to graduate than their public school peers, according to data released Monday.
The latest findings add a seventh year of data – for 2008-’09 – to a study that has followed the graduation rates of both groups of students since 2002-’03.
Because the latest graduation rate went up 5 percentage points from the previous year for both Milwaukee Parental Choice Program and MPS students, the report contends that choice (also called voucher) students were 17% more likely to graduate from high school than children in MPS over the past two years of the study.
For voucher school students, the graduation rate increased to 82% in 2008-’09; for MPS students, it increased to 70%, the study says.

Wisconsin is ripe for many more student/parental choices.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Rhee’s New Group Calls for Changes in Education

January 11, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Stephanie Banchero:

Michelle Rhee, who gained national attention as the chancellor of schools in Washington, D.C., called Monday for giving students government-funded vouchers to attend private schools, rating principals based on student achievement and getting rid of teacher tenure.
The release of the blueprint was the first formal action of Ms. Rhee’s new advocacy group, StudentsFirst, which she launched in December, after leaving her job heading D.C. schools in October. Ms. Rhee said she was in discussions with the governors of Florida, New Mexico, New Jersey, Tennessee, Nevada and Indiana to adopt part, if not all, of the agenda.
In an interview Monday, Ms. Rhee said she recognized her platform would be controversial and tough to implement but that her group could help push through the changes.
StudentsFirst has attracted 140,000 members, including nearly 20,000 teachers, and collected $1.4 million in contributions, Ms. Rhee said. She has said her group would donate to political campaigns and help school districts fund chosen strategies.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Florida Education Reforms

January 10, 2011 Jim Zellmer

STL Today:

As Florida’s governor, Jeb Bush shepherded a series of bold yet divisive school proposals into law.
A-plus Accountability Plan • Requires that students be tested annually, sets A-F letter grades for the state’s schools and allows students in persistently low-performing schools to transfer to higher-performing public schools.
The law — approved about three years before the enactment of the federal No Child Left Behind Act — also originally allowed families of students in persistently struggling schools to obtain vouchers to attend private schools.
Private School Option: Offered students average payments of about $4,200. The option ended when it was deemed unconstitutional by the Florida Supreme Court in 2006. But other voucher-type programs adopted during Bush’s tenure remain, including one that provides vouchers to students with disabilities to attend private schools. Another program, which offers corporations tax credits to cover private school tuition for low-income students, was expanded last year by Florida lawmakers.

Budget/Financing, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

Rules tie up Milwaukee Public Schools real estate

January 5, 2011 Jim Zellmer

Becky Vevea:

The former Garfield Elementary School building, stately and picturesque, looks as if it could be used for a movie set. That would be one way to fill the empty school with life.
For now, the century-old building at 2215 N. 4th St. sits empty.
Just down the road, construction is under way for a $7 million expansion to St. Marcus Lutheran School, one of the highest performing voucher schools in the city. But before St. Marcus raised millions of dollars, school leaders spent months in conversations with Milwaukee Public Schools about purchasing one of several nearby vacant buildings, including Garfield Elementary.
They were unsuccessful.
For MPS, one less building would mean revenue from the sale and a reduction in maintenance costs. So what happened?
“We were told we could buy them, but could not operate them as a school in competition with MPS,” said Henry Tyson, St. Marcus’ superintendent. “It became clear that the acquisition of one of those vacant MPS buildings was just not an option.”

Budget/Financing, School Climate

Dissecting change in Milwaukee School enrollments

November 22, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk

Like a glacier in a warming world, Milwaukee Public Schools keeps melting bit by bit.
But this year, don’t blame the private school voucher program as the reason MPS lost another notch when it comes to attendance.
In fact, for the first time since 1997, the number of voucher students in the city is down from a year ago, although only by a small amount.
Look to charter schools not staffed by MPS teachers and to public schools in the suburbs if you want to find the growth markets for Milwaukee students getting publicly funded educations this year.
Milwaukee is one of the places in the nation where the definition of public education is getting reshaped the most. The voucher program, which allows more than 20,000 students to attend private schools, the vast majority of them religious, remains the biggest cause.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

NEA’s View of the Near Future

November 7, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Mike Antonucci

NEA sent out its first post-mortem to its members, staff and activists. It is pretty straightforward.

Education policy/ESEA Reauthorization:
The new Speaker of the House is expected to be Representative John Boehner (R-OH) and Representative John Kline (R-MN) is expected to serve as the Chair of the House Education and Labor Committee. Under their leadership, Republicans are likely to be more focused on local control of school systems and local decision making. This week, Representative Kline outlined broad-based priorities for education and employment policy, including “pursuing education reform that restores local control, empowers parents, lets teachers teach, and protects taxpayers.” Representative Kline has also been a supporter of full funding for special education. Areas that NEA will be watching closely will include proposals for private school vouchers and increased support for charter schools.
Education Funding:
Representative Paul Ryan (R-WI), a rising star in GOP who has burnished his credentials as a fiscal hawk is likely to serve as Chair of the House Budget Committee, while either Representative Hal Rogers (R-KY) or Representative Jerry Lewis (R-CA), past chairman of the Appropriations Committee, could serve as Appropriations Chair. Republicans are expected to push hard on spending and are likely to propose dramatic cuts to education and other domestic priorities. Already, would-be Speaker of the House John Boehner has proposed cutting all non-defense federal spending to FY2008 levels.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

A Crack in the Wall

November 6, 2010 Jim Zellmer

The New York Times

When the Supreme Court took up a case about a school choice program in Arizona this week, Justice Elena Kagan said she had been “puzzling and puzzling” over it. Why, she asked the state’s lawyer, instead of providing families with vouchers, is Arizona’s program “so much more complicated and complex and unusual”?
The short answer is that the state’s Constitution prohibits direct aid to private schools. A more important one is that the convolutions hide a problem we’re not supposed to see. The program appears to be unconstitutional. As the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled, it appears to violate the First Amendment’s establishment clause by disbursing state funds on the basis of religion.
Last year in Arizona, $52.1 million in scholarships helped support more than 27,500 students at private and parochial schools. The money came from letting people who owe state income taxes take a credit, up to $500. They can contribute the amount to 50 or so nonprofit tuition organizations that give money to parents who want to send their children to schools they serve.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, Legal Rights, School Climate

Justices Revisit Use of Tax Credits for Religious Schools

November 5, 2010 Jim Zellmer

The Supreme Court on Wednesday returned to a subject that produced a major and closely divided decision eight years ago: how far may the government go in aiding religious schools?
In 2002, in a 5-to-4 ruling, the court upheld a school voucher system in Cleveland that parents used almost exclusively to pay for religious schools.
Four new justices have joined the court since then, but there was nothing in Wednesday’s arguments to suggest that the issue has become any less polarizing.
The program at issue on Wednesday gives Arizona taxpayers a dollar-for-dollar state tax credit of up to $500 for donations to private “student tuition organizations.” The contributors may not designate their dependents as beneficiaries. The organizations are permitted to limit the scholarships they offer to schools of a given religion, and many do.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Student Support

NAACP Schools & Politics

October 27, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Jason Riley

The nation’s unemployment rate is 9.6%, but it is 16.1% for blacks and an unconscionable 41% for black teens. Politicians continue to promote minimum-wage hikes that harm the job prospects of younger and less-skilled individuals, a disproportionate number of whom are black. Wal-Mart’s attempts to open a store that would bring jobs and low-price goods to a depressed neighborhood in Brooklyn, N.Y., have been thwarted repeatedly by labor unions. And the NAACP is issuing studies on the tea party movement?
Black children are funneled into the nation’s worst public schools, where they underperform and often don’t graduate. Black boys in eighth grade read at about the same level as white girls in fourth grade. The achievement gap persists through high school, where the average black student is graduating with an eighth-grade education–if the student graduates at all.
The situation has remained essentially unchanged for three decades. President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan have noted that just 2,000 of the nation’s 20,000 high schools produce half of all dropouts, and nearly 50% of black kids attend one of these “dropout factories.” But that hasn’t stopped the Obama administration from phasing out a Washington, D.C., voucher program for low-income students that improved graduation rates. Still, the NAACP is worried about the tea party?

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, School Climate

Teach for America infuses charter schools

October 18, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

A funny thing happened on the way to Teach for America trying to give Milwaukee Public Schools an infusion of idealism and energy from some of the best and brightest of America’s college graduates:
MPS ran out of jobs for them and for a lot of other young, promising teachers.
So instead, Teach for America’s Milwaukee work this year involves infusing itself mostly into charter schools and private schools in the publicly funded voucher program.
In the big picture, you can argue this doesn’t make much difference: The corps members, as TFA teachers are called, are still working with thousands of the city’s students who need good teachers.
In terms of the individual teachers involved, it doesn’t make too much difference either, at least in many ways. What they are doing is ultimately much the same: Giving at least their first two years out of college to teaching low-income kids. Whatever you call the schools they’re in, the work has similar demands, joys, frustrations and challenges.
But there are two ways it does make a difference.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

EDUPUNDIT MYOPIA

October 17, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Will Fitzhugh, via email:

The consensus among Edupundits is that teacher quality is the most important variable in student academic achievement.
I argue that the most important variable in student academic achievement is student academic work.
Edupundits have chosen very complex subject matter for their investigations and reports. They study and write about dropouts, vouchers, textbooks, teacher selection and training, school governance, budgets, curricula in all subjects, union contracts, school management issues, and many many more.
Meanwhile, practically all of them fail to give any attention to the basic purpose of schools, which is to have students do academic work. Almost none of them seems inclined to look past the teacher to see if the students are, for instance, reading any nonfiction books or writing any term papers.
Of course all of the things they do pay attention to are vitally important, but without student academic work they mean very little. Now, I realize there are state standards in math and reading, and some states test for writing after a fashion, but no state standards ask if students have read a history book while they were in school or written a substantial research paper, and neither do the SAT, ACT, or NAEP tests.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

Washington, D.C. shows its maverick schools chancellor the door.

October 14, 2010 Jim Zellmer

The Wall Street Journal

Michelle Rhee described her decision yesterday to step down as Washington, D.C., schools chancellor after 3½ years as “heartbreaking.” We share the sentiment. That one of the nation’s most talented school reformers was forced out does not bode well for students, or speak well of the man likely to become D.C.’s next mayor.
Ms. Rhee’s patron was Mayor Adrian Fenty, who lost his bid for a second term to City Council Chairman Vincent Gray in a Democratic primary last month. In Washington, the Democratic primary winner is presumed to be the next mayor, and few believed that Mr. Gray would retain Ms. Rhee’s services, especially since the teacher unions spent more than $1 million to elect Mr. Gray so that he would replace the chancellor.
The Washington Post reports that Ms. Rhee’s resignation “won immediate support from the Washington Teachers’ Union,” a strong signal that her departure is a victory for the adults who run public education, not the kids in failing schools. Ms. Rhee’s tenure was marked by improved test scores and putting the interests of students first. She closed underperforming schools, fired bad instructors, supported school vouchers for low-income families and opened charter schools. She also negotiated a new teachers contract that included merit pay and has become a model for other reform-minded educators and politicians in urban districts across the country.

Budget/Financing, Governance/Board Decision Making, Special Education, Student Support

School Boards: Your Attorney is Not Your Boss

October 11, 2010 Jim Zellmer

The Oklahoma Editorials

Here’s a reminder for some Tulsa-area school board members: Your attorney is not your boss. So when he advises that you disregard state law, think twice. And think about that part of your oath as a school board member that requires you to uphold state law.
The blatant disregard with which school board members in Broken Arrow and Jenks acted last week in voting not to comply with a new state law is outrageous. Worse yet, several other school boards may follow suit.
At issue is the Lindsey Nicole Henry Scholarship program, which allows children with special needs to attend private school at state expense. Doug Mann, attorney for the Broken Arrow and Jenks boards, advised board members not to pay the scholarships. He said the law is unconstitutional and paves the way for school vouchers.

Uncategorized

Speak Up on D.C. Schools, Mr. President The president remains silent about the fate of Michelle Rhee, the successful chancellor of public schools in the nation’s capital.

October 6, 2010 Jim Zellmer

William McGurn:

That deafening roar you hear–that’s the sound of Barack Obama’s silence on the future of school reform in the District of Columbia. And if he doesn’t break it soon, he may become the first president in two decades to have left Washington’s children with fewer chances for a good school than when he started.
This week President Obama will be out campaigning on the differences between the Republicans and Democrats on education. The primary thrust of his argument–which he repeated yesterday–is that Republicans want to cut education spending. Which may be a harder sell coming on the heels of his admission last week on NBC’s “Today” show that “the fact is that our per-pupil spending has gone up during the last couple of decades even as results have gone down.”
This debate over education is now coming to a head in Washington. In the first months after he took office, Mr. Obama kept quiet when Sen. Dick Durbin (D., Ill.) killed off a popular voucher program that allowed low-income D.C. moms and dads to send their kids to the same kind of schools where the president sends his own daughters (Sidwell Friends). This was followed by the president’s silence last month during the D.C. Democratic primary, in which the mayor who appointed the district’s reform-minded schools chancellor, Michelle Rhee, went down to defeat.

Uncategorized

School Reform Rainmakers

October 2, 2010 Jim Zellmer

The Wall Street Journal

It was a banner September for education philanthropy. Last week Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg appeared on Oprah Winfrey’s TV show to announce his $100 million donation to Newark, New Jersey, public schools. And this Wednesday the Charter School Growth Fund launched a new $160 million fund that will finance the expansion of high-performing charter networks across the U.S.
Since 1970, average per-pupil expenditures after inflation have more than doubled, yet test scores have remained flat. Today the Newark public school system spends some $22,000 per student, or more than twice the U.S. average, and the high school graduation rate is only 50%. Adding private money to this system would be a dreadful waste. So what excites us about these new donations is not the money per se but the reform agenda to which the dollars are tethered.
Mr. Zuckerberg is entrusting his donation to Newark Mayor Cory Booker, a strong advocate of vouchers and school choice, as is New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. The Newark teachers contract expired over the summer, and Mr. Booker has spoken favorably of the recently negotiated teacher contract in Washington, D.C., where schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee used private donations as leverage to enact reforms that tie teacher pay to student progress.

Uncategorized

Education Reform Goes Mainstream

September 30, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Jay Green:

I have no idea why a bunch of ed reformers are so gloomy. Matt has already observed how Rick Hess and Mike Petrilli can’t seem to enjoy the moment when ed reform ideas go mainstream. Now Liam Julian is joining the poopy parade, lamenting that the new crop of naive reformers are doomed to fail just as past ones have, and “it never works out.” And continuing the gloomy theme, Rick is worrying that school choice (in the form of vouchers) over-promised and under-delivered, losing the support of people like Sol Stern. That may be, but as a graduate student observed to me today, choice (in the form of vouchers) may have lost Sol Stern, but choice (in the form of charters) just gained Oprah, the Today Show, and the Democratic Party platform. Overall, he thought that was a pretty good trade, especially since he had to look up who Sol Stern was.
Let’s review. It is now commonly accepted among mainstream elites — from Oprah to Matt Lauer to Arne Duncan — that simply pouring more money into the public school system will not produce the results we want. It is now commonly accepted that the teacher unions have been a significant barrier to school improvement by protecting ineffective teachers and opposing meaningful reforms. It is now commonly accepted that parents should have a say in where their children go to school and this choice will push traditional public schools to improve. It is now commonly accepted that we have to address the incentives in the school system to recruit, retain, and motivate the best educators.

Uncategorized

Wisconsin Education: Sounding the Alarm: A Wakeup Call With Directions

September 27, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Frederick Hess & Oliva Meeks

There was a time when Wisconsin was a leader in school reform, and it wasn’t that long ago. All you have to do is go two decades back, and the state’s performance on reading and math assessments put its students in the nation’s upper tier. The 1990 Milwaukee Parental Choice Program was heralded as a watershed for school choice, and today, it is the nation’s largest school voucher program. Wisconsin was also an early adopter of charter schooling, and its SAGE class-size-reduction program gained national attention in the 1990s.
In the current education landscape, those days of innovation seem a long way off.
Wisconsin is no longer mentioned as an education innovator in the same breath as states like Louisiana, Tennessee, or Colorado. Wisconsin has also seen a tremendous erosion of its once-impressive math and reading performance. In 1990, Wisconsin outperformed 76% of the states in eighth-grade math scores. Today, Wisconsin has fallen to the middle of the pack. In reading, the decline has been even more precipitous.1 And all of this has happened in spite of the fact that statewide per-pupil spending has risen from $7,749 per student in 1990 to $10,041 in 2007 (in constant 2007 dollars), proving that just throwing money at a problem will not solve it.2
Perhaps the most vexing statistic is the racial divide – 93% of white students graduated high school in 2009 statewide, compared to only 66% of African-American students.3 This is a divide that no state or country can tolerate if it intends to remain functioning, let alone successful. The situation is most grim in Milwaukee, where only one-third of African-American tenth-graders–34%–are proficient in reading compared to 67% among their white classmates; in math, 19% of African-American students are proficient compared to 56% of white students.4

Uncategorized

Comments on Zuckerberg’s $100M for Newark Schools

September 24, 2010 Jim Zellmer

New Jersey Left Behind

Everyone’s abuzz over Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s donation of $100 million to Newark Public Schools on the condition that the State turn over control to Mayor Cory Booker. Here’s some choice quotes:
From detractors of the donation:
Joseph Del Grosso, president of the Newark Teachers Union, (fresh from his guest appearance on Jersey Shore [JK!]): “Vouchers is not going to happen.”
David Sciarra, Executive Director of Education Law Center: “It would be improper under the law for the governor to try to delegate authority to the mayor.”

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, History - Madison Schools, School Climate, Student Support, What Can I Do?

Madison School Board’s vote (to limit Outbound Open Enrollment) hurts kids — and the city

September 19, 2010 Jim Zellmer 22 Comments

Chris Rickert:

Open enrollment allows students to go to schools outside their district. If “school choice” and “vouchers” are the buzz words popping into your head right now, you’re probably not alone. When the legislation passed in 1997, it was in the same ballpark as those two old Republican saws. Open enrollment supposedly introduces choice to the public education “marketplace,” forcing districts to compete and get better.
Democrats typically see such policies as the first step toward balkanizing the public schools into the haves and have-nots, when they should be a hallmark of a society in which any kid can become president.
Open enrollment has not shown a particularly good light on Madison in recent years. More kids have been transferring out than in, with the net loss last year 435 students. The resolution the school board passed Monday calls on the state to allow districts to limit the students that could leave under open enrollment “if the school board believes the fiscal stability of the district is threatened.”
Clearly, district leaders feel open enrollment is a fiscal threat; their analysis shows it created about a $2.7 million hole in the district budget last school year.

Much more on the Madison School District’s attempt to limit outbound open enrollment here.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Student Support

An interview with Diane Ravitch

September 6, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Columbus Education Association:

Dr. Diane Ravitch is a polarizing figure in the education world. From 1991-1993, Ravitch served as Assistant Secretary of Education in President George H.W. Bush’s administration. Originally a strong proponent of school choice, vouchers and high-stakes testing, her views have changed considerably. She argues for her change of heart and in her new book, The Death and Life of the Great American School System.
It was recently announced that Dr. Ravitch will receive NEA’s 2010 Friend of Education Award. CEA recently interviewed Dr. Ravitch about the role of teaching and learning in the age of accountability.

Let’s say you were to walk into an elementary classroom in any school district ten years from now. If we stay on the present course set by NCLB, how will teaching and learning be different?
I think that there will be a great deal of drilling and teaching to the test. Most of the day will be spent on reading and mathematics. Kids will be encouraged to take lots and lots of test prep. This is happening now and I don’t see any change in the foreseeable future. The secretary has said that 100 percent of all kids should be proficient. There doesn’t seem to be an end date where this regime will conclude in victory. Now that so many states are tying teacher evaluation to test scores, it is predictable that we will have a system in which testing of basic skills is the basic purpose of education.

Mike Antonucci has more.

Events, School Climate

Duncan’s Invitation Just the Start of the Problem

September 3, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Neal McCluskey:

o U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan invited every Education Department employee to attend Rev. Al Sharpton’s Glenn Beck counter-rally. As David Boaz explained in the Examiner, it was a “highly inappropriate” thing to do, pushing people who are supposed to serve all Americans to support one side of a “political debate.” But that’s just the most obvious problem with Duncan’s weekend doings.
Perhaps just as troubling as his rally-prodding is that Duncan declared education “the civil rights issue of our generation” at Sharpton’s event. This only about a year after helping to kill an education program widely supported by many of the people he and Sharpton insist they want to empower. I’m talking, of course, about Washington, DC’s, Opportunity Scholarship Program, a voucher program that was proven effective. But the heck with success — Duncan and President Obama let the union-hated program die.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Wisconsin’s Mind is on Education

September 2, 2010 Jim Zellmer 1 Comment

Kenneth M. Goldstein and William G. Howell

Over half of Wisconsinites (51 percent) told us that they were paying either “a great deal” or “quite a bit” of attention to issues involving education. In national surveys, 38 percent of the American public as a whole. When asked about specific education reforms, moreover, Wisconsinites are as much as five times more likely to stake out a clear position either in support or opposition than is the American public. Assuming such differences aren’t strictly an artifact of survey methodology, a possibility we will discuss, Wisconsinites seem to pay more attention to educational issues and revealed a greater willingness to offer their opinions on education and potential reforms. In other words, when it comes to education, the people of Wisconsin have strong views and that makes them different from the rest of the country.
Wisconsin residents reported higher levels of support for a variety of reforms–in particular vouchers, charter schools, online education, and merit pay–than does the nation as a whole. That said, opposition levels to these reforms were also as high or higher than the nation as a whole. Though they give their local schools slightly lower grades than does the American public, Wisconsin residents also claimed (correctly) that their students perform as well as or better than students in other states on standardized tests. And Wisconsin residents are just as enthusiastic about student accountability requirements as is the American public. And Wisconsinites have another thing in common with their fellow Americans: they vastly underestimate the actual amount of money that is spent each year on students in public schools.
There is another important element that can be taken from this poll. The divide between residents of Milwaukee and the rest of the state is deep. When asked about the quality of education in the state, Milwaukee residents offered significantly lower assessments than do residents statewide. In addition, city of Milwaukee residents distinguish themselves from other Wisconsinites for their higher levels of support for various education policy reforms.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support, Wellness

Everyone Wins in the Postcode Lottery

August 20, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Tim Harford

Life expectancy at birth ranges from 80 years in Hawaii to 72 in Washington, DC; and from 83 in Japan to 40 in Swaziland. In vitro fertilisation is available in some regions of the UK within months; in others it takes years. Fill in your own example here, because it is now a commonplace that the price, availability and quality of anything from a nursing home to a good education will vary depending on where you live.
I am not sure whether the British complain more about this than anyone else, but we have developed our own term to describe it: the “postcode lottery”. For community-minded gamblers there is actually a real postcode lottery, in which prizes are shared between winning ticket-holders and those fortunate enough to have homes on the same street. But for most Britons, the term is a lazy shorthand for the fact that where you live affects what you get.
There is a glaring problem with this phrase: while the ticket that gets pulled out of the tombola is chosen at random, the postcodes where you and I live are not. We aren’t serfs. If we want to move and we can afford to move, we can move.
I live in Hackney, a London borough where crime is high and the schools are poor. If I had a few spare million, perhaps I would move to Hampstead or Chelsea. I do not. People who shop at Harrods expect better food than those who shop at Tesco. Ferraris are faster and sexier than Fords. There are many words to describe this state of affairs, but “lottery” is not the one I would choose.

Harford makes an excellent point. It is clearly futile to impose one size fits all approaches, particularly in education. We, as a society are far better off with a diverse governance (many smaller schools/districts/charters/vouchers) and curricular environment.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Milwaukee’s School Experiment Shows Promise

July 14, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Patrick Wolf:

On a rainy May morning in 2008, my research team assembled at the Italian Community Center in downtown Milwaukee for focus-group sessions with the parents of students enrolled in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program.
After a long morning of listening to parents vent about the aspects of their children’s schools that disappointed them, the tone of the meeting suddenly changed when we concluded with an “open mike” session.
“We may complain a lot about our children’s schools,” one of the parents told us, “but please, please, please don’t take our school choice away.”
Parents like this concerned mother have played a starring role in the long-running policy debate over the school-choice program, which enables parents to select a school for their child other than the assigned neighborhood public school. Charter schools, for example, offer choices within the public school system. School-choice programs like Milwaukee’s notably include private schools and are often called voucher programs.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, History - Madison Schools, School Climate, Student Support

Leading the charge: Kaleem Caire returns to south side to head Urban League

July 2, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Kaleem Caire & Maya Cole 2010 by Jim Zellmer at the Madison Screening of the Lottery

Pat Schneider:

Things have changed since Caire was raised by an aunt across the street from Penn Park at a time when adults didn’t hesitate to scold neighborhood kids who got out of line, and parents took on second jobs to make ends meet. Today, there is more “hard core” poverty, more crime, and much less sense of place, says Caire, who still can recite which families lived up Fisher Street and down Taft.
The supportive community of his boyhood began disappearing in the 1980s, as young parents moved in from Chicago to escape poverty and could not find the training and jobs they needed, Caire says. People started to lose their way. In a speech this month to the Madison Downtown Rotary, Caire said he has counted 56 black males he knew growing up that ended up incarcerated. “Most of ’em, you would never have seen it coming.”
Caire, once a consultant on minority education for the state and advocate for voucher schools, left Madison a decade ago and worked with such national nonprofit organizations as the Black Alliance for Educational Options and Fight for Children. Later he worked for discount retailer Target Corp., where he was a fast-rising executive, he says, until he realized his heart wasn’t in capitalism, despite the excellent managerial mentoring he received.
The sense of community that nurtured his youth has disappeared in cities across the country, Caire remarks. So he’s not trying to recreate the South Madison of the past, but rather to build connections that will ground people from throughout Madison in the community and inform the Urban League’s programs.

Caire recently attended the Madison Premiere of “The Lottery“, a film which highlights the battle between bureaucratic school districts, teacher unions and students (and parents).

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Competition boosts public schools

June 22, 2010 Jim Zellmer

The Tampa Tribune:

During a debate last February in Tallahassee on a proposal to expand a scholarship program that allows poor children to go to private schools, state Sen. Frederica Wilson decried the legislation.
“We’re taking children out of the public schools and making them weaker,” the Miami Democrat said. “This is not America.”
A recent study by a highly regarded Northwestern University researcher shows how wrong Wilson was. Florida voters are fortunate that the Legislature passed the bill and Gov. Charlie Crist signed it into law.
The study found public schools’ performance improved when they were faced with the possibility of losing students to private schools.
At issue is the Florida Tax Credit Scholarships, which provide vouchers to children from poor families.

Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Teacher Support

A drastic teacher overhaul at St. Joan Antida High School

June 21, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

How about this for strong medicine to improve a school: Ask every teacher and administrator to turn in resignations. Tell them they can reapply for their jobs, but there’s going to be higher expectations from now on. Hire back less than half of the staff. Revamp the academic program extensively.
I’ve rarely heard of it actually happening around the country, and never around here. Until now:
“It’s a new day,” the message board outside St. Joan Antida High School, the 300-student, all-girls Catholic school at 1341 N. Cass St., says. It certainly is.
It’s been a difficult few years for the 56-year-old school. Enrollment declined from close to the building’s capacity of 400 to about 300. Competition increased from other private schools, charter schools and even suburban public schools.
The level of academic success at St. Joan Antida wasn’t much different than in Milwaukee Public Schools, which means it wasn’t very good.
Some students who enrolled were far behind grade level and the school wasn’t doing well in accelerating their achievement. The student body had become much less diverse – higher-income and white students had just about all departed, 90% of the students qualified for publicly funded school vouchers, and the student body was about evenly split between African-American and Hispanic.
People involved in the school say discussions about making major changes go back several years. Some teachers at the non-unionized school were not renewed, and there were some other efforts to improve. But the results didn’t amount to much.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Teachers Are Fair Game

June 12, 2010 Jim Zellmer

David Brooks:

I started covering education reform in 1983, with the release of the “Nation at Risk” report. In those days everybody had some idea for how we should reorganize the schools or change the curriculum–cut school size, cut class size, create vouchers, create charters, get back to basics, do less basics, increase local control, increase the federal role.
Some of the reforms seemed promising, but the results were disappointing, and tangential to the core issue: the relationship between teacher and student. It is mushy to say so, but people learn from people they love.
Today, aided by the realization that teacher quality is what matters most, a new cadre of reformers have come on the scene, many of them bred within the ranks of Teach for America. These are stubborn, data-driven types with a low tolerance for bullshit. The reform environment they find themselves in is both softhearted and hardheaded. They put big emphasis on the teaching relationship, but are absolutely Patton-esque when it comes to dismantling anything that interferes with that relationship. This includes union rules that protect bad and mediocre teachers, teacher contracts that prevent us from determining which educators are good and which need help, and state and federal laws that either impede reform or dump money into the ancien régime.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

A Study on How Florida Tax-Credit Scholarship program impacts public schools

June 3, 2010 Jim Zellmer

David Figlio and Cassandra Hart [340K PDF]:

School choice option including both voucher and neo-voucher options like tuition tax credit funded scholarship programs have become increasingly prevalent in recent years (Howell, Peterson, Wolf and Campbell, 2006). One popular argument for school choice policies is that public schools will improve the education they offer when faced with competition for students. Because state funds are tied to student enrollment, losing students to private schools
constitutes a financial loss to public schools. If schools face the threat of losing students and the state funds attached to those students–to private schools, they should be incentivized to cultivate customer (i.e., parental) satisfaction by operating more efficiently and improving on the outcomes valued by students and parents (Friedman, 1962).
Alternatively, vouchers may have unintended negative effects on public schools if they draw away the most involved families from public schools and the monitoring of those schools diminishes, allowing schools to reduce effort put into educating students (McMillan, 2004).1
It is notoriously difficult to gauge the competitive effects of private schools on public
school performance because private school supply and public school performance affect each other dynamically (Dee, 1998; McEwan, 2000). In cross-section, the relationship between private school supply and public school performance could plausibly be either upward-biased or downward-biased. On the one hand, private schools may disproportionately locate in communities with low-quality public schools. In such a case, the estimated relationship between private school penetration and public school performance would be downward-biased. On the other hand, if private schools locate in areas with high valuation of educational quality, then the

Jay Greene has more.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

No magic bullet for education America keeps looking for one simple solution for its education shortcomings. There isn’t one.

June 1, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Los Angeles Times:

The “unschooling” movement of the 1970s featured open classrooms, in which children studied what they were most interested in, when they felt ready. That was followed by today’s back-to-basics, early-start model, in which students complete math worksheets in kindergarten and are supposed to take algebra by eighth grade at the latest. Under the “whole language” philosophy of the 1980s, children were expected to learn to read by having books read to them. By the late 1990s, reading lessons were dominated by phonics, with little time spent on the joys of what reading is all about — unlocking the world of stories and information.
A little more than a decade ago, educators bore no responsibility for their students’ failure; it was considered the fault of the students, their parents and unequal social circumstances. Now schools are held liable for whether students learn, regardless of the students’ lack of effort or previous preparation, and are held solely accountable for reaching unrealistic goals of achievement.
No wonder schools have a chronic case of educational whiplash. If there’s a single aspect of schooling that ought to end, it’s the decades of abrupt and destructive swings from one extreme to another. There is no magic in the magic-bullet approach to learning. Charters are neither evil nor saviors; they can be a useful complement to public schools, but they have not blazed a sure-fire path to student achievement. Decreeing that all students will be proficient in math and reading by 2014 hasn’t moved us dramatically closer to the mark.

Diffused governance, is, in my view, the best way forward. This means that communities should offer a combination of public, private, virtual, charter and voucher options. A diversity of K-12 approaches insures that a one size fits all race to the bottom does not prevail. I was very disappointed to recently learn that Wisconsin’s Democrat Senator Russ Feingold voted to kill the Washington, DC voucher program. No K-12 approach is perfect, but eliminating that option for the poorest members of our society is simply unpalatable.
Somewhat related Lee Bergquist and Erin Richards: Wisconsin Governor Candidate Mark Neumann taps public funds for private schools

Republican businessman Mark Neumann started his first taxpayer-funded school with 49 students, and in eight years enrollment has mushroomed to nearly 1,000 students in four schools.
Neumann, a candidate for governor who preaches smaller government and fiscal conservatism, has used his entrepreneurial skills to tap private and public funds – including federal stimulus dollars – to start schools in poor neighborhoods.
The former member of the U.S. House operates three religious-based schools in Milwaukee, a fourth nonreligious school in Phoenix and has plans to build clusters of schools across the country.
The Nashotah businessman is part of a growing national movement from the private sector that is providing poor neighborhoods an alternative to traditional public schools.
There are signs the schools are achieving one of their primary goals of getting students into post-secondary schools.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, School Climate

Republicans Sell Out Chicago Schoolkids

May 12, 2010 Jim Zellmer

William McGurn:

In the 19th century, Illinois was the land of Lincoln. In the 20th, it was the birthplace of Ronald Reagan. In the 21st, Illinois has given us a new breed of Republican: Roger Eddy.
Mr. Eddy is what they call a downstater, an assemblyman who serves an east-central Illinois district hugging the Indiana border. His day job turns out to be in government as well, as a public schools superintendent.
Last week Mr. Eddy became the face of the Republican failure to get a voucher bill through the Illinois assembly. The bill had passed the Senate. Yet despite being pushed by a remarkable coalition involving fellow Republicans, a free-market state think tank, and a prominent African-American leader, only 25 Republicans in the House voted yes. That was 12 votes short. Mr. Eddy was one of 23 Republicans who killed it by voting no.
“Last week was a missed opportunity for children in Chicago’s worst and most overcrowded schools, and it was a missed opportunity for Republicans,” says Collin Hitt, who handles education issues for the Illinois Policy Institute. “It’s not often that a minority Republican party has the chance to advance cornerstone policy with key African-American support. The good news is that the legislation remains alive, and this bill has another chance.”

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Student Support

4 initiatives seek to raise student proficiencies

May 11, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

Leaders and backers of the handful of high-energy “no excuses” schools in Milwaukee are launching efforts aimed at tripling the number of children attending such schools in the city.
The goal proclaimed by leaders of four efforts that have sprung up almost simultaneously is to raise the number of students in such demanding schools from about 6,000 now to 20,000 by 2020.
If the efforts succeed, they will dramatically change the education landscape in Milwaukee and, backers hope, make widespread the high achievement levels of the schools that are at the center of the new effort.
But for the effort to succeed, major political, institutional and financial hurdles will need to be jumped. People on both sides of the longstanding, giant chasm between partisans for Milwaukee Public Schools and partisans for charter schools and private voucher schools will need to cooperate and focus on matters of improving the quality of education where they might actually find common ground.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Student Support

Why Charter Schools Fail the Test

May 6, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Charles Murray:

THE latest evaluation of the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program, the oldest and most extensive system of vouchers and charter schools in America, came out last month, and most advocates of school choice were disheartened by the results.
The evaluation by the School Choice Demonstration Project, a national research group that matched more than 3,000 students from the choice program and from regular public schools, found that pupils in the choice program generally had “achievement growth rates that are comparable” to similar Milwaukee public-school students. This is just one of several evaluations of school choice programs that have failed to show major improvements in test scores, but the size and age of the Milwaukee program, combined with the rigor of the study, make these results hard to explain away.
So let’s not try to explain them away. Why not instead finally acknowledge that standardized test scores are a terrible way to decide whether one school is better than another? This is true whether the reform in question is vouchers, charter schools, increased school accountability, smaller class sizes, better pay for all teachers, bonuses for good teachers, firing of bad teachers — measured by changes in test scores, each has failed to live up to its hype.

Jay Greene:

Murray wants to be clear that he still favors choice, but not to improve test scores. Instead, he favors choice because it satisfies the diversity of preferences about how schools teach and what they teach. Standardized test scores impose a uniform concept of higher achievement on students, and so cannot capture the improved satisfaction of the diversity of tastes that choice can more efficiently satisfy.
There is a kernel of truth in Murray’s argument. We should support school choice simply because it allows us the liberty of providing our children with the kind of education that we prefer.

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Ongoing evaluation of Milwaukee Choice Program finds students achieving on same level as peers

April 7, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Stacy Forster:

Students in the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program scored at similar levels as their peers not participating in the school choice program, according to a study released Wednesday.
Researchers from the University of Arkansas and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, who led the study, presented their findings at UW-Madison. The study also found that Milwaukee Public Schools are doing better than expected when compared with other urban school districts.
The reports released Wednesday represent the midway point of a five-year study of the oldest and largest public voucher program in the United States, which provides funding for more than 20,000 students to attend private schools in Milwaukee.
The comparison between students in private voucher schools and those in public schools was made two years after large panels of students in the program and students in the Milwaukee public school system had been carefully matched to each other.

Books, Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Student Support

Ravitch is Wrong Week, Day #1

April 7, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Stuart Buck:

Diane Ravitch’s new book “The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education” has been burning up the charts. Ravitch has been ubiquitous, writing op-eds in support of her book, doing lectures and interviews all over the place, and being reviewed in all sorts of high-profile venues.
As an overall matter, the book says little, if anything, that is actually new on the subjects of testing and choice. What Ravitch is really selling with this book is the story of her personal and ideological conversion. Not so long ago, she was writing articles like “In Defense of Testing,” or “The Right Thing: Why Liberals Should Be Pro-Choice,” a lengthy article in The New Republic that remains one of the most passionate and eloquent defenses of school choice and vouchers in particular. Now she seems to be a diehard opponent of these things. But she’s not saying anything that other diehard opponents haven’t already said countless times.

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History of School Reform Offers Glimmer of Hope

March 30, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Laura Impellizzeri:

“Saving Schools: From Horace Mann to Virtual Learning” (Belknap Press, 336 pages, $25.95) by Paul E. Peterson: Education reformers have left the essential teacher-pupil relationship untouched for more than a century, fighting instead for changes outside the classroom: desegregation, teacher pay hikes, funding equality, increased testing, vouchers and changes in curriculum.
Harvard University government professor Paul Peterson argues that although many of those efforts have been well-intentioned, even noble, American schools haven’t kept pace with changes in society. And they’re just not very good.
In a compelling and enlightening narrative, “Saving Schools: From Horace Mann to Virtual Learning,” Peterson traces a variety of reform movements by profiling their leaders or other key players. Horace Mann fostered public schools nationwide, creating a global model in the 19th century; in the early 1900s, John Dewey pushed for education that respected children as individuals and erased social strata; the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., in leading the civil rights movement, forced schools to start doing as courts and legislators told them; Albert Shanker pushed for better pay and conditions for teachers; a series of “rights” reformers tried to improve quality across the board, while a series of scholars measuring their work found precious little benefit, and that led to the “adequacy” and choice movements, including the push for publicly funded vouchers and charter schools, which together involve less than 10 percent of U.S. schoolchildren.

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More on Diane Ravitch & School Choice

March 28, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

Milwaukee, in the strongly revised opinion of Diane Ravitch, is almost a textbook example for showing that the prediction that the tide of school choice will lift all educational boats is wrong.
“One might wonder about how much (Milwaukee Public Schools) is coming apart at the seams because of the competition,” Ravitch said in a telephone conversation. “The competition was supposed to make things better.”
A few years ago, Ravitch was a prominent voice for that latter sentiment. But in a way that has caused a stir in education circles nationwide, she now has come down emphatically in the opposite camp when it comes to private school vouchers, charter schools and the testing-based accountability regimen that is at the heart of the No Child Left Behind education law.
Those ideas just haven’t worked, she argues in “The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education.” It is time to return to emphasizing better curriculum and instruction as the key to better success, she says, and it is time for emphasizing the needs of the mainstream of public school students.

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A Setback for Educational Civil Rights

March 19, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Theodord Hesburgh:

I cannot believe that a Democratic administration will let this injustice of killing D.C. vouchers stand.
When President Dwight D. Eisenhower asked me to become one of the founding members of the newly formed U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, African-Americans drank at separate water fountains and our schools were segregated. A decade later, when people came together to march against these injustices, the idea that a black man could ever be elected president of the United States was still something for dreamers. My experience with that great movement gives me a particular appreciation for the historic importance of the presidency of Barack Obama–and the new dreams that his example will inspire in our young.
If Martin Luther King Jr. told me once, he told me a hundred times that the key to solving our country’s race problem is plain as day: Find decent schools for our kids. So I was especially heartened to hear Education Secretary Arne Duncan repeatedly call education the “civil rights issue of our generation.” Millions of our children–disproportionately poor and minority–remain trapped in failing public schools that condemn them to lives on the fringe of the American Dream.

Curriculum, Elections, Events, School Climate

Our Stand on Standards

March 13, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Jim Stergios:

Seems our report and the release of the common core standards draft have set off a lot of interest in Massachusetts’ view, and especially in Pioneer’s take on the national standards effort. See Jay Greene’s blog for a long string of comments. Here is a bit of a longish overview of some of the issues we see in this from the Massachusetts and the national perspective. First, the Mass perspective:

1. Standards are the lifeblood of student achievement in public schools; and that includes even those site-based managed schools that are based on parental choice. You all know the stories of charters and voucher programs that don’t deliver the kind of transformational improvement we all want. In MA, our charters for the most part are of a higher quality than elsewhere and far outperform their district counterparts. In part that is because of the great upfront business planning/vetting and accountability/closure processes (yes, regulation), but it is even more because MA has set really high academic standards, assessments, and teacher testing. Charters are effective at attaining goals but you have to set high academic goals for them to be good schools with high-achieving students. Arizona, with its numerous but too often lower quality charter schools, take note.

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A Decent Education

March 4, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Chicago Tribune Editorial:

When state Sen. James Meeks asks fellow Democrats to give education vouchers to kids who attend some of the worst schools in Chicago, the legislators often tell him they don’t want to divert dollars from public education.
Meeks’ response: “If the public schools are not doing their job, why do you want to continue to reward them with money?”
Good question.
We have yet to hear a good answer.
Meeks is trying valiantly to shake up the status quo in public education, and we stand with him in that effort. He is pushing a solid plan to create a voucher program for Chicago. The Senate’s executive subcommittee on education is set to discuss the bill on Wednesday.

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Parent Feedback on the Madison School District’s “Branding” Expenditures

February 28, 2010 Jim Zellmer 2 Comments

via a kind reader’s email: Parent Diane Harrington:

Dear Board Members, Dr. Nerad, and Madison Alders,
My 11-year-old and I visited John Muir Elementary for basketball practice one recent evening. Their gym has banners noting that for several years they’ve been named a “School of Excellence.”
Ben’s school, Orchard Ridge Elementary, had just been dubbed a “School of Promise.”
Which school would YOU rather go to?
But Ben didn’t need a marketing effort to tell him which school was which; he knows some John Muir kids. Ben, too, would like to go to a school where kids are expected to learn and to behave instead of just encouraged to.
Just like those banners, the very idea of your upcoming, $86,000 “branding” effort isn’t fooling anyone.
You don’t need to improve your image. You need to improve your schools.
Stop condescending to children, to parents and to the public. Skip the silly labels and the PR plans.
Instead, just do your #^%* job. (If you need help filling in that blank, head to ORE or Toki. Plenty of kids – some as young as kindergarten – use several colorful words in the hallways, classrooms, lunchroom and playground without even a second look, much less disciplinary action, from a teacher or principal.)
Create an environment that strives for excellence, not mediocrity. Guide children to go above and beyond, rather than considering your job done once they’ve met the minimum requirements.
Until then, it’s all too obvious that any effort to “cultivate relationships with community partners” is just what you’re branding it: marketing. It’s just about as meaningless as that “promise” label on ORE or the “honor roll” that my 13-year-old and half the Toki seventh graders are on.
P.S. At my neighborhood association’s annual Winter Social earlier tonight, one parent of a soon-to-be-elementary-age child begged me to tell him there was some way to get a voucher so he could avoid sending his daughter to ORE. His family can’t afford private school. Another parent told me her soon-to-be-elementary-age kids definitely (whew!) were going to St. Maria Goretti instead of ORE. A friend – even though her son was finishing up at ORE this year – pulled her daughter out after kindergarten (yes, to send her to Goretti), because the atmosphere at ORE is just too destructive and her child wasn’t learning anything. These people aren’t going to be fooled by a branding effort. And you’re only fooling yourselves (and wasting taxpayer money) if you think otherwise.

Parent Lorie Raihala:

Regarding the Madison School District’s $86,000 “branding campaign,” recent polls have surveyed the many families who have left the district for private schools, virtual academies, home schooling or open enrollment in other districts.
Public schools are tuition free and close to home, so why have these parents chosen more expensive, less convenient options? The survey results are clear: because Madison schools have disregarded their children’s learning needs.
Top issues mentioned include a lack of challenging academics and out-of-control behavior problems. Families are leaving because of real experience in the schools, not “bad press” or “street corner stories.”
How will the district brand that?
Lorie Raihala Madison

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Learning as We Go: Why School Choice Is Worth the Wait

February 24, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Paul Hill via a Center on Reinventing Public Education email:

Why haven’t schools of choice yet achieved a broader appeal? Publicly funded school choice programs–charter schools in forty-three states and vouchers in a few localities–have for the most part been qualified successes. Yet the rhetoric of choice supporters promised much more effective schools and an era of innovation that has not come to pass. In Learning as We Go: Why School Choice Is Worth the Wait, Paul T. Hill examines the real-world factors that can complicate, delay, and in some instances interfere with the positive cause-and-effect relationships identified by the theories behind school choice.
Hill explains why schools of choice haven’t yet achieved a broader appeal and details the key factors–including politics, policy, and regulation–that explain the delay. The author then suggests changes in public policy along with philanthropic investment that could overcome barriers and increase the rate of progress toward full operation of what he calls the “virtuous cycle” stimulated by school choice.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, School Climate

Harambee Community School has had periods of excellence. But now, lack of accreditation could mean its end after 40 years.

February 22, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

A rich history. Energetic, sweet students, including several kindergartners who spontaneously gave me hugs. Teachers and administrators who want to succeed. A good building. I enjoyed my visit to Harambee Community School, and I’d like to feel bad about what the school is facing now.
But I don’t.
Harambee faces its end, after 40 years. And it’s hard to reach any conclusion other than that it is the fault of leaders of the school.
If efforts to bring more quality to Milwaukee schools are going to mean anything, a central pillar has to be accountability or, to put it another way, taking a firm line on schools that don’t measure up, be they voucher, charter, or conventional public schools.
In a tough love sort of way, if Harambee closes after this school year, this probably will be a success for those saying high-needs children need better than what they are getting.
A law passed by the Legislature in 2006 was perfectly clear: To stay in Milwaukee’s private school voucher program and receive large sums of money from the state, a school had to get accredited by Dec. 31, 2009.
Three and a half years later, it was Dec. 31, 2009, and every school that was covered by the requirement had either succeeded or closed, except one: Harambee.

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Change and Race to the Top

February 21, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Robert Godfrey:

Which brings us to this next item, one with twist and turns not completely understandable at this point, but certainly not held up by people like myself as a model of how to “get the job properly done” — to use Herbert’s words.
Diane Ravitch, an intellectual on education policy, difficult to pigeonhole politically (appointed to public office by both G.H.W. Bush and Clinton), but best described as an independent, co-writes a blog with Deborah Meier that some of our readers may be familiar with called “Bridging Differences.” This past week she highlighted a possibly disturbing development in the Race to the Top competition program of the Department of Education, that dangles $4.3 billion to the states with a possible $1.3 billion to follow. Ravitch’s critique suggests that this competition is not run by pragmatists, but rather by ideologues who are led by the Bill Gates Foundation.

If this election had been held five years ago, the department would be insisting on small schools, but because Gates has already tried and discarded that approach, the department is promoting the new Gates remedies: charter schools, privatization, and evaluating teachers by student test scores.

Two of the top lieutenants of the Gates Foundation were placed in charge of the competition by Secretary Arne Duncan. Both have backgrounds as leaders in organisations dedicated to creating privately managed schools that operate with public money.

None of this is terribly surprising (See the Sunlight Foundation’s excellent work on the Obama Administration’s insider dealings with PhRMA). Jeff Henriques did a lot of work looking at the Madison School District’s foray into Small Learning Communities.
Is it possible to change the current K-12 bureacracy from within? Ripon Superintendent Richard Zimman spoke about the “adult employment” focus of the K-12 world:

“Beware of legacy practices (most of what we do every day is the maintenance of the status quo), @12:40 minutes into the talk – the very public institutions intended for student learning has become focused instead on adult employment. I say that as an employee. Adult practices and attitudes have become embedded in organizational culture governed by strict regulations and union contracts that dictate most of what occurs inside schools today. Any impetus to change direction or structure is met with swift and stiff resistance. It’s as if we are stuck in a time warp keeping a 19th century school model on life support in an attempt to meet 21st century demands.” Zimman went on to discuss the Wisconsin DPI’s vigorous enforcement of teacher licensing practices and provided some unfortunate math & science teacher examples (including the “impossibility” of meeting the demand for such teachers (about 14 minutes)). He further cited exploding teacher salary, benefit and retiree costs eating instructional dollars (“Similar to GM”; “worry” about the children given this situation).

I suspect that Duncan and many others are trying to significantly change the adult to student process, rather than simply pumping more money into the current K-12 monopoly structures.
They are to be commended for this.
Will there be waste, fraud and abuse? Certainly. Will there be waste fraud and abuse if the funds are spent on traditional K-12 District organizations? Of course. John Stossel notes that when one puts together the numbers, Washington, DC’s schools spend $26,000 per student, while they provide $7,500 to the voucher schools…..
We’re better off with diffused governance across the board. Milwaukee despite its many travails, is developing a rich K-12 environment.
The Verona school board narrowly approved a new Mandarin immersion charter school on a 4-3 vote recently These citizen initiatives offer some hope for new opportunities for our children. I hope we see more of this.
Finally, all of this presents an interesting contrast to what appears to be the Madison School District Administration’s ongoing “same service” governance approach.

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Education: Too Important for a Government Monopoly

February 20, 2010 Jim Zellmer

John Stossel:

The government-school establishment has said the same thing for decades: Education is too important to leave to the competitive market. If we really want to help our kids, we must focus more resources on the government schools.
But despite this mantra, the focus is on something other than the kids. When The Washington Post asked George Parker, head of the Washington, D.C., teachers union, about the voucher program there, he said: “Parents are voting with their feet. … As kids continue leaving the system, we will lose teachers. Our very survival depends on having kids in D.C. schools so we’ll have teachers to represent.”
How revealing is that?
Since 1980, government spending on education, adjusted for inflation, has nearly doubled. But test scores have been flat for decades.
Today we spend a stunning $11,000 a year per student — more than $200,000 per classroom. It’s not working. So when will we permit competition and choice, which works great with everything else? I’ll explore those questions on my Fox Business program tomorrow night at 8 and 11 p.m. Eastern time (and again Friday at 10 p.m.).
The people who test students internationally told us that two factors predict a country’s educational success: Do the schools have the autonomy to experiment, and do parents have a choice?

Locally, the Madison School District has 24,295 students and a 2009/2010 budget of $418,415,780. $17,222 per student.

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New regulations impacting Milwaukee school choice program: School closures up, number of new schools down

February 19, 2010 Jim Zellmer

The Public Policy Forum, via a kind reader’s email:

Between the 2008-09 and 2009-10 school years, fewer new schools joined the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program (MPCP) than ever before. In addition, 14 MPCP schools closed and another three schools merged–the most year-over- year closures the program has seen (Chart 1).
In this 12th edition of the Public Policy Forum’s annual census of MPCP schools, we find 112 schools are participating in the choice program, enrolling 21,062 students using taxpayer-funded tuition vouchers. The number of full-time equivalent students using vouchers is greater than in any other year of the program’s 19-year history; however, there are fewer schools participating today than earlier this decade (Chart 2, page 2).
The decline in the number of new schools and the increase in the number of closed schools are likely due to new state regulations governing the program. These regulations require schools new to the program to obtain pre-accreditation before opening and require existing schools to become accredited within three years of joining the program.
Throughout this decade, the average number of schools new to the program had been 11 per year. Under the new pre- accreditation requirement, 19 schools applied for pre-accreditation, but just three were approved. Another 38 schools had previously indicated to state regulators an intent to participate in the program in 2009-2010, but did not apply for pre -accreditation. The pre-accreditation process is conducted by the Institute for the Transformation of Learning (ITL) at Marquette University.

Milwaukee Voucher Schools – 2010.
Complete report: 184K PDF, press release: 33K PDF

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Book shares Chicago recipe for good schools

January 31, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

I think I have about as good a handle as anyone on the reasons to feel depressed about the Milwaukee school situation. I’ve been giving talks to groups around the city fairly often lately. I jokingly refer to it as my Spreading Gloom tour.
But at heart, I still am optimistic. Why?
Because I’ve had the privilege of visiting some schools lately that offer hope. There are too few of them, but they exist. You find them in the Milwaukee Public Schools system, among the private schools supported by public vouchers, and among the charter schools that operate outside MPS. I expect to feature some of them in upcoming columns.
Because there is ample reason to believe that other urban school systems are doing better than Milwaukee. Every school district that is dominated by children coming from impoverished settings has big struggles. But other cities are showing more success and exhibiting more energy than we are, and I don’t know any convincing reason why Milwaukee needs to be behind the pack so often. Certainly, this could be changed if we did the right things.
Because things have to get better in terms of the educational success of kids for the city, the metropolitan area and even the state to thrive, and I somehow think awareness of that will eventually create enough pressure to bring improvement.
And – my specific subject for today – because of a new book.

Organizing Schools for Improvement: Lessons from Chicago.

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Two New Governors Pick Reform Oriented Education Chiefs

January 20, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Wall Street Journal:

Kudos to the country’s two newest governors, Republicans Bob McDonnell of Virginia and Chris Christie of New Jersey, who have tapped strong school choice advocates to head their state education departments.
Last week, Mr. McDonnell chose Gerald Robinson to become Virginia’s next Secretary of Education. Mr. Robinson currently heads the Black Alliance for Educational Options, a national nonprofit that backs charter schools and performance pay for teachers. Meanwhile, Mr. Christie has picked former Jersey City Mayor Bret Schundler to serve as his state’s next education commissioner. Mr. Schundler is an unabashed supporter of using education vouchers and charter schools to improve the plight of urban school districts.
This is good news for all school children in both states, but it’s especially auspicious for low-income kids stuck in failing schools who have the most to gain from a state education official who is unafraid to shake up the establishment. Virginia has a grand total of three charter schools, one of the lowest numbers in the nation. New Jersey spends more money per pupil than all but two states, yet test scores in Newark and Jersey City are among the worst in the country.

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Our Opinion: If only wishing could pay the education bills

January 18, 2010 Jim Zellmer

Tallahassee Democrat:

Perhaps with business organizations behind it, a significant increase in the state’s investment in education from kindergarten through college could gain some traction in the Florida Legislature.
Certainly without it, there is virtually no likelihood that lawmakers in an election year will find the courage to search for ways — not all of them monetary — to improve public education, and therefore our state’s chances for the future.
An educated population and an accomplished work force are the underpinnings of a state where, as the Florida Council of 100 and Florida Chamber of Commerce expressed in a report last week, the American dream can be successfully carried out. Where better, asked Council of 100 Chair Susan Story “than in the state of Florida?”
Both Gov. Charlie Crist and former Gov. Jeb Bush put their stamp of approval on what was described at its unveiling Thursday as the “education wish list” of these two significant Florida business groups. Last year, the two joined with education leaders to get more money for higher education, even though the Legislature went in the opposite direction, cutting $150 million from our universities. Again this year budget committees are asking universities to be prepared for across-the-board cuts as high as 10 percent, in keeping with a budget shortfall of as much as $3 billion.
The recommendations from these groups, which are coincidentally against most tax or fee increases and lifting sales-tax exemptions, include tougher graduation standards at the pre-K-12 level, virtual elimination of teacher tenure and a constitutional amendment legalizing vouchers.

Closing the Talent Gap: A Business Perspective (January 2010) 3MB PDF.
Updates, via a Steven M. Birnholz email:
Press Release.
“Political, Business Leaders: Overhaul Education in Fla.” Lakeland Ledger
“Business groups propose major changes to education,” Daytona Beach News Journal.

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‘Duplicitous and Shameful’ Democrats vote to send poor kids to inferior schools.

December 20, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Wall Street Journal:

The waiting is finally over for some of the District of Columbia’s most ambitious school children and their parents. Democrats in Congress voted to kill the District’s Opportunity Scholarship Program, which provides 1,700 disadvantaged kids with vouchers worth up to $7,500 per year to attend a private school.
On Sunday the Senate approved a spending bill that phases out funding for the five-year-old program. Several prominent Senators this week sent a letter to Majority Leader Harry Reid pleading for a reconsideration. Signed by Independent-Democrat Joe Lieberman, Democrats Robert Byrd and Dianne Feinstein, and Republicans Susan Collins and John Ensign, it asked to save a program that has “provided a lifeline to many low-income students in the District of Columbia.” President Obama signed the bill Thursday.
The program’s popularity has generated long waiting lists. A federal evaluation earlier this year said the mostly black and Hispanic participants are making significant academic gains and narrowing the achievement gap. But for the teachers unions, this just can’t happen. The National Education Association instructed Democratic lawmakers to kill it.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Student Support

Will Obama’s School Reform Plan Work?

December 10, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Kim Clark:

America has tried many strategies over the decades to reverse the slow, steady decline in its public schools. Few of these have delivered real results. The “classrooms without walls” of the 1970s, for example, were supposed to open students’ minds to creativity and curiosity. It worked for some kids, but too many others ended up merely distracted. In the ’90s, school vouchers–publicly financed scholarships for low-income students to attend private schools–were praised as a way to give families choices and pressure schools to improve. Vouchers helped a fraction of families across the country but didn’t instigate any real change. The 2002 No Child Left Behind requirements were supposed to guarantee that every kid learned at least the “three R” basics. English and math scores for elementary students did inch up, but the scores of average American high schoolers on international science and math tests continued to sink. The United States currently ranks 17th in science and 24th in math, near the bottom of the developed world.
Now President Obama has launched the Race to the Top campaign to improve schools by holding students to higher standards, paying bonuses to teachers whose students excel, and replacing the worst schools with supposedly nimbler and more intimate charter schools. This time will be different, he insists, because he’s only going to promote strategies proven to help students, and he’s going to reward the winners of his reform race with prize money from a stimulus fund of at least $4 billion, a slice of the more than $100 billion he set aside for education in the stimulus bill.

Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

An undesirable inheritance
Children of illegal immigrants twice as likely as other kids to face poverty

December 9, 2009 Jim Zellmer

N.C. Aizenman:

Eight-year-old Alex picked up a 75-cent can of fruit punch from one of the grocery store’s shelves and called excitedly to his mother in Spanish.
Maria, 38, gave her stocky third-grader a sympathetic smile. She’d already made Alex and his 3-year-old sister, Emelyn, walk 30 minutes under a broiling sun from their house in suburban Maryland to the Safeway, the closest place that accepts Emelyn’s federal milk and cereal vouchers. Then they’d trekked 20 minutes more to this cheaper Latino grocery so Maria, an illegal immigrant from Mexico who can’t afford a car and wouldn’t be eligible for a driver’s license anyway, could save $3.40 on chicken.
“At home, my son,” Maria said soothingly. “When we get home, you can drink some water.”

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

Focus on raising well-rounded children

December 4, 2009 Jim Zellmer

South China Morning Post Editorial:

The voucher subsidy scheme for non-profit kindergartens triggered an uproar when it was announced three years ago, amid fears that an exodus of students would force profit-making schools to close and claims of discrimination against middle-class families. But critics failed to reckon with parents who believe it is never too soon to imbue the work ethic. As we reported yesterday, the voucher scheme is subsidising a new class of preschoolers, aged from three to six, who spend the entire day in two separate kindergartens – one for profit and one not.
Their parents claim the vouchers for half the cost of a half day at a local non-profit kindergarten, and can also afford to enrol them in international classes at profit-making private kindergartens for the other half day. One father concerned argues that twice the time spent interacting with other children and teachers is better than half a day watching television. Moreover, these children are exposed at an early age to two languages – English and either Cantonese or Putonghua – in a school environment. Thus the obsession with grades now extends almost from the nursery door to young adulthood.

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

Milwaukee School Choice Shapes Educational Landscape

November 29, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

Time for a status report on all the different ways Milwaukee children can use public money to pay for their kindergarten through 12th grade education:

Private school voucher program enrollment: Up almost 5% from a year ago, just as it has been up every year for more than a decade.
City kids going to suburban public schools using the state’s “open enrollment” law: Up almost 11%, just as it has been up every year for about a decade.
Enrollment in charter schools given permission to operate by the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee or Milwaukee’s City Hall: Up more than 19% and up substantially from a few years ago.
Enrollment of minority students from the city into suburban schools using the state’s voluntary racial desegregation law, known as Chapter 220: Up almost 5%, although the long-term trend has been downward.
Enrollment in what you can think of as the conventional Milwaukee Public Schools system: Down, but by less than 1%, which is better than other recent years. Mainstream MPS enrollment has been slipping every year and went under 80,000 a year ago for the first time in many years.

With all the controversy in recent months around whether to overhaul the way MPS is run, the half dozen other routes that Milwaukee children have for getting publicly funded education have been almost entirely out of the spotlight. But Milwaukee remains a place where the term “school choice” shapes the educational landscape in hugely important ways.
How important?

Budget/Financing, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

New Jersey teachers’ union’s ‘Electile Dysfunction’ for Corzine explained

November 29, 2009 Jim Zellmer

NEAexposed.com:

An interesting document found its way to my inbox over the weekend. It was a PowerPoint presentation of an analysis done by the New Jersey Education Association, regarding its efforts to re-elect Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine.
The document can be found at NEAexposed.com.
Citing “Electile Dysfunction,” meaning the polls were telling them that voters, including teachers, weren’t as enthusiastic about Corzine as they would like, the union’s Director of Government Relations, Ginger Gold Schnitzer, proposed a double-dose remedy: “A robust member-to-member campaign,” followed by “an independent communications campaign to inoculate the public.”
The first dose of the union’s plan was to appeal to its members. The radical community organizer Saul Alinsky taught the NEA that the trick to “organizing people is to appeal to their self-interest.” Thus, the union promoted Corzine’s pro-union “accomplishments,” like investing $3 billion into public pensions, increasing school funding, increasing school construction, expanded pre-kindergarten programs, opposition to vouchers, and free medical benefits for teacher for life.
Oddly, the union didn’t cite any accomplishment that actually helped students.

A pdf of the powerpoint presentation can be viewed here.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Teacher Support

The Edsel of Education Reform: The Ford Foundation finds a needy cause: teachers unions.

November 17, 2009 Jim Zellmer 1 Comment

Wall Street Journal Editorial:

We hate to say it, but don’t be misled by headlines. The biggest headline in education circles last week was that the Ford Foundation is making a whopping $100 million grant “to transform secondary education in the nation’s most disadvantaged schools.”
Our eyes raced to see which piece of the vibrant school-reform movement Ford was going to support. Would it be America’s 4,600 charters schools, many outperforming their traditional school peers and some even closing the race gap? Maybe it would be Teach for America, busting at the seams and turning down Ivy League applicants by the hundreds. Or, who knows, maybe Ford’s really on the leading edge, and would want to support voucher programs in cities like Washington.
Would you believe the recipients of Ford’s largesse are the teachers unions? Yup. The folks at Ford are giving new meaning to the word “retro.”
Ballyhooing the $100 million, the foundation’s president Luis Ubinas said, “Improving our schools, and giving the most vulnerable young people real educational opportunities, benefits all of us. With this initiative we want to shake up the conversations surrounding school reform and help spur some truly imaginative thinking and partnerships.”

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Will reforming teacher salaries bring mile high results?

November 1, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

Denver is to reform in the way teachers are paid what Milwaukee is to private school vouchers: It’s the place that’s broken a lot of new ground and been a magnet for national attention.
With the likelihood that the Wisconsin Legislature will take important steps in the next few weeks that will substantially increase the prospects for changing the classic system for teacher salaries, here’s some advice for Wisconsin from Brad Jupp, a central architect of the Denver system:
“The most important thing to do is not to be so cautious that you don’t move forward,” Jupp said. “Breaking the barrier doesn’t kill you.”
Nationwide for almost a century, salaries of teachers have been set almost entirely by how many years a person has taught and whether the person has a master’s degree or certain amounts of college credits beyond a bachelor’s degree. Research has pretty firmly established that there is little, if any, correlation between teaching quality and those traditional measurements.
The political appeal of changing the way teachers are paid is huge now. The idea of paying good teachers more than bad teachers or using pay as an incentive to improve educational results has become popular across the political spectrum. President Barack Obama is scheduled to visit Madison this week to speak on education, and you can bet he will hit on this point.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

School Choice Even Obama Supports

October 14, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Rishawn Biddle:

As a presidential aspirant last year, Barack Obama gained the support of the National Education Association — and the scorn of school choice activists — when he declared his skepticism of the school choice and accountability measures in the No Child Left Behind Act. Then in the early months of this year, the newly-elected president further pleased teachers unions when he tacitly allowed congressional Democrats to shutter the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Plan, the school voucher program that helps 1,716 Washington students attend private schools — even though he avoided sending his own children to D.C.’s abysmal public schools.
Declared Cato Institute Director Andrew Coulson this past May in the Washington Post: “[Obama] has sacrificed a program he knows to be efficient and successful in order to appease the public school employee unions.”

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Student Support

Charter Schools Pass Key Test in Study

September 23, 2009 Jim Zellmer

John Hechinger & Ianthe Jeanne Dugan:

New York City students who win a lottery to enroll in charter schools outperform those who don’t win spots and go on to attend traditional schools, according to new research to be released Tuesday.
The study, led by Stanford University economics Prof. Caroline Hoxby, is likely to fire up the movement to push states and school districts to expand charter schools — one of the centerpieces of President Barack Obama’s education strategy.
Among students who had spent their academic careers in charter schools, the average eighth grader in Ms. Hoxby’s study had a state mathematics test score of 680, compared with 650 for those in traditional schools. The tests are generally scored on a roughly 500 to 800 scale, with 650 representing proficiency.
Ms. Hoxby’s study found that the charter-school students, who tend to come from poor and disadvantaged families, scored almost as well as students in the affluent Scarsdale school district in the suburbs north of the city. The English test results showed a similar pattern. The study also found students were more likely to earn a state Regents diploma, given to higher-achieving students, the longer they attended charter schools.

Jennifer Medina, via a kind reader’s email:

Students who entered lotteries and won spots in New York City charter schools performed better on state exams than students who entered the same lotteries but did not secure charter school seats, according to a study by a Stanford University economist being released Tuesday.
Charter schools, which are privately run but publicly financed, have been faring well on standardized tests in recent years. But skeptics have discounted their success by accusing them of “creaming” the best students, saying that the most motivated students and engaged parents are the ones who apply for the spots.
The study’s methodology addresses that issue by comparing charter school students with students of traditional schools who applied for charter spots but did not get them. Most of the city’s 99 charter schools admit students by lottery.
The report is part of a multiyear study examining the performance of charter schools in New York City by Caroline M. Hoxby, a Stanford economist who has written extensively about her research on charter schools and vouchers.

Complete 2MB PDF report, via Rick Kiley.

Elections, Events, School Climate

The value of education: Obama’s message good for any classroom

September 11, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Greg Jordan:

Tuesday I went to Bluefield Intermediate School and watched as fourth-grade students did something that just didn’t happen when I was their age — listen to the president of the United States.
President Obama urged them and other students across the country to stay in school and strive to succeed despite any adversity fate threw their way. He recounted his own struggles to acquire an education, and spoke about how education was a vital part of finding success.
He stayed off controversial topics such as health care and bills like cap and trade, and kept driving home the fact that students needed to take advantage of their opportunities to get an education.
The sight of those children getting to see a live broadcast of the president’s speech brought to mind that time so many years ago when I first heard the word “president.” Things have really changed.

Greg Toppo:

Obama to kids: ‘You can’t drop out of school and into a good job’
President Obama delivered a pointed message to U.S. students Tuesday, telling high-schoolers in a packed Washington-area school gymnasium, “I expect you to get serious this year.”
Ignoring a simmering controversy among political opponents over the planned speech, which was broadcast live coast-to-coast, Obama exhorted students at Wakefield High School to stay in school, ask for help when they need it and resist giving up when school gets difficult. “You can’t drop out of school and into a good job. You’ve got to work for it and train for it and learn for it.”

Wall Street Journal:

A Real Education Outrage
President Obama’s speech to students this week got plenty of attention, and many conservatives looked foolish by fretting about “indoctrination.” They would have done far more good joining those who protested on Tuesday against the President’s decision to shut down a school voucher program for 1,700 low-income kids in Washington, D.C.
“It’s fundamentally wrong for this Administration not to listen to the voices of citizens in this city,” said Kevin Chavous, the former D.C. Council member who organized the protest of parents and kids ignored by most media. Mr. Chavous, a Democrat, is upset that the White House and Democrats in Congress have conspired to shut down the program even though the government’s own evaluation demonstrates improved test scores.

Budget/Financing, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

A Look at Public & Private School Per Student Spending in the Washington, DC Area

August 31, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Michael Birnbaum:

Private schools without religious affiliation spend almost twice as much per student as their public and Catholic counterparts and more than double that of other Christian schools nationwide, according to a new study.
In the Washington area, there are about 330 private schools with enrollments above 50 students, according to Education Department data. Two-thirds have some religious affiliation, and a quarter are members of non-Catholic Christian school associations. Although it is not surprising that some private schools spend more per student than public and faith-based schools, just how much more has not previously been documented.
“There are a lot of urban legends that drive the policy discussions,” said Bruce D. Baker, a professor at Rutgers University and the author of the study. He said that private schools tend to be costlier than the commonly accepted figures in policy debates, especially conversations about school vouchers.
The secular private schools analyzed in the study spent $20,100 on each student in the 2007-08 school year vs. $10,100 in public schools. Nonparochial Catholic schools tended to spend roughly the same as public schools. (Parochial schools were not included in the study because their tax data are not publicly available and because their finances are so tied to those of the Catholic Church.) Members of two of the largest associations of Christian schools spent $7,100 — several thousand dollars less per student than their public peers.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

How Kennedy Took Politics Out of Education

August 30, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Jay Matthews:

It is startling to realize, as we consider the legacy of Massachusetts Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, that this very liberal, very partisan Democrat was key to the consensus that has unified the two parties on education policy for the last two decades.
.
I was slow to pick up on this. It wasn’t until I looked carefully at the presidential candidate positions in 2000 that I understood how much the two parties agreed on how to make public schools better. George W. Bush and Al Gore were very different people, but their education platforms, once you got past their favorite wedge issue, vouchers, were nearly identical. Both wanted to use test scores to make schools accountable for improving achievement. If Gore had gotten to the White House, he would have produced a law similar to No Child Left Behind.
For some time I have attributed this to the good sense of education experts on both sides of the aisle. The people guiding the candidates on this issue have seen what works in schools, particularly in low income neighborhoods, and have rescued their parties from the kind of anti-testing rhetoric that was so popular with teacher union leaders.

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, Parenting, School Climate

Join me at the REACH Awards Day next Wed 8/5; Education Reform’s Moon Shot; A $4B Push for Better Schools; Taken to school: Obama funding plan must force Legislature to accept education reforms; President Obama Discusses New ‘Race to the Top’ Program

July 29, 2009 AdminsXss94m

1) I hope you can join me a week from Wednesday at the REACH Awards Day from 10-12:30 on Aug. 5th at the Chase branch on 39th and Broadway (see full invite at the end of this email).
REACH (Rewarding Achievement; www.reachnyc.org) is a pay-for-performance initiative that aims to improve the college readiness of low-income students at 31 inner-city high schools in New York by rewarding them with up to $1,000 for each Advanced Placement exam they pass. I founded it, with funding from the Pershing Square Foundation and support from the Council of Urban Professionals.
This past year was the first full year of the program and I’m delighted to report very substantial gains in the overall number of students passing AP exams at the 31 schools, and an even bigger gain among African-American and Latino students (exact numbers will be released at the event). As a result, more than 1,000 student have earned nearly $1 MILLION in REACH Scholar Awards! Next Wednesday, the students will come to pick up their checks, Joel Klein will be the highlight of the press conference at 11am, and there will be a ton of media. I hope to see you there! You can RSVP to REACH@nycup.org.
2) STOP THE PRESSES!!! Last Friday will go down in history, I believe, as a key tipping point moment in the decades-long effort to improve our K-12 educational system. President Obama and Sec. Duncan both appeared at a press conference to announce the formal launch of the Race to the Top fund (KIPP co-founder Mike Feinberg also spoke and rocked the house!). Other than not being there on vouchers, Obama and Duncan are hitting ALL of the right notes, which, backed with HUGE dollars, will no doubt result in seismic shifts in educational policy across the country.
Here’s an excerpt from Arne Duncan’s Op Ed in the Washington Post from Friday (full text below — well worth reading):

Under Race to the Top guidelines, states seeking funds will be pressed to implement four core interconnected reforms.
— To reverse the pervasive dumbing-down of academic standards and assessments by states, Race to the Top winners need to work toward adopting common, internationally benchmarked K-12 standards that prepare students for success in college and careers.
— To close the data gap — which now handcuffs districts from tracking growth in student learning and improving classroom instruction — states will need to monitor advances in student achievement and identify effective instructional practices.
— To boost the quality of teachers and principals, especially in high-poverty schools and hard-to-staff subjects, states and districts should be able to identify effective teachers and principals — and have strategies for rewarding and retaining more top-notch teachers and improving or replacing ones who aren’t up to the job.
— Finally, to turn around the lowest-performing schools, states and districts must be ready to institute far-reaching reforms, from replacing staff and leadership to changing the school culture.
The Race to the Top program marks a new federal partnership in education reform with states, districts and unions to accelerate change and boost achievement. Yet the program is also a competition through which states can increase or decrease their odds of winning federal support. For example, states that limit alternative routes to certification for teachers and principals, or cap the number of charter schools, will be at a competitive disadvantage. And states that explicitly prohibit linking data on achievement or student growth to principal and teacher evaluations will be ineligible for reform dollars until they change their laws.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

School Choice and Supreme Court Nominee Sonia Sotomayor

July 9, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Andy Smarick:

Will Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s life experience, including attending a private Catholic school, lead to an uncomfortable conclusion–that government-supported school choice is just?
The Obama administration has made Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s life story a central part of her introduction to the nation as a Supreme Court nominee. The administration has focused attention on her inspiring, only-in-America path from public housing through elite institutions of higher education to the top of the legal profession.
……
Consequently, we might expect to see these experiences clearly reflected in their positions on three contemporary issues.
First, President Obama ought to be a vigorous defender of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, which provides vouchers to low-income students in the nation’s capital so they can attend private schools.
Second, the president should be expected to act forcefully to save America’s urban Catholic and other faith-based schools, which are disappearing at a rapid pace, robbing disadvantaged families of desperately needed private education options.
Third, we should expect Judge Sotomayor to decide in favor of school choice programs while on the bench.
In practice, however, there appears to be a limit to the influence of personal experience. President Obama failed to stand up for the D.C. voucher program, and Democratic congressional leaders went after it with a vengeance. If his 2010 budget is adopted, no new students will be allowed into the program, and it will slowly wither away. Similarly, while his Department of Education has $100 billion in stimulus funding for America’s schools, neither he nor Education Secretary Arne Duncan has uttered a word about preserving faith-based urban schools.

Budget/Financing, School Climate

Microsoft Anti-Trust Settlement Generates Some Cash for Wisconsin Schools

June 12, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Erin Richards:

In a sea of otherwise bleak budget news, 850 schools in Wisconsin are looking at an unexpected windfall: a share of at least $75 million from Microsoft Corp. for new technology purchases.
According to estimates released this week by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, schools where at least 33.3% of the students qualify as low-income will split about $75 million to $80 million in vouchers that can be redeemed for cash after the schools purchase new hardware or software.
The money for eligible schools is part of a settlement from a class-action antitrust lawsuit that Microsoft reached with Wisconsin residents in 2006. Other states have reached similar settlements with Microsoft. Plaintiffs claimed that Microsoft stifled competition and harmed consumers.
Eligible schools may redeem their vouchers for cash after buying new desktop computers, laptops, printers, scanners, faxes and software, none of which has to be from Microsoft, said Stephen Sanders, director of instructional media and technology for the DPI.

It would be interesting to compare these amounts with the royalties districts have paid to Microsoft……

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

So Long, Washington, DC School Choice…..

May 8, 2009 Jim Zellmer

The Economist:

FOR all of the hype that preceded the Tea Parties, the first protest to win some sort of concession from Barack Obama’s administration may have been the protests against the end of Washington’s school-voucher programme. A month ago, the programme’s funding was shamefully struck from the president’s proposed budget. This prompted libertarian and liberal groups to fight back, culminating in a protest yesterday. And today comes news of a compromise of sorts:

President Obama will propose setting aside enough money for all 1,716 students in the District’s voucher program to continue receiving grants for private school tuition until they graduate from high school, but he would allow no new students to join the program.

Actually, that’s not much of a compromise. That’s more of a cover-up. Let’s remember that Mr Obama, who sends his own children to private school, made the following promise during his inaugural address:

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Curriculum, Elections, School Climate

Is Barack Obama’s education secretary too good to be true?

May 8, 2009 Jim Zellmer 1 Comment

The Economist:

IT IS hard to find anybody with a bad word to say about Arne Duncan, Barack Obama’s young education secretary. Margaret Spellings, his predecessor in the Bush administration, calls him “a visionary leader and fellow reformer”. During his confirmation hearings Lamar Alexander, a senator from Tennessee and himself a former education secretary, sounded more like a lovesick schoolgirl than a member of the opposition party: “I think you’re the best.” Enthusiastic without being over-the-top, pragmatic without being a pushover, he is also the perfect embodiment of mens sana in corpore sano–tall and lean, clean-cut and athletic, a Thomas Arnold for the digital age.
Since moving to the Education Department a couple of months ago he has been a tireless preacher of the reform gospel. He supports charter schools and merit pay, accountability and transparency, but also litters his speeches with more unfamiliar ideas. He argues that one of the biggest problems in education is how to attract and use talent. All too often the education system allocates the best teachers to the cushiest schools rather than the toughest. Mr Duncan also stresses the importance of “replicating” success. His department, he says, should promote winning ideas (such as “Teach for America”, a programme that sends high-flying university graduates to teach in underserved schools) rather than merely enforcing the status quo.
Nor is this just talk. Mr Duncan did much to consolidate his reputation as a reformer on May 6th, when the White House announced that it will try to extend Washington, DC’s voucher programme until all 1,716 children taking part have graduated from high school. The Democrat-controlled Congress has been trying to smother the programme by removing funding. But Mr Duncan has vigorously argued that it does not make sense “to take kids out of a school where they’re happy and safe and satisfied and learning”. He and Mr Obama will now try to persuade Congress not to kill the programme.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, Lifelong Learning, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

Arne Duncan’s Choice

May 5, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Wall Street Journal Editorial:

Washington, D.C.’s school voucher program for low-income kids isn’t dead yet. But the Obama Administration seems awfully eager to expedite its demise.

About 1,700 kids currently receive $7,500 vouchers to attend private schools under the Opportunity Scholarship Program, and 99% of them are black or Hispanic. The program is a huge hit with parents — there are four applicants for every available scholarship — and the latest Department of Education evaluation showed significant academic gains.

Nevertheless, Congress voted in March to phase out the program after the 2009-10 school year unless it is reauthorized by Congress and the D.C. City Council. The Senate is scheduled to hold hearings on the program this month, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has promised proponents floor time to make their case. So why is Education Secretary Arne Duncan proceeding as if the program’s demise is a fait accompli?

Mr. Duncan is not only preventing new scholarships from being awarded but also rescinding scholarship offers that were made to children admitted for next year. In effect, he wants to end a successful program before Congress has an opportunity to consider reauthorizing it. This is not what you’d expect from an education reformer, and several Democrats in Congress have written him to protest.

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

School Reform Talk Is Good, Now Let’s See the Walk

April 29, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Wall Street Journal Editorial:

Secretary of Education Arne Duncan tells us that “School Reform Means Doing What’s Best for Kids” (op-ed, April 22). His cry for “doing what’s best for kids” rings a bit hollow when he failed to do what is best for the 1,700 low-income kids in Washington, D.C. who were counting on him. Those kids were given a lifeline — a voucher to escape schools that continually failed them, schools in a district to which neither Mr. Duncan nor his boss would send their own children. When crunch time arrived, politics trumped educational freedom, at least when it came to poor, inner-city kids in the District of Columbia.
Mr. Duncan speaks eloquently about how the public education establishment must change. He correctly says “we need a culture of accountability in America’s education system if we want to be the best in the world.” But what greater accountability can there be than that which comes from customers exercising free choices? True accountability in education will only come about when all parents are empowered to choose what they deem is best for their own children, not just those, like President Obama, Mr. Duncan, and most readers of the Wall Street Journal, who have financial means. So my question is, “When will the Obamas, Duncans, et. al. stand up for low-income parents so that they, too, can make choices that are best for their kids?”

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, Parenting, School Climate

How Members of the 111th Congress Practice Private School Choice

April 23, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Lindsey Burke:

Policies that give parents the ability to exercise private-school choice continue to proliferate across the country. In 2009, 14 states and Washington, D.C., are offering school voucher or education tax-credit programs that help parents send their children to private schools. During the 2007 and 2008 legislative sessions, 44 states introduced school-choice legislation.[1] In 2008, private-school-choice policies were enacted or expanded in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, and Utah[2]–made possible by increasing bipartisan support for school choice.[3]

On Capitol Hill, however, progress in expanding parental choice in education remains slow. Recent Congresses have not implemented policies to expand private-school choice. In 2009, the 111th Congress has already approved legislative action that threatens to phase out the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP), a federal initiative that currently helps 1,700 disadvantaged children attend private schools in the nation’s capital.

Congress’s Own School Choices

At the same time, many Members of Congress who oppose private-school-choice policies for their fellow citizens exercise school choice in their own lives. Senator Richard Durbin (D-IL), the chief architect of the language that threatens to end the OSP, for instance, sends his children to private school[4] and attended private school himself.[5]

Washington Post editorial: “Only for the Privileged Few?“:

NEW SURVEY shows that 38 percent of members of Congress have sent their children to private school. About 20 percent themselves attended private school, nearly twice the rate of the general public. Nothing wrong with those numbers; no one should be faulted for personal decisions made in the best interests of loved ones. Wouldn’t it be nice, though, if Congress extended similar consideration to low-income D.C. parents desperate to keep their sons and daughters in good schools?

The latest Heritage Foundation study of lawmakers’ educational choices comes amid escalating efforts to kill the federally funded D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program that helps 1,700 disadvantaged children attend private schools. Congress cut funding beyond the 2009-10 school year unless the program, which provides vouchers of up to $7,500, gets new federal and local approvals. Education Secretary Arne Duncan cited that uncertainty as the reason for his recent decision to rescind scholarship offers to 200 new students. Senate hearings on the program’s future are set for this spring, and opponents — chiefly school union officials — are pulling out all the stops as they lobby their Democratic allies.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Governance/Board Decision Making, History - Madison Schools, School Climate

The Union War on Charter Schools

April 16, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Jay Greene:

On education policy, appeasement is about as ineffective as it is in foreign affairs. Many proponents of school choice, especially Democrats, have tried to appease teachers unions by limiting their support to charter schools while opposing private school vouchers. They hope that by sacrificing vouchers, the unions will spare charter schools from political destruction.

But these reformers are starting to learn that appeasement on vouchers only whets unions appetites for eliminating all meaningful types of choice. With voucher programs facing termination in Washington, D.C., and heavy regulation in Milwaukee, the teachers unions have now set their sights on charter schools. Despite their proclamations about supporting charters, the actions of unions and their allies in state and national politics belie their rhetoric.

In New York, for example, the unions have backed a new budget that effectively cuts $51.5 million from charter-school funding, even as district-school spending can continue to increase thanks to local taxes and stimulus money that the charters lack. New York charters already receive less money per pupil than their district school counterparts; now they will receive even less.

Unions are also seeking to strangle charter schools with red tape. New York already has the “card check” unionization procedure for teachers that replaces secret ballots with public arm-twisting. And the teachers unions appear to have collected enough cards to unionize the teachers at two highly successful charter schools in New York City. If unions force charters to enter into collective bargaining, one can only imagine how those schools will be able to maintain the flexible work rules that allow them to succeed.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

Democrats and Poor Kids

April 7, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Wall Street Journal Editorial:

Education Secretary Arne Duncan did a public service last week when he visited New York City and spoke up for charter schools and mayoral control of education. That was the reformer talking. The status quo Mr. Duncan was on display last month when he let Congress kill a District of Columbia voucher program even as he was sitting on evidence of its success.
U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, left, and Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, read to first graders at Doswell Brooks Elementary School in Capitol Heights, Md. on Wednesday, April 1, 2009.
In New York City with its 1.1 million students, mayoral control has resulted in better test scores and graduation rates, while expanding charter schools, which means more and better education choices for low-income families. But mayoral control expires in June unless state lawmakers renew it, and the United Federation of Teachers is working with Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver to weaken or kill it.
President Obama’s stimulus is sending some $100 billion to the nation’s school districts. What will he demand in return? The state budget passed by the New York legislature last week freezes funding for charters but increases it by more that $400 million for other public schools. Perhaps a visit to a charter school in Harlem would help Mr. Obama honor his reform pledge. “I’m looking at the data here in front of me,” Mr. Duncan told the New York Post. “Graduation rates are up. Test scores are up. Teacher salaries are up. Social promotion was eliminated. Dramatically increasing parental choice. That’s real progress.”

Budget/Financing, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

Teacher Unions vs. Poor Kids

March 29, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Nat Hentoff:

The “education president” remained silent when his congressional Democrats essentially killed the Opportunity Scholarship Program (OSP) in the city where he now lives and works.

Of the 1,700 students, starting in kindergarten, in this private-school voucher program, 90 percent are black and 9 percent are Hispanic.

First the House and then the Senate inserted into the $410-billion omnibus spending bill language to eliminate the $7,500 annual scholarships for these poor children after the next school year.

A key executioner in the Senate of the OSP was Sen. Dick Durbin, Illinois Democrat. I have written admiringly of Durbin’s concern for human rights abroad. But what about education rights for minority children in the nation’s capital?

Andrew J. Coulson, director of the Cato Institute (where I am a senior fellow) supplied the answer when he wrote: “Because they saw it as a threat to their political power, Democrats in Washington appear willing to extinguish the dreams of a few thousand poor kids to protect their political base.”

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

Public money for private schools?
Lawmaker: S.C.’s schools fail minorities; state should subsidize private school choice.

March 24, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Roddie Burris:

State Sen. Robert Ford is putting a new face on the long-running fight over whether to spend public education dollars to pay for private schools.
To the dismay of his African American colleagues, the Charleston Democrat is hawking a bill that would give students a publicly paid scholarship or tuition grant to go to a private school.
So far, the push for school choice has had mostly white faces out front. But Ford, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for governor, is making the case that the students who would benefit most from a voucher-style program in South Carolina are African Americans who attend poorly performing schools.
He dismisses those who say his program would hurt already struggling public schools, framing the argument as a choice between protecting schools or giving children the lifeline they need to succeed.
“You’re damn right I’m hurting public education, because public education is hurting our kids,” Ford said.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

2009 Wisconsin DPI Superintendent Candidate Debate Tony Evers and Rose Fernandez

March 22, 2009 Jim Zellmer

2009 Wisconsin DPI Superintendent Candidate Debate Tony Evers and Rose Fernandez

Via Wisconsin Public Television. CTRL Click here to download the 382MB 60 minute event video, or this 26MB mp3 audio file.
Candidate websites: Tony Evers & Rose Fernandez
Amy Hetzner:

Rose Fernandez regularly refers to herself as an outsider in the race to become the state’s next schools chief.
The implication is that her April 7 opponent, Deputy Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Evers, is an insider who is unlikely to change what is happening with education in the state.
The outsider candidate who can change things and shake up the status quo has long been a popular thrust in political campaigns. President Barack Obama, although a U.S. senator at the time, used aspects of the tactic in his campaign last fall.
But some wonder whether it will have the same impact in what is likely to be a low-turnout election April 7.
“The advantage to the insider is being able to draw off of established, organizational support,” said Charles Franklin, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “The outsider’s goal is to try to become visible enough that people unhappy with the status quo can voice their outsider outrage.”
From her Web site address – www.changedpi.com – to frequently tying her opponent to the state’s largest teachers union, the Wisconsin Education Association Council, Fernandez appears to be trying to capitalize on one of her many differences with her opponent.
“There are perils with entrenchment,” said Fernandez, a former pediatric trauma nurse and past president of the Wisconsin Coalition for Virtual School Families. “With that there comes an inability to see the problems as they really are.”
But being an outsider also has some disadvantages, which Evers is trying to play up as well.
At a recent appearance before the Public Policy Forum, Evers puzzled about Fernandez’s stance against a provision in Gov. Jim Doyle’s bill that he said was supported by voucher school proponents while she expressed support for voucher schools.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

A Summary of the Wisconsin DPI Superintendent Candidate Event

March 21, 2009 Jim Zellmer 1 Comment

Greg Bump:

WisPolitics: Evers, Fernandez question each other in We The People debate
3/20/2009
By Greg Bump
WisPolitics
Tony Evers questioned opponent Rose Fernandez’s qualifications for the state’s top education spot Friday night, while Fernandez countered by trying to portray him as a crony of Wisconsin’s largest teacher’s union.
The two, vying for the post of superintendent of Public Instruction, laid out competing visions in a We The People debate.
Evers, the deputy superintendent at DPI, touted his 34 years of experience in education while contrasting his resume with the credentials of Fernandez, who is a nurse by trade and has never worked in a public school.
Fernandez, a virtual school advocate, countered by continually trying to lay problems with the state’s educational system at the feet of Evers, who has held the No. 2 post at the agency for eight years.
Given the opportunity to question each other, Evers pointed out Fernandez represented virtual schools and has zero experience in the administration of public schools. He asked how parents with children in public schools can trust her to invest in their education rather than funneling money toward special interests.
“My own special interest is the boys and girls growing up in the state of Wisconsin,” Fernandez shot back.
Fernandez then stressed Evers’ endorsement by the Wisconsin Education Association Council and the “hundreds of thousands of dollars” the union has spent to support his campaign. She asked him to list three reforms he has supported that WEAC opposed.
Evers answered that the union was unhappy with a settlement DPI reached on allowing virtual schools — in which districts allow students to take courses on-line — to continue. He also said he has been a strong advocate of charter schools — which operate without some of the regulations of other public schools — something the union has opposed.
“I started charter schools. I know what charter schools are about,” Evers said. “I don’t need a lecture about charter schools.”
Evers also stressed his support from school boards, child advocates, parents and others.
“That’s why you have to have a broad coalition,” Evers said. “This isn’t about this overwhelming group of people driving policy at the state level. That just isn’t fact.”
Fernandez ripped DPI for not doing enough to help the struggling Milwaukee Public School system address issues like dropout rates and the achievement gap for minority students.
Evers countered that he has worked on the issue with educators in Milwaukee, but there are also socioeconomic factors that are hampering achievement.
“Laying this issue on my lap is irrational,” Evers said.
Fernandez also brought up a piece of Evers’ campaign lit that referred to voucher schools in Milwaukee as “a privatization scheme.”
“Some of the schools have been scheming, and those schools we have drummed out of the program,” Evers replied.
Evers warned that Fernandez would run DPI through the prism of the “special interest” of choice schools.
Both candidates agreed that a merit pay system for educators could have benefit, but they disagreed on the details. Fernandez indicated that she would base her merit pay system more on classroom outcomes, while Evers stressed that rewards for training were equally important.
They differed more prominently on the qualified economic offer, which Gov. Jim Doyle has proposed eliminating in his 2009-11 budget plan. Fernandez wants to retain it, saying that without the control on teacher compensation, property taxes could rise sharply.
“Children may become the enemy of the taxpayer,” she said.
Evers said he has bargained on both sides of the table, and he opposes the QEO because it hurts the state’s ability to stay competitive in teacher pay.
Evers embraced the coming federal stimulus cash, which will pump $800 million into state schools as “a historic event” that acknowledges “educators are the lever that can turn our economy around.” He said he would appoint a trustee to oversee the allocation of the funds in Milwaukee schools to ensure the money is getting to the classrooms.
In contrast, Fernandez said she looked upon the federal stimulus with caution in that it is one-time funding that won’t be there in the future
And while Evers touted the state’s ACT and SAT scores as being among the highest in the nation, Fernandez said those tests are only administered to college-bound students and aren’t indicative of the academic struggles in districts like Milwaukee.
We the People/Wisconsin is a multi-media that includes the Wisconsin State Journal, Wisconsin Public Television, Wisconsin Public Radio, WISC-TV, WisPolitics.com and Wood Communications Group.

Budget/Financing, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Parenting, School Climate, Student Support

Congress vs. Washington DC Kids

March 15, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Andrew Coulson:

Congressional Democrats succeeded this week in crippling a school choice program operating in the nation’s capital. For the last five years, the D.C. Opportunity Scholarships have made private schooling affordable to 1,700 poor children. Rather than reauthorizing the program for another five-year term, Democrats have all but ensured it will die after next year.
House Appropriations Committee Chairman David R. Obey, Wisconsin Democrat, has asked D.C. Public Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee to prepare for the return of voucher students to the city’s broken public schools.
Sen. Ted Kennedy’s office claims the senator opposed the voucher program from the start because it “takes funds from very needy public schools to send students to unaccountable private schools.” (The House Budget Committee holds hearings today on the U.S. Education Department budget).
But just how needy are D.C. public schools? To find out, I added up all the K-12-related expenditures in the current D.C. budget, excluding preschool, higher-education and charter school items. The total comes to $1.29 billion. Divide that by the official enrollment count of 48,646 students, and it yields a total per-pupil spending figure of $26,555.

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Community Partners, Curriculum, School Climate

Milwaukee’s St. Anthony to add high school

March 15, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

Govanne Martinez said it will be an honor to be in the first ninth-grade class at St. Anthony School.
Sebastian Pichardo said, “I want to test how smart I am, how much I can achieve.” The best way to do that, he thinks, is to stay at the school where he has been since he was 4 years old.
The two St. Anthony eighth-graders are among more than 90 students who have enrolled in what will be the first new Catholic high school in the Milwaukee archdiocese in more than 25 years. It also will be the first Catholic high school to operate on the south side and within the boundaries of the city of Milwaukee since St. Mary’s Academy closed in 1991.
St. Anthony is already the largest kindergarten through eighth-grade school in Milwaukee, with 1,045 students, all but a handful participants in the publicly funded private-school voucher program. That makes the school one of the largest Catholic grade schools in the United States
And now: St. Anthony, the high school.
School leaders plan to add a grade a year and reach 400 students or more by the fifth year.
A building just north of W. Mitchell St. on S. 9th St. is expected to house the high school for the first couple years, said Terry Brown, president of the school. That’s in the block north of St. Anthony church and the several buildings used now by the school’s upper grades.

Budget/Financing, Governance/Board Decision Making, Parenting, School Climate

The Early-Ed Big Lie

March 14, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Adam Schaeffer:

In a speech on education this morning at the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, President Obama repeats questionable statistics in support of his bid to expand the government’s monopoly on education back to the womb, asserting that “$1 of early education leads to $10 in saved social services.”
Unfortunately he’s referring to small-scale programs that involved extensive and often intensive total-family intervention rather than simple “early education.”
In contrast to the- real-world school choice programs have been tested extensively with solid, random-assignment studies. Nine out of ten of these studies find statistically significant improvement in academic achievement for at least one subgroup.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

A cruel school move

March 10, 2009 Jim Zellmer 1 Comment

Chicago Tribune Editorial:

We wrote last week about Democratic efforts to strip 1,900 low-income Washington children of $7,500 “opportunity scholarships” to attend private schools.
It’s an experiment in school vouchers, an experiment with little potential downside. But it’s an experiment that was launched in 2004 by a Republican-controlled Congress. Today it’s on the verge of extinction because the Democratic-controlled Congress wants to do the bidding of public-school teachers unions. The unions see vouchers that let poor kids go to private schools as aiding the enemy.
Language passed by the House as part of a massive $410 billion spending bill would effectively doom the federally funded program. The 1,900 kids would have to leave their schools and re-enter public schools in Washington, which has some of the worst schools in the nation.
The measure, by the way, is referred to as “the Durbin language” for sponsoring Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois.

Budget/Financing, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate, Staff Support, Student Support, Teacher Support

Obama and the Schools

March 9, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Wall Street Journal Editorial:

Education Secretary Arne Duncan said last week that poor children receiving federally financed vouchers to attend private schools in Washington, D.C., shouldn’t be forced out of those schools. Bully for Mr. Duncan. But the voice that matters most is President Obama’s, and so far he’s been shouting at zero decibels.
His silence is an all-clear for Democrats in Congress who have put language in the omnibus spending bill that would effectively end the program after next year. Should they succeed, 1,700 mostly black and Hispanic students who use the vouchers would return to the notoriously violent and underperforming D.C. public school system, which spends more money per pupil than almost any city in the nation yet graduates only about half of its students.
The D.C. voucher program has more than four applicants for every available slot. Parental satisfaction is sky high. And independent evaluations — another is scheduled for release later this month — show that children in the program perform better academically than their peers who do not receive vouchers. This is the kind of school reform that the federal government should encourage and expand.

Budget/Financing, College Preparation, Community Partners, Curriculum, Elections, Events, School Climate

Charter school opponents, watch out

February 26, 2009 Jim Zellmer

http://www.politico.com/arena/perm/Diane_Ravitch_7B4FB2BF-37EC-4D09-803F-21DE23DA672D.html

Budget/Financing, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

Panelists Skeptical about Milwaukee School District Governance Change

February 18, 2009 Jim Zellmer

Alan Borsuk:

A group of community leaders who disagree on a lot of other things about education were in general agreement Monday night on one important issue:
They don’t think much of the idea of turning control of Milwaukee Public Schools over to somebody other than the School Board.
From teachers union president Dennis Oulahan to school voucher advocate Howard Fuller, from liberal School Board member Jennifer Morales to business leader Tim Sheehy, it was hard to keep the people involved in a panel at the Marquette University Law School on the topic of whether there should be mayoral control of schools, or something in that vein, as they kept turning to other issues.
None expressed hope that a step of that kind, at least in itself, would change the rate of success in MPS.
“No matter who takes it over . . . if you don’t change anything that’s going on within the body itself that prevents good practice,” it will be an illusion to think things will get better, Fuller said.
“Any kind of governance can work if it has the right support.”
Oulahan said there was a long history of reforms in MPS, such as the Neighborhood Schools Initiative launched in 2000 and the small high school reform in recent years, that really were about buildings or programs and not about kids. Unless the focus is on teaching children using practices that actually work, nothing will change, he said.

Budget/Financing, Curriculum, Elections, Events, Governance/Board Decision Making, School Climate

Fernandez & Evers Advance in the Wisconsin DPI Superintendent Race

February 17, 2009 Jim Zellmer

AP:

Evers won the endorsement of the 98,000-member state teachers union, the Wisconsin Education Association Council, which paid for TV ads on his behalf. Evers was the only one of the five to pay for his own ads.
“I believe that my message of experience has played well so far,” Evers said. “I won the primary and I anticipate that we’ll just work hard to get the message out. I believe that people do believe experience matters.”
Fernandez, who has often been at odds with the state education department over virtual schools, reveled in the fact that she didn’t get the WEAC endorsement, touting it as another sign of her being outside the state education bureaucracy.
Fernandez was the only one of the five candidates without any professional education experience. A former nurse, she recently stepped down as president of the Wisconsin Coalition of Virtual School Families.
“Some people have dismissed me as just a mom on a mission, but that’s a label I’ll be wearing as a badge of honor,” Fernandez said. She pledged to overcome WEAC’s financial backing of Evers with a broad base of support that taps into teachers, parents and students across the state.
“We’re hearing that there’s a great hunger out there for our message that higher standards without higher taxes is what they want,” she said.
Her campaign called for reforming the state education department, enacting changes to allow for teacher merit pay and protecting alternative education options such as virtual schools, home schooling and Milwaukee’s school choice voucher program.
Evers, the deputy under retiring Superintendent Libby Burmaster for the past eight years, emphasized his 34 years of education experience during the campaign. Opponents criticized him as a status-quo insider candidate, while Evers countered he was the best-grounded to initiate reforms, particularly in the Milwaukee schools.

Curated Education Information