September 29, 2006
Schwarzenegger vs. the union
The Governator eked out a victory against the California Teachers Association:
In a rare defeat for teachers' unions, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill Thursday to make it easier for some principals to reject incompetent teachers.
The new law won't make it easier to fire public school teachers — something the governor sought and failed to win with an initiative last November — but it eliminates one escape route for teachers facing bad reviews.SB 1655 by Sen. Jack Scott (D-Altadena) restricts future union contracts so that principals at the lowest-performing schools no longer have to give jobs to weak teachers transferring within the district. The measure will affect about 3,000 schools.
It's not a big deal overall, but in California, where the CTA generally does what it wants--and given the fact that this was sponsored by a Democrat--it shows there are limits to the union's clout. This also seems to illustrate that that Schwarzenegger can still play hardball with the CTA, even in the wake of his failed battle from last year.
Education News for Friday, Sept. 29
Escape hatch for incompetent teachers closed - In a rare defeat for teachers' unions, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed a bill Thursday to make it easier for some principals to reject incompetent teachers.
State finds errors in high school graduation, dropout rates - Graduation and dropout rates reported by Michigan's high schools are not always accurate, according to a state audit released Thursday.
Utah schools suffer setback - School report cards under the federal No Child Left Behind law were released Thursday, and though achievement benchmarks remained the same, fewer schools scored up to par.
Feud over mayor's take over of LA schools public only - Even as Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and school district officials prepare to wage war in court, senior aides on both sides are quietly laying the groundwork for a future partnership and collaborating on major initiatives, including a system to track dropouts.
Check back later for more education news.
UPDATE:
All aboard the charters? - NRO: Chester Finn opinion: Charter schools have taught us much. Since Minnesota enacted America’s first charter law in 1991, 39 states have followed suit and eager school reformers have created some 4,000 of these independent public schools...
Debate on NY education heats up; charter or public schools? - It seems when you get both sides in a room, the number one topic is money. Both the charter and public schools need it to provide for the students, and each wants a bigger slice of the pie.
Posted by Daily News at 06:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
Ed schools, monopolies, and the source of change
Right Wing Prof is calling us out! These two posts are worth your time, but this stinger from the first link is pretty much the linchpin of his argument:
Educrats hold all the power, whether the school is private, public, or charter. And the source of all the problems in education today come directly from the educration bureaucracy.
No, even with vouchers, there will be no true, free market in education. There will be a severely constricted market, at least until schools start deliberately hiring teachers who do not drink the Dewey kool-aid. And that won't happen until there are schools that aren't being run by educrats that don't drink the Dewey kool-aid. So while I support vouchers, I don't believe for a second that vouchers — choice — will make a significant difference in the quality of education.
The Prof makes some very salient points. They're not new, either, especially with Arthur Levine's recent ed school report making waves.
Here's what I'd like everybody to do. Read those two posts. Internalize them. Because they connect quite nicely to some stuff I've been meaning to get to regarding Levine's study and the changing face of school choice dynamics. Stay tuned.
(UPDATE: Wrong name. Fixed now.)
Posted by Ryan Boots at 05:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)September 28, 2006
Average students doing AP-level work
La Maestra over at California LiveWire has my back on helping students in AP classes:
What I see Welsh upset about is what I've spent four years trying to do with my AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) students, and in fact, is what the AVID program is geared toward. AVID's purpose is to challenge students academically by placing them in higher-level classes than they would have otherwise been in, and then--the important part--PROVIDING THEM WITH SUPPORT ONCE THEY'RE THERE.
Mathews, while he does an excellent job refuting Welsh's arguments, misses one key necessity--co-curricular support outside of the class itself. The process of moving "average" kids to higher-level classes won't work just by dumping them in AP classes and hoping they hang on. Virtually every student in higher-level classes is there at least in part because of a supportive parent, and this often-overlooked factor is often the determining factor between an "average" student and a "higher-level" one.
My previous post on this is here. This notion that leaning on students to test their limits is somehow unfair or harmful is itself harmful.
First colleges, then hospitals
The fusion of higher ed and K-12 continues:
Loudoun County School Superintendent Edgar B. Hatrick III announced a partnership this week between the school system and Inova Loudoun Hospital to develop courses that will give more high school students hands-on training in medical professions.
The Claude Moore Charitable Foundation has given the venture a push with a $150,000 donation, which was presented to the partners before Hatrick's "State of Education" address at a Chamber of Commerce meeting Tuesday morning.
The training programs could offer a solution to staffing shortages at hospitals and become a national model, said J. Hamilton Lambert, executive director of the Fairfax County-based foundation.
Some might point to this as evidence that eeeeevil corporations are converting schools from places of childhood innocence to factories whose sole purpose is to churn out obedient little worker drones. Even assuming schools were ever independent from the labor force (which is something I seriously doubt can be supported by historical record), consider the fact that this nation is presently suffering from an ongoing health care labor shortage, which will only be exacerbated in a few years months when that first wave of baby boomer retirees really hits hard. Also, maybe it's a good thing that students are exposed to highly-paid career opportunities!
American education is a lesson in symmetry: in comparison to a suffering K-12 system stands our, post-secondary network, which with all its faults is the envy of the world. I think this is just another sign of an increasing collaboration between the two systems, and one that is long overdue. If students come out of it with increased career opportunities--not to mention opportunities for increased earning potential--then at the end of the day, victory will have been achieved.
Education News for Thursday, September 28
Statewide Poll Offers Findings on New Jersey Citizens' Opinions on Corporate Tax Credit Scholarship Program, School Funding Options and School Vouchers - News release: An overwhelming majority (74%) of New Jersey residents support establishing a corporate tax credit scholarship pilot program for students in four urban districts, a new poll of statewide opinions on school funding options revealed. A majority (54%) supports vouchers which would let parents "pay for tuition at the public, private, or religious school of their choice.
Teacher's union files grievances over overcrowded classrooms - The New York City teacher's union has been up in arms about overcrowded classrooms.
As 2 Bushes Try to Fix Schools, Tools Differ - Many figures say No Child Left Behind, which comes up next year for Congressional reauthorization, could use some improvement. But Bush vs. Bush may be the most striking part of the debate.
Judge Dismisses Most of No Child Left Behind Lawsuit - A federal judge dismissed most of the claims in Connecticut's challenge to the No Child Left Behind law Wednesday on jurisdictional grounds, the state's attorney general said.
State's `No Child' Lawsuit Still Alive - A federal judge Wednesday dismissed much of Connecticut's argument for challenging a controversial U.S. government school reform law but left open one avenue for the state's lawsuit to continue.
Closing the gap - Editorial: Magnet schools are no panacea for bringing struggling schools up to par. At the highest levels of state government, Florida needs leaders committed to helping struggling public schools, instead of throwing taxpayer dollars through vouchers to private schools that aren't held accountable for student achievement.
Davis presents his education platform - Democratic candidate for governor Jim Davis detailed a plan Wednesday to de-emphasize the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test and change the way it is used to rank schools on a scale of A to F, a system he equates to a "political weapon."
School choice called too complicated - The current school-choice system and transportation plan for Seattle Public Schools are overly complicated and costly, and need updating, School Board members agreed Wednesday.
School choice: close to home - Pinellas County, Florida schools will likely resegregate if parents get to choose where their kids go to school, because they want to keep them nearby.
America's educational system is failing its students - Opinion: Unfortunately, school choice programs have been slow to gain political traction. Until we change the system, we’ll keep pouring funds into underachieving public schools, and we’ll keep finishing in the middle of the pack.
She's building Bush's education legacy - Opinion: If Donald Rumsfeld is the face of the war that is President Bush's most controversial initiative, Margaret Spellings is the face of the education program that might become his most successful.
Palm Beach County board fights to maintain control over charter schools - Florida charter school operators fought Wednesday against the Palm Beach County School Board's bid to shut out a new state charter school authority.
Davis' school plan: Reduce influence of FCAT - Florida Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jim Davis said Wednesday that if elected, he would junk much of the FCAT-centered educational plan that has become the signature policy of term-limited Gov. Jeb Bush.
Legal challenge to schools plan is a shame - Letter to the editor: A recent LA Times article about the expected legal battle between Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and the board of the Los Angeles Unified School District leaves out one important fact.
You and I are Part of the School Reform Solution - Opinion: One can help shape and improve schools by being constructive and collaborative or one can stand on the sidelines and complain about everyone and everything. Hopefully, you and I are part of the solution for school reform.
There’s Got to Be a Market - Opinion: School choice is one important step in revolutionizing American education. But it is only a first step.
Teacher-pay increase long overdue - Editorial: Louisiana has suffered in a variety of ways because of a long-time failure to bring teacher salaries in line with the Southern regional or national averages. Refreshing new figures from the state Education Estimating Conference indicate, however, that we are finally on the way to correcting this dangerous deficiency.
Check back later for more education news.
UPDATE:
Change comes to a Carolina - WSJ (subscription required) South Carolina civil-rights advocate Dewey Tullis explained to reporters a few weeks ago why he's supporting a Republican running for the state's top education job, Karen Floyd: "Frankly, I'm tired of seeing our young black men graduate high school without knowing how to read and write."
USC study: What charter schools are doing right - A USC Rossier School of Education professor has identified 20 innovative programs in California charter schools and created a database to share their successes with other schools.
There's got to be a market - NRO: The supply side of school choice. onservative school reformers love to talk about giving families better options. As President Bush said, way back on the 2000 campaign trail, “If the schools are not teaching children, then something has to happen.
More Michigan parents choose charter schools - Detroit and some of the state's older school districts may be struggling when it comes to keeping students, but the number of children in Michigan charter schools seems to keep growing.
Ed Week: District chiefs do not share national leaders' worries about schools, poll finds - (subscription required) Concerns about high school improvement, teacher quality, and mathematics and science instruction may be grabbing headlines of late, but they’re not keeping most of the nation’s superintendents up at night, a new survey suggests.
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New Jerseyans are all about school choice
The results of an E3-commissioned poll indicate strong support for school choice:
An overwhelming majority (74%) of New Jersey residents support establishing a corporate tax credit scholarship pilot program for students in four urban districts, a new poll of statewide opinions on school funding options revealed. A majority (54%) supports vouchers which would let parents "pay for tuition at the public, private, or religious school of their choice."
The complete poll, including internals, is here. Obviously support differs across demographic lines, but as the pollsters themselves concluded, "All in all, the survey results indicate majority public support for school choice and alternate funding mechanisms in New Jersey." Interestingly, support for school choice even held up across party lines--and the tax credit program for urban scholarships got even more support from Dems than from Republicans (80 percent vs. 74 percent respectively).
Who can blame New Jerseyans for feeling the way they do? It's pretty much Milwaukee on a grander scale, and with even higher eduspending. Bottom line: after skyrocketing spending and nothing to show for it, these folks seem willing to try just about anything.
(And which organization conducted the poll? Monmouth University Polling Institute. Shhhh...nobody tell Jim Horn!)
Posted by Ryan Boots at 05:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)September 27, 2006
Carnival of Education
It's up over at the Education Wonks.
Posted by Ryan Boots at 02:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)Using charters to bash vouchers
This op/ed in the State (South Carolina) is a mixed bag. Some interesting things are happening with choice: using a new charter law, Republican state rep Bill Cotty is proposing the state government start its own public charters in areas with failing schools as a way to sidestep nasty takeover battles, which politically makes sense. But the writer--Associate Editor Cindi Ross Scoppe--can't seem to restrain herself at certain points.
Mr. Cotty says his plan would help students in and out of the charter schools because it “says to local districts there’s a new dog on the block and you need to clean up your own house.”
That sounds a little strange too, since “competition will improve the schools” is one of the main arguments put forward by those who want to give vouchers or tax credits to parents who send their kids to private schools — a proposal Mr. Cotty has been at the forefront of fighting off.
I would tend to agree that this puts Cotty in a rather uncomfortable position (if competition is a virtue for public charters, why is it a downside for vouchers?). But is Scoppe rejecting the notion? She seems to, but won't quite go there.
And the plan is susceptible to one of the same criticisms he and I and others have of the private school plans: It would trap kids who don’t have active, involved parents in failing schools that might become even worse once the best students with the most motivated parents move out.
Translation: we must not make school choice available, because the wrong people might just take advantage of it! I've commented before on similar prejudices against KIPP, and this column betrays a similar (and similarly disturbing) mindset: no matter how badly some parents want options for their children, they must remain confined where they are.
In fact, I have a suggestion for Scoppe: if those highly motivated parents and their children must remain in those schools, why don't we do the next best thing: exchange them for your children! She sounds like a very involved parent, and I'm sure her child will work wonders helping a low-achieving school improve!
Moreover, his plan addresses what he calls the one legitimate point made by those pushing for vouchers or tax credits — that kids in poor-performing schools don’t have time to wait for those schools to get better.
Mr. Cotty bills his plan as “an alternative, with none of the waste involved in tax credits and vouchers.” Unlike private-choice plans, which would “waste 90 percent of the money” on people who can afford to pay for their private choices, his plan would be limited to poor students in poorly performing schools in poor districts — those who truly don’t have any alternatives.
If you want to make sure low-income families are the primary beneficiaries, there's a very simple solution that has been successfully applied in lots of school choice programs: insert a means-tested requirement in the legislation. Cotty's desire to get kids some educational options is commendable. But his arguments against vouchers and tax credits are both tired and substanceless, and this one most of all.
Mr. Cotty is convinced that the anonymous financial interests backing “Put Parents in Charge” would oppose his plan because they wouldn’t get any money, and he might be right. Nor would it satisfy people who simply want to send their kids to private schools, and think the state should help pay for that.
Look, I don't question that there have been a lot of issues over donor disclosure in South Carolina. But naturally, Scoppe goes from there to conclude that this is just a money grab on the part of a lot of greedy privatizers, an awfully big jump indeed.
Unlike the voucher plan, the Cotty plan keeps public money in a system that is accountable to the public for its results. And best of all, it has the potential to actually fulfill the entirely unrealistic promise of vouchers and tax credits — that is, to provide a good education to children who attend those schools that are mired in poverty and thus far highly resistant to improvement.
Finally, buried in the very last paragraph, we get to the accountability canard. Scoppe is doing her level best to assert that a) school choice programs lack any semblance of accountability, and b) there's no possible remedy to the situation. So I'll just repeat what I've said in the past:
- Calls for accountability assume that parents are too stupid to see if a school is doing a good job teaching their children.
- As I've already said in response to the Palm Beach Post (which appears to be the State's inspiration in writing about school choice), the idea that schools are presently unaccountable or avoid measures like standardized testing is utterly absurd. The vast majority of private schools already administer accountability measures, because it's in their interest to do so. Furthermore, if voucher schools fail, they end up closing down--unlike public schools, which manage to stay open (and have historically successfully lobbied for spending increases) in spite of poor performance.
- As Scoppe herself said in the second paragraph of this piece: "The whole idea behind charter schools, after all, is to let parents and other interested community members run their own public schools. They can bypass some state regulations as long as they prove students are learning what the state says they need to know." In other words, charter schools can be held accountable. Replace the word "charter" with the word "voucher," and Scoppe will have stated my point precisely: set a minimum level for achievement, and let schools do their thing. But in Scoppe's world, aside from the recent legislation passed in Milwaukee and Florida, there's just no way to use the same approach for voucher schools.
Tag teaming
First Ken De Rosa pummeled this guy, now Right Wing Prof delivers a savage beating. I don't even want to imagine the carnage that would result if these two started a group blog...
Posted by Ryan Boots at 02:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)Education News for Wednesday, Sept. 27
Secretary vows to improve results of higher education - Saying she hoped to jolt American higher education out of a dangerous complacency, Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings vowed Tuesday to help finance state universities that administer standardized tests...
Supreme Court to hear Detroit union fee dispute - In a case that will test the limits on labor activism just before the 2008 presidential campaign, the Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to consider a constitutional clash over the rights of unions to make political use of fees collected from nonmembers.
Iowa tax credit law expands choices for families - With the recent passage of the Educational Opportunities Act in Iowa and the start of its implementation, school choice is receiving a great deal of attention in our state.
Cannibalizing public schools is a foolish thought - Missouri: Five state representatives from across the state grilled local educators and community leaders on how best to reform schools in Missouri. However, their collective idea of reform was clear — tuition tax credits or vouchers.
NY charter schools are not a drain on public education - It was very discouraging to me, our dedicated staff, concerned parents and involved community partners to see the Democrat and Chronicle editorial "Charter limbo" Sept. 15, which was not balanced.
Federalizing charters - With American students back in their classrooms, Congress who will face one of the most serious tests in education. Come 2007, the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 will be up for reauthorization...
Check back later for more education news.
UPDATE:
Kansas grant for charter schools draws board member's concern - The state has issued $32,000 in federal grants to individuals and groups in recent weeks to help start charter schools, prompting some concern from a member of the Kansas State Board of Education.
Left behind by 'reformers' - Alina Guerrero, a fourth-grader at the Amistad Dual Language School in northern Manhattan is among tens of thousands of immigrant children around the country who have been turned into political pawns as a result of the federal No Child Left Behind law.
Ed Week: School choice group grows as force in state elections - (subscription required) When Utah state Rep. David N. Cox persuaded fellow Republicans to vote against a school voucher bill last year, he did more than help doom the idea. He became an election-year target.
Ed Week: School finance vs. school choice - (subscription required) Estimates from the Alliance for School Choice suggest that at least 90,000 students participated in school choice programs in 2005, with a projection of more than 125,000 participating in 2006.
Ed Week: Political shift could temper NCLB resolve - (subscription required) The two top Democratic lawmakers on education policy have signaled that if their party regains control of one or both houses of Congress in November, they will seek to retain the core accountability features of the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
Ed Week: IES gets mixed grades as it comes of age - (subscription required) Concerned about the credibility of federally financed education studies, Congress passed a law in the fall of 2002 that replaced the U.S. Department of Education’s top research office with the Institute of Education Sciences.
Ed Week: Businessman, voucher backer vies to be next Michigan governor - (subscription required) In a campaign that’s almost entirely about the Michigan economy, wealthy businessman and school choice supporter Dick DeVos Jr. is giving Democratic Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm a tough challenge.
Most DC charter schools fail to meet benchmark - New data shows 30 of 40 charter schools in DC have failed to meet reading and math benchmarks on a new test...
Blacks take education into their own hands - Suisun City parents Benjamin and Tanya Marshall are part of a new homeschooling movement led by African American families fed up with the public school system.
Could state-run charter schools win the war over vouchers? - REP. BILL Cotty’s plan to have the SC establish charter schools in areas where the regular public schools aren’t getting the job done sounds strange at first.
Posted by Daily News at 05:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
September 26, 2006
Look out, NEA
Rest assured the NEA will be watching this with bated breath:
The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to decide whether public employee unions must get special permission before spending some workers' dues on political causes.
Justices accepted an appeal from the state of Washington that involves fees paid to the Washington Education Association by teachers who decline to join the union.
Those workers still can be charged fees by the union to help pay for labor negotiations that affect them. But they can't be forced to pay for the union's political activism.
At issue is whether the union needs teachers to say "yes" before the fees can be used for political causes or whether the fees can be used for that purpose unless the teachers say "no."
Washington's Evergreen Freedom Foundation, which is behind the lawsuit, has issued a press release.
Two thoughts. I can understand the notion of the "agency fee" in unionland, even if I don't agree with it. What I really don't get is the union getting carte blanche to use that fee--forcibly confiscated from the individual--in any way it chooses. If the union didn't insist on gaming the system (and taking positions on matters that have nothing to do with education), this case probably wouldn't be going to the Supremes.
Secondly, if the union loses, what do they do with all that cash? If they can't use it for political activities, it sounds like it will just keep collecting. So what will they spend it on? (Hey, there's always improved collective bargaining. Not to mention continuing education and professional development!)
If one of the union's biggest advantages--its deep pockets--is curtailed, the effects could be dramatic indeed. Stay tuned.
AP and standards
In a must-read, Jay Mathews continues to examine Advanced Placement, while simultaneously illustrating a rather disturbing mindset on the part of some teachers.
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Posted by Ryan Boots at 01:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)High Tech Hype (Ken De Rosa and Right Wing Prof)
Forget the wading boots for the educration hype about High Tech High. You need a hazmat suit and oxygen tanks, because there's nothing here but organic fertilizer of the equine fecal variety.
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Posted by Featured Guest at 09:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (9) | TrackBacks (0)Education News for Tuesday, September 26
They’re All Federal Educators Now - Opinion by Neal McCluskey of Cato: Quite simply, national standards — or government-imposed education standards at any level — are at best doomed to mediocrity.
Separating the Wheat from the Chaff: School Choice Can Transform the Teaching Profession, Study Finds - News release: Public schools shun the best and brightest teachers, claims a study released today by the Cato Institute.
New Orleans is No. 1 in charter school shares - New Orleans leads the growing charter school movement nationally, which has more than 1 million students enrolled in public charter schools.
Average teacher salary tops $42,000 - Thanks to a $1,500 across-the-board pay raise to teachers this year, the average salary for Louisiana educators is $42,100, a state panel said Monday.
Report details ethnic learning gap - Salt Lake City-based Centro de la Familia commissioned a report examining the racial achievement gap.
Lawmaker Asks Criminal Probe of U.S. Reading Program - A Democratic congressman called for a criminal investigation after an audit found that a $1 billion federal program to improve reading among grade-school children was run by staff who steered contracts to favored publishers.
Panel's chairman urges changes in No Child Left Behind law - When the No Child Left Behind law comes up for renewal next year, changes are needed to make it more effective, the chairman of a bipartisan commission said Monday.
Is Homework Necessary? Also: A Truce Over Teaching Math - Opinion: One educational dispute seems to be calming down, while another is heating up.
In the pursuit of classroom alchemy - Opinion: I'm beginning my 20th year of teaching in the Los Angeles Unified School District, and if I've learned anything, it is that good teaching cannot be measured quantitatively.
Experts: Education plan likely won't fly - A federal advisory group's call for an overhaul of American higher education, including sweeping changes in financial aid and standardized testing of college students, is unlikely to gain traction with lawmakers, education experts said.
Pin a blue ribbon on these 10 elementary schools - For their work at getting students to achieve at an exceptional level, a number of area schools have been honored as being among the best in the country.
Thanks, but no thanks - Editorial: The Los Angeles school board's refusal to allow Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to help choose the next schools superintendent is a big mistake.
Reading First's scandalous underbelly - Editorial: The independent inspector general at the Department of Education did not pull punches in a report on the administration of Reading First, a centerpiece Bush administration initiative.
Urban Tragedy - Opinion: The closure of Catholic parochial schools is nothing but a tragedy.
Open All the Books On Reading Funds - Editorial: The U.S. Department of Education can't preach greater accountability to the nation's school districts unless it is also willing to show accountability itself. Fixing the flaws in Reading First is a fine place to begin.
More needs to be done for college readiness - Editorial: More needs to be done -- before 12th grade -- to improve college readiness.
Check back later for more education news.
UPDATE:
Children, not church, benefit from school funding - Letter to the editor: The state, by supporting private schools, benefits the children who are citizens of that state. It is the children who receive the assistance, not the Catholic schools.
Learning on state’s dime - A look at the beginning of the new Ohio voucher program.
Open forum of No Child Left Behind: Is the feds' plan working?
-YES: Margaret Spellings, Secretary of Education
-NO: U.S. Rep. Sam Farr (D-Calif.)
High Court to Hear Case About Union Dues - The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to decide whether public employee unions must get special permission to spend some workers' dues on political causes, a case testing limits on labor activism just before the 2008 presidential campaign.
Federal managers abused powers, Education IG says - Two reading programs that were largely excluded from President Bush’s $1-billion-a-year Reading First program say they will ask Education Secretary Margaret Spellings this week to tell school districts nationwide their approaches are eligible for federal funding.
UPDATE:
Bulk of No Child 'here to stay,' but changes sought - When the No Child Left Behind law comes up for renewal next year, changes are needed to make it more effective, the cochairman of a bipartisan commission said yesterday.
Stemming the tide - Editorial: After losing increasing numbers of students to charter schools and state-funded vouchers, Columbus Public Schools can counter the exodus only by giving families more of what they’re going to charter and private schools for: a sense of improved safety, stricter discipline, individual attention for students, respect for parents and innovative programs.
Posted by Daily News at 05:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)Charter Schools Defined (Terrence O. Moore)
Charter schools are among the least understood public institutions around, perhaps even less understood than the bolder form of school reform known as vouchers. Often parents have called my school to ask, “How much is tuition?” One witty board member said, in light of human beings’ love of a good deal, we should respond with, “For you, it costs nothing.” Several of our critics in the paper have snarled that Ridgeview is “an elite private school.” (Presumably being an elite school is a bad thing, though no one complains of elite sports teams or auto-glass repairmen.) And yet as a charter school, Ridgeview charges no tuition, though we fancy that the education we provide is comparable to private schools that charge many thousands of dollars per child per year. Indeed, to underline our charter-school status, we have had to display prominently on our marquee, on our website, and in all advertising the words “no tuition.” Far from being private schools, charter schools are public institutions. In fact, they may be the most authentically American form of schooling.
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Posted by Featured Guest at 01:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (22) | TrackBacks (0)Response to Educating School Teachers (David A. Ritchey)
This response to Dr. Arthur Levine's recent study of teacher education was submitted by David A. Ritchey on behalf of the Association of Teacher Educators. -ed.
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Posted by Featured Guest at 01:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)In Support of Australia's Religious Schools (Jennifer Buckingham)
Last week Maralyn Parker, the education editor of the Sydney newspaper The Daily Telegraph, made some pretty inflammatory comments about religious schools. She described small religious schools as ‘ghetto schools’ and claimed that small Christian and Islamic schools teach creationism and hatred of homosexuals.
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Posted by Featured Guest at 01:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)Battling the Education Hydra (Nancy Salvato)
Research proves that effective reading teachers know how students learn to read (acquisition), how to teach students to read (instruction), how to judge how well students read (assessment), and how to strengthen students’ reading skills (remediation). Despite this, only three out of sixteen Reading First Education Network States require their licensed elementary school teachers demonstrate proficient knowledge of the essential components of reading instruction: phonemic awareness; phonics; vocabulary development; reading fluency; and reading comprehension strategies.
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Posted by Featured Guest at 01:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)Can They Call a Truce? (Matt Johnston)
I am not sure who, if anyone, said it first, but a former boss was fond of telling me, “In a battle between David and Goliath, the smart money is on Goliath.” It is not that my boss though Goliath always wins, just that he usually does. Alexis de Tocqueville wrote in Democracy in America that there is hardly a public question in America that doesn’t become a legal issue. Nowhere is the David and Goliath scenario more prominent in education than in the legal battles between charter schools and local school boards. For years the battle charter advocates faced was simply getting a law enacted to allow charter schools to be formed, but all that is changing. The battle over charter schools will now shift venues, from the legislative and lobbying world to the courtroom.
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Posted by Featured Guest at 01:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)September 25, 2006
Reading First scandal?
So thanks in no small part to some extra fuel, I managed to slog most of the way through the latest helping of chloroform in print from USDOE, the Reading First audit by USDOE's Office of Inspector General, which is sparking a minifirestorm in edureform circles. Check out the AP, NYT, and Eduwonk (who suggests that Reading First chairman Chris Doherty, who submitted his resignation the day before the report went public, is taking the fall for this thing).
On the face of it, it would seem there was some degree of insider politics and backslapping going on throughout this project. However, Ken De Rosa, who has put most of the edusphere to shame with his analysis of this thing, suggests that this is fallout from the ongoing battle against whole language. After going on to provide a blow-by-blow takedown of the audit, he concludes, "This is weak tea at best, which is not to say that it won't be milked for all the political capital in can."
A few thoughts in response. First off, I think there might be some actionable offenses by USDOE in here somewhere, but overall they seem a bit minor. Ken himself notes that the failure to form an oversight panel to manage the application approval process (more on that in a second) might get some traction. However, there's at least one other example: as part of the materials to be sent to states wishing to apply for a RF grant, USDOE prepared the Reading First Guidance, intended to, well, provide guidance for states to navigate the application process. From p. 15 of the audit:
The Assistant Secretary for OESE planned for the Reading First Guidance to include language that was not in the statute and exclude language that was in the statute. After reviewing a revision to the Department’s draft of the Reading First Guidance, the Assistant Secretary for OESE wrote to the Reading First Director, “under reading first plan. i’d like not to say ‘this must include early intervention and reading remediation materials’ which i think could be read as ‘reading recovery’ [a reading program]. even if it says this in the law, i’d like it taken out.” The subject phrase appears in the law twice. [emphasis added]
Ken will quickly add that Reading Recovery, a failed remedial reading program based on whole language, deserved to be excluded from the program. I don't disagree; however, it would seem to me that the language could have been crafted to both reflect the wording of the law and exclude all the whole language/balanced literacy fluff. By failing to properly do so, USDOE may have both run afoul of the law and ceded some ground to the whole language crowd.
However, I have a bigger point with respect to objectivity. One of the biggest complaints critics are raising right now has to do with the makeup of the panels which approved states' requests for RF grants. The legislation which created Reading First didn't require that such panels be screened for conflicts of interest; however, USDOE decided to implement a process to weed out such individuals. The audit faults USDOE for using an ineffective process. Not only does that sound like faulting a student for doing poorly on extra credit, but it points to the issue of objectivity, which I wrote about a few months ago.
Now, in that post I said that assertions and conclusions should be judged on their merits and validity rather than some measure of objectivity, which tends to be quite a stretch in most endeavors. However, the complaint here isn't merely concerned with objectivity, but conflict of interest (i.e. whether an individual might materially benefit from recommending a particular reading program).
Well, the way out of this seems pretty easy to me: simply disqualify an individual who presently has financial interests in curriculum development or education publishing. But I think it would be rather self-defeating to exclude individuals who have ever been employed by or connected to certain publishers or materials providers. Oh, I have no doubt such individuals can be found, but they're likely to be quite ignorant of the most valid literacy instruction techniques, of scientifically based reading research (explicitly required under the law)--in other words, they're the last people you want on a panel, and those most likely to screw it up.
It definitely looks like USDOE is guilty of sloppiness with respect to implementation of Reading First. A messy bureaucracy? I'm shocked, shocked. But that hardly passes muster for a criminal indictment.
The false teeth of NCLB
Here's a frequently overlooked aspect of NCLB: while a school can be judged failing under the law, only schools receiving Title I money actually face sanctions. So if a school isn't getting federal funding, the feds will not step in no matter how bad it is:
Chad Colby, a spokesman for the U.S. Department of Education, confirmed the limitations of No Child Left Behind enforcement.
"If you're a school that is not doing well, we want you to take action," Colby said, "but we can only control schools that received federal funds under Title I. Those schools are under an obligation to show accountability."
Of course, critics can still say that NCLB unfairly targets low-income schools. But it's a bit of a stretch to say that all schools are facing the NCLB axe. Furthermore, in some cases I don't know that (with the possible exception of the school choice provision) NCLB could make a difference in the case of districts like Camden (New Jersey) Public Schools; it's already under state oversight and spends somewhere in the neighborhood of $15,000 per student per year.
UPDATE: In an e-mail, Collin Hitt of the Illinois Policy Institute suggests that I was minimizing the situation:
Posted by Ryan Boots at 08:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)Schools may only be sanctioned if they are Title I schools. Moreover, according to the Illinois State Board of Education’s interpretation of the law, schools must have received Title I funds during the years in which they did not make adequate yearly progress and during the years in which sanctions are to apply. And, sanctions can only apply to schools that failed to make adequate yearly progress (and received Title I funding) during the two previous calendar years. If a school removes itself, for any reason, from Title I eligibility during that time period – the State Board of Education believes – the process begins anew. In other words, a school needs only to remove itself from Title I eligibility once every 3-5 years, and sanctions will never apply. Here is a policy statement released by the Board, which in effect advises already failing schools of how to take less money so as to not have to send their students to better schools.
Education News for Monday, Sept. 25
Tutors prepare them - for pre-school and kindergarten - Facing an emphasis on testing and the desire to get their children into good schools, parents are turning to private sessions for kids as young as 3.
Getting behind early education - The business community needs to provide more leadership in promoting the upfront prevention of social problems through early child development...
Fixing Ohio schools - Who would pay? - In the race for governor, Ohio’s schools often get caught in the crossfire, sometimes maligned by the candidates for failing schoolchildren.
5 years of giving kids a second chance - Steve Schuck’s foundation has won praise for offering hundreds of scholarships and grants.
FL private schools on the rise - As public school enrollment in Palm Beach County begins to slow, some private and religious schools say their student populations remain stable.
Report says education officials violated rules - Department of Education officials violated conflict of interest rules when awarding grants to states under President Bush’s billion-dollar reading initiative, and steered contracts to favored textbook publishers, the department’s inspector general said yesterday.
Detroit will blitz parents to get back in school now - With TV spots, newspaper ads, visits from truant officers and letters to parents, Detroit's city and school leaders prepared Friday for an all-out blitz this weekend and early next week to get kids -- about 25,000 of them -- back to class...
Check back later for more education news.
Posted by Daily News at 05:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)September 22, 2006
Detroit strike fallout
That teachers strike in Detroit may have dealt a critical blow to an already struggling school district:
A 16-day teacher strike may have cost Detroit Public Schools 25,000 students, district officials said Thursday, a potential loss that would mean a cut of $190 million in state aid and almost certainly another dramatic downsizing of schools and employees.
The gloomy estimate, which school officials acknowledge is not exact, comes in advance of Wednesday's official count day, when enrollment numbers are used to determine the amount of state funding to be allocated to districts across Michigan.
The district is embarking on a massive campaign to woo students back, with phone calls and letters to every student's home, enlisting the help of community groups and churches, in addition to count-day pizza and ice cream parties to make sure students are in school Wednesday.
There are charter schools in Detroit. Public school choice also exists (Detroit students can enroll in suburban school districts that opt to take them). So that's where those 25,000 students went. Right?
Detroit Public Schools may have lost 25,000 students, but few suburban school districts or charter schools are reporting large influxes of new students this year.
Only Oak Park had reported a significant influx -- with 266 additional students as of Sept. 7, when Detroit teachers were in the midst of a 16-day strike. Oak Park officials did not return calls on whether they've seen significantly more since.
So where did all the DPS students go?
Detroit school officials acknowledge they could have a bad number, but high numbers of dropouts also are possible.
"If (Detroit) lost them, they didn't lose them to us," said Jan Brill, superintendent for Warren's Fitzgerald Public Schools, which has not enrolled any Detroit students for the 2006-07 school year. The district reported 100 students from Detroit last school year.
25,000 students--enough to make up a suburb of their own--have left the district. Most of them are unaccounted for. Gone. Vanished.
The Detroit Federation of Teachers' single hope at this point is that the number of AWOL students ends up being wildly inaccurate. If it isn't--or worse, if it's understated--the union will have education blood on its hands. Period. (Mike Antonucci has more.)
Fordham wins two big converts
Cheers from Fordham as Bill Bennett and Rod Paige endorse national standards:
So while (NCLB) is clearly starting to get results, it is also starting to suffer from the law of unintended consequences. We can now see that it gives states entirely too much discretion over standards and tests while giving federal bureaucrats too much control over how schools operate.
The remedy? As both of us have long argued, Washington should set sound national academic standards and administer a high-quality national test. Publicize everybody's results, right down to the school level. Then Washington should butt out.
Of course, it's hard to overstate the significance of this. Rod Paige--EdSec when NCLB was passed--essentially says the law just isn't working well. Reagan-era EdSec Bill Bennett has his back. And all this just as NCLB reauthorization is starting to rev up.
Here's where I think Paige and Bennett--and, by extension, Fordham--have a tough row to hoe. As I and others have pointed out, Spellings has had a notoriously bad record of actually enforcing the law. If she won't enforce standards set by the states themselves--standards that, as Fordham itself says, are generally pedestrian--I don't know that she would have a reason to change course. If anything, if a set of across-the-board national standards are even slightly more difficult than those presently in place in many states, Spellings might be even less inclined to toughen up.
I'm also rather troubled by that last sentence: "Then Washington should butt out." What does that mean, precisely? Presumably it means a hands-off approach from Washington in day-to-day school management, which Paige and Bennett decry. So to borrow from Mike Petrilli (EdWeek subscription required), does that mean that NCLB should phase out of a "what works" into more of a "whatever works" mode of thinking? Assuming that's what they suggest, that wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing (in fact, it might elicit thunderous applause from some circles. But some clarification here (especially in terms of accountability) could definitely help.
Also, what Bennett and Paige suggest for moving forward sounds...
We're also painfully aware that national standards and tests are hard to get right -- and even harder to get through Congress. Another new report outlines four ways in which this might be done. Several scenarios would rely on a "bottom-up" approach, with states working together on a voluntary basis to forge common expectations, lessening the chances that Washington would mess them up.
...well, it sounds remarkably like what presently exists: the states draw up their standards, then present them to Washington for approval. Except under Bennett and Paige's plan, all 50 states would work together to present a single uniform set of standards to the feds. I know the devil is in the details (and in the report they mention, which I don't have time to look at just this minute), but I rather suspect getting all 50 states on the same page is going to take some form of divine intervention.
Regular readers will be aware of our introductory Edspresso debate wherein Petrilli and Neal McCluskey hashed out national standards in some length. Both sides of the discussion have merit. But to borrow from Second Amendment advocates, might we try enforcing the laws we have before passing new ones?
Education News for Friday, Sept. 22
Exams boost charter schools - NYC charter-school students bested students in traditional public school, passing their reading tests at a rate nearly 5 percentage points higher, a Post analysis of the results has found.
NCLB: Are we saving or ruining our public schools? - Law.com opinion: The No Child Left Behind Act has been in place for almost five years. But ever since its inception, there has been continuous debate about the act's effectiveness and consequences.
High-need schools, highly paid teachers - State schools Superintendent Elizabeth Burmaster proposed Thursday that Wisconsin provide $5,000 annual bonuses to highly qualified teachers to teach in high-needs schools such as most of those in the Milwaukee Public Schools.
Munsil agenda revealed - AZ gov candidate, Munsil's agenda includes: Expanded school choice through tax credits, vouchers and additional charter schools.
UT charter school cap met for 07-08 - For years, charter schools have been popping up all over the map in Utah, with about a third of those in Utah County. But with a cap set by the state Legislature for new charter schools already met for the 2007-2008 school year, the future is uncertain for at least 13 groups of parents looking for new education options.
Check back later for more education news.
UPDATE:
Spellings announces first list of 2006 NCLB blue ribbon schools - These public and private K-12 schools are being honored for helping close the achievement gap and for their students who achieve at very high levels.
US science education lags, study says - Science education in U.S. elementary and middle schools is overly broad and superficial, according to a government report issued Thursday that also faults science curricula for assuming children are simplistic thinkers.
CA academic standards bill vetoed - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed legislation Wednesday that proposed an instant fix for students failing to meet California's standard for proficiency: redefine proficiency.
Detroit Public Schools lose 25,000 pupils - A 16-day teacher strike may have cost Detroit Public Schools 25,000 students, district officials said Thursday, a potential loss that would mean a cut of $190 million in state aid and almost certainly another dramatic downsizing of schools and employees.
Posted by Daily News at 05:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
September 21, 2006
The new math
The Chicago Tribune looks at the announcement of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics to refocus on basic math skills. The Charlotte Observer cheers. Ken De Rosa is less than impressed.
Posted by Ryan Boots at 02:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)Education in electoral politics
Education is, as usual, proving to be a major football in electoral politics.
Continue reading "Education in electoral politics" »
Posted by Ryan Boots at 01:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)Education News for Thursday, September 21
No Child Left Behind leaves schools struggling - Editorial: We often joke that if you want something to be truly dysfunctional, get the federal government involved in it. Of course, that is generally an overstatement. But in the case of No Child Left Behind, nothing could be truer.
No Child Left Behind stirs Conn. campaigns - Recent congressional debate over the No Child Left Behind law has been largely nonpartisan, but that has not prevented struggles over implementing it from becoming a flashpoint this fall in Connecticut’s hotly contested races.
Questions Of Bias Surround ODE-Charter School Squabble - The Oregon Department of Education recently drew the ire of charter school supporters when it cracked down on admissions policies at Oregon's fastest-growing charter school. But ODE's fast action also got the attention of other school advocates, who have criticized the state for years for lax enforcement of other violations.
Illinois Giving Laptops to 1,700 Students - State officials say more than 17-hundred sixth-graders will get laptops as part of a five (M) million-dollar program to help children develop computer skills.
Ideas worth debating - An editorial looking at the education reform ideas of U.S. Rep. Mark Green, the Republican nominee for governor of Wisconsin.
Blackwell, Strickland clash over education in second debate - Steadfastly avoiding a school-funding solution, the two candidates for governor of Ohio today offered starkly different education plans in their second televised debate.
Schools Get Funds for Language Instruction - U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings announced yesterday that Fairfax County schools will receive more than $188,000 to expand Arabic and Chinese classes, part of a federal effort to increase the number of Americans who speak languages key to the global economy and international relations.
TEA head gathers ideas on school tours - The new president of the Tennessee Education Association is laying the ground for a battle that many teachers and administrators are ready to enter.
Response to Green plan unfair - Opinion: Unfortunately, education in Wisconsin has recently adopted a decidedly grimmer legacy: bloated administrative costs. The recent reaction to Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Green’s K-12 education plan proved it again.
School funding stances clash - The two major candidates for Ohio governor say they want to get more money to Ohio's schools, but in a debate on education offered vastly different approaches for how they would accomplish that goal.
High School Seniors Need to Knuckle Down, Test Finds - Most high school juniors in California are probably not ready for college courses, and need to hone their skills in their senior year, according to results of a voluntary statewide test released Wednesday.
The formula for math - Editorial: The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics has released a report calling for teaching math basics so kids are able to decipher problems in their heads -- without the crutch of calculators or computers. Can we get an amen?
U.S. bill would require student-search policies - Schools would be required to develop policies for searching students, or face the loss of some federal funding, under a bill that passed the U.S. House this week.
Menendez ought to get behind school choice - Editorial: Kids in failing schools deserve a decent education. Lawmakers such as Sen. Robert Menendez of New Jersey should help parents in poor communities by working to create school vouchers.
Panel will look at charter school control - Four Wyoming lawmakers will hear testimony about the contentious charter school issue and help the Legislature decide whether charter schools should remain under the control of local school districts.
Many not ready for college English, math - A voluntary test taken by the state’s 11th-graders to check their preparedness for the California State University system found that only 34 percent of those who took it in San Luis Obispo County were ready for college math.
Latest `new math' idea gets back to the basics - On Wednesday, a national organization of math teachers meeting in Chicago publicly unveiled a document that the group's leaders hope will turn the profession away from the controversy and toward teaching basic, key math skills.
UPDATE:
Why We Need a National School Test - Opinion: We need to find better and more efficient ways to produce an educated population and close the achievement gaps in our education system. Americans do ultimately get themselves educated -- at work, after school, online, in adulthood -- but a lot of time and money are wasted in the process.
State to explore abandoning No Child Left Behind law - Momentum is building across the political spectrum in Kansas to give No Child Left Behind a failing grade. President Bush’s major public school initiative is getting lambasted as unrealistic and counterproductive.
Posted by Daily News at 06:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)September 20, 2006
Education Next
The fall issue is out, with more great articles than you can shake a stick at. For example, Barry Garelick continues a theme started by Ken De Rosa of eviscerating math teaching, and Jenny Newmark's co-written examination of N'awlins charter revolution is finally available, Mike Petrilli and Checker Finn are still banging the national standards drum, and this is a good look at newly elected mayor of Newark (and Alliance board member) Cory Booker. (One question, though: why did they make the link so hard to find? I thought they would never redirect the Education Next URL.)
Shudder
In one of his online lesson plans, Andrew Pass links to an LA Times article which says that digital archives are actually quite perishable, and suggests the following question for students in his lesson plan:
"You go home from school today and find out that comptuers no longer work. You come back to school the next day and find that computers still don't work and will never work again." Ask students to consider what they've lost? Ask what might be lost throughout the world.
Gee, I don't know...my job, maybe? (Hat tip: this week's Carnival of Education, being hosted at Median Sib.)
PFAW throws its back out
The folks over at PFAW's blog must have at least pulled a muscle when they stretched to take a swipe at Cato's Andrew Coulson. Here's PFAW's account: Earlier this month, Andrew wrote a column in the Indianapolis Star critical of Indiana University's Center for Evaluation and Education Policy. CEEP periodically polls Indianans on school choice, and recent poll results have shown declining support for school choice among respondents. Andrew's principal complaints: CEEP's financial ties to IU's Department of Education make the group biased against school choice, and the question design was flawed.
CEEP's Jonathan Plucker fired back that CEEP is financially independent of IUDOE; that the costs of the poll are likewise paid by CEEP to prevent any hint of bias; and that CEEP works with outside polling experts to make sure the results are accurate and reliable. So concludes PFAW:
Faced with more and more evidence against privatization, voucher pushers have been forced to find creative rebuttals. And, like Mr. Coulson, they often prefer not to let facts get in the way of their ideology.
However, PFAW oddly fails to mention that, five days after the column ran in the Indy Star, Coulson subsequently posted this on Cato's blog. For the benefit of the thoughtful reader, here's the post in its entirety:
In a recent op-ed for the Indianapolis Star, I wrote that Indiana University’s Center for Evaluation and Education Policy (CEEP) had a vested interest in finding school choice to be unpopular with voters — because it was a part of the University’s Department of Education, and that department could well be rendered obsolete under a large scale school choice program. As it turns out, the Center is largely financially independent of the Department, and so would not likely go down with the ship under a voucher or education tax credit program.
I also expressed concern about the Center’s pattern of polling on school choice, which seemed to be moving away from the sort of neutral, general question that elicits more favorable responses, and toward narrower questions that elicit lower support. After speaking with CEEP’s director, Jonathan Plucker, I’m informed that they already have plans to ask their initial general voucher question once again, on their next survey, and so the appearance of a move away from such questions was illusory.
I’m delighted to hear both of these facts, should have taken the time to obtain them in advance, and owe Dr. Plucker and his staff an apology.
Now if Phi Delta Kappan, the publisher of an annual nationwide education survey, is willing to return to THEIR original voucher question, I will be delighted to apologize to them as well. Still not holding my breath on that one.
Read carefully, folks--that's a retraction and apology. Also note the mention of Phi Delta Kappa; the group, which has turned misleading voucher polling into an annual ritual, is really the main focus of Coulson's column (CEEP was more of a side issue). And, interestingly enough, PFAW also declines to observe that Plucker acknowledged and accepted Coulson's apology--and even complimented him for his work:
Andrew Coulson in his Sept. 3 My View on school vouchers made several incorrect claims about the Center for Evaluation and Education Policy. He has subsequently apologized on the Cato Institute blog, noting that he "should have taken the time to obtain (the facts) in advance, and owe(s) Dr. Plucker and his staff an apology." My staff and I appreciate his willingness to admit that he was mistaken.
[snip]
I usually find Coulson to be a fine, provocative scholar. In this case, however, he let his biases and assumptions get in the way of properly researching his comments. Indiana's education policy community deserved better.
Thing is, Coulson already apologized for what he said about CEEP. So why did Plucker go to the extra effort to do the letter to the Indy Star? Obviously Plucker would have to explain, but I imagine he felt the need to clarify matters through the outlet in which Coulson's column originally ran. I don't begrudge him that.
So, in summary: Coulson overdid things in a column, and ran a retraction and apology. CEEP accepted the retraction/apology and wrote a separate letter to the editor to set the record straight. In other words, this is a non-issue.
You know, if the school choice movement really is as corrupt and conniving as PFAW believes, you would think they could find a better issue to target.
UPDATE: First the AFTies, now People for the American Way! We get love from everywhere! Thanks for the sweet traffic, guys!
Posted by Ryan Boots at 03:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)Two sides of accountability
Eduwonk says:
If you follow school choice issues, I don't have to tell you the importance of this must-read by Alan Borsuk in the MJS.
The upshot of the article:
The decisions by two longtime private-school operators not to open this fall in Milwaukee underscore how the precedent-setting private school voucher program is being reshaped.
The Journal Sentinel and others had raised questions about the quality of the schools. Neither of the schools' operators - Amit Ray and Linda Meadors - had given any indication that their schools were ready to meet a new requirement that all schools with voucher students be accredited. Ray operated the Milwaukee Multicultural Academy and the Milwaukee School of Choice, and Meadors ran Grace Christian Academy.
The message underlying the new developments, and other changes in the voucher program? It's not as easy to run a weak publicly funded school in Milwaukee now as it was a c