Even when research studies come from prestigious universities like Stanford, they can be flawed. That’s the case with data cited in “The $5 billion bet on education,” Al Hunt’s recent New York Times commentary about the Obama Administration’s education agenda and its reliance on less bureaucratic, more accountable public schools known as charters.

A small research unit at Stanford (not the university itself) piloted a methodology pairing virtual twins in charters with students in traditional public education, producing results at odds with most state and national assessments that show far better results. And the longer students are in charters, the better they do.

Obama’s Race to the Top would not be complete without such reforms, but Hunt errors in giving credit to states that have done little to create strong laws that allow for high numbers of high performing charter schools to flourish. The real test will be whether, when state legislators return to work, they will be willing to allow charters to start outside of school board control, free from union contracts and other constraints and funded equitably.

MEMO

TO: Readers
FROM: Ed M. Onitor
DATE: January 28, 2009
RE: Did you think it was all about the kids?

I wanted to flag for you Sam Dillon’s piece on the education portion of the federal stimulus package from today’s New York Times.

Some lines worth highlighting:

“The economic stimulus plan that Congress has scheduled for a vote on Wednesday would shower the nation’s school districts, child care centers and university campuses with $150 billion in new federal spending…”

“Critics and supporters alike said that by its sheer scope, the measure could profoundly change the federal government’s role in education…”

“Obama administration officials, teachers unions and associations representing school boards, colleges and other institutions in American education said the aid would bring crucial financial relief to the nation’s 15,000 school districts and to thousands of campuses otherwise threatened with severe cutbacks.”

“This is going to avert literally hundreds of thousands of teacher layoffs,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan said Tuesday.”

“This really marks a new era in federal spending…”

And perhaps the most on-target statement comes from AEI’s Rick Hess (it almost made me spill my coffee):

“It’s like an alcoholic at the end of the night when the bars close, and the solution is to open the bar for another hour…”

Instead of throwing money at our crisis, why don’t we throw some innovation at our failing education system?

Got Mandate?

Andy Rotherham (via Eduwonk) has some fun dissecting today’s New York Times article on the unionization process within two Brooklyn-based KIPP charter schools (”Teachers at 2 Charter Schools Plan to Join Union, Despite Notion of Incompatibility“):

First, Jeanne Allen of the Center for Education Reform says that “A union contract is actually at odds with a charter school.”  “Actually” is the wrong word there.  The more accurate way to say that would be, “could be.”  Why?  Well one example is the unionized and highly sucessful Green Dot Public Schools, another is KIPP Bronx, which has been unionized for some time.  And there are others, good and bad.  What matters is what’s in the contract not unionization per se.

Beyond the quote as printed, what I actually said was that unions and the charter CONCEPT are at odds. Green Dot (Andy’s example) created its own contract, one that works within its model (though results in NYC will be interesting). What KIPP schools are experiencing is the equivalent of a takeover, even disguised as a restructuring, where management will no longer be able to set the tone or culture of their schools. That might work for some teachers who believe their work conditions are the most important aspect of their school, but this move puts students second. This thinking is what brought us the system failure that, to date, un-co-opted charter schools have sought to correct.

Oh my, dear eduwonkette! We are so delighted by your coverage of the most important issues of the day. Alas, you broke the first cardinal rule of wonk-dom — KNOW THY FACTS. We wonks and wonkettes must simply stick together, you know.

The extraordinary work of dozens of prize-winning researchers that signed the famous New York Times ad (including Nobel Laureates) spelled out the problem with bad journalism clearly. The New York Times had used an analysis of government data by a known opponent of charter schools to claim that charter schools were lagging other schools. It was akin to Philip Morris saying that tobacco is safe!

Besides the source, my dear, there is the sticky little issue of what the data really said. In this case, it was sample data of students in 4th grade compared across communities and states! In the case of the Washington Post’s journalism this week, reporters — not unions — analyzed the results of test scores from ONE community, and amidst those test scores are data for both (EVERY) conventional and charter public school, not just a sample, allowing for apples to apples comparisons.

If you are saying you don’t believe the Post, that’s okay. Many others have felt that way for years. However, if you are saying we are biased or have a double standard, you are simply wrong, lovely little wonkette. We respectfully beg to differ.

In the coming days, in between other important elf duties, we will show you more. For now, we bid you a fond farewell and a wish that in addition to world peace, we all embrace the notion of digging deeper than just what seems to meet the eye.