Studies Indicate Charter Schools Re-Segregating Students

Through Race to the Top is Obama unwittingly promoting a new wave of school segregation?

The growth of charter schools has promoted segregation both in California and nationwide, increasing the odds that black, Latino and white students will attend class with fewer children who look different from themselves, according to two new studies.

Revelation

From the New Yorker interview with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan:

Many people who voted for Obama are finding out that on education, as on other issues, he is more of a centrist than they ever imagined.

Yeah. Too bad some are so far to the right that they confuse "center" with "socialist".

Unintended Con$equence$

Twin Falls (ID) School District Superintendent Wiley Dobbs reacting to the idea of adopting a merit pay system for his teachers.

"You might discourage teachers from working with other teachers if they're competing for dollars. If I'm in competition with a teacher across the hall, I‘m not as likely to share strategies. That wouldn't be a good model." --

Hmm...

Bye Bye NCLB

Obama proposes major changes to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (aka NCLB).

Educators who have been briefed by administration officials said the proposals for changes in the main law governing the federal role in public schools would eliminate or rework many of the provisions that teachers’ unions, associations of principals, school boards and other groups have found most objectionable.

Replacing those old objectionable items are new ones: national "common" standards, unbridled charter school expansion, achievement-driven Title funding, and teacher "bonus-pay" based on student test scores.

I must get some of those teleprompters for my classroom.

Arne Duncan Talks Education to Politico

The good people over at Politico.com sat down with Education Secretary Arne Duncan and talked about the future role of the federal government in our schools.

Part 1: Data Firewalls

Politico: What are the programs you don't want to see cut.

Duncan: Well, obviously things like Race to the Top. We've seen-- before we've spent a dime-- we've seen massive change around the country. Forty-eight states working on common standards. Many, many states reducing restrictions on innovation. Folks tearing down data firewalls between teacher performance and student achievement. And so, programs like that.

Tearing down the firewalls between teacher performance and student achievement. I hope someone got a raise for coming up with that one.

Part 2: The Truth

Duncan: I think we’ve been, as a country, far too reluctant to tell the truth,” he said. “The truth can be good, it can be bad, it can be ugly, it can be somewhere in the middle. It could be that a school isn’t working or the school is doing a phenomenal job. Or a district or, for that matter, a state. Or take it all the way down to the classroom.

Part 3: Childhood Obesity

Politico: You've recently met with the First Lady on her anti-obesity efforts. What's going to be your part in that?

Duncan: All of us have to work together to make sure that our students are healthy. There is so much that I want to do to improve academic achievement. But if students aren't safe, they can't see the blackboard, they don't have clues, if they're not eating the right types of foods, they are not going to be successful academically. These, to me, are like foundational building blocks to making sure students have a chance to fulfill their true academic and social potential.

Coverage of Idaho School Opting Out of RTTT

"The school district is not going to pursue nickels and dimes on the sidewalk, while letting dollars slip out our pockets -- while looking at the priorities we've already established," said Boise School District Superintendent Dr. Stan Olson.

Will RTTT Become Political Chip?

Education Week takes a look at how RTTT funds might be used as a political chip to garner favor for passage of ESEA reauthorization or impact Congressional elections in purple states.

Surely not.

Education in State of the Union

RTTT Director Joanne Weiss Explains the Grant

Tracking ARRA in Education

A new website says it "will document spending of ARRA funds in states, school districts and schools." EdMoney.org is backed with funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Who is Supporting RTTT?

Here is a list of the thirty-one state teacher associations which somewhat or fully support their state's RTTT application:

Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming.

Here is a list of nine state teacher associations which did NOT support their state's RTTT application:

California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, Rhode Island, South Dakota.

Finally, a list of ten states which did not send in RTTT applications:

Alaska, Maine, Maryland, Montana, Mississippi, Nevada, North Dakota, Texas, Vermont, Washington.

From what I understand, the Arizona Education Association was unable to fully support Arizona's RTTT application because not enough data could be supplied by the DOE before the due date.

Good for the Gander?

The Arizona Guardian (subscription required) yesterday reported on the state's RTTT application. Governor Brewer's P-20 Council submitted the 300-page document to the US Secretary of Education just before the deadline. My former superintendent, Dr Debra Duvall, took the lead in the grant request.

A particular comment by Dr Duvall regarding how the new Arizona plan could impact teachers caught my eye.

Arizona's Race to The Top application proposes that local school districs craft new teacher evaluations so that half of a teacher's grade will be determined by his or her students' improvement.

That means that teachers of students that consistenly fail will be held accountable, said Deb Duvall, special advisor to Brewer on Race to the Top.

"One would have to question the teacher's effectiveness," she said.

Hmm. Dr Duvall was superintendent of Mesa during the years of NCLB. Under her watch, dozens of schools "failed" to reach Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) and the district is currently in their fourth year of being labeled "In Need of Improvement."

What does that say about you, Dr Duvall?

Is Education Too Big to Fail?

An interesting take on Race to The Top by school leaders from districts in California which do not wish to participate in the federal grant.

The RTTT initiative provides $4.5 billion nationally for qualifying states. California may be eligible for up to $700 million. Based on projected estimates, for many districts this would mean eligibility to receive one-time funds equaling about 1-2% of the average operating budget over the next two to four years. So while the RTTT has been "sold" as a major game-changing investment or "bailout" of public schools, local school districts know better.

So while Wall Street was given hundreds of billions of dollars with little to no conditions, schools are offered a fraction of the Wall Street monies with restrictive and costly mandates. Is not public education too big and too important to fail? All this said, districts were left questioning whether this money was a big enough carrot for large scale reform required of RTTT.

I wish there were more news about RTTT so that people could have made a rationale decision about it. Instead, there was a quick deadline. No time to be deliberate.

Will that come back to haunt us?

Weighty Decision

Arizona has submitted their Race to the Top (RTTT) application to Secretary of Education Arnie Duncan. In hopes of receiving a one time grant of a few hundred million dollars, Arizona is willing to create new standardized tests for kindergartners, shut down more "failing" schools (which implies we have schools which fail... and are doing nothing about them), and replace our state mandated AIMS test with a new, shiny, nationally-mandated, standardized test.

Oh... and require that 50% of a teacher's job evaluation be tied to student scores on all of those tests.

Chuck Essigs lobbies for the Arizona Association for School Business Officials. He is a smart man, and someone who always does seem to be wanting what is best for schools. That is why I am confused by his quote:

"(Schools are) going to have to do most of it anyway, so why not get the extra money to do it."

Gee, Chuck. Don't you watch TV? Iraq. Afghanistan. CEO Pay. Health Care. Nothing has gone the way the administration said it would.

Nothing.

Why are schools the only ones not willing to push back against federal mandates?

Words Matter

People need to be careful what they say, especially Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett.

Here is what he recently said regarding his state's RTTT application:

"I think it’s a pretty clear indication that Indiana is a reform-ready state and that the stakeholders in this state are ready for education reform," Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett said.

What he meant to say was:

We had no plans to implement any of these new policies, but the state is cash strapped, and we will evidently do anything-- including jumping through numerous new hoops and fundamentally changing our professional evaluation programs-- just to get more money.

It's not the same thing.

If people begin to confuse the reasons states are "rushing to the Race" then it will become easier to make more drastic reforms.

Check your assumptions, please

As far as I can tell, here is the central theme to Race to the Top: improve education through teacher evaluations.

Here is how The Apple puts it:

The Obama administration is concentrating on teacher effectiveness, he said last week. No Child focused on whether a teacher was qualified to be in the classroom; Race to the Top looks at whether a teacher is effectively educating students.

The teacher is central to education, no argument there. The parent and student play a very important role as well. If we could add evaluations of students and of parents to the plan, we might have a more accurate picture.

I wouldn't hold my breath.

Who Needs Privacy?

Certainly a teacher's personnel file shouldn't be private, at least that is what the Illinois State-Journal editorial board says:

If this law is going to leave that decision [to hire or fire a teacher] with the school district, then we believe parents deserve to know that the teacher in their child’s classroom has failed to live up to the professional standards established by the school district

.

I'm not sure of a single job anywhere where the public has access to personnel files. It's a basic right of privacy for the individual.

Isn't it?

Two States, Two Different Stories

The Tennessee Education Association has reluctantly endorsed measures which will put Tennessee in a more competitive position on their RTTT application.

A major sticking point in debate has been a decision on how much weight to give student testing data in evaluating teachers. Bredesen had previously insisted that results from the Tennessee Value-Added Assessment System should count for 50 percent of an evaluation score. The teachers union had insisted on no more than 35 percent.

Under the compromise announced Wednesday after lengthy negotiations, the "student growth data" from value-added testing will be the basis for 35 percent of an evaluation.

While in Michigan, the state teachers association is concerned new legislation passed there in December went too far.

Teachers are unhappy with reforms passed by lawmakers in December that link teacher pay, promotions and tenure to their students' performance on standardized tests. The union members also are upset that they haven't seen the final application yet, though a summary is posted on the state Web site.

[emphasis mine]

Whoa... I can see what they are saying. There is no call for movement or tenure to be tied to student test scores. Why would the Michigan legislature take those extra steps?

Gilbert Teachers Seek Important Answers

This is happening in too many articles I am reading. This time it was in Gilbert, where a crowd of teachers pressed their governing board for information regarding RTTT.

The [Gilbert] teachers questioned how Race to the Top will help them improve their teaching, instead of being a hindrance.

They had questions about how the money will be used, how struggling students will affect their evaluations and how professional development works into the plan. They wondered what happens after the four-year plan and after money runs out, and if it would force teachers to teach to the tests.

Teachers questioned how students and teachers will be held accountable.

Jo Bell, a Mesquite English teacher and president of the Gilbert Education Association, said she has held out signing the Race to the Top memorandum of understanding because "teachers are nervous and scared."

Board President Thad Stump said he has many of the same questions the teachers asked, and said the answers to those questions don't exist.

No one knows the answers, but few will risk being left out of the money chase.

Breaking Down RTTT

The Tennessee Report provides one of the more succinct (and understandable) explanations of Race to the Top I have yet read. It has a Tennessee slant to it, but nonetheless provides basic information on what is being asked of states to apply for the federal stimulus dollars.