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Time to teach vs. time to reflect

Wednesday, October 5th, 2011

My fourth graders have been in school 8 weeks and already it’s time to have the first conferences with parents. I have a rambunctious and very smart bunch this year to reflect on.

Last week, we went to the New Almaden Quicksilver Mine, a county park, now renovated and a must-see for every fourth grader in the Bay Area. The date my school could reserve is well-before we begin California Gold Rush unit. Still, the kids were enthusiastic to see mining tools and hear about procedures to extract quicksilver (mercury) from which gold could be separated. They will be prepared.

Our science unit covers rocks and minerals, and the docent at the Mine showed the students cinnabar, which the Ohlone Indians dug up well before Europeans entered California, as well as quartz and quicksilver. Every part of this country is extraordinary in its own way, but California students have opportunities to see everything from the ocean to the valley to the mountains. The parents I will be conferencing with are aware of their children’s good luck.

Which makes me think hard when I read or hear stories in the news about big school districts that must lay off staff-tutors, counselors, parent liaisons. Is it the stingy state legislators elected in 2010 or mismanagement in a large school district bureaucracy (that tightfisted legislators blame)? Children in those states will not have money set aside to see unusual places that make up the world where they live. Schools won’t even have money to support the students who need extra help with reading and math.

When I have time to read professional journals, every teacher magazine, newsletter, and website is relieved to report the revisions to the flawed parts of the No Child Left Behind Act. However, rather than focusing on change in education policy, many states and also California conservatives are offering bills and initiatives to block contributions from unions to campaigns, calling it “paycheck protection.” Don’t forget, a teacher in California can request their dues not be used for political purposes. In the bills being introduced, corporations may not request a political contribution from employees, but can still call in huge profits to fund initiatives.

I prefer to spend the school day helping students choose good books at their reading level because almost all read at grade level, if not higher. The need is to understand or “make meaning” of the text. Those are the lessons I teach. Unlike many low-performing schools which draw students in my Master’s degree preparation classes, I also have the time to teach science and social studies.

I don’t think I will ever regret choosing and being hired by a modest-sized school district with a conscientious set of parents. Even two years ago when the budgets were much worse than this year, everyone stood together. I can count on the parents of my fourth graders to stand by educational issues that are important.

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Posted in No Child Left Behind Act, low-performing schools, public schools |
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What’s the harm!?

Wednesday, September 21st, 2011

Incredible! Members of Congress can’t be persuaded of the harm caused by shortchanging school age children and young adults? Who wants children to live hardscrabble days in the richest country on Earth?

high school outside of Death Valley, CA

high school outside of Death Valley, CA

Even middle-class and upper middle-class kids in suburban public or private schools are affected by the despair in the education world. But the harm is most worrisome for the 13% of the impoverished American families (according to 2010 Census Bureau figures) made up of parents under 30 with children.

Why have some members of Congress continually voted to let high rollers add to their billions while students go to schools with missing ceiling tiles and antique air venting systems? Saying the federal government should not be the funding source for state and local needs is simply not looking at reality. The states must cut their spending to maintain balanced budgets in spite of the evidence that shows revenue will only rise when jobs are available. If not the federal government, where is money to repair schools (and provide jobs) going to be found?

Why must parents count pennies to purchase food at home at the same time funds are being subtracted from school district food programs? It was a joke when that smiling, but hard-hearted president wanted to count ketchup as a vegetable, but not any longer when the only decent breakfast and lunch are provided at schools. The story about a school district food manager finding sources for low-fat, interesting meals for kids is worth following, but one success must be replicated country-wide to provide healthy change.

In a rich nation, healthcare for families should not be only affordable for the well-to-do who have jobs. Right now there are 46.2 million poor Americans: children, teen agers, working age adults, veterans, and the elderly. In Texas alone it has been advertised in the news that 14 million don’t have health benefits. But that isn’t the only state with the problem. At the same time, the cost of health care keeps rising. Fighting about the individual right to choose to pay for health benefits is not the priority. Generating jobs and setting up insurance exchanges is the need.

Pretending that the main problem for the U. S. is the debt and that austerity measures like spending cuts are the way to buy the country out of recession is fuzzy math. The resources needed to close the achievement gap for low-performing students mean revenues must be generated. The news this weekend about the billions that can be produced by revising tax rates on the extraordinarily wealthy is staggering. Fiscal priorities aimed at students who don’t drop out, and who graduate from high school and college on time, are far more likely to promote and create new jobs.

Children do well in school when they’re healthy, vaccinated, and fed. They do better when the school buildings are safe. They do better when enough teachers and staff are on the payroll. Students achieve when their parents have good jobs and time to pay attention to their children.

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“The time has come…

Wednesday, September 14th, 2011

To talk of many things”-Lewis Carroll. But talk about the lack of revision to ESEA (NCLB in its last iteration) is dominating the education world in September 2011.

rural school and district on Lopez Island, Washington

rural school and district on Lopez Island, Washington

The No Child Left Behind Act- President George W. Bush’s title for the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA)– was first authorized in 1965 under President Lyndon Johnson and revised every 5 years until the last alteration in 2001. Since then, all calls for adjustments have hit the high Congressional wall of inaction.

Who’s talking? National teachers’ unions NEA and AFT advocate change. The Council of Chief State School Officers exhorts Congress. Members of the National Governor’s Association have been in the forefront.

All across the country non-union teacher’s groups are the biggest voices: Educators4Excellence in New York; Teacher Plus in Boston, Indianapolis, and Chicago; Center for Teaching Quality in North Carolina, Denver, and Seattle to name a few.

What did the 2001 act provide? The legislation is lengthy and detailed. The sections on which most talk centers are “Improve the Academic Achievement of the Disadvantaged” and “Improving Basic Programs…” which delineate the main provisions of the act. Next, qualifications for teachers and paraprofessionals led to time-consuming paperwork to assure each teacher was “highly qualified.” Also, Innovative Programs morphed into advocacy for charter schools. The section “Improving Basic Programs” outlined the actions to show “adequate yearly progress” in reading and mathematics: in brief, each state must teach to its curriculum standards and provide outcomes on benchmark exams which would lead to 100% school proficiency in reading and math by 2014.

Why is NCLB so despised? All of these mandated programs are underfunded. As has been declared in this blog many times, it was clear to most teachers and administrators from the beginning that to have every student in a state reach grade level proficiency in two subjects by 2014 was a preposterous goal. The cost of upgrading curriculum standards and providing tests that give a single score by which to judge students is a contentious argument.

The ESEA legislation should have been revised by Congress in 2005-2006. It wasn’t. President Obama laid out revisions for Congress to take up in 2009 and March 2011. No go. In August 2011, the U.S. Department of Education used a provision in the legislation to offer waivers to the 2014 proficiency benchmark. States that could show consistent improvement in the four big administration priorities for ESEA revision would be authorized to alter their programs. The administration’s priorities are 1) working state data systems; 2) turn-around plans for low-performing schools; 3) improve experienced vs. new teacher distribution in low-performing schools; 4) boost curriculum standards in the state.

To create jobs in a stricken economy and to provide a further push to Congress, President Obama in his speech on September 8, 2011, recommended $60 billion to be divided among states to save teachers’ jobs and fix the infrastructure of school property. The inference was also to finish ESEA revisions.

Representative John Kline, Education Committee, commented on the high cost and more regulation, calling the program a teacher’s union bailout. Representative George Miller and Senator Tom Harkin of their respective Education Committees were more enthusiastic. So far Congressional revisions have been offered to bolster charter schools, eliminate forty programs under the supervision of the U.S. Department of Education (like the Star Schools Distance Learning Program), and flexible shift of federal funds (like Title 1) from poverty budget lines to special education.

What to our surprise! John Kline’s House Education committee has passed a vote on the charter schools revisions yesterday, September 13, 2011. On to a full house vote.

On the other hand, teacher’s organizations look for revision in school and teacher accountability rules and evaluation; stability in curriculum standards; and testing that leads to better learning rather than a score by which to berate teachers and students when the hurdle is not vaulted even though students may have leaped higher.

The time has come….

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Posted in Adequate Yearly Progress, Council of Chief State School Officers, ESEA, Elementary and Secondary Education Act, NCLB, National Governor's Association, No Child Left Behind Act, highly qualified teachers, low-performing schools, public schools |
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Vouchers Cross the Lips Again

Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011

You’d think the anxiety about debt, deficit, revenue, and spending cuts would leave school vouchers, one of the bugaboos of public education, to molder in the corner behind the trash containers.

But, no, the Ryan budget proposal let the V word out when explaining his plan for Medicare revision. It is supposed to save Medicare, but like all voucher plans, the story has more than one ending.

Recall the ruckus to settle a budget for the entire United States government (only until October 2011)? The Obama administration negotiators actually held onto a good number of education programs ready to be hooked and tossed into the education budget garbage bin by conservative players in the game. Notably, Title I grants, special education state grants, Race to the Top (RTTT) competitive-grant programs, Investing in Innovation (i3), Head Start, Pell Grants, and Promise Neighborhoods Initiative remained, mostly unscathed.

But, House Speaker Boehner (R-Ohio) and his cadre, slipped in a measure to reinstate the District of Columbia Opportunity Scholarship program, euphemism for vouchers of up to $12000 for a low-income student to attend a private school. OK, the measure does provide some aid for Washington, D.C. public and charter schools also.

Did you figure out why House of Representative billion dollar slashers would put funds back into an education program? The ideological love for parochial school education and “choice” are the often heard reasons. Also “competition” for funds would force schools to improve academic achievement in order to keep funds on the school district balance sheets. Back to the school system as “marketplace.”

Three school systems in the U. S. have passed and maintained legislation to provide student vouchers, also called “tuition tax credits” by Ronald Reagan and “school choice” by economist Milton Friedman. Milwaukee-1990, Cleveland-1995, and the entire state of Florida-1999 have voucher programs touted as an alternative to help to low-income students attend private and parochial schools with better academic success.

As yet, after 25 years, studies of schools with voucher students have not shown significant gains in student achievement, the main goal in school reform efforts. However, parents who apply for the vouchers for their children cite the desire for schools where students behave and where students graduate from high school. In D.C. students in voucher programs do have better graduation rates than students in public schools.

Five talking points on vouchers are promoted on the National Education Association (NEA) website. In brief, 1) as stated above, vouchers don’t mean gains in student achievement. 2) Voucher schools have almost no accountability in place for the public funds that are siphoned off. 3) Vouchers don’t reduce the cost of public school education, but ask tax payers to fund two systems, public and private/parochial. 4) Parents must search around to find real “choice” in private and parochial schools which, for example, maintain exceedingly high admissions requirements and fees far above the voucher sum. 5) Surveys show that the public prefers spending their scarce taxes to improve the schools in the public system.

An article by Mike Winerip, August 8, 2010, from the New York Times examined public schools in Boston who applied for and are instigating turn-around programs which use tax dollars exactly as stated above. As most programs in which improvement begins to show significant results, these schools have implemented teacher leadership, teacher training, smaller classes, ongoing staff development, collaboration, and adequate resources to support the needs of the variety of children. It is difficult, relentless work to assure failing schools improve.

Furthermore, for anyone interested in justice for all,

“We have to be careful not to succumb to this nonsense that a public system is inherently flawed and that therefore we have to turn to the marketplace for solutions. I’ve never in my entire life seen any evidence that the competitive free market, unrestricted, without a strong counterpoise within the public sector, will ever dispense decent medical care, sanitation, transportation, or education to the people. It’s as simple as that.”

–Jonathan Kozol, author of “Savage Inequalities” and “Amazing Grace.”

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Buddy, Can You Spare Another Dime?

Wednesday, July 6th, 2011

Each article about prisons brings to mind “at risk” school kids who could benefit from the millions of dollars spent on building and staffing one more prison facility. In 2011 California needs to consolidate programs to address budget problems, but like many states, it has a crazy quilt of laws about prison sentences. When the quarreling stops, state prisoners will be sent to county facilities after the decision to reduce prison populations from the U. S. Supreme Court.

Look back two years.

“California Passes Bill Addressing Prisons,” by Solomon Moore, The New York Times, September 13, 2009, is another in the unending line of commentary on the cost of  felonies and misdemeanors, building another prison, overcrowded prison facilities, and court mandates to reduce prison populations.

Make no mistake.  Major criminals should be incarcerated, though FBI statistics in “Violent crime falls sharply…” by Devlin Barrett, Associated Press, San Francisco Chronicle, September 15, 2009, show that killings, for example, decreased 3.9% in 2008.  Still, the laws that send men and women to jail for petty theft or small drug sales, as if they had robbed the federal gold depository or had lorded over a multi-state drug cartel, need reform.

Know why?

Students “at risk” need every dime of help they can get.  And they need every adult who can be rehabilitated to support their children.  In California $7000 a year (in 2009 down to $6000) is allocated per student attending public schools.  At the same time, an average of $49,000 per year is spent for each prison inmate (current prison population-167,000).  However, the bill just signed by Arnold Schwarzenegger will release 16,000 inmates without violent records or serious offenses through changes in parole regulations and early-release rules.

Sound better?  Let’s see…

Studies (see post 6/30/09) have shown that for an “at risk” student to succeed, attendance is important, adequate safe facilities are necessary, highly-qualified teachers must be hired, adequate books and other resources are required, assessment and time/money for analysis of student academic needs is mandated, tutoring and before or after school programs should be provided, and parent commitment to encourage the student’s achievement must be supported.  Not counting the funds for a district to oversee each school’s budget in order to get every bit of use from each thin dime.  All that for $7000 a year per child in California (2011 investment).

Now for each person spending the year in prison, food must be provided; health care, a safe facility, rehabilitation services should be allocated; and prison guards and administrators must be paid to run the facility.  All for $49,000 a year per inmate.

Rarely is a word printed about any funded services to guide inmates ready to be released into programs that will help them return to their family responsibilities.  In fact, the local public school is held responsible for guiding parents: providing counseling, direction to family health services, and parent education so they can support their children’s academic success.  Again, unless the school receives a grant or qualifies for Title I monies, all those services are included in the $7000 per child per year (2011).

Rethink priorities.

Along with the entire financial mess that California has brought upon itself, how different groups in this state are supported financially must be carefully reviewed.

In the article “California’s costly budget decisions,” by Larry N. Gerston, San Francisco Chronicle, September 14, 2009, we are reminded that budget-cutting at the expense of students, who with education get jobs and enter professions, leaves them to drop out.  How many will think the only way to get money is to rob, sell drugs, or steal cars, eventually landing in prison at $49,000 a year?  Instead, how about spending “the fraction it might take to keep them in school?”

In addition, wouldn’t it be better to spend money on community colleges, half-way houses, drug and alcohol rehabilitation facilities for no other reason than to teach paroled adults the skills to help their children succeed in school.

Sanity must return to California’s finances.  What teacher wants to grovel, asking, buddy, can you spare a dime?

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