Posts Tagged ‘Race To The Top’

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What’s the Answer?

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010
a California high school

a California high school

Amazing in itself, two bills (SBX5 1 and SBX5 4) passed January 7, 2010, in the California legislature and were signed by Governor Schwarzenegger, aiming to get $700 million from the federal Race To The Top (RTTT) funds.

What will that money be used for?  Most of the California education world only expects it to shore up the fiscal crisis, allowing legislators to say “See, we didn’t take any more money from schools.”

Such manipulation does nothing to address the real crisis in California, the governor and his party’s refusal to consider taxes, the Democratic majority’s inability to pass legislation anyway because of the supermajority (2/3) needed by the legislature and/or from the voters in an election for any tax or finance legislation.

Meantime, the onslaught against teachers continues, pay cuts, furlough days, increases in student/teacher ratio, all of which really are to the detriment of students for whom RTTT funds are supposed to benefit.

Round and round we go, where we stop…

Actually, anyone who studies school reform knows where to stop.  At schools in deep failure, low-performing on exams; poor, poor, poor facilities; unsupported teachers; distracted parents consumed by pay and food for their children.  Whether tax haters like it or not, systemic failure needs money to reverse itself.  This blog has reported suggestions to reorganize without cost, but in the end, it’s dollar bills, used effectively and efficiently.

The legislation is geared to help the lowest-performing schools turn around, but two big issues dominate the legislation.

First, a bill component allows the linkage of school data to teacher evaluation, an ongoing concern with many competing ideas to put such a system in place. Randi Weingarten, AFT president, on Tuesday, January 12, 2010, offered a model in which teachers and other school personnel are part of the team designing the plan.  In the California legislation, collective bargaining is part of the process.

Second, the bill establishes a commission to update the state’s student content standards, not revised since the mid-1990’s.  No plan for teacher evaluation or changes to state testing would occur until the standards are revised.

Another aspect of the legislation has received strong support and strong condemnation. The provision allows parents to petition and state officials to force a school district to overhaul bad schools.

It’s true already that California State officials take over school districts, from community college to urban K-12.  Sometimes parents develop a charter school, so that’s already happening.  What will likely cause the uproar is allowing students to choose any school in the state to attend.

“Open enrollment” offers that possibility.  RTTT suggests that open enrollment policies to allow students to transfer out of schools that fail to raise state test scores high enough, quickly enough, will help.  Bruce Fuller, education and public policy professor UC Berkeley, says it’s just shifting chairs around on the sinking Titanic. (SFChronicle, January6, 2010)

Sounds good for the student, but what about the transportation costs, the cost to the receiving and sending school districts.  Who puts up the money to make it happen?

While teacher’s unions have been wading in to advocate for a number of these provisions, after making sure their objections have been heard, the California Teachers Association (CTA) is adamantly opposed to the “open enrollment” part of the legislation.

It’s not hard to imagine the unintended consequences of the proposal.  It will bring chaos to many school districts, like schools with high transient rates and low test performance, without offering any model for improvement.

Is that the answer to fix failing schools?

(Image by SHM)

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Posted in American Federation of Teachers, California Teachers Association, Race to Top, community colleges, low-performing schools, program improvement, public schools, school reform |
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Whose Fault???

Wednesday, December 23rd, 2009

Having been a teacher, blame placed on teacher’s unions “that view reforms more for how they affect pay and job security than whether they improve student learning” is unfair and inflammatory.

The accusation by David Davenport in the article “Value-added education in the race to the top” San Francisco Chronicle, November 29, 2009, is based on the country-wide dispute about using data to help students learn, rather than to evaluate teachers.

This is not to go along with every position NEA, for example, has taken in the past, but the constant denigration of teacher’s unions about their position on evaluation and student testing performance is misleading about a complex reform.

Davenport, a research fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, well-known for its conservative views, advocates the “value-added” model, originally a manufacturer’s economic theory, to address the problem of teacher evaluation with data, collectible from the vast pool of scores since NCLB began.

Actually, the teacher and student evaluation reform issue is touchy, easy to manipulate with statistics, and difficult to resolve because of the multitude of variables.

It’s easy for the media to grab onto student test scores and conclude the results are attributable to the skill, or not, of the teacher.  It doesn’t matter that a superintendent, a principal, or a teacher defends the year’s testing outcomes, if scores have not soared higher than a kite, those educators are said to be making excuses.

The term “value-added” education, partly referring to the student’s gain in reading and math proficiency over a year, has been around for nine years, at least, in California.  Every school knows its exact place in relation to other schools in the state.  Those in need of program improvement are deep into the change process.

Several reports can be found (Mass Insight Education & Research Institute and the California Governor’s Advisory Committee on Education Excellence are two) elaborating on conditions for bringing change to schools so that students actually learn more and more each year.

In addition, “value-added” refers to the other attributes in the school and classroom that can be assessed, such as the instruction received.

None of the “turn around” measures advocate evaluating a single teacher solely on the improvement in scores of his/her students.  As I’ve read it, unions are against that particular type of evaluation (which is the magic bullet whirling around in the media air), but NEA and AFT have offered suggestions to use the test as one part, along with other tools, to assess the teacher’s skill in the classroom.

As part of Race To The Top grant preparation, California’s Governor Schwarzeneggar has signed two bills to support data availability for teacher and school evaluation.

Next problem.

While reading that the “value-added” proposal can provide a foundation on which to build accountability, to be practical, how can time be spent to develop these evaluation tools when there is so little money?

And what will be done when the evaluation procedures are developed?  Will there be money to set in motion the practices needed to truly and fairly move unsatisfactory teachers from a school district?

Besides, does Mr. Davenport surmise that just getting rid of weak teachers is going to fix a school?  The article notes Eric Hanushek’s comment that replacing 6-10% of the nation’s poorest teachers with average teachers will make a difference in the quality of American education.

How will that happen?  A bit of research into Mr. Hanushek’s theories may provide some insight.  See next post.

Having supervised teachers in a program improvement school, the advice is every Race To The Top dollar should be spent for program evaluation, professional development for highly-qualified teachers, facility improvement, parent education so they know how to keep track of their children’s work and expect achievement, and school community celebration of effort and success.

While each teacher must be accountable, the overall success of those “good” school characteristics is the key.  That’s how the program improves.

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Posted in American Federation of Teachers, Mass Insight Education & Research Institute, NCLB, National Education Association, Race to Top, highly qualified teachers, public schools, school community, school reform |
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Am I Highly-Qualified?

Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009

Sometimes I wonder what the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation means when it requires all teachers to be highly-qualified.  It’s still the law.  No changes yet.  No matter how often my union (CTA) brings it up in its magazine.

3rd grader reads at home

3rd grader reads at home

In the latest issue of California Educator, September 2009, the problem is seen in the Race to the Top requirements: “paying teachers based on a single test score will increase the likelihood of teaching to the test and make it harder to recruit and retain teachers.” (p. 30)

I read those words and think how does my training make me want to be paid only for teaching to make sure students pass a test?  Is that what a highly-qualified teacher does?

I spent two years taking classes in the latest research before I was credentialed.  None of it was about teaching to a test.  In reading/language arts, the curriculum focused on the best practices known to show students how to figure out unknown vocabulary and to read for meaning so that no matter what text, fiction or non-fiction, is found in the test booklet, they will be able to show what they have learned.

For mathematics, we were trained to use the most up-to-date strategies to teach students beginning set theory for little kids through pre-algebra for upper elementary students.  In my current class, the students are very strong in mathematical understanding, so I spend my time assembling enrichment materials.

In California, the same as many other states, I wrote my own research papers, using the students in my student-teaching classes as subjects to test the strategies I was studying.  I took the CBEST, the exam that new teachers must pass before being credentialed.  I observed and student-taught at three different grade levels.  I was evaluated on my lesson plans and classroom management skills for those weeks.  Even in my second year, I’m still observed and evaluated, being a probationary teacher.  I get good remarks for my work.

Doesn’t it sound like I’m highly-qualified?  I know, however, that I’m fortunate to teach students that are highly motivated and who have parents who encourage them and spend a great deal of time giving them after-school opportunities.

What if, like some teacher friends from my credentialing program, I was hired in a low-income neighborhood where the students don’t have the advantages my students enjoy?  What if the students were struggling with another language?  Enough food?  Illness?  Parents who worked all the time and still didn’t have enough money for trips to museums or the beach or the sights of San Francisco, much less a home library?

And what if, no matter all the best practices of the teachers and enthusiasm of the students, the yearly test scores improve, but only little by little, and it takes relentless struggle to reach the benchmarks set by the state each year.  Some years, the benchmarks aren’t met.

Do those teachers not deserve recognition just like the teachers in schools where most students surpass the benchmarks every year?

So how is this ‘pay based on test scores’ evaluation plan supposed to fairly identify highly-qualified teachers?

Will this be another mandate with no guidelines and no money behind it?  Please say no.  In fact, put forward other well-documented ways to help students succeed, not pay-for-test-score-performance at all.

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Posted in California Teachers Association, NCLB, No Child Left Behind Act, Race to Top, highly qualified teachers, public schools, teacher preparation |
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Charter Schools vs. Public Schools

Wednesday, September 9th, 2009

Until Arnold Schwarzenegger’s desperate attempt to get Race To The Top money in order to turn around schools with dismal scores on the latest 2009 once-a-year exam, charter schools were floating under most teachers’ radar.

Known as places where parents, upset with the curriculum in their child’s school, and public school reformers got together and set up their own school.  Sometimes it was back to basics that charged them up, sometimes free-wheeling ideas about children choosing their own curriculum.  Many mission statements have been drafted, some authorized.

After much wrangling between the proponents and, often, teacher’s unions, legislation for charter schools was established (see US Charter Schools website), and now in 2009 about 750 California schools with about 276,000 students are chartered.  Not many, considering there are well over 6 million students in California.

For reformed-minded educators like those in New Schools Venture Fund and the Broad Foundation, the biggest draw to charter schools is the freedom from excessive regulation and the opportunity to set up innovative curriculum, instruction, and internal accountability for student success.

In the U. S. Department of Education’s Innovation in Education series, one finds that the effective charter schools do everything effective public schools do.  None of it is extraordinary, except those campuses are governed by a local board, not a far off school district board.  So those board members can move quickly to make changes without waiting for bureaucratic district approval, a big plus for reformers.

The California Teacher’s Association (CTA) agrees that the effective charter school has strong community support, small classroom size, good oversight of its financial management, health and safety plans with substantial attendance improvement, and instructional quality.  Everything all public schools want.

So why is there antagonism?

Mostly, it’s that charter schools came into existence to get around heavy-duty collective bargaining contracts that give teachers endless time to dispute termination decisions, as described in Steve Brill’s article “The Rubber Room,” The New Yorker, August 31, 2009.   Especially in the takeover of a regular public school, the charter hires its own teachers and administrators, some of whom don’t have credentials and who displace tenured staff.

However, the latest rendition of charter high schools in Los Angeles, Green Dot Public Schools, incorporates unionized staff under agreement with the public school district that those who don’t want to stay in the charter school can be placed in other schools.  From Florida to Oregon, as at Chicago International Charter School, “dissatisfied with long hours, churning turnover and, in some cases, lower pay,” teachers are organizing.  See “As More Charter Schools Unionize, Educators Debate the Effect” by Sam Dillon, New York Times, July 27, 2009.

Why else is CTA discontented?

The U.S. Department of Education’s Race To The Top (RTTT) guidelines suggest the best bet is charter schools, even though studies show very mixed results on exams used to hold schools accountable, and other non-charter public schools have turned themselves around.

CTA finds itself one of the few education organizations to be concerned about how teacher compensation and evaluation in all schools, including charter schools, will be designed.  The current emphasis on one test to judge the whole school as in No Child Left Behind is a huge problem.

It’s difficult to turn a school around, assembling the curriculum and instruction plan, committed teaching staff, consistent assessment and analysis, good facilities, and extra resources to address the needs of students and families in low-performing public schools or charter schools.

Finally, amassing enough money to run the charter school is as big a conundrum as it is for any campus in a public school district.  How many silent auctions can a parent attend?

What is difficult to understand is why CTA isn’t pushing for legislation in California to reform school finance, well-known as the first step to turn every low-performing school around, the entire purpose for RTTT funds?

(By the way,  the TakeCare project is a tool to facilitate talk about ‘turn-around’ in the school community.)

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Posted in NCLB, No Child Left Behind Act, Race to Top, low-performing schools, public schools, school accountability, school community, school finance reform, successful schools |
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Not a Gap-It’s a Chasm

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

In California education talk, the most important words are “achievement gap.”  Next most important are the tangle called “school finance reform.”

The two problem/solutions are as thorny as the briar patch at the edge of the moat surrounding Sleeping Beauty’s castle.

As if more money in itself is going to solve the multitude of education needs to close the achievement gap, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger is calling a special session in the Fall to design legislation ensuring the state’s ability to compete for Race to the Top (RTTT) federal funds.

Actually, the education world should be relieved that the real issues may finally come to the fore.

Federal Department of Education guidelines for any state plan expect measures to turn around struggling schools.  This blog has outlined one of many proposals and its recommendations (post 6/30/09).

Lawmakers’ first argument will be about repealing California’s charter school cap, a no-no for the National Education Association (NEA).  Their argument is that school governance by charter schools is only one of many options to improve the chances for low-income, at-risk students to achieve, while in the federal RTTT guidelines charter schools are being treated as the one best way to achieve student progress.

California students will benefit from the guidelines’ focus on the 5% of consistently under-performing schools.  It will, however, require money to provide consistent staff development for on-site assessment and analysis tools that help students; train, recruit, and retain highly-qualified teachers; and supply resources to keep those schools running smoothly.

Which highlights the section in the governor’s proposal to retain highly-qualified teachers and administrators.  For a long time, education articles have argued for pay arrangements to accommodate the difficulties for teachers in the most under-performing schools.  In truth, coaches or advisors to support the teacher’s best practices and counseling services for students and parents would do as much if not more to create incentives for achievement.

The last two pieces of the federal Department of Education guidelines to be debated in the legislature’s special session will leave lawmakers teetering on the edge of the chasm.  Improving accountability and linking student achievement to teacher performance are the most prickly of issues.

First, think about accountability.  How the state uses the data from one summative exam a year to designate successful and unsuccessful schools does little good.  How each school analyzes all the data collected from formative tests and uses it to diagnose what to teach next has been proven, for the few staffs trained in the techniques, to help students improve.  How will schools improve student performance with no funds to train teachers how to analyze the data?

Next, as the NEA in its letter to the U.S. Department of Education says, “It is inappropriate to require that states be able to link data on student achievement to individual teachers for the purpose of teacher and principal evaluation.”  Governor Schwarzenegger’s press release notes linked data may provide transparency, but numerous sources give reasons why it’s difficult for a single test’s data to inform anyone  how one teacher assures that an under-performing school closes the achievement gap.

It will take a lot of compromise to fairly make choices about evaluation of highly-qualified teachers and a process to ensure proficient student achievement.

Have your eyes caught the words “money” and “funds?”  In California (post 8/19) the tallest thorny vines surround the abysmal school finance system that hides the chasm, delicately referred to as the “achievement gap.”

No matter the bite from the $4.3 billion RTTT funds California might get if the legislature manages to rewrite education policies, one sure way to seal the achievement gap is to reform how state money is allocated to school districts.

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Posted in Race to Top, highly qualified teachers, low-performing schools, public schools, school accountability, school finance reform |
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