Board Bulletin - Educational Observations, Insights and Commentary for State Policymakers

It is the first day of school in the Washington, DC suburbs, always a poignant milestone - especially for younger children. Here’s a letter that one of my child’s teachers gave to us to mark this special day, and which was accompanied by a cotton ball - of all things.

Dear Parents,

Thank you for entrusting your child to us. We promise to do our best everyday to be your child’s companion in learning. So sit down, relax, and have a cup of tea. Hold the cotton ball in your hand to remind you of the gentle spirit of your child. We know this will be a wonderful year as we learn and grow together.

Sincerely,

Mrs. P & Mrs. S.

A new round of school consolidations in Iowa could reshape the “landscape” of education in Iowa. The physical landscape will remain flat and bountiful.

Not exactly the pay for performance issue that has long been debated, perhaps it is no surprise that one of the nation’s highest paid superintendents is betting that there is nothing like cash to similarly motivate student performance.

The Chicago Urban League filed a civil rights lawsuit against the Illinois State Board of Education charging that the state’s school funding system discriminates against minority students. The suit is different from other school finance cases because it is largely based on a state civil rights statute and the “disparate impact” of such spending inequities on racial and ethnic minorities. The suit also makes the more traditional arguments that the state’s school finance structure violates the Illinois constitution’s uniformity of taxation provision, as well as its equal protection guarantee and the right to attend “high-quality educational institutions.”

The lawsuit wants the state board of education and other state leaders to devise a fairer, more equitable school finance formula. According to the suit, the state’s contribution to school revenue in Illinois has dropped from 48 percent to 28 percent over the past 30 years. “Our children, especially African Americans and Latinos, have been left behind because of poorly funded schools while their white counterparts in wealthy communities are thriving,” said Cheryle Jackson, CEO of the Chicago Urban League and the lead plaintiff. “Their basic right to a quality education is being denied,” stated Jackson. Two other constitutional challenges to the state’s local property tax funding method were rejected in the 1990s.

 
Chicago Public Schools Superintendent Arne Duncan said he supports the lawsuit. “We would certainly have preferred the system be fixed through a deliberate legislative process…but for at least 30 years, we have waited expectantly, hoping for something, anything, to happen, only to be disappointed time and time again,” said Duncan.

Here’s an op-ed by Ms. Jackson in today’s Tribune elaborating on the lawsuit.

This Washington Post article neatly summarizes all of the problems associated with the school choice option required to be given to students in low-performing schools – lack of parent interest, lack of school options, tight timelines, complaints about the AYP formula, and the special needs considerations of some students – that are not unique to Washington, DC but apply to all districts in the country.

“The governor supports direct elections of state school board members. The board itself wants such a system. But after a preliminary discussion on the matter yesterday, Senate Republicans appear not to,” reports KCBW news.

The LA Times editorial page is not a fan of the state board’s new Algebra I requirement. Funny. In all the years past when Algebra I was touted as a “gateway” course and reformers were urging that it be made an 8th grade requirement so that high schoolers could take more advanced math courses in their upperclass years, I never heard a peep about all of the underlying issues and concerns that are now being raised by California opponents.

The Boston Globe reports:

Connecticut’s education commissioner says the state Board of Education is compiling a comprehensive proposal to overhaul the state’s secondary schools.

Commissioner Mark McQuillan said the plan is still in the works, but will emphasize ways to improve student engagement and their performance in math and science.

A local superintendent’s opinion about the California State Board of Education’s new 8th grade Algebra I requirement.

Are you smarter than a psychometrician?

In South Carolina, the state board of education is running a contest to name the state’s new statewide testing system that will replace the “Palmetto Achievement Challenge Test.”

Vote here by September 1.

Nothing focuses the attention of parents and the public to the school calendar than the looming school year start date. Alabama and Hawaii are wrestling with school calendar issues.

Congratulations to Joseph Torsella, the new chairman of the Pennsylvania State Board of Education.

I’m not sure what is more amazing: that the New York Times editorial board has come out in favor of national standards, or that it came out in support of the concept without actually mentioning “national standards” in its editorial today.

Instead, the Timesmen opted for the indirect and more ambiguous policy call for the National Assessment Governing Board to “create a rigorous test that would be given free to states that agreed to use NAEP scoring standards.” A test that would be based on national standards and would be used to hold states accountable for the academic performance of their students. The wonder is why the Times’ editorialists couldn’t or wouldn’t call it “national standards.”

The Nevada State Board of Education is making some tough choices in a time of declining state budgets.

Slight improvements to reading, writing, and science state test scores for Michigan high school students, but more than half failed the math exam.

The Arkansas State Board of Education is getting an update on school districts facing financial stress.

The problems rural schools/districts have in recruiting qualified teachers - and the consequences for the schools - is brought home in this story about the situation in Montana.

Nearly 30 percent of Montana’s public schools are failing to meet accreditation standards because more teachers are educating students in areas outside of their endorsement, along with other substandard factors, according to the Montana Board of Public Education.

While the Board of Public Education hasn’t yet concluded why this is happening, educators — from rural schools especially — say they are failing to meet standards simply because they don’t have the dollars to recruit the most qualified teachers.

“We’re having a very hard time recruiting and retaining teachers. The pay is a major issue,” said Yvette Majerus, superintendent in Moore, noting the district’s starting salary of $22,185.

Many rural schools say losing some of their accreditation status is the price they have to pay in order to fill specialized positions where they are unable to recruit a qualified teacher — especially when summer rolls around and they don’t have someone in music, technical education or P.E.

Former K-12 Assistant Secretary of Educcation Susan Neuman writes that “the impetus for change built into NCLB was to effectively “shame” schools into improvement. We now see that the shame game is flawed.”

She’s now joined/advocating for a “Bold Approach” to education reform, something she was never known for during her time in Washington.

The nation’s paper looks at local efforts to save/cut interscholastic sports expenditures.

A primer on the education policies of the presidential candidates.

State and local school budgets are getting tighter. In Hawaii, the State Board of Education considered but ultimately spared cuts that would have eliminated junior varsity sports.

Expect more stories like this in the coming year as policymakers grapple with widening budget deficits and look to save in non-core (i.e., non-academic) areas.

Harcourt Assessment botched the Illinois state assessments to the point where they lost the contract. Now their replacement, Pearson, is being ordered to rescore one million math and reading exams because of wildly fluctuating scores.

The voucher fallout in Utah continues to focus attention on the State Board of Education and its unique selection process.

Virginia Governor Tim Kaine is reviewing a proposal by the State Board of Education to increase the accountability standards for the Commonwealth’s high schools, reports the Washington Post.

Under the proposal, state officials would use a computer system to track students throughout their academic careers to determine the number of diplomas, GEDs and other certificates that schools award during any given year. Schools would receive accreditation based on those results. Current accreditation standards are based on pass rates on the annual Standards of Learning exams.

As part of the accreditation process, schools would be rated on a points system. For instance, schools would be awarded 100 points for each student who received a diploma; the school would earn 75 points if a student received a general equivalency diploma. If a student earned a certificate of completion, given to those who don’t earn high-school diplomas or their equivalent, the school would receive 60 points.

The Texas State Teachers Association is suing the Texas Education Agency over what it says is the department’s backdoor voucher scheme to fund private groups helping high school dropouts.

NASBE Executive Director Brenda Welburn is interviewed about the high turnover in chief state school officer positions, and NASBE’s role in helping state board’s select replacements.

Are the lack of school board candidates across Georgia that big a deal when “the state controls so many aspects of education” that local members are Pinochio to the state’s Gepetto?

More and better “education” is the pat answer offered by free trade advocates as a response to the labor disrputions caused by globalization. But can you get any better educated than the MBA grads whose six-figure salary Wall Street jobs are now being sent to India?

What I find most interesting distracting about this brief story on the complete lack of candidates for more than 100 school board seats in Maricopa County, Arizona is the misspelling of the word “dearth”…twice! In the headline (!) and and then again in the lede sentence.

The Miami-Dade school board did not fire Superintendent Rudy Crew last night. However, the 5-4 vote to keep Crew, the reigning National Superintendent of the Year, was hardly a ringing endorsement and still leaves his future in the nation’s fourth largest school system in doubt.

”I have to give some thought as to whether or not there is anything left of my superintendency…What has happened tonight has put a serious cramp in my ability to lead,’ said Crew after the vote’