That was my letter, at least most of it

I saw my letter to the editor on school reform in the JG today. I've written a number of them over the years. Surprisingly enough they have all been printed, although not always as I wrote them. Today's version was considerably shorter than what I wrote but I have to say it didn't change the essence of my thoughts, most of which were pretty well preserved.

My experience at my former high school, which included a year of tutoring in algebra classes after trying unsuccessfully to teach as a substitute, started my frustration with FWCS. The score at SSHS on last year's End of Course Exams (19% passing in math, omitted from the letter) show that, if anything, the situation is getting worse and meaningful reforms are not coming from within. Yet the official line from the board and administration continues to defy the reality in the classrooms. The reality is bad enough. The hypocrisy just compounds it.

FWEA "defiant" toward new legislation

Sounding much like past UAW president Ron Gettlefinger defying the new reality at GM (we know how that ended), FWEA and ISTA officials set a "defiant tone" (arrogant would be a better word) against the Governor and State Superintendent of Public Instruction at Northrop HS. FWEA president Al Jaquay bemoaned that teachers were being "blamed for all the ills of public education". A more accurate assessment would be that teachers' unions are being blamed. ISTA president Nate Snellenberger said he's getting the "cold shoulder of disrespect" from legislators. After decades of paying off Democrats to do their bidding, did he and the ISTA expect hugs and kisses from Republicans?

Snellenberger also said pending legislation would set back public education 40 years. If only that were true. I could still be proud of my former high school. But the demographics changed, teachers unionized, FWCS lost flexibility and couldn't adapt.

The prospects in the legislature are sobering because, as Steve Brace put it "we're fighting against ideas for change". Well, we certainly wouldn't expect those ideas to come from FWEA. Unless they involved remodeling the buildings.

HB 1003 spells out school voucher proposal

Indiana's school voucher bill , HB 1003 was submitted by Rep. Bob Behning of Indianapolis, head of the House Committee on Education. The bill would allow any student who has attended a public school for at least two semesters to apply for a taxpayer funded voucher to an accredited private school, including faith based schools. The amount of the voucher is determined by family income. Transportation is not provided. Private schools would not be required to alter their admission policies or curriculum but would be required to administer the state test to all students and receive letter grades as do government schools. There is no limit on the number of vouchers that can be given, although it's estimated that existing private schools, could accommodate about 20,000 students.

Naturally urban districts would be most affected by vouchers. Suburban parents are not the ones clamoring for alternatives through vouchers and charter schools. The country's biggest voucher program has been in existence in Milwaukee (the Viagra district) since 1989 affecting about 20,000 students. A study published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel claims that there is no appreciable difference in student achievement between those accepting the vouchers and those staying in the public system. Graduation rates were higher by 18% and overall cost to Wisconsin (but not Milwaukee) taxpayers is lower. Private schools accepting state funds were not subject to to the same accountability as government school, but that would be changed as part of the effort to expand the program, which is currently limited by law. Parents were said to be happy to have the choice.

Rep. Behner says his aim is to increase competition. Milwaukee public schools are said to have improved slightly with the challenge but there was no information on whether any poorly performing public schools were closed after losing students to private schools, which would be the other goal of providing competion. All in all it doesn't appear that the effect is as dramatic as predicted by both proponents and opponents. Contrary to the claims of the Indiana Teachers Union, this (Daniels) bill is not going to kill the existing public school system.

All five FWCS high schools on academic probation

In addition to the charter members of the IDE's bottom category SSHS, NSHS and WAYNE, the other two remaining FWCS high schools, Snider and Northrop, joined them last year by going on academic probation. Naturally neither the district nor the JG deemed this piece of bad news important enough to talk about it publicly. No gushing Mark and Wendy news conference. No apologist wailing by Karen Frisco. They could have legitimately claimed that the new high school test, the ECA, was more difficult than the GQE it replaced, which is true. The ECA's at FWCS were about 6% lower than the GQE's, which mirrors the 6% drop statewide. But then they would have been caught in a trap on their "improvement" on the k-8 ISTEP scores.

The IDE's recent review of NSHS and SSHS noted that FWCS seemed to be serious about reforming their high schools. That may be, but at the end of the day, they can't make a real and lasting improvement in the high schools until they improve the middle schools. How will we know if the middle schools are improving? When the district stops blanket social promotion through the middle schools and quits sending kids into high school unprepared. ECA scores will fluctuate. The state may "adjust" the difficulty but it only matters how they do relative to the rest of the state, so that's how the scores have to be viewed.

Social promotion in the middle schools is an admission of FWCS' failure to prepare kids for high school. They may be serious about improving the high schools in the face of a possible state takeover. But nothing the Superintendent, the board or the JG says about progress can be taken seriously until blanket social promotion stops. It's just more hollow rhetoric for public consumption. If they want to show us they're serious, they have a way to do so.

And speaking of vouchers....

Although the legislature is reportedly working on a school voucher proposal, I haven't found the details of an actual bill submitted. Nevertheless opponents of vouchers are already telling us why they are bad. The JG has a column this morning by an IU professor of elementary education, Daniel Holm with a list of six objections (surprise, surprise) to vouchers.

1. Private schools are not held accountable for meeting state standards-

So make them accountable as a condition for taking public funds. I don't know of any private schools in our area that don't already give the state tests and they're pretty much a non-event. Passing rates in the parochial schools are around 90%. The tests are easy.

2. Private schools can refuse admittance-

True, but to what extent and why are they doing so? Lack of space or refusal to deal with poor students? Government schools expel students who can't adapt after they admit them. Why not give government schools a better way to handle expected problem students rather than mainstreaming them in with everyone else?

3. Negatively affect government school finances-

Parents who opt out of a government school and take the money elsewhere is another way to provide competition for government schools. Government monopolies in education are no more desirable than any other kind of monopolies. Giving vouchers to parents who are already paying out of their own pockets to send their kids to private school will increase the cost of public education. Personally I'm willing to pay more taxes to see that happen but that doesn't mean everyone else will.

4. Transportation issues-

Lower income parents may have trouble providing transportation to a school outside their neighborhood. Perhaps but FWCS is already busing kids to schools outside their neighborhoods in their school choice plan. Many other urban districts bus them to magnet schools. Schools are not obligated to bus anyone unless they have a physical disability or if their local school is in trouble long enough that parents can opt to send their kids to another school. The schools do it because they're getting the money from the state to operate expensive transportation systems. I can see some justification in rural district but few of them are clamoring for alternatives. Why should taxpayers foot the bill for any transportation in an urban district? Nobody rode a bus to SSHS when I went there.

5. Private schools can't accommodate special needs students-

Another can of worms that needs to be aired out. How many of these students are there? Are we talking about special-ed and ELL? FWCS has 20% of their students designated as special ed, an astounding number. Do they do that because it brings in more money? Why are they mainstreaming these kids if they have so much trouble learning? The ones that can keep up shouldn't be special ed. The ones that can't are frustrated and hold the rest of the class back. Why are non-English speakers put into regular schools before they can function in a classroom? Why are they tested before they're proficient in English?

6. Parochial schools will push religious agendas-

Nonsense. Plenty of parents send their kids to parochial schools as an alternative to bad government schools, if they can afford the tuition. If they are going to get public money, they will have to limit the religious instruction to those that want it and keep it away from those who don't. Eventually non-religious private schools will spring up to serve disenchanted government school parents. Like the one GiaQuinta sent his kids to.

The professor closes by saying more money needs to be given to government schools because they are already providing a "quality" education. What does that mean? How does he define "quality"? He doesn't. It's meaningless. Then he adds we should spend more for pre-school and full day kindergarten. Fine. Show us how well that works. With data. A study by IU concluded that full day kindergarten was "no worse" than half day. FWCS has had full day kindergarten in Title I schools for over a decade. Where's the data on the benefits of that expenditure? Taxpayer funded babysitting and more jobs for education school graduates?

It's going to be fun following the uproar from the government education establishment, not to mention the JG. It may well end up in court, with religion as the pretext for a suit but the real issue will be money.

Harding as a charter?

EACS is reportedly discussing turning Harding into a non-conversion charter. That would turn its operation over to a charter operator but keep it under the district's control. It's hard to see what turning any high school into a charter would accomplish in terms of significantly improving academic performance, which is ultimately controlled by the quality of the feeder schools.

But the Harding debate has never been about academics. It's been lagging for years and nobody cared until the state threatened to intervene. Now the objections to the current EACS plan are based on the inconvenience of longer bus rides and incompatible cultures. And if the board goes along, it will only be to keep control of the money. There's no way this story can have a happy ending but the district would be better off to let the state have it and wash their hands of a can't win situation.

Education agenda going full steam

Sen Dennis Kruse of Auburn has filed a bill on teacher evaluation and pay, Rep. Brian Bosma of Carmel has introduced a bill to expand charter schools while a bill on school vouchers is also in the works. Finally after decades of staying the course while urban districts continue to churn out graduates with worthless diplomas, the politicians, make that Republican politicians, are willing to force change. No it won't be perfect, there will be unintended consequences and there will be adjustments down the road.

There has been relatively muted reaction from teachers' unions since they know they can't block the tide. They'll have to start buying Republican politicians instead of Democrats now. Predictably the hysterics have come from the JG, which went on another inane tirade against charter schools in Sunday's Perspective. Today's commentary mentioned that Tony Bennett's wife is consultant for the state charter school association. Like there's no hypocrisy at the JG.

Relax guys. The threat of extinction did wonders for the US automobile industry. It will do the same for FWCS.