Short takes

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / May 20, 2004

Minnesota's loss

Minnesota is a diminished place this week, Cheri Pierson Yecke having been rejected (by the state Senate, on a straight party-line vote of 35-31) as commissioner of education. Her sin was being an educator of strong principle who would not bend to expediency and whose concern for the state's children overrode the temptation to pander to adult interests. By which I mean not just the teacher unions but also the sizable band of frenzied ideologues that populates the education system of the Land of 10,000 Lakes. She stoutly supported high standards, rigorous and substantive content (especially bona fide history), school choice, and results-based accountability. Educators balked. And by targeting her, Minnesota's faltering DFL party was able to score a rare victory over GOP governor Tim Pawlenty?evidently, a higher priority than closing the state's $160 million budget gap. Having dispatched Yecke, the legislature adjourned for the year. Dr. Yecke will live to fight another day, perhaps in another place. She's one of the all-too-rare human treasures of American education. It's Minnesota that will suffer from her (temporary) eclipse.

"Legislature adjourns after name-calling, hurried voting," by Kevin Duchschere, Minneapolis Star Tribune, May 16, 2004 

"Yecke having her say, moving on," by Norm Draper, Minneapolis Star Tribune, May 19, 2004 

"School reformer rejected for post," by George Archibald, Washington Times, May 20, 2004

Equivalent to what?

The New York Times on Saturday reported a troublesome phenomenon that they (naturally) seek to blame on No Child Left Behind: the practice of using GED prep

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Short takes

No good deed. . . .

May 20, 2004

South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford is pushing a bill to create a statewide charter district that could authorize charter schools anywhere in the state, which would then fund these schools directly, bypassing local districts entirely. It's a smart and overdue change and one recommended in Fordham's report on charter authorizing (http://www.edexcellence.net/detail/news.cfm?news_id=67). Philanthropist Dennis Bakke of Imagine Schools, a charter operator, has sweetened the pot by promising a $20 million loan to get more such schools started if the bill passes. Local and state education officials naturally oppose the plan, however, as they would oppose any effort to strengthen the Palmetto State's weak charter law. And of course they're livid about Bakke's offer. "It's buying influence, and it's blackmailing the duly elected representatives of our citizens," sputtered Cecil Cahoon, South Carolina Education Association spokesman.

"Group pledges $20 mil if charter law passes," Associated Press, May 13, 2004 

South Carolina House Bill H5808

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No good deed. . . .

Blowing smoke on NCLB

May 20, 2004

Wisconsin Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager opined last week that Wisconsin can exempt itself from No Child Left Behind on the grounds that the law is not fully funded and encroaches on state control of education. Her opinion practically dared states and districts to sue the federal government to invalidate the law, and critics took up the call immediately, with Stan Johnson, of the Wisconsin Education Association Council, calling on states to "go to court to correct this injustice." We could have saved the people of Wisconsin from the bother of an opinion, since we've been saying for two years that any state that wants to can forego Title I funds if it doesn't want to enact NCLB testing and teacher quality requirements. (Note, though, Lautenschlager did not suggest that Wisconsin exempt itself from the $293 million in extra Title I funding it will receive next year under NCLB.) The timing of this opinion is a tad suspicious, coming just as President Bush was touring the upper Midwest and touting NCLB and as fellow Democrat John Kerry was blasting the law as an unfunded mandate. (And as Lautenschlager is reeling from a drunk driving arrest and reports that she twice damaged her state-issued car.) Justice may be blind, but this opinion, we suspect, is all politics.

"No Child Left Behind may not be enforceable, Lautenschlager says," by Alan Borsuk, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, May 13, 2004 

"Attorney: Feds can't force education act on

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Blowing smoke on NCLB

Brown in the classroom

May 20, 2004

As all know, Monday was the golden anniversary of the landmark Brown v. Board of Education case, and in honor of that epochal decision we have seen literally scores of articles celebrating and appraising it and its legacy. (Fordham pulled together some of the best, which you can find at http://www.edexcellence.net.) Among them, Anne Applebaum wrote an article in yesterday's Washington Post that hailed Brown for proving that "the language used by America's founders - words such as 'equality' and 'freedom'" were more powerful than "the forces of deep-seated racial prejudice." Yet, Applebaum criticizes schools for not giving students more context within which to appreciate Brown's significance. It seems that Applebaum's son, whose school was planning to celebrate Brown this week, had "yet to be introduced to the concepts of 'Constitution' and 'Supreme Court'" and also hadn't learned much about the American Revolution, George Washington, or slavery. Applebaum also criticizes history textbooks and laments their "tone of cheerful, sanitized neutrality so overwhelming that it actually renders the prose ahistorical." (See A Consumer's Guide to High School History Textbooks for a more detailed critique of the most widely used history texts.) If only more educators agreed and chose to use such "teachable moments" as the Brown anniversary to deepen students' knowledge of U.S. history, rather than as yet another excuse to hold uninformed debates on

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Brown in the classroom

Black flight

May 20, 2004

After Brown v. Board of Education and subsequent Supreme Court decisions ended de jure segregation, critics noted a disturbing pattern of "white flight" from urban public schools. According to Samuel G. Freedman of the New York Times, a similar phenomenon has lately surfaced in the black community, though few education commentators have taken note. Freedman says a growing number of African-American parents are opting to send their children to private schools that emphasize instruction in basic skills like phonics, grammar, and math, rather than the "progressive" curricula and constructivist pedagogies often found in urban public school classrooms. As evidence, he reports that minority enrollments in Catholic schools have risen from one-tenth in 1970 to more than 25 percent in 2004; that "some 400 historically black independent schools operate around the country"; and that voucher programs in Florida, Milwaukee, Cleveland, and Washington, D.C. enroll 33,000 pupils, most of them minorities. We agree with Freedman that "leaders in public education would be wise to pay attention to why a stable, devout, upwardly mobile segment of the African-American community is deserting."

"Black flight to private schools is growing," by Samuel Freedman, New York Times, May 19, 2004

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Black flight

New York, we have a problem

May 20, 2004

In the flood of dismaying statistics about American education, every once in while one bubbles to the surface that is so shocking it can scarcely be believed - even if you know it's true. Thus we learn that, among 8th grade New York City special ed students, the pass rates on state tests are 5 percent in math and 3.5 percent in reading. Fourth grade and high school results were a bit better, but in no grade did a majority of special ed students pass either test. If this were a survey or poll, we'd call the 8th grade results rounding errors. Unfortunately, they're fourteen-year-old kids whose lives are on a fast track to nowhere. Now, can we please drop the nonsense about how testing and accountability and standards and NCLB are destroying American education? Everyone knows that the vast majority of these kids - 12 percent of the city's students are in special ed - aren't disabled so much as pushed out by a system that has decided it can't, or won't, educate them.

"Staggering fail rate in special ed," by Kenneth Lovett and Carl Campanile, New York Post, May 19, 2004

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New York, we have a problem

Standards for What? The Economic Roots of K-16 Reform

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / May 20, 2004

Anthony Carnevale and Donna Desrochers, Educational Testing ServiceMay 2004

In this new ETS report, Carnevale and Desrochers demonstrate that the push for higher school standards and stronger student achievement is no phony invention perpetrated by educators or politicians but, rather, a profound structural readjustment dictated by changes in the U.S. (and world) economy over the past two decades. (Alan Greenspan has been making the same point in recent speeches and testimony.) In brief: jobs in the modern economy require college-level skills and knowledge, which means that, besides finding ways to make postsecondary education accessible to just about everyone, we need a K-12 system that prepares just about everyone to succeed. We've never needed to do that in the past so we don't have a system designed for that purpose. There are powerful equity considerations, too, as economic changes will cause the gap to continue widening between the incomes and life prospects of low- and high-skilled people. The present education system, however, is not designed to solve this problem and is going to need huge changes in efficiency and effectiveness in order to do so. Though not as concise (at 90 pages) as A Nation at Risk, this valuable report supplies plenty of hard evidence that to continue floating on a tide of mediocrity is to threaten the country's prosperity as well as its security. I cannot fathom why today's standards-based reformers don't

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Standards for What? The Economic Roots of K-16 Reform

Teaching Interrupted: Do Discipline Policies in Today's Public Schools Foster the Common Good?

Eric Osberg / May 20, 2004

Public Agenda, with support from Common Good
May 2004

This report is based on surveys of teachers and parents, designed to provide a glimpse into the problem of violence and discipline in public schools. It lacks hard data but reveals ample cause for concern: half of teachers report that their school has an armed police guard stationed on the premises and a third report that teachers have quit their school because of student behavior problems. As for prescriptions, there are many. Common Good's mission is to curb frivolous lawsuits, so the authors make that pitch, which is backed by survey results showing that most teachers favor limiting the right of parents to sue schools or teachers over discipline, except in extreme cases. The logic is that teachers are afraid to discipline the worst offenders (usually just a handful of troublemakers), lest they face a parental backlash sans support from school administrators. For root causes, this report points to two: parents who fail to discipline their own children and the "disrespect everywhere in our culture." To get a copy for yourself, click here.

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Teaching Interrupted: Do Discipline Policies in Today's Public Schools Foster the Common Good?

From Bystander to Ally: Transforming the District Human Resources Department

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / May 20, 2004

Christine Campbell, Michael DeArmond, and Abigail Schumwinger, Center for Reinventing Public EducationApril 2004

Despite its wonderfully boring subtitle, this report by Christine Campbell, Michael DeArmond, and Abigail Schumwinger follows valuable earlier studies from the Center on Reinventing Public Education with concrete advice about how to repair school system personnel offices so they do a better job of finding and hiring the sorts of people that districts need in key roles like teacher and principal. Based on interviews and case studies of three districts (Houston, Milwaukee, San Diego) "that are actively engaged in reshaping their HR offices," the authors adduce lessons for turning the personnel office into an "ally" of district-wide reform efforts rather than an endless source of frustration. As always, though, no silver bullets fly from this gun. Besides careful bureaucratic repair work, superintendents and other leaders must continually work at this. The report won't knock your socks off but warrants a look. Find it (and several others, all supported by the Wallace Foundation) at http://www.crpe.org/pubs.shtml#leadership.

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From Bystander to Ally: Transforming the District Human Resources Department

Serving Our Children: Charter Schools and the Reform of American Public Education

May 20, 2004

Kevin Chavous, Capital Books 2004

D.C. city council member Kevin Chavous's book is a sometimes frustrating mishmash of the smart and the not-so-smart. Chavous is no education thinker and breaks no new ground here, but his support of charter schools is serious (he's taken political hits for it from the D.C. teachers' union) and he rightly sees them as a possible lever to push for systemwide reform. Unfortunately, he sometimes shrinks from the consequences of his convictions and avoids their logical conclusions, instead offering half-measures that simply tinker with the status quo. For example, he admits that the D.C. special education system (long in receivership in federal court) is a disaster, yet the boldest reform he can imagine is shifting procurement and reporting responsibility for special ed over to the D.C. assistant superintendent for academic affairs. (A real reformer might instead contemplate something like Florida's McKay Scholarship program.) Still, this book is worth reading for some of the horrifying vignettes of a system beset on all sides, such as the boy who lived in a hole in the attic of a D.C. public school for several weeks to avoid his abusive foster parents. And Chavous deserves plaudits for courageous leadership on charter schooling in the nation's capital. The ISBN is 1931868697; find it at http://www.capital-books.com/Books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=85732.

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Serving Our Children: Charter Schools and the Reform of American Public Education