Why not Catholic charter schools?

Michael J. Petrilli / December 6, 2007

The holidays are here just in time, because seven of the District of Columbia's inner-city Catholic schools are in need of a Christmas miracle. Like their peers nationwide, they face a crippling financial crisis that threatens to bring their heralded work to an end.

Though indisputably a crisis, it's no surprise. The basic problem has been worsening for decades as middle-class families decamped for the suburbs, leaving weakened parishes and disadvantaged children behind, even as education costs rose. To their great credit, the Catholic schools continued to serve students in the Washington community, as did their counterparts in many other cities, even though, by and large, their parents couldn't afford the modest tuition, nor did many of them share the faith. But as Washington's legendary Cardinal James Hickey once said, "We don't educate these children because they are Catholic, but because we are Catholic." And not only did the church open its door to poor children from all walks of life, it succeeded in providing many of them with a top-rate education. Studies consistently show urban Catholic schools outperforming similar public schools--and even other types of private schools--because of their no-nonsense approach to curriculum, firm but loving discipline, dedicated teachers, and high expectations for all.

Of late, however, competition from public charter schools, as well as the fiscal toll of the church's sex-abuse scandal, have combined to threaten the already-fragile balance sheets of these treasured community institutions.

To

» Continued

Why not Catholic charter schools?

Rank and file rankings no more

December 6, 2007

Last week, U.S. News and World Report, the most widely known source of college and grad-school rankings, decided to try its hand at ranking America's high schools. This probably got Newsweek (which once had a monopoly on judging high schools) all bent out of shape.

Journalism professor Samuel Freedman, who sometimes pens the "On Education" column in the New York Times, was a bit unsettled, too. "The ranking is a centerpiece of what we might call the Anxiety Industry," he wrote yesterday. Freedman also quotes Stanford educationist David Labaree, who finds the proliferation of U.S. News's franchise "a little disquieting" and thinks that it "exacerbates the rankings mania that's harming education at all levels."

At a time when traditional weekly newsmagazines don't have a lot of traction, respect, or revenues, one readily understands the business impulse behind U.S. News's penchant for ranking everything that isn't tied down. But it wouldn't work if the customers didn't buy it. Lots of people clearly want to know which hospitals, business schools, etc. are better than others, and U.S. News has provided them answers where before few existed.

The answers are not always reliable, though. The magazine's college rankings, for example, are famously quirky and in many cases do a better job of conferring stature upon institutions than in evaluating their quality. U.S. News judges universities by such criteria as alumni giving and freshmen SAT scores, while paying scant attention to how well schools

» Continued

Rank and file rankings no more

Setback for virtual schools

December 6, 2007

"If you can't beat ‘em, sue ‘em," has become an unofficial American motto, and one that the teachers unions shrewdly employ across the land, pretty much wherever they lose in the legislature. This week's example comes from the Badger State. Terrified about competition from the Wisconsin Virtual Academy (WIVA), an online school affiliated with K12, the Wisconsin Education Association Council took its sponsor, the Department of Public Instruction, to court. The resulting union victory represents the first case in the country to go against virtual schools. (This Education Next article provides an excellent primer on the legal background of virtual schooling.) A court of appeals panel found that the school violated the state's charter school, open enrollment, and teacher licensing laws. The latter finding is most troubling; Judge Richard Brown wrote in his decision, "The problem is not that the unlicensed WIVA parents teach their children, but that they 'teach in a public school.'" Following that logic, will high school students who teach themselves have to become certified as teachers, too? Brown, painting himself as an anti-activist judge, argues that "if, as its proponents claim (and its opponents dispute), WIVA has hit upon a bold new educational model that educates pupils in a way equal to traditional school at a fraction of the cost, then the legislature may well choose to change the law to accommodate WIVA and other schools like it." Let's hope it does. Meanwhile, the

» Continued

Setback for virtual schools

Fenty forges ahead

December 6, 2007

D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty is spending political capital like it grows on trees. At least that's how it seemed last week, when Fenty announced his plans to close 23 District schools and received serious backlash from the city council. The Washington Post reports that Councilmember (and former Mayor) Marion Barry, normally such a picture of poise and decorum, attempted to give Fenty advice on his governing style and then swore when the mayor didn't care to listen. Those most affected by the school closures aren't too thrilled with hizzoner, either. Clarence Cherry, president of the PTA at the soon-to-be-shuttered John Burroughs Elementary School, said Fenty's decision "puts a question mark on the leadership we elected for the city." The mayor, for his part, thinks he still represents "that overwhelming tidal wave of outpouring of ‘Fix the schools.' People want us to fix the schools almost by any means necessary because it's taken so long." The Post editorial board is siding with Fenty, writing that "the final decisions should be based on the needs of students and not tit-for-tat ward politics." Gadfly agrees. Fenty is clearly thinking of children first; heaven knows what the council members, especially Mr. 8th Ward, are thinking of.

"D.C. School Closings," Washington Post, November 29, 2007

"Fenty's Mode On Schools Is Breeding Alienation," by David Nakamura and Nikita Stewart, Washington Post, December 3, 2007

» Continued

Fenty forges ahead

A TAKSing question

December 6, 2007

Which is scarier: a high-school student who can't read or a fifth grader with a beard? Since 2002-03, Texas has required third and fifth graders to pass a test in order to move on to the next grade level. The law, brainchild of then-Governor George W. Bush, does allow an exception: If a committee of parent, teacher, and principal agrees that a certain student should move to the next grade despite failing the test, that student can be promoted. The exception has now become the rule. Only 20 percent of fifth graders who fail the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) are held back. But the promotion is not without justification. Researcher Jay Greene points out that "there may well be harm from the social disruption caused by retaining an older student," especially for a fifth grader, all of whose friends will have left for middle school. But should students begin sixth grade--new school, new teachers, new classes--without knowing basic skills? Texas claims that the 80 percent of socially promoted fifth graders are given additional support. That's fine if true. But then why hold back any students at all? This is a tricky question. But Texas's current policy, which appears to be assembly-line promotion, isn't the answer.

"4 in 5 fifth-grade students who fail TAKS are promoted," by Terrence Stutz, Dallas Morning News, November 29, 2007

» Continued

A TAKSing question

Not so flat

December 6, 2007

Jackie Robson shows why the U.S. is the globe's innovator. She's a gifted 14-year-old who skipped high school, attends Mary Baldwin College, lives in a dormitory and takes classes such as Folk Dance and Japanese 101. When reflecting on her middle-school experience, Jackie says, "Most of the stuff throughout the year I knew already. We had these worksheets with 20 questions, and it was, ‘Oh great, you're done. Here's another one.'" Such drab routines can stifle creative and curious minds. But while more than a few gifted U.S. students like Jackie have options, few students in China do. David Brooks writes in his New York Times column that the top tier of Chinese students--those who pass the national exams that reward rote learning, who follow the rules and make it through the best universities into promising jobs in the Communist Party--are richly rewarded for doing what they're told. He wonders, though, whether, in the middle of the night, any of China's smartest people ask themselves if their country can sustain its amazing economic growth when everyone, no matter how brilliant, is treated like sheep. Many parts of America's education system are bad. But it has some things going for it.

"Young, Gifted, and Skipping High School," by Maria Glod, Washington Post, December 2, 2007

"The Dictatorship of Talent," by David Brooks, New York Times, December 4, 2007

» Continued

Not so flat

The greening of NCLB?

December 6, 2007

Guess why U.S. schoolchildren are said not to know enough about global warming? As with everything else that may or may not be wrong with young Americans, just blame NCLB. So says the North American Association for Environmental Education's recent study, Environmental Literacy in America. It asserts that, because of No Child Left Behind, the amount of environmental education in schools has "leveled off and may even be in decline for the first time in three decades." But fret not. Congress is allegedly considering legislation to include in a reauthorized NCLB greater emphasis on environmental education and more funding for it. We're skeptical--and not just because we haven't encountered that particular bill. Is environmental awareness really in decline in America's classrooms (just look at the, ahem, warm reception Al Gore's film, An Inconvenient Truth, has received)? Second, why does environmental education need to be enshrined in a massive federal law? Schools should teach science; ecology is part of science; and the environment is part of ecology. Teachers don't need more mandates heaped upon them, especially those motivated by actors and activists swooning over the latest Hollywood docudrama. What's next, a federally-funded Ethanol Awareness Week for 7-year-olds?

"Greener Lessons Needed," Associated Press, December 3, 2007

» Continued

The greening of NCLB?

Bugs: it's what's for dinner

December 6, 2007

If you live in New Zealand and you feel like chicken tonight, perhaps you should settle for The Other White Meat. That's because 17-year-old Kiwi Jane Millar, while working toward her IB Programme Diploma, conducted a science experiment that showed that several local supermarket chickens contained anti-biotic resistant bugs. (Fordham recently gave the IB biology course an "A," by the way.) When the young scientist treated the poultry-produced bacteria with several antibiotics, including some used in humans and not in chickens, a few strains refused to keel over like good prokaryotes should. "The main finding is that we can create resistance to medically important antibiotics by using antibiotics that are presumably safe in agriculture," Millar said. Whatever. The main finding is to go vegetarian, but stay away from the bagged spinach. And that Fordham's reports are clearly spot-on in all their assessments, always.

"Student exposes bugs in chicken," The Press, December 1, 2007

» Continued

Bugs: it's what's for dinner

PISA 2006: Science Competencies for Tomorrow's World

December 6, 2007

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
December 2007

Last week we reported the results of the latest Progress in International Reading Literacy test (PIRL). The punch line: American fourth grade readers are stagnating while other countries pass us by. This week, it's déjà vu all over again. The OECD released findings from the 2006 PISA exam, and guess what: U.S. 15-year-olds are performing more or less the same in math and science as they did in 2003 while students in other lands surge ahead. American students now trail their peers in 16 of 30 OECD countries in science and 23 in math. (In 2000, the U.S. was behind just eight OECD countries in math.) Finland is now the top performer in both math and science, with scores well above the OECD average. Other strong performers include Canada, Japan, and New Zealand. The full report, along with scads more findings, can be found here.

» Continued

PISA 2006: Science Competencies for Tomorrow's World