New ‘Best and Brightest’ Bonus Plan Proposed

According to the Tallahassee News Service of Florida, Governor Scott will support $43 million dollars in 2017 teacher bonuses.  Details of the plan are not yet available, but the Governor said that the plan will target new teachers who show great potential and veteran teachers who show the highest student academic growth among their peers.  The current method of qualifying based on test scores will change.

 

 

 

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New bill to end 3rd grade test based retention

Representative John Cortes D. Osceola has filed  bill 131 to end mandatory third grade retention based on the English Language Arts score on the Florida Assessment.  Districts may retain students if needed, but they must continue to provide intensive remedial instruction.  The provisions remain for promoting retained students mid year if the have improved their reading skills.

Rep. Cortes was elected to the Florida House in 2014.  He does not serve on any legislative education committees, and the bill has yet to gain a Senate sponsor.  Whether or not his bill progresses is worth watching.  Unfortunately, third grade retention helps inflate fourth grade NAEP scores, and illusion is one of the signatures of school choice.

 

 

 

 

Making Good Choices: Equitable Public Schools Do Better

Researchers at Stanford University have published a new study comparing public school vs. school choice privatization systems.  Public schools that focus on equity win hands down.

The data suggest that the education sector is better served by a public investment approach that serves each and every child than by a market-based competition approach that creates winners…..and losers.

It is worth taking a minute to see how and why.

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A Serious Look at Testing or at School Culture?

Rep. David Simmons, the chair of the Florida Senate Appropriations sub committee on Education wants a serious look at way to reduce over testing.  What is over testing?  Is it all the prep testing that goes on prior to the state tests?  On the other hand, is it too many redundant state or national tests e.g. requiring students to sit the FSA and the SAT if they are going to college?  Or, is it requiring students to take a state test like the FSA every year?  There is another way to look at over testing.  Perhaps it is a way to avoid looking for solutions.

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Plan to Revise the Constitution: Take the Public Out of Public Education

Can you imagine that the Florida House and Senate would support the repeal of the Fair Districting amendments, making the redistricting process secret, as well as rescinding constitutional bans on state support for private, religious schools?   The Miami Herald reports that these are the major goals of the legislative leaders. Florida’s constitution would have to be changed, and the process is now in place.  We need to know about this; it is real.

 

 

 

 

 

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Is a war brewing over education? Be there!!

The Tampa Bay Times reported that a bi-partisan panel of legislators voiced support for teacher pay raises and less testing in schools.  Even  more surprising was the opinion that all there should be more equity in school accountability for public schools, charter schools and private schools.  This has been a major issue in the League of Women Voters  arguments that all schools that receive state funding directly or indirectly through tax credit vouchers should meet the same testing and accountability standards.

Who is supporting public schools?  Is there a war brewing?

 

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Time is Money or Maybe Not!

wrist-watch-941249_640Suppose you are a really good teacher and can prove it.  You notice that a neighboring district has a pay for performance plan where high quality teachers with less experience earn more money than average teachers with more experience.  Would you change districts?  In today‘s Gainesville Sun, a local economist, Dave Denslow, summarized a study by Barbara Biasi, a Stanford graduate student, who compared school districts in Wisconsin that used a ‘pay for performance plan‘ with districts that did not.   The result?

 

 

 

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Evil Afoot? Who is the devil?

man-1776934_640The Tampa Bay Times says yes, indeed there is evil afoot in Tallahassee.  Daniel Ruth calls on his creative writing skills to explain incoming House Speaker Richard Corcoran’s comment that the Florida Education Association (and I suppose the League) is evil for opposing Florida tax credit vouchers for private schools.  He calls Corcoran ‘a cunning chap’ for running on a platform emphasizing the need for civility and responsible government.  Maybe Corcoran just meant for other people, not himself.  Corcoran’s message is anything but civil or responsible.

Ruth says, “Alas, this is Tallahassee where sober judgment goes to die.”

He continues with a quote from Corcoran about a group of professional educators who were trying to protect funding for public schools and opposed Corcoran’s plan to slash the education budget.

Corcoran referred to the educators as ‘the ISIS of the three Rs’.

This is not the rhetoric that leads to constructive approaches to improve student learning.  In fact, Corcoran has no apparent interest in negotiating with anyone including fellow Republican Senate President Joe  Negron.  He was quoted in the Miami Herald : “We are going to govern unabashedly principled and unabashedly conservative….That creates tensions, that creates internal strife.”

Put on your armor; you will need it.

 

 

 

 

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Pay For Charters that Do Not Succeed?

priority-1714375_640The 2015 Florida legislature tied charter capital outlay funds to their academic success.  Charters have privately owned school facilities paid for from public funds.  The new rules would disallow facility funding not only for charters that have consecutive failing grades but also for those with consecutive ‘D’ school grades.  The rule affects thirteen charters with consecutive ‘D’ grades.  Charter owners are protesting. An administrative judge has agreed with them, and they will get their money.  How much?  $408,500 since school began this fall.  Multiply it out and it would be over a million and a half dollars per year for 13 schools.

Let’s think about this.  Charters located in low income areas are given more facility money.  Public schools facility funding located in the same areas has steadily declined for years.   If the State shifts money from publically owned schools to privately owned failing charters, who wins?  Not the children.

Suppose a charter operating in the same neighborhood has a higher school grade than the local public school.  Is the charter doing a better job?  Or, do they enroll fewer children with learning disabilities?  Do they dismiss children who do not ‘fit their school norms’.  Do they draw the children from families at a higher income level?  It is no secret that if you want a higher performing school, select higher performing students to begin with.  This is a process called ‘creaming’.  These schools do not make students better, the students make the schools better.

What does make students better?  more time in school, tutors, support services, and good teachers and principals

Giving charters rent money is a much cheaper way to go.  The problem is that nothing changes for most kids who need a place to go.  School choice just moves children around; they go in circles leading nowhere.  We could fix this.

 

 

 

 

It is Time to PUNCH

child speakingWe can continue to feed information to the public about the destructive impact of ill thought out school choice policies.  There is a danger, however, that we are simply preaching to the choir.   Those who should be aware may not be tuned in.

Our strategies to increase awareness must be more diverse.  What would prompt your neighbor, colleague, fellow parent to tune in?

It is logical that busy people preoccupied with families and jobs will respond to calls for action if they recognize the urgency and the possibility for a positive impact. 

I am working on a set of ‘headlines’ and slogans that communicate the immediacy of the need to preserve our public schools.   What do we value about our public schools?  What are the threats to public education?  Which solutions do we propose?

Can we come up with short, single sentences that encapsulate a need or something you value.   Then we can refer people to more in depth analyses and ways to respond.

Let’s see:

  • Vouchers segregate, not integrate schools.
  • Vouchers for the poor pay for poor quality schools.
  • Vouchers help the rich get richer.
  • Private schools get public money with no strings attached.

OR

  • Public schools innovate, charters stagnate.
  • Charters choose, parents lose.
  • Public schools invite students in; charters counsel them out.
  • Charters profit from students; public schools invest in them.
  • When housing patterns limit access to quality education, fix it!

OR

  • School choice means all schools are under funded.
  • Teaching, not testing helps students learn.
  • We need more time, not more testing.
  • School choice is a distraction not an option to improve learning.

You get the idea.  Send me your captions and communication strategies.  We will hone them and use them to target issues.  We will discuss these at the League’s Orlando leadership conference in January.