www.protectstudents.org
SACRAMENTO – The California Education Coalition today launched their new website to educate Californians about the impact of Governor Schwarzenegger's broken promises on education.
The website, www.protectstudents.org, highlights the fact that Governor Schwarzenegger has broken his word to California's students and schools on two fronts, by withholding $2 billion in this year's budget and by proposing changes to the voter approved Proposition 98 – changes which would eliminate the minimum funding protections for schools via his flawed "Living Within Our Means" initiative proposal.
"Protectstudents.org is designed to be another tool in the fight against the continued attack on education funding," explained Education Coalition spokesman Roger Salazar. "It will help California parents, teachers, and students, as well as other concerned citizens, learn about the devastating impact of the Governor's broken promises on education and what we are doing to convince the Governor that our students and schools deserve better."
Governor Schwarzenegger's budget proposal underfunds Prop. 98; it reneges on his promise to our schools and students by withholding $2 billion; and will only lead to more school closures, larger class sizes, additional layoffs of teachers and school support personnel, and the elimination of key student programs.
Saturday, April 30, 2005
Thursday, April 28, 2005
The public and public education
PPIC Statewide Survey: Special Survey on Education, April 2005
Mark Baldassare
April 2005, 40 pp.
Some findings of the current survey
• The vast majority of Californians (82%) believe that the quality of education in the state’s K-12 public schools is at least somewhat of a problem.
• 59% of public school parents say that their local public schools do not receive enough state funding.
• Most Californians are more likely to say that private schools (60%) rather than public schools (24%) provide the best education.
• 78% of Californians say parents who fail to pay attention to how their children are doing is a big problem in K-12 public education.
• Parental hopes for their children’s future education are stunning. Nine in 10 aspire to college graduation for their children, and 41 percent hope that their children will earn a postgraduate degree.
This special edition of the PPIC Statewide Survey—a survey on education—is the first in a three-year PPIC survey series made possible with funding from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. The intent of this special series is to inform state, local, and federal policymakers; encourage discussion; and raise public awareness about a variety of education, environment, and population issues facing the state.
http://www.ppic.org/main/publication.asp?i=597
Mark Baldassare
April 2005, 40 pp.
Some findings of the current survey
• The vast majority of Californians (82%) believe that the quality of education in the state’s K-12 public schools is at least somewhat of a problem.
• 59% of public school parents say that their local public schools do not receive enough state funding.
• Most Californians are more likely to say that private schools (60%) rather than public schools (24%) provide the best education.
• 78% of Californians say parents who fail to pay attention to how their children are doing is a big problem in K-12 public education.
• Parental hopes for their children’s future education are stunning. Nine in 10 aspire to college graduation for their children, and 41 percent hope that their children will earn a postgraduate degree.
This special edition of the PPIC Statewide Survey—a survey on education—is the first in a three-year PPIC survey series made possible with funding from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. The intent of this special series is to inform state, local, and federal policymakers; encourage discussion; and raise public awareness about a variety of education, environment, and population issues facing the state.
http://www.ppic.org/main/publication.asp?i=597
Arnold drops in the polls
Schwarzenegger's rating drops sharply
Since January, his popularity has plunged 20 points.
By Gary Delsohn -- Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 2:15 am PDT Thursday, April 28, 2005 www.sacbee.com
Just as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger prepares to sell a reduced "reform" agenda to voters, a newly released statewide poll shows the Republican governor's popularity has plummeted.
The poll from the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California found that only 40 percent of adults now approve of the way Schwarzenegger is handling his job as governor, a whopping 20 percentage point drop since January.
Among "likely voters," his approval rating was a higher 45 percent, but that fell from 63 percent at the start of the year.
Schwarzenegger aides dismissed the results as little more than a temporary slide after months of attacks from public employee labor unions and other critics of his policies.
But while Republican voters are still solidly behind Schwarzenegger, pollster Mark Baldassare said the numbers make it clear Democrats and independent voters don't like him as much as they once did.
"Since January, the governor has been less able to communicate effectively with the people, particularly outside of his party, that he's representing their interests," Baldassare said. "People on the other side have been more effective in communicating that he's not.
"Whether it's a temporary drop or a trend, it's too early to say. I think the next few months are going to be crucial."
The poll was released at a pivotal point for the governor, who must decide soon whether to submit signatures to put initiatives that many Democrats oppose on a statewide ballot.
Since January, his popularity has plunged 20 points.
By Gary Delsohn -- Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 2:15 am PDT Thursday, April 28, 2005 www.sacbee.com
Just as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger prepares to sell a reduced "reform" agenda to voters, a newly released statewide poll shows the Republican governor's popularity has plummeted.
The poll from the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California found that only 40 percent of adults now approve of the way Schwarzenegger is handling his job as governor, a whopping 20 percentage point drop since January.
Among "likely voters," his approval rating was a higher 45 percent, but that fell from 63 percent at the start of the year.
Schwarzenegger aides dismissed the results as little more than a temporary slide after months of attacks from public employee labor unions and other critics of his policies.
But while Republican voters are still solidly behind Schwarzenegger, pollster Mark Baldassare said the numbers make it clear Democrats and independent voters don't like him as much as they once did.
"Since January, the governor has been less able to communicate effectively with the people, particularly outside of his party, that he's representing their interests," Baldassare said. "People on the other side have been more effective in communicating that he's not.
"Whether it's a temporary drop or a trend, it's too early to say. I think the next few months are going to be crucial."
The poll was released at a pivotal point for the governor, who must decide soon whether to submit signatures to put initiatives that many Democrats oppose on a statewide ballot.
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
Funding War not Schools
Fiddling While Crucial Programs Starve
Similarly, with roughly 10% of what we've spent in Iraq, we could make up the $27-billion federal funding shortfall in paying for Bush's controversial No Child Left Behind Act, which tells public schools that they will be all but scrapped if they don't improve — yet it doesn't provide the means to do so. This number comes from a lawsuit filed by school districts in Texas, Michigan and Vermont and the National Education Assn., the nation's largest teachers organization.
Sadly, these domestic failures provide a far greater long-term threat to our nation's security than the hyped-up claims surrounding our foreign adventures. Abroad, we must "support our troops" at all costs — even if the cost is their lives — while at home, the nation's leaders are all about tough love.
Has the U.S. become like ancient Rome, in love with costly conquest?
Robert Scheer
April 26, 2005
Notice the price of gasoline lately? Isn't it great that we have secured Iraq's oil? And as Congress signs off on yet another huge supplementary grant to supposedly protect U.S. interests in the Mideast, our president pathetically begs his Saudi buddies for a price break. As the fall of Rome showed, imperialism never pays.
Of course, back in 2003, conquering Iraq looked like a great package deal, what with all that oil — second only to Saudi Arabia — and the manufactured photo ops of cheering Iraqis. So what if those pesky weapons of mass destruction weren't really there? So what if no solid links to Al Qaeda are ever found? This was a win-win, as the corporate guys like to say: Not only would we be able to conduct this operation for next to nothing, we would be welcomed with flowers.
"There is a lot of money to pay for this. It doesn't have to be U.S. taxpayer money," then-Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told Congress days before the war, in testimony on the potential costs of invading Iraq. "We are talking about a country that can finance its own reconstruction and relatively soon." In the real world, however, this turned out to be utter nonsense.
With approval of the latest spending bill, taxpayers will have been forced to cough up more than $300 billion for the war to date — above and beyond the annual $400-billion Pentagon budget — and tens of billions for a bungled reconstruction. Even if the United States can lower its troop commitment to 40,000 troops in Iraq by 2010, as some Pentagon strategists optimistically anticipate, the war could still end up costing U.S. taxpayers up to $646 billion by 2015, according to Rep. John Spratt of South Carolina, the ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee. If insurgency, corruption and incompetence continue to plague the U.S. occupation as they have steadily for the last two years, however, the number could surge to a trillion dollars or more.
We need to put such gargantuan numbers in some perspective. The emergency funding that the Senate passed 99 to 0 last week gives the military roughly $80 billion and pays for the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan only through September. That is twice what President Bush insists he needs to cut from the federal support for Medicaid over the next decade.
Already the red state of Missouri is set to end its Medicaid program entirely within the next three years because of a lack of funds. As the Los Angeles Times reported, that will save the state $5 billion, but at the cost of ending healthcare for the more than 1 million Missourians enrolled in the program. That sum is less than half of what Halliburton, Vice President Dick Cheney's old company, alone has been paid for reconstruction efforts in Iraq, without much to show for it in terms of improving the Iraqis' quality of life.
Similarly, with roughly 10% of what we've spent in Iraq, we could make up the $27-billion federal funding shortfall in paying for Bush's controversial No Child Left Behind Act, which tells public schools that they will be all but scrapped if they don't improve — yet it doesn't provide the means to do so. This number comes from a lawsuit filed by school districts in Texas, Michigan and Vermont and the National Education Assn., the nation's largest teachers organization.
Sadly, these domestic failures provide a far greater long-term threat to our nation's security than the hyped-up claims surrounding our foreign adventures. Abroad, we must "support our troops" at all costs — even if the cost is their lives — while at home, the nation's leaders are all about tough love.
"Government is not here to do everything for everybody," admonished Missouri state Rep. Jodi Stefanick, a Republican representing suburban St. Louis. "We have to draw the line somewhere." Just not in Iraq, apparently.
Welcome to late-era Rome, where mindless militaristic expansion is considered patriotic and where demagogues who recklessly waste taxes and young lives in empire-building are deemed valorous. Wolfowitz, for example, has been rewarded for his ignorance and arrogance with the top job at the World Bank.
It is not too late, however, for us to wake up and recall that, in the end, once militarism trumped republicanism, the glory that was Rome proved to be a hollow boast.
Copyright 2005 Los Angeles Times
Similarly, with roughly 10% of what we've spent in Iraq, we could make up the $27-billion federal funding shortfall in paying for Bush's controversial No Child Left Behind Act, which tells public schools that they will be all but scrapped if they don't improve — yet it doesn't provide the means to do so. This number comes from a lawsuit filed by school districts in Texas, Michigan and Vermont and the National Education Assn., the nation's largest teachers organization.
Sadly, these domestic failures provide a far greater long-term threat to our nation's security than the hyped-up claims surrounding our foreign adventures. Abroad, we must "support our troops" at all costs — even if the cost is their lives — while at home, the nation's leaders are all about tough love.
Has the U.S. become like ancient Rome, in love with costly conquest?
Robert Scheer
April 26, 2005
Notice the price of gasoline lately? Isn't it great that we have secured Iraq's oil? And as Congress signs off on yet another huge supplementary grant to supposedly protect U.S. interests in the Mideast, our president pathetically begs his Saudi buddies for a price break. As the fall of Rome showed, imperialism never pays.
Of course, back in 2003, conquering Iraq looked like a great package deal, what with all that oil — second only to Saudi Arabia — and the manufactured photo ops of cheering Iraqis. So what if those pesky weapons of mass destruction weren't really there? So what if no solid links to Al Qaeda are ever found? This was a win-win, as the corporate guys like to say: Not only would we be able to conduct this operation for next to nothing, we would be welcomed with flowers.
"There is a lot of money to pay for this. It doesn't have to be U.S. taxpayer money," then-Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told Congress days before the war, in testimony on the potential costs of invading Iraq. "We are talking about a country that can finance its own reconstruction and relatively soon." In the real world, however, this turned out to be utter nonsense.
With approval of the latest spending bill, taxpayers will have been forced to cough up more than $300 billion for the war to date — above and beyond the annual $400-billion Pentagon budget — and tens of billions for a bungled reconstruction. Even if the United States can lower its troop commitment to 40,000 troops in Iraq by 2010, as some Pentagon strategists optimistically anticipate, the war could still end up costing U.S. taxpayers up to $646 billion by 2015, according to Rep. John Spratt of South Carolina, the ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee. If insurgency, corruption and incompetence continue to plague the U.S. occupation as they have steadily for the last two years, however, the number could surge to a trillion dollars or more.
We need to put such gargantuan numbers in some perspective. The emergency funding that the Senate passed 99 to 0 last week gives the military roughly $80 billion and pays for the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan only through September. That is twice what President Bush insists he needs to cut from the federal support for Medicaid over the next decade.
Already the red state of Missouri is set to end its Medicaid program entirely within the next three years because of a lack of funds. As the Los Angeles Times reported, that will save the state $5 billion, but at the cost of ending healthcare for the more than 1 million Missourians enrolled in the program. That sum is less than half of what Halliburton, Vice President Dick Cheney's old company, alone has been paid for reconstruction efforts in Iraq, without much to show for it in terms of improving the Iraqis' quality of life.
Similarly, with roughly 10% of what we've spent in Iraq, we could make up the $27-billion federal funding shortfall in paying for Bush's controversial No Child Left Behind Act, which tells public schools that they will be all but scrapped if they don't improve — yet it doesn't provide the means to do so. This number comes from a lawsuit filed by school districts in Texas, Michigan and Vermont and the National Education Assn., the nation's largest teachers organization.
Sadly, these domestic failures provide a far greater long-term threat to our nation's security than the hyped-up claims surrounding our foreign adventures. Abroad, we must "support our troops" at all costs — even if the cost is their lives — while at home, the nation's leaders are all about tough love.
"Government is not here to do everything for everybody," admonished Missouri state Rep. Jodi Stefanick, a Republican representing suburban St. Louis. "We have to draw the line somewhere." Just not in Iraq, apparently.
Welcome to late-era Rome, where mindless militaristic expansion is considered patriotic and where demagogues who recklessly waste taxes and young lives in empire-building are deemed valorous. Wolfowitz, for example, has been rewarded for his ignorance and arrogance with the top job at the World Bank.
It is not too late, however, for us to wake up and recall that, in the end, once militarism trumped republicanism, the glory that was Rome proved to be a hollow boast.
Copyright 2005 Los Angeles Times
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Do not sign Arnold's petitions
Local Education Coalition Members Urge Californians Not to Sign Governor's Budget Initiative Petitions
Measure Would Weaken Prop. 98 Protections
April 19, 2005
CHICO – Local members of the California Education Coalition today discussed the impact of Governor Schwarzenegger's broken promises to education and urged Californians not to sign the Governor's flawed budget measure petitions during a press conference at Jay Partridge Elementary School in Chico.
Local parents, teachers, school employees and administrators highlighted the fact that Governor Schwarzenegger has broken his word to California's students and schools on two fronts, by withholding $2 billion in this year's budget and by proposing changes to the voter approved Proposition 98 via his so-called "Live Within Our Means" (LWOM) budget initiative that would eliminate the minimum funding protections for schools.
"In the past four years, California's schools have lost more than 9.8 billion in state funding cuts," said Tamara Conry, a math teacher at Paradise Intermediate School. "As a parent and a classroom teacher I see how these cuts impact our local schools every day. Now the Governor wants us to sign petitions for an initiative that would destroy Prop.98, the law voters approved to make sure our schools receive minimum funding. Like the rest of the Governor's so-called reforms, this initiative will not help our schools one bit. We strongly urge Californians NOT to sign the Governor's petition."
Governor Schwarzenegger's budget proposal underfunds Proposition 98 and will only lead to more school closures, larger class sizes, additional layoffs of teachers and school support personnel, and the elimination of key student programs.
The Governor's LWOM Act exacerbates the problem by allowing him to make across-the-board cuts, including to education, during fiscal emergencies and eliminating the Prop. 98 provisions that require the state to repay the amounts owed to our schools and our students. Current provisions allow the legislature to make temporary cuts in funding without threatening the long-term funding level of education.
"Last year at this time, the one million members of the California State PTA worked with this Governor on a solution for the state's budget problem – a problem that was not created by our kids," said Ann Hayes, 13th District PTA. "This Governor promised that $2 billion in funding for our schools would be restored and that our kids would receive their fair share of any additional state revenues. He has broken his promise and once again our kids and our schools will suffer."
During his campaign for Governor, Schwarzenegger promised to protect Proposition 98, a law passed by voters that guarantees minimum funding for our schools, saying "Not over my dead body." Now, the Governor is proposing changes via the LWOM Act that would eliminate the funding protections the voters put into place with the initiative.
The California Education Coalition is comprised of organizations representing more than 1.5 million parents, teachers, school board members, school employees, and administrators, including:
Association of California School Administrators (ACSA) representing nearly 15,500 school administrators
California Association of School Business Officials (CASBO) representing more than 4,000 school finance and administrative managers
California County Superintendents Educational Services Association (CCSESA) representing all 58 county superintendents throughout California
California Federation of Teachers (CFT-AFL-CIO) representing nearly 90,000 education employees
California School Boards Association (CSBA) representing more than 1,000 K-12 school districts and county offices of education throughout California
California School Employees Association (CSEA) representing more than 230,000 classified school employees
California State PTA representing more than one million parents, teachers, and students in California
California Teachers Association (CTA) representing over 330,000 educators
Service Employees International Union (SEIU) representing more than 50,000 school employees in California
###
Measure Would Weaken Prop. 98 Protections
April 19, 2005
CHICO – Local members of the California Education Coalition today discussed the impact of Governor Schwarzenegger's broken promises to education and urged Californians not to sign the Governor's flawed budget measure petitions during a press conference at Jay Partridge Elementary School in Chico.
Local parents, teachers, school employees and administrators highlighted the fact that Governor Schwarzenegger has broken his word to California's students and schools on two fronts, by withholding $2 billion in this year's budget and by proposing changes to the voter approved Proposition 98 via his so-called "Live Within Our Means" (LWOM) budget initiative that would eliminate the minimum funding protections for schools.
"In the past four years, California's schools have lost more than 9.8 billion in state funding cuts," said Tamara Conry, a math teacher at Paradise Intermediate School. "As a parent and a classroom teacher I see how these cuts impact our local schools every day. Now the Governor wants us to sign petitions for an initiative that would destroy Prop.98, the law voters approved to make sure our schools receive minimum funding. Like the rest of the Governor's so-called reforms, this initiative will not help our schools one bit. We strongly urge Californians NOT to sign the Governor's petition."
Governor Schwarzenegger's budget proposal underfunds Proposition 98 and will only lead to more school closures, larger class sizes, additional layoffs of teachers and school support personnel, and the elimination of key student programs.
The Governor's LWOM Act exacerbates the problem by allowing him to make across-the-board cuts, including to education, during fiscal emergencies and eliminating the Prop. 98 provisions that require the state to repay the amounts owed to our schools and our students. Current provisions allow the legislature to make temporary cuts in funding without threatening the long-term funding level of education.
"Last year at this time, the one million members of the California State PTA worked with this Governor on a solution for the state's budget problem – a problem that was not created by our kids," said Ann Hayes, 13th District PTA. "This Governor promised that $2 billion in funding for our schools would be restored and that our kids would receive their fair share of any additional state revenues. He has broken his promise and once again our kids and our schools will suffer."
During his campaign for Governor, Schwarzenegger promised to protect Proposition 98, a law passed by voters that guarantees minimum funding for our schools, saying "Not over my dead body." Now, the Governor is proposing changes via the LWOM Act that would eliminate the funding protections the voters put into place with the initiative.
The California Education Coalition is comprised of organizations representing more than 1.5 million parents, teachers, school board members, school employees, and administrators, including:
Association of California School Administrators (ACSA) representing nearly 15,500 school administrators
California Association of School Business Officials (CASBO) representing more than 4,000 school finance and administrative managers
California County Superintendents Educational Services Association (CCSESA) representing all 58 county superintendents throughout California
California Federation of Teachers (CFT-AFL-CIO) representing nearly 90,000 education employees
California School Boards Association (CSBA) representing more than 1,000 K-12 school districts and county offices of education throughout California
California School Employees Association (CSEA) representing more than 230,000 classified school employees
California State PTA representing more than one million parents, teachers, and students in California
California Teachers Association (CTA) representing over 330,000 educators
Service Employees International Union (SEIU) representing more than 50,000 school employees in California
###
Saturday, April 16, 2005
Gov. owes an apology--and $2Billion : L.A. Times
The Governor Owes Schools an Apology -- and $2 Billion
George Skelton
Capitol Journal
Los Angeles Times
April 14, 2005
It's like they're shouting at each other in different languages - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the angry school folks.
They're debating the proverbial apples and oranges. Both are right, rhetorically.
Schwarzenegger is wrong politically - and many say morally.
Schwarzenegger insists everywhere he goes - on talk radio and at initiative campaign rallies - that his proposed budget includes a $2.9-billion funding increase for schools: kindergarten through community college.
When the "special interests" claim that school funds are being cut, he says, "They are lying."
"The [teacher] unions spread propaganda that I'm taking money away from education, which is totally incorrect, because I'm adding…. I am a pro-education governor."
The governor is correct. He is adding money. But what he leaves out - and the ed lobby is hollering about in TV ads and at protest rallies - is that he promised schools roughly $2 billion more and reneged.
He pledged that extra money in a face-to-face, handshake deal shortly after taking office. It was the schools' condition for passively surrendering $2 billion they were rightly owed under Proposition 98. The governor needed the $2 billion from schools to avoid raising taxes.
So there's a TV ad now running in California's largest urban areas that shows parents proclaiming: "I'm upset about Gov. Schwarzenegger breaking his promises on education. He said he'd never shortchange Prop. 98…. That would only happen, quote, 'over my dead body.' But then he borrowed $2 billion from the education budget and now refuses to pay it back."
The broken promise is at the heart of a bitter battle between Schwarzenegger and an education coalition led by the powerful, 335,000-member California Teachers Assn.
Breaking his word to the CTA and other school groups probably is the single most damaging error Schwarzenegger has committed as governor. It soiled his image as a straight shooter.
I don't know about Hollywood and moviemaking, but in Sacramento and politics, breaking your word is probably the worst sin. The term "double-cross" comes to mind.
"I'm out of the deal-making business with this governor," says Barbara Kerr, the CTA president.
"He owes us a bit of money and seems to be trying to make the lenders into the bad guys."
The governor's rationale for withholding money from schools was that it would spare other state programs from deep cuts, particularly healthcare for the poor and disabled.
H.D. Palmer, the governor's budget spokesman, offers this example: 190,000 children would have been forced off the Healthy Families medical care program for the working poor.
"The governor said that wasn't a trade-off he was willing to do," Palmer recalls. "So he stuck with what he believed was a reasonable balance."
As it was, Schwarzenegger still had to cut deeply into many health and welfare programs.
Of course, he also could have raised taxes. He'd have broken a different promise, but not one as signed and sealed as the school deal.
Here's what happened:
Schwarzenegger was desperate for money, and school officials wanted to cozy up to the charismatic, larger-than-life new governor. Also, they feared a worse result if there was no cooperation. So they agreed not to fight for the $2 billion on the condition that it be returned - that is, returned to their guaranteed annual funding base. It hasn't been.
The governor assured schools that if tax revenues increased this year, he'd give them their normal cut under Prop. 98. Revenues did, but he didn't.
The final paragraph of the statement Schwarzenegger released at the deal's announcement read: "This Prop. 98 funding will be restored as required by law and our agreement. Today, I am making that promise to our teachers and students."
Schwarzenegger didn't just renege on the deal. He's pushing a budget "reform" to amend Prop. 98 so that repayment of back money owed schools - roughly $4 billion - is stretched out over 15 years and not added to the guaranteed base.
There is logic in tinkering with Prop. 98. Under the current system, if the state gives schools a fat bonus during boom times, it's on the hook for that payment year after year, even when the economy sours. Of the $50 billion in state and local tax revenues Schwarzenegger is proposing for schools, nearly $10 billion is because of funding bonuses - called "over-appropriations" - between 1999 and 2002.
Schwarzenegger's budget control plan would allow the state to give schools a one-time bonus without it becoming part of the guaranteed base.
Senate leader Don Perata (D-Alameda) has said he's willing to tinker with Prop. 98. But not Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez (D-Los Angeles).
"When we're in the top five states in per-pupil funding," Nuñez says, "then perhaps we can talk about reforming Prop. 98." California currently is closer to the bottom five.
Anyway, Nuñez says, "the governor has to decide how long is a deal good for. He needs to clear the air and reestablish a certain level of trust."
Veteran Republican strategist Ken Khachigian thinks Schwarzenegger should take the statesman's route and address a joint session of the Legislature.
"Lay it out," Khachigian advises. "Say, 'This is not a problem I invented. It's a mutual problem…. Let's focus on the budget and avoid a ballot fight.'
"He's got a lot of maneuvering room. He's got great communication skills. He can be visionary, philosophical and assertive. He doesn't have to look like a wimp."
In the speech, Schwarzenegger could apologize for repeatedly referring to former negotiating partners as greedy special interests. And he could give the schools back their promised money.
George Skelton writes Monday and Thursday. Reach him at george.skelton@latimes.com.
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George Skelton
Capitol Journal
Los Angeles Times
April 14, 2005
It's like they're shouting at each other in different languages - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the angry school folks.
They're debating the proverbial apples and oranges. Both are right, rhetorically.
Schwarzenegger is wrong politically - and many say morally.
Schwarzenegger insists everywhere he goes - on talk radio and at initiative campaign rallies - that his proposed budget includes a $2.9-billion funding increase for schools: kindergarten through community college.
When the "special interests" claim that school funds are being cut, he says, "They are lying."
"The [teacher] unions spread propaganda that I'm taking money away from education, which is totally incorrect, because I'm adding…. I am a pro-education governor."
The governor is correct. He is adding money. But what he leaves out - and the ed lobby is hollering about in TV ads and at protest rallies - is that he promised schools roughly $2 billion more and reneged.
He pledged that extra money in a face-to-face, handshake deal shortly after taking office. It was the schools' condition for passively surrendering $2 billion they were rightly owed under Proposition 98. The governor needed the $2 billion from schools to avoid raising taxes.
So there's a TV ad now running in California's largest urban areas that shows parents proclaiming: "I'm upset about Gov. Schwarzenegger breaking his promises on education. He said he'd never shortchange Prop. 98…. That would only happen, quote, 'over my dead body.' But then he borrowed $2 billion from the education budget and now refuses to pay it back."
The broken promise is at the heart of a bitter battle between Schwarzenegger and an education coalition led by the powerful, 335,000-member California Teachers Assn.
Breaking his word to the CTA and other school groups probably is the single most damaging error Schwarzenegger has committed as governor. It soiled his image as a straight shooter.
I don't know about Hollywood and moviemaking, but in Sacramento and politics, breaking your word is probably the worst sin. The term "double-cross" comes to mind.
"I'm out of the deal-making business with this governor," says Barbara Kerr, the CTA president.
"He owes us a bit of money and seems to be trying to make the lenders into the bad guys."
The governor's rationale for withholding money from schools was that it would spare other state programs from deep cuts, particularly healthcare for the poor and disabled.
H.D. Palmer, the governor's budget spokesman, offers this example: 190,000 children would have been forced off the Healthy Families medical care program for the working poor.
"The governor said that wasn't a trade-off he was willing to do," Palmer recalls. "So he stuck with what he believed was a reasonable balance."
As it was, Schwarzenegger still had to cut deeply into many health and welfare programs.
Of course, he also could have raised taxes. He'd have broken a different promise, but not one as signed and sealed as the school deal.
Here's what happened:
Schwarzenegger was desperate for money, and school officials wanted to cozy up to the charismatic, larger-than-life new governor. Also, they feared a worse result if there was no cooperation. So they agreed not to fight for the $2 billion on the condition that it be returned - that is, returned to their guaranteed annual funding base. It hasn't been.
The governor assured schools that if tax revenues increased this year, he'd give them their normal cut under Prop. 98. Revenues did, but he didn't.
The final paragraph of the statement Schwarzenegger released at the deal's announcement read: "This Prop. 98 funding will be restored as required by law and our agreement. Today, I am making that promise to our teachers and students."
Schwarzenegger didn't just renege on the deal. He's pushing a budget "reform" to amend Prop. 98 so that repayment of back money owed schools - roughly $4 billion - is stretched out over 15 years and not added to the guaranteed base.
There is logic in tinkering with Prop. 98. Under the current system, if the state gives schools a fat bonus during boom times, it's on the hook for that payment year after year, even when the economy sours. Of the $50 billion in state and local tax revenues Schwarzenegger is proposing for schools, nearly $10 billion is because of funding bonuses - called "over-appropriations" - between 1999 and 2002.
Schwarzenegger's budget control plan would allow the state to give schools a one-time bonus without it becoming part of the guaranteed base.
Senate leader Don Perata (D-Alameda) has said he's willing to tinker with Prop. 98. But not Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez (D-Los Angeles).
"When we're in the top five states in per-pupil funding," Nuñez says, "then perhaps we can talk about reforming Prop. 98." California currently is closer to the bottom five.
Anyway, Nuñez says, "the governor has to decide how long is a deal good for. He needs to clear the air and reestablish a certain level of trust."
Veteran Republican strategist Ken Khachigian thinks Schwarzenegger should take the statesman's route and address a joint session of the Legislature.
"Lay it out," Khachigian advises. "Say, 'This is not a problem I invented. It's a mutual problem…. Let's focus on the budget and avoid a ballot fight.'
"He's got a lot of maneuvering room. He's got great communication skills. He can be visionary, philosophical and assertive. He doesn't have to look like a wimp."
In the speech, Schwarzenegger could apologize for repeatedly referring to former negotiating partners as greedy special interests. And he could give the schools back their promised money.
George Skelton writes Monday and Thursday. Reach him at george.skelton@latimes.com.
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Who funds Arnold, more
Editor -
I assume that Dan Walters wrote his article about public employee unions and their political power, before he read Ballot Watch by Dan Smith, in Saturday’s Bee.
Smith’s article listed Who’s Writing Checks – top contributors through Friday (4/9).
Contributions from Businesses, Corporations and Associations - $15.1 million
Citizens to Save California – Business groups supporting Schwarzenegger measures - $3.6 million
PhRMA – Pharmaceutical Industry – restrictions on union dues, opposing drug price caps - $9.7 million
Californians for Fair Districting – supporting the Governor’s proposal - $760,000
Californians for Fair Elections – supporting redistricting measures - $300,000
Californians to Stop Higher Taxes – opposing tax measures, including closing tax loopholes - $400,000
Coalition for Employee Rights – restrict public employee unions from using dues for politics - $375,000
Contributions from Unions - $2.9 million
Alliance for a Better California – opposing the Governor’s initiatives, re-regulation of energy, etc. - $2.6 million
Californians for Tax Fairness – supports measure to increase non-residential property taxes - $250,000
Examination of this report on money and politics, dramatically documents the power of the business and corporate sectors in trying to influence public policy.
The tragedy is that these contributions are transparent - they are published.
The fundamental problem is the corruption of the political process, and the proliferation of ballot initiatives is designed to subvert the legislative process. The initiatives are efforts to bamboozle Californians, under the guise of democracy in action.
There is only one solution, at every level of government – public financing of elections.
Emanuel Gale
I assume that Dan Walters wrote his article about public employee unions and their political power, before he read Ballot Watch by Dan Smith, in Saturday’s Bee.
Smith’s article listed Who’s Writing Checks – top contributors through Friday (4/9).
Contributions from Businesses, Corporations and Associations - $15.1 million
Citizens to Save California – Business groups supporting Schwarzenegger measures - $3.6 million
PhRMA – Pharmaceutical Industry – restrictions on union dues, opposing drug price caps - $9.7 million
Californians for Fair Districting – supporting the Governor’s proposal - $760,000
Californians for Fair Elections – supporting redistricting measures - $300,000
Californians to Stop Higher Taxes – opposing tax measures, including closing tax loopholes - $400,000
Coalition for Employee Rights – restrict public employee unions from using dues for politics - $375,000
Contributions from Unions - $2.9 million
Alliance for a Better California – opposing the Governor’s initiatives, re-regulation of energy, etc. - $2.6 million
Californians for Tax Fairness – supports measure to increase non-residential property taxes - $250,000
Examination of this report on money and politics, dramatically documents the power of the business and corporate sectors in trying to influence public policy.
The tragedy is that these contributions are transparent - they are published.
The fundamental problem is the corruption of the political process, and the proliferation of ballot initiatives is designed to subvert the legislative process. The initiatives are efforts to bamboozle Californians, under the guise of democracy in action.
There is only one solution, at every level of government – public financing of elections.
Emanuel Gale
Thursday, April 14, 2005
Dear Arnold
In California our unfair tax system damages our schools. We rank about 37 in the nation in per pupil expenditures. And, the recent study by the Harvard Civil Rights Project reveals once again that our schools are failing Latinos, Blacks, and low income Whites. We grossly under fund our schools, and we get reading and math results appropriate to our funding levels. This inadequate funding is confirmed each year in the state budgets.
I have written a book, now in its third edition, called Choosing Democracy: a practical guide to multicultural education. ( Merrill/Prentice Hall, 2004). In Choosing Democracy I describe and define several of California’s choices to under fund their schools. Then, when the students fail, the Governor blames the teachers. In truth this is a political failure and the cause lies directly in the legislature and the governor’s office.
In the next edition I will update this report. I will report whether or not you supported tax reform to help the working people and the middle class, or did you continue the present practices of support for an unfair tax system that benefits the rich. I will also report on school progress or lack thereof in my on-line web log. http:www.choosingdemocracy.blogspot.com
I request a response from your office on how you are working to adequately fund our schools. The initiatives which you are promoting on schools are a deception.
Dr. Duane Campbell
I have written a book, now in its third edition, called Choosing Democracy: a practical guide to multicultural education. ( Merrill/Prentice Hall, 2004). In Choosing Democracy I describe and define several of California’s choices to under fund their schools. Then, when the students fail, the Governor blames the teachers. In truth this is a political failure and the cause lies directly in the legislature and the governor’s office.
In the next edition I will update this report. I will report whether or not you supported tax reform to help the working people and the middle class, or did you continue the present practices of support for an unfair tax system that benefits the rich. I will also report on school progress or lack thereof in my on-line web log. http:www.choosingdemocracy.blogspot.com
I request a response from your office on how you are working to adequately fund our schools. The initiatives which you are promoting on schools are a deception.
Dr. Duane Campbell
Wednesday, April 13, 2005
NCLB Study: Academic growth slowed
April 13, 2005
Study Finds Shortcoming in New Law on Education
By GREG WINTER
The academic growth that students experience in a given school year has apparently slowed since the passage of No Child Left Behind, the education law that was intended to achieve just the opposite, a new study has found.
In both reading and math, the study determined, test scores have gone up somewhat, as each class of students outdoes its predecessors. But within grades, students have made less academic progress during the school year than they did before No Child Left Behind went into effect in 2002, the researchers said.
That finding casts doubt on whether schools can meet the law's mandate that all students be academically proficient by 2014. In fact, to realize the goal of universal proficiency, the study said, students will have to make as much as three times the progress they are currently making.
The study was conducted by the Northwest Evaluation Association, which develops tests for about 1,500 school districts in 43 states. To complete it, the group drew upon its test data for more than 320,000 students in 23 states, a sample that it calls "broad but not nationally representative," in part because the biggest cities, not being Northwest clients, were not included.
One of the more ominous findings, the researchers said, is that the achievement gap between white and nonwhite students could soon widen. Closing the gap is one of the driving principles of the law, and so far states say they have made strides toward shrinking it.
But minority students with the same test scores as their white counterparts at the beginning of the school year ended up falling behind by the end of it, the study found. Both groups made academic progress, but the minority students did not make as much, it concluded, an outcome suggesting that the gaps in achievement will worsen.
"Right now it's kind of a hidden effect that we would expect to see expressed in the next couple of years," said Gage Kingsbury, Northwest's director of research. "At that point, I think people will be disappointed with what N.C.L.B. has done."
The findings diverge from those of other recent studies, including a survey last month by the Center on Education Policy, a research group. It found that a significant majority of state education officials reported widespread academic progress and a narrowing of the achievement gap.
"This new study should give everybody pause before they run off and say, 'We're marching to victory,' " said Jack Jennings, the center's president. "Maybe we're not."
Kerri Briggs, a senior policy analyst at the Education Department, said the Northwest study had both encouraging and worrisome aspects, but added that she would have to examine it more closely before passing judgment.
Some critics speculated that because the study lacked data from big cities, which have large populations of minority students and have posted significant gains on test scores in recent years, it might have overstated or mischaracterized what was happening with the achievement gap.
"It's hard to know how much you can extrapolate from this study," said Ross Wiener, policy director for the Education Trust, which released its own report in January showing mixed results on student performance and achievement gaps. "I don't think you want to make generalizations about what's going on nationwide."
Still, the Northwest study tracked student performance at a level that others did not, a factor that may help explain why some of its findings appear unorthodox. Rather than relying on test scores at just one point in the year, the Northwest study looked at how students fared in the fall and then again in the spring, in an effort to see how much they had learned during the year.
With this approach, Northwest found that test scores on its exams did, in fact, go up from one year to the next under No Child Left Behind, typically by less than a point. The reason successive classes appear to do a little better than those before them may stem from the fact that younger students have grown up during a time of more regular testing than their immediate predecessors, the researchers said, and are therefore higher achievers.
But rising test scores tend to mask how much progress individual students make as they travel through school, the researchers found. Since No Child Left Behind, that individual growth has slowed, possibly because teachers feel compelled to spend the bulk of their time making sure students who are near proficiency make it over the hurdle.
The practice may leave teachers with less time to focus on students who are either far below or far above the proficiency mark, the researchers said, making it less likely for the whole class to move forward as rapidly as before No Child Left Behind set the agenda.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/13/national/13child.html?
Study Finds Shortcoming in New Law on Education
By GREG WINTER
The academic growth that students experience in a given school year has apparently slowed since the passage of No Child Left Behind, the education law that was intended to achieve just the opposite, a new study has found.
In both reading and math, the study determined, test scores have gone up somewhat, as each class of students outdoes its predecessors. But within grades, students have made less academic progress during the school year than they did before No Child Left Behind went into effect in 2002, the researchers said.
That finding casts doubt on whether schools can meet the law's mandate that all students be academically proficient by 2014. In fact, to realize the goal of universal proficiency, the study said, students will have to make as much as three times the progress they are currently making.
The study was conducted by the Northwest Evaluation Association, which develops tests for about 1,500 school districts in 43 states. To complete it, the group drew upon its test data for more than 320,000 students in 23 states, a sample that it calls "broad but not nationally representative," in part because the biggest cities, not being Northwest clients, were not included.
One of the more ominous findings, the researchers said, is that the achievement gap between white and nonwhite students could soon widen. Closing the gap is one of the driving principles of the law, and so far states say they have made strides toward shrinking it.
But minority students with the same test scores as their white counterparts at the beginning of the school year ended up falling behind by the end of it, the study found. Both groups made academic progress, but the minority students did not make as much, it concluded, an outcome suggesting that the gaps in achievement will worsen.
"Right now it's kind of a hidden effect that we would expect to see expressed in the next couple of years," said Gage Kingsbury, Northwest's director of research. "At that point, I think people will be disappointed with what N.C.L.B. has done."
The findings diverge from those of other recent studies, including a survey last month by the Center on Education Policy, a research group. It found that a significant majority of state education officials reported widespread academic progress and a narrowing of the achievement gap.
"This new study should give everybody pause before they run off and say, 'We're marching to victory,' " said Jack Jennings, the center's president. "Maybe we're not."
Kerri Briggs, a senior policy analyst at the Education Department, said the Northwest study had both encouraging and worrisome aspects, but added that she would have to examine it more closely before passing judgment.
Some critics speculated that because the study lacked data from big cities, which have large populations of minority students and have posted significant gains on test scores in recent years, it might have overstated or mischaracterized what was happening with the achievement gap.
"It's hard to know how much you can extrapolate from this study," said Ross Wiener, policy director for the Education Trust, which released its own report in January showing mixed results on student performance and achievement gaps. "I don't think you want to make generalizations about what's going on nationwide."
Still, the Northwest study tracked student performance at a level that others did not, a factor that may help explain why some of its findings appear unorthodox. Rather than relying on test scores at just one point in the year, the Northwest study looked at how students fared in the fall and then again in the spring, in an effort to see how much they had learned during the year.
With this approach, Northwest found that test scores on its exams did, in fact, go up from one year to the next under No Child Left Behind, typically by less than a point. The reason successive classes appear to do a little better than those before them may stem from the fact that younger students have grown up during a time of more regular testing than their immediate predecessors, the researchers said, and are therefore higher achievers.
But rising test scores tend to mask how much progress individual students make as they travel through school, the researchers found. Since No Child Left Behind, that individual growth has slowed, possibly because teachers feel compelled to spend the bulk of their time making sure students who are near proficiency make it over the hurdle.
The practice may leave teachers with less time to focus on students who are either far below or far above the proficiency mark, the researchers said, making it less likely for the whole class to move forward as rapidly as before No Child Left Behind set the agenda.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/13/national/13child.html?
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
NCLB; A Progressive Critique
NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND: A PROGRESSIVE RESPONSE
New Politics (NP) journal has published the contributions of researchers
and activists who were invited by NP to analyze the origins and impact of
NCLB, as well as the contours of a genuinely progressive response. All of
the contributors identify critical problems with NCLB, but they differ on
whether progressives should press to eliminate or reform the legislation.
Michael Charney and Michele Brooks advance the perspective of many
activists in the American Federation of Teachers and parent advocacy
groups that would like to reform NCLB and fund it at higher levels. Stan
Karp, Carlos Torres, and Lois Weiner each describes the legislation in
more starkly critical terms. Torres and Weiner (a member of the NP
editorial board) argue that public education can only serve the needs of
students, parents, and teachers if the neoliberal agenda that NCLB
represents is comprehensively defeated.
http://www.wpunj.edu/newpol/issue38/edintro38.htm
New Politics (NP) journal has published the contributions of researchers
and activists who were invited by NP to analyze the origins and impact of
NCLB, as well as the contours of a genuinely progressive response. All of
the contributors identify critical problems with NCLB, but they differ on
whether progressives should press to eliminate or reform the legislation.
Michael Charney and Michele Brooks advance the perspective of many
activists in the American Federation of Teachers and parent advocacy
groups that would like to reform NCLB and fund it at higher levels. Stan
Karp, Carlos Torres, and Lois Weiner each describes the legislation in
more starkly critical terms. Torres and Weiner (a member of the NP
editorial board) argue that public education can only serve the needs of
students, parents, and teachers if the neoliberal agenda that NCLB
represents is comprehensively defeated.
http://www.wpunj.edu/newpol/issue38/edintro38.htm
Monday, April 11, 2005
Who is paying for Arnold's war on teachers?
This story is taken from Politics at sacbee.com.
Ballot watch
WHO'S WRITING CHECKS?
Top contributors through Friday:
Citizens to Save California
(Business groups supporting Schwarzenegger measures):
A Jerrold Perenchio (Univision owner), $1.5 million
John A. Gunn, president, Dodge & Cox (mutual fund manager), $500,000
William Lyon Homes, $250,000
Security National Servicing Corp. (distressed mortgage buyer), $250,000
Carl H. Lindner, chairman, American Financial Group (Chiquita bananas), $200,000
Capital Pacific Holdings Inc. (real estate), $150,000
Lawrence K. Doyle Trust, American Sterling Corp. (financial services), $130,000
American Sterling Corp. (financial services), $120,000
Ameriquest Capital Corp. (mortgages), $100,000
Henry Segerstrom Trust (mall owner), $100,000
California Retailers Association, $100,000
Target Corp. (retailer), $100,000
The New Majority PAC (Republican activists), $95,000
Alliance for a Better California
(Unions, Democrats opposed to Schwarzenegger measures; pushing re-regulation of electricity, lower drug prices, protections for car buyers):
California State Council of Service Employees Political Actions Issues Account, $700,000
American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees International Union, $500,000
SEIU Local 1000 - California State Employees Association Issues PAC, $450,000
California Teachers Association, $617,000
Association of California School Administrators Issues PAC, $150,000
California Federation of Teachers COPE Prop/Ballot Committee, $100,000
PACE of California School Employees Association, $100,000
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America CA Initiative Fund
(Supporting restrictions on union dues, opposing drug price caps):
Merck & Co. Inc., $1.3 million
Johnson & Johnson, $1.3 million
Pfizer Inc., $1.3 million
GlaxoSmithKline, $1.3 million
Aventis Pharmaceuticals Inc., $650,000
Amgen Inc., $650,000
Wyeth, $650,000
Eli Lilly and Co., $650,000
Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp., $650,000
Abbott Laboratories, $650,000
AstraZeneca LP, $650,000
Californians for Fair Redistricting
(Supporting Schwarzenegger redistricting measure):
Round One Investments (venture capital firm), $385,000
David Lack General Contractor Inc., $100,000
William A. Mundell, CEO, Vidyah Inc. (marketing training firm), $100,000
AOS Technologies (computer product developer), $100,000
Lawrence B. Abramson, producer/investor, $75,000
Californians for Fair Elections
(Supporting all redistricting measures)
John Walton (Wal-mart heir), $100,000
Small Business Action Committee (business groups, anti-tax groups), $100,000
William E. Bloomfield, retired businessman, $100,000
Californians to Stop Higher Taxes
(Business and anti-tax groups opposing a variety of tax measures, including those to close so-called tax loopholes)
Ameriquest Capital Corp. (mortgages), $250,000
California Business Properties Association Issue PAC, $50,000
Chevron/Texaco, $100,000
Coalition for Employee Rights
(Supporting measure to restrict public employee unions from spending dues money on political campaigns)
Small Business Action Committee (business groups, anti-tax groups), $375,000
Californians for Tax Fairness
(Supports measure to increase non-residential property taxes)
California Teachers Association, $250,000
Q: When is the election?
A: That's up to Schwarzenegger. Election law allows the governor to call a special statewide election after a measure has qualified for the ballot. But the election can be called no later than 148 days before it is to be held. One scenario from Secretary of State Bruce McPherson's office has determined that if Schwarzenegger wants a Nov. 8 election, he must issue the proclamation no later than June 13. California has had four statewide special elections since 1973. Voter turnout exceeded 47 percent only once, in the 2003 gubernatorial recall in which 61.2 percent of registered voters cast ballots.
About the writer:
The Bee's Dan Smith can be reached at (916) 321-5249 or smith@sacbee.com.
Ballot watch
WHO'S WRITING CHECKS?
Top contributors through Friday:
Citizens to Save California
(Business groups supporting Schwarzenegger measures):
A Jerrold Perenchio (Univision owner), $1.5 million
John A. Gunn, president, Dodge & Cox (mutual fund manager), $500,000
William Lyon Homes, $250,000
Security National Servicing Corp. (distressed mortgage buyer), $250,000
Carl H. Lindner, chairman, American Financial Group (Chiquita bananas), $200,000
Capital Pacific Holdings Inc. (real estate), $150,000
Lawrence K. Doyle Trust, American Sterling Corp. (financial services), $130,000
American Sterling Corp. (financial services), $120,000
Ameriquest Capital Corp. (mortgages), $100,000
Henry Segerstrom Trust (mall owner), $100,000
California Retailers Association, $100,000
Target Corp. (retailer), $100,000
The New Majority PAC (Republican activists), $95,000
Alliance for a Better California
(Unions, Democrats opposed to Schwarzenegger measures; pushing re-regulation of electricity, lower drug prices, protections for car buyers):
California State Council of Service Employees Political Actions Issues Account, $700,000
American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees International Union, $500,000
SEIU Local 1000 - California State Employees Association Issues PAC, $450,000
California Teachers Association, $617,000
Association of California School Administrators Issues PAC, $150,000
California Federation of Teachers COPE Prop/Ballot Committee, $100,000
PACE of California School Employees Association, $100,000
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America CA Initiative Fund
(Supporting restrictions on union dues, opposing drug price caps):
Merck & Co. Inc., $1.3 million
Johnson & Johnson, $1.3 million
Pfizer Inc., $1.3 million
GlaxoSmithKline, $1.3 million
Aventis Pharmaceuticals Inc., $650,000
Amgen Inc., $650,000
Wyeth, $650,000
Eli Lilly and Co., $650,000
Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp., $650,000
Abbott Laboratories, $650,000
AstraZeneca LP, $650,000
Californians for Fair Redistricting
(Supporting Schwarzenegger redistricting measure):
Round One Investments (venture capital firm), $385,000
David Lack General Contractor Inc., $100,000
William A. Mundell, CEO, Vidyah Inc. (marketing training firm), $100,000
AOS Technologies (computer product developer), $100,000
Lawrence B. Abramson, producer/investor, $75,000
Californians for Fair Elections
(Supporting all redistricting measures)
John Walton (Wal-mart heir), $100,000
Small Business Action Committee (business groups, anti-tax groups), $100,000
William E. Bloomfield, retired businessman, $100,000
Californians to Stop Higher Taxes
(Business and anti-tax groups opposing a variety of tax measures, including those to close so-called tax loopholes)
Ameriquest Capital Corp. (mortgages), $250,000
California Business Properties Association Issue PAC, $50,000
Chevron/Texaco, $100,000
Coalition for Employee Rights
(Supporting measure to restrict public employee unions from spending dues money on political campaigns)
Small Business Action Committee (business groups, anti-tax groups), $375,000
Californians for Tax Fairness
(Supports measure to increase non-residential property taxes)
California Teachers Association, $250,000
Q: When is the election?
A: That's up to Schwarzenegger. Election law allows the governor to call a special statewide election after a measure has qualified for the ballot. But the election can be called no later than 148 days before it is to be held. One scenario from Secretary of State Bruce McPherson's office has determined that if Schwarzenegger wants a Nov. 8 election, he must issue the proclamation no later than June 13. California has had four statewide special elections since 1973. Voter turnout exceeded 47 percent only once, in the 2003 gubernatorial recall in which 61.2 percent of registered voters cast ballots.
About the writer:
The Bee's Dan Smith can be reached at (916) 321-5249 or smith@sacbee.com.
Thursday, April 07, 2005
Teachers and Nurses 1 Schwarzenegger 0
Schwarzenegger backs off pension plan
By John Hill -- Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 12:06 pm PDT Thursday, April 7, 2005
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday backed off his plan to overhaul the public pension system this year.
The Republican governor, whose plan to shift public pensions to a 401(k)-style plan for employees hired in 2007 and beyond, had been battered by critics, said he would try again next year barring a legislative agreement.
"Let's pull it back and do it better," the governor said in a surprise news conference at the Capitol.
The move represents a huge political defeat for Schwarzenegger that illustrates the perils of governing by initiative. Unions and Democrats said the governor's retreat would help open the way for discussions of problems they said were more pressing to most Californians.
The governor said he had listened to the concerns of survivors of public safety officers killed in the line of duty and others who claimed the initiative would end death and disability payments. While the governor said the initiative was never intended to end the special benefits, he acknowledged that the criticism had clouded the issue.
He denied that he was swayed by public pressure.
"The protestors or poll numbers have absolutely no impact on what I do," he said.
The pension overhaul was one of five proposals the governor has proposed for a special election ballot this year, along with plans to change the way political districts are drawn, give more budget-cutting power to governors, eliminate teacher tenure and institute merit pay for teachers.
Teachers and Nurses 1: Arnold 0. but, we are still in the first quarter of the game.
And>>>
As you may have heard, Arnold has withdrawn the pension initiatives because they contained a error which would have made them defeatable. He promises to return in June 06.
There are still two anti teacher initiatives headed for the ballot.
The first issue,
Should teachers unions, or CSEA, be able to use members money to fight the Scwarzenegger project.
He can raise $50 million from his corporate buddies. Can teachers fight back?
Second,
Should teachers have tenure. Or, should they be subject to Principal's whims. Sort of like working for Civil Service or working as a political appointee.
This attack on teacher tenure is motivated by the Republican’s failure at school reform. See articles below.
Duane Campbell
By John Hill -- Bee Capitol Bureau
Published 12:06 pm PDT Thursday, April 7, 2005
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday backed off his plan to overhaul the public pension system this year.
The Republican governor, whose plan to shift public pensions to a 401(k)-style plan for employees hired in 2007 and beyond, had been battered by critics, said he would try again next year barring a legislative agreement.
"Let's pull it back and do it better," the governor said in a surprise news conference at the Capitol.
The move represents a huge political defeat for Schwarzenegger that illustrates the perils of governing by initiative. Unions and Democrats said the governor's retreat would help open the way for discussions of problems they said were more pressing to most Californians.
The governor said he had listened to the concerns of survivors of public safety officers killed in the line of duty and others who claimed the initiative would end death and disability payments. While the governor said the initiative was never intended to end the special benefits, he acknowledged that the criticism had clouded the issue.
He denied that he was swayed by public pressure.
"The protestors or poll numbers have absolutely no impact on what I do," he said.
The pension overhaul was one of five proposals the governor has proposed for a special election ballot this year, along with plans to change the way political districts are drawn, give more budget-cutting power to governors, eliminate teacher tenure and institute merit pay for teachers.
Teachers and Nurses 1: Arnold 0. but, we are still in the first quarter of the game.
And>>>
As you may have heard, Arnold has withdrawn the pension initiatives because they contained a error which would have made them defeatable. He promises to return in June 06.
There are still two anti teacher initiatives headed for the ballot.
The first issue,
Should teachers unions, or CSEA, be able to use members money to fight the Scwarzenegger project.
He can raise $50 million from his corporate buddies. Can teachers fight back?
Second,
Should teachers have tenure. Or, should they be subject to Principal's whims. Sort of like working for Civil Service or working as a political appointee.
This attack on teacher tenure is motivated by the Republican’s failure at school reform. See articles below.
Duane Campbell
Assemblywoman Bass on Exit Exams
Opposing view: Make the exit exam one among several measures of skills
By Karen Bass
Thursday, April 7, 2005
Assemblywoman Karen Bass, D-Los Angeles, is responding to The Bee's editorial "Retain exit exam / Diploma should mean something," which appeared March 21.
The Sacramento Bee mischaracterized legislation I am proposing. AB 1531 would not eliminate the high school exit exam; the bill simply calls for the exam to be one of several measures used to determine if a student has mastered high-school level course work. With so many attempts under way to improve California's educational system, we have to ask ourselves what the goal of the exit exam really is.
If it is to ensure students demonstrate competency in basic high school curriculum, then there should be more than a single test to measure skills.
According to the Stanford school of education, 25 states have passed legislation requiring a high school exit exam. But only eight of those states do not consider other performance information for a diploma. In some cases, districts use a combination of state exams and local performance assessments - along with grades, portfolios and teacher recommendations. School districts in Maine, Rhode Island and Pennsylvania combine results from local performance assessments with state assessments for graduation decisions.
Research is divided about the impact of the high school exit exam on the dropout rate. But even the study The Bee cited notes that school districts in Massachusetts, Texas and New York - under pressure to improve test scores as required by the "No Child Left Behind Act" - encouraged low-performing students to leave school and pursue a GED. A Harvard study released last month found that devastating numbers of African American (43 percent) and Latino (40 percent) children do not finish high school.
We cannot afford to drive more students out of school. Nor should we put districts and administrators under pressure that could result in even more students leaving our high schools without a diploma and the skills required to achieve their best.
If our goal in California is to measure competency in basic skills and curriculum, then we should take advantage of the research and experience of other states and adopt a comprehensive approach that includes multiple methods of assessing competency. This would result in a higher standard and greater accountability than that afforded by a single exam.
this op ed piece provided by the office of Assemblywoman Bass.
By Karen Bass
Thursday, April 7, 2005
Assemblywoman Karen Bass, D-Los Angeles, is responding to The Bee's editorial "Retain exit exam / Diploma should mean something," which appeared March 21.
The Sacramento Bee mischaracterized legislation I am proposing. AB 1531 would not eliminate the high school exit exam; the bill simply calls for the exam to be one of several measures used to determine if a student has mastered high-school level course work. With so many attempts under way to improve California's educational system, we have to ask ourselves what the goal of the exit exam really is.
If it is to ensure students demonstrate competency in basic high school curriculum, then there should be more than a single test to measure skills.
According to the Stanford school of education, 25 states have passed legislation requiring a high school exit exam. But only eight of those states do not consider other performance information for a diploma. In some cases, districts use a combination of state exams and local performance assessments - along with grades, portfolios and teacher recommendations. School districts in Maine, Rhode Island and Pennsylvania combine results from local performance assessments with state assessments for graduation decisions.
Research is divided about the impact of the high school exit exam on the dropout rate. But even the study The Bee cited notes that school districts in Massachusetts, Texas and New York - under pressure to improve test scores as required by the "No Child Left Behind Act" - encouraged low-performing students to leave school and pursue a GED. A Harvard study released last month found that devastating numbers of African American (43 percent) and Latino (40 percent) children do not finish high school.
We cannot afford to drive more students out of school. Nor should we put districts and administrators under pressure that could result in even more students leaving our high schools without a diploma and the skills required to achieve their best.
If our goal in California is to measure competency in basic skills and curriculum, then we should take advantage of the research and experience of other states and adopt a comprehensive approach that includes multiple methods of assessing competency. This would result in a higher standard and greater accountability than that afforded by a single exam.
this op ed piece provided by the office of Assemblywoman Bass.
Saturday, April 02, 2005
Leaving Children Behind in Texas
Angela Valenzuela
The alleged “Texas Miracle” in education (Haney, 2000, 2001), combined
with the 2002 reauthorization of the federal Elementary and Secondary
Education Act (popularly known as the “No Child Left Behind
Act” [NCLB]), has shifted what was once an intrastate debate over educational
accountability to a national-level issue. Supporters of accountability
claim that it promotes equity by making schools teach poor
and minority children who have been historically neglected by our public
school system (see Scheurich & Skrla, 2001; Scheurich, Skrla, &
Johnson, 2000; Skrla, Scheurich, & Johnson, 2000a, 2000b). Opponents,
including the contributors to this volume, argue that the Texas
system of educational accountability has failed—and will continue to
fail—Latina/o and other minority youth and their communities.1 We interpret
Texas-style accountability as exacerbating historic inequities,
mainly through the collateral effects of state policy, but also through a
systemwide failure to accommodate the needs and abilities of Englishlanguage
learners (see the chapters by Alamillo, Palmer, Viramontes, &
García; and by Ruiz de Velasco). Moreover, as McNeil points out (see
chapter 3), the dramatic educational improvement attributed to Texas’
system of accountability is itself questionable. The state’s methods of
collecting and reporting educational data, including the critically important
high-stakes test scores, hide as much as they reveal. When the
focus is shifted to Texas’ students’ performance on nationwide tests
such as the American College Test (ACT) and Scholastic Assessment
Test (SAT) 1, or when skyrocketing dropout and projected retention
rates are factored in (see McNeil and Valencia & Villarreal), the state’s
“miracle” looks more like a mirage.
1
That schools should be held accountable is indisputable. This volume
does not suggest otherwise. Rather, what we question is the Texas
model of accountability. Specifically, the authors reject high-stakes testing,
the system’s centerpiece. We further contend that the Texas approach
is deeply flawed, for three interrelated reasons: for attaching high-stakes
consequences—in the areas of retention, promotion, and graduation—to
a single measure of students’ academic abilities; for attaching high-stakes
consequences to schools and districts and thereby encouraging a reductionist,
test-driven curriculum; and for promoting a uniform and objectivist
way of knowing, to the detriment of other cultures, languages, and
approaches to knowledge.
Our collective admonition to the nation is that policies supporting
high-stakes testing are harmful to all children, especially for children
from poor, minority, or non-English-speaking families.2 Indeed, these
policies curtail or compromise the very achievement the public seeks.
Moreover, state policies that attach high-stakes consequences to children’s
test scores are inherently invalid, undemocratic, and unjust
(Heubert & Hauser, 1999). They distort the process of schooling, as well,
through the creation of perverse incentives to “lose” children or limit curriculum,
or both (see the chapters by Alamillo, Palmer, Viramontes, &
García; Hampton; McNeil; Sloan; and Valencia & Villarreal). Finally,
when the test is the sole or primary arbiter in decisions with such longlasting
consequences for children, we insist that students have a right to
be assessed in a complete and fair manner, using as many criteria as may
reasonably indicate children’s cognitive abilities and potential.3
We would like to see the terms of the current debate over educational
accountability overhauled. At issue is not whether schools and districts
should be accountable, but what means should be used to
accomplish the widely shared goal of ensuring that all children receive a
high-quality education. When we allow the state to equate academic excellence
with a single test score, when we agree to tie our children’s performance
on one test to their classroom teachers’ jobs and school
administrators’ bonuses, we implicitly validate the host of values, presuppositions,
and attitudes that underlie a flawed version of accountability.
Recasting the debate, we hope, will draw necessary attention to the
questionable nature of such typically unexamined assumptions.
In calling for a new approach to the ongoing conversation about accountability,
we seek to create a larger public space for a Latina/o, researchbased
perspective and epistemology (see Padilla) in the development of a
more just assessment system.
From:
Leaving Children Behind: How Texas Style Accountability Fails Latino Youth,
(SUNY press, 2004) Angela Valenzuela, ed.
The alleged “Texas Miracle” in education (Haney, 2000, 2001), combined
with the 2002 reauthorization of the federal Elementary and Secondary
Education Act (popularly known as the “No Child Left Behind
Act” [NCLB]), has shifted what was once an intrastate debate over educational
accountability to a national-level issue. Supporters of accountability
claim that it promotes equity by making schools teach poor
and minority children who have been historically neglected by our public
school system (see Scheurich & Skrla, 2001; Scheurich, Skrla, &
Johnson, 2000; Skrla, Scheurich, & Johnson, 2000a, 2000b). Opponents,
including the contributors to this volume, argue that the Texas
system of educational accountability has failed—and will continue to
fail—Latina/o and other minority youth and their communities.1 We interpret
Texas-style accountability as exacerbating historic inequities,
mainly through the collateral effects of state policy, but also through a
systemwide failure to accommodate the needs and abilities of Englishlanguage
learners (see the chapters by Alamillo, Palmer, Viramontes, &
García; and by Ruiz de Velasco). Moreover, as McNeil points out (see
chapter 3), the dramatic educational improvement attributed to Texas’
system of accountability is itself questionable. The state’s methods of
collecting and reporting educational data, including the critically important
high-stakes test scores, hide as much as they reveal. When the
focus is shifted to Texas’ students’ performance on nationwide tests
such as the American College Test (ACT) and Scholastic Assessment
Test (SAT) 1, or when skyrocketing dropout and projected retention
rates are factored in (see McNeil and Valencia & Villarreal), the state’s
“miracle” looks more like a mirage.
1
That schools should be held accountable is indisputable. This volume
does not suggest otherwise. Rather, what we question is the Texas
model of accountability. Specifically, the authors reject high-stakes testing,
the system’s centerpiece. We further contend that the Texas approach
is deeply flawed, for three interrelated reasons: for attaching high-stakes
consequences—in the areas of retention, promotion, and graduation—to
a single measure of students’ academic abilities; for attaching high-stakes
consequences to schools and districts and thereby encouraging a reductionist,
test-driven curriculum; and for promoting a uniform and objectivist
way of knowing, to the detriment of other cultures, languages, and
approaches to knowledge.
Our collective admonition to the nation is that policies supporting
high-stakes testing are harmful to all children, especially for children
from poor, minority, or non-English-speaking families.2 Indeed, these
policies curtail or compromise the very achievement the public seeks.
Moreover, state policies that attach high-stakes consequences to children’s
test scores are inherently invalid, undemocratic, and unjust
(Heubert & Hauser, 1999). They distort the process of schooling, as well,
through the creation of perverse incentives to “lose” children or limit curriculum,
or both (see the chapters by Alamillo, Palmer, Viramontes, &
García; Hampton; McNeil; Sloan; and Valencia & Villarreal). Finally,
when the test is the sole or primary arbiter in decisions with such longlasting
consequences for children, we insist that students have a right to
be assessed in a complete and fair manner, using as many criteria as may
reasonably indicate children’s cognitive abilities and potential.3
We would like to see the terms of the current debate over educational
accountability overhauled. At issue is not whether schools and districts
should be accountable, but what means should be used to
accomplish the widely shared goal of ensuring that all children receive a
high-quality education. When we allow the state to equate academic excellence
with a single test score, when we agree to tie our children’s performance
on one test to their classroom teachers’ jobs and school
administrators’ bonuses, we implicitly validate the host of values, presuppositions,
and attitudes that underlie a flawed version of accountability.
Recasting the debate, we hope, will draw necessary attention to the
questionable nature of such typically unexamined assumptions.
In calling for a new approach to the ongoing conversation about accountability,
we seek to create a larger public space for a Latina/o, researchbased
perspective and epistemology (see Padilla) in the development of a
more just assessment system.
From:
Leaving Children Behind: How Texas Style Accountability Fails Latino Youth,
(SUNY press, 2004) Angela Valenzuela, ed.
Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Education and amateurs
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/opinion/orl-edpbrady27032705mar27,1,464606.story?ctrack=1&cset=true
Amateurs amok -- call in the pros
By Marion Brady
Special to the Sentinel
March 27, 2005
'War is too important to be left to the generals."
So said Georges Clemenceau, twice prime minister of France in the early 20th century. Generals, he thought, were likely to be short on perspective, with imaginations hemmed in by military backgrounds, training and experience.
That possibility notwithstanding, it doesn't take too much digging into history or current events to know that ignoring professional military expertise isn't usually a good idea.
What Clemenceau should have said, then, is "War is too important to be left entirely to generals." Amateurs will sometimes be able to see a problem freshly, but when there's a battle to win, a heart to transplant, a bridge to build, an airliner to fly, deciding whether to go with an amateur or a professional is easy. When a job is difficult and important, we call on professionals.
Except in education. After the publication of A Nation At Risk in 1983, business leaders decided that education was too important to be left to professional educators. So they used their political clout not to help professional educators, but to shove them aside and take over.
The public went along. And goes along. Thoughtful people who'd consider it crazy if politicians told surgeons how to operate, engineers how to build bridges, or airline pilots how to fly, see nothing wrong with educational amateurs in Washington and state capitols running the education show. The nation's governors recently wrapped up this year's education-policy conference, issuing for the umpteenth time their standard education-reform formula: "Raise the bar, especially in math and science."
America is now deep into an amateur-engineered, single-strategy educational experiment. TEST! PASS! FAIL!
Many amateurs think this is a wonderful, long-overdue policy. Indeed, it seems to make so much sense that teachers who question it are likely to be viewed with suspicion. Good teachers, many believe (those deserving to be called professionals) constantly "raise the bar." Good teachers welcome being held accountable. Good teachers aren't overly concerned with students' self-concepts. Good teachers raise test scores.
Professionals know it isn't that simple. To cite a minor example of educational complexity: Professionals know that the areas of the brain that control mathematical thinking usually kick in earlier in boys than in girls -- sometimes as much as four years earlier. Girls eventually catch up, and after about age 12 there's no measurable difference in innate ability, but, in the meantime, there's that third- or fourth-grade standardized test the amateurs have put in place.
So what often happens? Little girls take the test. Then they (and their parents) jump to false conclusions about a lack of mathematical ability, conclusions that may follow them through school and life, forever affecting performance and school and career choices.
An amateur-mandated, high-stakes, standardized test -- a test that ignores male-female differences -- turns what the professional knows is a non-problem into a potentially serious problem.
That kind of thing happens all the time. Amateurs think there's a "standard" level of reading for 9-year-olds. Professionals know better. Amateurs think that kids who can't read "at grade level" can't learn anything else. Professionals know better. Amateurs think test-makers know how to write culture-neutral tests that precisely measure skills and abilities. Professionals know better. Amateurs think hanging negative labels on kids and schools doesn't seriously affect performance. Professionals know better.
Why do the amateur educators in the Business Roundtable and Congress enjoy more respect and influence than professional educators? There's a slew of possible sociological explanations, but a simple one is important. As in everything else, the less known about something, the simpler it seems to be. What separates amateurs and professionals is ignorance of complexity, and when it comes to complexities, every kid in every classroom is a walking bundle of them.
Take the matter of grade retention. Professionals know that "grade level" is an invented, arbitrary idea left over from the school-as-factory era, know that academic gains from grade retention are almost always temporary, know that kids mature at different rates, know that individual differences are America's greatest intellectual asset, know grade repeaters rarely graduate, know we've created no alternative career paths for "non-standard" kids, know that helping helps a lot more when kids don't think they're stupid. And they know this just begins the list of complex issues being ignored by grade-retention legislation.
If the fog of political rhetoric ever lifts and the true state of education in America becomes clear, don't blame the professionals for the chaos. Their opinions have been ignored for years.
Marion Brady, a longtime educator, lives in Cocoa. He can be reached at mbrady22@cfl.rr.com. He wrote this commentary for the Orlando Sentinel.
Copyright © 2005, Orlando Sentinel | Get home delivery - up to 50% off
Amateurs amok -- call in the pros
By Marion Brady
Special to the Sentinel
March 27, 2005
'War is too important to be left to the generals."
So said Georges Clemenceau, twice prime minister of France in the early 20th century. Generals, he thought, were likely to be short on perspective, with imaginations hemmed in by military backgrounds, training and experience.
That possibility notwithstanding, it doesn't take too much digging into history or current events to know that ignoring professional military expertise isn't usually a good idea.
What Clemenceau should have said, then, is "War is too important to be left entirely to generals." Amateurs will sometimes be able to see a problem freshly, but when there's a battle to win, a heart to transplant, a bridge to build, an airliner to fly, deciding whether to go with an amateur or a professional is easy. When a job is difficult and important, we call on professionals.
Except in education. After the publication of A Nation At Risk in 1983, business leaders decided that education was too important to be left to professional educators. So they used their political clout not to help professional educators, but to shove them aside and take over.
The public went along. And goes along. Thoughtful people who'd consider it crazy if politicians told surgeons how to operate, engineers how to build bridges, or airline pilots how to fly, see nothing wrong with educational amateurs in Washington and state capitols running the education show. The nation's governors recently wrapped up this year's education-policy conference, issuing for the umpteenth time their standard education-reform formula: "Raise the bar, especially in math and science."
America is now deep into an amateur-engineered, single-strategy educational experiment. TEST! PASS! FAIL!
Many amateurs think this is a wonderful, long-overdue policy. Indeed, it seems to make so much sense that teachers who question it are likely to be viewed with suspicion. Good teachers, many believe (those deserving to be called professionals) constantly "raise the bar." Good teachers welcome being held accountable. Good teachers aren't overly concerned with students' self-concepts. Good teachers raise test scores.
Professionals know it isn't that simple. To cite a minor example of educational complexity: Professionals know that the areas of the brain that control mathematical thinking usually kick in earlier in boys than in girls -- sometimes as much as four years earlier. Girls eventually catch up, and after about age 12 there's no measurable difference in innate ability, but, in the meantime, there's that third- or fourth-grade standardized test the amateurs have put in place.
So what often happens? Little girls take the test. Then they (and their parents) jump to false conclusions about a lack of mathematical ability, conclusions that may follow them through school and life, forever affecting performance and school and career choices.
An amateur-mandated, high-stakes, standardized test -- a test that ignores male-female differences -- turns what the professional knows is a non-problem into a potentially serious problem.
That kind of thing happens all the time. Amateurs think there's a "standard" level of reading for 9-year-olds. Professionals know better. Amateurs think that kids who can't read "at grade level" can't learn anything else. Professionals know better. Amateurs think test-makers know how to write culture-neutral tests that precisely measure skills and abilities. Professionals know better. Amateurs think hanging negative labels on kids and schools doesn't seriously affect performance. Professionals know better.
Why do the amateur educators in the Business Roundtable and Congress enjoy more respect and influence than professional educators? There's a slew of possible sociological explanations, but a simple one is important. As in everything else, the less known about something, the simpler it seems to be. What separates amateurs and professionals is ignorance of complexity, and when it comes to complexities, every kid in every classroom is a walking bundle of them.
Take the matter of grade retention. Professionals know that "grade level" is an invented, arbitrary idea left over from the school-as-factory era, know that academic gains from grade retention are almost always temporary, know that kids mature at different rates, know that individual differences are America's greatest intellectual asset, know grade repeaters rarely graduate, know we've created no alternative career paths for "non-standard" kids, know that helping helps a lot more when kids don't think they're stupid. And they know this just begins the list of complex issues being ignored by grade-retention legislation.
If the fog of political rhetoric ever lifts and the true state of education in America becomes clear, don't blame the professionals for the chaos. Their opinions have been ignored for years.
Marion Brady, a longtime educator, lives in Cocoa. He can be reached at mbrady22@cfl.rr.com. He wrote this commentary for the Orlando Sentinel.
Copyright © 2005, Orlando Sentinel | Get home delivery - up to 50% off
Monday, March 28, 2005
California High School Exit Exams; and the Bee
Back to the California High School Exit Exams.
California High School Exit Exam.
On Monday, March 21, 2005, The Sacramento Bee editorial writers took a position in favor of the California State High School Exit exams scheduled for implementation in 2006.
This blog raised some questions about the editorial position on that date, including an analysis of the report the editorial writers claim to have used. Now, with more time, the exit exam can be further examined. (Please see blog date Monday, March 21 )
The editorial writers argued, "Retain the Exit Exam." They say,
" Now the most recent independent evaluation reaches a different conclusion: "Keep the exit exam requirement in place for the Class of 2006 and beyond." Legislators should heed that recommendation, too."
This is interesting. It is fundamental to writing, and fundamental to passing a high school exit exam, that when you cite a source, you provide the details of the source so that readers can consider the original source. This would be considered required by 9th. grade English.
Upon raising the question with the Bee editorial page editors, I found out that, “All the independent evaluations of the exit exam can be found on the website of the California Department of Education at http://www.cde.ca.gov/ta/tg/hs/evaluations.asp
Section 60855 of the Education Code requires an independent evaluation of the quality and impact of the exit exam. The California Department of Education awarded a five-year contract for this evaluation to the Human Resources Research Organization beginning Jan. 2000.” Pia Lopez, Associate Editor.
I encourage you to read the report itself.
The above report ,which was apparently the source of the Bee editorial, is worth consideration for all of us struggling with these exams. A series of questions were raised in the earlier blog entry of March 21. The report cited above also raises a number of vital issues including the possibility that the tests are focusing the curriculum on the tests. The report notes that the tests have not increased drop out rates. However, it is not clear if the report is using the drop out rates of the CDE, or the more accurate data as developed by the Harvard Civil Rights Project. The report calls for the development of more programs of remediation and support for those not passing the tests. Each of these are important issues to teachers.
Here are a number of additional serious questions about this testing not raised in the State’s evaluation. First, it is rather clear that the testing movement has lead to a distinct narrowing of the curriculum and an emphasis on teaching what is in the test. Algebra teachers, for example, might think that this is good since most of the students are now drilling and repeating algebra. But such testing has pushed out art, science, and much of the social sciences, particularly those social sciences considering multicultural issues and identity. (See Valenzuela, 2004)
As we develop a theory on testing in general, and high school exit testing in specific during this era of business lead “reform”, it would be good to learn from studies already completed and states that have been using such tests.
The Executive Summary of the report State High School Exit Exams, cited by the Bee says,
"Currently, more than half (52 percent) of all public school students and even more (55 percent) minority public school students live in states requiring they pass the tests in order to graduate. By 2009, 7 in 10 public school students and 8 in 10 minority students nationwide will be affected, according to State High School Exit Exams: A Maturing Reform, the third in a series of annual studies conducted by the Center.
The report finds that with the right conditions, exit exams “probably have some positive effects on student motivation and achievement,” but also may encourage some students to pursue a general education diploma (GED) instead of a regular diploma, and that the tests may be linked to increased dropout rates for key groups of students and states with tougher exam systems."
They say,
“The evidence on the effects of exit exams is mixed and tentative. With adequate
supports and the right policy context, exit exams probably have some
positive effects on student motivation and achievement and on curriculum
and instruction, at least for some groups of students. But there is also enough
evidence of negative effects of these exams, such as encouraging some students
to pursue a GED instead of a diploma, to suggest that policymakers are making
tradeoffs when they adopt exit exam requirements. “
State High School Exams: A Maturing Reform, (2004) Center on Education Policy.
http://www.ctredpol.org/
So, this major study finds the evidence mixed and tentative. Well, if it tentative, perhaps we should look at the results in some other states prior to implementation in California.
Here is a report from New York. A group working in New York, calling themselves the Teachers Network share these experiences in a document yet to published:
DOING IT RIGHT: ASSESSMENTS AND HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATION
Lets look at New York where they have a long history of high school exit exams.
New York State public school students must pass five standardized Regents examinations — Global History, American Government and History, English Language Arts, the Mathematics Course A exam and one of the Science exams — to graduate high school. It is hard to imagine a system of examinations with higher stakes. Yet year after year, one reads in the newspaper about some mishap with yet another exam: Physics one year, Math the next, ELA the third.
What is clear is that the New York State Education Department is making these high stakes examinations on the cheap, without the necessary development and due diligence and care. Exams are written without the input of a wide, representative range of teachers, and questions are almost fully field tested. It is irresponsible, plain and simple, to provide flawed instruments for such purposes. Insofar as Regents Examinations are going to play a major role in decisions over whether a student will graduate high school, they must fit the principles we have laid down here.
But that is only part of the problem. The Regents seem to have mistaken setting high standards with standardization. We support without reservation the setting of high standards for graduation from high school, but we also believe that there should be more than one way to demonstrate that one has met those standards. Specifically, we support the development of an option where a school and a student could substitute academically rigorous and accredited forms of performance based assessment for the three Regents examinations — Global History, American Government and History and Science.
While the English Language Arts and Mathematics A examinations are largely skilled based examinations, the Social Studies and Science examinations are subject knowledge intensive tests. Given the sheer breadth of the Social Studies curricula, examinations of this nature effectively prevent Social Studies teachers from looking at any topic in some depth, and instruction suffers as the course becomes a mile wide and an inch deep. If schools and students had the choice of substituting rigorous performance based assessments for the Social Studies and Science examination, instruction in these subject areas would improve. Instruction would drive assessment, as it should, instead of assessment driving instruction.
See the Standards for Psychological and Educational Testing developed jointly by the American Psychological Association, the American Educational Research Association and the National Council on Measurement in Education, and published in a second edition by the APA in 1999, and the Code of Fair Testing Practices in Education, prepared by the Joint Committee on Testing Practices, which includes the three above organizations and the American Counseling Association, the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, the National Association of School Psychologists, and the National Association of Test Directors. [www.apa.org/science/FinalCode.pdf]
Among the responsibilities of test users such as school districts and other educational authorities laid out in the Code of Fair Testing Practices in Education, one finds “Avoid using a single test score as the sole determinant of decisions about test takers. Interpret test scores in conjunction with other information about individuals.” [Ibid., p. 9] And again, in the American Psychological Association’s Statement on “Appropriate Use of High-Stakes Testing in Our Nation's Schools” [www.apa.org/pubinfo/testing.html]: “Any decision about a student's continued education, such as retention, tracking, or graduation, should not be based on the results of a single test, but should include other relevant and valid information.”
Code of Fair Testing Practices in Education, p. 9: “Avoid using tests for purposes other than those recommended by the test developer unless there is evidence to support the intended use or interpretation.”
In the language of psychometrics, exams used to test whether or not a student has met or surpassed a particular set of standards should be criterion, not norm, referenced exams. This means that the student is tested on a fixed performance standard of what she should know and be able to do, rather than where she stands in relation to other students, which is the primary measure on norm referenced exams. [Norm referenced tests are designed to distribute test takers along a normal curve and thus fail a target percentage, usually around 16%, regardless of how much they know, and pass another target percentage, usually around 84%, regardless of how little they know.]
AERA Research Points: Essential Information for Education Policy, “Standards and Tests: Keeping Them Aligned.” Vol.1,No. 1. {Spring 2003][www.aera.net/uploadedFiles/Journals_and_Publications/Research_Points/RP_Spring03.pdf]
So, while the Sacramento Bee editorial board finds the issue clear, those of working in schools find the issue much more complex. Readers are encouraged to use this blog to share their experiences with this testing.
California High School Exit Exam.
On Monday, March 21, 2005, The Sacramento Bee editorial writers took a position in favor of the California State High School Exit exams scheduled for implementation in 2006.
This blog raised some questions about the editorial position on that date, including an analysis of the report the editorial writers claim to have used. Now, with more time, the exit exam can be further examined. (Please see blog date Monday, March 21 )
The editorial writers argued, "Retain the Exit Exam." They say,
" Now the most recent independent evaluation reaches a different conclusion: "Keep the exit exam requirement in place for the Class of 2006 and beyond." Legislators should heed that recommendation, too."
This is interesting. It is fundamental to writing, and fundamental to passing a high school exit exam, that when you cite a source, you provide the details of the source so that readers can consider the original source. This would be considered required by 9th. grade English.
Upon raising the question with the Bee editorial page editors, I found out that, “All the independent evaluations of the exit exam can be found on the website of the California Department of Education at http://www.cde.ca.gov/ta/tg/hs/evaluations.asp
Section 60855 of the Education Code requires an independent evaluation of the quality and impact of the exit exam. The California Department of Education awarded a five-year contract for this evaluation to the Human Resources Research Organization beginning Jan. 2000.” Pia Lopez, Associate Editor.
I encourage you to read the report itself.
The above report ,which was apparently the source of the Bee editorial, is worth consideration for all of us struggling with these exams. A series of questions were raised in the earlier blog entry of March 21. The report cited above also raises a number of vital issues including the possibility that the tests are focusing the curriculum on the tests. The report notes that the tests have not increased drop out rates. However, it is not clear if the report is using the drop out rates of the CDE, or the more accurate data as developed by the Harvard Civil Rights Project. The report calls for the development of more programs of remediation and support for those not passing the tests. Each of these are important issues to teachers.
Here are a number of additional serious questions about this testing not raised in the State’s evaluation. First, it is rather clear that the testing movement has lead to a distinct narrowing of the curriculum and an emphasis on teaching what is in the test. Algebra teachers, for example, might think that this is good since most of the students are now drilling and repeating algebra. But such testing has pushed out art, science, and much of the social sciences, particularly those social sciences considering multicultural issues and identity. (See Valenzuela, 2004)
As we develop a theory on testing in general, and high school exit testing in specific during this era of business lead “reform”, it would be good to learn from studies already completed and states that have been using such tests.
The Executive Summary of the report State High School Exit Exams, cited by the Bee says,
"Currently, more than half (52 percent) of all public school students and even more (55 percent) minority public school students live in states requiring they pass the tests in order to graduate. By 2009, 7 in 10 public school students and 8 in 10 minority students nationwide will be affected, according to State High School Exit Exams: A Maturing Reform, the third in a series of annual studies conducted by the Center.
The report finds that with the right conditions, exit exams “probably have some positive effects on student motivation and achievement,” but also may encourage some students to pursue a general education diploma (GED) instead of a regular diploma, and that the tests may be linked to increased dropout rates for key groups of students and states with tougher exam systems."
They say,
“The evidence on the effects of exit exams is mixed and tentative. With adequate
supports and the right policy context, exit exams probably have some
positive effects on student motivation and achievement and on curriculum
and instruction, at least for some groups of students. But there is also enough
evidence of negative effects of these exams, such as encouraging some students
to pursue a GED instead of a diploma, to suggest that policymakers are making
tradeoffs when they adopt exit exam requirements. “
State High School Exams: A Maturing Reform, (2004) Center on Education Policy.
http://www.ctredpol.org/
So, this major study finds the evidence mixed and tentative. Well, if it tentative, perhaps we should look at the results in some other states prior to implementation in California.
Here is a report from New York. A group working in New York, calling themselves the Teachers Network share these experiences in a document yet to published:
DOING IT RIGHT: ASSESSMENTS AND HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATION
Lets look at New York where they have a long history of high school exit exams.
New York State public school students must pass five standardized Regents examinations — Global History, American Government and History, English Language Arts, the Mathematics Course A exam and one of the Science exams — to graduate high school. It is hard to imagine a system of examinations with higher stakes. Yet year after year, one reads in the newspaper about some mishap with yet another exam: Physics one year, Math the next, ELA the third.
What is clear is that the New York State Education Department is making these high stakes examinations on the cheap, without the necessary development and due diligence and care. Exams are written without the input of a wide, representative range of teachers, and questions are almost fully field tested. It is irresponsible, plain and simple, to provide flawed instruments for such purposes. Insofar as Regents Examinations are going to play a major role in decisions over whether a student will graduate high school, they must fit the principles we have laid down here.
But that is only part of the problem. The Regents seem to have mistaken setting high standards with standardization. We support without reservation the setting of high standards for graduation from high school, but we also believe that there should be more than one way to demonstrate that one has met those standards. Specifically, we support the development of an option where a school and a student could substitute academically rigorous and accredited forms of performance based assessment for the three Regents examinations — Global History, American Government and History and Science.
While the English Language Arts and Mathematics A examinations are largely skilled based examinations, the Social Studies and Science examinations are subject knowledge intensive tests. Given the sheer breadth of the Social Studies curricula, examinations of this nature effectively prevent Social Studies teachers from looking at any topic in some depth, and instruction suffers as the course becomes a mile wide and an inch deep. If schools and students had the choice of substituting rigorous performance based assessments for the Social Studies and Science examination, instruction in these subject areas would improve. Instruction would drive assessment, as it should, instead of assessment driving instruction.
See the Standards for Psychological and Educational Testing developed jointly by the American Psychological Association, the American Educational Research Association and the National Council on Measurement in Education, and published in a second edition by the APA in 1999, and the Code of Fair Testing Practices in Education, prepared by the Joint Committee on Testing Practices, which includes the three above organizations and the American Counseling Association, the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, the National Association of School Psychologists, and the National Association of Test Directors. [www.apa.org/science/FinalCode.pdf]
Among the responsibilities of test users such as school districts and other educational authorities laid out in the Code of Fair Testing Practices in Education, one finds “Avoid using a single test score as the sole determinant of decisions about test takers. Interpret test scores in conjunction with other information about individuals.” [Ibid., p. 9] And again, in the American Psychological Association’s Statement on “Appropriate Use of High-Stakes Testing in Our Nation's Schools” [www.apa.org/pubinfo/testing.html]: “Any decision about a student's continued education, such as retention, tracking, or graduation, should not be based on the results of a single test, but should include other relevant and valid information.”
Code of Fair Testing Practices in Education, p. 9: “Avoid using tests for purposes other than those recommended by the test developer unless there is evidence to support the intended use or interpretation.”
In the language of psychometrics, exams used to test whether or not a student has met or surpassed a particular set of standards should be criterion, not norm, referenced exams. This means that the student is tested on a fixed performance standard of what she should know and be able to do, rather than where she stands in relation to other students, which is the primary measure on norm referenced exams. [Norm referenced tests are designed to distribute test takers along a normal curve and thus fail a target percentage, usually around 16%, regardless of how much they know, and pass another target percentage, usually around 84%, regardless of how little they know.]
AERA Research Points: Essential Information for Education Policy, “Standards and Tests: Keeping Them Aligned.” Vol.1,No. 1. {Spring 2003][www.aera.net/uploadedFiles/Journals_and_Publications/Research_Points/RP_Spring03.pdf]
So, while the Sacramento Bee editorial board finds the issue clear, those of working in schools find the issue much more complex. Readers are encouraged to use this blog to share their experiences with this testing.
Saturday, March 26, 2005
California drop out crisis
It is great that the Sacramento Bee found this report. These alarming figures have been known to civil rights activists in schools for over a decade.
Red flag raised on state dropouts
The problem among blacks and Latinos is at the crisis stage, a study warns.
By Laurel Rosenhall -- Bee Staff Writer
Published 2:15 am PST Thursday, March 24, 2005
Only about half of California's African American and Latino ninth-grade boys graduate from high school within four years, a new study reveals.
The report, "Confronting the Graduation Rate Crisis in California," is being issued today at a conference in Los Angeles where civil rights advocates and education researchers will present findings on racial disparities in high school graduation.
It's part of a national campaign that has led to legislative changes concerning high school graduation reporting in Illinois and Ohio.
Researchers at the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University, which produced the report, are hoping for stronger results in California. They say the state's high overall dropout rate and even higher dropout rate for most nonwhite students amounts to an "educational and civil rights crisis" that will cost billions in lost wages, more prisoners and greater dependence on public health care.
"If students don't make it through high school, they really don't have any kind of chance in our economy," said Gary Orfield, author of the report and director of the Civil Rights Project. "And if communities don't make it through high school, their future is very severely threatened."
http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/education/story/12615096p-13469172c.html
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
~ George Orwell
The Governor will not have anything to say about this. Instead he will talk about teacher tenure.
Red flag raised on state dropouts
The problem among blacks and Latinos is at the crisis stage, a study warns.
By Laurel Rosenhall -- Bee Staff Writer
Published 2:15 am PST Thursday, March 24, 2005
Only about half of California's African American and Latino ninth-grade boys graduate from high school within four years, a new study reveals.
The report, "Confronting the Graduation Rate Crisis in California," is being issued today at a conference in Los Angeles where civil rights advocates and education researchers will present findings on racial disparities in high school graduation.
It's part of a national campaign that has led to legislative changes concerning high school graduation reporting in Illinois and Ohio.
Researchers at the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University, which produced the report, are hoping for stronger results in California. They say the state's high overall dropout rate and even higher dropout rate for most nonwhite students amounts to an "educational and civil rights crisis" that will cost billions in lost wages, more prisoners and greater dependence on public health care.
"If students don't make it through high school, they really don't have any kind of chance in our economy," said Gary Orfield, author of the report and director of the Civil Rights Project. "And if communities don't make it through high school, their future is very severely threatened."
http://www.sacbee.com/content/news/education/story/12615096p-13469172c.html
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.
~ George Orwell
The Governor will not have anything to say about this. Instead he will talk about teacher tenure.
Cesar Chavez Presente
César Chávez: "Presente"
By Duane E. Campbell
The spirit of Cesar Chavez lives on in the struggle for union rights and justice in the fields of California. Along with Dolores Huerta, Philip Vera Cruz, and others, César created the United Farm Workers (UFW) the first successful union of farm workers in U.S. history. There had been more than ten prior attempts to build a farm workers union.
The United Cannery and Packinghouse Workers (UCAPAWA) organized in the 1930's, the National Farm Workers Union (NFW) led by Ernesto Galarza tried to organize Farm workers in the 40's and 50's. In 1959, the AFL-CIO tried to organize again with the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC). AWOC had several weaknesses, including a top down leadership selected by AFL-CIO leaders, not by farm workers, and a strategy of working cooperatively with labor contractors. AWOC continued the prior efforts of Ernesto Galarza and the NFW in struggling against "braceros" or guest workers, contract workers imported from Mexico, from breaking strikes. A renewed "guest worker" bill is presently before Congress.
Each of the prior attempts to organize farm worker unions were destroyed by racism and corporate power. Chávez chose to build a union that incorporated the strategies of social movements and allied itself with the churches, students, and organized labor. The successful creation of the UFW changed the nature of labor organizing in the Southwest and contributed significantly to the birth of Latino politics in the U.S.
Today, under the leadership of UFW president Arturo Rodriguez, over 28,000 farm workers enjoy benefits on the job. They are incorporated into California's educational, health and civic communities. The UFW has shown the AFL-CIO that immigrants can and must be organized. In 2002 we won significant victories in the legislature and numerous elections.
César Chavez, Dolores Huerta, Philip Vera Cruz, and others deliberately created a multiracial organization, Mexican, Mexican American, Filipino, African-American, Dominican, Puerto Rican and Arab workers, among others, have been part of the UFW. This cross racial organizing was necessary in order to combat the prior divisions and exploitations of workers based upon race and language. Dividing the workers on racial and language lines always left the corporations the winners.
In the 60's Chávez became the pre-eminent civil rights leader for the Mexican and Chicano workers, helping with local union struggles throughout the nation. He worked tirelessly to make people aware of the struggles of farm workers for better pay and safer working conditions. It is a testament to Cesar Chavez's skills and courage that the UFW even survived. They were opposed by major interests in corporate agriculture including the Bruce Church and Gallo Corporations as well as the leadership of the Republican Party then led by Ronald Reagan. Workers were fired, beaten, threatened and even killed in pursuit of union benefits . Non union farm workers today continue to live on sub-poverty wages while producing the abundant crops in the richest valley, in the richest state in the richest nation in the world.
In response to corporate power, Cesar developed new strategies, such as the boycott, based upon his personal commitment to non-violence in the tradition of Ghandi and Martin Luther King Jr. César Chavez died in his sleep on April 23, 1993 near Yuma, Arizona.
Today Mexican, Mexican American and Puerto Rican union leadership is common in our major cities and in several industries. For myself and others, the UFW was a school for organizing. Hundreds of activists in labor and community organizations owe their skills to UFW training and experience. Along with improved working conditions, salaries, and benefits, training this cadre of organizers remains a major legacy of the UFW.
César taught us that all organizations have problems, that all organizations are imperfect. But, if you wait for the perfect organization, nothing gets done. Building popular organizations builds people's power, and democracy. Chavez' legacy to popular struggles, to Chicano/Mexicano self determination and to unions for the immigrant workers is beyond measure. He is present in all of our work. I plan to march on March 26, and celebrate March 31,2005 in memory of Cesar Chavez' contributions building a more democratic society for working people. You can find our more about this remarkable leader at www.ufw.org
And, www.cesarchavezfoundation.org
Duane Campbell is a Professor of Bilingual/Multicultural Education at Calif. State University-Sacramento and the author of Choosing Democracy; a practical guide to multicultural education. (Merrill/Pren Hall.2004)
By Duane E. Campbell
The spirit of Cesar Chavez lives on in the struggle for union rights and justice in the fields of California. Along with Dolores Huerta, Philip Vera Cruz, and others, César created the United Farm Workers (UFW) the first successful union of farm workers in U.S. history. There had been more than ten prior attempts to build a farm workers union.
The United Cannery and Packinghouse Workers (UCAPAWA) organized in the 1930's, the National Farm Workers Union (NFW) led by Ernesto Galarza tried to organize Farm workers in the 40's and 50's. In 1959, the AFL-CIO tried to organize again with the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC). AWOC had several weaknesses, including a top down leadership selected by AFL-CIO leaders, not by farm workers, and a strategy of working cooperatively with labor contractors. AWOC continued the prior efforts of Ernesto Galarza and the NFW in struggling against "braceros" or guest workers, contract workers imported from Mexico, from breaking strikes. A renewed "guest worker" bill is presently before Congress.
Each of the prior attempts to organize farm worker unions were destroyed by racism and corporate power. Chávez chose to build a union that incorporated the strategies of social movements and allied itself with the churches, students, and organized labor. The successful creation of the UFW changed the nature of labor organizing in the Southwest and contributed significantly to the birth of Latino politics in the U.S.
Today, under the leadership of UFW president Arturo Rodriguez, over 28,000 farm workers enjoy benefits on the job. They are incorporated into California's educational, health and civic communities. The UFW has shown the AFL-CIO that immigrants can and must be organized. In 2002 we won significant victories in the legislature and numerous elections.
César Chavez, Dolores Huerta, Philip Vera Cruz, and others deliberately created a multiracial organization, Mexican, Mexican American, Filipino, African-American, Dominican, Puerto Rican and Arab workers, among others, have been part of the UFW. This cross racial organizing was necessary in order to combat the prior divisions and exploitations of workers based upon race and language. Dividing the workers on racial and language lines always left the corporations the winners.
In the 60's Chávez became the pre-eminent civil rights leader for the Mexican and Chicano workers, helping with local union struggles throughout the nation. He worked tirelessly to make people aware of the struggles of farm workers for better pay and safer working conditions. It is a testament to Cesar Chavez's skills and courage that the UFW even survived. They were opposed by major interests in corporate agriculture including the Bruce Church and Gallo Corporations as well as the leadership of the Republican Party then led by Ronald Reagan. Workers were fired, beaten, threatened and even killed in pursuit of union benefits . Non union farm workers today continue to live on sub-poverty wages while producing the abundant crops in the richest valley, in the richest state in the richest nation in the world.
In response to corporate power, Cesar developed new strategies, such as the boycott, based upon his personal commitment to non-violence in the tradition of Ghandi and Martin Luther King Jr. César Chavez died in his sleep on April 23, 1993 near Yuma, Arizona.
Today Mexican, Mexican American and Puerto Rican union leadership is common in our major cities and in several industries. For myself and others, the UFW was a school for organizing. Hundreds of activists in labor and community organizations owe their skills to UFW training and experience. Along with improved working conditions, salaries, and benefits, training this cadre of organizers remains a major legacy of the UFW.
César taught us that all organizations have problems, that all organizations are imperfect. But, if you wait for the perfect organization, nothing gets done. Building popular organizations builds people's power, and democracy. Chavez' legacy to popular struggles, to Chicano/Mexicano self determination and to unions for the immigrant workers is beyond measure. He is present in all of our work. I plan to march on March 26, and celebrate March 31,2005 in memory of Cesar Chavez' contributions building a more democratic society for working people. You can find our more about this remarkable leader at www.ufw.org
And, www.cesarchavezfoundation.org
Duane Campbell is a Professor of Bilingual/Multicultural Education at Calif. State University-Sacramento and the author of Choosing Democracy; a practical guide to multicultural education. (Merrill/Pren Hall.2004)
Friday, March 25, 2005
School improvement and tenure battles
The Governor argues that we need an initiative to change teacher tenure, but there has been no evidence offered that this is a problem causing school failure. The governor’s proposals are in SCAXI, introduced by Senator George Runner (Republican- Antelope Valley. This bill, which the governor threatens to make an initiative, would create a merit pay system for teachers that would tie pay to student scores on statewide tests. It would also require a ten year probationary period for teachers.
We do not have evidence, that tenure is a problem. We have a few anecdotes from principals complaining about a few teachers. These principals were trying to explain why they were unable to turn around failing schools. This is not rational policy development, it is just scape goating, similar to Pete Wilson’s campaign for Prop. 187 blaming immigrants for the economic crisis of 1994.
We need to ask why the argument is made by the Governor and the Los Angeles Times that tenure is a major problem.
One source of repeating this message is the screaming on right-wing radio. A group has created an image that tenure is the problem. How is this position manufactured? This is, of course, only one of several ideological messages created there. See The Republican Noise Machine: Right Wing Media and How it corrupts Democracy, (2004) David Brock.
How is it that a group of editorial writers at the Los Angeles Times have adopted this position since there is no research to support the position?
We need to ask how did tenure become the issue rather than adequate school funding.
The author Barbara Ehrenreich describes a part of the manufacturing of this viewpoint in her excellent book, Nickled and Dimed on (Not) Getting by in America.(2001) She notes that most who work in the private sector of the economy work in a very authoritarian work place. It seems “normal” that bosses arbitrarily make decisions and even fire workers in many private sector jobs. Work life for many is dictatorial, not democratic. In the work life of editorial writers, apparently, this dictatorial work regime is “normal”.
Fortunately, through a decade of organizing and political work, teachers in public schools in many states in the U.S. have achieved the legal process of tenure. Teachers, working with others, established tenure to keep partisan politics out of the public schools. All tenure does is protect teachers from arbitrary dismissal. Poor teachers are dismissed. Quality principals at times remove poor teachers. Tenure does not prevent the removal of the incompetent teachers. It only provides procedural safeguards against arbitrary and capricious dismissal.
Why is this so important? Because arbitrary hiring and firing used to happen frequently. Hiring and dismissal of teachers was too often a petty, patronage based, unprofessional process by school boards and principals. Tenure is very important. It protects teacher’s freedom to speak and their basic citizenship rights. As a teacher you can speak out, make political statements, without having to fear that your school board or your principal is going to fire you.
Where is the evidence that tenure is a vital issue at all in school reform? Those making this case are confusing tenure at the college or university level with tenure in the public schools. They are quite different in their impact. Consider the just released report by the Harvard Center on Civil Rights on California drop out rates. California has one of the higher drop out rates in the nation, and our urban schools have a more severe rate than our suburban schools. Yet, there is no relationship whatsoever between states with high drop out rates and states with laws providing teachers with tenure.
We do not have evidence, that tenure is a problem. We have a few anecdotes from principals complaining about a few teachers. These principals were trying to explain why they were unable to turn around failing schools. This is not rational policy development, it is just scape goating, similar to Pete Wilson’s campaign for Prop. 187 blaming immigrants for the economic crisis of 1994.
We need to ask why the argument is made by the Governor and the Los Angeles Times that tenure is a major problem.
One source of repeating this message is the screaming on right-wing radio. A group has created an image that tenure is the problem. How is this position manufactured? This is, of course, only one of several ideological messages created there. See The Republican Noise Machine: Right Wing Media and How it corrupts Democracy, (2004) David Brock.
How is it that a group of editorial writers at the Los Angeles Times have adopted this position since there is no research to support the position?
We need to ask how did tenure become the issue rather than adequate school funding.
The author Barbara Ehrenreich describes a part of the manufacturing of this viewpoint in her excellent book, Nickled and Dimed on (Not) Getting by in America.(2001) She notes that most who work in the private sector of the economy work in a very authoritarian work place. It seems “normal” that bosses arbitrarily make decisions and even fire workers in many private sector jobs. Work life for many is dictatorial, not democratic. In the work life of editorial writers, apparently, this dictatorial work regime is “normal”.
Fortunately, through a decade of organizing and political work, teachers in public schools in many states in the U.S. have achieved the legal process of tenure. Teachers, working with others, established tenure to keep partisan politics out of the public schools. All tenure does is protect teachers from arbitrary dismissal. Poor teachers are dismissed. Quality principals at times remove poor teachers. Tenure does not prevent the removal of the incompetent teachers. It only provides procedural safeguards against arbitrary and capricious dismissal.
Why is this so important? Because arbitrary hiring and firing used to happen frequently. Hiring and dismissal of teachers was too often a petty, patronage based, unprofessional process by school boards and principals. Tenure is very important. It protects teacher’s freedom to speak and their basic citizenship rights. As a teacher you can speak out, make political statements, without having to fear that your school board or your principal is going to fire you.
Where is the evidence that tenure is a vital issue at all in school reform? Those making this case are confusing tenure at the college or university level with tenure in the public schools. They are quite different in their impact. Consider the just released report by the Harvard Center on Civil Rights on California drop out rates. California has one of the higher drop out rates in the nation, and our urban schools have a more severe rate than our suburban schools. Yet, there is no relationship whatsoever between states with high drop out rates and states with laws providing teachers with tenure.
Monday, March 21, 2005
LA Times on tenure
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-tenure21mar21,0,3605685.story
EDITORIAL
Rewards, Not Tenure: The Los Angeles Times
March 21, 2005
Here's how a California teachers union leader protests efforts to make the state's teachers work more years before getting tenure: Who, she asks, takes a job in which he or she must spend five years without tenure? Uh, most of us, actually.
Mary Bergan, who heads the California Federation of Teachers, points out rightly that too many teachers leave in their first few years. Eliminating tenure would make it harder to attract and keep teachers, she contends. Teachers are said to need tenure as protection from fussy parents and weak principals.
Even if that were true — and it's not — the last thing California classrooms need is teachers who enter the profession for a chance at a lifelong sinecure after two years. Thank goodness very few of them do.
This editorial reveals again how newspaper editorial boards have claimed knowledge and expertise on educational matters. And, the editorial reveals again why those of us in education need to develop better public responses, such as a blog.
For more on this see, The Republican Noise Machine: Right Wing Media and how it corrupts democracy. (2004) David Brock.
By the way. See the L.A. Times sections on school improvement. They "know" how to teach reading too.
I hope that they get a job teaching. One year of teaching experience as they would quickly find out how much they do not know about life in schools- and learning to read.
EDITORIAL
Rewards, Not Tenure: The Los Angeles Times
March 21, 2005
Here's how a California teachers union leader protests efforts to make the state's teachers work more years before getting tenure: Who, she asks, takes a job in which he or she must spend five years without tenure? Uh, most of us, actually.
Mary Bergan, who heads the California Federation of Teachers, points out rightly that too many teachers leave in their first few years. Eliminating tenure would make it harder to attract and keep teachers, she contends. Teachers are said to need tenure as protection from fussy parents and weak principals.
Even if that were true — and it's not — the last thing California classrooms need is teachers who enter the profession for a chance at a lifelong sinecure after two years. Thank goodness very few of them do.
This editorial reveals again how newspaper editorial boards have claimed knowledge and expertise on educational matters. And, the editorial reveals again why those of us in education need to develop better public responses, such as a blog.
For more on this see, The Republican Noise Machine: Right Wing Media and how it corrupts democracy. (2004) David Brock.
By the way. See the L.A. Times sections on school improvement. They "know" how to teach reading too.
I hope that they get a job teaching. One year of teaching experience as they would quickly find out how much they do not know about life in schools- and learning to read.
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