Trent England: I don't care if online schools aren't effective, it's all about breaking the unions

From the Freedom Foundations email newsletter:

As both a parent and a taxpayer, I'm excited about the potential for online education. The Freedom Foundation's iLearn Project advances online learning because of its promise to help students, but also because it will help break down union control over schools and school districts. Information technology makes it easier to measure actual student learning, makes seat time and location less important, and can allow teachers to compete worldwide. iLearn is a key to unlocking the union's control over Washington schools.

Yet more explicit messaging from the Freedom Foundation that it doesn't matter how generally poor the online schools are, it's all about trying to find a way to break the WEA.

If the good Mr. England had to choose between sending his kids to a bad charter or a good public school that happened to have union employees, one wonders which option he'd take.

Read more here, if any.

I Was Kindly Invited to the Freedom Foundation Rally

So this Wednesday the Evergreen Freedom Foundation is holding a rally in support of Wisconsin governor Scott Walker. The email announcement brings the funny:

This rally is not an attack on the individual public employees who are our friends, neighbors and fellow taxpayers. It is about the unhealthy relationship between union leaders and state lawmakers that is forcing our state into bankruptcy.

Maybe they missed the announcement about the DIME PAC, two years ago, when a big labor bill was killed under the dumbest of circumstances because Governor Gregoire and Speaker Chopp didn't want to bring it forward. That's old news, I suppose, but this notion that labor gets what they want to the exclusion of every other interest in Olympia is rather absurd.

We condemn the labor policies where the State has given unbalanced power to one special interest group.

It was awesome when I totally bounced in and imposed the contract I wanted on the management team. High five!

We need to see courageous leadership regarding this issue from our elected officials now, before the situation becomes much worse and there is a meltdown similar to what is currently taking place in Wisconsin.

Wisconsin is going through all of this over about $100,000,000; our hole is 50 times that. What's causing this "meltdown" is Governor Walker's attack on organized labor, which is exactly what you're proposing a rally in support of. Good work, guys.

Make signs – We need to have signs that spread our message. Please avoid any hateful or harmful language that will misconstrue the positive steps we are trying to take.

Examples:

Oh, this'll be good.

Taxpayers treated like 2nd class citizens Remember up above, when we said to remember that union members were also tax payers? Just kidding!

Stop leeching, start teaching Teachers have lost three days of pay because of the Learning Improvement Days going away, they're about to lose three more days of pay when the calendar reduction goes through for next year, the salary schedule freeze is finally going through so that there will be no more raises, and the state might save millions on the back of National Board Certified teachers by not giving them their promised bonuses. You're right, F those guys.

Even FDR opposed public unions Read the quote a little closer. He specifically mentions collective bargaining, which is an element of unionism but not the entire picture. And really, the EFF is going to praise Roosevelt?

Our kids can't afford your pensions anymore Therefore, we should show our kids that contracts mean nothing by ripping them up. Trying to make something as complex as pension policy fit on a sign is a fool's errand.

Hey public unions: You can't bully your way into a pay raise! Hey, idiot think tank: there's a long, long, long list of unions around this state that have made concessions in the last year. The ones in Wisconsin are, too.

I can barely afford my rent, but my taxes are going up to pay for your pension! And if you want your sign to be really good, cite the bill that would do this!

I look forward to seeing the crowds.

Read more here, if any.

No E, Just FF

So the Evergreen Freedom Foundation is dropping some syllables and choosing to just become The Freedom Foundation. Why?

Turns out, our name and brand didn’t help us make an accurate first impression. People either thought we were an environmental group, or were simply confused. So over the past three years we’ve been making changes to ensure we present a more accurate image of who we are that makes sense to the people we need to reach. Because the Internet has become the most important point of introduction for people, we knew that it had to be a major part of our rebranding effort.

Gotta say, don't like it.

Evergreen means Washington. We are the Evergreen State, after all--we used the nickname on one of the public universities, fer chrissakes. Cutting loose the association with Washington sort of makes them look like just another think tank (Heritage Foundation! Gates Foundation! Hewlett Foundation!), and I really can't see how that branding helps.

The name confusion that I've noticed is between them and the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which does a ton of work on censorship and net neutrality, but that raises the obvious question of what a Google search for "Freedom Foundation" will bring up. How about:

• Some charity in Selma, Alabama.
  
• The US Freedom Foundation, which hasn't updated their front page since 2009.
  
• The American Freedom Foundation, the Progress and Freedom Foundation, and the Future of Freedom Foundation. Kindred spirits, I suppose.

One wonders about their long term health. Bob Williams and Lynn Harsh have both recently left day-to-day involvement for other opportunities, their hire for CEO doesn't exactly fit the mold, and we've yet to see another run of the school report card project they started in 2009. On the other hand, the Liberty Live blog is still quite active, and their Supreme Court coverage is second to none in the state, but still.....is there enough space for both the EFF and the Washington Policy Center?

Something to watch.

Read more here, if any.

Irrational Exuberence

(via)

One of the stories in education this week has been the final settlement of the WEA v. Evergreen Freedom Foundation lawsuit regarding union dues being spent on politics; the releavant press release from the EFF here and here. They spent a lot of time and effort on this effort, and I don't begrudge them their satisfaction, but the case is being a bit overstated. For example, from an email that I received this morning:

But the $1.2 million in penalties and restitution was the least of the union’s losses. The union also suffered a major blow to its reputation as the entity that claims it's "all about the kids." Few people, policy folks, or members of the media believe that any longer. Over the last ten years the number of teachers who voluntarily give to the union's PAC has plummeted and remains very low.

Truth is, over the last 5 years the number of teachers who voluntarily give to the union's PAC has increased dramatically. We're now at about 25,000 WEA-PAC members statewide. A scant few of years ago, it was less than 10,000. Given that one of the bigger membership drives is the time right up to Rep Assembly next month, WEAPAC could be tickling 30,000 members right soon. I'm betting there are more than a few groups around the state who would love to have that kind of membership.

In the years since Davenport was decided in January of 2007, the WEA was at the front lines of getting the simple majority for school levies passed, did quite well in the 2008 elections, got absolutely creamed in the 2009 legislative session, and recovered nicely this year to win legislative battles on levy equalization and school reform. It's very hard to look at what they have accomplished and declare that their reputation is damaged beyond the veil; the current Race to the Top fad is constructed for union input, much to the consternation of some.

The beat goes on.

Read more here, if any.

Washington Education Week #6: The Calm Before the *hitstorm

The Washington State Legislature gets back to work tomorrow. It's expected to be a bipartisan affair where tough budget decisions are made in a spirit of teamwork and cooperation, where the needs of the individual are pushed aside so that the needs of the state can be fully shriven to the benefit of the citizens that make the Evergreen State great.

Nah, just kidding! Think crabs in a bucket, or out-of-control toddlers. Think out of control toddlers in a bucket with crabs. That's actually probably pretty close to the reality.

Item #1: School District Consolidation and Levy Equalization. It's looking like Rep. Sam Hunt of Olympia is the guy who's going to be the grinch that finally brings this conversation to the forefront. The money quote:

"It's a terribly hot issue. But I don't think we can justify having 295 school districts," Hunt said. "If you want to save money, I think this is one way to do it. It sets up a commission."

Rep. Hunt's proposal to get it done is HB2616, which would establish a commission to look at cutting the number of school districts in the state from the current 295 down to 150. Looking it over I like how he's written it--there's a lot of public involvement, and the bill just commits to the conversation, not the eradication of school districts. Whenever it comes up before the House Education Committee (and given that Rep. Dave Quall, the committee chair, is a co-sponsor, you can bet that it will) I'll have to try to make the trip over and watch the proceedings.

Another piece to keep an eye on is the School District Cost and Size Study that the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Committee (JLARC) has started work on this year. Their final report is due in either May or June, which means that this is an effort that could really work hand-in-glove with what Rep. Hunt is proposing.

The practical impact, then, is that Eastern Washington newspapers like the Yakima Herald-Republic can host superintendents and write angry editorials until they're blue in the face, but if small school advocates aren't willing to look at every cost--including the cost of their very existence--then they're ceding the moral high ground to folks like Governor Gregoire who can now go out and say "Look, I wanted to save levy equalization, but we can't poor more money into those districts without knowing that it's worth it, yadda yadda I hate this budget."

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Item #2: If the State Doesn't Want to Raise Tuition, Let the Colleges Do It To Themselves. An interesting idea wandering around Olympia is to allow the University of Washington the power to set its own tuition prices. It's come up before and never really gone anywhere, but maybe this is the right economic climate for something to happen.

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Item #3: Things That Only the Shadow Knows. On one hand, you've got budget director Victor Moore saying that we can't change union contracts.

On the other, you've got Amber Gunn of the Evergreen Freedom Foundation with the contract language; her reading is that the state can re-open should revenues decreased.

What's the education angle? Idaho, where school districts are declaring fiscal emergencies and reopening their teacher's contracts. Numerous small districts here in my area have given back pay and benefits, and as my local president I might end up leading my people that way as well.

You might be surprised at how many teaching contracts have language related to financial conditions. An example:

The following instructional load standards are established except for traditional large group instruction classes, such as music, K-6 physical education, team teaching and special education programs for which state standards are prescribed, and except when the District because of financial crisis (such as levy failure) has significantly less money for the instructional programs than it traditionally has.

The trick is that these things have to be collectively bargained, but that is also as it should be. Some districts are overstaffed at the administrator level, and demanding that the cuts be applied to the classified, certificated, and administrative levels is fair.

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Item #4: The State Board of Education and the New Accountability Plan. This is one of those stories that I've been wanting to spend more time on. With the Bylsma Plan set to come on line soon and the Board of Education getting ready to push through legislation, this'll be something to keep an eye on. Edie Harding, the executive director of the SBE, says that it's not a state takeover. Edie Harding is a damned liar.

The trick is, like with everything going on in the state right now, there is no money. It's a happy conceit that you can make extremely troubled systems better with only existing resources, but anyone who has worked with struggling kids knows that is not true. The money quote from the article:

“Some of the lowest 5 percent have made attempts to improve and have not been successful,” said board member Kristina Mayer, an educational consultant from Port Townsend.

She said some districts have not chosen to make changes, so the state board is acting on behalf of the children in those schools.

If it sounds outrageous, it probably is. C'mon, Ms. Mayer--if there really are districts that have chosen to ignore the needs of their kids, name them.

If you want a hint of where things could go, check out the EFF's School Rankings and go to the bottom of any one of the lists, like I did with elementary schools. This isn't going to be easy.

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Bits and pieces:

• No Child Left Behind had a birthday last week. The CW is that reauthorizing the ESEA with a new name will be a high priority this year so that the DC pols have something to hang their hat on as they gear up for the mid-term elections.
  
  
• Calculated Risk says that the reason the unemployment rate is holding steady is because a lot of people are just dropping out of the job hunt and not trying any more. Similarly, the Huffington Post says that 1-in-5 working age men is unemployed. That's scary.
  
  
• WEA President Mary Lindquist on school funding in Washington State.
  
  
• Offered without comment: the League of Education Voters is very proud of their recent appearance on Fox News.
  
  
• A group called MomRising is deliving brown-bag lunches to the legislators on Monday, encouraging them to work hard on the needs of kids. This is much better than my "A Flaming Bag of Doody on Their Doorsteps" initiative.
  
  
• I still haven't seen a good answer to the concern that privatizing the liquor stores would only make our short-term economic problem worse.
  
  
• The Washington Budget and Policy Center on what the Governor's proposal could mean for the schools and colleges.

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This week in the Legislature:

Tuesday, January 12th:
House Education Appropriations Committee, 8:30.
House Education Committee, 10:00.
House Higher Education Committee, 10:00.
Senate Higher Education and Workforce Development, 10:00.

Wednesday, January 13th:
Senate K-12 Education and Early Learning Committee, 8:00.
House Education Committee, 1:30.
House Higher Education Committee, 1:30.
Senate Higher Education and Workforce Development, 3:30.
House Education Appropriations Committee, 6:00.

Thursday, January 14th:
House Early Learning, 8:00.
Senate K-12 Education and Early Learning Committee, 10:00.
House Education Appropriations, 1:30.

Friday, January 15th:
House Education Committee, 8:00.
House Higher Education Committee, 8:00.
House Early Learning, 1:30.
Senate Higher Education and Workforce Development, 1:30.

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Next time: we'll look at the Governor's State of the State address, I'll have finally digested the report coming out of the QEC, and the first 7 days of the legislature. Salud!

Read more here, if any.

Today's Unfortunate Tweet

Amber Gunn of the Evergreen Freedom Foundation:

Fact: most politicians have never held a private sector job in their adult life. Lynn Harsh

From Lynn Harsh's biography on the EFF's website:

Lynn Harsh is Chief Executive Officer and Senior Education Fellow for EFF. She taught high school English and history and served briefly as a school principal, before leaving the field of secondary education to work in politics and eventually public policy.

I'm not exactly seeing a whole ton of private sector work in that job history, Lynn.

Read more here, if any.

Washington Education Week #3: Thanksgiving Turkeys Edition

The Race to the Top: With the lull between budget announcements and Legislative Assembly Days, most of the blog chatter this past week has been looking at how Washington State measures up in the federal Dash for the Cash Race to the Top grant program. The League of "Education" Voters has done a 6 part series on their blog that's worth your time to read; also with several blog posts that boil down to "Teachers suck, change everything" are the Partnership for Learning, here. And, just to clear out my RSS reader: Publicola.

I'm working on my own posts on each of the impacted areas, but one thing I do have to chuckle at is just how earnest some of the folks on the pro-RttT side are. "We have to allow the state to just take over failing schools!" they'll protest, without seeming to make the connection that we have laws regarding school boards and local control that are every bit as ingrained in the people of this state as dams and snowy mountain passes.

You can get an inkling of the fight if you go and look at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation's School Report Cards. Using their metrics, the worst high schools in the state are in places like Toppenish, Walla Walla, Pasco, Aberdeen, Puyallup, and Coulee City--all represented by Republicans, all places where the community will revolt if you try to send in a bunch of "outsiders" from Olympia to run their schools. "It's for the kids!" needs to be overwhelmingly supported by the evidence to make school takeovers work, and I'm not convinced in the slightest that plan that the State Board of Education has in place gets us where the LEV and SFC want to go.

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Randy Dorn Cares for Children/Randy Dorn Hates All Children: The reaction to the recent proposal by Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn to delay the math and science graduation requirements is still bringing in a ton of reaction. Dorn tried to get out in front of the storm, and a hell of a storm it is: when papers like the Walla-Walla Union-Bulletin are saying that you "continue to undercut the effort to reform — and improve — education", you've got a publicity problem.

Personally, I think that the best, most sensible reaction came from Cliff Mass, a meteorologist of some note at the University of Washington. Keeping science and math as graduation requirements punishes the kids for the failures of adults to get the system right, whether it's the 20 different iterations of testing that we've had in the last decade or trying to define exactly what standards we want to hold them to. The failure of the kids is also the failure of the system, and right now we certainly don't have the system in place to get them all where we want them to be. This thread from the Center for Strengthening the Teaching Profession is also quite well written and on point. Check out Crosscut as well.

Also not really working in Dorn's favor: President Obama came out this week with a new initiative on expanding STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) education. When the Department of Education is saying higher standards, and the President is saying higher standards, it's pretty clear that Dorn is going against the tide.

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The State Budget: Amber Gunn of the EFF stirred up a hornet's nest over on Crosscut when she echoed Sen. Zarelli's call for a special session to start cutting into the state budget right now. You've got some elected officials in the thread saying pretty incendiary things, and that's always fun!

(Personal aside: You don't hear anyone from any of the professional school organizations talking about a special session, because in a special session there's absolutely nothing good that could happen for schools.)

Publicola has a link to a video that Governor Gregoire put out talking about just how bad things are; consider it the anesthesia before the emergency appendectomy come January. The Capital Record also has the video and some pull-out quotes, here.

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"Merit" Pay in Action, and Inaction: The Superintendent of the Seattle Public Schools, Maria Goodloe-Johnson, met 4 of her 20 performance goals last year. That's a bad batting average, a really bad spelling test, and not exactly anything to write home about on the job.

That's also $5,280 more in her pocket, according to the Seattle Times.

The way that Goodloe-Johnson's contract is strucutred she can earn up to 10% on top of her base salary for meeting her 20 goals; that means that each goal met is worth $1,320. Under the goose/gander school of thought, if the state designed a plan to allow every teacher to earn up to 10% of their salary in incentives, the legislature would have to allocate about another $250,000,000 just to cover the costs.

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Other bits of note from the week:

• Joanne Jacobs on Why Arts Education Isn't a Luxury. The half-time art teacher in my district already knows that she's at risk of getting cut in the budget crunch to come; hopefully, I can use this to help mount a good defense.
  
  
• I love this and want to marry it.
  
  
• The United Faculty of Washington State has put together a great blog on higher education issues here in Washington; you can check it out here.
  
  
• People are flocking to community colleges, which isn't a surprise given high unemployment and a down economy.
  
  
• This commentary on what happens when school levies fail is important, particularly given the current state budget realities.
  
  
• When the teachers take over the schools.

Read more here, if any.

Mike Antonucci Channels the EFF

I'm underwhelmed. To my way of thinking the contract is between the school district and the teacher's association, and if the public wants a seat at the table they should insist that their school board members show the hell up and advocate. I've got this nightmare about contract negotiations happening in the high school gymnasium so that everyone can see, and while that might be "open" it certainly wouldn't be effective.

Read more here, if any.

Trading One Agenda for Another

This quote from the EFF blog on the St. John's educators voting to disaffiliate from the WEA and NEA is fairly fascinating:

“It is liberating to declare our independence from the big teacher unions,” said Ms. Gfeller, who teaches at St. John Elementary School. “Our politics just did not mesh with the politics of the WEA, and we couldn’t see throwing any more money to their causes.”

That's an interesting viewpoint, and it makes one wonder--what are the politics of the Northwest Professional Educators and their umbrella organization, the Association of American Educators? In fairness I'm going to use the same exacting standards that they've applied to the WEA and NEA and say that if anyone affiliated with the AAE ever said something in any place, ever, then that's clearly the viewpoint of the AAE as well. Let the games begin!

• We'll start with their very own official September newsletter, which leads off with a reprint of an article from Education Week on national education standards (so long, local control!), and then moves into the usual attack on using seniority in layoffs (which I've talked about here).
  
  
• Their July/August issue is even better, because the front page story is a bold, principled attack.....AGAINST PRE SCHOOL. I'm sad that the teachers in St. John would stand against pre-school, but for better or worse that is their choice, because after all, that is the agenda of the AAE.
  
  
• Hey, look, they have a foundation! Who's on that foundation? Why, there's one Anne Canfield, of the lobbying firm Canfield and Associates Inc. of Washington D.C., and before I even go on you know that this won't end well because, crap, they're a lobbying firm, but if you follow the string you'll find that C&A is working for big pharma companies like Wyeth and Merck (remember Vioxx?) and industry trade group Consumer Mortgage Coalition to the tune of $1.5 million dollars in 2008.
  
  
• The whole enterprise was founded by one Gary Beckner; let's see what he thinks the schools should be doing:
  
  

  Not so, says Gary Beckner, head of the California-headquartered Association of American Educators (AAE), a growing national teachers organization.
  
  In a recent speech, Beckner observed that: "We can all agree that we must raise our academic standards.However, for our children's sake, indeed, for America's sake, we must at the same time raise our moral standards." Although modernists and liberals will scorn the suggestion, Beckner says that our moral standard must be based on religious principles such as those contained in the Ten Command-ments and Christ's Sermon on the Mount: "In other words, our Judeo-Christian foundations-and that is what we suggest should be the underlying principles of any good character education program."
  
  Religious principles are key because they transcend time, fashion, and individual opinion.Since they are based on the premise of a "supreme being" as the final authority, Beckner argues that religious principles answer the question of "‘who says' I should or shouldn't do something, or what is right or wrong." "Without a final moral authority," says Beckner, "it is very difficult, if not impossible, to teach morality."

  Agnostic? Atheist? Buddhist? Strongly believe in the separation of church and state? Questioning? Here's the face of the AAE saying that you don't really matter.
  
  
• I'd make a run at the Northwest Professional Educators, but they haven't updated their newsletter archive since 2006 because they don't have much to say.

In reality, though, we know that this whole thing is an exercise in stupidity. It's very easy to go and take quotes out of context, or from a different time, or on a different subject, and make anyone look foolish. This is especially easy in a group context, when you can look at everyone associated and try to say that they ARE the group. It isn't right, and it isn't good argumentation.

But that's the brush that the WEA and NEA get painted with every single day by those who are opposed to public sector unionism in general and for teachers in particular. A debate at the WEA Representative Assembly on gay marriage doesn't make the WEA an organization in favor of gay marriage; the same applies to the NEA. It's rhetorically lazy, and I'll probably be doing it again tomorrow because hey, this is blogging.

This angels v. demons dichotomy that's been set up simply isn't based in any kind of reality. NWPE can pound the drum of "professionalism" long and hard, but I can show you just as many people in the WEA ranks who care passionately about kids and schools as they can on their side. Further, they can poo-poo involvement in politics all they want, but it's Olympia that decides what we're paid, it's Olympia that's taking unprecedented involvement in what the local curricula is, it's Olympia that decides who gets to be in the classroom or not--any "professional" organization that would conscientiously run away from those issues isn't a real professional organization in the slightest.

Welcome to the AAE/NWPE agenda, St. John. You don't like pre-school, you don't like local control, you're happy to throw senior teachers out to save money, Sunday School is now Monday through Friday as well, and you're a friend of Big Pharma. That's the agenda you're standing with, now that you've chosen to make the agenda the issue. Good luck with it.

Read more here, if any.

It's Conclusive: Strikes are Good for Students

So Liv Finne, who is to education policy what Michelle Bachmann is to rationality, has a poorly-formatted post up about how Kent shouldn't strike because of their poor WASL scores. The Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF) has piled on, too, in an editorial that I'll spend more time with in a different post.

The obvious argument for a union hack like myself, then, is that those scores would be better if the teachers weren't going to useless meetings, or if the class size was what it should be, or if teachers didn't flee the district to brighter horizons.

I think it's Al Shanker who's attributed with the idea that if it's good for the teachers then it's good for the students. With that in mind, I used the School Report Card that the EFF released last spring, along with their list of districts that have been out on strike recently. On the EFF report card a rating of "6" is considered average, and the cut-off score for a 6 is to be ranked 570 or higher.

In Bellevue, which went out on strike in 2008, the elementary schools are ranked #1, 615, 104, 104, 44, 431, 650, 30, 855, 16, 49, 259, 227, 227, 295, 461, 57, and 401. That's an average ranking of 268, well above average. Only three schools in Bellevue are ranked "Below Average" on the EFF metric. If you take them out, the average ranking rises to 180.

Collective bargaining and a strike don't seem to be slowing Bellevue down any.

Let's try Shoreline, who went out in 2007. Their schools are ranked 95, 104, 136, 295, 295, 372, and 372. That's an average of 208, even better than Bellevue. Every school in Shoreline, which also had labor troubles this year, is above average in the EFF rankings.

How about Lake Stevens, which had a strike in 2003 and is looking likely to have another one? Their 6 elementary schools are ranked 259, 401, 208, 136, 227, and 549. An average ranking of 297, and again no school is below average on the EFF scale.

If strikes hurt, then every post-strike district should look like Marysville (2003, an average ranking of 687, 6 of 10 schools below average). These school rankings, though, show that there isn't much of a trend to be found.

So if a strike is the ultimate manifestation of out of control teachers, and if out of control teachers are the antithesis of student achievement, then why do the kids in districts that have gone on strike seem to be doing pretty well?

Read more here, if any.

A Swing and a Miss, EFF Edition

So it's August, and you know what that means--more rightous indignation about the potential for teachers to go out on strike. This post from the EFF's blog is on point, and it lays out the anti-strike position well, even though I'd respectfully disagree with where they're going with it.

At the bottom, though, they really go off the rails when they talk about the Kent School District and their ongoing negotiations with the Kent EA:

If the Kent teachers' union truly cares about the education of the children in that district, it should not strike. Instead, continue to work out problems at the bargaining table. Don't take them out on the students.

Here's the trick--the KEA would like to work those problems out at the table, but it's the District that cut off negotiations and declared an impasse, refusing to interact with the EA any longer.

If Kent gets pushed to the brink, it's going to be the KSD that put the kids in a bad way. They pretty much admit as much in their open letter to the community.

It's going to be an interesting couple of weeks.

Read more here, if any.

Measuring Teacher Effectiveness

Something I've been thinking a lot about lately is the idea of linking test scores to teacher evaluation. It's a topic that's everywhere this summer:

• The EFF school report card makes the point.
  
• It's also the heart of Arne Duncan's remarks at the NEA Representative Assembly.
  
• The ASCD put out a newsletter recently on union/management collaboration; tying test scores to evaluation was a big part of it.
  
• And of course, there's the state-level hijinx going on vis-a-vis HB2261, the State Board of Education, and the PESB. Wheeee!

One of the notions that you often hear during these discussions is, "The good teachers have nothing to be afraid of." Let's talk about that for a bit.

Last year, for one of my Master's classes, I dug into testing data I had on hand for the first grade team in my building. These are real numbers and real averages with real kids behind them; the test in question is the Measures of Academic Progress, from the Northwest Evaluation Association.

Teacher A: In the fall, her class had an average score of 162.5 on the MAP. In the spring the class average rose to 184.3, an average gain of 21.8 points.

Teacher B: Her fall average was 164.7; her spring average, 183.85, for an increase of 19.15 points.

Teacher C: 169.05 in the fall, 189.35 in the spring, so an average gain of 20.3 points.

Teacher D: An average score of 155.30 points in the fall and 174.85 in the spring. Her fall-to-spring gain, then, was 19.55 points.

With this data, then, you could argue the case for two different teachers as the "winners" in the group. If you look at the average gain, Teacher A is your champion:

1. Teacher A: 21.8 points
   
2. Teacher C: 20.3 points
   
3. Teacher D: 19.55 points
   
4. Teacher B: 19.15 points

But, if you look at the overall class average at the end of the year, Teacher C is far and away your winner:

1. Teacher C: 189.35
   
2. Teacher A: 184.3
   
3. Teacher B: 183.85
   
4. Teacher D: 174.85

If we went strictly by these numbers from this year, then, you can see who your quality teachers are. If you were judging solely by the numbers, you might also think that you have a problem with Teacher D--her class average trails the class average of everybody else by almost 10 points, which on the MAP is very nearly an entire year's worth of growth.

But we have to dig even deeper before making a statement about teacher quality, because here the raw numbers aren't telling the whole story.

In the fall, the average score for this test is 164 points. In the spring, the average score is 178. Knowing that, here's some new data to chew on.

In Teacher A's room in the fall, 10 kids scored in the below average range. In the spring, 6 kids scored below average.

In Teacher B's room, 7 kids were below average in the fall, while 3 were below average in the spring.

In Teacher C's room, 6 kids were below average in the fall, and 3 in the spring.

In Teacher D's room, 16 kids were below average in the fall, and 6 tested below average in the spring.

With this new information, you can make two new arguments. First, Teacher B is your best teacher because she had more of her kids cross the finish line (the goal score, 178) than the other teachers did. You could also argue that Teacher D is your best teacher because she lowered her percentage of kids who were below standard more than any of the other teachers did.

So, who is your Most Valuable Teacher?

Is it Teacher A, who added the most value to her class over the course of the year?
Is it Teacher B, who had more of her kids meet the year-end goal?
Is it Teacher C, whose class scored the highest in the spring?
Is it Teacher D, who turned around more failing kids than any of the others?

"Value" is a homophone; there's the value signified by the numbers, but there's also the values of the school, the district, and the state which have to be superimposed atop any effort to link the data to the teacher. If the incentive pay/merit pay/whatever pay in this case goes to only one of the four teachers, you're making a statement about the value of the work the other three did, and it's a pretty lousy thing to say to the other three who also made progress that their success didn't matter as much.

Similarly, can we countenance a system where every one of these teachers is given the bonus money, indicating that they all did a good job? In the eyes of some reformers I could see that being too close to what we do now, where every teacher is assumed to be a good teacher. If a merit pay system is intended to have winners and losers, and to inspire the "less-capable" teachers to emulate the "better" teachers, can we really have a 4-way tie?

These are the questions that have to be answered going forward.

If you'd like to see the raw scores presented in a spreadsheet, you can find them here.

Read more here, if any.

I <3 My Commenters

It took me a long time to figure out that <3 is supposed to be a heart. I'm old.

Al left a great comment to my posting about the best schools in the EFF school report card, talking about the APP program in Seattle. He also runs a blog on the program that I'll certainly be following, here.

Also check out that same comment thread to see Piper Scott calling the post "sophomoric treacle." It's nice to have all sides of the argument represented, right?

Read more here, if any.

The EFF School Report Card: Who Are the Winners?

Previously we've taken an overall look at the EFF school report card, along with the schools that it identified as being the very worst (or, in their words, the losers) in the state. Today I thought it might be fun to take a look at the winners--is there anything that we can learn from them?

For the school year 2007-2008 there were 15 schools that tied with a perfect 10 in the EFF rankings. Of those, 6 have had a perfect 10 in each of the last 5 years. Who are these high achievers?

1) Medina Elementary, Medina, King County. You know who lives in Medina? Bill Gates. Go to their census page and you can read lots of fun information, like how the average family income is well above $100,000, the largest number of families make $200,000+, there wasn't a single "Female Householder, No Husband Present" to be found in the whole town, and 99% of the residents aged 25+ are high school graduates.

I'm going to hazard a guess, but I'm thinking Medina may have it a little bit better that some other places in the state.

2) Lowell Elementary, Seattle, King County. From their website:

Lowell Elementary School is home to two of the Seattle Public School District's all-city-draw programs, the Accelerated Progress Program (APP) and education for Low Incidence Special Education students.

Accelerated Progress Program. I wonder what that is?

APP is a program of accelerated instruction in Seattle Public Schools, generally two years above grade level. It serves intellectually advanced students who meet eligibility criteria and whose learning needs are not fully met in conventional classrooms.

Ah. Take the brightest kids in the state's biggest city, put them all together, and see how they do on the WASL. It's not by chance that this is a succesful school.

3) Libby Center, Spokane, Spokane County. Of the 6 schools that earned a perfect 10 Libby Center has the highest percentage of kids from low-income families: 23.1%. That's a success story, absolutely. The secret to the success?

Tessera is a one day per week program at Libby Center for highly capable students in grades 3 - 6 who represent the top 3% of their norm group. Students are selected on the basis of academic, intellectual, and creative ability.

Yeah, but that's a one-day-a-week thing. Those kids probably take the WASL at their home schools. Where do Libby's WASL scores come from?

The Spokane Public Schools elementary and middle school Odyssey Program is a full day, every day gifted magnet program at Libby Center for fifth through eighth grade students.

Magnet programs: great for gifted kids. Alas, not replicable.

4) Island Park Elementary, Mercer Island, King County: Remarkably, all three of the elementary schools on Mercer Island scored a perfect 10 on the EFF rankings for the 2007-2008 school year. There were 15 schools to get 10.0, and three of them are from the same school district. Why could that be?

• Could it be the median family income of about $147,000?
  
• Or that about 30% of the households bring in $200,000+?
  
• Or the median home value of $880,000, which compares well to the national average of $182,000?
  
• Or that about 75% of the residents have a Bachelor's degree or higher?

Look, Mercer Island has a well-deserved reputation as a center of wealth in Washington State, where the high school kids drive nicer cars than their teachers do, where you go when you've made it in life. It's no surprise that Mercer Island has great schools, because Mercer Island is a high-achieving community with money to burn. Thta's why comments like this, from Diana Cieslak of the EFF, drive me absolutely insane:

“The reason we chose to do this is to equip parents with the very best info available,” she said.

“We feel that the ranking system gives them a useful conclusion that allows them to see how their schools are doing compared to others in the state.”

When asked why Mercer Island performed so well in the study, Cieslak suggested that parents should go and find out the answer themselves.

“That is our goal,” she said. “The school will have the answers.”

Absolutely, on its face, ridiculous. It's the myth of replicability that I've talked about before--a school is successful here, so a school can be successful there, too--and Ms. Cieslak pushes that myth to the most ridiculous edge.

5) Challenge, Mountlake Terrace, Snohomish County: If you're a terrible cynic you're probably going, "Feh! I bet it's a magnet program in some well-to-do school district! Feh!"

Sometimes, the cynics are right. Challenge is a special magnet program for gifted kids in the Edmonds School District, admission based on referrals and testing.

6) Cedar Wood Elementary, Bothell, King/Snohomish County: A school that's proud to be mentioned in the EFF's report card, they trumpet their high ranking right off of their home page. Mind you, they don't mention the EFF by name (they call them "an educational research foundation">, nor do they link to the EFF's web page, or to the report itself, but why would I want to read anything into that unless I was being snarky, right?

Anyhow, this looks to be an actual public school, in the Everett School District! I know, right? Weird! Going off of their school report card they have 6.2% of the kids taking free or reduced price lunch, about 15% in special education, and 100% fans of locally connected band Death Cab for Cutie.

Congratulations to Cedar Wood for what they've accomplished.


So, to review: 3 magnet programs, 2 of the richest elementary schools in the state, and Cedar Wood of Bothell.

There's a quote that I thought was Molly Ivins, but Google attributes to Ann Richards, referring to George Bush: "He's a guy who was born on third base and thinks he hit a triple." What the top of the EFF report card is showing us is not a collection of schools that have had to struggle to get their success, but that are maintaining the successes that the kids showed up with in kindergarten.

Another phrase that's been put out is "Cinderella Schools"; those schools that have socio-economic factors lined against them but that are still succeeding, like Pateros. I'm still mining the report to pick those out (personal and confidential to the EFF and Fraser Institute: spreadsheets would be nice), and that will be the next post to come.

Hopefully that's where the value will be, because there hasn't been a whole lot to learn from looking at the extremes.

Read more here, if any.

The EFF School Report Card: The Worst Schools in the State

(Second in a look at the 2009 Elementary School Report Card from the Evergreen Freedom Foundation. For the first installment, including links to the report, go here.)

The School Report Card sorts out the elementary schools here in Washington from #1 to a four-way tie for #1,127. The Simon Fraser Institute, which carried out the research for the study, says that it identifies the winners and losers, so let's look at the biggest loser schools in Washington State. These are the four that were called out by name in the media.

#1127 Wa He Lut, Olympia, Thurston County. An Indian school in the most basic sense of the word, Wa He Lut isn't a public school at all--it's managed by the Bureau of Indian Affairs for the federal government, and you must be a member of a federally recognized tribe to even attend. Consider, too, that Wa He Lut's low score is based off of one year's scores--they only have WASL results for 2008.

I remember being at an OSPI Summer Institute a couple of years ago where Terry Bergeson talked about the crisis in education surrounding our Native American students statewide, and she was right--less than half graduate from high school. I think it's a problem that needs to be viewed through a different lens than the school reform movement writ large, though.

Here is an example of where I question the methodology of the report--how can Wa Le Hut be called a "loser" school based off of one year's results, when it's not even really a public school at all?

#1127.2: Virgie Robinson Elementary, Pasco, Franklin County: 96.5% low income and 95.8% Hispanic, a fun school where Chicago White Sox jerseys and Ben Davis uniforms are banned because of gang affiliations. Where 75% are in the transitional bilingual program, 1-in-6 are identified special education students, and more than 20% are migrant. It's also 3 times larger than the Pateros School District, which will be important because of something I'll be posting later.

#1127.3: Muckleshoot Tribal School, Auburn, Pierce County: Not really part of the Auburn School District, not really a public school (it's 100% Native American). They're getting a nice new building, which is good for them. They're also at the bottom of the list based on one year's scores-2008-because that's the only year they have scores reported for. My guess is that's because they only have 83 students.

That's right, you 30 or so kids in grades 3 through 5. Mmm-hmm. Tsk, tsk, tsk.

#1127.4: Lummi Tribal School, Bellingham, Whatcom County: The very worst school in the state, says the report. The only school to receive a cumulative 0.0 score for the past five years, which means that in no year, ever, did they score even a fraction of a point in the EFF's system. This article from 2001 seems rather humorous in light of what hasn't happened--academic renaissance--but the humor dies quite quickly when you recognize that this has been an ongoing problem for several generations now.



"But Ryan," I'm hearing someone say, "Ben Chavis. Skooled. It can happen. Soft bigotry, low expectations, et cetera."

And that's fine. What I'm finding ridiculous here is the belief put forward by the report that some how, some way, it's competition that is going to make these schools better.

There are systemic reasons that some schools fail. It's these schools, the outliers, that prove that more than any other. The affirming-the-consequent conceit is to argue that if some schools succeed, then any school can succeed, and since Pateros is doing well, these schools should be too.

But conceit and rankings aren't going to help.

Read more here, if any.

Winston Churchill. Martin Luther King Jr. Frederick Douglass. Glenn Beck?

Over at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation's Liberty Live blog they have an animated bar at the top with quotes related to liberty, democracy, etc. You've got your MLK Jr., Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, Winston Churchill, Adam Smith, and a couple of others.

You've also got the EFF hosting a big fundraising event when they bring Glenn Beck to town this September.

On one hand, Frederick Douglas: "If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters."

On the other, Glenn Beck: "Cindy Sheehan is a tragedy slut."

On one hand, Martin Luther King Jr.: "I submit to you that if a man has not discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live."

On the other, Glenn Beck: "And when I see a 9-11 victim family on television, or whatever, I'm just like, "Oh shut up!" I'm so sick of them because they're always complaining."

On one hand, Winston Churchill: "I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat."

On the other, Glenn Beck (talking about the San Diego wildfires of 2007): "I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today."

Then there's the newest video, where a guest on Glenn's show says that he hopes Osama Bin Laden nukes America, and Glenn doesn't seem to disagree:


But it's OK, because he loves America and freedom. Or something.

Read more here, if any.

Proving the Correlation Between Poverty and Academic Success

One of the joys of summer is that I finally have the time to process the various reports that I gather during the school year but don't always have a chance to read; I'm starting off with Report Card on Washington State's Elementary Schools 2009 from the loyal opposition at the Evergreen Freedom Foundation.

What they've done is actually quite impressive--a rank order, from 1st to 1,127th place, of all the elementary schools in Washington State. I have some qualms about the methodology--these rankings are completely WASL-driven, which makes them rank in another sense of the word--but if we look at the report more as a discussion piece and less as an evaluative measure, it has some potential value.

(Might as well dispense with the snark right away--I'm a union guy, a teacher union guy, and as such fairly well disposed to not like anything, ever, that the EFF does. That said, I've had pleasant e-mail exchanges with a number of their staffers, and while their beliefs are diametrically opposed to mine, I won't question the sincerity of what they think.)

I think the over-reach, though, can be found right in the introduction to the report:

Previous studies have shown that variations in student results from school to school cannot be accounted for solely by the personal and family characteristics of a school’s students. Many other factors—including good teaching, counseling, and school administration—contribute to the effectiveness of schools. Indicators like low income describe past relationships between a socioeconomic characteristic and a measure of school effectiveness. It should not be inferred that these relationships will, or should, remain static. The more successfully schools enable all their students to succeed, the weaker will be the relationship between the family characteristics of students and their academic success. Thus, this socioeconomic indicator should not be used as an excuse for poor school performance.

Laudable, certainty. The great legacy of the Bush administration will be No Child Left Behind, and I say that with the utmost sincerity--the focus on disaggregated scores, and measuring all sub-groups, and making sure that all kids are coming along--that's what we should have been doing since the beginning. It's never a comfortable conversation, but it's the most important one we can have. That said, in the context of failing schools and failing kids, "excuse" is a loaded word. Poverty and race should never be the excuse for a school's low performance, but to ignore those metrics as even being factors would be a hell of a mistake to make.

And frankly, the report itself backs me up on this. Creating tables in Blogger is nigh-on impossible, but here you can see a spreadsheet that I made comparing the top 15 schools in the state, those that earned a perfect 10 on the rankings, to the bottom 20 schools in the state, those that earned less than a 2.0 on the scale. The interesting pieces:

• Of the bottom 20, 19 of them are majority-minority schools, where the majority of the students come from minority populations. Only Oakville Elementary breaks even, with 50% caucasian students.
  
• On the other hand, in the top 15 schools, white students are always the majority (all at 60%+). In 13 of the 15 the largest minority group is Asian students; in the other two (both from Spokane), the largest minority group is mixed-race students.
  
• Each of the bottom 20 schools has higher than 70% of the kids coming from low-income households. 4 of the schools are tribal schools and don't report the percentage of their kids who are low income. Of the 16 reporting schools, the average percentage of low-income students is about 83%.
  
• At the top 15 the average percentage of low-income students is 6%. One school (Libby Center of Spokane) has 23% low-income; if you take it out of the picture, the average drops to less than 5%. At two of the top 15 schools, less than 1% of the kids are low-income.

The Fraser Institute, which has been doing these analyses on Canadian schools for a number of years now, is quite explicit in calling the high schools winners and the bottom schools losers.

By their metrics, then, the way to be a winner is clear: be well-off and white. It's also very explicit who the report thinks the losers are. That's a shame.

Read more here, if any.

The Evergreen Freedom Foundation Will KILL YOU IN YOUR SLEEP If You Don't Go To Their Tea Party

Most of the blogs I follow I read through Google Reader. Some feeds send along the graphics to go along with the post; the feed for the highly readable Liberty Live blog from the Evergreen Freedom Foundation isn't one that sends the pictures.

So in context, with the Revolutionary War emblem right there to see, ending a post with "Join or die" makes good sense.

In Google Reader, with a long block of text and nothing else, ending a post with "Join or die" made me lock the door and hide under my kitchen table with only copies of Al Franken's books at hand to throw at anyone who might come to haul me away.

All that said, check out their coverage of the Washington Supreme Court. It's probably the most ignored piece of our state government, and I'm glad that someone's on the watch.

Read more here, if any.

My Harem of Buxom 18-year Old High School Seniors and I Would Like to Share a Few Words

Sure, I'm two weeks behind on this one, but Stacy, Stacie, and Stacey asked that I blog about it, so hey!

You've probably heard of the case of Matthew Hirschfelder, a piece of crap who taught choir in Hoquiam and was 33 when he began a sexual relationship with an 18 year old student. He was drummed out of the profession, as he should have been, but the outstanding question was to decide whether what he did was criminal. The girl, after all, was 18, and as the WEA correctly pointed out in their amicus brief to the appelate court there was some ambiguity to the law.

This, of course, pushed the EFF over the edge:

The WEA doesn't care that the teacher was in a position of authority over the student or that the victim was possibly coerced by that authority, only that the student was 18, so it shouldn't count.

...which requires a very jaundiced reading of the situation, but that's also to be expected.

It gets better, though, when the Court of Appeals goes and says that the WEA was right. Mike Reitz gets his outrage on:

Legal victory for the WEA: Teachers can have sex with 18 year old students

....which is a weak, pathetic, maudlin attack line that ignores the reality that the teacher in question still lost his job and will not teach in Washington State again.

Similarly:

• Fox News: Washington Court: Teachers Can Have Sex With 18-Year-Old Students
  
• The Tacoma News Tribune: 18-year-olds fair game for sex with teachers?
  
• Channel 13 out of Seattle: Teachers Can Have Sex with 18-year-olds

...all of which ignore the piece that even if it isn't illegal, it's still a violation of the Professional Code of Conduct for Teachers. To wit:

WAC 181-87-080 SEXUAL MISCONDUCT WITH STUDENTS.

Unprofessional conduct includes the commission by an education practitioner of any sexually exploitive act with or to a student including, but not limited to, the following:

(1) Any sexual advance, verbal or physical;

(2) Sexual intercourse as defined in RCW 9A.44.010;

(3) Indecent exposure as defined in RCW 9A.88.010;

(4) Sexual contact, i.e., the intentional touching of the sexual or other intimate parts of a student except to the extent necessary and appropriate to attend to the hygienic or health needs of the student;

(5) PROVIDED, That the provisions of this section shall not apply if at the time of the sexual conduct the participants are married to each other.

Rep. Larry Haler out of the Tri-Cities has introduced HB1385, which would close the loophole. I think it's a bill we all should support, and I hope that it passes and becomes law. He's taking the right approach--actually fixing the problem, instead of shifting the blame. Bravo, Rep. Haler.

Read more here, if any.

Que?

From a recent email I received from the EFF, containing their legislative recommendations for the year:

Require Schools to Have Budgets: State law does not require that any of the more than 2,300 schools in our state have their own operating budget separate from the larger district, making efficient management of resources next to impossible. Following a previous JLARC recommendation, the legislature should insist that management and senior staff at every school be responsible for properly allocating the education resources each receives.

Reading between the lines I'm seeing a call for weighted student funding here, which isn't the best idea ever to come down the pipe. I also reject the underlying premise that schools don't have their own budgets; mine does, and it's something that every teacher in the building is highly cognizant of.

I've asked them to send me more information about the JLARC piece they cite; I'd be curious to see just how it reads.

Read more here, if any.