myshortpencil

A Times Union Letter to the Editor


When medical science develops a new wonder drug, it is not allowed on the market before undergoing years of careful testing. I wish the same cautious approach were taken with charter schools.

I wish the same cautious approach had been taken with government schools. Charter schools are public schools. They are no more or less experimental than government schools. Charter schools are staffed with "highly qualified" teachers, just like government schools. There is not a single charter school in the whole state that produces results as bad as New York's worst public school. The call for delay and careful testing is about union hostility toward charter schools and politics, not science. Why don't teachers' unions tell the public their real reasons for wanting to slow growth in charter schools? To publicize good-sounding but disingenuous rationales is manipulative.

Your June 20 editorial was right about stopping the mad rush to flood the city of Albany with charter schools. Let's face it, charter schools are not an educational panacea; they are the institutions where politics and education converge.

Government schools are no panacea, either. Politics and education are far more intertwined in government schools than in charter schools. This is another spurious argument designed to conceal the important reasons for NEA opposition to charter schools.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on School Choice
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

Charter schools were born out of a political deal in 1998, in which the governor held up a legislative pay raise until a charter bill was passed. Once the bill was passed, the charter school forces went to town, particularly focusing their efforts on communities like Albany in which the schools were already underfunded by the state and overextended by the needs of an increasingly poor population.

Let's see, charter schools were born illegitimately, therefore their growth should be stopped. Great argument. The truth is that charter schools were born out of the repeated failure of government schools to produce the kind of education outcomes desired for the money spent on them.

Charter schools prey on poor communities with underfunded schools. According to US Census data on schools, Albany City Schools are in the 96th percentile, nationally, in per-pupil spending for instruction. Only 508 school districts out of the 14,276 listed in the 2002 school spending census having data on spending for instruction spend more than Albany's $8,983 per pupil. Would that Albany's public schools turned in academic performance in the 96th percentile!

Charter schools locate in places like Albany for many reasons, but chief among them is the fact that so much money is being spent with such poor results that the probability of failing is as close to zero as you can get in the private sector. Albany has the lowest mean scores on 4th and 8th grade state exams of any of the 41 school districts in our area.

So, what does NEA-NY VP Matt Jacobs want to do? He wants to stop charter school growth in Albany! How's that good for kids? This year, a Long Island charter school, with nearly all African-American and Hispanic students and more than half qualifying for free or reduced school meals, had 87% score proficient or higher on the 4th grade ELA exam. Know what percentage of students scored proficient or higher in Albany? 44.4%

Yep. We'd better stop charter school growth and make them undergo years of careful testing.

I'd like to know how supposedly smart people can say such stupid things. The NEA is grasping at straws. If this is the best argument it can make for stopping charter schools in NY, the unions are clearly desperate to save the system which they have learned to milk for everything they can get to line their own pockets at the expense of students.

The high monopoly prices paid in Albany makes it possible for charter schools to educate children better, for less money, while making a profit!

So far, there's not much to show for the charter school experiment in Albany or across our state. Occasional flashes of excellence are overshadowed by average and below-average results.

How's that different from public schools? Even if charter schools produce no better results than government schools, if they do it for less money with better satisfied parents who participate more in education--which they do--then what's to complain about? That sounds like improvement to me.

The Regent's draft report on "The Educational Effectiveness of the Charter School Approach" noted substantial increases by charter schools on state assessments with no adverse fiscal impact on public schools! While charter schools have existed a mere 5 years in New York, government schools in their current configuration are 100 years old. It's nothing short of phenomenal that such young institutions with relatively inexperienced teaching staffs can replicate public school results in such a short time.

It's time for a moratorium on charter schools. Let the political forces pushing them take a breather and let's, as a state, look at the results they're producing. Then we can decide if we are moving in the right direction.

The royal "we." I'd like to know if the "we" include students and parents or just educator unions and their bought-off politicians? There is absolutely no justification for slowing the growth of New York charter schools, and the distorted misinformation provided by Matt proves it. If there were a good reason for stopping charter schools, I'm sure Matt would have mentioned it.

It's not what the charter entrepreneurs want, but it's what New York's students need.

It's that pathetic? What about the government school entrepreneurs who are extremely successful at pulling inflation-busting sums of money into their personal wallets? As pointed out by a retired teacher, The quality of education falls as teacher pay increases.

The NEA is a teachers' union, not a students' union. IF it really knew what students' need, no one would have ever come up with the idea for charter schools. The NEA's arguing against charter school growth is like a conglomerate of gold mine operators lobbying against the opening of a small up-start gold mine because it will hurt the environment. Pay no attention to the environmental damage done by their mines.

One might suspect that protecting the price of gold, not the environment, excites their passion for the status quo.

MATT JACOBS
NEA/NY Vice President
Albany

A Boulder (CO) Daily Camera Letter to the Editor



It's been a difficult school year in the Boulder Valley School District. Teacher morale is low. After the passage of the teachers' contract, I was ready to "move on," hopeful for a collaborative environment next year and time to plan for the restructuring of the salary schedule, without negotiations looming overhead. However, the article, "BVSD, teachers look to repair relationships, improve morale," in the June 13 Daily Camera immediately stopped the "moving on" I was trying to accomplish. Instead, school board president Julie Phillips' words fueled my frustration.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Teachers' Unions & Salaries
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

On one hand she states, "We believe teachers make a tremendous contribution to our kids and our schools" and, "This board is probably the most pro-teacher that I've ever known." And on the other hand, she says, "All the walkout did was really convince the board that teachers didn't care about kids." Teachers wouldn't have used annual leave days in unison had the district not offered us a contract that drastically reduced our career earnings. Teachers felt backed into a corner, so we felt we had no alternative.

Here's what the June 13 article said:

Board president Julie Phillips said repeatedly hearing that the district doesn't care about teachers is frustrating. The board would love to pay teachers more, she said, but it isn't willing to increase class sizes or cut programs to do it.

"We believe teachers make a tremendous contribution to our kids and our schools," she said. "This board is probably the most pro-teacher that I've ever known."

Several board members also expressed anger at the walkouts, which they said violated the teachers' contract and disrupted classes.

"All the walkout did was really convince the board that teachers didn't care about kids," Phillips said.

Ms. Phillips stated that the board was not willing to cut programs to increase teacher salaries. Quality teachers make the difference in children's learning, not programs. Part of the Referendum 3A money taxpayers approved was to increase teacher salaries in order to "attract and maintain quality teachers." That money isn't being used to honor taxpayers' wishes.

No matter how much you pay current teachers, their quality isn't going to improve. Increasing teacher pay to attract high quality teachers makes sense if that pay goes to the new, high quality teachers.

Beyond that, teachers over-value their own services. The most important factor in learning is the student, not the teacher. Students who have access to the programs they need can, if they are motivated, learn nearly just as much with poor teachers as with great teachers. Why? Because learning is a student activity, not a teaching activity.

90% of what teachers teach comes directly from textbooks. Students who have been taught how to learn can learn from the textbooks and from Internet resources no matter how bad their teachers are. But if the school doesn't offer the course or program at all, then students are highly likely not to do academic work in the areas left off the curriculum.

Moreover, K-12 teachers are college graduates. If they endeavor to always do their best, they will always produce a learning environment adequate for a K-12 level of understanding. If they can't, they have no business teaching and certainly do not deserve bigger pay raises.

Something else in the article bothered me. Superintendent George Garcia said the difficulties with negotiations "came down to money, not negotiating style." During the '90s, Colorado was benefiting from a rich economy, but there was little money for schools. Salary increases were zero percent to two percent percent for several years. Because our negotiations were collaborative and interest-based at that time, there was not the contentious atmosphere that has been prevalent since Dr. Garcia came to Boulder.

Just stop it. I wonder if it is at all possible that teachers caught up in the years when salary increases were 2% or less?

Let's look at the facts from the US Census School Data. Here's the 1992 and 2002 data for this poor teacher's school district, Boulder Valley:

Year	Enroll- ment	Expendi- tures	Wages for Instruction	Benefits For Instruction	(W + B)/pupil	2002 Dollars	Increase/pupil
1992	22,534	$127 M	$50.8 M	$10.7 M	$2,729	$3,493
2002	27,963	$231 M	$93.8 M	$16.7 M	$3,952	$3,952	13.10%

As the table shows, instructional spending per-pupil has increased 13.1% faster than the rate of inflation. Part of this increase may be related to reducing class sizes in BVSD. Let's assume that BVSD reduced K-3 class sizes from 25 to 20 students, on average. Let's also assume that the 86 additional teachers would cost an average of $100,000 a teacher. That brings the per-pupil increase in instructional costs unrelated to reducing class sizes down to $3,644, which still beats the $3,493 cost equivalent to the rate of inflation by 4.3%.

Total district spending per-pupil has increase from $5,636 in 1992 to $8,261 in 2002, for a percentage increase of 47% with inflation of 28%. Over this same period, teachers have seen their compensation (salaries and benefits) grow by at least 33.5% and perhaps as much as 44.8%, with inflation of 28%.

The statement, "During the '90s, Colorado was benefiting from a rich economy, but there was little money for schools," is just flatly false for the school district where this teacher has nightmares about things that aren't true. Public spending on education and on teacher compensation beat inflation despite the number of years when salary increases were 2% or less.

In this topic I am asked, "Why do you hate teachers so much?" I am called a "teacher hater" here.

I don't hate teachers. I hate people who don't tell the truth and who distort the truth for personal gain. I hate it especially when it comes from college-educated people who should have the knowledge, professionalism and ethics not to deceive the public for whom they work from their privileged positions.

Why do teachers do this? It's simply easier to lie about the truth and create the public perception that teachers are being treated unfairly to use as leverage for higher wages than it is to make the case that teachers should be paid more. No wonder school boards become frustrated with teachers who believe the lies they tell themselves to lower their morale and pressure the public to pay them even higher salaries so they will not have to suffer in their self-inflicted, falsified hell.

To say that teachers don't care about children is an insult. We are more than willing to "move on," but refuse to "roll over" when mistreated.

The notion that BSVD teachers have been mistreated when it comes to salaries and benefits is completely false in comparison to the rate of inflation. To distort the truth for personal gain, and then to falsely claim abuse on top of it, is nothing less than bullying.

JOAN STANDEFER
Lafayette

Educators deny using children on pro-tax issues
By Franco Ordonez, Boston Globe Staff

Burke Anderson was incensed. His 13-year-old son had come home from school one day this spring almost hyperventilating about how he wouldn't get into college unless his parents voted for an upcoming tax increase.

The Medway seventh-grader, according to Anderson, reported that the new high school couldn't open without the additional money. And he fretted that his diploma would be useless if the old high school lost its accreditation -- a word he'd never uttered before.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Budget Issues
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

''If you could have heard my kid that day when he came home," said Anderson, who believes the middle school principal was illegally promoting the tax increase to the students on school time, a charge the principal denies. ''I was furious because he was totally brainwashed, in my opinion."

Medway passed the $1.9 million measure last month.

But Anderson, who opposed the tax increase, is pressing the school system to establish a more explicit policy on what's OK to say about such issues in the classroom and what's not.

His allegations bring up a sensitive question, one that arises frequently when school-related tax increases are put to voters: When does explanation cross the line and become advocacy?

The medium is the message. If the explanation is coming from the school, the implied message is always to support the decisions the school has made. Beyond that, when schools get to choose which facts they use in explaining budgets, and they use only the facts that support their position, ignoring the many facts that cut against it, and when they focus only on the school and not on the bigger picture of the interrelationships among schools, budgets, communities and the economy, they present a biased, incomplete and distorted version of reality. As a matter of ethics--school officials being public servants--they should not have to be told that their duty is to provide all the relevant information they would give to a friend who has the responsibility for making an important decision. They should act like objective advisors, not advocates. But they don't.

Accusations that tax increase proponents are using schoolchildren to promote their message are on the rise.

According to Denis Kennedy, spokesman for the state Office of Campaign and Political Finance, his agency is receiving more allegations of misconduct as cash-strapped communities pursue Proposition 2 overrides, which allow cities and towns to increase local taxes beyond the limits set by state law.

''Anytime you live in a small town, an issue like this is going to come into the schools, whether you want it to or not," said outgoing Medway Middle School principal William B. Lynch, who said he was simply answering questions from students in a social studies class. ''What you can do is stick your head in the sand and forget it exists. Or, you can give an honest answer to the kids, which is what we did."

I wonder if that honest answer included the possibility of union give-backs on increases in compensation in excess of the rate of inflation? The "honest" answers schools give are loaded with assumptions and limitations on what is possible that aren't true.

School administrators and teachers face a dilemma when students ask about tax increase issues tied to education. It's against the law to use public time or resources to campaign for a political cause. A teacher, for example, is not allowed to tell students to make sure their parents vote a certain way.

But it's OK for a teacher to discuss the merits of a tax increase and give an opinion.

I have yet to hear of a report from students where teachers have discussed the pros and cons of either parts of the budget or of the budget as a whole. In general, they simply point to the good things that are in the budget without any consideration of what has been left out or of the better things that could be substituted for the good things, and assert that the good things are sufficient justification for supporting the budget. In doing this, they rarely fail to make an appeal to the students' self-interests, completely ignoring the possibility that the highest self-interests of students is examining the big picture rather than their immediate wants. "If the budget is adopted, what impact will that have on college costs? On job growth? On funding for the elderly and the poor? On access to health care services? Is the trend in school spending advantageous to the long-run health of the community? Does the budget include the services that will maximize future student success in education and in life?" I haven't hear of any teachers discussing these in an objective manner that explores alternatives. Yet, that's precisely what a "teacher" would do and that's precisely what's in the best interests of students, both in fact and in learning how to think and become a responsible citizen.

The key question, according to the Office of Campaign and Political Finance, is whether the activity is really geared toward influencing voters.

The agency investigates about a dozen complaints a year, Kennedy said. Rarely, he said, does the agency find that a local official knowingly violated the law.

But, he said, there are cases where the agency will rule that a community improperly used public resources to influence voters. The most common examples: distributing literature via a mass mailing or stuffing materials in children's backpacks.

''The prohibition applies not to the speech, not to the position being taken by officials, but in some cases by the means that information is disseminated," Kennedy said.

The penalties, however, are minimal. Activists who campaign against tax increases see that as a significant problem because, they say, officials and parents, knowing that the penalties are light, will cross legal barriers to promote their cause.

Exactly. Should a citizen in New York choose to spend thousands of dollars in attorney fees to challenge a school district's budget advocacy and win, the most that will happen is the Commissioner of Education will tell the school district not to do that again. That's it. No revote. No fine. No probation with observation.

''They usually do what they can until someone complains," said Barbara Anderson, director of the statewide group Citizens for Limited Taxation. ''It's an old expression: 'It's easier to apologize than ask permission.' "

Two years ago, according to town officials in Ashland, School Committee members were told by town counsel that they needed to reimburse the town after using public funds to print a pro-tax increase flier that was distributed in the local newspaper.

''People, in their zeal to do the absolute best for their children, will break the law," said John Ellsworth, a member of the Board of Selectmen. ''There is no malice in it. It just happens."

Are they really doing the best for their children when they do this? Beyond that, is it the children educators are concerned about or their jobs and the size of the paychecks? See, Reasonable reforms would control school costs.

Kennedy said the Office of Campaign and Political Finance investigated the city of Newton four years ago following complaints that school officials were illegally campaigning during public meetings for a additional public funding.

But the agency found no wrongdoing, stating that there was no prohibition on political speech in public buildings.

Opponents of the successful $11.5 million override in 2002 also contended that some school officials were sending home biased information with students.

''Newton is the king of all election misconduct," said Brian Camenker, vice president of the Newton Taxpayers Association, who said his children were told by teachers that they would lose their jobs if voters didn't approve the tax boost. ''They basically came home thinking I was this bad guy because I was against it."

The issue has come up recently in Bridgewater, which will vote on a $2.2 million override next month. Bridgewater Selectwoman Mary Beth Lawton, who is against the tax increase, said that students are being used as ''mules," and she believes information being sent home with them is worded deliberately to highlight the importance of approving the measure.

Parents have complained to me about the same misconduct in S-G. Children use class time to do projects to take home to parents that promote "yes" votes on school budgets. These projects never reveal objective and comprehensive thinking. They reveal indoctrination and appeals to self-intrests, which are exactly the opposite of what it means to be a teacher.

Less than a week before Winchester residents voted down a $3.75 million override this spring, John Natale said he was angry after finding a note in his fifth-grade daughter's backpack detailing the dramatic cuts that would occur if he didn't vote for it.

These "dramatic cuts" are always "possible" cuts, but frequently sold as inevitable cuts. Educators simply pick the services that give them the most political leverage and say, "If the budget fails, these will be cut." Some say, "These could be cut," but in the absence of a list of possible cuts with smaller impacts on student learning, the message is the same. In reality, when districts are forced to make cuts, the most damaging cuts are avoided. Yet, the most damaging cuts are what educators use to leverage "yes" votes.

''They have free access to 400 free couriers to prosyletize the school message to pass the override or else," Natale said.

Municipal officials, knowing how sensitive they have to be, say addressing overrides as a public official can be tricky.

''It's become a Catch-22," said Selectman David Teller of Ashland. ''You want to get the information out so people can make a logical choice, but as a town official you are strapped by the channel you can use to get the information out."

Kennedy said he found that most public officials were being too careful, stating that, as long as public resources are not used, they are free to voice their opinions.

Why should educators be free to voice their biased and self-interested opinions on school budgets to captive classrooms of students with whom they've built a trusting relationship? It's unprofessional and unethical, especially in the elementary grades where the practice is probably most prevalent.

''I oftentimes find school officials who are overly cautious, saying 'I haven't told people how they should vote on an override,' " Kennedy said. ''Well, I say go ahead, knock yourself out. Just don't do a mailing."

In Medway, Lynch said he gave no biased information and never raised the possibility that the high school could lose its accreditation. What he did tell students, he said, was that the tax increase was being requested because there was not enough money in the school budget.

Is that an "honest" answer, or does it reflect a narrow and biased interpretation of reality?

As long as Lynch only answered questions and did not advocate a position, he did nothing wrong, Kennedy said.

Medway Superintendent Arthur Bettencourt, who met with Anderson earlier this month, said it was unclear whether there was any wrongdoing, but he apologized to Anderson anyway. Bettencourt said he would clarify what is appropriate behavior for school officials in teachers' handbooks for the fall.

Anderson said he wants to make sure it's not just swept under the rug. But he also said that he was pleased with the superintendent's response.

''I am going to be watching carefully . . . it seems that they're taking action," Anderson said. ''I would give it a B."

BY STEVE PATTERSON / Chicago Sun-Times Staff Reporter

The mother of an eighth-grade student is suing the Chicago Public Schools, seeking to force the system to let her daughter graduate to the ninth grade.

Ana Accove filed suit Monday in Cook County Circuit Court. She wants her daughter Juliana to be allowed to graduate with the rest of her classmates at the Newberry Math and Science Academy, 700 W. Willow.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Grades & Grading Policy
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

Juliana, the suit claims, is an above-average student, but is being denied the promotion to high school because she failed to pass the Iowa Test of Basic Skills.

But graduation is set for Wednesday and school officials are standing by their policy of denying graduation to anyone who doesn't score a passing grade on the test.

"We began this policy several years ago because we believed people were socially promoting kids, sending them all the way through without properly preparing them for the next grade," CPS spokesman Peter Cunningham said.

"Since we passed that policy, performance is up dramatically across the system.

"We stand by that policy."

Here's the problem. The parent thinks everything is fine because the grades are good. Then, WHAMMO! No graduation. And no opportunity for the parent to help the child along because the teacher was giving out inappropriate grades. If other professionals did that to their clients, they could expect to pay hefty damages in a lawsuit. This really stinks. What parent would voluntarily submit their children to conditions like this?

Imagine taking your child to Dentist A for years, who never finds a cavity. Then, upon taking your child to Dentist B, you learn your child has a mouthful of cavities. Dentist A would be banned from the profession.

In schools designed for The 21st Century Student, no child would finish the 8th-grade curriculum and be unable to pass the IOWA test. That's because every student must demonstrate mastery of every lesson before taking the next lesson. It may take the student 5 years to get through all the materials through 8th-grade, or 10 years. It really doesn't matter. In 21st Century Schools, quality is constant and time is variable--precisely the opposite of today's schools.

Accove, who identified herself in the suit as administrator of an abstinence education program for the State of Illinois, pointed to her daughter's history of average-to-above-average grades, as well as an Individualized Education Plan, which provided no prior indications that her daughter was not on track to graduate with her class.

The 14-year-old's report card was attached to the lawsuit, as was the IEP and a report on her grades at a previous private school. Also attached was a chronology provided by her mother, who did not hire an attorney for the suit.

Last week, she said, her daughter and two other Newberry students were called in for a meeting with principal Renaud Beaudoin, assistant principal Linda Foley-Acevedo and the school's case manager, Rita Ross, where they were told they wouldn't graduate.

Accove appealed the decision to area instructional officer Emil DeJulio, it claims, to no avail. Saturday, the appeal was denied, leading to Monday's lawsuit.

Accove did not return calls for comment Monday evening.

A Gazette Editorial



See, also, Teacher draws heat for Reagan remarks.

What's wrong with this picture? A Shenendehowa High School teacher is in hot water for bad-mouthing former President Ronald Reagan during a moment of silence ordered in homeroom by Principal Robert Melia. School officials suggest that her remarks violated district policy against staffers politicking in school and might punish her.

The teacher's indiscretion isn't just about disobedience to prohibitions on politicking. It's about courtesy, respect, empathy, temperance, leadership, dignity and tolerance. It's about decorum and exemplifying proper conduct during a moment of reflection upon the loss of life.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Character Education
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

Perhaps the teacher exercised poor judgment in using the moment of silence to disparage the former president's policies a discussion afterward would have been a more appropriate time to express her opinions, which she is entitled to. (And it's hardly making a political endorsement to talk, pro or con, about a dead president.)

Perhaps it's poor judgment to disparage a dead person's life during a moment of reflection about that life and the family's grief? On what planet did the Gazette learn etiquette?

The teacher has a right to discuss Reagan's policies? I would rather think she has a duty to stick to the curriculum. While a policy discussion might be appropriate in some classes, it certainly isn't necessary. Such discussions can be held in homes and other places. Just because a school doesn't do it doesn't mean students don't have other opportunities for learning.

But if the district thinks what she did amounted to a political endorsement, wasn't the principal's call for an observance much the same?

Are you kidding? A moment of silence upon the passing of former presidents can't be held without being a political endorsement? That's rubbish. One can recognize the need to grieve the loss of a life regardless of the decedent's politics.

While millions of Americans loved Reagan, acclaim for him was by no means universal. He was a controversial, highly political figure long before he was elected president, and his policies and remarks as president rubbed some people the wrong way. Unionized workers - and the teacher presumably is one - never forgave Reagan for busting the air traffic controllers' union, for example.

Yes. Does that mean its an unrealistic burden for them to keep their mouths shut for one minute? Surely, even those who disagreed with Reagan can have some empathy for his family and some compassion over his passing.

And so it is understandable that a teacher might have strong feelings about Reagan, and take offense at being asked to honor him.

I hardly think a moment of silence is the equivalent of honoring someone. Even if it is, are schools so offense-free that even moments of silence for the dead are to be banned? How offended should someone be by sacrificing a minute of their life's time during a moment of silence for someone they didn't particularly like?

Unfortunately, school board members, the teachers union president, even town Supervisor Philip Barrett have expressed shock over her words (which she has apologized for), and school officials are threatening to punish her. That would be a serious overreaction. All she was guilty of was being disrespectful and rude.

She was disrespectful and rude during a time set aside for mourning! More than that, she disrupted that time and students have been charged criminally for disrupting schools for engaging in misconduct as trivial as cafeteria food fights.

Would the Gazette have students and staff making snide remarks during a moment of silence upon the passing of former president Clinton? Should a moment of silence for former governor Cuomo be usurped by those who disliked him and turned into a platform for dissent?

This is ridiculous. Of course the teacher must be disciplined for setting a poor example of behavior, not for her opinions about Reagan.  This is--as teachers are fond of saying in such circumstances--a teachable moment.

Kristi Haunfelder, Lake Country (WI) Reporter staff writer

Pewaukee School District ­- The Pewaukee School District, or any school district, needs to balance the school's obligation to maintain an environment where all can learn and its students' right to free speech, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

The ACLU of Wisconsin released a statement in response to Pewaukee High School prohibiting senior Tyler Schultz's picture in the yearbook because it portrayed him holding his trapshooting shotgun with a Confederate flag in the background.

"Having a photo included in a school publication with a gun and a Confederate flag isn't necessarily inappropriate or to be forbidden, but the student doesn't have an absolute right to have his image in the school yearbook, either," said Chris Ahmuty, executive director of the ACLU in Milwaukee.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Students' Rights
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

"We did not consult with the ACLU prior to making the decision to ask Tyler Schultz to offer another picture for the Pewaukee High School yearbook," said JoAnn Sternke, superintendent for the Pewaukee School District.

"We did, however, consult with the legal counsel for the school district, who advised us that weapons or images of the Confederate flag are not something we must endorse or condone in the school environment," Sternke said. Weapons, by law and school policy, are not allowed on school property.

"As the yearbook is representative of the school and a publication of Pewaukee High School, it is, by its very nature, an extension of the school and school district," Sternke said.

"Therefore, it is reasonable for the school and school district to regulate the messages that the school sends via our publications," Sternke said.

While Ahmuty acknowledged the editorial power and responsibility of a school in a school publication, he stated that restrictions may be tolerated only when they are employed to forestall events that would clearly endanger the health or safety of members of the school community or clearly and imminently disrupt the educational process.

"Neither the faculty advisers nor the principal should prohibit the inclusion of material for publication except when such publication would clearly endanger the health or safety of the students, or clearly and imminently threaten to disrupt the educational process," Ahmuty said.

"The school really has to go through an analysis," Ahmuty said.

The district would need to look at race relations and the racial diversity of the district and past incidents of racial tension, he explained.

"Apparently, Tyler had earlier worn some T-shirts (with the Confederate flag), and there was no problem," Ahmuty said. "Tyler asked a couple of African-American students in the school, 'have you got a problem with this?' and they said they didn't because 'we know you, Tyler.' "

If a school had a history of problems, that school would certainly be justified in prohibiting that expression, "not because it's offensive, but because it disrupted the educational environment. That's something that a school should look at before making its decision," Ahmuty said.

Ahmuty drew a distinction, however, if the school requested students to include in their photos items that identified their personalities, which Schultz said PHS did in this case.

"The constitutionality of the school's actions in Pewaukee come down to two factual questions," Ahmuty said. One is if the school has a history of racial tension that justifies administrators' concerns and the other is if the school opened up the yearbook to personal expression.

"If the first question is answered in the affirmative, then the school, according to recent court decisions, can restrict images of the Confederate flag or guns. If the first question is answered in the negative and the second in the affirmative, then the school has no business refusing to accept a photo, even if it is offensive," Ahmuty said.

Although the ACLU issued a statement about the situation at PHS, there are no plans to take any kind of legal action.

Ahmuty said the district could allow the photo in the yearbook, but also print a disclaimer saying the school does not condone the viewpoints portrayed in the pictures.

"It's not contradictory for them (the school) to (have students express themselves) and yet go on and say we want everyone in our school to know that his does not represent the view of the school and we're doing whatever we can to instill good civic values," Ahmuty said.

Ahmuty did not believe that such a disclaimer would harm the student making the expression.

"If a student is going to engage in controversial speech, they should expect people to react," he said.

Schultz and his mother, Tammy Ankomeus, stated they understood how someone could misconstrue the photo but that it was not an expression of intolerance.

The mother and son were upset because they submitted the photo in October and were not told it was unacceptable until May 26.

According to Sternke, PHS Principal Marty Van Hulle determines the appropriateness of items for the yearbook, but the photo was not brought to his attention until May 26.

Suppose Tyler wore an armed forces uniform while holding a gun in front of the American flag? Same result? Would the school have banned the picture?

Wonder if he had worn a Boy Scout uniform while holding a gun, a shooting target and a merit badge for shooting? What result then?

Suppose he had worn a confederate uniform, held a gun, and displayed the confederate flag, but the picture was taken at a re-enactment of an historical civil war battle? Banned or not?

What if there were no gun but just the confederate flag? What result?



How about no gun and this flag?


Mississippi State Flag

Finally, suppose he had dressed up like a colonist from the Revolutionary War, held a musket and displayed the following flag? (See this article.) Picture in or out?



Banning Tyler's picture is just good old-fashioned censorship brought to you by the sensitivities of the politically correct and people who care more about their jobs and getting along with others than a few words about free speech in some old constitution.

And now, here's Tyler's picture. WARNING: THE FOLLOWING IMAGE MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS. IT HAS BEEN DEEMED INAPPROPRIATE FOR INCLUSION IN A HIGH SCHOOL YEAR BOOK, WHICH MEANS NO HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT SHOULD VIEW IT. PLEASE CLOSE YOUR EYES IF YOU'RE UNDER 18. SCROLL DOWN AT YOUR OWN RISK.

By Richard Chapleau / Washington Post

It's been an average day in a regular week in the middle of a typical year. I got off the phone about an hour ago with another parent in denial. At snack, the usual six or eight of us complained about today's crisis. After school, I read the latest administration e-mail on something I can't control that is still my fault.

It's hard not to become a curmudgeon in this environment of distrust and blame, and I often lose sight of the dreams I had of watching young minds see new worlds in my classroom. If they'd just let me be Emperor of Education, I could straighten out the whole mess.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Education Reform & Learning Standards
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

Why can't I change things? Why does it seem like "Up the Down Staircase" was written yesterday? I've heard the same reasons every time I've sat down with a group of my colleagues. The teacher unions are too strong. The administration won't listen to new ideas. The parents think we're supposed to call them daily with updates on their little darlings.

The reason I hear most often, though, whether from teacher, administrator, or someone I meet socially who learns I'm a teacher, is that the kids are too lazy, and just don't care. If I were emperor, I'd show them that all these ideas are wrong.

Essentially correct. However, rather than saying all the ideas are wrong, I'd say there are more important factors affecting education quality and that when it comes to student laziness, the system breeds it.

My first two imperial acts would be to fire one-third of American teachers and then to give every parent a one-question quiz.

There you have it. Based on other reports, it seems that 25% to 33% of teachers aren't doing the job.

I'd fire the teachers who have stopped trying in their rooms, who use their training and intellect to belittle the kids. There's no place in our schools for teachers who pass out endless worksheets or show non-stop videos. I'm a proud member of two unions, mind you: the California Teachers Association and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (from a former career). Unions were not designed to protect the incompetent workers, but instead were designed to protect workers from incompetent bosses. We built the strongest middle class in the world in the last century because of unions, but now are in danger of losing the middle class, also because of unions.

You simply can't address what is fundamentally wrong in education without addressing what is wrong with education unions. Bonus points to Richard for making the politically incorrect point.

Next, every parent of a two-year old would have a one-question quiz, and they'd all have to take it at the same instant. I know too much about cheating, of course. The question would be "One Fish, Two Fish." Any parent who didn't write "Red Fish, Blue Fish" would be required to sign a Universal Release of Liability and Parental Promise Not to Whine Statement. A parent who can't spout Dr. Seuss or Mother Goose, but who can name 10 movie stars, pro sports players or rock idols is ruining their child's future.

Frankly, I didn't know the answer. Children's literature is my wife's forte. On the other hand, I can't name many movie stars, rock idols or sports stars, either. But his point is sound. Parents are educators but most of them don't act like it. The core problem here is that all the adults in most households work outside the home. It decreases learning opportunities between parent and child and depletes the energy available to fulfill the teaching role.

They can't give their children the first four years of life in an impoverished educational environment, then expect the schools to fix all of their mistakes. A parent is the first and most important teacher their children will ever know, but most parents never spend that magical time with their child on the sofa. The TV is off, the book is open, and their child is captured for life by the rhythm of a nursery rhyme. Four years watching reruns or ball games hardwires the future student to expect entertainment, not education, from 12 years of school.

Yes and no. There is hardwiring going on in the brain, though. Research has shown that the brains of students get wired differently when they "interface" more with technology than with nature and working with their hands. That's not to say they become less capable learners. It is to say that they become less capable learners in a system designed for children whose brains were wired differently. What teachers need to do is learn how to take advantage of children's brains in the way they are wired rather than keep beating their own brains out trying to reform children's brains to fit the system they work in.

As important as parental attention to learning is in the early years, Richard doesn't tell us how to get parents more involved. Turn off the TV. Pick up the book. That kind of advice ain't goin' change nuthin. What has the potential to get more parents more deeply involved with learning during the early years is developing an online curriculum with online books and online games for ages 1 through 4 and making it available to every household with children. The "curriculum" should include lessons that pull parents and children into learning, not push them.

The cost for doing this would be far lower than the alternatives being proposed by public schools. Plus there's an invaluable added benefit: children will have learning relationships with their parents. That doesn't happen when the state takes control. It's all part of teaching The 21st Century Student.

And here's another benefit/incentive for parents and children: When children formally start school they will start at the level at which they are at. If your child is reading on a first-grade level, then s/he starts with first-grade reading. There'll be no more of placing children in classes that meet the system's needs rather than the student's needs.

My last act as emperor is the only one I know could really be achieved in the "real world" I hear so much about. I would take teacher evaluation away from administrators. Who is in charge of the American Bar Association? Attorneys. Who runs the AMA? Physicians. Who watches the teachers? People who haven't been in a classroom in many years. Administrators, criminally overworked administrators. They must watch hundreds of students, tens of secretaries and custodians, and also a few dozen teachers. Guess who takes up most of their time? The children who spent four years watching videos. Yet, these same harried administrators are also asked to give clinical input into the skills of classroom teachers.

Every teacher in the country could give you a list of who's pulling their weight and who should go to the emperor for a final paycheck. Teacher evaluations should be done by working teachers, in a manner similar to professors at most American universities. Professors take turns on some sort of "faculty review committee," where they check each other for professionalism, for commitment to learning new ideas, and for doing their jobs well. I hear many people complain about our public schools, but I still notice that people flock from all over the world to attend our universities. Perhaps it's at least partly because no university dean or provost sits in a professor's classroom for one hour every two years and calls that evaluation.

Improving teacher evaluation processes won't improve public education much. Here, Richard steers off course.

Bodie is a ghost town in northern California. You must drive up into the Sierra Nevada, then turn off the major freeway and go down a dirt road for several miles. You come to an old collection of buildings in a town at an elevation over 8,000 feet. There's an abandoned schoolhouse there that bills itself as the highest in the country. You can tell that no one's taught there for the better part of a hundred years.

Still, I'll bet I could walk in that room and teach a class tomorrow. Neat rows of chairs, a teacher's desk up front, a chalkboard, and some maps. The flag in a corner. If I were Emperor of Education, classrooms would change, just like the rest of the world has done while we were all so busy blaming each other for what went wrong in education.

Back on track . . . almost. It's not that classrooms need changing, they need to be eliminated for all but a few courses and students. More than anything Richard mentions, the system of public education limits the quality and quantity of education provided. Schools must be designed to teach The 21st Century Student in ways that better match the wiring of students' brains.

The alarm went off, so I can wake up now, and go back to another average day in a regular week in a typical year. Sadly, dreams are for those of us who can also tell you who Sam I Am is, and I must face a group of teenagers who only know about Kobe.

By David Wheat / Originally published in the Fort Collins Coloradoan on May 25, 2004

• More articles by David Wheat

Here's an educational riddle: What's more important in math class than doing actual math? The answer follows.

Recently, my eighth-grade son completed his math homework, turned it in on time and received a nice fat zero for his efforts. He hadn't gotten every answer wrong. Worse, he'd made a mistake that superceded two pages of geometry work -- he hadn't written his name on his paper. Automatic zero, no questions asked.

The reason? That's his math teacher's "policy" (which she changed mid-year). No name, no grade, no recourse. (In her reply to my e-mail about the issue, the teacher addressed me as "Ms. Whest." Applying her own standard, I gave her a zero for misspelling my name and impugning my manhood.)

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Grades & Grading Policy
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

Should a student be expected to put his name on his paper? Absolutely, and I told my son so. And should there be a consequence for leaving his name off of assignments? Of course. But receiving the same grade for an administrative lapse as you would for blowing off the homework altogether is a case of the punishment not fitting the crime.

Names are needed on papers not to teach responsibility, but to make the grading process efficient. Missing names interrupt that process slightly, so there should be a correspondingly slight penalty (a full letter-grade deduction should suffice). Completed schoolwork should always trump a teacher's desire for a tidy grading process.

By this point in the year the teacher probably recognizes the student's handwriting, too.

Here's another riddle: When is there no excuse for an excused absence? Read on.

My other son is a sophomore. His math teacher gives two points a day for "participation" -- one point for simply showing up for class and one for having your textbook. (I question whether it makes sense to give points just for coming to class. Imagine getting a $10 bonus for appearing at work every day.)

Problem is, the teacher doesn't give the points when you're not in class, even if the absence was excused. So when my son had surgery and was out for several days, he actually lost points. He also lost points for orthodontic appointments and after suffering a concussion at track practice.

The topper was when another class (band) required him to miss school for a regional competition. A mandatory requirement in one class cost him points in another. Presto, change-o! Excused becomes unexcused when a teacher decides that's how it will be in his private little teaching world.

The teacher offers a nonsensical make-up plan for the points that borders on punitive. A student can sit in on any of the teacher's other classes to make up the lost time. It doesn't have to be the subject they're currently enrolled in, and they don't even have to work on math -- just park your rump in his room for 3,600 seconds and you get your two points back. This is what the teacher calls "fair." It's what I call "silly" and "arbitrary."

The real riddle is why teachers are allowed to craft personal grading policies that undergo no review or approval and that aren't governed by any district policies. That's an invitation for some teachers to codify their pet peeves and idiosyncracies. (I found examples from other districts of teachers who give automatic zeros for using the wrong color of ink or for paper "torn from a spiral notebook with the frilly edges hanging off.")

The board of education probably is too busy chasing fickle superintendent candidates and huddling with their lawyers to address an issue as mundane as capricious grading policies. Until they do, it's up to us parents to enforce our policy of zero tolerance for those teachers who omit common sense from their work.

David Wheat lives in Fort Collins.

Any alert parent can find lots of examples like this. Much of this nonsense would go away in schools that teach The 21st Century Student.

A Corollary to The Root Cause of Education Mediocrity
By ELISSA GOSS / Houston Chronicle



''OH, my God! You're sooo smart!"

"Dude, you're, like, a superwhiz."

These remarks are a few of the many I receive from my fellow classmates when they see that I have gotten an A, while they got a big, honking F.

After the news gets around that most of the kids in class have failed the assignment, the complaints start rolling.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Character Education
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

"The teacher hates me!"

"This was too hard!"

"The assignment was sooo stupid!" And the all-time favorite, "I can't do it because I am stupid."

The fact is, most of the kids in my class are far from wavering on the stupid side. Many of them, when they apply themselves, are actually capable of getting good grades. They just don't apply themselves.

It has become fashionable among my peers for them to fail. When the teacher hands them back a paper with a low grade, they proudly puff their chests out, put their papers in the air, and exclaim, "Guess what? I failed!" and the class will erupt with laughter mixed with remarks such as, "Me, too!" and "I'm so stupid!"

All that Elissa reports is produced by the system. It's a consequence of what's happening in the system. How?

First, there's an advantage to being stupid in school. It gets you more time, more resources, more attention, more positive strokes and more empathy. All for doing less work.

Second, being stupid causes a slow down in the pace of learning in the classroom. Less to learn means less work. If students happen to have a teacher with enough self-discipline not to slow the pace of learning, then being stupid gets you by with less work because many teachers are highly resistant to flunking students who regularly show up for class.

Third, most students learn that doing your best academically simply doesn't get you very far. There's no extrinsic reward for it. You don't get to finish your courses earlier. You don't get to enroll in college courses in high school. You don't spend less time in class. Putting forth minimum effort gets you about the same thing as putting forth maximum effort except your name will be left off the honor roll. Big deal.

Fourth, the self-esteem school of education has indoctrinated teachers to praise all work, regardless of its quality. Students become conditioned to believe that their work is much better than it really is. In the early years, they receive praise for work requiring little effort. The come to believe that good work requires little effort.

Fifth, educators love to label students, then they react to them as if they are those labels. Being stupid is a label educators react to. Consequently, some kids recognize this and glorify their status. There's a benefit to it.

There are other forces at work, but without the positive reinforcement provided by schools, the badge of stupidity would soon disappear.

Elissa Goss, the 14-year-old writer, has seen the light. She lives in the cave, but she is telling you the cave isn't reality. That's her message.

When they talk abut how stupid they are, they're smiling. My peers smile as if grades are one big game and by failing, they're winning.

Oh! Grades are a game. That's what teaching to the test and endless hours of test preparation for state exams are all about. Students are nothing if not perceptive. They may not understand why they have their perceptions, but they have them and they are generally accurate. Teachers communicate daily that its more important to create the illusion of successful learning by focusing on grades than it is to become an educated person. The grades-as-games philosophy comes directly from the teachers. And, as pointed out above, failing has its rewards.

In schools designed for The 21st Century Student, grades would be irrelevant and failing would have negative consequences, not positive ones. Failing would mean slowing your pace through the curriculum and having less time to do what you want to do. If you don't demonstrate mastery at the end of each lesson, you do it again. And the amount of learning required doesn't decrease because it's fixed. There's no classroom of students to be held back while you get your act together. Other students are moving on, or attending seminars, or playing sports, or relaxing while you are redoing your lesson. Other students will be taking college courses while you are still working on 6th-grade math. The incentive structure completely changes from one that rewards procrastination to one that rewards steady progress at the student's optimal rate of learning.

Then, after the excitement of "winning" has died down, they eventually get around to glancing at my paper and exclaim, "How in the world did you do that?"

The answer to their question is simple: I didn't procrastinate.

Students today are getting into the habit of waiting until the last minute to do their work and saying to themselves: "If I pass, great. If I don't pass, oh, well. I will just talk to the teacher, and if that doesn't work, I'll let loose my secret weapon — The Parent."

Resorting to The Parent is rarely necessary. It's simply easier for the teacher to forgive the bad work than it is to uphold a standard. In 21st Century Schools, teachers don't have an incentive to excuse bad work because requiring the student to repeat it doesn't make their jobs more difficult.

Then they will fail. They will blame it on any factor other than their lack of planning ahead. What these kids aren't realizing is that in the real world, you can't just say, "Oh, well."

Imagine what will happen to procrastinators when it comes to paying a mortgage. With a mortgage, you pay a certain amount of money at a certain time of the month, and if you don't pay on time, you get a warning and a late fee.

If you keep missing the due date, you will eventually get a foreclosure on your house and bad credit. Along with bad credit, you will also get a big bad stack of late fees.

The same consequences also go with a job deadline. If you don't do your job correctly and on time, you get a warning. And if you keep procrastinating, you will get fired. Then how are you going to pay the mortgage that is already late?

It's the light coming into the cave. Only people with tenure can get away with a fair amount of procrastination. Perhaps that explains why educators are willing to forgive it.

Students need to learn to plan ahead and stop procrastinating, because in the real world, you can't call on Mommy when you fail.

Goss, age 14, recently graduated from Clear Lake Intermediate School.

By Kimberly Miller, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Florida's public school superintendents failed in their underground revolt against the president's No Child Left Behind Act earlier this year, but a new lobbying group using Florida's teachers as spokesmen took up arms Wednesday against the sweeping education reform law -- just months away from the November election.

The group, Citizens for Quality Education, debuted nationwide television ads criticizing the 1,100-page law passed in 2002 that requires all public school students to be performing on grade level by 2014 regardless of race, disability, or newness to the country.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Educators Posing as Neutral Citizens
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

During the past 10 years, educators have worked to conceal their lobbying and advocacy by creating websites and groups that create the illusion of being run by neutral citizens. It's like if I start a myshortpencil fan club but you don't know it's me who is running it.

All of these groups take on issues that have the happy coincidence of increasing educators' political, wealth and power objectives. Educators point to the groups as bolstering their own opinions. They use them to make themselves look bigger than they are, though with over 3.5 million active educators, as a group, they are one of the biggest in America. There are only 1 million lawyers.

Society is slowly being transformed to a state that is run by and for the educators. Their "needs" are increasing met while others go wanting. It's a consequence of power. If minimum wage workers were allowed to organize by pay status rather than by industry, you'd find they would be getting inflation-busting raises, too.

An educator-run state might not be so bad except educators don't know what's best for education and they seldom display the attributes of educated people--adherence to the golden mean and putting other people's needs before their own. By the time citizens realize what is happening it will be too late to do anything about it.

Schools that consistently miss goals set by each state must provide transportation to better-rated public schools, pay for tutoring, and ultimately could face state takeover.

The ads are being aired in Florida, Arizona, Ohio and Nevada, with an emphasis on the Sunshine State, where the group says there is a disparity between Gov. Jeb Bush's education reform plan and President Bush's.

Last year 84 percent of Florida's schools failed to meet standards under the federal law, even as the Florida Department of Education was touting that more schools than ever -- 48 percent -- had earned A grades under Gov. Bush's "A-Plus" education plan.

"There is such a conflict between these two assessments," said Damien Filer, a spokesman for Citizens for Quality Education. "Lots of folks are very proud they are an A school, and then they are told they are a failing school by the federal government."

Here we see an example of overstatement. The federal law does not say every aspect of the school is failing. It says a portion of the school is failing, generally as it pertains to one demographic group. However, if you don't like the law, it's just too easy to skip over the details and paint the whole school with a broad stroke and then condemn the law for doing what it does not do! I remind you, this is being done by so-called educated people. It's pathetic.

Filer would not say how much the 30-second ads cost the newly formed group, which is supported by the National Education Association and the Florida Education Association.

See. Thank goodness this newspaper did the work to find out who is pulling the strings.

Florida officials have maintained that the two plans work in tandem, with Florida's system measuring a school's overall performance and learning gains, while the federal program pinpoints specific areas that need improvement.

Right.

"These groups should be applauding the education achievements and great strides Florida has made instead of criticizing high standards and accountability," said MacKay Jimeson, spokesman for the Florida Department of Education.

Florida education officials debuted a new school report card Wednesday they hope will help parents understand how their child can attend an A school, but that doesn't make standards under No Child Left Behind. The report card will be available after school grades are issued June 15.

That's a good thing, provided it's accurate.

Because each state was able to create its own standards in meeting the federal law, there is no way to compare one state with another, and some states set the bar lower.

* * * *

Test scores prove the model works for young teenagers, proponents said.
By Leslie Postal / Orlando Sentinel Staff Writer

After decades of packing young adolescents into middle schools, some educators now think these hormonal, mercurial creatures would learn more in the sort of school their great-grandparents likely attended.

Old-fashioned, kindergarten-to-eighth-grade schools are being touted nationwide as a way to improve lackluster achievement among today's middle-schoolers. Their relatively small size and elementary-school atmosphere, some argue, make them better places for many 11- to 14-year-olds.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on the Middle School Model & Alternatives
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

"Kindergarten and first-grade teachers know eighth-grade students by name," said Paige Tracy, principal of Arbor Ridge School in Orange County, one of a half-dozen K-8 schools in Central Florida. "There's that environment of genuine nurturing and caring."

Middle schools are the norm in Florida -- hundreds have been built in the past 30 years. But K-8 schools have cropped up in recent years in Orlando, St. Cloud, Miami and Tampa, among other places.

Students in these schools often outscore their middle-school peers on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test. In Orange County, eighth-graders at the three K-8 schools outperformed eighth-graders at all other middle schools on reading and math this year.

K-8 schools also appeal to parents, who often fear large middle schools are incubators for bad behavior.

* * *

Skeptics warn that shuffling students to newly configured schools won't solve more-fundamental problems plaguing the education of America's middle-grade students. They say older students can benefit from the electives and extracurricular activities typically found in middle schools, and that the middle-school age is a unique one that doesn't always meld well with younger students.

"The K-8 [option] sometimes looks like an appealing button to push," said Sue Swaim, executive director of the National Middle School Association. "It begins to look like a magic button, and it's not."

Right. The fundamental problem with education is the system. K-8 schools may make the system work a little better, but they still suffer from the limitations and deficiencies of the current system. The 21st Century Student needs a different system. Investing in K-8 schools is an "investment" in the current system, which has repeatedly demonstrated an inability to dramatically improve education outcomes despite massive increases in spending.

Still, some state officials say it's time for Florida to look seriously at the K-8 model, especially as it embarks this year on middle-grade reforms prompted by the slow-to-improve test scores in grades six to eight.

This year, for example, only 50 percent of Florida's middle-school students could read at grade level, compared with 65 percent of its elementary-school students, FCAT results show.

* * *

Orange County officials studied K-8 schools last year, concluding their three schools yielded better test scores, higher attendance rates and fewer discipline problems for middle-grade children than middle schools with similar demographics. K-8 schools in Miami and Philadelphia had similar results.

* * *

"There's no doubt about the success of the K-8s," said Rick Roach, an Orange County School Board member. "But it's just too expensive."

Right. It's time to stop pouring more money into a system that cannot produce academic excellence and cannot improve the skills of slower students without sacrificing the needs of talented students.

* * *

Despite some drawbacks, such as limited extracurricular offerings, Darden thinks the benefits outweigh them. Her son, who just finished ninth grade, started high school "very well-prepared."

Massive extracurricular offerings in middles schools may actually detract from academic preparation.

* * *

Ken McEwin, a professor of middle-grades education at Appalachian State University in North Carolina, recently surveyed officials at more than 100 K-8 schools nationwide. He didn't find support for a mass conversion to K-8 schools.

Only 14 percent of the K-8 principals surveyed thought middle-grade students belonged in K-8 schools, McEwin said, and a majority thought a middle school was the best place for them.

That reflects resistance to change and the bias in favor of middle schools taught and learned in college by teachers and administrators.

"What we really need to do," McEwin said, "is make our middle schools better."

And that means redesigning the schools to teach The 21st Century Student.

* * *

Local K-8 principals say the schools aren't right for everyone. Some students need the sports, music and other middle-school offerings.

Sounds like an argument for school choice.

But for many students, a small school where they are well-known is what they need most -- and the key to improved academics.

"It's more of a community," said Polly Roper, Blankner School's principal. "The teachers still care about them, all the way to eighth grade."

Mary Shanklin of the Sentinel staff contributed to this report.

A Times Union Letter to the Editor



Over the years, I have enjoyed the usually on-point, insightful opinions Fred LeBrun offers. The May 21 column, "A lesson in voter anger for schools" stands in marked contrast to that standard. Beyond improperly characterizing voter sentiment, Mr. LeBrun excludes critical aspects from his school budget analysis.

At the outset, clarification is warranted. Voters did support school budgets despite trying circumstances. State Education Department information indicates 85 percent of budgets passed statewide.

TODAY'S BEST OF MYSHORTPENCIL.COM
• SEE A LIST OF THIS WEEK'S COMMENTARIES
• More Stories on Budget Issues
• Compare your salary to any teacher's

Beyond this core flaw, Mr. LeBrun offers an incomplete analysis when he cites Business Council figures claiming school budgets are a runaway train. School budgets have two sides to their balance sheets. Schools face huge uncontrollable cost increases. Pension and health insurance costs are rising at incredible rates.

This is simply untrue. Why? There is no such thing as an "uncontrollable cost increase." Why? People, and only people, agree to the contracts and write the laws that determine how rising costs impact on school budgets. Educators are members of the most powerful union in the world. If they wanted laws and contracts that reduced the impact of costs on school budgets, they could easily get them.

But the truth is, they don't want them. Why? It's not in their economic self-interest. It's better for them to use the political leverage of threatening cuts to student programs as a means for acquiring greater personal wealth than it is to slow the growth of their salaries and benefits to a rate closer to inflation and take the pressure off student programs.

Health insurance costs uncontrollable? In Alaska, school districts agree to contribute a fixed sum to educator health benefits. When health insurance costs spiral upwards, educators pay the increases, not the schools.

Pension costs uncontrollable? In Ohio, educators fund their own pensions. When investment earnings decline, their contributions go up.

Every "uncontrollable cost" has a solution. My question is: What are the superintendents doing to change laws and educator contracts to reduce "uncontrollable costs" from school budgets? The answer is: Almost nothing.

Beyond that, reasonable educators around the nation realize that the advantages for educators built into the system must not be used to produce unreasonable results. Consequently, educators in Newbury and Mentor Ohio, Oregon, Ulster County, New York, Connecticut, Michigan, Arizona, Louisiana and Florida have offered to forego raises, work more days, limit cost of living increases to below the rate of inflation or take pay cuts to protect programs for students and prevent an escalation in taxes.

It's self-serving hypocrisy to tell the public that nothing can be done because costs are uncontrollable.

From 2002-03 to 2003-04, schools faced a 630 percent increase in their contribution rate to the Teachers Retirement System.

Here we have an example of dishonest manipulation of public perception. It's true that schools faced the threat of this increase, but they didn't have to pay it! The governor signed a bill, designed by Comptroller Hevesi, that both deferred the 2003-04 increase and reduced its size for 2004-05.

They face another 125 percent increase in 2004-05. The Employees Retirement System contribution rate is increasing even more rapidly, and health insurance costs are rising at double-digit rates annually.

So? Apply a little private sector self-discipline and create laws and contractual terms that prevent these from adversely impacting on school budgets.

Schools are labor-intensive organizations. Seventy to 80 percent of their budgets are tied up in personnel. Reducing costs almost always means reducing the workforce. School leaders know the worst thing they can do for education is increase class sizes.

This is really bad. First, 80% of school budgets in every state are tied up in personnel. However, education costs are not spiraling out of control in every state. Why? They have laws and contracts that better reflect economic realities. NY spends more per pupil than any state in the nation. Its teachers earn the highest salaries. We have more teachers for our students than all but two other states. In other words, NY education spending and labor size busts national averages while producing near average results on national exams.

And nothing could be further from the truth than proclaiming "the worst thing [educators] can do for education is increase class sizes." Reduced class sizes benefits only about 30% of students while the extraordinary cost for doing it deprives 70% of students of the programs and opportunities that would greatly enhance the value of their educations. See, The Truth About Class Size and Good Teachers + Small Classes = Quality Education.

Mr. LeBrun also offers to "take school board members by the hand" to the gas pumps. Schools need no such hand holding. They witness escalating fuel costs first hand. Mr. LeBrun does not even inquire how increased fuel costs impact Albany or, with its vast fleet of buses, Shenendehowa schools.

Fuel costs can be controlled by making bulk purchases among a consortium of school districts. Moreover, even farmers know how to use the futures market as a hedge against price shocks.

It is amazing school leaders are able to keep budget increases as low as they are this year.

I always love it when people praise themselves for managing problems they are responsible for creating. It's like conspiring to have somebody rob a bank, but calling the police to stop the robbery. People think they should be praised for that.

Finally, perhaps Mr. LeBrun's most egregious omission is his failure to recognize the role the state plays in the school budget process.

Policy-makers in Albany have yet to adopt the state budget -- the source of nearly half (on average) of school budget funds. Nor have they resolved the Campaign for Fiscal Equity case. That case has the potential of bringing not just additional funds but a more equitable, predictable, understandable and sustainable school funding formula to all districts. Until this is done, every school budget is threatened.

No question, the state is far from blameless. While Education Week recognizes funding equity is a problem, it gives New York an A for funding adequacy. We spend more per pupil on education than any state in the nation. Money is not the problem, despite the travesty of justice perpetrated by CFE's greedy grab for more money. School budgets are primarily under threat not from state funding formulas, but from educators who refuse to support reasonable laws and contractual terms designed to reduce the growth in costs to levels closer to the rate of inflation.

DOUGLAS E. GERHARDT
Assistant Director
Council of School Superintendents
Albany