Education Priorities for the Mayoral Candidates-- A Primer for Reading Between the Lines, Part 2

In today’s Daily News, the Mayoral Candidates discuss their priorities for the schools, and education in general. It might be helpful to consider what each candidate is offering as priorities. It might also be helpful to read between the lines to see what they aren’t saying. I’ll try to do both. You can read their responses here.

When you have finished this series of posts, I'd encourage you to head over to the website for each candidate, and explore their thoughts on schools and education. The format for the Daily News article was very confining; each candidate may have more information available at their sites. You can reach Donna Holaday here, and James Shanley is here.

Time on Learning

Time-on-learning is an important issue on a number of levels. Our ability to stay in compliance with the state regulations for teaching time is important. Linked to that will be our ability to retain our accreditation with the agency that accredits schools in the country; that accreditation will be critical to the state’s willingness to fund the school. No certificate, no funding. The candidate correctly identifies the problem, identifies one complication that is currently being considered- the present use of the block schedule. What is lacking is a basic acknowledgement that some this will take funding beyond that currently provided to reintroduce some electives and sections of curriculum.

That theme, funding, will haunt the rest of this assessment. That’s where, for the most part, dear reader, you have to go between the lines.

Superintendent

The Superintendent search is important. Hiring the strongest possible Superintendent should not be controversial; there is a very capable national search firm generating candidates, and a local search committee that will send three of the six applicants forward to the School Committee for their decision. The reputation of this search firm, and our own unfortunate experience with their recruiting Kevin Lyons away from Newburyport is a strong indication that if there is a great candidate out there, we’ll see them.

Perhaps a more telling response might be what one considers a “strong” superintendent; and what kind of a relationship each mayoral candidate feels they should have as mayor with the Superintendent.

Restoring Foreign (World) Language to the Middle School

An important issue. Eight years ago, Newburyport had a World Languages program that was considered a state model. It began in kindergarten, and flowed through high school. We did that because it is research-based conclusion that the younger a child is, the easier it is for a child to become proficient in another language.

Because of budget cuts, we are in the process of eliminating French as an option. We have also cut back our offering of World Languages significantly. For those students currently in the system, they will need to wait until 9th grade to start a language, and they will have very few choices of which language that will be. Of course, in a global economy, and with census projections that the United States will shift to a Hispanic majority well within the lifetime of our currently enrolled students, we are sending Newburyport students out to seek their fame and fortune in the world with a distinct communication disadvantage.

Some of this can be funded grants, and from the support of educational philanthropies. Twice in the last several years the community has turned down a debt exclusion and an override that would have generated funds that were specifically targeted towards restoring World Languages in the schools.

Based on my own experience over the last eight years, restoration of World Languages at a level that provides the minimal opportunity for the greatest number of students will require significant commitment of funds; greater than will be available through grants and philanthropies. But it is a high priority.

The next post will finish with candidate priorities, and offer some questions for readers to consider as they make their choices about which candidate will best address school issues.

Education Priorities for the Mayoral Candidates-- A Primer for Reading Between the Lines

This is a long, long post. I have divided it up into several separate postings; conventional wisdom (something I’ve never ascribed to) says that no one will read a dense, focused article that requires a bathroom break to finish. So, this is the first part.

In today’s Daily News, the Mayoral Candidates discuss their priorities for the schools, and education in general. It might be helpful to consider what each candidate is offering as priorities. It might also be helpful to read between the lines to see what they aren’t saying. I’ll try to do both. You can read their responses here.

I’m not going to pretend that there aren’t other issues affecting the community that deserve attention. There are. I’ve got an enlightened self-interest in this particular topic, though. It is not my intention to publicly support one of the two candidates; I am not going to do that here, or anywhere. There is a Holaday sign at 83 Lime Street, and it reflects the support of my wife for her candidacy. Frankly, it means she has one supporter in the house, and another voter who isn’t saying which candidate gets his vote. If you wander a little farther up Lime Street, there is a house that has both a Shanley and a Holaday sign, so having one voter declare their support and another choose not to isn't so odd. I don’t think that a public declaration of which candidate I intend to vote for adds anything to this discussion, and might actually subtract from a fair consideration of the issues.

I’m offering you a framework for evaluating candidate positions on education issues. You may, and should draw your own conclusions. As far as this mayoral race goes, as a voter, taxpayer, and School Committee member I am interested in some very simple outcomes. Like the election of a mayor who recognizes that the schools represent 45% of the total budget of the city, who understands that a measure of the vitality of the community (and to be mercenary, the ability of a community to hold real estate values high) is the quality of it’s schools. One who understands in a very fundamental way that the quality of a school is comprised of many things- administrative leadership, active parents, thoughtful teachers who feel supported and are able to engage students and teach a challenging and coherent curriculum. I want a mayor who believes that schools are a community asset, and works to engage the entire community in supporting local education. Finally, I’d like to see the election of a mayor who understands this will require that the school and city ensure that the resources and funding it provides are spent efficiently, and ultimately, are ample enough to do the job.

Yeah. Maybe I’m setting the bar pretty high. Using the questions I am suggesting in the above paragraph, and the answers of the two candidates published in today’s Daily News, you can see which candidate will score above the mean. Then go to their websites for those answers that didn’t fit into the Daily News format. Hopefully you’ll find them there; I think they should be there.

Each candidate was asked to set three priorities, so we can look at what those priorities are, or appear to be, and discuss them a little bit.

By my reading, the range of priorities includes time-on-learning at the high school, hiring the strongest superintendent, restoring foreign language at the middle school, working on a budget to present to the City Council (and being the first mayor to actually sit at the negotiating table with school employees in at least the last nine years); implementing and funding the Strategic Plan, doing a school building analysis to make sure the school facilities are up to the task of education, (and establishing good relationships on the state level to get any school capital needs funded). Also included in the list, as a sort of bonus, was a priority encouraging cooperation between the schools and youth services to ensure services are complementary.

I think this is a fair range of issues, and in some cases actual priorities, as far as it goes. Might not have been the three I would have chosen, but I’m not running for mayor. Let’s look at the overarching issues these priorities reflect; after we do that, you can decide whether either candidate, in their artificially shortened response, actually tells you what they will do. After that, I’ll share those priorities that will determine my own vote on Election Day.

Resources for Parents of Challenged Kids

We have a posted comment recently that identified several websites that may be of use to parents of kids with challenges. I wanted to create hyperlinks to them for you.

I can personally vouch for LDonline, I've subscribed for a year; they provide a daily summary of relevant articles about learning disabilities.

http://www.ldonline.org/

http://www.schoolsattuned.org/

http://www.schwablearning.org/

http://www.additudemag.com/

Singing those "Rock and a Hard Place" Blues...

A long post about money woes; digest in small bits.

For those of you unable to attend the Chapter 70 presentation offered tonight by Dave Tobin, who works with the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents, you missed an expert and somewhat demoralizing explanation of upcoming changes in the Chapter 70 School funding laws that will benefit Newburyport over the coming four years-- sort of.

A quick overview (look for a linkage to useful documents in a day or two) is that when the Education Reform Act of 1993 was adopted as law, it used certain formula to calculate a number of factors affecting the amount of state aid going to municipalities for schools. The good news is that for the first time since 1993, some of those formulas will be adjusted. Slightly. Over time. One would say glacially, but at the rate glaciers are melting, that would imply far greater speed than we are looking at here.

In 1993, the state established what is called the "Foundation Budget", which essentially established the cost of providing a "fair and adequate minimum" funding per student- that is, the Foundation Budget establishes what it costs to educate a student. Since it has not really been adjusted since 1993 to any significant degree, it is fair to say "what it cost to educate a student in 1993." That would be the same 1993 that is 14 years ago. That one. Yup.

The next part of the formula was establishing a standard minimum for each community to pay towards education; this was based on a very complicated series of calculations somewhat related to demographics, evaluations, the number of blintzes consumed on a monthly basis, whether or not it was a good year for lemmings, and the number of letters in the Governor's middle name. Sorta mysterious. What the state did, in effect was say, "Hey Newburyport, since you have exceeded what we think you need to pay by supporting your schools better than many other communities, we'll set your local contribution at that 'high water mark.' That way we won't have to screw around with any magical formulas!"

Ahem.

Finally, Chapter 70 Aid was supposed to make up the difference between A (the Foundation Budget) and B (the local contribution). Net School Spending is therefore equal to, or exceeds the total of Municipal Spending plus Chapter 70. Of course, the only way NSS would exceed Foundation would be if the municipal spending exceeded the minimum required by the state.
Which Newburyport, to its credit, has nearly always done.

You can see where this is going.

The next bit of '93 Ed reform news was that any money needed for charter schools would be taken right out of the 'cherry sheet,' the state estimated aid for the given fiscal year. Without arguing about the need, or efficacy of the charter school, the net result impacted state aid for Newburyport.

Cut to 2004, a good year for cheese, but not for state revenues. The state, low on revenue, pulled a number out of the hat and took back 20% of the Chapter 70 Aid from every community in the Commonwealth. They soon discovered that such a dramatic and seemingly arbitrary cut would push a number of school systems to funding levels that dipped below the Foundation Budget. Those communities saw their money restored. Newburyport did not.

It cost us $750,000. If the number sounds familiar, it is the average deficit run by the schools for the years 2004-7. Punched a whole in the budget that you could drive a mack truck through for four straight years. Five, if you count last year, six if you count the year to come. Like clockwork.

The good news is that there has essentially been legislative "buy-in" to a plan developed jointly by the MA Association of School Committees, and the MA Assoc of School Superintendents; at some point, this will be codified into law at some point.

The new formula will include setting a floor for minimum Chapter 70 Aid at 17.5% of Foundation. Nbpt has fluctuated over the past five years between 24.8% and 17.8%.
Well, that doesn't really look like a winner for the City, does it.

It also caps the Local Contributions (the local support expected) at 82.5% of Foundation. Newburyport has exceeded minimum local contributions; it has had to, because the formula in use has inadequate inflation estimates factored in, and the overall Foundation budget is filled with expense estimates that have little relationship to the reality-based community.

The upshot, the good news, is that Newburyport can expect a gradual reduction in local expected contribution of about $4,000,000 over the next four years; that hole will be filled by additional state aid which is estimated to total, over the next four years, top estimate, no fooling around, not kidding, of $640,000.

Well, I bet you can see a problem here, can't you. We're heading backwards. At top speed.

I'm putting a lot of faith in the School Revenue Task Force, most of whose members were in attendance tonight. I'm hoping that those City Councilors who were present, don't rush off in the great excitement of reallocating that money away from schools and into other City projects, not just yet.

Folks, we have some thinking and wishing and a lot of creative work to do in the months ahead. More information on the new formula tomorrow; and about the presentation in the days ahead.

Sheesh.

Another worthwhile aricle to read

Recently, Newburyport resident and grandparent Clare Keller sent the School Committee a link to an article she recommended regarding the role of schools in serving the changing needs of students.

It's a great article; with her permission I link to it and encourage you read it:
http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/334/

The article quotes Neil Postman, who has been one of the most assertive, challenging and thoughtful philosopher writing about schools and popular culture. He rarely minces words; the first paragraph of the first chapter of his first book, Teaching as a Subversive Activity, suggests that the most important job of a teacher and a school system is provide kids with a "crap detector", so that they can actively filter out the unrelenting commercial garbage they are exposed to everyday.

I'm a big fan of Postman.

School Budgeting 101

For those with a keen interest in learning more about the budgeting challenges and approaches used by school systems, and their strengths and weaknesses, this piece from the University Encyclopedia is a great introduction, written in clear language. Among the approaches it considers you'll find Zero-Based Budgeting, which was part of the discussions in the recent Override debate.


http://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/2342/Public-School-Budgeting-Accounting-Auditing.html

Putting No Child Left Behind in Perspective

The passage of the federal No Child Left Behind statutes, (never been funded at more than 15% annually of the estimates for getting the standards met) has had a significant impact here in Newburyport.

Dr. Lyons has identified literacy as a critical issue that needs to be addressed in our schools.

The following link will send you to a very thoughtful piece about how the NCLB laws are impacting language instruction. The second paragraph of the piece establishes the bona fides of Jim Cummings, who delivered this analysis at a recent conference in California.

"A treasured, no-nonsense voice in the world of second-language acquisition, during the past three decades, Cummins, now a professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, has touched the life of many an English as a second language teacher, inspiring thousands with a thoroughly grounded iconoclastic approach to the pedagogy of language. He has shattered myths, developed new theories and concepts, promoted innovations in the classroom, affected policy, and arguably done as much to shift the paradigm of language instruction as Noam Chomsky 20 years earlier did to shift scientific thought toward a paradigm of innate universal grammar."

Thanks to Daily Kos Commentator Meteor Blades for providing the diary discussing Cummins' ideas. Despite all the brouhaha about the Kos website, there are a number of regular diarists who have a great deal to say about education in the United States. I would recommend the diaries of TeacherKen as a place to start.


www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/7/26/131722/394