Duval County has over a hundred TFA teachers at the same time many local teachers can't find jobs. -cpg
From the Washington Posts Answer Sheet
by Arthur Levine
A bill recently introduced in Congress, the GREAT Teachers and Principals Act, would designate programs based outside of universities as special academies for preparing teachers and principals. This misses the fundamental problem: a number of the nation’s teacher education programs are failing. It makes more sense to close the weak programs than to pay to create bandaids over them.
While excellent teacher preparation programs can be found at universities nationwide, too many programs have low admission and graduation standards, weak curricula, inadequate time in school classrooms, faculty who are out of touch with practice, and limited contact with schools. There has never been a better time than right now for states to dramatically improve university-based teacher education.
The simple fact is that for the past two decades, the nation has been dancing around this problem. States have created alternative routes into the teaching profession which minimize the amount of time future teachers must spend taking education courses. A variety of non-university teacher recruitment and preparation programs have been developed as substitutes for education schools. Most recently, New York State established a mechanism giving such organizations de facto degree granting authority.
Ideally, we should invest in the best teacher education programs, strengthen the good programs, and close the poor ones. The argument against doing this has been that, in spite of current layoffs, the United States needs two million new teachers over the next decade. Urban and rural schools cannot fill all their vacancies, particularly in math, science, special education, and English as a second language. They already must staff some classrooms with unqualified teachers and substitutes. We simply do not have the luxury—this argument goes—of closing the bottom third of teacher education programs.
While some alternative programs, such as Teach for America, bring high-achieving college graduates into teaching, investing in them rather than fixing university programs doesn’t deal with the real problem — that significant numbers of bad university programs keep churning out teachers.
It is wrong to lump all teacher education programs together, the excellent and the failing, establishing an elaborate patchwork of alternatives to both. It is also expensive to operate multiple systems for educating teachers, especially if the reason is that one system is not working well, but the remedy doesn’t distinguish between what works and what doesn’t.
If states seize this moment, they have an unprecedented opportunity to address the real problem. Owing to the economy, many districts are laying off teachers rather than hiring at previous levels. While the scale of the layoffs is unknown, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has said it could be as many as 300,000 teachers.
So it is now possible for states to shut down the worst of their teacher education programs because they don’t need as many teachers. States have authority over the college and university academic programs that operate within their borders. According to a study by the Education Commission of the States, 45 states currently approve new programs and 41 engage in some form of program review.
States have a high degree of authority over teacher education programs in particular. In almost every state, they are more closely regulated by state departments of education than are other university programs. In setting program approval and review standards, state government — led by committed governors, chief state school officers and state higher education executives — is in an excellent position to close the weak, demand continuing improvement in the strong, and highlight the exceptional.
This is the moment for states to review all their teacher education programs — and, while they are at it, their programs for principals and superintendents, which are even weaker. These programs should be evaluated primarily on the basis of outcomes —student learning in a particular teacher’s class compared to the classes of that teacher’s peers. A generation ago, we simply did not have this sort of data. Now we do, and it is incumbent on us to use it.
Using this data, it is possible to assess teachers’ performance by the programs that prepared them. This could be augmented with data on individual programs, such as admission and graduation standards, curriculum design, length and quality of clinical experiences, relationships with schools and school districts, and mentoring experiences. Based upon this data, states can make decisions about which programs to maintain, support, and grow.
States that choose to do this can benefit from the experience of Louisiana, which has been engaged in such activities for over a decade and is widely heralded as a model worth emulating, not only with regard to what they are doing, but how they are doing it.
America’s university-based teacher education and school leadership programs now prepare more than 90 percent of the nation’s teachers and school administrators. The Willie Sutton principle says this is the wisest area for states to focus upon if they are serious about improving teacher education. When asked why he robbed banks, Sutton replied, “Because that’s where the money is.” Higher education is where the teachers are. All other remedies pale in comparison.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/how-to-improve-teacher-education-now-and-why-teach-for-america-isnt-the-answer/2011/08/02/gIQANclsqI_blog.html?wprss=answer-sheet
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
The middle class convinced by the Tea Party and the rich to go against its self interests
From the Guardian
by George Monbiot
There are two ways of cutting a deficit: raising taxes or reducing spending. Raising taxes means taking money from the rich. Cutting spending means taking money from the poor. Not in all cases of course: some taxation is regressive; some state spending takes money from ordinary citizens and gives it to banks, arms companies, oil barons and farmers. But in most cases the state transfers wealth from rich to poor, while tax cuts shift it from poor to rich.
So the rich, in a nominal democracy, have a struggle on their hands. Somehow they must persuade the other 99% to vote against their own interests: to shrink the state, supporting spending cuts rather than tax rises. In the US they appear to be succeeding.
Partly as a result of the Bush tax cuts of 2001, 2003 and 2005 (shamefully extended by Barack Obama), taxation of the wealthy, in Obama's words, "is at its lowest level in half a century". The consequence of such regressive policies is a level of inequality unknown in other developed nations. As the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz points out, in the past 10 years the income of the top 1% has risen by 18%, while that of blue-collar male workers has fallen by 12%.
The deal being thrashed out in Congress as this article goes to press seeks only to cut state spending. As the former Republican senator Alan Simpson says: "The little guy is going to be cremated." That means more economic decline, which means a bigger deficit. It's insane. But how did it happen?
The immediate reason is that Republican members of Congress supported by the Tea Party movement won't budge. But this explains nothing. The Tea Party movement mostly consists of people who have been harmed by tax cuts for the rich and spending cuts for the poor and middle. Why would they mobilise against their own welfare? You can understand what is happening in Washington only if you remember what everyone seems to have forgotten: how this movement began.
On Sunday the Observer claimed that "the Tea Party rose out of anger over the scale of federal spending, and in particular in bailing out the banks". This is what its members claim. It's nonsense.
The movement started with Rick Santelli's call on CNBC for a tea party of city traders to dump securities in Lake Michigan, in protest at Obama's plan to "subsidise the losers". In other words, it was a demand for a financiers' mobilisation against the bailout of their victims: people losing their homes. On the same day, a group called Americans for Prosperity (AFP) set up a Tea Party Facebook page and started organising Tea Party events. The movement, whose programme is still lavishly supported by AFP, took off from there.
So who or what is Americans for Prosperity? It was founded and is funded by Charles and David Koch. They run what they call "the biggest company you've never heard of", and between them they are worth $43bn. Koch Industries is a massive oil, gas, minerals, timber and chemicals company. In the past 15 years the brothers have poured at least $85m into lobby groups arguing for lower taxes for the rich and weaker regulations for industry. The groups and politicians the Kochs fund also lobby to destroy collective bargaining, to stop laws reducing carbon emissions, to stymie healthcare reform and to hobble attempts to control the banks. During the 2010 election cycle, AFP spent $45m supporting its favoured candidates.
But the Kochs' greatest political triumph is the creation of the Tea Party movement. Taki Oldham's film (Astro)Turf Wars shows Tea Party organisers reporting back to David Koch at their 2009 Defending the Dream summit, explaining the events and protests they've started with AFP help. "Five years ago," he tells them, "my brother Charles and I provided the funds to start Americans for Prosperity. It's beyond my wildest dreams how AFP has grown into this enormous organisation."
AFP mobilised the anger of people who found their conditions of life declining, and channelled it into a campaign to make them worse. Tea Party campaigners take to the streets to demand less tax for billionaires and worse health, education and social insurance for themselves.
Are they stupid? No. They have been misled by another instrument of corporate power: the media. The movement has been relentlessly promoted by Fox News, which belongs to a more familiar billionaire. Like the Kochs, Rupert Murdoch aims to misrepresent the democratic choices we face, in order to persuade us to vote against our own interests and in favour of his.
What's taking place in Congress right now is a kind of political coup. A handful of billionaires have shoved a spanner into the legislative process. Through the candidates they have bought and the movement that supports them, they are now breaking and reshaping the system to serve their interests. We knew this once, but now we've forgotten. What hope do we have of resisting a force we won't even see?
• A fully referenced version of this article can be found on George Monbiot's website. On Twitter: @GeorgeMonbiot
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/01/us-debt-deal-tea-party
by George Monbiot
There are two ways of cutting a deficit: raising taxes or reducing spending. Raising taxes means taking money from the rich. Cutting spending means taking money from the poor. Not in all cases of course: some taxation is regressive; some state spending takes money from ordinary citizens and gives it to banks, arms companies, oil barons and farmers. But in most cases the state transfers wealth from rich to poor, while tax cuts shift it from poor to rich.
So the rich, in a nominal democracy, have a struggle on their hands. Somehow they must persuade the other 99% to vote against their own interests: to shrink the state, supporting spending cuts rather than tax rises. In the US they appear to be succeeding.
Partly as a result of the Bush tax cuts of 2001, 2003 and 2005 (shamefully extended by Barack Obama), taxation of the wealthy, in Obama's words, "is at its lowest level in half a century". The consequence of such regressive policies is a level of inequality unknown in other developed nations. As the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz points out, in the past 10 years the income of the top 1% has risen by 18%, while that of blue-collar male workers has fallen by 12%.
The deal being thrashed out in Congress as this article goes to press seeks only to cut state spending. As the former Republican senator Alan Simpson says: "The little guy is going to be cremated." That means more economic decline, which means a bigger deficit. It's insane. But how did it happen?
The immediate reason is that Republican members of Congress supported by the Tea Party movement won't budge. But this explains nothing. The Tea Party movement mostly consists of people who have been harmed by tax cuts for the rich and spending cuts for the poor and middle. Why would they mobilise against their own welfare? You can understand what is happening in Washington only if you remember what everyone seems to have forgotten: how this movement began.
On Sunday the Observer claimed that "the Tea Party rose out of anger over the scale of federal spending, and in particular in bailing out the banks". This is what its members claim. It's nonsense.
The movement started with Rick Santelli's call on CNBC for a tea party of city traders to dump securities in Lake Michigan, in protest at Obama's plan to "subsidise the losers". In other words, it was a demand for a financiers' mobilisation against the bailout of their victims: people losing their homes. On the same day, a group called Americans for Prosperity (AFP) set up a Tea Party Facebook page and started organising Tea Party events. The movement, whose programme is still lavishly supported by AFP, took off from there.
So who or what is Americans for Prosperity? It was founded and is funded by Charles and David Koch. They run what they call "the biggest company you've never heard of", and between them they are worth $43bn. Koch Industries is a massive oil, gas, minerals, timber and chemicals company. In the past 15 years the brothers have poured at least $85m into lobby groups arguing for lower taxes for the rich and weaker regulations for industry. The groups and politicians the Kochs fund also lobby to destroy collective bargaining, to stop laws reducing carbon emissions, to stymie healthcare reform and to hobble attempts to control the banks. During the 2010 election cycle, AFP spent $45m supporting its favoured candidates.
But the Kochs' greatest political triumph is the creation of the Tea Party movement. Taki Oldham's film (Astro)Turf Wars shows Tea Party organisers reporting back to David Koch at their 2009 Defending the Dream summit, explaining the events and protests they've started with AFP help. "Five years ago," he tells them, "my brother Charles and I provided the funds to start Americans for Prosperity. It's beyond my wildest dreams how AFP has grown into this enormous organisation."
AFP mobilised the anger of people who found their conditions of life declining, and channelled it into a campaign to make them worse. Tea Party campaigners take to the streets to demand less tax for billionaires and worse health, education and social insurance for themselves.
Are they stupid? No. They have been misled by another instrument of corporate power: the media. The movement has been relentlessly promoted by Fox News, which belongs to a more familiar billionaire. Like the Kochs, Rupert Murdoch aims to misrepresent the democratic choices we face, in order to persuade us to vote against our own interests and in favour of his.
What's taking place in Congress right now is a kind of political coup. A handful of billionaires have shoved a spanner into the legislative process. Through the candidates they have bought and the movement that supports them, they are now breaking and reshaping the system to serve their interests. We knew this once, but now we've forgotten. What hope do we have of resisting a force we won't even see?
• A fully referenced version of this article can be found on George Monbiot's website. On Twitter: @GeorgeMonbiot
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/01/us-debt-deal-tea-party
Rick Santorum bashes pre school
From the TalkingPointsMemo.com
by Eric Kleefeld
Rick Santorum fired a verbal salvo at early-education programs on Tuesday, telling an Iowa crowd that government pre-school programs are part of a hideous plot by the government to indoctrinate children.
"It is a parent's responsibility to educate their children. It is not the government's job. We have sort of lost focus here a little bit," said Santorum, the Des Moines Register reports.
"Of course, the government wants their hands on your children as fast as they can. That is why I opposed all these early starts and pre-early starts, and early-early starts. They want your children from the womb so they can indoctrinate your children as to what they want them to be. I am against that."
In order to shield his own family from indoctrination, Santorum and his wife have home-schooled their seven children through the eighth grade.
This is not the first time Santorum has warned against pre-school indoctrination. As the Huffington Post reported in May, Santorum spoke to a South Carolina audience and compared pre-school to his grandfather's experiences in Fascist-era Italy:
Rick Santorum, a possible candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, even raised the specter of Benito Mussolini's Fascist Italy in a speech here Friday night while explaining why his grandfather emigrated to the U.S. His uncle, he said, "used to get up in a brown shirt and march and be told how to be a good little fascist."
"I don't know, maybe they called it early pre-K or something like that, that the government sponsored to get your children in there so they can indoctrinate them," Santorum said.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/08/santorum-govt-pre-school-programs-want-to-indoctrinate-your-children.php
by Eric Kleefeld
Rick Santorum fired a verbal salvo at early-education programs on Tuesday, telling an Iowa crowd that government pre-school programs are part of a hideous plot by the government to indoctrinate children.
"It is a parent's responsibility to educate their children. It is not the government's job. We have sort of lost focus here a little bit," said Santorum, the Des Moines Register reports.
"Of course, the government wants their hands on your children as fast as they can. That is why I opposed all these early starts and pre-early starts, and early-early starts. They want your children from the womb so they can indoctrinate your children as to what they want them to be. I am against that."
In order to shield his own family from indoctrination, Santorum and his wife have home-schooled their seven children through the eighth grade.
This is not the first time Santorum has warned against pre-school indoctrination. As the Huffington Post reported in May, Santorum spoke to a South Carolina audience and compared pre-school to his grandfather's experiences in Fascist-era Italy:
Rick Santorum, a possible candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, even raised the specter of Benito Mussolini's Fascist Italy in a speech here Friday night while explaining why his grandfather emigrated to the U.S. His uncle, he said, "used to get up in a brown shirt and march and be told how to be a good little fascist."
"I don't know, maybe they called it early pre-K or something like that, that the government sponsored to get your children in there so they can indoctrinate them," Santorum said.
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/08/santorum-govt-pre-school-programs-want-to-indoctrinate-your-children.php
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
The Myth of the extraordinary teacher
Yes, we need to get rid of bad teachers. But we can't demand that teachers be excellent in conditions that preclude excellence.
From the Los Angelas Times
by Ellie Herman
The kid in the back wants me to define "logic." The girl next to him looks bewildered. The boy in front of me dutifully takes notes even though he has severe auditory processing issues and doesn't understand a word I'm saying. Eight kids forgot their essays, but one has a good excuse because she had another epileptic seizure last night. The shy, quiet girl next to me hasn't done homework for weeks, ever since she was jumped by a knife-wielding gangbanger as she walked to school. The boy next to her is asleep with his head on the desk because he works nights at a factory to support his family. Across the room, a girl weeps quietly for reasons I'll never know. I'm trying to explain to a student what I meant when I wrote "clarify your thinking" on his essay, but he's still confused.
It's 8:15 a.m. and already I'm behind my scheduled lesson. A kid with dyslexia, ADD and anger-management problems walks in late, throws his books on the desk and swears at me when I tell him to take off his hood.
The class, one of five I teach each day, has 31 students, including two with learning disabilities, one who just moved here from Mexico, one with serious behavior problems, 10 who flunked this class last year and are repeating, seven who test below grade level, three who show up halfway through class every day, one who almost never comes. I need to reach all 31 of them, including the brainiac who's so bored she's reading "Lolita" under her desk.
I just can't do it.
I've been thinking about the challenges of teaching a large and diverse class in a new context lately. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan recently said that, in his view, the billions spent in the U.S. to reduce class size was a bad idea. Many countries with high academic achievement, he noted, have accepted larger class sizes to pay talented teachers more and concentrate larger numbers of kids with the best teachers. "The best thing you can do," he said recently in an interview with Andrea Mitchell, "is get children in front of an extraordinary teacher."
That's a common viewpoint at the moment. Every day I see data showing that in countries such as Japan and South Korea, students score higher in reading and math, often with larger classes, and that the U.S. has spent a tremendous amount of money reducing class size to little effect.
But a huge percentage of students in Japan and South Korea pay for after-school tutoring to make up for a lack of individualized attention at school. Finland, with the best scores in the world, has average class sizes in the 20s, and it caps science labs at 16. Still, it's become a popular fantasy that all you need is a superstar teacher, and that he or she will be just as effective even as budget cuts force us to pack more kids into each classroom.
I've taught for the last three years at a charter high school in South-Central Los Angeles where all the teachers are excellent. Our test scores are high. We have terrific administrators, and because teachers are a priority, unlike almost any other LAUSD school, we haven't had layoffs; even so, our school has had to allow enrollment to rise to stay on budget. My largest class last year was 34. My smallest was 20. And I can assure you I was a whole lot more "extraordinary" in my smallest than in my largest.
I'm not sure what the breaking point is, but once you get much above 25 students, providing individual attention becomes difficult. To keep my English class of 31 under control, I have to rely on high-energy routines and structured group activities. In place of freewheeling discussion, I pepper the room with rapid-fire questions. To respond to their essays, I use a rubric emphasizing the four or five qualities I'm targeting for the whole class, and then write one or two short individualized sentences at the bottom of the page. With more than 150 students in my classes, I don't have enough time to spend more than five or 10 minutes on each essay.
Do students really learn best this way? A whole chunk of my students are alienated by this highly structured environment: the artists, the rebels, the class clowns — in other words, some of my smartest kids.
On a good day, about a fourth of my students don't do the reading or the homework; if I set up a conference after school, they might show up and they might not. Why? Because one kid thinks he has an STD, and another girl's brother just got out of juvie, and another guy wandered to the ice cream truck and forgot. Because they're teenagers. Because they're human.
And that's my biggest problem with the myth of the extraordinary teacher. The myth says it doesn't matter whether the crazy kid in the back makes me laugh so hard I forget what we were talking about, or two brilliant kids refuse to accept my rubrics, scrawling their long-winded objections as a two-part argument that circles over every square inch of the backs of their essays — the makeup of the class, the nature of each student and the number of students are immaterial as long as I'm at the top of my game.
But nobody talks that way about the children of the wealthy, who can pay for individual attention in tutoring or private schools with small classes. I understand that we need to get rid of bad teachers, who will be just as bad in small classes, but we can't demand that teachers be excellent in conditions that preclude excellence.
Our children — even our children growing up in poverty, especially our children growing up in poverty — deserve to have not only an extraordinary teacher but a teacher who has time to read their work, to listen, to understand why they're crying or sleeping or not doing homework.
To teach each child in my classroom, I have to know each child in my classroom. We teachers need to bring not only our extraordinariness but our flawed and real and ordinary humanity to this job, which involves a complex and ever-changing web of relationships with children who often need more than we can give them.
I'm willing to work as hard as I can to be an excellent teacher, but as a country we have to admit that I'll never be excellent if we continue to slash education budgets and cut teachers, which is what's actually happening in California despite all our talk of excellence, particularly in schools that serve poor children. Until we stop that, we'll never have equal education in this country.
Ellie Herman is a teacher at Animo Pat Brown Charter High School in South Los Angeles.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-herman-class-size-20110731,0,3910343.story
From the Los Angelas Times
by Ellie Herman
The kid in the back wants me to define "logic." The girl next to him looks bewildered. The boy in front of me dutifully takes notes even though he has severe auditory processing issues and doesn't understand a word I'm saying. Eight kids forgot their essays, but one has a good excuse because she had another epileptic seizure last night. The shy, quiet girl next to me hasn't done homework for weeks, ever since she was jumped by a knife-wielding gangbanger as she walked to school. The boy next to her is asleep with his head on the desk because he works nights at a factory to support his family. Across the room, a girl weeps quietly for reasons I'll never know. I'm trying to explain to a student what I meant when I wrote "clarify your thinking" on his essay, but he's still confused.
It's 8:15 a.m. and already I'm behind my scheduled lesson. A kid with dyslexia, ADD and anger-management problems walks in late, throws his books on the desk and swears at me when I tell him to take off his hood.
The class, one of five I teach each day, has 31 students, including two with learning disabilities, one who just moved here from Mexico, one with serious behavior problems, 10 who flunked this class last year and are repeating, seven who test below grade level, three who show up halfway through class every day, one who almost never comes. I need to reach all 31 of them, including the brainiac who's so bored she's reading "Lolita" under her desk.
I just can't do it.
I've been thinking about the challenges of teaching a large and diverse class in a new context lately. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan recently said that, in his view, the billions spent in the U.S. to reduce class size was a bad idea. Many countries with high academic achievement, he noted, have accepted larger class sizes to pay talented teachers more and concentrate larger numbers of kids with the best teachers. "The best thing you can do," he said recently in an interview with Andrea Mitchell, "is get children in front of an extraordinary teacher."
That's a common viewpoint at the moment. Every day I see data showing that in countries such as Japan and South Korea, students score higher in reading and math, often with larger classes, and that the U.S. has spent a tremendous amount of money reducing class size to little effect.
But a huge percentage of students in Japan and South Korea pay for after-school tutoring to make up for a lack of individualized attention at school. Finland, with the best scores in the world, has average class sizes in the 20s, and it caps science labs at 16. Still, it's become a popular fantasy that all you need is a superstar teacher, and that he or she will be just as effective even as budget cuts force us to pack more kids into each classroom.
I've taught for the last three years at a charter high school in South-Central Los Angeles where all the teachers are excellent. Our test scores are high. We have terrific administrators, and because teachers are a priority, unlike almost any other LAUSD school, we haven't had layoffs; even so, our school has had to allow enrollment to rise to stay on budget. My largest class last year was 34. My smallest was 20. And I can assure you I was a whole lot more "extraordinary" in my smallest than in my largest.
I'm not sure what the breaking point is, but once you get much above 25 students, providing individual attention becomes difficult. To keep my English class of 31 under control, I have to rely on high-energy routines and structured group activities. In place of freewheeling discussion, I pepper the room with rapid-fire questions. To respond to their essays, I use a rubric emphasizing the four or five qualities I'm targeting for the whole class, and then write one or two short individualized sentences at the bottom of the page. With more than 150 students in my classes, I don't have enough time to spend more than five or 10 minutes on each essay.
Do students really learn best this way? A whole chunk of my students are alienated by this highly structured environment: the artists, the rebels, the class clowns — in other words, some of my smartest kids.
On a good day, about a fourth of my students don't do the reading or the homework; if I set up a conference after school, they might show up and they might not. Why? Because one kid thinks he has an STD, and another girl's brother just got out of juvie, and another guy wandered to the ice cream truck and forgot. Because they're teenagers. Because they're human.
And that's my biggest problem with the myth of the extraordinary teacher. The myth says it doesn't matter whether the crazy kid in the back makes me laugh so hard I forget what we were talking about, or two brilliant kids refuse to accept my rubrics, scrawling their long-winded objections as a two-part argument that circles over every square inch of the backs of their essays — the makeup of the class, the nature of each student and the number of students are immaterial as long as I'm at the top of my game.
But nobody talks that way about the children of the wealthy, who can pay for individual attention in tutoring or private schools with small classes. I understand that we need to get rid of bad teachers, who will be just as bad in small classes, but we can't demand that teachers be excellent in conditions that preclude excellence.
Our children — even our children growing up in poverty, especially our children growing up in poverty — deserve to have not only an extraordinary teacher but a teacher who has time to read their work, to listen, to understand why they're crying or sleeping or not doing homework.
To teach each child in my classroom, I have to know each child in my classroom. We teachers need to bring not only our extraordinariness but our flawed and real and ordinary humanity to this job, which involves a complex and ever-changing web of relationships with children who often need more than we can give them.
I'm willing to work as hard as I can to be an excellent teacher, but as a country we have to admit that I'll never be excellent if we continue to slash education budgets and cut teachers, which is what's actually happening in California despite all our talk of excellence, particularly in schools that serve poor children. Until we stop that, we'll never have equal education in this country.
Ellie Herman is a teacher at Animo Pat Brown Charter High School in South Los Angeles.
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-herman-class-size-20110731,0,3910343.story
Florida Board of Ed Member Roberto Matinez says it is time we put our children first
From the St. Petersburg Times
It is time for an open and honest discussion about funding for Florida's public schools, which are suffering from cuts in per-pupil spending and the Legislature's obsession with charter schools and vouchers. Now at least one member of the state Board of Education has persuaded his colleagues to hold a daylong discussion this week on the issue. In a state where few public officials are willing to even talk about whether enough money is being spent on public schools, that's progress.
Board of Education member Roberto Martinez sought Tuesday's workshop in Tampa. The state Constitution guarantees a "high quality system of free public schools." As Martinez points out, education is the only right in the Florida Constitution that is spelled out with such specificity — and with the obligation to spend enough money to ensure that quality.
The workshop, he believes, "will be the board's first effort to fulfill its (constitutional) obligation in a meaningful and comprehensive manner." It is a worthy step in the right direction.
Martinez has assembled an impressive list of educators and advocates to provoke the discussion: school superintendents who are innovators, such as Hillsborough's MaryEllen Elia and Miami-Dade's Alberto Carvalho; several community college presidents; Andy Ford, the president of the Florida Education Association; David Lawrence, the former Miami Herald publisher who is a staunch advocate of early education; Bill Montford, chief executive officer of the Florida Association of District School Superintendents; and Wayne Blanton, executive director of the Florida School Boards Association. They have different agendas and come from different political persuasions. But they all have ideas about how to improve education for Florida's children — and they know what works.
The goal is to put good minds together to discuss the issue, figure out how to get the necessary money and spend it wisely on programs that succeed.
Martinez, no starry-eyed liberal, was appointed to the board by Gov. Jeb Bush and reappointed by Gov. Charlie Crist. He doesn't believe that education reform is a partisan issue. But he does believe that education is the state's highest priority. He has children in both private and public schools and is fully aware of the promises and the challenges of both. He also believes that the state needs to spend more on public education — not raise taxes but spend a larger percentage of the state budget on it. "We have to reprioritize our spending, put more of that money toward the development of our kids," he said in an interview.
He believes that reforms over the past decade have set the table for educational performance to rise if enough money is spent — and prudently. Focus on programs that are measurable and accountable, he believes. If a program is working, give it more to soar. If a program is failing, analyze why, but don't throw good money after bad.
But Martinez also believes that the Board of Education has "an obligation to tell legislators what is needed to achieve a world-class education." In a world of zero-sum budgets, he feels it is essential that educators make their case for the state's schools to be adequately funded as a critical need for the once and future success of the Sunshine State, even if it means there are fewer dollars to spend in other areas.
In a climate rife with spending cutbacks and a focus on creating jobs, Martinez reminds us that the most important capital is human capital and that the best way to raise it is through education. Education is the state's future. And educating Florida's children is a duty enshrined in the state's Constitution. The workshop is a commendable start to make that discussion public, pointed and urgent. Good education doesn't come cheap. It's time for the state to acknowledge that and meet its constitutional obligations to Florida's children.
http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/editorials/article1183187.ece
It is time for an open and honest discussion about funding for Florida's public schools, which are suffering from cuts in per-pupil spending and the Legislature's obsession with charter schools and vouchers. Now at least one member of the state Board of Education has persuaded his colleagues to hold a daylong discussion this week on the issue. In a state where few public officials are willing to even talk about whether enough money is being spent on public schools, that's progress.
Board of Education member Roberto Martinez sought Tuesday's workshop in Tampa. The state Constitution guarantees a "high quality system of free public schools." As Martinez points out, education is the only right in the Florida Constitution that is spelled out with such specificity — and with the obligation to spend enough money to ensure that quality.
The workshop, he believes, "will be the board's first effort to fulfill its (constitutional) obligation in a meaningful and comprehensive manner." It is a worthy step in the right direction.
Martinez has assembled an impressive list of educators and advocates to provoke the discussion: school superintendents who are innovators, such as Hillsborough's MaryEllen Elia and Miami-Dade's Alberto Carvalho; several community college presidents; Andy Ford, the president of the Florida Education Association; David Lawrence, the former Miami Herald publisher who is a staunch advocate of early education; Bill Montford, chief executive officer of the Florida Association of District School Superintendents; and Wayne Blanton, executive director of the Florida School Boards Association. They have different agendas and come from different political persuasions. But they all have ideas about how to improve education for Florida's children — and they know what works.
The goal is to put good minds together to discuss the issue, figure out how to get the necessary money and spend it wisely on programs that succeed.
Martinez, no starry-eyed liberal, was appointed to the board by Gov. Jeb Bush and reappointed by Gov. Charlie Crist. He doesn't believe that education reform is a partisan issue. But he does believe that education is the state's highest priority. He has children in both private and public schools and is fully aware of the promises and the challenges of both. He also believes that the state needs to spend more on public education — not raise taxes but spend a larger percentage of the state budget on it. "We have to reprioritize our spending, put more of that money toward the development of our kids," he said in an interview.
He believes that reforms over the past decade have set the table for educational performance to rise if enough money is spent — and prudently. Focus on programs that are measurable and accountable, he believes. If a program is working, give it more to soar. If a program is failing, analyze why, but don't throw good money after bad.
But Martinez also believes that the Board of Education has "an obligation to tell legislators what is needed to achieve a world-class education." In a world of zero-sum budgets, he feels it is essential that educators make their case for the state's schools to be adequately funded as a critical need for the once and future success of the Sunshine State, even if it means there are fewer dollars to spend in other areas.
In a climate rife with spending cutbacks and a focus on creating jobs, Martinez reminds us that the most important capital is human capital and that the best way to raise it is through education. Education is the state's future. And educating Florida's children is a duty enshrined in the state's Constitution. The workshop is a commendable start to make that discussion public, pointed and urgent. Good education doesn't come cheap. It's time for the state to acknowledge that and meet its constitutional obligations to Florida's children.
http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/editorials/article1183187.ece
Monday, August 1, 2011
Just how deep does Florida's distain for public education go?
from the Orlando Sentinel
by Leslie Postal
Florida's decision to reject federal grants tied to the Obama administration's health-care overhaul means it might not be able to compete for $100 million to improve the care and education of young children.
A new federal Race to the Top program that aims to improve early learning was launched in May, the latest push from Washington to spur reform through competition among states.
Elections The first Race to the Top competition, embraced by then-Gov. Charlie Crist, resulted in a $700 million grant for the state last year. But Florida could remain on the sidelines in the newest competition, which has the potential of netting the state an additional $100 million.
Meanwhile, 36 other states and theDistrict of Columbia plan to take a shot at the new grant.
"It's a big deal," said Laura Bornfreund, a policy analyst with the New America Foundation in Washington. She called it a "potentially powerful way" for states to improve early education.
Florida might not be able to apply for the grant because one of the proposed eligibility guidelines requires states to take part in a federal child-abuse-prevention program.
Florida had been participating in the prevention program until the Florida Legislature decided against authorizing it this spring. The program's grant money was among about $54 million the state has rejected or refused to apply for since last fall.
All the rejected grants are part of the Obama administration's health-care overhaul law.
The Florida Attorney General's Office has sued over the law, which both Gov. Rick Scott and Republican leaders in the Legislature oppose.
State lawmakers have said it doesn't make sense to take money tied to a law they view as unconstitutional.
But their decision has angered many who work on children's issues. They argue Florida residents are missing out on needed programs they help fund through their federal taxes. And, given the state budget cuts enacted this year, state programs need all the extra money they can get.
The news that the state also might be ineligible for the newest Race to the Top program added to their criticism. Florida's existing early-childhood programs often fall short of national academic and funding standards.
"Florida is at the bottom of almost every indicator of child well-being," said Mimi Graham, director of Florida State University's Center for Prevention & Early Intervention Policy, from high infant mortality to low high-school-graduation rates. "It's appalling that Florida would reject these monies when the need is so great."
Scott would have to sign any new Race to the Top application. His office said it would wait until the U.S. Department of Education releases final guidelines before making a decision on the early-learning grant.
But the state did not file a "notice of intent to apply" because its decision against taking the child-abuse-prevention grant — worth $3.4 million this year and millions more in coming years — seemed to make it ineligible.
The final Race to the Top eligibility guidelines are expected next month.
Florida's reaction to this grant is notably less enthusiastic than when the first-round public-school grant was announced.
In July 2009, then-Education Commissioner Eric Smith spoke at the kickoff ceremony in Washington for the competition.
This time, there has been no public reaction from state leaders, even as counterparts in other states, such as Colorado and New Jersey, have announced they are entering the race.
A spokesman for House Speaker Dean Cannon said it was too early to say Florida was out of the running for the early-childhood money.
But some early-childhood officials worry there won't be support for a Race to the Top bid, no matter the requirements, given the opposition inTallahassee to federal programs that could require state investment, too.
Katie Betta, Cannon's spokeswoman, said the child-abuse grant the Legislature and Scott turned down was a problem not only because of the health-care law but also because it could come with "strings attached" that require state funding once the federal money runs out.
If Florida won a Race to the Top grant for early-childhood education, it would take additional money to continue the work after the four-year grant runs out, said Karen Willis, executive director of the Orange County Early Learning Coalition, which oversees subsidized child-care and state-funded pre-kindergarten.
However, Willis added, "There is major interest in the field in applying for these dollars. … We're at the bottom of the barrel in terms of funding for early education. … Quality costs — it does."
Florida voters approved state-funded pre-K in 2002, showing they want an investment in early-childhood programs. So state leaders should try for the Race to the Top grant, said Linda Alexionok, executive director of the Children's Campaign, a state advocacy group.
If they don't, Florida becomes a "donor state" whose residents' taxes support programs across the country but not here.
"We believe Florida should not walk, but run, to this appropriation," she added.
lpostal@tribune.com or 407-420-5273.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/features/education/os-race-to-top-early-childhoold-20110730,0,3680367.story
by Leslie Postal
Florida's decision to reject federal grants tied to the Obama administration's health-care overhaul means it might not be able to compete for $100 million to improve the care and education of young children.
A new federal Race to the Top program that aims to improve early learning was launched in May, the latest push from Washington to spur reform through competition among states.
Elections The first Race to the Top competition, embraced by then-Gov. Charlie Crist, resulted in a $700 million grant for the state last year. But Florida could remain on the sidelines in the newest competition, which has the potential of netting the state an additional $100 million.
Meanwhile, 36 other states and theDistrict of Columbia plan to take a shot at the new grant.
"It's a big deal," said Laura Bornfreund, a policy analyst with the New America Foundation in Washington. She called it a "potentially powerful way" for states to improve early education.
Florida might not be able to apply for the grant because one of the proposed eligibility guidelines requires states to take part in a federal child-abuse-prevention program.
Florida had been participating in the prevention program until the Florida Legislature decided against authorizing it this spring. The program's grant money was among about $54 million the state has rejected or refused to apply for since last fall.
All the rejected grants are part of the Obama administration's health-care overhaul law.
The Florida Attorney General's Office has sued over the law, which both Gov. Rick Scott and Republican leaders in the Legislature oppose.
State lawmakers have said it doesn't make sense to take money tied to a law they view as unconstitutional.
But their decision has angered many who work on children's issues. They argue Florida residents are missing out on needed programs they help fund through their federal taxes. And, given the state budget cuts enacted this year, state programs need all the extra money they can get.
The news that the state also might be ineligible for the newest Race to the Top program added to their criticism. Florida's existing early-childhood programs often fall short of national academic and funding standards.
"Florida is at the bottom of almost every indicator of child well-being," said Mimi Graham, director of Florida State University's Center for Prevention & Early Intervention Policy, from high infant mortality to low high-school-graduation rates. "It's appalling that Florida would reject these monies when the need is so great."
Scott would have to sign any new Race to the Top application. His office said it would wait until the U.S. Department of Education releases final guidelines before making a decision on the early-learning grant.
But the state did not file a "notice of intent to apply" because its decision against taking the child-abuse-prevention grant — worth $3.4 million this year and millions more in coming years — seemed to make it ineligible.
The final Race to the Top eligibility guidelines are expected next month.
Florida's reaction to this grant is notably less enthusiastic than when the first-round public-school grant was announced.
In July 2009, then-Education Commissioner Eric Smith spoke at the kickoff ceremony in Washington for the competition.
This time, there has been no public reaction from state leaders, even as counterparts in other states, such as Colorado and New Jersey, have announced they are entering the race.
A spokesman for House Speaker Dean Cannon said it was too early to say Florida was out of the running for the early-childhood money.
But some early-childhood officials worry there won't be support for a Race to the Top bid, no matter the requirements, given the opposition inTallahassee to federal programs that could require state investment, too.
Katie Betta, Cannon's spokeswoman, said the child-abuse grant the Legislature and Scott turned down was a problem not only because of the health-care law but also because it could come with "strings attached" that require state funding once the federal money runs out.
If Florida won a Race to the Top grant for early-childhood education, it would take additional money to continue the work after the four-year grant runs out, said Karen Willis, executive director of the Orange County Early Learning Coalition, which oversees subsidized child-care and state-funded pre-kindergarten.
However, Willis added, "There is major interest in the field in applying for these dollars. … We're at the bottom of the barrel in terms of funding for early education. … Quality costs — it does."
Florida voters approved state-funded pre-K in 2002, showing they want an investment in early-childhood programs. So state leaders should try for the Race to the Top grant, said Linda Alexionok, executive director of the Children's Campaign, a state advocacy group.
If they don't, Florida becomes a "donor state" whose residents' taxes support programs across the country but not here.
"We believe Florida should not walk, but run, to this appropriation," she added.
lpostal@tribune.com or 407-420-5273.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/features/education/os-race-to-top-early-childhoold-20110730,0,3680367.story
Florida turns down millions that would help children, the elderly, the sick and the disabled
From the New York Times
by Kevin Sack
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — When it comes to pursuing federal largess, most of the states that oppose the 2010 health care law have refused to let either principle or politics block their paths to the trough. If Washington is doling out dollars, Republican governors and legislators typically figure they might as well get their share.
Then there is Florida. Despite having the country’s fourth-highest unemployment rate, its second-highest rate of people without insurance and a $3.7 billion budget gap this year, the state has turned away scores of millions of dollars in grants made available under the Affordable Care Act. And it is not pursuing grants worth many millions more.
In recent months, either Gov. Rick Scott’s administration or the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature has rejected grants aimed at moving long-term care patients into their homes, curbing child abuse through in-home counseling and strengthening state regulation of health premiums. They have shunned money to help sign up eligible recipients for Medicare, educate teenagers on preventing pregnancy and plan for the health insurance exchanges that the law requires by 2014.
While 36 states shared $27 million to counsel health insurance consumers, Florida did not apply for the grants. And in drafting this year’s budget, the Legislature failed to authorize an $8.3 million federal grant won by a county health department to expand community health centers.
In interviews, Mr. Scott, a Republican, and state legislative leaders were clear about their rationale. They said they detested everything about the federal health law, which was declared unconstitutional by a federal judge in a case filed by the state. Unless ordered to do otherwise by an appellate court, they said, they had no intention of putting it in place, even if that meant leaving money on the table.
“There are a lot of programs that the federal government would like to give you that don’t fit your state, don’t fit your needs and ultimately create obligations that our taxpayers can’t afford,” said Mr. Scott, a former hospital company executive who rose to political prominence by financing an advertising campaign against the health care legislation.
State Representative Matt Hudson, the chairman of the Health Care Appropriations Subcommittee, said his chamber’s leadership felt the same way.
“I do not believe that act is the right thing for the country or the right thing for Florida,” Mr. Hudson said, “and I am not going to start implementing things that I don’t believe in.” Asked whether states had the authority to stymie federal law, Mr. Hudson answered, “We’re not required to accept a grant.”
Florida is by no means the only state hostile to the health care law. A majority of those states have gone to federal court to challenge the law’s central requirement that most Americans obtain health insurance. Alaska, Oklahoma and Wisconsin, among others, have turned away grants, some of them substantial.
But many of the states challenging the law have taken a posture more like that of Idaho, where Gov. C. L. Otter, a Republican, made a show this spring of ordering his agencies not to pursue Affordable Care Act grants and then quickly issued 10 exceptions to that rule.
Florida has had few peers in subverting the law’s provisions since Mr. Scott took office in January. After a federal district judge in Pensacola invalidated the entire act later that month, Mr. Scott quickly put the brakes on planning for the insurance exchanges and started rejecting grants pursued by his predecessor, Charlie Crist, a more moderate Republican. The state maintained its stance even though the judge, Roger Vinson, suspended his ruling pending appellate review.
“I don’t want to waste either federal money or state money on something that’s unconstitutional,” Mr. Scott said in a 30-minute interview in his office on Friday.
The governor, sporting black cowboy boots embossed with the state seal, said his subordinates had made case-by-case decisions about whether particular grants advanced the state’s efforts to remake its Medicaid program. This year, Mr. Scott and the Legislature enacted Florida’s own law directing most recipients into managed care plans.
But Mr. Scott deflected requests to explain where the line was drawn, other than to say that competition, personal choice and quality incentives should drive the health care market.
I’d have to go through each program to look at it,” Mr. Scott said. “We have a Medicaid plan, so if it fits with that plan, then we’re interested, and if it doesn’t, we’re not.”
In distancing itself from the law, Florida declined to participate in a Medicaid pilot program that would have authorized up to $2 million in reimbursement to providers using a new hospice model for severely ill children. The state insurance commissioner applied to the Obama administration for a waiver from this year’s requirement that health insurers spend at least 80 percent of premium revenue on medical care. Only at the last minute did the State Health Department agree to provide required letters of support for community groups applying for federal wellness and prevention grants.
Critics say the state’s Republican leadership has carried its opposition to the health care law too far. The grants being shunned by the state, they point out, have little connection to the provisions that Florida is challenging in court, namely the insurance mandate and the expansion of Medicaid eligibility.
“It’s simply unconscionable that they’re turning back federal tax dollars that our citizens and businesses pay and sending those tax dollars to other states,” said Representative Kathy Castor, a Democrat who represents the Tampa Bay area. “Florida’s economy has been hit very hard, and we need every dollar and every job in our state.”
Health care advocates scoff at the assertion by Mr. Scott and the Legislature that some of the rejected grants would duplicate existing state programs (a few of the grants require a state contribution).
“Residents will suffer if the grants are turned away,” said Elizabeth M. Rugg, the director of the Suncoast Health Council in St. Petersburg. “There’s a lot of need in Florida, as everywhere else.”
Although Florida is the fourth most populous state, it ranks 12th in the amount of money received from health care act grants, according to the government’s grant-tracking Web site. The law has directed $46.4 million to the state out of $1.98 billion awarded nationally. Much of the money has gone directly to local governments, community groups and medical providers.
Three of four grants to expand community health clinics in Florida went to medical centers that are beyond the reach of the governor and the Legislature. The fourth was to the Osceola County Health Department, which under Florida law is effectively a unit of state government. The Legislature used its power to not authorize a grant won by the county to expand two health centers and build a third.
“The speaker had a policy that we weren’t going to be implementing any part of health care reform, so those grants were not included in our budget,” said Katherine Betta, a spokeswoman for Dean Cannon, a Republican and speaker of the State House.
Some of the forsaken grants were for small amounts, but others, over time, would have infused state programs with substantial sums. As long as the state makes no moves toward setting up an insurance exchange, it will not compete for grants worth tens of millions of dollars to help establish them and invest in needed technology. If Florida does not demonstrate adequate progress by early 2013, the federal government can take over the state’s exchange.
Although many conservative governors consider that the worst scenario, Mr. Scott said his antipathy toward the exchanges was so strong that he would oppose running it. “I’d rather nobody run it,” Mr. Scott said. “I don’t think there’s any way the state can do it where it’s good for health care policy.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/01/us/01florida.html?_r=3&pagewanted=2
by Kevin Sack
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — When it comes to pursuing federal largess, most of the states that oppose the 2010 health care law have refused to let either principle or politics block their paths to the trough. If Washington is doling out dollars, Republican governors and legislators typically figure they might as well get their share.
Then there is Florida. Despite having the country’s fourth-highest unemployment rate, its second-highest rate of people without insurance and a $3.7 billion budget gap this year, the state has turned away scores of millions of dollars in grants made available under the Affordable Care Act. And it is not pursuing grants worth many millions more.
In recent months, either Gov. Rick Scott’s administration or the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature has rejected grants aimed at moving long-term care patients into their homes, curbing child abuse through in-home counseling and strengthening state regulation of health premiums. They have shunned money to help sign up eligible recipients for Medicare, educate teenagers on preventing pregnancy and plan for the health insurance exchanges that the law requires by 2014.
While 36 states shared $27 million to counsel health insurance consumers, Florida did not apply for the grants. And in drafting this year’s budget, the Legislature failed to authorize an $8.3 million federal grant won by a county health department to expand community health centers.
In interviews, Mr. Scott, a Republican, and state legislative leaders were clear about their rationale. They said they detested everything about the federal health law, which was declared unconstitutional by a federal judge in a case filed by the state. Unless ordered to do otherwise by an appellate court, they said, they had no intention of putting it in place, even if that meant leaving money on the table.
“There are a lot of programs that the federal government would like to give you that don’t fit your state, don’t fit your needs and ultimately create obligations that our taxpayers can’t afford,” said Mr. Scott, a former hospital company executive who rose to political prominence by financing an advertising campaign against the health care legislation.
State Representative Matt Hudson, the chairman of the Health Care Appropriations Subcommittee, said his chamber’s leadership felt the same way.
“I do not believe that act is the right thing for the country or the right thing for Florida,” Mr. Hudson said, “and I am not going to start implementing things that I don’t believe in.” Asked whether states had the authority to stymie federal law, Mr. Hudson answered, “We’re not required to accept a grant.”
Florida is by no means the only state hostile to the health care law. A majority of those states have gone to federal court to challenge the law’s central requirement that most Americans obtain health insurance. Alaska, Oklahoma and Wisconsin, among others, have turned away grants, some of them substantial.
But many of the states challenging the law have taken a posture more like that of Idaho, where Gov. C. L. Otter, a Republican, made a show this spring of ordering his agencies not to pursue Affordable Care Act grants and then quickly issued 10 exceptions to that rule.
Florida has had few peers in subverting the law’s provisions since Mr. Scott took office in January. After a federal district judge in Pensacola invalidated the entire act later that month, Mr. Scott quickly put the brakes on planning for the insurance exchanges and started rejecting grants pursued by his predecessor, Charlie Crist, a more moderate Republican. The state maintained its stance even though the judge, Roger Vinson, suspended his ruling pending appellate review.
“I don’t want to waste either federal money or state money on something that’s unconstitutional,” Mr. Scott said in a 30-minute interview in his office on Friday.
The governor, sporting black cowboy boots embossed with the state seal, said his subordinates had made case-by-case decisions about whether particular grants advanced the state’s efforts to remake its Medicaid program. This year, Mr. Scott and the Legislature enacted Florida’s own law directing most recipients into managed care plans.
But Mr. Scott deflected requests to explain where the line was drawn, other than to say that competition, personal choice and quality incentives should drive the health care market.
I’d have to go through each program to look at it,” Mr. Scott said. “We have a Medicaid plan, so if it fits with that plan, then we’re interested, and if it doesn’t, we’re not.”
In distancing itself from the law, Florida declined to participate in a Medicaid pilot program that would have authorized up to $2 million in reimbursement to providers using a new hospice model for severely ill children. The state insurance commissioner applied to the Obama administration for a waiver from this year’s requirement that health insurers spend at least 80 percent of premium revenue on medical care. Only at the last minute did the State Health Department agree to provide required letters of support for community groups applying for federal wellness and prevention grants.
Critics say the state’s Republican leadership has carried its opposition to the health care law too far. The grants being shunned by the state, they point out, have little connection to the provisions that Florida is challenging in court, namely the insurance mandate and the expansion of Medicaid eligibility.
“It’s simply unconscionable that they’re turning back federal tax dollars that our citizens and businesses pay and sending those tax dollars to other states,” said Representative Kathy Castor, a Democrat who represents the Tampa Bay area. “Florida’s economy has been hit very hard, and we need every dollar and every job in our state.”
Health care advocates scoff at the assertion by Mr. Scott and the Legislature that some of the rejected grants would duplicate existing state programs (a few of the grants require a state contribution).
“Residents will suffer if the grants are turned away,” said Elizabeth M. Rugg, the director of the Suncoast Health Council in St. Petersburg. “There’s a lot of need in Florida, as everywhere else.”
Although Florida is the fourth most populous state, it ranks 12th in the amount of money received from health care act grants, according to the government’s grant-tracking Web site. The law has directed $46.4 million to the state out of $1.98 billion awarded nationally. Much of the money has gone directly to local governments, community groups and medical providers.
Three of four grants to expand community health clinics in Florida went to medical centers that are beyond the reach of the governor and the Legislature. The fourth was to the Osceola County Health Department, which under Florida law is effectively a unit of state government. The Legislature used its power to not authorize a grant won by the county to expand two health centers and build a third.
“The speaker had a policy that we weren’t going to be implementing any part of health care reform, so those grants were not included in our budget,” said Katherine Betta, a spokeswoman for Dean Cannon, a Republican and speaker of the State House.
Some of the forsaken grants were for small amounts, but others, over time, would have infused state programs with substantial sums. As long as the state makes no moves toward setting up an insurance exchange, it will not compete for grants worth tens of millions of dollars to help establish them and invest in needed technology. If Florida does not demonstrate adequate progress by early 2013, the federal government can take over the state’s exchange.
Although many conservative governors consider that the worst scenario, Mr. Scott said his antipathy toward the exchanges was so strong that he would oppose running it. “I’d rather nobody run it,” Mr. Scott said. “I don’t think there’s any way the state can do it where it’s good for health care policy.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/01/us/01florida.html?_r=3&pagewanted=2
Just where is the Florida Lottery money going?
From Sunshine News
by Gray Rohrer
Florida lottery sales totaled $4 billion in the 2010-2011 fiscal year which ended June 30, an increase of 2.8 percent. The numbers reverse a two-year trend in declining sales due to the downturn in the economy.
The sliding sales figures had led to a decrease in the amount of money given to Florida’s Education Enhancement Trust Fund, to which the lottery was designed to contribute. Last year, lottery transfers to the fund totaled $1.122 billion, but are expected to increase for the 2011-2012 fiscal year along with increasing sales.
“Lottery sales continue to move because people want the opportunity of the fun and the entertainment. It’s really just that simple. They want the entertainment value the lottery offers regardless of the economic times. But people have to make choices with their discretionary dollars. It is a discretionary entertainment dollar,” Department of Lottery Secretary Cynthia O’Connell said Friday at a meeting of the Economic Club of Florida in Tallahassee.
She was appointed to head the Department of Lottery in February by Gov. Rick Scott.
“I can only take credit for half the year, but I’ll take credit for it,” O’Connell said.
O’Connell’s goals for the current fiscal year are to improve on the uptick in sales. She expects to hit $4.22 billion in sales and give $1.25 billion to the Education Enhancement fund.
Yet many taxpayers remain concerned about the amount of money flowing into education from the lottery. It was set up in the 1980s to do just that, but lawmakers have consistently siphoned funds from the education trust fund for general revenue, leading the lottery money to sustain rather than "education" funding.
In the late 1980s, voters approved a lottery for Florida primarily because those who sponsored the ballot initiative promised the proceeds would go to bolster education, not replace money the state held back.
It didn't happen. In fact, that broken promise was a bone that stuck in the craw of voters for 10 years -- until 1997 when Ken Pruitt, then in the House, and Don Sullivan in the Senate, crafted and sponsored the Bright Futures scholarship program.
Bright Futures was funded with 25 percent of the state's lottery proceeds, with an understanding that the scholarship program could grow to 50 percent without touching the lottery's payouts or administrative costs.
Over the years the lottery trust fund has been raided, legislators talk about Bright Futures as "too costly too sustain in its original form" and there is little public discussion of how much "enhancement" money now goes straight into education general revenue.
“We’re in the business of providing revenue to the Department of Education,” O’Connell said when asked about the lack of increase in education enhancement dollars.
The lottery gives money to the DOE, and can’t help what it does with the funds and how legislators appropriate for education, she explained. “We let them appropriate where it goes."
Lawmakers have been nearly unanimous in their support of the state lottery, but some have sought to curtail unsanctioned forms of gambling throughout the state. Most recently, this has come in the effort to shut down Internet cafes, where customers pay money for a card to play games of chance on a laptop.
The new businesses have popped up in strip malls throughout the state. O’Connell admitted they present a rival to the traditional lottery, but highlighted the differences between the two games.
“Well, certainly it's competition for the Florida lottery. We publish odds for our players, we’re a legal entity and we’re moving forward to show our players great benefits in terms of their play going to fund education,” O’Connell said, adding that a legislative study to determine the impact of Internet cafes on the lottery has been commissioned.
Reach Gray Rohrer at grohrer@sunshinestatenews.com or at (850) 727-0859.
http://www.sunshinestatenews.com/story/florida-lottery-sales-up-proceeds-enrich-education-enhancement-no-answer
by Gray Rohrer
Florida lottery sales totaled $4 billion in the 2010-2011 fiscal year which ended June 30, an increase of 2.8 percent. The numbers reverse a two-year trend in declining sales due to the downturn in the economy.
The sliding sales figures had led to a decrease in the amount of money given to Florida’s Education Enhancement Trust Fund, to which the lottery was designed to contribute. Last year, lottery transfers to the fund totaled $1.122 billion, but are expected to increase for the 2011-2012 fiscal year along with increasing sales.
“Lottery sales continue to move because people want the opportunity of the fun and the entertainment. It’s really just that simple. They want the entertainment value the lottery offers regardless of the economic times. But people have to make choices with their discretionary dollars. It is a discretionary entertainment dollar,” Department of Lottery Secretary Cynthia O’Connell said Friday at a meeting of the Economic Club of Florida in Tallahassee.
She was appointed to head the Department of Lottery in February by Gov. Rick Scott.
“I can only take credit for half the year, but I’ll take credit for it,” O’Connell said.
O’Connell’s goals for the current fiscal year are to improve on the uptick in sales. She expects to hit $4.22 billion in sales and give $1.25 billion to the Education Enhancement fund.
Yet many taxpayers remain concerned about the amount of money flowing into education from the lottery. It was set up in the 1980s to do just that, but lawmakers have consistently siphoned funds from the education trust fund for general revenue, leading the lottery money to sustain rather than "education" funding.
In the late 1980s, voters approved a lottery for Florida primarily because those who sponsored the ballot initiative promised the proceeds would go to bolster education, not replace money the state held back.
It didn't happen. In fact, that broken promise was a bone that stuck in the craw of voters for 10 years -- until 1997 when Ken Pruitt, then in the House, and Don Sullivan in the Senate, crafted and sponsored the Bright Futures scholarship program.
Bright Futures was funded with 25 percent of the state's lottery proceeds, with an understanding that the scholarship program could grow to 50 percent without touching the lottery's payouts or administrative costs.
Over the years the lottery trust fund has been raided, legislators talk about Bright Futures as "too costly too sustain in its original form" and there is little public discussion of how much "enhancement" money now goes straight into education general revenue.
“We’re in the business of providing revenue to the Department of Education,” O’Connell said when asked about the lack of increase in education enhancement dollars.
The lottery gives money to the DOE, and can’t help what it does with the funds and how legislators appropriate for education, she explained. “We let them appropriate where it goes."
Lawmakers have been nearly unanimous in their support of the state lottery, but some have sought to curtail unsanctioned forms of gambling throughout the state. Most recently, this has come in the effort to shut down Internet cafes, where customers pay money for a card to play games of chance on a laptop.
The new businesses have popped up in strip malls throughout the state. O’Connell admitted they present a rival to the traditional lottery, but highlighted the differences between the two games.
“Well, certainly it's competition for the Florida lottery. We publish odds for our players, we’re a legal entity and we’re moving forward to show our players great benefits in terms of their play going to fund education,” O’Connell said, adding that a legislative study to determine the impact of Internet cafes on the lottery has been commissioned.
Reach Gray Rohrer at grohrer@sunshinestatenews.com or at (850) 727-0859.
http://www.sunshinestatenews.com/story/florida-lottery-sales-up-proceeds-enrich-education-enhancement-no-answer
Veteran teachers flee Florida's struggling schools
From the Daily Journal
by BILL KACZOR
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Math teacher Antoine Joseph already had been thinking of leaving Miami Norland Senior High School, so when its annual grade from the state dropped from a D to an F nine years ago that just solidified his decision.
Joseph said it wasn't just a matter of being stigmatized as a failure — he was just tired of the circumstances behind the failing grade.
"There is a propensity to go to another school where the parents are more involved, the students are more eager to learn and they are more thirsty for knowledge," he said.
Joseph apparently was not alone. A recent study by a trio of economists showed a disproportionate number of Florida teachers left schools that got lower grades in 2002 after the state changed the way it evaluated them.
The researchers call it "accountability shock." That's their term for unexpected results from shake-ups in the way students, teachers, administrators or schools are evaluated, graded, rewarded or punished. The study is timely advice because accountability changes are in the works across the nation due to President Barack Obama's "Race to the Top" school initiative. The program is providing $4.35 billion in federal stimulus money to Florida, 10 other states and the District of Columbia for innovative changes aimed at improving student achievement.
Not a single Florida school had failed in 2001 before the grading change, but Norland was among 63 that received an F after the new procedure was adopted. It bases A-through-F grades on gains students make on standardized tests from year to year rather than simply on that year's scores.
"The increased pressure probably produced some benefits but also led some teachers to move away from low-achieving schools," said Florida State University economist Tim Sass. "The general lesson there is you have to be careful about potentially unintended consequences."
A key provision in Florida's Race to the Top plan, as well as part of a new accountability law, is teacher merit pay that will be closely tied to how much students improve on the standardized tests. Joseph thinks the changes will again cause more teacher transfers.
Joseph transferred in 2002 to William H. Turner Technical Arts High School, which received a C that year, and he's still teaching there. Besides the school grading change, Joseph said a conflict with Norland's principal and personal issues, contributed to his decision to leave.
Saul Berenson said the new grading system also was a factor, but not the only one, in his departure from Miami Jackson Senior High School. He said he decided to retire after 40 years in part because of the focus on testing and computerization that was taking up more of teachers' time.
"Anybody who stays in teaching needs their heads examined," Berenson said. "You are no longer a teacher. You are a glorified baby sitter or you're teaching to the test."
The Associated Press contacted seven other Miami-Dade County teachers who left failing schools in 2002, but all said they did so for other reasons. Robert Black left Norland for Lake Ariel, Pa., so he could be closer to his aging parents, but said he found the researchers' theory interesting.
"They may not be off by much," Black said. "I know that teachers get very frustrated."
Sass collaborated with Li Feng of Texas State University-San Marcos and David Figlio of Northwestern University. Their study was published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization based in Cambridge, Mass. All three also have done other research on school accountability and performance measures.
They found teachers at failing schools were 1.4 times more likely to leave than those at schools with higher grades.
"The evidence is pretty clear that teachers tend to move toward schools that have higher achievement, fewer kids in poverty, fewer discipline problems," Sass said.
Besides the stigma, Florida's F schools miss out on financial rewards given to those that get an A or show significant improvement. Failing schools, though, do get other help such as additional reading coaches and they may undergo staffing changes. They also could face closure or conversion into charter schools. This year, 31 Florida schools received an F — 1 percent of the total.
While some poorly performing teachers left in 2002, the study indicated that wasn't entirely the case. The researchers found teachers who left for other schools as well as the ones who remained showed improvement. The extra help given to failing schools may have been a factor in the improvement shown by those who stayed, Sass said.
Figlio agreed with the unintended consequences lesson that can be drawn from the study, but said the results also showed "it's really challenging to design a system that takes everything into account."
"The big takeaway message for Race to the Top will be that the schools that serve low-income kids are going to be particularly vulnerable," he said. "Any system that's going to provide incentives for good teachers needs to be particularly focused on these most vulnerable schools."
Florida school officials realized they had a problem with teacher mobility in failing schools soon after the 2002 grading system change.
Wayne Blanton, executive director of the Florida School Boards Association, said some districts gave extra pay to teachers who stayed.
Florida House Education Committee Chairman Bill Proctor, a St. Augustine Republican who is a career educator and chancellor of Flagler College, said he wasn't surprised by the findings.
"We need to take cognizance of it," Proctor said. "We probably need to be sensitive to it, but the question with each school may be a different."
Former Florida K-12 Chancellor Frances Haithcock said the findings are correct but that she's confident the state will avoid another accountability shock from its $700 million Race to the Top plan
The merit pay provision in that plan could keep teachers from leaving shocked schools, Sass acknowledged, but he said there are plenty of pitfalls in designing evaluation systems. One is test scores. He called it a "noisy" measure due to outside influences such as illness or even a fire alarm going off.
"You give the same test to the same kid a couple days apart and the score won't be the same," Sass said. "They get lucky guessing on a few questions or misinterpret a question."
Haithcock said that's why Florida isn't relying on a single test but will use scores from a three-year period.
"That lessens the noise to the point that it's fair," Haithcock said.
Sass said the research also shows student testing can do a good job of identifying teachers at the very top and bottom of the performance scale, but not for those that are "a little better than average or a little worse than average."
The researchers expect Race to the Top will give them more opportunity to study accountability shock and related issues.
"Researchers love when there are policy changes," Figlio said. "Every policy change is going to introduce some type of good and bad luck. I mean, that's just the nature of the beast."
http://www.dailyjournal.net/view/story/642acc6b96ea48d0bcbeab61a6f6bd32/FL--Accountability-Shock/
by BILL KACZOR
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Math teacher Antoine Joseph already had been thinking of leaving Miami Norland Senior High School, so when its annual grade from the state dropped from a D to an F nine years ago that just solidified his decision.
Joseph said it wasn't just a matter of being stigmatized as a failure — he was just tired of the circumstances behind the failing grade.
"There is a propensity to go to another school where the parents are more involved, the students are more eager to learn and they are more thirsty for knowledge," he said.
Joseph apparently was not alone. A recent study by a trio of economists showed a disproportionate number of Florida teachers left schools that got lower grades in 2002 after the state changed the way it evaluated them.
The researchers call it "accountability shock." That's their term for unexpected results from shake-ups in the way students, teachers, administrators or schools are evaluated, graded, rewarded or punished. The study is timely advice because accountability changes are in the works across the nation due to President Barack Obama's "Race to the Top" school initiative. The program is providing $4.35 billion in federal stimulus money to Florida, 10 other states and the District of Columbia for innovative changes aimed at improving student achievement.
Not a single Florida school had failed in 2001 before the grading change, but Norland was among 63 that received an F after the new procedure was adopted. It bases A-through-F grades on gains students make on standardized tests from year to year rather than simply on that year's scores.
"The increased pressure probably produced some benefits but also led some teachers to move away from low-achieving schools," said Florida State University economist Tim Sass. "The general lesson there is you have to be careful about potentially unintended consequences."
A key provision in Florida's Race to the Top plan, as well as part of a new accountability law, is teacher merit pay that will be closely tied to how much students improve on the standardized tests. Joseph thinks the changes will again cause more teacher transfers.
Joseph transferred in 2002 to William H. Turner Technical Arts High School, which received a C that year, and he's still teaching there. Besides the school grading change, Joseph said a conflict with Norland's principal and personal issues, contributed to his decision to leave.
Saul Berenson said the new grading system also was a factor, but not the only one, in his departure from Miami Jackson Senior High School. He said he decided to retire after 40 years in part because of the focus on testing and computerization that was taking up more of teachers' time.
"Anybody who stays in teaching needs their heads examined," Berenson said. "You are no longer a teacher. You are a glorified baby sitter or you're teaching to the test."
The Associated Press contacted seven other Miami-Dade County teachers who left failing schools in 2002, but all said they did so for other reasons. Robert Black left Norland for Lake Ariel, Pa., so he could be closer to his aging parents, but said he found the researchers' theory interesting.
"They may not be off by much," Black said. "I know that teachers get very frustrated."
Sass collaborated with Li Feng of Texas State University-San Marcos and David Figlio of Northwestern University. Their study was published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, a private, nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization based in Cambridge, Mass. All three also have done other research on school accountability and performance measures.
They found teachers at failing schools were 1.4 times more likely to leave than those at schools with higher grades.
"The evidence is pretty clear that teachers tend to move toward schools that have higher achievement, fewer kids in poverty, fewer discipline problems," Sass said.
Besides the stigma, Florida's F schools miss out on financial rewards given to those that get an A or show significant improvement. Failing schools, though, do get other help such as additional reading coaches and they may undergo staffing changes. They also could face closure or conversion into charter schools. This year, 31 Florida schools received an F — 1 percent of the total.
While some poorly performing teachers left in 2002, the study indicated that wasn't entirely the case. The researchers found teachers who left for other schools as well as the ones who remained showed improvement. The extra help given to failing schools may have been a factor in the improvement shown by those who stayed, Sass said.
Figlio agreed with the unintended consequences lesson that can be drawn from the study, but said the results also showed "it's really challenging to design a system that takes everything into account."
"The big takeaway message for Race to the Top will be that the schools that serve low-income kids are going to be particularly vulnerable," he said. "Any system that's going to provide incentives for good teachers needs to be particularly focused on these most vulnerable schools."
Florida school officials realized they had a problem with teacher mobility in failing schools soon after the 2002 grading system change.
Wayne Blanton, executive director of the Florida School Boards Association, said some districts gave extra pay to teachers who stayed.
Florida House Education Committee Chairman Bill Proctor, a St. Augustine Republican who is a career educator and chancellor of Flagler College, said he wasn't surprised by the findings.
"We need to take cognizance of it," Proctor said. "We probably need to be sensitive to it, but the question with each school may be a different."
Former Florida K-12 Chancellor Frances Haithcock said the findings are correct but that she's confident the state will avoid another accountability shock from its $700 million Race to the Top plan
The merit pay provision in that plan could keep teachers from leaving shocked schools, Sass acknowledged, but he said there are plenty of pitfalls in designing evaluation systems. One is test scores. He called it a "noisy" measure due to outside influences such as illness or even a fire alarm going off.
"You give the same test to the same kid a couple days apart and the score won't be the same," Sass said. "They get lucky guessing on a few questions or misinterpret a question."
Haithcock said that's why Florida isn't relying on a single test but will use scores from a three-year period.
"That lessens the noise to the point that it's fair," Haithcock said.
Sass said the research also shows student testing can do a good job of identifying teachers at the very top and bottom of the performance scale, but not for those that are "a little better than average or a little worse than average."
The researchers expect Race to the Top will give them more opportunity to study accountability shock and related issues.
"Researchers love when there are policy changes," Figlio said. "Every policy change is going to introduce some type of good and bad luck. I mean, that's just the nature of the beast."
http://www.dailyjournal.net/view/story/642acc6b96ea48d0bcbeab61a6f6bd32/FL--Accountability-Shock/
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