How the Duval County School Board taught me to lie

Okay I am just going to vent. Earlier this year I got married, thanks, thanks but before I got married I had to get a new social security card, my old one lost to my filing system which is reminiscent of the Hindenburg.

So I took two half days, one to get the card and the other to prepare for my wedding. I didn’t need subs because I have third period planning followed by lunch and my last period could be covered by a teacher with a planning period, for which they would be paid the bargain rate of 12 bucks. Still a pretty good savings as I didn’t need half day subs.

I filled out my leave forms indicating I would be taking personal time. Fast forward nearly 3 months, yep 3 months, and I have been docked a days’ pay. Now I still have lots of hours I can miss, but unfortunately for me and my bank account they are sick hours not personal hours.

I wasn’t given a heads up, a, hey Chris budget a little better this week because you are going to be a few hundred short. No I noticed quite by chance as I was about to write a big check, which I will now have to write next pay day.

All right if that’s how we are going to do it, something that must be new because to be honest I have never paid attention to sick and personal hours, just hours, then fine, I will just have to make sure this doesn’t happen again even if that means I have to lie. so if you see me out during the day one day next year be careful before coming on up, I may or may not be sick.

I mention this because teacher morale has been talked about a lot recently. Well quite often it is the big things, discipline, over testing, bullies masquerading at administrators but sometimes it is the little things too.

I now feel a cough coming on.

Aother reason absenteeism is up, Chronic Testing

From a reader:

People are not realizing that, because of testing, teachers are missing 1-2 weeks of class time, which requires a sub to be in the class while the teacher is out testing. Testing includes all of the subject areas and AP exam administration. That is 5-10 days. Then, a teacher has 10 personal/sick days, plus professional development. One year I missed like a month of school, only 5 days which were used for myself. Most were for professional development and some were for testing. The chronic testing, I believe, is completely skewing the numbers.

For Profit Charter Schools want more public money

In Palm Beach they have a 25 cents on a thousand dollars mileage rate tax to pay for art, music and other teachers, about 50 dollars for a 200 thousand dollar house. It’s a sad and dirty secret but the state more often than not does not give districts enough money to pay for their needs. I would say things like art and music are needs. We can’t make school such drudgery for so many then scratch our heads wondering why they do poorly. Well in Palm Beach, which has 50 charter schools many of whom are for profit, they want a piece of this pie.

I would like to say why we give for profit charter schools one cent more than the per pupil rate is beyond me but it isn’t. You see many of these charter schools use public money to lobby for even more public money and also give campaign donations to legislators they think they can sway.

Nobody forces a charter school to open and neither are they required to guess how much they will receive too. Yes they do receive less per pupil but that hasn’t stopped a lot of people from getting very rich.

The citizens of Palm Beach should tell the charter industry no, you have taken more than enough public money.

To read more, click the link:  http://www.mypalmbeachpost.com/news/news/local-education/county-seeks-clarification-before-putting-school-

Duval Public Schools Morale Problem

The Superintendent admitted our teachers had a morale problem in the Times Union’s recent article about absenteeism. First I would like to say I don’t think the problem is nearly as pronounced as the article indicates, influenced both by outliers; yes there are a small percentage of teachers that miss a heck of a lot of days and they should be dealt with, and the National Council of Teacher Excellence’s bias. This is not a non-partisan group and I imagine they revel in embarrassing teachers.

Full disclosure twice in the last five years I missed more than ten days, one year I had a blood clot and I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy and the other I was on target to carry days over when I had a scooter accident which saw me laid up and unable to drive for the better part of the last two weeks of school.

First let’s talk about Temporary Duty Elsewhere or the designation teachers’ use when going to training or doing IEPs. Even though teachers are working they have to fill out leave forms. Yes they aren’t in front of students but should this really count as absenteeism?

So now that we have that out of the way is there to much absenteeism? I imagine that’s debatable but what isn’t is the morale problem that Vitti mentions.  He went on to say, “When teachers feel better respected and valued and enjoy going to work, they go to work”.

Um duh.

I have to tell you when Vitti and the new school board members arrived; even though he and a couple of the board members weren’t my first choice it was like a breath of fresh air. We were prior to them heading in the wrong direction and now we had hope again. Unfortunately a year and a half in and it the new boss same as the old boss.

Fischer is there not to improve our schools but privatize them and most of the board members have taken money from charter school operators. Couch and Smith-Juarez, a multi-millionaire by the way, suggested taking some of that money ear marked for teacher raises and use it not to fire secretaries and security personal, um wrong on both answers. Hall said why do elementary schools need their own art teachers? Why can’t they share with another school? What?!? Grymes has said, um, gee not much. Then Wright and sometimes Couch too asks tough questions and then vote against what they have to know to be best for the district. Either do what’s right ladies or stop wasting our time please.

Then there is Vitti and his see if it sticks management style. What we desperately needed last year, more A.P.s, testing coordinators, permanent subs, we don’t need this. Let’s put in all these discipline people and then have them ignore discipline, his restorative justice mantra is falling flat as are the double occupancy electives. He says he is going to cut back on testing when we have tested more than ever before. Open enrollment anyone? Yeah who thinks it is a good idea to fundamentally change the district in less time than it takes me to write an IEP? He relies on Teach for America, bends over backwards for charter schools and cuts staff left and right. Then there is his leadership team. I guess iron fist is one technique to motivate people.

Only two-thirds of the staff has missed more than ten days? Wow we should have a parade.

Vitti and the board have squandered the capital they received when they ascended to their positions and quite frankly I don’t know how they get it back.

Absentee study slams Teach for America

From the Times Union: “It matters because teacher attendance definitely has an impact on student achievement,” said Nancy Waymack, who helped oversee the study. “When teachers are absent 10 days, the decrease in student achievement is the same difference between having a brand new teacher and one with two to three years experience.”

Hmm, it seems according to the study experience matters; well you don’t know who has experience? Teach for America teachers and since most leave after two years they don’t get the chance to have any. This begs the question that since experience is so important why is the district insisting on putting hundreds of TFA recruits in our classrooms. It’s worse to because TFA assures we have an ever revolving door of teachers.

This is not rocket science people. If the district wants to be successful it needs to strive to put professional teachers and teachers who will be more than just two and done in our classrooms. 

It is almost like we want to do bad.

MSNBC and NPR’s common love affair with Common Core.

Common core certainly is controversial. It’s like the evolution fight in Texas on steroids times ten nationwide. NPR and MSNBC, not as education friendly as one might think, funded by the Walton’s and Education Nation anybody, seemed to have recently taken a side and both seem to be pro-common core.  

Trymaine Lee recently asked in a MSNBC piece has the world gone crazy over Common Core? His main point seems to be that since some nut-bag Tea Party members are against it, and Charles Van Zant of the infamous, it is here to turn your children gay comments, I am looking squarely at you, it must be okay.

Where he does mention that finally some teacher organizations after initially supporting it, gobs of Bill Gates money anyone, they have been coming out against it, he doesn’t even mention how it doubles down on high stakes testing, siphons money out of classrooms and ignores the effects of poverty.  All pretty big omissions, but he covered that Van Zant thing pretty good so I guess all is well.

 http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/common-core-crazy-reactions-education-teachers

Then there is the NPR Common Core piece by Corey Turner. Most of the piece is about how publishers tried to make a quick buck off of common core and raced to put out bogus materials, but hey don’t blame common core, it’s two thumbs up because a lot of governors signed on.

He doesn’t mentioned how at first many were first coerced through Race to the Top with offers of money during the great recession when they were cash strapped and unsure about the future and how since the recovery they have been blackmailed by Arne Duncan and his no child left behind waivers.  But gosh don’t you blame common core. 

About two thirds of the way through the he stopped being a journalist, thank you Bill and Melinda Gates foundation?, and became a shill for common core instead.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/ed/2014/06/03/318228023/the-common-core-curriculum-void

I get it, nut-bags sell papers and drive ratings and you got to butter the guys who gave you the bread but if we can’t count on them to give the public the entire story, then who can we count on? Fox news? Sorry just kidding.  

Redefined Ed and the school choice crowds eroding credibility

Patrick Gibbons, who never met a public school he liked and a voucher he didn’t recently wrote about how the Friedman institute said Florida’s Voucher program is the most heavily regulated in the nation.

http://www.redefinedonline.org/2014/05/floridas-tax-credit-scholarship-program-most-regulated-in-u-

Well the Maclver Institute, the great north’s equivalent of Redefined Ed just wrote a piece saying Milwaukie’s voucher program was the most heavily regulated in the nation.  

http://www.maciverinstitute.com/research/2014/06/study-shows-milwaukees-voucher-program-is-most-government-regulated-school-choice-program-in-america/

Pat wrote in ReDefined Ed: Friedman, a free-market education think tank, actually ranks the Florida tax credit scholarship as the most regulated state scholarship law in the nation.

Then the Maclver Institute wrote: The Milwaukee Parental Choice Program (MPCP) was named "the most heavily regulated private school choice program in the country" in a study released by the Friedman Foundation last week.

Um how can they both be the most heavily regulated?

The answer is these guys will say and do whatever they can to sell their privatization, anti-public school agenda and it is shameful.

Don't beleive the hype about Florida's eductaion budget!

I am reminded of the words “Don’t believe the Hype” when it comes to the victory lap that Rick Scott and the republicans are doing when it comes to education funding. They say that this year we are spending 18.9 billion dollars on education and the most we had ever spent before is 18.75 (in 2007) billion dollars and where true it only tells a fraction of the story.

Today we have 67,000 more students and per pupil spending has dropped 199 dollars. Furthermore Scott and the legislature must have never heard of inflation as according to the Lakeland Ledger the value of 2007’s budget would be 21.44 billion in 2014 dollars.     

Then factor in senate bill 736 which requires entirely new pay scales based on next year’s standardized tests, tests we don’t have by the way, all the costs for Common Core and the staggering amount of unfunded mandates and districts aren’t just doing more with less, they are doing a lot more with a crippling amount of less. The only people who could possibly be happy about this budget our charter school operators and private schools that take vouchers because they have seen their piece of the pie grow exponentially while public schools are starved.

If you are okay with the governor and legislature starving our schools then this is the group for you. If you think we should and can do better then its time you started demanding it.  I believe the governor should call a special session to adequately fund our schools and hopefully you do too.

So much for Florida investing in its children. #therealeducationbdget

From Scathing Purple Musings, by Bob Sykes
The editors of the Lakeland Ledger focus on Polk County Schools  woes they will experience under the education budget which Governor Rick Scott signed yesterday.

Florida legislators have been patting themselves on the back for increasing school funding in their annual session, which ended May 2.

Even so, funding for public schools in Florida — particularly in Polk County — is not nearly enough. Public schools, although governed by county school districts, are funded by the state primarily.

As Polk school officials spoke with lawmakers during the 60-day legislative session, they were told to expect a budget increase of about $23 million. Instead, the budget passed by the Legislature May 2 and signed by Gov. Rick Scott on Monday increased education funding in the county by about $16 million — and by $529.4 million statewide.

New state spending mandates, said Polk Superintendent of Schools Kathryn LeRoy, will chew up nearly all of the county’s funding increase, reported The Ledger’s Bill Rufty in an article May 27.

Looks like Florida republicans want to get by with unfunded mandates again. Meanwhile they give their Chamber of Commerce corporate cronies a tax break to fund voucher expansion.

Incrementalism becomes clear in state education budgeting when one examines this year’s increase, hailed by Scott as an “education investment” and as a record for Florida.

This year’s $18.9 billion in public school spending exceeds the previous greatest amount of $18.75 billion passed in 2007. The amount passed last year was $18.325 billion.

In two ways, the $18.9 billion education amount, signed into law by Scott on Monday, is a record on paper only.

First, because Florida had about 67,000 fewer students in 2007, statewide funding per student was $7,126 in 2007 vs. $6,937 this year. The amount allotted this year for Polk is $6,768.

Second, because of inflation, the 2007 state public school fund is worth $21.44 billion in 2014 dollars vs. the $18.9 billion approved this year. The 2007 state funding per student is worth $8,148 in 2014 dollars.

It is these numbers which the Ledger referred to as a “paper tiger,” and provides real numbers to back state Democrats attack on Scott’s budget. From Sunshine State News reporter Kevin Derby:

“For three years, Floridians have witnessed the devastating effects Rick Scott has had on public education. Now, in addition to running for re-election, Rick Scott is trying to run from his record of slashing education funding while lining the pockets of special interests and top campaign contributors,” said (Chairwoman of the Florida Democrats) Allison Tant on Monday. “But no amount of poll-tested talking points can change the fact that per-pupil spending still remains below 2007 levels, and that Bright Futures serves far fewer students than it did seven years ago.

“This week, Rick Scott is expected to sign a budget filled with hundreds of millions in pork-barrel spending,” Tant added. “He will have to answer to Florida’s teachers, students, and parents for every dollar he fails to veto as our schools continue to struggle. Floridians will be watching carefully as Rick Scott decides what’s most important: pet projects for special interests or giving our children the best education possible.”

Having numbers available which any 4th grade kid can understand – even in a convoluted Common Core lesson – is a political consultant’s dream. Will it still matter to voters in November?

http://bobsidlethoughtsandmusings.wordpress.com/2014/06/03/rick-scotts-education-investment-a-paper-tiger/

Duval County snubs its nose at teachers

Follow me for a second.

All across the district hundreds of teachers are being surplussed while at the same time the district is slated to bring in hundreds of Teach for America teachers. How does that make sense?

It doesn’t unless you don’t think teachers are professionals (Ashley-Smith-Juarez, Jason Fischer and Dr. Vitti) and you think anybody just anybody can show up and be a teacher.  It doesn’t unless you want to break the power of the union and privatize our schools.

The district has some explaining to do if it thinks it can surplus professional teachers and bring in TFA hobbyists at the same time.