The way they think

Deb Meier's latest (and last for the summer) post on Bridging Differences, quotes IBM's Louis Gerstner wanting to replace the country's 16,000 school districts with just one. It made me think back to the wish expressed by L.A. Supt. Ramon Cortines for a "dictatorship" over his district. Deb also offers some good summer reads.

The Duncan Era

I don't know why it took me so long. But I finally got around to reading Matthew Blake's comprehensive assessment of the Duncan era in Chicago, "The educators new clothes: Everybody loves Arne Duncan. But do his reforms work?" It was well worth the read. Check it out.

More on mayoral control

The Tribune carries the latest chapter on the Daley machine's job/patronage dealings. That Arne Duncan still touts mayoral control of the schools as the "model" for every city is almost laughable. The only question is when the federal prosecutor's noose will tighten around the Fifth Floor of City Hall.

• Inspector general wants Daley to fire HR chief (Chicago Breaking News)
• Daley defends resigned personnel aide (Chicago Breaking News)
• Mayor Daley's personnel chief quits (Chicago Tribune)
• Former Daley aide upset IG made report public (Chicago Breaking News)
• Accused of lying, Daley's personnel chief quits (Chicago Breaking News)

Briefs

Mayoral out of control

In response to the Civic Committee's charge that Chicago test score increases were the product of changes in the test:

"Why don't you mention where you go to school? Or your grandchildren? Why haven't they mentioned them? Ah hah. Why? That's the question.''

Stop the presses!

Talk about your duh! headlines. From Edweek: NEA, Obama Administration May Not Be in Sync

Congratulations...

...to Small Schools Workshop alum Gabrielle Lyon and Paul Sereno. Project Exploration just won the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science Mentoring.

Data-driven reform?

"Suppress it!"

I have received more confirmation on Tuesday's post , re. attempts by the Civic Committee and the Renaissance Schools Fund (RSF) to suppress or delay the release of a study of Chicago Renaissance 2010 schools. The study, released in April, showed mixed results for the Daley/Duncan reform initiative.

The Ren10 schools, mostly charters run by outside management companies, did no better than the "failing" neighborhood schools they were supposed to replace. This despite having lower rates of bilingual and special education students.

Obviously, the mediocre results were not to the the liking of the study's sponsors, nor to those who have been touting Chicago as "the model" for districts nationwide to follow. Yesterday I received further confirmations of suppression efforts by Civic Committee and RSF leaders, including threatened lawsuits, to prevent the study from being shown to the public.

One correction: In my earlier post, I attributed the study solely to the Consortium on Chicago School Research. But, I was informed, the study was actually done by SRI International with the Consortium serving as a sub-contractor. Since it was published on the Consortium's website, I had assumed that the study was theirs. But it was the SRI that became the target of the suppression and intimidation attempts. Kudos to them for not being cowed and releasing the study in good time.

Take that, Civic Committee

On the heels of the Civic Committee's report, calling Chicago school reform an "abysmal" failure, Mayor Daley called a press conference of his own to announce (hold on to your hats) that reading scores went up 1.1 % over last year. That's not all. Math scores increased by 3% and science by 1.7%.

Take that R. Eden Martin.

Daley:"We are...convinced that our progress is truly being made in every school," said Daley.

The Tribune: "Of the 519 elementary schools in the city, 320 showed improvement over last year's test scores. That leaves roughly 200 performing at the same or worse, though the district did not provide data for those schools."

Russo: "The City Hall press release here (PDF) reveals quite a bit of hedging and uncertainty -- taking credit for increases at the same time as it acknowledges the sorry state of affairs. It's a delicate line to walk. "

Catalyst: "Catalyst didn’t receive word about the press conference and therefore didn’t attend. Let’s just call it a technical glitch that we are working on remedying."

Don't feel bad, Catalyst. Neither did SmallTalk. Our invitations probably got lost in the e-mail.

NEA follow-up

Duncan vs. Darling-Hammond

Looking back and looking ahead, a lot of us can't help wondering how different things might be had Obama chosen Linda Darling-Hammond rather than Arne Duncan, as his ed secretary. At last weekend's NEA Conference, the two speakers offered two different takes on school reform and on the source of the problem:

Arne Duncan:

2,000 high schools produce half of the dropouts in the country. Their kids are years behind grade. They are perpetuating poverty and social failure...But if we agree that the adults in these schools are failing these children then we have to find the right people and we can't let our rules and regulations get in the way... And we can't continue to blame each other or blame the system. We are the system... (Ed.gov)

Linda Darling-Hammond:

It’s not the people who are at fault, it’s the system that needs an overhaul. We need federal policies that support educators in doing the challenging work that they have committed to do...We need a new form of accountability. Tests and punishments will not create accountability."(Teacher Beat)

Merit pay -- Who wants it?

We know that most teachers don't want it. The AFT and NEA can live with it so long as they can help shape it.

Business doesn't use it

It is conventional to say that holding educators accountable and paying for higher test scores will improve performance. Eli Broad, whose foundation promotes incentive pay for teachers, states, "Virtually every other industry compensates employees based on how well they perform. … We know from experience across other industries and sectors that linking performance and pay is a powerful incentive."

Yet in reality, private sector pay is almost never based primarily on quantitative performance measures. (Richard Rothstein, Forum for Education and Democracy)

It doesn't excite school administrators either

In the June survey, conducted by the American Association of School Administrators and completed online by 536 administrators from 45 states, 44 percent of the respondents said they had a “moderate to strong” interest in exploring the use of a pay-for-performance program for individual teachers, 46 percent said they would be interested in using it to reward groups of teachers, and 44 percent reported being interested in a pay-for-performance initiative that would reward all teachers. (Edweek)

The South Pasadena Unified Grade "A" Jug Band

Failed attempts to suppress Chicago study

Whispers over at the Consortium on Chicago School Research are all about attempts by members of the Civic Committee and the Renaissance School Fund to suppress a Consortium report before it hit the street this past April.

The report, "Renaissance Schools Fund-Supported Schools: Early Outcomes, Challenges, and Opportunities" offered evidence that the new, privately-managed charter schools created under the Mayor's Renaissance 2010 initiative, were producing no better results than their traditional, neighborhood school counterparts.

At least two sources tell me that Civic Committee President R. Eden Martin along with unnamed members of the RSF, "tried to suppress or slow the release of the data" to avoid embarrassment to the Mayor and Arne Duncan. Duncan has been touting the Chicago model and pressuring other states and school districts to follow it or risk losing stimulus dollars.

When Consortium researchers went ahead, despite pressure and published the report, the usual panic, butt-covering and scapegoating set in, leading to the publication last week of the Civic Committee's own report which painted Chicago reform as an "abysmal" failure. The report made no mention of the Renaissance 2010 plan, authored by that very same Civic Committee under mayoral control. Ren10 became the blueprint for the failed reform. Duncan, who had faithfully carried out the plan before going to Washington, now becomes the fall guy.

The Consortium followed up on the report with another devastating study in June, "The Schools Teachers Leave: Teacher Mobility in Chicago Public Schools," revealing CPS's chronically high rates of teacher turnover, especially in schools serving low-income, African-American children.

Kudos to the Consortium.

The answer

In the new National Journal Online, Arne Duncan continues spreading the Chicago miracle manure around. He's still insisting that, in Chicago and other cities, "mayoral control is the answer for turning around schools." I guess he's ignoring the report from his old bosses at the Civic Committee who are calling the past decade of Chicago reform "abysmal."

I'm no hoo hoo

BTW, I tried to respond to Duncan's silly claims at NJO, but the new Gates-sponsored site, which Edweek's Dakarai Aarons calls, "a veritable who's who among education policymakers" only allows comments from "invited participants." No practitioners allowed. They're not hoo-hoos.

Sun-Times Editorial on Civic Committee Report

Mostly, it's an overly simplistic analysis of test data, assembled largely to bash traditional public schools and promote the business group's preferred solution -- expanding the number of charter and other privately managed schools.

I agree

Quotables

It's an illusion

The stark conclusion: Nothing that Paul Vallas or Arne Duncan did in the last 15 years has had any significant effect on the number of CPS students who can read and write acceptably and do arithmetic, fractions and elementary algebra easily. It's all an illusion. (Bill Sweetland, Huffington)

Duncan on the education business

Q & A with the Chicago Tribune:

Q Why include business in the policy debate about public education? A We all need to work together on this stuff, business leaders and educators. Everyone's mutual interests are absolutely aligned.
Q Business leaders want reform but don't want to pay for it, right?
A No; there's been unbelievable generosity, not just in resources but in ideas. We've had a great relationship with the Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable. I've met with a number of CEOs.

Disconnected youth

The costs of leaving six million young adults completely out of the economy and bereft of hope are going to be dangerously high. Everyone recognizes that this population is inevitably a source of crime. Currently, New York State has 60,000 people incarcerated and 23,000 on parole and the fifth highest recidivism rate in the country. It destroys individuals, their victims, and their families (David Jones, President and CEO, Community Service Society of New York).

In my mailbox

WaPo's Jay Mathews says he doesn't deserve to be called "union basher":

...this is all fair comment, but i hope you also read the column and see the praise i heaped onto AFT president Randi Weingarten. that doesnt look like union bashing to me.

Okay, Jay. Maybe I shouldn't have called you a union basher. You did indeed praise Randi. But geeez, that was a crappy column you wrote. I'm glad you don't even try and defend it.

Anti-union spy Mike Antonucci claims he really did mingle with NEA teachers:

Repeating something over and over again doesn't make it true, Mike. Fred spent 10 minutes with me and claims to know where I've been for six days. Maybe he should have spoken to some of the people in his own delegation who complained they couldn't find me because I wasn't in the press area. You also left out the names Fred called me. Thank you for that.

You make some good points, Mike. Repeating something certainly doesn't make it true. And name calling is never right. Thanks for reminding us. But how do you know that Fred didn't have his own spies watching your every move? Do you have any evidence, ie. pictures, signed affidavits from teachers, proving that you left the press area? If not, I'm afraid I've got to go with Fred on this one.

Keep those comments coming.

Duncan at the NEA meeting

7,000 delegates. Lots of boos when Duncan says he want to tie teacher pay to test scores. Even my brother booed despite Andy Rotherham's admonition. But Fred points out something that most bloggers, obsessed with the booing (who never talked with teachers on the floor) missed. Many, if not most of the delegates seemed OK with Duncan.

Back to the speech

Lots of Arne's usual cliches--"the status quo is not good enough"..."it's a moving train and we all need to get on board." More of the same about Chicago's miracle "turnaround." No mention however, of the Civic Committee's report which blows all that away (surprise, surprise). He once again blames schools and teachers for "perpetuating poverty and social failure." He even told the teachers that they could "no longer blame the system." The system will be glad to know that.

But on the whole, there seemed to be an NEA buy-in to Obama's larger agenda of school funding and union participation. It's definitely a major shift from the Bush days and it offers new openings for partnership and for unions to organize amongst the growing base of disenchanted charter school teachers. Faced with the inescapable evidence of charter school failures, Duncan said: "Charter schools are public schools and they should be held to the same standards as everyone else." Did KIPP, Civitas and the NLRB hear that?

No wonder the privatizers and union-busters are nervous and here. For that matter, so is the left. I think Obama likes it that way. Fordham's Andy Smarick loved it. He admires Duncan's verbal gymnastics.

Finally, after all of Duncan's "ton-of-bricks" threats these past few weeks, this statement made me chuckle:

The President and I have both said repeatedly that we are not going to impose reform but rather work with teachers, principals, and unions to find what works.

Iif you buy that, I have this condo on Florida's Gulf Coast for sale. Call me. (:>)

Fighting words

Anti-union blogger/spy Mike Antonucci, who hid out during the entire meeting in the press area, went so far as to call my brother, the PREAPrez, "lame".

Memories...

Duncan even harks back to his days in the small-schools movement:

"After that, I helped start a small new traditional neighborhood public school - the Ariel Academy. It wasn't a charter. It had union teachers and today it is one of the highest-performing public schools in Chicago - even though all of the kids come from poverty."

Today's guest blogger. My brother Fred from the NEA RA

Hey bro,

I want to share with you some of my impressions of the NEA RA and try and respond to some of your questions.

1. What's different this year?

The main thing that's different is Barack Obama.

A lot of the hot button issues when we had Bush as president have a different meaning with Obama in the White House. The attitude towards charters is the most obvious, although not the only one. Perceived with little differentiation as an anti-union, anti- public school strategy under Bush, the simplest response that made the most sense was to simply say no. Now the discussion is more nuanced. New Business Item A, the main position statement on charters is an 8 point directive on how to collaborate on developing charters, rather than a plan of opposition to them. It was approved by the body overwhelmingly.

2. About the reaction to Duncan's speech. What does it signify?

Some education bloggers, including those who are here and some who are not, heard boos to some of Duncan's comments and got their pants all twisted around. There were some boos of course. But in plenty of conversations outside the hall, the reaction was considerably friendly and open. I found this was almost universally true among minority teachers. Remember, Obama got booed when he spoke at the RA in Philadelphia during the primary campaign and the NEA members voted for him in huge numbers.

Outside the hot house of wonker debates, and away from Chicago, where we have had
experience with Duncan's leadership, the Duncan approach works pretty well.

His personal story about his mom, and the success stories of the lives she touched, is a powerful one, particularly if you haven't heard it dozens of times before.

Again, there is the issue of context. As one observer said to me, a Bush EdSec could have come into the hall and given the same speech and the place would have gone up in flames (of course, no Bush EdSec ever did or ever would).

But Duncan can talk about pay-for-performance, teacher accountability, charter schools and even testing and get an entirely different reaction. He can do it because of Obama. Teachers know Obama isn't an anti-union guy, and Duncan says it in a way that implies respect for union input and voice. Nobody in the Bush USDE ever did that.

3. Will the NEA jump into charter organizing.

I can't tell if they are willing to put the resources, organizers and money into it that it requires. But they now have permission from the rank-and-file. That's new.

4. Why do I complain about my seats? Because it's funny. And true.

Two things you don't hear around the hall: Not much about the economic crisis. Nothing about the wars.

See you soon.

-Fred

Civic Committee's Martin denies blaming Duncan for failed reform

Sorry, I couldn't get the embedded video of Rick Arruza's interview with R. Eden Martin to play here. But you can watch it at WTTW Chicago's websight HERE.

Only "vested interests" to blame...LOL

Catalyst's Lorraine Forte sets him straight--It's not just about being a charter. There are good and bad. Both charters and neighborhood schools need good teachers and resources.

CTU's McGuire touts the Stanford report that shows only 1/3 of charters doing well. Martin responds--"But in Chicago, they're all good."

Background on R. Eden Martin from my August 19, 2006 post on SmallTalk, "R. Eden Martin, anti-monopoly warrior???"

The 'Four Assurances'

In recent speeches, Arne Duncan answers the question I asked last week--what do you (states) have to do to keep him from dropping "a ton of bricks" on your head? Answer--Give Arne four assurances.

...adopting rigorous standards; recruiting and retaining effective teachers; turning around chronically low-performing schools; and building data systems to track student achievement and teacher effectiveness. (Ed Review) h/t Bob Pearlman

Bricks will also fall if you restrict the growth of charter schools (only good ones, of course) or turnarounds.

The good news is that he leaves some openings for turnaround efforts besides the Gates "model" of just closing thousands of urban schools or turning them over to private charter operators.

“We have four basic models in mind,” including awarding planning grants in the fall so new principals and lead teachers can develop curricula to meet students’ needs, followed by recruiting new teachers in the spring; turning the school over to a charter or for-profit management organization; changing the school culture through a variety of actions (for example, extending learning time for students); and closing low-performing schools and re-enrolling the students in superior schools." (Turning Around Low-Performing Schools)

The other point of note is that Duncan, while continuing to make charters a centerpiece in his reform strategy, has opened the door to the AFT and NEA to organize charter school teachers and/or create union charter schools.

Is this the reason hard-line anti-union charterites, like the Chicago Civic Committee, have turned on him?