I had to pick my jaw up off the floor when I read an Op Ed in the New York Times -- yes, the New York Times! -- supporting vouchers and calling out the Newark teachers union for their outrageous, despicable and desperate tactics (running billboards saying "Stop the Killings in Newark Now!" in a futile attempt to pressure Cory Booker -- see my previous emails on this at http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/03/newark-teachers-send-city-deadly.html, http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/03/newark-union-accused-of-protecting-bad.html and http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/04/protecting-bad-teacherscom.html).  They obviously don't know Cory at all...

Joseph Del Grosso, president of the union, won’t say how much the signs cost. He has, however, said that the “cost has no bearing on anything.”

But it does. Union leaders are spending substantial amounts of money advancing a political agenda that has nothing to do with education. And this is a growing problem throughout the country. All too often, America’s teachers’ unions claim to be championing education when, in fact, they’re pursuing unrelated political agendas...

Newark spent $17,502 per pupil in the 2005-06 school year, or more than twice the national average. To put this figure in perspective, a full year at Rutgers University — including tuition, fees and room and board — totals $19,000 for New Jersey residents.

So what are Newark taxpayers and schoolchildren getting for all this money?

Well, last year, only 38.8 percent of Newark seniors graduated with a normal high school diploma.

In other words, Newark’s schools are in serious need of repair. But instead of worrying about Newark’s schoolchildren, the union’s leadership has used its resources to lease billboards. Meanwhile, the union has waged a very public battle against Mayor Booker over school vouchers, and many think the billboard campaign is part of this effort.

Why the fight? Because the mayor supports school vouchers. He believes that vouchers would allow students who are trapped in underperforming schools to transfer somewhere better. The union has stood against school vouchers from the very beginning.

In the interest of scaring voters, for example, the union’s parent organization has claimed that there is no evidence that vouchers will improve achievement. But this is false. Study after study has demonstrated that voucher systems improve student achievement, regardless of socioeconomic background. Indeed, the National Research Council issued a report during the Clinton administration recommending that the government finance a large-scale school choice experiment.

Quite simply, union leaders are against vouchers because they fear such efforts will divert money into less unionized, or non-union, schools.

The union claims to have Newark’s best interests at heart. But instead, it has chosen to aggressively oppose the measure most likely to improve Newark’s schools while wasting its resources on billboards that will do little but drive business out of the city.

-----------------------

April 29, 2007

Op-Ed Contributor

Blackboards Not Billboards

By DAVID WHITE

www.nytimes.com/2007/04/29/opinion/nyregionopinions/29NJwhite.html

Arlington, Va.

SEVERAL months ago, the Newark Teachers Union put up signs across the city about Newark’s escalating murder rate. “Help Wanted,” the signs implored. “Stop the Killings in Newark Now!”

Peter Denton's speech on the need for parental school choice in New Jersey

Peter Denton, Chairman and Founder of New Jersey's E3 (Excellent Education for Everyone; www.nje3.org), gave a passionate, inspiring speech at the conference I attended a couple of week ago (the same one in which Dana Rone spoke about how bad things were in Newark -- if you missed my email about this, see my blog post at: http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/04/horrifying-statistics-for-newarks-high.html).

 

Peter was kind enough to send me the text of it, in which he talks about how he got involved with the school reform battle, how bad things are in New Jersey's schools for children of color, who is opposing reform, and why he's such a believer in parental school choice.

 

Peter shares my belief that reforming our schools so that they work for children of color, not just white children, is THE civil rights issue of our time (as Howard Fuller once asked, "What good is it to be able to sit at the lunch counter if you can't read the menu?" -- and, I might add, "...or pay for what's on it?").  Consistent with that belief, Peter thought about what Martin Luther King might say today, were he to come to Newark or Camden or Trenton.  I think Peter's got it exactly right -- VERY powerful:

MARTIN LUTHER KING’S SPEECH IN AUGUST OF 1963

 

            We all remember some or all of Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream Speech.”  But what would Dr. King say today, 53 years after Brown verses the Board of Education?  Here is what I think he would say:

 

            First, a direct quote from Dr. King’s speech:

 

            “Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you my friends – so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.  It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

 

            “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

           

            And now, what Dr. King might say today:

 

              “I have a dream that one day the grandsons and daughters of slaves and slave owners can sit down in school together and learn how to participate in the American Dream;

 

            I have a dream that one day even in the State of New Jersey; a state sweltering in the heat of educational apartheid, foundering on the shoals of educational bankruptcy, will be transformed into an oasis of equal educational opportunity and freedom;

 

            I have a dream that all our children, whether brilliant or challenged, will have educational options that work for them, in schools that are safe, with teachers that love them, teachers that demand their students meet and exceed their capabilities; and work tirelessly to make sure their students succeed.

                                   

            I have a dream that one day in NJ, with its entrenched special interests and bureaucratic indifference, our legislature will hear our children’s cries for help, and let our brown and black boys and girls go from a bad educational place to a better one.

----------------------- 

PRESENT AT THE CREATION

 

                                                                        Peter R. Denton

                                                                        Chairman and Founder

                                                                        Excellent Education for Everyone, Inc. (E3)

 

 

                                                                        April 12, 2007

                                                                        Coalition for Educational Freedom

 

            Interesting title for a talk; not one I came up with, we have Dan Gaby to thank for that. 

 

            Present at the Creation:  Does that make me Adam? No. Probably not Eve, though one never knows these days; I certainly was the apple of my mother’s eye, and the teacher’s union certainly thinks I’m the snake.  No way I qualify for the other person that was “Present at the Creation” though my kids seem to think I try to act like him.

 

            Well, it turns out Dan meant the creation of E3; a different story, and one I know something about.  In 1998, my wife and I attended a conference on family investing and philanthropy, with an emphasis on education.  We realized we had enough resources to be more than comfortable, so what was the point of working for more.  We had always been upset about the quality of the supposedly good suburban schools our two children attended, and one of my sisters was one of the 3 or 4 people who made charter schools a reality in Washington, DC.  We knew public schools were not up to snuff and I knew a tiny bit about school choice.

 

I HAD A DREAM

 

            I had a dream that I had that money, the time, the organizational skills, and the ridiculous optimism to fix New Jersey public schools.  My plan was this:  I would start a public policy institute.  We would spend a year and $250,000 to hire good educational consultants to design the proper public education system.  Then we would spend another $250,000 and another year hiring lobbyists to convince the legislature to pass the bills needed to implement our vision.  Oh yes, I HAD A DREAM.  But dreams can become nightmares. Was this dream to become a nightmare?  

 

TALE OF TWO EDUCATION SYSTEMS – “THE BIG LIE”

 

            I had to get educated about education. One of our supporters took me to Trenton, to the steps of the state capital, and told me to look up and down the street.  “What is the biggest building you see?”, he asked.  “That one”, I said.  Whose building is it?  I didn’t know (and didn’t realize I cared).  “That’s the NJEA building”, he said; “their revenue is over $60 million/year. They spend that $60 million to make sure your dreams are nightmares.

 

            So what is the truth about education in New Jersey?  The truth is we have two different public education systems in New Jersey:  Urban and Suburban:

 

•           Suburban is mostly white; urban, black and hispanic;

•           Graduation rates: suburbs-75% (plus/minus); Urban-25% and less; Camden in June of 2005 graduated 118 seniors out of a senior class of about 550, and a total K-12 enrollment of over 15,000;

•           NJ’s urban (or Abbott) districts spend over $20,000/child/yr, the suburbs about $13,000;

•           There is school choice in the suburbs, and a bit, but only a bit, in urban districts;

•           This is institutionalized SEGREGATION:  BY RACE, BY GEOGRAPHY AND BY SPENDING, BUT NOT THE WAY YOU THINK IT WOULD BE;

•           The teacher’s union and the rest of education establishment repeat their big lie about how great our public education system is; but the truth is they control an expensive, dysfunctional segregated school system that does not educate children of color.

•           There are 32,000 first graders in NJ’s urban public schools today.  In 12 years, 24,000 of them will not have high school diplomas.  What kind of life will they have?  Prison, drugs, death?  24,000 first graders (and 24,000 second graders, and third graders…) all with little hope for a productive life.

 

“WHERE IS THE RAGE!”

 

NEW JERSEY’S GIFT TO THE UNITED STATES:

 

            You can spend billions on educating black and brown children, but if you don’t change who controls the money, you won’t get kids educated, you only get bankrupt taxpayers.  If any of you think funding equity lawsuits make sense, study the sad history of New Jersey over the last 30 years.

 

SO WHAT IS THE SOLUTION?

 

            No surprise here, it is parental school choice.  I think everyone here understands school choice, so I won’t discuss it in detail, except for two points. 

 

First, parental school choice is not one on a list of education reforms that can be treated like a menu, pick your reform du jour, and if it doesn’t work, try another one. 

                                                                                                                       

None of the reforms we hear so much about (whole school reform, smaller class size, teacher merit pay, standards, universal pre-k etc.) will have any lasting impact until the power relationship between the school and the parents/students is changed.  The parents must have the power to vote with their feet and take the cash with them.  Only then will the public school monopoly be broken up and children become the focus of the system.  PARENTAL SCHOOL CHOICE IS A NECESSARY PRECONDITION TO PUBLIC ECUCATION REFORM.

 

            Second:  If you don’t support parental school choice you are not a liberal.  Parental school choice is the most liberal public policy position one can take.  School choice is all about putting an asset of $5,000 or more per child per year in the hands of poor, disadvantaged parents.  It’s better than Section 8 housing, food stamps, welfare, and health insurance.  And the payoff to society of educating all our children is virtually immeasurable.

 

DON’T UNDERESTIMATE THE NIGHTMARE MAKERS – THE OPPOSITION

 

            The opposition is broad, powerful and sometimes unexpected, but they are not focused on children, only on power and money for themselves.

 

•           Teacher’s Union;

•           Educational Establishment;

•           Traditional Democrats focused on party funding and workers;

•           Republicans selling out to the union and education establishment;

•           Suburbanites with racist fears;

•           Minorities focused on their jobs, or who don’t send their children to urban public schools;

•           Ultimately in NJ this isn’t about kids and education, but a fight over who controls $22 billion annually.

 

BUT DON’T DESPAIR AND REMEMBER IN THE WORDS OF MARTIN LUTHER KING:

 

            “Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future.  When our days become dreary with low hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil; a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows.”

                                                                                                                       

OUR STRATEGY FOR PLEASANT DREAMS

 

1)         Be clear what OUR battle is about; it is not about:

o          Public funding of religious education;

o          Getting Republicans elected;

o          Destroying the teacher’s union;

o          Saving taxpayers money;

o          Increasing patronage dollars; 

2)         This is about educating kids and specifically disadvantaged kids, mostly of color;

 

It is first, foremost, and last a civil rights struggle;

 

3)         Pete’s Law Number # 1 – When we meet to discuss school reform, we only discuss school reform.  We do not discuss any other issues, not the war in Iraq, tax policy, abortion, affirmative action, or any of the many issues that divide us.  Our coalition, which is unique in America, including all races, all religions, and all political persuasions, holds together because everyone knows we are in a room together focused only on children, and no other issues.  And now that we have these disparate folks working together, they find they have far more common ground than one would ever have thought.

 

4)         We must implement parental school choice with Democrats, and they must be equal partners, and preferably the lead partner in our efforts.  This is a battle for the heart and soul of the Democratic Party;

 

5)         We must provide a current service to poor parents; this is E3’s School Choice Now and the Center for Education Justice efforts;

 

o          Ill-defined future benefits don’t build active minority support;

o          The parent you help now is the parent who votes on your issue;

o          School Choice Now canvassing is a major grass roots organizing activity;

o          Alliance Strategy – create an organization of organizations

 

SO WHERE ARE WE TODAY?

 

•           School choice is a legitimate and common conversation in NJ today;

•           Look at the diverse members of E3’s board;

•           There are school choice majorities in both houses of the legislature;

•           Cory Booker has been elected major of Newark;

•           School Choice impacted the Newark City Council elections, which now supports the Urban School Scholarship Act 9-0;

•           The Camden educational disaster has been exposed;

•           Our local legal efforts are producing consistent successes; our statewide class action lawsuit is progressing;

•           Democratic legislators are making the connection between high property tax bills and the teacher’s union.

 

MARTIN LUTHER KING’S SPEECH IN AUGUST OF 1963

 

            We all remember some or all of Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream Speech.”  But what would Dr. King say today, 53 years after Brown verses the Board of Education?  Here is what I think he would say:

 

            First, a direct quote from Dr. King’s speech:

 

            “Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you my friends – so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.  It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

 

            “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”

           

            And now, what Dr. King might say today:

 

              “I have a dream that one day the grandsons and daughters of slaves and slave owners can sit down in school together and learn how to participate in the American Dream;

 

            I have a dream that one day even in the State of New Jersey; a state sweltering in the heat of educational apartheid, foundering on the shoals of educational bankruptcy, will be transformed into an oasis of equal educational opportunity and freedom;

 

            I have a dream that all our children, whether brilliant or challenged, will have educational options that work for them, in schools that are safe, with teachers that love them, teachers that demand their students meet and exceed their capabilities; and work tirelessly to make sure their students succeed.

                                   

            I have a dream that one day in NJ, with its entrenched special interests and bureaucratic indifference, our legislature will hear our children’s cries for help, and let our brown and black boys and girls go from a bad educational place to a better one.

 

SO, ARE MY DREAMS NIGHTMARES?

 

            No, we in this movement are simply and clearly right.  This is not an academic discussion of tax policy, immigration, or even foreign policy.  We have the moral high ground, the facts and the civil rights of our children on our side.  We will prevail against high odds, simply because we are right and we can not and will not fail.

 

            So, my dreams are positive dreams; and they are clear as a bright sunny day:

 

            I have a dream that we all will have the political will to put children first above all;

 

            I have a dream of building our coalition so elected officials fear us more than the education monopoly;

           

            I have a dream that the Democratic Party will go back to its principles of helping the disadvantaged above all;

           

            I have a dream that my Republican brethren will remember their history of leadership on civil rights and never cave in to special interests;

 

            I have a dream that taxpayers will finally get the educational performance they have been paying for all these years;

 

            I have a dream that all our supporters of education reform will see the light at the end of the tunnel and fear not the inevitable setbacks, and will continue the fight side by side with us in NJ and across the country.

 

 

AND WHEN I AWAKE FROM MY DREAMS, I WILL FIND THOUSANDS AND MILLIONS OF OTHERS WITH THE SAME DREAMS; AND THEN ALL OF GOD’S CHILDREN – HISPANIC AND BLACK AND WHITE – JEWISH, MUSLIM, CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANT -- WILL BE ABLE TO JOIN HANDS AND SING IN THE WORDS OF THE OLD NEGRO SPIRITUAL -- “OUR CHILDREN ARE FREE AT LAST! ARE CHILDREN ARE FREE AT LAST!  THANK GOD ALMIGHTY, THEY ARE FREE AT LAST!"

Bloomberg Reaches Deal With Principals

This is GREAT news on many dimensions: it puts to rest a huge issue that could have interfered with the big reforms underway (which depend in many ways on principals), it gives principals a well-deserved raise, and most importantly, completely reforms their contract, allowing the DOE to identify, rate and reward the best principals and have stronger tools for deal with the bad ones.

The Bloomberg administration and the union representing New York City school principals and assistant principals reached a tentative contract agreement yesterday that would offer bonuses of up to $25,000 a year to select principals who agree to spend three years in troubled schools.

The deal would increase base pay by 23 percent, compounded over nearly seven years, and add 15 minutes to principals’ and assistant principals’ workdays. The contract would also revamp how principals are rated on their performance each year, discarding the blunt thumbs-up or thumbs-down system under which they are labeled either satisfactory or unsatisfactory.

It would be replaced by a more nuanced review, aligned to the Education Department’s new accountability system, which grades schools from A to F based on students’ progress.

The contract, which must be ratified by union members, would also end seniority rights that allowed veteran assistant principals without school assignments to force their way into certain vacancies, even over principals’ objections.

The change has long been sought by Schools Chancellor Joel I. Klein, who argued that “bumping rights” saddled principals with unwanted staff members.

--------------------

Bloomberg Reaches Deal With Principals

By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

Published: April 24, 2007

www.nytimes.com/2007/04/24/nyregion/24principals.html

The Bloomberg administration and the union representing New York City school principals and assistant principals reached a tentative contract agreement yesterday that would offer bonuses of up to $25,000 a year to select principals who agree to spend three years in troubled schools.

 

Cultures of Commitment

This article correctly highlights the critical importance of finding enough high-quality teachers, esp. in schools serving the most disadvantaged students (it's KIPP's biggest barrier to growth, not money, buildings or school leaders), and the issue of teacher burnout at high-performing schools serving these students.  For more on this, see:

http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/03/discussion-of-teacher-burnout-at-high.html

Whatever promise the small-schools approach holds, though, there’s widespread agreement it won’t be realized without a sufficient supply of teachers who are up to a triple threat of challenges: urban teaching in the context of a start-up operation, often with a heavy dose of surrogate parenting thrown in.

And as Ms. Madell and many other small-schools educators can attest, ensuring that supply will be no simple task.

“Human capital is going to make or break this enterprise,” said Timothy S. Knowles, who directs the University of Chicago’s Center for Urban School Improvement, which opened its first small high school last September and plans several more. “Our view is human capital is gold.”

Many of the new small schools, especially the ones in cities, virtually guarantee teachers long hours as they struggle against the inadequate preparation of their students. Teachers pour their time, too, into shaping the new institutions, where they are obliged to wear a number of hats.

--------------------

Cultures of Commitment

Teachers in the small public high schools cropping up in many U.S. cities find the human dimension of their jobs bringing both strains and rewards.

By Bess Keller

Ed Week, 4/17/07

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2007/04/18/33strain.h26.html

"About how many hours did you put in a week?”

The question prompted an eruption of laughter. But there was nothing funny about the answer teacher Jody Madell finally delivered.

Starting at 8 in the morning, the faculty members at Ms. Madell’s new, small secondary school in New York City routinely worked till 6:30 or 7 at night. And then, after the teaching, planning, meeting, and tutoring, she and others went home many evenings to solitary thought and a heap of student work.

Now as a co-founder of a school not unlike her old one, where she plans to keep a hand in teaching while coaching her colleagues, the 39-year-old mother of two is about to ask a fresh band of teachers to shoulder similar burdens. The audacity of it makes her laugh.

“There’s no way I can do [that job] and be a parent,” she admitted.

Billionaires Start $60 Million Schools Effort (Strong American Schools)

I applaud what the Gates and Broad Foundations and Gov. Romer are doing, as it's critical to raise the issue of our failing schools to the top of the national agenda.  Not to say I don't have some comments, however: nothing about choice, charter schools or empowering parents?! 

 

And I hope this campaign goes FAR beyond the initial messaging -- related to the initial advertisement (http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/national/20070425_eductionAD.pdf), even the staunchest defenders of the status quo would agree that good schools are critical for our nation and there's plenty of room for improvement; they would simply say to spend more money -- and into more controversial topics like educating people about what works and, critically, what doesn't (for example, spending more money without reform; wouldn't it be great, for example, to run advertisements highlighting the points in these slides: www.tilsonfunds.com/Personal/Spendingmyth.pdf?  I don't think most Americans know, for example, that we've roughly DOUBLED per pupil spending in the past 30 years (slide 2) and have NOTHING to show for it -- studnet achievement hasn't budged (slide 3)).

Eli Broad and Bill Gates, two of the most important philanthropists in American public education, have pumped more than $2 billion into improving schools. But now, dissatisfied with the pace of change, they are joining forces for a $60 million foray into politics in an effort to vault education high onto the agenda of the 2008 presidential race.

Experts on campaign spending said the project would rank as one of the most expensive single-issue initiatives ever in a presidential race, dwarfing, for example, the $22.4 million that the Swift Vets and P.O.W.s for Truth group spent against Senator John Kerry in 2004, and the $7.8 million spent on advocacy that year by AARP, the lobby for older Americans.

Under the slogan “Ed in ’08,” the project, called Strong American Schools, will include television and radio advertising in battleground states, an Internet-driven appeal for volunteers and a national network of operatives in both parties.

--------------------

April 25, 2007

Billionaires Start $60 Million Schools Effort

By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN

www.nytimes.com/2007/04/25/education/25schools.html

Eli Broad and Bill Gates, two of the most important philanthropists in American public education, have pumped more than $2 billion into improving schools. But now, dissatisfied with the pace of change, they are joining forces for a $60 million foray into politics in an effort to vault education high onto the agenda of the 2008 presidential race.

Cory Booker's Battle for Newark

A great article about Cory, the enormous challenges he faces, and the equally enormous integrity, smarts, energy and determination he brings to the task!  I've seen and/or had dinner with Cory four times in the past six weeks and, while I've always thought this, I'm even more convinced that he ROCKS -- the greatest mayor in America, bar none.

-----------------------

Cory Booker’s Battle for Newark

A bold reformer takes on entrenched crime and corruption.

Steven Malanga

City Journal, Spring 2007

http://www.city-journal.org/html/17_2_cory_booker.html

 

Some politicians shape their election strategies on the campaign trail. Others develop them while poring over poll numbers or plotting with advisors. Cory Booker found his on the streets of Newark. One day in 2004, as Booker strolled near his apartment building with his father, the pair heard shots ring out, and then watched chaos erupt as a pack of teens ran past. Booker rushed toward the source of the gunshots and saw a young man staggering toward him. “I caught him in my hands and saw that his chest, his white T-shirt, was filling with deep rich red blood,” Booker remembers. Though Booker urged the boy to “hold tight” and “stay with me,” 19-year-old Wazn Miller died in his arms, gunned down in broad daylight by a hooded assassin.

KIPP and retention; social promotion; 58% and 54% of black and Latino 4th graders nationwide are illiterate

In Jay Mathews' article about KIPP that I sent around last night, for the first time I read a sensible discussion about KIPP's retention issue:

At the KIPP Bridge College Preparatory school in Oakland, Calif., for instance, of the 87 students who enrolled in fifth grade in 2003, 32 later moved out of the area and 30 had parents who decided to remove them from KIPP for other reasons. Twenty-two went back to their regular public schools -- nine left because they did not like the long KIPP day and 13 because KIPP wanted their children to spend another year in fifth grade.

KIPP Bridge principal David Ling said when he told parents repeating the grade would help get their children up to grade level, they often said they thought their children were already excellent students, and would be stars back at their regular schools. I call this the American Idol syndrome, similar to the insistence of untrained singers and their parents on that show that they are great because everyone has been telling them that for years.

The retention issue has been a hot topic in KIPP conferences and email traffic. How can they help these students reach national standards if they quit because of wounded pride? The KIPP schools in Baltimore are now in their third year of a solution they call the Rapid Readers program. It serves all fifth-graders who test below the second grade level in reading. Their families are told from the beginning that it may take them five years to get to eighth grade level. There are no surprises. If they don't like that idea, they are free to withdraw, but most don't. During their first fifth grade year, they spend three hours a day on reading. By the end of their second year in fifth grade, they are ready for sixth grade. At most, only one or two of these dozen families each year, according to KIPP Baltimore executive director Jason Botel, have transferred their children back to the regular school system.

There is one blogger I've read who claims that a big reason for KIPP's big jumps in scores is that KIPP forces out underperforming students.  Nothing could be further from the truth -- I've never seen KIPP give up on a student for academic reasons.  That would be totally antithetical to KIPP's culture and, as Mathews' article makes clear, KIPP is very focused on improvement here. 

 

I haven't seen the data across all KIPP schools, but I don't think KIPP Bridge in Oakland is typical -- losing 62 of 87 students sounds extreme -- but let's examine this case study:

 

Regarding the 32 who moved out of the area, there's nothing KIPP can do about that and there's no reason I can think of why these students would be low performers, so this would not affect KIPP's scores.

 

As for the other 30, we have some data on 22.  9 left because the student or parents didn't like the extended school day and year.  Should KIPP change that to accommodate the students or parents who aren't willing to do what it takes?  Of course not.  Are these students likely to be underperforming?  Yes.

 

As for the other 13 who aren't happy about being held back a year (also obviously underperforming), I have the same attitude: KIPP shouldn't back down and should instead do what's working in Baltimore, combining extra help and setting appropriate expectations. 

 

In summary, despite KIPP's best efforts, some students and families aren't a good fit with KIPP's program -- in particular, there are no doubt some for whom education is not the most important thing to them and aren't willing to do what it takes to succeed academically and go to college, even after KIPP does everything to persuade them otherwise.  The fact that some of these students withdraw from KIPP no doubt helps improve some of KIPP's performance metrics like percentage of students testing at or above grade level. 

 

Does this mean that KIPP success is an illusion and that KIPP isn't adding value?  Of course not.  There are many other ways to cut the data that remove any effect from students who leave and the data here still shows that most KIPP schools are having enormous positive impact.

 

But it's important to note that KIPP is not for every student and family.  For example, my wife and I wouldn't want our children in any school with such long hours every day, plus Saturdays and summer school (unlike most families in neighborhoods in which KIPPs are located, we are fortunate enough to have our children in various enriching activities during these times).  KIPP is a very focused, intense program, and students and parents have to commit to it or there will be little benefit.  Given this, let's return to this comment that I dismissed in my last email (I said I wouldn't waste my time doing this -- but I lied!):

Caroline Grannan, a public school advocate and blogger who follows charter school issues, said "KIPP schools succeed for some students--but it's a select subset of students. KIPP is evidently not the solution to the challenges facing urban public education. It would be wonderful to see the vast private funding that's poured into the KIPP schools, which serve just that limited subset, benefiting a larger segment of high-need students."

Let's go through this, point by point:

 

1) "KIPP schools succeed for some students" -- indeed.  Given that these students, if there were no KIPP, would likely not be succeeding in a failing public school, why doesn't she celebrate KIPP's success?

 

2) "but it's a select subset of students."  If she simply made the point that KIPP does not work for every student, I would have no quarrel, but what does "a select subset" mean?  "Select" implies that KIPP is selecting only privileged, elite students -- utter nonsense -- and "subset" could mean 90%, but could also mean 10%.  Which does she mean?  It's clear from the context (and when she later says "limited subset"), that she means a really low number -- again, utter nonsense.  The facts are that KIPP works for the great majority of students -- and not carefully selected, high-performing, likely-to-succeed-anyway students, but students for whom maybe 10-20% would go to any type of college (vs. KIPP sending 80% to four-year colleges).

 

3) "KIPP is evidently not the solution to the challenges facing urban public education."  Of course KIPP is not THE solution -- there IS no ONE solution!  But is KIPP a powerful model with important lessons for anyone trying to reform schools serving the same demographic of students, and has KIPP had a major impact on the national debate about how best to educate these students and what they're capable of, given high-quality schools and teachers, hard work, high expectations and the right mental attitude?  YOU BET!

 

4) "It would be wonderful to see the vast private funding that's poured into the KIPP schools, which serve just that limited subset, benefiting a larger segment of high-need students."  I think Grannan has set a record for the number of foolish points that can be fit into one sentence -- four by my count:

 

a) The "vast private funding" she refers to is a tiny fraction of the truly vast public funding that's being poured into our inner-city schools -- with mostly widespread, horrifying failure to show for it.

 

b) She's back to the "limited subset" again -- WRONG!

 

c) "benefiting a larger segment of high-need students" -- the two implications here are both wrong:

i) that KIPP does not serve high-need students (90% are minority and 80% qualify for free and reduced lunch -- if these students aren't high-need, which are?!); and

 

ii) that the private money, if poured into regular public schools serving high-need students, would materially benefit them.  To see how unlikely this is, see my post on Newark's catastrophic schools, despite being the highest-spending school district in the country (http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/04/horrifying-statistics-for-newarks-high.html), my comments on spending at http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/04/memo-about-school-funding-arguments.html, and my slides on the Spending Myth at: www.tilsonfunds.com/Personal/Spendingmyth.pdf.

One final point: KIPP is losing some students because it refuses to promote them to the next grade until they are proficient at the current grade level, which raises the larger issue: why should any school be promoting any student at to the next grade level if they haven't even learned the basics of the current grade level?!?!?  How dare a school fail to teach, say, a 4th grader to read, yet still pass this child along to the 5th grade.  We see a lot of these students entering KIPP -- children who are academically at the 1st or 2nd grade level (that's the "select subset" for you!) -- and, despite herculean efforts, it's sometimes impossible to get them up to the 5th grade level in one year.

 

It is so obvious that passing failing children along year after year is a massively stupid and immoral thing yet, believe it or not, there is a huge controversy about this.  I kid you not -- there are people who think it's better for kids, when a school fails to educate them, to simply pass them along to the next grade, where they're even further behind.  The result is a HUGE number of students many years below grade level.  Check out the slide at www.tilsonfunds.com/Personal/4thgradereading.pdf -- the single most stunningly horrifying data I've ever seen on this topic: 58% and 54% of black and Latino 4th graders nationwide -- not low-income ones who live in inner cities, but all of them -- are essentially illiterate.  They have trouble reading "see Spot run".  For perspective, my 4th grader (and every one of her classmates and friends) was cranking through 1,000-page Harry Potter books...

 

For more of my thoughts on ending social promotion, see: http://edreform.blogspot.com/2006/09/joel-klein-and-jay-greene-on-social.html

Charter school math tournament in NYC

Kudos to Seth Andrew and Democracy Prep for starting this math tournament -- sign your school up by the end of this week! 

From: Seth Andrew
Sent: Wednesday, April 18, 2007 7:17 PM
To: Amanda Simson
Subject: Invitation to Math Competition @ Democracy Prep Charter School

Charter school friends and colleagues,

Earlier this year, Democracy Prep competed in our first inter-scholastic competition called Math Counts, a national math program in which middle-school students compete on advanced math problems.   Our scholars were the only 6^th graders, some of the few students of color, and the only charter school out of the 40 New York public and private schools represented.  When we returned, our amazing Math teacher and coach, Amanda Simson, decided to host our own Charter School tournament to both celebrate our students and to help prepare our scholars for the regional competitions next year.

We’d like to invite your school to participate in the 5^th & 6^th grade tournament this year to be held on May 12^th at Democracy Prep Charter School in Harlem.  As this will be the first tournament of its kind, we want to keep it simple so we can grow and, in time, we hope that other charter schools will host similar tournaments.

Please read the details below about the competition and forward it to the appropriate school leader, math teacher, or math coach at any charter school with grades 5 and/or 6. The more participants, the more fun we’ll have. Please RSVP to Asimson@democracyprep.org by April 27^th to ensure that we have all the necessary trophies and supplies ready for May 12^th.   

 

We hope you will chose to participate in this friendly competition and to make it the first of many academic tournaments in the charter school community.

 

Best regards,

 

Seth Andrew

 

WHAT:     Middle School Math Competition for 5^th and 6^th grade teams

WHEN:     May 12^th, 2007   from 9am-2pm

WHERE:   DPCS Auditorium at PS92, 222 West 134^th street, (Near the B,C,2, or 3 Trains)

WHO:       Up to two teams of 4 students from each school (8 students total).

WHY:        To promote and celebrate math excellence in New York area Charter Schools.

HOW (much):        $50 per team of 4 students to cover breakfast, lunch, and prizes

HOW (to prepare):   Visit www.mathcounts.org or http://www.mathcounts.org/webarticles/anmviewer.asp?a=510&z=29 

 

Schedule:

9:00-  Arrival & Continental Breakfast Served

9:15-  Introduction of schools, teams, and hosts and welcome

9:30 - Individual/sprint competitions 

10:15- Break

10:30- Team competition

11:30- Break and Pizza Lunch Served 

12:30- Guest Speaker  (TBD)

1:00-  Oral countdown competition for highest ranked individual competitors. 

1:30 - Trophy ceremony for individuals and teams, participation ribbons for all.

2:00- Teams depart DPCS

 

Math and scoring logistics: 

There will be separate individual and group rounds.  At the end of the day there will be individual awards based on the countdown round and there will be school awards based on the team round.  

• The individual round will be similar to MathCounts sprint round questions (link below).  There can be up to eight students entered for the individual round.   
• The team round will be similar MathCounts target round questions (link below).  Each school can enter up to two teams.   The team round will average the two team scores.  Teams can be up to four children.   
• The countdown round will be similar to MathCounts countdown round questions. These will be oral questions, presented on PowerPoint, for the top 10 individual competitors from the morning activities. The countdown round will decide the ranking of the top ten individuals.   

·        The teachers making the competition problems will be from a non-competing private school and will be based on the past MathCounts annual competition questions.   

 

Seth Andrew, Ed.M.

Founder & Head of School

Democracy Prep Charter School

222 W. 134^th St. NYC, NY 10030

212-281-1248 (o)

212-283-4202 (f)

www.DemocracyPrep.org

www.DemocracyBuilders.org

Advocates Want Bigger Role for Charters Under NCLB

Speaking of charter schools and the renewal of NCLB, the National Alliance for public charter schools has come up with some great ideas!  (For details, see their publications at http://www.publiccharters.org/content/publication/detail/1914/ and http://www.publiccharters.org/content/publication/detail/1973/)

As Congress gears up to revise the No Child Left Behind Act, some charter school advocates are calling for changes to enhance the sector’s role in providing new alternatives for communities with low-performing public schools, and in replacing some troubled schools altogether.

Bush administration officials recently highlighted ideas to help make the autonomous public schools bigger players in the drive to reach the law’s goals for improving student achievement, such as having federal law trump state-imposed caps on the number of charter schools in cases where communities want to shut down chronically low-performing schools and reopen them as charters.

“The whole idea of restructuring [is that] … the old way didn’t work, all bets are off,” Karl Zinsmeister, President Bush’s chief domestic-policy adviser, said at an April 5-6 charter school conference here hosted by the Department of Education. “We need to try something dramatic, something new, and getting around the caps is, we think, an important first step.”

--------------------

Advocates Want Bigger Role for Charters Under NCLB

By Erik W. Robelen

Washington, Ed Week

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2007/04/18/33charter.h26.html

As Congress gears up to revise the No Child Left Behind Act...