School reform needs reform
Published: Saturday, August 3, 2013 at 10:48 p.m.
Last Modified: Saturday, August 3, 2013 at 10:48 p.m.
Since we here in Florida like to grade our education system, or at least our politicians do, let’s take a look at how things are going.
We have been measuring our students and their schools based on a single test since 1998, long enough for a couple of classes of students to go all the way from kindergarten to diploma, and we still can’t get it right. The “accountability” system developed in the name of education reform has become an in-state joke, with annual testing foul-ups, school-grade inflation and a revolving door at the state education commissioner’s office.
Tony Bennett is the latest education commissioner to come in full of reform ideas and promise, only to end up slinking out the back door in either disgrace or frustration. Bennett quit Thursday after it was revealed that he helped orchestrate a school-grade change back in his home Indiana, where he had also been education commission. Turns out the owner of the charter school for which Bennett is accused of altering the grade just happened to donate $100,000 to his election campaign — they elect the education commission in the