The Fall Guy Philadelphia City Paper
From: Andrew J. Rotherham
To: Diane Ravitch
Subject: Death and Life is being debated as a policy prescription. That's a problem, because it doesn't offer an agenda.
My e-mail inbox contains missives from people claiming your book,The Death and Life of the Great American School System, is the most important written work about education in decades. They’re right next to other ones from people urging me to use it for kindling. Like too many debates in education, the one stemming from your book is turning into a Manichaean affair, in the eyes of too many a battle of good versus evil. Close observers of education policy debates increasingly wonder if the field knows how to debate any other way.
The stridency is unfortunate because The Death and Life of the Great American School System is not without its merits. But it’s also not without its problems.
The merits are straightforward. Diane, your stature as arguably the most important
. . . .Whatever his wins and losses in other areas, there’s no question that Obama and his Ed Sec Arne Duncan have shifted the terms of debate on ed policy – and moved charters into the center ring of reform. We’ve seen a lot of press about charter cap-lifts but that’s only part of the story. Duncan’s personal commitment to charter growth and accountability – and sometimes his direct intervention --
Gov. Chris Christie at the Statehouse in Trenton in this March 2010 file photo.
At the center of the country’s school funding crisis are little boys and girls like Kyle Wolfe, a 3-year-old pupil in Rising Stars, a pre-kindergarten program for at-risk children in communities near Rockford, Ill.
“I can’t even begin to describe the way Kyle has grown since starting this program,” said his mother, Carolyn.
Last week, the Harlem School District Board of Education, which serves the communities of Loves Park, Machesney Park and southern Roscoe, voted to eliminate Rising Stars because the state of Illinois hasn’t made good on the grants that support it. The vote means the nearly 400 youngsters the program serves “will be entering kindergarten delayed academically and socially,” said Lynn Wade, a pre-K teacher at the Donald C. Parker Early Education Center in Machesney Park.
No one disputes that Rising Stars is “an excellent program,” said Julie M. Morris, the
I am writing today out of great concern for the children of Milpitas and their education. This is something I feel very strongly about and in many ways it involves my daily life. I have a daughter attending Sinnott Elementary School. I work part time as an instructional assistant in a special day preschool class at Weller Elementary School. And I am a Cadette Girl Scout leader in Milpitas with 15 girls in my troop. This is very personal to me but I wanted to share some information with my fellow Milpitas citizens as it affects so many people.
I personally feel that Milpitas Unified School District is a wonderful school district. I'd like to keep it that way.
-Did you know in our district eight of 12 schools has received the prestigious "California Distinguished Schools" Award?
-The district has one of the highest student graduation rates and lowest dropout rates in Santa Clara County.
-The district's cumulative Academic Performance Index score is 815 (800 is the benchmark for high-performing schools).
n Four eligible schools have Academic Performance Index scores more than 870.
-Nine of 12 schools have Academic Performance Index scores more than 800.
-Milpitas won the California League of Middle Schools "2009 Teacher of the Year" Award.
-It has three California High School Academy Partnership Programs.
The budget projections out of Sacramento continue to get worse. About $1.2 million must be cut from the upcoming
On the same day that State Superintendent O’Connell announced in my classroom that I was a 2010 California Teacher of the Year, I received a text message from my brother, a public defender. It said simply: “In trial. Another meth addict.”
Since 2008, 3.5 million American students have dropped out of school, one every nine seconds. In 2007 alone, law enforcement agencies in the United States made an estimated 2.18 million arrests of youth under the age of 18. And the discussion continues about how much we spend on incarcerating Californians as compared to educating them.
We live in a society that is founded on the ideal of equal opportunity for all. Yet this principle is not a reality for far too many students. We have all seen the devastating examples in our teaching careers. The fifteen-year-old girl who knows that, in a few short months, she will most likely need to drop out of school to care for her newborn child. The battered boy who has stopped dreaming of success because he constantly hears “you’re no good.” The frustrated student who cannot see the benefit of the daily classroom challenges. There is a look in their eyes, a spark that is no longer there. The doors in our society often slam hardest in the faces of those who are not academically prepared for the complexities of our global community.
However, at my school, and many other schools throughout our great state, we can see the power of a functioning educational system; a system built around faculty, administration, parents, and community members who offer constant encouragement, belief in potential, and unfailing support. Such a system can transform a student from one who has all but given up to one whose passion to learn is ignited and whose future is reclaimed. We have the power as teachers, administrators, parents, and community members to make that difference in a child’s life and not let any student slip away.
Last week, an article and editorial in our newspaper announced that Sacramento has been determined to be a “finalist” as a potential new location for Teach For America. If selected, the Sacramento City Unified School District would commit to hiring thirty teachers a year for three years (for a total of ninety). The District would pay the salary and benefits of each TFA intern, along with a $4,000 fee to Teach For America for each one. In addition, $2.7 million in private funds would need to be raised for Teach For America. The District says it plans to place the first thirty at three “under-performing” schools (though I think the plan might be to expand that to six) where they would teach math, science, and special education, and that no credentialed teacher “will be displaced by a Corps member.”
. . . .The stakes are enormous: For-profit schools have long derived the bulk of their revenue from federal loans and grants, and the percentages have been climbing sharply.
The Career Education Corporation, a publicly traded global giant, last year reported revenue of $1.84 billion. Roughly 80 percent came from federal loans and grants, according to BMO Capital Markets, a research and trading firm. That was up from 63 percent in 2007.
The Apollo Group — which owns the for-profit University of Phoenix — derived 86 percent of its revenue from federal student aid last fiscal year, according to BMO. Two years earlier, it was 69 percent.
For-profit schools have proved adept at capturing Pell grants, which are a centerpiece of the
Editor's note: Anne O'Brien is our guest blogger today. She is a project director at the Learning First Alliance, a Teach for America alumna, and a former public school teacher in the greater New Orleans area.
The Obama administration has made turning around America's lowest performing schools a cornerstone of its education agenda. And with good reason -- all children should have access to an excellent education. Schools that are not providing their students with such an education need to change.
Recently one particular turnaround strategy has received some high-level support: the wholesale replacement of teachers -- interesting choice, given what researchers say about this approach. Turnaround experts Emily and Bryan Hassel wrote in Education Next, "Successful turnaround leaders typically do not replace all or most of the staff at the start, but they often replace some key leaders who help organize and drive change." And the 2009 Department of Education IES practice guide concluded, "The school turnaround case studies and the business turnaround research do not support the wholesale replacement of staff."
We at the Learning First Alliance have collected a number of successful school turnaround stories. In some cases the replacement of some staff started the process, such as at George Hall Elementary in Mobile, Alabama, where it was accompanied by a focus on innovative technology, rich vocabulary, and content knowledge.
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