Citizens for Reasonable And Fair Taxes

The Michael Letters - Heaven's Answer to Screwtape

2010-08-24T17:30:00.004-05:00

Product Description
In the mid-20th century, C.S. Lewis' seminal work
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The Michael Letters is an uplifting journey into the
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About the Author
Raised as one of six children in a Roman Catholic household, Jim Peschke has written several short articles dealing with diverse issues such as mathematical analysis, public education, and electronic technology. He discovered C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters at age 10, committing to write the story from the angel's perspective. Jim has a Bachelor of Science degree in Nuclear Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, continuing his studies in plasma physics and thermonuclear fusion at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. Jim is an electrical engineer and lives in New Hampshire's Upper Valley with his wife Cathy and children Anastasia and Alexander.

It is official we have moved and sold our home in Illinois.

2007-04-01T18:23:00.000-05:00

It is official we have moved and sold our home in Illinois. We will no longer be updating this BLOG. We will continue to update our CRAFT website
and our Croydon CRAFT BLOG.

Good luck to Harvard residents fighting future referenda our home has been sold to school teachers, future fights may be tough.

We suggest the following sites for future reference.

Family Taxpayers Network

Illinois Policy Institute

Spontaneous Solutions

Heartland Institute

<$BlogItemTitle$> Education Intelligence Agency

Townhall.com

We will not be posting March 22 - March 30

2007-03-21T13:42:00.000-05:00

We will not be posting March 22 - March 30. We suggest the following sites in the mean time.

The Family Taxpayers Network

Education Intelligence Agency

Education Matters

House panel vote today on school tax swap plan?

2007-03-20T13:35:00.000-05:00

The income tax increase is one step closer to passing.

House panel vote today on school tax swap plan?

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

By Phil Kadner
Source: Daily Southtown
Searching for signs of life in the state Legislature can be like interpreting Da Vinci's "Last Supper."

Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, a master political artist, may be whispering important secrets about school funding into the ears of key committee members today.

Then again, he may merely be creating an illusion.

The Illinois House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations -- Elementary and Secondary Education
is expected to hold a public hearing today on House Bill 750.

This is a measure that would change the way public schools are funded by increasing the state income tax
from 3 percent to 5 percent while providing property tax relief to homeowners.

There are some other tax and tax relief components to the plan as well, but this stuff is confusing enough
without getting into all the details.

I mean, sponsors of this bill are calling it the Education and Fiscal Responsibility Act. If you like
that title, you can find the details for yourself online.

The important thing here, I think, is that Madigan is allowing the bill to be heard by a House committee.

Last year, the speaker refused to take the measure seriously.

Even while the measure, sponsored by state Sen. James Meeks (D-Chicago) was passing out of a Senate
committee, Madigan's staff was laughing at its chances of ever getting a hearing in the House.

Turns out they were right.

Senate President Emil Jones (D-Chicago), who had boasted of supporting school funding reform and a tax
hike, refused to let the measure onto the floor for a vote of the full Senate.

Well, things have changed in a year.

Now Jones is supporting Gov. Rod Blagojevich's school funding plan, which includes a new gross receipts tax
on businesses.

State Rep. David Miller (D-Calumet City), the sponsor of HB 750 in the House, is delighted Madigan has
decided to allow a public hearing on his bill.

Miller even expects the committee to vote on the measure today.

Since Democrats control the House and Madigan controls the Democrats, he likely wouldn't embarrass Miller by
allowing a vote that would result in the bill's defeat.

If there is a vote, it's because Madigan wants the bill pushed out of committee.

And the timing suggests Madigan wants an alternative to the governor's gross receipts tax.

"I don't think the speaker has any position on the gross receipts tax at this point," said Steve Brown,
Madigan's spokesman.

"He just doesn't know enough about it. All we have are speeches and press releases.

"The speaker needs to know what the plan would actually do, the details, before he takes a position."

But the speaker is allowing HB 750 to be called for a vote. So something in his position has changed since
last year.

"It's a new year," Brown said. "It's obviously time to discuss this issue now."

It also is possible that Madigan is seeking leverage in negotiations with Blagojevich and Jones.

Whatever the case, Madigan may now be the last and best hope for the so-called tax swap proposal.

Jones has said that as far as he's concerned the measure is in the Senate's "Hospice Committee.'

When I asked Meeks about that, he said, "I reminded the Senate president that hospice is not for the dead,
but for the living. My bill is still alive."

Looking at the political picture in Illinois is like studying one of Seurat's paintings at the Art
Institute.

At a certain distance, the image has clarity.

But the closer you look, the more obvious it becomes that you're just looking at a jumble of dots on
canvass.

The governor has vowed to veto any bill that includes a tax increase.

The governor has proposed a gross receipts tax that's going to result in higher prices for consumers, but he
claims that's a tax on big business, not consumers.

In the meantime, Mayor Richard Daley, who has said he wants the Legislature to pass school funding reform
this year, has yet to take a position on either of the bills.

He did ardently defend businessmen, ripping the governor for calling them "fat cats."

"You have to be optimistic," Miller said.

"House Bill 750 has been assigned to committee. I expect a committee vote (today).

"That's more than we've gotten in the past."

Will Madigan be there?

"I don't know, but his top legal guy will be running the meeting," Miller said. "That's significant."

You know, it must be because when I looked at the "Last Supper" again, there was Madigan's guy whispering in someone's ear.

Ten ways to cut school spending

2007-03-18T10:01:00.000-05:00

The following letter to the editor appeared in the Daily Herald.

Daily Herald Letter to the editor -- 3/18/07
Ten ways to cut school spending
Gov. Rod Blagojevich wants a new “value-added” tax on Illinois businesses to support more education spending.

Before I move my engineering business to another state to escape this onerous tax, here’s my “Top 10 Ways To Cut Education Spending.”

1) Eliminate teachers’ pensions. Pensions don’t exist in the private sector. Why can’t teachers have a 401(k) or Keough plan?

2) Cut teachers’ salaries. A friend just retired after serving as the “weight room” teacher for a local high school. He was nothing more than a glorified personal trainer, but with his Ph.D. in education, he earned more than $110,000 per year.

3) Raise the retirement age to 65. That same friend worked 30 years and retired with an annual pension of about $80,000 per year plus cost of living adjustments. The pension is guaranteed until the day he dies, and he’s only 56.

4) Stop the “advanced degree” scam. The main reason teachers get advanced degrees is to get a salary increase. If you were qualified to teach with only a bachelor’s degree, you don’t need an advanced degree.

5) Eliminate AP classes. If you want college credit, go to college.

6) Don’t start all-day kindergarten. We already have all day kindergarten. It’s called first grade.

7) Increase class size. When I was in school, the average class size was 30-35 pupils.

8) Eliminate teacher’s aides. Why do teachers need aides? You’re the teacher, so teach!

9) Cut health care expenditures. In the private sector, employees pay a greater share of their health insurance and so should teachers.

10) Take computers out of grade school. Just like calculators did not improve math competence, computers do not improve penmanship, language or writing skills. Software spell- and grammar-check features do not teach anything.

At the last Democratic National Convention, one-third of the delegates were teachers. The governor’s plan is nothing more than a political payoff to the teachers union — his biggest constituency — and we shouldn’t have to pay for his votes. And you wonder why Democrats keep asking for more education spending.

John Schadl

Arlington Heights

Fight or pack up

2007-03-18T08:43:00.000-05:00

The following letter to the editor appeared in the Northwest Herald.

Fight or pack up

To the Editor:

Gov. Rod Blagojevich is pushing the largest expansion of state government in Illinois history.

And he’s doing it in classic Blagojevich style, with vague bold strokes. He has no detailed plan for this massive proposal, just a partisan speech, a news release, and a new straw man, the Illinois businessman.

The gloves are off now, it’s his second term. His budget address sounds like a declaration of war against Illinois businesses. Blagojevich wants free health care, piles of money for overdue bills, and another $10 billion for education. And instead of real working people (i.e. union labor), he’s going to make you pay for it.

But Blagojevich isn’t raising taxes, he’s just expanding them – expanding them to everything you do with a gross receipts tax. The average voter won’t understand economic ramifications of the all-inclusive taxes and the multiplier effect, but should understand that Illinois is the eighth-worst state to do business in, and it’s about to get much worse. The most aggravating part of all this is putting more good money down that bottomless pit in Springfield.

This is a fight-or-flight situation. Stop Blagojevich or start researching new state residency requirements.

Drew Veeneman

Elgin

Gross receipts taxes are extremely destructive for a state's economy for more information we refer you to the The really gross ‘Gross Receipts really Tax’ article by the Illinois Policy Institute.

How Taxes Work

2007-03-17T09:52:00.000-05:00

The following piece is self explanitory and came from the Maine Public Policy Institute.

How Taxes Work
by T. Davies

This is a VERY simple way to understand the tax laws. Read on - it does make you think!! Let's put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand. Suppose that every day, ten men go out for dinner.

The bill for al ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this: The first four men -- the poorest -- would pay nothing; the fifth would pay $1, the sixth would pay $3, the seventh $7, the eighth $12, the ninth $18, and the tenth man -- the richest -- would pay $59. That's what they decided to do. The ten men ate dinner in the restaurant every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement -- until one day, the owner threw them a curve (in tax language, a tax cut). "Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily meal by $20." So now dinner for the ten only cost $80. The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. So the first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But what about the other six -- the paying customers?

How could they divvy up the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his fair share? The six men realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would end up being PAID to eat their meal. So the restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.

And so the fifth man paid nothing, the sixth pitched in $2, the seventh paid $5, the eighth paid $9, the ninth paid $12, leaving the tenth man with a bill of $52 instead of his earlier $59. Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to eat for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got a dollar out of the $20," declared the sixth man, but he (pointing to the tenth man), got $7!" "Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man, "I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got seven times more than me!" "That's true," shouted the seventh man.

"Why should he get $7 back when I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks!" "Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison. "We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!" The nine men surrounded the tenth man and beat him up. The next night the tenth man didn't show up for dinner. So the nine sat down and ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, the nine men discovered -- a little late -- what was very important. They were FIFTY-TWO DOLLARS short of paying the bill! Imagine that! And that, boys and girls, journalists and college instructors, is how the tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction.

Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up at the table anymore. Where would that leave the rest? Unfortunately, most taxing authorities anywhere cannot seem to grasp this rather straight-forward logic!

Improving public schools

2007-03-14T05:46:00.000-05:00

The following piece appeared in the Washington Times. No further commentary is needed.

Improving public schools
TODAY'S COLUMNIST
By David White
March 12, 2007

Steve Jobs, the co-founder and CEO of Apple, just lost any friends he had in the executive offices of the nation's teacher unions. Speaking recently at an education reform conference in Austin, Mr. Jobs blamed the unionization of America's public schools for much of what's wrong with today's public education system.
"What kind of person could you get to run a small business," he asked, comparing school principals to CEOs, "if you told them that when they came in they couldn't get rid of people that they thought weren't any good?" Unfortunately for America's schoolchildren, Mr. Jobs' criticisms are just scraping the surface.
Across America, there are more than 3 million public-school teachers. Organized through the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers -- the nation's two largest labor unions -- they wield enormous political influence and aren't afraid to use it. Much of this power comes through the dues that union leaders deduct from teachers' paychecks, supposedly to improve the working conditions of the teachers they represent. In California, for example, the state teachers' association represents 340,000 workers and collects more than $150 million each year in mandatory dues.
But in reality, the unions often promote an agenda that doesn't reflect the interests of their members. Performance-based pay for teachers is a prime example of how the unions work directly against their members' own best interests. In inner-city schools, the best teachers often leave after just a year or two for better salaries, nicer neighborhoods and less stressful work. Merit pay, however, makes it possible for these schools to retain effective teachers by paying them more. But the unions usually fight tooth and nail against such measures.
By standing against proven reform, the union agenda also harms the nation's schoolchildren.
Using member dues, unions regularly lobby against efforts to allow students trapped in underperforming schools to transfer to better schools by using vouchers. Never mind the fact that study after study has demonstrated that voucher systems boost student achievement in both public and private schools, regardless of socioeconomic background.
Further, when using their collective-bargaining powers, teacher-union leaders often rely on tough, confrontational tactics to win concessions from local school boards. Across the country, they've negotiated generous taxpayer subsidies and other unfair benefits.
In cities like Los Angeles, New York, Chicago and Philadelphia, a teacher who decides against joining the local union is required by contract to pay a fee to that union.
Most large school districts also offer paid leave for teachers to conduct union business. For example, San Diego's contract gives union members an "unlimited number of workdays per fiscal year of leave to use for association business." And in Providence, teachers selected by their union to serve as delegates to any AFL-CIO meeting are eligible for five paid days of leave. This places a double cost burden on schools. In addition to paying the absent teachers their full salary, many districts are also responsible for finding and paying substitute teachers.
Shockingly, in some cities, teachers on paid leave can be hired as substitute teachers without terminating their leave. In other words, a teacher could take time off but continue working as a substitute teacher collecting two paychecks, at the same time, from the same school. In many districts, schools must give unions free use of equipment like copy machines, telephones and computers. Some districts are even contractually obligated to provide union presidents with free office space and time at faculty meetings.
Further, if city and state governments simply eliminated the taxpayer subsidies that are being used to support union activities each year, they could channel that money back to providing a high-quality education to every student, using the funds to raise teacher pay to attract the best and brightest.
Steve Jobs has started an important conversation about the impact of America's teachers unions. Those who seek to improve the quality of our nation's public schools -- parents, teachers and local school-board members -- would be wise to take part.

David White is an adjunct scholar at the Lexington Institute.

Teachers Unions Behind Group To Take Away School Choice From Utahns.

2007-03-13T05:22:00.000-05:00

If you are not a regular reader of the Education Intelligence Agency you should be. This is some of the great stuff you are missing.

Utahns for Public Schools = NEA UniServ. With the passage of a statewide voucher program into law in Utah, opponents have decided to gather signatures for a referendum that would first suspend, then overturn the law. The main group is working under the banner Utahns for Public Schools. An alert EIA reader noticed something unusual about the organization. Upon deeper investigation, the roots of Utahns for Public Schools are beginning to show.

On its website, the coalition describes itself as "a group of parents, teachers, and others interested in the quality of education provided to Utah children." This sounds a lot better to the general public and the press than "a group of employees and officers of the Utah Education Association and the Utah PTA."

The organization lists 128 names as county contacts for people interested in signing or distributing the petition against the voucher law. The 128 names are of 50 individuals, almost all of whom can be identified by very specific job titles.

Of the 50 people, 13 are UniServ directors employed by the Utah Education Association, whose pay is subsidized by grants from the National Education Association. Another 12 contacts are elected officers or representatives of the Utah Education Association and its local affiliates, and another 14 contacts are regional directors of the Utah PTA. The jobs of the other 11 contacts could not be immediately determined.

Quote of the Week. "A 4% increase in teachers across the state is not particularly large, even amidst declining student enrollment." – Vermont-NEA Angelo J. Dorta. (March 2007 Vermont-NEA Today)

The Michigan Teacher Glut

"There are thousands and thousands of teachers without job opportunities in Michigan," says Michigan State Superintendent of Public Instruction Mike Flanagan.

Except when it comes to applying for federal supplemental loans for critical teacher shortage areas. Then the state of Michigan has a long, long list of openings for teachers.

Or is it indeed a glut? They are turning away candidates at the teacher colleges in Ontario, Canada, and part of the reason is the oversupply of teachers from "border schools" - that is, teacher colleges in Buffalo and other American cities.

"It's simple supply and demand," said a Canadian official.

Not so simple for some.

For more great information from the Education Intelligence Agency click here.

Virtual Schools: Parents over Prejudice

2007-03-12T05:13:00.000-05:00

The following piece is from the Spontaneous Solutions A publication of the Illinois Policy Institute posted by Collin Hitt. Please be sure to contact your legislator at tell them to vote no on House Bill 232.

Virtual Schools: Parents over Prejudice

posted by Collin Hitt

The following post discusses 'virtual schools.' For more on virtual schools, and on the Chicago Virtual Charter School, go here.

I have been closely following a particular piece of legislation, House Bill 232, commonly called a 'virtual school ban.' Alexander Russo picked up on my edspresso post on the subject last week, and did a good job discussing the controversy that surrounds virtual schools.

In Illinois, both the Chicago Teachers Union and Representative Monique Davis have taken measures to close Illinois' lone virtual charter school. The Chicago Teachers Union's motives are obvious. Davis' are somewhat more...complex.

During a meeting of the House Elementary and Secondary Education Committee last month, while her virtual school ban was being debated, Davis stated, "Tomorrow, who knows what somebody's bright idea may be, to pick people, who...Some people give less than a darn whether they get educated or not. And I am going to tell you, I am not going to sit by and have you miseducate a number of people to fill up the prisons in the state of Illinois."

Davis' comments were directed at the staff, parents and students of the Chicago Virtual Charter School attending the committee meeting on February 22. I was present at that meeting, and able to witness the Representative's behavior first-hand. I believe her comments were made in very poor taste. But that's not the point. In her diatribe against parents, she spoke to the central issue of school choice.

And so did Lilly Henton, the aunt of a CVCS student and of the 'you' who Davis was talking to: "This is all about integrity - the integrity of the parent, in their home. You asked us to be more involved with our children and then when we try to be we get all kinds of heat and questions about our integrity..."

Ms. Henton had, at the time, been asked to prove that students were doing their own homework. She continued thus: "I am not helping Angelie by doing her homework...

"How am I going to teach Angelie about how to succeed, if I'm doing her homework? I am on there with her, to help her, not do it for her. That's not going to make her a better citizen. That's not going to make her a better student. That will not help my niece..."

The decision to chaperon a child's education, rather than send her to school all day, is not one that a parent takes lightly. A virtual classroom is not the best environment for every child. Parents know this. But a CPS classroom is not the best environment for every child, either, to say the least.

I have visited the CVCS campus. I have met with parents. I have written and published on the issue, but my familiarity with the school pales in comparison to that of the hundreds of parents who have put their children in - and kept them in - the Chicago Virtual Charter School.

So, I have to wonder, who are the parents to whom Ms. Davis was referring? Those who don't give a darn about education? Surely, they are out there. But they aren't touring virtual schools. They aren't staying home with their children, and attending training seminars on how to use new software. Which begs the question, are lawmakers like Davis so traumatized by the poor choices of a select few that she is willing to stigmatize her entire electorate?

The fact is, the only way to help the children of 'those parents' is to improve their public schools. And those schools will only be improved by the competive pressures that mount once parents are offered a diverse array of unique schools from which they can choose.

The Chicago Virtual Charter School is certainly a unique school. If the school is allowed to remain open, time will tell and parents will decide if they want to send their children there. I suspect that they will, as long as they have the opportunity to do so.

To read more of Collin Hitt's articles go to the Spontaneous Solutions website. Be sure to visit the site so you can visit the links in his above post.

Tax Credits For All

2007-03-10T08:18:00.000-06:00

Collin Hitt of the Illinois Policy Institute has a great piece on Spontaneous Solutions a Publication of the Illinois Policy Institute
called Tax Credits For All.

Tax Credits For All

posted by Collin Hitt

The Illinois Policy Institute has partnered with the Illinois chapter of Americans for Prosperity to host a series of education reform forums. The most recent event was in Quincy, and the Herald Whig did a good job covering it.

I've spoken at both events, detailing the new Institute proposal, an "Earned Education Tax Credit." The idea is simple: a $4,000 refundable tuition tax credit (think rebate, or voucher) for every student under the age of twenty three. Among other things, the tax credit would count against incurred tuition costs of preschool, private school and college.

I'm going to be writing and speaking on the topic a lot in the coming year. I'd like to have your thoughts on it, sooner rather than later. So, Conservatives, what do you think of the state underwriting the costs of preschool and college? Liberals, can you reasonably defend a preschool and college subsidy that doesn't also apply to K-12 education - the area where it is needed most?

To read more posts on the BLOG Spontaneous Solutions a Publication of the Illinois Policy Institute click here.

Houston Teachers Asked to Return Bonuses After School District Overpayed Them

2007-03-09T07:48:00.000-06:00

The following story appeared on Foxnews.com

Houston Teachers Asked to Return Bonuses After School District Overpayed Them

Friday , March 09, 2007

The school district that runs the nation's largest merit pay program gave oversized bonuses to nearly 100 teachers and is asking them to give it back. The president of Houston's largest teachers' union is telling members not to return the overpayments, which range from $62.50 to $2,790.
A total of almost $75,000 was overpaid because a computer program mistakenly calculated the bonuses of part-time personnel as if they were full-time employees, according to the Houston Independent School District. Less than 1 percent of teachers were affected, the district said.

Gayle Fallon, president of the Houston Federation of Teachers, said the district can't force the 99 teachers to sign forms authorizing it to deduct the money from their paychecks, and promised legal action if it attempts to do so.

"If it's the district's error, then the district should bear the loss," she said.

District spokesman Terry Abbott, however, said the money must be repaid.

The union opposes the merit system unanimously approved by the school board last year. The district doled out $14 million to almost 8,000 teachers two months ago, but distributed another $1 million after officials realized several hundred teachers had been overlooked.

Salaries for full-time teachers in the district range from about $40,000 to nearly $68,000.

Raise your hand if you think that the school should underpay the next paycheck. Do you think the union will just sit back and say it was an error you do not have to pay us more? When will the greed of the unions and teachers end?

Gayle Fallon, president of the Houston Federation of Teachers said "If it's the district's error, then the district should bear the loss." Nice job screwing the taxpayers Gayle.

Fixing No Child Left Behind

2007-03-06T08:53:00.000-06:00

The following piece appeared in the Wall Street Journal.

Fixing No Child Left Behind
WSJ Editorial: March 6, 2007; Page A18

The No Child Left Behind education law is up for renewal this year, and an independent commission recently released some recommendations for improvement. Not to be outdone, the White House has also put out its own "blueprint" for strengthening the law. The legislation could use a serious reworking, but any fixes won't go far enough unless they do more to expand public and private school choice.

NCLB's political bargain was that, in return for a big increase in federal education spending, the government would hold schools more accountable for results in the classroom. Six years later, taxpayers have done their part. Since 2001 overall NCLB funding has risen by 34%, and federal spending on Title I schools serving low-income students has gone up 45%.

NCLB and the Bush Administration also deserve some credit for shifting the terms of the education debate. The law has focused attention on learning gaps between students of different races and economic backgrounds that persist even at some of the nation's best public schools. The law's requirement that schools test annually in grades 3-8, and report both averages and the results of racial and economic subgroups, has made it much more difficult for administrators to hide the fact that all students aren't learning.

NCLB has been much less successful in bringing pressure to bear on states and school districts that fail to implement the law. That's especially true of the school choice provisions, which are the best way to get the attention of the education bureaucracy. Unfortunately, the Bush Administration abandoned its voucher proposal very early in the 2001 negotiations. What passed was a watered-down version of public school choice, which in theory allows a child in a failing school to transfer to a better public school or get free after-school tutoring from private providers.

* * *

In practice, however, the Education Department has too often allowed school districts to skirt even these limited choice provisions, either by granting exemptions or looking the other way. It took a formal complaint from the Alliance for School Choice before Secretary Margaret Spellings did anything about Los Angeles failing to notify parents of their transfer rights as required under the law. So far she's sent the district a sternly worded letter.

And the Chicago public school system, which has been repeatedly labeled "in need of improvement" and thus should be banned under NCLB from offering its own after-school tutoring, has been given a waiver to do exactly that. So while it would be nice if the Bush Administration enforced its own law, the larger lesson is that school choice "lite" turns out to be no substitute for the real thing.

To be fair, some of these problems are structural. Even if more school districts were implementing NCLB's transfer provisions, there often isn't enough room in decent schools to handle all the children who qualify for a transfer. And many of the private after-school tutoring services allowed under the law are simply employing the same teachers from the local public school system who are failing the kids during regular school hours.

There's also the problem of allowing each state to develop its own standards and tests to determine proficiency in reading and math. The Administration was deferring to federalist principles on an issue that's traditionally been handled at the state and local level. But the reality has been a "race to the bottom," with some states constructing easy tests to avoid federal penalties.

"If you're in Oklahoma right now, you're told that 95% or 96% of your schools are doing fine," says Frederick Hess, who follows education at the American Enterprise Institute. "And if you're in Massachusetts, you're told that 40% to 45% of your schools are doing fine. But if you look at the actual achievement data, it suggests that kids in Massachusetts are doing far better than kids in Oklahoma."

Some education reformers are now calling for "national standards" to address this problem. But we tried national history standards in the 1990s, and the politicized results weren't pretty -- unless, of course, you favor a history curriculum that downgrades the Founding Fathers while playing up the working experiences of midwives in 19th-century Nebraska.

Rather than force a national test on states, the best compromise here may be to require them to benchmark their own assessments against the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP), a federal standardized test that already exists and that most educators agree is fairly rigorous. "So people at least have a common metric by which to judge the rigor of the state assessment," says Mr. Hess.

It's worth considering, and we wish we could say the same about the Commission on No Child Left Behind, which was funded by private foundations and co-chaired by former Governors Tommy Thompson and Roy Barnes. But the panel's report is more interested in tinkering than fundamental change, and its 75 recommendations don't include the one that would make the biggest difference: school vouchers.

* * *

The Administration's proposed fixes are bolder and potentially more consequential. President Bush's 2008 budget sets aside $250 million for "promise scholarships" for low-income students in schools that have consistently underperformed for five years. The scholarships would average about $4,000 and "the money would follow the child to the public, charter or private school of his or her choice."

Them's fightin' words for the Democrats who now control Congress. But Mr. Bush has the bully pulpit, as well as the moral authority from five years of evidence on failing schools. We hope his Administration uses them to explain why real school choice is essential to any reform in K-12 education.

Education Lags

2007-03-05T08:12:00.000-06:00

The following editorial appeared in the Northwest Herald
No further comments are needed.

Education lags

Comments (2)
Most high school students still are not achieving proficiency in math and reading, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Only 35 percent of high school seniors scored at or above the proficient level on the 2005 national reading test.

In math, the story is even more troubling: Just 23 percent reached proficiency, which indicates solid but not exceptional academic performance.

Since 1983, billions of dollars have been spent on state and federal school reform programs. Despite this massive investment, national tests show few signs of academic progress.

Clearly, it’s time to take reform in a different direction. It no longer makes sense to pour billions of dollars into an outdated bureaucratic model of public education. Top-down reforms that funnel money through the bureaucracy will never raise the schools above mediocrity.

In the next wave of education reform, money should flow from parents to the schools. Let the decisions of parents push schools toward excellence.

Lawmakers and business leaders need to stop wringing their hands and start pushing for reforms that will make a real difference.

Press-Register, Mobile, Ala.

Neverending tax increases

2007-03-04T10:42:00.000-06:00

This article appeared in the Kane County Chronicle. In a state that already can't afford to pay off its giveaways to special interest groups, the Governor wants universal health care and maintenance of the obscene state pension system. They can't print money, so either the overpaid state retirees must sacrifice from their multimillion dollar pensions (paid by private citizens who usually don't have pensions at all) or ordinary taxpayers must suffer. Sadly it seems our lawmakers have chosen the latter path. There are two ways to balance a budget, and its high time the state chooses spending cuts over higher taxes.

Neverending tax increases

To the Editor:

It’s only two cents a gallon.

That two cents increase will equate to $4.5 million a year according to Kane County board member Jan Carlson.

If that was the only increase we anticipate, that would be wonderful.

However, let’s talk about other things that are happening in Kane County. I’ll use myself as an example.

My 2005 real estate taxes bill had a 30 percent tax increase for Kane County, 45 percent increase for Kaneland School District 302, 31 percent increase for Black-berry Township Road District, 22 percent increase for Elburn Village, 28.6 percent increase for Waubonsee Community College, 55 percent increase for Elburn Fire District and 22.8 percent increase for Town and Country Library. I dread to see the increases for the 2006 tax bill.

The governor states that he wants billions more a year for universal health care.

Last week a coalition of business and labor groups called on the state to put $5 billion a year into transportation for five years.

Will Kane County see any of that money? So why the two cents?

Also, recently State Sen. James Meeks and the teachers union unveiled a modified version of the infamous Senate Bill 750, which not only will provide new education dollars and roll back property taxes but also will pump $3 billion into the states under-funded pension systems. Also, Gov. Blagojevich will propose a multibillion dollar “gross receipts tax.”

The tax would zap pretty much every transaction performed by businesses and provide billions of dollars (business groups say maybe as much as $9 billion) a year for state coffers.

I’m sure businesses are not going to pass that on to consumers, just like gas stations are going to eat the two-cent increase.

The county also wants to raise impact fees for new homes and businesses in Kane County.

Do you not think these increases are not going to be passed on to Kane County citizens? So, going back to the two cents, there is a lot more facing taxpayers in Kane County than ever before.

Kane County board chairperson Karen McConnaughy was quoted in October 2005 saying that 2006 tax cuts are part of a new culture at the county.

However, consultant fees alone grew by more than 50 percent last year, just to name one of the increases.

Now the board wants to add only two cents more in gas taxes. The board should be aware we are watching the voting of this board and how it effects our tax dollars.

I oppose any future tax increase and believe board members should remember that the chairman is opposed to increases also or is this just political puffery as they say in Springfield.

James MacRunnels

Elburn

Quote of the day.

"Collecting more taxes than is absolutely necessary is legalized robbery." Calvin Coolidge

“More and more, retirees are finding that it pays to have worked for the government instead of the private sector”

2007-03-03T19:35:00.000-06:00

The following piece appeared in USA Today on February 21..

“More and more, retirees are finding that it pays to have worked for the government instead of the private sector”
This article mentions the City of Dover

By Dennis Cauchon
USA TODAY

Johnnie Nichols, a civilian Defense Department employee, contributes to a federal pension that will let him retire at age 56, after 32 years of service.

His wife, Kimberly, a math teacher at a private business college, has no pension after two decades of teaching and running a horse farm. Their marriage reflects the new world of retirement: government employees who have secure benefits and private workers who increasingly are on their own.

“If we were both in her shoes, we’d be in a world of hurt,” says Nichols, 45, an information technology manager in Middletown, Ind. “We wouldn’t be able to retire until age 67.”

As the first wave of 79 million baby boomers heads to retirement, the nation is dividing into two classes of workers: those who have government benefits and those who don’t. The gap is accelerating in every way: pensions, medical benefits, retirement ages.

Retired government workers are twice as likely to get a pension as their counterparts in the private sector, and the typical benefit is far more generous. The nation’s 6 million retired civil servants — teachers, police, administrators, laborers — received a median benefit of $17,640 in 2005, according to the Congressional Research Service. Eleven million private-sector retirees covered by traditional pensions got $7,692.

Governments’ generosity could have serious consequences for taxpayers and pensioners. Some states — including Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio and West Virginia — have troubled retirement systems that may require huge tax increases, spending cuts or even defaulting on promised benefits. The U.S. government has a bigger unfunded liability for military and civil servant retirement benefits ($4.7 trillion) than it does for Social Security ($4.6 trillion).

The pension gap will continue to widen because governments pump far more money into employee pensions than companies do. Civil servants earn an average of $12.38 an hour in benefits, about $5 an hour more than private-sector workers, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The difference was just $2.70 an hour in 1995.

Pension promises have “gotten out of hand,” says Peter Hanson, 73, chairman of NAI James E. Hanson Inc., a real estate firm in Hackensack, N.J. His firm offers a healthy private pension — up to 25% of compensation, given to employee retirement accounts — but it is tied to profits and given as a lump sum, not a lifetime promise of benefits.

Supporters of government pensions say the decline in private pensions is the problem, not the generosity of public retirement plans. “Rather than lower the bar for public employees, we need to stabilize retirement programs for everyone,” says Richard Ferlauto, director of pension and benefit policy for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, a union with 1.4 million members.

He acknowledges public pensions are getting more scrutiny. “People want to know, ‘Why should you have more security than us?’ ” he says. “It’s pension envy.”

State and local governments have sweetened retirement benefits during the past decade at a time when corporations have soured on them because of their cost. Only 18% of private workers now have traditional defined benefit pension plans, compared with more than 80% of government employees.

Contrary to a widely held notion, the extra government benefits aren’t compensation for lower pay. Most government workers are paid more than private employees in similar jobs, and the wage gap is growing.

A typical full-time state or local government worker made $78,853 in wages and benefits in the third quarter of 2006, $25,771 more than a typical private-sector worker, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports. The difference was $7,604 in 2000. The compensation advantage holds true for all types of public workers, from teachers to laborers and managers. Better benefits for government workers is the biggest reason for the growing compensation gap.

“The government is in direct competition with us for employees. It’s hard to compete against these benefit packages,” says James Bellis, owner of Tree Tech, a 120-worker tree trimming company in Randolph, N.J. His company has a 401(k) plan that matches up to 2% of employee pay.

By comparison, tree trimmers working for a government in New Jersey would get a pension benefit worth more than three times that.

Superior retirement benefits for civil servants can be traced to the establishment of Social Security, which originally did not cover government employees, says E.J. McMahon, a pension expert at the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank that deals with economic policy. Today, three-fourths of government workers participate in Social Security, but their overall benefits have not been reduced accordingly, he says.

The boost in benefits since the 1960s reflects the rising power of public employee unions, which have thrived as industrial labor unions and the benefits they won have eroded, he says.

The growing benefit gap makes government an increasingly attractive employer.

Anneliese Crosby, 46, who codes medical records at a private hospital in Manchester, N.H., is trying to get a government job for financial reasons — better pay, benefits and job security. The hospital recently ended its pension plan for new employees. That didn’t affect Crosby, but her retirement depends mostly on contributions to her tax-deferred retirement account.

“It’s scary. I feel like I need a second job or to be on the lookout for a new job,” she says. “I should put more in my retirement account, but I can’t afford it.”

Her solution: Apply for a similar job at a Veterans Affairs hospital. She’d get a pay raise, better benefits and a secure future. “My ex-husband keeps encouraging me to get a government job, and he’s right about that,” she says.

Pensions for civil servants often are superior to private pensions in subtle ways that make a huge financial difference. For example, government pensions:

•Generally base benefits on a worker’s top three earning years. Private pensions typically base benefits on the top five years of pay, which lowers the average.

•Often let retirees add the value of overtime, unused leave and other benefits into the pension formula. The results can be extreme. Dover, N.H., Police Chief William Fenniman, 46, added more than $200,000 for severance, sick leave and other payouts into his three-year salary average when he retired in January. This will boost his retirement benefit to as much as $125,000 a year, more than he made as chief.

•Permit early retirement at age 50 or 55 with less of a benefit reduction than private pensions.

•Provide free or subsidized medical care for retirees under age 65 and supplemental coverage after that for those on Medicare.

•More often provide automatic cost-of-living increases to benefits.

Baby boomer retirements will force governments to confront the rising costs of civil servant benefits. The U.S. government’s unfunded retirement obligation grew $200 billion last year to $4.7 trillion. That’s the amount the government would need today, set aside and earning investment returns, to pay for promised retirement benefits.

Before 1984, federal workers had a defined benefit plan and no Social Security. Today, new employees have Social Security and a pension that is part defined benefit plan (lifetime monthly payments) and part defined contribution (a lump sum at retirement).

The pension is more generous than most private pensions, but workers have to pay more to take advantage of the plan. “You have to be aggressive about making contributions if you want a good retirement,” says Nichols, the Defense Department employee.

Unlike private pensions, though, the federal system still encourages early retirement. “The sweet spot for me is about age 56. When I run the numbers, the system almost forces me to retire” early, Nichols says. For example, he expects to qualify for a free supplemental annuity at age 56 that provides a benefit equal to what he’d get at age 62 under Social Security.

Another big incentive to retire early: Most governments offer health insurance to early retirees until they qualify for Medicare at 65. Massachusetts spent $377 million on retiree medical benefits last year. The state’s unfunded liability for such costs is $13.3 billion, nearly as much as its actual debt of $18.5 billion, which is counted separately.

“It’s a burden on taxpayers, of course,” says Delores Mitchell, executive director of the Massachusetts Group Insurance Commission, which runs the program. But she doesn’t foresee major benefit cuts. “States have a tradition of treating retirees well.”

Medical insurance may be the most vulnerable benefit because it has fewer legal protections than pensions, which often are guaranteed in state constitutions. Orange County, Calif., recently slashed promised retiree medical benefits, cutting its liability from $1.4 billion to $600 million. The county hasn’t done anything about its pension problem.

“Pension benefits are like a lobster trap. You can get in, but you can’t get out,” says John Moorlach, an Orange County supervisor who has tried to reduce retirement benefits for government workers.

He blames elected officials for awarding unsustainable retirement benefits to win support from employee unions. “Elected officials love to give generous retirement benefits because they don’t cost anything today and they’ll be out of office when the payments come due,” Moorlach says. “And the public? Eyes droop with boredom when you bring up the topic.”

The financial soundness of civil servant pensions varies across the country. Government pensions are, on average, in a similar condition as private pensions — about 20% below the assets needed to be properly funded. But some states, especially in the industrial Midwest, have severely troubled pensions.

“The taxes needed to pay for these promises would push many of these states’ economies into a death spiral,” Chicago bankruptcy lawyer James Spiotto says.

He says public employee unions should not overestimate legal protections for pension benefits. Localities can shed their obligations in a bankruptcy filing, and states, as sovereign governments, can ignore the requirements, he says. “Unions can win all the litigation and still lose because the judgments can’t be enforced,” Spiotto says.

Tim Lee, executive director of the Texas Retired Teachers Association, says unions understand the cost of the retirement benefits. He says his association’s top goal is improving the financial health of the pension fund, not winning new benefits.

As expensive as government pensions are to taxpayers, civil servants don’t feel the benefits make them rich. Frank Caron, 49, maintains lab equipment at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He makes about $40,000 a year.

He has contributed heavily to his pension, including an extra $74 a week to restore pension credit for earlier government jobs. That will let him retire:

•At 55 with 47% of pay;

•At 60 with 72% of pay;

•Or at 65 with 103% of pay.

He also will have medical benefits and be eligible for Social Security at 62. “I’ve worked hard to have my ducks lined up in a row for retirement,” he says.

New tax targets firms

2007-03-02T08:13:00.000-06:00

The piece below states that the tax plan puts a burden on businesses. The fact is it puts a burden on everyone except for those that will benefit from the income redistribution and that would be the education industry and those involved with socialized medicine. When you tax businesses it risks jobs and the increased tax burden is shifted on the buyers of the businesses products. This is a lose, lose, win situation. The only ones who are winning are those that benefit from income redistribution or the tax increases.

The following piece appeared in the Daily Herald.

New tax targets firms
Plan puts more tax burden on businesses

By John Patterson
Daily Herald State Government Editor
Posted Friday, March 02, 2007

SPRINGFIELD — Gov. Rod Blagojevich is expected to roll out a dramatic change next week in how businesses pay taxes in Illinois, a move that could raise billions for health care and education spending but which already has business interests howling.

Specifics are unlikely before the governor’s March 7 budget speech, but the general idea involves doing away with the corporate income tax and instead imposing a tax on virtually every transaction businesses make.

The concept is to put a relatively low tax rate on all the money that comes in the door rather than a higher tax only on company profits.

Illinois isn’t alone in considering this. Ohio and Texas enacted similar tax policies in recent years.

The bottom line result in Illinois could be upward of $7 billion in new tax revenue flowing into state coffers, money Blagojevich sorely needs to shore up previous populist programs, such as his children’s insurance plan, and launch new ones, all while keeping his campaign mantra of not raising the state’s sales or income taxes.

Supporters of the idea describe it as restoring fairness to the state’s tax structure, saying more than half the Illinois corporations do not pay the state’s corporate income tax.

Doug Kane, a former Illinois lawmaker and president of a Wisconsin-based economic consulting firm, said the state’s existing tax structure no longer represents its economy and, as a result, a greater burden increasingly falls on individuals. Switching to this new tax structure would reverse that trend and at the same time ensure every business pays, if for no other reason than the loophole-filled corporate income tax system would be abolished.

“The advantages of a gross receipts tax are: one, the simplicity; two, the very broad base which allows a very low rate,” said Kane, who’s been retained at $125 an hour by the Blagojevich administration to help make the case for such a tax change.

He notes Republicans and business groups have led the push for similar tax policies in Ohio and Texas.

But Illinois business groups aren’t convinced, with makers of everything from bottle caps to bulldozers fearing they’ll get soaked.

Hardest hit, critics say, are major manufacturers relying on myriad supply chains and companies with low profit margins whose daily business consists of numerous small transactions.

“Good year or bad year, you’re going to get hit on your sales and not on your profitability,” said John L. Mikesell, a government finance professor at Indiana University.

“Almost anybody who’s done graduate-level work in economics is going to be against that turkey. The only exception is politicians,” Mikesell said. “There’s literally nothing good that can be said about it.”

As for other states, Mikesell notes Ohio businesses backed this kind of tax as a replacement for a system they despised even more. Nor are all states rushing to impose these taxes. Indiana has done away with its gross receipts tax.

Back in Illinois, the pending proposal almost certainly will create an all-out lobbying war at the Capitol, as virtually every business entity is already lining up to fight the plan. On the other side are myriad education, health care and other interest groups who covet state funding for their programs and have no shortage of ideas for how to spend more tax dollars.

In between are lawmakers who, on one hand, don’t want to appear overly anti-business but on the other hand will have the Blagojevich administration tempting them with the opportunity to come up with billions for spending without having to go home and defend a tax hike to the general public.

Business groups, however, are already emphasizing that such a tax will result in higher prices and the fingers should point to Blagojevich.

“The governor’s going to impose the largest tax on the people of Illinois, period,” said Greg Baise, president and chief executive of the Illinois Manufacturers’ Association. “They’re going to pay for it.”

But supporters dispute the guarantee of higher prices and say such criticism ignores the bigger problem of how to fix the state’s overall tax structure.

“It’s way too easy to trash a tax individually,” Kane said. “No tax is good.”

The question Kane has for critics is, if not this tax, then which one?

A+ Illinois $500,000 from Gates to Ram HB 750 down your throats.

2007-03-01T08:49:00.000-06:00

In a recent news release from A+ Illinois we learned that the Gates Foundation gave the "lobbying group" for the teachers' unions and public education monopoly, $500,000. Starting March 1st A+ Illinois will be using this money to encourage you and legislators to increase income taxes and business taxes for the "funding" problem in our public schools. It is not a funding problem it is a spending problem.

Pete Speer sent the following message to Mr. Gates.

Dear Mr. Gates:

I have just learned that the Gates Foundation has provided a $500,000 Grant to A+ Illinois.in its efforts to lobby legislators to increase Illinois school funding.

Regretfully, A+ Illinois does not have the same objectives as has been excellently presented in public speeches by Mr. Gates. Perhaps I have misread what I thought to be his clear train of logic.

The money from the tax increase which A+ Illinois is supporting is for two purposes. Part would go to increase funding for Illinois public schools without requiring reform. Part would go to increase taxes generally.

A small group of us in Illinois follow school funding closely. The State, according to the NEA, in combined state and local funding ranks 11th in the nation. However, it is the quality of the education output which concerns us.

In our view, the box that is Public Education is broken. What is clearly lacking is Education Value -- that which can be provided only by teachers with Subject Matter Mastery, a love of the subject and an affection for their students. The teachers in Illinois by this standard are underqualified. They are rewarded on a grid system of pay with longevity increases and additional increases for additional coursework. Of the graduate degrees held by Illinois High School teachers a large majority are not in the subject matter area they are teaching

Entry into the teaching force is tightly controlled by the Schools of Education who demand, we think unreasonably, multiple semesters of education theory and practice -- even of those who have had teaching experience in the military and wish to provide upon retirement continued public service. The environment is a closed shop, much like the industrial unions of the 1940s.

Union control over local Districts is absolute. It remains the largest source of contributions for a single political party. While Charter Schools are permitted in a limited fashion, only the political muscle of Chicago's Mayor has forced a single Charter School district through. The remainder of the state has not. The teachers unions and the administrators have advised Districts to opt out of the No Child Left Behind program, because of whatever small amount of rigor which it imposed. That would, of course, reveal the shortcomings to the public.

The "standards" agency -- the Illinois State Board of Education -- this last year has dumbed down the standardized tests, normed up the results and lowered the passing grade on subject matter competency for teacher certification. Once again, underqualified performance has been hidden behind inflated test scores...and grades.

Mr. Gates has spoken about the reform of the school system. The website www.wheresthemath.com deals with the math area and has a good short video by a professor in your state.

When the nadir of American car quality was reached in the 1960s, foreign competition entered the market and both amenities and qualities were increased across the board. We believe that this applies, not only to Illinois schools but across the nation. It is time for Competitive Competition in the Education field. The solution is simple, the cost would probably be less than the present cost of public education:

After accounting for special education needs vest the parents, on behalf of each child, with an equal amount of funding now going to Education Fund of each District. Funds would accrue from Federal, State and local resources. Let them choose from any accredited school -- in District or out. This would include the present District, a charter school, any accredited private school , and even a parochial school or a religious school, provided that the school's curriculum did not have religious courses during normal time.

This does two things. It empowers the family -- the building block of the Republic. It involves the parents in school selection and can remotivate them.

We are moving through a period during which early school leavers of the past, who had been ill served both at home and in the school, no longer believe that Education is an economic and a social good. Combined with a continuing program of GED equivalent education as a condition of welfare, Competitive Choice offers a way to form families to rejoin society.

In the case at hand, however, I am saddened to report that your grant will not reform schools, merely maintain the status quo.

Respectfully,

Paul D. (Pete) Speer, Jr.

Will plan spell r-e-l-i-e-f?

2007-02-28T08:38:00.000-06:00

HB - 750 will undoubtedly pass in the fall veto session. But this will not help McHenry County Schools. Once the income taxes leave the County they will not come back. Schools will continue to overspend and referenda will not cease. Please take the time to contact your legislators and tell them to vote no on any income tax increases, tax swaps or new taxes to businesses. There are two ways to balance a budget. One way is to increase revenues the other is to decrease spending. It is time to decrease spending in the schools. Taxpayers should not be the ones to always take a pay-cut.

The following piece appeared in the Northwest Herald.

Will plan spell r-e-l-i-e-f?

By ALEXA AGUILAR - aaguilar@nwnewsgroup.com
Comments (63)
Local school district leaders aren’t pinning their hopes on HB 750 – the latest education funding reform proposal reintroduced this month.

And they don’t think that it is the solution to Illinois’ school funding woes.

Officials aren’t even bothering to crunch the numbers to see how they will fare under the bill. Many of the county’s education veterans have seen so many proposals come and go over the years, they are wondering why this one will be any different.

“I’ve been in education 31 years,” said Ronald Miller, superintendent of Crystal Lake District 47.

“It comes up all the time, ... and then it stalls.”

House Bill 750 is designed to equalize the state’s funding system, which critics say is too reliant on local property-tax dollars.

The bill would increase the state income tax and tax consumer services, such as haircuts and lawn care, to provide a revenue stream to boost state aid to schools. It guarantees property tax relief, in the form of a refund from the state, to taxpayers.

The organization that wrote the legislation, the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability, says no school district in Illinois would lose money under the proposal.

Local legislators are skeptical. Even if local school districts don’t lose money, the taxpayers of McHenry County likely will be helping foot the bill of making the system more equitable, they said.

“McHenry County would lose money,” said state Sen. Pamela Althoff, R-Crystal Lake. She and state Rep. Jack Franks, D-Woodstock, say they oppose the legislation.

Local school district leaders say they aren’t sure how they would be affected.

Allan Smigiel, director of finance for McHenry District 15, said he didn’t know the specific impact on his district. He said similar proposals to HB 750 already had been proposed without any action.

But until the Legislature addresses the state’s structural deficit, he said, it shouldn’t be taking on the school’s education system.

Education leaders throughout the state agree that the quality of a child’s education shouldn’t depend on where the child lives. But part of the challenge is that each district and legislator wants to protect their local districts. In McHenry County, local dollars provide up to 90 percent of school funding. In other areas of the state, the percentages are far less.

Miller said there was a natural skepticism from McHenry County taxpayers about any reform that meant sending money to Springfield for the state to dole it out.

“No ifs, ands and buts,” Miller said. “Anytime money goes to Springfield, we worry about it.”

As much as property-tax dollars are a burden, taxpayers prefer to have that local control, said Mike Tanner, assistant superintendent of finance for Prairie Grove District 46.

The Truth About Teacher Salaries

2007-02-27T18:25:00.000-06:00

Jerry Moore of My Short Pencil.com
has a Lifetime Earnings Calculator where "you can directly compare your lifetime compensation to a teacher's . . . in a matter of minutes!"

On his site you will find some great information about teacher and administrator salaries. Although his site is directed toward New York schools the information is still useful since the NEA and AFT direct most union activities and employ the same tactics in school districts across the United States.

The following is from Jerry Moore's website.

"The setting of government school administrator and teacher salaries in New York is now a purely political exercise. Salaries are no longer strictly a product of skills and job difficulty, nor regulated by free market forces. Private sector New York teachers earn far less than public sector teachers. "

To read more go to My Short Pencil.com

Quote of the Day

"The setting of government school administrator and teacher salaries in New York is now a purely political exercise. Salaries are no longer strictly a product of skills and job difficulty, nor regulated by free market forces." Jerry Moore

Magna Charters

2007-02-26T08:50:00.000-06:00

The following is a start toward school reform, unless we dismantle the current failures of our current public education system these same failures in particular the teachers' unions and administrator associations will invade and dismantle the good things that are now happening in our charter schools.

The following article appeared in the Wall Street Journal.

Magna Charters

By NELSON SMITH
February 26, 2007; Page A19
As he prepared to announce the Aspen Commission's recent recommendations for revamping the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), co-chair Tommy Thompson made a telling remark: "We have been much more successful at identifying struggling schools than we have been in actually turning them around." Regrettably, as with other mainstream groups that have weighed in on the NCLB, the commission's report focuses almost exclusively on fixing ailing schools rather than starting healthy new ones. Both tracks are needed.

The NCLB has laid bare the troubling gaps in student achievement among racial and socioeconomic groups, and it has spurred some improvement, particularly in the early grades. Yet its prescriptions for reform have provoked meager change in schools and systems that produce chronically weak results.

The law lets parents move kids to a higher performing public school -- but in many cities there simply aren't any better choices available. Using federal dollars for "supplemental services" can help -- but tutoring often takes place after students have spent the school day in learning-deprived classrooms.

The act's coup de grâce, after years of failure, is to require "restructuring" a dysfunctional school from scratch, through state takeover, contracting-out, or re-opening as a public charter school. But its impact has been stifled by legislative language allowing "any other" step as well. Districts and states have opted to switch principals, give pep talks and hire "turnaround specialists" instead of coming to terms with intractable failure.

Indeed, according to a recent analysis by SRI International for the U.S. Department of Education, only one of 12 states with Title I schools identified for restructuring as of 2004 had reopened a school as a public charter; one turned over operations to the state; two states replaced school staff and eight took no action.

Ironically, the best illustration of the NCLB's mission may be outside this whole "turnaround" apparatus, in the open sector of public education called charter schooling, where parents, teachers and entrepreneurs are creating new schools that are publicly accountable but independent of bureaucratic rules. Reporter Paul Tough recently wrote about three charter-school networks (Achievement First, the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP), and Uncommon Schools) for the New York Times magazine. Students attending these institutions made large learning gains despite years of educational neglect elsewhere.

Rather than cobbling together remediation strategies, these schools create an unyielding culture of high expectations, offer significantly longer learning time than traditional public schools, and organize everything (including personnel decisions) around evidence of student achievement. While these are superstars, dozens of independent studies show that public charter schools around the country are closing achievement gaps at a faster pace than their district counterparts.

Despite low participation rates for "official" NCLB-driven choice (less than 1% of those eligible to transfer, according to federal figures), more than a million families, disproportionately poor and minority, have sought out public charter schools on their own. Charters now educate 26% of all public school kids in Washington, D.C.; 28% in Dayton; and 18% in Detroit (and climbing since that city's recent teacher strike). According to our research, charters now account for more than 13% of public school enrollment in 19 jurisdictions.

By all means, the next No Child Left Behind Act should continue pushing to improve existing schools. But the reauthorized NCLB should also be an engine for creating new, high-quality schools in communities where they're most needed. Here's how:

Quality first. The federal Charter Schools Program, authorized in Title V of the NCLB, provides critically important seed funding for startups. It has been an important source of support, especially for small, community-based charters. Created with bipartisan support when only seven states had charter laws (there are 40 today), the program is due for an overhaul, placing more emphasis on funding the strongest startups and replicating top-quality charters.

Grants should be targeted toward places with high numbers of schools "in need of improvement." And states should be expected to promote and monitor quality like the best venture capitalists -- or lose the right to administer the grant program altogether.

The charter program has been flat-lined for four appropriations cycles; it's time to align funding levels with need. Related programs that support charter facilities should be reauthorized and put on a sound financial footing as well, since charter schools do not qualify for state capital programs and only 11 states offer any kind of compensation for facilities needs.

Bust caps. More money will be pointless unless artificial limits on charter growth are lifted in the 26 states that now have them. In some cases these "caps" directly pre-empt the intent of the NCLB. It's actually illegal to create a new charter school in New York State right now -- meaning that a mother desperate to pull her child out of a failing school in the South Bronx may simply have to wait until Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has a change of heart about the state's limit of 100 public charter schools.

U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings recently proposed reauthorization language permitting local officials to reopen a failing school as a charter even if it would exceed a state charter cap. The secretary's idea is on-target, but Congress should go her one better, permitting cap-free chartering wherever students lack suitable public schools. And the local school board should not be the only game in town. In states where universities and state boards can approve charter schools, they too should be able to override restrictive caps.

Add teeth. Persistently failing schools need fundamental change, not cosmetic touch-ups. Re-opening as a charter, with a proven academic model, new team and clear accountability for performance, can provide a fresh start. But to work, such "re-opened" charters must have independent governance with full autonomy over budgets, personnel and working conditions. That independence must be spelled out in the federal law, or else we risk creating a raft of so-called "charters" still tethered to the same central offices that let students down in the first place.

In its first five years, the NCLB has affirmed a national commitment to educational opportunity for all. In the next five years, it should do more to galvanize real change by ratcheting up its support of public charter schools. A vibrant new-schools sector is the best way to challenge the status quo and offer real promise of achievement for every American public-school student.

Mr. Smith is president of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.

Quote of the Day.

Persistently failing schools need fundamental change, not cosmetic touch-ups. Nelson Smith

Apple CEO lambasts teacher unions.

2007-02-24T15:56:00.000-06:00

Our friend Pete the Finance Guy forwarded us the following information. A similar article can also be found on the Star-Telegram website.

The "Issues and Insights" page of Investors Business Daily, February 26 edition carried an excellent piece, which opened with:

"Steve Jobs recently addressed a forum on education reform in Austin TX. Jobs could contain his tough diagnosis no longer", according to the editorial:

" 'I believe what is wrong with our schools in this nation is that they have become unionized in the worst possible way,' Jobs charged. "This unionization and lifetime employment of K-12 teachers is off-the charts crazy."

The editorial continues:

"It was what you'd call a throat-clearing moment. Absorbing Job's comment, the room erupted into applause, even as another panelist, competitor Michael Dell, sat politely nearby. Assessing his impolitic outburst, Jobs grinned: "Apple just lost some business in this state, I'm sure."

"Maybe more than that. The Associated Press carried the story across the fruited plain. In teachers' lounges throughout the 50 states, iPod earplugs popped onto slumped shoulders as tenured pedagogues pondered life without their precious Macs.

"Jobs said a little more on the subject, comparing school principals to corporate CEOs: "What kind of person could you get to run a small business if you told them that when they came in they couldn't get rid of people that they thought weren't any good?" He answered himself to uproarious applause: "Not really great ones because if you're really smart, you go, 'I can't win.'"

"It took the estimable Dell seconds to seize some good will:

"Unions were created," Dell argued, "because the employer was treating his employees unfairly and that was not good. So now you have these enterprises where they take good care of their people. The employees won, they do really well and succeed."

"Dell vaguely prescribed a shot of competitive spirit to be imbibed by the school principals' employment market. So the longtime Jobs-Dell rivalry now rises from the respective merits of their products to the historic debate over organized labor's contributions-or lack thereof-to our economic health.

"It's a debate worth reviving, as has been discovered by the academic blogosphere, where one commentator even accused Jobs of abandoning corporate responsibility to Apple's shareholders by alienating such a large market for his computers.

"It's hard to know if Jobs intended such bluntness beforehand, but that kind of impromptu bravery should be saluted. Apple's chief has struggled lately with his own set of compensation issues, enough to have interested regulators, so he could be charged with diversionary bravado.

"But he adds his vision to other critics -- futurist Alvin Toffler and Microsoft's Bill Gates come to mind -- who've called for replacing government schools as we know them with a system friendlier to market principles.

"Jobs may be overenthusiastic about the prospect of scrapping textbooks for online, Wikipedia-like educational content. But he does grasp, tatter than most unionized and tenured end majors, the mental cybernetices of learning.

"His ideas are at least dynamic, theirs static. He's now advanced the revolution, deserving cheers far beyond that Texas auditorium."

Quote of the Day

" 'I believe what is wrong with our schools in this nation is that they have become unionized in the worst possible way. "This unionization and lifetime employment of K-12 teachers is off-the charts crazy." Steve Jobs

SB 541 Lowers Comupulsory Attendance Age

2007-02-23T05:50:00.000-06:00

The following piece was sent to us by the Home School Legal Defense Association. Please contact your legislators and tell them to vote no on SB 541. This is not only important for homeschoolers but all parents who choose to raise their children as opposed to having the government raise their children. For more information on compulsory attendance age legislation visit the Home School Legal Defense Association website.

Dear HSLDA Members and Friends:

Senator Kwame Raoul is back. He is attempting, once again, to pass a bill to lower the compulsory attendance age from seven to five years old and to require all school districts to establish kindergartens for children who are five years old. This bill, SB 541, is a step towards Senator Raoul's continuing goal to lower the compulsory attendance age to three. Senator Raoul expressed this aim in the committee hearing last year.

Last year, Senator Raoul introduced SB 409, which was opposed tirelessly by hundreds of homeschoolers. The homeschoolers were so tenacious in their continued calls in opposing the bill, that even though Senator Raoul thought he had the votes, he was never able to pass it out of the House Educational Committee. Even though the bill passed the Senate, it never got to the floor of the House after numerous delays due to the constant barrage of phone calls.

Your phone calls and constant pressure made a difference last year. You won the uphill battle; even though the compulsory attendance age bill was targeted for passage and should have been passed, considering the make up of the legislature.

Once again we are calling on you to oppose the lowering of the compulsory attendance age to five and the establishing of mandatory kindergarten which would result from Senator Raoul's new bill, SB 541.

We are working closely with Ralph Garcia and the Christian Home Educators Coalition to oppose this bill.

REQUESTED ACTION

Please call as many members of the Senate Education Committee as possible. You can give them this message:

"Please vote against SB 541, which lowers the compulsory attendance age two years and mandates kindergarten. This bill is unnecessary and restricts parental choice, and wastes tax payer's money since there is no study showing any long-term positive benefits from children attending school early."

SENATE EDUCATION COMMITTEE MEMBERS:

Chair Kimberly A. Lightford, (217) 782-8505
Vice-Chair: Deanna Demuzio, (217) 782-8206
Jacqueline Y. Collins, (217) 782-1607
William Delgado, (217) 782-5652
Susan Garrett, (217) 782-3650
James T. Meeks, (217) 782-8066
A. J. Wilhelmi, (217) 782-8800
Dan Cronin, (217) 782-8107
J. Bradley Burzynski, (217) 782-1977
David Luechtefeld, (217) 782-8137
John J. Millner, (217) 782-8192

BACKGROUND
According to the 2005 NAEP test scores, children from states that have low compulsory attendance ages (5-6) did not score any higher than children from the other states, and in some subjects their average was actually lower.

Many education experts have concluded that beginning a child's formal education too early may actually result in burnout and poor scholastic performance later.

A report published February 6, 2007 by the Goldwater Institute examines Stanford 9 test scores and finds Arizona kindergarten programs initially improve learning but have no measurable impact on reading, math, or language arts test scores by fifth grade.

The data show that students in schools with all-day kindergarten programs have statistically significant higher 3rd-grade test scores, but there is no impact on 5th-grade scores. This finding is consistent with previous research. Forcing children into school early delivers short-term benefits at best.

Another significant impact of expanding mandatory schooling is the inevitable tax increase to pay for more classroom space and teachers to accommodate the additional students compelled to attend public schools. When California raised the age of compulsory attendance, unwilling students were so disruptive that new schools had to be built just to handle them and their behavior problems, all at the expense of the taxpayer.

For more information on compulsory attendance, please see our
memorandum at the Home School Legal Defens website.

Thank you for standing with us in this fight for freedom.

Sincerely,

Christopher J. Klicka

Quote of the Day

Friedrich Engels, who in an 1847 draft of the Manifesto called "Principles of Communism" wrote as one of its tenets:
"Education of all children, from the moment they can leave their mother's care, in national establishments at national cost."

School Board Elections

2007-02-22T07:36:00.000-06:00

The following letter to the editor appeared in the Northwest Herald.

To the Editor:

I’d like to remind everyone that there are elections coming up for some local school boards.

I think school boards have gotten pretty complacent with handing out exorbitant raises and bonuses, all under the guise of it being “for the kids.”

It is the responsibility of everyone to get out to vote and let them all know how we feel about their ethics.

Larry Schultz

Hampshire

Quote of the Day

"This is about money and contracts and selfishness." Senator Chris Lauzen on the recent contract of U-46 Stupidintendent Neale.

Butt out, government

2007-02-21T21:27:00.000-06:00

The following letter to the editor appeared in the Northwest Herald.

Butt out, government

To the Editor:

State Rep. Mary Flowers, D-Chicago, recently introduced House Bill 382, making it state law that school children wash their hands before eating.

I’m not anti-hygiene, but where does government nannying stop?

In 2005, Illinois passed a law (Public Act 093-0946) requiring kindergartners through second-graders and sixth-graders to have dental exams. It was sponsored by state Rep. David Miller, D-Dolton, who, by coincidence, is a dentist and president of the Illinois State Dental Society’s Political Action Committee.

Gee, I wonder if Flowers owns stock in an antiseptic soap supplier.

It’s clear parents are incapable of electing ethical officials who understand the concept of limited government.

Are parents also completely incapable of raising children without the government telling them what to do every step of the way?

Why stop with washing hands?

Chris Jenner

Cary

Quote of the Day

"If it is wrong for you to take money from someone else who earned it, to take their money by force for your own needs, then it is certainly just as wrong for you to demand that the government step forward and do this dirty work for you."
Neal Boortz

U-46 Super's pay far outpaces peers across the nation

2007-02-20T08:21:00.000-06:00

The following piece appeared in the Daily Herald. This article points out very well one of the major problems that plagues our public education system. Administrators across Illinois are playing a ratchet game with their salaries with threats of quitting for higher paid districts and jumping around districts across the state of Illinois ratcheting up salaries. The salary increases are not market based but based on a ratchet game played by the administrators themselves. In their path the leave a wake of broken budgets, pension deficits and a terrible tax burden for current and future taxpayers.

U-46 Super's pay far outpaces peers across the nation
BY EMILY KRONE

Elgin Area School District U-46 Superintendent Connie Neale this year will be paid at least $100,000 more than any superintendent in the country directing a district of similar size and wealth.

The Daily Herald analyzed the annual salary, benefits and bonuses of superintendents in school districts that have enrollments within 5,000 students of U-46 and median family incomes within $5,000 of U-46. Nine districts in the nation fit that description.

According to U.S. Census data, U-46 enrolls 38,936 students and has a median family income of $68,037, placing the district squarely in the middle of the sample group on both measures.

But Neale's contract isn't middle of the pack.

She makes 43 percent more than the group's next highest paid superintendent, Don Stockton from Conroe, Texas.

The salary and extra payment totals for the other nine districts ranged from a high of $230,000 to a low of $160,479.
Neale's current package weighs in at $329,667.

A current proposal would inflate that package to $391,403 to lead Illinois' second largest school district.

The disparity stunned some educators and legislators.

"This is about money and contracts and selfishness," said state Sen. Chris Lauzen of Aurora. "What this does to damage the reputation of public education is just disgraceful."

If U-46 board members formally approve the $20,000 raise and 10 percent tax-free bonus they agreed to during Neale's annual review last month, Neale will make about $161,403, or 70 percent more, than Stockton.

Neale would collect nearly 2¨ times the compensation of the group's lowest-paid superintendent, Bradley Barrett of Gilbert, Ariz.

Neale refuses to further discuss her contract, though she had defended it by saying it simply is a reflection of the market.

Critics say the Daily Herald's findings refute that assertion.

"As you begin to examine what other school districts are putting in the compensation packages, it just doesn't match up locally or, apparently, nationally," Elgin Teachers Association President Tim Davis said.

Board surprised

Neale's contract has been scrutinized since board member Dan Rich resigned last month, saying he could not support the board's decision to sweeten Neale's contract.

Taxpayers, teachers and legislators all expressed outrage as more and more details of Neale's compensation and benefit package came to light.

The remaining six school board members publicly have stood by Neale's contract, citing the competitive market for superintendents as justification for a pay package that teachers and residents have deemed overly generous.

"I am convinced that she is a very marketable employee," school board President Ken Kaczynski said the day after Rich resigned and made public the board's closed-door debate over Neale's contract.

"I believe we have a responsibility to the kids to make sure her compensation is competitive," Kaczynski said.

But competitive with whom?

School board members emphasized that as superintendent of the second-largest school district in Illinois, Neale has few in-state peers.

The district's law firm advised school board members that Neale's pay likely ranked among the three top administrators in Illinois - even without the proposed raise and bonus worth about $60,000.

"I understand community-wise, it raises an eyebrow because there's no one here to compare her to," said longtime board member Karen Carney, who sat on the board that hired Neale in 2002 from a 15,000-student district in Texas.

"Our board members have been exposed to national board members outside of Illinois," Carney said shortly after Rich's resignation. "We're well aware that there are other superintendents out there that are getting more."

Rich said he pushed the board to commission a study of the national market before voting on her raise and bonus, in order to verify Carney's information.

"By everyone's admission, we simply didn't have the comparables in front of us," Rich said. "I wanted to find out what the market would bear out, and there simply wasn't any interest in doing that."

Yet in a district whose improvement plan places a priority on data management, Kaczynski acknowledged the board relied on word of mouth, rather than hard numbers, to gauge where Neale's salary placed her relative to other superintendents.

"It's mostly based on what we hear and talk to people about," Kaczynski said Friday.

Kaczynski, whose district just emerged from a $40 million deficit, said he wouldn't have expected Neale's salary to place her out of range with superintendents from other districts.

"I guess that surprises me," he said. "I really don't have a comment for you."

The 'market'

School search firms say the pool of qualified superintendents is small and getting smaller.

This year, about 3,000 superintendent spots will open up, according to Bill Attea of the national search firm Hazard Young, Attea and Associates "and there just aren't that many people with experience and a proven track record applying."

Attea advises his clients that to attract quality candidates, they should expect to pay 10æ to 20 percent more than the candidates are making at their current jobs.

"It's a seller's market," Attea said.

Compensation experts say the market should figure prominently in determining how much to pay a top executive - whether that executive runs a school or a business.

But experts also caution that corporate boards and school boards alike must be realistic about how they define that market.

"What boards tend to do is pick firms that are not really comparable, but rather firms they'd like to be," said Susan Gates, an economist with the California-based Rand Institute who specializes in the applications of economic management principles to public sector organizations.

Kent Johansen, a former superintendent, teaches educational leadership at Western Illinois University. He also works part-time for the search firm School Exec Connect.

He tells school boards to create a salary range based on the pay of superintendents of districts with similar enrollment, housing value, and tax base.

A large, urban district, for example, can't necessarily compensate its executive the way a wealthy suburban community would, Johansen said.

"That's not a comparable district," he said. "You've got to make a data-driven decision."

Kaczynski agreed data is important, but so are more subjective measurements of a superintendent's worth.

"You have to judge what you're paying in terms of what value you perceive that product or person brings to the organization, and a lot of that is judgment," Kaczynski said.

But in education, more than in other industries, it's challenging to peg what a top executive is worth, said Mark Rosen, a North Carolina-based senior vice president with Clark Consulting who specializes in helping boards of public companies and academic institutions set executive compensation packages.

"It's difficult if not impossible to establish meaningful performance measures," Rosen said.

As a result, the best measure of whether a superintendent is underpaid or overpaid is a benchmark analysis of comparable districts, Rosen said.

"That's the evidence. If you can show that, it's over."

Information is power

That kind of objective data, however, often eludes school boards.

Former Elgin state Sen. Steve Rauchenberger said the Illinois General Assembly has long been concerned with the independence of school boards.

"Superintendents control all the information. ... There's no independent staff for the U-46 school board to decide if a contract is reasonable," Rauchenberger said.

Neale presented the board at her annual review a memo titled "Considerations 2007."

Under the heading "Immediate Salary Realignment," Neale noted her 2005-06 salary ranked her 40th in the state.

"I believe that doesn't fairly represent my work or the challenge of U-46," she wrote, adding a $50,000 raise would be necessary to put her among the top 10.

Neale did rank 40th on that particular list, but the list is widely regarded as incomplete and in its original form is labeled as unreliable for comparison purposes. And the district's law firm had made the board aware that Neale's total package likely ranked third in the state.

Even when board members do have the relevant information at their disposal, it can be difficult for them to act independently.

"It's hard to separate your role as adviser and supporter and champion of the administration from that of board member as supervisor who needs to act as a check on compensation," said John Challenger of Challenger, Gray and Christmas of Chicago, an outplacement consulting firm for executives.

Ultimately, Challenger said, it's the public that serves as a check against runaway executive pay.

"The brakes come when that candidate runs for office, and the opponent says, 'There's no check here, they're letting the district run wild.' "

ekrone@dailyherald.com

Quote of the Day

How much is enough? Bud Fox

For educrats it is never enough and that is why we must seek school choice and end the monopoly of the public education system as it is today.

Time to write or call your legislators and tell them to vote no on SB541

2007-02-19T12:00:00.000-06:00

The following post is from our from Dave Ziffer.

February 19, 2007

State Senator Kwame Raoul
1013 E. 53rd St., Second Floor
Chicago, IL 60615

Dear Senator Raoul:

I am deeply distressed to learn of your sponsorship of bill SB541, which would lower the compulsory schooling age in Illinois from seven to five. This is part of a seemingly endless series of similar bills that have failed in the past due to their justifiable unpopularity. Clearly the strategy here on the part of certain members of the legislature is that the will of the people can eventually be subverted if only the legislature can mount enough attempts.

Our educational system in Illinois is not failing because of hordes of irresponsible, clueless parents who are keeping their kids out of the public schools. It is failing because we have assigned the task of education to a mindless, heartless bureaucracy that has a near monopoly on our education dollars.

I am a parent who has spent the past eleven years observing the behaviors of the public schools. I find both the urban and suburban varieties afflicted with the same problems:

top-heavy self-serving administrations whose priorities are driven more by political interests such as the teachers’ unions (IEA) than by educational priorities;
introspective school boards whose agendas seem more directed by their appointed administrators than by the desires and needs of the public;
poorly trained staff (teachers) who themselves are the victims of our failed system of colleges of education;
a self-serving system of teacher “support” organizations (NCTM, NCTE, NAEYC, IRA, ASCD, etc.) that appear to be controlled primarily by unscrupulous curriculum publishers who influence our teachers to adopt an endless series of bizarre fads conceived by the lunatic fringe of the education field;
and consequently a teaching “profession” steeped in irrational belief systems and curricula that serve nobody.

We are not going to fix things by forcing kids into this dysfunctional system at ever-earlier ages. If you are truly interested in improving the quality of education in Illinois, look to the model of Utah, where the legislature and governor recently passed the Parent Choice in Education Act, which empowers parents rather than treating them as ignorant serfs.

Future generations will look back on the legislators of our time to see who among us was looking forward to the future, which is school choice, and who was looking backward to the era of corrupt, monopolistic educational paternalism. I am hoping, for the sake of your legacy if nothing else, that you will consider joining the forward-looking group.

Sincerely,
David Ziffer
Batavia, IL

Quote of the Day

"Future generations will look back on the legislators of our time to see who among us was looking forward to the future, which is school choice, and who was looking backward to the era of corrupt, monopolistic educational paternalism."
Dave Ziffer

Thank you District 50 Board Members

2007-02-18T00:01:00.000-06:00

The Northwest Herald is reporting that only two school districts in McHenry County are running referenda. The two districts that are running referenda only serve a small portion of McHenry County and they are Barrington Community Unit School District 220 and Belvidere Community Unit School District 100.

A big thank you goes out to Ken Book and the rest of District 50 for not running another referendum. Good luck to Steve Miller, Mark Stricker and Ken Book who all deserve to be re-elected because they have managed to control costs and balance the budget while improving student performance in District 50 schools.

As Ken Book reported in the March 27, 2006 edition of the Northwest Herald
"We have tightened our belts and done what the public has asked us to do in terms of balancing the budget."

District 50 has not run a referenda since it seventh defeat of a referenda on April 5th 2005. Despite threats of cancellation of programs if the referenda failed the board has since balanced the budget and reinstated programs.

Quote of the Day
""We have tightened our belts and done what the public has asked us to do in terms of balancing the budget." Ken Book District 50 School Board President.

A’ for initial assessment:

2007-02-17T07:54:00.000-06:00

The following editorial is from the Daily Herald. It would be great if Gov. Blago would appoint the same time of person for the State Board of Education that oversees the K-12 system as well. Bravo to Ms. Hightman who stated “We need to be looking at affordability and accountability, and making sure whatever dollars we’re given are spent well.”

A’ for initial assessment:

At first glance, Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s appointment of Carrie Hightman to head the state’s Board of Higher Education is surprising. After all, Hightman has spent her career as an attorney and telecommunications executive, not an education professional. But the Buffalo Grove resident sure hit the right notes in telling one reporter after her appointment, “We need to be looking at affordability and accountability, and making sure whatever dollars we’re given are spent well.” That assessment — in light of declining state aid and soaring tuition — is right on the money.

Quote of the Day

“We need to be looking at affordability and accountability, and making sure whatever dollars we’re given are spent well.” Carrie Hightman.

A new twist in ballot battle

2007-02-16T07:34:00.000-06:00

The following piece appeared in the Daily Herald.

Our guess is that the district's electoral board will throw these two candidates off the ballot because they are not part of the tax and spend crowd. If these two individuals were part of the tax and spend crowd they would surely remain on the ballot. A similar incident occurred in a recently passed election where a school board member had their petition passed at a school event and they remained on the ballot. The district's electoral board should do the right thing since the paperwork was filled out wrong by those trying to remove the candidates they should let the voters decide whether or not Groth or Clark should be elected. The board should prove once and for all they want a truly representative board elected in District 300.

A new twist in ballot battle
By Jeffrey Gaunt
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Thursday, February 15, 2007

Turnabout, it seems, is fair play in Community Unit District 300.

A pair of residents are trying to remove two school board candidates from the April ballot for failing to adhere to the letter of state law.

But the objections filed by residents Lisa Ihssen and Silvia Realzola also seem to violate the technical requirements of state statute.

And if the district’s electoral board agrees that the objections don’t conform to state code, the candidates stay on the ballot — whether or not their election paperwork contains errors.

Realzola’s objection cites six specific errors in the election paperwork submitted by candidate John Groth.

For instance, Realzola said, Groth wrote that he’s from Rutland-Dundee Township — which doesn’t exist.

Groth also wrote that District 300 is in Kane County, when it’s also in Cook, DeKalb and McHenry counties, Realzola said.

“Illinois statute says if you’re going to do this, you have to fill out paperwork in a certain manner,” Realzola said Tuesday.

Illinois statute also says the objections have to be filled out in a certain manner.

State election code says, “The objector’s petition … shall state the interest of the objector and shall state what relief is requested of the electoral board.”

Realzola didn’t include her interest in filing the objection.

Her objection states only, “These above mentioned inaccuracies/omissions should be grounds for removing John Groth from the ballot.”

When asked about the omission, Realzola said she does have an interest in the case — even if she didn’t include it on her paperwork.

“Then they can leave him on (the ballot) I guess,” Realzola said. “But I do have an interest. Like I said, I’m a parent. I’ve got four kids in the district. I’m a district voter in Dundee Township.”

There was a similar omission in the objection Ihssen filed against candidate Monica Clark.

Ihssen’s objection states that Clark left her nominating forms at a local restaurant and that no one was present to collect the requisite signatures.

But Ihssen, who did not return calls for comment Monday or Tuesday, also did not include her interest in filing the objection.

And she violated a second requirement of that same law by failing to say what should happen if the electoral board finds in her favor.

Her petition reads, “I believe that a candidate or the circulator of the petition should be present when obtaining petition signatures and I would like to object formally.”

The decision on whether or not to remove Clark and Groth from the April ballot now rests with the three District 300 school board members who form the electoral board: Mary Warren, Susie Kopacz and Anne Miller.

Hearings on the two cases are scheduled to start at 4 p.m. Tuesday at the district offices, 300 Cleveland Ave., Carpentersville.

Quote of the Day
"In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards. "
Mark Twain

Comments on our Blog and Labels

2007-02-15T10:35:00.000-06:00

Dear Friends and Readers,

For some reason the settings on our Blog were accidently changed. Comments were set to be moderated. I have since posted those comments that were backed up over the past year. We will make every effort to have comments posted.

Google recently updated its templates for Blogs. I am in the process of placing labels on our previous posts so readers can better search specific topics on our Blog. I will notify you all when the labeling is complete.

Best Regards,

Cathy

NEA vs. America's Future

2007-02-14T19:41:00.000-06:00

Ms. Zettler's posts on the Northwest Herald website
reminded me of the following article in the World Net Daily.

When U.S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige called the National Education Association a terrorist organization last February, he wasn't as far off the mark as the terrorists said he was. The National Education Association annual convention just concluded, and it is clear the NEA is more harmful to America's future than ever before.

This year's NEA platform reads a bit like a manifesto of a Third World socialist party. It isn't simply the NEA's typical opposition to parental choice, local educational control, charter schools, performance-based teacher salaries, vouchers, religious faith in school, and – since many NEA members pay dues by force of threat, intimidation and coercion – ordered liberty in general.

The NEA opposes those things, but its new platform also reaches into further political extremes that bear no hint of reflection of America's fine teachers. Though the National Education Association – at the local, state and national levels – collects nearly 1 billion dollars in annual dues from members, those members often have no choice about paying dues, nor about the expending of their hard-earned dollars to promote the appalling platform of national union bosses.

Above all else, the NEA is a political organization. According to Forbes magazine, the NEA fields "the largest army of paid political organizers and lobbyists in the U.S., dwarfing the forces of the Republican and Democrat national committees combined." But in one sense, the NEA is the most powerful constituency of the Democratic Party – 95 percent of political expenditures go to the Democrats, and the union enthusiastically endorsed John Kerry at the NEA convention.

How else is the NEA bearing in vain the names of America's teachers? Here are some sample business items and resolutions from their convention:

Feasibility study of NEA coalition with NAACP and National Council of La Raza (The Race) to seek a gargantuan lawsuit "on behalf of the economically poor students of this country."
"Priority" lobbying for the socialistic "establishment of a national, universal health care system."
Support for a New York City communist teacher.
Endorsement of a range of family-planning options for students.
Endorsement of in-state university tuition rates for illegal aliens.
Opposition to Wal-Mart's corporate decisions relating to unions.
Opposition to the Bush tax cuts.
Endorsement of Cesar Chavez National Holiday (Apparently, Labor Day isn't left-wing enough).
At a special banquet, the NEA bestowed its award for Creative Leadership in Human Rights to Kevin Jennings, co-founder and director of the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network. Among other radical efforts, GLSEN sponsors an annual day-long interruption of classes in thousands of high schools to protest the "silencing" of homosexuals. The implication is that the NEA endorses GLSEN's efforts to infuse an anti-traditional family agenda into America's schools.

Even more stunning was the NEA reaction to a Department of Education report, released on the eve of the NEA convention, suggesting that 4.5 million students might be victims of sexual misconduct by teachers during their time in school. NEA spokesman Michael Pons dismissed the report, saying it did "more harm than good by creating unjustified alarm and undermining confidence in public schools." In a similar statement in Education Week in March, an NEA spokesman rejected evidence that some teachers were guilty of sexual misconduct like that of the Catholic Church.

Unlike many school districts that responded to the shocking Department of Education study by suggesting that more will be done to prevent abuse and harassment, the NEA is in denial that there are sexual misconduct problems in America's schools. Professor Warren Throckmorton of Grove City College observes, "The nation's largest teachers union is on the defensive."

There isn't space to delve into all the problems with the NEA beyond its recent convention. But the activities of the convention are enough evidence that teachers are without a real voice in the school system. The NEA effectively stifles the diverse wills of professional teachers who want individual career plans instead of obnoxious and expensive dues-funded political agitation by a mass-fueled, agenda-driven socialist union.

The NEA has become America's most noteworthy rip-off. Teachers pay into what they are told is a professional organization for their benefit. Instead, teachers are frequently stuck paying annual dues in the hundreds of dollars for the sake of an extremist political agenda in which they are absolutely voiceless.

For too long, the NEA has done everything it can to take the professionalism out of teaching. If Americans fight back now, at school-board meetings, in state legislatures, at the polls, in every circle of public opinion and public policy in which we can have our say, there just might be hope for the future of America's schools.

Tax swap will shortchange

2007-02-13T20:18:00.000-06:00

The following editorial appeared in the Northwest Herald.

After years of endorsing referenda we hear the following from the Northwest Herald Editorial board: "Also, tax swap supporters continue to ignore the fact that there is a huge spending problem in education. Any tax swap plan that ignores the gross inefficiencies in Illinois public education should be a nonstarter." Stop the presses hell must have frozen over and pigs must now fly?

Tax swap will shortchange

A new proposal to fund education in Illinois would shortchange McHenry and Kane counties.

Some lawmakers want to raise the state income tax by 2 percent, while decreasing property taxes. The plan also would impose a sales tax on services such as hair cuts and lawn care. This is not the first such tax swap plan to be proposed. And like the others, it has all the earmarks of a shell game.

The biggest problem with such proposals always has been that they do not provide enough property tax relief. The result is that areas with higher incomes, such as McHenry and Kane counties, end up paying more in taxes.

State Rep. Jack Franks, D-Woodstock, said McHenry County would end up paying $97 million more in taxes if the proposal became law. That’s not acceptable.

Also, tax swap supporters continue to ignore the fact that there is a huge spending problem in education. Any tax swap plan that ignores the gross inefficiencies in Illinois public education should be a nonstarter.

Franks, who is opposed to the tax swap plan, has raised one potential change that should be considered: Countywide school districts. Illinois is littered with tiny school districts that employ entire administrations to oversee paltry enrollments for one or two schools.

“We could have more efficiency and get rid of a lot of administration,” Franks correctly observed.

Many people agree that relying on property taxes is not the best way to fund education in Illinois.

But any talk of reform must be all inclusive. The goal cannot simply be to boost revenue for schools at the expense of taxpayers without taking a long, hard look at how schools are run and how existing tax dollars are spent.

The elimination of wasteful spending must be part of the discussion.

Unfortunately, we keep getting these tax swap plans that simply attempt to collect more tax money and soak suburban taxpayers for the benefit of Chicago.

Utah lawmakers OK vouchers for all public school kids

2007-02-12T13:44:00.000-06:00

The following piece appears on the CNN website.

Utah lawmakers OK vouchers for all public school kids

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah (AP) -- A divided Utah Legislature approved one of the nation's broadest voucher programs Friday, allotting up to $3,000 for any public school student to put toward private school tuition.

Voucher programs in the handful of other states that have them generally are aimed at poor families or students attending schools that have poor academic records. There will be no such restrictions in Utah, which has the largest class sizes in the country and until now has spent less per student than any other state.

The Senate approved the bill 19-10 on Friday, a week after the House endorsed it by a single vote, 38-37. Both chambers are controlled by Republicans. Gov. Jon Huntsman, a Republican whose children attend public schools, has said he will sign the bill into law.

The vouchers will be open to any of Utah's 512,000 public school students. The amount will depend on family income, but even affluent families would be eligible for at least $500 per child. Students already in private schools would not be eligible.

To view the whole story visit the CNN website.

Quote of the day.

“What is needed in America is a voucher of substantial size available to all students, and free of excessive regulations”
— Milton Friedman

Watch your pocketbooks - Coalition offers plan to raise taxes to help schools, pensions

2007-02-11T14:01:00.000-06:00

A 67% increase in your income taxes looks to be on its way. The following story is posted on the Students First website.

Coalition offers plan to raise taxes to help schools, pensions

2/9/2007

Associated Press

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. (AP) - A coalition of Illinois lawmakers and interest groups tried to jumpstart debate over school funding Thursday by introducing a plan to raise state taxes.

They want to raise income taxes by two percentage points, to 5 percent, and impose a new sales tax on services, such as hair cuts or lawn care. Those increases would be partly offset by cuts in property taxes and income tax breaks for the poor.

Supporters said only the top 40 percent of Illinois taxpayers would see any net increase.

They estimate the plan would generate $5 billion that could be used to increase school funding and shore up state pension systems.

Similar tax plans have been discussed before without generating enough legislative support to pass. And teachers, parents, lawmakers and business groups have complained for decades about the school-funding system, to no avail.

But the critics hope this year will be different.

''I think the political will is there,'' said the sponsor, Sen. James Meeks, D-Chicago.

Lawmakers won't have to face the voters again for nearly two years. Democrats have a larger majority than ever in the Legislature. State finances are in disarray, removing any hope of getting significantly more school money through normal channels. Supporters have spent years discussing a ''tax swap'' and building support for the concept.

The biggest hurdle could be Democratic Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who opposes a tax increase and early in his administration ruled out expanding sales taxes to cover services.

Blagojevich has suggested privatizing the state lottery to raise money for schools.

But that would generate nothing for government pension systems, which are billions of dollars short of the money they'll eventually need to pay retirees.

Meeks predicted supporters would be able to find enough votes to override any veto.

He was joined at a Statehouse news conference by the Illinois Federation of Teachers, Voices for Illinois Children, several Urban Leagues chapters, the A-plus Illinois Coalition and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.

German Homeschooled Child Sentenced to a Child Psychiatry Unit

2007-02-08T07:50:00.000-06:00

The following letter was sent to us by our friends at Home School Legal Defense Association. Please take a the time to write a letter if you have the time.

February 5, 2007

HSLDA--German Homeschooled Child Sentenced to a Child Psychiatry Unit

Dear HSLDA Members and Friends:

The situation for homeschoolers in Germany is getting worse each week. Just last Thursday, a 17-year-old homeschooled girl was forcibly removed from her parent's custody by over 15 police officers. The homeschooled girl has been placed in the child psychiatry unit of the Nuremberg clinic.

Homeschooling is not legal in Germany. There are over 40 cases currently in court or being appealed. Christian families are fleeing Germany for safety in nearby countries. The unconscionable treatment of sincere and faithful Christian homeschool families is a sad legacy from Germany's past. Homeschooling was first banned under Adolf Hitler, and that ban is still enforced today.

Many families who have had their children forcibly taken from their home each day and taken to government school have since fled Germany, but there are still some homeschoolers. The latest incident involves 17-year-old Melissa Busekros, the girl sent to the Nuremberg psychiatry unit. What is being done to this sensitive girl--just to set an example of enforcing the compulsory schooling at all costs--is reprehensible and causing trauma to unassuming and lovable Melissa.

In the summer of 2005, when Melissa was 15, she was told she would have to repeat the seventh grade at the government school because she was failing math and Latin. She had good grades in the rest of her classes, so her parents tutored her at home for those two subjects. When the school officials found out they were angry and then expelled Melissa, so the family began to homeschool full time.

However, the Youth Welfare office then took the family to court because they were homeschooling. Then, on Tuesday, January 30, 2007, social workers and police officers came to the Busekros home and forcibly took Melissa to the child psychiatric unit where she was questioned for four hours before she was returned home. Then two days later, 15 police officers and social workers came to the Busekros home and took Melissa away from her parents by force and placed her in the child psychiatric unit.

According to Melissa's father, Hubert Busekros, this treatment was justified by the psychiatrist's finding two days previously that Melissa was supposedly developmentally delayed by one year and that she suffered from school phobia.

Nevertheless, one organization concerned with education expressed outrage at the treatment of Melissa Busekros.

"The Netzwerk Bildungsfreiheit [the Network for Freedom of Education] condemns this inconsiderate and totally incommensurate behavior on the part of the officials involved and demands that they give Melissa her freedom and return her to her family immediately," the group was quoted in an article on its website. To view the site, as well as more information and a photograph of the Busekros family, go to http://www.hslda.org/elink.asp?id=3697 .

ACTION

We ask you to take a moment and do two things: First, call or email the German Embassy and give them this message:

"We are shocked to hear of the Busekros' homeschooled daughter Melissa being removed from the custody of her parents and being placed in a child psychiatric unit. This is an outrage that hearkens back to the Nazi era. We cannot believe a free nation would put a homeschooled child in a psychiatric ward for 'school phobia.' The attack on the
homeschool families throughout Germany must stop."

The German Embassy can be contacted at:

Dr. Klaus Scharioth
Ambassador
German Embassy
4645 Reservoir Road NW
Washington, DC, 20007-1998
(202) 298-4000

The embassy can be emailed from its website: http://www.hslda.org/elink.asp?id=3696 .

Second, pray for the German situation. Only God can change the situation for homeschoolers in Germany. Attempts by German homeschoolers to organize or to change the laws through court continue to be lost, but with God all things are possible. We ask that you cry out for the German homeschool families.

BACKGROUND

German parents have been fighting for the right to homeschool for the last seven or more years. However, all efforts have failed in the face of the stubborn German government and their official response that they cannot "allow a counterculture to exist."

We believe the hope for Germany will be via the international pressure bearing down so that they abandon their witch-hunt after homeschoolers and their terrible treatment of these innocent families.

Homeschoolers remaining in Germany are hoping to legalize homeschooling in one state and thereby make a safe-haven for
homeschoolers. However, the German homeschoolers are so few and the attacks so intense that it is hard to make any progress in this area.

If you wish to assist the Germans in their struggle for homeschool freedom, or with many other struggling countries, you can donate to HSLDA's international fund via the Home School Foundation at http://www.homeschoolfoundation.org/ .

Your donation will be used to meet the homeschooling needs in Germany. After meeting the known homeschooling needs in this country, if there are remaining funds, this money will be transferred to the Foundation's International Fund to meet homeschooling needs in other countries.

Thank you for standing with these families and taking a moment to assist them.

Sincerely,

Christopher J. Klicka
HSLDA Senior Counsel
Director of State and International Relations

Valedictorian Complains of ‘Hollow’ Public School Education

2007-02-06T07:50:00.000-06:00

The following piece appeared on the BLOG Political Party Poop.com.

Valedictorian Complains of ‘Hollow’ Public School Education
Snoop June 29th, 2006
By Kate Monaghan
CNSNews.com Correspondent
June 29, 2006

(CNSNews.com) - The valedictorian of a Blue Ribbon-awarded high school in New Jersey has left teachers and administrators with a sour taste in their mouths after using his June 20 valedictory speech to describe his education as “hollow” and one filled with “countless hours wasted in those halls.”

“I felt like the most important questions were not asked.” said Kareem Elnahal, the top rated student at Mainland Regional High School in Linwood, N.J. “Things like ethics, things that defined who we are, were ignored so in that way I thought it was hollow.” he told Cybercast News Service Wednesday.

Mainland High School was ranked 403rd among the nation’s top 1,200 schools in Newsweek Magazine’s “America’s Best High Schools” report from August 2005.

But at the June 20 commencement, Elnahal told his audience that “the education we have received here is not only incomplete, it is entirely hollow.”

“[It is] grade for the sake of a grade, work for the sake of work.” Elnahal added, according to a transcript of the speech posted on the Press of Atlantic City website.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the spirit of intellectual thought is lost,” Elnahal said. “I know how highly this community values learning, and I urge you all to re-evaluate what it means to be educated,” he concluded before leaving the ceremony without collecting his diploma.

Elnahal told Cybercast News Service that teachers refused to discuss certain topics because they were too closely tied to religious views. In his valedictory speech, he argued that there is a connection between a person’s faith and that person’s power of reasoning.
“Is there a creator? And if so, should we look to it for guidance,” Elnahal asked the audience gathered at the high school graduation ceremony. “These are often dismissed as questions of religion, but religion is not something opposed to rationality. It simply seeks to answer such questions through faith.”
Elnahal said the reaction to his speech from fellow students was the most dramatic development on the night of June 20. “I think the story really is not me or what I said but what the reaction was. If you were there you would have seen the kids stand up and clap,” he told Cybercast News Service.

“The reaction from the students to me has been overwhelmingly positive.” he continued. “For some reason, I don’t know if for the same reason, I think they were all disappointed in some way or unfulfilled and I think that’s what the school should be thinking about.”
Daniel Loggi, superintendent of the Atlantic County, N.J., School District, said he was not troubled with Elnahal sharing his thoughts, but disagreed with the manner in which he chose to do it.

“I don’t have any problem with anybody speaking what they feel.” Loggi told Cybercast News Service. “But there are certain parameters when you have a graduation or any kind of ceremony where you prepare for it. I don’t believe the way he did it was appropriate.”
Loggi added that the student did not give school administrators the chance to either approve or disapprove. “Who knows whether the Mainland administration would have approved it or not. Maybe they would have, but he didn’t give them that opportunity.”
He also defended the quality of education at Mainland Regional High School. “I know Mainland is one of our top high schools in this county.” Loggi said. “They’ve been a Blue Ribbon school and received a lot of awards. The education [Elnahal] received there is permitting him to go on to Princeton.”

Elnahal said he would have chosen another occasion to say what he thought, but that his graduation seemed to be the only one available. “Had there been another venue I would have used it, but there really wasn’t,” said Elnahal. “So I felt I had to do it there. I felt it was the right thing to do.”

Had he not chosen to speak out, Elnahal said, the opportunity for change would have been lost. “I felt like nothing would change. I felt like it had to be said and if this was the only time I could say it, then I should.”

Quote of the Day

"I am entirely certain that twenty years from now we will look back at education as it is practiced in most schools today and wonder that we could have tolerated anything so primitive. "--John W. Gardner

TEA's check register now online! Texas leads the way in public education financial transparency

2007-02-04T06:46:00.000-06:00

The following is from Peyton Wolcott's Website.

" You have no idea how much pleasure it gives me as a native Texan to be able to write this headline.

After toiling in the grassroots education reform vineyards as a volunteer for many years, suddenly late last
September a light bulb went off and I realized that many of our public records issues could be addressed by a very simple remedy: School districts could post their check registers online.

Thus of a simple remedy was born a very simple project, The National School District Honor Roll, honoring those
districts posting their check registers online. Texas Governor Rick Perry (left) with Texas Commissioner of Education Shirley Neeley and Deputy Commissioner Robert Scott

Increased transparency: clearly an idea whose time has come. Responding to questions earlier today regarding the
Texas Education Agency's decision to post its check register online this week (link below right in red box) in conjunction with the governor's press release today (below right, grey box) deputy TEA commissioner Robert Scott pointed out that increased transparency was the governor's initiative. "It's something he feels very strongly about, Scott said. "We at TEAwholeheartedly agree."

To view the rest of the story click here.

The following press release from the Texas Governor is also on Peyton Wolcott's website.

Gov. Perry's press release
"Texans deserve a budget that make sense. Perry today offered budget reform proposals that he says are meant to promote
fiscal responsibility and transparency in state government. The list includes....requiring all Texas agencies to publish expenditures online in a clear and consistent format. Perry says Texas has a record budget surplus, so it's time to make one-time payments to reconcile past accoun- ting maneuvers and accurately balance the budget. The governor also
says--starting today-- expenditures made by his office will be available to view online.
DATE: 01/31/07

Quote of the Day

"Superintendents and school boards would have to be willing to be perceived as being anti-open government and anti-
transparency to turn down your request that they post their check registers online."

Peyton Wolcott

Utah House passes universal school choice - Milton Friedman’s vision is one step closer to victory

2007-02-03T04:50:00.000-06:00

The following press release was sent out by the Milton & Rose D. Friedman Foundation. New Hampshire must define an "adequate education" by this summer. This is a perfect opportunity for our legislators to include universal school choice for all students. School choice will not only improve the quality of education but also reduce the costs of education.

Utah House passes universal school choice
Milton Friedman’s vision is one step closer to victory

INDIANAPOLIS—Today, the Utah House passed, by a vote of 38 to 37, what could become the nation’s first ever universal school voucher program. The legislation, House Bill 148, would allow every family in the state to have a choice in their child’s education and would become the first program to achieve Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman’s vision for universal school choice.

“ Utah is getting to the core of what education is all about — learning should be tailored to each student,” said Elisa Peterson, executive director of the Salt Lake City-based Parents for Choice in Education, which has led the local school choice effort. “ Utah parents want the freedom to choose education based on their child’s unique needs.”

HB 148, spearheaded by the tremendous leadership of Speaker Greg Curtis and bill sponsor Rep. Steve Urquhart, would establish the “Parent Choice in Education Act,” that would provide every Utah parent with school-aged children a voucher worth $500 to $3,000 that could be used at any eligible private school. Children currently enrolled in private school who meet the eligibility for free and reduced price lunch would also qualify for the voucher. The voucher amount will based on a families’ annual income.

"Utah's children are smiling today...and somewhere so is Dr. Milton Friedman,” said Peterson. “How fitting that a bill giving choice to all of Utah's children could be passed in the same week that Dr. Friedman was honored."

On Monday, Milton Friedman, who passed away last November at the age of 94, was honored in cities around the country including Chicago, New York and San Francisco. Because of his 1955 essay on the role of government in education, Friedman is widely recognized as the father of the school voucher movement.

"This is the biggest step that has been taken toward achieving Milton Friedman’s dream of liberating children so they can reach their full potential,” said Patrick Byrne, president and CEO of Utah-based Overstock.com and Friedman Foundation board member. “This is the greatest social issue facing our country.”

HB 148 will now be sent on to the Utah Senate. In previous years, broad-based school choice programs have received much support in the Senate. Successful passage there would send the bill to Gov. John Huntsman, Jr., who signed the state’s special needs voucher bill in 2005.

“The victory today proves that in the end freedom always trumps fear,” said Robert C. Enlow, executive director and COO for the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation. “Over the past six years, we have been honored to work with so many dedicated Utah legislators and local leaders. Their passion for educational freedom is what has made this possible.”

-30-

The Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation, dubbed "the nation's leading voucher advocates" by the Wall Street Journal, is a non-profit organization established in 1996. The origins of the foundation lie in the Friedmans' long-standing concern about the serious deficiencies in America's elementary and secondary public schools. The best way to improve the quality of education, they believe, is to enable all parents with the freedom to choose the schools that their children attend. The Friedman Foundation builds upon this vision, clarifies its meaning to the public and amplifies the national call for true education reform through school choice.

For more information on school choice in Illinois we recommend the Heartland Institute
and

The Champion.org.
and

"A major source of objection to a free economy is precisely that group thinks they ought to want. Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself. "
Milton Friedman

$34.06 an Hour That's how much the average public school teachers makes. Is that "underpaid"?

2007-02-02T07:48:00.000-06:00

The following article appeared in the Wall Street Journal.

No commentary needed the article speaks for itself.

$34.06 an Hour
That's how much the average public school teachers makes. Is that "underpaid"?

BY JAY P. GREENE AND MARCUS A. WINTERS
Friday, February 2, 2007 12:01 a.m. EST

Who, on average, is better paid--public school teachers or architects? How about teachers or economists? You might be surprised to learn that public school teachers are better paid than these and many other professionals. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, public school teachers earned $34.06 per hour in 2005, 36% more than the hourly wage of the average white-collar worker and 11% more than the average professional specialty or technical worker.

In the popular imagination, however, public school teachers are underpaid. "Salaries are too low. We all know that," noted First Lady Laura Bush, expressing the consensus view. "We need to figure out a way to pay teachers more." Indeed, our efforts to hire more teachers and raise their salaries account for the bulk of public school spending increases over the last four decades. During that time per-pupil spending, adjusted for inflation, has more than doubled; overall we now annually spend more than $500 billion on public education.

The perception that we underpay teachers is likely to play a significant role in the debate to reauthorize No Child Left Behind. The new Democratic majority intends to push for greater education funding, much of which would likely to go toward increasing teacher compensation. It would be beneficial if the debate focused on the actual salaries teachers are already paid.

It would also be beneficial if the debate touched on the correlation between teacher pay and actual results. To wit, higher teacher pay seems to have no effect on raising student achievement. Metropolitan areas with higher teacher pay do not graduate a higher percentage of their students than areas with lower teacher pay.

In fact, the urban areas with the highest teacher pay are famous for their abysmal outcomes. Metro Detroit leads the nation, paying its public school teachers, on average, $47.28 per hour. That's 61% more than the average white-collar worker in the Detroit area and 36% more than the average professional worker. In metro New York, public school teachers make $45.79 per hour, 20% more than the average professional worker in that area. And in Los Angeles teachers earn $44.03 per hour, 23% higher than other professionals in the area.

Evidence suggests that the way we pay teachers is more important than simply what they take home. Currently salaries are determined almost entirely by seniority--the number of years in the classroom--and the number of advanced degrees accumulated. Neither has much to do with student improvement.
There is evidence that providing bonuses to teachers who improve the performance of their students does raise academic proficiency. With our colleagues at the University of Arkansas we found that a Little Rock program providing bonuses to teachers based on student gains on standardized tests substantially increased math proficiency. Researchers at the University of Florida recently found similar results in a nationwide evaluation.

Of course, public school teacher earnings look less impressive when viewed on an annual basis than on an hourly basis. This is because teachers tend to work fewer hours per year, with breaks during the summer, winter and spring. But comparing earnings on an annual basis would be inappropriate when teachers work significantly fewer hours than do other workers. Teachers can use that time to be with family, to engage in activities that they enjoy, or to earn additional money from other employment. That time off is worth money and cannot simply be ignored when comparing earnings. The appropriate way to compare earnings in this circumstance is to focus on hourly rates.

Moreover, the earnings data reported here, which are taken directly from the National Compensation Survey conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, do not include retirement and health benefits, which tend to be quite generous for public school teachers relative to other workers. Nor do they include the nonmonetary benefit of greater job security due to the tenure that most public school teachers enjoy.

Educators sometimes object that hourly earnings calculations do not capture the additional hours they work outside of school, but this objection is not very compelling. First, the National Compensation Survey is designed to capture all hours actually worked. And teachers are hardly the only wage earners who take work home with them.

The fact is that teachers are better paid than most other professionals. What matters is the way that we pay public school teachers, not the amount. The next time politicians call for tax increases to address the problem of terribly underpaid public school teachers, they might be reminded of these facts.

Mr. Greene holds the endowed chair of education reform at the University of Arkansas and is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, where Mr. Winters is a senior research associate. Their report, "How Much Are Public School Teachers Paid?," was released this week.

We highly recommend the book Education Myths by Jay P. Greene before any parent or voter considers a tax increase for education.

Quote of the Day

Whenever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found state education. It has been discovered that the best way to insure implicit obedience is to commence tyranny in the nursery. -- (1874) Benjamin Disraeli

Using the Delphi Technique to Achieve Consensus

2007-02-01T19:45:00.000-06:00

The piece below is about the Delphi Technique and the complete article is posted on the Eagle Forum.org.

The Delphi techinque is used at pro-referendum meetings and schools at pro-referendum group meetings to persuade voters and parents to take the stance of the referendum pushers.

"In group settings, the Delphi Technique is an unethical method of achieving consensus on controversial topics. It requires well-trained professionals, known as "facilitators" or "change agents," who deliberately escalate tension among group members, pitting one faction against another to make a preordained viewpoint appear "sensible," while making opposing views appear ridiculous.

In her book Educating for the New World Order, author and educator Beverly Eakman makes numerous references to the need of those in power to preserve the illusion that there is "community participation in decision-making processes, while in fact lay citizens are being squeezed out."

"How to Diffuse the Delphi Technique

Three steps can diffuse the Delphi Technique as facilitators attempt to steer a meeting in a specific direction.

Always be charming, courteous, and pleasant. Smile. Moderate your voice so as not to come across as belligerent or aggressive.

Stay focused. If possible, jot down your thoughts or questions. When facilitators are asked questions they don't want to answer, they often digress from the issue that was raised and try instead to put the questioner on the defensive. Do not fall for this tactic. Courteously bring the facilitator back to your original question. If he rephrases it so that it becomes an accusatory statement (a popular tactic), simply say, "That is not what I asked. What I asked was . . ." and repeat your question.

Be persistent. If putting you on the defensive doesn't work, facilitators often resort to long monologues that drag on for several minutes. During that time, the group usually forgets the question that was asked, which is the intent. Let the facilitator finish. Then with polite persistence state: "But you didn't answer my question. My question was . . ." and repeat your question.
Never become angry under any circumstances. Anger directed at the facilitator will immediately make the facilitator the victim. This defeats the purpose. The goal of facilitators is to make the majority of the group members like them, and to alienate anyone who might pose a threat to the realization of their agenda. People with firm, fixed beliefs, who are not afraid to stand up for what they believe in, are obvious threats. If a participant becomes a victim, the facilitator loses face and favor with the crowd. This is why crowds are broken up into groups of seven or eight, and why objections are written on paper rather than voiced aloud where they can be open to public discussion and debate. It's called crowd control.

At a meeting, have two or three people who know the Delphi Technique dispersed through the crowd so that, when the facilitator digresses from a question, they can stand up and politely say: "But you didn't answer that lady/gentleman's question." Even if the facilitator suspects certain group members are working together, he will not want to alienate the crowd by making accusations. Occasionally, it takes only one incident of this type for the crowd to figure out what's going on.

Establish a plan of action before a meeting. Everyone on your team should know his part. Later, analyze what went right, what went wrong and why, and what needs to happen the next time. Never strategize during a meeting.

A popular tactic of facilitators, if a session is meeting with resistance, is to call a recess. During the recess, the facilitator and his spotters (people who observe the crowd during the course of a meeting) watch the crowd to see who congregates where, especially those who have offered resistance. If the resistors congregate in one place, a spotter will gravitate to that group and join in the conversation, reporting what was said to the facilitator. When the meeting resumes, the facilitator will steer clear of the resistors. Do not congregate. Instead gravitate to where the facilitators or spotters are. Stay away from your team members.

This strategy also works in a face-to-face, one-on-one meeting with anyone trained to use the Delphi Technique."

Be sure to visit the Eagle Forum.org website to learn more about the Delphi Technique.

Lynn Stuter is an education researcher in Washington state and wrote the above piece for the Eagle Forum. Her web site address is www.learn-usa.com/.

Quote of the Day

How we take back our children's education -- one person, one question, one school at a time.
Copyright 1999-2006 Peyton Wolcott

Editorial: Disappointing direction taken by District 300 board

2007-01-31T14:55:00.000-06:00

The following editorial appeared in the Daily Herald.

These same tactics, lies and half-truths are used by school districts across the county, state and country. When will parents and taxpayers learn it is not "for the kids"? It is for the the teachers, administrators, support staff, bus drivers, contractors with the schools, developers, architects, builders, union leaders, text book providers, legislators who receive contributions from these groups and anyone else feeding off the taxpayer trough. It was really for the kids education dollars would follow the student (school choice or a voucher system) and not the institution. The tactics and request will not stop until parents and taxpayers across the board get mad at the insane greed of those feeding off the system.

Editorial: Disappointing direction taken by District 300 board

1/30/2007

Daily Herald

When voters elect school board members, most hope to find careful stewards of public money, visionaries of thoughtful planning and cautious guardians of the trust placed in them. They also expect board members to protect tax dollars as if they were their own and to be honest and upfront about how that money is spent.

It would seem Community Unit School District 300 leaders have let residents down on all fronts.

At minimum, district officials misled residents during their campaign for a 55-cent education fund tax hike and $185 million bond issue last spring. Although school officials say vastly reduced enrollment projections are due to a changing housing market, it now seems that they may have used the most dramatic enrollment projections to hype their contention that classroom overcrowding would dramatically worsen. It also appears - now that we know their revenue projections are elusive and changing numbers - that they were creating a worst-case scenario to help sell the referendum.

It is, of course, hard to be certain what District 300 officials were thinking, for we're learning daily that they're not very open about their discussion of public business. In fact, it appears they regularly flout the Open Meetings Act, often meeting behind closed doors to discuss topics that rightfully belong in the public spotlight.

As reporter Jeff Gaunt revealed after careful perusal of six months of executive session board minutes, District 300's board and administrators often say one thing and do another. We have had to persistently push to get them to notify us when and where basic committee meetings are being held.

Less than six months after voters, facing the threatened loss of extracurricular activities, approved substantial tax hikes, the school board gave Superintendent Ken Arndt a $5,000 bonus and a substantial retroactive raise, effectively muting the salary freeze oft touted as evidence of financial distress in the referendum campaign.

They then quickly awarded other administrators substantial increases, including Chief Financial Officer Cheryl Crates, who also got a hefty bonus. The board also approved a nice salary hike for teachers and awarded employees new health savings plans to which the district is contributing at least $250 per plan.

It would seem the referendum campaign slogan of "It's for the kids" was only part of the incentive district employees had to push for referendum approvals.

That campaign was filled with promises - including one clearly made to the public and voiced to this editorial board to refrain from using capital appreciation bonds, which ultimately cost taxpayers far more than they approve at the ballot box. School officials also vowed not to use a loophole that would permit them to collect more than the 55-cent increase in the tax rate. Officials now say they not only might use those high-cost bonds but also would consider that loophole - which state lawmakers fortunately closed for all future tax requests.

It turns out that the district's dire enrollment projections were way off. Instead of an additional 7,200 students in five years, the district may be welcoming fewer than 3,000. It turns out that those classrooms won't be so crowded after all. School officials attribute the change to a declining housing market, and that certainly could account for some of the difference. But the district's penchant for closed meetings, changing numbers and retroactive pay hikes gives pause.

We're disappointed in District 300 and, like many taxpayers, feeling betrayed. We recommended taxpayers say "no" to the education fund hike because of shifting numbers even before the vote and the fact that no teacher pact was in place. We did back the bond sale, but only because school officials looked us - and by extension, the public - in the eye and vowed they wouldn't use the high-cost bonds.

It takes a long time to build up trust and a short time to shred it. District 300 officials may have just set a record.

Quote of the day.

"Greed is a fat demon with a small mouth and whatever you feed it is never enough." Janwillem van de Wetering

Our interpretation.
The public education system is a fat demon with a small mouth and no matter how much money you give the system it is never enough

Wall Street Journal -- on Abolishing State Income Taxes

2007-01-30T18:25:00.000-06:00

The Wall Street Journal article below was sent to us by our friend Marilyn Rickert of Fair Tax Now.

She reported the following background information on the report.

The research on which the Wall Street Journal article was based was funded by Americans For Fair Taxation (FairTax). The goal was to compare the states that had income taxes and those with no income taxes to see which ones did better. As Flat Tax supporters, the team of Arduin, Laffer, & Moore was chosen to carry out this research because we felt their bias would be against the FairTax and in favor of an income tax -- yet as honest researchers they would accurately report their findings no matter the result.

Our research in IL shows that using the FairTax base, we can eliminate the state income tax and property tax at about the same sales tax rate as we have now while raising the same amount of money as our current tax system. Remember under the FairTax bill, everyone is protected up to the poverty level. Also how much you pay in taxes is always your choice.

To view the A Macroeconomic Analysis of the FairTax Proposal click here.

Incentives drive all economic behavior. Taxes are a negative incentive. From an economic efficiency perspective, the appropriate goal for tax policy is to establish a tax system that minimizes the tax disincentives on economic activities, given the revenue needs of the government.

The article below appeared in the Wall Street Journal.

Rich States, Poor States

January 25, 2007

Wall Street Journal, Page A18

If you're searching for the next big thing in American politics, it's wise to keep an eye on the states. Here's one possibility: the abolition of state income taxes.

In Georgia, Missouri and South Carolina, Governors and state legislatures are drafting serious proposals to repeal their income taxes to promote economic development. St. Louis, one of America's most distressed cities, may overturn its wage/income tax as a way to spur urban revival. And in Michigan, the legislature is in the last stages of phasing out its hated business income tax -- the most onerous in the land. "States are now in a ferocious competition to attract jobs and businesses," says economist Arthur Laffer, who is advising several Governors and legislators on the issue, "and one of the best ways to win this race is to abolish the state income tax."

The timing for fixing state tax codes could hardly be more ideal because states are swimming in budget surpluses thanks to the booming national economy. This should be a big year for state tax cuts. Governors in Arkansas, Florida and West Virginia have already announced major tax relief plans for 2007. Even New York City has a $1 billion surplus and Mayor Michael Bloomberg is promising a property tax cut.

But the biggest target is the income tax. Newly re-elected South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford is talking of reviving his plan to phase out the income tax over 18 years. Mr. Sanford ran into opposition from the legislature in his first term, but he tells us that "I still consider this one of my top priorities and if the legislature wants to do it, I would be ecstatic."

Georgia may beat Mr. Sanford to the punch. House Republicans in Atlanta have announced that one of their top priorities is to use the half-billion-dollar budget surplus as a downpayment to "dismantle the current tax code." House Republican Majority Leader Jerry Keen tells us the debate in Atlanta is between a flat-rate income tax and a plan that would "do away with the personal income tax but broaden the sales tax by eliminating 107 exemptions. We're committed to a pro-growth tax plan that announces to the country that Georgia is open for business."

In Missouri the legislature is reviewing a plan by the state think tank, the Show Me Institute, that would increase the rate of the sales tax to 7.5% and limit spending growth to population plus inflation, in return for eliminating the state's income tax over 10 years. House Speaker Carl Bearden says "I would like to see a phasing out of our current tax structure in Missouri. . . . Eliminating the income tax can have a huge positive impact on a state's economy."

The idea of financing state services without an income tax is hardly radical. Nine states today -- Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, and Wyoming -- manage well without one. With a few exceptions, the non-income tax states are America's most prosperous. Meanwhile, the high income tax states, which tend to be congregated in the Northeast, keep surrendering jobs, people, and voters to the South and West.

State lawmakers also seem to have learned from two of the most recent states to adopt an income tax: New Jersey and Connecticut. As recently as 1965 New Jersey had neither an income nor sales tax, but managed to balance its budget every year. Now it has both taxes -- its income tax is the 5th highest in the nation -- but the state is facing what Stateline.org calls a "staggering budget deficit." Allied Van Lines reports that the Garden State is now one of the leading places for people to flee.

The latest state to adopt an income tax was Connecticut in 1991, but a new report by the Yankee Institute reveals that the tax has been a calamity. The state has ranked last in employment growth since 1991, losing 240,000 of its native born citizens between 1991-2002. No other state has since enacted an income tax, and lawmakers in Georgia, Missouri and South Carolina say Connecticut is now the model for how not to run a state economy.

Whether these states will be able to eliminate their income taxes in the next few years is an open question. But what's undeniable is that the debate in state capitals has swung decisively in the direction of chopping income tax rates, not raising them.

Quote of the day.

"A taxpayer is someone who works for the federal government but who doesn't have to take a civil service examination."
Ronald Reagan

The Read Naturally Program

2007-01-29T11:05:00.000-06:00

We recently heard about the Read Naturally Program and wanted to share the following.

Research into the program revealed that the "Read Naturally" program focuses on "fluency", it makes use of "repeated reading" of the same material to develop a steady relaxed pace in reading.

To learn to read children and people need to learn the mechanics of reading.

With some help of a friend with much experience in the subject we learned.

"The constructivist view of reading is that it is "natural" and should be therefore taught as though it were as natural as speaking. But it's not. Reading requires instruction and learning of a specific skill: decoding."

"I checked the "What Works Clearinghouse" of the USDOE to see what they had."

"Read Naturally" was reported having only a single study that could be said to be research-based. And that study had kind of a screwy design, had very few kids involved, and was limited to Spanish-speaking English language learners. Worse, in that one study, WWC reports:

" Read Naturally was found to have no discernible effects on elementary school ELL students' reading achievement."

"Reading achievement. Denton and colleagues (2004) reported, and the WWC confirmed, no statistically significant differences between the intervention and comparison groups on students' reading achievement. In addition, the average effect size was small and deemed not substantively important. Therefore, the one study reviewed showed no discernible effects."

Sounds like a loser!

Thanks to our friend Kevin Killion of the IllinoisLoop.org
for helping us with research into the "Read Naturally Program.

As our friend stated this program sounds like a loser school districts should only consider proven curricula that is well tested and not fade learning programs for the critical years of learning. A good source for them would be "What Works Clearinghouse" of the USDOE.

Many teachers and others have made millions of dollars off of taxpayers and on the backs of our children's education by introducing fade programs such as the read naturally program. Parents and taxpayers need to be attuned to this, our children's education and futures are too important to be wasted on fade programs.

Quote of the Day

"IT IS, IN FACT, NOTHING short of a miracle that the modern methods of education have not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry; for this delicate little plant, aside from stimulation, stands mainly in need of freedom; without this it goes to wrack and ruin without fail. It is a very grave mistake to think that the enjoyment of seeing and searching can be promoted by means of coercion and a sense of duty. To the contrary, I believe that it would be possible to rob even a healthy beast of prey of its voraciousness, if it were possible, with the aid of a whip, to force the beast to devour continuously, even when not hungry, especially if the food, handed out under such coercion, were to be selected accordingly. "--Albert Einstein

Milton Friedman Day

2007-01-28T06:38:00.000-06:00

The following story appeared onTownhall.com

We also recommend the book Capitalism and Freedom: Fortieth Anniversary Edition by Milton Friedman for all students, parents and taxpayers.

Milton Friedman Day
By John Stossel
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Monday is Milton Friedman Day.

At 2 p.m. a memorial service will be held at the University of Chicago, where Friedman taught for so many years.

In New York City I'll join a Manhattan Institute seminar to celebrate the man The Economist called "the most influential economist of the second half of the 20th Century ... possibly of all of it."

That magazine will host a web discussion on Friedman's contributions to economics beginning tomorrow and going through Monday.

A "Day of National Debate" about Friedman's work will be held at universities, and free-market think tanks throughout America will hold events.

There will even be a "Challenge the Status Quo" video contest in honor of Friedman on YouTube.

Finally, on Monday evening, PBS will premier a documentary about Friedman titled "The Power of Choice," produced by Free to Choose Media.

It's a fitting tribute to a man who did more than anyone to remind the world that individual freedom matters.

Friedman won the Nobel Prize in 1976 for his technical work in consumption analysis and monetary theory. But his real impact came through his popular writings in books and magazines. The consummate public intellectual -- clear, concise, and congenial -- Friedman taught millions worldwide about the virtues of the free market and individual liberty. When communism fell in the Soviet bloc, a new generation of Friedman-inspired activists and intellectuals were ready to implement his message of less government and more freedom.

As you'll see in the documentary, Friedman was the furthest thing from a stuffy academic. With his impish smile and sparking eyes, he lucidly debunked the once-reigning idea that government regulators know best.

His interests were not narrowly focused on economics. He pointed out the folly of the government's so-called "war on drugs." His ideas helped create the school-voucher movement. And when the Vietnam war raged in the 1960s and early 1970s, no one argued more eloquently for ending the draft, and he helped bring about the all-volunteer army.

But you probably know all that. You may be less aware of how brilliantly Milton Friedman made the case for freedom in plain English. Here are samples from Reason magazine:

"The case for free enterprise, for competition, is that it's the only system that will keep the capitalists from having too much power. ... The virtue of free enterprise capitalism is that it sets one businessman against another, and it's a most effective device for control."

"[S]tate laws requiring people who ride motorcycles to wear helmets ... is the best litmus paper to distinguish true believers in individualism ... because the person riding the motorcycle is risking only his own life. He may be a fool to drive that motorcycle without a helmet, but part of freedom ... is the freedom to be a fool."

"Many people complain about government waste, but I welcome it. ... [W]aste brings home to the public at large the fact that government is not an efficient and effective instrument for achieving its objectives. One of the great causes for hope is a growing disillusionment with the idea that government is the all-wise, all-powerful big brother who can solve every problem that comes along."

"I want [education] vouchers to be ... available to everyone. They should contain few or no restrictions on how they can be used. We need a system in which the government says to every parent: 'Here is a piece of paper you can use for the education purposes of your child. It will cover the full cost per student at a government school. It is worth X dollars toward the cost of educational services that you purchase from parochial schools, private for-profit schools, private nonprofit schools, or other purveyors of educational services. You may add from your own funds to the voucher if you wish and can afford to.'

"Empowering parents would generate a competitive education market, which would lead to a burst of innovation and improvement, as competition has done in so many other areas. There's nothing that would do so much to avoid the danger of a two-tiered society, of a class-based society ... "

The cause of liberty will miss Milton Friedman.

John Stossel is an award-winning news correspondent and author of Myths, Lies, and Downright Stupidity: Get Out the Shovel--Why Everything You Know is Wrong.

U-46 board should dump too generous offer to Neale

2007-01-26T08:58:00.000-06:00

The following editorial appeared in the January 26th, 2007 edition of the Daily Herald. The editorial staff is correct and school boards across the state should take to heart the message in this editorial. It times for boards to tell both administrators and staff to stuff it.

U-46 board should dump too generous offer to Neale
The definitions and details may be in dispute, but there’s absolutely no doubt the Elgin Area District U-46 Board of Education has tentatively approved a 2006-07 superintendent compensation package for Connie Neale that will exceed $400,000.
The board, which has firsthand experience with financial trouble, appears to have developed a sad case of fiscal responsibility amnesia and forgotten the sacrifices made by many along the way.

Consternation over his own acquiescence last Saturday in the large pay-out drove school board member Daniel Rich of Elgin to resign Monday night, saying he felt it was excessive and the result of a “shakedown” of the board by Neale. Rich said Neale said she might leave if she didn’t get what she wanted.

Neale said Tuesday she never made such a threat. But board members acknowledged they spent part of their Saturday discussing a possible superintendent succession plan, something they wouldn’t have done without the possibility of a Neale departure on the table, especially given their glowing review of her performance.

Neale also contended in public statements that she doesn’t negotiate with the board about her pay package, but only provides context.

“I didn’t say I deserved anything,” she told a Daily Herald reporter. But her own words, as found in the submission she gave board members, argue differently.

“I believe those are remarkable feats and more than justify this special recognition,” said her statement to the board regarding an “Immediate Performance Bonus” of 10 percent to 20 percent.

“I believe that doesn’t fairly represent my work or the challenge of U-46,” Neale said of her salary in the “Immediate Salary Realignment” portion of her submission, where she noted she was significantly underpaid compared to other superintendents. If those aren’t arguments that she deserves more, what exactly are they?

And what were those “remarkable feats” Neale identified as deserving of a bonus? Elimination of the deficit and all elementary schools making annual yearly progress in 2006.

Yes, those are laudable accomplishments, and we’ve said so in this space. But they also are the duties for which she was already being paid handsomely. The school board fell victim to Neale’s “this is the market for superintendents” sales pitch and failed to ask the far more pertinent question: Can we afford this market and the financial expectations it will raise across the district?

Though the answer to that question clearly is “no,” the board agreed to a $20,000 raise from a salary of $242,000 to a salary of $262,000, backdated to last July. It OK’d a 10 percent tax-free bonus on top of that, another $26,200 or so plus the tax bill. That $46,200 increase would represent about a 19 percent hike for the year. That’s not likely to sit well with district employees who believe they’re the ones doing the real work. Nor will it sit well with Elgin taxpayers whose 2005 median annual household income of $51,232 would barely exceed Neale’s increase alone.

And those numbers don’t include the additional $133,000 or so tax dollars that will fund Neale’s time-in-service step increase, multiple pension plans, a retirement bonus, multiple insurance plans and automobile expenses.

Neale is, of course, free to ask for anything she likes in terms of compensation. But she ought not be offended if the public responds to her request by noting her greed and her lack of interest in its ability to pay. For bowing to those demands without a whimper, though, the school board is wholly responsible.

Board members also seem to have forgotten it was Neale who led them into the morass of a multimillion-dollar discrimination lawsuit, not because of overt discrimination during boundary discussions so much as disregard for residents of all colors. That behavior hasn’t been forgotten, and apparently hasn’t changed.

Still, the board is ultimately responsible for contract terms. It must reverse course before this deal is finalized and make a deal with which the public can live, even if it means Neale’s departure.

Quote of the day.
"Greed is a fat demon with a small mouth and whatever you feed it is never enough." Janwillem van de Wetering

Squelching your right to speak out. Coming to a school district near you?

2007-01-25T08:12:00.000-06:00

The following editorial appeared in the Daily Southtown and was posted on the Students First website.

Editorial: Residents have a right to speak

1/22/2007

Daily Southtown

The issue: West Harvey-Dixmoor school officials warn residents not to speak "harshly" about the school district and its employees.

We say: Considering the cloud the district is under over questionable spending practices, citizens have a right to speak up about district operations and demand answers.

A true sign that a public official does not have a handle on what democracy is all about is when that official tries to stifle free speech.

The president of the board of embattled West Harvey-Dixmoor School District 147 read a statement at a recent board meeting that indicated he and his cohorts did not want to hear any discouraging words about the job they and other district officials are doing.

"At this point, we would like to caution everyone not to speak harshly or inadvisably about the board of education or the administrators in the public," board president J.C. Smith said. "Remarks made that are unsubstantiated, inappropriate or slanderous will be dealt with, and you might have to substantiate your statement."

Residents within the district have spoken up in the past, but after Smith's statement at the meeting, only one person spoke -- and that was to gush praise on the board.

But if people wanted to speak "harshly" about District 147 these days, they certainly would be justified. Last summer, a state audit uncovered questionable spending of grant money within the district. And last month, Cook County investigators raided district offices and the home of Supt. Alex Boyd and confiscated financial documents. They also arrested Boyd and charged him with not having a firearm registration card after a gun was found in his house.

If you were a taxpayer in District 147, wouldn't you like to know what the heck was going on? Of course you would. And one of the ways to get information is to speak up at public meetings and request it. Yet, when citizens are met with intimidating statements like Smith's, they might be reluctant to speak up, lest they be "dealt with." That's not how democracy should work.

If Smith and his fellow board members don't want to be criticized by the constituents they are supposed to serve, maybe they could do a better job overseeing business being conducted by employees on the public payroll in the first place. For example, where were they when the district was spending $2.2 million in state grant money -- money that was supposed to be spent in the classrooms -- on such things as expensive meals, limousine rides, Lake Michigan cruises and "clown service"?

Folks, we're talking about a school district that is one of the poorer ones in the area. A total of 97 percent of the students are classified as low-income. But state grant money, according to the audit, went for such things as "a large alcohol bill," meals at the swank Ruth's Chris Steak House, candy, televisions, cameras and fruit snacks.

And what does the board know about why prosecutors thought it important enough to take district documents back to their office for close examination?

Time will tell if those documents lead to further action by prosecutors. As for the audit, Smith claims a hearing later this year will clear the district of any perception of misspending.

Until then, though, the district remains under a microscope, and the people who live there deserve answers and should not be denied their right to speak up. Keep that in mind, Mr. Smith.

Public officials long have tried to silence the public and the press -- including this paper -- when they have had the temerity to question how they operated. We always refuse to back down, and we urge the citizens of District 147 not to back down because it's your right to demand answers, and you'll never know what you'll learn.

There was one Southland superintendent who a few years ago did everything he could to thwart the press and the public from learning about his fiefdom. In the end, courage and persistence paid off. And if you want to hear more of the story, feel free to contact that superintendent. His name is Thomas Ryan. He ran the school district in Sauk Village. Nowadays you can reach him through the Illinois Department of Corrections.

Quote of the day.

"There is, in fact, only one solution: the state, the government, the laws must not in any way concern themselves with schooling or education. Public funds must not be used for such purposes. The rearing and instruction of youth must be left entirely to parents and to private associations and institutions." Ludwig von Mises

D-300 closes out the public

2007-01-23T08:26:00.000-06:00

What is next, will yes voters, parents and taxpayers learn? If we do not learn from history the referenda that Arndt is planning for 2011 (only 4 years away) will pass. District 15 in McHenry promised to pay back taxpayers several years ago. They reneged, never paid them back and asked for more with another referendum. The District 15 referendum passed not because many parents trusted the board but because they felt they had no choice. The board and district held the taxpayers' children's education over their head, many felt they had no choice but to vote yes. The result of spineless yes voters is only to ensure districts will use the same tactics to pass future referenda.

The article below appeared in the Northwest Herald editorial section.

D-300 closes out the public

District 300 officials have needlessly closed meetings, locking members of the public out of the public’s business.

In doing so, the district is being disrespectful to its constituents and risks violating the Illinois Open Meetings Act. District officials sorely need a reality check. On this issue, they have lost their way.

Let’s make a couple of things clear: Although the Open Meetings Act states that public bodies can sometimes close a meeting, it never states that a meeting must be closed. The law simply states that there are times – exceptions – when a public body can choose to close a meeting.

The intent of the law is for governmental entities in Illinois to conduct their business in public. Even when there might be cause to close a meeting, public officials should consider whether closing the proceeding really is necessary. Unfortunately, instead of looking to keep as many meetings as possible open to the public, officials often will do the opposite and search for any excuse to close the proceedings.

Generally, meetings can be closed for reasons such as personnel matters, land acquisition, and pending litigation. District 300 officials have interpreted this to mean that they can close any meeting relating to Superintendent Ken Arndt meeting his goals for the district because that information will be used to evaluate Arndt.

By this logic, just about every meeting District 300 has should be closed to the public. Clearly this is not a correct interpretation of the law. In another instance, district officials closed a meeting to discuss lightning in relation to an outdoor graduation ceremony. The reason given to close the meeting? Security.

District 300’s practice of closing these meetings creates the perception that it is trying to hide something – or things – from the public.

District 300 officials need to, individually, read the Open Meetings Act. They then need to change their thinking and policies relating to when a meeting should be closed. A safe rule of thumb for District 300 is this: When in doubt, keep the meetings open.

Quote of the Day

Whenever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found state education. It has been discovered that the best way to insure implicit obedience is to commence tyranny in the nursery. -- (1874) Benjamin Disraeli

Much A Buzz in District 300

2007-01-22T13:49:00.001-06:00

Last year many people put in a good fight against the District 300 referenda. Those who spoke out against the referenda were not only vilified by the press but those who supported the referenda. The truth is prevailing but much too late. The Northwest Herald is painting a great picture as why not to support or trust school districts with future referenda, but alas it is too little too late. The Northwest Herald was the only paper to encourage a yes/yes vote for the referenda. But we all know the primary reporter who blatantly supported the referenda is now working for District 300.

We suggest the following as well titled Lower enrollment might not delay D-300 request in the Northwest Herald.

If that is not convincing enough how about Growth numbers fall in D-300
Year after referendum, projection falls almost 50 percent also in the Northwest Herald.

Not Settled in But Still Fighting

2007-01-22T13:42:00.000-06:00

Dear Friends,

We are not settled in our new home in New Hampshire as we have not sold our home in Illinois. We are spending time in both homes. Until our home in Illinois is sold we will continue to fight for education reform and education spending reform as we are still paying taxes for schools.

We have started our new taxpayer advocacy/education reform group in New Hampshire called Croydon Citizens for Reasonable And Fair Taxes.

America is a land of taxation that was founded to avoid taxation. ~Laurence J. Peter

We are moving.

2006-12-11T14:56:00.000-06:00

Dear Friends,

Our family will be moving in the near future. Until the move is complete our Blog will not be updated regularly. We will continue to fight for education reform and education spending reform until we move and when we move to our new location.

Regards to All,

Cathy

D-300 agrees to deal

2006-11-26T08:31:00.000-06:00

The following article Northwest Herald.
Referendum passes as usual the school employees win while the taxpayers and children lose.

D-300 agrees to deal

By DAVID FITZGERALD - dfitzgerald@nwherald.com
Comments (23)
CARPENTERSVILLE – After 10 months of negotiations, the District 300 school board approved a new four-year contract for teachers Wednesday night. The school board also approved raises for administrators and a $5,000 bonus for Chief Financial Officer Cheryl Crates.

Teachers and other Local Education Association District 300 union members will get a 17.4 percent raise over the span of the deal. Annual raises will come to 8.6 percent over the four years in addition to an annual step increase boost of 2.2 percent. The contract leaves open the possibility of future raises for teacher performance and student achievement.

The district estimates that it will spend $3.7 million more in teacher salaries than last year, but that figure includes 95 new teachers who were hired after the March referendums passed.

District administrators will see about a 5 percent annual raise including 1.9 percent to 2 percent step increases.

Board member Mary Warren cast the only vote against the contracts, citing philosophical differences with their retirement packages. The other members, however, said they felt comfortable defending the raises to the public.

Under both contracts, employees will pay more in health-care deductibles and co-pays, but receive annual tax-free health-reimbursement accounts ranging from $1,000 to $250.

Full-year administrators will get the $1,000 HRAs, school-year administrators will get less, and union members will get $250 annually. In the four years before their retirements, union members will get an additional $500 deposit in their HRA annually.

The accounts bear interest and can be used at any time in the employee’s lifetime.

School board President Mary Fioretti said the district was the first in the state to incorporate the tax-free funds into a teachers’ contract.

Both contracts also eliminate the 20 percent raises teachers and administrators received in their last four years of employment.

Under a new state law, districts face stiff penalties for end-of-career bonuses of more than 6 percent. Administrators and union members each will receive that maximum. The district, however, no longer will pay the fee that employees face for early retirement.

Warren said she voted against the contracts because of the four 6 percent raises for retirees.

“I firmly believe new dollars in the system do not belong in enhancing end-of-career bonuses because they do not enhance student achievement,” Warren said.

Administrators will continue to get 12 sick days a year, but union members will see an increase from 10 days to 12.

Teachers also will receive more in tuition reimbursement for continuing their educations.

Both contracts are retroactive to July 1, 2006.

Superintendent Ken Arndt’s contract will not be affected by the new deal.

The school board also unanimously approved a one-time $5,000 deposit in an HRA for Crates based on her job performance.

The contracts at a glance

Teachers

– 17.4 percent raise over four years.

– Two additional sick days, bringing the total to 12.

– Four 6 percent raises in the four years preceding retirement.

– Higher medical deductibles and co-pays.

– All dental and vision premiums paid first three years, going to 80 percent in the contract’s fourth year.

– Annual deposits of $250 into a tax-free, interest-bearing health reimbursement account.

– More tuition reimbursement for continuing education.

Administrators

– 5 percent annual raises for four years.

– Four 6 percent raises in the four years preceding retirement.

– Annual deposits ranging from $1,000 to $350 into a tax-free, interest-bearing health-reimbursement account.

– Higher medical deductibles and co-pays.

All about the kids, tee-hee

2006-10-30T20:59:00.000-06:00

The following piece appeared in the Daily Herald. Remember vote no for education referenda on election day.

Divide between public servants, those paying bill only grows deeper

Chris Bailey
Posted Sunday, October 29, 2006

All about the kids, tee-hee

Right about now, a lot of Community School District 300 voters are probably feeling pretty angry. Having fallen for the self-righteous and guilt-inducing “it’s all about the children” spiel during the successful tax hike vote last spring, they now know it really was about more cash for educators.

The district has offered teachers pay raises of about 4 percent per year for four years, including step increases — a reasonable pay hike commensurate with the rest of the world these days. The teachers’ union, of course, was appalled at such a paltry figure. Aggrieved teachers descended en masse last week on the school board, no doubt as a reminder of how much the tax hike was really “all about the kids.”

Referendums are never about the kids. A teacher arriving early or staying late to help a struggling or curious student; that’s about the kids. A coach disciplining a selfish player; that’s about the kids. A teacher bringing Shakespeare to life; that’s about the kids. Picking new textbooks over a fancy building; that’s about the kids.

No, referendums are always about money — how much can be taken from your pocket and put into theirs. Though we were vilified for saying it, we did tell you so. Our editorial endorsement urged a “no” vote on the education fund tax hike, saying, among other things, that a contract settled before the vote “would have assured voters their money wouldn’t go mostly for pay raises.”

That editorial also said the district should “ink a multiple-year teacher pact that includes a freeze or minimal increases. Employees represent the greatest part of the budget. They either are part of the solution or there won’t be one.”

We know how those employees chose, don’t we? So here’s one more unpalatable observation. If the district doesn’t stick to its guns on raises of 4 percent or so, it likely won’t pass another referendum for, oh, I’d say, at least another school generation. It would be that long before a new set of parents would be susceptible to the “it’s all about the kids” lie again.

State’s 100 percent solution to education woes is to fund the child

2006-10-10T14:40:00.000-05:00

The following piece came to us from our friends at the Illinois Policy Institute.

State’s 100 percent solution to education woes is to fund the child
By COLLIN HITT
The State Journal-Register

Published Tuesday, October 10, 2006

On Oct. 14, the Rev. Jesse Jackson will march to protest the deep inequities in an education finance system in Illinois that leaves schools underfunded and children uneducated. I’m going to march with him.

Sen. James Meeks, a compatriot of Jackson’s, has introduced legislation (HB750) to level funding between school districts by coupling a state income tax increase with property tax relief. And Jackson has pledged “to put high quality and equal education funding in the middle of the debate.” He has said, “We want equal access and high quality public education for all of our children – make the playing field even for all of our children.”

Proponents of HB750 believe that the bill will achieve those ends. They’re wrong.

While HB750 makes funding more equitable between school districts, it does not address the terrible imbalances in funding within those districts and within their schools. It is a virtual guarantee that unless HB750 is accompanied by fundamental reforms in education spending, little will come in the way of progress in the classroom - and at great expense.

If passed, HB750 would substantially increase the role of state government in education finance and go a long way toward enabling the state to achieve uniformity in average-per-pupil funding. If amended, however, HB750 could instead enable the state to “Fund the Child.”

This is the title of a new proposal released by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, wherein its authors advocate the “100 Percent Solution” - a dramatic rethinking of public school finance, one that could revolutionize American public education, one that requires each student be educated according to his needs and be allowed to attend the public school in which those needs are best met.

Under the present system of school finance, there are huge disparities between the poorest and most wealthy districts. But even within those districts, the situation is no less dire. Neighborhood schools with a high number of low-income students are often unable to attract and retain high-quality teachers.

There is little or no financial incentive for teachers with even just a few years of experience to remain in troubled schools. They often opt, as soon as possible, to transfer to a school in a more affluent neighborhood with a more comfortable working environment. The funds follow the teacher. Schools in the poorest neighborhoods are left with the least experienced, lowest-paid teachers, and therefore spend far less per pupil than their more affluent counterparts.

Under the 100 percent solution, the funds follow the child. Each student would receive funding according to a weighted formula, and those funds would follow that student to the public school setting of his parents’ choice. Those from more affluent, stable backgrounds - those least at risk of academic failure -would receive a base amount. Those from more adverse backgrounds or those who suffer from disabilities - those who are more expensive to educate - would receive more.

Parents would be allowed to select the most appropriate public school setting for their children. Principals would be afforded the flexibility to best address the needs of the students. The system of public education in Illinois could become “one in which schools compete to hire the best teachers and to attract the hardest-to-educate students, and in which [parents and educators] are free to try new and dynamic solutions to ensure that all of their students succeed.”

HB750 should be amended to require that state government and local school districts “fund the child.” Thus amended, HB750 is one that replaces an antiquated school finance system with one of equality and opportunity. Such an HB750 would deserve the support from all across the state, from both parties, and from Jackson.

Jackson has said of his march for equal education funding, “This is neither left nor right, Democrat nor Republican. It is the moral center.” The same is true of the 100 percent solution, and it, too, is worth marching for.

Collin Hitt is director of Education Policy and Reform at the Springfield-based Illinois Policy Institute. He can be reached at collin@illinoispolicyinstitute.org.

Teachers’ unions a negative

2006-10-09T07:59:00.000-05:00

The following letter to the editor appeared in the Northwest Herald. We posted this once before but it is well worth a second read.

Teachers’ unions a negative

Comments (0)
To the Editor:

As a former teacher, principal and superintendent of schools in New York, Ohio, Kentucky, Illinois, New Jersey, and California, I have some knowledge of education in the United States.

My studies at the University of Dayton [B.A.], Xavier University [M.A.] and The Ohio State University [Ph.D.] with majors in English, philosophy, educational administration, and sociology have helped me understand public education.

I began my teaching career 51 years ago and I have come to the following conclusion: Teachers’ unions are the worst institution that have pervaded our schools and have the most deleterious and negative impact on education.

There are four reasons for this conclusion. Based on the union proposals that I have studied and negotiated for the past 30 years, they all contain the same demands: 1) Unions want more money; 2) Unions want more fringe benefits; 3) Unions want less work; and 4) Unions want more power.

That’s it.

Of all the demands in their negotiations, I never have seen one that redounds to the direct benefit of the child’s education.

Read teachers’ contracts. If you find one item that will contribute to the direct, positive learning of the student, let me know.

Donald E. Bond

Huntley

Teacher Hacked to Death in Mexican City -for opposing a teachers' strike.

2006-10-07T16:21:00.000-05:00

The following story appeared on Fox News.com.

Teacher Hacked to Death in Mexican City
Friday , October 06, 2006

OAXACA, Mexico — A teacher was hacked to death in this historic Mexican city that has been paralyzed for months by protests and violence, police said late Thursday. A colleague claimed the man was killed for opposing a teachers' strike.

Thousands of trade unionists and leftists have been camped out in Oaxaca since May, building barricades, taking over buildings and burning buses. The protesters are demanding the resignation of Oaxaca Gov. Ulises Ruiz, accusing him of rigging the 2004 election to win office and sending armed thugs against dissenters.

Victor Alonso Altamirano of the Oaxaca state police said teacher Jaime Rene Calva Aragon was on his way to a meeting Thursday evening when he was killed by two assailants wielding hefty ice picks.

Fellow teacher Alma Rosa Fernandez accused militant leftists of killing Calva for opposing a statewide teachers' strike that was a catalyst for the wider protests. Fernandez, who also opposes the strike, said the dissident teachers have been receiving death threats.

"We blame this murder directly on the radical teachers' wings," Fernandez said.
Florentino Lopez, a spokesman for the protesters, denied the accusation and instead blamed the governor.

"This is a plan by Ulises Ruiz to provoke the intervention of federal forces," Lopez told reporters and protesters in Oaxaca's main square.

The protests began when thousands of teachers went on strike to demand higher pay. After Ruiz sent police to try to dislodge the camps in June, the teachers were joined by a broad coalition of leftists, students, anarchists and Indian groups.

Ruiz denies the protesters' accusations against him and has repeatedly called for federal troops to restore order.

In recent days, helicopters and military planes have flown over the protesters while thousands of state police have
gathered outside the city. Protesters broadcast alerts from occupied radio stations, fearing an onslaught was imminent.

Enrique Rueda, head of the Oaxaca teachers union, traveled to Mexico City Thursday and met with Interior Secretary Carlos Abascal to try and resolve the conflict.

After the meeting, Rueda said Abascal promised he would not order soldiers to move against the protesters.

"We have the guarantee from the interior secretary that there will be no military incursion in Oaxaca," Rueda told a news conference.

The Interior Department later released a statement saying "the conflict in Oaxaca will be solved via the law and institutions." It did not comment on the use of soldiers.

Clashes involving protesters, police and armed gangs have already left two people dead, and both the U.S. and British embassies in Mexico have issued advisories warning their citizens about going to Oaxaca.

The unrest has scared most tourists away from the city, which is normally popular for its colonial architecture and ancient pyramids. Business leaders put losses at more than $300 million.

Ruiz has been supported by other governors from his Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, which held the Mexican presidency from 1929 until 2000.

Who really benefits when referenda pass? How does your school compare? $5,400 bonus for Dist. 158 officials

2006-10-06T12:03:00.000-05:00

Recently District 158 passed a referendum. The claim was it was for the kids. Who benefits most from the passage of referenda? If your school district is running a referendum this year be sure to review salaries and contracts of school employees before supporting any referenda.

To review the salarires of your school's employees visit The Champion.org.

The following article appeared in the Daily Herald.

$5,400 bonus for Dist. 158 officials
By Jeffrey Gaunt
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Thursday, October 05, 2006

Several top Huntley District 158 administrators have been receiving cash payments for opting out of the district health insurance program — while still receiving health coverage.

Under a practice that board members say was started by former officials, administrators received $5,400 a year when passing on district insurance.

Three officials with spouses who worked in the district were able to receive coverage under their spouses’ plans while still collecting the $5,400 incentive.

Three more officials are on single-coverage plans but still receive the $5,400 benefit because they don’t get family
coverage.

Only one of the seven officials who were receiving the $5,400 payouts doesn’t have any district insurance.

Providing the “cash in lieu” payments to employees who don’t get insurance, which is not unique to District 158, is
intended to save on the $12,000 to $14,000 the district otherwise would pay for health coverage.

But board members decided to phase out the practice this year, saying they don’t know when the district started offering the benefit.

“I couldn’t tell you honestly when it started,” school board President Mike Skala said of the payments. “There didn’t seem to be any policy in place that defined that benefit.”

Board members said that in a closed meeting earlier this year they agreed to pay six officials the extra $5,400 this year but phase out the practice over the next three years.

“The board of education felt that there needed to be some control on the expenditures we were having in regard to insurance,” Skala said.

But board member Larry Snow said there is another problem: a seventh official who is receiving the $5,400 without board approval.

Superintendent John Burkey raised the issue with the board at a committee meeting but never sought a board vote before extending the extra payment, Snow said.

District officials said that because of poor record keeping under the past administration, they didn’t know at the time of the school board vote that the employee was receiving the cash in lieu payments.

And Burkey said he didn’t know the lack of an official school board vote on the one employee was an issue, given the person had been receiving the payment for several years.

“We couldn’t not give it to him,” Burkey said, explaining that the administrator showed district officials documentation confirming he had been getting cash in lieu money in the past. “Whether the cash in lieu was right or not, we gave it to him like everyone else. I told the board about it right away. It wasn’t a sneaky thing.”

Burkey also pointed out that the cash in lieu payments — which haven’t been properly documented — are one reason he recommended a forensic audit of the district’s payroll department.

Board members last month sent out requests for a forensic auditor to look into both the payroll department and site and construction fund.

IASB Conference Sessions I Would Attend

2006-10-05T07:57:00.000-05:00

Cal Skinner of McHenry County Blog has a great piece up about the courses offered at the Illinois Association of School Boards annual convention.

The Illinois Association of School Boards is holding it annual convention this week and weekend in Chicago.

There's one seminar I would really like to attend.

It seems to be about how the Carpentersville District 300 tax hike committee, Advance 300, convinced a slim majority of voters to approve both a 55-cent tax hike and a huge bond referendum.

Do you agree that a session entitled, "Organization and Communication--'Vote Yes Twice' Wins Big at Polls," probably refers to this springs massively expensive campaign in District 300?

I wonder if they will point out that developers and school vendors financed the effort.

I also wonder if the topic of "Mandate Shortfall Levies" being offerred by the Illinois Association of School Boards is about an existing way to avoid the property tax cap or one which its members hope to get passed next year.

To view the rest of the piece click here.

You be the judge. Do some public schools have a political agenda?

2006-10-04T09:25:00.000-05:00

The following article appeared on the First Amendment Center website.

Tennessee high school OKs Muslim headscarf

By The Associated Press
01.16.05

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — A public high school changed its dress code to allow religious headscarves after a national civil rights group for Muslims complained to the principal on behalf of a student.

A spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations said Emily Smith, 18, a senior at suburban East Ridge High School, wore her “religiously mandated headscarf,” or hijab, on campus for the first time Jan. 13.

Smith said friends and a few teachers told her “congratulations.”

“I wanted to keep it as low-key as possible,” she said.

Rick Smith, an assistant superintendent for Hamilton County schools, said he talked to an assistant principal who told him that there was “not a word, not a question by a student or adult of any kind” in reaction to the headscarf.

An assistant principal, Gary Lowery, declined comment when contacted by phone. He said the school principal, Cheri Dedmon, was out of town.

Khadija Athman, civil rights manager for the Washington, D.C.-based council, said the student asked about her rights in a Jan. 3 e-mail. A letter of complaint was sent to Dedmon on Jan. 6.

The letter said the student as a Muslim is “required to cover her hair in public. Ms. Smith stated that despite numerous efforts to explain to you the importance of the headscarf in her faith, you always found an excuse to hinder her. The various excuses are: needing her grandmother’s permission, it is against the school’s dress code; other students would feel excluded, negative image of Muslim would create safety concerns for Ms. Smith; need to speak to other schools in the area about how they handle the issue etc.”

The letter said religious headscarves are protected by the Constitution and laws that prohibit discrimination in public schools.

Rick Smith said schools have individual dress codes and that the complaint was the first one he was aware of in the county system.

“The school had a standardized dress code in place. Any kind of head wear was prohibited,” he said. “This particular item was a little different because it is a religious garment.”

He said attorneys were consulted and the principal “agreed to allow the student to wear the headscarf.”
Rick Smith said he did not speak with anyone from the council. He said the school system did not have a policy regarding religious clothing.

“It’s something we will look into,” he said.

Athman said the student advised the council that the principal “was willing to work with her. It was just that she wasn’t getting the response she could wear it right now. It was not like it was a hostile environment or anything.”

The student said she first requested permission to wear the headscarf in August but school system spokeswoman Cheryl Marsh said the request was first made “prior to winter break.”

“This hasn’t been lingering around for months but is a relatively new issue,” Marsh said.

The following article appeared on The Rutherford Institute's website.

Maryland School Officials Threaten Seventh Grader with Disciplinary Action for Reading Bible During Lunch Time
Rutherford Institute Attorneys Sue Middle School in Defense of Student’s Right to Read Bible

GREENBELT, Md. — Attorneys for The Rutherford Institute have filed a civil rights lawsuit in defense of the First and Fourteenth Amendment rights of a seventh grader who was allegedly ordered by a Maryland middle school employee to stop reading her Bible during free time at school or face disciplinary action. Institute attorneys have asked the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland to declare that prohibiting students from reading Bibles or other religious texts during their free time is unconstitutional.

“We live in a country that touts itself as the cradle of freedom and democracy,” said John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute. “However, what kind of freedom do we really have when a young girl can’t even read her Bible during lunch time without being punished for it?”

On September 14, 2006, seventh-grader Amber Mangum, who was reading a Bible in the school cafeteria during her lunch period, was allegedly approached by an employee working at the Dwight D. Eisenhower Middle School in Prince George’s County, Md. In keeping with school policy, students are allowed to read books or engage in interpersonal communications during non-instructional time at school, including lunch periods. Furthermore, published administrative procedure of the Prince George’s County Public Schools provides that “[s]tudents may read their Bibles or other scriptures, say grace before meals, and pray before tests to the same extent they may engage in comparable, non-disruptive activities.”

However, the complaint filed by Rutherford Institute attorneys alleges that the school official informed Amber that reading a Bible was a violation of the school’s policy and warned her that she would be subject to more severe disciplinary action if she were found reading a Bible at school again. In defending Amber’s right to read a Bible during non-instructional time at school, Institute attorneys have pointed out that according to the U.S. Department of Education’s 2003 guidelines under the No Child Left Behind Act, students have the right to read Bibles or other religious scriptures during lunch hour, recess or other non-instructional times.

School Superintendent Behind Videotape Scandal

2006-10-03T06:13:00.000-05:00

The joke is on him?
SD 228 superintendent's 'funny' video may lead to his removal from school district

September 30, 2006
By Kati Phillips Staff writer
A school superintendent's job will be on the line Tuesday because he posted a video with mock teacher interviews on the district's Web site.

Supt. Richard Mitchell spliced his fake questions with real answers from first-year teacher interviews to make it appear the teachers stripped, abused prescription drugs and wanted to kill a principal.

To view the rest of the article visit the Daily Southtown website.

To view the transcript of the video visit Free Republic.com.

Golden Handcuff Award

2006-10-02T21:09:00.000-05:00

Golden Handcuff Award

Since teachers have the Golden Apple Award I thought it only appropriate to have a similar award for politicians called the “Golden Handcuff Award”. Whereas the Golden Apple recognizes the highest achievement in the classroom, the Golden Handcuff would recognize those politicians with the highest achievement in garnering political contributions from the teacher unions. To get the Golden Handcuff you must have received at least $50,000 in teacher union contributions.

I call it the Golden Handcuff because once you have received money from the unions you are no longer able to lift anything heavier than a 5-figure contribution check. The heavy lifting involved in curbing 6-figure teacher salaries, $300,000 administrators salaries, multi-million dollar pensions, vouchers, endless property tax increases etc cannot be done when you are encumbered with the Golden Handcuffs. No sir, all you can do after your Golden handcuffs are snapped closed is sign on to (or sponsor) bills providing more money and benefits to the teachers.

Although the state does have a website to track political contributions http://www.elections.state.il.us/CampaignDisclosure/ContribCanSearch.aspx it is not easy because the contributors can use many different names thereby making tracking more difficult. Of course the various teacher union organizations do their best to confuse the public. For example the largest contributor ($11 million plus) the Illinois Political Action Committee for Education (IPACE) can be found using the following names: IPACE, I.P.A.C.E., 1 PACE, !PACE, IPACE PAC, IPACE-Il, IPACE-PAC, IPACE-ILLINOIS, IPACE/ILLINOIS, LPACE, Ipage, IPACE-EDUC. In addition the various teacher organizations launder their contributions by sending money back and forth to each other in a manner befitting a Columbian drug cartel.

Therefore the $23 million total I have managed to come up with is probably low even though that is frightening enough. For example if you search for contributions from organizations containing the word “teacher” in it you get $16 million, for the letters “ift” (Illinois Federation of Teachers) $8 million, the letters “aft” (America Federation of Teachers) $3 million plus the IPACE $11 million gives you $38 million including the money laundering amounts back and forth. The largest 3rd party contribution to Blagojevich was $300,000 from IPACE along with $250,000 and $225,000 from other teacher union funds. And all of the money does not come from Illinois: over $1.7 million came from the American Federation of Teachers headquarters in Washington DC. Over $500,000 from the teacher unions has been donated just since Jan 2006.

You will notice that although Democrats dominate the following list there are enough Republicans to make certain that the union’s demands are met no matter which party is in power. The biggest donations in 2006 have gone to Emil Jones ($27,500), the Madigans ($40,000), Tom Hynes ($20,000) and interesting enough 2 Republicans Sydney Mathias of Buffalo Grove and Mark Beaubien of Wauconda, $15,000 each.

If this kind of vote buying isn’t “special interest” what is?

Bill Zettler

To see a list of donations visit the The Champion.org website.

Pete Speer's response to the dumbing down of our education system.

2006-10-01T14:01:00.000-05:00

The state teachers unions and the the NEA have joined hands to nullify NCLB.
Local boards have been influenced by the local unions and their half
brothers, the similarly educated administrators, to reject NCLB money.

That legislation, as cumbersome as it may be, was passed to overcome the
under-education rendered by underqualified teachers in primary and secondary
schools. The 2004 report of the President's Advisory Commission on Science
and Technology indicated that when compared to the public education in
Europe, the entire Asian littoral plus Japan and India, the level of
knowledge and the curriculum requirements were generally below the 50th
percentile.

Those well publicized 'Advanced Placement' courses in Math and Science?
They ranked at the sixth and the zero percentile respectively.

How did my state of Illinois react? The Illinois State Board of Education
is supposed to set standards for the field. Within the last year, they
dumbed down their standardized tests -- creating the appearance of higher
grades -- and normed up the results -- making the parents believe that
Johnny was learning. The last smooth move was to reduce the passing grade
on the certification test for History and the Social Sciences.

The schools rely on degree granting Schools of Education and provide their
certified staff for pay raises based on longevity and on additional
Education School course work.

There is no concept of Subject Matter Mastery. The buzz phrase is Content
Mastery -- just be able to teach what is in the textbook. Subject Matter
Mastery implies that the teacher has an undergraduate degree in the subject
being taught. Additional studies in that subject at the graduate level keep
the teacher up to date in his/her field. Implied is a love of the subject
that can be transitted to the student.

Education degreed teachers usually can not qualify for such graduate
courses. And if they do, they become lost.

65% in the classroom is a very nice folly. Illinois teachers took advantage
of early retirement and extraordinary raises in the last three years to
enable them to buy out and qualify for the highest state pensions. 65%
would have been corrupted.

65% will further enrich a system which recognizes itself as a closed union
shop, not unlike the UAW in the days before the Japanese importers started
building quality in their product.

How so we return Quality and Education Value?

The only answer -- and it is being done in San Francisco and other places --
is Competitive Choice.

After accounting for special needs children, each district must vest every
student equally in the federal, state and local tax moneys. The parent(s)
will then choose where to use that money: public, provate, parochial and
shiva (religious classes taught after hours), charter and even home
schooling. All that is required is certification by a (now reformed) state
agency.

Choice of a school costing less than the fair share will result in moneys
being kept in the District. Choice of a more expensive option will require
the parent(s) fund the difference.

Families still have dreams of interclass mobility for their children.
American must still have to compete in the 21st Century world economy/

Let us not drag ourselves down.

Coalition for Public Awareness

2006-09-30T10:10:00.000-05:00

Keith Steinacher of the Coalition for Public Awareness
has asked CRAFT to pass on the message that their site has been updated. If you have not reviewed their site it is highly recommended before supporting any tax increase for public schools.

Many Teachers Are OK; It's the Damn Teachers Unions That Are the Problem

2006-09-28T10:20:00.000-05:00

As a former teacher, principal and superintendent of schools in New York, Ohio, Kentucky, Illinois, New Jersey, and Califoria, I have a fairly good knowledge of how education works in the U.S.

My studies at the University of Dayton (B.A.), Xavier University (M.A.) and The Ohio State University (Ph.D.) with majors in English, Philosophy, Educational Administration, Sociology, and an S.T.B at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland have helped me to think through many issues in public education.

It has been 51 years since I began my teaching caareer in New York. I have come to the following major conclusion:

TEACHERS UNIONS ARE THE WORST INSTITUION THAT HAVE PERVADED PUBLIC SCHOOLS AND HAVE HAD THE MOST DELETERIOUS EFFECT AND NEGATIVE IMPACT ON EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES!

Think it through with me. There are four reasons why I have reached this rational conclusion. It is based on the union proposals that I have studied, argued, and negotiated for the past 30 years. They all contain the same major ideas and issues.

1) They want more money.

2) They want more fringe benefits.

3) They want less work and less responsibility.

4) They want more power.

That's it!

Of the hundreds of demands that I have read in their proposals for negoations, I have NEVER seen one that asks for some item to be placed in their contracts that will redound to the direct benefit for the child's education. Not one.

Read teachers contracts. If you find one positive item that states that they want some element or item added that will contribute to the direct, positive learning of the student, please let me know about it. It will be a FIRST.

Do you agree with this simple, but rational analysis?

Response to Don.

I do not agree. Teachers can choose to be a part of the union or not. If a person does not speak out against the problem they are not part of the solution. Cathy

"And if you are a teacher who belongs to the teachers union, thus helping to perpetuate with your dues their iron grip on the current system, you, too, are anti-education. " Charles Muth

District 300 budget doesn't factor in new teachers contract

2006-09-27T13:40:00.000-05:00

The following article appeared in the Daily Herald.

Wondering why District 300 pushed for passage of the referendum? The teacher's contract was up this past June. The teachers knew it and that is why they pressured the very children they educate to push their parents to pass the referendum. This referendum was about money for the teachers and school employees nothing more. The school board will pass a budget busting contract and the need for another referendum will arise in 3 to 5 years. The same Simpletons who supported this referendum will blindly support the next referendum. What will have occurred during this time period? School employees will benefit from larger paychecks, spending per pupil will increase while performance, graduation rates and drop out rates will remain essentially flight or decline. The cost of educating our children will grow. The tax burden passed on to our children will grow. While the public school employees aka our government employees are laughing all the way to the bank while retiring at 55 earning a pension greater than the average working stiff.

Why will this happen? Because parents blindly trust the system they leave their children in 9 months a year. If you really care about your children and their future do a little research instead of letting strangers raise your children.

The amount of money spent on education has little to do with the quality of education your child receives.

We often wonder why parents blindly throw money at a failing system. These are some of the conclusions we made.

1. Parents want to believe a system that is to educate their child will not waste their money and will properly educate their children.

2. Parents would prefer to have their children raised by the system instead of themselves.

3. Parents are apathetic and believe there is nothing they can do to fight the system but keep throwing money at the system.

4. Parents were not properly educated themselves and have no understanding of simple mathematics, finances, economics, logic and problems solving skills.

5. Parents voted yes out of guilt and pressure from the system that threatened their children.

6. Parents just do not care about the education of their children and their children's future.

If any of these reasons are why you will support or have supported a referendum. You are doing nothing for the future of your children. It is easy to vote yes. It is hard to vote no and fight for true reform of our education system.

District 300 budget doesn't factor in new teachers contract

9/26/2006

By Jeffrey Gaunt

Daily Herald

Community Unit District 300 now has a budget for the 2006-07 school year - sort of.

The school board Monday night approved a new budget with a $9.7 million surplus in the district's operating funds.

Assuming that number held up, district officials would be able to cut their budget deficit from $13.6 million last year to $3.9 million this year.

But that's not going to happen, district officials said.

The new budget doesn't take into account a new teachers contract, which district officials are still trying to negotiate with the teachers union.

Contract talks stalled earlier this month, leading both sides to call in a federal mediator to facilitate the negotiations.

Right now, the budget shows a nearly $9 million increase in teacher salaries this school year - from $80.8 million to $89.8 million.

But that number is likely low, chief financial officer Cheryl Crates said.

The $9 million increase includes only an estimate of the cost of new hires, yearly raises from added experience and education, and a 2 percent "fudge factor," Crates said.

It doesn't include the across-the-board raises that will come out of the negotiating sessions.

And officials budgeted only a $1.4 million increase in the cost of employee benefits.

"That will all be revised," Crates said.

Board members had to approve the budget before this month's state filing deadline, with or without a new contract.

But neither board members nor administrators discussed Monday what may happen to the district's bottom line as the district wraps up contract talks.

Board member Dave Alessio said only that the budget is a living document and subject to change.

"I imagine there will be changes throughout the rest of the year," Alessio said.

Time to remind our readers of an article that states what is truly wrong with our public education system.

NEA plans lower, not raise, education bar
Ruben Navarette, Jr.
San Diego Union Tribune

SAN DIEGO - After five years of trying to undermine the No Child Left Behind Act, the nation's largest teachers union has decided that it can live with the education reform law after all - as long as the legislation is gutted, its standards lowered and its accountability measures watered down.

Great. So we're making progress.

This month at its annual conference, the National Education Association voted to launch a nationwide campaign to lobby Congress to radically change NCLB when the law comes up for reauthorization next year. The goal behind the changes seems to be to wrest power away from government and put it back where the union thinks it belongs - with educators and those who represent them.

Call me cynical, but I never thought for a minute that the NEA was really concerned about, well, education. I never believed the organization was eager to find new ways to empower students or to hold schools accountable for the educational products they turn out.

I always assumed that the NEA was focused primarily on what any union tends to focus on - the interests of its members. And since the education establishment has been trained to believe that it is not in the interests of teachers to demand more from them or tie them to the performance of their students, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that groups such as the NEA have reacted with hostility to No Child Left Behind.

That's exactly what's been happening since 2001, when the law - perhaps the most significant domestic policy achievements of the Bush administration - took effect.

According to a recent report by Education Sector, a Washington-based think tank, the NEA has given more than $8 million to various education, civil rights and public policy groups that opposed or criticized No Child Left Behind. Lead researcher Joe Williams says that what the union did wasn't illegal, but it is clear that it "actively pursued partnerships" with groups intent on fighting NCLB. And questions remain about whether the funding that was given to some of these groups influenced the research some of these groups produced - research that was, to no one's surprise, critical of the education reform law.

Not that the law doesn't have its critics. When I hear from teachers, or even school board members - some of whom have accepted campaign contributions from the NEA and other teachers unions - I get an earful about how NCLB is single-handedly destroying the public education system due to its emphasis on testing, its punishing of underperforming schools and its one-size-fits-all approach.

And yet, knowing all that, it's still frightening to get a peek behind the curtain at the specifics of what the NEA, if it had its druthers, would do to make NCLB more palatable to its members - or at least, some of them, as the more hard-line members won't be satisfied unless the law is repealed.

Convinced that there is too much emphasis on regular testing, and that low-performing schools are being unfairly punished when students come up short, the union would prefer a broader-based accountability system that relies on "multiple measures of success." Whatever that means.

The union also is queasy about the requirement in No Child Left Behind that schools test students in math and reading and then report scores according to race, disability, English proficiency and economic background. The NEA instead wants benchmarks that take into account students' differing abilities and demographics. It seems that many educators are less than confident in the job they've done when it comes to teaching minorities, those with limited English proficiency and the economically disadvantaged, and they're not eager to broadcast their failures.

It's outrageous.

If these people get their way, the practical effect would be a lower bar for students of different racial, ethnic or economic backgrounds - and by extension, those who teach them. And they would do all this not for the good of students but for the professional welfare of those who are supposed to be teaching them and who have, for too long, been coming up short.

And why does the nation's largest teachers union want to make all these changes in No Child Left Behind?

It's so the truth does not come out about whom the public schools serve and whom they sacrifice.

Ruben Navarrette Jr. is a columnist and editorial board member of The San Diego Union Tribune.
ruben.navarrette@uniontribcom

Parents demand smaller class sizes

2006-09-26T20:51:00.000-05:00

The following article appeared on the Students First website. Students First did not attribute the source however Ms. Schory is a reporter for the Northwest Herald.

Why do parents in District 47 demand smaller class size? Who or what group said that smaller class size is an important issue? If district 47 parents did any research into the subject they would know this. It appears these parents believe the propaganda fed to them by a PR firm, the district and/or district employees (including the teachers). What do these people have in common? They would all benefit financially from class size reduction? Parents fall for the baloney thinking there kids will benefit when in fact they will not.

"The great masses of the people will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one."
Adolf Hitler

“Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it.”
Adolf Hitler

Kevin Craver one of the Northwest Herald's best reporters did a report on small class sizes which appeared in the May 2, 2004 edition of the Northwest Herald.

To research class size issues we suggest the following sources Politicizing Class Size by Casey J. Lartigue Jr.
and the class size series by Eric Hanushek of the Hoover Institute Stanford University.

Parents demand smaller class sizes
9/25/2006
By BRENDA SCHORY

CRYSTAL LAKE - With 30 or more students in their children's third-grade class at North Elementary School, some parents are demanding that District 47 do more to make the class sizes smaller.

"That's too many kids for one teacher," parent Lisa Van Bosch said. "They are not getting the education they deserve. I have every faith in the teachers, but common sense should tell you if there are 31 or 34 children in a class, those struggling would be left out."

Parents said it was not fair that their children were in classrooms that on average had six more students than other third-grade classrooms in the district. But school officials said they were under budget constraints and couldn't hire a new teacher, so aides would have to work with the children in the larger classrooms.

Two North third-grade classrooms have 31 students and three have 30. One with 31 students also soon will have three special-education students and their aide for half a day. The third grades in the district's other eight elementary schools average 24 students, officials said.

Superintendent Ronald Miller said the district had to consider the cost, as District 47 has a $724,000 deficit in its operating budget that officials were trying to contain by saving money and getting more revenue.

The five half-time aides in North's third grades cost $32,500 or about $6,500 each, Miller said.

Overall, the district spends nearly $180,000 on aides.

"We have reserves," Miller said. "Should we use those reserves now? It's a very difficult balance providing help to teachers and students and being fiscally responsible. It's a trade-off."

Donna Relic said her daughter started first grade at North in 2004 with 30 in the class.

"The overcrowding issues were glaringly apparent at that time," Relic said. "It is two years later and nothing has changed."

But Miller said the district has tinkered with boundaries and moved some students from North to Husman.

North has the largest enrollment among the district's elementary schools with 881 students. The others range from 462 at Canterbury to 830 at Glacier Ridge.

The problem is not confined to third grade. Miller said North also has 167 second-graders in six classrooms.

"This is not the first time we've had 30 students in a classroom," Miller said. "Our board recognizes the higher the class size, the more help a teacher needs. As with other schools in the past, our board believes at this time, it is best to address it with classroom aide service."

Teachers asking for outrageous hikes

2006-09-25T14:26:00.000-05:00

Teachers asking for outrageous hikes

Grant High School teachers have threatened to strike over wages and benefits (what else?), even though state records show increases averaging 35 percent for all employees who were employed there for the four-year period 2001 to 2004 (8 percent per year).

This latest teacher union outrage comes after the recent announcement by the Bureau of Labor Statistics that the average American worker saw his salary increase by 1 percent last year. This item was reported last month on the front page of the Daily Herald.

So teachers get 8 percent while taxpayers get 1 percent, and the teachers are so unhappy they want to strike.

And in Mount Prospect District 57, officials and parents are concerned with class size as they struggle with budget problems. District 57 employees have averaged 31 percent from 2001 to 2005.

If they had averaged, say, 15 percent instead, how many more teachers could have been hired thus lowering class size?

And it is not just schools either, as the Gurnee mayor complains about 6 percent increases for their employees, causing budget shortfalls in other areas.

The so-called budget problems in schools and cities are not lack of revenue it is large salary and benefit increases for public employees. Put public employee salary increases on the same basis as private employees and magically budget problems disappear.

How much longer are taxpayers going to allow this to go on? And how long will it be before school boards and city councils use these numbers, which are publicly available, to negotiate contracts?

It’s very simple: public employee salaries cannot increase faster than taxpayer’s salaries.

Bill Zettler
Mundelein

BBCHS Fight

2006-09-24T07:54:00.000-05:00

The following piece was sent to us by a fellow tax fighter and education reformist in Bourbonnais, IL.

BBCHS Fight!

It should be very clear by now that the fight against wasteful school spending and planning is going to be done against the power of the government and the Daily Journal.

BBCHS just sent out a full-color “illegal” mailing full of one-sided information to persuade you to vote for the referendums. Paid for by you!
The Journal is doing everything but going to school and failing because of overcrowding.

We must, as taxpayers look at this logically, not as misty-eyed “anything for the children” patsies.

BBCHS has increased its total tax take by 84.1% over the last 10 years. Enrollment has grown by 28%.

They could have economized, saved money and been ready to meet what they now call a crisis.

They pay a Gym Teacher $103,000 per year. They pay their business manager $121,000 per year. The business manager retired from the position is drawing about $100,000 per year retirement and was hired back.

That’s all money that could be used for the “children”!.

This is only a small example of waste and abuse of your money, which isn’t going into reading, math, english, science, computer skills, history, geography or any other real education.

Our kids are important to the future of this country.

Too important, to allow the School Board and Administrators of BBCHS to continue making a mess of the education system in our community.

Just one more point, these people that claim to be “so” interested in the welfare of our kids have negotiated some of the most secure jobs in the country.

Safe from firing once they receive tenure. They have great retirement benefits and salaries that rival the average attorneys, doctors, architects, engineers and others that have much higher levels of education.

Ron Hansen

Many fall tax-increase requests in question

2006-09-23T08:08:00.000-05:00

The following article appeared in the Daily Herald September 21, 2006. The follow up article below the first article appeared in the Daily Herald September 22 , 2006.

The best solution solution to the problem is to vote no on the referenda in question and to replace fiscally irresponsible school board members as soon as possible. Members of each community with referenda in question should go to the appropriate courts and ask the ballot questions be removed from the November 7th ballots.

Many fall tax-increase requests in question

Some referendums in November election won’t be giving correct cost estimates

By Jeffrey Gaunt and Catherine Edman
Daily Herald Staff Writers
Posted Thursday, September 21, 2006

Judges — not voters — may cast some of the deciding votes in the November election.

New revisions intended to close loopholes in the state’s property tax cap and make tax-increase costs clearer for voters have been misunderstood or erroneously communicated, and many ballot questions are now in doubt.

A Daily Herald review of 18 fall ballot questions found more than half the requests for tax-rate increases in the suburbs were worded incorrectly.

An attorney with the Illinois State Board of Elections said Wednesday his office has been fielding calls from around the state about ballot errors that may invalidate many fall requests for tax-rate increases.

Tens of millions of taxpayer dollars are at stake.

“I can see a judicial challenge as to whether the questions can be put in place after the election,” said Steve Sturm, the state election board’s legal counsel. “It will be up to a judge, or perhaps a series of judges.”

State lawmakers rewrote the tax cap law to ensure voters knew the true cost of tax-increase requests. But different interpretations of the revised law mean voters in many taxing districts still won’t have accurate information on the ballot when they head to the polls.

Several ballot questions could face legal challenges this year, including:
•A $1.35 rate-increase request in Big Hollow District 38.
•A 38-cent rate-increase request in Lincolnshire-Prairieview District 103.
•An 85-cent rate-increase request in East Aurora District 131.
•A 20-cent rate-increase request in the Bartlett Fire Protection District.
•And a 13-cent rate-increase request in the Roselle Fire Protection District.

In all five cases, the cost estimates printed on the ballot — as now required by law — are calculated differently than the method used by Chapman and Cutler partner Dan Johnson, who drafted the legislation.

The worst difference the errors would make to owners of $100,000 homes is $500 over four years, in the East Aurora school district case.

Chapman and Cutler is one of the largest law firms in Illinois serving public bodies on tax and finance issues.
Johnson didn’t review the calculations used in those specific cases. But he did say that if the calculations are different, it won’t necessarily invalidate the ballot questions.

“I’m not the law,” Johnson said. “But I’m not sure a $60 difference, that wasn’t intentional, is the sort of thing that invalidates the proposition.

“That’s not to say it’s right,” he said. “Any new law that is highly technical in its nature can lead to different interpretations, without anyone intending to mislead anyone.”

Despite the confusion, advocates of the legislation say when applied correctly, the revisions should still serve to better inform voters and reduce or eliminate the hidden costs of tax-rate increases.

“Any new law will require some back and forth in the implementation to make sure that we get it right,” said state Sen. Don Harmon, an Oak Park Democrat who sponsored the legislation with state Rep. Mike Tryon, a Crystal Lake Republican.

“I’m glad that we’re fighting over how best to disclose information to voters, rather than whether to disclose key information to the voters at all.”

A summer seminar on the new ballot measures — led by Chapman and Cutler’s Lynda Given and Lake County Director of Tax Extension Wayne Wasylko — serves as an example of how problems developed.

Officials in Lincolnshire-Prairie View Elementary District 103 attended the seminar to learn about the revamped law and how districts should word their fall ballot questions.

District 103 Superintendent Larry Fleming said it was there he was given a detailed packet of information explaining the data and calculations needed to word ballot questions.

But Wasylko said Wednesday those packets, prepared by Chapman and Cutler, were wrong, although he didn’t find out until later when he saw ballot questions from other school districts.
Fleming didn’t find out at all until asked about the ballot wording this week by the Daily Herald.

“What I find interesting is that my business manager and I, and our law firm — each of us in separate training by Chapman and Cutler — got the same information,” Fleming said.

In a prepared statement Wednesday, Chapman and Cutler defended their handling of tax cap law changes.

“Chapman and Cutler is confident that every taxing district that has sought our direct advice on their specific ballot proposition has been provided a consistent and accurate interpretation of the law,” the firm said.

Either way, District 103 officials said they’ll now need to explain to taxpayers why the ballot question doesn’t necessarily mean what it says.

And that obviously presents its own set of challenges, Fleming said.

“I think it’s up to us to describe it,” he said.

Voters’ ballots to stay wrong
Clerk says incorrect wording on tax hikes can’t be stopped
By Lee Filas and Bob Susnjara
Daily Herald Staff Writers
Posted Friday, September 22, 2006

Lake County Clerk Willard Helander said incorrectly worded tax-rate increase questions will remain on the Nov. 7 ballot, despite calls for their removal.

Helander said unless a judge issues an injunction, voters will have to decide whether to support tax increase requests in Big Hollow Elementary District 38 and Lincolnshire-Prairie View Elementary District 103.

“We have no authority to stop the ballots,” she said. “The ballots are printed and we are starting absentee voting, so short of a judge telling me to (remove the questions), we don’t have the authority to do it.”

At issue are legislative revisions intended to close loopholes in the state property tax cap referendum law and clarify costs to voters. But different interpretations of that law caused incorrect formulas to be released to school districts before filing referendum questions with the Lake County Clerk.

The formula was later clarified by Chapman and Cutler, the law firm that helped write the legislation, but not in time to prevent districts from listing incorrect cost figures in their ballot questions.

Chapman and Cutler is one of Illinois’ largest law firms serving public bodies on tax and finance issues.
Attorneys at the state board of elections speculate that should incorrectly worded questions pass, they could be challenged in court and possibly overturned.

Political activist Jack Martin of Libertyville, who’s fighting tax hike proposals in districts 38 and 103, said Helander
shouldn’t allow erroneous ballots to go before voters in November if she is aware of problems now.

“I’m surprised,” said Martin, who heads Taxpayers for Good Government. “Who’s at fault? Who made the mistake? The individual school districts?”

Among the incorrectly worded questions in Lake County are those on the ballot in districts 38 and 103.

Mundelein High School District 120 has a 24-cent tax-rate increase on the ballot, but that question is worded correctly, officials said.

District 38 is asking voters to approve a tax-rate increase of $1.35 per $100 of equalized assessed valuation. According to the ballot, the owner of a $100,000 home would see an increase of $450 in the first year, if approved.

But wording that follows is incorrect. It states the owner of the same home, who receives an average 6.1 percent increase in market value, would pay increases of $477 in 2007, $506 in 2008 and $537 in 2009.

The corrected calculations show that the homeowner would see the tax rise $514 in 2007, $582 in 2008 and $655 in 2009.

District 38 Superintendent Ron Pazanin and board President Vicki Gallechio did not return phone calls Thursday.

The same situation occurred at District 103.

That ballot question states the district wants a 38-cent tax-rate increase. In the first year, the owner of a $100,000 home would — correctly — see an increase of $127.

But the question states the owner of the same home with a 5.2 percent increase in home values would see their property taxes rise $133 in 2007, $140 in 2008 and $148 in 2009. The correct figures should be $163 in 2007, $201 in 2008 and $241 in 2009.

Helander said dollar totals on the ballots should not be considered etched in stone, especially three years down the road.

“If you talk about the approximate impact on future years, those are nothing but educated guesses anyway,” she said.
“It’s just there for an example. It’s all guestimated.”

District 103 Superintendent Larry Fleming said he believes the referendum figures were correct as of Thursday, and the issue will be studied further.

Larry Rivkin, co-chairman of the pro-tax increase group Residents to Preserve 103, said he’s confident all will be OK by Election Day.

“This is obviously a new (referendum) law and very complicated,” Rivkin said, “and people will need to work through it.”

A Sad Day In Illinois

2006-09-22T13:25:00.000-05:00

To all of my Friends, Family and Neighbors in Illinois,

Today is a sad day for those of us who live in Illinois. Today is the day that Judge Lois Bell made me lose my faith in the judicial system in our state. She took an overwhelming case, with legal implications that effect Billions of YOUR state tax money, and she dismissed it. Why, you ask? She dismissed it because, she said, we waited to long. We waited to long, to seek justice. She said we did nothing for the last 40+ months. If she had only looked at the facts, at the evidence that we presented, she would have seen that we didn't wait. Jeff Ferguson started this battle over 40 months ago. More than 40 months of contacting state, federal and local agencies that all fell upon deaf ears. He had to spend months doing this, because he had to wait for replies that he was told he would get. He didn't get any replies though, all he got was silence. A silence that shouted, YOU DON'T MATTER! That is what our government thinks of us. All we are to them is a tax bill and a vote. If you don't vote, they will still get your taxes and you will have NO say in what they do with them. In Jersey County, though, the voters said NO. They said it to the tune of a 71% (NO) to 29%(YES) vote. The voters should have had their say that day, but they were denied. The school district sought to acquire Fire Prevention and Safety Bonds to repair our old high school, at least that is what they said they were going to do. Instead, they took that money and used it to get matching state grant money and built 2 new schools. One of which that wasn't even voted on. After all, they were going to go against the will of the voters on one schools, so why even give them an opinion on the other. Hundreds of other schools in this state were build against the will of the voters and it seems that they had it down to a science. Not only does it not matter if you say NO, it doesn't matter if you take it to court, as they will use their corrupt system to beat you down. All I can say is this, do all of you out there in Illinois want to pay for the GREED of a few? Do you like paying taxes toward projects you didn't approve, or didn't even take place in your county?

Folks, I don't need to go into detail. The details are on our website, as they always have been. So this time, when you get this email, don't ignore it. Don't go back to watching this evening's TV shows. If you ignore someone stealing from you, they won't ever stop. They will come up with new ways to take your money and hide it in tax bills, bond issues and other legislation, that you know nothing about. This is all because they know that you are busy living your own life. All I am asking, is that you take a few minutes and find out what they are doing behind your backs. This issue effects the WHOLE state, because the MATCHING GRANT MONEY that ALL of those school construction projects received, is paid by the WHOLE STATE. So, when our school district sold bonds for schools we didn't want, you helped buy them.

This is not some cheesy chain letter that you get every day. This is a WARNING. This is something you need to pass onto anyone , that you know, that lives in this state. If you hit the delete key, they win again. How many times should we let them win before we've had enough? How many times will you let them take money out of your pocket that you could have used for your children's future?

I'm asking you to forward this on to everyone. If you know someone that doesn't have the Internet, get out an envelope and a stamp and mail it to them. Go to our website ( www.jccfpa.org ) and see for yourself what they have done. Additionally, I have attached a copy of a letter written by Jeff Ferguson, this evening, after our case was dismissed today in court. A copy of the email I received from him is also pasted below. Jeff has given countless hours to fight a cause you may not have known even existed. He has sacrificed personally and financially to do this. If you want to help, send the CFPA a small donation. Anything helps and your support goes a long way to keep things like this from happening again. We plan to appeal the judges ruling, such as it was, but we need your support. Though we appreciate all the thanks and praise and "good luck" we've received, but it doesn't help pay the legal fees necessary to fight this cause. If you have questions, please email me with them and I'll do my best to answer them.

Please send all donations to:
Coalition for Public Awareness
P.O. Box 177
Jerseyville, IL. 62052
All requests to remain anonymous will be honored.

Warmest Regards,

--
Keith Steinacher

Hi all,
Well, we've been passed around the ENTIRE system now. I had hoped and prayed that Judge Lois Bell would allow this suit to move forward, but as we all saw today, there is no justice for the taxpayers at any level. I have written my thoughts as I ponder next steps and have attached the resulting letter. I do not blame anyone who wants to give up at this point but I would encourage you not to. To do so would be to admit defeat and to invite our elected officials to walk all over us anytime they desire. I am too deep into this to stop now and I will continue to pursue it through any avenues I can find. Frank will work up an estimate on what he anticipates it will cost to appeal and we can make a decision at that time if the "justice" system is our best way to move forward. At this point in time, I don't see that we have any option but to continue with the "legal" process, regardless of how flawed it obviously is. Please distribute this letter to everyone you know and ask that they forward it with a vengeance. WE MUST LET PEOPLE KNOW WHAT THE JUSTICE SYSTEM DID TO US TODAY!!!

Jeff

Bob Shelstrom's Guest Column to the Daily Southtown

2006-09-21T08:02:00.000-05:00

Guest Column September 14, 2007

RE: Response to “Rising School Fees Tax Bills Stem from States Failure to Act”/”School Funding Mess Main Cause of Big Property Tax Hikes”

The Southtown’s recent editorials blaming “The State” for high student fees and taxes clearly missed the real problem.

High taxes and fees are due more to school system “greed” than student “need”.

Consider the fees in High School District 230..

Last year, District 230 had a budget SURPLUS of about $3.5 million, yet still burdened parents with minimum fees of $286 per student, among the highest in the Southland.

Such high fees clearly were not needed to fund the students’ educational costs, but it was in the staff’s interest to save the money for future raises.

Guess who won?

Perhaps the biggest abuse of fees this year is in Palatine High School District 211.

The Palatine Superintendent claims a whopping $44.5 million surplus this year..

They still charge students a minimum $140 fee for enrollment, among other high "use" fees.

High real estate taxes also are often due to student unfriendly decisions by school boards, not "inadequate state funding".

Thornton High School District 205 illustrates this point well.

Thornton 205 has among the highest tax rates in the state.

Its operating expenses are over $12,000 per student. This is about $4,000 more than Lincoln Way District 210, a district known for providing quality education at fair cost.

Average teacher salaries in Thornton are about $81,000 for nine months work, around $25,000 above state average. By comparison, the average civil engineer in the Chicago area makes only about $67,000 for 12 months work.

Over 100 of the Thornton staff had six figure annual compensation according to recent Teacher Retirement System data. The highest paid teacher in Thornton made over $137,000.

With such highly paid teachers and staff, and spending 50% higher than the top high school district in the Southland, Thornton students should be extremely successful, right?

Wrong.

Report Cards show that Thornton students meet or exceed state overall testing requirements at less than 40% of the state average, despite having the same percentage of low income students.

It was the Thornton school board that decided paying teachers $25,000 above state average was more important than providing the courses, extracurriculars, and tutoring necessary for student success, not the state.

It was District 230 President Dennis Cook and the school board that decided creating a surplus for future raises and “pork” spending was more important than fair fees, not the state.

I won’t dispute the fact that our school funding from Springfield is unfair.

Roundout District 72 in the North Suburbs spends over $24,000 per student each year from local funding. This is about triple the state average. Despite this local “overfunding”, Roundout still receives over $600 per student in state aid.

Property rich Palatine Elementary District 15, which spends around $10,000 per student, receives about $1,100 per student in state aid.

I believe it is unconscionable that taxpayers in Harvey, Matteson, and Robbins are subsidizing Palatine and Roundout with their state income tax dollars, while their own school taxes and fees are oppressively high.

Raising income taxes, while increasing unnecessary aid to the “rich” schools, will only make this unfairness worse.

There are many things Springfield can do to reduce property taxes and student fees without raising income taxes.

It could prohibit fees and truly protect “free’ public education for families.

It could address funding inequity by improving “means testing” in the state formula without raising taxes. We can take care of the underfunded schools, special education needs, and disadvantaged students before distributing state funds to the wealthy.

Springfield can abolish the costly “early retirement” benefits and “end of career” raises which are bankrupting our pension system and creating school budget deficits.

They could also standardize and cap school salaries and benefits, which make up about 80% of school spending.

In the end, however, only parents and taxpayers can protect themselves from excessive taxes and fees regardless of what's done in Springfield .

Study your school report cards (www.isbe.net) and hold your board accountable for excessive and “student unfriendly” spending.

Check your school staff pay at www.thechampion.org. You’ll be amazed how much many districts can afford to pay staff while the students’ programs are being threatened.

Vote in school Board elections and find out which candidates are for the students and taxpayers, and which ones have the Big Ed “network” as their priority.

Better yet, run for the school Board. It only takes fifty petition signatures, some time, a little money, and really thick skin if you criticize school spending or performance.

Remember, the greatest fear of those abusing taxpayers and parents in the “Big Ed” bureaucracy is a well informed and active community.

Student need will only beat Big Ed greed when parents and taxpayers diligently work together to make student success our schools’ top priority.

Bob Shelstrom

Bob Shelstrom is a former High School and College Math and Science Teacher and a Professional Engineer, and has three children in Southland public schools. He may be reached at southlandedwatch@yahoo.com.

School Choice: 2006 Progress Report

2006-09-20T15:17:00.000-05:00

The following is from the Heritage Foundation's 2006 Progress Report for school choice. Be sure to visit the Heritage Foundation's website to read the full report.

School Choice: 2006 Progress Report
by Dan Lips and Evan Feinberg
Backgrounder #1970

September 18, 2006

Reforms that give parents greater ability to choose their children’s schools continue to expand across the nation. Just a decade ago, only a few school choice programs existed. Today, a dozen states and the District of Columbia have private school choice programs. In 2006, eight states— Arizona, Florida, Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Utah, and Wisconsin—enacted new school choice programs or expanded existing programs. By 2007, as many as 150,000 students will be par?ticipating in publicly funded tuition scholarship programs.[1]

N.Y. School Official Sentenced for Theft

2006-09-19T12:40:00.000-05:00

By FRANK ELTMAN
Associated Press Writer

MINEOLA, N.Y. (AP) - One of two administrators behind the theft of as much as $11 million from a school district was sentenced Tuesday to up to 9 years in prison.

To view the rest of the story go to the Federal News Radio website or read a series on the topic on The New York Times website.

Class Size Reduction... the Detroit Way

2006-09-18T12:27:00.000-05:00

The following piece appears on the Education Intelligence Agency website. Be sure to visit the EIA website to view the links. Another example of the greed of our public school employees.

Class Size Reduction... the Detroit Way

Detroit school officials are in a panic because next Wednesday is the day the state counts the number of students enrolled to determine the amount of state funding each district gets. And, due to the illegal 16-day teachers' strike, enrollment is roughly 25,000 students below projections.

It's a measure of just how much of a mess Detroit is in that people can't decide whether this is actually true, or a manipulation of the numbers by various players in order to apply political pressure.

Daniel Howes of the Detroit News nails it with his assessment. After noting that since 1994, Detroit's enrollment dropped 23 percent, but its per-pupil revenue increased 94 percent, Howes spells it out for everyone involved:

"No work means fewer students. Fewer students beget less money. Less money
promises fewer jobs. Those are pretty powerful economics, which overwhelm all
the picket signs, finger-pointing and administrative begging now under way, just
days from the dreaded 'count day' that determines state funding."
UPDATE: Something is rotten in the state of Michigan. Where did the 25,000 students go?

We will be away until September 18th.

2006-09-10T14:54:00.000-05:00

While we are gone we suggest the following sites for your reading pleasure.

The Champion

Education Matters

The Illinois Loop

McHenry County Blog

Heartland Institute.

Illinois Policy Institute

New hire goal to make D300 accountable

2006-09-10T09:35:00.000-05:00

The following article appeared in the Courier News Newspaper
My husband and I have been fighting for education spending reform for almost four years. Over this time I learned to read newspaper articles and quotes within newspapers with more skepticism. I have learned that there is probably a lot more behind the story. A half hour conversation with reporters has more often than not been boiled down to one or two lines. The reporters usually choose to report on my minor points instead of my major concerns or points. I have come to know why so many others just do not want to talk to reporters.

Some points that I made to Miss Hovanec that were not reported were the following.
Government monopolies such as schools do not need public relations persons as it is not a matter of choice for parents and students as to where they send their children unless they are wealthy. School's primary goal is to educate students. If schools were educating students properly and spending tax dollars wisely there would be no need for public relations persons for schools. What more proof does someone need that Allison Smith was biased toward District 300 than that they hired Allison Smith as their publication relations person.

In the article below Ms. Smith said "Superintendent Arndt said he chose me because he wants me to play devil's advocate with the district, " If Mr. Arndt were truly looking for someone to play devil's advocate he should have hired a vocal critique and not someone who wrote fluff pieces like "Monkey business afoot in D-300 " which appeared in the August 11, 2006 edition of the Northwest Herald. This was a fluff piece that was better suited for the Sneed column in the Chicago Sun Times.

New hire goal to make D300 accountable

By Jeanne Hovanec
STAFF WRITER

CARPENTERSVILLE — Two shootings were reported in the village Monday and the first instance prompted a 40-minute lock-down at three local schools.

It was a heck of a first day for Community Unit School District 300's new communications specialist, Allison Smith.

Smith says crises and shootings are nothing new to her. The former education reporter for the Northwest Herald worked on the police beat when she started her profession at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel for a year and a half after graduating from journalism school at the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.

"It was a great first day because everyone was safe," Smith said. "Being on the police beat made me a better listener and more compassionate. You have to be good under pressure."

But the pressure continues for the Texas native who is housing pages of future projects on her desk and whose name is no stranger to local blogging sites.

Pushing communications

Although she has finished only one week of work, and only a four-day week at that, Smith has projects in the works to elevate District 300's ability to communicate both internally and externally.
She already has began working with District 300's webmaster to give its Web site an overhaul both aesthetically and in the information provided. She hopes to be able to post press releases online to keep the public up to date with District 300 matters.

In addition, Smith plans to start polls on the Web site to help gage the public's opinion of the district. One example of a possible topic of a poll question would be if people feel the district is living up to its promises about a $185 million bond referendum that voters passed in March.

"I don't feel like I have a huge mountain to climb," Smith said. "I have a trust to maintain. Right now the status between the district and the public is positive and I have two tools to maintain that: making the district accountable for its promises and being honest."

Has critics, supporters

But that might be difficult for Smith who already is being scrutinized for her attention to District 300 while she worked as an education reporter for the Northwest Herald. Cathy Peschke, spokeswoman for Citizens for Reasonable and Fair Taxes, criticized Smith for the way she covered the referendum last year for the newspaper. Peschke says Smith "bent over backwards to defend the school district" and labeled Peschke's group as an anti-referendum group when the group had told her it was a taxpayer advocacy group. She says the mislabel, "clearly showed she was biased toward our view."
Smith is not shocked by the attention and says she would be disappointed if people did not voice their complaints.

"I have never shied away from alternate viewpoints of the district," Smith said. "At the time, opponents of D300 cheered and thanked me for the research. I encourage them to recall my efforts and know that I will keep questioning D300."

Cal Skinner, who contributes on the Web site, McHenry County Blog, agrees with Smith that figures used during the referendum campaign were correct and found her stories helpful when blogging.

"I found one of her articles prior to the campaign very revealing," he said. "I am delighted with how she covered it."

And in the end, it is those researching and critical thinking skills that contributed to her getting hired for the position in the first place, Smith says.

"Superintendent Arndt said he chose me because he wants me to play devil's advocate with the district," she said. "If I didn't know that coming in here, I would have been destined to fail. I want to keep D300 accountable."

09/10/06

Hold elected officials accountable for poor public school outcomes

2006-09-09T07:12:00.000-05:00

The following letter to the editor appeared in the Courier News Newspaper on 9/9/06.

Hold elected officials accountable for poor public school outcomes

A recently released research paper shows that out of every 100 Chicago public school freshmen, only six will earn a bachelor's degree — the certificate to a middle-class lifestyle.
When only six out of 100 Chicago students graduate from a four-year college, it means 94 percent of city school children are doomed to low-paying, low-status prospects in a changing world economy that will be driven by highly-skilled, professional jobs.

This is outrageous and unacceptable. All of our elected officials should be held accountable for this systemic failure.

In this election year, Illinois voters must demand that candidates commit to a necessary part of the solution: fixing our unfair, broken system of funding public schools based on local property taxes. Without this reform, far too many kids across Illinois will continue to struggle to learn in schools with huge class sizes, outdated textbooks and materials, and few college-bound course options.

Sadly, they won't get a second chance to repeat their school years, and neither should state leaders who fail to push for comprehensive reform have a second chance to repeat their sorry performances.

Anthony Ryan

Bartlett

Educrats Spin Poll

2006-09-08T16:10:00.000-05:00

The following piece appeared on the Campus Report Online website.

Educrats Spin Poll
by: Malcolm A. Kline, August 24, 2006

The Gallup poll released on Tuesday will probably be promoted by public school officials as evidence that they are doing a great job but the survey requires close examination.

“In contrast to the public’s pessimistic view of [No Child Left Behind] NCLB, the poll finds strong support for the public schools,” according to Phi Delta Kappa International. PDK conducted the poll in conjunction with the Gallup organization.

Clearly, the poll takers harbored an animus towards NCLB. Thus, it came as something of a surprise when PDK executive director Lowell Rose admitted, “Test scores have gone up and I credit NCLB and they have gone up among blacks and Hispanics.”

Actually, one of the poll questions was, “Let’s say that large numbers of public schools fail to meet the requirements established by the NCLB law. In your opinion, which would be more to blame for this—the public schools themselves or the NCLB law?”

Nearly half—48 percent—blamed the public schools while less than half—41 percent—blamed the law itself. Nonetheless, Dr. Rose concluded that, “The public holds schools blameless.”

To read the rest of the article and learn more about Campus Report Online click here.

California class size reduction. Great expenditure with minimal to no improvement in outcomes.

2006-09-07T17:53:00.000-05:00

The following piece appears on the Education Intelligence Agency website.

California Redoubles Its Efforts. George Santayana once famously wrote: "Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim."

Fix your gaze upon this story from the Sacramento Bee, concerning the $2.9 billion deal to reduce class sizes in additional grades at California's 500 lowest performing schools. The legislature passed a law in 1996 lowering K-3 class sizes to a maximum of 20. While the article goes further than most by suggesting "the jury's still out" on across-the-board class size reduction, it seems 10 years of data should be sufficient to judge whether the tens of billions of dollars Californians have dropped into the well are making our wishes come true.

In 1998, before 4th-graders had the benefit of smaller classes, California's 4th-graders ranked ahead of only those in Hawaii and Louisiana in reading (NAEP test). The benchmark for math is 1996, where California's 4th-graders finished ahead of those in Mississippi and tied with those in Louisiana.

In 2005, California's 4th-graders beat out Mississippi in reading. Hawaii and Louisiana passed us. The brightest picture is 4th-grade math. California finished ahead of Alabama, Mississippi and New Mexico, and tied with Louisiana and Nevada.

What's worse is that we have had class size reduction for so long, we can now compare the NAEP scores of 8th-graders under the old class sizes with 8th-graders who experienced four years of 20-student classes. They are virtually indistinguishable.

Everyone loves class size reduction. Parents love it. Politicians love it. Teachers love it. And unions especially love it (the new bill will mean up to 3,000 new CTA members). We all love ice cream, too. But we shouldn't pretend it's the best use of our money.

To view more stories on the Education Intelligence Agency website click here.

D-50 board approves teachers' contract

2006-09-06T08:20:00.000-05:00

The below letter was written to the reporter in response to her District 50 article in the Northwest Herald.

Dear Jenn,

Without having seen the contract, let me make two surmises.

First, the Contract is not a 34 year contract. It will in fact be superseded by others which will increase the base salary for entry level teachers and make other adjustments up the longevity ladder. Experienced teachers would come into the system with credit for years teaching at other schools. Regarding this, it may be the first push towards an industry wide (as opposed to a factory) wage scale.

Second, the published information makes no reference to the other source of increasing salaries, commonly found in most contracts: the educational attainment part of the matrix. Credit is given and wages increased if the teacher goes back to school (evenings and summers). Usually it is increments of fifteen hours of credited additional schooling -- one semester worth. Unfortunately for the students most teachers do not take subject matter courses -- they do not, for instance, have a math degree, they are only certified to teach math. They are not qualified to take graduate level courses in the subject they teach. Some do, some have. but their numbers are quite small. So raises flow naturally through the medium of education courses.

It is the combination of longevity raises and education rewards that turn a three percent contractual raise into an actual eight percent increase in the budget.

It is important that all education reporters, all parents and all taxpayers understand this.

pete speer

D-50 board approves teachers' contract

[published on Wed, Sep 6, 2006]
HARVARD – The District 50 school board approved a base teacher salary increase of almost 11 percent at a meeting Tuesday and revamped the schedule by which raises are granted for longevity and education.

According to a joint statement from the school board and the teachers union, the Harvard Education Association, the changes were made "to help in recruitment and retention of quality teachers."

The board increased the base teacher salary to $32,000 this year and $32,500 next year from $28,860. It also changed the set salary increases for years of service and additional education from a percentage to a flat dollar amount, eliminating the compounding that gave teachers high on the pay scale larger increases each year while the teachers nearer to the base salary had comparatively small increases, school board President Ken Book said.

"In the long run, the flat-salary schedule will benefit the district and the teachers," said Book, who abstained from the 5-0 vote to approve the contract because his wife is an employee of the district. Board member Diana Bird was absent.

Mary Cooke, president of the union, said she was pleased with the contract. Going to a flat-salary schedule was necessary to accomplish the teachers' other goals, she said.

"In order to really raise our base salary, with the compounded salary schedule it became too costly," Cooke said.

Teachers also will be able to receive longevity raises for up to 34 years in the district under the new contract. Until now, their salaries topped out at 17 years.

No cuts to other education fund expenditures were made to fund the salary increases, Book said.

"We're dead on for what we had budgeted," he said.

By JENN WIANT

jwiant@nwherald.com

Can we assume since they are dead on for what they budgeted that a referendum will not be needed? Probably not, a referendum will probably be likely come next spring or within the next year because the board will have underestimated the impact of the new contract. The excuse will be growth. But growth with fiscally responsible budgets and good planning can pay for itself. Let us hope Mr. Book does not let the community down.

According to a joint statement the board and the union said the contract will ".. help in recruitment and retention of quality teachers." However this does nothing to get rid of underperforming teachers protected by tenure.

Parents to launch campaign for support of referendum

2006-09-05T12:21:00.000-05:00

The story at the end of this post appeared in the Northwest Herald and on the Students First Website. Parents who oppose this referendum must step up to the plate and start fighting this referendum now. The tactics that were used recently in Carepentersville-District 300, Huntely-District 158 and McHenry-District 15 will certainly be used to pass this referendum in Riley District 18. Ward states below "And we are being very aggressive." You can count on this. Expect literature to be sent home with your children threatening increased class sizes and program cuts, letters to the editors from teachers and their relatives, letters from children pleading emotionally for passage of the referendum, a door to door campaign by children who do not know better, announcements during school hours and encouragement from your child's teacher to encourage you to vote yes for this referendum. At the polls people from the school will check to see if you voted, if you have not voted expect a phone call on election day.

If this referendum truly had merit an "aggressive" push would not be needed. Passage of the referendum would occur on merit alone. Passage of the referendum will not ensure lower fees, reduced class sizes, improved educational outcomes but it will benefit the pocketbooks of the very people who educate your children. It will also ensure the same tactics and even larger tax burdens on your children when they are adults. Is that the kind of future you want to leave your children? Throwing more dollars at a corrupt system that refuses to spend only the revenues received ensures the perpetuation of the broken system.

We suggest parents read John Stossel's report titled Stupid in America

Three books we recommend include "Angry Parents, Failing Schools: What's Wrong With the Public Schools & What You Can Do About It" by Dr. Elaine McEwan, "Education Myths: What Special-Interest Groups Want You to Believe About Our Schools and Why it Isn't So" by Jay P. Greene, and "Cheating Our Kids: How Politics and Greed Ruin Education" by Joe Williams.

There is one or two things the voters of Marengo can count on, passage of this referendum without vocal parental opposition and excessive salary increases if this referendum passes.

Parents to launch campaign for support of referendum
9/5/2006
By Brenda Schory

Northwest Herald

MARENGO - With barely two months to shape up a vote "yes" campaign for Riley School District 18, Lori Ward has high hopes that the public will support her cause.

"We have our committees organized. We're getting all our ducks in a row," said Ward, who co-chairs three committees and serves on a fourth. "We have about 10 weeks. And we are being very aggressive."

Riley school officials are asking voters for a 43-cent rate increase on the Nov. 7 ballot. The financially troubled district has a debt of $1 million, 40 percent of its $2.5 million operating budget.

More than program cuts or larger classrooms are at stake: State school officials warned the district that if it does not cut its spending or bring in more revenue, the state could take over running the district.

For Ward, who has one child who has graduated and another still in the one-school district, every effort counts.

"We want the public to be informed," Ward said.

"We're calling it the 'Save Our School' campaign. We're going to start pounding the pavement."

Ward co-chairs committees for printed information, canvassing neighborhoods, and telephone canvassing. She serves on the signs and public messages committee.

Board member Donna Wardzala said having parents take the lead instead of the school board might make all the difference in getting it passed.

Wardzala served as chairwoman of three previous referendum efforts, all of which failed.

"We did not have a parent group to go out and get the message out, and I think we have that now," Wardzala said.

The Camel’s Nose Of School Choice.

2006-09-04T14:11:00.000-05:00

Our friend Ralf Seiffe sent us the following piece which is posted on the Illinois Reveiw Website.

The Camel’s Nose Of School Choice.

By Ralf Seiffe

Ever since I installed a TIVO on the television, I’ve been vaccinated against television advertising. Except for the old car shows that feature ads for carburetors and automobile tools that interest me, I have not watched general interest advertising for some time. Over the weekend, however, my ten-year old controlled the remote and I’m glad he did because he hasn’t yet figured out how to zip through the advertising clutter. As a consequence, we saw two important commercials. One illustrated the least common denominator approach to public policy while the other showed a path to school choice. The way to reform the schools is beginning to take form and for supporters of free markets, the news is good.

To view the full piece visit the Illinois Reveiw Website.

A bold plan to set black boys up for success

2006-09-03T07:00:00.000-05:00

The following article appeared in the The Chicago Sun Times. The Chicago Public Education System is failing this population. Choice is an excellent step to improve the future of this group and all groups. All parents should have the right to choose the best education opportunity for their child that will ensure success and a productive adult life.

A bold plan to set black boys up for success

September 3, 2006

BY KATE N. GROSSMAN Education Reporter

One hundred forty black high school boys, sharply dressed in polo shirts and khakis, stood silently in five long lines in an auditorium in West Englewood on a recent Tuesday.

It was the final week of summer school for the new Urban Prep Charter Academy, the city's first all-boys public high school in 35 years. The school officially opens Tuesday.

"There's a vibe, a feeling in this room -- some of you are losing focus!" bellowed Ben Blakeley, one of three Urban Prep administrators leading the school's daily "community'' meeting in the auditorium. "When we lose focus, something bad happens, we stray off our path!"

Their misdeeds?

Three came late. A few forgot their belts. A handful stared into space.

In many schools, those infractions might go unnoticed.

Goal is 5 schools

Not so at Urban Prep, one of 14 new schools opening this fall as part of Renaissance 2010, the city's controversial plan to close and re-create its most troubled public schools, including Englewood High, which Urban Prep is replacing. When Englewood's phaseout began in 2005, just 16 percent of its juniors read at grade level.

As an antidote, Urban Prep's founders opted for something radically different. They've designed a school they believe will work for boys, particularly black boys, who have only a one-in-four chance of graduating from a Chicago public school. They're starting with 160 freshmen on one campus. They hope eventually to open five all-boys schools.

Tim King, the school's president and driving force, says research suggests boys learn better under conditions of stress. So he and his 17 teachers and administrators -- including 15 African-American males -- are ladling it on.

The students will face a rigorous college prep curriculum taught in an in-your-face, Socratic style, with double periods of English, an eight-hour school day and required after-school activities, community service and internships. They're already greeting teachers with handshakes. Starting Tuesday, they will wear red ties and black blazers.

The idea is to create a sense of community and brotherhood and give the boys enough support so they know their teachers truly want them to succeed.

'There's no power struggles'

So far, they are lapping it up.

"I came because I felt they were going to make me work for my education," said Andre Young, a freshman from Englewood. "Here, you feel like you're someone important."

Nearly all of the freshmen showed up for summer school at Lindblom High, where Urban Prep will be this year while nearby Englewood High is renovated. For three weeks, boys took standardized tests, read silently for 25 minutes daily and were drilled on school rules. They met in small discussion groups daily.

Many were uneasy about a single-sex school but were starting to see the big picture.

"I don't want to be around all boys, but I came because they said it would prepare me to be a man and go to college,' said Melvin Brown, who lives in Chatham.

Even the teachers were floored by how quickly the boys fell in line.

"There's no power struggles -- and I've seen different," said Chezare Warren, who taught eighth grade at a North Lawndale school last year. When he took on that class in December, five teachers had already left in frustration

Residents skeptical

The Urban Prep boys graduated from 52 elementary schools, including parochial ones, but about 70 percent live in Englewood.

When King proposed his idea to people in Englewood, some thought his design team -- a group of well-dressed, well-educated African Americans -- couldn't relate to poor kids from Englewood. At a community forum last fall, several people asked pointed questions suggesting the team was underestimating the intense social problems some Englewood kids might face.

King, an easygoing 39-year-old, is former president of Hales Franciscan, an all-boys Catholic High School on the South Side where most of the African-American families struggle financially. During his five years as president, 100 percent of each graduating class was admitted to college. He has been working on Urban Prep since 2002.

'We believe in them'

King says his staff is fully aware of the social problems his kids may face and is tackling that head-on with the highly structured day, an experienced staff and extra student supports, such as daily advisory sessions and school meetings, low student-to-staff ratios, access to teachers via cell phones and black role models.

"How can we not manage that?" said Eric Smith, an African-American English teacher. "For too long, we've said, 'Those kids,' but they were our kids, dead, in jail, working minimum-wage jobs. They're my babies, and we believe in them. It's idealistic but not so farfetched to believe we can set them up for success."

With three successful weeks of summer school behind him, King took a moment to enjoy the victory.

"We've got a group that has really bought into what we're selling," he said in late August.

But no one at Urban Prep is naive enough to think the battle is won.

"We have no illusions," King said. "We know it'll be incredibly difficult and challenging, but it's very encouraging to see the group taking steps to at least meet us halfway."

kgrossman@suntimes.com

Along with this story we suggest the book Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America--and What We Can Do About It by Juan Williams.

Here is one of the editorials that appears on the site.

Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
When Bill Cosby addressed a 50th-anniversary celebration of Brown v. Board of Education, he created a major controversy with seemingly inoffensive counsel ("begin with getting a high school education, not having children until one is twenty-one and married, working hard at any job, and being good parents"). Building from Cosby's speech, NPR/Fox journalist Williams offers his ballast to Cosby's position. Williams starts with the question, "Why are so many black Americans, people born inside the gates of American opportunity, still living as if they were locked out from all America has to offer?" His answers include the debacle of big-city politics under self-serving black politicians; reparations as "a divisive dead-end idea"; the parlous state of city schools "under the alliance between the civil rights leaders and the teachers' unions"; and the transformation of rap from "its willingness to confront establishment and stereotypes" to "America's late-night masturbatory fantasy." A sense of the erosion of "the high moral standing of civil rights" underlies Cosby's anguish and Williams's anger. Politically interested readers of a mildly conservative bent will find this book sheer dynamite. (Aug.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Myths and Misconceptions About Teaching: What Really Happens in Classrooms

2006-09-02T06:54:00.000-05:00

Heads up to a comment on Cal Skinner's Blog that lead to this post on the TC Record The Voice of Scholarship in Education website.

Myths and Misconceptions About Teaching: What Really Happens in Classrooms

Recent trends in education have encouraged democratic and holistic approaches to learning through discovery-oriented teaching approaches. At the same time, research on teaching for students with learning difficulties and disabilities suggests that direct instruction, explicit teaching, and highly regulated learning environments are the best practice for teaching special education classes. These distinct theoretical approaches have been used to argue that regular classrooms are inappropriate learning environments for students with learning difficulty, disabilities, or behavior disorders (Kauffman, 1999; Kauffman & Sasso, 2006). Vicki Snider’s new book, Myths and Misconceptions About Teaching: What Really Happens in the Classroom, challenges whether regular classrooms with holistic, discovery-oriented and democratic philosophies are appropriate teaching environments for any students. Snider suggests that the most effective teaching methods are direct instruction, explicit teaching, and highly structured curricular environments. She bases this argument on empirical evidence of the effectiveness of these teaching methods.

Snider proposes that many teaching strategies have come from theories of learning that have not been empirically tested, such as multiple intelligence, and that student failures to a large extent can be explained by the fact that education systems do not empirically test teaching methods and curricula. She argues that the trend toward whole language, discovery-oriented, and experiential approaches to learning hinders learning at best, and at worst, actually causes some students to have learning difficulties. Snider instead advocates curriculum that is proven successful in rigorous testing. She uses extensive reading research as an example, pointing out that the scrutiny of reading instruction indicates that phonics and direct instruction are proven effective teaching strategies. Current general education practice, Snider suggests, has been undermined by six myths or misconceptions about teaching that arise from untested theories that have become widely accepted. These myths are as follows:

• that learning outcomes are not as important as learning process;
• that learning has to be fun and interesting rather than hard work and sometimes difficult;
• that good teaching is always eclectic rather than due to proven methods that work for most children;
• that teachers have intrinsic characteristics that make them good teachers;
• that individual students have unique learning styles;
• and that learning difficulties or disabilities are intrinsic characteristics of students rather than the result of poor teaching.

To view the full article go to the TC Record The Voice of Scholarship in Education website.

Teachers And Unions Disregard For Laws And Ethical Behavior

2006-09-01T06:30:00.000-05:00

Time and time again teachers and unions put their interests ahead of the very children they are to educate and the communities they serve. Public school teachers are no longer the noble professionals they once were. Public School Teachers are the first to whine and complain about the children they teach. Maybe if public school teachers would improve their actions and behaviors they would not have as many problems with behavioral issues in the classroom.

This past week we saw the highest paid teachers in Indiana go on strike. In Indiana teachers went on strike despite being illegal under Indiana statutes. Visit the Chicago Tribune website to see the full story.

The Education Intelligence agency reports how Detriot Teachers disregard the no strike law in Michigan.

The EIA further reports how Washington Teachers blatantly disregard the no strike laws. Teachers Union Lawyer Kathy O'Toole stated "They are not going to put 850 of you away," Gee what great examples public school teachers set for our children.

Teacher retirement fund consultant facing lawsuit

2006-08-31T08:21:00.000-05:00

The following article appeared in the Chicago Tribune.
The allegations below are just part of the chronic problems that face our public school system (government schools). Yet another reason to do away with public pensions and switch to self-funding individual retirement accounts for government school employees.

Teacher retirement fund consultant facing lawsuit

By Michael Higgins
Tribune staff reporter
Published August 31, 2006

A former top consultant to the state's teacher retirement fund took in millions of dollars in fees from money managers, including managers that the consultant later recommended for lucrative state work, a retired school official alleges in a lawsuit.

By taking the fees, Callan Associates, based in San Francisco, violated its duty to serve only the interests of the state's school teachers, who depended on Callan to provide fair and objective recommendations, contends Patrick Patt, a retired school superintendent from Lake Forest.

"The Illinois Pension Code is clear," said Brian McTigue of Washington, an attorney representing Patt. "You cannot have an investment manager with a conflict of interest. ... Callan should pay for any losses that result from the conflict."

Patt is seeking class-action status of the suit, filed last week in Cook County Circuit Court.

Officials at Callan, which faces similar allegations in a lawsuit by city officials in San Diego, declined to comment.

Officials at the Teachers' Retirement System of the State of Illinois said this week that Callan disclosed the potential conflict, as required under its state contract, and that no investor money was lost. With Callan as adviser, the pension fund ranked in the top 10 percent among funds of similar size, said Jon Bauman, executive director of Teachers' Retirement System.

The performance "was excellent and does not indicate any substandard managers," Bauman said.

But officials at Teachers' Retirement System, which is not named as a defendant in the suit, also acknowledge that they downsized Callan's consulting role in March and that the outside fees were "a consideration" in making that decision.

Callan was a primary investment consultant to the retirement fund from December 2001 to March 2006. The state paid Callan about $2.8 million in fees from fiscal 2002 to 2006, state officials said.

At the same time, Callan was receiving fees from money managers, who paid to attend Callan seminars, such as its Callan College and Callan Investments Institute, the suit alleges.

Teachers' Retirement System officials said they studied the matter in 2004 and found that various state consultants had collected combined fees of $6 million to $7 million per year from money managers from 2001 to 2003, and that Callan's share of that was millions of dollars. State officials said they could not determine on Wednesday how many of the money managers that paid fees to Callan received the consultant's recommendation or how many the state ultimately hired.

Patt is seeking to force Callan to return its fees from Teachers' Retirement System to the state fund. Patt's attorneys said that as part of the litigation, they also will investigate whether Callan's influence regarding the choice of investment managers caused the retirement fund to lose money.

----------

mjhiggins@tribune.com

Copyright © 2006, Chicago Tribune

District 300 Hires Northwest Herald’s Allison Smith to Run Public Relations

2006-08-30T10:05:00.000-05:00

Cal Skinner has a great piece on his Blog about Allison Smith. Allison Smith was a Northwest Herald reporter who is now the District 300 public relations person. Ms. Smith has been biased towards the education establishment and referenda throughout her reporting career at the Northwest Herald. When reading future reports in our local newspapers supporting referenda keep this story in the back of your mind. How many other reporters when supporting referenda our vying for the lucrative position as a public relations person in our government schools? Ms. Smith has gained financially from her pushing of the passing of the referenda. We ask the residents of District 300 is this how you expected your tax increase to be spent when you voted yes for these referenda?

Here is the introduction to Cal Skinner's post on his BLOG.

8/29/6 - At last night’s school board meeting, Superintendent Ken Arndt welcomed Northwest Herald reporter Allison Smith as the new communications director for District 300.

Smith covered School District 300 for the Northwest Herald during the past referendum and gave the tax hikers fits.

She will be paid $60,707, which has to be a substantial increase from her Northwest Herald salary, where she worked about three years. She starts her new job Sept. 5th.

She must be getting at least a 50% pay hike. And, that’s assuming that the Northwest Herald pays a lot better than I think they do.

Maybe she doubled or almost doubled her salary (as would be the case if she were earning $30,000 before).

There was a good political reason for District 300’s hiring of Allison Smith.

To view the rest of Cal Skinner's piece click here.

East Side schools will ask for tax hike

2006-08-29T07:54:00.000-05:00

The following story appeared in the Beacon News Newspaper. A fellow taxpayer from District 131 asked us to put this story on the CRAFT Blog.

Bruce Schurbert asked the school board members the following questions: "Why not impart a salary freeze?" and "Where is the deficit reduction plan?" Mr. Schurbert this referendum is about teachers, administrators and school employees salaries. Salary freezes when and if ever given in school districts are always repaid in later years with even larger salary increases. This is about greed and not need. The only interests the tax increase will serve is school employees and their bank accounts.

This same scenario is playing out around school districts across Illinois. Once referendum pass large salary increases always follow just ask voters in District 15 McHenry and District 158 in Huntley.

To view the District 131 salaries go to thechampion.org.

East Side schools will ask for tax hike

By Justina Wang
Staff writer

AURORA — The East Aurora School Board gave their approval Monday for a November referendum that will ask voters for a tax rate increase of 85 cents per $100 of equalized assessed valuation.

The hike, which will cost the owner of a $100,000 home an estimated $283 more in taxes the first year, is lower than earlier numbers proposed by administrators.

At a public forum this month, school officials presented four scenarios that would raise the tax rate by anywhere from 95 cents to $1.25 per $100 of assessed valuation and cost owners of a $100,000 home between $316 and $416 in the first year.

"We challenged the administration to come up with an even lower rate," Board Member Russell Pietrowiak said during Monday's meeting. "We have tried to come down and listen to people's concerns."

Several residents who attended Monday's meeting said they believe the district will still have a hard time passing a referendum in an area with many low-income families.

"The thing is, people here don't want to give you more money," resident Rayanne Carlson told Board members.

Carlson and another East side resident, Bruce Schubert, also questioned teacher and administrator salary increases, which make up large portions of the district's budget.

"Why not impart a salary freeze?" Schubert asked School Board members. "Where is the deficit reduction plan?"

School Board members responded that they cut dozens of positions in 2004, and that many of the larger pay raises were because of promotions to administrative positions. Board Vice President Dan Barreiro added that the district has to negotiate with teacher's unions and needs to offer a salary schedule that is competitive enough to attract top educators so that East Aurora will "stop being a training ground for other school districts" and "retain our best."

"We're being asked, I think, to look at making cuts, but we've made cuts and it's hard to make cuts when you have growth," Barreiro said. "We're going to have to ask voters to help us get over this hurdle."

School officials said a tax hike is needed to prevent a projected $21.9 million deficit by 2010, a year when a new state law requires all districts to have a balanced budget. The district's last operating fund rate increase passed in 1993.

If the referendum is successful, the new tax rate would be locked in for four years and would not be subject to tax caps. The hike would leave the district with a $15 million balance in all funds in the 2009-2010 school year.

East Aurora tax hike referendum

The district's proposed tax hike of .85 cent per $100 of equalized assessed valuation would cost the owner of a $100,000 home an estimated:

• $283 in the first year

• $306 in 2007

• $332 in 2008

• $359 in 2009

Are U.S. History Textbooks Still Full of Lies and Half-Truths?

2006-08-28T09:40:00.000-05:00

The piece below by Ray Raphael appeared on the History News Network website.

Are U.S. History Textbooks Still Full of Lies and Half-Truths?

By Ray Raphael

Mr. Raphael is the author of PEOPLE’S HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, THE FIRST AMERICAN REVOLUTION, and FOUNDING MYTHS, which was just published.

It’s been a quarter century since Frances Fitzgerald in America Revised critiqued our history texts, and a decade since Jim Loewen in Lies My Teacher Told Me revealed many of the biases that lingered on. Where are we now? Have we gotten any better?

Textbooks in recent years have certainly become more inclusive, but giving the nod to multiculturalism is not synonymous with getting the story right. We’ve come a long way, baby — but we have a long way to go.

In conjunction with my latest book, Founding Myths: Stories that Hide our Patriotic Past, I have reviewed twenty-two current elementary, middle school, and high school texts. Fourteen were displayed at a recent National Council for the Social Studies convention, while eight are approved for use in California, which has among the strictest criteria in the nation. I compared the mythologies of the American Revolution discussed in my book with those perpetuated in these texts, and the results are startling. Although some texts fare better than others, all are culpable of some serious lapses.

Most texts do mention African American participation in the war, but they focus primarily on those who sided with the Americans. In fact, those who sided with the British were far more numerous, but you’d never guess it from reading the texts. When they offer numbers, they typically compare the estimated number of black patriot soldiers during the course of the entire war (5,000) with the number of slaves who sought freedom with the British in a single week (generally cited as 300).

Likewise, current texts include some mention of the Native American presence in the Revolutionary War, but their narratives display a serious bias. In chapters on the post-war period — right at the moment of the greatest white incursion onto Native lands in United States history— the Indian presence mysteriously disappears. Discussions of white conquest appear earlier and later in these texts, but not at the critical point of our nation’s founding, when it is most relevant but also most embarrassing. The pan-Indian resistance movements of the 1780s — again, the largest coalitions of Native Americans in our history — are entirely neglected. With nary a nod to the impact on indigenous people, the texts celebrate the ordinances of 1785 and 1787 — blueprints for westward expansion and death knells for Indian sovereignty.

To read the rest of the post go to the History News Network website.

Unions Serve Teachers, Fail the Students

2006-08-26T14:07:00.000-05:00

The following piece appeared on the Real Clear Politics website. No commentary needed the piece speaks for itself.

July 23, 2006
Unions Serve Teachers, Fail the Students
By Ruben Navarrette
SAN DIEGO -- After five years of trying to undermine the No Child Left Behind Act, the nation's largest teachers union has decided that it can live with the education reform law after all -- as long as the legislation is gutted, its standards lowered and its accountability measures watered down.

Great. So we're making progress.

This month at its annual conference, the National Education Association voted to launch a nationwide campaign to lobby Congress to radically change NCLB when the law comes up for reauthorization next year. The goal behind the changes seems to be to wrest power away from government and put it back where the union thinks it belongs -- with educators and those who represent them.

Call me cynical, but I never thought for a minute that the NEA was really concerned about, well, education. I never believed the organization was eager to find new ways to empower students or to hold schools accountable for the educational products they turn out.

I always assumed that the NEA was focused primarily on what any union tends to focus on: the interests of its members. And since the education establishment has been trained to believe that it is not in the interests of teachers to demand more from them or tie them to the performance of their students, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that groups such as the NEA have reacted with hostility to No Child Left Behind.

That's exactly what's been happening since 2001, when the law -- perhaps the most significant domestic policy achievements of the Bush administration -- took effect.

According to a recent report by Education Sector, a Washington-based think tank, the NEA has given more than $8 million to various education, civil rights and public policy groups that opposed or criticized No Child Left Behind. Lead researcher Joe Williams says that what the union did wasn't illegal, but it is clear that it "actively pursued partnerships'' with groups intent on fighting NCLB. And questions remain about whether the funding that was given to some of these groups influenced the research some of these groups produced -- research that was, to no one's surprise, critical of the education reform law.

Not that the law doesn't have its critics. When I hear from teachers, or even school board members -- some of whom have accepted campaign contributions from the NEA and other teachers unions -- I get an earful about how NCLB is single-handedly destroying the public education system due to its emphasis on testing, its punishing of underperforming schools and its one-size-fits-all approach.

And yet, knowing all that, it's still frightening to get a peek behind the curtain at the specifics of what the NEA, if it had its druthers, would do to make NCLB more palatable to its members -- or at least, some of them, as the more hard-line members won't be satisfied unless the law is repealed.

Convinced that there is too much emphasis on regular testing, and that low-performing schools are being unfairly punished when students come up short, the union would prefer a broader-based accountability system that relies on "multiple measures of success.'' Whatever that means.

The union is also queasy about the requirement in No Child Left Behind that schools test students in math and reading and then report scores according to race, disability, English proficiency and economic background. The NEA instead wants benchmarks that take into account students' differing abilities and demographics. It seems that many educators are less than confident in the job they've done when it comes to teaching minorities, those with limited English proficiency and the economically disadvantaged, and they're not eager to broadcast their failures.

It's outrageous. If these people get their way, the practical effect would be a lower bar for students of different racial, ethnic or economic backgrounds -- and by extension, those who teach them. And they would do all this not for the good of students but for the professional welfare of those who are supposed to be teaching them and who have, for too long, been coming up short.

And why does the nation's largest teachers union want to make all these changes in No Child Left Behind? It's so the truth does not come out about whom the public schools serve and whom they sacrifice.

ruben.navarrette@uniontrib.com
(c) 2006, The San Diego Union-Tribune

Illinois is a high-tax state

2006-08-24T06:30:00.000-05:00

The following letter to the editor appeared in the Daily Southtown Newspaper.
In McHenry County School Districts must adopt referendum questions on or before September 5th. The last day to file in this office is September 7th. Will you be voting to increase the tax budern of your fellow Illinois residents?

Illinois is a high-tax state

Thursday, August 24, 2006

Despite the claims of some government employees and pro-tax political activists that Illinois is a "low-tax" state, the latest statistics from the non-partisan Tax Foundation headquartered in Washington, D.C., show that Illinois is a high-tax state; Illinois, in fact, has some of the highest tax burdens in the nation (www.taxfoundation.org/research/show/336.html).

The Tax Foundation measures tax burden by taking taxes as a percentage of income. In 2000, Illinois' combined state and local tax burden was 10 percent, ranking 30th in the nation. By 2004, Illinois' state and local tax burden had climbed to 10.4 percent, the 16th in the nation. Two years later, in 2006, Illinois' tax burden for state and local taxes had increased to 10.9 percent, the 14th highest in the nation. Only 13 out of 50 states had higher state and local tax burdens than Illinois in 2006.

When the federal tax burden is added to Illinois' state and local figures, Illinois has the 10th highest total tax burden in the nation for 2006 — 32.7 percent (taxes as a percentage of income).

Illinois' economic growth and tax increases have resulted in a flood of taxpayer dollars pouring into state coffers. For Illinois' fiscal year 2006, ending June 30, tax revenues were nearly $4 billion higher than in FY 2005. Illinois' total state revenue growth was more than twice the 3.3 percent rate of price inflation for the same period (www.ntui.org/itef/ITEFComment12-3/index.html).

Unfortunately, in fiscal year 2006, the Illinois General Assembly and Gov. Rod Blagojevich were responsible for accelerating the growth of spending. Total state expenditures increased by a huge amount, $5 billion, nearly $1 billion more than revenues — a spending orgy that threatens the long-term financial health of the state.

Illinois is a high-tax state plagued by runaway spending. This is a deadly combination for individual taxpayers and businesses alike. The high state and local taxes, combined with the state's irresponsible spending, are hurting its economy, driving small businesses out of state and enriching government employees at the expense of productive workers in the private sector.

Dennis Constant
Research director
Illinois Taxpayer Education Foundation

Restitution?

2006-08-24T06:17:00.000-05:00

The following story appeared in the Chicago Tribune.

Ex-school official must pay $40,000

Published August 24, 2006

SAUK VILLAGE -- A former Sauk Village school administrator was ordered to pay $40,000 in restitution this week after pleading guilty to one count of theft from the district. Former maintenance manager Edward Bernacki, who had been accused of stealing more than $100,000 from Elementary School District 168, also was sentenced to a year of probation.

Bernacki's plea comes on the heels of two other high-profile cases in the financially troubled district.

Former Supt. Thomas Ryan is serving 8 years after pleading guilty to theft in November. He paid $400,000 in restitution.

Former school board president Louise Morales pleaded guilty to official misconduct in February. She was sentenced to 18 months of probation and was forced to pay $350 to have her name removed from one of the district's buildings.

Copyright © 2006, Chicago Tribune

The solution: School vouchers

2006-08-23T18:51:00.000-05:00

The following letter to the editor appeared in the Daily Southtown Newspaper.

Letter to the Editor: The solution: School vouchers

8/21/2006

By Timothy A. Van Eck, South Holland

Phil Kadner's column (Aug. 15) contends that the educational system in Illinois for some of the poorer districts is analogous to "a plane with an incompetent pilot at the controls."

His analogy is a ringing endorsement for school vouchers.

After deregulation, the airlines had to compete. Fares went down; service went up. New airlines began to compete with the established airlines and gave the passengers economic power they lacked before.

The same rang true for the telephone companies. We are no longer impressed when someone receives or makes a long-distance telephone call.

Once government got out of the way, costs were reduced and better service was demanded. The same can be done with the schools. Let the money follow the child, and let the schools compete for each student. Schools currently cannot succeed because their focus over the past 20 years has been on indoctrinating political correctness into the children, not on education.

One problem with the analogy is that with an airplane, there is a known destination. With the current educational system, we do not know where the children will end up.

According to Dr. Bruce Shortt, "If we have our children in public schools, the public school is indeed our children's teacher and, effectively, their parent. The federal courts agree. In Fields v. Palmdale, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals candidly stated that public-school parents ' ... have no constitutional right ... to prevent a public school from providing its students with whatever information it wishes to provide, sexual or otherwise, when and as the school determines that it is appropriate to do so.' "

This is a main reason why a faction in the Southern Baptist church has repeatedly, with an ever increasingly favorable vote, tried to pass a resolution at its conventions to remove its members' students from the public schools.

If that resolution passes, the question then will be: Will Sen. Meeks continue to pursue his political agenda, or will Rev. Meeks follow the dictates of his denomination and abandon the public education platform that has given him so much media attention?