What we glean from the letter to the editor posted in the Daily Herald below is that Mr. Snow did not jump on board with the District 300 tax and spend mentality. It appears to us that D - 300 started nagging the Distrirct 158 board to shut Mr. Snow up. Let us hope he does not listen. If you research Mr. Snow you will find he is the only fiscally accoutable school board member on the District 158 board. Mr. Snow uncovered the fact the school board could take in millions of dollars more than promised the taxpayers among other items. The taxaholics do not like that.
When reviewing the D 300 finances he found millions of dollars in unaccounted for revenue. It appears that D - 300 is doing all they can to make Mr. Snow look bad and shut him up. Yet another reason to vote "no".
The school board members in the letter to the editor below are hypocritical. In 2004, board member Skaja wrote a letter to the editor and signed it as a board member, clearly advocating a yes vote on their referendum. She also
defended CFO Paul Halvorsen who was subsequently lost his job for withholding information from the
public. Her letter is at Election Interference.org
Then at a board meeting in 2004, the Daily Herald quoted her as saying they were having "informational"
meetings to ensure the referendum passed. You can view that article here.
Further comments about this matter can be viewed at Cal Skinners site McHenry County BLOG
Snow doesn’t speak for Dist.158 board
District 158 board and finance committee member Larry Snow has engaged in speaking at various events both within and outside District 158. Some of the comments he made at these events were published in local papers.
As board members, we would like to clarify that Snow was not speaking on behalf of District 158, the board of education or our finance committee. We regret any damaging effects his comments may have on the staff, students and residents of District 300 and surrounding communities.
Snow also called upon local village officials and accused them of not caring about children. Furthermore, he attempted to mislead them into thinking he was speaking as a representative of District 158. We regret any damaging effects his comments to those officials may have had.
We would like to publicly state that board President Mike Skala and interim Superintendent Robert Hammon are the spokesmen for our board. No one else has been given authority to represent District 158 at public meetings.
We further encourage concerned officials and citizens to contact the board of education through the District 158 administration at (847) 659-6158 regarding any concerns about representations by Snow.
Every citizen, whether a member of an elected board or not, has a right to free speech. However, it is our hope that everyone understands a board of education member has no legal authority as an individual and that board decisions can be made only by a majority vote at a board of education meeting.
We would also like to clarify that we are signing this letter as individual board members.
Frank Coleman, Huntley
Shawn Green, Union
Kim Skaja, Union
Mike Skala, Huntley
Glen Stewart, Huntley
Rosemary Herringer
Huntley
Wednesday, February 22, 2006
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
District 181 investigates tax mistake
The Daily Herald
has another great story relating to public education issues. Are the school board member and the administrator in the story below incompetent or purposely trying to cheat the public. Decide for yourself.
District 181 investigates tax mistake
By Catherine Edman
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Tuesday, February 21, 2006
School board members in Hinsdale Elementary District 181 want to know why an extra $5 million wound up in the district’s property tax request this year despite their explicit orders to the contrary.
Monday night the board discussed who was responsible, meeting behind closed doors for several hours to talk about “personnel.”
“On the surface it appears to be an innocent mistake; however, it’s a serious one,” board member Kevin Hanrahan said.
Last week, the board learned that despite its direction to the administration, officials requested $43.6 million, not $38.6 million, from the property tax rolls in 2005.
Board Vice President Bill Moucka refused to comment on the results of the investigation into the multimillion-dollar gaffe, saying the board would release a statement at next Monday’s board meeting. The investigation remains ongoing, he said, adding that the board was assured by the district attorney, as well as by the DuPage and Cook county clerks, the error can be corrected with “no difference to the taxpayer.”
Other board members said they are concerned, though, about how the mistake will play to residents already skeptical of the district’s fiscal management.
In December, the board voted 4-3 to drop the 2005 property tax request by $5 million after residents pointed out the district took far more money from a 2002 tax rate increase than it promised voters four years ago. Before the vote, the administration presented three financial options ranging from $38.6 million to $43.6 million and argued strongly in favor of the largest amount.
The board, amid much controversy, opted for $38.6 million.
At last week’s meeting, though, former Glen Ellyn resident Michael Lynch presented copies of the county tax levy documents to the board, showing the district requested the $43.6 million.
“I was surprised, disappointed and concerned,” said Hanrahan, who was among those who had voted for the $38.6 million request.
Officials, who could not be reached Monday, had said at last week’s meeting the documents were submitted in error, board members said.
Catherine Delany, a board member whose signature appears on several of the forms, she said she did not notice the amount was wrong when they were presented for her to sign.
Delany was among the members who voted to drop the levy request in December because it was clear the district exceeded the amount it told voters to expect when it asked them to approve a 31-cent increase in the education fund. The district said the cost would be an additional $605 per year for the owner of a $600,000 house, but then it used a portion of the property tax cap law that allows it to continue taking more money for up to five years.
A Daily Herald analysis last year of 25 school districts, of which District 181 was not included, showed they took $263 million more than voters likely expected over a span of five years using the same portion of the law.
“We told them it was going to cost $605 additional a year,” said Delany, a seven-year board member in District 181. “We lied — it cost hundreds more than that. I felt we should have taken the amount we asked for.”
Asking for less money than the district was legally entitled to this year, or only $38.6 million in property taxes, was “the only way we could stop overtaxing,” she said.
Click here to view the rest of the story in the Daily Herald.
has another great story relating to public education issues. Are the school board member and the administrator in the story below incompetent or purposely trying to cheat the public. Decide for yourself.
District 181 investigates tax mistake
By Catherine Edman
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Tuesday, February 21, 2006
School board members in Hinsdale Elementary District 181 want to know why an extra $5 million wound up in the district’s property tax request this year despite their explicit orders to the contrary.
Monday night the board discussed who was responsible, meeting behind closed doors for several hours to talk about “personnel.”
“On the surface it appears to be an innocent mistake; however, it’s a serious one,” board member Kevin Hanrahan said.
Last week, the board learned that despite its direction to the administration, officials requested $43.6 million, not $38.6 million, from the property tax rolls in 2005.
Board Vice President Bill Moucka refused to comment on the results of the investigation into the multimillion-dollar gaffe, saying the board would release a statement at next Monday’s board meeting. The investigation remains ongoing, he said, adding that the board was assured by the district attorney, as well as by the DuPage and Cook county clerks, the error can be corrected with “no difference to the taxpayer.”
Other board members said they are concerned, though, about how the mistake will play to residents already skeptical of the district’s fiscal management.
In December, the board voted 4-3 to drop the 2005 property tax request by $5 million after residents pointed out the district took far more money from a 2002 tax rate increase than it promised voters four years ago. Before the vote, the administration presented three financial options ranging from $38.6 million to $43.6 million and argued strongly in favor of the largest amount.
The board, amid much controversy, opted for $38.6 million.
At last week’s meeting, though, former Glen Ellyn resident Michael Lynch presented copies of the county tax levy documents to the board, showing the district requested the $43.6 million.
“I was surprised, disappointed and concerned,” said Hanrahan, who was among those who had voted for the $38.6 million request.
Officials, who could not be reached Monday, had said at last week’s meeting the documents were submitted in error, board members said.
Catherine Delany, a board member whose signature appears on several of the forms, she said she did not notice the amount was wrong when they were presented for her to sign.
Delany was among the members who voted to drop the levy request in December because it was clear the district exceeded the amount it told voters to expect when it asked them to approve a 31-cent increase in the education fund. The district said the cost would be an additional $605 per year for the owner of a $600,000 house, but then it used a portion of the property tax cap law that allows it to continue taking more money for up to five years.
A Daily Herald analysis last year of 25 school districts, of which District 181 was not included, showed they took $263 million more than voters likely expected over a span of five years using the same portion of the law.
“We told them it was going to cost $605 additional a year,” said Delany, a seven-year board member in District 181. “We lied — it cost hundreds more than that. I felt we should have taken the amount we asked for.”
Asking for less money than the district was legally entitled to this year, or only $38.6 million in property taxes, was “the only way we could stop overtaxing,” she said.
Click here to view the rest of the story in the Daily Herald.
Monday, February 20, 2006
Oberweis terms tenure for teachers ‘bunk’
As many of you know CRAFT has getting rid tenure in the K -12 system as part of the No Taxpayer Left Behind platform.
Oberweis terms tenure for teachers ‘bunk’
By Eric Krol
Daily Herald Political Writer
Posted Saturday, February 18, 2006
Republican governor candidate Jim Oberweis called teacher tenure “bunk” Friday, suggesting the state scrap the practice in favor of a system based on merit pay.
“If you really care and you really want to improve our educational system, you’ve got to reward the best teachers and you’ve got to get rid of the bad teachers,” said Oberweis in a meeting with the Daily Herald editorial board. “Tenure does one thing. It protects the bad teachers.”
That stand puts the Sugar Grove dairy magnate alone among the four major candidates running in the March 21 Republican governor primary. Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka of Riverside, Chicago businessman Ron Gidwitz and Bloomington state Sen. Bill Brady support teacher tenure.
The tenure question was spurred by a downstate Small Newspaper Group series last year that showed only 38 of the state’s 876 school districts have ever been successful in firing a teacher the past 18 years.
“Absolutely I would get rid of tenure because it only hurts the school system,” Oberweis said. “It only helps keep the bad teacher in their position.”
Oberweis acknowledged his stance probably wouldn’t win him support from teachers and teacher unions, but said he’s “a businessman, not a politician.”
He suggested a merit-based pay system for teachers, but would leave the details to be worked out by a panel of experts he’d appoint if elected.
For the rest of the story click here to go to the Daily Herald.
Oberweis terms tenure for teachers ‘bunk’
By Eric Krol
Daily Herald Political Writer
Posted Saturday, February 18, 2006
Republican governor candidate Jim Oberweis called teacher tenure “bunk” Friday, suggesting the state scrap the practice in favor of a system based on merit pay.
“If you really care and you really want to improve our educational system, you’ve got to reward the best teachers and you’ve got to get rid of the bad teachers,” said Oberweis in a meeting with the Daily Herald editorial board. “Tenure does one thing. It protects the bad teachers.”
That stand puts the Sugar Grove dairy magnate alone among the four major candidates running in the March 21 Republican governor primary. Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka of Riverside, Chicago businessman Ron Gidwitz and Bloomington state Sen. Bill Brady support teacher tenure.
The tenure question was spurred by a downstate Small Newspaper Group series last year that showed only 38 of the state’s 876 school districts have ever been successful in firing a teacher the past 18 years.
“Absolutely I would get rid of tenure because it only hurts the school system,” Oberweis said. “It only helps keep the bad teacher in their position.”
Oberweis acknowledged his stance probably wouldn’t win him support from teachers and teacher unions, but said he’s “a businessman, not a politician.”
He suggested a merit-based pay system for teachers, but would leave the details to be worked out by a panel of experts he’d appoint if elected.
For the rest of the story click here to go to the Daily Herald.
Oberweis only candidate to support school choice for parents and children
Solutions to improve education vary candidate by candidate
2/20/2006
By John Chase and Rick Pearson
Chicago Tribune
Republicans and Democrats running for governor all agree more needs to be done to improve education in Illinois, but they have sharp disagreements about the best way to achieve those successes.
For Republican Judy Baar Topinka, Illinois can't make significant improvements to public education without first addressing a budget she says is imbalanced, begin paying down the state's growing pension obligation, and cutting burgeoning health-care expenses.
But the incumbent, Democrat Rod Blagojevich, says more can be done now to increase the state's contributions to school districts across the state, particularly those in poorer communities.
The answers from the two--as well as from the other Democratic and three other major Republican candidates seeking nominations March 21 for governor--came in response to the second Tribune questionnaire on issues confronting the state.
Nearly every candidate agreed that the state's current funding system for education is too reliant on property taxes. But none was willing to embrace a tax swap that would probably bring more equity to education funding statewide by reducing property taxes while increasing state taxes.
Republican Ron Gidwitz, a businessman from Chicago and former head of the State Board of Education, acknowledged that the idea should be examined, as did Democrat Edwin Eisendrath, who is currently a vice president at Kendall College.
"I'll put the entire revenue system on the table," said Eisendrath, the governor's sole opponent in the Democratic primary.
Republican Bill Brady, a state senator from Bloomington, has a proposal to dedicate half of all natural revenue growth for education, which he estimates would be about $1 billion over four years. Aurora businessman Jim Oberweis said school vouchers allowing taxpayer dollars to help pay for private school tuition is the answer.
"Parents deserve to have a choice in the marketplace among a full range of public and private options," Oberweis said.
Both Blagojevich and Topinka said the key to improving education is increasing state funding to boost the minimum amount of money spent on each student in the state, which is known as the foundation level.
"We have raised the foundation level by $600 per student. Previous administrations averaged much less," Blagojevich said.
Topinka, the state's three-term treasurer, argues that though Blagojevich has increased the foundation level, he hasn't increased it as much as he promised.
"Four years ago, candidate Rod Blagojevich promised to raise the foundation level $250 a year or $1,000 over his four-year term," she said.
Topinka and Blagojevich also have a significant disagreement over what the state's response should be to claims by the Chicago Public Schools that it is facing one of the worst fiscal crises in recent memory.
Blagojevich has promised $100 million in state aid to help, but Topinka said making the promise is a "knee-jerk response." Instead, she said that if she's elected, the Chicago schools will have to make their case before getting a dime of new money.
Oberweis said the answer is to allow "children and parents escape from failing schools" through vouchers, while Gidwitz said the answer to the Chicago schools' problems is for the state to adopt a "zero-based" strategy that starts the state's spending process from scratch each year. That move would free up more money for schools statewide, he said.
"Chicago is not alone in suffering from a lack of resources," Gidwitz said.
"More than 80 percent of the school districts in the state are operating at a deficit."
Eisendrath said teacher training needs to be improved, as does school management, with which Brady agreed.
"I will use the savings from eliminating bureaucracy to incrementally increase classroom spending," Brady said.
Brady was the only candidate who said that if elected, he would dismantle the State Board of Education and restructure it into a department that reports directly to the governor. Most of the others said they would change the board's makeup with more members "independent" of the governor's office.
To view the rest of the article click here.
2/20/2006
By John Chase and Rick Pearson
Chicago Tribune
Republicans and Democrats running for governor all agree more needs to be done to improve education in Illinois, but they have sharp disagreements about the best way to achieve those successes.
For Republican Judy Baar Topinka, Illinois can't make significant improvements to public education without first addressing a budget she says is imbalanced, begin paying down the state's growing pension obligation, and cutting burgeoning health-care expenses.
But the incumbent, Democrat Rod Blagojevich, says more can be done now to increase the state's contributions to school districts across the state, particularly those in poorer communities.
The answers from the two--as well as from the other Democratic and three other major Republican candidates seeking nominations March 21 for governor--came in response to the second Tribune questionnaire on issues confronting the state.
Nearly every candidate agreed that the state's current funding system for education is too reliant on property taxes. But none was willing to embrace a tax swap that would probably bring more equity to education funding statewide by reducing property taxes while increasing state taxes.
Republican Ron Gidwitz, a businessman from Chicago and former head of the State Board of Education, acknowledged that the idea should be examined, as did Democrat Edwin Eisendrath, who is currently a vice president at Kendall College.
"I'll put the entire revenue system on the table," said Eisendrath, the governor's sole opponent in the Democratic primary.
Republican Bill Brady, a state senator from Bloomington, has a proposal to dedicate half of all natural revenue growth for education, which he estimates would be about $1 billion over four years. Aurora businessman Jim Oberweis said school vouchers allowing taxpayer dollars to help pay for private school tuition is the answer.
"Parents deserve to have a choice in the marketplace among a full range of public and private options," Oberweis said.
Both Blagojevich and Topinka said the key to improving education is increasing state funding to boost the minimum amount of money spent on each student in the state, which is known as the foundation level.
"We have raised the foundation level by $600 per student. Previous administrations averaged much less," Blagojevich said.
Topinka, the state's three-term treasurer, argues that though Blagojevich has increased the foundation level, he hasn't increased it as much as he promised.
"Four years ago, candidate Rod Blagojevich promised to raise the foundation level $250 a year or $1,000 over his four-year term," she said.
Topinka and Blagojevich also have a significant disagreement over what the state's response should be to claims by the Chicago Public Schools that it is facing one of the worst fiscal crises in recent memory.
Blagojevich has promised $100 million in state aid to help, but Topinka said making the promise is a "knee-jerk response." Instead, she said that if she's elected, the Chicago schools will have to make their case before getting a dime of new money.
Oberweis said the answer is to allow "children and parents escape from failing schools" through vouchers, while Gidwitz said the answer to the Chicago schools' problems is for the state to adopt a "zero-based" strategy that starts the state's spending process from scratch each year. That move would free up more money for schools statewide, he said.
"Chicago is not alone in suffering from a lack of resources," Gidwitz said.
"More than 80 percent of the school districts in the state are operating at a deficit."
Eisendrath said teacher training needs to be improved, as does school management, with which Brady agreed.
"I will use the savings from eliminating bureaucracy to incrementally increase classroom spending," Brady said.
Brady was the only candidate who said that if elected, he would dismantle the State Board of Education and restructure it into a department that reports directly to the governor. Most of the others said they would change the board's makeup with more members "independent" of the governor's office.
To view the rest of the article click here.
Sunday, February 19, 2006
Pensions obligations - Yet another reason to vote "NO" March 21st
The item below was put together by our friend Bill Zettler. Passing referenda increases salaries placing a larger burden on the taxpayers (that includes you) who pay 80% of the pensions. Today's pension burdens will be paid for by your children and grandchildren. We need legislation reform and spending reform. Throwing more money at the problem only makes the problem worse.
PENSION UPDATE: TOP 2005 STATE PENSION = $357,800
The top pension in 2005 was $357,800 as opposed to last years measly $314,000. To give you an idea of what that pension is worth think about it this way: in order to receive $357,800 in interest each year you would have to buy a CD worth at least $7 million.
In 2005 the State of Illinois continued to make 1,000’s of pension millionaires out of retired public employees with the taxpayer picking up the tab. Here are some more disturbing pension facts:
…In 2005 1,578 former state employees had pensions of over $100,000, up 40% from 2004’s 1,129. Next year we should easily cross the 2,000 mark.
…Last year 24 former public employees had pensions greater than President Clinton. Despite a nice increase for Clinton, this year’s total is 29.
…For the first time you need a pension of at least $150,000 to even make it into the Top 100.
…Ninety of the 100 were University or K-12 employees meaning they probably spent the majority of their careers working 9 months a year with tenure.
…Over 80% of the pension payment comes from taxpayers.
…Over 275 state pensions had MONTHLY payments greater than average Social Security ANNUAL payment of $11,000.
… Former U of I coach Lou Henson left Illinois for New Mexico years ago but we, the generous taxpayers of Illinois, continue to send him pension checks totaling $250,440 per year.
Another way to look at it is the top pension is 33 times the amount the average Social Security recipient receives and 12 times the median wage of the average full time Illinois worker ($28,806).
Why do average people, most of whom do not have enough money for their own retirement, have to pay taxes to buy the equivalent of a $7 million CD for one public employee?
If these former Illinois Public employees had been on Social Security and a 401K program during their working years (like the rest of us) taxpayer liability for their pensions would be zero as opposed to $182 Billion for the Teacher Retirement System alone.
PENSION UPDATE: TOP 2005 STATE PENSION = $357,800
The top pension in 2005 was $357,800 as opposed to last years measly $314,000. To give you an idea of what that pension is worth think about it this way: in order to receive $357,800 in interest each year you would have to buy a CD worth at least $7 million.
In 2005 the State of Illinois continued to make 1,000’s of pension millionaires out of retired public employees with the taxpayer picking up the tab. Here are some more disturbing pension facts:
…In 2005 1,578 former state employees had pensions of over $100,000, up 40% from 2004’s 1,129. Next year we should easily cross the 2,000 mark.
…Last year 24 former public employees had pensions greater than President Clinton. Despite a nice increase for Clinton, this year’s total is 29.
…For the first time you need a pension of at least $150,000 to even make it into the Top 100.
…Ninety of the 100 were University or K-12 employees meaning they probably spent the majority of their careers working 9 months a year with tenure.
…Over 80% of the pension payment comes from taxpayers.
…Over 275 state pensions had MONTHLY payments greater than average Social Security ANNUAL payment of $11,000.
… Former U of I coach Lou Henson left Illinois for New Mexico years ago but we, the generous taxpayers of Illinois, continue to send him pension checks totaling $250,440 per year.
Another way to look at it is the top pension is 33 times the amount the average Social Security recipient receives and 12 times the median wage of the average full time Illinois worker ($28,806).
Why do average people, most of whom do not have enough money for their own retirement, have to pay taxes to buy the equivalent of a $7 million CD for one public employee?
If these former Illinois Public employees had been on Social Security and a 401K program during their working years (like the rest of us) taxpayer liability for their pensions would be zero as opposed to $182 Billion for the Teacher Retirement System alone.
Increased spending reduces literacy.
COLUMN: Vin Suprynowicz
Increased school spending reduces literacy
I got a phone call last week from the head of one of the many departments in the Clark County School District which I had mentioned in my March 16 essay on elephantine school districts, headlined "Mission Creep."
"Do you even know what my department does?" demanded the fellow, whose listing in the district's administrative phone directory says only "Warranty Department."
I had no idea, I said. And, I continued, that was the whole point of the listing: The sheer number -- hundreds -- of bureaucrats being paid $60,000 and $80,000 and more per year, leeches living off taxpayer funds to do things the average taxpayer doesn't know about, doesn't understand, has never been told about, and couldn't possibly be expected to explain, justify or favor if he were asked to.
"And you think just because the taxpayers are too stupid to understand the importance of what my department does, that's a reason we should be closed down?" he asked.
Even though I had not proposed any specific department be "closed down," I wrote down his words, because I couldn't possibly have invented such a succinct summary of bureaucratic arrogance if I'd tried.
It's apparently fine to require the great unwashed masses of cud-chewing taxpayers, at gunpoint, to pay for all this bureaucratic overhead (the fellow's department apparently double-checks to make sure private contractors are building new school buildings properly). But the bureaucrats should in no way be subject to the whims of those taxpayers, should they try to stop funding functions they don't understand, which have never been explained to them, and which have never been tested against any free-market competitive model to find out if they're truly necessary, or even being done at anywhere near as low a cost as possible.
(Care to compare administrative and maintenance costs at the average private or parochial school to those at a tax-funded campus?)
"Leeches?" my supercilious caller shrieked, pretending to laugh but instead issuing forth with something more like the chattering of an African pack scavenger. "There are no guns involved," he sneered. "Taxes are paid voluntarily."
"You're telling me that if I refuse to pay the property taxes that prop up the government schools, men with uniforms and guns won't eventually come and surround my house with yellow police tape, set my belongings out on the sidewalk, and auction it off?" I asked.
"Well, of course," my caller replied. "If you don't pay your taxes you have to pay the consequences. That's the free choice you have -- to pay your taxes or to face the consequences."
That was his definition of "voluntary," as opposed to coercion. Comply or get evicted from your own home -- and if you resist that, run the risk of getting shot or burned out with incendiary grenades.
"He lost the argument right there," volunteered a visiting Arizona Baptist minister of my acquaintance, with whom I happened to have dinner the following evening. "If you're not willing to admit that taxes are mandatory, that they're collected by the coercive use of force -- even if it's only applied to the occasional protester to 'set an example' -- then there's no common moral ground on which you can continue that discussion."
My chortling caller next tried to get me to admit that building new government school buildings was necessary.
Just the opposite, I said. New York state (government) teacher of the year John Taylor Gatto, in his book "The Underground History of American Education," cites statistics from the National Adult Literacy Survey and the National Assessment of Educational Progress confirming that the literacy rate in this country in 1940 was 96 percent for whites and 80 percent for blacks, but fell over the next 60 years to 83 percent for whites and 60 percent for blacks.
"Put another way," Gatto reveals, "black illiteracy doubled; white illiteracy quadrupled," despite the fact that "We spend three or four times as much real money on schooling as we did 60 years ago."
Why this change since the 1940s? It was during the Second World War that the government schools began to abandon the old, tried-and-true, phonetic method of teaching reading, Mr. Gatto reports.
If we built fewer government schools, that would increase pressure on parents to either home-school or get their kids into private schools, which would rescue more millions of souls from the enervating government youth indoctrination camps.
My caller could respond only by alternating between snorting, chuckling and cackling his disbelief that I could actually dare to say such things. "Where would all these private schools come from?" he sputtered.
"That's the same question they used to ask in the Soviet Union when it was suggested the state get out of the food distribution business and allow the private sector to take over: 'Where would all these so-called "private grocery stores" come from?! The greedy capitalists would charge such high prices that millions would starve!' Yet it turns out the free market works just fine, as always; in America everybody gets more and better food for less."
For the rest of the story go to Las Vegas Review Journal
http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2003/Apr-13-Sun-2003/opinion/21085253.html
Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Review-Journal and author of the books "Send in the Waco Killers" and "The Ballad of Carl Drega."
Increased school spending reduces literacy
I got a phone call last week from the head of one of the many departments in the Clark County School District which I had mentioned in my March 16 essay on elephantine school districts, headlined "Mission Creep."
"Do you even know what my department does?" demanded the fellow, whose listing in the district's administrative phone directory says only "Warranty Department."
I had no idea, I said. And, I continued, that was the whole point of the listing: The sheer number -- hundreds -- of bureaucrats being paid $60,000 and $80,000 and more per year, leeches living off taxpayer funds to do things the average taxpayer doesn't know about, doesn't understand, has never been told about, and couldn't possibly be expected to explain, justify or favor if he were asked to.
"And you think just because the taxpayers are too stupid to understand the importance of what my department does, that's a reason we should be closed down?" he asked.
Even though I had not proposed any specific department be "closed down," I wrote down his words, because I couldn't possibly have invented such a succinct summary of bureaucratic arrogance if I'd tried.
It's apparently fine to require the great unwashed masses of cud-chewing taxpayers, at gunpoint, to pay for all this bureaucratic overhead (the fellow's department apparently double-checks to make sure private contractors are building new school buildings properly). But the bureaucrats should in no way be subject to the whims of those taxpayers, should they try to stop funding functions they don't understand, which have never been explained to them, and which have never been tested against any free-market competitive model to find out if they're truly necessary, or even being done at anywhere near as low a cost as possible.
(Care to compare administrative and maintenance costs at the average private or parochial school to those at a tax-funded campus?)
"Leeches?" my supercilious caller shrieked, pretending to laugh but instead issuing forth with something more like the chattering of an African pack scavenger. "There are no guns involved," he sneered. "Taxes are paid voluntarily."
"You're telling me that if I refuse to pay the property taxes that prop up the government schools, men with uniforms and guns won't eventually come and surround my house with yellow police tape, set my belongings out on the sidewalk, and auction it off?" I asked.
"Well, of course," my caller replied. "If you don't pay your taxes you have to pay the consequences. That's the free choice you have -- to pay your taxes or to face the consequences."
That was his definition of "voluntary," as opposed to coercion. Comply or get evicted from your own home -- and if you resist that, run the risk of getting shot or burned out with incendiary grenades.
"He lost the argument right there," volunteered a visiting Arizona Baptist minister of my acquaintance, with whom I happened to have dinner the following evening. "If you're not willing to admit that taxes are mandatory, that they're collected by the coercive use of force -- even if it's only applied to the occasional protester to 'set an example' -- then there's no common moral ground on which you can continue that discussion."
My chortling caller next tried to get me to admit that building new government school buildings was necessary.
Just the opposite, I said. New York state (government) teacher of the year John Taylor Gatto, in his book "The Underground History of American Education," cites statistics from the National Adult Literacy Survey and the National Assessment of Educational Progress confirming that the literacy rate in this country in 1940 was 96 percent for whites and 80 percent for blacks, but fell over the next 60 years to 83 percent for whites and 60 percent for blacks.
"Put another way," Gatto reveals, "black illiteracy doubled; white illiteracy quadrupled," despite the fact that "We spend three or four times as much real money on schooling as we did 60 years ago."
Why this change since the 1940s? It was during the Second World War that the government schools began to abandon the old, tried-and-true, phonetic method of teaching reading, Mr. Gatto reports.
If we built fewer government schools, that would increase pressure on parents to either home-school or get their kids into private schools, which would rescue more millions of souls from the enervating government youth indoctrination camps.
My caller could respond only by alternating between snorting, chuckling and cackling his disbelief that I could actually dare to say such things. "Where would all these private schools come from?" he sputtered.
"That's the same question they used to ask in the Soviet Union when it was suggested the state get out of the food distribution business and allow the private sector to take over: 'Where would all these so-called "private grocery stores" come from?! The greedy capitalists would charge such high prices that millions would starve!' Yet it turns out the free market works just fine, as always; in America everybody gets more and better food for less."
For the rest of the story go to Las Vegas Review Journal
http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2003/Apr-13-Sun-2003/opinion/21085253.html
Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the Review-Journal and author of the books "Send in the Waco Killers" and "The Ballad of Carl Drega."
Friday, February 17, 2006
Teachers need lesson in private sector
The below editorial appeared in the Herald News.
Teachers need lesson in private sector
The issue: Teachers expect some interesting perks these days.
We say: Time to get real.
How times have changed.
Twenty years ago, the teaching profession was often the last resort in career choices. Low pay, basic benefits and long hours were an unattractive option to opportunities offered in the private sector.
Since then, the pay for teachers and administrators has risen steadily. Though their salary increases have come down somewhat in the past few years, 3 percent to 5 percent yearly bumps aren't unusual. Teachers still receive pensions, which is understandable since they don't earn Social Security benefits. Up until a couple of years ago, many districts still provided full medical benefits at no cost, though the trend now is to more closely mirror benefits received in the private sector and have the teachers share a portion of the cost.
Speaking of the private sector, much has changed there, too, in the last two decades. Pensions, fully paid medical coverage and double-digit pay increases have become things of the past for a majority of workers in nongovernment jobs. In many industries, downsizing, cost-cutting and subcontracting of staff work has become a yearly occurrence. A 1 percent or 2 percent yearly pay increase, if you're lucky, is often the most many expect these days.
Despite this, school officials are baffled when they have a difficult time convincing the Legislature, or even parents in their district, that they need more money to run the schools.
Much of the money used by a school district is for salaries. Teachers are educating the future of our country, and smaller class sizes help make teaching — and learning — easier.
But empathy works both ways. Educators need to be sensitive to the economic and lifestyle realities of the communities they serve. And that hasn't always been the case.
On Monday, for instance, the teachers' union in Plainfield protested the fact that their traditional two-full-week winter holiday was being cut by five days. The union claimed the extra five days off were needed to maintain the "continuity of education," especially for Hispanic students whose families may visit Mexico for three weeks at winter break. Though we laud the union for its sensitivity to diversity, we must say of their claim: Yeah, right.
The union also requested that spring break be rescheduled to coordinate with that of schools in DuPage County so teachers wouldn't have the financial burden of paying for day care. Are they even trying to understand what other parents, parents of the children they teach, must go through?
Finally, in a recent OpenLine submission, a teacher lamented the fact that it took 20 years for him or her to get an annual salary up to $90,000. A lot of households will never see that kind of money on two salaries, let alone one.
For the rest of the story click here.
Teachers need lesson in private sector
The issue: Teachers expect some interesting perks these days.
We say: Time to get real.
How times have changed.
Twenty years ago, the teaching profession was often the last resort in career choices. Low pay, basic benefits and long hours were an unattractive option to opportunities offered in the private sector.
Since then, the pay for teachers and administrators has risen steadily. Though their salary increases have come down somewhat in the past few years, 3 percent to 5 percent yearly bumps aren't unusual. Teachers still receive pensions, which is understandable since they don't earn Social Security benefits. Up until a couple of years ago, many districts still provided full medical benefits at no cost, though the trend now is to more closely mirror benefits received in the private sector and have the teachers share a portion of the cost.
Speaking of the private sector, much has changed there, too, in the last two decades. Pensions, fully paid medical coverage and double-digit pay increases have become things of the past for a majority of workers in nongovernment jobs. In many industries, downsizing, cost-cutting and subcontracting of staff work has become a yearly occurrence. A 1 percent or 2 percent yearly pay increase, if you're lucky, is often the most many expect these days.
Despite this, school officials are baffled when they have a difficult time convincing the Legislature, or even parents in their district, that they need more money to run the schools.
Much of the money used by a school district is for salaries. Teachers are educating the future of our country, and smaller class sizes help make teaching — and learning — easier.
But empathy works both ways. Educators need to be sensitive to the economic and lifestyle realities of the communities they serve. And that hasn't always been the case.
On Monday, for instance, the teachers' union in Plainfield protested the fact that their traditional two-full-week winter holiday was being cut by five days. The union claimed the extra five days off were needed to maintain the "continuity of education," especially for Hispanic students whose families may visit Mexico for three weeks at winter break. Though we laud the union for its sensitivity to diversity, we must say of their claim: Yeah, right.
The union also requested that spring break be rescheduled to coordinate with that of schools in DuPage County so teachers wouldn't have the financial burden of paying for day care. Are they even trying to understand what other parents, parents of the children they teach, must go through?
Finally, in a recent OpenLine submission, a teacher lamented the fact that it took 20 years for him or her to get an annual salary up to $90,000. A lot of households will never see that kind of money on two salaries, let alone one.
For the rest of the story click here.
Battle lines drawn in D - 200
A group that opposes the insane spending in D 200 emerges in Woodstock. The story below was reported in the Northwest Herald on February 17, 2006.
Battle lines drawn in D-200
[published on Fri, Feb 17, 2006]
WOODSTOCK – As election day nears, supporters and opponents are drawing battle lines over the Woodstock School District 200's request for $105 million in new taxes to build more schools.
Mailings from a pro-referendum committee called Citizens for District 200 Schools soon could be hitting mailboxes, while an anti-referendum campaign has taken to cyberspace.
When voters head to the polls March 21, they will be asked whether School District 200 should be allowed to build three new schools, including a new high school with a pool; renovate Olson Middle School and Verda Dierzen Early Learning Center; and temporarily keep open Clay Elementary School.
The proposal, which could cost taxpayers $105 million payable over 20 years, was designed to help manage a projected 4,300-student population boom by academic year 2013-14.
For the owner of a $200,000 home claiming the $5,000 homestead tax exemption, the bond issue would mean an additional $141.83 in property taxes the first year.
The Woodstock Citizen, a blog launched earlier this month in response to the referendum, raised eyebrows by posting anti-referendum ads on a site supported by many of downtown Woodstock's prominent businesses. Blogs such as The Woodstock Citizen are on-line journals maintained by one person or a group of people who post short articles and running commentary about various issues.
One of the ads features a series of unsigned testimonials purportedly from referendum opponents. For the rest of the story in the Northwest Herald click here.
To visit Woodstock Citizens for Sane Spending and Stop D 200 Tax hike click here.
To view the unsigned testimonials click here.
To view the main website woodstockcitizen.com click here.
CRAFT tried to contact this group via email. As of this posting we have not had a response.
Battle lines drawn in D-200
[published on Fri, Feb 17, 2006]
WOODSTOCK – As election day nears, supporters and opponents are drawing battle lines over the Woodstock School District 200's request for $105 million in new taxes to build more schools.
Mailings from a pro-referendum committee called Citizens for District 200 Schools soon could be hitting mailboxes, while an anti-referendum campaign has taken to cyberspace.
When voters head to the polls March 21, they will be asked whether School District 200 should be allowed to build three new schools, including a new high school with a pool; renovate Olson Middle School and Verda Dierzen Early Learning Center; and temporarily keep open Clay Elementary School.
The proposal, which could cost taxpayers $105 million payable over 20 years, was designed to help manage a projected 4,300-student population boom by academic year 2013-14.
For the owner of a $200,000 home claiming the $5,000 homestead tax exemption, the bond issue would mean an additional $141.83 in property taxes the first year.
The Woodstock Citizen, a blog launched earlier this month in response to the referendum, raised eyebrows by posting anti-referendum ads on a site supported by many of downtown Woodstock's prominent businesses. Blogs such as The Woodstock Citizen are on-line journals maintained by one person or a group of people who post short articles and running commentary about various issues.
One of the ads features a series of unsigned testimonials purportedly from referendum opponents. For the rest of the story in the Northwest Herald click here.
To visit Woodstock Citizens for Sane Spending and Stop D 200 Tax hike click here.
To view the unsigned testimonials click here.
To view the main website woodstockcitizen.com click here.
CRAFT tried to contact this group via email. As of this posting we have not had a response.
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
Why we should reject universal preschool
There has been recent talk of universal preschool in the story below. Just below the Chicago Tribune story is an excerpt from and a link to No Universal Preschool.
Doubts cast on preschool proposal
2/13/2006
By Diane Rado and Rick Pearson
Chicago Tribune
Under attack from political opponents, Gov. Rod Blagojevich acknowledged Sunday that it won't be easy to push through his proposal to create the most expansive state preschool program in the nation.
Nevertheless, "we will roll up our sleeves and we will fight," Blagojevich said in announcing his "Preschool for All" initiative, which would offer state-paid pre-kindergarten to all 3- and 4-year-olds, regardless of family income.
If approved by lawmakers, Illinois would be the first state in the nation to offer so-called universal preschool to 3-year-olds and the fourth state to offer such access to 4-year-olds.
The program--a minimum 2 1/2-hour school day--would not be mandatory, and many families would likely stay in private preschools. Blagojevich's plan would cost an extra $135 million in the initial three years, with the price tag in outlying years still uncertain. In addition, the governor wants to finance the plan in part with money from state accounts reserved for special purposes, a practice that has spurred legal challenges.
After details of the plan first appeared in the Tribune over the weekend--just weeks before the March primary--Democratic and Republican candidates alike blasted Blagojevich.
"Unfortunately for the children of Illinois, in this election season the governor will use them as props for all sorts of promises," Edwin Eisendrath, Blagojevich's challenger in the March 21 Democratic primary, said in a statement.
Republican gubernatorial candidate Ron Gidwitz, a former Illinois State Board of Education chairman, called the governor's announcement "another headline-grabbing stunt."
And Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, another Republican candidate for governor, said Blagojevich keeps "coming up with all these big, expensive, huge `warm-fuzzies,' usually involving children, and not really coming up with ways to pay for them."
For the rest of the story go to Doubts cast on preschool proposal
No Universal Preschool
Preschool-For-All is a prescription for stress, not success, and will literally make kids sick. The National Institute of Child Health and Development found that children who attend structured, curriculum-oriented, non-parental involved preschools have higher cortisol (stress hormone) levels caused by too early separation from their parents and too early academics. The Preschool-For-All Act dovetails with CA Assembly Bill 1246 that implements "preschool learning standards" in line with public school curriculum standards that include Math, English Language Arts, History, Science, and Social Sciences. Accountability will be required in the form of testing. This kind of academic stress takes a physical toll on young children reducing tolerance to viral and bacterial infections that result in chronic childhood illnesses.
Children enrolled in preschool have higher incidences of obesity. Physical activity is restrained in typical preschool classrooms. Fine motor development is impaired, contributing to learning disabilities. Active play such as running, jumping, climbing, and gross motor movement is discouraged. Kids get flabby and fat with lifelong health consequences.
Children who attend preschool exhibit problem behaviors, and are being expelled! The National Institute of Child Health and Development found that children who attend non-parental, structured, curriculum-oriented preschools have poorer work habits, lower grades and test scores, inferior peer relationships, substandard emotional health, aggression, and they are disobedient. In fact, children are being expelled from preschools at an alarming rate!
There is no such thing as "quality" public preschool. In fact, so-called "quality" state-run preschools can harm little kids. The artificial environment of a classroom, the supervision by transient, impassive strangers (certified teachers and aids), and indoctrination with standardized curriculum has been shown to be harmful to the intellectual, social, emotional, psychological and physical development of young children by researchers and educational psychologists including David Elkind, Kathy Hirsch-Pasek, Mary Eberstadt, and Jane Healy. These kinds of preschool environments are of a very poor quality. Current research studies show that young children learn best through interest-initiated learning, lots of imaginative play, and the opportunity to explore their environment in a natural rhythm and routine such as takes place at home, under the guidance of parents and attentive, loving adults.
For the rest of the story go to No Universal Preschool /
You may want to send the above story to Governor Blagojevich and tell him no universal pre-school.
Doubts cast on preschool proposal
2/13/2006
By Diane Rado and Rick Pearson
Chicago Tribune
Under attack from political opponents, Gov. Rod Blagojevich acknowledged Sunday that it won't be easy to push through his proposal to create the most expansive state preschool program in the nation.
Nevertheless, "we will roll up our sleeves and we will fight," Blagojevich said in announcing his "Preschool for All" initiative, which would offer state-paid pre-kindergarten to all 3- and 4-year-olds, regardless of family income.
If approved by lawmakers, Illinois would be the first state in the nation to offer so-called universal preschool to 3-year-olds and the fourth state to offer such access to 4-year-olds.
The program--a minimum 2 1/2-hour school day--would not be mandatory, and many families would likely stay in private preschools. Blagojevich's plan would cost an extra $135 million in the initial three years, with the price tag in outlying years still uncertain. In addition, the governor wants to finance the plan in part with money from state accounts reserved for special purposes, a practice that has spurred legal challenges.
After details of the plan first appeared in the Tribune over the weekend--just weeks before the March primary--Democratic and Republican candidates alike blasted Blagojevich.
"Unfortunately for the children of Illinois, in this election season the governor will use them as props for all sorts of promises," Edwin Eisendrath, Blagojevich's challenger in the March 21 Democratic primary, said in a statement.
Republican gubernatorial candidate Ron Gidwitz, a former Illinois State Board of Education chairman, called the governor's announcement "another headline-grabbing stunt."
And Treasurer Judy Baar Topinka, another Republican candidate for governor, said Blagojevich keeps "coming up with all these big, expensive, huge `warm-fuzzies,' usually involving children, and not really coming up with ways to pay for them."
For the rest of the story go to Doubts cast on preschool proposal
No Universal Preschool
Preschool-For-All is a prescription for stress, not success, and will literally make kids sick. The National Institute of Child Health and Development found that children who attend structured, curriculum-oriented, non-parental involved preschools have higher cortisol (stress hormone) levels caused by too early separation from their parents and too early academics. The Preschool-For-All Act dovetails with CA Assembly Bill 1246 that implements "preschool learning standards" in line with public school curriculum standards that include Math, English Language Arts, History, Science, and Social Sciences. Accountability will be required in the form of testing. This kind of academic stress takes a physical toll on young children reducing tolerance to viral and bacterial infections that result in chronic childhood illnesses.
Children enrolled in preschool have higher incidences of obesity. Physical activity is restrained in typical preschool classrooms. Fine motor development is impaired, contributing to learning disabilities. Active play such as running, jumping, climbing, and gross motor movement is discouraged. Kids get flabby and fat with lifelong health consequences.
Children who attend preschool exhibit problem behaviors, and are being expelled! The National Institute of Child Health and Development found that children who attend non-parental, structured, curriculum-oriented preschools have poorer work habits, lower grades and test scores, inferior peer relationships, substandard emotional health, aggression, and they are disobedient. In fact, children are being expelled from preschools at an alarming rate!
There is no such thing as "quality" public preschool. In fact, so-called "quality" state-run preschools can harm little kids. The artificial environment of a classroom, the supervision by transient, impassive strangers (certified teachers and aids), and indoctrination with standardized curriculum has been shown to be harmful to the intellectual, social, emotional, psychological and physical development of young children by researchers and educational psychologists including David Elkind, Kathy Hirsch-Pasek, Mary Eberstadt, and Jane Healy. These kinds of preschool environments are of a very poor quality. Current research studies show that young children learn best through interest-initiated learning, lots of imaginative play, and the opportunity to explore their environment in a natural rhythm and routine such as takes place at home, under the guidance of parents and attentive, loving adults.
For the rest of the story go to No Universal Preschool /
You may want to send the above story to Governor Blagojevich and tell him no universal pre-school.
Tuesday, February 14, 2006
Vote "NO" Signs
People have been writing to ask about Vote "NO" signs. If you are looking for signs in Lake County contact the Republican Assembly of Lake County. If you are looking for "NO" signs for the D-300 referenda contact the Family Taxpayers Network at 847-428-0212 or email them at mail@thechampion.org. CRAFT has run out of signs many were stolen when we loaned them to the folks in District 1, District 2 and District 158 to fight their referenda. Many were also stolen during the District 50 referenda campaign, luckily they are not running any referenda this election.
To keep your signs from being stolen keep them as close to your house as possible but still visible for the public to view. Contact the police if any signs are stolen. Bravo to the first individual who catches a no sign stealer on video tape and gets them prosecuted.
Fancy signs are not needed. You can make a sign on your own rather cheaply. Go to Home Depot or Mernards pick up a couple of two by fours a can of spray paint and a sheet of ply wood and make your own vote no sign. A few nails and a hammer and in minutes you will have your own sign. The cost of a no sign is much cheaper than raising your property taxes forever.
The other great thing is as soon as the opposition puts up their signs it is a great reminder for the no voters to get to the polls and vote.
To keep your signs from being stolen keep them as close to your house as possible but still visible for the public to view. Contact the police if any signs are stolen. Bravo to the first individual who catches a no sign stealer on video tape and gets them prosecuted.
Fancy signs are not needed. You can make a sign on your own rather cheaply. Go to Home Depot or Mernards pick up a couple of two by fours a can of spray paint and a sheet of ply wood and make your own vote no sign. A few nails and a hammer and in minutes you will have your own sign. The cost of a no sign is much cheaper than raising your property taxes forever.
The other great thing is as soon as the opposition puts up their signs it is a great reminder for the no voters to get to the polls and vote.
Monday, February 13, 2006
Big tests, big sticks
Commentary by Pete Speer
The article below addresses the differences in social context between PRC students and those in America. It discounts the No Child Left Behind program based on these differences. However, it implies that American schools must change.
Missing from discussion is the strong motivation in China -- under a communist dictatorship -- to move in some small way up the economic ladder. Implied (by listing the costs) is the value of such an education.
This article will be taken by proponents of our bankrupt system to mean that the social differences are responsible for the higher scores in China -- therefore scores may be ignored. This is not a correct reading of the article's content.
Indeed, the author concludes by suggesting that for our own dismal schools there must be another way. In America, the only other way is full competitive choice.
People hoping to intelligently debate this issue must be familiar with the article.
Pete Speer
The below article was reprinted with the permission of Dr. Orsini
-------------------------------------------
Illinois School Board Journal
January/February 2006
Big tests, big sticks
Social context of high-stakes
testing in China and U.S.
by Alfonso J. Orsini
Alfonso J. Orsini is director of the Western International School of Shanghai and a former special English teacher in Qingdao, China. His article first appeared in Education Week, July 13, 2005, and is reprinted with permission from the author.
This past school year, I have been teaching English for a special program at a public school in China. The experience has made me think a lot about the push toward high-stakes testing in the United States, especially with the impetus of the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
China is a country that promises to change the economic face of the globe in the years ahead. It has an incredibly lean, mean education machine. American policymakers, seeing embarrassing data such as the poor showing of U.S. students on recent international assessments in science and math, say they want to prepare our children to meet the global competition posed by countries like China.
If the No Child Left Behind law is meant to do that ?to help us compete with countries that have used big tests for a long time to scientifically weed and stratify their citizens ?the plan will fail. This is not just because of the problems inherent in creating and enacting such tests, but also because of the differing social, economic and cultural contexts that surround such tests.
Here is what the United States is up against. In China, all of the items on American business interests' education agenda are in evidence. There is a focus on the "useful" subjects of math, science and technology. There are large, economical classes of 50 to 60 students each. This works fine in China, because the students here are driven, and their teachers mostly lecture. (Their bow to modernization is in using a computer beamer instead of the blackboard.)
Walking through a Chinese classroom, you hear students chanting a lot in unison. The teachers are well-trained, in that they follow the script of slavishly preparing for the big exams. While they teach only about 10 classes a week, they must be in the school from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily to prepare. Some big exam ?schoolwide, citywide or nationwide ?is always looming. The school's headmaster even assigns teachers research papers. They comply because they want to get a promotion, perhaps a merit raise of 200 yuan ($24) added on to a monthly salary of, say, 2,000 yuan ($242) for a veteran.
Office talk is often about "grammar points" that may appear on an exam. The exams must have a number of virtually impossible questions to keep teachers and students scrambling, and to allow the remarkable few to rise to the top. If students do poorly, it comes back to haunt the teacher and the school. Last year, the local newspaper asked why fewer graduates at my school had been admitted to top universities. That heightened the anxiety.
Another numerically based improvement has been enacted here: more class time. At my boarding school (the stronger public schools in China are boarding), students are in the classroom from late August to late July, six days a week, from 7:30 a.m. to 4:25 p.m., with a 1?hour lunch/nap break and a five-minute eye-massage break led by a woman's peppy, almost militaristic voice broadcast over the public address system.
After some sports, dinner and time to do laundry by hand (we all do laundry by hand here), the students are back in the classroom for study from 6:30 p.m. to 9:45 p.m., with monitoring chiefly done by students and only a few teachers roving the halls. When evening study concludes, it's back up to the dorm to wash up with a basin; there are no hot showers. Then, eight kids bed down in each 9-by-12-foot room.
My kids are from a higher socioeconomic bracket. Their parents are paying 24,000 yuan ($2,900) extra, on top of the regular tuition of 3,000 yuan ($362) per year. I am preparing them to pass the new English entrance exam for a Canadian university. They got into this school only because they paid extra for the special program. With rising prosperity, these kinds of educational back doors, including Australian and United Kingdom foundation-year programs, are popping up all over.
My students, always weary but still cheerful, have never dated, never camped or been to a dance, and have almost never traveled. In a paired-discussion exercise in which they had to find something interesting about a classmate, everyone was astounded that a boy called Nick had danced with a girl at his aunt's wedding. In our town of Qingdao, one of the hottest places to be on a Saturday or Sunday is not the shopping mall but the Xin Hua bookstore.
The educational rigor in China results from the social context. Only about 48 percent of rural residents and 79 percent of urban residents attain more than a primary school education. Of the 27 million students completing the "compulsory" grade 9, around 25 percent go into a three-year academic high school program and 18 percent go into vocational training. Of those 6.67 million who go to academic high schools, around 3.5 million will make it to a four-year university program. The statistics are harsher in some areas. In Beijing, 49 percent of 18- to 22-year-olds are enrolled in postsecondary studies, but in places like Yunan Province, fewer than 9 percent are enrolled.
But this doesn't mean that the Chinese don't value education. There are 310 million people in schools at all levels here, including over a million studying through TV university. The number of university students in China has grown from 1.08 million in 1998 to more than 17 million in 2003. And the Chinese government has just launched a program to send 5,000 college teachers overseas each year for doctoral study or research.
China has a cheap, willing workforce composed partly of the 310 million surplus workers from the rural provinces, only 180 million of whom found jobs in 2003. It also has a cheap, well-trained professional class. Doctors earn perhaps 2,000 yuan ($242) a month, beginning teachers maybe 1,000 yuan ($121). People live remarkably frugal lives. China is progressing not through empire building or aggression, but because it has people willing to do virtually any work with incredible patience and persistence to survive. And it is selling this, the cheapest labor in the world, to all takers, including many U.S. investors. It is also building cooperative ties with Canada, Europe and Latin America, and with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations group, which will create a free-trade zone of 2 billion people.
U.S. business leaders, in their urgent push to whip American education into line, may be among the few in our country who are truly aware of how things are outside the United States. They have a concrete motivation to be aware: money. And they may be seeing, correctly, that the peaceful threat posed by China and others developing nations requires that we do something differently. Some might say that a first step should be lowering the salaries of business executives. But if my perspective from China is valid, then a more general "leaning" of America may have to happen before big tests are widely tolerated by U.S. students and their families.
Big, consequential tests run up against a lot of obstacles in America. One of them is fundamental ?what the historian Richard Hofstadter labeled in his influential book as Anti-Intellectualism in American Life. Others include the distraction posed by the cultural excesses that assault American kids every day and the fact that U.S. students know there is a college in America for just about anyone who can pay for it. But beyond such problems, I wonder if American kids sometimes don't care about study because they sense that many adults don't care about them ?about the life of their minds and the enrichment of their souls.
When American adults who are busy making money create the kinds of sweeping educational schemes we have now, they implicitly view young people's learning ?and young people themselves ?as a means to an end, the figures on a balance sheet. And too often they don't even care enough to spend sufficient time or money on education. The No Child Left Behind initiative, which might better be called "no child left unclassified and not appropriately employed," is a case in point. When American kids start to get "left behind" (in most countries with big tests, that's what the tests are for), we can assume that parents with the means and education will be lined up to yell about it. But when federal funds get withdrawn from schools that fail, where will those already-beleaguered schools turn? How will their low-income students find another school?
If America winds up with the diminished role in the world and leaner standard of living that the new global economy may offer, there may be far fewer American parents with means and education. And one can bet that far more people will fall into line behind rigorous national testing. They will have no choice, as is the case today in China and in many other lands. My Chinese students always say: "That's how it is, with so many people and so little money. That's just how it is."
For now, we Americans can make all the tests we want. Kids will never be "lean and hungry" in a fat society. And the egotism of infinite possibility will never prevail against the fierce capacity for self-abnegation in the Asian psyche.
Isn't there another way that America can use its prosperity, not to build empires, but to enhance the quality of its people's lives? How China will use its eventual prosperity remains to be seen. We can hope, however, that its choices will not help prove the axiom that countries attaining prosperity and democracy must become effete, stratified and sometimes arrogant.
The author maintains an e-mail account at alfonso.orsini@gmail.com.
The article below addresses the differences in social context between PRC students and those in America. It discounts the No Child Left Behind program based on these differences. However, it implies that American schools must change.
Missing from discussion is the strong motivation in China -- under a communist dictatorship -- to move in some small way up the economic ladder. Implied (by listing the costs) is the value of such an education.
This article will be taken by proponents of our bankrupt system to mean that the social differences are responsible for the higher scores in China -- therefore scores may be ignored. This is not a correct reading of the article's content.
Indeed, the author concludes by suggesting that for our own dismal schools there must be another way. In America, the only other way is full competitive choice.
People hoping to intelligently debate this issue must be familiar with the article.
Pete Speer
The below article was reprinted with the permission of Dr. Orsini
-------------------------------------------
Illinois School Board Journal
January/February 2006
Big tests, big sticks
Social context of high-stakes
testing in China and U.S.
by Alfonso J. Orsini
Alfonso J. Orsini is director of the Western International School of Shanghai and a former special English teacher in Qingdao, China. His article first appeared in Education Week, July 13, 2005, and is reprinted with permission from the author.
This past school year, I have been teaching English for a special program at a public school in China. The experience has made me think a lot about the push toward high-stakes testing in the United States, especially with the impetus of the federal No Child Left Behind Act.
China is a country that promises to change the economic face of the globe in the years ahead. It has an incredibly lean, mean education machine. American policymakers, seeing embarrassing data such as the poor showing of U.S. students on recent international assessments in science and math, say they want to prepare our children to meet the global competition posed by countries like China.
If the No Child Left Behind law is meant to do that ?to help us compete with countries that have used big tests for a long time to scientifically weed and stratify their citizens ?the plan will fail. This is not just because of the problems inherent in creating and enacting such tests, but also because of the differing social, economic and cultural contexts that surround such tests.
Here is what the United States is up against. In China, all of the items on American business interests' education agenda are in evidence. There is a focus on the "useful" subjects of math, science and technology. There are large, economical classes of 50 to 60 students each. This works fine in China, because the students here are driven, and their teachers mostly lecture. (Their bow to modernization is in using a computer beamer instead of the blackboard.)
Walking through a Chinese classroom, you hear students chanting a lot in unison. The teachers are well-trained, in that they follow the script of slavishly preparing for the big exams. While they teach only about 10 classes a week, they must be in the school from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily to prepare. Some big exam ?schoolwide, citywide or nationwide ?is always looming. The school's headmaster even assigns teachers research papers. They comply because they want to get a promotion, perhaps a merit raise of 200 yuan ($24) added on to a monthly salary of, say, 2,000 yuan ($242) for a veteran.
Office talk is often about "grammar points" that may appear on an exam. The exams must have a number of virtually impossible questions to keep teachers and students scrambling, and to allow the remarkable few to rise to the top. If students do poorly, it comes back to haunt the teacher and the school. Last year, the local newspaper asked why fewer graduates at my school had been admitted to top universities. That heightened the anxiety.
Another numerically based improvement has been enacted here: more class time. At my boarding school (the stronger public schools in China are boarding), students are in the classroom from late August to late July, six days a week, from 7:30 a.m. to 4:25 p.m., with a 1?hour lunch/nap break and a five-minute eye-massage break led by a woman's peppy, almost militaristic voice broadcast over the public address system.
After some sports, dinner and time to do laundry by hand (we all do laundry by hand here), the students are back in the classroom for study from 6:30 p.m. to 9:45 p.m., with monitoring chiefly done by students and only a few teachers roving the halls. When evening study concludes, it's back up to the dorm to wash up with a basin; there are no hot showers. Then, eight kids bed down in each 9-by-12-foot room.
My kids are from a higher socioeconomic bracket. Their parents are paying 24,000 yuan ($2,900) extra, on top of the regular tuition of 3,000 yuan ($362) per year. I am preparing them to pass the new English entrance exam for a Canadian university. They got into this school only because they paid extra for the special program. With rising prosperity, these kinds of educational back doors, including Australian and United Kingdom foundation-year programs, are popping up all over.
My students, always weary but still cheerful, have never dated, never camped or been to a dance, and have almost never traveled. In a paired-discussion exercise in which they had to find something interesting about a classmate, everyone was astounded that a boy called Nick had danced with a girl at his aunt's wedding. In our town of Qingdao, one of the hottest places to be on a Saturday or Sunday is not the shopping mall but the Xin Hua bookstore.
The educational rigor in China results from the social context. Only about 48 percent of rural residents and 79 percent of urban residents attain more than a primary school education. Of the 27 million students completing the "compulsory" grade 9, around 25 percent go into a three-year academic high school program and 18 percent go into vocational training. Of those 6.67 million who go to academic high schools, around 3.5 million will make it to a four-year university program. The statistics are harsher in some areas. In Beijing, 49 percent of 18- to 22-year-olds are enrolled in postsecondary studies, but in places like Yunan Province, fewer than 9 percent are enrolled.
But this doesn't mean that the Chinese don't value education. There are 310 million people in schools at all levels here, including over a million studying through TV university. The number of university students in China has grown from 1.08 million in 1998 to more than 17 million in 2003. And the Chinese government has just launched a program to send 5,000 college teachers overseas each year for doctoral study or research.
China has a cheap, willing workforce composed partly of the 310 million surplus workers from the rural provinces, only 180 million of whom found jobs in 2003. It also has a cheap, well-trained professional class. Doctors earn perhaps 2,000 yuan ($242) a month, beginning teachers maybe 1,000 yuan ($121). People live remarkably frugal lives. China is progressing not through empire building or aggression, but because it has people willing to do virtually any work with incredible patience and persistence to survive. And it is selling this, the cheapest labor in the world, to all takers, including many U.S. investors. It is also building cooperative ties with Canada, Europe and Latin America, and with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations group, which will create a free-trade zone of 2 billion people.
U.S. business leaders, in their urgent push to whip American education into line, may be among the few in our country who are truly aware of how things are outside the United States. They have a concrete motivation to be aware: money. And they may be seeing, correctly, that the peaceful threat posed by China and others developing nations requires that we do something differently. Some might say that a first step should be lowering the salaries of business executives. But if my perspective from China is valid, then a more general "leaning" of America may have to happen before big tests are widely tolerated by U.S. students and their families.
Big, consequential tests run up against a lot of obstacles in America. One of them is fundamental ?what the historian Richard Hofstadter labeled in his influential book as Anti-Intellectualism in American Life. Others include the distraction posed by the cultural excesses that assault American kids every day and the fact that U.S. students know there is a college in America for just about anyone who can pay for it. But beyond such problems, I wonder if American kids sometimes don't care about study because they sense that many adults don't care about them ?about the life of their minds and the enrichment of their souls.
When American adults who are busy making money create the kinds of sweeping educational schemes we have now, they implicitly view young people's learning ?and young people themselves ?as a means to an end, the figures on a balance sheet. And too often they don't even care enough to spend sufficient time or money on education. The No Child Left Behind initiative, which might better be called "no child left unclassified and not appropriately employed," is a case in point. When American kids start to get "left behind" (in most countries with big tests, that's what the tests are for), we can assume that parents with the means and education will be lined up to yell about it. But when federal funds get withdrawn from schools that fail, where will those already-beleaguered schools turn? How will their low-income students find another school?
If America winds up with the diminished role in the world and leaner standard of living that the new global economy may offer, there may be far fewer American parents with means and education. And one can bet that far more people will fall into line behind rigorous national testing. They will have no choice, as is the case today in China and in many other lands. My Chinese students always say: "That's how it is, with so many people and so little money. That's just how it is."
For now, we Americans can make all the tests we want. Kids will never be "lean and hungry" in a fat society. And the egotism of infinite possibility will never prevail against the fierce capacity for self-abnegation in the Asian psyche.
Isn't there another way that America can use its prosperity, not to build empires, but to enhance the quality of its people's lives? How China will use its eventual prosperity remains to be seen. We can hope, however, that its choices will not help prove the axiom that countries attaining prosperity and democracy must become effete, stratified and sometimes arrogant.
The author maintains an e-mail account at alfonso.orsini@gmail.com.
Sunday, February 12, 2006
School Choice Gaining Ground Across Country
For more great information on school choice visit The Heritage Foundation The article below appeared on FoxNews.com.
School Choice Gaining Ground Across Country
Friday, February 10, 2006
By Dan Lips
Supporters of school choice in Arizona must feel like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football.
And they must think of Gov. Janet Napolitano as Lucy -- pulling away the ball once again.
During budget negotiations last summer, Gov. Napolitano agreed to provide $5 million in tax credits for corporations contributing to private-school scholarship funds for low-income students who now attend public schools.
The governor -- long opposed to school choice -- explained at a news conference that “the $5 million tax credit was not a bad price to pay” to reach a budget compromise.
But days later, Napolitano changed her mind and vetoed the measure. She told the Arizona Republic she did this because the tax credit wouldn’t automatically “sunset,” as she had requested in the negotiations.
Jim Weiers, then the Republican speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives, couldn’t believe his ears. “There's only one way to put this,” he said. “The governor lied to me.”
Who to believe?
Consider this: On Jan. 11 of this year, the state legislature again passed tax credits for school choice. And this time, it included the sunset provision Gov. Napolitano had requested. A few days later, Gov. Napolitano vetoed the measure again. This time, she said she will consider a tax credit only during budget negotiations in the spring.
So, choice supporters will have to try again this summer to expand education opportunity for Arizona’s low-income students. Assuming the legislature can pass tax credits a third time, Gov. Napolitano will have to decide again whether to honor her promise or veto this popular program yet again.
It’s not an easy calculation. She must strike a balance between the demands of the 30,000-member Arizona Education Association, which opposes school choice, and Arizona families, who support school choice by nearly a 2:1 margin, according to a recent poll by the Goldwater Institute. Already, 100,000 children in Arizona attend charter schools or private schools, thanks to a 1997 scholarship tax-credit program.
The governor’s fellow Democrats are siding with the underprivileged in increasing numbers. In Washington, D.C., Democratic Mayor Anthony Williams and Sens. Robert Byrd, D-W.V., Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Joe Lieberman, D-Conn. provided critical support for the District’s new voucher program.
Last year, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell approved legislation to expand the state's private-school tax-credit program. And in New Jersey, a coalition of Democratic state legislators is pushing a school voucher program to help poor, inner-city children.
Gov. Jim Doyle of Wisconsin, a Democrat, faces a similar quandary. Like Napolitano, he faces re-election in 2006 and must choose between the educational establishment and students. Wisconsin is home to the Milwaukee school-voucher program -- perhaps the most successful choice program in the nation. This program helps 15,000 low-income, inner-city children attend private school and has been shown to boost graduation rates.
The Milwaukee voucher program has proven so popular that there aren’t enough scholarships to meet popular demand. The program limits participation to 15 percent of the student population. Gov. Doyle has vetoed several proposals to raise the cap, which means thousands of inner-city children now in the program could be sent back to public schools this fall under the state's system for rationing vouchers.
The school-choice movement is nothing new. It’s been clamoring for alternatives to failing public schools for more than 20 years now. As successes, such as those in Milwaukee, mount, so does public support.
Lawmakers can’t treat the issue like Lucy does that football. Ultimately, they won’t be able to pull it away at the last minute. Then, they’ll have to make a stand. And what will it be: Will these leaders stand with the teachers’ unions or with underprivileged families?
Dan Lips is a policy analyst who specializes in education issues at The Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based public policy research institute.
School Choice Gaining Ground Across Country
Friday, February 10, 2006
By Dan Lips
Supporters of school choice in Arizona must feel like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football.
And they must think of Gov. Janet Napolitano as Lucy -- pulling away the ball once again.
During budget negotiations last summer, Gov. Napolitano agreed to provide $5 million in tax credits for corporations contributing to private-school scholarship funds for low-income students who now attend public schools.
The governor -- long opposed to school choice -- explained at a news conference that “the $5 million tax credit was not a bad price to pay” to reach a budget compromise.
But days later, Napolitano changed her mind and vetoed the measure. She told the Arizona Republic she did this because the tax credit wouldn’t automatically “sunset,” as she had requested in the negotiations.
Jim Weiers, then the Republican speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives, couldn’t believe his ears. “There's only one way to put this,” he said. “The governor lied to me.”
Who to believe?
Consider this: On Jan. 11 of this year, the state legislature again passed tax credits for school choice. And this time, it included the sunset provision Gov. Napolitano had requested. A few days later, Gov. Napolitano vetoed the measure again. This time, she said she will consider a tax credit only during budget negotiations in the spring.
So, choice supporters will have to try again this summer to expand education opportunity for Arizona’s low-income students. Assuming the legislature can pass tax credits a third time, Gov. Napolitano will have to decide again whether to honor her promise or veto this popular program yet again.
It’s not an easy calculation. She must strike a balance between the demands of the 30,000-member Arizona Education Association, which opposes school choice, and Arizona families, who support school choice by nearly a 2:1 margin, according to a recent poll by the Goldwater Institute. Already, 100,000 children in Arizona attend charter schools or private schools, thanks to a 1997 scholarship tax-credit program.
The governor’s fellow Democrats are siding with the underprivileged in increasing numbers. In Washington, D.C., Democratic Mayor Anthony Williams and Sens. Robert Byrd, D-W.V., Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Joe Lieberman, D-Conn. provided critical support for the District’s new voucher program.
Last year, Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell approved legislation to expand the state's private-school tax-credit program. And in New Jersey, a coalition of Democratic state legislators is pushing a school voucher program to help poor, inner-city children.
Gov. Jim Doyle of Wisconsin, a Democrat, faces a similar quandary. Like Napolitano, he faces re-election in 2006 and must choose between the educational establishment and students. Wisconsin is home to the Milwaukee school-voucher program -- perhaps the most successful choice program in the nation. This program helps 15,000 low-income, inner-city children attend private school and has been shown to boost graduation rates.
The Milwaukee voucher program has proven so popular that there aren’t enough scholarships to meet popular demand. The program limits participation to 15 percent of the student population. Gov. Doyle has vetoed several proposals to raise the cap, which means thousands of inner-city children now in the program could be sent back to public schools this fall under the state's system for rationing vouchers.
The school-choice movement is nothing new. It’s been clamoring for alternatives to failing public schools for more than 20 years now. As successes, such as those in Milwaukee, mount, so does public support.
Lawmakers can’t treat the issue like Lucy does that football. Ultimately, they won’t be able to pull it away at the last minute. Then, they’ll have to make a stand. And what will it be: Will these leaders stand with the teachers’ unions or with underprivileged families?
Dan Lips is a policy analyst who specializes in education issues at The Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based public policy research institute.
Saturday, February 11, 2006
Open letter to Ron Gidwitz Regarding his "Education Plan"
Kevin Killion of the www.Illinoisloop.org sent the below message to Ron Gidwitz regarding his education plan. Illinoisloop.org is a must read website for all true education reformists.
To: Ron Gidwitz
Dear Ron,
It seems that the press has all but ignored the announcement of your "P16" plan for education in Illinois. I'm sorry to say it, but that's not a surprise. The plan was woefully lacking in anything that would actually enthuse anyone. Where was the EXCITEMENT? The INNOVATION? Where were any common-sense REFORMS?
Here are the points in your press release, which I've copied in their entirety:
- Creation of more pre-school opportunities, with a special emphasis on encouraging enrollment of children from low income families;
Yawn. Maybe it would be simpler just to insist on effective,
research-based and teacher-directed reading instruction in
K-3?
- Mandatory kindergarten for all Illinois children by the age of 6. For parents who choose to homeschool, the state will provide educational resources.
Huh?
WHEN the state schools start demonstrating competence at
what they have now, THEN let's talk about expanding their
dominions.
Why not simply offer a full-cost voucher for Kindergarten,
good at ANY school?
- Smaller class sizes during the early years to allow more individual attention
Aw, Ron, c'mon now! YOU KNOW that smaller class sizes haven't
been shown to improve objective scores! We DO know that
small class sizes are popular with the Big Ed unions because
they cut workloads. Unfortunately, small class sizes,
besides being hugely expensive (more teachers and more classrooms),
also make it MUCH easier for weak teachers to fill class time with
pointless projects and activities.
- Intensive reading programs focused on first, second and third graders to assure that students are not promoted to fourth grade without achieving reading proficiency;
Uh, and that means what exactly? What exactly are you pledging
to do? Boring, boring, boring, Ron.
Ron, if you had put some DRAMA into this, you would have
had something. For example, "We have to sweep out the remnants
of failed education theories from our classrooms and ed schools.
It's time to concentrate on what works!"
- Shifting of the high school mathematics courses of algebra and geometry into the middle school experience.
Oh Ron, what a distinctly HORRIBLE idea!
Only a lousy half (54.3%) of students even came up to the
MINIMUM state standards for 8th grade math in the 2005 ISAT,
and yet you want to cram MORE into pre-high school years?
What a horrible, horrible idea!
We've got a vast number of kids in this state who can't
handle basic math, don't know standard algorithms, have
little or no experience with operations on fractions,
are vague at best on decimal conversions -- in short,
are utterly incompetent. AND YOUR RESPONSE IS TO
FORCE ALGEBRA AND GEOMETRY INTO THOSE YEARS?
I honestly can't even begin to imagine what you were
thinking on this one.
Meanwhile, you're ignoring the more basic problem:
the infestation of our K-8 schools by theory-based fuzzy math
programs that have been a disaster.
- Increased graduation requirements: four years of math and three years of science
Let me get this straight:
1) Our schools are using trendy but discredited fuzzy theories
to teach math,
2) and a thin soup of gee-whiz pyrotechnics to "teach" science,
3) with predictably awful results.
4) And your solution is NOT to restore rigor, but rather
to extend the nonsense by extra years?
Do I have that right?
- More options for 11th and 12th graders, including career training and apprenticeship programs and dual enrollments with community colleges and universities
OK, so that sounds like a fine idea since so many kids
come out of our schools with little ability to do much
of anything that requires thinking or knowledge.
- Cooperation and exchange between public and private higher education
And this is in the press release WHY EXACTLY? It's
inscrutable and means nothing on its face, so why did you
think anyone would be enthused about this?
- Incentives for teachers to encourage excellence in instruction
Ah, a Rorschach test!
Uh, does this mean you are going to reward teachers for
"achieving" meaningless steppingstones such as goofy
NBPTS certification, or going to fuzzy-wuzzy in-service
chatfests?
Or,
does it mean that you will reward teachers for
concrete evidence of teaching success, through merit pay
for gains in Value Added Assessment (VAA)?
If it IS the latter, and you are prepared to support
the common-sense notion that GREAT teachers deserve better
compensation, then why not simply SAY so and generate
some enthusiasm for your campaign?
- Funding our state's P-16 education needs FIRST, before all other programs
Sounds good for a few seconds, until one thinks,
"But what is that supposed to MEAN?"
I've tried and tried, but I can't see that it means anything
other than you intend to spend EVEN MORE MONEY on
a bloated cesspool of a bureaucracy that is already
awash with cash!
Heavens knows the education bureaucracy in this state needs a major shaking up. TWO MILLION KIDS in public schools in Illinois need your help in fixing the lunacy in their classrooms. It's an old but apt metaphor: We don't need to talk about rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. We need REAL REFORM.
I suspect that Illinois voters would respond to a message of REAL REFORM as well.
Sincerely,
Kevin Killion
Director, Illinois Loop
To: Ron Gidwitz
Dear Ron,
It seems that the press has all but ignored the announcement of your "P16" plan for education in Illinois. I'm sorry to say it, but that's not a surprise. The plan was woefully lacking in anything that would actually enthuse anyone. Where was the EXCITEMENT? The INNOVATION? Where were any common-sense REFORMS?
Here are the points in your press release, which I've copied in their entirety:
- Creation of more pre-school opportunities, with a special emphasis on encouraging enrollment of children from low income families;
Yawn. Maybe it would be simpler just to insist on effective,
research-based and teacher-directed reading instruction in
K-3?
- Mandatory kindergarten for all Illinois children by the age of 6. For parents who choose to homeschool, the state will provide educational resources.
Huh?
WHEN the state schools start demonstrating competence at
what they have now, THEN let's talk about expanding their
dominions.
Why not simply offer a full-cost voucher for Kindergarten,
good at ANY school?
- Smaller class sizes during the early years to allow more individual attention
Aw, Ron, c'mon now! YOU KNOW that smaller class sizes haven't
been shown to improve objective scores! We DO know that
small class sizes are popular with the Big Ed unions because
they cut workloads. Unfortunately, small class sizes,
besides being hugely expensive (more teachers and more classrooms),
also make it MUCH easier for weak teachers to fill class time with
pointless projects and activities.
- Intensive reading programs focused on first, second and third graders to assure that students are not promoted to fourth grade without achieving reading proficiency;
Uh, and that means what exactly? What exactly are you pledging
to do? Boring, boring, boring, Ron.
Ron, if you had put some DRAMA into this, you would have
had something. For example, "We have to sweep out the remnants
of failed education theories from our classrooms and ed schools.
It's time to concentrate on what works!"
- Shifting of the high school mathematics courses of algebra and geometry into the middle school experience.
Oh Ron, what a distinctly HORRIBLE idea!
Only a lousy half (54.3%) of students even came up to the
MINIMUM state standards for 8th grade math in the 2005 ISAT,
and yet you want to cram MORE into pre-high school years?
What a horrible, horrible idea!
We've got a vast number of kids in this state who can't
handle basic math, don't know standard algorithms, have
little or no experience with operations on fractions,
are vague at best on decimal conversions -- in short,
are utterly incompetent. AND YOUR RESPONSE IS TO
FORCE ALGEBRA AND GEOMETRY INTO THOSE YEARS?
I honestly can't even begin to imagine what you were
thinking on this one.
Meanwhile, you're ignoring the more basic problem:
the infestation of our K-8 schools by theory-based fuzzy math
programs that have been a disaster.
- Increased graduation requirements: four years of math and three years of science
Let me get this straight:
1) Our schools are using trendy but discredited fuzzy theories
to teach math,
2) and a thin soup of gee-whiz pyrotechnics to "teach" science,
3) with predictably awful results.
4) And your solution is NOT to restore rigor, but rather
to extend the nonsense by extra years?
Do I have that right?
- More options for 11th and 12th graders, including career training and apprenticeship programs and dual enrollments with community colleges and universities
OK, so that sounds like a fine idea since so many kids
come out of our schools with little ability to do much
of anything that requires thinking or knowledge.
- Cooperation and exchange between public and private higher education
And this is in the press release WHY EXACTLY? It's
inscrutable and means nothing on its face, so why did you
think anyone would be enthused about this?
- Incentives for teachers to encourage excellence in instruction
Ah, a Rorschach test!
Uh, does this mean you are going to reward teachers for
"achieving" meaningless steppingstones such as goofy
NBPTS certification, or going to fuzzy-wuzzy in-service
chatfests?
Or,
does it mean that you will reward teachers for
concrete evidence of teaching success, through merit pay
for gains in Value Added Assessment (VAA)?
If it IS the latter, and you are prepared to support
the common-sense notion that GREAT teachers deserve better
compensation, then why not simply SAY so and generate
some enthusiasm for your campaign?
- Funding our state's P-16 education needs FIRST, before all other programs
Sounds good for a few seconds, until one thinks,
"But what is that supposed to MEAN?"
I've tried and tried, but I can't see that it means anything
other than you intend to spend EVEN MORE MONEY on
a bloated cesspool of a bureaucracy that is already
awash with cash!
Heavens knows the education bureaucracy in this state needs a major shaking up. TWO MILLION KIDS in public schools in Illinois need your help in fixing the lunacy in their classrooms. It's an old but apt metaphor: We don't need to talk about rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. We need REAL REFORM.
I suspect that Illinois voters would respond to a message of REAL REFORM as well.
Sincerely,
Kevin Killion
Director, Illinois Loop
Friday, February 10, 2006
Q&A | MATH TEACHING
Yet another article pointing out why American students are not properly educated. More money is not the answer reform is the answer. Paying bad teachers more will not improve the quality of education in any school system. What is needed is real reform. Teachers with masters degree in the subjects they teach, teaching degrees do not lead to mastery in the subject they teach. No more money to the schools until legislators are willing to legislate real reform. Our concern must be to the students not to the unions and administrators who are destroying the education system and students lives by not properly educating them or preparing them and this Country to prosper in the 21st century. Please be sure to catch the complete series in the LA Times.
Q&A | MATH TEACHING
Students in the U.S. Could Use New Formulas
By Tanya Caldwell
Times Staff Writer
February 3, 2006
The nation's children aren't the best and brightest in the world when it comes to math, according to the 2003 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study. Even among industrialized countries, the United States ranked ninth out of 12.
As the Los Angeles Times' Monday installment of "The Vanishing Class" series described, 35% of future elementary school instructors who studied at Cal State Northridge, the largest supplier of new teachers to the Los Angeles Unified School District, got Ds or Fs in their first college-level math class last year.
Los Angeles schools Supt. Roy Romer has cited the "cumulative failure of our ability to teach math adequately in the public school system."
William Schmidt, a professor at Michigan State University and executive director of its Third International Math and Science Study Research Center, was asked by The Times whether other countries have as much trouble finding adequately trained math teachers as the United States.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Question: Why are many other countries so far ahead of the United States in math achievement?
Answer: These other nations have a much higher level of expectation for their students. The teachers who
then teach these courses — at least in the highest-achieving countries — have a much greater preparation in the subject matter of mathematics, so that they're able to teach those more challenging levels of mathematics.
Put simply, from the data we have, we know that by the end of eighth grade, U.S. students are probably some
two years behind their counterparts in most of the rest of the world…. Middle school in the rest of the world is about algebra, geometry, chemistry, physics. In this country it's still about a lot of arithmetic and what I call "rocks and body parts."
Q: It seems that the quick solution would be to just set higher expectations.
A: That's really what the whole thing surrounding No Child Left Behind is about. States have begun to raise their standards and, as a result … there has been a movement to greatly increase the rigor and the demand of the state standards. Here in Michigan we have new standards, and they are much more demanding than were the standards that preceded them. So I think that there has been a response to this and it's beginning to change.
Q: How is it that students aren't excelling as well in high school math classes — presumably because they haven't learned the basics — when they seem to have done better in previous years when those basics were first applied?
A: Studies show that middle school is where we lose a great deal of ground, at least internationally. The middle school in these other countries in mathematics is much more demanding. And it's much more of a transition into what we in this country first do in high school. So when our kids come into high school, they're a couple of years behind already. And our high schools just can't make it up.
Basically, the middle school is not preparing kids adequately. But it actually goes all the way back even into primary school, where, again, the kids are not being prepared well, don't understand and aren't able to do the computations associated with simple arithmetic.
Q: So it starts in elementary school?
A: We need to really start a much more serious, clearly defined, coherent curriculum all the way back there, and then we'd have a better shot at doing better with our kids.
A lot of mathematics in this country is not designed very coherently. It doesn't progress from the simple to the more complex in ways that are reflective of the mathematics discipline. There's a sequence of things that make the most sense. And very typically in American schools, these sequences are not very clearly laid out.
Q: What do you mean?
A: Fractions, for example, are very difficult for students. Instead of introducing the concept clearly enough so that they understand fractions as numbers on the number line, we oftentimes try to move too quickly to other parts of fractions, such as the operations, before they really have a clear understanding of what fractions are and how they fit into the broader number system.
So kids are trying to learn how to operate on these things, and at the same time they really don't understand what they are, so things get very muddled in their minds.
Q: What will it take to get U.S. students to perform better than their overseas peers?
A: We need a more coherent, challenging curriculum. And we need a set of teachers who have a strong background in mathematics and who know how to teach mathematics to kids and can then bring those high expectations to these kids. It's fairly simple. You look across the world, and that's what the difference is.
Q: Are the nations throughout the world using a different curriculum? Do they have different teaching methods?
A: That's actually a point I want to make very clearly. There doesn't seem to be one perfect method for doing this across the world. Different countries have different methods, just like we do here in the United States.
The real issue is the what. What it is that they're studying, in what grade levels in what sequence and at what level of rigor. Those are the issues that become important, not the how. It's more the what.
Q: We're just not being hard enough.
A: Yes. That's it, in a certain sense. As we move through the grades, we keep repeating topics year after year. We try to do too many topics at each grade level. We coined the phrase the "mile-wide, inch-deep curriculum" as a characteristic of the U.S., which means they just keep repeating these topics and as a result they have so much every year that it's too much
for the kids to try to learn.
In these other countries it's a more focused attention on a smaller number of topics that progress across the grades in a logical fashion, leading to higher levels of expectation as you get up in the grades, like in the middle grades. And that's what we need.
Q: In Los Angeles, some educators say they have a hard time finding qualified teachers. Is that a problem for other nations?
A: For some. In the elementary grades, everybody struggles with this, because elementary teachers have to teach all the subjects. But once you get into about middle school, this is more of a problem in the United States, where our teachers are not as well prepared as the teachers in these other countries.
We are doing a study right now across six countries in which we very clearly find that U.S. teachers — U.S. teachers from middle school — are not being … required to take the same level of mathematics that is true in other countries. Teachers that are going to teach middle school mathematics have to have a stronger background.
Q: What can be done to ensure that the future math teachers who are still in school will be better than the teachers who taught them?
A: The simple answer is that they have to have a more rigorous training while at the university level. Many of our teachers carry with them that inadequate preparation and carry it right back and teach much the same way. It is a vicious cycle.
We need to raise the level of expectation for the students that are in our K-12 system so that they are more competitive. But we also have to raise the level of preparation of our teachers so that they can come in and actually teach those more challenging and more demanding curricula. It really demands both of those things in order to make the difference and catch up with the rest of the world.
*
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)
By the numbers
A 2003 study found that U.S. 15-year-olds scored low
among industrialized nations on the PISA* mathematics
test. Rank Country Score
1. Hong Kong (region) 550
2. Netherlands 538
3. Japan 534
4. Belgium 529
5. Australia 524
6. New Zealand 523
7. Norway 495
8. Hungary 490
9. Latvia 483
(tie) United States 483
11. Russia 468
12. Italy 466
* Program for International Student Assessment
-
Source: American Institutes for Research
Q&A | MATH TEACHING
Students in the U.S. Could Use New Formulas
By Tanya Caldwell
Times Staff Writer
February 3, 2006
The nation's children aren't the best and brightest in the world when it comes to math, according to the 2003 Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study. Even among industrialized countries, the United States ranked ninth out of 12.
As the Los Angeles Times' Monday installment of "The Vanishing Class" series described, 35% of future elementary school instructors who studied at Cal State Northridge, the largest supplier of new teachers to the Los Angeles Unified School District, got Ds or Fs in their first college-level math class last year.
Los Angeles schools Supt. Roy Romer has cited the "cumulative failure of our ability to teach math adequately in the public school system."
William Schmidt, a professor at Michigan State University and executive director of its Third International Math and Science Study Research Center, was asked by The Times whether other countries have as much trouble finding adequately trained math teachers as the United States.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Question: Why are many other countries so far ahead of the United States in math achievement?
Answer: These other nations have a much higher level of expectation for their students. The teachers who
then teach these courses — at least in the highest-achieving countries — have a much greater preparation in the subject matter of mathematics, so that they're able to teach those more challenging levels of mathematics.
Put simply, from the data we have, we know that by the end of eighth grade, U.S. students are probably some
two years behind their counterparts in most of the rest of the world…. Middle school in the rest of the world is about algebra, geometry, chemistry, physics. In this country it's still about a lot of arithmetic and what I call "rocks and body parts."
Q: It seems that the quick solution would be to just set higher expectations.
A: That's really what the whole thing surrounding No Child Left Behind is about. States have begun to raise their standards and, as a result … there has been a movement to greatly increase the rigor and the demand of the state standards. Here in Michigan we have new standards, and they are much more demanding than were the standards that preceded them. So I think that there has been a response to this and it's beginning to change.
Q: How is it that students aren't excelling as well in high school math classes — presumably because they haven't learned the basics — when they seem to have done better in previous years when those basics were first applied?
A: Studies show that middle school is where we lose a great deal of ground, at least internationally. The middle school in these other countries in mathematics is much more demanding. And it's much more of a transition into what we in this country first do in high school. So when our kids come into high school, they're a couple of years behind already. And our high schools just can't make it up.
Basically, the middle school is not preparing kids adequately. But it actually goes all the way back even into primary school, where, again, the kids are not being prepared well, don't understand and aren't able to do the computations associated with simple arithmetic.
Q: So it starts in elementary school?
A: We need to really start a much more serious, clearly defined, coherent curriculum all the way back there, and then we'd have a better shot at doing better with our kids.
A lot of mathematics in this country is not designed very coherently. It doesn't progress from the simple to the more complex in ways that are reflective of the mathematics discipline. There's a sequence of things that make the most sense. And very typically in American schools, these sequences are not very clearly laid out.
Q: What do you mean?
A: Fractions, for example, are very difficult for students. Instead of introducing the concept clearly enough so that they understand fractions as numbers on the number line, we oftentimes try to move too quickly to other parts of fractions, such as the operations, before they really have a clear understanding of what fractions are and how they fit into the broader number system.
So kids are trying to learn how to operate on these things, and at the same time they really don't understand what they are, so things get very muddled in their minds.
Q: What will it take to get U.S. students to perform better than their overseas peers?
A: We need a more coherent, challenging curriculum. And we need a set of teachers who have a strong background in mathematics and who know how to teach mathematics to kids and can then bring those high expectations to these kids. It's fairly simple. You look across the world, and that's what the difference is.
Q: Are the nations throughout the world using a different curriculum? Do they have different teaching methods?
A: That's actually a point I want to make very clearly. There doesn't seem to be one perfect method for doing this across the world. Different countries have different methods, just like we do here in the United States.
The real issue is the what. What it is that they're studying, in what grade levels in what sequence and at what level of rigor. Those are the issues that become important, not the how. It's more the what.
Q: We're just not being hard enough.
A: Yes. That's it, in a certain sense. As we move through the grades, we keep repeating topics year after year. We try to do too many topics at each grade level. We coined the phrase the "mile-wide, inch-deep curriculum" as a characteristic of the U.S., which means they just keep repeating these topics and as a result they have so much every year that it's too much
for the kids to try to learn.
In these other countries it's a more focused attention on a smaller number of topics that progress across the grades in a logical fashion, leading to higher levels of expectation as you get up in the grades, like in the middle grades. And that's what we need.
Q: In Los Angeles, some educators say they have a hard time finding qualified teachers. Is that a problem for other nations?
A: For some. In the elementary grades, everybody struggles with this, because elementary teachers have to teach all the subjects. But once you get into about middle school, this is more of a problem in the United States, where our teachers are not as well prepared as the teachers in these other countries.
We are doing a study right now across six countries in which we very clearly find that U.S. teachers — U.S. teachers from middle school — are not being … required to take the same level of mathematics that is true in other countries. Teachers that are going to teach middle school mathematics have to have a stronger background.
Q: What can be done to ensure that the future math teachers who are still in school will be better than the teachers who taught them?
A: The simple answer is that they have to have a more rigorous training while at the university level. Many of our teachers carry with them that inadequate preparation and carry it right back and teach much the same way. It is a vicious cycle.
We need to raise the level of expectation for the students that are in our K-12 system so that they are more competitive. But we also have to raise the level of preparation of our teachers so that they can come in and actually teach those more challenging and more demanding curricula. It really demands both of those things in order to make the difference and catch up with the rest of the world.
*
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)
By the numbers
A 2003 study found that U.S. 15-year-olds scored low
among industrialized nations on the PISA* mathematics
test. Rank Country Score
1. Hong Kong (region) 550
2. Netherlands 538
3. Japan 534
4. Belgium 529
5. Australia 524
6. New Zealand 523
7. Norway 495
8. Hungary 490
9. Latvia 483
(tie) United States 483
11. Russia 468
12. Italy 466
* Program for International Student Assessment
-
Source: American Institutes for Research
Thursday, February 09, 2006
Threats don't work
We at CRAFT encourage all parents being subjected to the same threats in your school district to write similar letters to the editor and to your school board expressing your sentiments if they are the same as this persons sentiments below. This Letter to the Editor appeared in the February 9 edition of Beacon News newspaper. Click on the post title to get to the Beacon News website.
Threats don't work
After reading all the threats about cutting activities if the school referendum doesn't pass, we've received a letter from the school, through our children, highlighting the cuts. This begs me to ask a few questions about the people on the School Board and the administrators for the school. First, why do they have to resort to threatening rhetoric? I work, along with my wife, to pay the taxes on our house in Yorkville, but neither of us respond well to the threats. If my children want to participate in after-school activities, we would find a way to pay for them. So by cutting the after-school activities they have not hurt our feelings. If you want to play, you should have to pay.
Why do we need buildings of such opulence with curved walls? Isn't it cheaper to make it a straight-forward building with square corners? Do we need a showcase for someone's ego, or a facility in which to teach the children? Every school I ever attended was a brick building, with square corners and minimal architectural details. All of them are still in use today. Why not pick one plan that can be replicated as the need grows, instead of several different designs?
I think the people of Yorkville should be very leery of the direction we're heading, when threats instead of logical options are the way to get in peoples pocketbooks. You are not going to embarrass me into voting for some referendum by bullying me and telling me my kids will suffer. This just shows me that you placed the children second.
Tony Pekich
Yorkville
Threats don't work
After reading all the threats about cutting activities if the school referendum doesn't pass, we've received a letter from the school, through our children, highlighting the cuts. This begs me to ask a few questions about the people on the School Board and the administrators for the school. First, why do they have to resort to threatening rhetoric? I work, along with my wife, to pay the taxes on our house in Yorkville, but neither of us respond well to the threats. If my children want to participate in after-school activities, we would find a way to pay for them. So by cutting the after-school activities they have not hurt our feelings. If you want to play, you should have to pay.
Why do we need buildings of such opulence with curved walls? Isn't it cheaper to make it a straight-forward building with square corners? Do we need a showcase for someone's ego, or a facility in which to teach the children? Every school I ever attended was a brick building, with square corners and minimal architectural details. All of them are still in use today. Why not pick one plan that can be replicated as the need grows, instead of several different designs?
I think the people of Yorkville should be very leery of the direction we're heading, when threats instead of logical options are the way to get in peoples pocketbooks. You are not going to embarrass me into voting for some referendum by bullying me and telling me my kids will suffer. This just shows me that you placed the children second.
Tony Pekich
Yorkville
Wednesday, February 08, 2006
Bullying starts with pro-referendum pushers
It is no wonder we have a problem with bullying in public schools. The very people that are to be educating our children bully our children, their families, the taxpayers and government officials into supporting referenda. The children learn bullying from the pro-referendum hoodlums. All across Illinois school districts are threatening program cuts and shunning fiscal responsibility. Some school districts are threatening lawsuits against those who are opposing referenda. This must stop.
The school district and school board exist to educate our child and to be good stewards of our taxpayer dollars. The school board is not there to serve the interests of the teachers unions, administrators, banks, contractors, real estate agents, bound counsels and various other special interests groups.
Developers’ not current homeowners should shoulder the burden for the building of new schools. This can be done through impact fees and agreements with the city councils and zoning boards before these developments are built.
School boards, teachers and administrators cry that there is a funding problem, the problem is their spending. One just needs to review the teachers’ and administrators’ contracts and a history of revenues to understand that spending is the problem.
Bravo to those public officials who will not take a position on referenda. Bravo to those parents who are speaking out against these referenda if more parents like you speak out these referenda will fail. Parents can teach their children a great deal about sticking up for themselves by not giving into these bullies. Sticking up for yourself also leads to better self esteem. Parents as well as children should write school boards and let them know the boards primary interests are to the children and being fiscally responsible with taxpayer dollars. Reasonable contracts would lead to balanced budgets. A no vote does not mean cut programs, it means we think you have enough money and we want you to spend it wisely. Vote no on March 21st this is the first step toward fiscal accountability.
The school district and school board exist to educate our child and to be good stewards of our taxpayer dollars. The school board is not there to serve the interests of the teachers unions, administrators, banks, contractors, real estate agents, bound counsels and various other special interests groups.
Developers’ not current homeowners should shoulder the burden for the building of new schools. This can be done through impact fees and agreements with the city councils and zoning boards before these developments are built.
School boards, teachers and administrators cry that there is a funding problem, the problem is their spending. One just needs to review the teachers’ and administrators’ contracts and a history of revenues to understand that spending is the problem.
Bravo to those public officials who will not take a position on referenda. Bravo to those parents who are speaking out against these referenda if more parents like you speak out these referenda will fail. Parents can teach their children a great deal about sticking up for themselves by not giving into these bullies. Sticking up for yourself also leads to better self esteem. Parents as well as children should write school boards and let them know the boards primary interests are to the children and being fiscally responsible with taxpayer dollars. Reasonable contracts would lead to balanced budgets. A no vote does not mean cut programs, it means we think you have enough money and we want you to spend it wisely. Vote no on March 21st this is the first step toward fiscal accountability.
End Teacher Strikes
End teacher strikes
In his recent letter to Crain's, Arnold Aprill claimed it was "no secret" that Illinois "ranks at the bottom of the country in funding education." Of course it's "no secret" because even the latest rankings reported by the National Education Assn. (NEA), the union representing most teachers outside Chicago, show that it's patently false.
According to the NEA rankings for 2005, Illinois spends the ninth-highest amount per pupil among the states. The report also showed that our spending is about 20% higher than the national average.
The NEA report identified why our children are shortchanged in programs such as art and other educational enrichments: disproportionately high staff salaries and raises.
The study reported that instructional staff in Illinois have the third-highest salaries among the states. Perhaps more troubling is the revelation that average Illinois instructional staff salaries grew at the highest rate of any state last year at 5.5%. This level of salary increase is unsustainable from any state or local revenue stream.
The solution to this problem is technically simple, but politically difficult. The General Assembly needs to prohibit teacher strikes in suburban and Downstate schools as they are in Chicago and 41 other states. It also needs to prohibit school boards from approving labor contracts for which they do not have a secured funding source and eliminate tenure protection for poorly performing senior staff.
Bob Shelstrom
Southland Education Watch
Palos Park
In his recent letter to Crain's, Arnold Aprill claimed it was "no secret" that Illinois "ranks at the bottom of the country in funding education." Of course it's "no secret" because even the latest rankings reported by the National Education Assn. (NEA), the union representing most teachers outside Chicago, show that it's patently false.
According to the NEA rankings for 2005, Illinois spends the ninth-highest amount per pupil among the states. The report also showed that our spending is about 20% higher than the national average.
The NEA report identified why our children are shortchanged in programs such as art and other educational enrichments: disproportionately high staff salaries and raises.
The study reported that instructional staff in Illinois have the third-highest salaries among the states. Perhaps more troubling is the revelation that average Illinois instructional staff salaries grew at the highest rate of any state last year at 5.5%. This level of salary increase is unsustainable from any state or local revenue stream.
The solution to this problem is technically simple, but politically difficult. The General Assembly needs to prohibit teacher strikes in suburban and Downstate schools as they are in Chicago and 41 other states. It also needs to prohibit school boards from approving labor contracts for which they do not have a secured funding source and eliminate tenure protection for poorly performing senior staff.
Bob Shelstrom
Southland Education Watch
Palos Park
Tuesday, February 07, 2006
Broken Bonds Daily Herald Series Continues
The stories below are day two of the three day Broken Bond series reported by Jeffrey Gaunt and Emily Krone of the Daily Herald. Be sure to get a copy of the stories and read them all before voting on any referendum. You may also want to contact the Daily Herald and tell them to keep up the great investigative reporting on public schools.
How the Daily Herald school bond study was done
What you should be asking
To be clear, schools aren’t thrilled, either
How the Daily Herald school bond study was done
What you should be asking
To be clear, schools aren’t thrilled, either
Monday, February 06, 2006
Daily Herald Series Drops Another Bombshell on School Spending Practices
More stories in the series "Big money, unspoken practices: The costly world of school loans" published in the Daily Herald. Stories publised in the Daily Herald on February 6th.
‘Whatever it Takes’: $103.7 million and counting
Costly loans get free rein in Illinois
BROKEN BONDS
District errs in search for delicate balance
Which do you prefer?
‘Whatever it Takes’: $103.7 million and counting
Costly loans get free rein in Illinois
BROKEN BONDS
District errs in search for delicate balance
Which do you prefer?
Sunday, February 05, 2006
Big money, unspoken practices: The costly world of school loans
Jeffery Gaunt and Emily Krone are doing another great series regarding schools. Be sure to pick up the Daily Herald the next three days, better yet they often do great articles on education you should obtain a subscription if you are willing and able. Must reads before you vote yes on any referenda.
Our analysis
Is this how you’d borrow money?
BROKEN BONDS Big money, unspoken practices: The costly world of school loans
On the hook for almost a half-billion
Know these terms
Premium path takes you above debt limit
Why lower rates?
Buy now, pay later
Our analysis
Is this how you’d borrow money?
BROKEN BONDS Big money, unspoken practices: The costly world of school loans
On the hook for almost a half-billion
Know these terms
Premium path takes you above debt limit
Why lower rates?
Buy now, pay later
Saturday, February 04, 2006
Questionable Practices of the School Construction Program
Please note the letter below. You may want to take the information in the letter below and send a letter to the Governor, your Senator and your Representative and ask them not to pour any more money into The School Construction Program.
This is a copy of the following message sent to Web-master via Illinois
Senate Republicans
This is an enquiry e-mail via http://www.senategop.state.il.us from:
Jeffrey D. Ferguson
I am writing to bring to your attention, a process that must not be allowed to continue. The School Construction Program is riddled with questionable practices. Per CDB records, only 254 of the 497 projects since 1998 were approved by the local voters in their respective district. Our district was one of the 243 that built schools with nothing more than a school board
resolution as authorization, despite a referendum being defeated 71-29%. I have spent the past 35 months researching and documenting the process at the local, regional, and state level. I have also contacted every conceivable state agency, as well as two Senators and the US Attorney's office. Still, Governor Blagojevich is proposing another $500 million be poured in to this Program. We have residents literally being taxed off their property and out of their homes, and the State, at every level, allows it to continue. Enough is enough. We are considering legal action in our district, which will undoubtedly have far reaching implications if we proceed. Our website is www.jccfpa.org. I suggest the Illinois GOP educate themselves on this
Program before any consideration is given to additional funding.
Cordially,
Jeffrey D. Ferguson, Chairman
Coalition for Public Awareness
chairman@jccfpa.org
This is a copy of the following message sent to Web-master via Illinois
Senate Republicans
This is an enquiry e-mail via http://www.senategop.state.il.us from:
Jeffrey D. Ferguson
I am writing to bring to your attention, a process that must not be allowed to continue. The School Construction Program is riddled with questionable practices. Per CDB records, only 254 of the 497 projects since 1998 were approved by the local voters in their respective district. Our district was one of the 243 that built schools with nothing more than a school board
resolution as authorization, despite a referendum being defeated 71-29%. I have spent the past 35 months researching and documenting the process at the local, regional, and state level. I have also contacted every conceivable state agency, as well as two Senators and the US Attorney's office. Still, Governor Blagojevich is proposing another $500 million be poured in to this Program. We have residents literally being taxed off their property and out of their homes, and the State, at every level, allows it to continue. Enough is enough. We are considering legal action in our district, which will undoubtedly have far reaching implications if we proceed. Our website is www.jccfpa.org. I suggest the Illinois GOP educate themselves on this
Program before any consideration is given to additional funding.
Cordially,
Jeffrey D. Ferguson, Chairman
Coalition for Public Awareness
chairman@jccfpa.org
$10 million spent annually by district for classroom subs
The article below appeared in the Chicago Tribune . Be sure to email the authors and tell them to keep up the great investigative reporting.
Chicago to target absent teachers
$10 million spent annually by district for classroom subs
By Tracy Dell'Angela and Darnell Little
Tribune staff reporters
Published February 4, 2006
Driven by parental concerns about teacher absenteeism, the Chicago Public Schools for the first time will start scrutinizing schools with high numbers of teachers taking sick days.
The district also plans to publicize teacher attendance rates at each school beginning next school year.
"This is important to parents. There's never been a spotlight on this, and that's a mistake," Schools Chief Arne Duncan said of the new scrutiny, which was announced to schools in a memo this week. "I think it's like any workplace. When people feel good about the work, people want to be there. This is not only important for student learning, it's important to school culture."
On any given school day in Chicago, an average of 1,500 teachers, about 6 percent of the teaching staff, call in sick or take a personal day, according to a Tribune analysis of teacher payroll records. The absentee rate is highest on Fridays, when an average of 1,800 teachers don't show, the analysis revealed.
While some individual schools track teachers' attendance, the district has never tried to analyze how many teachers are out systemwide--or whether some schools have a disproportionate number of absent teachers.
For each of the last six school years, Chicago teachers missed an average of 12 unscheduled days in their 39-week work year. Their current contract calls for 10 sick days and three personal days.
By comparison, salaried employees nationwide take an average of five sick and personal days during their 50-week work year, according to a 2004 survey of 536 employers by a major human resource consulting company.
The district's effort is an attempt to address the academic disruption that occurs in schools with large numbers of teachers calling in sick. But it also is expected to reduce the hiring of substitutes, which costs the cash-strapped system more than $10 million a year.
Last school year, the district tapped 280,000 substitutes, with the peak coming in February, when demand for substitutes topped 47,000--or about 2,350 each day. The demand for subs in the 2005-06 school year is even higher, up about 27 percent for the first five months of this school year compared with the same period the year before, according to district reports.
The absentee problem falls hardest on students in schools perceived to be dangerous or chaotic because their schools have the toughest time securing substitutes, principals say. In May, an average of about 200 substitute requests each day went unfilled, which meant that the school had to find another staff member to cover the classroom. Stable schools typically have their own stock of steady substitutes and don't rely on the district's substitute center.
Union officials contend that the district is unfairly trying to punish teachers for taking days that are guaranteed by the contract.
"The district is using this as an intimidation tactic," union President Marilyn Stewart said. "Teachers may take off for a lot of reasons, either because they are sick or frustrated. It's no one's business. I don't see why it has to be public. Why do parents care, if it's not tied to test scores? You can clean your house without letting everyone see your dirt."
Stewart argued that most Chicago teachers are dedicated professionals who are working under heavy stress and are not misusing sick time. She blamed the high absentee rates in certain schools on principals, who contribute to teachers' stress but do little to manage their staffs.
One principal agreed, saying the new policy stigmatizes schools without addressing some of the underlying reasons that drive teachers to call in sick even when they are not.
"There are a lot of things coming down from the central office from people who have no idea what it's like to be in a classroom with 32 children and an unsupportive principal," said Christina Gonzalez, principal of Zapata Academy on the Southwest Side. "Absences create chaos in the classroom and it creates chaos in the building. And of course you don't want teachers to be absent. But I don't think this is fair. I really don't think most teachers abuse it."
Duncan said the idea is not to shame teachers, but to spot schools where the absences suggest a deeper morale problem.
"If teachers are feeling that level of stress, then the question needs to be why and what can we do to relieve it," Duncan said.
Some school leaders favor the public attention because it lends weight to their own scrutiny of teachers suspected of misusing sick days.
At Otis Elementary, Principal James Cosme tracks his teachers' attendance yearly and looks for excessive absences that can't be explained by a long illness or family emergency. In a typical year, he may call in three teachers--out of his staff of 50--to discuss excessive absences. Usually it works, but sometimes it doesn't. He once had a teacher who frequently called in sick on Mondays, which Cosme suspected was caused by a drinking problem. He ultimately decided to dock the teacher's pay, and the teacher retired soon after.
Cosme also makes a practical appeal, urging teachers to conserve their sick days and bank them in case they need them in coming years for an unexpected illness. Or they can cash them in at the end of their career for a richer pension.
Even though he's paying attention to the issue, he welcomes the extra scrutiny.
"Anytime you shine a light on something, it forces self-examination," said Cosme, who said that in a typical year his teachers average six to seven sick days. "It will be interesting data because I don't know how well I do compared to other schools like mine."
At Bethune Elementary, Principal Charlotte Stoxstell is already one step ahead of the district. She sends out notices to teachers every month or two, detailing their attendance and punctuality rates. When it dips below 95 percent, the teachers are "reminded" they are falling short of the school's improvement goals.
And she tries to set a good example, taking care of her personal business in the evening or the weekends. At times, she even covers a teacher's classroom when he or she calls in, which is usually embarrassing enough to discourage frivolous absences, she said.
"I do fuss at them, but I don't just focus on the people who are out absent," she said. "I give it to everyone and I salute those who come every day."
----------
tdell'angela@tribune.com
dlittle@tribune.com
Chicago to target absent teachers
$10 million spent annually by district for classroom subs
By Tracy Dell'Angela and Darnell Little
Tribune staff reporters
Published February 4, 2006
Driven by parental concerns about teacher absenteeism, the Chicago Public Schools for the first time will start scrutinizing schools with high numbers of teachers taking sick days.
The district also plans to publicize teacher attendance rates at each school beginning next school year.
"This is important to parents. There's never been a spotlight on this, and that's a mistake," Schools Chief Arne Duncan said of the new scrutiny, which was announced to schools in a memo this week. "I think it's like any workplace. When people feel good about the work, people want to be there. This is not only important for student learning, it's important to school culture."
On any given school day in Chicago, an average of 1,500 teachers, about 6 percent of the teaching staff, call in sick or take a personal day, according to a Tribune analysis of teacher payroll records. The absentee rate is highest on Fridays, when an average of 1,800 teachers don't show, the analysis revealed.
While some individual schools track teachers' attendance, the district has never tried to analyze how many teachers are out systemwide--or whether some schools have a disproportionate number of absent teachers.
For each of the last six school years, Chicago teachers missed an average of 12 unscheduled days in their 39-week work year. Their current contract calls for 10 sick days and three personal days.
By comparison, salaried employees nationwide take an average of five sick and personal days during their 50-week work year, according to a 2004 survey of 536 employers by a major human resource consulting company.
The district's effort is an attempt to address the academic disruption that occurs in schools with large numbers of teachers calling in sick. But it also is expected to reduce the hiring of substitutes, which costs the cash-strapped system more than $10 million a year.
Last school year, the district tapped 280,000 substitutes, with the peak coming in February, when demand for substitutes topped 47,000--or about 2,350 each day. The demand for subs in the 2005-06 school year is even higher, up about 27 percent for the first five months of this school year compared with the same period the year before, according to district reports.
The absentee problem falls hardest on students in schools perceived to be dangerous or chaotic because their schools have the toughest time securing substitutes, principals say. In May, an average of about 200 substitute requests each day went unfilled, which meant that the school had to find another staff member to cover the classroom. Stable schools typically have their own stock of steady substitutes and don't rely on the district's substitute center.
Union officials contend that the district is unfairly trying to punish teachers for taking days that are guaranteed by the contract.
"The district is using this as an intimidation tactic," union President Marilyn Stewart said. "Teachers may take off for a lot of reasons, either because they are sick or frustrated. It's no one's business. I don't see why it has to be public. Why do parents care, if it's not tied to test scores? You can clean your house without letting everyone see your dirt."
Stewart argued that most Chicago teachers are dedicated professionals who are working under heavy stress and are not misusing sick time. She blamed the high absentee rates in certain schools on principals, who contribute to teachers' stress but do little to manage their staffs.
One principal agreed, saying the new policy stigmatizes schools without addressing some of the underlying reasons that drive teachers to call in sick even when they are not.
"There are a lot of things coming down from the central office from people who have no idea what it's like to be in a classroom with 32 children and an unsupportive principal," said Christina Gonzalez, principal of Zapata Academy on the Southwest Side. "Absences create chaos in the classroom and it creates chaos in the building. And of course you don't want teachers to be absent. But I don't think this is fair. I really don't think most teachers abuse it."
Duncan said the idea is not to shame teachers, but to spot schools where the absences suggest a deeper morale problem.
"If teachers are feeling that level of stress, then the question needs to be why and what can we do to relieve it," Duncan said.
Some school leaders favor the public attention because it lends weight to their own scrutiny of teachers suspected of misusing sick days.
At Otis Elementary, Principal James Cosme tracks his teachers' attendance yearly and looks for excessive absences that can't be explained by a long illness or family emergency. In a typical year, he may call in three teachers--out of his staff of 50--to discuss excessive absences. Usually it works, but sometimes it doesn't. He once had a teacher who frequently called in sick on Mondays, which Cosme suspected was caused by a drinking problem. He ultimately decided to dock the teacher's pay, and the teacher retired soon after.
Cosme also makes a practical appeal, urging teachers to conserve their sick days and bank them in case they need them in coming years for an unexpected illness. Or they can cash them in at the end of their career for a richer pension.
Even though he's paying attention to the issue, he welcomes the extra scrutiny.
"Anytime you shine a light on something, it forces self-examination," said Cosme, who said that in a typical year his teachers average six to seven sick days. "It will be interesting data because I don't know how well I do compared to other schools like mine."
At Bethune Elementary, Principal Charlotte Stoxstell is already one step ahead of the district. She sends out notices to teachers every month or two, detailing their attendance and punctuality rates. When it dips below 95 percent, the teachers are "reminded" they are falling short of the school's improvement goals.
And she tries to set a good example, taking care of her personal business in the evening or the weekends. At times, she even covers a teacher's classroom when he or she calls in, which is usually embarrassing enough to discourage frivolous absences, she said.
"I do fuss at them, but I don't just focus on the people who are out absent," she said. "I give it to everyone and I salute those who come every day."
----------
tdell'angela@tribune.com
dlittle@tribune.com
Friday, February 03, 2006
The Teachers' Unions - is there a more destructive force?
The article below appeared in the Wall Street Journal on the Editorial Page. The Wall Street Journal has been doing a great job as of late discussing the problems with teachers' unions and the American Public Education system.
The Education Borg
In Florida and Wisconsin, teachers unions crush
educational opportunities.
Sunday, January 29, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST
Teachers unions keep telling us they care deeply, profoundly, about poor children. But what they do, as opposed to what they say, is behave like the Borg, those destructive aliens in the "Star Trek" TV series who keep coming and coming until everyone is "assimilated."
We saw it in Florida this month when the state supreme court struck down a six-year-old voucher program after a union-led lawsuit. And now we're witnessing it in Milwaukee, where the nation's largest school choice program is under assault because Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle refuses to lift the cap on the number of students who can participate.
Milwaukee's Parental Choice Program, enacted with bipartisan support in 1990, provides private school vouchers to students from families at or below 175% of the poverty line. Its constitutionality has been supported by rulings from both the Wisconsin and U.S. Supreme Courts. Yet Mr. Doyle, a union-financed Democrat, has vetoed three attempts to loosen the state law that limits enrollment in the program to 15% of Milwaukee's public school enrollment. This cap, put in place in 1995 as part of a compromise with anti-choice lawmakers backed by the unions, wasn't an issue when only a handful of schools were participating. But the program has grown steadily to include 127 schools and more than 14,000 students today. Wisconsin officials expect the voucher program to exceed the 15% threshold next year, which means Mr. Doyle's schoolhouse-door act is about to have real consequences.
"Had the cap been in effect this year," says Susan Mitchell of School Choice Wisconsin, "as many as 4,000 students already in the program would have lost seats. No new students could come in, and there would be dozens of schools that have been built because of school choice in Milwaukee that would close. They're in poor neighborhoods and would never have enough support from tuition-paying parents or donors to keep going."
There's no question the program has been a boon to the city's underprivileged. A 2004 study of high school graduation rates by Jay Greene of the Manhattan Institute found that students using vouchers to attend Milwaukee's private schools had a graduation rate of 64%, versus 36% for their public school counterparts. Harvard's Caroline Hoxby has shown that Milwaukee public schools have raised their standards in the wake of voucher competition.
Mr. Doyle says he will agree to lift the cap to 18%, but only if it's tied to a change in the school-aid formula that he knows would never pass the Republican legislature--particularly in an election year. So instead of building on this education success, Mr. Doyle and his union allies are poised to close the book.
The unions scored a separate "victory" in Florida three weeks ago when the state supreme court there struck down the Opportunity Scholarship Program. Passed in 1999, the program currently enrolls 700 children from chronically failing state schools, letting them transfer to another public school or use state money to attend a private school. Barring some legislative damage control, the 5-2 ruling means these kids face the horrible prospect of returning to the state's education hellholes next year. The decision is a textbook case of results-oriented jurisprudence. The majority claimed the program
violates a provision of Florida's constitution that requires the state to provide for "a uniform, efficient, safe, secure, and high quality system of free public schools." Because "private schools that are not 'uniform' when compared with each other or the public system" could receive state funds under the program, the majority deemed it unconstitutional.
This is beyond a legal stretch. Not only have courts in such states as Wisconsin and Ohio rejected similar bogus "uniformity" challenges to school voucher programs, but so have other Florida courts. The logic of the ruling could also apply to charter schools, which are public schools that are able to live by non-uniform rules. That's the entire point of school choice--to break out of the stifling monopoly that traps so many poor children in "uniformly" awful schools.
What the Milwaukee and Florida examples show is that unions and their allies are unwilling to let even successful voucher experiments continue to exist. If they lose one court case, they will sue again--and then again, as long as it takes. And they'll shop their campaign cash around for years until they find a politician like Jim Doyle willing to sell out Wisconsin's poorest kids in return for their endorsement. Is there a more destructive force in American public life?
The Education Borg
In Florida and Wisconsin, teachers unions crush
educational opportunities.
Sunday, January 29, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST
Teachers unions keep telling us they care deeply, profoundly, about poor children. But what they do, as opposed to what they say, is behave like the Borg, those destructive aliens in the "Star Trek" TV series who keep coming and coming until everyone is "assimilated."
We saw it in Florida this month when the state supreme court struck down a six-year-old voucher program after a union-led lawsuit. And now we're witnessing it in Milwaukee, where the nation's largest school choice program is under assault because Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle refuses to lift the cap on the number of students who can participate.
Milwaukee's Parental Choice Program, enacted with bipartisan support in 1990, provides private school vouchers to students from families at or below 175% of the poverty line. Its constitutionality has been supported by rulings from both the Wisconsin and U.S. Supreme Courts. Yet Mr. Doyle, a union-financed Democrat, has vetoed three attempts to loosen the state law that limits enrollment in the program to 15% of Milwaukee's public school enrollment. This cap, put in place in 1995 as part of a compromise with anti-choice lawmakers backed by the unions, wasn't an issue when only a handful of schools were participating. But the program has grown steadily to include 127 schools and more than 14,000 students today. Wisconsin officials expect the voucher program to exceed the 15% threshold next year, which means Mr. Doyle's schoolhouse-door act is about to have real consequences.
"Had the cap been in effect this year," says Susan Mitchell of School Choice Wisconsin, "as many as 4,000 students already in the program would have lost seats. No new students could come in, and there would be dozens of schools that have been built because of school choice in Milwaukee that would close. They're in poor neighborhoods and would never have enough support from tuition-paying parents or donors to keep going."
There's no question the program has been a boon to the city's underprivileged. A 2004 study of high school graduation rates by Jay Greene of the Manhattan Institute found that students using vouchers to attend Milwaukee's private schools had a graduation rate of 64%, versus 36% for their public school counterparts. Harvard's Caroline Hoxby has shown that Milwaukee public schools have raised their standards in the wake of voucher competition.
Mr. Doyle says he will agree to lift the cap to 18%, but only if it's tied to a change in the school-aid formula that he knows would never pass the Republican legislature--particularly in an election year. So instead of building on this education success, Mr. Doyle and his union allies are poised to close the book.
The unions scored a separate "victory" in Florida three weeks ago when the state supreme court there struck down the Opportunity Scholarship Program. Passed in 1999, the program currently enrolls 700 children from chronically failing state schools, letting them transfer to another public school or use state money to attend a private school. Barring some legislative damage control, the 5-2 ruling means these kids face the horrible prospect of returning to the state's education hellholes next year. The decision is a textbook case of results-oriented jurisprudence. The majority claimed the program
violates a provision of Florida's constitution that requires the state to provide for "a uniform, efficient, safe, secure, and high quality system of free public schools." Because "private schools that are not 'uniform' when compared with each other or the public system" could receive state funds under the program, the majority deemed it unconstitutional.
This is beyond a legal stretch. Not only have courts in such states as Wisconsin and Ohio rejected similar bogus "uniformity" challenges to school voucher programs, but so have other Florida courts. The logic of the ruling could also apply to charter schools, which are public schools that are able to live by non-uniform rules. That's the entire point of school choice--to break out of the stifling monopoly that traps so many poor children in "uniformly" awful schools.
What the Milwaukee and Florida examples show is that unions and their allies are unwilling to let even successful voucher experiments continue to exist. If they lose one court case, they will sue again--and then again, as long as it takes. And they'll shop their campaign cash around for years until they find a politician like Jim Doyle willing to sell out Wisconsin's poorest kids in return for their endorsement. Is there a more destructive force in American public life?
District 41 Referendum - Same tale different district.
The same games are being played with children, families and taxpayers across Illinois. This time it is District 41 in Glen Ellyn and their building referenda. The below story appeared in The Sun Glen Ellyn. To view the site and LTE click on the title of this post.
It's same old story: 'Emperor has no clothes'
Remember the fairy tale story of the two deceitful tailors who see an opportunity and convince the emperor that they can create some fine new clothes for him? They "work" behind closed doors, spinning with invisible thread and reveal the fine new clothes. The only problem — no one can actually see the clothes, but they don't want to admit it because only fools can't see them, explain the tailors. Of course, we all know that no one can see them because they don't exist. This story is a good anecdote for the activities in recent years in District 41.
We've gotten a new "tailor," who seems very adept at spinning nothing into something very costly. He came to Glen Ellyn seeing the opportunity presented in the form of millions of tax dollars available because of the 2001 referendum. This new administrator hardly waited one second to unpack his bags before setting on the task of creating the need for and attempting to convince the citizens of that need for a new school building.
As far as I know, the definition of "overcrowded" has never been explained.
Is "overcrowding" planting mobile classrooms in our school fields like tulips and filling them with classes well below the amount of 24 to 26 students the community asked for? Does overcrowding occur when children are moved around schools like shells in a shell game, while specialists or teachers' lounges now command what used to be classrooms in the bricks-and-mortar buildings?
Does "overcrowding" occur when the pre-K program was moved out of rented space at the Main Street Rec Center and into a K-5 school building? There are many questions about the new but not-yet-approved fifth- and sixth-grade center: How much will it really cost us? When will this big, new school break the education fund bank and require yet another infusion of cash into the coffers of District 41? How much has already been spent in the quest for the fine new school?
... If the new building is approved and built, it is slated to open around the year 2009. Coincidentally, that is just about the time that Dr. Barshinger's contract runs out. Apparently, he has said that he will move out of his home near Hadley and move back to DeKalb. Similarly, the tailors left the emperor and the townspeople scratching their heads in the realization that it was because they didn't speak up when they could have that they were duped.
I know that there are others, like me, who don't mind saying publicly — or privately in the voting booth — that "the emperor has no clothes."
Monica Miller Glen Ellyn
It's same old story: 'Emperor has no clothes'
Remember the fairy tale story of the two deceitful tailors who see an opportunity and convince the emperor that they can create some fine new clothes for him? They "work" behind closed doors, spinning with invisible thread and reveal the fine new clothes. The only problem — no one can actually see the clothes, but they don't want to admit it because only fools can't see them, explain the tailors. Of course, we all know that no one can see them because they don't exist. This story is a good anecdote for the activities in recent years in District 41.
We've gotten a new "tailor," who seems very adept at spinning nothing into something very costly. He came to Glen Ellyn seeing the opportunity presented in the form of millions of tax dollars available because of the 2001 referendum. This new administrator hardly waited one second to unpack his bags before setting on the task of creating the need for and attempting to convince the citizens of that need for a new school building.
As far as I know, the definition of "overcrowded" has never been explained.
Is "overcrowding" planting mobile classrooms in our school fields like tulips and filling them with classes well below the amount of 24 to 26 students the community asked for? Does overcrowding occur when children are moved around schools like shells in a shell game, while specialists or teachers' lounges now command what used to be classrooms in the bricks-and-mortar buildings?
Does "overcrowding" occur when the pre-K program was moved out of rented space at the Main Street Rec Center and into a K-5 school building? There are many questions about the new but not-yet-approved fifth- and sixth-grade center: How much will it really cost us? When will this big, new school break the education fund bank and require yet another infusion of cash into the coffers of District 41? How much has already been spent in the quest for the fine new school?
... If the new building is approved and built, it is slated to open around the year 2009. Coincidentally, that is just about the time that Dr. Barshinger's contract runs out. Apparently, he has said that he will move out of his home near Hadley and move back to DeKalb. Similarly, the tailors left the emperor and the townspeople scratching their heads in the realization that it was because they didn't speak up when they could have that they were duped.
I know that there are others, like me, who don't mind saying publicly — or privately in the voting booth — that "the emperor has no clothes."
Monica Miller Glen Ellyn
Thursday, February 02, 2006
Why one parent is voting No on the D-300 referenda.
The District 300 referendum is a passionate issue with emotions running high on both sides. Although, my views will support a “no” vote, my interest in getting involved is to simply provide transparency and clarity. The decision of how to vote is, of course, yours to make. State Senator (and Lt. Governor Candidate) Steven Rauschenberger (R-Elgin) said recently at a campaign forum in Huntley that today’s school districts “…are seemingly run for the benefit of the adults working within it.” What I have found thus far seems to support his view.
My concerns with this referendum are twofold:
1) In my view, District 300 has not provided what I consider a quality education for my children and has not demonstrated fiscal self-discipline. Simply throwing more money at a problem doesn’t solve it.
2) I suspect there is more to the Advance300 organization than what they would like you to believe.
My research into Advance300 (formerly Schools for Now Dist. # 300 Committee) began in mid-January after I visited their website. I was impressed by its construction and concluded immediately that it was professionally produced (i.e. expensive). I emailed them and asked very specific questions:
1) Would you provide me a list of your leadership and members?
2) How are you funded?
3) Who created and paid for the website?
I received a response from Nancy Zettler (who serves on District 300’s Community Finance Committee), who identified herself as co-chair with Douglas Sibery. Her response was evasive at best, stating that… “Advance 300 is a growing coalition of several hundred parents, grandparents, students, business owners, community leaders and other community members dedicated to providing our children the excellent education they deserve and ensuring the health and strength of our communities… We are funded by donations. The website was put together by a hard-working, dedicated group of Advance 300 volunteers who have worked very hard for several hundred man-hours researching dozens of sources of information for accuracy, truthfulness and relevance.” My impression was that is their standard response to all inquiries which was likely created with professional assistance.
Ms. Zettler’s comment stating the website was created by volunteers is not truthful. According to their Schedule B document filed with the Illinois State Board of Elections on January 31, $7,000.00 was paid to M&R Strategic Services of Washington, DC for “web site services” on December 19, 2005. In M&R’s website, their self-description is, “For over 15 years, M+R has been helping groups we believe in (notice the phrase, “we believe in”) accomplish their policy and organizational goals... we provide integrated strategy, field organizing, communications, lobbying, direct mail, web production, online advocacy and fundraising services.” A review of their client list reveals the groups they “believe in” point toward a far left political philosophy naming clients such as The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, International Planned Parenthood/Western Hemisphere, The Lesbian, Gay and Transgender Community Center of New York and People for the American Way.
As instructed on M&R’s website, I also requested a list of their “electoral” clients from Ms. Debra Rosen, Senior Consultant. As of February 2nd, I have received no response from her. Incidentally, Advance300’s Schedule B also reveals $6,750.00 was paid to Campaign Solutions of Algonquin for “referendum consulting”. Campaign Solutions has a P.O. Box for an address and has no phone number listed in the Internet Yellow Pages. Last time I checked, volunteers are not paid for their services, and I wonder who owns that company.
District 300 cannot legally financially support Advance300 directly, even though it appears they have hired (with taxpayer funds?) St. Louis based public relations firm Unicom.ARC. As of February 1, a request from Unicom to confirm this has been unanswered.
On January 20, Northwest Herald Reporter Allison Smith published an article on a meeting she attended with District 300 Superintendent Ken Arndt, “about” 25 builders and real estate agents, as well as village officials from Algonquin, West Dundee and Hampshire to raise $153,000 (the minimum amount needed to fund a successful referendum according to Unicom.ARC). As Allison points out in her article, “The campaign money, administered by the Advance 300 citizens group, will pay for an office, mailings, T-shirts, yard signs, TV and radio ads, and possibly even billboards.” Cal Skinner’s blog site, McHenry County Blog (mchenrycountyblog.com), has recently detailed the extent of the pro-referendum contributions that have rolled in (and who they are from). Keep scrolling down until you find them (there are several posts on this topic) or if you prefer, I can send you copies. Check back there often.
Another topic worthy of discussion is District 300’s handling of its finances. Besides the issue of having $38 million available in its working fund to cover the $27 million deficit in the education fund (which the District claims it cannot use because its in a trust and is needed to ease cash flow problems between property tax receipts), were you aware that in 2003, the District had to repay the U.S. Dept. of Education $607,908.06 for violating the terms of a grant that was provided to support the effort to serve limited English proficient students? According to the Federal Register, the funds "...had been used for improper or unsupported expenditures for personnel, fringe benefits, travel, supplies, training and other items."
I personally spoke with the contact person from the D.O.E. for this matter, who verified this information as correct. I have a copy of the Federal Register document as well and was informed by the D.O.E. contact person that District 300 has a copy of the settlement agreement. Also, because of current loopholes in property tax law, we must take the District at their word that the 55 cents/$100 they are asking for the education fund will only be used for the current tax year. State Rep. Michael Tryon (R-Crystal Lake) has introduced legislation in Springfield to close these loopholes. However, even if passed, it will not be in place in time for our referendum.
Although Advance300 portrays itself as a local grassroots organization, it is clear what we have here is a well calculated, well financed and covert public relations effort on the part of District 300 to win this referendum. The deplorable tactic of using our children as pawns to accomplish their desire is nothing short of extortion. I personally don’t believe for a minute that all extracurricular activities will be cut if the referendum fails. The amount of money spent on athletics and music amounts to approximately 1% of the budget and I assure you, no elected school board official who is interested in retaining their office would ever be re-elected if that happened and the public outcry for Superintendent Arndt’s resignation would be immediate. Also, don’t believe the myth that our home values will decline if the referendum fails. Simply ask yourself how much your home has risen in value over the past several years since the last referendum was voted down?
Although my views on this referendum are unmistakable, I hope you can see that my opinion is based upon objective, verified information — not less than truthful rhetoric designed to play on your fears and emotions. Please pass this along to others who are interested, regardless of what their present opinion may be. Besides the McHenry County Blog, I encourage you to visit the web sites of The Family Taxpayer’s Network (thechampion.org) and Citizen’s For Fair and Reasonable Taxes (http://user.mc.net/~igloo/craft.htm). Please feel free to contact me and I will do my best to keep you informed.
Sincerely,
John Ryan
Committeeman
Precinct 62
Algonquin Township
My concerns with this referendum are twofold:
1) In my view, District 300 has not provided what I consider a quality education for my children and has not demonstrated fiscal self-discipline. Simply throwing more money at a problem doesn’t solve it.
2) I suspect there is more to the Advance300 organization than what they would like you to believe.
My research into Advance300 (formerly Schools for Now Dist. # 300 Committee) began in mid-January after I visited their website. I was impressed by its construction and concluded immediately that it was professionally produced (i.e. expensive). I emailed them and asked very specific questions:
1) Would you provide me a list of your leadership and members?
2) How are you funded?
3) Who created and paid for the website?
I received a response from Nancy Zettler (who serves on District 300’s Community Finance Committee), who identified herself as co-chair with Douglas Sibery. Her response was evasive at best, stating that… “Advance 300 is a growing coalition of several hundred parents, grandparents, students, business owners, community leaders and other community members dedicated to providing our children the excellent education they deserve and ensuring the health and strength of our communities… We are funded by donations. The website was put together by a hard-working, dedicated group of Advance 300 volunteers who have worked very hard for several hundred man-hours researching dozens of sources of information for accuracy, truthfulness and relevance.” My impression was that is their standard response to all inquiries which was likely created with professional assistance.
Ms. Zettler’s comment stating the website was created by volunteers is not truthful. According to their Schedule B document filed with the Illinois State Board of Elections on January 31, $7,000.00 was paid to M&R Strategic Services of Washington, DC for “web site services” on December 19, 2005. In M&R’s website, their self-description is, “For over 15 years, M+R has been helping groups we believe in (notice the phrase, “we believe in”) accomplish their policy and organizational goals... we provide integrated strategy, field organizing, communications, lobbying, direct mail, web production, online advocacy and fundraising services.” A review of their client list reveals the groups they “believe in” point toward a far left political philosophy naming clients such as The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, International Planned Parenthood/Western Hemisphere, The Lesbian, Gay and Transgender Community Center of New York and People for the American Way.
As instructed on M&R’s website, I also requested a list of their “electoral” clients from Ms. Debra Rosen, Senior Consultant. As of February 2nd, I have received no response from her. Incidentally, Advance300’s Schedule B also reveals $6,750.00 was paid to Campaign Solutions of Algonquin for “referendum consulting”. Campaign Solutions has a P.O. Box for an address and has no phone number listed in the Internet Yellow Pages. Last time I checked, volunteers are not paid for their services, and I wonder who owns that company.
District 300 cannot legally financially support Advance300 directly, even though it appears they have hired (with taxpayer funds?) St. Louis based public relations firm Unicom.ARC. As of February 1, a request from Unicom to confirm this has been unanswered.
On January 20, Northwest Herald Reporter Allison Smith published an article on a meeting she attended with District 300 Superintendent Ken Arndt, “about” 25 builders and real estate agents, as well as village officials from Algonquin, West Dundee and Hampshire to raise $153,000 (the minimum amount needed to fund a successful referendum according to Unicom.ARC). As Allison points out in her article, “The campaign money, administered by the Advance 300 citizens group, will pay for an office, mailings, T-shirts, yard signs, TV and radio ads, and possibly even billboards.” Cal Skinner’s blog site, McHenry County Blog (mchenrycountyblog.com), has recently detailed the extent of the pro-referendum contributions that have rolled in (and who they are from). Keep scrolling down until you find them (there are several posts on this topic) or if you prefer, I can send you copies. Check back there often.
Another topic worthy of discussion is District 300’s handling of its finances. Besides the issue of having $38 million available in its working fund to cover the $27 million deficit in the education fund (which the District claims it cannot use because its in a trust and is needed to ease cash flow problems between property tax receipts), were you aware that in 2003, the District had to repay the U.S. Dept. of Education $607,908.06 for violating the terms of a grant that was provided to support the effort to serve limited English proficient students? According to the Federal Register, the funds "...had been used for improper or unsupported expenditures for personnel, fringe benefits, travel, supplies, training and other items."
I personally spoke with the contact person from the D.O.E. for this matter, who verified this information as correct. I have a copy of the Federal Register document as well and was informed by the D.O.E. contact person that District 300 has a copy of the settlement agreement. Also, because of current loopholes in property tax law, we must take the District at their word that the 55 cents/$100 they are asking for the education fund will only be used for the current tax year. State Rep. Michael Tryon (R-Crystal Lake) has introduced legislation in Springfield to close these loopholes. However, even if passed, it will not be in place in time for our referendum.
Although Advance300 portrays itself as a local grassroots organization, it is clear what we have here is a well calculated, well financed and covert public relations effort on the part of District 300 to win this referendum. The deplorable tactic of using our children as pawns to accomplish their desire is nothing short of extortion. I personally don’t believe for a minute that all extracurricular activities will be cut if the referendum fails. The amount of money spent on athletics and music amounts to approximately 1% of the budget and I assure you, no elected school board official who is interested in retaining their office would ever be re-elected if that happened and the public outcry for Superintendent Arndt’s resignation would be immediate. Also, don’t believe the myth that our home values will decline if the referendum fails. Simply ask yourself how much your home has risen in value over the past several years since the last referendum was voted down?
Although my views on this referendum are unmistakable, I hope you can see that my opinion is based upon objective, verified information — not less than truthful rhetoric designed to play on your fears and emotions. Please pass this along to others who are interested, regardless of what their present opinion may be. Besides the McHenry County Blog, I encourage you to visit the web sites of The Family Taxpayer’s Network (thechampion.org) and Citizen’s For Fair and Reasonable Taxes (http://user.mc.net/~igloo/craft.htm). Please feel free to contact me and I will do my best to keep you informed.
Sincerely,
John Ryan
Committeeman
Precinct 62
Algonquin Township
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