I occasionally get a comment on the blog that says something like this: “Throwing money at schools doesn’t work. We already spend too much. …” The other day, I responded to a comment of this sort by pointing out that the people who say this have no issue “throwing money” at the schools their own children attend. Meanwhile, in Philadelphia, the city and state will no longer “throw money” at the public schools; the students will have large classes, no art, no music, no sports, no librarians, no guidance counselors, etc. meanwhile, the corporate reformers and tycoons are still throwing money at the schools where they send their own children, to make sure their every need and wish is satisfied.
A regular reader, known as KrazyTA, added the following comment:
“Throwing money at a problem doesn’t solve anything?
For the edubullies and their edupreneur backers, let’s see what that means when it comes to THEIR OWN CHILDREN…
Harpeth Hall, home to at least one of Michelle Rhee’s children. Please go to their website for the info and quotations below:
http://www.harpethhall.org/podium/default.aspx?t=151797
Fine Arts: multiple arts courses, including art, music, theatre [their spelling!] and dance.
Athletics: “Harpeth Hall athletes have won 11 state championships in cross-country and 14 state titles in track–both state records for the most championships won by any school, boys or girls; Harpeth Hall varsity teams have also won championships in basketball, golf, lacrosse, swimming, tennis, and volleyball. Middle School teams have recorded conference championships in basketball, cross country, tennis, track, and volleyball.”
Exchange Programs: “For several years, Harpeth Hall has offered an international exchange program for our students with schools in China, France, Germany, New Zealand, and South Africa.”
Library and Technology: “The Ann Scott Carell Library, the centerpiece of Harpeth Hall’s campus, was dedicated on November 18, 2001. This 20,000-square-foot facility serves as the information and technology hub of the campus, housing traditional library services along with the school’s network and technology support team.
Comfortable and inviting spaces are available for all who enter the doors to the Ann Scott Carell Library. A fireplace, surrounded by comfortable seating, is the central feature of the reading area on the main floor. Six group study rooms provide quiet areas where individuals or small groups can work together, do research, read, or study. Non-fiction spaces include tables, workstations, and window seats.
The lower level includes two classrooms for library and technology instruction, and the Bear Cave, our laptop help desk. Also on the lower level are the Archives room, and a meeting room with state-of-the-art equipment.”
I invite viewers of this blog to peruse “Academics” and other areas at their leisure.
And to just include one more detail, this one from Cranbrook:
“The Summer Theatre School, our oldest summer program, presents classic theater skills like character acting, lighting, dance, voice, costuming, set design and other stage crafts. The Theatre School operates from Cranbrook’s beautiful Greek Theater grove, an outstanding full sized stone replica of a classic outdoor Greek theater setting nestled in a mature pine forest. Evening outdoor theater productions attract ample crowds from neighboring communities.”
Link: http://schools.cranbrook.edu/podium/default.aspx?t=146451
I guess that clinches it: throwing money at education doesn’t solve A thing—it solves
ALMOST everything.
For those who still don’t get it, heed these words of Marx:
“A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five.” [Groucho Marx]”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Now, that you’ve “incited class warfare” (ha ha) and even quoted Groucho, will the usual suspects accuse you of being a Marxist?!
I say I am the only democrat in my family and my nephew age 60 says he is the only socialist (he live in Dubai and works in the oil felds and pipelines). Thanks for the laugh this morning, Michael
Michael, since you like humor I thought I would send this; it is from Ellenberg who wrote an article on Slate today about the IN flaws in their formulas and how they apply algorithms.
WHO IS THE BRITISH MARK TWAIN?
By which I mean: if you’re in the United States of America, and you can find a Mark Twain quote which bolsters a point you’re trying to make, you are golden. Because somehow Twain is seen as a sort of conduit for the wisdom of the nation, a proxy for American common sense and knowhow. Nobody ever says “Mark Twain was full of shit.” You’re kind of not allowed.so I asked a British friend whether there was a British equivalent of this, whether, for instance, it was George Orwell. He said, no, in Britain, Orwell is seen as being for children, it’s not Orwell. Then he thought for a while and said, oh, no, obviously, it’s Samuel Johnson.
Agree? Disagree? Other candidates? Is there a French Mark Twain, or a Chinese one?
you could respond on Ellenberg’s blog if you are interested; he is at U Madison Wisconsin and has a new book on math coming out.
Groucho and Mark Twain always rank high on my listings
And just why DOES Michelle Rhee send her kids to a school in Nashville when Rhee herself now lives in Sacramento???
Could it be because her current husband, Mayor of Sacramento and former basketballer Kevin Johnson, has been accused seven times of child sexual abuse, the latter instances of which were during his leadership role as head of St. Hope schools, including Sacramento CHARTER High School, allegations which were swept under the rug by payoffs to victims, at least two of which were engineered by Rhee herself???
Of course he was also accused of, and nearly prosecuted for, federal fund fraud in relation to his use of Americorps volunteers for his own personal and political work…
…all of which was reported in archived (inaccessible, but for a hefty fee to the paper) articles in the Sacramento Bee by former investigative reporters Dorothy Korber and Terry Hardy….
Could her children’s attendance in Nashville be somehow related to her ex-husband’s residence there, where her ex husband used to run the NEW TEACHER PROJECT which provided plenty of scab replacement teachers for Rhee when she headed DCPS and fired nearly a thousand teaching personnel, funneling about $15,000 per replacement teacher to the organization in a kickback scheme that, in addition to allegations of Rhee’s role in test score manipulations, prompted a board inquiry into the subject that raised more than eyebrows of DCPS board members???
Small wonder Rhee would pontificate about public education while hypocritically spending lavish sums on her own kids imposing standards upon those she rails against that her children enjoy only because of their economic opulence…
Michelle Rhee is a disgusting creature of the corporate right, a mannequin to Wall Street greed, and a disgrace to the ideals of American public education and to constitutional democracy itself….
Unfortunately she has been lauded by corporate Democrats and Republicans alike, and I suppose that things will need to get worse before they get better…
“Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud, HATCH OUT!” from Robert Graves’ I CLAUDIUS, upon the ascension of Nero to the Roman imperial throne….
There is a special jail cell waiting for Rhee and her two Kevins.
Just one cell, huh? Not a pretty picture…
What a hoot, Linda. Thanks so much for the laughs!!
From my Devil’s Dictionary of Education see:
Karmic Gods of Retribution: Those ethereal beings specifically evolved to construct the 21st level in Dante’s Hell. The 21st level signifies the combination of the 4th (greed), 8th (fraud) and 9th (treachery) levels into one mega level reserved especially for the edudeformers and those, who, knowing the negative consequences of the edudeformers agenda, willing implemented it so as to go along to get along. The Karmic Gods of Retribution also personally escort these poor souls, upon their physical death, to the 21st level unless they enlighten themselves, a la one D. Ravitch, to the evil and harm they have caused so many innocent children, and repent and fight against their former fellow deformers. There the edudeformers will lie down on a floor of smashed and broken ipads and ebooks curled in a fetal position alternately sucking their thumbs to the bones while listening to two words-Educational Excellence-repeated without pause for eternity.
Jail cell?
Too small.
I suggest a facility the size of a football stadium so that we can throw in Broad, the Waltons, Jindal, Bennett, Walker, Booker, Obama, Duncan, Klein, Kopp, Bloomberg, Walcott, Emanuel, Weingarten, Roekel, Gates, and a few hundred other power players including most members of the National Governor’s Association . . . .
It would be an excellent use of my tax dollars to jail these people for life without parole . . . .
Duane,
When will you publish this dictionary? I’m seeing “best seller”, NY Times list. . . . So many people in the USA are ripe and ready for retribution in the form of protest, boycotts, and demonstrations, no?
Ugh, I become nauseated when I hear, “Throwing money at schools doesn’t work. We already spend too much.” This bumper sticker oft repeated phony baloney mantra, especially on right wing radio, Fox News, CNBC and the horde of libertarian think tanks, is parroted and re-echoed multiple times a day as if it were some kind of unquestioned given wisdom. As Diane and the other commenters have well noted, there is never enough money spent when it comes to the elite private schools. The elite private schools with tuitions from $28,000 and way beyond that amount, have small classes of 8 to 16 students and the best of facilities. The whole point of the reformist rhetoric is to defund and kill off the real public schools.
Yes!
The problem is that we are currently “throwing money” at a bunch of “reform” ideas that research (and common sense) tell us don’t work. If people are really concerned about “throwing money” at schools they should be up-in-arms about all the unfunded experiments being carried out on our children that have no track record of success. I don’t want to “throw money” at schools, I want to spend what it takes to give kids a quality education. No more and no less.
Bruce Baker has several informative posts about private school spending per pupil.
I have a friend with a child in private school. On top of the large tuition, they are expected to bring in money via fundraising (think private auctions and donations, not wrapping paper sales).
Just a reminder that when Philly teachers were authentic, professional participants in another “tight budget” era, they imagined an innovative solution and launched the Parkway Program. Would have put Harpeth Hall to shame.
From what Krazy TA has described in his comment, I can’t help but conjure up images of coach vs. first class on Air France.
For lack of a better image, I keep on thinking of that Seinfeld episode where Jerry gets first class and Elaine is relegated to coach, and there is a thin wisp of a curtain that separates the two on-board worlds, but it is a barrier whose utility is upheld and whose symbolism says everything about the realms outside of flight.
This clip was a pure metaphor for class differences and privilege. When it comes to flight, I personally don’t care about comfort other than the safety of the flight.
When it comes to education, a world class, excellent education is anything but a luxury.
This is the clip. It’s less then 9 minutes, but worth every second:
The only time I ever flew 1st class was when the airline oversold in coach and they suddenly decided to bump me up, probably because I was flying alone and arrived a bit late. It really did feel like heaven.
The truth is though, the folks in education who fly 1st class are just the lackeys of the real power brokers, who have their own private jets. Remember trying to speculate on the purpose of them all flying to meet with Gates on a secluded South Carolina island last spring? Jeb Bush, Mike Bloomberg, Warren Buffet, Oprah, et al. (My bet is on their plan for Oprah’s high profile support of Corey Booker, the Bradley Foundation supported right-wing plant in the Democratic party –who loves vouchers, charters, etc.)
You can see a great picture of all their private jets lined up here: http://www.timebomb2000.com/vb/showthread.php?428396-Bill-Gates-Jeb-Bush-Oprah-and-Warren-Buffett-meeting-at-SC-island
Excellent connection!
I think the the pseudo-bi-partisanship amongst billionaires was summed up really well on the Simpsons, when venture capitalists wanted to take the brand of Moe the bartender’s special whiskey public. The day before the IPO, they said to him, “Enjoy your last night as a Democrat.”
I don’t watch commercial shows often at all, but the few Simpson episodes I’ve seen have a lot of bite and great truth telling satire.
There’s not enough money for learning, but there’s plenty of money for testing learning.
Excellent point and apparently there’s plenty of money to funnel to the edufrauds.
Watch this video…live school..as if we would have the time and it’s “fun” for teachers.
$tudent$: the new ca$h crop for corporation$
http://atthechalkface.com/2013/08/01/track-and-improve-your-school-culture/
Right, that’ll be real “fun,” like when you have to rush to clock in kids each time they return from the bathroom, so everyone else in the entire building doesn’t think you’ve lost track of your students for hours.
This is soooo old school Behaviorist Special Ed. When did all low income kids become classified as disabled? Oh yeah, that would be the KIPP “no excuses” military style model.
Excellent work, Krazy TA! You hit the hypocritical nails on their heads with a thunderous crash of your hammer-like research.
Keep it up.
JerseyJazzman takes on the same attitude as enunciated by Derrell Bradford.
http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/2013/08/derrell-bradfords-fraudulent-voucher.html
Bradford: Because we’re spending on all the wrong things, like ridiculous facilities, right? Ridiculous, you know, bells and whistles that we don’t need. And the most important things, like breaking the monopoly, empowering people with choice, focusing on teacher quality and compensation – we don’t do that stuff.
– See more at: http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/2013/08/derrell-bradfords-fraudulent-voucher.html#sthash.je2agX1b.dpuf
Of course throwing money at schools doesn’t work, because it doesn’t actually get thrown at schools; it gets thrown at consultants, upper level administrators, Pearson, etc.
Such an important point!
Derrick Thomas (Kansas City Chiefs linebacker) Academy has created a legal mess for the corporate reformers, Edison Learning and the bondholder Lord Abbett and Co, based in New Jersey. How will Duncan respond?
http://www.lordabbett.com
http://www.kmbc.com/news/kansas-city/lawsuit-says-kc-charter-school-owes-millions/-/11664182/21305628/-/15b2oxmz/-/index.html
Tuition at Harpath Hall is a little under $22,000. Washington DC public schools spend a little over $29,000 per student. What does the extra spending buy for the students in the District?
A. For the 2012-2013 academic year, Upper School tuition is $22,770 and Middle School tuition is $21,910. While we recognize that the cost is significant, we are fortunate that our strong Annual Giving Program and income from our endowment provide for 12 percent of the cost of educating each student. A family can expect a tuition increase each year. Harpeth Hall has a strong financial aid program. Approximately 17 percent of our students will recieve financial assistance for the 2012-2013 school year.
I don’t know if your DC stat is correct, but if so ask Michelle and Kaya…they have been running the schools for years now. See contact form here:
http://dcps.dc.gov/DCPS/About+DCPS/Contact+Us/Contact+Chancellor+Henderson
The figure for the private school was last years tuition. Glad you could update it. The figure for DC is from here (http://www.cato.org/blog/census-bureau-confirms-dc-spends-29409-pupil). You might wish to go to the census website to verify the math.
Please use the contact form to get an answer to your question. Kaya Henderson is the chancellor who continued the Rheeforms. She should be able to help you.
Any thoughts on the substance of the post? About what the extra spending in DC buys?
Last time TE….read carefully…..talk to Kaya…who better to ask?
IF you really want an answer. Your past has proven otherwise.
Click the link, submit your question and wait for an answer.
TE,
The private schools also have something else that the public schools don’t: they get to teach the way they want, relatively unprescribed in methods and curriculum, and they get to teach childlren who are very verbally and experientially developed as a result of coming from highly educated and better off to rich families, and they get to teach class sizes that most of us only dream about.
You want to know what the alleged difference in per pupil spending pays for, but you are also comparing two vastly different populations, and the job policies for both are substantially different also.
I think your right that it is less expensive to teach students at private schools. What would be a ball park expenditure per student in public urban schools to replicate the private school experience for all public school students? Would it need to double?
How would you find that out, TE?
If you want to do some back of the envelope calculations, you could start with the Brookings institute’s estimate that a reduction in the student teacher ratio by one student would cost about 12 billion a year in higher teacher salaries (this assumes no increase in average teacher salaries). Of course we would have to add on benefits as well, along with expanding the number of classrooms and perhaps an increase in some back office staff.
You have made the very good point that giving the average public school student the equivalent of a private school education will likely require the public school classes to be smaller than those at Harpeth Hall, Sidwell Friends, or the Lab School at U of C. Do you have an estimate of how much smaller than private schools the public classes should be?
Can you please provide a citation for your claim about a Brookings study indicating that it would cost $12 billion / year for class sizes to be diminished by one student?
I find that very difficult to believe, and I suspect the offhand reference misstates any actual unbiased study…
Here is the link:http://www.brookings.edu/research/papers/2011/05/11-class-size-whitehurst-chingos
There are many caveats to the cost basis of this presupposition, including the breadth of the impact of a reduction in class size across all classrooms in America… Whether there may be economies available to such an assumption remains an open question, with $12 billion affecting a population of some 50 million classroom students nationwide rather much of a bargain, especially considering the $500 billion aggregate school budgets across the land…
…not including the learning benefit afforded students granted the advantage of smaller class size, which is not quantified in your referenced citation and their supporting references… which could more than top the nominal cost of lowering class size…
Sure there are lots of implicit assumptions. This is just a place to have a rough start. I would certainly be interested in any alternative starting point you would propose.
For the state of Utah, it’s $6,000 per student per year, and yet the legislators STILL say that we “throw too much money at education.” Most areas do not pay the levels of Washington, D.C.
Off the top of my head I would name two things that are important
Class sizes
and in the Chicago and Boston areas I know the unions were asking for nurses in the school (at the building not through 911). This has been important to me since the 60s and teachers are still fighting the same issue. I know I told my colleagues I can take 40 students in first grade but if you give me one with a breathing tube I want a nurse in the building. Today I know I couldn’t handle 40 any more….
Does your yardstick you use recognize the factors of different cities and costs? For example, a homeless person attempting to work and get into an apartment has to earn $25 an hour where I live (mid-sized , middle/low average economy in the city) to have room for parents and one or more children. We only take in moms with children who are homeless (so please don’t apply the alcoholic stereotypes). Two parents have to work a full schedule to get the $25 …. That mean kids get farmed out , go unsupervised, or whatever when both parents work. That is our goal to get them out of the shelter. The public schools have been extremely helpful in
meeting his goal. Also, our church sponsors the food bank so that the individuals who need it can obtain food (which is more difficult in the summer — no school breakfast etc). I’m not sure where you live but these are realities in Massachusetts which is doing exceptionally well considering the Great Recession. I am certain that OH families are doing less well given the statistics. I don’t want to go back and name other things but class size and school health /nure availability were important in the 60s and still are today when Boston negotiates a union contract. I won’t say anything now about the social capital that a private school brings if you are fortunate to live in gated communities.
TE, look up Bruce Baker’s work on this.
http://schoolfinance101.wordpress.com/
DCPS includes the capital costs.
Also, as you know, HH tuition does not cover all expenses. They have donors and a capital fund to support operational expenses.
After you read up on costs, get back to us and we can discuss your disingenuous point.
Thanks for the link. I suppose the folks at the US Census Department could be wildly wrong.
Bigger bureaucracy, better health and retirement benefits for school employees, and a lot of special education contracts.
Sorry. Apologies in advance for focusing on a small part of this post instead of the Big Issues that usually engage me. But I am an L.A. Teacher after all. The spelling of the word theater with the last two letters reversed (theatre) is the English spelling. England and the United States have a few spelling differences arising from differences that appeared in early dictionaries. Other common examples are “colour” and “centre”.
I usually offer my students “bonus points” for finding either our vocabulary words or editing/spelling mistakes in any printed material such as their free reading books, magazines, textbooks, or handouts. They get double points if they find mistakes in something I have done. (Sadly, our local paper is a source of many bonus points.) Every year a sharp-eyed student will ask about one of these English spellings. We have great discussions on how language changes, and how usage and even spelling often depend on context. For example, fragments are appropriate in conversation and fiction, but they are generally not used in nonfiction or business materials.
Why would an expensive private or charter school use the English spelling? Well, assuming they knew it was the English spelling, one might infer that they wanted to add that faux upper-class English “gloss” to appeal to snooty patrons. This reminds me of a (probably apocryphal) story about the Harkness bell tower at Yale. It is said that one of the architects poured acid down the sides of the tower to make it appear older, like the English towers upon which it was modeled.
They’re also the French spellings.
It is curious that BOTH Harpeth and Cranbrook spell it “theatre.”
Generally in theater circles, it’s spelled in the English/French spelling. This is legitimate.
Jonathan Kozol presented a keynote address at a United Church of Christ General Synod in 1999 in Providence, RI. Here is one of the memorable things he said, paraphrased after 14 years:
Some people say we shouldn’t throw money at the problems in public schools. Now there is one thing we haven’t tried. We ought to try it. Throw it out of helicopters. Money won’t solve all the problems, but without it we won’t be able to address the needs of the children who struggle.
All the money I really want or need is a supplementary budget to pay for a few things the kids need, so as to not call their parents away from the important jobs of working to support their families. According to the itemization section on my taxes, it is usually around $2000 annually for things like : healthy snacks, extra used clean clothing, new shoes, gently used backpacks, gently used clean winter gear, and more healthy snacks. Look at this list, it is the bottom tier of Maslow’s hierarchy of need. We can only begin to “pour in” academic content after these human needs are met, because if they aren’t, there is no chance of progressing. A hungry or cold child will remain hungry or cold until those things are remedied, then we can address curriculum. First we have to calm the emotional upset that comes from starting the day hungry or cold. How do we spell the biggest challenge to school aged children: P-O-V-E-R-T-Y. How do I spell what I generally think of “reformers” and their ill-informed proposals and rules:….hmmmm, let’s try this for starters: C-L-U-E-L-E-S-S.
If every child could experience a school like Cranbrook, we would truly be headed toward educational progress.
thanks for the comments Denise; I have been assisting the Board of our local homeless shelter and I am appalled at some of the clueless attitudes even from administratorsj such as “DSMV should have a listing for lazy”….. “these people all had lousy parents.” This is also what happens in schools where one principal in an affluent school district said “the dregs of society” and this allows them to apportion funds. If we call some one a name and sterotype them it justifies the way we set up budgets. That is the political process deciding how the funds are to bet spent. we need more voices in the process and your comments are appropos. Keep up the work you are doing
Whenever I hear about throwing money at education my response is that one throws money at pole dancers and we invest in public education. (with no disrespect to pole dancers.)
FYI – the summer theater program at Cranbrook is part of their summer camps. Those camps are used by many within the nearby community including children from the nearby local public schools. This doesn’t change the basic premise of the post that spending money on a curriculum which includes the arts is worth it, but it would have been better if the writer had used this link for the school itself: http://schools.cranbrook.edu/podium/default.aspx?t=148934
To me the problem is that money (or perhaps the taking away of money is the better description) is used as a bludgeon for punitive actions against schools and students.
One of my USC professors this summer repeated this canard and said that studies have shown that money doesn’t change outcomes. When I scoffed, she said that one of the worst schools in LAUSD gets $15,000 per student and still doesn’t get the outcomes it should, and I about fell off my chair. My school here in Michigan was closed due to declining enrollment and a state budget of under $7,000 per student. If we’d had double that, there would have been no need to close the school to avoid an emergency manager taking over the district.
Once I calmed down and was able to explain my reaction, the professor had to admit that money and the lack thereof sure can cause problems. Don’t get me wrong, schools often mismanage funds. So does every other big organization out there–just ask the people who work there and wonder why money’s spent on this and not that or where this other thing came from and why it’s there. The reality is, though, schools need enough to pay fair wages, provide the resources needed, and have safe and welcoming facilities.
There sure seems to be a lot of money being “thrown at” politicians, too. And Bill Gates must have a sore arm after “throwing around” so much money the last few years. When you ask people who say that we shouldn’t “throw money” at the problem how much we should spend on education their only answer is “less”.
Michael Scriven was one of my professors.
REFERENCE: Written by one of the leaders in evaluation, Evaluation Thesaurus, Fourth Edition, provides readers with a quick analysis of the leading concepts, positions, acronyms, processes, techniques, and checklists in the field of evaluation. Containing nearly 2000 entries, Michael Scriven’s thesaurus offers professionals and students a guide for understanding the relation of evaluation to the doctrine of value-free social science, ways to integrate the parts of multi-dimensional evaluations into an overall rating, the realities of evaluation consulting, and techniques for the use of spreadsheets in qualitative evaluation.
————————-
Tony Bennett never studied these I am sure; I am serious when I say we need a glossary of concepts. And, i would start out with Henry Levin “cost effectiveness” , “cost avoidance” and I would integrate Scriven’s work with Levin’s. I might just as well get off this computer and get to work on a PRIMER … that includes these terms and concepts. Physician heal thyself… or continue reading “Hippocrates Cried” that I found at the public library yesterday!
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many years ago, even before NCLB Alabama graded school based on their yearly standardized testing which at the time was the Stanford Achievement Test. Schools either Passed or were put into the Caution, Alert 1 or Alert 2 categories. I don’t remember specifics, but at some point the State department of Education would intervene, fist by sending in a specialist of its choice (usually a teacher) to the school and if that did not work, then by making the school a Transformation School. Transformation Schools were restaffed and provided extra resources such as more assistant principals,teachers and counselors. One of the middle schools in my county’s public school system has been transformed several times. Things seem to get better for a couple of years while funding is available for the extra resources, but as soon as the funding is gone and the school looses its resources such as extra teacher, counselors and administrators, things get ugly again. This middle school is in one of the poorest areas in the county.
I think if you look at Kansas City schools. It shows that spending more money is not enough. Large parts of the public simply does not trust the public education system. That is sad but it is reality.
I have my opinions as to why but I am pretty certain that they would not be well received here.
So ask people here. Why do you believe that there is mistrust in public education?
The public distrusts education because the deformers, for the last 10 or 15 years, have spent significant amounts of money to denigrate good, hardworking teachers. These “reformers” have sponsored things list NBC’s education nation and other advertisements to say “we love teachers, but we have SOOO many bad teachers, and we must get rid of them.” Studies have shown that parents tend to think that teachers in the U.S. overall are bad, but that the teachers in their own schools are fine. That’s what propaganda does for you: states that there are major problems. But parents know their own teachers and so they know that their own kids generally have good teachers, but don’t generalize it to the U.S. in general.
Not only do they throw money at their own children’s schools, they demand that the government throw money directly at the wealthy themselves when their scams fail.
I figured out a long time ago that you can tell what politicians really care about not by their words, but too simple actions:
What they love, they throw money at and deregulate.
What they hate, they starve of money and strangle with regulation.
So it’s clear Washington loves war and Wall Street, and hates our children and their education.
I would also add a third test:
What they love they will do ANYTHING to protect and nourish, democratic process, law, or constitution be damned.
What they hate, they SAY they can’t do anything to help because of democratic process, law, or the constitution.
I heard that Huffman’s child is not enrolled at Harpeth Hall this school year. Their children will attend the top magnet school in Nashville. Now, Michelle Rhee and Kevin Huffman can honestly say that they are “public school parents,” even though their children are not attending a typical public school. Think public pressure had anything to do with this decision? Couldn’t have been the cost since both are rich from all this reform.
This is not the most recent study but it is the one I have saved ; I promise to dig out more data this week…
Education reform in Massachusetts, I contend, improved as early as the 766 instructional arrangements, curriculum reform, and teacher preparation prior to P.L.94-142. I also contend that the federal funds we used in Massachusetts to “beef up ” the programs had a strong impact. 1993 was an early wave of educational reform with legislative action and Kennedy offered support for NCLB . From these efforts, even the early reports were positive as quoted here for Massachusetts schools:
“Spending increases do lead to improved test scores. Estimates for 4th- graders suggest that a one standard deviation increase in per-pupil spending ($1000) increases math, reading, science and social studies test scores by about a half of a standard deviation. Estimated effects are remarkably consistent across specifications and test subjects. Estimates for 8th-graders do not show the evidence. One explanation for the difference between 4th- and 8th-grade effects is that 4th-graders spent a larger fraction of their education in well-funded schools ( funding partly on fixed district characteristics so there was some stability across years for cohorts of students) Further investigation into the effects of spending on the distribution of test scores suggests that increases in 4th-grade test scores come as a result of an increase in performance by students at the bottom of the distribution. The results also suggest that increases in spending led to a decrease in the fraction of 8th-graders scoring at both ends of the distribution. ” This latter statement can have various interpretations; for example, educational programs and interventions can tighten up the standard deviation so that more students are showing in the average; whereas, in Chapter I a general goal is to take students who are scoring at the 25 th percentile (or thereabouts) and move them closer to the 50th percentile. There are a lot of nuances.
The quote above is NOT from newest research; however, I contend that the waves of educational reform and the iterative recursions of MCAS tests (over decades) have been responsible for the improved test scores with legislative support for funding. Furthermore, we have reduced the achievement gap ….. yet, there is still room for improvement; yet, there is no need for this constant battering of teachers and Harvard professors saying “Massachusetts is failing in teaching reading.” I promise to get more recent research and provide the references. It is important to document and share the information so that these headlines about “failure” can be put in perspective. But of course, Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush wouldn’t agree with me… And, Romney would take credit for the results even while he kills the goose that lays the golden eggs as he devolved more support from state back to the overburdened school districts while he was on the “throne”.
It’s always a good day when Diane is quoting Marx. Locally here in the Chicago area, throwing money at the public schools in the city’s more affluent suburbs has been standard. The suburbs with the “best” high schools (measured by test scores and other “matrices”) can’t beat Chicago’s top schools (e.g., Whitney Young, where my eldest graduated a generation after Michelle Obama), but they have a lot more of everything: sports, curricular depth, social and personal services, etc., etc. When I was trying to get a job at New Trier and talking with one of the English teachers, he told me “You have a good idea for the kids and someone will figure out how to fund it…” (That was before the school learned I had been blacklisted… I was never called back despite all my elite qualifications…). I was asking about a “Mystery Writers Club” I had sponsored once upon a time at Amundsen High School in Chicago, where a bunch of kids had fallen in love with the genre and wanted to write teen detective and spy stories…
Those suburbs pay double the adjusted amount in property taxes as we do here in Chicago. They know they get what they pay for, and are willing to pay for the schools their children deserve.
For you George…another chink in his armour:
Such beliefs, however, seriously misread why urban district students fail to reach proficiency levels and graduate high school. As important as it is to reorganize district offices, alter salary schedules, get rid of incompetent teachers and intractable principals, such actions in of themselves will not turn around a broken district. While there is both research and experiential evidence to support each of these beliefs as factors in hindering students’ academic performance, what undercuts sprinter-driven reforms in these arenas is the simple fact that fast-moving CEOs fast-track their solutions to these problems, get spent from there exertions or create too much turmoil, and soon exit leaving the debris of their reforms next to the skid marks in the parking lot. Swift actions certainly garner attention but sprinters quickly lose steam after completing 100 meters.
Consider long-distance runners. They carefully scrutinize and adapt reforms as they get implemented. Behind-the-scenes, they build teacher and administrator expertise to put changes into practice, mobilize staff and community to support long-term changes in teaching and learning, and, most important, create a pool of leaders ready to assume responsibility for sustaining the ever-shifting reform agenda.
They ask hard questions that few sprinter superintendents ask:
1. Did policies aimed at improving student achievement (e.g., small high schools, pay-for performance plans, new reading and math curricula, parental choice) get fully implemented?
2. When implemented fully, did they change the content and practice of teaching?
3. Did changed classroom practices account for what students learned?
4. Did what students learn achieve the goals set by policy makers?
Sprinter superintendents neither have the breathing capacity nor motivation to ask and answer these questions. They are too busy eyeing the finish line. Marathoners spend time and energy on these questions although 2 and 3 get skimpy attention from even the best of the long-distance runners. Still, urban children are better served by superintendents willing to go the distance rather than those swift runners who flash by without a backward glance.
Paul Vallas is (or was)* a sprinter at a time when marathoners are needed for turning around failing districts.
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*A hearing on the removal of Vallas will occur in the fall before the Connecticut Supreme Court
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/08/04/the-problem-with-the-paul-vallas-brand-of-school-reform/
Diane.
It’s actually very simple.
If the school is Lakeside Academy, or Sidwell Friends, or Andover or Choate, an infusion of capital is “a wise and prudent investment which will enhance the living and learning experience of our current and future students, while ensuring that this premier provider of secondary education stands on a solid fiscal foundation for the years ahead!”
If the school is a public school, serving ALL children in the surrounding community, an infusion of capital is “THROWING MONEY AT THE SCHOOLS WHICH WILL NEVER SOLVE ANYTHING!!!”
Liars…