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Pennsylvania: 89% of School Districts Call for Reform of Charter Law

By dianeravitch
January 21, 2023 //
7

Pennsylvania has an outdated charter school law that funds charter schools generously. For a long time, the legislature was controlled by Republicans whose billionaire donors wanted to encourage charter schools and defund public schools. The state is also extravagant in funding virtual charter schools, many of which operate for profit. All the virtual charters are low-performing.

The Keystone Center for Charter Change, established by the Pennsylvania School Boards Association, has led a campaign to revise the charter law, especially the funding formula. 89% of the school districts in the state have joined their program for reform.

.@PennsManor Area SD becomes Pennsylvania’s 445th locally elected, volunteer board of school directors to pass a resolution calling upon the General Assembly to pass charter reform.

Keystone Center for Charter Change Website
More than 440 school districts have adopted a resolution calling upon the General Assembly to meaningfully reform the existing flawed charter school funding system to ensure that school districts and taxpayers are no longer overpaying or reimbursing charter schools for costs they do not have. The map and list below will show which school districts have approved a resolution.
If your school board has not yet adopted a resolution, you can find a copy of the resolution and instructions on how to submit the resolution after adoption below.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Education Reform, Equity, Funding, Pennsylvania

Florida: Republicans Plan Major Expansion of K-12 Vouchers

By dianeravitch
January 20, 2023 //
19

Florida has one of the largest voucher programs in the nation, and Republicans expect to make the program even larger. With a large majority in both houses and a choice-friendly governor, they will push their bill through with little or no resistance. Florida’s voucher schools are not required to hire certified teachers; their students do not take state tests. Although accountability was a major thrust of the Florida “reforms,” voucher schools are exempt from any accountability. Most are religious schools.

The Miami Herald reported:

Florida’s school voucher program could see a major expansion under new legislation filed Thursday by House Republicans. Standing at a lectern with a sign reading “Your Kids, Your Choice,” House Speaker Paul Renner introduced House Bill 1 to make vouchers available to all Florida children eligible to enter kindergarten through 12th grade. Children from families with incomes up to 185% of the federal poverty level, which is $55,500 plus $9,509 for each additional family member, would continue to get priority for the funding. Children in foster care also would receive priority.

The bill would allow voucher recipients to use the public funds for more than tuition at a private school and transportation, as is currently in law. Families would be allowed to spend the money on home-schooling, college courses, private tutoring and specialized testing such as Advanced Placement exams, among other expenses.

Students may not be in public school to qualify for a voucher, which is the equivalent of per-student funding in a public school — currently about $8,216 per year.

Families would receive the money through state-funded education savings accounts, a longtime goal for Florida Republicans. “It’s about freedom and opportunity,” Renner, R-Palm Coast, said during his news conference. “We empower parents and children to decide the education that meets their needs.”

State Rep. Kaylee Tuck, chairperson of the House Choice and Innovation subcommittee, is carrying the bill. The Lake Placid Republican said the measure should allow families to customize education for their children.

Renner predicted broad bipartisan support for the bill, which he said also should clear the waiting list for students with special education needs to receive a state scholarship. Currently about 9,400 children are on that list, according to Renner’s staff.

DEMOCRATS CALL IT ‘DEFUNDING PUBLIC EDUCATION’

House Democratic Leader Rep. Fentrice Driskell disagreed with Renner’s comments regarding support for the bill. She called it a “defunding of public education” and said she expected most members of her party to oppose it. “There is nothing in this bill that I like, because we continue to take these public dollars and use them for private purposes,” Driskell, D-Tampa, said.

Other Democrats attending a news conference to counter the Republicans’ announcement held similar views. They said they support vouchers for students who need special services, and agreed that parents deserve choices — including within the public schools, which 2.9 million children attend.

“Let’s not defund one institution to fund another one,” said Rep. Felicia Robinson, D-Miami Gardens, who also called for more accountability in the voucher system. Schools that accept vouchers should at least have certified teachers, Robinson said.

And parents who accept funding should have to prove the money is going toward approved education services, added Rep. Yvonne Hayes Hinson, D-Gainesville. ”There is no accountability for tracking funds,” said Hinson.

“This might be a get-rich scheme. I’ve seen it all over the country.” Rep. Allison Tant, D-Tallahassee, referenced her city’s Red Hills Academy, a charter school that closed within weeks of opening last year, citing low enrollment and processing issues, according to the Tallahassee Democrat. ”They got state funding to go create themselves,” Tant said. “Then they turn the kids back to public schools and guess what? They kept the funding.” In Palm Beach County, the founder of one charter school was found profiting off the venture by steering school contracts to companies he owned, according to the Palm Beach Post.

RENNER OFFERS REBUTTAL ON FUNDING

Renner said critics who claim the Republicans are seeking to dismantle public education ignore the fact that the Legislature has put more total dollars into district schools every year, something he said would likely continue. He also pointed to the state’s efforts to improve teacher pay, adding millions of dollars to boost the base salary.

“It’s going to be a good year for our traditional public schools as well,” Renner said.

Read more at: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/education/article271373917.html#storylink=cpy

Categories Education Reform, Florida, Funding, Privatization, Religion, Separation of church and state, Vouchers

New Hampshire: Voucher Drive Accelerates

By dianeravitch
January 19, 2023 //
8

Republican control of the state legislature has produced the customary demand to defund the state’s public schools by enacting vouchers to pay for private and religious schools from state funds. The initial proposals, as usual, are understated. Next steps will remove limits on income and eligibility and will increase the payments per students. The camel’s nose will soon be an entire camel inside the tent. Don’t believe the promises. The attack on public school funding is just the opening bid.

If state law permits it, the people of New Hampshire should demand a referendum and determine whether they want to defund their public schools for the benefit of those already in private and religious schools.

Gary Rayno of InsideNH reports:

National School Choice Week is a week away and to celebrate, the House Education Committee has a number of hearings this week on the Education Freedom Account program.

Last fall, the program’s funding was challenged by the head of the American Federation of Teachers — NH claiming state law earmarks public education money for public education not private programs or schools and sought an injunction to block sending any more Education Trust Fund grants to parents.

“If the state desires to operate an Education Freedom Account or similar program, whereby it grants public money for parents to utilize for private use, it must separately fund it through additional taxation or another source of funds,” the suit claims, noting there currently is no mechanism for doing so.
While program advocates downplayed the suit, at the time, a constitutional amendment and a bill were introduced to change the state constitution and state statutes to allow Education Trust Fund money to be spent on the program. That would appear to imply “we got a problem Houston,” as the astronauts said aboard Apollo 13 many years ago.

Constitutional Amendment Concurrent Resolution 7, with prime sponsor Rep. Glenn Cordelli, R-Tuftonboro, would remove a sentence from the state constitution that reads “Provided, nevertheless, that no money raised by taxation shall ever be granted or applied for the use of the schools or institutions of any religious sect or denomination.”

To date about 75 percent of the state funds spent for the freedom account program has subsidized tuition for students who attended private and religious schools before the program was launched in 2021 and not students leaving public schools for private or religious schools as advocates had predicted.

To date the program has cost the state $24 million and the private organization that manages and administers the program, which the suit also says is not legal, the Children’s Scholarship Program, is holding a School Fair Jan. 21 in Manchester to recruit more students in “celebration of school choice week.”

Cordelli is also the prime sponsor of House Bill 440, which would change the statute for the Education Trust Fund allowing the distribution of funds “to scholarship organizations approved under RSA 77:G that administers and implements the education freedom accounts program pursuant to RSA 194-F.”

The change would also allow the transfer of general fund money into the Education Trust Fund if it runs out of money and cannot pay its obligations.

Public hearings have not been set for either the proposed constitutional amendment or the bill changing the use of Education Trust Fund money.

However, there will be public hearings this week on two bills that would expand who would qualify for the freedom account program.

Currently program participants are limited to 300 percent of the federal poverty level or about $80,000 for a family of four and $52,000 in a two-person household.

The guideline is just for income and does not include a person’s assets.

Parents could own a lakefront home, but do not earn $80,000 the first year of eligibility, and their child or children may participate in the program for as long as they are school age.

House Bill 357 would increase the income threshold to 500 percent of poverty level which would be about $140,000 for a family of four and $68,000 for a two-person family.

The prime sponsor of the bill is Rep. Alicia Lekas, R-Hudson, and the public hearing will be held before the House Education Committee at 11 a.m. Thursday in Rooms 205-207 of the Legislative Office Building.

The same day at 9:30 a.m., the committee is scheduled to hear House Bill 464, which would also expand who is eligible for the scholarship program.

The bill would retain the 300 percent of poverty level threshold, but would add a child in foster care, or homeless or disabled, or has an educational hardship; or his or her parents travel for work like farm workers, are in the armed services or National Guard; or in a school in need of improvement under the No Child Left Behind Act or is designated as persistently dangerous; or if a child qualifies for the free or reduced lunch program.

The additional children added under this bill would bring it more in line with how it was sold as an opportunity for lower-income families to find the best educational opportunity for their child instead of subsidizing the tuition payments of children already attending private and religious schools.

However, the bill, with prime sponsor Rep. Erica Layon, R-Derry, could add a substantial number of children to the program.

The program’s average grant this school year is about $5,000 per student, so the state’s obligation could increase substantially. It would take 200 new students to add $1 million in annual costs.

The original estimate for program costs was $300,000 the first year and $3.3 million the second. Instead it was more than $8 million the first year with 1,500 students, and as of November, $15.2 million this school year with 3,110 students.

Another bill sponsored by Lekas would eliminate an income limit on the program, which could cost the state as much as $70 million if all eligible students participated under the current guidelines.

A public hearing on House Bill 331, which would eliminate the income threshold, has not yet been scheduled.

And the bills do not stop there.

Please open the link and read on. New Hampshire’s public schools are at risk.

Categories Education Reform

The Surprising Life Story of Yong Zhao

By dianeravitch
January 17, 2023 //
3

One of my personal heroes is Yong Zhao, a Chinese-American scholar from whom I have learned much about education. I first met him through his writings, which are informative and provocative. Over the years, I met Yong at conferences, and we became friends. Not long after Anthony Cody and I created the Network for Public Education, we invited Yong to be the keynote speaker at our annual meeting in Chicago. He was a sensation. He had no prepared speech, but he did have a computer loaded with images. As he flashed from one image to another, he told a coherent story that was both based in scholarship, personal, and uproariously funny. When I created a lecture series at Wellesley College, I invited him to speak, and he again gave an informal talk that was illuminating, authoritative, and delivered with grace and humor.

I reviewed one of his books—demystifying the myth of Chinese super-schools—in the New York Review of Books.

I recently learned that Yong Zhao collaborated with Bill McDiarmid of the University of North Carolina to tell the story of Yong’s life. I remember his telling jokes about his impoverished childhood in a rural village and the unlikely trajectory of his life. He explained with a smile that he was too small and scrawny to plow the fields with a water Buffalo, so he was allowed to go to school instead. If you read the excerpt from the new book, you will see that this was no joke.

This is a column in Valerie Strauss’s blog, The Answer Sheet, at the Washington Post. She excerpted a part of a new book about Yong’s life.

Valerie Strauss wrote:

This is an excerpt of a new book, “Improbable Probabilities,” about and co-written by Yong Zhao, whose unlikely story starts in a village in China during the disastrous 1966-76 Cultural Revolution and takes him to a renowned career in academia. An internationally known scholar, author and speaker, Yong’s research and work has focused on how globalization and technology affect education. He has also been a prominent critic of school reform efforts in the United States that rely on high-stakes standardized tests and look to China — whose students excel on these tests — as a model. He has written for The Answer Sheet over the past decade on this and other topics.


In telling Yong’s story and why he consistently challenges conventional wisdom in education, Yong and co-author G. Williamson McDiarmid look at what factors are needed for success and how “forces outside human control play an essential role in the unfolding of human life.” I am publishing this because I think it offers valuable insights into what leads to success in school and in life.


Yong has written some 30 books, which education historian Diane Ravitch once said were “saturated with remarkable scholarship and learning,” and he has done extensive work in creating schools that promote global competence and language-learning computer games. He is now professor of education at the University of Kansas, as well as professor of educational leadership at the Melbourne Graduate School of Education in Australia.

Yong has taught at other schools, including the University of Oregon, where he was presidential chair and director of the Institute for Global and Online Education in the College of Education, and a professor in the Department of Educational Measurement, Policy, and Leadership. He was previously university distinguished professor in the College of Education at Michigan State University, where he was founding director of the Office of Teaching and Technology and the U.S.-China Center for Research on Educational Excellence, and executive director of the Confucius Institute. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Education and elected fellow of the International Academy for Education.

McDiarmid is dean and alumni distinguished professor emeritus at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and distinguished chair of education at East China Normal University in Shanghai.


This is part of the introduction of the book:


Too often, the lives of people who have climbed out of dire circumstances and subsequently left their mark on the world are portrayed as miracles of the human spirit or valorized as the main character of a rags-to-riches tale. Such narratives perpetuate the idea that only extraordinary individuals succeed against overwhelming odds; they focus on the individual qualities that led to a person’s success while downplaying the circumstances that contributed to their success. Even less often is chance or luck assigned a major role in these success stories.

In 2018, scholars Alessandro Pluchino, Alessio Emanuele Biondo, and Andrea Rapisarda set out to investigate the “largely dominant meritocratic paradigm of highly competitive Western cultures [that] is rooted on the belief that success is due mainly, if not exclusively, to personal qualities such as talent, intelligence, skills, smartness, efforts, willfulness, hard work or risk taking.”[i] They conclude that, while talent contributes to a person’s success, it’s not the most talented people who are most successful; mediocre people who get lucky often surpass talented people.[ii]

So, what’s really going on? Evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin suggests that forces outside human control play an essential role in the unfolding of human life; if we wish to understand living things, we must see that genes, organisms, and environments (Lewontin’s triple helix) are not separate entities.[iii]. Observers may attribute individuals’ successes to their genes or to their environment – or the interactions of these factors. Lewontin argues that a critical third strand must be included if we are to understand how people’s lives unfold: chance.[iv] The American myth of rugged individualism (the belief that humans succeed against heavy odds solely through their individual talent, determination, and intelligence) obscures the role that the interaction of genes, environment, and chance play in shaping a person’s path to success or failure.

In what follows in this chapter, we examine the roles that these three factors played in determining Yong’s improbable path. We start with the role that chance events play in all aspects of our daily lives. We then describe some of the chance occurrences that helped shape Yong’s life. We consider how Yong’s unfavorable environment offered him, paradoxically, opportunities to develop his interests and abilities. We also examine the role that Yong’s personality traits may have played in his taking advantage of those opportunities. We conclude with an overview of the book.

Chance Encounters

Rags-to-riches and rugged individualism narratives ignore the fact that contingencies play a determinative role in individual success. Challenging these myths, Historian John Fea writes about the role contingency plays in events and people’s lives:

Contingency is . . . at odds with other potential ways of explaining human behavior in the past. Fatalism, determinism, and providentialism are philosophical or religious systems that teach that human behavior is controlled by forces—fate, the order of the universe, God—that are outside the control of humans. . .. [I]t is undeniable that we are all products of the macrolevel cultural or structural contexts that have shaped the world into which we have been born. Karl Marx suggested that human action is always held in check by “the circumstances directly encountered, given, and transmitted from the past.” It is unlikely that any proponent of contingency would deny that human behavior is shaped by larger cultural forces, but in the end, historians are in the business of explaining why people—as active human agents—have behaved in the past in the way that they did.[v]

Fea uses the example of the Union army’s victory at the Battle of Antietam during the U.S. Civil War that turned the conflict in favor of the Union (at the cost of 6,200 casualties).[vi] Prior to the battle, a copy of General Robert E. Lee’s battle plans fell into the hands of the Union command purely by chance. Fea quotes fellow historian James McPherson, who wrote that the “odds against the occurrence of such a chain of events must have been a million to one . . . yet it happened.”[vii]

Many of us are uncomfortable with the idea that chance occurrences have significantly shaped the world in which we live. We prefer to believe that there is a grand plan, that “everything happens for a reason.” The idea that success is not simply a function of our hard work and talent and that chance plays a significant role in how our lives unfold challenges both culturally imbedded beliefs as well as our sense of control over our destinies. Sociologist Duncan J. Watts points out that:People observe unusually successful outcomes and consider them as the necessary product of hard work and talent, while they mainly emerge from a complex and interwoven sequence of steps, each depending on precedent ones: if any of them had been different, an entire career or life trajectory would almost surely differ too.[viii]

Let’s examine some of the chance events that, had they turned out differently, would have changed the course of Yong’s life. Of particular interest are random circumstances, events, or encounters that could have been debilitating yet, somehow , moved Yong down the path to success.

• Historical moment:

Yong was born between two events that killed millions of Chinese—the Great Leap Forward and the Great Cultural Revolution (see the Preface). Social chaos, political uncertainty, internecine conflict, and continuing depravations characterized this period. A boy born in an obscure village to the lowest class of peasants, Yong was in a vulnerable position. If he had been born earlier, he might have died of starvation, malnutrition, or disease. If he had been born later, he might not have had the opportunities that opened to him as a member of the lowest peasant class under the reforms of Chinese communist leader Deng Xiaoping (page XX).

• Family:

Yong had the good fortune to be born into a family that placed no expectations on him, loved him, and allowed him to pursue his own path. Although illiterate, the family saw the value of schooling for Yong, especially as his poor health and corporal weakness made him ill-suited for manual labor. They supported him in whatever way they could as he worked his way up the educational system and allowed Yong to decide for himself how to live his life. If he had been born into another family, Yong might have faced familial expectations for what he should do and what he should become, which was common among his peers. He might also have been subjected to the physical and verbal abuse that undoubtedly left many children with physical and emotional scars.

• Schooling: Despite woeful conditions, Yong managed to succeed in school when no one else from his village did. He benefitted from a few teachers who recognized his potential and found ways to help him. He also benefitted from Mao’s educational reforms, which opened more opportunities for learning and brought experienced teachers to rural China (page XX). If he had not had the teachers that he had, gained access to Mao’s reformed school system, and learned English instead of Russian (the required second language until the early 1960s), his path might have been very different.

• Higher education: Because his university career was delayed for a year due to his small stature, Yong qualified for a newly created English teacher-training program at the Sichuan Foreign Language Institute (SFLI), the flagship university for foreign language education and information in southwest China. The program covered student tuition and fees and offered access to a much wider world, including a bookstore that sold English-language books, journals, and magazines. Yong’s success in computer and pedagogy courses earned him a spot on a research team, where he taught himself coding and statistics and wrote a program to analyze the survey data. If Yong had not been malnourished, he might have entered higher education the year before the English-teacher training program was created. If he had not been able to take and succeed in courses in computing and pedagogy, he might not have come to the attention of his professors or earned a spot on the research team.

This is, of course, a highly condensed account of a few of the chance events and contingencies Yong experienced in the first 25 years of his life. Each of us could chronicle our life in a similar way, identifying myriad random events, occurrences, encounters, and people that nudged us this way and that.Along the way, chance events shape our environment to create unforeseen opportunities. Do we recognize opportunities? Do we take advantage of them? Let’s examine some of the factors in Yong’s environment that influenced his ability to capitalize on opportunities and embark on a path to success.

Environmental Factors

Yong’s life illustrates how random events create unique and unforeseen paths. Changes in our environment present us with opportunities. Changes cause disequilibria that people, if they are ready, can exploit. What factors in Yong’s environment shaped him throughout his life?

• Yong’s father’s influence: Yong’s father was the most influential person in his early life. He was loving and caring toward Yong, allowed him the freedom to explore his interests and passions, and modeled an entrepreneurial approach to embracing opportunities rather than settling for the status quo.

• Village life: Life in Yong’s village was almost exclusively focused on survival. As members of the peasant class, villagers were fully occupied with feeding, clothing, and sheltering themselves just as their ancestors had done for thousands of years. Given this survivalist mentality, villagers did not judge how Yong spent his time, his chosen career path, or his adherence to social norms.

• Positive teacher relationships: Yong had teachers who noticed his unique academic gifts and sought to encourage and mentor him, opening doors for him into higher education.• Chinese education: Historically, the Chinese have seen education as a means toa career (preferably as a government official), prizing obedience to authority and rote memorization over all else. Student autonomy and critical thinking were typically punished. thus perpetuating a culture of student apathy, acquiescence to authority, and conformity. As a result, Yong’s penchant for creative thinking, risk-taking, innovation, and love of learning for its own sake made him an outlier who was unusually attuned to opportunities that others missed.

• Global perspective: As an adult, Yong traveled widely, developing friendships and collaborations with people from many different countries, As a result, he recognizes that no single culture or ethnicity can claim to be the bearers of “the truth” and that contributions to solving global problems can come from anyone.

Every person, even siblings in the same family, encounters a different set of environmental factors shape who they are and offer various opportunities. This is an experience common to everyone. The difference is that some people recognize opportunities while others don’t. Some people jump at the chance to walk through an open door while others hold back or turn away. Why was Yong able to recognize and take advantage of opportunities when many around him did not? Part of the answer to this may lie with his personality traits.

Influence of Personality

Research on the recognition of opportunities has focused almost entirely on entrepreneurial opportunities and the characteristics of those who seize on what appear to be promising opportunities. Most of the factors that researchers have identified and explored, such as social capital and prior knowledge of a given business sector, seem unhelpful in understanding Yong’s ability to recognize opportunities.[ix]

However, one vein of research—focused on the psychological and cognitive factors that help explain the phenomenon—may help us understand Yong’s eye for opportunity. Researchers have found that personality traits play a vital role in a person’s ability to recognize and capitalize on opportunities.[x], [xi], [xii]

Researcher Scott Shane and colleagues conclude: “Genetic factors account for a large part of the variance in opportunity recognition by influencing the probability that people will be open to experiences.”[xiii] This research speaks to Lewontin’s formulation, supporting the idea that genes interact with both the environment and chance. Is it possible that certain personality traits could tip the scales, could increase the probability that some people are more likely than others to encounter promising opportunities?

Researcher Richard Wiseman became curious about this very question. Why do some people seem to be luckier than others?[xiv] Speculating that luck might not be totally random, he conducted several studies to learn more about what lucky people have in common and why they differ from those less lucky. When he studied the underlying dimensions of personality that psychologists had identified as universal, he found that luckier people shared four of the “Big 5” personality traits: extroversion, neuroticism, optimism, and openness.[xv] How did these traits seem to play out in Yong’s life?

• Extroversion: Evidence of Yong’s extroversion includes his wide circle of friends across the globe and the numerous (over 100 annually) invitations he receives to speak to business, educational, and governmental audiences. This speaks not only to the value others find in his ideas but also to his inherent likeability and the genuine pleasure he takes in meeting and talking with others, especially those whose backgrounds differ from his own.

• Optimism: Despite the harsh conditions of his upbringing, Yong consistently expects good fortune.[xvi] He has an unflagging belief that if a door closes or an opportunity doesn’t pan out, something else will emerge.

• Neuroticism: Wiseman notes that lucky people have “a relaxed attitude toward life.”[xvii] The less anxious we are, the less absorbed we are in worrying about what others think of us, the more attention we can focus on our environment and, therefore, the more likely we are to see opportunities. Despite his full schedule, Yong seems relaxed whatever the situation. This is rooted, in part, in his wealth of experiences. Across his life, he has faced many adversities, and yet, he has not only survived but thrived.

• Openness: Being open to new experiences or embracing a sense of adventure means that when opportunities do arise, lucky people tend to seize them. Research suggests that openness is moderately associated with intelligence and creativity.[xviii] Because Yong remains open to new and novel experiences, he embraces and thrives on an unconventional life of adventure and innovation.

The story of our lives is a complex fabric of many factors. As Lewontin observes, not only do our genes and environment intertwine, but chance plays a major part in how that fabric is woven.[xix][MB1] This is clear in Yong’s life in the unique environmental factors that shaped his experiences, the chance encounters and events that opened unforeseen opportunities, and the inherent qualities and predispositions that allowed him to capitalize on them.

Book Overview

In this book, we strive to understand Yong’s success by exploring the complex interplay of genes, environment, and chance. Each chapter examines a phase of Yong’s life through this lens, containing a brief vignette from that time, relevant historical factors, an account of events that characterized that period of his life, and reflections on the implications for education.

In chapter 1, readers meet the boy from Sichuan Province: five-year-old Yong tagging along behind his father, the primary influence in his early life. Adults in Yong’s rural village are concerned with feeding, clothing, and sheltering their families, which leaves Yong free of social expectations. As Yong uses his free time to devise entrepreneurial ventures around the village, he capitalizes on unlikely assets—his curiosity, penchant for rule-breaking, and rebellious nature—to follow his instincts toward what would become a scholarly life.

Chapter 2 describes how Yong teaches himself to read and enters school amid the upheaval of China’s Cultural Revolution. Educational reforms after the establishment of the People’s Republican of China (PRC) in 1949 allow Yong unprecedented access to school in rural China, as well as teachers who recognize his intellectual interests and gifts. Believing education to be the means to a career only, the Chinese have long valued diligent and compliant students. Relentlessly curious, questioning, and innovative, Yong is an outlier. This doesn’t prevent him for mastering the knowledge and skills needed to succeed in school and pass the extremely stringent university entrance exam — not once but twice. His facility with languages earns him entry into the Sichuan Foreign Language Institute (SFLI) at a time when English-language teachers were in high demand.

Chapter 3 follows Yong during his time at SFLI where he indulges his wide range of academic interests in the library and at a local bookstore. He also cultivates friendships with foreign faculty, opening opportunities to improve his English and learn more about the world beyond China. His success in his classes impresses his professors who ask him to accompany a visiting scholar from Beijing to SFLI in Chongqing. From the visiting scholar, Yong learns about the potential of desktop computers to run data analysis software. Asked to join an international team conducting research on English-language learners, Yong sees an opportunity to develop a program to analyze the survey data. He teaches himself statistics and programming to create the first data analysis program for PCs in China.

In chapter 4, Yong joins a team of faculty who have volunteered to teach English in a remote Sichuan Province. Designated as the deputy team leader, Yong learns valuable leadership lessons and tests his capacity for managing a group. One of his fellow volunteers, Xi, catches his eye, and they begin dating. During a visit back to SFLI, Yong’s roommate convinces him to travel to the newly created Special Economic Zone on Hainan Island. There, Yong and a partner create a successful translation business. Despite his success in Hainan, Yong finds himself missing the scholarly life and returns to SFLI to resume teaching and publishing.

Chapter 5 chronicles how Communist Leader Deng Xiaoping’s economic reforms open China to Western culture and, in the late 1980s, spark debate on college campuses around the country. Eager to join the conversation, Yong opens his apartment as “ salon” for faculty and students to gather and discuss the future of the country. As the tragic events of June 4, 1989, unfold in Tiananmen Square, the momentum Yong and others had felt building dies abruptly, leaving him despondent and aware that he needs to seek opportunities elsewhere. A visit from a U.S. professor to SFLI results in a friendship that, in turn, leads to an invitation to spend time at Linfield College in Oregon.

In chapter 6, Yong embarks on his first trip to the United States, an experience that expands his view of the world, education, and emerging technologies. During his time at Linfield, Yong teaches, makes friends, explores the world of the just emerging World Wide Web, and realizes that becoming a college professor will allow him to pursue the life he wants for himself and his family, which now includes a son, Yechen in addition to Xi, his wife. Yong decides to pursue a graduate degree and gains admittance to the doctoral program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Yong completes his master’s in one year, welcomes his young family to the U.S., and leaves an unsatisfactory job at Willamette University on Oregon for a more promising opportunity.

Chapter 7 begins with Yong, Xi, and Yechen making a home at Hamilton College in New York, where Yong is part of a collaborative project between Hamilton and Colgate to enable students to take courses offered by both institutions. His successes earns him a tenure-line position at Michigan State University in Lansing, Michigan, where he works on a project to increase student engagement via online learning. He also creates an online submission platform for the America Educational Research Association annual meeting. Success in these projects as well as his outstanding publications record and award-winning teaching earns him the title of University Distinguished Professor. Although thought by some as only an educational technology specialist, his interests and scholarship have expanded to include pedagogy, assessment, policy, globalization, and other issues.

In chapter 8, we attempt to explain the central ideas and themes that run through Yong’s prolific scholarly output. Over his career, he has engaged several of the seminal questions in education such as: What kind of educational model best serves students? What are the consequences of schooling as a mechanism of state control? What are the pernicious effects of high-stakes assessment? How does personalized education benefit students? How can technology best serve education? How can promoting global thinking help us solve the world’s most pressing problems?

The epilogue provides a brief review of Bill’s life and how he came to collaborate with Yong on this book. He describes the events that have shaped a worldview that is remarkable similar to Yong’s.

[i] Pluchino, A., Biondo, A. E., & Rapisarda, A. (2018). Talent versus luck: the role of randomness in success and failure. Advances in Complex Systems, 21(3.4). https://doi.org/10.1142/S0219525918500145%5Bii%5D Plucjinco et al. (2018).[iii] Lewontin, R. (2001). The triple helix: Gene, organism, and environment. Harvard University Press, p. 38.[iv] Lewontin, R. (2001). 38.[v] Fea, J. (2020). What is historical contingency? https://currentpub.com/2020/08/18/what-is-historical-contingency.%5Bvi%5D Fea, J. (2020).[vii] Fea, J. (2020).[viii] Watts, D. J. (2011). Everything is obvious: once you know the answer. Crown Business. 8.][ix] George, N., Parida, V. Lahti, T., & Wincent, J. (2014). A systematic literature review of entrepreneurial opportunity recognition: insights on influencing factors. International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, 12(2). 309–350. DOI 10.1007/s11365-014-0347-y.[x] Baron, R. (2006). Opportunity recognition as pattern recognition: how entrepreneurs “connect the dots” to identify new business opportunities. Academy of Management Perspectives, 20(1), 104–119.[xi] Heinonen, J., Hytti, U. & Stenholm, P. (2011). The role of creativity in opportunity search and business idea creation. Education + Training (53: 8/9), pp. 659-672. DOI 10.1108/00400911111185008[xii] Shane, S., Nicolaou, N., Cherkas, L., & Spector, T. D. (2010). Do openness to experience and recognizing opportunities have the same genetic source? Human Resource Management, 49(2), 291–303.[xiii] Shane et al. (2010)), 299.[xiv] Wiseman, R. (2003). The luck factor. Arrow Books.[xv] Soto, C. J. (2018). Big five personality traits. In M. H. Bornstein, M. E. Arterberry, K. L. Fingerman, & J. E. Lansford (Eds.), The SAGE encyclopedia of lifespan human development (pp. 240-241). Sage.[xvi] Wiseman, R. (2003). The luck factor. Arrow Books, 96.[xvii] Wiseman, R. (2003), 48.[xviii] Jauk, E., Benedek, M., Dunst, B., & Neubauer, A. C. (2013). The relationship between intelligence and creativity: New support for the threshold hypothesis by means of empirical breakpoint detection. Intelligence, 41(4), 212–221. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.intell.2013.03.003%5Bxix%5D Lewontin, R. (2001), 38.[MB1]I added a citation for Lewontin. Is this sufficient?

Categories Accountability, Character, Courage, Creativity, Education Reform, International, Technology

Pastors for Texas Children and Dr. MLK: A Shared Mission

By dianeravitch
January 16, 2023 //
3

Dr. Charles Foster Johnson, founder of Pastors for Texas Children, is a dear and beloved friend. I can’t give him enough praise for the work he does every day to protect the public schools of Texas and the five million children enrolled in them. He shared the following message today.

Dr. King and the Work for Justice

Dear PTC Pastor and Friend,

 

It is good to set aside a day as a nation to remember the world-changing life, ministry, and legacy of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. The prophetic vision he cast for our nation is far from realized.

 

As a 65-year-old white man from Alabama, I remember very well how Dr. King was vilified by the white power structure of this nation. What the Hebrew prophet Isaiah said about the suffering servant was true for Dr. King: he was “despised and rejected.” He was assassinated not because he was popular but because he was hated. Indeed, God has used his death and martyrdom as means to bring our nation into a “more perfect union.”

 

In 2008, I was privileged to be inducted into the Martin Luther King, Jr. Board of Preachers at Morehouse College. I knelt with other ministers before the full congregation in the King Chapel that day, vowing before God that I too would dedicate my life and ministry to the justice of Christ. It was one of the most moving moments of worship Jana and I have ever experienced.

 

The Rev. Dr. Billy Kyles, Pastor of the Monumental Baptist Church of Memphis, was the day’s keynote speaker.

Rev. Kyles was on the balcony when Dr. King was murdered. They were on the way to the Kyles’ home for supper. He retold the story that day, moment by moment, building to the awful instant when the shot rang out.

 

Rev. Kyles began musing to himself in his sermon why God placed him on that Lorraine Motel balcony that day, at that historic moment, standing beside Dr. King. Then he paused, with the perfect timing of a great preacher, and said, “Now I know. I know why the Lord had me right there. Because every crucifixion has to have a witness.”

 

We dishonor Rev. Martin Luther King’s life and legacy with easy platitudes or historical whitewashing. We honor him– and our Lord who led him– only with the painful, painstaking work of justice-making.

 

That is why we stand strong for quality public education for all children. We have a long way to go in delivering this promise of justice. But, no private model of education will ever ensure this provision of God. Only the public trust can and will do this.

 

Thank you for bearing witness so faithfully to this call!

 

Rev. Charles Foster Johnson, Executive Director

DONATE TO PTC

 

PO Box 471155, Fort Worth, Texas, 76147

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Categories Civil Rights, Courage, Democracy, Education Reform, Funding, Privatization, Texas

Stop the Lies About Dr. Martin Luther King’s Legacy

By dianeravitch
January 16, 2023 //
36

Donna Ladd, editor and CEO of the Mississippi Free Press, writes here about the sustained rightwing effort to co-opt Dr. Martin Luther King’s legacy of militant resistance to racism and his dedication to telling the truth about our tarnished history. This is an important essay. It’s about a concerted attempt to hijack the words of Dr. King by those who hate his message. It’s about conservative white people like Chris Rufo and Ron DeSantis trying to use his words to prevent honest teaching about the history of racism. I have left the fund-raising appeals in the article because I hope you will send some money to this brave publication.

She writes, powerfully:

I grew up hearing people around me badmouthing Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. To hear white folk in east central Mississippi in the 1960s and 1970s tell it, he was the very root of all evil, and everything wrong in their lives was his damn fault. He had marched in my hometown of Philadelphia, Miss., in 1966 amid violent chaos when I was a kid—he spoke near the murderers of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner by law-enforcement officials.

Yes, Dr. King gave his life in the search for more love and less hate, but he was not only spreading a message of love, as so many white thieves of his legacy try to say today. His message was pure fire. And he was out to hold a mirror up to our nation about white Americans—not only Mississippians and southerners—using terror to maintain power over everyone else and to enjoy the fruits of that terrorism.

Throughout his life, Dr. King toiled and ultimately sacrificed his life in the fight to change power structures and systems established and enforced to keep white people on the top and Black people on the bottom. He wanted America to understand that enslaved people built this nation—after many of their enslavers figured out how to steal the land from Indigenous Americans and forcefully remove them from the land they coveted.

None of this history is pretty or honorable, and Dr. King never tried to say it was or to cover up any of it. He wanted it taught to every person in this country and certainly wanted children to grow up having learned the lessons of the past. He knew that the “arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” And he was blunt that he was not likely to live long enough to see that happen.

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When a white man shot him at the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis, Dr. King was more focused than ever on systemic racism and its links with poverty, and he was a harsh critic of capitalism and the Vietnam War. He was putting together the Poor People’s Campaign intending to occupy Washington, D.C., to bring more attention to the racism-poverty connection.

Of course, I didn’t know all that until I was well into adulthood. I knew most white folks in Mississippi hated him, and he was a martyred hero against racism. Like many Americans, I was fed the whitewashed version of Dr. King, which has worsened over the decades. I was nearly 40 when I studied with Dr.Manning Marable at Columbia University and learned the larger and more accurate history of Dr. King, Malcolm X, Marcus Garvey, and many Black freedom fighters. I’ve also read his speeches; I know fully what Dr. King was about and what he supported.

Just read his “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop Speech” in Memphis.

Now, 54 years after Dr. King went to Memphis to support a labor strike by sanitary workers, we see so many arrogant efforts by white Americans to remake him into their preferred hero—you know, the one who would tell us all now to forget all that sticky history and get along despite the systemic inequities our history embedded into our nation’s DNA.

It would be funny if it weren’t so sick and offensive. Right here in Jackson, a public-policy institute led by a former Brexiteer from the U.K. used a photo of Dr. King and his words out of context in a report a year ago to push legislation against so-called “critical race theory” in schools. Their report argued the precise opposite of what the Black freedom hero said or wanted. They even twisted his call for “being judged by the content of their character” out of context to make absurd statements about Dr. King, like this one: “Instead of celebrating the enormous achievements made since the Civil Rights Movement, critical race theory specifically rejects King’s color blind ideal and seeks to racialize every aspect of culture, sport, and public discourse.”

“Color-blind ideal”? That’s what this institute—and its board of prominent white Mississippians—think Dr. King meant by the need for white Americans to stop judging people by the color of their skin? Seriously? That’s some shoddy thinking. Or propaganda, as it were. Such cynicism can explain why this institute claiming Dr. King’s moral ground as its own has nine white men and two white women on its board.

January is Member Month! Join now to support our work and take advantage of special programming for MFP VIP members.

As we consider Dr. King’s legacy this weekend, we must study the whole legacy. No serious person can argue that he would want this nation to block the teaching of our full race history from colleges, schools and homes. No serious person would say that he would want us to simply be proud of how far we’ve come and not examine how far we’ve got to go—until that arc bends toward actual justice and inequity is no longer baked into our systems. No serious person thinks Dr. King would not want us to interrogate how and why inequity became baked into our systems and how to fix them so they don’t keep replicating themselves.

And no serious person would argue that Dr. King would not want the systemic history of slavery, massacres and lynchings that helped end Reconstruction and install Jim Crow, the story of little Ruby Bridges or our Medgar Evers or Lamar Smith down in Brookhaven, the story of ongoing attacks on public education since integration—or the full story of his real dreams taught to every American on this road to eradicating the baked-in legacies of racial suppression and white supremacy.

I get it. Complaining that teaching real race history is somehow “Marxism”—which no serious person would do, either—is bringing back the stunts and propaganda the rich and powerful white people used successfully to scare white folks back in the 1950s and 1960s and even inspire violence against Dr. King and Mr. Evers. The rewriting of history is sick politics. But it is a stunt that all serious people of any party who are, indeed, working not to judge people by their skin color must reject loudly and definitively.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his life to speak truth to power. We owe it to him to continue doing just that.

Donna Ladd, Editor and CEO

[I am not inserting a link because I can’t find one. Google Mississippi Free Press. If you find a link, please send it.]

I am sending my third contribution this year to MFP.

Categories Accountability, Civil Rights, Democracy, Education Reform, Equity, Ethics, Fake, Fraud, Freedom, History, Hope, Racism

AFT Poll: Voters Want Investment in Public Schools, Don’t Care About Culture War Issues

By dianeravitch
January 14, 2023 //
16

The AFT commissioned a highly reputable polling form to find out how voters think about the big education issues. The poll was conducted after the election last November. Bottom line: Voters want better, well/resourced public schools; few are interested in the Republican agenda of fighting “wokeness,” censoring books, and choice.

New Polling Reveals GOP/McCarthy Schools Agenda Is Unpopular and at Odds with Parents’ Priorities

Latest Data Show Parents, Voters Reject Culture War Agenda, Support Academic Focus and Safe Schools Instead

WASHINGTON—The American Federation of Teachers today released new national polling that shows voters overwhelmingly reject House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s anti-school, culture war agenda. Instead, voters want to see political leaders prioritize what kids need to succeed in school: strong fundamental academic skills and safe and welcoming school environments. 

“The latest education poll tells us loud and clear: Voters, including parents, oppose McCarthy’s agenda to prioritize political fights in schools and instead support real solutions, like getting our kids and teachers what they need to recover and thrive,” said AFT President Randi Weingarten. 

“Rather than reacting to MAGA-driven culture wars, voters overwhelmingly say they want lawmakers to get back to basics: to invest in public schools and get educators the resources they need to create safe and welcoming environments, boost academic skills and pave pathways to career, college and beyond.”

According to Geoff Garin, president of Hart Research Associates: “One key weakness of the culture war agenda is that voters and parents reject the idea that teachers today are pushing a ‘woke’ political agenda in the schools. Most have high confidence in teachers. Voters see the ‘culture war’ as a distraction from what’s important and believe that politicians who are pushing these issues are doing so for their own political benefit.”

Polling conducted by Hart Research Associates from Dec. 12-17, 2022, among 1,502 registered voters nationwide, including 558 public school parents, shows that support for and trust in public schools and teachers remains incredibly strong: 

  • 93 percent of respondents said improving public education is an important priority for government officials.
  • 66 percent said the government spends too little on education; 69 percent want to see more spending.
  • By 29 points, voters said their schools teach appropriate content, with an even greater trust in teachers.
  • Voters who prioritized education supported Democrats by 8 points.
  • Top education priorities for voters include providing:
    • students with strong fundamental academic skills; 
    • opportunities for all children to succeed, including through career and technical education and greater mental health supports, as examples; and 
    • a safe and welcoming environment for kids to learn.
  • According to voters, the most serious problems facing schools include:
    • teacher shortages;
    • inadequate funding; 
    • unsafe schools; and 
    • pandemic learning loss. (And, critically, voters and parents are looking forward to find solutions: by 85 percent to 15 percent, they want Congress to focus on improving schools through greater support, rather than through McCarthy’s investigation agenda.)

“COVID was terrible for everyone,” added Weingarten. “Educators and parents took on the challenges of teaching, learning and reconnecting and are now asking elected officials to focus on the building blocks of student success. Instead, legislators in 45 states have proposed hundreds of laws making that harder—laws seeking to ban books from school libraries; restrict what teachers can say about race, racism, LGBTQIA+ issues and American history; and limit the school activities in which transgender students can participate. Voters are saying that not only are these laws bad policy—they’re also bad politics.”

In state after state in the November midterms, voters elected pro-public education governors and school board candidates and rejected far-right attacks on teachers and vulnerable LGBTQIA+ students. 

The survey’s confidence interval is ±3.0 percentage points.

Click here for toplines, here for the poll memo and here for the poll slides.

https://www.aft.org/press-release/new-polling-reveals-gopmccarthy-schools-agenda-unpopular-and-odds-parents-priorities

Categories Budget Cuts, Censorship, Civil Rights, Democracy, Education Reform, Equity, Fake News, Hoax, Parents, Real Education, School Choice, Supporting public schools

Pennsylvania: Governor-Elect Picks Experienced Educator as New State Superintendent

By dianeravitch
January 13, 2023 //
14

Pennsylvania elected a Democrat as its new governor, Josh Shapiro, the former state attorney general. During his campaign against the Trumper candidate Doug Mastriano, Shapiro campaigned as a centrist Democrat and won handily. One worrisome detail is that Gov.-Elect Shapiro endorsed vouchers, despite their widespread failure and their affiliation with hardcore rightwingers. It is therefore somewhat reassuring that he selected an experienced education as the state superintendent. This article was republished by the Keystone Center for Charter Change of the Pennsylvania School Boards Association.

Pa. is getting a new education secretary: Lower Merion superintendent Khalid Mumin

Inquirer by Kristen A. Graham, January 9, 2023

Gov.-elect Josh Shapiro has named Khalid Mumin, currently superintendent of the Lower Merion School District, as his education secretary. Mumin, a Philadelphia native, has led the Montgomery County district for a little over a year. He came to Lower Merion from Reading, where he was named Pennsylvania’s Superintendent of the Year in 2021.

“During the past 15 months, I have grown to love Lower Merion, our inspiring students, exemplary staff, committed families and community members; however, Gov.-elect Shapiro has offered me a unique and exciting opportunity to reshape educational policy and practices across the Commonwealth, so all Pennsylvania students can experience the level of educational excellence our students enjoy and that all students deserve,” Mumin said in a letter to the Lower Merion community. The Secretary of Education job, he said, “was an offer I couldn’t refuse.”

Mumin is scheduled to be sworn in as Acting Secretary of Education on Jan. 17. “For over 25 years, I have served as a teacher, dean of students, principal, and school superintendent — and I know firsthand what it takes to move our education system forward,” Mumin said in a statement. “I look forward to working with the Gov.-Elect to fully fund our schools, make our students’ mental health a priority, and empower parents and guardians to ensure their children receive a quality education.”

Click here for more.

Though he currently runs one of the state’s best-funded school systems, Mumin has extensive experience in low-wealth districts, too. Prior to working in Lower Merion, Mumin was superintendent of Reading city schools, where he worked for six years. He also served as an administrator in Maryland.

We will keep a watchful eye on Governor Shapiro, as he chooses whether to fully find the state’s public schools or to waste money on vouchers to satisfy a campaign donor.

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Education Industry, Education Reform, Pennsylvania, Vouchers

Josh Cowen: The False Promise That Vouchers Improve Public Schools by Competing with Them

By dianeravitch
January 12, 2023 //
12

Josh Cowen of Michigan State University is among the most experienced voucher researchers in the nation. He is a member of the inner circle of voucher researchers and has been for nearly two decades. He began the work believing that vouchers were promising. As the research accumulated over the years and converged, he realized that vouchers harm the students they are meant to help. I have invited Josh to contribute to this blog whenever he wishes.

He writes here about the claim that the offer of vouchers causes public schools to do better, known as “competitive effects.” Nonsense, he writes.

Over the last few months, as I’ve written here in this blog and elsewhere about how recent data and research show incredibly harmful school voucher impacts for kids, one question that some readers have asked me to address has been the issue of so-called “competitive effects” of vouchers and school choice.

The idea comes from economics, and basically holds that competition between two or more providers of a good or service lowers costs and ultimately provides greater value to consumers. In the economics of education world, the idea that school choice policy forces competition onto public schools to improve the “product” of education is summarized as “a rising tide lifts all boats.”

Before I give you the details, here’s the take-home point: academic research does show that the threat of school choice pressures do prompt upticks in public school test score achievements. That’s particularly true for schools that stand to lose financially from voucher enrollment.

Those tend to be the vulnerable schools with respect to both longstanding historical marginalization, and economic health.

So here’s what you should ask yourself: is that really the way we want to spend public dollars to improve academic outcomes?

Here’s what I mean.

Participant vs. Competitive Effects

First, some definitions. If you’re not in the weeds of school choice research or advocacy, it’s important to clarify the difference between participant and competitive effects because researchers and advocates point to both.

Participant effects are the impact of school vouchers on kids who use them to attend private school. Competitive effects are the impact of school vouchers on kids who stay behind in public classrooms.

It’s inarguable that school vouchers have devasting participant effects. Over the last decade, as voucher programs have gotten larger, we’ve seen impacts as high as twice the academic damage that the pandemic caused to test scores.

But as I wrote above, it’s also true that research shows modest, positive competitive impacts. That is to say: vouchers appear to genuinely pressure public schools to drive up test scores. But voucher advocates who point to that outcome rarely talk about academic drops for kids who use vouchers themselves. When they do, they use industry-funded positive research from groups like the Heritage Foundation or the Goldwater Institute to mask what independent analysts have found.

And as I’ve written both for this page and elsewhere, kids who leave public schools for vouchers tend to do so only temporarily. Their parents are what you might call “voucher curious.” They try a private school out, tend to have average academic declines that are as large as anything we’ve seen in the history of education policy research, and then go back to public schools. Thankfully their outcomes do improve after returning to public education. Studying those kids in Milwaukee, my co-authors and I called that return to academic progress “life after vouchers.”But because these are some of the most at-risk kids in our classrooms, these disruptions can cause long-term if not permanent damage.

So I never want to dismiss the children who temporarily move to voucher schools. They’re not lost to us and they need our help too. Which means it’s important not to talk about competitive effects on public schools without always remembering the horrible outcomes for kids who do leave for vouchers.

It’s “Settled:” Direct Investment in Public Education Works

But what if, despite all of that collateral damage vouchers cause, you’re still wondering about competitive impacts? Just as few voucher activists will cite harmful participant effects when advertising competition, most competition studies do not include analysis of which policy alternatives might be better.

Here’s the obvious alternative: simply spending more money on public schools in the first place.

When I was in graduate school in the early 00’s, the prevailing truism on public school spending was that additional increases in funding had limited value. This thinking was driven almost entirely by the remarkable influence of one man, the economist Eric Hanushek, who compared it to simply “throwing money” at a problem—a phrased used more recently by Betsy DeVos, among others.

Just like the research on voucher participant effects has been entirely upended by more recent evidence, that old work on school spending has been retired by more technically sophisticated statistical approaches and more finely grained data. When it comes to education, money matters—how much, and how it’s spent.

Northwestern economist and National Academy of Education member Kirabo Jackson, one of today’s leading authorities on the subject of school spending, describes the debate as “essentially settled:” direct investment in public education has had consistently large impacts on outcomes ranging from test scores, to graduation rates, to adult earnings later in life. Just a few months ago here in Michigan where I write, University of Michigan scholars released a study showing school finance improvements through our state’s equalization reforms even reduced local crime rates.

Remember that every time you see a conservative scholar point to competition as a policy lever to impact public schools. There may be some small short-term benefit on test scores, but it’s not a substitute for direct and sustained investments directly in schools, teachers and kids.

Just Because We Can, Doesn’t Mean We Should

So yes, research does tend to show that if states threaten public schools with the loss of revenue by implementing private school vouchers, public school test scores may improve somewhat.

Does that mean public schools are better off with vouchers? No. It simply means that so long as standardized tests are the coin of the realm for accountability and revenue, reasonable school leaders will have no choice but to react accordingly. It’s almost tautological: public schools need funding, and threatening to reduce their funding with vouchers is going to have some response—whether desirable or not. In states that have bans on reproductive rights for example in a post Roe v. Wade world, I’m sure we’re going to see the number of abortions drop drastically.

Does that mean eliminating Roe was good public health?

As a researcher who’s become a strong advocate for public schools by following the data and following simply the right thing to do, I put little stock in conservative arguments centered around competitive school voucher impacts simply because the same outcome—test scores—shows massive academic declines for kids who actually go to voucher schools. To me it’s the same argument as saying something like “sure this vaccine kills sick people to whom we administer it, but it doesn’t harm a perfectly healthy patient.”

That’s not public health. And it’s not public education either.

Finally a simple comment on identity and policy. I identify as a white male who is married to a woman. The vast majority of school voucher research comes from white men like me. Vouchers originated with a while male economist. I decline to accept the idea implied by school competition that there is something moral about setting low-income children and communities of color—as public schools threatened with voucher-induced funding loss often are serving—against each other to improve outcomes.

Research might show it can work, but just because we can does not mean we should.

Let’s just take the other research-supported route and spend more money on public education, period. One way or another, I don’t think a person needs to be a public school advocate to realize that threatening schools is hardly an optimal role for public policy. Not when there’s a more supportive way available simply by investing in schools as if our children’s lives and futures matter.

My thought: it’s possible to think of many policies that would lead to improved competitive effects, but would be horrible policies. As Josh says, just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Suppose your school or district threatened to horse whip children who misbehave; that would lead to better behavior, but only by inflicting inhumane punishments. Similarly, you could cut truancy by administering harsh punishments on those who are truant. There are all sorts of ways to induce competitive effects.

In the case of vouchers, it involves encouraging students to leave their public school to attend a voucher school where they will get an inferior schooling and likely return to their underfunded public school.

Categories Education Reform, Privatization, Research, School Choice, Vouchers

Jan Resseger: The Good, the Bad, the Ugly in the Ohio Legislature

By dianeravitch
January 11, 2023 //
5

Jan Resseger keeps close tabs on education in Ohio, which is constantly under attack in the legislature. In this post, she reviews what happened in the past year. The “good” consists of bad things that didn’t happen. The Republican-dominated legislature is intent on constant privatization of public funds. Ohio is rife with failing charters and ineffective vouchers. The legislature wants more failure. The chair of the House Education Committee, Andrew Brenner, calls public schools “socialism.” The Ohio legislature deserves a spot on this blog’s Wall of Shame.

Jan Resseger wrote:

In the midst of the big 2022 Christmas week storm, a frozen sprinkler-system pipe burst at the Ohio Statehouse and flooded the state senate chamber. This year in Ohio’s gerrymandered, supermajority Republican legislature, democracy itself has been so severely threatened that many of us wondered if the event was an expression of cosmic justice.

As Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor retired due to the state’s mandated age limit,O’Connor—herself a Republican—condemned legislators who created one gerrymandered legislative and Congressional district map after another, O’Connor told the Associated Press: “My advice to them was, please review the Constitution and maybe go back to, what is it, fourth or fifth grade and learn about our institutions… And maybe, just maybe, review what it was like in Germany when Hitler intimidated the judiciary and passed those laws that allowed for the treatment of the Jewish population… This country cannot stand if the judiciary is intimidated.” The AP reports that, “In retirement, she has pledged to champion a constitutional amendment that fixes Ohio’s redistricting process…”

BAD THINGS THAT DID NOT HAPPEN IN 2022

The 134th Ohio General Assembly did not pass Ohio Senate Bill 178 to hollow out the Ohio State Board of Education and shift its primary responsibilities (including overseeing the Department of Education itself) to a new cabinet Department of Education and the Workforce under the Governor. Politics have already to some degree invaded the Ohio State Board of Education, because the governor already appoints 8 of its 19 members. And during the past two years there have been several legislative/gubernatorial interventions to gerrymander the districts of elected members to favor Republicans, and to fire unruly members and appoint new members who would be more faithful to Ohio Republicans’ priorities.

In 2022, the Ohio Senate passed SB 178 to move the important functions of the State Board of Education under the governor’s control, to insulate the state board from the will of the people, and to remove many of the State Board’s responsibilities. In December, during the last week of the legislative session, SB 178 was heard by the House Education Committee, but the bill never came up for committee vote and never was acted on by the Ohio House. At 2:30 AM, before the the 134th General Assembly permanently adjourned at 6:30 AM, Senate President Matt Huffman inserted the entire 2,144 page SB 178 into HB 151 to ban transgender girls from sports, inserted another amendment to ban school vaccine mandates, and sent the entire package back to the Ohio House, where it failed by 6 votes. Although this problematic bill failed in the 134th General Assembly, Senate President Matt Huffman has pledged another attempt during 2023 to politicize the State Board of Education in the 135th Ohio General Assembly.

A Mass of Culture War Bills Will Die Because They Never Came Up for a Vote (For details, see Honesty for Ohio Educationor the Northeast Ohio Friends of Public Education.)

  • HB 322, HB 327, and HB 616 to ban teaching and materials about divisive concepts including racism and sexual orientation.
  • HB 529 to demand that school curricula be posted online.
  • HB 454 to ban gender affirming care for minors.
  • HB 704 to affirm that gender identity is identifiable at birth according to DNA.
  • HB 722 to ban discussion of any ‘sexually explicit’ content and establish a ‘parents bill of rights.’
  • SB 361 to enable former military troops to become teachers with relaxed credentialing.
  • SB 365 to include curriculum about free market capitalism in educational standards.

HB 290, the “Backpack” universal education savings account voucher programnever came up for a vote in the 134th General Assembly. Most people expect, however, that a similar bill will be introduced in the 135th General Assembly, perhaps as part of the FY 2024-2025 biennial budget bill. For more information see here.

GOOD THINGS THAT DID NOT HAPPEN IN 2022

The Ohio Legislature did not pass HB 497 to eliminate the Third Grade Reading Guarantee. After HB 497 passed the Ohio House by a margin of 82-10 and after the bill was unanimously endorsed by the Ohio State Board of Education, HB 497 was never considered by the Ohio Senate Primary and Secondary Education Committee and never forwarded for a vote by the full Ohio Senate. The bill died with the end of the 134th Ohio General Assembly. The bill would have eliminated mandatory retention in third grade of any student who does not reach a proficient score on the state’s third grade achievement test. Research demonstrates that holding kids back in grade damages self esteem and makes it more likely that students will drop out of school before graduating from high school. For background see here.

BAD THINGS THAT HAPPENED IN 2022…

Keep reading to learn about the “Bad Things That Happened in 2022” and the One Good Thing That Happened.

Jan concluded her post:

There is no reason to believe that in 2023 the legislative majority of Ohio’s 135th General Assembly will be supportive of Ohio’s public schools. Persistence will be required as advocates press for the full six year phase-in of adequate school funding under the Cupp-Patterson Fair School Funding Plan. And, as Ohio Public Education Partners declares, we must demand that the Legislature “rejects the school privatization agenda, which includes school voucher schemes (and) charter schools….”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Democracy, Education Reform, Ohio, Politics, Privatization, Vouchers, Wall of Shame
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