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Mississippi: Ethics Commission Rules that State Legislature Is Not a “Public Body”

By dianeravitch
December 17, 2022 //
20

Imagine a crusading news site in Mississippi, one of the poorest and most corrupt states in the nation. That news site is the Mississippi Free Press. It recently filed a complaint with the state ethics commission after it was excluded from a meeting of the GOP caucus, which is so large that it constitutes a quorum.

The ethics commission ruled that the state legislature is not a “public body.”

The Mississippi Ethics Commission held its likely final discussion on the Mississippi Free Press’ complaint against the State House of Representatives today, restating their disagreements over the commission’s decision to declare the Mississippi Legislature not a public body under the Open Meetings Act. The Zoom stream of today’s meeting had high attendance of up to 70 viewers at one time, including representatives of multiple media outlets.

The Mississippi Free Press first filed a complaint in April 2022, after this reporter was barred from a meeting of the House GOP Caucus at the Mississippi Legislature. The caucus, which contains 75 of the 122 members of the chamber, represents a quorum of the Legislature, and is a powerful, secretive driver of key legislative agendas. Later, attorney Rob McDuff filed an additional complaint on behalf of the Mississippi Free Press.

Last week, Ethics Commission Executive Director Tom Hood recommended that the commission rule in favor of the Mississippi Free Press, writing that “it is essential to the fundamental philosophy of the American constitutional form of representative government and to the maintenance of a democratic society that public business undertaken by a quorum of the House of Representatives be performed in an open and public manner.”

But the commission overruled his recommendation 5-3, substantially rejecting the argument that the House of Representatives constituted a public body, but pushing off a final decision to the debate this week.

Stephen Burrow, who argued against the Legislature’s inclusion in the Open Meetings Act, summed up the perspective of his five fellow commission members who voted against the Mississippi Free Press’ complaint. “(The Legislature is) constitutionally obligated to keep (its) doors open,” Burrow said, referring to Section 58 of the Mississippi Constitution. It states: “The doors of each House, when in session, or in committee of the whole, shall be kept open, except in cases which may require secrecy.”

Furthermore, Burrow said, he agreed with this reporter’s complaint in principle. “I think I speak for every member of this commission that we believe that the Legislature should be open, is required to be open and that meetings of the (House Republican) caucus should be open, but that’s not what’s before us.”

“What is before us is whether or not the Legislature chose to include itself within the definition of a public body, and it’s very plain to me that while they included (legislative) committees, they excluded other committees from this for whatever reason. When the Open Meetings Act was passed in 1975, they chose not to include themselves.”

Apparently, in the view of the Ethics Commission, the State Legislature is a private club. Sounds about right seeing how they take care of public needs.

Categories Accountability, Mississippi

Mississippi: How Haley Barbour Turned $570 Million for Low-Income Housing into a Port that Benefited Few

By dianeravitch
December 4, 2022 //
11

Ellen Ann Fentress is a Mississippi writer who dug deep into a state tradition of converting federal funds for the poor into a boondoggle for the few. She writes here in an upstart online investigative journal called the Mississippi Free Press. (To learn more about this brave entry into investigative journalism in Mississippi, read this post.) Federal money intended to supply housing for poor and middle-income Mississippians was diverted by politicians to refurbishing a port, which benefitted the casino industry.

She writes:

The plantation-owner model lingers in the Mississippi imagination. It’s manifested, for example, in the local soft spot for white columns on McMansions and even gas stations in suburban communities.

The plantation archetype, however, is not a yokel, but the opposite. To make money off his cash crop—that’s the definition of a plantation over a self-sustaining farm—the plantation owner had to master credit lines and commodity futures in a far-off financial market and put that mastery into play on his home soil. His success rested on being a bifurcated practitioner. His feet in his home dirt, his head attuned elsewhere.

I wrote a version of those words in mid-2008 for the Oxford American magazine about how then-Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour had channeled $570 million in Hurricane Katrina housing recovery funds away from rebuilding housing for poor Gulf Coast residents and toward improving the state port at Gulfport.

In words not that different from what we’re hearing now about the arrogant and greedy redirection of federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families funds, Barbour’s excuse for hubristic diversion was economic development.

Sinking recovery money into the port would bring 6,500 direct jobs, the Yazoo City native declared in 2009. His economic trickle-down policy hit the right note with the national free-market conservative audience. The powerful Washington lobbyist and former head of the party tested the GOP presidential waters for 2008, in fact, stymied in part by his own words about racism in his hometown.

Barbour’s port move, however, was at the expense of low- and middle-income Coast residents cut out of the state’s recovery aid framework that was weighted toward homeowners with insurance policies. The promised high-paying jobs hardly materialized, either.

Amid the outrage around the money grab of $77 million in TANF funds discovered in a state audit of 2016-2020 TANF spending, Haley Barbour’s $570-million port gambit must not be forgotten. And it’s historically instructive. The willingness of Mississippi leaders to arbitrarily hijack federal funds away from specific needy recipients is not a new story.

The TANF scandal is only the latest rendition.

‘Not Asking the Hard Questions’

Reilly Morse was a Mississippi Center for Justice attorney involved in the court fight over the port funding. Morse sees the similarities in Barbour’s handling of Katrina funds from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the recent TANF revelations that emerged in early 2020 during the administration of Barbour’s successor, Phil Bryant.

Bryant was state auditor during Barbour’s time in office, and current Gov. Tate Reeves was state treasurer.

“They count on people not asking the hard questions,” Morse said in an Oct. 4 telephone interview. “I think that’s another common theme here because all of these folks that lambast Washington adore disaster-response money or other block-grant money, social-services block-grant money, that they think they can just clear out regardless of whether it benefits the people.”

In December 2008, the Mississippi Center for Justice and other community groups sued HUD for allowing the port funding since Congress had appropriated the monies for low- and middle-income home repair. The litigation ended in 2010 when Barbour, HUD and the Mississippi housing advocates negotiated an agreement to provide $133 million to assist low-income Mississippians still in need of Katrina-damaged home repair.

HUD had expected the project to create 1,300 jobs and retain 1,300 more. By 2013, no new permanent jobs had been created, a 2013 PEER committee report found. That number is shocking in the way that learning that the State of Mississippi only qualified 1.5 percent of TANF applicants for cash assistance in the nation’s poorest state in 2016, the first year of the MDHS audit.

But shunting Katrina housing money toward the port wasn’t shocking enough to break through in Mississippi media outlets that tend to give Barbour a pass, nor has it re-emerged now in most outlets as important context for the current TANF scandal.

In 2019, HUD declared the job-creation goals met. Yet reaching the job-count goal required a fuzzy calculation, as journalist Anita Lee reported at the time in the Sun Heraldin Biloxi. During the Trump administration, HUD allowed Mississippi to count jobs that the Island View Casino Resort added at a new casino hotel facility since the resort was on port property. The job total still initially didn’t meet the project requirement until HUD then allowed recalculating part-time hotel jobs into full-time jobs through hours worked.

The State of Mississippi thus counted 1,167 jobs at the casino hotel as jobs creation, although the number of actual higher-paying maritime jobs at the port was only 262. Lee noted in her reporting that the state investment netted one job for every $2.2 million in recovery funds spent….

Barbour has long done his post-Katrina part for his team’s ideology—if not for the Gipper, at least for Milton Friedman. That favorite conservative economist taught that the best time to slip in a political change was in the wake of disaster. “Only a crisis—actual or perceived—produces real change,” the Nobel Laureate wrote. “When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas lying around.”

Blanco: ‘He Only Cared What He Got’

The casinos had ideas lying around when Katrina hit.

Ever since their 1992 debut in Mississippi, it was the widely held belief in this Bible Belt state that the industry was just waiting for their then-floating facilities to crumple up in the next hurricane to justify legalizing their expansion onto land. Katrina provided the scenario. The barge on which the Grand Casino sat actually managed to crush the new Frank Gehry-designed Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art in Biloxi.

Barbour’s first—and chief—legislative response was to convene the Mississippi Legislature to legalize the casinos’ move inland. The powerful Southern Baptist lobby howled. But, by December, three casinos had reopened on terra firma, and by 2007, the $1.3 billion in revenue from the 11 Coast casinos topped the old pre-Katrina tally.

The state legislation squared away, Barbour headed up to his Washington stomping grounds, where Mississippi proportionately outscored Democrat-led Louisiana in Congress’ $29-billion recovery appropriation in December 2005. Barbour was the closer, persuading then-House Speaker Dennis Hastert to accept the funding terms, the New York Times reported, calling it “using a lobbyist’s pull from the governor’s seat.”

Mississippi’s take was at Louisiana’s expense, its former governor, Democrat Kathleen Blanco, later said in a July 2008 telephone interview about Barbour: “He didn’t care how much anyone else got. He only cared what he got.”

Please open the link and read more about high-level corruption at the expense of the poor people of Mississippi.

Categories Corruption, Fraud, Mississippi

Jeff Bryant: An Unlikely City in the South Is Leading a Public School Renaissance

By dianeravitch
December 4, 2022 //
21

Jeff Bryant writes here about the surprising emergence of Jackson, Mississippi, as a trailblazer for public school reform. Jackson is right now renowned for the failure of its water supply. Jeff also documents years of the state government underfunding its public schools. Racism can be seen is almost every aspect of the relationship between the state and the city. The public schools of Jackson are 95% Black. Under these circumstances, what is happening in the schools is remarkable.

Before it got national headlines about its severe water crisis, Jackson, Mississippi, was much renowned for its potholes. “The amount [sic] of potholes in the city is crazy,” exclaimsthe narrator of “Jackson, Mississippi: The Second Most Dangerous City in America,” a video posted to a popular travel YouTube channel in December 2021. The vlogger continues, “It’s just amazing to me there is a city in America that looks like this. … It’s hard to believe that this is the United States.”

“It is not uncommon to walk through west Jackson and see water flowing out of pipes for weeks,” observed Yoknyam Dabale, a Nigerian immigrant who moved to Jackson, in an op-ed in the Jackson Free Press. “Roads are overrun with potholes and uncleaned gutters.”

“The city says 90 percent of its roads are in poor shape,” television news outlet WLBT reported in 2021. “A Google search pulls up endless complaints, dangerous accidents, and hazardous barricades,” reporter Sharie Nicole wrote. “Local comedians write songs about the potholes; out-of-towners rant about it.”

The steady decay of Jackson’s public infrastructure goes beyond potholes and the water supply.

In 2018, the Mississippi Clarion Ledger reported that Jackson libraries faced a crisis that included “black mold, leaking buildings,” and “chronic flooding issues at two of its main branches.” Jackson libraries have been “suffering from needed repairs,” and some libraries were even facing temporary closure due to lack of money for repairs, according to an August 2022 report in the Northside Sun.

In 2017, the Clarion Ledger, in reporting on the “deteriorating” conditions in the city’s parks and recreation facilities, found a “$1.2 million hole” in the Department of Parks and Recreation budget.

The lack of government investment in Jackson’s public infrastructure, and across the state in general, extends to public schools as well.

Were Jackson schools funded according to state law, the district would receive $11,447,922 more in state funding for the 2022-2023 school year alone, according to the Parents’ Campaign, a parent advocacy group in the state.

Funding for Mississippi students is even worse if they happen to be Black. “Between 1954 and 1960, the state gave Black students more than $297 million less (in 2017 dollars) than white students,” the Sun Herald reported while referring to government data. “And if that number is extended back to 1890, Black students were shortchanged more than $25 billion.”

Jackson Public Schools (JPS) are 95 percent Black, according to the 2019 Better Together Commission (BTC) Findings Report by the nonprofit One Voice. The Better Together Commission is a public-private partnership that included city and state officials, Jackson citizens, and representatives from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, a private foundation based in Michigan.

As I reported for the Progressive magazine in 2018, BTC was formed as an alternative to a takeover of the district by the state after an audit by the Mississippi Department of Education found a significant number of state regulatory violations by the district. Fearing state takeover would lead to schools being handed over to charter school management groups—which is what happened in New Orleans, Newark, and other majority-Black school districts—a coalition called Our JPS quickly formed to oppose the takeover and demand an alternative approach to improving the public school system.

One such alternative was to remake schools into community-based centers for providing student- and family-oriented supports and programs designed to address the high levels of poverty, homelessness, and mental and economic trauma in the district.

“We need schools that serve as hubs of the community,” Pam Shaw, a leading spokesperson for Our JPS at the time of writing the article for the Progressive, told me. “Communities should own that space and use it as a launching pad for everything children need.”

Our JPS has since refined that idea into a campaign for the district to adopt what’s become loosely known as community schools. Our JPS defines community schools as “neighborhood schools that partner with families and community organizations to provide well-rounded educational experiences and supports for students’ school success…”

Meanwhile, the idea of community schools has caught on with progressive think tanks, teachers’ unions, public education advocates, and philanthropic groups across the nation. California has provided $3 billion in new state funding for transitioning schools to the approach in 2022, and Maryland has pledged to convert at least one-third of the state’s public schools to community schools.

One philanthropic group advocating for the community schools approach in Jackson is the NEA Foundation, a Washington, D.C., based nonprofit founded by educators.

“We entered this work in Jackson at the invitation of Mississippi educators,” NEA Foundation president and CEO Sara Sneed told Our Schools. “There is enormous community pressure for positive change but also expectations that any effort to include community voice in the process will come with a fight.”

The NEA Foundation’s effort also targets two other communities in school districts in the South—Little Rock, Arkansas, and East Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana. But Sneed expects their work in Jackson to lead the initiative for spreading the community schools approach throughout the South.

“We want to make community schools a signature issue in Mississippi and believe the effort in Jackson is an opportunity to transform the education experiences of children in the South,” Sneed said.

Please open the link and read the rest of this hopeful post.

Categories Community Schools, Courage, Education Reform, Funding, Mississippi, Racism, Supporting public schools

Mississippi: Judge Rules that Public Funds Can’t Use Public Funds for Private Schools

By dianeravitch
October 18, 2022 //
9

Here is good news. The politicians in Mississippi tried to divert public funds to benefit private schools. This is taking from the poor and middle-class to benefit the children of the affluent. The judge said no. in most red states, state judges have repeatedly ruled that state constitutions are invalid when it comes to funding private and religious schools. All state constitutions require that public funds are for public schools. Mississippi is lucky to have a judge who ruled that the state constitution means what it says.

(JACKSON, MS October 13, 2022) On Thursday, Hinds County Chancery Court Judge Crystal Wise Martin ruled that a recent law which would allocate $10 million of federal pandemic relief money to infrastructure grants for private schools is unconstitutional. This ruling by Judge Martin is a major victory for Parents for Public Schools, a national organization based in Mississippi with chapters in several states.

Parents for Public Schools (PPS), represented by The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)-Mississippi, Democracy Forward, and the Mississippi Center for Justice, filed a complaint in June petitioning the court to prevent the State from implementing this grant program. The attorneys representing PPS argued that Section 208 of the Mississippi Constitution prohibits the use of any public funds in support of private schools, and thus, the money allocated through this law is indeed unconstitutional.

The grant program, created as the result of one law and funded by an additional law, would allow only private/independent schools in Mississippi which are members of the Midsouth Association of Independent Schools to receive up to $100,000 each for infrastructure improvements, yet public schools are not eligible to apply for these grants. By contrast, the Mississippi Legislature created a loan program for public schools to improve infrastructure; however, those loans, although interest free, must be repaid to the State within 10 years. The grants to private schools do not have to be paid back.

PPS Executive Director, Joann Mickens, testified during the hearing in August that any public funding spent on private schools has a detrimental impact on public school students due to the Mississippi Legislature’s historic underfunding of public schools. “For 23 of the past 25 years, the Legislature has chosen to underfund the Mississippi Adequate Education Program (MAEP), which is the State portion and main source of funding for Mississippi’s public schools. One of the results of this is that we now have schools all over the state that are struggling in multiple ways, including – and especially in – infrastructure needs. For over 30 years, PPS has worked with parents, public schools, and other organizations to improve equity and student outcomes in public schools,” said Mickens.

“Parents for Public Schools advocates on behalf of public schools because each child, each family, each community, and our collective democracy depend on education. We chose to enter this arena in Mississippi knowing that victory would not mean monetary gain for us or even for Mississippi’s public schools. We entered this argument because one of our core values is to educate all children well and equitably. In this case, we’re standing up for almost half a million children, their families, and their communities. In doing that, we stand up for a stronger, better Mississippi and against perpetuating inequity. We’re grateful to PPS parents and families who spoke up, for our legal representatives, and for the Court’s wise decision to honor the plain and clear language of our constitution,” said Becky Glover, Policy Analyst at Parents for Public Schools, Inc.

Vangela M. Wade, president and CEO of the Mississippi Center for Justice: “Today’s ruling is a resounding victory for the hundreds of thousands of public school students in Mississippi. At a time when public schools are already strapped for resources, the legislature’s attempt to funnel $10 million to private schools was egregious. We thank the court for its ruling but also recognize that much more must be done to foster high-quality public education for all Mississippi school children.”

“We are elated with the Court’s ruling, which affirms our argument that the Mississippi Constitution explicitly forbids appropriating public funds to private schools. Public funds must have a system of accountability. Senate Bill 2780 and Senate Bill 3064 funneled taxpayer dollars to private schools, which have no responsibility to taxpayers. This outcome returns $10 million to Mississippi taxpayers,” Joshua Tom, legal director at ACLU of Mississippi.

“Today’s ruling is a victory for the Mississippi Constitution and every person who cares about public education in the state,” said Will Bardwell, Senior Counsel at Democracy Forward. “When the state legislature violated the Constitution by directing public money to private schools, it did more than merely continue Mississippi’s shameful history of undermining its children’s public schools. It broke the law, period. Today’s ruling makes clear: no one, not even the Mississippi legislature is above the law.”

Parents for Public Schools, Inc. is a nonpartisan nonprofit that began in Mississippi more than 30 years ago by parents who organized to support their public schools while educating and mobilizing themselves and others to demand higher standards and better resources for each student. Following interest from other cities around the nation, the National Office for Parents for Public Schools, Inc. (PPS) was founded in 1991. Since then, PPS has become a diverse, national organization of community-based chapters whose mission is to advance the role of parents and communities in securing a high-quality public education for every child by providing professional leadership training that prepares parents and others to become equal partners with and responsible stewards of their public schools.

Democracy Forward Foundation(“Democracy Forward”) is a nonprofit legal organization founded in 2017 that litigates cases involving government action on behalf of organizations, individuals, and municipalities. The organization has taken 650 legal actions and achieved victories supporting democracy and improving the lives and well-being of people and communities. Democracy Forward Foundation is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.

ACLU of Mississippi is a non-partisan, not-for-profit organization that defends and expands the constitutional rights and civil liberties of all Mississippians guaranteed under the United States and Mississippi Constitutions, through its litigation, legislative and public education programs. It is an affiliate of the national ACLU.

The Mississippi Center for Justice is a nonprofit, public interest law firm dedicated to dismantling the state’s culture of inequity and injustice. Supported and staffed by attorneys and other professionals, the Center pursues strategies to combat discrimination and poverty statewide.

Categories Accountability, Education Industry, Funding, Justice, Mississippi

Mississippi Corruption: Funds for the Needy Used for a Volleyball Stadium

By dianeravitch
October 5, 2022 //
18

Investigative journalists Ashton Pittman and William Pittman exposed a major scandal in Mississippi. The governor misappropriated millions of dollars intended for the needy and diverted the money to build a volleyball stadium to please NFL star Brett Favre. They gained access to text messages among the major actors.

They begin:

Between 2016 and 2019, the Mississippi Department of Human Services and nonprofits associated with it allegedly misspent more than tens of millions of dollars in federal Temporary Assistance For Needy Families funds that should have gone to the poorest families in the poorest state. More than $5 million of those funds went toward a volleyball-stadium project at the University of Southern Mississippi favored by retired NFL quarterback Brett Favre and $1.1 million went to Favre himself.

This timeline focuses on that element of the welfare scandal, including text messages with Favre and others revealed in court filings by former Gov. Phil Bryant and by Nancy New’s nonprofit, the Mississippi Community Education Center. The text messages are not a complete record, however; Bryant’s texts include redactions; New’s texts do not indicate redactions, but nevertheless appear to leave out important exchanges. When necessary, text exchanges that were spread across multiple pages in the court filings have been stitched together.

Though New, former MDHS Director John Davis, and four others have faced criminal charges, prosecutors have not accused Favre nor Bryant of a crime.

Categories Accountability, Corruption, Ethics, Mississippi

Love the Unborn, Neglect the Born

By dianeravitch
May 5, 2022 //
117

Caitlin Huey-Burns writes for CBS News that the states most likely to ban abortion are the states LEAST likely to provide resources for children. Their politicians love the unborn. The born and living, not so much.

The expectation that Supreme Court is about to scrap decades of federal protections of abortion rights is highlighting another issue: the lack of resources and support available for women to have and raise children.

More women living in states without abortion access, should Roe v. Wade be overturned, will likely carry to term. Yet, not one of the two dozen states with laws on the books restricting abortion access offers paid family leave.

Eight of them have opted out of expanding Medicaid coverage under the health care law, which covers pregnancy through postpartum for low-income Americans.

And Mississippi, whose abortion restriction law is at the heart of an impending Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, ranks as the state with the highest rate of young child poverty and low birth weight and among the highest when it comes to infant mortality rates.

It is also ironic that the states with the most horrible history of racism are likely to see an increase in their black population, since impoverished black women are not likely to have the money to travel to a state where abortion is protected by law. Over many years, the black population in Mississippi may grow large enough to demand a change in the political order.

Categories Accountability, Childhood, Evil, Mississippi, Poverty, Shame

How Dangerous Is Children’s Literature?

By dianeravitch
March 12, 2022 //
40

Toby Price, an assistant principal of an elementary school in the Hinds County School District in Mississippi, was fired because he read a book to second graders on Zoom called I Need a New Butt! The school board did not approve. Nor did the superintendent.

The school was participating in “Read Across America” day to honor Dr. Seuss’s birthday and to encourage children to love reading. Mr. Price thought the children would find the book hilarious, and they did. But they also got a lesson in the power and danger of books when Mr. Price was fired a few days later. He’s trying to get his job back and has a GoFundMe to support his family and pay a lawyer.

When I first read this story, I sent it to Carol Burris, my friend and executive director of the Network for Public Education. She immediately responded that she must be a criminal grandma because she’s shared that same book with her grandchildren many times, and they love it.

She drafted a confession:

True confession. I am a terrible grandma to my five grandkids. I confess. I bought little Phinney I Need a New Butt! I did not even wait for second grade—I bought it for him when he was two. We would laugh all the way through and he would beg me to read it… again and again and again.

But I did not stop there. I bought a copy for my other two grandkids, Merek and Reeve, then four and two. That’s me, a serial corrupter of young children’s minds.

And if there were a grandma license in the State of Mississippi, then mine would surely be snatched away. I am referring, of course to the tragic ridiculousness of the firing of an assistant principal in Mississippi for reading I Need a New Butt! to second-graders over Zoom.

Anyone who has ever spent any time with young kids knows that silliness is a magnet that draws kids into stories. I devoured Dr. Seuss, limericks, and rhymes as a child. My daughters loved the hilarity of Where the Sidewalk Ends with its rhymes about a child poet in a lion’s belly, baby brothers that ran away, and of course that sack with its mysterious contents (perhaps an extra butt is inside?) Stories with rich rhymes and rhythms build literacy. And maybe a sense of humor—something the world sorely needs.

I worked in schools long enough to figure out the back story on this one. Some self-righteous fool, who likely never liked the man, heard the story and called their friend on the school board. And then a spineless administrator complied, rather than standing up for a man whose life work was spent among children.

It’s a chilling tale of power and fear and extremism. And worst of all, the children of Gary Road Elementary lost someone who understands them, only to be left with school leaders whose butts may be tight and intact, but most certainly have cracks in their hearts and heads.

So, here’s the irony: I Need a New Butt! is now #1 bestseller on Amazon’s list of beginning readers for children.

The word should go out to every school board and legislature in the nation: whenever you ban a book, its sales will soar! Authors will wear your ban as a badge of honor. They may even ask you to ban their books so they too will benefit. Don’t do it!

Categories Accountability, Censorship, Childhood, Literature, Mississippi

Alabama: Politicians Win, Educators Lose

By dianeravitch
June 20, 2021 //
16

Larry Lee, a close follower of education politics in Alabama and former board member in Montgomery, writes here about an ill-informed decision by Governor Kay Ivey. Over the objections of experienced educators, Governor Ivey vetoed a bill that would have delayed implementation of the Alabama Literacy Act by two years. The Act requires that third grades be retained if they can’t the third grade reading test.

Larry talked to some of the educators he respects most, and they were appalled.

The phone rang about 8 p.m. on Thursday night, May 27.  The person on the other end was dejected and discouraged.  I immediately recognized the voice of Hope Zeanah, a 40-year veteran educator, assistant superintendent of the Baldwin County school system and a former Alabama Elementary Principal of the Year.

In my book, Zeanah is one of the best educators anywhere.  She has learned a lot in her 40 years and knows how to convey her knowledge in a way that makes sense and is guided by what is best for children.

“I just wish politicians WOULD NOT make educational policies and leave educating children up to educators,” she said  “It makes us feel like they are saying we are not smart enough to make a decision for our students whether or not they should be promoted to the next grade. I feel like these type decisions are the reason we are seeing fewer young people going into education.”

Larry reviewed the literature about third grade retention and saw that it was not only controversial but some of the most respected experts thought it was detrimental to children.

But Alabama has been looking jealously at Mississippi’s NAEP scores and trying to copy the state next door. The secret to Mississippi’s success in fourth-grade NAEP is that it retains poor readers in third grade. That’s not really a strategy, it’s cheating. But it works for Mississippi. Apparently the illusion of success works as well as genuine success. A recent issue of The Economist lauded Mississippi as a national leader in literacy. But Mississippi gets those scores by retaining more third graders than any other state.

He writes:

“The so-called “Gold Standard” of all testing is the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP).  This test is given across the country every two years to a random selection of fourth and eighth graders.  Only about 5,000 students in both grades are tested in each state.  This is probably themost misunderstood and abused test in the U.S.  (Especially by politicians who constantly want to break education down into only numbers.)

“(Go back to 2016 for a great example of misusing NAEP scores.  The state school board picked a new state superintendent that year.  Governor Robert Bentley had a vote and used it to be the deciding vote to hire Mike Sentance, a Boston attorney who had never been a teacher, principal or local superintendent.  His reason?  Massachusetts had the highest fourth-grade NAEP  scores on math in the country.  Sentance was a disaster and lasted only one year.)

“Truthfully, while no one pays much attention to retention info, they do like to compare NAEP scores.

“And Mississippi has done very well on NAEP in the last few years.  In fact, they have made larger gains, particularly for fourth-graders, since 2013 than any other state.  But it should be pointed out that Mississippi retains a higher percent of third-graders than any other state.

“So Mississippi is making sure its poorest performing kids are not taking the fourth-grade NAEP tests.  It’s just like you told the third-grade teacher that you wanted to weigh all her students and get the average weight–but you can’t weigh the fat kids.“

Categories Alabama, Hoax, Literacy, Mississippi, NAEP

Mississippi: School Bus Drivers Face Fine, Even Jail, for 2–Day Strike

By dianeravitch
May 11, 2021 //
14

School bus drivers in Greenville, Mississippi, did not report to work for two days to protest their low wages. Apparently they were unaware that the legislature had passed a law in 1985-36 years ago-absolutely prohibiting any strikes by any school employees, including bus drivers.

The local school board debated whether the drivers’ failure to work was or was not a strike. They did not realize that their own board could be fined thousands of dollars each for failing to report the names of those who struck.

One thing is clear: Mississippi loathes the very idea of unions. And another: they “appreciate” their teachers and other school staff but they don’t want to pay them a living wage.

Categories Education Reform, Mississippi, Teacher Pay, Unions

Mississippi: The Shame of a Nation

By dianeravitch
February 22, 2020 //
4

Mississippi boasts about its gains on NAEP reading scores, but those “gains” were largely the result of holding back students who didn’t pass the third grade reading tests. It’s a form of “gaming the system,” aka cheating.

This article by Bracey Harris for the Hechinger Report tells a different story, a story of unequal opportunity for black children in the state, a history of racism and segregation, a legacy of underfunding black schools, of crumbling schools and high teacher turnover.

Large proportions of black children live in deep poverty, and their schools are ill-equipped to prepare them for college or career.

State leaders offer nothing but gimmicks that have failed elsewhere: merit pay, A-F grades, bonuses for new teachers, and state takeovers. What they have not offered is the funding necessary to give the schools and students and teachers the resources they need. The conservative white legislature has not been willing to do what is needed.

State leaders have attempted to improve the state’s poor educational outcomes in recent years by requiring third graders to pass the state reading test before they can enter fourth grade, offering $10,000 bonuses for Nationally Board Certified teachers to work in the Delta, assigning schools and districts A-F ratings and, on occasion, taking over failing school districts. Mississippi’s newly elected Gov. Tate Reeves, who took office in January, has also proposed paying new teachers a one-time $10,000 bonus to instruct in struggling areas like Holmes.

Mississippi has also made some positive traction after investing $15 million per year, in part to train and coach the state’s teachers on the science of reading and reading instruction, an investment that some officials said helped boost the state’s scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Mississippi ranked No. 1 nationally in gains in fourth grade reading and math, and near the top in eighth grade score gains in math.

To some observers, the NAEP scores suggest the state’s focus on these reforms have helped, a lot. But locals say the reforms don’t go far enough, failing to address the deeper issues of racism and poverty that are embedded in the marrow of the Mississippi Delta. Each year, districts in the region hold back dozens of third graders. At one school in Holmes, Durant Elementary, more than 80 percent of third graders failed the reading test on their first try.

Ellen Reddy, an advocate who has pushed to improve education in Holmes County said the state’s solutions haven’t reduced the challenges that dominate the average school day. Reddy, executive director of the Nollie Jenkins Family Center, said the state has to step in to help districts that struggle to raise money. “The reality is we’ll always fail. We’ll always be a step behind until they put in more resources,” she said. “You get what you pay for.”

Strapped for cash and teachers

Strapped for cash and teachers

Children in communities with a high rate of poverty are at a greater risk of poor health and high levels of stress that require more support in the classroom. Years of research have documented that poverty “creates constant wear and tear on the body” and that safe learning environments, coupled with “responsive parenting and high-quality childcare” can help children progress. But it costs money to train teachers on how to support students and to hire support staff like guidance counselors.

Never underestimate the power of poverty and racism.

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Education Reform, Funding, Mississippi, Poverty, Racism
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