Archives for category: Texas
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Texas: A Chance to “End the Public School Era”

By dianeravitch
May 5, 2015 //
16

Writing in the Houston Chronicle, Chris Ladd describes a voucher proposal that just passed the State Senate as the most sweeping privatization plan in the nation. He calls it “neo-Confederate.” It is a stunning editorial that should be read by everyone who thinks that public education is a public responsibility and that public money should not be funneled to religious institutions. Hopefully, good common sense  will prevail in the state House, but one never knows.

 

Ladd writes:

 

Texas’ legislature is poised to deliver a massive gift to the state’s religious fundamentalists. The Senate has passed the boldest school privatization program in the country, a pilot program that would finally neuter the “godless” public schools. This is what happens when you place a mildly deranged radio host in a state’s most powerful elected office.

 

Sending public school students to private religious schools may not seem like a ticket to a well-educated citizenry prepared for 21st century demands. That’s ok. Those are not the goals of this program. Legislators are looking for ways to further cut taxes and rescue Texas children from the godless influence of science, history, and empirical knowledge.

 

There’s nothing particularly revolutionary about school vouchers. Thirteen states plus DC already have programs that let students attend private institutions with public funding under some limited circumstances. What makes Texas’ proposal special is its ambitious scope and its potential to remove the last major edifice of public capital in Texas…..

 

So, let’s review. Texas’ proposed school reform would, at least on a limited scale for now, allow taxpayers to opt out of paying taxes to public schools in order to direct their contributions to EAO’s. Those entities would decide which students to fund in private schools, with no constraints on sending students to religious academies and no oversight on which students they fund.

 

If expanded, this offers Texas’ religious fundamentalists a huge achievement. They could finally destroy their most hated public institution – the schools. This proposal would gradually starve the public schools of their revenue stream, further cutting the amount that the state pays after years of careful under-funding. Meanwhile it would leave the public schools trapped under their existing infrastructure and mandates, a trap that would finally finish off the beast.

 

Undersized vouchers would fail to deliver enough funding to support a competent private education. Affluent families would get to take the money and run, receiving a state subsidy which they could combine with their family’s own contributions to pay for a reasonably good private education. Middle income families who can’t afford to pay above the voucher value would be left in the lurch, trapped between a collapsing public school system and a collection of cheap, storefront Christian madrassas.

 

A new generation of young people will be spared from learning about their history or discovering anything about the natural world that might challenge their religious assumptions. They’ll be ignorant, bigoted, and reliably pious, which this legislature will see as a big fat win.

 

The roots of this concept are perhaps even worse than the shape of the plan itself. In response to the Supreme Court’s decision striking down racial discrimination in schools, Georgia passed a constitutional amendment in 1954 allowing their legislature to privatize the entire school system. They never took that radical step, but the law remained in place until Georgia introduced a new constitution in 1982.

 

One of the architects of Texas’ current plan is Arthur Laffer, a man who has manufactured a successful career out of being wrong about everything. He became famous for formulating what George Bush, Sr. famously called “voodoo economics.” Laffer most recently used his policy voodoo to rip the bottom out of Kansas’ state finances. People are still listening to this guy because results don’t matter in politics.

 

It isn’t clear whether the current proposals can gain enough support to pass in this session. The Senate has already approved the plan, but its future in the House is uncertain.

 

What is clear is that Texas’ experiment with radical Neo-Confederate government is reaching a crucially painful stage and there is no relief in sight. This disastrous and bizarre proposal may fail this year, but there is nothing to stop it from emerging again and again until it, something even worse, finally passes. Elections have consequences and there are no signs of Texas elections delivering sanity any time soon.

Categories Religion, Texas, Vouchers

Texas: Temporary Insanity?

By dianeravitch
May 2, 2015 //
10

I am a native Texan, and I have many wonderful friends in Texas. So it pains me to write this. There are a bunch of people with some crazy ideas in Texas. Unfortunately, a significant number of them are elected officials.

Do you think that pre-K is Godless socialism? Do you think that Texas should secede to form a Christian nation? Are you suspicious of the U, S. military invading Texas? Do you think the state should pay for religious education?

I went to public schools in Houston during the Red Scare of the 1950s. I thought my home state had left those days behind. Guess not.

Categories Texas

Texas Superintendent Has a Plan to Save Children from Failing Charter Schools

By dianeravitch
May 1, 2015 //
12

Dr. Mark Henry, superintendent of the Cypress-Fairbanks school district in Texas, says it is time to save students from failing charter schools.

Dr. Henry proposes:

“I have an even better prescription that Texas should try. In my solution, Cypress-Fairbanks ISD will create “The Cypress-Fairbanks ISD Opportunity School District” to take over and manage failing charter schools.

“Around 8.2 percent of public school campuses are classified as failing, but nearly 17 percent of charter schools are designated as failing. In fact, within three years of being included on the low-performing list, only seven out of approximately 8,500 traditional public schools are still designated as failing. If you are mathematically inclined, less than one-tenth of 1 percent of all Texas public school campuses are rated IR or AU for more than three years.

“It seems that public schools are doing a great job of addressing low-performing schools without the added bureaucracy of another state agency. But there does appear to be a need to help charter schools, when nearly 1 in 5 are considered failing.

“CFISD is recognized as one of the most effective school districts in the state when considering academic achievement and financial efficiency. We don’t pick and choose our students; we educate all students within our borders. The principles we practice should be quite useful in assisting the great number of failing charter schools. We feel that with more funding, less regulation and our processes, we can give thousands of students trapped in failing charter schools hope for a better tomorrow.

“The proliferation of failing charter schools is the “civil rights issue of the 21st Century.” CFISD sees an opportunity to rescue these students and generate additional dollars to help offset the current underfunding (less operation funding than charters) that we receive. It is a win-win! Students at the failing charter school will benefit by receiving a quality education and CFISD students will benefit with more funding.”

When I read this brilliant parody of the “reformers'” favorite reform, I concluded their days of hoaxing the public are numbered.

Categories Charter Schools, Texas

Arlington, Texas, School Board Takes a Stand Against High-Stakes Testing

By dianeravitch
April 18, 2015 //
10

Texas is the home of high-stakes testing, and it is also home to some independent school boards who are sick of high-stakes testing. After 20 years or more of using testing to reward, punish, and shame students, teachers, principals, and schools, those closest to the schools know that this strategy has failed. Parent pressure forced the state legislature to back down on plans to expand the number of high-stakes tests from 5 to 15. Almost every school board in the state adopted resolutions opposing the testing regime.

 

Now the Arlington, Texas, school board has passed a resolution calling on the legislature to let local school districts devise their own accountability plans and specifically, to de-emphasize the importance of high-stakes testing. The district has created its own accountability plan, and only two of its 28 measures are test-baed. This may upset the battalion of lobbyists for Pearson, but it reflects the will of the people.

 

Here is the letter that accompanied the resolution (which is linked inside the letter):

 

On behalf of the Board of Trustees and the Arlington ISD, I am writing today to share information about the resolution regarding high-stakes assessments that the Board approved on April 16. The resolution urged the 84th Texas Legislature to end high-stakes assessments and to empower local school board to create and implement local accountability systems using standard measures of student success.

 

Accountability and assessment is a key point within the district’s legislative agenda. While an effective, efficient and equitable academic accountability system is necessary to carry out the mission and objectives of the Texas public education system, Texas’ current accountability system is too complex for school districts to drive continuous improvement for districts and campuses. Assessments should provide standard measures while allowing local superintendents and school boards to control how to respond to those measures but should not cause undue stress to students and families or teacher dissatisfaction and burn-out.

 

With the adoption of the Achieve Today. Excel Tomorrow. strategic plan, the district developed a comprehensive local accountability system. In that system, only two of the 28 measures are related to high-stakes STAAR testing. Other items included in that system are participation and success in rigorous courses, percent of graduating seniors taking and performing well on a college-bound assessment, percent of students on track to graduate on time, college enrollment and success, extracurricular and co-curricular participation, facilities, customer service, and effectiveness of leadership development. Each year, the Board receives a report on the districts’ success relative to the local accountability system. Last year’s report is available online.

 

We will continue to work with legislators throughout the session to encourage local control in establishing a sensible local testing system and setting an accountability system that works for the local community and best serves our students.

 

Sincerely,
Bowie J. Hogg
Board President

Categories Accountability, Resistance, Standardized Testing, Texas

Sara Stevenson: The Texas Voucher Proposal Should Be Killed, Now!

By dianeravitch
April 14, 2015 //
10

Sara Stevenson, librarian at O. Henry Middle School in Austin and a member of the honor roll of this blog, is a relentless thinker and doer. She writes frequently to set the record straight when rightwing ideologues and reformers attack public education. In this post, she questions the rationale behind voucher legislation in Texas, which comes back session after session, a true zombie. Texas is a conservative state, for sure, but every time the subject of vouchers has come up, it has been beaten back by a coalition of rural representatives, mostly Republicans, who value their hometown schools, and urban representatives, mostly Democrats, who don’t want to drain money away from their underfunded public schools. The voucher proponents are back, and Stevenson says it is time to stop them again.

 

She writes:

 

Even though this latest version states that eligible students must
have attended a public school the previous year, once the door opens,
this bill will achieve what it was originally designed to do all
along. As a rural Republican in the Texas House said recently,
“Vouchers are just tax breaks for people who already send their kids
to private schools.”

 

I spent ten years teaching in a private Catholic school in Austin. I
admire greatly the work of private schools and the communities they
serve. However, if parents choose to send their child to a private
school, they do not deserve a tax credit. Just because their child
does not attend a public school does not mean they are not obligated
to support public education. Millions of Texas citizens with no
children of school age pay taxes to support our public schools, which
educates 5 million children. Every citizen benefits from an educated
populace. We used to refer to this concept as the common good.

 

It’s important that we citizens respect our own traditions. The United
States was the first country in the world to enact compulsory, free
education. By this important 19th century innovation, our nation
became a world leader, dominating the 20th century. This value is
inscribed in Article VII of the Texas Constitution.

 

The main difference between public and private schools is that the
latter have enormous freedom to teach what they want. They are
completely free from any state-imposed curricula, accountability, or
punitive testing schemes. They are also exclusive. You must apply to
a private school, and these schools can reject or expel students for
any reason. They do not have to accept the students who wipe their
feces on the bathroom walls or those with a mental age of one and a
half. Will private schools be equipped and willing to serve these
severely disabled children? Will they be able to teach students who
speak languages other than English, a group that comprises almost 20%
of the current Texas public school population?

Categories Texas, Vouchers

Texas Voucher Bill Proposed by Politicians Eager to Harm Public Schools

By dianeravitch
April 13, 2015 //
16

The details of the Texas voucher plan were released, and the politicians pushing it can’t wait to siphon money away from the state’s underfunded public schools. They show no remorse for cutting $5 billion from the public schools in 2011, and now they are back looking for ways to drain even more money away from the public schools that enroll about 90% of the children in the state.

 

As a graduate of the Houston public schools (San Jacinto High School, class of 1956), I resent that these men are tearing down their community’s public schools. They claim they want to “save poor kids from failing schools,” but the schools aren’t failing: the politicians are failing the schools. Poor kids can’t learn when they don’t have access to decent medical care, when they don’t have enough to eat, when they are deprived of necessities that advantaged families take for granted. Poor kids will learn better if they have smaller class sizes, experienced teachers, and a full curriculum instead of incessant testing. By cutting funding and sending it to religious schools, the Texas legislators will guarantee larger classes and a stripped-down curriculum. Furthermore, while they won’t pay for what kids need, they have set aside millions for the inexperienced temps called Teach for America, most of whom will disappear after two years.

 

I am proud to be a native Texan, but I am not proud of the men who are destroying the public schools that educated me and my family and made it possible for me to go to a good college.

 

If I were in Austin, I would say to State Senator Larry Taylor and Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick that vouchers and tax credits (backdoor vouchers) hurt the great majority of children who attend public schools. I would say to them that they should take a trip to Milwaukee, which has had vouchers for 25 years, and is one of the lowest scoring cities on the NAEP federal tests. I would tell them that poor black children in Milwaukee are doing worse in voucher schools than they were in public schools. I would tell them they are cheating the children of Texas, to placate their ideology and their pals in the corporate world.

 

I would tell them to hang their heads in shame.

 

Categories Cheating, Scandals Fraud and Hoaxes, Texas, Vouchers

Katy, Texas, School Board Votes to Eliminate High-Stakes Tests

By dianeravitch
April 7, 2015 //
45

The school board of the Katy, Texas, Independent School District voted unanimously to eliminate high-stakes testing.

This is a bold and dramatic step in a state that inflicted the “miracle” of high-stakes testing on the nation. Up until now, Pearson and its stable of lobbyists have called the shots.

The Katy school board has bravely demanded a return to common sense and real education, where tests are diagnostic and used to help students, not to label them. I place the Katy, Texas, school board on this blog’s honor roll.

“The Board resolution also calls for state-funded local assessments in lieu of the high-stakes tests. Such local assessments would provide detailed diagnostics that could assist students in their learning. However, these assessments would not be considered high-stakes, nor have any bearing on accountability ratings.”

Categories Honor Roll, Opt Out, Resistance, Standardized Testing, Texas

Texas: How to Buy Education Policy

By dianeravitch
April 2, 2015 //
18

Here is a pathetic contrast that says a whole lot about the politics of education, not only in Texas but across the nation. The latest ethics report in Texas shows that “Texans for Education Reform,” a spinoff of Democrats for Education Reform, has hired 15 lobbyists to work the legislature this session. Most will be paid between $50,000-100,000, some less, some more. One will be paid between $150,000-200,000. This group would not call itself “Democrats for Education Reform” in Texas, because the Democratic Party is out of favor; the constituency this group appeals to would not want to be affiliated with any organization that called itself “Democrats.” The name may be helpful in fooling people in liberal states, but it would be a stigma in Texas.

 

Here is the contrast: the main anti-testing group is led by parents. It is called Texans Advocating for Meaningful Student Assessment (known to fans as Moms Against Drunk Testing). TAMSA has hired one lobbyist, who will be paid less than $10,000.

 

The lesson: People who are super-rich are pouring big money into politics to kill off public education and replace it with high-stakes testing, charters and vouchers. They don’t care that there is now substantial evidence that most charters do not have higher test scores than similar public schools. They don’t care that voucher schools don’t outperform public schools. What drives them? They say it’s all about the kids but it seems more likely that they just don’t like public education and want to starve it of resources.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Democrats for Education Reform, Teacher Evaluations, Texas, Vouchers

Houston: No Choice for Opt Outs

By dianeravitch
April 1, 2015 //
11

Very few parents are expected to opt out in Houston. The culture of testing is so deeply ingrained that few question why their children are subjected to weeks of preparation for bubble tests and for a school year dominated by the tests. Parents and children are afraid of hurting their teacher if they don’t take the tests.

The article goes into depth about the docility created by that culture in a state that claims a strong streak of individualism. Frankly it sounds like the education system creates sheep, not people capable of thinking for themselves.

Read this terrible story:

“A TEACHER at a Montrose elementary school is refusing to administer the test for the same reasons.

”Before moving to Houston I taught in a private school,” says the teacher, who asked that both she and her school not be named. When she first arrived in Houston, she says, she taught at an HISD school outside Montrose, and was horrified by her first glimpse of test culture.

“It was not teaching, it was not learning,” she says. “It created an abusive environment for everyone: children, teachers, administration.” She moved to her current teaching position in Montrose with the idea of eventually starting her own school, and was delighted by the humane environment she found. Until, that is, this February, when she had to administer the DLA, a STAAR length practice test required by the district.

”You have to understand: the school shuts down,” the teacher says. ”There is no teaching. There is no learning. I had to sit there and force fourth grade kids to take four-hour long tests, and do it the next day and the next day, and act to them like it was a totally normal thing. It made me feel like a hypocrite. I was implying to the kids that this is something I believe in.”

“Worse, she says, even when the testing is done a corrosive effect on learning continues.

“Once the testing was over last year, I thought, I’ll actually be able to teach my kids something,” the teacher remembers. “I passed out a story, we read it as a class, and the next day I passed out a quiz. One of my students raised her hand and said, ‘I don’t get it – isn’t there multiple choice?’ She didn’t know what to do when it wasn’t multiple choice and the answers weren’t provided. I don’t feel that my kids understood what learning was.”

“The teacher has decided to leave HISD at the end of this school year. But first, she told her principal, she was going to protest.

”All I will say is that my principal was as understanding as he or she could possibly be,” the teacher says. Instead of administering the exam, the teacher will take personal days during the testing period, offering volunteer enrichment education for students who are opting out.

“Like many parents, though, the teacher broods about the wellbeing of her colleagues. “Unfortunately I can’t make as public a statement as I want to,” she says. “Test culture is a culture of fear. Everybody is terrified. Nobody knows what the consequences of their actions are going to be.”

Categories Opt Out, Standardized Testing, Texas

Houston Chronicle: Vouchers Are a Waste and a Diversion

By dianeravitch
March 29, 2015 //
5

A few days ago, I saluted Representative Jimmie Don Aycock of Killeen, Texas, for his plan to add $3 billion to the public schools’ budget.

Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, a powerful figure in the state, prefers vouchers.

Happily, the Houston Chronicle published an editorial supporting Aycock and dismissing vouchers. This is the real world, folks, not fantasy land, where wishes are horses. The legislature cut the public schools by $5 billion and has restored only a tiny fraction. Meanwhile the children are majority Hispanic, and they are in public schools. Their schools need the resources, the teachers, the class sizes, and the librarians and social workers to help them now.

The Chronicle says:

“While Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick scampers down a rabbit trail in pursuit of costly school-voucher legislation, an influential public education policymaker in the House is doing what’s right for Texas school children and Texas taxpayers.

“State Rep. Jimmie Don Aycock, R-Killeen, announced last week that the lower chamber will tackle the daunting task of finding a fair and equitable way for the state to fund its public schools.
By taking up the challenge instead of waiting for a state Supreme Court ruling, the low-key Republican chairman of the Public Education Committee shows us what a true representative of the people looks like. A formerKilleen school board member, Aycock does the people’s business with little fanfare, with an effort to be fair and open to all sides and with a goal to getting useful things accomplished….

“Patrick’s beloved voucher scheme would divert taxpayer money from public education to cover all or part of a student’s tuition at a private or religious school, with little or no accountability to the people whose money is being spent. Aycock, on the other hand, understands the urgent need to invest in the state’s public schools and their five million students, 60 percent of them economically disadvantaged. He’s also aware, we’re sure, that the number of low-income students is growing at twice the rate of the overall student population….

“The voucher issue distracts from the fact that public schools, whatever their problems, are the backbone of every Texas community. They require attention and investment.

Aycock’s proposal would add $800 million to the $2.2 billion the House already had allocated to public schools. In the Senate, Patrick and his voucher cohorts, including state Sen. Larry Taylor, R-Friendswood, have proposed about $1.8 billion less for public education than the House. Patrick also is pushing hard for tax cuts worth about $4.6 billion.”

Taylor, chairman of the Senate Education Committee, is sponsoring legislation that would create a $100 million private-school tuition program to help lower-income students pay for private or religious schools. Patrick told the Education Committee last week that the legislation would give approximately 10,000 students an opportunity to escape failing schools, primarily urban schools. Funding would come through donations from businesses, which in turn would receive tax credits.”

“Since the House and Senate are so far apart on the issues, they probably won’t be addressed in depth until a special session this summer. When that happens, we urge lawmakers to look to the man from Killeen for direction and not the man pushing vouchers.”

Categories Texas, Vouchers
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