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--- Monday --- May 12, 1997 --- Vol. 7 --- No. 42 ---
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THE NATIONAL UPDATE ON AMERICA'S EDUCATION REFORM EFFORTS
A service of the National Education Goals Panel
__________ __________
THE HARTFORD SEVEN | SPOTLIGHT |
Seven education, civic and | |
business leaders last week were | EARLY CHILDHOOD CONUNDRUM |
named to run Hartford, Conn., | |
schools (Green and Frahm, | Brain research that |
Hartford COURANT, 5/8). "The | details the development of |
new board of trustees has an | a young child's brain and |
agenda for reform," said | powerfully exclaims the |
Theodore Sergi, Conn. education | importance of parental and |
commissioner. "They also need | caretaker interaction with |
to stabilize the system." | young children is rendered |
Hartford schools are operating | impotent when contrasted |
under a state takeover. | with the nation's welfare |
The seven trustees are: | reform package, says |
Robert Furek, a retired CEO at | Harvard U's Lisbeth Schorr. |
the Heublein Corp.; Lorraine | |
Aronson, special assistant to | Schorr: "For when you |
the provost at the U of | superimpose the findings on |
Connecticut; Richard Weaver- | the importance of devoted, |
Bey, president and CEO of | attentive care in the early |
Greater Hartford Realty | years onto new policies |
Management; Anna-Maria Garcia, | that require young mothers |
Hartford Region YWCA CEO; Marie | to leave their children in |
Spivey, vice president for | the care of others, with |
community relations at Hartford | only skimpy support for |
Hospital; Diane Alverio, vice | out-of-home child care, the |
president and general manager | picture is alarming." |
of radio station WLAT-AM; and | |
Rev. Henry Frascadore, retired | She issues a clarion call |
president of West Hartford's | for universal preschool |
Northwest Catholic High School. | programs for 3- and 4-year- |
The panel was selected from | olds, supported by public- |
about 100 names assembled by | private partnerships. (#1) |
Gov. John Rowland and | |
legislative leaders. |_____________________________|
============== QUOTE OF THE DAY ==============
"Schools won't get good unless teachers take joint custody of the
reform agenda."
Charles Taylor Kerchner, co-author of "United Mind Workers:
Unions and Teaching in the Knowledge Society." (#2)
_______________________________________________________________
| (c) by the Education Policy Network, Inc. |
| 1255 22nd Street NW; Washington, D.C. 20010; 202/632-0952 |
| EPN, Inc. hereby authorizes further reproduction and |
| distribution with proper acknowledgement. |
| Publisher: Barbara A. Pape |
|_______________________________________________________________|
============== TABLE OF CONTENTS ==============
GOAL ONE: SCHOOL READINESS
A NO-BRAINER: Lisbeth Schorr on early childhood. (#1)
GOAL FOUR: TEACHER EDUCATION/PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
"UNITED MIND WORKERS:" A teachers' union for tomorrow. (#2)
CHARTING A NEW COURSE
CHARTER HEADLINES: Pa., S.C., Mass. (#3)
TIME AND LEARNING
SLEEPY HEADS: You'll want to move to Minneapolis. (#4)
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===== GOAL ONE: SCHOOL READINESS =====
*1 A NO-BRAINER: LISBETH SCHORR ON EARLY CHILDHOOD
The White House conference on early childhood brought to the
public eye scientific evidence of the importance of adults
talking, singing, reading and responding to babies and toddlers
on early brain development. But, according to Lisbeth Schorr,
director of the Harvard U Project on Effective Interventions,
"one element was missing." Schorr: "No one focussed on the
implications of the new brain research for the families caught up
in the new world of reformed welfare." (WASH POST, 4/30).
In her editorial, Schorr paints an "alarming" picture that
merges the brain-development findings with welfare policy: "The
importance of devoted, attentive care in the early years" does
not mix well with "new policies that require young mothers to
leave their children in the care of others with only skimpy
support for out-of-home child care," she writes. For Schorr, the
picture reveals a need for a "redefinition of societal
responsibility for supporting young families." She adds:
"Neither the market nor individual communities, unassisted, can
assure mothers who must leave their babies in the care of others
that their babies' prospects will not be damaged in the process."
Schorr calls for a partnership among federal-state and
public-private agencies and groups to help communities guarantee
that young children will receive deserving care. According to
Schorr, this commitment rests on two foundation stones. She
writes: "First, a universal preschool program, providing all 3-
and 4-year-olds with access to a setting offering both a high-
quality preschool experience and child care during the hours that
parents work."
The second foundation stone is a "universal system of
supports to ensure that infants and toddlers get the best
possible start on life." Schorr points to several successful
programs featured at the White House conference, including:
HIPPY, Avance, Parents as Teachers, Early Head Start and Healthy
Families America. "Needed now is a national commitment to doing
what it takes to provide a place in every neighborhood --
typically but not necessarily the neighborhood school -- from
which these programs could reach out to improve care for the
youngest children."
Schorr also encourages the White House to resurrect a
national initiative to make a pre-kindergarten year of school a
universal option for all children -- a plan bandied about but
eventually dropped due to its cost. She concludes: "This is the
time to reconsider that idea and to combine it with systematic
efforts to create a family friendly place in every neighborhood
offering the services and supports reflecting what we now know
about the unmatched opportunities -- and the profound
vulnerabilities -- of the earliest years of life."
===== GOAL FOUR: TEACHER EDUCATION/PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT =====
*2 "UNITED MIND WORKERS:" A TEACHERS' UNION FOR TOMORROW
The "engine of teacher unionism" must be hitched to the
"train of school reform," according to the authors of a new book
on teacher unions and education. Unions need to reinvent
themselves to not be "the blockade around school reform, but its
strongest crusaders," write Charles Taylor Kerchner and Joseph
Weeres, education professors at Calif.'s Claremont Graduate
School.
The book also was co-authored with Julia Koppich, an
education consultant and managing partner of Management Analysis
& Planning Associates in San Francisco.
The WASH TIMES presents the book's key recommendations:
unions must back rigorous standards and thorough job assessments,
"while teachers must take responsibility for removing peers who
don't measure up;" school decision making should be moved to the
school site under union and school district directive; unions
should develop electronic "hiring halls" to "give teachers access
to jobs, make it easier to switch jobs and make pensions and
benefits portable," writes the paper (Innerst, 5/6).
"The classic division of labor is that boards make policy,
administrators make rules, and teachers follow orders," said
Kerchner. However, he added, "schools won't get good unless
teachers take joint custody of the reform agenda. It's a big
change in the way we think of managing schools and teachers'
work."
The book also advocates for performance-based pay schedules
that offer incentives for knowledge and skills, reports the
paper. This approach should not be confused with merit pay,
which the authors claim generates "the kind of individual
competitiveness destructive to teamwork and cooperation."
Another recommendation: "Hiring hall agreements," a plan in
which schools agree that the union will be the "sole source of
workers for the schools in those jobs where the union represents
workers," writes the paper. Charter school teachers, even those
in private schools, should form professional practice
organizations, according to the book.
"We are listening closely to their ideas and to their
criticism," said NEA President Bob Chase. He told the TIMES
that the NEA is reinventing itself, taking the lead in school
reform, and helping to rid schools of incompetent teachers. For
example, the NEA is encouraging its affiliates to establish
systems of peer review and evaluation to help remove "weak"
teachers, reports the paper. The union's model is the AFT
affiliate in Columbus, Ohio, which has run a peer-review system
for over a decade.
Chester Finn, president of the Fordham Foundation and former
assistant secretary of education in the Reagan administration,
expresses caution over union claims of reinventing themselves.
"Teachers unions say one thing in Washington and do another with
the legislature and around the bargaining table." He pointed to
unions that helped kill a charter school bill in Washington
state, opposed additional funding for charter schools in Colo.,
and "killed" tenure reform in Fla., according to the paper.
===== CHARTING A NEW COURSE =====
*3 CHARTER HEADLINES: PA., S.C., MASS.
A Clinton County (Pa.) school board decision to bus 200 of
Sugar Valley high school students to a larger school 16 miles
away was the last straw for the town's parents (Russell,
AP/PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER, 5/7). However, their proposal to begin
a charter school is being stymied by "constant bickering between
the [Pa. Gov.] Ridge (R) Administration and school boards,"
writes the paper.
According to the INQUIRER, Ridge prefers charter school
legislation that includes the creation of a state appeals board
with authority to overrule local school boards that deny
charters. Local school boards oppose Ridge's plan; they want
final authority in creating charter schools. The battle between
the two forces killed a charter school bill last November,
reports the paper.
Sugar Valley parent Gordon Breon said that already 218
families have committed to enroll their children in a charter
school, if a bill passes. The group received a $15,000 planning
grant for the charter from the state in January, notes the paper.
A Senate bill includes the appeals board proposed by Ridge,
while a House bill would "make voter referendum the
method to overrule school boards denying charters," writes the
paper.
Hilton Head, S.C.'s Lighthouse Charter School's application
was rejected by the Beaufort County School Board on grounds that
the school "might lead to the establishment of racially
identifiable schools in the district," writes GOALLINE, citing a
board press release (5/10).
S.C.'s charter school law "requires the school's racial
population to vary no more than 10 percent from the district's.
A Beaufort County charter school would have to have at least 40
percent of its students be minority students to reflect the
district's racial makeup. The countywide district's student
population is about half black and half white," reports the
ISLAND PACKET (4/8, 10, 11), reports GOALLINE. School board
members expressed concern that the Lighthouse application did not
include enough information about the student body to determine
compliance with desegregation regulations.
Jackie Rosswum, Lighthouse Charter executive director,
appealed to the state Board of Education, which unanimously
overturned the Beaufort County Board's decision, notes GOALLINE.
The school board is expected to appeal the decision.
Beaufort County is a beta site for the Coalition for Goals
2000's Creating High Performance Schools Project.
Mass. Gov. William Weld (R) has introduced legislation that
would more than triple the number of charter schools in the state
(Sullivan, BOSTON HERALD, 5/4). Currently, Mass. has 24 charter
schools; Weld's bill would push that number to 75.
A long waiting list of students wanting to enroll in charter
schools is one reason behind the expansion bill. According to
the HERALD, more than 3,600 students are on the waiting lists to
get into the 21 operating charter schools; the other three
schools are expected to open this fall.
The paper also reports that surveys conducted by the state
DoEd and Pioneer Institute, a pro-charter school think tank,
reveals that vast majorities of parents and students rate the
charter schools superior to their previous ones. Other findings
about charter schools: nearly all require community service and
parental involvement; most teach classes on civility, virtue and
interpersonal relationships; 47% of enrolled students are
minorities; and almost 40% are from disadvantaged families.
State Senator Robert Hedlund (R), however, is not pleased
with the amount of money some communities lose due to charter
schools. Under the 1993 Education Reform Act, charter schools
receive the per-pupil cost of educating a student from the school
where the child came from, reports the paper. Some lawmakers
claim the formula is unfair because the cost of educating a child
at a regular public school is the average of regular education,
special and bilingual education. "It's not a one-to-one
situation and [the funding] includes things that wouldn't be
figured in public per-pupil," explained Rep. Harold Lane (D).
"It's not really a fair way to do it."
For the past three years, Hedlund has "inserted language
into the state budget ... to reimburse communities that lose out
to charter schools," writes the paper.
==== TIME AND LEARNING ====
*4 SLEEPY HEADS: YOU'LL WANT TO MOVE TO MINNEAPOLIS
The Minneapolis school system, heeding pleas from doctors'
that teenagers forced to show up at school by 7:15 a.m. puts them
in a permanent state of jet-lag, will experiment with later start
times for middle and high schools (Peterson, Minneapolis STAR
TRIBUNE, 5/7). Beginning next fall, high schools will begin at
8:40 and end at 3:10 and middle schools will begin at 9:40 and
end at 4:10.
As the plan was about to be voted on by the school board,
some opponents of the start-up time change relayed that an
"informal last-minute survey of parents" found "deep misgivings"
about the plan, writes the paper. However, supporters quickly
pointed out that a scientifically controlled survey had turned up
strong support for a later school start. "People responded to
this issue with passion," noted George Headrick, a school
district official who helped direct the effort.
Cutting back on youth crime was another reason given for
starting schools later, which keeps students in school until
later in the afternoon. Board member Judy Farmer commented on
the need for change. "We do have a rising juvenile crime rate,"
she said. "We do have student falling asleep in school."
However, she conceded that the program will need close
monitoring. "We particularly have to track whether middle-school
students get to school," she said.
According to the paper, the change in class start-up times
has a ripple effect, particularly on parochial schools that
depend on public school transportation for their students.
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