No excuse

Louisiana Weekly reports that a number of charter schools do not obey open meeting laws--not even bothering to announce and post their agendas in advance. The actions of these schools affect the image of charter schools everywhere.

Charter schools, please do the simple things well. These aren't difficult, and they ought not be controversial. Take the time to govern well.

I love teachers...

great ones, that is.

Let's face it. We haven't always been great proponents of the teachers unions. Many accuse us, and others like us, of being anti-teacher. However, we've also written some blogs about great teachers. So, let's clear up a couple of things.

First, I love teachers--not just charter schools teachers. So, full confession. My sister was a school teacher and is now a principal at a non-charter school. I love her dearly. She does great things for kids in a school that has one of the highest percentages of free and reduced lunch students in our city. I have done volunteer work at the school at which she taught. I do not hate non-charter schools nor non-charter school teachers. I appreciate them when they do the things that cause students to get excited about their education.

Here is another example. Because I haven't asked for his permission, I'll just call him Mac, but my daughter had a great fifth grade teacher (in a non-charter school) who was great. Sure, he and I had our differences on a couple of points, but he really allowed the kids to learn.

That brings up another good point. Mac was teaching in a program in a school district that was for creative and advanced learners. You did have to apply to be in the program, so it was sort of for gifted kids, but more importantly, it was for kids who wanted more out of their education. It was a great program. It also forced those kids to take at least some electives in the traditional program so that they weren't completely separated from the rest of the school. So, second point is that some non-charter school programs are excellent and parent friendly--although it wasn't as parent friendly as the charter schools with which I am familiar.

So, to be absolutely truthful, if my kids were not in their existing charter school (and my daughter has now graduated and is studying at one of the finest engineering schools in the country), they would likely be in the local non-charter schools.

Having said that, I'm also fortunate to live in one of the best school districts in the state of Colorado as well as perhaps one of the best school districts in the country. I am also on their District Accountability Committee. I also recognize that not everyone in the U.S. is as fortunate as I am, especially if they do not live in an area where parents (charter school or non-charter school) have high expectations for their children.

But, please, in the future, read our blog in context. We are not rabidly anti-public schools. We are, in fact in favor of public education. We are also in favor of accountability in education.

We love great teachers who love and encourage their students and hold up a high bar for their students and then are able to help the students reach that bar.

Go teachers, Go!

Is concurrent enrollment the answer? Part 2

Yesterday, I wrote about the academic advantages of concurrent enrollment. I believe that beyond the advantages of keeping more kids in school and allowing them to graduate sooner, there are also advantages to society at large. I haven't bothered to do the calculations so far, but perhaps I'll think more about it in the future or allow an economist who gets paid to do these things have at it.

So, here is my list of economic advantages:

• States pay less overall for education as students spend approximately two fewer years in college
• Students add two years of earning power
• The economy adds additional workers and consumers

A universal concurrent enrollment system would likely decrease the number of teachers needed, which is a downside for individual teachers, but an upside for a system that has a difficulty finding good teachers. Assuming that the 25% reduction in the number of teachers (combining 8 years of education into 6 years) can be done by eliminating the least effective teachers, education should improve as well as graduate more students.

This is an overly simplistic calculation. I understand that, but certainly one that bears consideration, especially as we wrestle with both funding issues and the difficulty of attracting high quality teachers to the profession.

Is concurrent enrollment the answer?

I've recently been talking with some educators that I know and found a strange commonality between two distinctly different schools.

One school is in an above average suburb. The other is downtown. One serves kids from typical suburban families. The downtown school serves primarily kids that have not been successful in a traditional program--in fact many students are 17 years old with only a few high school courses completed.

The similarity is that both have a concurrent enrollment option. The other similarity is that both leaders told me that the unplanned outcome of the concurrent enrollment option is that students become excited about college. They become more goal oriented.

A Denver Post article finds the same phenomenon.

Given a recent report that many students don't learn much in their freshman and sophomore years of college, it seems to me that concurrent enrollment might be the best option for many, if not all college bound students. A study of teaching college economics rather than AP or IB economics in high school also supports this idea.

In an age where college readiness is the mantra, perhaps the way to make students college ready is to get them into college sooner so that they are more focused on college to begin with. If college starts when you are ready, not at some arbitrary age of 18, perhaps more students would get ready. If students knew they could graduate from college and be working by age 19 or 20, perhaps it would be more attractive.

College isn't for everyone, but college, especially community colleges, offer options that aren't always considered. What if a students chose a technical field for which they could be prepared and certified with an Associate of Arts degree by age 18 rather than age 20? Wouldn't they be more likely to stay in school?

Whether or not concurrent enrollment is the answer is dependent upon what the question is. If the question is how can we get more kids to stay in school, perhaps it is?

In the face of budget cuts...

It might be interesting to go back and read The Cato Institute study by Adam B. Schaeffer on what public schools really spend compared to what they publish. Mr. Schaeffer also compares this to an average private school. The study is enlightening.

They Spend What?

Destructive Diploma’s—And What To Do About Them

If you cook, do you cook the same four recipes or do you branch out with new foods and flavors?
When you pick a movie, do you go for cinematic comfort food or do you want something edgy?
If you go to the doctor, do you want general proscriptions for wellness or a personalized evaluation?


These simple choices are a tiny slice of what it means to be an adult in America. We have such great personal liberty that many of us build routines and preferences to deal with the overwhelming number of options. We are Homo Sententia—people with an opinion.

Except in high school.

To hear most education reformers over the last decade, every student should leave high school prepared for college. Famous lists of high-performing high schools reference college prep curricula and assessments. Reformer pronouncements celebrate college readiness.

We tell students that high school should be about getting ready for college. Then we tell them how.

I respectfully propose we back off the one-future-fits-all approach to high school. Let's think together about what might be different if students exercised their innate preference to choose.

What if every student, upon entering high school, were to build an educational plan for the next four years? Some students would aim high—we already know their tribe. Some students would aim low. That isn't ideal, but if they fulfill their modest plan, that is certainly better than dropping out of somebody else's preferred version of your future.

A lot of students would make choices that we wouldn't make for them, but more of them would thrive than we like to admit.

Imagine a student finishing 8th grade with a basic foundation in verbal, written, and math literacy. That student would have enough communication skill to take advantage of further study, internships, technical training, vocational options, certification programs or working in the community as an apprentice or unskilled worker. This is precisely the model of education that gave us the greatest generation.

Under the current system, many students learn a lot in high school. Just as many stop learning at about the 8th grade. They may take more classes and hear more teaching, but most entry-level college professors can tell you that many students finish high school "successfully" with little more than 8th grade proficiency.

Now contrast that with a generation of literally self-directed learners. As an employer, would you rather hire someone who took initiative and designed a course of study and experience that prepared them for your open position? Or would you rather take a generalist who passively went along with the default curriculum because that's what the school said to do?

Given the choice, I'd prioritize initiative, internships, independent study and self-selected learning over Algebra II, Physics, British Lit or Philosophy. Those are all important and worthwhile subjects of study, but so are hundreds of other kinds of learning experiences that get squeezed out of the current decision process.

Let's restore humanity to our high school learners. Let's give them the right and responsibility to set a good plan and execute it well. The students who want to build a scholarly plan can adopt the current graduation standards and meet them with vigor. The students who are demoralized and defeated by living under the wrong expectations can find a new way. They can develop themselves and enter the community of adults as self-directed learners—prepared for a world of their own choosing and making.

Atlanta burning?

Atlanta school officials are accused of targeting teachers who expose cheating on standardized tests.

It's a bit ironic isn't it? I've always told me kids that a test is a measure of what they know, and so it's important to be honest on tests and simply do their best. Doesn't cheating defeat the purpose of testing?

I applaud those teachers who are willing to stand up for what is right. Thank you for your courage. These teachers should be chosen to replace the leaders in Atlanta. Perhaps then real education would take place.

SEED succeeds in educating all kids

Manzanita SEED Elementary School was recently honored for excellence in closing the achievement gap. This interesting school is part of the Oakland Schools Foundation's Family Engagement and Leadership Initiative.

The school has raised achievement in a language immersion environment in which kids are taught for half the day in English and half in Spanish.

OSF's Family Engagement and Leadership Initiative (FamELI) program helps schools develop their on-site Family Resources Centers (FRCs) managed by paid Coordinators. FamELI hosts quarterly meetings for the Coordinators where they develop tools for the FRCs, create strategic plans and systems, learn about managing family workshops, and build their professional capacity.

This amazing school can be a model for others to follow.

A way to stretch ed dollars

The Thomas B. Fordham Institute published suggestions for stretching the education dollar. Many of these are highly controversial, but in this time of extremely tough budgets with states not having a lot of options, it's worth a read.

Here is the list.

15 Ways that States Can Stretch the School Dollar

1. End “last hired, first fired” practices.
2. Remove class-size mandates.
3. Eliminate mandatory salary schedules.
4. Eliminate state mandates regarding work rules and terms of employment.
5. Remove “seat time” requirements.
6. Merge categorical programs and ease onerous reporting requirements.
7. Create a rigorous teacher evaluation system.
8. Pool health-care benefits.
9. Tackle the fiscal viability of teacher pensions.
10. Move toward weighted student funding.
11. Eliminate excess spending on small schools and small districts.
12. Allocate spending for learning-disabled students as a percent of population.
13. Limit the length of time that students can be identified as English Language Learners.
14. Offer waivers of non-productive state requirements.
15. Create bankruptcy-like loan provisions.

The full document can be found here.

If you are in Washington DC...

you might want to stop by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute on Groundhog's Day. The institute is having a discussion "Are Bad Schools Immortal?" The discussion will include Diane Ravitch.

See the video on their web site. If nothing else, you'll get a laugh. Think Bill Murray.

Are charter school supporters segregationists?

Nancy Flanagan essentially accuses charter school supporters of being segregationists. I'm offended at her insinuation.

I'm sure that she doesn't really think that, but the title of her blog certainly implies it. There are a number of problems with her argument, and it isn't that I don't believe in integration.

She says, "But when we're talking about something as complex and critical to the national well-being as public education, an either-or choice of integration vs. good schools is unacceptable."

She follows with "Here's the real question: Shouldn't all Americans be concerned about promoting racial and economic equity?"

The problem is that when something is as complex as integration saying that this choice is "unacceptable" is unacceptable. There are a couple of ways I can think of to use the term "unacceptable. One is in a very literal way. An example could be, "It is unacceptable that one person murders another person." I think we'd all agree with that. We mean, not that it will never happen, but that we will not allow it to happen.

However, there are limits to what we can and can't prevent and there are differences between live options and real options.

I think that human trafficking is unacceptable. I think it's one of the worst disgraces on the planet today. Almost nothing is being done about it, relatively speaking. However, I believe that most people reading this blog would also say that it is "unacceptable."

I believe that racism is unacceptable. It doesn't mean that I can stop it.

In the same way, the fact that many ethnic minority families choose charter schools and that some charter schools become less integrated than the public schools is not something that I can stop. It is something that I hope changes over time. I also hope that by every child becoming better educated that more integration will happen in workplaces because children from backgrounds that have not traditionally been well educated will have opportunities that their parents and even their older siblings might not have had.

Perhaps the choice is "unacceptable" in a philosophical sense, but since today it appears that I have to choose, I would choose to send my child where I thought he or she would receive the best education. To argue that I'm "fine with segregation--as long as we have charter schools" is an exaggeration and a false dichotomy. In the same way that it's false to say, "I'm fine with human trafficking--as long as I still have my Chinese manufactured running shoes." Someone can wear running shoes from China and still oppose human trafficking in other ways--ways that might actually be more productive than worrying too much about who made the shoes.

Just because I support charter schools, doesn't mean that I'm "fine" with segregation. It can also mean that while I encourage integration, I'm also going to support charter schools and their work to better educate kids. I do promote racial and economic equity AND support charter schools. Sometimes I may not be able to prioritize both at the same time at the same level in all aspects of life, but it doesn't mean that I've forgotten either priority.

Does school funding matter?

A new study on school district productivity seems to show that high spending doesn't necessarily mean top results.

The measures also show that high-spending districts are often inefficient. The report notes that only 17 percent of the Florida districts in the top third in spending were also in the top third in achievement.

The study also concluded that many districts serving "disadvantaged students" were inefficient, even taking into account the additional resources required to education those students.

Looks as if North Carolina will lift caps on charter schools

NBC reports that North Carolina may be lifting caps on charter schools. This obviously has been met with mixed feelings. The typical arguments for and against charter schools have not changed. See the coverage here.

Teacher harassing parents who want a charter school?

Two Compton, California parents have accused a teacher of harassing them and turning their child against them because they support a charter school.

"Romero said in her complaint that her third-grade son told her that he hated her for supporting charter schools and then revealed his teacher, Victor Tellez, had told him that charter schools are a "bad thing" and shouldn't be supported."

The parents at McKinley Elementary school have filed a complain with the U.S. Department of Education.

Can charter schools get better?

I'm not talking about those that are already performing at superior levels. I'm talking about those in the middle. I'm talking about those that have either not found their real purpose or simply aren't very good at fulfilling their mission.

The great debate about charter schools is all around these schools. The argument is that if charter schools are no better than their traditional public school peers, then why have them with all of the extra effort involved.

From my experience, I have a theory. It seems to me that many of the mediocre charter schools that I know do not learn from other schools or they have a leader that doesn't really know what high quality education looks like. The third element is that the schools are sometimes in neighborhoods where schools are already high performing, but I don't think too many people care about them.

The real issue is in those areas where students are not being served well by the traditional schools. If charter schools start in those areas, shouldn't their be a promise of high performing (or at least higher performing) schools? I think the answer is yes. As much as I support choice for choice sake, I still think that charter schools need to do something different, something better.

I believe schools can be better, but they need to be serious about what they are doing and find assistance when they do not succeed at begin better. They should look for outside consultants, help from other high performing schools, hire better teachers and leaders.

What are the barriers that I've seen? Sometimes the founder of the school is also the school leader. Sometimes that person needs to go, but that's a tough decision to make. Firing the founder is hard enough. It's harder when the person is an employee.

Sometimes disappointment is overwhelming or people think, next year will be the year. There is self-deception instead of self-reflection.

I'm not suggesting that my observations are statistically valid. I am suggesting that if you are associated with a mediocre charter school, you need to do some self-reflection and get some outside help. You need to change something. You are in a stage of academic stagnation that is unlikely to change unless you begin to innovate again. I believe that you and your school can get better, but it won't happen by beating your head against the wall or ignoring the problem.

Get better. Get help.

Rural districts to have Oklahoma's first online school

In an interesting move a district with 120 students plans to open Oklahoma's first online charter school.

Check this out.

Are charter schools part of the democratic process?

Some have said that charter schools thwart the democratic process because they are self-governed and are not subject (or not as directly subject) to democratically elected officials.

First, it is a myth that charter schools are not subject to democratically elected officials. They are simply not as directly subject, but they are subject to democratically passed laws.

Second, pure democracy isn't what the U.S. (or any country) has ever really embraced. Pure democracy brings its own problems, as the founders of the U.S. saw. In addition, John Stuart Mill warned that democracy is a means of oppressing dissenters or minorities.

Charter schools do not thwart the democratic process, but are a way to allow choice for those who don't agree with the majority. They allow the democratic process to work by restoring freedom of dissenters to choose.

Would you teach for $250,000?

If you got one of the 4.2 jobs funded by the stimulus, that's about what you should have earned. I'm just guessing that school systems didn't pass those funds through to the teachers.

Hat tip Ed Intercepts.

Charter school opens up a fantastic option

In addition to the College Pathways school mentioned in yesterday's blog, Colorado Springs Early Colleges offers students the change to graduate college early. The school is on the campus of Colorado Technical University. The school offers and aggressive dual enrollment program to try to combat the rate of remedial work that colleges need to do. One student will earn her bachelor's degree by age 19. This kind of innovation puts these schools way out ahead of what others are doing.

Blended learning frees up money

The evidence suggests that one way to deal with the stressful budget issues facing school today is a blended learning model that uses online learning to supplement classroom learning.

Rocketship Education is one organization that has introduced this method with success.

The program supplements traditional classroom lessons with online instruction. Its model allows it to reallocate about $500,000 annually per school, based on savings in staffing and class structure, and put that money toward higher teacher salaries, tutoring, mentoring teachers, and other areas.

The Classical Academy in Colorado Springs has opened a school for approximately 400 students grades 7-12 with an early college enrollment piece. The program offers blended courses at the school campus and a full range of courses at Pikes Peak Community College, which is right across the walkway. The school is called College Pathways.

The idea behind College Pathways is that it serves kids who want to either accelerate or have a more flexible schedule. Some students can finish a complete college course load by the time they are 19 or 20 years old. This saves the entire system money. In addition, the charter school building is located on the Community College land under a lease agreement and includes classrooms dedicated to PPCC that could not have been built otherwise.

It's creative methods of education that will see us through these budget times and beyond. These forms of education are both cost effective and academics rigorous and so meet many of the goals that society needs to accomplish.

StudentsFirst introduces policy agenda

Michelle Rhee may no longer be the Superintendent of Washington D.C.'s school system, but that doesn't mean she's left the education world.

You may know that she has started an organization called StudentsFirst based on the idea that everything in education should focus on the students before any other priorities. Many of us believe that this essential priority has been lost my the current education system.

The organization released its policy agenda the other day saying that it will be focused on:

1. Elevate the teaching profession by valuing teachers' impact on students.
2. Empower parents with real choices and real information.
3. Shift spending taxpayers' money to get real results for students.

To see the full agenda see the web site.

Is Colorado 39th Best in School Quality?

Education Week produces an annual report comparing education environments in the various states. The annual report is Quality Counts, and this year the special title is Uncertain Forecast. Much more detail is incorporated in the press release.

Here's the quick summary of grades and ranks for Colorado: (39th Overall)

B 11th/51 "Chance for Success" (a measure of "Cradle to Career" educational excellence.)

D+ 21st/51 "K-12 Achievement"

C 29th/51 "Transitions and Alignment"

D+ 43rd/51 "School Finance"

Overall, Education Week assigns Colorado a low C (73.7%) and ranks Colorado 39th.

Having worked in several of the states that rank above Colorado, my experience doesn't jibe with our ranking. I also disagree with a national ranking of C, so that's a factor.

What do you think? Is Colorado really near the bottom 20% of all states?

Outsource all non-instructional services?

As a person who provides non-instructional outsourced services to charter schools, and who would love to take on some school district clients, I noticed in the Colorado EdNews legislative analysis that Nancy Spence (R) Littleton is planning a bill to require all district to bid out all non-instructional services and hold public meetings about the bids.

The purpose of this bill would be to make it transparent to all taxpayers whether or not the district is spending too much money on non-instructional services. This would include everything from janitorial to accounting.

It's hard to tell if this bill would even have a chance of passing, but what an interesting concept, especially in a time when budgets are tight, and districts are looking for creative ways to put more money into the classroom.

Could this be a real answer? I'm still thinking about it, but I know what my company and our competitors could provide. It may be worth trying.

Caution, Consolidation, and Cuts: Education in the Colorado Legislature for 2011

You must read the thorough analysis of potential legislative developments for Colorado education produced by EdNews Colorado.

The online version with comments is at the EdNews Colorado site, but I recommend you download the pdf version so you can mark it up and share it with your colleagues.

What's missing?

I don't see anything about funding hybrid schools. This is a simple adjustment, and one that Colorado needs to implement this year. CDE is obviously on the ball. Will the legislature follow their lead?

What would you add? What else needs to be on the docket?

Forget Highly Qualified Teachers—Give Me Some High Maintenance Teachers

(image generated at redkid.net)

As a principal and school director, I've spent most of the last decade trying to understand and implement the highly-qualified provisions of No Child Left Behind.

Let me suggest a different metric. I want more high-maintenance teachers. According to common usage, a high-maintenance person is one who requires extra attention and has little tolerance for discomfort. He or she is royal. We sometimes call one of my daughters HM because it works well for both "Her Majesty" and "High Maintenance." The original high maintenance character was probably the princess who couldn't sleep over a pea, but let's be clear that lots of men are high maintenance too.

As I define it, a high maintenance teacher is like a overachieving salesperson or a prima donna athlete. They have talent. They deliver. They have an ego that precedes and proceeds from their accomplishments. They are the achieving elite. I could list a bunch that have worked for me, and I'd bet they'd all admit to the label.

High maintenance teachers are a little different. They are hard to manage, but easy to love. I have led a whole bunch of high maintenance teachers in my day, and I'd like to think I was one once. Here's why we need more high maintenance teachers and more flexibility to keep them happy.

HM teachers have high standards. The expect a lot out of themselves, their students and their school. Because they have high standards, they don't suffer fools—in the classroom or in the principal's office.

HM teachers are impatient for excellence. They want their students to perform. They demand their colleagues work hard. They constantly propose improvements, challenge practices and generally agitate for something better.

HM teachers are critical. They are often wickedly smart and cynical, so they sharpen the colleagues and leaders who work around them. If you can gain the respect and partnership of a high maintenance teacher, you have a powerful ally.

HM teachers deliver. They are crusty, edgy, quirky, and unpredictable, but their students learn and thrive. A staff of high maintenance teachers will wear you out, but they will make your school a better place.

I'm sure there are lots of downsides to the high maintenance personality. They can be unforgiving opponents and potent threats to teacher morale. But they are an excellent barometer for the strength of leadership. My perfect staff would be a mix of solid and diligent teachers seasoned with fresh prospects and a generous sprinkling of high maintenance educators. My students and colleagues might not always like it, but they would learn.

Please support educational leaders when we ask for more flexibility to select, schedule, pay and praise our best teachers. If they really are the kind of high maintenance teachers we need, a single-lane salary system and traditional school schedule won't be enough to keep them in the profession.

Why charter schools?

With reports that the average charter school does no better than the average traditional public school, many wonder why charter schools should exist. Tom Bohs at the Jackson Sun gave a good list of reasons why charter schools can still benefit the American educational landscape.

Read it here.

State charter school laws do not keep up with demand

The Center for Education Reform ranks charter school laws each year. Even with many recent movies criticizing the state of public education in the U.S., many states still create substantial barriers to new charter schools. According to CER's evaluation most states still need improvement in their charter school laws.

"Only 11 states and the District of Columbia have charter school laws that do not require significant improvements in order to allow for the effective creation and growth of these innovative school options."

Should Arian Foster be paid on a single salary scale?

While I've never been a big proponent of bonuses alone or a pure merit pay system, I do feel as if I need to justify what I've written about Strategic Teacher Compensation due to a couple of interesting pieces suggesting that the reasons for a merit or performance pay system are a "leap of faith"--the idea being that there is no real way to know if a performance based system is effective.

It seems to me that these criticisms are wrong on a few points, but I'll stick primarily with the "leap of faith" issue in this blog. The other idea that I want to attack is the view that the answer is to simply increase teacher pay for every teacher.

I should establish first that my view of teacher compensation is not one purely based on test scores, nor is the proof of its success. The idea of Strategic Compensation that I support is based on a number of characteristics that teachers display or bring to the table that are measurable, even if not perfectly so. Those characteristics can also improve or disappear over time, depending on the person, which is also a justification for eliminating or modifying tenure.

The reasons for a strategic compensation system are:
1. Reward better teachers for begin better
2. Motivate poor teacher to get better or to leave the field
3. To provide compensation such that it motivates teachers to embrace or pursue the greater good of the strategic goals of the school and classroom, not simply their own benefit
4. To motivate new teachers into the profession

The criticism that such a program is a "leap of faith" is based on the idea that there is no way to really show that such a compensation program works. This is strange because there are surely ways to determine if teachers at a school are better than prior years. Perhaps some of those measurements are not simply test scores, nor might they be completely objective, but it isn't as if we'd have no clue if teachers were better. If we did have no clue, then perhaps we have the wrong people hired as educational leaders.

The criticism does have some merit because, for example, if we continue to say that only those who have a teacher's license and proper education from a teaching college are qualified to teach or that the compensation system continues to place a high value on years of service irrespective of the quality of the teacher, then goal number 4 of the strategic compensation system will never be achieved. In other words, a strategic compensation system has the most potential for good IF other barriers of entry into the teaching profession are removed.

There are other ways to ensure that better teachers enter the profession that could also work well with a strategic compensation system. One is to make it more difficult to enter a teacher's education program. For example, most engineering schools have extremely high entrance requirements. If teaching programs also had higher standards, then it is likely that better teachers would enter the profession. This does beg a question that I won't try to answer here about what makes a good teacher at various levels. I'm not an expert in this area, but those who are have told me that there is good research to suggest that the characteristics of a great K-3 teacher may not be the same as those for high school.

The suggestion that all teachers' salaries should be raised across the board simply defies common sense unless there are significant changes to tenure requirements and the teacher evaluation process. Giving a poor teacher a substantial raise just because he happens to be in the field already is absurd. Salary for any position is a reward for doing a job the way it is supposed to be done. Given the current single salary structure, this would mean that two teachers make the same salary simply because they have the same number of years of experience and the same education. Neither of these factors have been shown to have substantial causal relationship to teacher quality. In addition, they certainly have little relevance when evaluating any particular teacher. To pay a teacher more because he or she fits into a class that should be better is like paying all quarterbacks drafted in the first round the same salary because they should perform approximately the same way. I'd guess that someone like Tom Brady would have something to say about that. Could you imagine Tom Brady being paid the same as all other sixth round draft picks? Or what if quarterbacks were paid based on years in the league. I'm sure that the Rams' Sam Bradford might have a problem with that. Arian Foster might also have a bit of a problem with that logic. The undrafted rookie would make entry level wages based on a single salary schedule.

Strategic Compensation systems, if done well, have the potential to do a lot of good for education and for teachers and for the teaching profession. It isn't a "leap of faith" to suggest that we can identify good teachers and reward them for who they are and what they've done. It isn't a mystery why some teachers do better with students than others. Good educational leaders know who their best teachers are and know how to take care of them, IF they are given the means to do so.

So, what does it mean to innovate?

A charter schools is supposed to innovate. What does that mean?

Let me think of a few criticisms of charter schools I've known, and let's think together about whether they are innovative or not. OK?

In my state, Colorado, we have a large number of Core Knowledge schools. Core Knowledge is usually associated with E. D. Hirsch and a set of content that leads to what Hirsch calls "cultural literacy." The curriculum is sometimes criticized as being pro-western or too Anglo-Saxon in its focus. However, in its own way, it is innovative.

Innovation is often marked by word "new" or "original." The criticism is that Core Knowledge is not new, but is based on old material that is not necessarily reflective of the entire American (or global) culture.

It seems to me that Core Knowledge is new in the fact that it goes against many current ideas that "cultural literacy" is relevant in society. In fact, it can be said that the idea that America is no longer Anglo-Saxon is now an old idea. While I don't have a real preference for or against Core Knowledge, I do think that there are ideas from the Anglo-Saxon past that are crucial and are often ignored in some forms of modern education. 21st Century education is one example that can easily ignore "cultural literacy."

The fact that Core Knowledge bumps up against established ideas about education makes it new. The best I can tell is that Core Knowledge is not merely a return to the 1950s or some other glorious period of American education. Core Knowledge is a re-discovering of what knowledge from America's past is essential to being literate in its culture. In that sense, it is innovative.

In addition, it seems to me that Core Knowledge can be taught using different methods. A core content does not require a specific instructional method. A school or teacher can still use differentiated instruction.

Last, it also seems to me that Core Knowledge or some modified form can be complemented with other content that might not be required for cultural literacy. In other words, schools or individual teachers can add to the core content with all sorts of content that is not "core." The teacher or school would not have to tell students what is or is not core. In fact, I'd guess that the best teachers wouldn't even give students a hint as to what was or was not core.

In other words, many of the global issues or cultures that have come to influence the U.S. over the past few decades could be included as either additional "core knowledge" or simply added because schools decide that students need to know about various cultures and influences on the country they live in and what is going on in this flattening world.

It also seems to me that for many of the "innovators" in traditional education, there is (or should be) pressure to see how their methods and content are innovative. In addition, there is another question to answer in a later blog, which is "If education is too innovative might it be no good at all?"

In another blog, I suggested that we have a problem. If something is completely researched based, then almost by definition it isn't innovative. If something has no research basis, then perhaps it's too innovative. Another question, that I'll need to hit some time soon is "Who decides how much research has to be behind a method or set of content in order for it to be used in education?" That's the question that really interests me.

West Virgina charter advocated set agenda for 2011

After posting a blog about Sallye Clark the other day, I was contacted by Tim McClung of West Virginians for Education Reform with their press release for their upcoming forum.

The January 13th forum will include Nelson Smith the former President of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.

The forum will be in the Charleston, West Virginia Cultural Center.

More to come from this group and West Virginia, I'm sure.

Illinois teacher tenure reform: Good or Bad?

In the Heritage Foundation's blog The Foundry, the writer praises teacher tenure reform efforts.

Two key items in the reform are:
1. Teacher evaluation and tenure based on student test scores
2. Teacher tenure renewed every two years

I'm for the second one, but have serious doubts about the second. If you've read around this blog much, you know that I am a bit leary about using test scores as the only means of evaluating teachers. Certaintly, long term trends may prove to have a causal relationship, but I'm very wary of using short term results.

However, teacher tenure being temporary and not permanent makes a lot of sense to me. No one should keep a job just because at some time in the past he or she was proficient. All employees in all jobs must earn their salaries. Tenure is simply a way to avoid the idea that a salary is earned.

So, I wonder what you think.

What if this were a charter school?

Chicago Public School Board Presidents have been accused of misspending the district's resources.

I saw this in one tweet on Twitter. Every time there is something like this about a charter school, the news is retweeted like crazy by charter school opponents.

I wonder why. Are charter schools being held to a higher standard? Or is it that we are so numb to public servants that game the system that we aren't surprised when it happens?

I'm a bit confused.

I'm not suggesting that it's OK for charter school leaders to misspend money. Everyone should be accountable for the use of public funds. However, the treatment of those who do these things ought to be treated the same.

A charter school whose leader misspends funds might get fired or reprimanded, but that doesn't mean the school should be closed (as some occasionally suggest). If that were the case, then we'd need to talk about shutting down some of the districts that have misappropriated funds or not educated students. It seems that few are ready to do that.

Will school buildings be obsolete?

Some of the enticing elements of online learning for a finance geek like me are that the need for infrastructure is so small. With the cost and technical challenges of internet access approaching zero within the next ten years, it's interesting to think about what ten years might bring.

So, let's look back as amateurs to the technology of the year 2000. For example, everyone was paranoid about the year 2000 fixes that had to be done to ensure that banking and and other important data wasn't lost. What was a smart phone? An iPad was inconceivable. Even the iPod wasn't invented yet. I am not sure when I set up my first wireless home network, but I know it wasn't in 2000.

In one recent article in Voices over in The Washington Post, Larry Cuban said that he doesn't think online education will take off as others have projected. He cites social reasons as part of the cause.

However, it's clear that social reasons are different for this and coming generations. They have difference ways of socializing. They do not need to be at school together to socialize. Socializing is something that can be done elsewhere. Between face to face, Skype, texting, and calling, youth can stay connected more than ever.

So, where does that leave all of the schools that are building new buildings today? What will they be in ten or twenty years. Let's try to envision, knowing that whatever I project will likely be too conservative.

Students will want most of their content delivered through online or other electronic means. They'll want to produce and submit much of their work through electronic means. They'll want help, and so teachers will not be irrelevant, but the definition of a teacher will change and the way the job is carried out will change.

In addition, students will want to engage with each other more for help. Just as online games allow for participants to help one another, future education will allow for more (not less) collaboration.

Ten years from now, I'm not even sure that I can imagine what those technologies might be. Wireless access will be more prevalent. I'm sure that we won't have to look for a Starbucks or Panera Bread shop. In addition, I can imagine that other internet technologies will be faster and more prevalent as cell coverage increases.

Twenty years from know is not even imaginable (at least not by me). Technology is moving so fast that I can't see that far. My aged crystal ball is just not functioning at that level.

The point is that buildings are usually built to last virtually forever. The buildings being constructed today are essentially "forever buildings." They are expensive, but if they won't be used as schools what good is it to build such a high quality long lasting structure?

I may be wrong, but I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that school buildings may be obsolete in ten or twenty years and as districts look at new facilities, they need to plan for the long range and not merely for the next five years or so.

Charter schools are a great bang for the buck...

Says the Christian Science Monitor. Citing examples of waste in traditional public school districts, even in these tough budget times, the Monitor praises charter schools for their frugality.

"Green Dot Public Schools, a leading charter school operator in the L.A. area, has built seven schools there to serve 4,300 mainly low-income students for a total of less than $85 million. Its graduation rate is nearly twice that of the school district as a whole."

"As long as lack of prudence characterizes fiscal policy, school districts everywhere will remain in dire straits. But let's not forget that, ultimately, voters possess the power to demand financial reform. If they don't, then they have no basis for complaint."

Time to eliminate traditional school districts?

Rishawn Biddle at Dropout Nation argues that the time to eliminate traditional district thinking is here.

The post is a response to Alexander Hoffman of Gotham Schools, with whom I've had the opportunity to discuss whether or not charter schools are public schools.

The point is that because so many thinkers still look at charters as some sort of aberration and the district schools as the rightful owners of public education that real education reform can't happen. Biddle thinks that only once the district bureaucracy is eliminated can true reform begin. One example he uses is that districts are seen as that organization that "runs school buildings." This interferes with real dialogue about what a school is and what education is. More importantly, it prevents discussion about what is best for students.

As times change educational models should to. The discussion of what is public education needs to change as well.

How much leash should charter schools have?

Charter schools are a different animal. Most people still don't really understand them. People still ask me, "so how much is tuition at a charter school?"

Charter schools are still a developing breed. They normally have less oversight from the district board of education, but they also have their own board. This has led to problems in some schools. The charter board doesn't really understand their responsibilities or doesn't take them seriously.

On the other hand, laws in many states are beginning to crack down. Abuses by some have led to restrictions on all. This means that high performing charter schools that are well run, but might actually be forced to give up some of their innovations and freedom because of poorly run, poor performing charter schools. In other words, bad schools may be causing districts and states to restrict good charter schools in ways that they shouldn't be restricted.

This is always a tension in creating any laws. Just as with business, Sarbanes-Oxley causes extra work for all companies, not just those who violate the public trust, most laws have the unintended effect of hindering the actions of law abiding people and organizations. Another prime example, is the move of the TSA to implement the new scanners and pat downs for every passenger through certain airports.

The question is whether education should be affected in such a way, especially if the measures actually hinder good schools from doing good work. While there is clearly a need to discipline ineffective or unethical charter schools (and district schools and districts), there is also clearly a need to unleash good and great schools to continue and improve the work they are doing.

Let's be clear that charter schools, in order to avoid the implementation of laws that hinder their freedom, need to perform administratively and educationally at a high level. The whole concept of charter schools means that charter schools must have strong self-discipline in governance, educational program and hiring and training excellent teachers.

New York ranking system flawed, but may tell us something

A system for ranking teachers in New York has been criticized for being inaccurate and perhaps useless. Others say that there is at least some value in the system as consistently low or high scores do show that there are teachers on the extremes. It could be used to weed out or improve the worst teachers.

The question is whether there is any valuable information about those in the middle and whether or not the ranking helps tell principals anything about their individual teachers, especially those whose rankings change each year or those that consistently score in the middle of the pack.

There is no question that inaccurate rankings should not be used to judge teachers, but it is possible that the system itself could be improved to the point that it does provide useful information about individual teachers at all levels. In addition, many of us aren't nearly as concerned about those teachers who rank as average, but are deeply concerned about those teachers who are below average, but still manage to keep their jobs and stay in the classroom. If the ranking system could at least tell us which teachers are consistently below average, principals could determine which teachers respond to improvement plans and which do not.

As the debate about rankings inevitably continues, let's not pretend that ranking teachers is irrelevant to improving education. We know that a good teacher is a key element to a student's learning. The more we know about those teaching our kids--both their abilities and desire to teach--the better off we are. Improving, not abolishing, the ranking systems is the way to go.

Evil in the education system?

I've been having an interesting tweet fest with education expert Ira Socol through Twitter. One of the things that came up is a question of whether the problems in education have to do with stupidity of education leaders or if it's just plain evil that perpetuates our failing education system, especially for those with the greatest needs.

We've been throwing some evils back and forth. I'm not suggesting that Ira agrees with me on all of these, but here are a few that we've thought of. Do you agree? Can you think of more?

1. We only care about our own kids and not the issues of others.
2. Education leaders and politicians who only want real change if it impacts their salaries or their positions
3. Not taking the successful practices of others to heart
4. Not researching the successful practices of others
5. Not requiring the best of our superintendents, principals, and teachers
6. Presuming that some students can't learn or can't learn without significant additional resources
7. Refusing to be open to the fact that some students need a different environment or approach
8. Restricting education to a traditional 8 hour school day, 5 days a week--as if that's how/when the best learning takes place.
   

There is probably another list of the stupid things that happen in education. Feel free to respond with your list.

Crazy laws that hurt the innocent

In The Wrong Lunch Box, Joanne Jacobs tells the story of an honor student recently suspended for the remainder of her senior year because she brought her dad's lunch box to school. It had a paring knife in the box.

Now, this is just one more examples of how broad laws designed to restrict those who are a potential hard to others actually end up hurting those that are no harm at all. These laws leave no room for a principal's judgment or common sense.

What's wrong is not just the girl's mistake in grabbing a lunch box off the kitchen table, but a society that thinks that creating sweeping laws will cure all of its evils. There is no substitute for teaching and coaching good reasoning and judgment skills. A society that doesn't trust a principal to make a good decision about a student's behavior is one that hasn't put proper measures on what it takes to be a good principal and has allowed bad principals to stay in jobs they shouldn't have.

You can't cure crazy easily, but we have to make the effort.

West Virginia charter school advocate quits

The Daily Mail reports that West Virginia's opposition to charter schools has been so strong that Sallye Clark, co-founder of West Virginians for Education Reform has stopped working with the organization.

"I decided after those special sessions this summer, it was an exercise in futility," Clark said. "We're like Sisyphus, trying to push that rock to the top of the hill. We spent hours and hours and hours unsuccessfully."

The article states that teacher unions have been the biggest opponents of charter schools in the state.

An Appeal to West Virginia law makers

The Intelligencer appealed to West Virginia charter school proponents not to give up the fight. The writer says that some proponents have been "so frustrated" that they may give up.

West Virginia is one of ten states that still do not allow charter schools.

My New Year's Resolutions

I don't usually make New Year's Resolutions, but was thinking about my professional and blogging life and decided to post a few things I've been thinking about.

1. Write what I really think.
2. Be civil and encourage rational conversation, even on the most controversial issues.
3. Support charter schools and encourage them to be better.
   
4. Not support schools just because they are charter schools.
5. Find ways to locally support students to graduate from high school.

In non-education related areas:

1. Get involved in local anti-trafficking and anti-slavery organization.
2. Continue working on Russian and find more ways to support orphans in Russia.

I know that many of you don't care about non-education related activities, but I thought I'd post them just to give you a bit more insight into the things that I care deeply about. Those who need support NEED support. It isn't something just to blog about or lobby about or vote about. It's time to do something.

Happy New Year.