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                      ·    December 21, 2007- Bits & Briefs

 

CHARTER SCHOOLS TOUT NEW 'VALUE-ADDED' GRADING SYSTEM  Charter school advocates said Thursday the Department of Education's new "value-added" grading system, which attempts to measure student progress year-to-year, more accurately reflects the privately run, publicly funded schools' success. ...Gongwer News Service

PRINCIPAL KEY TO LEADING SCHOOL TO SUCCESS  A new study by Advocates for Children and Youth (ACY), a Baltimore-based nonprofit child advocacy group, ties school performance to the experience of principals and calls for bonuses and other incentives to attract and retain the school administrators. "We believe the principal is key to leading a school to success. ... It's a matter of paying now or paying later. The cost is so much smaller if we pay now," the ACY education director said.  Read the ACY studies, click:   Baltimore City;    Baltimore County;    Prince George’s County.

U.S. NUMBER ONE IN GLOBAL COMPETITIVENESS  A report in the publication Straight A's from the Alliance For Excellent Education, said, "Rebounding from a sixth place finish last year, the United States knocked Switzerland off of the top spot in the World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Index (GCI). Of the twelve 'pillars' that the report tracks, the United States ranks first in labor market efficiency, market size, and innovation but is thirty-fourth out of 131 countries in health and primary education." View the index. Click:  Global Competitiveness Index  

HIGH COST OF HIGH SCHOOL DROPOUTS  According to the Alliance For Excellent Education, only about 70 percent of all high school students nationwide graduate on time, and graduation rates for poor and minority students are even lower. The Alliance said the failure to graduate every child prepared for the twenty-first century has serious consequences for individual students and their parents, but it also has major repercussions for American society at every level. Read the report. Click: The High Cost of High School Dropouts: What the Nation Pays for Inadequate High Schools.

 

                     ·    December 20, 2007- Ohio, U.S. Lag In High-Speed Internet

 

U.S. citizens enjoy a fraction of high-speed Internet access available in other countries, according to Speed Matters: A Report on Internet Speed in all 50 States, a report released by the Communications Workers of America. The average U.S. download speed is 1.97 megabits per second. Compare that to the 61 megabits per second, or 30 times faster speed, enjoyed by the Japanese. The U.S. also trails South Korea, Sweden, Finland, and Canada. According to the report, an entire movie can be downloaded in two minutes in some countries, but the same task can take two hours or more in the United States. The chart below shows Ohio internet speed lags even further behind, according to the report.
 
Country                             Median Download Speed
                                                         (Megabits per second)
Japan..............................61.00
South Korea.......................45.60
Finland.............................21.70
Sweden............................18.20
Canada..............................7.60
United States......................1.97
Ohio.................................1.36
 
The United States is 16th behind other industrialized nations in high speed internet access. 
 

                       ·    December 19, 2007- Ohio Facing Budget Shortfall?

 

The Associated Press reported yesterday that thirteen states could face shortfalls for the fiscal year that begins July 1, 2008, including large states like California and New York. Ten states are projecting deficits next year and three are predicting shortfalls in revenue that could lead to budget deficits. They are Florida, Kentucky and South Carolina. Another 11 states say their budgets are likely to see holes open in their budgets next year, or in the financial year beginning July 1, 2009, including Alabama, Ohio and Texas.
 
On what may be a related issue, the Gannett News Service reported that Governor Strickland said one of his "top goals" for 2008 was working on fixing the state's school-funding system. The following is the Governor's response to the question, When will you propose a solution to school funding, and what form it may take?
 
"If I answered that question directly, then I would be giving you my school reform and funding proposal. And that's not yet ripe, so to speak. ... I've said that there is a lot of money in our schools, but I'm not sure that it's being used in the most efficient, cost-effective manner. ... I would like to see it resolved legislatively. If it cannot be resolved legislatively, then I certainly will keep on the table the possibility of taking a ballot initiative to the people of Ohio in the form of a constitutional amendment."

 

                     ·    December 18, 2007- Study: Middle School Math Teachers Ill-Prepared

 

A new study says U.S. middle school math teachers are ill-prepared. The findings of the Michigan State University study, Mathematics Teaching in the 21st Century (MT21), were released last week. The study found that middle school teachers in the United States are not as well prepared to teach mathematics compared to teachers in five other countries, something that could negatively affect the U.S. as it continues to compete on an international scale.

MT21 studied how well a sample of universities and teacher-training institutions prepare middle school math teachers in the U.S., South Korea, Taiwan, Germany, Bulgaria and Mexico. Specifically, 2,627 future teachers were surveyed about their preparation, knowledge and beliefs in this area. Compared to the other countries, the U.S. future teachers ranked from the middle to the bottom on MT21 measures of math knowledge.

“What’s most disturbing is that one of the areas in which U.S. future teachers tend to do the worst is algebra, and algebra is the heart of middle school math,” the researcher said. “When future teachers in the study were asked about opportunities to learn about the practical aspects of teaching mathematics, again we ranked mediocre at best.”

Read the report. Click:  MT21 Report

                    ·    December 17, 2007- Status Quo Is An Unacceptable Goal

  
The Associated Press (AP) reported yesterday that Governor Strickland said, “The status quo does not result in things staying the way they are. The status quo results in things getting increasingly worse in comparison to the rest of the world.” He said that rule applies to initiatives he has in the works, including a plan for addressing the state’s unconstitutional school funding system. “This [fixing school funding] is my responsibility as governor. I’ve got a four-year term. I want to get it done,” the Governor said. “My self judgment and probably the judgment of the people of Ohio will be made based on whether I am able to do this. So I want to do it in a way that actually leads to positive results.” 

AP said the Governor envisions a single statewide educational system that extends from preschool through adulthood where credits and courses are more uniform to eliminate confusion and disparities. He said has not yet figured out how he would pay for such a system in a state whose formula for paying for public education has been deemed inequitable because it relies too heavily on property taxes. But he said, through input from many interested groups, he is coming closer to a proposal. “I don’t want to just have another failed attempt,” Strickland said. “There have been sincere efforts in the past which I think have fallen short because they have not been adequately embraced by the parties involved.” 
 
The AP article appeared in the Toledo Blade, December 16, 2007

 

                    ·    December 14, 2007- Value-Added Results

 

The Cincinnati Enquirer reported today that students in nearly half of Ohio's public elementary and middle schools made more than a year's worth of progress in 2006-07, according to new data released yesterday by the Ohio Department of Education. Value-added is an attempt to measure individual students' progress over time rather than comparing overall performance. Schools are rated by color code. A school is rated "green" if its students showed more than one year of progress, "yellow" if students show one year of progress, and "red" if students show less than one year of progress.

To determine a school's spot in the color scheme, the state compared its fourth through eighth graders' scores on the 2006 Ohio Achievement Test in math and reading to the same students' 2007 scores after they advanced to the next grade. Throughout Ohio, 1,358 schools are "green," 718 are in "yellow" and 694 are in "red," according to the Enquirer report.

In the future, if a school stays in "green" for two consecutive years, it could boost its annual report card rating by one category. The value-added measurement would pull down a school's rating if it stays red for three consecutive years.

View the value-added data on ODE web site. Click: Click here to access Power User value-added reports.  Value-added data can be found in the “Ratings” folder. 
 
Sources: Cincinnati Enquirer and Ohio Department of Education

 

                     ·    December 13, 2007- Report Finds New Teachers More Academically Qualified

 

New teachers are more academically qualified today than just a decade ago, according to a new report released yesterday by Educational Testing Service (ETS) Policy Information Center. The study examines the relationship between improvements in the academic quality of America’s teachers and the policy focus on improving teacher quality in recent years. The report attributes the academic improvement to policy changes that focused on issues of teacher quality.

The study found that college grades of prospective teachers has improved. About 40 percent of the prospective teachers taking the licensing tests from 2002 to 2005 had a grade point average of 3.5 or higher on the traditional 4-point scale during college, up from 26 percent in the 1990s, according to the report. The percentage of candidates earning lower than a 3.0 G.P.A. decreased to 20 percent from 32 percent. “By this measure, we are witnessing a dramatic improvement in the quality of the teacher pool,” the report said.

The New York Times said, "The finding that the academic qualifications of teachers had risen significantly was encouraging news for federal and state education policy makers after a period of hand-wringing over teacher quality in the nation’s 90,000 public schools. The most successful educational systems in the world, like those in Singapore and Finland, recruit teachers from among the top third of their college graduates. By contrast, some studies over the years have found that the United States recruits from the bottom third."

Education researchers debate, however, whether teachers with higher academic qualifications are more effective, as measured by higher student achievement, the New York Times said.

Read the report, Teacher Quality in a Changing Policy Landscape: Improvements in the Teacher Pool, and/or view the slide presentation. Click:  Full Report (PDF)   and/or  Press Briefing Slide Presentation (PDF)

               ·    December 12, 2007- CORAS Membership Approaching Record Numbers

 
The Coalition of Rural and Appalachian Schools (CORAS) membership renewals are running ahead of past years with 131 active members as of early December 2007. Thirteen of the 29 Ohio Appalachian counties have already achieved 100% membership in the Coalition. They are Athens, Pike, Gallia, Hocking, Vinton, Perry, Meigs, Morgan, Noble, Monroe, Muskingum, Jackson and Harrison. Eight counties, Brown, Coshocton, Guernsey, Holmes, Ross, Belmont, Jefferson and Washington, are just one school district short of having 100% membership. Scioto and Lawrence counties lack only two districts of having full membership.

CORAS membership includes 98 local, city and exempted village school districts, 11 educational service centers, 11 joint vocational school districts, 8 institutions of higher learning and three other education agencies. This marks the 8th consecutive year that CORAS has attained 125 members or more, and four consecutive years of topping 130 members.

To view a list of CORAS members, Click: Counties and Members

                  ·    December 11, 2007- Code Of Conduct For Educators

 

The Columbus Dispatch reported Sunday that the Educator Standards Board failed to notify the public or media that it was meeting to write Ohio's code of conduct for educators. The Dispatch said this is a violation of state law. The Ohio Department of Education press secretary said an oversight is to blame for the private meetings where the code was written, but from now on the public is invited to weigh in. The entire standards board will vote on the code in January and the State Board of Education is expected to review it in February, the Dispatch said.
 
To read the draft of the proposed code of conduct for educators, click: code of conduct draft

 

                    ·    December 10, 2007- Amendment Proposal "Draws Praise, Measured Support"

According to an Associated Press (AP) report yesterday, State Senator Kirk Schuring's proposed constitutional amendment that would dedicate at least 59.6 percent of income tax receipts and 71.2 percent of sales tax collections to fund Ohio schools is drawing praise from statewide education groups, and measured support from Democratic Governor Ted Strickland and Republican State Senator Joy Padgett, who heads the Senate's education committee.

The Associated Press printed the following comments. "It's a very positive thing because it tries to put children at the front of the line for state tax dollars," said Fred Pausch, a lobbyist for the Ohio School Boards Association. The Ohio Association of School Business Officials also approves. "In any school solution that we would advocate for, there's got to be a revenue source and a methodology to determine what it would cost to educate a child," said David Varda, executive director of the association. "Sen. Schuring's proposal is attractive to us in that it answers the revenue question." Strickland's spokesman said the governor found Schuring's proposal "admirable." Padgett called Schuring's plan "a novel approach."

AP reported that Senator Schuring said unlike the current system, the money earmarked for education under the amendment could not be diverted to other interests. The amount of money generated by the formula this year would equal what the state currently spends on education, Schuring said. However, as state revenue increases, the sales and income tax collections would automatically increase as well, yielding more money for Ohio schools. In the past 20 years, tax collections have grown 200 percent, he said.    

AP said some education advocates question how the money would be divided between grades K-12 and higher education, and what would happen if lawmakers cut taxes. AP said Schuring wants to create a commission made up of education and business representatives that would recommend how the money is distributed to Ohio’s 613 school districts.

Read the AP article. Click:  Proposed school funding plan to draw from state taxes  

                   ·    December 7, 2007- Teacher Experience Matters Most

 

A new report by researchers at the Washington State Institute for Public Policy says teacher experience, and not advanced degrees, has a greater effect on how well students succeed.

The REPORT TO THE JOINT TASK FORCE ON BASIC EDUCATION FINANCE: School Employee Compensation and Student Outcomes, issued December 1st said, "In the first few years on the job, a teacher gains considerably in her or his ability to improve the academic performance of students." The researchers found a dramatic improvement in student achievement between one and five years of teacher experience and a more gradual boost in the years following. Student achievement was mostly tracked through scores on standardized reading or math tests. An analysis of studies concerning teachers getting graduate degrees found the degrees seemed to have little or no impact on student outcomes.

The report makes a preliminary recommendation that any changes in the way teachers are paid should emphasize financial rewards for experience rather than higher pay for teachers with graduate degrees.

Read the report. Click:  Full Report 

                       ·    December 6, 2007- Governor, Voters Reject Vouchers

The Akron Beacon Journal reported Monday that Governor Strickland said, ''I remain adamantly opposed to vouchers. I support a moratorium on any new charters schools until we get accountability and transparency standards in place.'' ''I'll never submit a budget that has voucher money in it,'' Strickland said. ''I think vouchers are inherently undemocratic. This is my deeply felt personal opinion. When public dollars are being allocated, there needs to be public oversight. The taxpaying public has no ability to influence decisions that are made by these institutions that accept vouchers.''

On a related note, The Leaders Edge, published by the American Association of School Administrators (AASA), said after a hard-fought battle, the proposed school voucher in Utah was defeated at the polls on November 6th. Voters rejected the program, which had been passed by the legislature and sent to the election ballot by the courts, by a margin of 62% to 37%. "It thus joins the long and distinguished line of voucher programs that have been continuously rejected at the polls, almost all of which by more than a two-thirds majority," AASA said. The list of voucher issues rejected by the voters include:

  • 1970 Nebraska Tuition Reimbursement, Rejected 57 percent - 43 percent
  • 1972 Maryland Voucher Program, Rejected 55 percent - 45 percent
  • 1978 Michigan Voucher Program, Rejected 74 percent - 26 percent
  • 1981 Washington, D.C., Tuition Tax Credit, Rejected 89 percent - 11 percent
  • 1990 Oregon Tuition Tax Credit, Rejected 67 percent - 33 percent
  • 1992 Colorado Voucher Program, Rejected 67 percent - 33 percent
  • 1993 California Voucher Program, Rejected 70 percent - 30 percent
  • 2000 California Voucher Program, Rejected 71 percent - 29 percent
  • 2000 Michigan Voucher Program, Rejected 69 percent - 31 percent
  • 2007 Utah Voucher Program, Rejected 62 percent - 37 percent

 

                     ·    December 5, 2007- Around The Statehouse

 

What's happening at the Statehouse in Columbus?
BAN ON STRIKES   School employees would be banned from going on strike under legislation proposed by State Senator John Carey . Instead, teachers and other district employees would be required to settle disputes through binding arbitration, much like police and fire personnel. "We've had five or six strikes in Ohio this year, and they can do a lot of damage to the community," Carey said. Senator Carey will formally roll out his proposal today at a news conference. ....Columbus Dispatch
BAN ON CORPORAL PUNISHMENT   Two Ohio lawmakers Tuesday proposed banning corporal punishment in schools, a practice already rare in the state. Under the measure introduced yesterday by State Representatives Jon Peterson and Brian Williams, all school officials would be prohibited from using corporal punishment. Since 1993, the state has banned the practice unless a local school board specifically acts to allow it. Seventeen school systems in 16 counties still use corporal punishment, according to the Center for Effective Discipline, an advocacy group pushing the proposal.  ....Cincinnati Enquirer
SCHOOL FUNDING RESPONSE BY 2010   Speaking five years after the Ohio Supreme Court last found the state's school funding system unconstitutional, Governor Ted Strickland said he intends to propose a response before his current term ends at the close of 2010. ....Gongwer News Service
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS ABOUT FUNDING PROPOSAL   People like the effort, but they have questions that remain unanswered by the constitutional amendment introduced by State Senator Kirk Schuring yesterday to change how education is funded in Ohio. Chief among those questions is how will the proposal reduce property taxes for each school district. Schuring doesn’t know, only that he expects state revenues sent to schools to grow if his plan is approved first by the General Assembly and then voters, if it gets that far.   ....Canton Repository
Read article by GateHouse Columbus Bureau Chief. 

 

 

                       ·    December 4, 2007- Another School Funding Amendment To Be Introduced Today

 

The Canton Repository reported this morning that another constitutional amendment that would change how schools in Ohio are funded will be introduced today. Its sponsor wants it on the November 2008 ballot. State Senator Kirk Schuring will introduce a long-promised plan to change how primary, secondary and higher education are funded in Ohio. Each chamber of the Legislature must pass the measure with a three-fifths majority to get it onto the ballot.

Schuring expects the proposal to relieve pressure on property taxes by increasing the state’s share of money. Schuring said a similar plan was passed in Michigan in the 1990s that dropped the local share of school funding from 60 percent to 20 percent, while the state contribution increased by a like amount. He expects that to happen in Ohio, according to the Repository. 

The Repository said, based on current funding of $12.24 billion, Schuring’s proposal would fund schools using 59.6 percent of income tax receipts; 71.2 percent of sales and use tax receipts; 70 percent of the Commercial Activity Tax; 25.4 percent of the Kilowatt-hour Tax; and 100 percent of Lottery profits. 
 
Senator Shuring said, “This is a complicated jigsaw puzzle. By introducing this now, it starts the process of the leadership in the Legislature and the Governor to work together to get something done.”
 
Read the Canton Repository article. Click: School-funding revamp
 

                       ·    December 3, 2007- Governor Renews Commitment To Fix School Funding

 

According to the Columbus Dispatch, yesterday Governor Strickland renewed his commitment to fix school funding in Ohio. Speaking at the Trinity Baptist Church in Columbus, the Governor acknowledged the school-funding problem isn't fixed, but pointed out, "I've been in office 11 months and the problem has festered for nearly 11 years." Last year, Strickland told the group he would consider himself a "failed governor" if he didn't resolve the school-funding mess. "I own this issue," he said again yesterday. "I am not going to run away from it or walk away from it. I am not crawling away from it either. I think about it every day. It is my strong commitment to get this done."

Today, the Akron Beacon Journal reported that Governor Strickland said the issue [school funding] is active, not dormant in his administration, and rarely a day passes that he doesn't think or talk about school funding and reform with his staff. He said he would like the problem to be solved through a joint effort with the legislature, but he will support a ballot initiative to amend the Ohio Constitution if nothing materializes in the Ohio General Assembly. ''I owned this issue as a candidate. I have continued to own it as the governor. I am not interested in a failed attempt to solve the problem of school funding and school reform,'' the Governor said. 

                   ·    November 30, 2007- Education Bits & Briefs

Forty years ago, the United States ranked No. 1 in the percentage of people with a high school diploma; now the U.S. ranks 19th. Currently, Ohio ranks 38th out of the 50 states in the number of high school graduates academically ready for college.  ...Akron Beacon Journal

For the 2006-07 school year, 120 Ohio school districts reduced the amount spent per student over the previous year while 494 averaged more spent per student. ...Toledo Blade
 
Students who live below the poverty line need 1.2 times more funding than other students do. ...National Center for Education Statistics
 
The Center for Special Education Finance estimates that disabled students need 1.9 times more money than other students do. ...Center for Special Education Finance
 
Nationally, $9,969 is the projected average expenditure per pupil for fall enrollment in public elementary and secondary schools in 2007-08.  ...National Center for Education Statistics

 

                    ·    November 29, 2007- Study: More Money Needed To Meet State And Federal Mandates

Education spending must increase by nearly 27 percent in Pennsylvania in order to reach its goal of bringing all students to proficiency in mathematics and reading by 2014 as mandated by the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act, according to a financial analysis ordered by state lawmakers. Pennsylvania spent an average of $9,512 per child in 2005-06, the study found, but should have spent $12,057 per child in order to meet its academic goals.

The study noted that Pennsylvania’s poorest districts had to raise taxes more than its wealthiest because they lack the tax base to support local schools. The state attempts to ease those disparities by sending more money to needier districts, but since state funds account for only about one-third of total school spending, the state cannot close those gaps. The study also found that 95 percent of Pennsylvania school districts are spending less than the recommended levels.

Similar, if not worse, conditions exist in Ohio. Ohio's average expenditure per pupil was $8,675 (EFM-Expenditure Flow Model) in 2005-06. However, some Ohio rural Appalachian school districts per pupil expenditure was as low as $6,653 that same year. Ohio school districts must also meet state and federal mandates.

Read the Pennsylvania study. Click: key findings of a “costing-out” studyRequires Adobe Acrobat Reader

                    ·    November 28, 2007- Indiana Debates School Funding, Property Tax Relief

 

The Indianapolis Star reported yesterday that the Indiana State Teachers Union is calling for the legislature to reject proposals for the state to cover all of school general operating costs rather than property taxpayers, saying doing so "threatens the stability of public school funding." Both the state's governor and a bipartisan legislative commission have proposed the shifting of school general funds to state taxpayers and off property taxpayers, as one element of broader property tax reform packages." Union officials said the governor's proposal "could be a problem, because in tight times in the past lawmakers have let schools generate funds from property taxes to make up for shortfalls in state revenue." Instead, the union suggested that "the state could achieve the property tax cuts sought by picking up half of school transportation and capital projects funding," which the union claims "are growing faster, and therefore causing property taxes to grow faster, than school general funds."

According to the Associated Press, property taxes in Indiana make up about 15 percent of the school general fund, which pays for things like instructional programs and teacher salaries in Indiana, while the state already pays for the other 85 percent.

Read newspaper articles. Click : Indianapolis Star     Click: AP   Click: Louisville Courier-Journal

Source: School Business Daily

 

                   ·    November 27, 2007- College Board Targets Low-Income Students

The College Board is seeking to mobilize its more than 5,200 members in a national campaign to better help students from low-income families prepare for, get into, and succeed in college. Among the ideas put forward for action are setting student-aid policies that narrow the gap in enrollment between students from low-income and affluent backgrounds, waiving college-application fees for low-income students, and mounting college-awareness programs.

An October 2007 College Board report finds that nearly half of all college-qualified graduates from low- and moderate-income families do not enroll in four-year colleges because of financial barriers. It also points to other barriers, such as poor preparation, low expectations for students, and a lack of reliable information about college possibilities and the value of attending college.

"Put simply, our country cannot prosper without fully developing all of its human resources," the College Board president writes in the introduction. "It would be both morally wrong and competitively foolish to foreclose young people’s options for higher education, based even in part on income. And yet, that is where we find ourselves today."

Read the College Board press release. Click:  “CollegeKeys Compact”  For full report. Click:  Final Report (.pdf/748K)

On a related note, a recent proposal from the Ohio Board of Regents for public four-year universities would reward schools with more first-generation students. The board said increasing degrees among those with no college graduates in their family "represents the greatest possible return on the state's investment."

Sources: Education Week and Cincinnati Enquirer

                    ·    November 26, 2007- Needy Children Fare Poorly In Ohio

 

A new study to be released this week by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, which advocates for needy children and families, says Ohio ranked 42nd of the 50 states for low-income children who fare the worst in health care, education, social and emotional well-being and family structure. According to the study, 38 percent of Ohio's children are from low-income households. "Many states that looked as if they're doing quite well when all children were assessed don't look so good when you assess only low-income children," the author of the study said.  
 
The report is the first to look at the well-being of low-income children by state and is based on newly available federal data. Children in low-income families was defined as those below 200% of the poverty level, about $41,000 last year for a family of four. 
 
The full report should be available on the Annie E. Casey Foundation web site later this week at  www.aecf.org

 

                  ·    November 21, 2007- The Per Pupil Expenditure Gap

 

A recent Toledo Blade article reported the per pupil expenditures for Ohio's top spending school districts. Below are the total expenditures per student during the 2005-06 school year, based on districts’ ‘Average Daily Membership,’ for the top five Ohio school districts.
 
     School District                   2005-06
Cuyahoga Heights                      $17,811
Beachwood                                $17,368
Orange                                     $17,518
Cleveland Hts-Univ Hts             $15,488
Shaker Heights                         $15,103
 
In addition, the Blade article listed the expenditure for Cuyahoga Heights, Beachwood and Orange at well over $18,000 per pupil for the 2006-07 school year
 
The average expenditure per pupil (EFM-expenditure flow model) for school districts in the 29 Ohio Appalachian counties was $8,229 for the 2005-06 school year. One Ohio Appalachian district spent as low as $6,653 per pupil, with several other school districts near that same figure.
 
Data Source: Ohio Department of Education and Toledo Blade

 

                   ·    November 21, 2007- Where's the Money?

 

Would-be Ohio charter-school operators received a total of $2.55 million in state and federal "planning grants" to start 33 schools that never opened, state records show. The Ohio Department of Education is trying to recoup $1.56 million from 19 schools that either misspent startup grants or could not document how the money was spent.
 
Read the Canton Repository editorial.  Click:  Charter schools waste state money

 

                  ·    November 20, 2007- Another Local Chamber Of Commerce Enters School Funding Fray

 

An article in the Saturday Canton Repository said, "The Ohio Supreme Court ruled in 1997 that school funding needed to change. Ten years later, a funding fix remains elusive, and school districts are slashing budgets, cutting programs and continually going back to property owners for more tax revenue." In addition, the article said, five out of seven Stark County school issues failed November 6th. As a result, the chairman of the Canton Chamber of Commerce board said the community can’t afford to wait on the state legislative process.
 
Therefore, the Canton Chamber of Chamber has established a task force, including members from the educational community and local business leaders, in an attempt to develop community-based solutions to school funding. The group expects to meet monthly for at least six to eight months, and anticipates releasing next year a report to the community that includes recommendations for action. Some of those recommendations, according to the Repository, could include what expenses school districts can share and what alternative funding sources are available. The task force will center its work around two questions: (1) How can we raise more money and how can those dollars be used? and (2) How can we save more money? 
 
Earlier this month the northeast regional Chamber of Commerce held a second meeting on a proposal to consolidate  local public school administrations in Mahoning, Trumbull and Columbiana counties. The chamber claims the consolidation will save money.
 
Read the Canton Repository article. Click: • Task force to tackle school funding

 

                  ·    November 19, 2007- Governor's Promises, School Funding, Education Reform, Proposed Solutions

 
On Sunday, several Ohio newspapers choose to write about the Governor's 'education' promises, school funding, education reform and proposed solutions. The Akron Beacon Journal went so far as to offer "some examples of major changes that could help produce that efficient system." The ABJ examples included:
  • Combining funding and governance of pre-kindergarten through 12th-grade education with that of higher education.
  • Providing more time for students who need it, and faster progression through the system for capable students, enabling them to gain college credits before graduation and realize tuition savings.
  • Giving staff and parents authority over individual school budgets, along with training so that they could exercise the authority wisely.
  • Improved early screening, followed by more-accountable prevention and intervention programs for all kids.
  • Benchmarking Ohio's standards and tests to those of the National Association for Educational Progress, and eliminating low cut-off scores to increase passage rates.
  • Expediting data-driven systems now available that can assess students' strengths and weaknesses, show teachers what each student needs to perform at grade level and guide better decision-making in our schools.
  • Using technology to more widely promote on-line instruction, interactive television and presentations on DVDs by superstar teachers, computerized record-keeping, online teacher training and professional development and administering and scoring proficiency tests.
  • Statewide collective bargaining and benefits, and a teacher career ladder that includes an internship required for licensure.
  • Statewide implementation of the new Educational Region Service System to provide services more efficiently.
  • Per-pupil funding based on student needs and following the student.
  • Adopting a year-round quarterly calendar to gain instructional time now spent on review each fall, and tutoring students needing more time during quarterly breaks.
  • Increasing apprenticeships and other school-to-work programs to better prepare students who want education alternatives.
  • Of course, little of the above will be possible without remedying conditions that limit productivity — the high incidence of behavior problems, computer downtime, teaching to proficiency tests and interference with instructional time.

Read the Akron Beacon Journal article. Click: The all-inclusive task of education reform 

Read additional related articles from Sunday newspapers. Click on the links below.

Editorial: Strickland's deeds on school finance fall well short of his words                                                                                         

  (Cleveland Plain Dealer  11/18/2007)   

EDITORIAL: A priority no more                                                                                                                                                                (Lima News  11/18/2007)

Proposals being pushed for Ohio's 2008 ballot could emerge as a key subplot if the state reprises its role as kingmaker                 (Toledo Blade  11/18/2007)

Per-student spending rises in most of Ohio
(Toledo Blade  11/18/2007)

Schools that never were got millions                                                                                                                                          (Columbus Dispatch  11/18/2007)

              ·    November 16, 2007- School Funding Problems: Ohio Not Alone

 

School funding problems are prevalent across the country. Read some of the headlines and/or related articles.

·  Despite court ruling, Ohio 's governor has yet to address state funding formula. Related article. Click:  AP

·  New Jersey education commissioner expects new school funding formula "within a week." Related article. Click: Star-Ledger

·  Maryland legislature approves change to funding formula. Related article. Click: Gazette

·  Wisconsin legislature may call for new funding formula. Related article. Click: WISC-TV

·  Report: Pennsylvania underfunding schools by more than $4 billion per year. Related article. Click: Philadelphia Daily News

·  Pennsylvania costing-out study may guide new funding formula. Related article. Click: York Dispatch

·  Report: Kentucky school funding increases used primarily to cover employee benefits. Related article: Click: Herald Leader

· Arizona schools object to construction funding system. Related article. Click: Daily Star

· Task force recommends new school funding formula to New Mexico legislature. Related article. Click: AP

On a related note, Pennsylvania state legislators directed the state's Board of Education to commission the independent cost study of the state's education system. The study, completed by Augenblick, Palaich and Associates Inc., based in Denver, was released Wednesday. The study asserts that school districts would have to spend on average $12,057 per student every year for that student to meet the state's standards. The study put forth a "base" amount for students who need no special services -- $8,003 per year -- but added money to account for students with special needs. 

Source: School Business Daily

             ·    November 15, 2007- Statewide Healthcare Plan

 

A bill making its way through the Pennsylvania House of Representatives would "create a 12-member Public School Employees' Benefit Board, with four members from the state government, four representing teacher unions and four representing employers," responsible for deciding whether a single, statewide insurance system is feasible." If so, districts would be required to join as current teacher contracts expire." Supporters say the system would remove a contentious issue from contract negotiations between school districts and unions throughout the state, and would probably reduce the cost of health insurance for most school employees. 

The Cleveland Plain Dealer reported today that one of the ideas the Northeast Ohio Universities Collaboration & Innovation Study Commission, made up of civic leaders and the heads of the region's five public universities, plan to present to  Governor Strickland is to combine employees' health care plans. 

Sources: School Business Daily and Cleveland Plain Dealer

           ·    November 14, 2007- Another Math/Science Study

The new study, published today (Nov. 14) by the American Institutes for Research, compares the performance of 8th graders in individual American states not against each other, but against students in top-performing foreign nations. Students in most U.S. states are performing as well as or better than most students in foreign countries in math and science, but the highest achieving states are still significantly below the highest achieving countries, according to the report. The study compared U.S. students' scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, a test often called the "nation's report card," with how foreign students performed on the International Mathematics and Science Study. Twelve states and eight countries were ahead of Ohio in science, 17 states and nine countries in math. 

On a related note, the Columbus Dispatch reported today that just less than 17 percent of degrees awarded by U.S. universities are in science, technology, engineering and math, compared with 52 percent in China, 64 percent in Japan and 41 percent in South Korea. What the Dispatch failed to say was how many degrees the percentage represents.

Read the news release and/or report: 8th Graders in Most U.S. States Performing Better in Math and Science than Students in Most Foreign Countries

Sources: American Institutes for Research and Columbus Dispatch

          ·    November 14, 2007- More Schools In Poor Communities Failing Under NCLB

The Gannett News Service reported today that about one fifth of schools in the nation's poorest communities were flagged as poor performers last year, and more are expected to make the list as a 2014 performance deadline approaches under the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law. There are more than 51,000 high-poverty, or Title 1, schools in the country. According to the Education Department statistics, about 10,700 of those schools, or 21 percent, failed to meet the NCLB standard last year. That's up about 8 percent from the year before. The number of high-poverty schools identified as "needing improvement" last year rose in 26 states and the District of Columbia, according to federal education statistics.

School officials believe without greater flexibility to measure student growth, thousands more schools will be labeled as failing even if 99 percent of the kids at each school score well on standardized tests. As most know, a school can miss making "adequate yearly progress" if: (1) Its students, as a whole, fall short of targets on state math and reading tests; (2) Individual subsets of students fall short (Subsets consist of students who, for example, are low-income, don't speak English as a first language, have disabilities or belong to a distinct racial or ethnic group); or (3) More than 5 percent of students eligible to take the tests fail to do so.

Source: Gannett News Service

           ·    November 13, 2007- "The Turnaround Challenge"

 

An Education Week article said thousands of low-performing schools are likely to face the severe consequences under the federal No Child Left Behind Act in the next few years.
 
The report, The Turnaround Challenge, by Mass Insight Education and Research Institute, a Boston-based research and advocacy group, will be released this week. The authors of the report maintain that the traditional approach to helping the nations most troubled schools is too fragmented and “timid” to be effective or sustainable. This report is intended to serve as a flexible framework for how states and school districts can reverse the downward slide of their worst schools within a couple of years.
 
Mass Insight envisions a broad-based and highly cooperative system of rapid school improvement. States and school districts would form small, specialized units to supervise and coordinate the work of locally based “lead” turnaround specialists, who would partner with a range of providers to supply an integrated array of services to schools. States would provide incentives to be part of the turnaround work, seek out and develop a corps of skilled turnaround experts, and make sure money was allotted to make the work possible. The specialized units would need enough freedom and authority to respond swiftly to schools’ needs.

Read the Executive Summary of the report. Click: The Turnaround Challenge -- EXECUTIVE SUMMARY  for an eight-page summary that provides an overview of the main points and recommendations in the report. 

The Turnaround Challenge is part of a larger, multi-phase initiative of the Mass Insight Education & Research Institute, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The initiative is aimed at helping states, districts, schools, and partners to successfully address the issue of chronically under-performing schools – and to use failing school turnaround as the entry point for fundamental change more broadly in public education.

 

        ·    November 12, 2007- Ohio Charter Schools In National News

 

The New York Times reported Friday that Ohio charter schools has a far higher failure rate than most states. The report said fifty-seven percent of Ohio's charter schools, most of which are in cities, are in academic watch or emergency, compared with 43 percent of traditional public schools in Ohio’s big cities........and the state’s school report card gave more than half of Ohio’s 328 charter schools a D or an F in 2006-07.
 
Behind the Ohio charter school failures, the New York Times said, are systemic weaknesses that include loopholes in oversight, a law allowing 70 government and private agencies to authorize new charters, and financial incentives that encourage sponsors to let schools stay open. In addition, the Times said federal money helped fuel the growth, with up to $450,000 available to every new school in its first three years and Ohio sweetened that incentive with $50,000 more.
 
Some Ohio charters were formed, not to innovate in the classroom, but to take advantage of the start-up money, experts said, which is in addition to state financing allocated by enrollment numbers. Also setting Ohio apart has been the large number of charter schools managed by commercial companies. "The state’s largest commercial operator, David Brennan, an Akron industrialist, is a major donor to Republican candidates," the article said. "Most of his 30 or so charter schools are on academic emergency or watch."
 
Read the New York Times article. Click: Ohio Goes After Charter Schools That Are Failing

 

          ·    November 9, 2007- Most Voters Say "No" To "New Money" For Schools

 

While 54% of Ohio's 200 school tax issues passed in the November 6, 2007 election, the 29 Ohio Appalachian counties fared less well. The Ohio Appalachian counties had 24 issues on the ballot with only 9, or 37.5%, passing. The 24 school tax issues in the 29-county region included 17 requests for "new money" with only 3, or 17.65%, passing. The approval rate statewide for "new money" school tax issues was about 30%.

 

         ·    November 8, 2007- November 6th School Election Results

 

There were 200 school issues on the November 6, 2007 ballot. Twenty-three districts had 2 issues on the ballot and one district had three issues on the ballot. The Ohio Department of Education reported that 107 issues passed and 93 failed for a 53.5% passing rate.
 
View the election results. Click on the following.