Budget boosts private & charter schools at the expense of public schools

Innovation Ohio has taken a close look at the public education implications of the budget bill making its way through the legislature

In particular, we find that HB 59:

• sends more money to charters, regardless of performance
• lowers standards for charter schools, exempting them from accountability expected of Ohio’s traditional public schools
• continues the push to privatize our public schools by union-busting and outsourcing
• sends more taxpayer money to fund private schools, and
• forces traditional schools to do more with less

They further found that the senate budget

• Cut 3 in 4 school districts compared to 2010-2011 funding levels, to the tune of $532.7 million.
• Cut 1 in 4 school districts compared to 2012-2013 funding levels.
• Continued the need for an unprecedented $1.3 billion in new school levies for operations that have appeared on local ballots since Kasich took office, and causing 82 percent of school districts to cut staff positions last year.

You can download their report, here.

Why such inequity? Some reason it is because for-profit charter school operators such as David Brennan and William Lager are such huge contributors to the very politicians making these inequitable decisions

Brennan and Lager are the top individual contributors to the Republican leadership in the House and Senate (or close to it) . And they're no slouches when it comes to Gov. John Kasich either. They've given nearly $1 million to politicians since 2008.

It should come as little surprise then, that even though Brennan and Lager operate some of the worst charter schools in the state, they are receiving some of the largest increases in state spending - even more than some of their higher performing charter school peers.

Charter school performance crisis

The Ohio Department of education finally released their complete set of school ratings data, so we can once again take a look at the performance of traditional public schools and Ohio's charter schools. Keep in mind as you look at these results that charter schools in Ohio cost $54 more per pupil than traditional public schools, and that 90% of the money going to charter schools that are rated in Ohio go from better performing school districts to poorer performing charter schools on the Performance Index.

So, with that in mind, how do these schools stack up against each other?

The answer is, that charters do not stack up well against traditional public schools at all. Less than 10% of Ohio's charter schools rate excellent or better, compared to 54% of Ohio's traditional public schools. Worse still, at the bottom end, almost 40% of Ohio's charter schools are in academic emergency or academic watch, compared with just over 11% of Ohio's traditional public schools.

These results make it very difficult to justify diverting over $820 million from traditional schools delivering a quality education to charter schools delivering failure.

Standards are now so low in some Ohio charter schools that an investigative report by State Impact has found

Can’t pass the Ohio Graduation Tests? No problem, some charter schools say. You can still graduate.

At some Ohio charter schools, if a student can’t pass Ohio’s five graduation exams — in reading, writing, math, science and social studies — the schools enroll them in a series of correspondence courses through an Illinois-based school. The student then earns a high school diploma from the state of Illinois. Illinois does not require students to pass a state test to graduate.

If there's an education crisis in Ohio, it's with Ohio's charter schools first, and most.

Repeal of SB5 favored by double digits

A new Quinnipiac poll has just been released showing that Ohioans continue to reject SB5 by double digit margins.

Ohio voters support 51 - 38 percent repeal in a November referendum of SB 5, the law limiting collective bargaining for public employees, compared to 56 - 32 percent in July.
[...]
In the SB 5 referendum, Republicans say keep the law 65 - 23 percent, up from 56 - 35 percent July 20. Men oppose SB 5 50 - 45 percent, compared to 55 - 37 percent. Women want to repeal the law 53 - 31 percent, compared to 56 - 28 percent in July.

From inside the poll, Ohians continue to view the extreme measures in SB5 as unacceptable, Oppose 58 - 36 percent banning public employees from striking;
Oppose 53 - 41 percent eliminating seniority rights as the sole factor in layoffs;
Oppose 54 - 39 percent banning public employees from bargaining over health insurance.

Despite the fact that the overwhelming number of public employees already contribute their fair share to their benefits, the pro SB5 message does have some traction with voters
Support 59 - 35 percent requiring public employees to pay at least 15 percent of their health insurance costs;
Support 56 - 33 percent requiring public employees to pay 10 percent of their wages toward their pensions;

With 6 weeks left until election day, there is still work to do to continue to press home the fact that SB5 is unfair, unsafe and hurts midddle class workers, and over come these distortions being spread by SB5 supporters.

Poll	For SB5	Against SB5
PPP Mar 15th	31%	54%
Wenzel Apr 12th	38%	51%
Quinnipiac May 18th	36%	54%
PPP May 25th	35%	55%
Quinnipiac Jul 20th	32%	56%
PPP Aug 18th	39%	50%
Quinnipiac Sep 27th	38%	51%