Education News for 05-31-2013

State Education News

• Ohio's school spending could shoot up (Cincinnati Enquirer)

Ohio public school funding would grow by 11 percent over the next two years versus 2012- 2013 spending levels, the largest percent increase in education spending in at least a decade, under the proposal Senate Republicans…Read more...

• School aid would be boosted under Ohio Senate proposal (Cleveland Plain Dealer)

Ohio Senate leaders this afternoon proposed boosting basic state aid to districts from $6.3 billion this school year to more than $7 billion…Read more...

• Ohio Senate ups education funding in budget (Columbus Dispatch)

Most Franklin County school districts would see state funding increases averaging nearly 9 percent per year under Senate-proposed changes to the new two-year budget…Read more...

• Schools challenge families to scale back on tech use (Columbus Dispatch)

Her daughter yearned for the television, her son for his iPod. Both parents felt disconnected without phones and computers. But for one week they left electronics untouched.Well, at least the kids did…Read more...

• ODOT grants will help kids get to school more safely (Columbus Dispatch)

The Ohio Department of Transportation has approved $7.2 million in projects to improve safety for students getting to and from school…Read more...

• Senate funding plan aims to assist Ohio education system (Lorain Morning Journal)

A substitute version of Ohio’s school funding plan proposed by the Senate would increase aid for state education $717.4 million over the next 10 years…Read more...

• Bill with similarities to "Cleveland Plan" could soon pass for Columbus schools (Ohio Public Radio)

It’s been a rough school year for Columbus City Schools. The district is under investigation by the State Auditor’s office and the FBI for tampering with student attendance data and grades. And the struggling district has a history of less-than-stellar…Read more...

• Senators say their school funding plan is constitutional (Ohio Public Radio)

Ohio Senators are calling their new budget plan “a work in progress” but they are touting it as a major improvement in funding for Ohio’s public schools…Read more...

• State Senate plan for 2-year budget not as good for TPS (Toledo Blade)

Senate Republicans on Thursday said they will pump $717 million more into basic aid for K- 12 schools during the next two years in the budget they plan to approve next week…Read more...

• School funding plan in the works could increase dollars for some districts (Youngstown Vindicator)

Senate Republicans unveiled a new school-funding formula Thursday that likely will change as it moves through committee deliberations and passage in the Senate…Read more...

Local Education News

• Clear Fork to improve school routes (Mansfield News Journal)

The Ohio Department of Transportation said Thursday it will dole out $7.2 million for 58 different Safe Routes to School projects in Ohio communities…Read more...

• Brecksville-Broadview Heights educators hoping to expand EdCamp (Sun Newspapers)

A pair of Brecksville-Broadview Heights educators once again are teaming to host a free conference about education…Read more...

Education News for 10-25-2012

State Education News

• Staff earns cash for grades (Dayton Daily News)

Springboro Community City Schools is planning to pay staff more than $200,000 in bonuses…Read more...

Local Education News

• Lakota anticipates spending deficits in next 4 of 5 years (Hamilton Journal-News)

Spending deficits are projected in Lakota’s near future, and school officials have said further budget reductions will have to come…Read more...

• Granville schools, Lodge strike deal on valuation (Newark Advocate)

The Granville School District and five other tax districts will not have to refund tax collections to the current owners of Cherry Valley Lodge because of a decrease in the lodge’s property valuation…Read more...

• BP sets STEM curriculum (Warren Tribune Chronicle)

Trumbull County Schools' new curriculum will give students a competitive edge in both their education and their career of choice…Read more...

• Lorain: School system, city on the brink (WKYC)

The city of Lorain and the Lorain City School District are struggling to survive. The area has been hit hard by the economy and unemployment, and families are struggling to get by…Read more...

Education News for 10-22-2012

State Education News

• School chiefs making exodus from districts (Columbus Dispatch)

Almost half the school districts in Franklin County will lose their leaders this school year, an educational brain drain for central Ohio…Read more...

• 2004 schools audit died quiet death (Columbus Dispatch)

In the fall of 2004, Andrew J. Ginther, who was then on the Columbus Board of Education and is now Columbus City Council president, received two anonymous messages…Read more...

• School levies ruling ballot (Columbus Dispatch)

Two-thirds of the school levies on the Nov. 6 ballot are seeking additional local revenue to support public education, the highest percentage of new tax issues…Read more...

• In some school districts, about 40 percent of their third-graders could be held back by a new state law (Columbus Dispatch)

Ohio school districts have started to tell some parents that their child is behind in reading, offering a glimpse of how many students could be held back under the state’s new third- grade reading-guarantee law…Read more...

• Schools districts find ways to incorporate digital textbooks (Middletown Journal)

When U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan said this month that all schools should convert to digital textbooks, some less affluent school districts cried foul…Read more...

• Ohio e-book purchasers in line (Portsmouth Daily Times)

If you purchsed certain electronic books (e-books), you should be looking for an email…Read more...

• State remaking the grade on report cards (Warren Tribune Chronicle)

Like other local administrators, Lakeview Schools Superintendent Robert Wilson said that his district will work to hit the state's academic target regardless of where it stands…Read more...

• Patrol prepares for Bus Safety Week (Warren Tribune Chronicle)

Area Ohio State Highway Patrol posts are participating in National School Bus Safety Week, which starts Monday…Read more...

Local Education News

• Trial in Chardon High shootings postponed until January (Cleveland Plain Dealer)

The trial of T.J. Lane, the teenager accused of killing three students and shooting three others at Chardon High School, has been rescheduled to Jan. 14…Read more...

• Group wants Columbus schools’ seclusion-room doors removed (Columbus Dispatch)

Take the doors off seclusion rooms before more children are harmed, a disability-rights group told the Columbus school district…Read more...

http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2012/10/20/group-wants-columbus-schools-seclusion- room-doors-removed.html

• Former Perrysburg woman indicted, accused of stealing from school, community groups (Toledo Blade)

A former Perrysburg woman accused of stealing thousands of dollars from school and community groups was indicted this week on charges she stole from three other organizations…Read more...

• TPS’ challenge will get tougher without new tax (Toledo Blade)

This wasn’t the October surprise that Toledo Public Schools wanted. Even as TPS is pleading with voters to approve a big tax increase this fall, school leaders are scrambling to explain why a new state-issued report card has downgraded…Read more...

• iPads no longer going home with Cleveland Heights students after thefts (WEWS)

A dozen thefts in the past two weeks have robbed middle school students…Read more...

• Perry Schools' 5-year forecast points to deficit spending (Willoughby News Herald)

The Perry School District has approved a five-year forecast that projects deficit spending in 2016. Treasurer Lew Galante explained that each year, the time frame for when deficit spending could be expected has been delayed…Read more...

Editorial

• Awash in excellence (Akron Beacon Journal)

What’s all the grousing about an underperforming public school system in Ohio? Take a look at the latest state report cards, and the impression is that the public is needlessly critical of the quality of public education…Read more...

Romney’s plan would cut education, drastically

During the last Presidential debate, Mitt Romney surprised a lot of watchers by claiming, “I’m not going to cut education funding. I don’t have any plan to cut education funding.”

But according to his own plan, that claim doesn't hold water, as Innovation Ohio point out, after looking at his plan

But that’s exactly what his plan proposes. From “The Romney Program for Economic Recovery, Growth, and Jobs”:

Reduce federal spending as a share of GDP to 20 percent – its pre-crisis average – by 2016.

Even while it cuts total spending to 20 percent of the nation’s economy, compared to 23 percent today, the plan also promises to increase the rate of growth in GDP, but also increases spending on defense and holds Social Security and Medicare harmless. To make the numbers work, Romney has admitted it will require nearly $500 billion in annual cuts by 2016.

That kind of money is not going to come exclusively from eliminating Big Bird.

Innovation Ohio and the Center for American Progress have calculated that the plan will result in across-the-board cuts to remaining federal programs equal to 11 percent in 2013, and averaging 39 percent a year over the next decade.

What does that mean for education?

According to the Ohio Department of Education, in 2011, Ohio school districts received $1.7 billion in federal education funding.

In 2013, this means Ohio schools would be cut by $189 million. Over the decade, schools would see $669 million less, each year, under the Romney plan.

We know candidates often try to put their plans in the best possible light, but Romney’s claim he won’t cut education doesn’t hold up.

Tea partiers threaten public education

Not content with the Governor's $3 billion dollar state budget assault on public education, tea partiers, supported by the far right "1851 Center for Constitutional Law" - an offshoot of the right wing Buckeye Institute, are seeking to assault public education funding at the local level too.

Taxpayers for Westerville Schools, a group that opposed a 6.9-mill levy that voters approved in March, has begun collecting signatures to repeal an equal portion of an 11.4-mill levy approved in 2009.

The group is reaching back to that levy because state law bars the repeal of temporary tax issues, such as the five-year levy passed this year. The 2009 tax issue is permanent.

This is a move so radical and extreme that it has only ever been proposed once in the history of the state. If the "Center for Constitutional law" really cared about the Ohio constitution and public education it would be lobbying for a constitutional funding formula for our schools instead of trying to defund them. But rather than do that, they have published a document that contains the broad tactics groups can use to defund public education, a document that contains such information as

Warning: if you follow the advice in this guide, proponents of higher spending and taxation will assert, as always, that children will suffer unless new levies are enacted, while current revenue sources are maintained. However, if you’ve read this far, you and your neighbors (1) have likely already heard and dispelled this argument; (2) are aware that your local school district has a spending problem, not a revenue problem; and (3) simply want to keep more of what you have rightfully earned, and want to this seemingly endless cycle of tax hikes to stop.

Clearly they think every district has a spending problem, and every citizen is over taxed - regardless of whether voters in places like Westerville disagreed by passing a levy just months ago. Their roadmap even includes this nugget:

(6) Keep a low profile. Remember, only once every five years can an attempt be made to reduce any given levy. If your school district’s teachers union gets wind of your plans too early in the process, they may quickly gather signatures and place a .000001 mil reduction of the levy tax on the ballot before you are able to gather and submit signatures for your more significant reduction.

Wanting to operate in the shadows was evident yesterday when confronted over twitter

@jointhefutureOH @DispatchEteam @dougcaruso @cbinkley We are all WCSD residents concerned about our schools' future-NOT a tea party group.

We responded

@TFWS1 Really? All just a coincidence you're involved with the 1851 center? Same agenda as the tea party, same support. Same, same.

As did others

@TFWS1 @jointhefutureOH Sounds like the tenets of the Tea Party? Why fight the association to Tea Party? What's the difference?

At this point, this tea party group tried to make ridiculous claims about the 1851 Constitutional Law Center

@ascheurer @jointhefutureOH They're a non-proft, non-partisan legal ctr dedicatd to protctng the constitut rights of Ohioans from govt abuse

A quick survey of their agenda and their board of directors quickly dispels any notion this is a non-partisan group.

What is striking about this recent move by the tea party to attack public education is their unwillingness to embrace their agenda. Instead, as the 1851 center urges, they want to "keep a low profile". We're going to see to it that that doesn't happen.

Charters spend more on admin, less on class

We observed that SB316 delayed, by 12 months, the requirement passed in the budget to rank schools based upon their classroom spending. As was noted at the time, this was an ill conceived, ill considered plan. As that plan now hits the slow track, research emerges that charter schools spend less in the classroom than traditional public schools.

One of the most frequent criticisms put to traditional public schools is that they waste money on administrative bloat, instead of channeling more funding where it belongs—the classroom. A much leaner and classroom-centered model, some say, can be found in charter schools, because of their relative freedom from stifling bureaucracy.

A new study, however, concludes that this hypothesis has it exactly wrong.

The study, released by the National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education, at Teachers College, Columbia University, examines school spending in Michigan and concludes that charter schools spend more per-pupil on administration and less on instruction than traditional public schools, even when controlling for enrollment, student populations served, and other factors.

Researchers David Arsen, of Michigan State University, and Yongmei Ni, of the University of Utah, found that charters spend $774 more per pupil on administration, and $1,140 less on instruction, than do traditional publics. To come up with their estimates, the authors analyze the level and source of funding for charters and traditional publics, and how they spend money, breaking it out by function. They then use a statistical method known as regression analysis to control for factors that could skew their comparisons of spending on administration and instruction in various schools.

Of the extra $774 that charters devote to administration, $506 went to general administrative services, such as the costs of charter school boards, or the fees of the organizations managing the school.

While Arsen and Ni don't examine in depth the causes of charters' relatively low instructional spending, they speculate that a couple factors could be at work. An obvious one is that more than 80 percent of traditional public schools' spending goes to personnel costs, mostly salaries and benefits—which would presumably drive instructional costs up. Charters, on average, pay lower salaries for teachers with similiar credentials to those hired by traditional publics, and also employ a less experienced and less costly teaching force, the authors say, which would keep instructional costs down.

HEre's the paper in question for your review.

Is Administration Leaner in Charter Schools? Resource Allocation in Charter and Traditional Public Schools