ODE shifting rhetoric in wake of scandal

It's hard not to feel dizzy with all the spinning that is occurring in the wake of the brewing attendance scrubbing scandal ODE is embroiled in. Stan Heffner, the State Superintendent appears to have taken a new position, when the fallout from the high stakes are pointed at his department

With all the mania about improving student test scores, and now the apparent cheating on school-attendance reports, state schools Superintendent Stan Heffner says there’s too much emphasis on district report cards.

“If you focus on doing right by kids, you’ll do OK on your report card. But if you worry about doing well on your report card first, there is no guarantee that your kids are getting what they need,” Heffner said yesterday following remarks about Ohio’s education system before the Columbus Metropolitan Club.

“The report card over time has just taken on way too much importance.”

Just a little over 2 months ago, he had quite the opposite view, in testimony to the House education committee

We should not let the failure of Congress to reauthorize ESEA stop us from seizing the chance to secure a waiver to implement common sense reforms. The new system will change the standard by which schools are judged – moving from mere minimum competency to needed college and career readiness for all students. This means raising the bar, and some schools and districts may initially not look as high performing in the new system. Change can be difficult, especially when districts and schools have been told for years that they are "Excellent" or "Effective." Last year, over half of Ohio’s schools were rated "Excellent" or "Excellent with Distinction.” Yet, 40% of Ohio graduates entering our public universities required remediation before taking first-year, credit-bearing courses in English and mathematics.

It is unfair to students and their families not to provide them with a complete assessment of their academic progress. And, it is unfair to fault local educators who are working hard and have responded to the current system that the state has given them. When the new Local Report Cards are released, parents and the community will have a clearer and more comprehensive view of how their schools impact student performance.

Not a word uttered about the report card taking on too much importance, indeed, he was testifying in order for the report card to take on even more importance. Why the sudden change of heart? Toledo Public Schools might be hinting at the answer

When TPS officials first acknowledged the test score manipulation, they argued that state direction was unclear. Don Yates, president of the Toledo Association of Administrative Personnel, said Friday that the test reporting process has been confusing for years, with rules at times unclear or directions inconsistent.

"I don't have any indication that TPS has done anything that was not fully communicated back and forth with folks within ODE, and certainly internally," Mr. Yates said. "I don't think [ODE direction] has been clear, and I don't think it's been consistent."

District officials point to past publicity about removals of test scores, called scrubbing, that they say failed to produce inquiry or direction from the education department, as evidence the department never clearly opposed the practice.

Has ODE, yet again, been asleep at the switch when it came to oversight responsibilities, or worse still, allowing the scrubbing with a wink and a nod?

Whatever all the ongoing investigations discover, Stan Heffner is not the only one having second thoughts about the shift to high stakes, Rep Stabelton, the chair of the House education committee is too

Rep. Gerald Stebelton (R-Lancaster), who is leading the process to develop the report card change, said he agrees with Superintendent of Public Instruction Stan Heffner's comment earlier this week that the report card might be becoming too important and is pressuring districts to achieve a high ranking.

"I don't disagree with that," he said in an interview. "I think what we need to focus on is educating these children and educating them to the best of our ability using a maximum amount of school time to do that as opposed to, perhaps some districts are choosing to direct their focus primarily to achieving a good score on a test. That's probably not a good idea.

"I think if you're directing, especially in elementary grades, if you're directing your attention to achieving a passing grade on a test, you're probably losing the culture of an excellent classroom where the culture breeds creativity and breeds a desire for learning as opposed to repetition."

Every policy prescription being passed or proposed over the last two years has been focused on the high stakes need to pass one form of test or another. Whether it's for a 3rd grade reading guarantee or a teachers career impacting evaluation.

Now we need to wait and see whether this new change of heart when it comes to school ratings is going to be reflected in new legislature, or whether policy makers and their enablers are going to have short memories, and long brooms with which to sweep the current imbroglio under the rug.

Fordham Exposed Part II

In part I of Fordham Exposed we introduced you to the conservative corporate education reform organization running some Ohio charter schools, and two of its biggest boosters, Terry Ryan and Michael Petrilli. Now let us take a closer look at this Foundation.

You can see the list of Fordham's charter schools here. We knew a short while ago that Fordham was publicly talking a good game, but playing a weak one, when the Ohio Department of Education released the ranking of charter sponsors. Of those 38 ranked sponsors, Fordham was down in a lowly 24th position. You don't rank that low by running quality schools and delivering quality education to students.

This view was further confirmed when ODE released their preliminary school rankings in mid November. The following table is the performance of Fordham's Ohio charter schools from that ODE report, the ranking is out of 3456 schools, and sorted with best first.

2011 RANK	SCHOOL NAME	SCHOOL CLASS TYPE	2011 LRC RATING
1792	Columbus Collegiate Academy	Middle School	Effective
2661	Sciotoville	High School	Cont. Improve.
2687	Phoenix Community Learning Ctr	Elementary School	Effective
2716	Dayton Leadership Academies-Dayton View Campus	Elementary School	Cont. Improve.
2840	Sciotoville Elementary Academy	Elementary School	Cont. Improve.
2977	KIPP: Journey Academy	Middle School	Effective
3052	Springfield Acad Of Excellence	Elementary School	Academic Watch
3188	Dayton Leadership Academies-Dayton Liberty Campus	Elementary School	Cont. Improve.

Almost 2,400 students are in Fordham charter schools that rank in the bottom half of all of Ohio's schools. Why hasn't Fordham been able to translate SB5 like tools into educational success in the many years they have been sponsoring these charters?

They are unencumbered by unionized teachers, state mandated regulations, all the things that should add up to a corporate education reformer's brightest dream. Yes their results are poorer than the majority of Ohio's traditional public schools, who allegedly are held back by unions, bad teachers, and outdated rules.

How can Fordham possibly have any credibility on the issue of education reform when their corporate reform ideas when implemented are delivering such real world lackluster results? When their performance is worse than the majority of traditional schoold they would seek to supplant.

It surely cannot be on account of money. The Fordham Foundation spends an inordinate amount of money on education reform. According to the latest publicly available tax return - their 2009 IRS form 990 from Guidestar, Fordham has over $37 million on hand, and spends over $4 million a year on its programs and advocacy.

Indeed, in 2009 alone, according to the same document, Fordham spent $485,000 on management of its Ohio charters, $745,000 on "National reform efforts", $163,000 on Ohio specific education "reform efforts" and a further $571,000 on Ohio legislative lobbying and what even they deem as "provocative analysis".

But lobbying and "provocative analysis" aren't the only largesse that Fordham spend their vast resources on. As employees of Fordham such as Mr. Ryan and Mr. Petrilli rail against education associations and teacher pay they have both been significant recipients of the Foundation's generosity.

Name	2007 (link)	2008 (link)	2009 (link)
Mr. Terry Ryan	$73,905 for 20 hours per week	$83,700 for 20 hours per week	$91,100 for 20 hours per week
Mr. Michael Petrilli	$73,905 for 20 hours per week	$83,700 for 20 hours per week	$91,100 for 20 hours per week

Their annual increases, for this part-time work, represent 13.2% and 8.8% up to 2009. One can only imagine what these two gentlemen are earning in 2011 for the part-time work of railing against teachers and their unions. But when you're earning almost twice that of the average Ohio teacher, and doing so for part-time work, all the while receiving up to double digit increases in pay, year on year, these kinds of comments are hard to swallow.

And to be sure, you can find examples of unions—of police, firefighters, even teachers—who have agreed to freeze wages or reduce benefits in order to protect the quality of services or keep colleagues from being laid off. But they are the exceptions that prove the rule.

They hare hardly the exception to prove any rule, real or as is the case here, imagined. Ohio public employees, especially teachers, have been responsible for saving taxpayers over 1 billion dollars in wage and benefit concessions.

So where does all this leave us? It leaves us wondering why an organization that espouses corporate education reform ideas cannot successfully implement them in their own lackluster schools, and why they biggest and most vocal boosters think the gravy tastes better on their plate than on any others. It is this then, that is the pure essence and purpose of corporate education reform.

If education quality actually mattered to Fordham they would expend more energy figuring out why their schools are under performing so as to use those lessons to actually benefot the debate over educstion reform. Instead what we have is "provocative analysis" to defend failing ideas while attacking public school teachers and their union, who in the majority are producing far high quality results at a fraction of the cost.

Un-Accountable Charters

There's so many things wrong with the elements of this story its hard to know where to begin, and even harder to understand why Republican lawmakers want to reduce an already weakened oversight system for charter schools

State payments to two charter schools will resume later this week, now that the state auditor's office has finally been able to complete audits.

The Auditors reports are due in a few weeks and we'll be sure to bring news of those findings to you. But back to the story of charter schools so messed up (and that's the best case scenario) that they can't perform basic accounting functions. The cost of such incompetence?

Teachers and other employees have gone without paychecks since the funds were cut off. Charter schools, which are public but run independent of districts, get most of their money from the state.

They may be public right now, but if HB153 passes, we'll see a proliferation of private schools receiving public money, with their accounts hidden from public view.

All three schools are sponsored by the Cleveland-based Ashe Culture Center, which is responsible for monitoring academics and finances.

Rainbow said the Arts Academies' relationship with Ashe had become "very strained" and they gave notice in January that they would seek a new sponsor.
[...]
The Education Department has been trying to take away Ashe's sponsorship authority since December 2009, mainly because of financial issues. The final decision will be up to the state school board after an independent hearing officer rules.

Audits are still under way at two other Ashe-sponsored schools -- Elite Academy of the Arts and Lion of Judah Academy, both in Cleveland -- that also were declared unauditable in November.

Ohio already has too many sponsors, and soon if changes are not made to HB153, even more - with the accounts hidden from public view inside of for-profit corporations. Only those who seek to profit from this undemocratic scheme are supporting it. As the Ohio Senate debates the budget bill, we'll have a clear view of just how many legislators the vampire squid tentacles have gripped.

The Columbus Dispatch has already been ensnared by the lobbyist for White Hat Management, the very person who helped the GOP House Majority write the current HB153 charter school wild west provisions.

New Poll shows high support for SB5 opponents

A new poll recently conducted by Fallon Research & Communications, Inc. shows that labor opponents of SB5 are regarded highly by the electorate.

Unions that represent police officers and firefighters are the most popular in the survey, with an overall favorable rating of 70% and an unfavorable rating of just 22%, while the remaining 8% have mixed opinions or were unsure.
[...]
Among the specific types of unions tested in the survey, results for teachers’ unions provided the most intriguing insights. Overall, 56% of Ohio voters surveyed said they have favorable views of teachers’ unions, which is 8% higher than the favorable rating for general views of unions, and 34% said they have unfavorable opinions, which is 5% lower than the unfavorable rating for general views of unions. The remaining 10% have mixed opinions or were unsure. Teachers’ unions are most popular with 18 to 29 year-olds (71%), African-Americans (92%), union households (79%) and Democrats (74%). Teachers’ unions are least popular with non-union households (43% unfavorable) and Republicans (61%). Impressively, 57% of unaffiliated voters view teachers’ unions favorably, while just 31% view them unfavorably, which indicates high standing and, presumably, credibility with this vital segment of the electorate that is frequently the deciding factor in many local levy campaigns.

The full survey can be read below

Ohio Survey Results

Petition training at JTF world HQ

Now that we are just about ready to hit the streets and collect signatures to repeal S.B.5, we need to make sure everyone who is going to help is fully trained. Our adversaries are waiting to pounce on the smallest irregularity, and we're determined to not only win by a huge margin, but fair and square.

To that end, you are cordially invited to the JTF world HQ for petition training.

When: April 18th
There are two sessions to choose from:
Session 1: 4:30 pm - 6:00 pm
Session 2: 6:00 pm - 7:30 pm

Where: 947 Goodale Blvd., Columbus, OH. 43212

Parking is available at the rear of the building, and the training will be on the second floor.

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OEA Petition Training Schedule

OEA is hosting about a hundred S.B.5 referendum petition circulation training sessions around the state.

You can view the schedule of training, dates, times and venues here. (pdf)

Please note these training sessions are currently for OEA Members ONLY. We're told training will be available for non members a little later.