Education; Education; Education!

Folks, another huge "cut and paste" effort here. Do not start this post if you only have 5 minutes.

I start with an Associated Press piece published in the Boston Globe today that speaks of the economic gap between blacks and whites during this time of economic prosperity. The second is a grown-up discussion on local Massachusetts education reform, also from today's Boston Globe. I end with an exchange between President Bush and the Great Equivocator, Sen. John F. Kerry, during the third presidential debate held on October 13, 2004. I honestly think I was the only person that fell off his chair when I originally heard the exchange as I never read any professional commentary on Sen. Kerry's completely out-of-touch statement. Do not jump ahead. I accept all of the facts of the National Urban League in the first story; I lament the League is short on solutions to the problem, however. That's OK, read on. Mature, thoughtful, leaders do provide solutions.

Blacks left behind as economy improves, Urban League says; Report indicates gap with whites in well-being

By Erin Texeira, Associated Press March 29, 2006

NEW YORK -- Even though the economy has picked up, stubborn gaps between blacks and whites remain -- a reality highlighted by Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath, the National Urban League reports in a new study.

''Two years ago, we saw that things were tough, but there was a recession," Urban League president Marc H. Morial said. ''Now that things are better, we're still suffering. The jobless recovery is a real thing for black Americans."

The Urban League's annual State of Black America report, released yesterday, pulls together government data and academic analysis to measure black progress and problems. The nearly 300-page report includes charts, essays, and suggested policy changes.

For three years, blacks' overall well-being compared with whites has stagnated, the report says. Although some African-Americans are prospering, in economics, health, education, social justice, and civic engagement, blacks generally fare about three-quarters as well as whites, the report noted, citing figures from Global Insight Inc., an economic analysis company.

Government data indicate that black Americans have more than double the rates of infant mortality, unemployment, and poverty as whites, the report also notes.

Owning a home is the way most Americans accumulate wealth, writes Lance Freeman, a Columbia University urban planning professor. In 2004, 49.1 percent of blacks owned homes, the highest rate ever. Still, that was 25 percentage points lower than for whites, and blacks' homes were worth less, Freeman writes. Census data in 2000 indicated that blacks had barely one-10th the net worth of whites.

Another essay analyzes causes and effects of the nation's ballooning prison rolls. George Curry, an editor at the National Newspaper Publishers Association, writes that harsher laws for drug offenders led to a doubling of prison and jail populations in the 1990s. Curry cites a Justice Policy study which found that, by 2000, there were more African-American men in prison and jail (791,600) than in higher education (603,000).

''When we send [students] to college instead of prison," Curry writes, ''we strengthen them, their families, and our country in the process." (Blogger's Note: Amen!)

Morial, former mayor of New Orleans, writes that the nation's attention was turned to the plight of poor Americans during Hurricane Katrina. He called the storm and flood that hit the Gulf Coast last August ''this generation's Bloody Sunday," referring to the March 1965 civil rights march in Alabama that focused the nation's attention on racial segregation in the South.

''Unfortunately," he writes, ''the initial flurry of concern and attention to poverty and injustice has given way to the status quo." (End of first article.)

Taking on the teachers unions

By Frederick M. Hess and Martin R. West March 29, 2006

IT IS RARE -- and risky -- for a governor and national political aspirant to put the interests of children above those of a constituency that has as much electoral clout as the teachers unions. Yet Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney has done just that with the education reform package he proposed last September and is touting nationwide.

The governor's bill seeks to upend the status quo in teacher pay and evaluation that has been written into collective bargaining agreements across the Commonwealth. Specifically, it would offer annual bonuses for teachers with a math or science degree who pass the teacher test in their subject, forgo tenure, and receive a satisfactory year-end evaluation. It would also make teachers in all subjects eligible for a bonus upon receiving an exemplary evaluation and empower superintendents to reward teachers who work in low-performing schools. Crucially, the bill would remove teacher evaluation from the collective bargaining process and establish statewide criteria for assessing each teacher's ''contribution to student learning."
While several states and districts nationwide are experimenting with differential pay for teachers, Romney's proposals are noteworthy for their breadth and the size of the proposed bonuses. All told, an effective math or science teacher could receive up to $15,000 a year in three bonuses.

Catherine Boudreau, president of the Massachusetts Teachers Association, predictably criticized Romney's proposals as ''inequitable, divisive, and ineffective." The MTA denounced the proposal as ''uniquely designed to destroy collegiality in a school," ignoring the fact that performance pay is routine in such other professions as medicine, law, and engineering, not to mention in the Commonwealth's first-rate universities, including those that are unionized by the MTA.

The governor can expect a similarly abrupt reception nationwide -- a fact he should consider as he eyes a presidential run. Teachers unions control enormous political resources, including a network of readily mobilized voters. Moreover, the public likes to think that the interests of teachers and kids are always aligned, a line tirelessly advanced by the unions. The National Education Association's political action committee even bills itself as the ''Fund for Children and Public Education."

However, what the unions want may not always be good for students. Teacher pay is exhibit one. While unions have fought to boost salaries, they have resisted efforts to ensure that this money recruits, rewards, and retains the most essential or effective teachers. Current pay scales reward teachers only for experience and graduate credits, neither of which is a meaningful predictor of quality. The result is that districts reward long-serving veterans while failing to recognize those teachers who improve student achievement, possess high-demand skills, or take on more challenging assignments.

Proposals to revamp collective bargaining by tackling teacher pay are only a start. Teacher collective bargaining agreements extend far beyond bread and butter matters, frequently privileging the interests of employees over those of students.

Across the nation, contracts include clauses that prohibit principals from factoring student achievement into teacher evaluation (Blogger's Note: Say what?!), that allow senior teachers to claim the most desirable school and classroom assignments, and that engage in a dazzling array of minutiae, such as when teachers are allowed to wear an NEA membership pin. As a result, schools are organized and managed more like mid-20th century factories than professional 21st century centers of learning. None of this serves students, valuable teachers, or communities.

Improving teacher collective bargaining is not only a question of knowing what to do, but of persuading school boards and the public to tackle the issue. State policymakers must change the environment in which negotiations take place by maintaining pressure on local officials to raise student achievement. Local newspapers must shine light on contract provisions that serve adults rather than children. School boards and superintendents need to push for fundamental changes in contract language and fully exploit ambiguous language where it exists. Civic leaders and citizens must support management measures that may entail, at least initially, disgruntled unions and increased labor unrest.

Since 1993, education reform in Massachusetts has been a bipartisan triumph, accomplishing both a dramatic leveling of the financial playing field between wealthy and poor school districts and the creation of a nationally recognized accountability system. Building on that start is no short journey, but overhauling teacher collective bargaining is the crucial next step. It would be something if Romney did not have to take it on alone. (End of second article.)

If you're still with me, congratulations, hang in there, we're almost done.

From the web site Debates.org, I finally found the transcript of the "jobs" question from October 13, 2004:

SCHIEFFER (moderator): Let's go to a new question, Mr. President. Two minutes. And let's continue on jobs.

You know, there are all kind of statistics out there, but I want to bring it down to an individual.

Mr. President, what do you say to someone in this country who has lost his job to someone overseas who's being paid a fraction of what that job paid here in the United States?

BUSH (Blogger's Note: A person that gets the correlation between education and good paying jobs and the impact good paying jobs have on owning a house and participating in a growing economy by being part of the ownership society): I'd say, Bob, I've got policies to continue to grow our economy and create the jobs of the 21st century.

And here's some help for you to go get an education. Here's some help for you to go to a community college.

We've expanded trade adjustment assistance. We want to help pay for you to gain the skills necessary to fill the jobs of the 21st century.

You know, there's a lot of talk about how to keep the economy growing. We talk about fiscal matters. But perhaps the best way to keep jobs here in America and to keep this economy growing is to make sure our education system works (Blogger's Note: re-read the previous seven words).

I went to Washington to solve problems. And I saw a problem in the public education system in America. They were just shuffling too many kids through the system, year after year, grade after grade, without learning the basics.

And so we said: Let's raise the standards. We're spending more money, but let's raise the standards and measure early and solve problems now, before it's too late.

No, education is how to help the person who's lost a job. Education is how to make sure we've got a workforce that's productive and competitive.

Got four more years, I've got more to do to continue to raise standards, to continue to reward teachers and school districts that are working, to emphasize math and science in the classrooms, to continue to expand Pell Grants to make sure that people have an opportunity to start their career with a college diploma.

And so the person you talked to, I say, here's some help, here's some trade adjustment assistance money for you to go a community college in your neighborhood, a community college which is providing the skills necessary to fill the jobs of the 21st century. And that's what I would say to that person.

SCHIEFFER: Senator Kerry?

KERRY (Blogger's Note: A person that could not complete a connect-the-dots picture if the only two numbers on the picture were "1" and "2"): I want you to notice how the president switched away from jobs and started talking about education principally. (End of debate excerpt.)

The economy, jobs, outsourcing, unemployment, home ownership, capital gains taxes, the prison population, teacher unions and beholden Democrats, school vouchers, school choice, dare I say the 2000 Presidential election, two-parent families, race-relations, and abortion, they are all connected to EDUCATION. Good education begins (continues?) a cycle of positive developments. Poor education begins (again, continues?) a cycle of negative developments. Education, to borrow an expression from a popular prime time television show, is the "silver bullet". When any of these topics is discussed, assess how it relates to education and education reform. Assess who is providing a solution (Cleveland and Philadelphia are participating in solutions; a big shout out to Democrat Mayor John Street in Philly, by the way) and who has nothing to offer but criticism (usually those that are asked to be accountable). Gov. Jeb Bush has shown tremendous initiative in Florida only to be thwarted by the same State Supreme Court that thought selective election recounts was a good idea. Assess the agenda of all the parties. And, then, of course, vote your conscience and intellect.

Congrats if you hung in there with me to the end.

On a lighter side, this was an education post, if anyone came across a grammar (subject/verb disagreement) or usage (when I type quickly I'm vulnerable to "their" when I mean "they're") or other error, let us all know. Teaching and learning should never stop.