THE
OHIO EDUCATION GADFLY
A Bi-Weekly Bulletin of News and
Analysis from the Thomas B. Fordham Institute
Volume 3, Number 6. March 18, 2009
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Do term limits dumb down the political dialogue in Ohio?
Have term-limits hurt public policy in Ohio? When term limits were passed by Ohio voters in 1992 the idea was simple: they promised relief from mediocre, self-interested incumbents and partisan legislatures stuck in gridlock. Term limits were intended to create more competitive elections while also creating citizen legislatures. Or, as the CATO Institute argued in 1995, "to effectively end politics as a lifetime sinecure," (see here) thereby making public service a leave of absence from a productive, private sector career.
Ohio is one of 15 states with term limits. Ours kicked in for lawmakers and other state-level elected office holders in 2000 when 45 House seats and six Senate seats were term-limited. The 2008 election resulted in the biggest turnover since then. Of 99 House members, 32 are new members and 21 of those are new because of term limits. The Senate is far more senior with only four of the 33 members new to the chamber, and the new senators all had previous legislative experience.
A month into their first term, and before they even received their new business cards, these new House members were presented with a 3,000-plus page biennial budget bill from the governor that included a substantial redesign of the state's education system. The proposed changes included a significantly revamped school funding system, proposals for new academic standards and state assessments, myriad changes to the teacher licensure and retention system, and major revision of the state's charter school law (see here). These new lawmakers have had to become experts in a hurry, and for most, this has meant coming up to speed on issues without knowing much, if any, of the history around what they now have to vote on.
Here's an example that relates specifically to the education portion of the budget proposal. During a recent House hearing, an Ohio Education Association researcher presented the results of a study he conducted that found charter schools performed worse than Ohio's traditional district schools. Now the OEA, despite its protestations, can hardly be considered neutral on the issue of charter schools. They've been trying to kill them off since their birth in 1997. Unfortunately, not one member of the subcommittee questioned the report's results, but seemingly took them at face value.
The OEA report results may be true--yes, charter students don't perform as well as children in the suburbs--but its findings are loaded and largely irrelevant. Comparing urban charter performance with urban district performance, as Fordham has been doing for the past five years, shows that both sectors perform at comparable levels. In truth, neither sector is delivering what children really need.
Given the level of understanding of issues among new legislators, their lack of questioning may be lamentable but not surprising. How can a freshman lawmaker even begin to master a 3,000 page document in a couple of months? A lawmaker with eight years of experience is just getting savvy with the budget process when he or she must leave. This relative inexperience puts members of the Ohio General Assembly at the mercy of lobbyists and interest groups. It has also made the work of nonprofits like KnowledgeWorks Foundation, Policy Matters Ohio, the Buckeye Institute, the Ohio Grantmakers Forum, and, yes, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, more important as lawmakers and staffers look to such groups for analyses and recommendations about key legislation. There are no term limits for lobbyists, special interest groups, or nonprofit research groups, all of whom are eager to educate incoming lawmakers.
On the other hand, term-limit proponents counter that lawmakers can become entrenched in office and can become bedmates with interest groups who loyally fund their re-election campaigns over and over. Maybe, maybe not. The experience that a long-time lawmaker gains enables him or her to ask informed questions and, just as much, the ability to resist too much influence from any one interest groups.
In addition, many new lawmakers come to Columbus with axes to grind. They are more likely to be politically extreme--either right or left--and they gravitate naturally to the lobby groups that are going to reinforce their prejudices. Personal friendships across the aisle are harder to nurture. This all makes for far more partisan politics and less thoughtful policies. This is a shame as lawmakers are dealing with incredibly complex issues and problems that need more intellect than emotion to resolve.
by Terry Ryan and Mike Lafferty
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Maybe the budget bill needs a few more brains working on it
The House Finance and Appropriations Primary and Secondary Education subcommittee will wrap up public hearings this week on Gov. Strickland's education reform plan, despite disagreement about whether a Finance subcommittee is the appropriate group to consider massive changes to state education policy.
The governor's budget proposal would not only change how Ohio funds its public schools but also make major changes to things like academic content standards, student assessments, teacher employment and licensure rules, and the governance of teacher preparation programs. Because of the complexity and extent of the education provisions in the budget bill, Rep. Gerald Stebelton (R-Lancaster), ranking minority member on the House Education committee, believes it is beyond the capacity of any one committee to fully explore its implications.
"The House Education committee, under the worthy leadership Rep. Brian Williams [D-Akron], a retired educator and superintendant of schools, has many members who have a great deal of experience with public education who are capable of exploring the myriad of education issues raised by this bill," Stebelton told The Gadfly in an e-mail. Stebelton believes the two committees could work simultaneously on the budget bill. "We could be working in parallel with the Finance committee, analyzing the bill, taking testimony, and reviewing proposed amendments and attempting to finalize it while the Finance committee addresses the financial issues of not only education but also the remainder of budget."
Rep. Steve Dyer (D-Green), chair of the Finance Primary and Secondary Education subcommittee disagrees. "The pieces [of the governor's plan] should stay all in one place," Dyer said. "All of these reform components are now driving money through the funding model." Because the reforms ultimately affect what the state spends on education, Dyer thinks the bill should remain in the Finance committee but pointed out that he is working with Rep. Williams on the budget.
Dyer has given the public more opportunity to weigh in on the myriad education-related budget proposals. The subcommittee held three evening regional hearings in Akron, Marietta, and Dayton that were open to the public. More than 150 people testified who might not have had the ability to travel to Columbus to testify during regular hearings.
Stebelton, who also has concerns about the constitutionality of the governor's proposed conversion levy, sent a letter to House Speaker Armond Budish (D-Beachwood) several weeks ago requesting that the education portions of the budget be moved to the Education committee. His request was denied. Other lawmakers are putting together a similar request, but with the House planning to have its version of the budget to the Senate the week of April 20, it seems unlikely their request will be honored either.
"Given the very limited time-frame we have to finalize this bill and send it to the Senate it just seems to me that the leadership of the House is not availing itself of all the talent available in the House, both Democrats and Republicans, who could be working to clarify the many confusing issues that remain to be resolved before its comes to the floor of the House," he said.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
We see the fluff, but where's the beef?
There's very little real evidence in Gov. Ted Strickland's proposed "evidence-based" education proposals, according to a review by the Ohio Academy of Science.
The Academy, which is particularly interested in science, technology, and engineering education, including STEM, examined the bibliography on which Gov. Strickland's education proposals are based.
"After a brief review of that document...it appears that most references are to political action or opinion reports; only a few articles appear to be from primary, peer-reviewed, refereed journals that the Academy would consider fundamental to understanding how children learn and how we should organize learning environments and pedagogy," wrote OAS Chief Executive Officer Lynn Elfner in a letter to the House Finance and Appropriations Primary and Secondary Education Subcommittee.
The governor's assertion that his plan is based on expert education research is being scrutinized. For example, University of Washington education finance expert Paul T. Hill found little merit in the governor's assurances (see here).
In his letter to the subcommittee, Elfner offered the Academy's help finding experts qualified to judge the plan.
"When we looked at the list, it lacked a lot of the references we expected. It wasn't as rigorous," Elfner told The Gadfly. "Given the priority of STEM, I would have expected to see more than the references I already knew about."
The "research-based, evidence-based" assurances given to back up the governor's proposals, Elfner said in an interview, lacked studies based on cognitive science, learning, and brain mapping. Too many of the papers cited were policy-based discussions.
"I only saw one reference that had to do with cognitive learning and how kids learn and how we teach," he said. "If it's not based on the best science of learning we're kind of wasting our time."
How science is taught and how people learn, he said, are vital to effective science teaching. For example, the governor has called for smaller class sizes. But while smaller classes can help in science teaching, they are not enough in and of themselves. Teachers who teach poorly will do so in a class of 15 students. Good teachers who teach many more students will continue to teach well and those students will learn.
"They may have 30 kids and they're still doing a great job," Elfner said.
Elfner said Strickland has not done a good job of explaining his proposals. He is particularly skeptical of how proposed the so-called 21st century skills called for in the plan will be taught in the current configuration of schools. Others also are skeptical (see here).
It appears the governor and his education advisers decided on a course of action and then went looking for "evidence" to back it up, Elfner said.
"Here's an issue and here's a solution but they didn't define the problem. The biggest fault in public policy making is a poor job of defining the problem," he said.
New report supports Fordham's recommendations for charter schools
According to a new report, charter schools don't produce substantially different academic results than their district peers. A longitudinal study conducted by RAND used student-level data to examine charter schools in Chicago, San Diego, Philadelphia, Denver, Milwaukee, and the states of Ohio, Texas and Florida (see here). It found that charter schools do not have an effect, good or bad, on the achievement of students in nearby district schools. The study also confirms that charter schools do not "skim the cream" when it comes to recruiting students--children enrolling in charter schools have similar academic achievement levels as those attending district schools, except in Ohio and Texas, where students entering charter schools are substantially behind the achievement levels of their district peers.
The report, Charter Schools in Eight States: Effects on Achievement, Attainment, Integration, and Competition, offers two major concerns about the Buckeye State's charter schools. First, that the state's virtual schools lag far behind both district schools and brick-and-mortar charter schools in terms of student performance, and second, that the performance levels of charter schools in Ohio vary to a much greater degree than other sites.
The report's authors present two theories for why charter school performance varies so widely in Ohio: 1) The state has an unusually diverse group of authorizers (sponsors) and the quality of those authorizers varies greatly, and 2) Ohio's charter schools operate on significantly less funding than their district peers. The report suggests holding authorizers and schools more accountable for results, including closing low-performing charter schools, echoing testimony earlier this week by Fordham's Terry Ryan before the Ohio House Finance & Appropriations Primary and Secondary Education subcommittee. Ryan shared with the committee Fordham's suggestions for improving the governor's education reform plan, including provisions related to charter schools (see here).
Fordham supports the governor's proposal that all charter school sponsors be under the oversight of the State Board of Education if at the same time a bipartisan Community School Quality Advisory Council is created and empowered to deal with charter school quality issues and subsequent policy matters related to school and sponsor quality on an ongoing basis. Members of the Community School Quality Advisory Council should be named by the state superintendent of instruction and the chancellor of higher education. This body would serve as an oversight and advisory body to the Ohio Department of Education.
Fordham further recommends that lawmakers ratchet up the state's "academic death penalty" for charter schools and fund all public schools, including charter schools, equally. Then, the state can focus resolutely on performance of charters by letting the closure law work to eliminate poor charter schools.
Specifically, Fordham proposes that the state should automatically close charter schools that:
Under the current charter closure law, two schools were identified to be closed based on their August 2008 report card issued by the state education department. If Fordham's recommendation had been in place then and if drop-out recovery schools were not exempted from the law, 62 charter schools would be closing their doors at the end of this school year--roughly 20 percent of the charter sector.
Let's not forget about education's ugly little dilemma
Perhaps the only thing related to K-12 education that Ohio's governor and lawmakers aren't talking about "fixing" is the State Teachers Retirement System (STRS) (see here). That's odd, as few things are more out-dated, cost-laden and in need of reform than public pension systems.
None of STRS's problems have changed in the two years ago since we pointed them out in our report Golden Peaks and Perilous Cliffs: Rethinking Ohio's Teacher Pension System (see here). The STRS system is still opaque, costly, encourages early retirement, hinders mobility, and backloads teacher compensation from early in a career to the very end. And according to the system's latest annual report (which covers July 2007 through June 2008) the financial health of the system is worsening (see here). As the economy has melted down STRS's unfunded liability has topped $18 billion (up $3.7 billion from the previous year). As this liability has increased, so has its amortization period, up from 26.1 years in 2007 to 41.2 years in 2008 (despite state law requiring an amortization period of no more than 30 years).
STRS says its troubles are due to "investment returns being less than expected, retirees living longer and payroll growth being less than expected." The Wall Street collapse has only made matters worse. Also, retirees are not going to start dying younger and teachers are not going to willingly retire later when the incentives favor them retiring in their mid-50s.
Many individuals and families have seen the values of their 401(k)s plummet over the last year, and many of us have had to adjust our expectations accordingly. Teachers and other public sector employees do not have to do this in Ohio, or most other states, because their retirement benefits are guaranteed by the state. No matter how bad the public pension investments tank, the only ones who will take any of the hit will be taxpayers.
We wonder what taxpayers will think of a move to raise taxes and divert hundreds of millions or a couple of billion in "education" money to the STRS and other state retirement systems so folks can continue to retire in their mid-50s while the rest of us look at working until our 70s?
Public pensions are such a serious issue that economists got together last month at Vanderbilt University to discuss them (see here). Well before the financial meltdown, roughly 40 percent of the major teacher pension plans, nationally, were short of cash. Public pension funds are generally considered in OK shape when their assets are roughly 80 percent of liabilities. But Jay Greene, of the University of Arkansas, who attended the Vanderbilt meeting, points out that those supposedly solid pensions assume eight percent returns (see here).
No responsible financial manager ought to be banking on that. Greene agrees. He says it makes more sense to gauge growth, and presumably future pension payments, on the risk-free rate of long-term U.S. Treasury bonds. They are currently earning a little less than four percent. Assuming a four percent return, a teacher pension that would have been 70-percent funded at eight percent would drop to 44-percent funded.
To get a significantly higher return requires a lot more risk, but the gamble is, ultimately, with taxpayer money.
When the inevitable proposals surface for increasing pension contributions and making other changes to the system, the governor and legislature should seriously consider a redesign akin to what the federal government is starting to do for Social Security and Medicare.
by Emmy L. Partin, Mike Lafferty, and Terry Ryan
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
How eight state education agencies in the Northeast and Islands Region identify and support low-performing schools and districts
The National center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance
March 2009
This report analyzes how state education agencies in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, Vermon,t and the territory of Puerto Rico identify and support low-performing schools and districts under the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act.
The report shows each agency had more schools newly identified as low-performing for 2007-2008 than schools losing that designation. The parameters set by the NCLB Act give state agencies flexibility in identifying schools and districts that need support as well as the kind of interventions to be taken. All eight states had intervention systems for schools or districts and they provided a variety of services centered on assessment, improvement plans, consultation, and professional development.
For Connecticut, state guidance and support for district-level systems is the key to sustained improvement in instruction and learning and for developing a clear accountability system. In Massachusetts, the districts are predominantly responsible for monitoring and support while the state provides resources and targeted assistance. New York has a system of customized supports requested by the districts and schools and administered from regional education centers. Finally, Rhode Island strives to create partnerships and reciprocal accountability between the state education agency and the local districts.
This study points to the need for continued learning in regards to building the capacity of schools and districts to improve student achievement, as well as the role state education agencies should take. It should serve as a building block for districts and state agencies in other areas of the country struggling to find a similar balance and make their schools a more effective place to learn.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Frank Stoy of the Lucas County Educational Service Center Office of Community Schools took issue with a March 4 piece concerning troubles in the Summit Academies.
I really wish you had done your homework before making the sweeping comments about Summit Academies in the most recent Ohio Gadfly. Summit Academies serve 99% special education students, mostly diagnosed with ADD, ADHD and Aspergers. As most experts will agree, the measures used on the Ohio Report card do not accurately measure these students' progress and performance.
The issues with Summit schools is much more complicated than the Beacon Journal article you used as the basis of your information stated and we as sponsor for most of the Summit schools are working very hard to address the issues.
...about the governor's education plan
Bill Wilken, a retired businessman and educational finance expert, responded to a February 18 Ohio Gadfly editorial (and newspaper op-ed) concerning Gov. Ted Strickland's education proposals.
What strikes me about the Strickland plan (like so many other state education policy initiatives) is its silence about school management. Essentially, it preserves unchanged the historical congeries of many cooks in the kitchen, a system in which many are responsible for running the schools but in which no one is really responsible. Everyone can point fingers at everyone else. The story is no different than the one about the fall of man in the Garden of Eden. Just as in that fable, we never seem to tire of arguing about the source of our problems--teachers, principals, school boards, state bureaucrats, or various elected officials.
While I concur with your desire for improved standards, I seriously doubt that any revisions on this front will have much impact without parallel and substantial changes in our mechanisms for managing schools. We need to move aggressively toward a management structure which vests unambiguous responsibility for education management and outcomes either at a single point at the state or building level. Equally important, we need to make certain that those at the locus of responsibility have the training, experience, and disposition necessary to serve as managers.
The Strickland plan places primary responsibility for educational outcomes not on management, but on labor. While teachers obviously are pivotal to educational outcomes, it defies logic to argue that they should be responsible for outcomes when they have no actual management authority. Making matters worse, we allow teacher unions to muddy and diminish management authority by granting them the power to effectively dictate a wide range of often perverse and byzantine work rules. Add to this equation principals and school superintendents who have had virtually no formal management training and school boards divided by single-issue agendas and you have, well, a real mess.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------The Ohio Education Gadfly is published bi-weekly (ordinarily on Wednesdays, with occasional breaks, and in special editions) by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. Have something to say? Email the editor at [email protected]. Would you like to be spared from the Gadfly? Email [email protected] with "unsubscribe gadfly" in the text of your message. You are welcome to forward the Gadfly to others, and from our website you can even email individual articles. If you have been forwarded a copy of Gadfly and would like to subscribe, you may email [email protected] with "subscribe gadfly" in the text of the message. To read archived issues, go to our website and click on the Ohio Education Gadfly link. Aching for still more education news and analysis? Check out the original Education Gadfly.
Nationally and in Ohio, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, along with its sister organization the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, strives to close America's vexing achievement gaps by raising standards, strengthening accountability, and expanding high-quality education options for parents and families. As a charter-school sponsor in Ohio, the Foundation joins with schools to affirm a relentless commitment to high expectations for all children, accountability for academic results, and transparency and organizational integrity, while freeing the schools to operate with minimal red tape. The Foundation and Institute are neither connected with nor sponsored by Fordham University.