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State Charter Law Punishes Ohio’s Largest Districts

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The release of the latest school report card data is proving to be a fly in the ointment of a lot of people who were making hay running around claiming Ohio's education system was in crisis and required radical, extreme changes. Contrary to that misbegotten belief, Ohio's public schools are showing widespread improvements, even in large urban districts that have long suffered under Ohio's unfair funding model.

Policy Matters Ohio recently released the information below, on how the recent chart expansion law is going to further hinder this progress.

That progress is in stark contrast to the 2011 charter school report card, which continues to show terrible overall results, with only 1 in 5 charter schools rated as effective or better

Designation 2011 % of Charters 2010 % of Charters
Academic Emergency 20.9% 23.8%
Academic Watch 16.8% 16.6%
Continuous Improvement 28.9% 30.4%
Effective 11.8% 10.0%
Excellent 7.4% 8.5%
Excellent with Distinction 1.5% 0.3%
Not Rated 12.7% 10.3%

Charters versus Districts: CPE, a statewide group of education, parent and civic organizations was quoted in Gongwer

The coalition said report cards show that although strengthened accountability has led to improved performance for some charter schools, a significant drop-off exists on performance index scores between the highly rated charters and the majority of poorly performing ones.
[...]
About two dozen community schools performed well on the performance index, which is a weighted measure of individual student assessment scores. CPE said those schools deserve further examination, but overall charters fall short compared to district schools. Only 7% of charter schools would rate in the top half of traditional public schools on the performance index rankings.

"We are encouraged that legislative changes in charter school accountability over the past few years seem to be having a positive impact, but are concerned that loosening those measures - as was done this summer in House Bill 153- will cause these modest gains to be quickly lost," Ohio Parent Teacher Association President Gloria Cazan said.

"This improvement happened with better accountability standards implemented, not the hands-off approach lawmakers took in the first eight years of the charter school program."

When it comes to the poster child of the failed charter experiment, White Hat Management, this is the best they can say about themselves

"This year's academic data highlights the challenges faced by some of our schools," CEO Tom Barrett said. "We're focused on improvement and will redouble our efforts to improve the quality of instruction and outcomes for our students."

It's clearly time to reevaluate their continued provision of education in Ohio, especially in light of the continued improvement of Ohio's traditional schools and the negative impact failing charters are having on that improvement.

State Charter Law Punishes Ohio’s Largest Districts

Teacher testing law is disgraceful and must be repealed

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With the release of the state report card data, it was possible to calculate which school buildings fall into the lowest performing 10%, and thereby qualify their teachers to have to retake the PRAXIS test, a provision inserted into the state budget.

Plunderbund published the list of teachers who would be affected by this. We're not going to publish that list. We believe the existence of such a list, and this policy, is one of the most disgraceful pieces of anti-teacher legislation passed by the general assembly. Punishing and shaming teachers who work in some of the most disadvantaged schools in the state will have no positive impact on performance.

Indeed, such a policy may cause both staff retention and recruitment problems. What quality educator would want to move to a distrcit where their efforts would be rewarded by being unfairly shamed?

If one looks at the list of school buildings affected, a simple pattern emerges. Urban and charter schools dominate the list. We have already begun to discuss why charter schools are under serving their students, and the inclusion of urban schools is explained by a smart op-ed on Ohio.com notes

Most suburban districts do well, and large city schools are struggling, the overall trends driven by family income, parental involvement and the degree of stability at home.

What's not mentioned is how Ohio's unconstitutional school funding system severely damages urban education. Neither is the notion of poor quality teaching in these schools mentioned, and for good reason.

Cincinnati public schools, Columbus City public schools, and Toledo public schools to name just 3 of the big 8 are showing widespread improvements - putting to bed the lie that the problems lie with "bad teachers" who must be shamed into taking remedial examinations.

What should not go unnoticed however is the cost of this disgraceful legislation. Over $2 million in testing fees will be subtracted from already anemic education budgets. That money will be siphoned away and put into the back pocket of testing company ETS.

It is in ways and means like this, that public education is eroded from within and public dollars become private profits.

This law must be repealed. It is unfair, unjust, unfounded in its goal, and subtracts much needed dollars away from the classroom, that could genuinely be used to improve struggling schools and reward those teachers who work hard every day to improve them.

Let's Say You're a Teacher

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So--let's say you're a teacher.

Not "just a teacher," but one of those special teachers we hear about in news and policy discussions-- the supposedly rare educator who has passionate disciplinary expertise, a toolbag full of teaching strategies and genuine caring for their students. You're in education because you want to make a difference, change the world, raise the bar. You actually love teaching, finding it endlessly variable and challenging. You plan to spend a long time in the classroom.

So you begin pursuing a graduate degree in education. You notice that getting a masters degree in education is scorned in policy world as having little impact on student learning. A few of your classes are tedious. But some of them are genuinely interesting and valuable, pushing you to think more deeply about the work you do and increasing your content knowledge. Even though pundits declare your advanced degree does not correlate with increased student achievement, you press on. You're enjoying the intellectual stimulation and--let's face it-- accruing credits is another way to increase your salary and you need the money.

You're fascinated by new instructional strategies and curriculum ideas. You're eager to learn. But your district--which just replaced all its computers in the past two years--has no money for professional development. So you burn two of your business days, pay your own registration fee and mileage, and travel with three colleagues to a conference across the state, where--being a teacher type--you attend every single session and collect tons of free stuff to take back to your classroom in a canvas bag (which you will later give to a student as a reward for reading 25 books). The four of you share the $200 hotel room, and split a pizza. The high life.

[readon2 url="http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/teacher_in_a_strange_land/2010/03/lets_say_youre_a_teacher.html"]Continue reading...[/readon2]

A charter teacher answers our honest question

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A short while ago we asked pro SB5 supporters a simple question.

Given that Ohio charter schools already have SB5 like "tools", why is their performance so bad when compared to traditional public schools?

We waited for an answer. And we waited, and waited. Not a single pro SB5 supporter could or would answer the question. Over at the Join the Future Facebook page however we did get an answer, a great one, from a charter school teacher.

I work at an excellent-rated charter school.

Why? Because my co-workers and I are good, dedicated teachers who for the most part cannot find sought-after union/public school jobs.. and despite the inability to collectively bargain, despite the longer hours, despite the fact that we find out typically last day of school if we are coming back the next year, we still do our best to educate our students.

But it sucks to not have the protections that SB5 wants to do away with.

In other words, it's those working conditions that are created by SB5 like "tools" that drive dedicated professional away. Those "tools" are causing them to seek an environment of teamwork, security and stability where they can concentrate their skills on developing student achievement instead of wondering if they will have a job.

Another smart observation followed, that explains why charter schools see such high staff turnover

Had I not been fortunate enough to find a part time position at an excellent-rated public school when I had to relocate from one Ohio city to another, I probably would have tried for a charter school.

But why would anyone (no matter how dedicated to the profession) choose a charter, even one rated excellent, over a public school, with the working conditions Ms. Grabski describes?

No one takes out college loans and works toward a master's degree hoping for that kind of a professional life. I imagine Ms. Grabski and her skilled, dedicated co-workers would all jump at the chance to move to a public school.

That leaves lots of new, inexperienced, and possibly less skilled teachers--without working conditions that could improve instruction--remaining at charters over the long term. If SB5 remains, why would anyone enter the profession at all?

SB5 like "tools" only drive dedicated people away, it does not attract the highly skilled, highly trained experience professionals needed to deliver a quality education. This goes a long way to explaining why charters fail to outperform traditional public schools, and why SB5 is bad for public education.

We vehemently oppose SB5 at Join the Future because we believe, and all evidence indicates, it is harmful to the teaching profession and consequently students. Public education should be about a race to the top, SB5 is a rapid decent to the bottom, and if you con't believe that, take another look at charter school performance in Ohio.

You should also "Like" us on Facebook and join in the conversation.

For further reading about teacher turnover, this is highly recommended - Teacher turnover in charter, traditional public schools.

A Honest question, answered

in

A short while ago we asked pro SB5 supporters a simple question.

Given that Ohio charter schools already have SB5 like "tools", why is their performance so bad when compared to traditional public schools?

We waited for an answer. And we waited, and waited. Not a single pro SB5 supporter could or would answer the question.

Over at the Join the Future Facebook page however we did get an answer, a great one, from a charter school teacher.

I work at an excellent-rated charter school.

Why? Because my co-workers and I are good, dedicated teachers who for the most part cannot find sought-after union/public school jobs.. and despite the inability to collectively bargain, despite the longer hours, despite the fact that we find out typically last day of school if we are coming back the next year, we still do our best to educate our students.

But it sucks to not have the protections that SB5 wants to do away with.

In other words, it's those working conditions that are created by SB5 like tools that drive dedicated professional away. Those "tools" are causing them to seek an environment of teamwork, security and stability where they can concentrate their skills on developing student achievement instead of wondering if they will have a job.

Another smart observation followed that explains why charter schools see such high staff turnover

Had I not been fortunate enough to find a part time position at an excellent-rated public school when I had to relocate from one Ohio city to another, I probably would have tried for a charter school.

But why would anyone (no matter how dedicated to the profession) choose a charter, even one rated excellent, over a public school, with the working conditions Ms. Grabski describes?

No one takes out college loans and works toward a master's degree hoping for that kind of a professional life. I imagine Ms. Grabski and her skilled, dedicated co-workers would all jump at the chance to move to a public school.

That leaves lots of new, inexperienced, and possibly less skilled teachers--without working conditions that could improve instruction--remaining at charters over the long term. If SB5 remains, why would anyone enter the profession at all?

SB5 like "tools" only drive dedicated people away, it does not attract the highly skilled, highly trained experience professionals needed to deliver a quality education. This goes a long way to explaining why charters fail to outperform traditional public schools, and why SB5 is bad for public education.

We vehemently oppose SB5 at Join the Future because we believe, and all evidence indicates, it is harmful to the teacher profession and consequently students. Public education should be about a race to the top, SB5 is a rapid decent to the bottom, and if you con't believe that, take another look at charter school performance in Ohio.

You should also "Like" us on Facebook and join in the conversation.