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ODE shifting rhetoric in wake of scandal

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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.

Romney education claims: are exaggerations, inaccuracies a pattern?

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Much as Mitt Romney’s claims about the number of jobs he created and outsourced while president and CEO of Bain Capital continue to generate skepticism, his central assertions about his education record while governor of Massachusetts raise the question about whether his at-times selective and less-than accurate credit-taking reflect a pattern.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning PolitiFact.com rated as “Half True” this statement from Romney made this month: “When I was governor, not only did test scores improve – we also narrowed the achievement gap.”

According to the fact-checking service, “State education figures over two years support Romney’s claim about learning gains, although it’s worth noting that some areas declined on his watch, such as the drop-out rate. And it’s always somewhat dubious to take a snapshot of statistics from only one or two years . . .”

It goes on, “What’s more, Romney, a single-term governor, should not get all the credit for improvement in the achievement gap, which is influenced by myriad factors. His statement is partially accurate but omits a lot of important information and overstates his impact.”

Massachusetts education leaders called on by PolitiFact were less generous in their assessment of Romney’s contribution to closing the state’s achievement gap.

“The most important point to make with Gov. Romney’s record is that the reform he initiated was part of a much larger and longer movement that existed in Massachusetts,” said Chad d’Entremont, executive director of the Rennie Center, an independent, nonpartisan education research organization.

Glenn Koocher, executive director of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees, offered this pointed appraisal:

He had nothing to do with it. It’s the teachers in the classrooms who are making the difference.

What, then, are some verifiable education-related actions taken by Romney as governor?

Among them:

  • Romney proposed eliminating early literacy programs, full-day kindergarten, and class size reduction programs. [Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center, March 5, 2003]
  • Romney vetoed a universal pre-kindergarten bill and “questioned the benefits of early education.” [Massachusetts Telegram and Gazette, February 2, 2007]
  • College fees soared 63% under Romney because of his cuts to higher education budget as governor. [Boston Globe, June 29, 2007]

To be sure, Romney’s education record is not all thorns and thistles. A closer look, however, reveals some worrisome facts that he won’t likely highlight in a campaign ad or speech.

Via

Major scandal brewing

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As news that at least three Ohio school districts, Columbus, Toledo and Lockwood, are being investigated for manipulating student attendance records in order to boost their report card ranking, the State Superintendent, Stan Heffner, began issuing threats.

Ohio’s school superintendent says the investigation of changes made to student attendance data in several districts could lead to criminal charges for any educators who commit fraud.

Heffner may have spoken too soon, as his own department is now in the cross hairs of the Auditor of State.

Saying that student attendance-data fraud in Ohio appears to be systemic, the state auditor will take his Columbus schools investigation statewide, including questioning whether the Ohio Department of Education was complicit.

State auditors will scrutinize every school district, charter school and the department, said Carrie Bartunek, spokeswoman for state Auditor Dave Yost.

“In short, it appears that attendance report rigging is not a localized problem with Columbus Public Schools, but that it may be more systemic — and that raises the question of what role ODE played during the time that false reports were made by multiple schools,” Yost said in letter to Debe Terhar, president of the State Board of Education. Terhar didn’t respond to calls or an email seeking comment.

ODE has long been criticized for its poor oversight ability, famously for failing to properly oversee charter schools it was sponsoring. Now it is being alleged that it has failed to oversee school report card data - the very piece at the center of the Governor's corporate education plans.

It was recently proposed that Ohio's school report card be changed to an A-F grading system, and made more rigorous. A move supported by the State Superintendent.

State officials say the new system presents a clearer picture of how Ohio schools are actually performing, and corrects the rating-inflation they say has crept into the state system over time. During a statewide speaking tour in the fall, state schools chief Stan Heffner said Ohio’s school school evaluation system sets the bar too low and creates “a false sense of achievement.”

Stan Heffner was quoted as saying

“We need to tell the truth. No one wants to hear bad news, and we are not in the business of making people look bad. The goal is to get edu-speak out of the report cards and get common English in.”

Right now, lots of people are looking bad, with few knowing the truth. It has been proven repeatedly that with corporate education reform policies and the high stakes attached to them, comes corporate type behaviors. Worse than that however, one educated commenter points out

A child misses 100 out of 180 days. Will their scores accurately reflect what has been taught the whole year?! Will the teachers that have these students be judged based on these scores? Yes. Will the principals and districts be judged on the scores? Yes

Ohio's efforts to created "Accountability" has instead created an unfair mess. As Greg Mild at Plunderbund notes, This is going to be big, folks. Real big.

Kasich manufacturing a funding crisis

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According to the Columbus Dispatch, the Ohio Lottery recently announced that

it was transferring a record $771 million to the Ohio Department of Education to support kindergarten-through-12th grade education. The profit — which by law goes to schools — came from record lottery sales of $2.73 billion in the fiscal year ending June 30.

That sounds like great news for cash strapped school districts that have suffered from historically massive budget cuts enacted by the Governor and his legislature in the last biennium budget.

However, the good news is only surface deep. For every dollar of lottery money that flows into the schools, the state removes a dollar of funding. Something school administrators recently wrote the Governor about

The Ohio School Boards Association (OSBA), the Buckeye Association of School Administrators (BASA) and the Ohio Association of School Business Officials (OASBO) want to set the record straight about lottery profits and their link to school funding.
[...]
“While it is true that all Ohio Lottery profits are used by the state to fund education, the profit from increased sales was simply used to free up other state funds that had previously been set aside for schools, allowing more money to be transferred into the stateʼs rainy day fund,” said OSBA Executive Director Richard Lewis. “No increase in this yearʼs funding for school districts will be available as a result of these unexpected profits.”

BASA Executive Director Kirk Hamilton said, “The increase in lottery profits was positive news for the state of Ohio because of its recent devastating budget shortfall. However, we were disappointed to see reports implying that it is school districts that will benefit. In reality, when lottery profits exceed estimates, the total amount available for Ohio schools does not change.”


[...]
“We urge Gov. Kasich to use this ʻextraʼ state money from the increased lottery profits to restore the budget cuts to education that were included in the current state budget,” said OASBO Executive Director David Varda. “It should also be utilized to help fund schools in the future as Gov. Kasich develops a new school-funding formula.

So all that extra lottery money didn't go to schools at all, instead it went into the Governor's rainy day fund. This move is made all the more troubling when one considers the news out of Cleveland this week.

The Mayor and Cleveland schools will be requesting an massive 15 mils in their levy

The Cleveland School District and Mayor Frank Jackson will ask voters this fall to raise their school taxes by about 50 percent to make major changes aimed at pulling the district out of its academic and budget hole.

The 15-mill levy -- the first operating increase for the district since 1996 -- would give the district an estimated $77 million more a year to add to its $670 million operating budget and $1.1 billion total budget.

We have long pointed out that the real crisis with Cleveland schools was its funding.

As buzz about the tax spread Wednesday, some jaws dropped at the amount. "I hope they dispense Depends when they announce it," said Cleveland City Councilman Mike Polensek, "so that when homeowners crap their pants it doesn't get too messy."

A little graphic, but it captures the problem. A problem the MAyor never sought to address with the legislature when crafting his "Cleveland Plan" - that plan now looks downright ridiculous given this levy news. Stephen Dyer, at 10th period is sanguine about it

It looks like there is little hope that the much ballyhooed Cleveland Plan will ever reach its promise of turning around Cleveland's public school system. Cleveland's teachers made major concessions to the district, including giving up seniority as a means of determining pay. All so that kids might be able to be helped by the necessary, but expensive, wrap around services the Plan promised.

Now that it looks like it will take a miracle to see any of that. And Cleveland teachers' good-faith efforts and sacrifices are all that will ever come from this Plan, whose legacy appears to be resigned to shorter school days, reduced offerings and larger classes.

I lay little of the blame for this issue at Cleveland's feet. This is a state problem, as it has been for decades. When the state cuts school funding, which it did in the last budget by $1.8 billion (nearly $3 billion if all stimulus money's included), districts are forced to make impossible, desperate choices.

When will the public schools rise again and force the state to fulfill its constitutional obligations? Maybe if the levy fails, media and others will finally take note of the State's failure. But why should it.

Indeed, the Mayor should have asked the Governor for funding as part of his plan, and the Governor given record lottery profits that are supposed to benefit the schools, ought to be ensuring that all that excess profit actually does go to the schools. Students and communities are being massively short changed.

We have a school funding crisis in Ohio, and there is literally no need for it to be happening. The state has both the constitutional responsibility, and the means to address it, it is simply refusing to do so.

Shady group secretly plots against voters

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According to Gongwer, a "by-invitation-only" meeting of lobbyists and political insiders was held Tuesday morning at a private club in Columbus by a group seeking to oppose the Voters First Amendment.

The meeting was sponsored by Protect Your Vote Ohio. Voters First responded to this new revelation

"Today's backroom meeting at a private club is yet another example of the broken political system where politicians, lobbyists and insiders rig districts for their own benefit-and exactly why we need this reform," Ms. Turcer. "The hosts of this meeting are the same people who spent months in a hotel room they called 'the bunker,' drawing political boundaries to benefit themselves. It's no surprise that they'll say or do anything to protect their own power."

The Dayton Daily News gets the scoop on who some of the people are who are forming this shady group

Protect Your Vote solicited the help of state lobbyists Tuesday during a private event at the Capital Club in Columbus, according to an invitation obtained by the Dayton Daily News. The campaign organizers listed on the invitation include fundraisers and others with ties to the Republican elected officials who had a hand in drafting the new boundaries.

Campaign Manager Brandon Lynaugh declined Tuesday to comment on the fundraiser and other Protect Your Vote activities.

One of the finance consultants listed on the invitations, Ray DiRossi, was paid $105,000 to assist elected officials in drawing the boundaries last year. Another consultant, Pamela Hashem, is a major fundraiser for U.S. House Speaker John Boehner, R-West Chester Twp.

Secrecy is no stranger to these people and the politicians they serve to keep the political system working for everyone but voters.

According to the Ohio Redistricting Transparency Report released this afternoon, Republican lawmakers at the state house implemented a strategy of deliberate secrecy to withhold information from the public about redistricting efforts. The documents paint a picture of lawmakers who purposely operated in a legal gray area to prevent their actions from ever being made public.

For months, Republican lawmakers and staff meet in secret to work on redistricting efforts in possible violation of Ohio’s open meetings law. The documents show a Republican party that are so obsessed with privacy that they used taxpayer dollars to rent a secret hotel room in Columbus that was used as a location to meet on redistricting issues.

You can read the report and all the shady secret dealings that went into drawing Ohio's new political boundaries, here.