ALEC is working to ensure that public education dollars get diverted to private profits. Their approach is working -- for them. Not so much for the students who pay the price in the form of a subpar education and poor performance.
Statewide Stories of the Day
Columbus City Schools officials wiped 2.8 million student absence days off the district’s computers during the past 51/2 school years, with some key officials responsible for tens of thousands of deletions. The officials routinely erased more recorded student absences than they reported to the state — in some years, substantially more — according to district data tables The Dispatch obtained by filing a public-records request. Read more...
Twenty-one percent of Ohio’s third-graders – 25,963 students – were not proficient in reading last school year, according to preliminary test results released by the Ohio Department of Education. That’s up from 20 percent in 2010-11. Starting in 2013-14, scoring poorly on the test will have major consequences for third-grade students. That’s when a new law by Ohio Gov. John Kasich will require them to repeat the school year if they don’t do well enough on the test despite two years of reading intervention. Read more...
Youngstown - The city school district will see its school-improvement money slashed more than 50 percent for next year because the schools didn’t meet growth goals. The federal School Improvement Grant money allotted for University Project Learning Center, Chaney and East totaled $3.3 million. For next year, the amount is reduced to about $1.5 million, said Doug Hiscox, deputy superintendent for academic affairs. “Each year, you have to go through a process for evaluating how well things were done or whether you met targets,” he said. Read more...
Local Issues
Toledo Public Schools has manipulated some students' attendance data to improve state report-card scores, the district's superintendent told The Blade on Friday. Under the practice, schools retroactively withdraw and re-enroll chronically absent students to erase their poor attendance records. Ohio school districts apparently are allowed to throw out test scores of students who are not continuously enrolled from October through the testing dates in March and May. Read more...
GRANVILLE - Alma Zahar is a 13-year-old student at Southmoor Middle School in Columbus. She's had thoughts of becoming a doctor but had no idea how to go about it. "That takes a lot of years," she said. "But I wasn't sure what schools to go to. But this explained to me what type of colleges there are: community college, technical college and four-year college." Zahar was just one of about 40 middle school students at Denison University from Saturday to June 29 learning how to navigate the path to college in a program called CampUS. Read more...
The Perry family of Collinwod may represent one of Cleveland's best hopes for passing an enormous 15-mill school levy request that will likely appear on the November ballot. But to make that happen, it's pretty important that their son, Shaquille, stays alive. It's that simple. Shaquille is an emerging role model for the city. He should be encouraged and protected. He's a good example of what a determined young man can do in the face of formidable odds when bolstered by strong parental support. He will enroll at Kentucky State University this fall. Read more...
State auditors say former employees of a Canton-based community school made nearly $4,500 worth of questionable purchases during a Best Buy shopping trip in 2010. The Ohio Auditor’s Office flagged the transactions during its most recent annual financial review of Imagine Schools on Superior at 1500 Superior Ave. NE. The school, formerly known as Pathways to Success Canton Community School, serves roughly 180 students between kindergarten to fourth grade and is not affiliated with a public school district. Read more...
Columbus Schools Superintendent Gene Harris will shake up her top staff, in part to cover for reassignments resulting from a state investigation into whether district officials rigged school performance data. In a memo dated Monday, Harris said she would again name the district’s former lobbyist to a major leadership role. With the departure of former Chief Academic Officer Keith Bell to become superintendent of Euclid schools, Harris will promote the district’s chief operating officer, John Stanford, to the new post of deputy superintendent. Read more...
Editorial
On a recent evening, an unexpected knock on my study window in the back of the house brought me face to face with the problem of runaway teenagers. A young girl in her early teens, clad in not-too-clean clothes, begged to be let in. Instead, I met her in front of the house. Waiting for police to arrive, we talked in the driveway. She had run away from a nearby group home for troubled teens, she told me. She said she had run away at least 30 times in the past three years. Somehow, every place she was sent annoyed her to the point she thought her only option was to run away. Read more...
Gasp. That's the sound that came from many Clevelanders when they learned last week that the Cleveland public schools are asking for a 15-mill levy to implement Mayor Frank Jackson's hard-won school reform plan. Despite their skepticism of -- or even outright anger at -- their long-troubled school system, voters must take a leap of faith for the future of Cleveland's 41,000 students. The levy would deliver an estimated $77 million annually to support the Cleveland Plan for Transformation over the next four years. Read more...
The Warren Board of Education wants to achieve academic excellence. But it decided against conducting an excellent search for a new school superintendent. The board last week named Warren G. Harding High School principal Michael Notar as the district's next superintendent. The board did not accept any applications or conduct any interviews prior to deciding who would be in charge of the district. Board members said there was no need because of how familiar they are with Notar. Read more...
According to the Columbus Dispatch, the Ohio Lottery recently announced that
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
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 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.
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
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.
Statewide Stories of the Day
NEWARK - Although state report cards likely are a month away, Newark administrators said they are excited about preliminary Ohio Achievement Assessment results. According to preliminary results released by the Ohio Department of Education, Newark students passed more indicators than in 2011, including seventh-grade reading. Although nothing is final until report cards are released, Newark is on track to meet 23 of 26 indicators, said Maura Horgan, director of secondary curriculum instruction. Read more...
Youngstown - Getting the school district’s curriculum up to state standards will be an expensive proposition. One of the elements of the Academic Recovery Plan for the district updated by the state-appointed Academic Distress Commission earlier this year calls for up-to-date Ohio standards based pre-kindergarten through 12 plans in literacy, math, science and social studies. Teams of teachers and administrators determined the books, materials and supplies needed to accomplish that and the cost is nearly $500,000 for grades seven through 12. Read more...
Local Issues
CLEVELAND - It's been a monumental week for the Cleveland Municipal School District. Since last Friday, ground has been broken for four new, 21st century elementary schools: Paul L. Dunbar, Miles, Almira, and Orchard. Groundbreakings for the new Max Hayes and John Marshall high schools are coming soon. Meanwhile, on Wednesday, the school board voted to seek a new 15 mill levy to finance the new education reform plan and avoid a huge budget deficit next year. Read more...
CLEVELAND — Taxpayers can't quite wrap their heads around the 15-mill school tax the school board proposed Wednesday night, some Cleveland City Council members say, predicting the tax is likely to fail by a large margin. "It's going to go down in utter defeat," said Ward 2 Councilman Zack Reed. Councilman Mike Polensek, of Collinwood, said he and his office have received call after call from families shocked at a request that is twice as big as he expected -- an amount that he said families can't afford. Read more...
FOSTORIA - Fostoria school board approved fiscal year 2013 general fund temporary appropriations of more than $21.7 million at Thursday's regular meeting. The meeting was rescheduled from Monday to accommodate board members' schedules. The district finished fiscal year 2012 on June 30 with a carryover balance of $400,939, according to information from Treasurer Jaime Pearson, so the available general fund balance is more than $22.1 million on July 1, which is the beginning of the fiscal year. Read more...
Statewide Stories of the Day
LIBERTY - Almost a year after the school district was placed in fiscal emergency, school officials met with the state-appointed financial oversight committee Wednesday. Chairman Roger Nehls and his committee discussed appropriations and expenditures with Liberty Superintendent Stan Watson and Treasurer Jim Wilson. The committee went through budget items from the previous school year as well as items for the upcoming year, said Nehls. The district spent approximately $15.5 million from its general fund by the end of fiscal year 2012. Read more...
Higher-than-expected state lottery profits in the past fiscal year do not equal a windfall for Ohio's schools this year, according to three major public education associations. Earlier this month, the Ohio Lottery Commission released results for this past fiscal year, which concluded June 30. Sales surpassed $2.7 billion, and that led to a profit of $771 million, well above the $717.5 million that had been budgeted for schools. By law, all Ohio Lottery profits must be directed toward K-12 public education. Read more...
COLUMBUS — As Ohio considers new ways to pay for public schools, legislative analysts said Wednesday one option is to replace local property tax revenue with an increase in the state sales tax, but they cautioned that it might be a risky move. To raise the more than $9.9 billion that’s needed, policymakers would need to more than double the sales tax rate — from 5.5 cents on the dollar to 13.2 cents. It’s one of many ideas being kicked around by an Ohio House subcommittee laying the groundwork for a new state funding formula for schools. Read more...
Local Issues
JOHNSTOWN - More than a month after it passed a resolution deeming busing for some non-public school students impractical, the Johnstown-Monroe School Board retracted its decision at its Wednesday meeting. The board will work with Northridge Local Schools and administrators from private schools in Newark and Granville to attempt to find another solution, board president Roger Montgomery said. This past school year, Johnstown had about 35 students the district bused to private schools, including Granville Christian Academy. Read more...
CLEVELAND — 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. It would also provide $5.5 million to go to charter schools that partner with the district, making it the first local tax in Ohio to go to charters. Read more...
Northwestern board members are expected to vote tonight on a controversial decision to eliminate a position championed by some families. The board will decide whether to eliminate the family liaison and middle school principal positions to prepare for the move from three to two buildings when Northwestern opens its new schools next fall, said Superintendent Tony Orr. The board will vote at 6 p.m. tonight in the auditorium at Northwestern High School. Read more...
Editorial
The idea of shared school administrations is taking hold near and far. If school districts in Trumbull and Mahoning counties don't figure out ways to share these duties, local teachers and students will continue to get shortchanged. Nearby, Grand Valley and Pymatuning Valley school districts in southern Ashtabula County have opened discussions on sharing a superintendent beginning this fall. Pymatuning Valley Superintendent Alex Geordan resigned to accept a job in Canfield, prompting the Board of Education to contact Grand Valley about sharing its superintendent. Read more...
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
The Dayton Daily News gets the scoop on who some of the people are who are forming this shady group
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.
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.