Education Reform Now

For those of you that missed The Lottery movie last month, it will be showing in select cities over the summer.  It's been getting nothing but great reviews from National Public Radio to the Wall Street Journal.  Denver is having a weeklong run starting today through July 16 at the Starz Theater downtown.  San Francisco's showing will be at the Roxie July 23-29.  Check the Lottery website for other showings this summer and look for the general release this fall.

An interesting indicator of the shifting political power dynamics on education reform was apparent last week when the US House of Representatives tried to gut school reform and President Obama responded with a veto threat. 

Who would have thought Democrats would be publicly fighting among themselves on Race to the Top, Charters and the Teacher Incentive Fund in a critical election year.  

While the House vote was hardly a win for reformers, there appeared to be much surprise at the speed and outrage from the reform community.  The fight is far from over as it moves to the Senate.  Thankfully, 13 key Democratic Senators hit the ground running willing to step up for kids to save these programs.   Please keep the pressure ON by contacting your US Senators and anyone else in your state that has access to them, it will be a fierce battle with all the pressure to save jobs and reduce spending. 

We all have to remind policy makers at every level of government that long term economic development for the US will depend upon our public education system educating many more at much higher levels than today. 

Some of you may have been following the latest news from the NEA and AFT teacher union conventions this week.  It's been fun to watch the festivities from a distance as the rhetoric becomes more shrill.  Big surprise, Diane Ravitch won an award from NEA and made another data free speech.  I will say she's an interesting person; I can't wait to read her biography.   

Education Week's Politics K-12 blog described NEA's president Dennis Van Roekel doing "rhetorical pretzels."  Here's an excerpt-

"Mr. President, your instincts were right--the path your advisers have laid out is not! We got a system that creates too few winners and far too many losers. Our members feel betrayed, and so do I," 

Funny thing is that President Obama has been very clear from the start on the critical need for education reform and use of federal incentives.  He never said the problem with low achievement or dropouts was tied to pension or tenure protection. 

Maybe Van Roekel forgot about all his speeches and the boos Obama got when NEA endorsed him in 2008. I know he's a math, not a history teacher.   I'd hardly call it a betrayal.   Hey if NEA wants more Race to the Top winners in Round 2 and 3, they should call for more funding like the rest of us reformers.

Some of the high-pitched diatribes coming from the teacher unions reminds me of the autoworkers of the 80's as they began to see the American car industry being pummeled by competition from quality car manufacturing (Japanese in this case). 

Let's hope some NEA members don't take sledgehammers to some KIPP or Achievement First school as autoworkers did to a few Toyota's.  I can only hope cooler and more thoughtful heads prevail at the local level like the Douglas County AFT did when they stood up for effective teaching policies with their support for Colorado's "Great Teachers and Leaders" bill passed this past May or when DC teachers approved their bold new contract.  

I believe that most teachers recognize the need to improve schools and professionalize teaching (more pay for more accountability). Nobody entered teaching for the pension or lifelong employment, we all entered the profession to make a difference in the lives of kids.  Here's hoping but not counting on the teacher unions to reflect on why they exist.  

There was a great new study reported this week on return on investment for college. There's been a fair amount of chatter on the value of college with ever increasing tuition and lack of jobs but the data is overwhelming on the long-term value of a quality college education. The PayScale.com study showed that

"Overall, the best value proved to be public schools attended by in-state students, yielding a 9.7% average net annualized ROI. The worst deal was attending an out-of-state public school, yielding an annualized net ROI of 8.4%. The net annualized return for private institutions was 9.1%."

Many of this countries best public and private colleges provide 10% or higher LIFETIME return on investment.  My daughter, a high school senior can now make a somewhat cogent argument on the value of applying to NYU, in spite of tuition close to $50,000 with a 30 year annual ROI of 9.9%.  The University of Colorado, Boulder, not her first choice, she wants a smaller liberal arts school near one of the coasts is nevertheless a great deal at 11.4% ROI (total cost less than half of NYU for in-state students).

The most recent data on jobs seem to suggest that college degrees matter more than ever in terms of pay and employment (college educated unemployment is still less than 5%!).  And unfortunately the latest jobs data suggest that the jobs not needing a college education are never coming back.

K-12 public education and higher education financial aid must be radically redesigned if we expect more students to be prepared and succeed in college. It's totally unacceptable (and foolish) that fewer than 12% of the bottom income quartile of 24 year olds obtain college degrees while 73% of the top income quartile successfully complete college by this same age.   The middle quartiles of income are still only seeing about 22% of 24 year olds graduating with a college degree.  We have got to wake up and dramatically increase these numbers if we expect to maintain this nations standard of living, not to mention a vibrant democracy.

Keep up the fight and stay cool (unless you are in Denver where you might want a fleece).