Post-Election.....the Beat goes on

An amazing grassroots victory for Glenda Ritz who campaigned almost solely on the idea that Tony Bennett had gone too far, bereated teachers, and ultimately was a tool for larger political forces.  But, remember that many activists would argue that voting is the lowest form of civic engagement.  There is always more to do.   For you consideration.....the battle in Indiana doesn't seem to be over, folks.  Looks like the State Board of Education plans to ignore the will of the people.  This seems like a reasonable request offered in today's Indy Star.  Thoughts?

Wait for Ritz to take helm before moving on

With the elections behind us, leaders of both parties have called for national unity. In his concession speech, Gov. Mitt Romney called for government at all levels to put the people before the politics. I hope that will be the case here in Indiana, where the people have spoken about the pace and direction of education reform.

Perhaps one of the first tests will be the Rules for Educator Preparation and Accountability II (REPA II) proposals now before the state Board of Education. This body, chaired by the superintendent of public instruction, is scheduled to meet Dec. 5 under the current administration. Though the agenda has not been announced yet, indications are they’ll consider REPA II.

REPA II changes would lower standards for teacher and school leader preparation in the state. For example, REPA II would make it possible for someone to become licensed to teach just by taking a standardized test. It would also lower academic requirements to become a school principal. REPA II would de-professionalize teaching at a time when our students need great teachers most.
During the required period of public comment on REPA II, more than 99 percent of Hoosiers who submitted testimony spoke against the proposals. The state board should defer action on REPA II until Superintendent-elect Glenda Ritz is inaugurated. Then, under her leadership, it should table REPA II for good.

Approving a policy so overwhelmingly opposed by citizens of Indiana would not be putting people before politics.
Gerardo M. Gonzalez
Dean, School of Education

Tony Bennett's Fiasco

....in case you're local paper won't print it.  Take a look.

Dear Editor,
Tony Bennett’s plan to give letter grades to schools has turned into a fiasco. Last January, all 35 speakers in the only public hearing on his plan opposed it, including representatives of all education groups and the Indiana Chamber of Commerce. Dr. Bennett did not attend the hearing. Nevertheless, he pushed the plan through in February without any of the recommended changes, despite information from his own department that the plan would result in 22% D’s and F’s for Indiana schools. In comparison, Florida last year gave D’s and F’s to 6% of their schools. Indiana schools are not over 3 times worse than Florida schools! This fact is certifiably grounded in data from the National Assessment, which is a test taken in common by all states and is known as “the nation’s report card.” On the National Assessment, Indiana consistently outscores Florida in 4th and 8th grade math and in 8th grade reading, and Indiana consistently scores higher than the national average. Tony Bennett’s A-F system has demeaned the performance of Indiana’s schools compared to Florida. Conveniently, low grades would feed more schools into his pipeline for state intervention which in Indianapolis and Gary has resulted in for-profit corporations taking over schools, accompanied by discord, litigation and fragmented communities.

Mayors have complained that unfairly low school grades damage local economic development efforts to attract new jobs. The calibration of this A-F system is simply wrong. It will hurt our schools and our economy.

This fall implementation has seen major delays, the director of the program took another job in the midst of the roll out, and local school officials say they can’t get answers to their questions about the flawed growth statistics. We need a change. I support Glenda Ritz for State Superintendent who stands for a revised system of grading our schools.

Dr. Vic Smith
Indianapolis, IN

Indiana Citizens for Public Education

Indiana Education Reform: Community Conversation

Calling All Parents, Guardians, Community Stakeholders

“New Indiana Education Laws and our Children”

                             Tuesday, October 23, 2012, 6:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.

Light of the World Christian Church, 4646 N. Michigan Road, Indianapolis, IN

Join Us in Discussing How New Laws Affect Our Children’s Education

Special Guest Panelists:  Representative Greg Porter, City County Councilman Leroy Robinson, Washington Township Teacher Glenda Ritz,Ed Power CEO Marcus Robinson, Indianapolis Deputy Mayor Jason Kloth, and Attorney Brenda A. Roper, National Council of Negro Women

Be informed about how several of the following laws impact our children:

-Teacher Evaluation and Performance System

-School Accountability-New Federal Waiver of NCLB

-Growth Model                       -Charter School Expansion

-Discipline                               -Turnaround Schools

-Vouchers                                -Minority Teacher Recruitment

“We can’t ADVOCATE, if we don’t KNOW.”

Co-Sponsored by the Greater Indianapolis National Association of the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Indianapolis Alliance of Black School Educators (IABSE), National Council of Negro Women (NCNW), and the Indianapolis Chapter of the National Coalition of 100 Black Women (NCBW)

A Timeline of the Battle in Indy

Dear concerned citizen:     Over the past three-plus months, local and state print media have picked up on the value of a dialogue around the future of education in Indianapolis. A slew of commentaries, blogs, and stories from a wide variety of sources including NUVO, the Indianapolis Star and now even the Ft. Wayne Journal-Gazette are providing readers a variety of view points to help them make informed decisions about the future of public education.  In particular is the commentary on local education issues from someone outside Marion County by a Ft. Wayne newspaper editor /blogger. Black & Latino Policy Institute/ Parent Power / Education-Community Action Team September 6 “The problem is not parents” Here’s the link to a commentary “The problem is not parents; it's a crisis in democracy” by Councilor Jose Evans published in NUVO’s Perspectives on Education. http://www.nuvo.net/PerspectivesinEducation/archives/2012/09/06/perspectives-in-education-josandeacute-evans#.UFXmYbJlTwt  September 9 “Daring to trust parents” Here’s the link to Indy Star columnist Dan Carpenter on the issues surrounding Local School Council proposal he titled, “Daring to trust parents…” http://www.indystar.com/article/20120907/OPINION05/209090328/Dan-Carpenter-Daring-trust-parents  September 12 “Coming to a school near you…” The Ft. Wayne Journal-Gazette editorial writer Karen Francisco published a blog she titled: “Coming to a school near you…” http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20120912/BLOGS13/120919830/0/SEARCH  September 13 “Our schools can benefit from self-government” Here’s the link to the Letter to the Editor published in the Star regarding the Local School Council proposal he presented: “Our schools can benefit from self-government” http://blogs.indystar.com/letters/2012/09/13/my-view-our-schools-can-benefit-from-self-government/  August 22 “A grassroots approach to school reform” NUVO article on the Local School Council Plan http://www.nuvo.net/indianapolis/a-grassroots-approach-to-school-reform/Content?oid=2484953  In mid-June, NUVO began an on-line forum for written commentaries regarding education called “Perspectives in Education. “  June 14 : Here’s the link to the first Perspectives on Education by community activist Wes Bernard, “What is the purpose of education?” where is argues that education is really all about skillfully drawing out of what is inside the student, establishing and fortifying the students' identity and competence and their place in community and society. http://www.nuvo.net/PerspectivesinEducation/archives/2012/06/14/perspectives-in-education-wes-barnard#.UFYUDbJlTws  June 21: Here’s link to comments by educator Jeffery C. White on urban education reforms around the idea that the cluster of incompetent administrators in IPS warrants significant change right now. http://www.nuvo.net/PerspectivesinEducation/archives/2012/06/21/perspectives-in-education-jeffery-c-white#.UFYX8LJlTws June 28: Here’s the link to essay from local writer Doug Martin concerning those who study the corporate school movement realize that "autonomy" is merely a code word for letting charter school leaders do anything they desire to collect a hefty profit. http://www.nuvo.net/PerspectivesinEducation/archives/2012/06/28/perspectives-in-education-doug-martin#.UFYrUbJlTwt July 5: Here’s the link to teacher Annette Magjuka’s essay on the issue of how we provide free public education for all citizens, so even poor children can compete. But unfortunately, all public education is not equal. http://www.nuvo.net/indianapolis/perspectives-in-education-indys-naacp/Content?oid=2482495#.UFYrbLJlTws July 12: Here’s link to the essay by IPS teacher Mary Noland on how it is terribly frustrating to hear people who are NOT teachers talk about reform, and add to that the term "accountability." http://www.nuvo.net/PerspectivesinEducation/archives/2012/07/13/perspectives-in-education-mary-nolan#.UFYaWLJlTws  August 16: Here’s the link to a commentary from our local NAACP encouraging participation in a new round of talks on education, adhering to the philosophy that "if you are not on the table, you are on the menu." The essay encourages a wide variety of citizens respond to the “What’s possible?” conversations so that solutions to the problems that we did not create should not be left to the politics of power, status, and wealth. http://www.nuvo.net/indianapolis/perspectives-in-education-indys-naacp/Content?oid=2482495#.UFYrbLJlTws  June 8: Here’s link to NUVO story on “In the Mind Trust we trust? http://www.nuvo.net/indianapolis/a-grassroots-approach-to-school-reform/Content?oid=2484953#.UFYEALJlTws August 15: Introduction letter to the Local School Council proposal by Jose Evans www.indy.gov/eGov/Council/Documents/Evans.pdf  The Local School Council proposal: www.indy.gov/eGov/Council/Documents/Local%20School%20Councils%20in%20IPS.pdf

Election 2012!  Glenda Ritz for Superintendent of Public Instruction



On Thursday Indiana gubernatorial candidate John Gregg endorsed Glenda Ritz for Indiana Superintendent for Public Instruction. Speaking at the State Capitol, Gregg introduced Ritz, saying that she "has been at the forefront of the fight here in Indiana to protect public education."
Ritz has been an educator for 33 years, serving as an elementary school teacher, as a library media specialist, on the Board of Directors of the National Board of Professional Teaching Standards, and numerous other positions.

Gregg said that "the best ideas don't come from Washington, DC or Indianapolis, and as an educator for 33 years Glenda understands that. This is a women who has understood from day one that the key to Indiana's future is public education."
Ritz said, "When our students go out into the world, whether it be to technical schools, or universities, or to the workplace, they need to know how to think in ways that support them in the changing world that we live know. That kind of thinking cannot be learned by just passing a test."

From KokomoPerspective

Comments?

Who's Really Behind Education Reform?

Julie Underwood on ALEC & Education
Julie Underwood, the Dean of the UW-Madison School of Education, discusses ALEC's school privatization agenda.

Privatizing Public Education, Higher Ed Policy, and Teachers from ALEC Exposed

• Indiana Rep. Cindy J. Noe (R-87)^[17], ALEC Education Task Force Member, spoke on "Enacting a Comprehensive K-12 Education Reform Agenda" at the 2011 ALEC Annual Meeting on August 3, 2011
• Featured speakers have included: Milton Friedman, Newt Gingrich, Dick Cheney, Dan Quayle, George Allen, Jessie Helms, Pete Coors, Governor Mitch Daniels

I-READ Petition

Indiana Legislators: Tell the IDOE to Scrap IREAD-3
www.change.org

http://www.change.org/petitions/indiana-legislators-tell-the-idoe-to-scrap-iread-3

Why This Is Important

IREAD-3 is a forty-question test that will determine whether public school students in Indiana may advance to fourth grade. It channels education dollars toward redundant assessment, not instruction, and favors retention over remediation; it is therefore a misuse of public funds.

No major decision about a child's future should be made on the basis of a single test score. Retaining students has been shown to increase the risk that they drop out of school and to have a null or negative effect on their academic achievement in the long run.

Like other high-stakes standardized tests, IREAD-3 will disproportionately punish low-income children and families. Indiana students' reading skills are already assessed continually by their teachers as well as through ISTEP+ and NWEA or Acuity. Money allocated for this test directly reduces funds available for remediation. Our tax dollars should go to local schools for literacy programs and teachers rather than to assessment overhead and testing companies.

DOE Seeks Public Comment

Educator Standards Public Comment


Posted: Fri, 03/16/2012 - 9:15am Updated: Thu, 03/22/2012 - 9:32am The Indiana Department of Education is seeking public comment in regards to two newly developed sets of standards. These standards are intended to serve in the preparation and assessment of preservice teachers or school counselors. Please note the Exceptional Needs-Mild Intervention Reading Instruction Standards are meant to serve as an addendum to the existing Exceptional Needs-Mild Intervention Standards which may be found HERE. Once you have read the draft standards below, please visit the survey site (link below) to contribute your feedback.

The IDOE will be collecting public comment on these standards between March 23 and April 23, 2012, at the following link: Survey for Public Comment on Educator Standards.

Indiana School Counselor Standards


Indiana Exceptional Needs-Mild Intervention Reading Instruction Standards

If you have further questions, please contact us at eel@doe.in.gov.

Upcoming Education Events

The next E-CAT of Innovate Indy continuing conversation on education reform in Indianapolis will take place 5:30pm to 7:30pm on Tuesday March 27th at the KI EcoCenter, 159 West 28th Street Indianapolis, Indiana 46208 (Southeast corner of Capital and 28th Street).


On Tuesday March 20th at Christian Theological Seminary, Rev. Dr. Floyd Flake will be making a presentation titled: "Politics, Religion, and the Common Good: The Case of Education Reform”. The event is free and open to the public, but registration is encouraged. The public event starts at 5 pm and will run to 7pm. More information can be found here: https://christiantheologicalseminary14608.thankyou4caring.org/sslpage.aspx?pid=387

On Wednesday March 21st at the Central Library, the Educate Indiana Speaker Series, presented by Education Reform Now, will feature Neerav Kingland, Chief Strategy Officer for New Schools for New Orleans , as well as David Harris, CEO of the Mind Trust. Registration is encouraged, but not required according to the Central Library. The event will be held from 6-7:30 pm at the Indianapolis Central Library, located at One Library Square, 40 E. St. Clair St. Indianapolis, IN 46204.

More info can be found here: http://indychamber.com/ContentFiles/1389/Educate%20IN%20speaker%20series.pdf

And here: http://indfer.org/2012/03/educate-indiana-speakers-series-lessons-learned-from-new-orleans/

We encourage everyone to attend these events. For those who have read the Mind trust plan you can see that they really need our help to transform education in a way that will help our children.

TX school board resolution vs. high-stakes testing

 For your consideration....an important reminder here that public education is still part of a democratic process (at least for now) and that we and are elected officials are responsible.  It'd be very interesting to see some discussion here as it relates to Indiana.  Have at it!!

Guy Brandenburg writes that here is an excellent resolution that has been passed by Clear Creek School District, a large district near NASA, as well as several other school boards in Texas. It has been called "The shot heard around the county." [see http://galvestondailynews.com/story/298894] Why not around the country? If Texas school boards can pass this resolution, why shouldn't all school boards in the nation adopt similar ones?
From Guy Brandenburg on the EDDRA2 listserve, Tuesday, March 13, 2012. See http://parentsacrossamerica.org/2012/03/clear-creek-tx-school-board-resolution-vs-high-stakes-testing/



BOARD OF TRUSTEES
CLEAR CREEK INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT

RESOLUTION CONCERNING HIGH STAKES, STANDARDIZED TESTING

OF TEXAS PUBLIC SCHOOL STUDENTS


STATE OF TEXAS §
COUNTY OF GALVESTON


WHEREAS, the over reliance on standardized, high stakes testing as the only assessment of learning that really matters in the state and federal accountability systems is strangling our public schools and undermining any chance that educators have to transform a traditional system of schooling into a broad range of learning experiences that better prepares our students to live successfully and be competitive on a global stage; and

WHEREAS, we commend Robert Scott, Commissioner of Education, for his concern about the overemphasis on high stakes testing that has become "a perversion of its original intent" and for his continuing support of high standards and local accountability; and

WHEREAS, we believe our state's future prosperity relies on a high-quality education system that prepares students for college and careers, and without such a system Texas' economic competitiveness and ability and to attract new business will falter; and

WHEREAS, the real work of designing more engaging student learning experiences requires changes in the culture and structure of the systems in which teachers and students work; and

WHEREAS, what occurs in our classrooms every day should be student-centered and result in students learning at a deep and meaningful level, as opposed to the superficial level of learning that results from the current over-emphasis on that which can be easily tested by standardized tests; and

WHEREAS, We believe in the tenets set out in Creating a New Vision for Public Education in Texas (TASA, 2008) and our goal is to transform this district in accordance with those tenets; and

WHEREAS, Our vision is for all students to be engaged in more meaningful learning activities that cultivate their unique individual talents, to provide for student choice in work that is designed to respect how they learn best, and to embrace the concept that students can be both consumers and creators of knowledge; and

WHEREAS, only by developing new capacities and conditions in districts and schools, and the communities in which they are embedded, will we ensure that all learning spaces foster and celebrate innovation, creativity, problem solving, collaboration, communication and critical thinking; and

WHEREAS, these are the very skills that business leaders desire in a rising workforce and the very attitudes that are essential to the survival of our democracy; and

WHEREAS, imposing relentless test preparation and boring memorization of facts to enhance test performance is doing little more than stealing the love of learning from our students and assuring that we fall short of our goals; and

WHEREAS, we do not oppose accountability in public schools and we point with pride to the performance of our students, but believe that the system of the past will not prepare our students to lead in the future and neither will the standardized tests that so dominate their instructional time and block our ability to make progress toward a world-class education system of student-centered schools and future-ready students; therefore be it

RESOLVED that the Clear Creek ISD Board of Trustees calls on the Texas Legislature to reexamine the public school accountability system in Texas and to develop a system that encompasses multiple assessments, reflects greater validity, uses more cost efficient sampling techniques and other external evaluation arrangements, and more accurately reflects what students know, appreciate and can do in terms of the rigorous standards essential to their success, enhances the role of teachers as designers, guides to instruction and leaders, and nurtures the sense of inquiry and love of learning in all students.

PASSED AND APPROVED on this 27 day of February, 2012.

Indiana Groups that Want to Privatize Your School

A center out of Columbia University is tracking the lobbying and funding actions of so-called education reform groups that--whether they say this publicly or not--support turning public education over to for-profit companies.  Here's the Indiana list that I'm sure could be expanded.  Comments?
National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education (NCSPE): Check it out.

Who supports privatization of education?



A descriptive analysis of NCSPE's links to national and state-specific organizations that tend to support or oppose privatization of education

INDIANA LIST:
Greater Educational Opportunities (GEO) Foundation Indiana
“GEO Foundation, as featured in Forbes Magazine, has been making access to quality schools a reality for children since 1998. GEO incubates quality charter schools and then supports their growth. All four GEO-sponsored public charter schools are high academic growth schools and feature a unique K-14 model--full day kindergarten all the way through two years of college. GEO seeks to provide greater access to quality education for all kids. The foundation currently operates four charter schools.” (website quote)

Indiana School Scholarship Tax Credit
“The Indiana School Scholarship Tax Credit is designed to provide scholarship support for thousands of low and middle income families to enroll their children into the private or public school of their choice. Funding for these scholarships will come from private, charitable donations to qualified scholarship granting organizations (SGOs). Donors (individuals or corporations) would be eligible to take advantage of a 50% credit against their state tax liability for contributions made to an SGO. The program is entirely privately-funded, with an incentive to charitable giving from the tax credit.” (website quote)

Indiana Virtual Families
“Indiana Virtual School Families (IVSF) is a grassroots coalition that was formed four years ago, before grassroots coalitions became popular! The Indiana Virtual School Families board consists of a group of passionate parent volunteers that have united in an effort to educate and inform the public and policymakers at all levels of the potential benefits virtual learning opportunities can bring to Indiana. A coalition supporting virtual schools in Indiana” (website quote)

School Choice Indiana
“School Choice Indiana, Inc. is a non-partisan, statewide organization dedicated to the principle that providing parents with real choices in the education of their children will improve educational outcomes and improve the quality of education, both in private and public schools.” (website quote)

Who supports privatization of education?

In 2000, the National Center for the Study of Privatization in Education (NCSPE) began to collect and classify website links to organizations involved in advocacy or research related to privatization of education. We created three general classifications: (1) organizations that: "tend to support privatization of education," (2) "present both supporting and opposing perspectives," and (3) "tend to oppose privatization of education." Within the general classifications we subcategorized organizations as: "advocacy," "research and policy" "nonprofit and for-profit and education management organizations," "news," and "research journals." In addition, in 2009, since much of the debate and activity related to privatization of education occurs at the state level, we began to add and classify links to state-specific organizations that "tend to support" or "tend to oppose" privatization of education.


Because of the enormous expansion of activity and interest in educational privatization, we recently concluded a robust search of the internet in order to update our links. The purpose of this announcement is to share with you the results of that search.

First, some descriptive data about our links:
In 2005 we had 49 links to organizations that "Tend to Support Privatization in Education;" we now have 85 such links.

In 2005 we had 23 links to organizations that "Present Both Supporting and Opposing Perspectives;" we did not find any new links to add to this category

In 2005 we had 22 links to organizations that "Tend to Oppose Privatization in Education;" we found only one new link to add to this category

In 2009 we had 19 links to state-specific organizations that "Tend to Support Privatization in Education;" we now have 164 such links

In 2009 we had 7 links to state-specific organizations that "Tend to Oppose Privatization in Education;" we now have 247 such links

In addition to serving as a valuable resource for students of school choice and privatization, the links provide a unique window into the evolution of support for school choice and privatization at the state and national levels. The following observations are based on our review of the changes in the distribution of website links within and between the state and national levels.

Continued Ideological Polarization in the National Dialogue on Privatization of Education

Even though a plethora of new reforms, such as online learning, are now part of the national education reform debate, school choice remains a highly divisive political issue. There are a total of 71 advocacy organizations but only 17 research and policy organizations among the support and oppose categories. In fact, if we counted the Education Management Organizations (EMOs) on our list as advocacy organizations, then essentially all of the growth in our list of national-level organizations since 2005 has come from the addition of advocacy organizations. Furthermore, we could not find neutral organizations at the state-level so we left that category out entirely for the states.

Growth in Organizations that Tend to Support Privatization at the State-level

At the national level, there are significantly more organizations that tend to support privatization (85 that support vs. 22 that oppose), while the opposite is true across the states (164 support vs. 245 oppose). This is largely because every state has at least one well-established teachers' organization (usually more than one) clearly opposed to privatization. However, a diverse coalition of state-level organizations that support school choice has emerged to mobilize parents and counter the power of teachers' organizations. These organizations include religious groups (especially religiously-motivated homeschoolers), free market policy organizations, parent advocacy organizations (e.g. Stand for Children), private school networks, and state-specific education management organizations. Most of these organizations, however, are more recently established and not as well connected or entrenched as those that oppose privatization. This trend suggests that we may see some significant legislative conflicts on school choice issues at the state-level in the not-too-distant future.
About the NCSPE
The Center provides independent, non-partisan information on and analysis of privatization in education. The Center's program includes research, evaluation, conferences, publications, and dissemination on a full range of issues regarding privatization of education from pre-school to higher education, both national and international.

Opting Out in Indiana

A great story here on WFYI on how some parents are choosing to Opt-Out of the standardized testing in Indiana.  Interestingly, the Indiana DOE didn't respond to some of these folks for three months but sent an email the day this story came out.  Shows what it takes these days sadly.  The conversation is building steam and getting interesting.

Why Some Indiana Parents Won’t Let Their Kids Take State Tests This Spring

They’ve tried organizing. They’ve tried criticizing. They’ve tried testifying.

But despite efforts to get their message out, some parents still feel shut out of the discussion about changes in education policy across Indiana and the nation.

So now, a handful of them is trying a new way to make their point — resisting.

Having long criticized laws like the federal No Child Left Behind act and Indiana’s Public Law 221 for relying too heavily on test scores, small groups of parents are planning to have their students “Opt Out” of statewide testing this spring. On test day, their kids simply won’t show up to school.

• ‘This Page Intentionally Left Blank’: Opt Out In IndianaEvery Indiana third grader will take a new reading exam in March to determine whether he or she can move on to the fourth grade. As Kyle Stokes reports, that’s one more reason some parents who worry about the increasingly-high stakes of state testing don’t want their children taking the exams this spring.Download

‘WE DON’T HAVE A PROBLEM WITH TESTING PER SE’

Though state officials doubt the legality of such a move, organizers say Opt Out is a vehicle parents can use to vent their frustration with education policies. National opponents of high-stakes standardized testing say if as few as five or six percent of students were to skip statewide exams, state officials could no longer consider the rest of the test results valid.

READ MORE:

Good Points on the MindTrust Plan

Dan Carpenter does a nice job here of pointing to some of the logical problems with this plan.  It is fundamentally anti-democratic, notably saying to the parents and communities of IPS that they're not capable of electing a school board.  Don't get this wrong however; there's a lot to be desired in the IPS school board and its superintendent and changes are needed.  But Carpenter is right that this plan is part of a corporate strategy to make money off of so-called reform.

IPS as a civics lesson

• Should a mayor who won re-election with 16 percent of the potential vote be given control of schools because of low turnout in school board elections?
• Is the answer to too little democracy, in other words, less democracy?

The "entrepreneurial" approach to education reform, as espoused by The Mind Trust and its corporate and political partners, would give us this logic. Indeed, saith The Mind Trust's David Harris, "We do think the board needs to be moved out of the way."
Who's the board? It's the people chosen, for better or worse, without suburban supervision, by residents of the Indianapolis Public Schools territory to educate more than 30,000 children.
A better question: Who is "We," and who elected "Us"?
It wasn't We the People, but We the People get most of the bill. The $700,000 study that produced an IPS overhaul plan enjoyed a $500,000 grant from Indiana Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett, a champion of non-public education and the state's co-leader with Gov. Mitch Daniels in channeling public money into privatization.
The wholly unsurprising makeover/takeover plan, with its emphases on charter schools, the gelding of the IPS central office and the disempowering of central city voters as well as the teachers union, fits the pattern of the prevailing "reform" movement but hardly strikes this writer as a blueprint for better times in and of itself.
Site-based decision-making was tried in IPS, and collapsed in the face of relentless pupil mobility. Mayorally appointed school boards have been tried in other cities, without notable success. Charter schools, for-profit and nonprofit, have not outperformed traditional public schools.
Yet these are the power relationships that eclipse pedagogy in the made-up minds of business-model reformers. Get the administration, the board, the union, the messy local politics "moved out of the way," and impose a simplified education market in which families' choices will be limited to consumer choices. And first, by all means, declare the system broken.
If the system is not broken, but merely running unsatisfactorily (like many of its neighbor systems), then reformers have a problem. They must find ways to help, not merely people and structures to discard. They must acknowledge strengths (of which IPS has many). They must address the low profile given school board races in the election process. They must answer for their own funding cuts, to education directly and to the demands of the monster at its doorstep called poverty.
If, on the other hand, class size and hunger and crime and families fighting to survive can be portrayed as excuses on the part of complacent incompetents who stand in the way of efficiency, the stage is set for a handover of control.
This is a national, even international, phenomenon. Check the rightwing American Legislative Exchange Council. Check the Milton Friedman brigade out of the University of Chicago and the Indianapolis-based Friedman Foundation for Educational Choice. Your Republican lawmakers, and some key Democrats as well, are listening to them. Are the people who own the public schools too few, and too small, to be heard?
Carpenter is Star op-ed columnist. Contact him at (317) 444-6172 or at dan.carpenter@indystar.com.

Innovate Indy on Education Reform: Join us Jan. 5th!

DO NOT LEAVE EDUCATION REFORM IN THE HANDS OF “EXPERTS”
IN BUSINESS, FINANCE, AND LAW!


On December 3rd a conversation began about education reform in Indianapolis. That conversation continues next on:  Thursday January 5th at 7:00pm at Big Car Service Center, 3919 N. Lafayette Road.

We will talk about authentic measures for learning and stopping the abuse of children by testing them.

Phil and Joan Harris from Bloomington, two of the three coauthors of:
The Myths of Standardized Tests: Why They Don't Tell You What You Think They Do
will join us to share their knowledge and we will discuss further activities to educate a wider community.

Matthew Brooks, coordinator for Opt- out Indiana will also join the discussion of how to protect our kids and our communities.

Adults please bring students to share their insights and add their voices to this vital discussion.

A tremendous concentration of wealth and political power has been focused in Indianapolis to drive an agenda of change in education. We find that agenda dangerously misinformed. We intend to inform and redirect that agenda toward the betterment of our neighborhoods, our schools and our children. We need the participation of parents, students, teachers and all concerned members of the community in order to accomplish this goal. Please join our conversation.

The Mind Trust and a Local Control Ruse

This post from School Matters nicely gives some counter voice to the local gushing over the Mind Trust's plan to gut  Indianapolis Public Schools.  It is important to note how much taxpayer money is already going to these folks and how much this "gift" as the Indy Star puts it positions them to receive in the future.  We're not going to say that some of these ideas aren't good but this is shady politics and it's time that the public pay much more attention to the money trail.  Finally, the idea that mayoral control is more democratic is preposterous (just ask community folks in DC, New York, New Orleans, or Chicago).

The Mind Trust’s plan to redesign IPS

Posted on December 20, 2011 by stevehinnefeld

The Mind Trust, an Indianapolis-based nonprofit that promotes education reform, released an ambitious proposal Sunday for remaking Indianapolis Public Schools. It certainly has people talking.

Here are some initial thoughts:

– A key feature of the plan involves killing off the IPS school board and turning control of the district over to the Indianapolis mayor and city-county council. Whether this is a good or bad idea, it’s certainly undemocratic. As Heather Gillers points out in theIndianapolis Star, it means “telling voters who live in IPS that they are the only ones in the state who will not be allowed to elect their school board.”

More significantly, the city of Indianapolis and IPS cover very different geographical areas –- the mayor of Indy isn’t the mayor of IPS. The mayor and city-county council are elected by voters from throughout Marion County, but IPS is only one of 11 school districts in the county. About three-fourths of public-school students in Marion County attend non-IPS schools.

The argument for mayoral control is that the mayor will be “politically accountable” for the schools. But even if the mayor screws up, IPS residents may not have the votes to punish him at the polls.

– More than 80 percent of IPS students qualify for free or reduced-price school lunches. No other public school district in Indiana comes close to that level of poverty, except for some districts in Lake County (Gary, East Chicago). The Mind Trust plan barely mentions this fact, or the challenges it presents for any scheme to dramatically improve performance in IPS schools.

Sure, poverty can’t be an excuse for failing to do everything possible to improve schools. But as Helene F. Ladd and Edward B. Fiske wrote in a recent New York Times op-ed, pretending poverty doesn’t matter only gets in the way of serious attempts at reform.

– The Mind Trust plan envisions converting all IPS schools to what it calls “opportunity schools,” with the freedom and flexibility that are usually associated with charter schools. All would be “schools of choice”: parents could send their kids to any school in the district, subject to the IPS somehow playing traffic cop.

It’s the standard market-based ideology of education reform: “Great schools” will thrive because parents send their children there; “failing schools” will close for lack of enrollment. The models for this approach are New York City under Mayor Michael Bloomberg and New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.

The Mind Trust claims it will be possible to reallocate 80 percent of IPS administrative costs to the schools, leaving the district’s central office to be a low-level provider of services. This seems like a stretch. But even if it isn’t, a whole lot more responsibilities also would flow to the schools. Principals would apparently be responsible for hiring and firing teachers, establishing curriculum, selecting textbooks, arranging for school meals, lining up transportation, securing special-education services, handling the paperwork for federal Title I funds, etc., etc.

Oh, and also finding time to be great instructional leaders.

– According to the Star, the Mind Trust paid $700,000 to have its plan produced by Public Impact, a North Carolina consulting firm. That seems like a hefty price for a product that appears to involve no original research, and with its executive summary packed with reformist jargon about bold visions, reinventing education, empowering parents, great leaders, great teachers, ad nauseum.

Some $500,000 came from the Indiana Department of Education, the Star reports – a lot of public money to spend at a time when state government is cutting services.

– For those of us who don’t live in Indianapolis, it’s probably hard to comprehend the hunger that many civic-minded people must feel for something, anything, that will turn IPS into a great school system. It’s common to hear that “IPS is broken and can’t be fixed,” or words to that effect. Superintendents have raised hopes but produced disappointing results, at least when it comes to test scores. So it’s not surprising that the Mind Trust plan has won praise from folks on the left, right and center.

But as education historian Diane Ravitch often warns, there are no “silver bullets” in education. There are no miracle cures for poverty. Making a difference in the lives of children is hard work that takes time, resources, dedication and sustained focus.