It is time for parents and educators to hold the bureaucrats and politicians accountable for the damage Wrought by the counterreforms of public education. The latest grading structure for school accountability in place, the Indiana Department of Educations mandated turnaround process claims yet another dedicated and qualified educator, Principal Frey of Edison Elementary, as scapegoat for the crisis of public education in Indiana. Sitting through the mandated accountability meetings for Hammonds schools we learned two very important lessons: 1) good schools are being unfairly evaluated by the state, and 2) in spite of the states determined efforts to blame them, our educators are doing more with less and their morale has not been broken. The IDOE knows full well that the real crisis facing public schools is a lack of funding. Instead, the bureaucrats have dedicated their efforts to developing increasingly complex testing standards. Constantly revising these in an arbitrary manner with the obvious intent of making hardworking educators accountable for the failures of public education.Thus the IDOE has turned accountability upside down. Of course solid testing metrics can and should be used to analyze how and where we can improve the quality of education being provided by our public schools. Testing, however, is like a thermometer; it can be used to measure the temperature of a sick child, but it wont reduce the fever. Yet, it is clear from the states handling of the testing process, changing the grading scale mid-course more than once, that the intent was never to actually measure how we are failing our children. So we are dealing with two crises, a phony grading crisis created by people looking to hide their responsibility for the much more important crisis, inadequately funding public education. Schools have been hurt by two very important changes. First, local property taxes can no longer be used to finance operating budgets (salaries, text books, etc.), instead the state is to use sales tax revenue to provide the minimum funds to each school. This was intended to eliminate the disparities between spending across districts, but Indianapolis was supposed to make up for the funds lost to the districts. This never happened, so instead of funding being equally raised, it was universally lowered. Second, while local property taxes can be used to pay for school capital improvements (new buildings, buses, etc.), the state capped property taxes. This is why Hammond High Schools swim team does not have functioning pool facilities, and some rural districts can no longer provide busing. This is why the school buildings in Gary are falling apart. Yes, times are tough, but even in the middle of a drought, when theres a fire at a school, you use the water required to put the fire out, the rationing comes later. Balancing budgets on the backs of children may be financially sound, but it is morally bankrupt. These priorities are so obvious that it raises the question as to why our able state leaders are engaged in cutting funding to public education. The answer can be found in other changes to funding rules. Under the illustrious phrase, funding follows the students, the state government is defunding public education so that it can fund private schools. Our leaders want to wash there hands of responsibility for quality public education. The states real priorities help us to understand the love affair with Right to Work legislation, as this undercuts a potential source of resistance--the teachers union. Lets be clear, this is not partisan politics. We need only look next door to Illinois to find Democrats leading the charge against public education. In fact, these are national policies, begun with No Child Left Behind--which really leaves no politician behind in the race to appear fiscally responsible, while it dumps the kids in a roadside ditch. The second Bush, the education president, concocted NCLB, but it passed Congress with bipartisan support. We can anticipate a response: theres no limit to the amount of money that can be spent on this generation, but this will only add to the debt burden of the next. This would be a valid argument, if we were anywhere near the minimum level of funding. The hard reality is schools across the state have been dealing with less money, year after year. Our teachers have responsibly been doing more with less, and less. Armed with the right priorities, we will find the money, but not in the shallow pockets of working people and the cash-strapped middle class. The money spent on education prepares kids to work for employers. As we are often told, quality jobs cant be filled by a poorly educated workforce. This is why pegging schools general funding on sales tax revenues is wrong. Aside from the fact that these revenues are highly cyclical, this amounts to a regressive tax structure being used to subsidize corporate success. The Edison Elementary community is coming to an agreement, we are reaching an agreement that there is a lack of accountability, that the politicians and bureaucrats in Indianapolis are acting irresponsibly. We know this sentiment is widely held, and we will be looking for our allies in school districts across the state.
Posted on: Wed, 05 Mar 2014 07:48:51 +0000
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