________________________________________  THE VERMONT EDUCATION REPORT December 03, 2001 Vol. 1, No. 37 ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯  Covering education news in Vermont and beyond... Informative, provocative, unique... Published by Vermonters for Better Education  VBE is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization whose mission is to enlist parents and the public at large in achieving quality educational opportunities for all the children of Vermont by monitoring the state of education in Vermont; promoting the value of educational freedoms for all parents; and giving parents the evaluative tools with which to identify excellence. Libby Sternberg, executive director: MAILTO:LSternberg@aol.com STATE NEWS... MCNULTY DISAPPOINTS When interviewed for the November 12 issue of this newsletter, incoming Education Commissioner Raymond J. McNulty stressed that he was open to new ideas. This did not stop him, however, from testifying on November 26 against a new idea in education reform -- charter schools - before the state's charter school study committee, which soon will issue a report to the legislature. McNulty claimed that the introduction of charter schools would be a distraction, and he fears that they will take resources away from public schools. McNulty made his comments with no input from pro-charter school groups in the state. In response to McNulty's testimony, the Burlington Free Press published an editorial on Monday, December 3 that read, in part, as follows: "The Vermont educational establishment…has apparently decided to vigorously fight charters, perhaps fearing that competition would draw students away from regular schools and force changes in public education that the educators dislike. "Indeed, some Vermont educators are so worried about losing control that they have ignored research showing the benefits of charter schools. A report released in August by the highly respected Center for Education Reform [http://www.edreform.com] found overwhelming evidence of the positive effects of charter schools. Of particular note are two U.S. Education Department studies confirming that competition from charter schools drives regular schools to reform. "Also, an Arizona study that tracked approximately 50,000 students found that the longer a young person attends a charter school the greater the scholastic gains -- with no similar improvement among regular school students. A Texas study found comparable results… "Sadly, McNulty and other Vermont educators seem to think that they alone have the wisdom to educate children and don't want to be challenged by other approaches."  CHARTER SCHOOL STUDY COMMITTEE WORKING ON DRAFT A November 19 seven-page draft of the charter school study committee's report contains a summary of the committee's charge and a round-up of information on charter schools around the country. But sprinkled throughout the report are a few clues to where the committee is headed. For example, the committee has this to say about transportation: "Provision of transportation will be very important if lower income families are to have equal access to charter schools. Therefore, we think that provision of transportation aid to charter schools is important and should be provided on the same basis as that provided to traditional public schools." While a laudable goal, this policy would mean charter schools would have less flexibility than Vermont's current tuition towns where transportation is handled in a variety of different ways. The report also recommends that charter schools not receive capital construction aid from the state, and gives research on charter schools mixed reviews. CLEVELAND CASE AMICUS BRIEFS OFFER A VALUABLE HISTORY LESSON As noted in a prior VER, Vermonters for Better Education has filed an amicus curiae brief in the Cleveland voucher case to be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court this term [read it here]. While the VBE brief focuses on the prohibition against discriminating against religion in otherwise neutral programs, some other amicus briefs filed with the court offer a fascinating, and extremely valuable, history lesson for those who falsely believe that the tradition of religious schools being cut off from public funding is rooted in the Constitution. Two briefs, in particular, are of note: The Landmark Legal Foundation's brief on behalf of Fannie Lewis, a Cleveland Democratic City Councilwoman, and the Beckett Fund for Religious Liberty's brief. The Fannie Lewis brief says:  "…there is no historical support for the notion that the Establishment Clause requires the state to discriminate against religious individuals or institutions with respect to generally available public benefits. In this litigation, respondents have not pointed to a single instance during the early days of the Republic in which the legitimacy of public grants to religious institutions for the performance of public functions was even challenged, let alone held to be unconstitutional. And, despite careful historical research, we are not aware of one… "At the time of the framing of the Bill of Rights, there were virtually no state schools. In the early years of the Republic, public support for education generally took the form of grants to private schools, many of which were religious in nature. In Washington, DC, where the Establishment Clause then applied, education was provided entirely through private and semi-public institutions - including denominational schools - partially at public expense until 1848… "Only in the second quarter of the 19th Century did the States of the north and west begin to establish public schools with exclusive rights to public subvention. Even then, the defunding of private schools was not based on supposed Establishment Clause problems, but primarily on nativist and anti-Catholic opposition to alternatives to the Protestant public schools. For example, when Catholics sought to participate in New York's pluralistic educational funding system, a bitter political battle broke out, featuring violent anti-Catholic riots. The end result was to confine funding to public schools… "…hostility to Catholic education remained an effective bar to aid to private schooling in most States until after World War II."  From the Beckett Fund for Religious Liberty's brief:  "This amicus brief traces the 19th Century efforts to bar aid to 'sectarian' schools, which, we will demonstrate, were not based on fair-minded debates over the proper separation of church and state, but rather were the result of anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant nativism and a desire to preserve the Protestant character of the public schools. "…this amicus brief argues that this Court should not treat primary and secondary school aid as a special analytical category, as it has frequently done, but instead should look at this case under general Establishment Clause principles… "Amicus urges this Court to reject the argument that money flowing to religiously affiliated or oriented primary and secondary schools constitutes a separate analytical category under the Establishment Clause. "…While some of this Court's direct-aid opinions, separate opinions of Justices, and various commentators have viewed monetary aid for education at primary and secondary religious schools as being especially suspect, this concept in the law does not have its origins in well-meaning theories of how best to maintain the proper separation of church and state. Rather, this practice of treating aid to lower schools as a unique Establishment Clause problem has its origin in the nativist and anti-Catholic bigotry of the 19th and early 20th Century. In short, it flowed not from the 18th Century thought of Madison and Jefferson, but from the fears and prejudices of later generations… "Amicus does this (lays out the history of public schools) not to score debater's points, or to construct a history of grievance, but to urge this Court to view the Cleveland school choice program through a lens unclouded by anachronistic biases and shoddy history. Correctly understood, nothing in the Establishment Clause requires this Court to reserve particular suspicion for religious primary and secondary schools. Again, following Professor Laycock, we urge this court to agree that "Americans today should not unwittingly reason from a premise rooted in nineteenth century anti- Catholicism. We must think these questions out afresh, with no inherited presuppositions." For a look at all the amicus briefs filed in favor of the Cleveland voucher program, go to: http://www.ij.org/cases/school/facts *    *    * COMMENTARY... THINKING AFRESH Over the past few weeks, Vermont education leaders - those who have a stake in the status quo - have been leading the charge away from an important education reform. On November 26 Education Commissioner-to-be Raymond J. McNulty disappointed school choice advocates with his testimony before the state's charter school study committee. McNulty, unlike his predecessor David Wolk, is not enthusiastic about charter schools or anything that could possibly affect the resources available to the schools he will control. The message is clear: forget about kids' needs; think of the schools' needs first. Yet charter schools, according to a study released by the U.S. Department of Education last summer, actually do both. They not only serve the individual children who choose them. They prompt improvements in public schools which must compete with them for students, says the study [read it here: http://www.ed.gov/PressReleases/06-2001/06142001.html]. This is an important point reinforced by other peer-reviewed studies on school choice in general. Some of the charter school committee members wonder why we can't accomplish the same wonderful things in public schools that are accomplished in charters and other schools of choice. The answer lies in these studies - without the healthy forces of market pressures, reforms are not always sustainable. Linked to specific individuals with grand ideas and the energy to implement them, creative approaches wither on the vine when the innovators pass from the scene. The effects of competition are long-lasting. The U.S. Department of Education study that talks of the beneficial effects of competition, by the way, is cited in a draft report of Vermont's charter school study committee in a grudging way filled with caveats, probably reflecting the committee's predisposition to shy away from anything that smacks of the beneficial effects of the marketplace. Those who cringe at the thought of a more open, competitive educational delivery system would do well to review their history. American public schools enjoy a unique position in our society not because of noble design, but rather because of ignoble fears that led to the defunding of private schools (see amicus briefs cited elsewhere in this newsletter). It is far past time for us to "think these problems out afresh," as one of the lawyers argues in the Cleveland voucher case, and "with no inherited presuppositions." *    *    * ELSEWHERE... SKEPTICISM OVER TEACHER CERTIFICATION The Progressive Policy Institute, a Washington, DC-based think tank, recently released a paper on "The Case for a Radical Overhaul of Teacher Certification." For those concerned about the teacher shortage, it's a must-read available on-line at: http://www.ppionline.org/documents/teacher_certification.pdf America needs better teachers, not just more teachers, says the author Frederick M. Hess, an assistant professor of education and government in the Curry School of Education and the School of Government and Foreign Affairs at the University of Virginia. Hess believes that to meet the needs of the future, "we must go beyond our traditional system of teacher education, which is archaic and demonstrably failing …" After including a brief history of certification, Hess lays out the three "myths" surrounding certification: that without it, teachers will not be able to perform adequately; that certification weeds out unsuitable people; and that certification helps to make teaching more "professional." Each of these assumptions, he says, is flawed. In particular, teacher preparation programs "neither screen out nor weed out weak candidates, with even elite programs generally admitting 50 percent or more of applicants." While it fails to weed out potentially bad teachers, certification programs also have a negative effect on potentially good teachers by dissuading some people from going into the field. Even the former Education Secretary (under President Clinton) acknowledged this when he said, in 1999, that "too many potential teachers are turned away because of the cumbersome process that requires them to jump through hoops and lots of them." Hess proposes a far simpler approach to getting people into teaching. He believes aspiring teachers should merely be required to have completed an undergraduate education and possess a bachelor's degree from a recognized college or university; they should be required to pass a competency test in knowledge or skills essential to what they seek to teach; and they should be subjected to a rigorous criminal background check. While he does not believe these criteria will ensure that applicants are ready to teach, he believes this will remove enough barriers to allow quality people into the field. Principals, he believes are the "best equipped" to assess whether teachers are right for the job. *    *    * The VERMONT EDUCATION REPORT is published by Vermonters for Better Education 170 Church Street, Rutland, VT 05701, 802.773.5240 Contact LSternberg@aol.com for more information.

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