________________________________________  THE VERMONT EDUCATION REPORT April 24, 2006 - Vol. 6, No. 17 ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯  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: VTBetterEd@aol.com NEWS & ANALYSIS... TO OUR READERS: A HIATUS For five years, Vermonters for Better Education has produced this weekly e-newsletter, the Vermont Education Report. But now we are going to take a hiatus. VBE's executive director, Libby Sternberg, leaves the organization for another job next month. With her departure, VBE's board will be discussing how best to serve the needs of education reformers in the state. During this period, the Vermont Education Report will not be published, at least not on a regular basis. We have appreciated the support and encouragement of Vermonters who have contributed in any way to the work of VBE. We believe that VBE has played a significant role in the life of education reform in Vermont and that there continues to be a need for a vigorous voice challenging the education status quo. In the coming weeks and months, we hope to come up with a plan that will serve education reformers, so watch your email for news of our efforts. In the meantime, thank you for reading, responding and contributing to our efforts. Sincerely, Vermonters for Better Education Board of Directors: Lenore Broughton, chair; Jeffrey Pascoe, secretary; William Corrow; Virginia Duffy; Richard Hilton; Chris Robbins; Robert Roper; and Wendy Wilton  SPECIAL COMMENTARY: A LONG GOOD-BYE by Libby Sternberg This marks my last regular issue as editor of the Vermont Education Report and as executive director of Vermonters for Better Education. I am departing VBE to return to my first love - music - after accepting a position in the arts. I have served as VBE's executive director for nearly seven years. When the organization first began, our goals were simple but straightforward. We wanted to promote school choice policies and we wanted to better inform the public, especially parents, about education in Vermont and beyond. It was this latter goal that prompted the start of this newsletter. We hoped to fill a void by communicating important information that was going unnoticed by the general public. This was due, in part, to the smallness of the state. Vermont has very few really large media venues. And reporters usually wear several hats. The scribe who covers education might also be covering health care, for example, or legislative issues, or general statewide matters. Contrast that to the education "beat" of my former hometown's newspaper, the Baltimore Sun. When I lived in Charm City, the Sun employed not one, but two, education reporters. One covered K-12, the other secondary education. It has been heartening to see education reporting improve in Vermont. There used to be a time when press releases from the Vermont Department of Education would appear virtually verbatim as news stories. Now, those press releases are examined and analyzed more thoroughly. Education reporters in the state are more likely to be asking the skeptic's question -- sez who? -- rather than parroting what those who have a stake in education's status quo have to say. School Choice Slow to Materialize.... While education reporting has improved, school choice opportunities have moved at the pace of a languid turtle. Before VBE was formed, school choice advocates saw some success in the passage of Act 150. But this weak, extremely restrictive public high school choice program hardly allows enough students to access other schools to have any impact beyond the lives of the individual students involved (significant to be sure). Its low numbers of permissible students means that only a minority of parents have firsthand experience with the benefits of school choice. Their voices are likely to be more of a whisper than a roar. It's easy for them to be drowned out when other voices are raised about health care reform, rising gas prices and upcoming elections. Meanwhile, opponents of choice continue to see success in blocking charter school legislation, more expansive public school choice, tax credit programs, and, of course, vouchers. Unfortunately, opponents don't have to work very hard to block choice these days. That's because school choice champions in the legislature and governor's office have been hard to come by. The usual allies - Republicans - have their hands full with other matters because of their minority status. And the few Democrats who support school choice more often than not run for the tall grass when choice advocates look to them for support. Elsewhere in the country, school choice has become a bipartisan issue. In Vermont it stays locked along rigid party lines. The governor, meanwhile, spoke eloquently about school choice two years ago. As eloquently, in fact, as Howard Dean when he spoke of school choice in one of his State of the State addresses. But Governor Dean could at least point to the passage of Act 150 on his watch. Governor Douglas, whose belief in the benefits of choice is probably deeper than Dean's, has spent his political capital on other things. More than once, I've wistfully imagined how different things might have been had Governor Douglas ran a school choice campaign similar to the one he's waged for his Promise Scholarship program. Whatever one's thoughts on that program, it focuses education aid on students whose critical K-12 years are over. In fact, if I were to name two reforms that I think would have the most benefit for the state, I would pick school choice as one of them - no surprise there. The reasons have been enumerated many times in this newsletter. Here's a quick recap: School choice benefits both the common good and the individual good by allowing even those of limited financial means the same access to "quality" (however they define it) that their more well-off peers have. School choice also introduces the pressures and incentives of the marketplace into a nearly-monopolistic structure. Peer-reviewed economic studies have shown school choice improves quality with no increase in cost. Diluting the Education Lobby's Power...... Just as important, however, is choice's potential impact on other, unrelated education reform ideas. The true educational consumer - parents and children (not business, not government) - becomes the greatest influence on quality under a choice regime. Currently, the greatest influences on education quality (or not) are the powerful education lobby members - the VT-NEA, the VSBA, the VSA, and the VPA to name a few. These groups have staff members who are paid to attend education-related policy meetings and influence education legislation and regulations. Why is it no surprise then that we have an education system that seems to treat superintendents, teachers, school board members and the like as the customer? Until students and parents have the power of the consumer, it will always be this way. This shift in focus would dilute the power of the education lobby, making other reforms, such as merit pay for teachers, easier to pass. But school choice supporters - whether they're legislators, school board members, ordinary taxpayers or even the governor himself - have to understand this hard reality: the power of the education lobby will not decrease UNTIL school choice is enacted, which means you'll have to deal with the education lobby's opposition to choice in the meantime. In other words, nobody's going to make it "safe" for you to support choice, sweeping opposition from the field so you can march victorious to the goal. Giving More Control to the Governor.... The other critical education reform that I believe would help Vermont would be to allow the governor to appoint the commissioner of education. Vermont is among only a minority of states that has such a low-accountability education structure. Our commissioner is hired by the State Board of Education whose members are appointed by the governor for six-year terms. That means that a governor won't shape the SBOE's membership for several years after he's in office and even then his influence is limited to those appointments. Once SBOE members get on the board, they're free to do as they like. And they do. They're not rubber stamps for the governor's ideas. This low-accountability system leaves taxpayers and parents in the lurch when "hot button" policies are approved or denied. For example, the SBOE, under the guidance of Douglas appointee Tom James as chair, recently okayed an early education recommendation that calls for a study committee, ties the hands of the SBOE for several years, but still allows the drawdown of Education Funds for universal preschool (even the Los Angeles Times is now raising concerns about universal preschool - see the editorial below). The policy recommendation spearheaded by James took place just before several towns voted on Town Meeting Day to limit preschool funding to "at risk" children and many more towns made it clear they want education money spent only on precisely what education statutes outline. So, who can the voters toss out if they're angry enough about this policy recommendation? Not Tom James, SBOE chairman. He's an appointee, after all. Not Commissioner of Education Richard Cate, under whose guidance the Vermont Department of Education has championed universal early ed. He was hired by appointees and can't be touched by an elected official. And not even the governor because, although he appointed five of the ten SBOE members, he has no control over them once they're in their seats. If the governor appointed the Commissioner of Education, however, the governor would be held accountable more directly for virtually all education policies in the state, just as he's held accountable for roads (he appoints the Transportation secretary), the state hospitals (he appoints the head of Health and Human Services), the business climate (he appoints the commissioner in charge of economic development) and more. In short, voters have a clear idea of where the buck stops with other issues because the governor is responsible for the key staff members in those areas. In education he has no control. The Vermont Department of Education operates as a virtual fiefdom of its own with very little influence from elected representatives of the people. Education Is Political And That's a Good Thing..... The counter argument to allowing the governor to appoint the commissioner is that education would then become too political; policies would twist and sway in the prevailing political winds, especially since we elect our governors every two years. To which I say: uh, education already IS political. As well it should be! After all, champions of the public schools are constantly reminding choice advocates that public schools belong to the people and are accountable to the people in ways that private schools are not. (I disagree with the premise that private schools aren't accountable to the public but that's a different topic entirely.) Okay, if the public school system is supposed to be so accountable to the people, when can I begin a campaign to oust Tom James as chair of the SBOE for foolishly removing his board from an important education debate (early education) for two years? I can't un-elect him. Nobody can. He can go on influencing education and there's not a darned thing you or I can do about it. I could un-elect the governor, however, if an education issue bothered me enough and he was responsible for it. And if he appointed the commissioner of education, the governor would be constantly aware of the public's understanding and perceptions of his policies. That's politics. Despite its bad reputation, it serves us well. As to the argument that a new governor every two years would mean quickly-changing policies that would dizzy teachers and administrators, let alone students, I offer this consolation: Vermont might have two-year terms for governor but its citizens don't capriciously throw out incumbents. In fact, our governors serve for long spans before leaving the capitol. It's unlikely that will change. And even if it did, it's unlikely that any governor would arbitrarily shift education policies, knowing he or she would be held accountable to the voters for reckless changes. Two simple but difficult changes - school choice and allowing the governor to appoint the commissioner of education - would make a world of difference. More than any other reform, I think these two actions would serve the students, parents and taxpayers of the state for centuries to come. Enacting these changes will require climbing a steep hill. I hope some policy leaders are willing to take that hike. Finally, I can't say good-bye to the VER without publicly thanking the many people who have supported its efforts - the thoughtful readers who've engaged in email discussions with me, our financial contributors, policy leaders who've worked hard fighting lonely battles, and VBE's board of directors, a group of intelligent, caring individuals whose passion is trying to improve education for the next generation. Sometimes they have had to endure public insult as the result of their commitment to education reform and I've never heard them grumble even in the face of mean-spirited accusations. VBE's board chair, Lenore Broughton, also deserves a great deal of thanks. She is a woman who never seeks the limelight but whose patience, understanding and generosity were never in the shadows. I will miss working with these wonderful people but will always cherish the time I've spent on trying to promote education reform in Vermont. Libby Sternberg  *   *   * FROM ELSEWHERE... FROM....The Los Angeles Times On the web at: http://www.latimes.com LOS ANGELES TIMES ON UNIVERSAL PRESCHOOL EDITORIAL Preschool pretensions April 14, 2006 GOV. ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER opposes Proposition 82, which would raise taxes to fund universal preschool. His main Democratic opponents, state Treasurer Phil Angelides and state Controller Steve Westly, support it. But on the issue of universal preschool, they all agree: It's wonderful. And they're all wrong. As the campaign gears up - Schwarzenegger, Angelides and Westly issued dueling statements Wednesday about Proposition 82 - voters will become familiar with mantras that universal preschool will return a profit for every dollar spent, be a great equalizer, improve scholastic achievement and reduce dropouts. But the research is less clear. Preschool does benefit poor children, and the state should help their parents pay for it. Yet, despite many studies and the $2.3 billion a year Proposition 82 would spend on three hours daily of public pre-kindergarten, little is known about how long lasting the benefits are or what it takes to get them. The chief research cited by actor/director Rob Reiner, the driving force behind the initiative, is a Rand Corp. study suggesting that for each dollar spent on universal preschool, Californians can expect $2.62 in savings on jails, special education and other services. But that study is based mostly on a successful Chicago program for impoverished black children. Preschool was only one part of the program, which provided parent education, healthcare, social services and long-term assistance. The Rand study extrapolates what that may mean in a far more limited California program with a very different population. The Chicago experiment shows that weaving an extensive social services net for struggling families that includes preschool has big benefits. But it says little about what a half-day of preschool would accomplish for California kids. Universal preschool does not appear to raise test scores. In Georgia, which has had universal preschool for more than a decade, preschool-educated children fared much better academically in kindergarten, but the advantage faded by third grade. A recent nationwide study by a UC Santa Barbara professor showed similar results, as has other research, though the study also found preschool graduates were somewhat less likely to be placed in special education or held back a grade. Part of the initiative's high cost stems from its requirements that preschool teachers must have a bachelor's degree and a teaching credential and be paid the same as public schoolteachers. But do preschool teachers need as much education as, say, high school math teachers, and should they be paid as much? Several studies suggest college-educated teachers interact better with preschoolers. But those interactions don't necessarily lead to more success for children. A study in Georgia found former preschoolers did equally well once they reached school, regardless of whether their preschool teachers had a two-year, technical or bachelor's degree. Supporting Proposition 82 because it would provide untold benefits to California students, as Angelides and Westly do, is misguided. And opposing it because it would raise taxes, as Schwarzenegger does, is simplistic. There are better reasons to raise taxes, and better ways to improve educational achievement. http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-preschool14apr14,1,652 7508.story  *   *   * WHO COVERS EDUCATION IN VERMONT? We do! Consider a gift to Vermonters for Better Education, the publisher of the weekly Vermont Education Report, Vermont's ONLY continual source of education news. Send donations to: VBE, 170 Church Street, Rutland, Vermont 05701. VBE is a nonprofit organization and contributions are tax-deductible.  *   *   * The VERMONT EDUCATION REPORT is published by Vermonters for Better Education 170 Church Street, Rutland, VT 05701, 802.773.5240 Contact VTBetterEd@aol.com for more information.   Subscribe Here SubscribeRemove

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