[RP TownTalk] Prince George’s county executive moves to take over struggling school system
Dwight Holmes
dwightrholmes at gmail.com
Tue Mar 19 03:51:30 UTC 2013
A few thoughts on our school "system". I preface all of this with the
observation that anything like a US public school system is tremendously
complex. The major flaw in all of the so-called reform efforts we see and
hear about is their thirst for easy answers. One-size-fits-all. We have
not one but three systems - district, state, and federal, each with its own
laws, regulations and authority, and funding sources and distribution
systems. And then there's the school, with its neighborhood, culture and
traditions... Most of all, we're talking about human beings, then overlay
that with various layers of political systems. We are producing knowledge,
and the skills to create and acquire it. We are producing and cultivating
aspirations. We are not producing widgets. It's complicated.
Personally, I believe we are not served well here in Maryland by our system
of 1 county = 1 school district. This creates many very large districts in
the areas around DC and Baltimore. Decades ago there was a big push to
consolidate systems into larger ones, and consolidate schools into larger
ones for cost savings and the ability to offer a wider curriculum. Those
points are valid, but I believe there's a lot of evidence indicating that
there is a point on the size scale beyond which we are not well-served -
nor does it continue to always be less expensive as size increases - but I
digress. Upper Marlboro can seem a long, long way from Riverdale
Elementary, I'm sure, to anyone (teacher, administrator, parent) who is
trying to make things better in our local school. In any case, this is the
system we have, and it's hard to imagine in today's world where the
political will would come from to assert and pull off a successful campaign
to break up our county districts into smaller ones. But I can wish.
Meanwhile, let's move on. Our schools are funded from three main sources:
local (county), state, and federal. Federal funding is largely
"compensatory", intended to provide needed, greater resources for the kids
who need them most - those who live in areas of concentrated poverty, those
who live in homes where English is not the first language, and those with
special needs. (PG schools get 6% of their funding from the feds,
Montgomery about 4%). Every state handles the state - local balance
differently, but in general the state provides funding in an effort to
equalize the inequalities that exist between districts. If we relied 100%
on local tax sources then the Montgomery Counties of the world would be
schooled in castles while the Hancock County, Tennessees (poorest school
district last I checked) of the world would be schooled in quonset huts or
crumbling old buildings. State funding helps to smooth out those
differences. The guiding principle is that the level of funding your
school gets should not be correlated with your zip code. The courts
consistently uphold the rule, but in practice per pupil expenditures still
vary widely both within states (Worcester County MD schools spend more than
$21,000 per student while Caroline County schools spend about $13,000) and
across states (US minimum and maximum figures would blow your mind,
probably about $3500 and $100,000+).
Anyway, our county is nowhere near the bottom of anybody's list for the
revenues it gets for its schools, so what's my point? In many respects,
absolute numbers are less important than relative numbers. We the
residents of Prince George's County are all too used to hearing and seeing
ways in which we compare unfavorably with our neighbor, Montgomery. So it
should be no surprise to find that the revenues dedicated to your child's
education here in PG County is only about 80% of what is spent on our
neighbors' kids in Montgomery. Because of the vast differences in the tax
base of our two counties, local revenues fund 72% of Montgomery's schools
but only 38% of ours here in PG; in an effort to partially offset that gap,
the state funds 55% of PG's school budgets but only 24% of Montgomery's.
But it's only a partial solution - the Montgomery's local revenues per
student exceed ours by well over $7000 and the state makes up only about
$4000 of that. Federal revenues make up another $200-$300 per student, but
that still leaves our kids $3000 worse off than their peers in Montgomery.
*Does that sound like 'equal opportunity' to you? *
So in total, our kids get less than $15,000 spent on their educations while
over in Montgomery kids in the same cohorts have more than $18,000 spent on
theirs. One crucial and obvious impact of that that we all suffer from is
that this creates two separate and unequal labor markets for teachers in
the two districts. If you were a young aspiring teacher, where would you
want to teach? Starting salaries for someone with a bachelor's degree
aren't all that different - the minimum in PG is 97% of the minimum in
Montgomery ($44,800 vs $46,400). But as you gain in credential and
experience, the gap widens significantly. The top end for teachers with a
master's degree is $14,000 less in PG than in Montgomery ($82,900 vs
$97,000). So what happens is that PG is always battling against a serious
"brain drain" in its teaching force. Young teachers who do well and show
promise are very likely to be hired away to Montgomery County and receive a
good boost in their salary when they make the jump. If everything else
about the two counties was more or less the same this might not be such a
powerful factor, but given the history of dysfunction here, it just
exacerbates the problem. The good teachers are pulled by the significantly
higher salaries next door while at the same time they are pushed out by
whatever dysfunction they experience here in their school or district.
Fixing all of the problems here is a huge challenge - I think everyone
recognizes that. And nobody - despite the simplistic arguments we see
flung about - would seriously argue that simply boosting revenues for the
schools would solve all the problems. On the other hand, all evidence
would indicate that the kids who get the least at home need the most from
schools (and other public services, health care being prominent among them)
if they are indeed to have equal opportunity to succeed in school, or life.
And right now they are not getting that. Not even close.
The quick-fix reformers would have us believe what? That charter schools
will fix our problems (despite the lack of any evidence supporting that)?
That busting teacher unions will fix that? That getting stricter with
testing programs and making teachers (and students) more "accountable" will
fix that? Or some combination thereof will fix everything? They criticize
US schools for poor test performance but fail to notice that the countries
who do well have, many of them, lower poverty rates, 100% unionization of
their teachers, and that they give much more authority and responsibility
to the teachers. Nor do they obsess over annual tests that do much to
extinguish the students' desire to learn and little to help them reach
their life or career goals. Countries where the teaching profession is
respected and treated as a profession, and where poverty, hunger and
ill-health are not tolerated by the society seem to do well by their
students, setting the standards in education that we claim to aspire to,
but somehow unable to inspire us to emulate the kind of action that would
actually bring any of that about.
The quick-fix reformers rail against teacher tenure, claiming that it's a
job for life. And they blame the unions. While doctors and other
professionals govern their own professional associations, setting
credential and licensing requirements, teachers are given no such power.
Administrators have the right of hiring, and of firing, and of evaluating
teachers prior to their receiving "tenure". All tenure does is require
that due process be followed when dismissing a teacher. Neither teachers
nor their unions (where they are allowed to exist) have any of those
powers, and yet somehow it is all their fault. As was, apparently, the
crash of Wall Street and collapse of the housing market. (Am I leaving
anything out?)
Unfortunately, the track record for mayoral takeovers of metro area school
districts isn't very promising. One can argue that Baker is faced with
having no better alternative. Perhaps the candidates willing to apply for
the superintendents job as it is now constructed simply aren't of the
caliber that would be required to begin to turn things around (I have no
knowledge or information about the process - this is pure conjecture on my
part). It is tempting to want to consolidate power in the executive when
one is the executor, and managing the system and the people who work in it
proves difficult or even hopeless. I understand that. But none of us
should believe this would be any better as a quick-fix than any of the
other reform ideas being slung about.
On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 6:07 PM, Lou King <lking at knob.com> wrote:
> And here in lies part of the problem.
> Nation wide view of "elected officials" is low, except each of us feel
> differently about our own official.
>
> Dwight your remarks reminded me of a Marine Captain in a inter-service
> communication class. His answer to Identification of aircraft as friend or
> foe (IFF) was "shoot them all down and sort it out on the ground" From his
> point of view as a ground pounder, I can see the simplicity/effectiveness
> of his solution. The flyers in the class took exception.
>
> I have no clue about the County Executive's qualifications as an educator.
> Hopefully he has the executive skills to hire the correct School
> Superintendent, one most of us can support. Something has to break the
> logjam, create the inertia, to change things for the better. The current
> structure hasn't produce an answer.
>
>
> Lou
> O< ascii ribbon campaign - stop HTML mail - www.asciiribbon.org
>
> Dwight Holmes wrote, On 3/18/2013 5:11 PM:
>
>> And I would like to say that I would NOT want Michelle Rhee, or anyone
>> selling what she has to sell, given the reins of our school board. Which
>> is not to say that we don't need some serious changes; we do.
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Mar 18, 2013 at 5:03 PM, Sarah Wayland <sarah.wayland at gmail.com
>> <mailto:sarah.wayland at gmail.**com <sarah.wayland at gmail.com>>> wrote:
>>
>> > You must have some education even to ask "do you want
>> > fries with that?" and cash a paycheck.
>>
>> Or to determine how to vote for competent Board of Education members.
>>
>> I would like to say that I do NOT paint all the BOE members with the
>> same brush. I have found our board member, Peggy Higgins, to be
>> responsive, open-minded and thoughtful.
>>
>> -Sarah
>> ______________________________**_________________
>> TownTalk mailing list
>> To post to the list, send mail to TownTalk at riverdale-park.org
>> <mailto:TownTalk at riverdale-**park.org <TownTalk at riverdale-park.org>>
>> TownTalk-request at riverdale-**park.org<TownTalk-request at riverdale-park.org>
>> <mailto:TownTalk-request@**riverdale-park.org<TownTalk-request at riverdale-park.org>>
>> is for automated
>>
>> subscription processing only
>> http://riverdale-park.org/**mailman/listinfo/towntalk<http://riverdale-park.org/mailman/listinfo/towntalk>
>>
>> For more information about Riverdale Park, visit
>> http://www.riverdaleparkmd.**info <http://www.riverdaleparkmd.info>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> ______________________________**_________________
>> TownTalk mailing list
>> To post to the list, send mail to TownTalk at riverdale-park.org
>> TownTalk-request at riverdale-**park.org<TownTalk-request at riverdale-park.org>is for automated subscription processing only
>> http://riverdale-park.org/**mailman/listinfo/towntalk<http://riverdale-park.org/mailman/listinfo/towntalk>
>>
>> For more information about Riverdale Park, visit
>> http://www.riverdaleparkmd.**info <http://www.riverdaleparkmd.info>
>>
>>
> ______________________________**_________________
> TownTalk mailing list
> To post to the list, send mail to TownTalk at riverdale-park.org
> TownTalk-request at riverdale-**park.org<TownTalk-request at riverdale-park.org>is for automated subscription processing only
> http://riverdale-park.org/**mailman/listinfo/towntalk<http://riverdale-park.org/mailman/listinfo/towntalk>
>
> For more information about Riverdale Park, visit
> http://www.riverdaleparkmd.**info <http://www.riverdaleparkmd.info>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://riverdale-park.org/pipermail/towntalk/attachments/20130318/b8400c8f/attachment.html>
More information about the TownTalk
mailing list