Voucher caps: the threat to MPS

The Department of Public Instruction has recently issued its rules for implementing the caps on voucher enrollments. These could have a devastating impact on MPS schools.

The rules ask each school to estimate its enrollment. The ratio of the cap to the total estimate is then calculated. This ratio is applied to each school's estimate to calculate the number of students that the school may enroll. This creates a huge incentive for schools to inflate their estimates.

Consider this example. Assume that total enrollment with no caps would be 16,000 students. Assume further that schools that would enroll half the students give an accurate estimate (8,000), the others inflate their estimates by a factor of three (24,000). The total estimate, 32,000 is divided into the cap of 14,500 to give a factor of 45%. The schools that exaggerate their enrollment are allowed to accept 10,875 students, but only 8,000 enroll. Those giving an accurate estimate have a cap of only 3,625, forcing them to reject 4,375 potential students.

It is likely that many of these rejected students will enroll in MPS but remain on the schools' waiting lists. Presumably, shortly before the start of school the DPI reallocate unused spaces to the schools with waiting lists. In this scenario almost 3,000 students could make a last-minute switch from MPS to a private school. But MPS school budgets are largely dependent on enrollment, so they would be faced with severe last-minute budget cuts.

More on incentives

I am seeing an increasing number of articles pointing out the growing gap between results of state tests and those on the federal NAEP tests. A number of states report a much higher percentage of students proficient in math and reading than the federal test finds for students in that state.

The explanation, of course, is that the federal No Child Left Behind requires that all children in schools be proficient in reading and math within a few years. But in a bow to states-rights conservatives, it left the testing and the definition of proficiency to the states. The predominant incentive on the states is to set the standards low so that their schools will appear to be turning out proficient students.

One answer would be national tests, similar to those in most other countries. Educationally, this seems like the best solution. Mathematics, for instance, does not change when a graduate crosses the state line. Even though the advocates of national testing seem to be increasing, I doubt that the political will exists for this. Much of the left will oppose it because they hate testing, while many on the right will oppose national testing because it implies national standards.

A possible compromise might be to leave states to determine their own tests but use NAEP results to recalibrate the proficiency levels. For example if 40% of the students in a state were proficient by NAEP standards, the state score corresponding to the 40th percentile would be the cut-off for proficiency.

High school diploma mill

Every month or so, I receive an e-mail that invites me to get my bachelor's, master's, or PhD degree from a "prestigious unaccredited university" with no required classes or exam. In other words from a diploma mill. This morning's New York Times has an article on a high school diploma mill in Florida.

It appears that the major market for this high school consists of athletes whose grade point averages fall below the 2.75 needed for an athletic scholarship and are in danger of failing Florida's required high school graduation exam. In its wisdom, the Florida legislature exempted private schools from the requirement that all students need to pass the exam.

Diploma mills prosper when the symbols of education become more important than its substance. So universities, anxious to rack up a winning season, look the other way when their athletes are unprepared for college work.

Likewise, markets can be very powerful, for both good and ill, as they respond to incentives. When the incentives are to find loopholes, some entrepreneur will find them.

Board civility and MPS progress

A recent J-S article describes incidences of incivility on the Milwaukee school board, implying the board is becoming unglued. In my experience, school boards usually have trouble figuring out when they are a board and when individuals. In some ways board members are like legislators, representing diverse constituencies and issues they ran on. Yet while the governor is elected separately, the board hires the superintendent and is expected to support its employee. I am not sure there will ever be a good solution, particularly when boards disagree on long-term goals. (By contrast, corporate boards tend to be too civil, not challenging the management.)

Despite this, two other recent articles give evidence that MPS continues to progress in responding to parents' desires. One describes MPS enrollment trends, particularly the movement from unpopular programs (like middle schools) to ones parents favor (such as K-8 schools). And despite unfavorable demographic trends, MPS seems to be holding its own. A second describes the increasing demand for Montessori teachers as MPS and districts nationwide respond to growing interest in Montessori education.

(Speaking of Montessori education, click here for an analysis of Downtown Montessori Academy, a school chartered by the city of Milwaukee. Full disclosure: I am on the Downtown Montessori board and am definitely biased.)

The MPS medical plan

An article in the Journal Sentinel last week described recent changes in the MPS, medical plan. With the regular insurance plan, employees are now required to make copayments. It is hoped that this will encourage some of the employees to switch to the lower cost HMO plan.

Not surprisingly, this change has been met with complaints from MPS teachers. It is probably not a coincidence that another article reports that teachers have given the superintendent a low rating.

For anyone enrolled in a private-sector plan, however, the striking thing about the MPS plan is how lavish it still is. Apparently teachers and other employees are still not required to make any contribution to the cost of the plan. Thus, except for the co-pays, there is no incentive to move to a lower cost plan. This contrasts to the approach taken by the city of Milwaukee several years ago in which employees were offered an array of plans with the city covering the full cost of the lowest cost plan and the employee making up the difference with higher cost plans.

Sharing school buildings

An article in this morning’s Journal Sentinel describes several buildings that are shared by different schools.

This represents a huge cultural shift for MPS. Schools were always synonymous with their buildings at MPS. In fact, the school’s union representative is called the “building” representative, not the school representative.

By sharing buildings, schools can better respond to a variety of student needs. They can grow, and they can shrink. Extra space can serve as incubators for new schools.

But in the past MPS sharing efforts were notably unsuccessful. The dominant school often made life miserable for the tenant schools. The difference today is budgets. As school control over budgets has grown, schools have become more concerned about sources of revenue. If other schools can help share the building expenses than there is more money for education, a strong motivator for cooperation..

How much does open enrollment cost MPS?

This morning’s Journal Sentinel has an article headlined “MPS loses big in open enrollment.“ I find this a particularly annoying article.

One problem is the mixing of time periods. Most of the dollar figures and enrollment numbers are for a six year period, essentially inflating them by a factor of six compared to annual numbers. Most egregiously, the $32 million calculated as the lost revenue over six years is compared to the annual budget of about $1 billion. The more honest comparison would have divided the $32 million by six.

Likewise, the claim that MPS lost 6900 students to open enrollment is pretty misleading. The more honest figure is 1155 students, the annual number leaving. The 6900 figure does not even give a good picture of the number of students participating over the six year period since many of the same students would have been reported year after year.

Less serious, but still annoying is the lack of any discussion of how the state aid and spending cap formulas work (I used to understand the formula, but at this point, am reluctant to discuss them in detail, particularly because they may have changed over time), but it is not clear that MPS is hurt financially by the exodus of the students. The money transferred to other districts is likely to be less than the total money that MPS receives for those students leaving, some residual. The main problem, of course, is that MPS has yet to bring its capacity in line with reduced enrollment. But this problem is hardly limited to the loss due to open enrollment, which is small compared to combined effects of charter schools, choice schools, chapter 220, and, most particularly, an overall decline in the school-age population.

This article was not written by one of the regular Journal Sentinel education reporters, which may in part explain its problems. But even if the problems can be blamed on inexperience by the reporter, this article is another example of the increasingly questionable judgment of Journal editors that would put such an article on their front page.

MPS Future and Vouchers

I plan to come back to this blog when I find a bit more time, but I wanted to point out two escellent articels by Alan Borsuk in this morning's Journal Sentinel. Both bring us up to date on important developments in Milwaukee education:

• The first is a recap of the series of articles he and Sarah Carr wrote on the voucher program. It even has a web site where information on each individual school can be looked up.
• The second discusses that changes that started with the Neighborhood Schools Initiative five years ago and are still continuing.

Both are sophisticated, nuanced report, in sharp contrast to the one-dimensional attacks on vouchers or MPS reform that are still too common.

This excellence in educational reporting contrasts to an embarrassing episode in the August 21 Crossroads section. A column appeared about appointing US supreme court justices which was credited to Frank Zeidler. The column was a clear fraud, since the positions expressed were standard conservative arguments. (When no correction appeared on Monday, I sent an e-mail to the editor stating flatly that Zeidler could not have written it.) The question is why no one at the Journal Sentinel recognized its fishiness. I think part of the explanation comes in the Journal Sentinel having outsourced its national and international news. People interested in questions of the supreme court would not be attracted to the Journal Sentinel. One hopes the sharp bookkeepers at corporate office won't find a way to oursource education reporting. (For the correction, click here. The whole August 21 Crossroads seems to have disappeared from the Journal Sentinel's web site.)

The Journal's series on school choice

I was out of town when the Journal Sentinel published its massive series on school choice and am just now getting around to reading it. So far it strikes me as an excellent job of getting past the cant and presenting a picture of school choice that better reflects reality, both what works and what does not.

It was depressing, therefore, to read the letters in Sunday's paper. Most of them could have been written without ever reading the articles.

One in particular I found especially depressing--that from the local director of the ACLU. Particularly with the blindness of the current Washington administration towards the need for civil liberties and due process, there is a growing need for a credible ACLU. By getting involved in controversies so far from its core mission, the ACLU squanders its credibility and makes itself easy to ignore.

Mayor Barrett's Education Plan

This morning's Journal Sentinel reports that Mayor Tom Barrett issue a plan that included four elements:

1. Restoring two-thirds state funding of education.
2. Increasing the cap on enrollment in the choice (voucher) program by 6,000 over four years.
3. Counting choice students as part of MPS in calculating state aid.
4. Having some accountability measures of choice schools. The article mentions either accreditation or testing.

From the account in the paper, this plan strikes me as very good. All four elements are desirable in themselves. If putting them together makes the plan more politically viable, so much the better.

The Wisconsin state aid formula depends on the ratio of the total property value divided by the number of students. The lower this ratio the more a district must struggle to support its schools, justifying a higher percentage of state aid. By excluding choice students, present law makes Milwaukee richer than it is, unfairly penalizing Milwaukee taxpayers (the same effect could be achieved by neglecting to count fifteen thousand MPS students). The last time a proposal to change this formula was made, it died for lack of Democratic support. With Barrett's support, it may be harder for Democrats to vote against the interest of Milwaukee property tax payers.

I particularly like the idea of including choice students in the testing program. The argument that including such requirements would create constitutional problems strikes me as both dubious and hypocritical. Choice is constitutional precisely because its purpose is to educate children, not to aid religion. Testing that helps determine whether the education is effective fits this purpose. If government did not care whether the education was effective, one might conclude that aiding religion was the purpose of the legislation.

Deniability and Tests

Many years ago, I worked for a major Milwaukee corporation which became the subject of a criminal investigation of its sales practices. The company eventually went out of business--not primarily due to the fines it paid but because the years of investigation took a huge toll in creativity and decisiveness.

One conversation early in the investigation still haunts me. Two of my colleagues agreed that there was a tacit agreement between management and the sales people. The sales people understood that they should do whatever was required to gain an account, while protecting management's deniability. When pressed, management needed to be able to deny it knew how the sales were made. Several recent events recall that conversation--including prisoner abuse in Iraq, the recent firing of police officers in Milwaukee, and cheating on standardized tests in schools.

The basic characteristic of the deniability culture is a wide gap between the official rules of conduct and the implicit rules. The assumption is that the official rules are useful for public consumption but that anyone following them will be at an advantage. In this view, scruples are for losers. Changing this culture can be very difficult even if management desires to do so; it is assumed that management will loudly proclaim its adherence to the highest principles even while benefitting from corner-cutting within the organization.

In the recent Jude beating case, by firing not only those officers who took part in the beating but also those who refused to report their fellow officers, the Milwaukee police chief does seem to be making a major effort to change the culture. How successful she will be may depend in large part on whether officers view it as simply an attempt by the chief to burnish her image. In a culture of deniability, the boss is expected to express outrage when the facts come out.

There has been a deal written recently about the attempts by lawyers in the Bush administration to exempt the United States from the Geneva convention and to relax the strictures against torture. Most discussion, however, has concentrated on the validity of the legal arguments. What is surprising is that there appears to have been little concern by those involved in the changes about the signal that was being sent to people in the field. The clear message was that scrutiny and oversight would be lessened and that many of the old rules would no longer apply.

If education is to improve, accurate assessment of learning is a prerequiste. Otherwise, schools will continue to invest money and effort into programs that are not effective. Yet there is a culture that accepts efforts to artificially inflate test results. Despite teachers' interest in discouraging cheating by students, some forms of cheating by teachers are obvious to students, such as signaling to the student that an answer is wrong or preparing lessons based on advanced knowledge of the tests.

Other kinds of cheating, such as erasing and correcting students' answer sheets, are not done in front of students. But it is possible to develop measures that detect many of these kinds of cheating, including looking for sudden growth in student scores followed by declines in later years or students getting the hard questions right and the easy questions wrong.

Every superintendent will denounce cheating by teachers. But is this simply part of the deniability culture? That such detection measures are not more widely used suggest that it is. Superintendents' talk about test scores as an end in themselves rather than a measure of learning reinforces the idea that any means of increasing the scores is desirable.

Is Milwaukee creating or losing wealth--or both?

Recently, the Public Policy Forum issued a report comparing the income of people moving into counties with those leaving and those staying. In particular, the average income of people moving out of Milwaukee County was higher than that of either those moving in or those staying.

While not particularly surprising, it is not clear what one should make of these results, or their policy implications. One interpretation is that Milwaukee County is on the way down, as wealthier people continue to abandon it. This seems to be the view of the people the Journal Sentinel found to comment on the study. Why, then, are we seeing the rapid rise in property values, particularly in the poorest sections of Milwaukee?

Another interpretation is that, despite all its trials, Milwaukee continues to play the classic role of the American city over the last two centuries. People with little come to the city because that is where the opportunity is. As they become successful in the city, they move elsewhere to spend their money.

The question about education, then, is which model is it promoting, one of opportunity or one of loss.

Is 4k child care?

On Sunday, the Journal Sentinel published an article about the battle in the state legislature about the battle over whether to extend funding for four year olds. One legislator expressed the fear that four year old kindergarten was "subsidized day care for certain children."

If the legislator was questioning the need for the four year old program--particularly for low-income children--his remarks missed the target. The typical low-income child enters school with substantial disadvantages compared to a typical middle-class student from a well-educated family. There have been several studies, for instance, documenting the strikings differences in the number of vocabulary words recognized.

If the need is clear, it is less clear how well the schools are meeting this need. The usual antipathy among the educational establishment towards measurement is even stronger when it comes to very young children. Systematic testing does not start until third grade. In the absence of data, my guess is that some schools do a good job while at others it really is just "child care." Unfortunately, this legislator seems to have missed the opportunity to push educators to say how they would measure results.

Property values and schools

Recently I advanced the thesis that changes in Milwaukee education are behind much of the recent surge in property values. In essence, by giving families far more choices--within MPS, with charter schools, and with the choice program--homes in Milwaukee become increasingly valuable. Even if many schools remain unsatisfactory, in this hypothesis, the property value effect could still take place since the families most concerned about education will be precisely those most likely to take advantage of the increased options. From the family viewpoint, the question is not how MPS is doing as a whole but how the school their children attend is doing. By being able to pick the school, the family is likely to be far more satisfied than if the school were imposed on them.

I would be the first to admit the thesis is untested. There are a variety of other possible hypotheses that might explain part or all of the increase in property values, such as:

• That it is simply part of a national movement back to the cities.
• That having been down so long, these neighborhoods could go nowhere but up.
• That other local effects explain the results, such as welfare reform.
• That while it appears the poorest districts are taking the lead in the rise, the jumps mainly represent gentrification on the fringes of these districts.
  

It has become increasingly clear that problems with the Milwaukee education were a major factor behind the lag in Milwaukee property values in the 1980s and 1990s, as middle class parents left the city to find better schools. Thus it seems quite plausible that an increase in values would also reflect the schools. However, a number of studies could help better define the role of the schools:

• Comparisons of property value trends in Milwaukee with those in cities that are similar except that control of schools remains centralized.
• Micro analysis of the property values. How did homes attractive to families perform compared to others?
• A history of property values over more years and broken down into smaller geographical areas.
• Comparison of trends in the MPS census data and geographical enrollment data with those in property values. For example, what was the relationship between the number of children and property values, as well as the type of schools they attended and whether the schools were nearby?
  

School board budget hearing

I dropped by Thursday's public hearing on the MPS budget at Madison high school. Compared to previous hearings, where hundreds turned out to denounce the school board, this was a real yawner. There were about as many people on stage as in the audience. Only two members of the public spoke--someone who speaks at almost every meeting and a retired principal--and both left the board puzzled as to what point they were trying to make.

The proposed budget, with less than a 1% tax increase, seems like good news. But that good news is hugely dependent on decisions by others. It assumes both that the state legislature will agree to restore two-thirds funding and that MPS will win the current arbitration on its contract with the union to reduce health care costs.

Director Tom Balistreri (who seems perpetually angry, about what is not clear) threatened to vote against the 1% tax increase. In effect this would be a vote to permanently reduce MPS funding, since revenue caps reflect the previous year's spending. This raises the question: where are organizations like MICAH and the Institute for Wisconsin's Future? For years, these organizations have criticized the school board for not convincing the legislature to increase funding. Yet when a school board member threatens to cut funding, they are strangely silent. For that matter, where is the Milwaukee Teachers' Education Association?

Schools and property values

This morning's Journal Sentinel reports on a dramatic rise in Milwaukee property values. This is the most convincing evidence yet that the Milwaukee education reforms are working.

For the past few years Milwaukee has experienced a surprisingly robust boom in condo construction, in areas like the Beer Line and the Third Ward. However, the connection with education reform has been easy to dismiss because the majority of condo purchasers seem to be people with little direct concern about the schools--empty nesters, young professionals, single people, gays.

Yet the growth in property values is quite different. The poorest areas experienced by far the highest percentage increases in property values. (See the graph in the post below.) These are areas with a great many children. Concern about education should have a much greater effect on property values in these areas. Here is my hypothesis about what happened:

The Milwaukee reforms were aimed at empowering parents by giving them choices over their children's education. In recent years, the number of real choices for Milwaukee parents have vastly increased. These include the school choice program (and recall that most residents of the areas with the biggest jumps in property values would qualify for this program), a wide and growing variety of charter schools, and continuing efforts by MPS to restructure its schools to make them more attractive (such as the move from middle schools to K-8s).

All of these changes would have the greatest impact on the areas with the most children and the lowest incomes, precisely the districts seeing the greatest percentage increases in property values. So families that in the past might have struggled to buy a house in the suburbs for better schools now find more opportunities in Milwaukee.

Increases vs Values 

Senate restricts special elections

An article in this morning's Journal Sentinel reports that Wisconsin's senate voted to restrict local school boards' power to call special elections to exceed the spending caps. From a strictly MPS point of view, this measure is a moderately good thing. For a number of reasons, particularly the increasing disconnect between voters and MPS, all informed opinion agrees that a proposal to exceed the spending cap has no chance of passing in Milwaukee. Thus the ability of other districts to (sometimes) get voters to agree to raise their spending limits has the effect of increasing the financial gap between MPS and its neighbors. This in turn makes it more difficult for MPS in the competition for teachers.

That said, the vote is a sad one for what it says about the growing willingness of conservatives and Republicans to violate their own most basic principles. One of the most cogent critiques Republicans have made over the years is that Democrats are too eager to centralize authority when they don't like what local government does. Yet in this vote the Republicans show the same disdain for local government. As more decisions move to Madison, it will be increasingly difficult to interest capable people in serving on school boards or to interest citizens in what school boards do.

In praise of partisanship

Tomorrow's Journal Sentinel has an article by Sarah Carr, "School Board president denies posts to opponents," noting that Ken Johnson did not appoint any of the four Defenders on the board to committee chairmanships. Carr clearly disapproves, predicting the board will "grow more polarized and combative."

Another interpretation is that the appointments represent a determination to make significant progress on improving MPS in the next two years. Reforming large urban schools systems is immensely difficult under the best of circumstances. Putting in place committee chairs prepared to obstruct reform would seem to be a recipe for futility.

One size fits all students

There are intriguing parallels between Joel Klein, the New York City public schools chancellor, and Alan Bersin, the recently-departed San Diego schools chief (who was just appointed by Arnold Schwarzenegger to be education secretary and member of the California school board). Both were federal prosecutors who depended on high-profile educators to pick their instructional programs. Both centralized authority.

Fundamental to their approach is the belief that there is one right model of education that works for all students. Many of their critics believe that Klein, Bersin, and their educational mentors chose the wrong math and reading programs. But even many of these critics believe the same fundamental idea--that there is one model that is right for every student, just not the ones chosen for New York and San Diego.

A contrasting concept is that there is no one right model that will fit every student. This was the central organizing idea behind the Milwaukee educational reforms. In this view as much decisionmaking as possible should be moved to the schools and to parents. As parents search and find schools that work for their children, successful schools will expand or be replicated; unsuccessful schools will change or close. Almost all of the reforms--admissions standards, school councils, neighborhood schools, letting schools choose principals, changing the way principals were chosen and trained, per pupil funding, charter schools, annual testing, and even support of vouchers--can be viewed as tools to make decentralization work.

The challenge for the school board over the next two years is to determine how to make these tools more effective and what additional tools are needed.

New Joe Williams book

Connoisseurs of MPS board fights will recall that Joe Williams covered MPS for the Journal Sentinel over several years before moving on to the New York Daily News. He had a singular knack for making the often arcane board controversies into matters of high drama. I received a note that he has a new book coming out October 7 titled: Cheating Our Kids: How Politics and Greed Ruin Education. He promises that Milwaukee, "figures prominently in several chapters." As a former greedy politician myself, I look forward to reading it. It can be pre-ordered from Amazon.

New MPS Leadership

The annual organization meeting of the MPS board holds a strange attraction--offering drama, bitterness, and surprises. Tonight's meeting made it abundantly clear that the board is split along party lines. Even the opening role call underlined this division, with Reformers answering "here" to the Defenders' "present." I leave it to a better psychologist than I to figure out whether the difference simply reflects group identification or a difference in views as to how active a board member should be (voting "present" on an issue is to obstain, after all).

An early mini-drama was played out over a Morales proposal to change the voting procedure. Although it was unclear exactly what she had in mind, apparently it involved being able to argue the merits of the candidates. Not necessarily a bad idea, I think, but it appeared to be a last minute idea that had neither been fully developed nor discussed with anyone in the Reform group. The proposal was defeated 5-4 along party lines.

The board then elected officers in its traditional fashion, with each member announcing their preference in turn. Ken Johnson was elected president by the five Reformers, with all but one of the Defenders voting for Peter Blewett. (Morales voted for Joe Dannecker, but this seemed a tactical move, since she did not support Dannecker for vice president.)

Again voting along party lines, the board elected Dannecker as vice president on a 5-4 vote.

Not at all surprisingly, the board voted not to increase its own pay.

Overall, I got the impression that several of the Defenders were quite bitter about their current minority role. This does not bode well for collegiality but may be good for reform.

Time ripe for MPS reform?

The headline for an editorial this morning expresses the hope and expectations for the new board: "Time ripe for MPS reform." But will MPS be noticeably more effective in two years than today? Will the public perception that MPS is irrelevant to the daily lives of Milwaukeeans--reflected in the miserable voter turnout--start to reverse?

The challenge for the reformers is to develop a few priorities that will start to reconnect MPS to its communities. Their danger is that they heed the calls to build a consensus with the defenders, resulting in little reform, poorly implemented.

End free busing!

One of the most important challenges faced by the administration and new board is to make the Neighborhood Schools Initiative work. Kids have to get off buses and move into neighborhood schools. This has a number of advantages, especially in encouraging schools once again to play a role in creating strong neighborhoods. But without stronger measures, it seems unlikely there will be a significant reduction in busing or a significant increase in attendence at the neighborhood school.

One approach is simply to end busing. Denver, for example, ended busing when the state subsidies stopped and reassigned all students to schools in their neighborhoods. Probably the strongest argument against such a drastic measure is fear that it would kill the citywide specialty schools--the Montessori, arts, gifted and talented, language immersion, and others that attract students from all over the city because of the strength of their programs. From a business sense it hardly seems intelligent to kill the most successful products. Thus MPS has arrived at a standoff: it needs to drastically reduce busing but not at the expense of killing the specialty schools.

There is a solution that could achieve both aims: keep busing but charge parents for it. Thus, parents who found busing beneficial because it allowed their child to attend a specialty school could continue to do so if that was high on their priority list. Those parents who chose busing as a form of free day care might take another look at real day care.

If parents paid the cost of busing there would no longer be reasons for the rules aimed at reducing the number of children eligible for busing but also forming an incentive to send kids to distant schools so they would qualify for free busing. For example, when my daughter was five, I found she did not qualify for a bus ride because her day care was too near the school. If we had moved her to a center across the city she would have qualified for a free trip. Because of the MPS rules, I was unable to get her on the bus even if I paid for it.

An immediate criticism of this proposal is that it is unfair because low income parents will find it harder to pay for busing than middle class parents. One solution might be to set up a fund to subsidize busing on a sliding scale based on income. But if MPS has the money for such a fund, is busing the best use for it? One can think of many uses that might better benefit low-income students: subsidized tutoring after school, a longer school day, or books for the student's home, for example.

Andrekopoulis the election winner?

In an interesting article in this morning's Journal Sentinel, Alan Borsuk points out that the superintendent is a "significant winner" of the election. This is both because control by the reform group on the board would give the Andrekopoulis more support in pursuing his agenda and also because Danny Goldberg's opponent would likely have joined Tom Balistreri as a strident critic of Andrekopoulis. I encourage everyone to read this article.

I note that the Journal continues to have trouble figuring out how to identify the two groups--or "factions" in Journalese--on the board. Borsuk identifies the reform group through indirection: that it has been on the short-end of the 5-4 split on the board over the past two years and that none of its members were endorsed by the union. I continue to think my terms of "reformers" and "defenders" are both far more succinct and recognize that the differences are not superficial personality clashes but instead reflect very different views on the role of the board.

Reformers and Defenders

With the recent school board election the balance on the board has shifted from five to four in favor of one group to five to four in favor of the other. But what should each of these groups be called? Despite the many years of this divide, even the members of these groups have trouble agreeing on labels. In its report on the election results the Journal Sentinel reverted to the practice of identifying each group with an organization that supported it: “candidates backed by the teacher’s union and those backed by the school choice community.”

But both these designations are problematic as well as cumbersome. Teacher union backing only helps explain behavior on the minority of issues of concern to the union; on most issues the union is indifferent. The use of school choice as the defining issue is even more problematic since the school board has no say in the school choice program and the school choice community sat out the last election.

In an effort to come up with better terms, I took a look at how the supporters of the two groups described their favored candidates. Specifically, I looked at what terms the endorsement editorials in the Journal Sentinel and the Shepherd Express used to praise the candidates the endorsed and to criticize their opponents.

There is no question about the Journal’s favorite term. In a fairly short editorial, I count it using “reform” or “reformers” nine time. But, one may ask, doesn't everyone want to be considered a reformer? Does also claim the mantle of reform? Not at all. In a much longer series of endorsement editorials, the Shepherd does not once mention reform.

Instead of reform, the Shepherd wants strong loyalty to MPS from its board members. One candidate is described as a “defender of public schools.” A second is an “advocate for public schools.” A third a “passionate advocate of public education.”

What form does this defense of public education take? In the Shepherd’s view it largely consists of opposition to anything that might compete with conventional public schools. The only word I found shared by both editorials was “charter.” But the attitude towards charter schools were diametrically opposed. While the Journal praised candidates’ involvement charter schools as reflecting a willingness to innovate, the Shepherd found such involvement showed alarming disloyalty to MPS.

Thus the reformers and defenders–and their supporters–have very different philosophies as to the proper role for board members. Reformers want the board to push for improvement while defenders see it as protecting MPS from its enemies.

Wisconsin Citizen Action

A flyer from Wisconsin Citizen Action sets a new low for sleaze:

Rampant corruption. No accountability. Dangerous criminals in taxpayer-supported schools. Does that sound like a program you would support? Danny Goldberg does.

More on the Shepherd Express

A while back, I expressed surprise about actually agreeing with the Shepherd Express. In their school board pre-election articles, however, they returned to form. In an article speculating on pro-voucher money the paper expected in the election, the paper said "Bruce Thompson .... wouldn't reveal his plans for this election." I suspect most readers would interpret this to mean the paper asked me for my plans and I refused to discuss them. In actuality the Shepherd never talked to me. So I never had a chance to refuse to reveal my plans.

The reporter did leave a message on my phone but stressed that there was no urgency in returning the call. When I called back, his message said he was out of town for the week. I haven't heard from him since.

This could be racked up to sloppy reporting, but over the years I have noticed the Shepherd's sloppiness has a purpose. If a story works against the cause of reform in MPS, the Shepherd will run it whether or not it is true.

This is unfortunate on several levels, I think. First unethical journalism hurts our society whatever the ideology of the publisher. Second, there are a number of strong conservative voices in Milwaukee; it would be beneficial to have a strong, trustworthy, liberal voice to balance them.

Bicycles and School Board Elections

With the (sort of) coming of spring last weekend, I took a bike ride from the East Side to Muskego. One striking change crossing into the suburbs was the explosion of signs for school board candidates. By contrast, in Milwaukee, even in districts with races, the number of signs was pitifully few.

Why do suburbanites care so much about their school systems? Part of the explanation is simply size; MPS seems too large and too remote. But suburbanites also recognize their stake in the schools. Even if they have no children in the schools, their property values and their neighborhood depend on the attractiveness of the schools.

In Milwaukee, unless they either work for the schools or have children enrolled, most people seemed profoundly uninterested in who runs the schools. The schools simply seem irrelevant to most.

Can this situation be changed? Part of the answer may be to really push the Neighborhood Schools Initiative to restore the local school as the glue that holds its community together.

Another is to get better leadership on the school board, so that once again there is a sense of progress. This morning's Journal Sentinel points out that Kevin Ronny, Danny Goldberg, and Bernardine Bradford offer much more effective leadership than their opponents.

Where are the children?

A Thursday New York Times article (sorry, don't have a link) and a follow-up NPR program describe cities that have been most successful economically but find they have fewer and fewer children. Portland Oregon, for example, has about half as many children as it had in the 1960s.

On a much smaller scale than the cities described in the article, Milwaukee has also enjoyed a revival, notably in Brewer's Hill and along the river. But as with these other cities, few of the people moving in are families with children. An article about Brewer's Hill in the current Milwaukee magazine (not available on the web) describes, inadvertently perhaps, why making schools attractive to middle class parents is so difficult. Palmer elementary school is in the heart of Brewer's Hill but is considered unacceptable to most residents. By most measures, Palmer has been among the poorest performing of all MPS schools for many years.

Yet all schools, no matter how much in need of change, have their passionate defenders. The article describes a proposal from then-board member John Gardner that quickly bogged down in racial and class politics. Yet, according to the same article, few of the Palmer students came from its attendance area.

Side Note: I am increasingly puzzled by Milwaukee magazine's practice of hiring partisans to do reporting without disclosing potential biases. For example, the author of this article is a retired teacher and former union officer who ran against Joe Dannecker (an ally of John Gardner) for school board. The magazine simply describes him as a free-lance writer.

Funding school choice

At a candidates' forum this last week MPS board president Peter Blewett suggested that funding of school choice should be changed so that choice students should be included in the MPS count for figuring state aid. While he is right, his support probably comes too late to help Milwaukee taxpayers.

Some years ago I became convinced that the state funding formula for choice schools was unfair to Milwaukee taxpayers. By not including choice students in the overall count, it made Milwaukee’s financial resources per student look stronger than they really were. After considerable resistance, the choice coalition finally agreed that the fairest solution would treat those students as if they attended MPS. Once convinced, the coalition went to work and convinced the Republican leadership in the legislature to support this change.

Unfortunately this change died when none of the Democrats on the Joint Finance Committee–including those from Milwaukee–supported it. Much of the opposition seemed to stem from fear that including choice students in the MPS count would offer legitimacy to the choice schools. As became clear later some of the Democrats also hoped to defeat Republicans by charging them with favoring Milwaukee. This vote happened early in Blewett's term on the MPS board. Perhaps his involvement in support of the funding change--along with other opponents of school choice--might have changed a vote or two, saving the proposal.

In essence, Milwaukee Democrats voted to raise their constituents’ tax burden in order to thumb their noses at choice schools. I suspect the Democrats' lack of support for Milwaukee, combined with the later attempt to capitalize on the Republicans' vote, would make it very hard to enlist Republican support for a similar measure today. Sometimes, there is a window that closes if the opportunity is not seized.

Too often, the battle about school choice becomes an end in itself. People forget that the children involved are some of the neediest in Wisconsin. And Milwaukee taxpayers are not well served by this obsession.

"Attract and Retain"

One symptom of becoming an adult is the recognition that the world is full of limits and trade-offs. To have more of one thing, it is often necessary to have less of something else.

One course I teach includes something call linear programming. It is part of a larger group of models described as "constrained optimization." These are based on the recognition that most real-world problems have a set of constraints or restrictions, such as budgets or limited resources. The aim, then is to find the best solution (optimize) that fits those constraints. The organization whose leaders recognize the constraints and optimize most effectively within them will prosper while others will fall behind.

Unfortunately, while recognizing constraints is the mark of a good leader, pretending they don't exist can be good politics. Of course we can cut taxes and increase spending. We shouldn't worry about global warming, running out of oil, or environmental pollution because some new technology will come along and solve the problem. The politician who also wants to be a responsible leader is at a disadvantage.

The "Attract and Retain" signs that sprouted around Milwaukee a while back fit into the politics of unconstrained optimization. They tell the school board and administration it should be generous to the teachers, a sentiment that only a grouch could disagree with. Yet those displaying the signs don't suggest where the money for this generosity should come from. That a majority of the school board subscribes to this sentiment goes a long way to explain why MPS's financial problems continue to grow. Unfortunately, good leadership requires the ability to make hard decisions.

Wasserman poll on vouchers

State representative Sheldon Wasserman posted a constituent poll that included a question on school choice. While 43% said they did not support the program, 44% supported one of three expansion proposals (remove the income limits, expand state-wide, or do both). The remainder had no opinion. Oddly the expansion proposals are more radical than those proposed by the choice coalition. Apparently the position adopted by mayor Barrett and governor Doyle--keep the program as it is--was not included as an option.

Constituent polls are notoriously unreliable as random samples of all opinion. This poll is particularly interesting, however, when opinions on choice are compared to responses on other issues. It seems evident that the North Shore residents responding to this poll are a predominantly liberal group. For example, the ratio of those describing themselves as pro-choice to pro-life was about 3 to one. 81% opposed concealed weapons. And 71% supported same-sex marriage or civil unions compared to 27% supporting present law or a constitutional amendment.

Thanks to Davey Moore for pointing out the link to this poll.

Democrats and Vouchers (cont)

Davey Moore comments further on the Democrats problem: "At what point did petty political bickering become more important than social justice for the neediest families in Milwaukee?" I think the Democrats' weakness reflects a broader problem: they lack a vision and an overall sense of what they stand for.

Rather than come forward with an overall vision of what direction Wisconsin should be heading, they hope to develop a winning coalition by appealing to people as members of one or another interest groups. (I was first struck by this tendency twenty-five years ago as a delegate to the state Democratic convention. Resolution after resolution was passed demanding rights for this or that group.)

More on MATC

In his on-line column for Milwaukee Magazine, Bruce Murphy takes a much more skeptical stance towards the shepherd article on MATC changes than I did yesterday. Certainly there are valid reasons for his skepticism. In my experience, the people quoted in the article spent most of their energy opposing an reexamination of MATC that might lead to its better serving its students, particularly the neediest students who could most benefit from the technical programs that open the door to good jobs. Thus I was surprised to find myself agreeing with their criticisms of the purported direction of MATC.

The other reason for skepticism is the Shepherd itself. Can it be trusted to fairly report this issue? Too often ideology trumps journalistic integrity, so that the story that fits the Shepherd's publisher's mindset runs whether or not it is accurate.

I continue, however, to worry that the direction implied in the article is accurate--that MATC is moving from a mission of preparing people for jobs to emphasizing liberal arts. I think the first role is unique to MATC, while the second is one that many other institutions can do better.

That said, it is refreshing to have Murphy's voice back. He helps fill the huge gap between the ideologues on the far right and the far left.

Have vouchers hurt Democrats?

Most of my friends who are active in Democratic politics or serve in the legislature seem to believe that, whatever the merits of the voucher program for schools, they have not hurt Democrats politically. As evidence, they point to the fact that few of the legislators who represent the inner city neighborhoods where most families benefiting from vouchers live supported expanding enrollment in the program.

So far, at least, the beneficiaries have not been organized into an effective electoral force. In part, this reflects the fact that they are by definition low-income and political participation is inversely proportional to income. It also reflects the fact that Republicans have taken too many positions that repel minority and inner city voters to win them over on this one issue. These Milwaukee seats are among the safest for the Democrats anywhere in Wisconsin.

Yet control of the legislature is not determined in Milwaukee. It is determined by a relatively few seats where support for the two parties is evenly matched. And even thought the Democrats narrowly won Wisconsin for John Kerry, they continued to lose these marginal seats, further strengthening the Republicans' grip on the legislature.

In looking at the puzzle of why the Democrats continue to lose in the legislature, I have become increasingly convinced that their opposition to vouchers undermines their ability to present themselves as the party of vision, of idealism, and of solutions. It does this in several ways:

• It undermines one of the Democratic Party's core values, the concern for the underdog, one that dates at least from the New Deal. When FDR saw one-third of the nation ill-clothed and ill-fed, he did not add that they should be ignored because they did not vote.
• It supports the charge that Democrats are a party of special interests, in this case WEAC.
• It strengthens the suspicion that Democrats like government institutions because they like government, rather than using government to solve problems.
  

Strange bedfellows

The current Shepherd Express has an article about some current trends at the Milwaukee Area Technical College. According to the article, MATC has eliminated its adult high school program and reduced the early childhead program by cutting the day care center. The implication is that these and other changes are part of a move to transition MATC as a two-year liberal arts institution, while deemphasizing programs that directly prepare students for jobs.

It is not clear from the article where adults lacking a high school degree will now turn. My understanding is that at one time MPS offered a high school program for adults but dropped it in favor of MATC. Presumably they will still have the GED to turn to but the statistics on the effectiveness of the GED are not encouraging.

If the article is accurate--and I have learned from personal experience to treat the Shepherd with skepticism--these changes seem wrong-headed. Instead of concentrating on its unique role, MATC seems to be further losing site of its vision. The critics quoted in the article, Rosen, Redovich, Goldstein, and Baker, who represent the traditional MATC constituencies, seem justified in their concerns.

When I was president of the MPS board I tried to encourage new membership on the MATC board because I thought MATC had lost focus on its vision. Too many MPS graduates, particularly minority students, were encouraged to go into the liberal arts division rather than towards the technical programs that led to good jobs. This effort was one of my more dismal failures, in large part because of opposition from the very people criticising the current direction of MATC.

We have a critique

Last post, I mentioned a couple of reasons for the recent dearth of commentary here. Another was the lack of responses. Real blogs have people agreeing, arguing, and accusing the blogger of being an arch-villain. In the category of be careful what you wish for, tonight I received responses to a couple of fairly ancient posts (September 10 and August 15). Unfortunately, Anonymous won't set any standards for either civil discourse or reasoned argumentation. He or she does make a couple of interesting points, however:

• He or she argues that the insurance deal I discussed saved MPS $17 million. This would be major news, if true. $17 million is the sort of money that would have a significant impact on the perennial budget shortfall. Since I played a crucial role in pushing MTEA and the MPS administration to keep working on this deal, I would add it to my resume, if I believed it. Unfortunately, I don't believe it. If it were true, I believe both the MPS administration and the MTEA would be broadcasting the good news about cooperation. And under the deal, the teachers would get a part of this savings. At a time when good news about MPS is sorely lacking I find it hard that news of this sort would be buried.
  
• In the other post I commented on an exchange between a retired teacher arguing that MPS teachers are underpaid (but actually talking more about working conditions) and a current teacher taking the risky position that they are not. I expressed some concern about the latter's relations with his colleagues. Anonymous adds to those concerns by saying he or she works with that teacher and then proceeding to disparage him. Perhaps in person Anonymous is both charming and tolerant of disagreement, but based on Anonymous's anonymous comments, I don't envy that teacher.
  

Can MPS close schools?

I have been very negligent about postings on this blog, mainly because I have been involved in other things, like work, starting a new on-line journal (first article received and out for review), and starting a website devoted to Wisconsin bicycle routes. (Talk about lack of focus!) But mainly, I think, it is because I have become increasingly pessimistic about the future of education in Milwaukee.

Part of the reason for this pessimism is underlined by an article in this morning's Journal-Sentinel, "MPS panel holds off on closing several schools." According to this article, directors Blewett, Morales, and Balistreri voted to defer any decision on closing low-enrollment schools until a "community needs" analysis can be done. This decision--or lack of decision really--is symptomatic of the inability of the board majority to make hard decisions, the kind of decisions that will rile a vocal minority but help the system as a whole. Transferring resources from more popular schools to the low-enrollment schools will only make it more difficult for all schools to operate and accelerate the downward spiral.

Theoretically, it is possible that a couple of good things could come out of this:

1. With the threat of imminent closure, perhaps some of the schools will figure out what parents are looking for in schools (it is ironic, I think, that even choice schools with quite inept management seem able to figure out how to attract students).
2. Perhaps they will develop an economic model for a small enrollment school, recognizing that such a school will have to concentrate on doing a few things well, and not try to be all things to all families.

But first MPS schools will have to shake off their debilitating culture that expects someone else to rescue them and the MPS board will have to get over its reluctance to make hard decisions.

Charlene Hardin

Some time back, Schools Now promised to profile the four Milwaukee School Board members facing election this year. Unfortunately it stopped at only three. Part of the reason for procrastinating is that it is hard to talk about Charlene Hardin without talking about personality and behavior.

She can be charming in person, but at board meetings is often belligerent. A typical example occurred at the committee meeting considering renewal of Afro Urban Institute. Larry O'Neill expressed is unhappiness with her behavior:

At the meeting, we had board members screaming, shouting at the superintendent, pounding on the table. It is false to say there was not help from the administration. The review committee recommended that it was time to revoke the charter. It was well documented. It doesn't help to do some of the things that were done at that meeting. We don't want to set up children for failure.

Oddly, her outbursts often include appeals to the board to work together.

Other than passionate defenses of any group getting funds from MPS--no matter how ineffective, it is hard to associate any set of policies with Hardin.

School board elections start

Assuming sufficient signatures survive, there will be three district school board races this April, but no primaries.

In the eighth district (south west side), Larry O'Neil decided not to run for re-election. The two candidates to replace him are Danny Goldberg and John Malloy Hagen.

Kevin Ronnie will run against School Board President Peter Blewett in the sixth district (west side).

Bernadine Bradford will run against Charlene Hardin in the fourth district (north side).

In the fifth district (east side and near south side), Jennifer Morales is unopposed, reflecting in part perhaps a belief that she was politically in synch with the political views of many of the east side activists and would be hard to beat. The lack of a contest also seems to reflect a lack of interest in MPS on the part of most east siders, few of whom have children in MPS.

More on this race as it develops. Coming up next: why MPS is important.

Cheating in Texas

The Dallas recently published two articles alleging cheating in several Houston schools on the Texas state tests. It appears that teachers gave students cues so they would score higher on the tests. When these students moved to middle school, suddenly their scores were much lower. Former teachers report that they were told to give their students more help.

At a few Milwaukee elementary schools, there is a similar decline in sixth grade, but it appears no one has examined the reasons.

Part of the problem is that for some schools, principals, and teachers, high test scores become an end in themselves. Rather than looking at the tests as a measure of what students are learning and using them to improve learning, teachers come to look at the scores themselves as the goal. It is then a relatively small step to look at anything that improves the scores as a good, even if it does not improve student learning, and in fact gives a false impression of learning.

Perhaps that cultural shift helps explain why such cheating can go on for years.