Voice For Liberty

Tag: Education

  • Kansas teachers union email: who is reasonable?

    Kansas progressives in both major political parties who want larger state government are promoting themselves as “reasonable.” Another email from an official of Kansas National Education Association (KNEA) asking union members to switch their voter registration in order to vote in Republican primaries provides additional insight into the true motivations of the union, and a look at who is reasonable.

    The email, printed in its entirety below, is from Tony White, Director of UniServ Southeast. UniServs are regional offices that provide services to teachers union members.

    In this email, White mentions students, writing “Stand up for yourself, for your profession, and Yes, for your students.” Mention of students was absent from a previous email White sent.

    White also uses words that we see progressives — including progressive Republicans — commonly use: “reasonable people” and “ideologues.” The mantra these days is that the Kansas Senate is the last bastion of a reasonable approach to government, and that hard-right ideologues have occupied the House of Representatives and the governor’s mansion.

    Kansans, however, ought to take a look at what “reasonable” has meant for Kansas schools, since that is purportedly the concern of White and the teachers union.

    While the Kansas school establishment touts rising test scores, this improved performance is only on tests managed by that very same establishment. On the national NAEP tests that Kansas school officials don’t control, Kansas scores are unchanged or falling. Despite this, Kansas Education Commissioner Diane DeBacker says scores on Kansas tests are rising — “jumping,” in her own words. See Kansas school test scores.

    Compare Kansas with Texas, a state that Kansas school spending boosters like to deride as a state with low-performing schools. In Kansas 69 percent of students are white, while in Texas that number is 33 percent. So it’s not surprising that overall, Kansas outperforms Texas (with one tie) when considering all students in four important areas: fourth and eighth grade reading, and fourth and eighth grade math.

    But looking at Hispanic students only, Texas beats or ties Kansas in these four areas. For black students, Texas bests Kansas in all four. Texas does this with much less spending per pupil than Kansas.

    We also know that when compared to other states, Kansas has low standards. The U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) has analyzed state standards, and we can see that Kansas has standards that are below most states. The table of figures is available at Estimated NAEP scale equivalent scores for state proficiency standards, for reading and mathematics in 2009, by grade and state. An analysis of these tables by the Kansas Policy Institute shows that few states have standards below the Kansas standards. See Despite superintendents’ claim, Kansas schools have low standards.

    White and his education spending establishment allies want more spending on schools, and they claim that school spending has been dramatically cut in recent years. Their focus on base state aid contains a grain of truth about school spending. But despite that figure having been cut, total spending on schools in Kansas this year is likely to set a record high. See Base state aid is wrong focus for Kansas school spending and Wichita school spending: The grain of truth.

    The teachers union and school establishment are opposed to, and generally successful in opposing other reforms that would help Kansas schools, such as improving teacher quality and implementing school choice. See In Kansas, school reform not on the plate.

    Kansas is falling behind other states in implementing meaningful reforms. That’s the way the teachers union likes it. Kansas students and taxpayers suffer for their benefit.

    This ought to cause us to reconsider who is reasonable.

    Following is the email from White:

    One last time, just for the procrastinators out there (which I will admit includes Member #1 – I think she’s resisting just to mess with me). Just like you, she’ll come through.

    So I’m sending this to all KNEA members in UniServ Southeast, even though many of you have told me you have your registration all squared away. You can feel quietly superior and totally prepared while I go on.

    Here’s the online link to register/switch to the important Republican party: https://www.kdor.org/voterregistration/Default.aspx

    THIS MUST BE DONE BY NEXT TUESDAY, JULY 17TH IF YOU ARE CURRENTLY REGISTERED AS A DEMOCRAT.

    If you have a valid driver’s license, you can do it online. However, make sure it “went through” (sorry for the tech talk J).

    You should get a wallet size voting card back from your county clerk, or at least that’s how it worked for me in Crawford County. It took about 10 calendar days and it shows my updated registration, including the polling place. Now I’m ready if there are any hiccups at the polls when I go to vote.

    If you do not receive a confirmation, you should check with your county clerk’s office to see if the change was received. There have been some instances where the clerk had no record of the update. You don’t want that when you go to vote.

    Finally, it seems my emails to you all have created a bit of a stir among the radical conservatives. They have been forwarded some of them, I guess. In turn, I have received several offensive emails lambasting me for encouraging you all to register and to vote, to have a say in the type of state in which we live and the quality of school system in which we work.

    They have blathered about it and me on the internet as well and in some news articles. They are greatly outraged, I tell you.

    Called me lots of names. Demanded I stop asking you to register and to vote, and that I apologize for doing so.

    Ain’t a gonna happen.

    Their reaction does demonstrate they are worried, worried that reasonable people are exerting their own right to vote.

    Maybe they know that less than 20% of the registered voters in SEK voted in the primary 2 years ago. That’s typical.

    Maybe they understand how every vote counts, and that goes double for a primary with low turnout.

    Maybe they want only the ideologues like them to make these decisions that will affect all of us so profoundly.

    Well, we also know those numbers, and we know the ideologues will turn out to vote 100%.

    The rest is up to you. Stand up for yourself, for your profession, and Yes, for your students. There are more of us than them, if we’ll do it.

    Get registered, and influence any like-minded person to do likewise. And then vote on August 7.

    Want to do more? For the primary:

    · Yards signs – and even highway signs if you have a good location. Let me know.

    · Walking as teacher/KNEA members to leaflet. We will just go to the doors of registered Republicans and hand out campaign pieces. It’s easy and fun, and the candidates love local teachers helping out. Nothing gives them more credibility than teachers helping in their own town. Help as little or as much as you can. Let me know – we’re quickly organizing things.

    · We have helped walk Erie and have Independence, Baxter Springs, and Columbus set for this Saturday. Parsons, Chanute, and the rest will soon follow.

    · In Cherokee, Crawford, and Bourbon counties, Bob Marshall needs you.

    · In Montgomery, Labette, and Neosho counties, it’s Dwayne Umbarger. (and Rich Proehl and Ed Bideau, too.)

    Thanks for reading this far. I really wouldn’t be such a pest if it wasn’t this important. We are fighting for the future of our state and the quality of life we enjoy. So I’ll risk being annoying.

    Thanks for everything you do for your students and for your colleagues. See you at the polls.

  • School funding suitability in Kansas

    As a Kansas court considers intervening in Kansas school finance, the importance of accurate and meaningful evidence on school funding should be the court’s top priority. Supporters of increased school funding rely on two studies that they claim supports more funding for schools. An analysis by Kansas Policy Institute is helpful in understanding why the studies relied on in the past should be discarded.

    “Suitable” Funding of K-12 Should Not be Based on Montoy

    Augenblick & Myers Gave the Court Deliberately Inflated Numbers

    June 7, 2012 — Wichita — The attorneys representing Kansas school districts suing taxpayers for additional funding in Gannon v. State of Kansas are trying to prove that the state is not making suitable provision for K-12 funding. Their definition of “suitable” is based on a formula that the legislature implemented after the Kansas Supreme Court ordered nearly a billion dollar increase in the 2005 Montoy decision. But the Montoy decision was based on a seriously flawed study.

    “Basing suitability on the Montoy decision or any variation thereof throws efficient use of taxpayer money out the window. The 2001 Augenblick & Myers (A&M) study was supposed to take efficiency into account but they admitted that they deviated from their own methodology and by doing so, gave the court inflated numbers,” said Kansas Policy Institute president Dave Trabert.

    KPI published a legal analysis of Montoy in 2009 that was written by Caleb Stegall, now Gov. Brownback’s general counsel. Stegall wrote a critique of the previous efforts to determine suitability with a nod to cost-effectiveness that still holds today, “So while the Legislative Post Audit (LPA) study — and the A&M study for that matter — attempted to provide informed estimates of the price of certain policy decisions, in the end, LPA rightly recognized that only the Legislature is capable of making such decisions. As such, the best that any cost study can do is inform the Legislature as to the range of possible costs associated with different policy decision, and not dictate the exact price tag associated with a funding system that passes constitutional muster. This fact simply brings critical clarity to the contradictions at the heart of the school finance debacle in Kansas.”

    Trabert continued, “The subsequent Legislative Post Audit study was designed to essentially replicate the A&M study. LPA very deliberately reported that they were not asked to determine what it would cost if schools were organized and operated in a cost-effective manner.”

    LPA made this very clear on page two of their report. “In other words, it’s important to remember that these cost studies are intended to help the Legislature decide appropriate funding levels for K-12 public education. They aren’t intended to dictate any specific funding level, and shouldn’t be viewed that way.

    Finally, within these cost studies we weren’t directed to, nor did we try to, examine the most cost-effective way for Kansas school districts to be organized and operated. Those can be major studies in their own right. However, such issues potentially could be addressed in the on-going school audits we’ll be doing after these cost studies are completed. Topics for those audits will be approved by the 2010 Commission, which was created by the 2005 Legislature.”

    The 2010 Commission waited three years to have LPA begin to look at efficient operations of schools. They released a study in July 2009 that cited eighty recommendations for schools to save money without impacting outcomes. The next step was to have been audits of individual districts but superintendents objected and convinced the Commission to stop the mandatory efficiency audits.

    Trabert continued, “All along the way, the Legislature has attempted to receive information on the efficient use of taxpayer money in public education but their efforts have been thwarted. They passed legislation that encouraged districts to direct 65 percent of funding into Instructional costs in another attempt to ensure that taxpayer money was put to the best use but districts ignored them. Instruction spending accounted for 53.6 percent of total spending in 2005; total spending was $1.3 billion higher in 2011 but Instruction spending was only 54.3 percent of the total. Upon discovering that districts had used another $400 million in state and local tax dollars to increase cash reserves since 2005, legislation was passed to make a lot of that money easily accessible but very little of the money has been used.”

    Trabert concluded by saying, “Legislators have shown multiple good-faith efforts to make provision for suitable finance of public education and we believe they have fulfilled their constitutional obligation to do so. ‘Suitability’ may not be a clearly-defined term but it certainly hasn’t been established by any study to date.”

  • Wichita school spending: The grain of truth

    Reporting on USD 259, the Wichita public school district teacher contract negotiations provides another example of how schools are not being truthful regarding school spending.

    According to Wichita Eagle reporting, the district’s attorney used “repeated cuts in state funding” as a reason why the district can’t raise teacher salaries. He also referred to “the state and the cuts that have been made to school finance” and also said “I think it’s the state legislature and all the cuts that have occurred that have put us in this position.”

    These statements contain a grain of truth, but in a wider context, they are not truthful. It’s not just the Wichita school district attorney that makes these claims of large cuts to school funding. So do the Kansas school spending establishment and their allies such as the editorial boards of most Kansas newspapers.

    The grain of truth is base state aid per pupil, which is the starting point for the Kansas school finance formula. It has been cut, as shown in this chart that the school spending establishment uses.

    Kansas school spending, as presented by the Wichita public school district.

    Focusing on base state aid misses the larger picture. As an example, for the 2010-2011 school year, base state aid was $3,937. Yet the Wichita school district received $7,092 per pupil from the state, 80 percent more than base aid. Focusing only on base state aid per pupil also misses the federal and local sources of revenue to schools. For this year the Wichita district received $2,132 per pupil from the federal government, and $3,855 per pupil from local taxpayers, for a total of $13,069 per pupil. The same figure for the previous year was $12,526.

    As it turns out, when you consider all sources of funding, the Wichita school district has been able to spend more money each year for many years, despite the claims of cuts. What cuts have been made to base state aid per pupil have been more than compensated for by weighted state spending, federal aid, and local aid, as shown in the following chart.

    Wichita school spending, as reported by Kansas State Department of Education.

    Why do school spending supporters focus only on base state aid? Its decline provides the grain of truth for their larger and false argument about school spending. As explained in Kansas school spending: the deception this grain of truth enables school spending advocates like Mark Desetti (Director of Legislative and Political Advocacy at Kansas National Education Association (KNEA), our state’s teachers union) to be accurate and deceptive, all at the same time.

    We expect this behavior from union officials. Their job — as advocates for a special interest group — is to direct more spending to schools, without regard to need or cost to taxpayers.

    Newspaper editorial writers, however, ought to be held to a higher standard. But: A recent Lawrence Journal-World editorial contained “In the last four years, per-pupil state funding for public schools has declined by about 14 percent, from $4,400 per student to $3,780.” And writing in the Wichita Eagle, Rhonda Holman complained of “several years of cuts totaling $653 per pupil.” (Reason to be wary, December 16 Wichita Eagle) Actual facts do not support these claims.

    Similarly, we ought to expect more truth from school districts and school officials regarding school finance. Then, we can ask for truth on Kansas school test scores.

  • Despite superintendents’ claim, Kansas schools have low standards

    In the Wichita Eagle a number of school district superintendents made a plea for increased funding in Kansas schools, referring to “multiple funding cuts.” (Reverse funding cuts, May 3, 2012)

    As an aside, I wonder if these superintendents know that Deputy Commissioner of Education Dale Dennis has said that this school year is likely to be a record-setting year for Kansas school spending, when considering all sources of funding.

    But what Kansans ought to take notice of is the superintendents’ claim in this sentence: “Historically, our state has had high-performing schools, which make Kansas a great place to live, raise a family and run a business.”

    The truth is that when compared to other states, Kansas has low standards.

    The U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) has analyzed state standards, and we can see that Kansas has standards that are below most states. The table of figures is available at Estimated NAEP scale equivalent scores for state proficiency standards, for reading and mathematics in 2009, by grade and state. An analysis of these tables by the Kansas Policy Institute shows that few states have standards below the Kansas standards.

    This table is from KPI’s report earlier this year titled Removing Barriers to Better Public Education: Analyzing the facts about student achievement and school spending.

    The conclusion by NCES is “… most states’ proficiency standards are at or below NAEP’s definition of Basic performance.” KPI, based on simple analysis of the NCES data, concluded: “Kansas is one of those states, with its Reading Proficiency standard set lower than what the U.S. Department of Education considers Basic performance. Math Proficiency levels are above what NAEP considers to be Basic but still well below the U.S. standard for Proficient.”

    The superintendents write: “We recognize that improvement is still possible.” One improvement is for Kansas to upgrade its standards to at least the average of other states. In this way, Kansans will be better informed about the true performance of their schools. Let’s also ask that school district superintendents be truthful about spending and student achievement.

  • Kansans uninformed on school spending

    As the Kansas Legislature debates spending on schools, we have to hope that legislators are more knowledgeable about school spending than the average Kansan. Surveys have found that few Kansans have accurate information regarding school spending. Surprisingly, those with children in the public school system are even more likely to be uninformed regarding accurate figures. But when presented with accurate information about changes in school spending, few Kansans are willing to pay increased taxes to support more school spending.

    These are some of the findings of a 2010 survey commissioned by Kansas Policy Institute.

    Not only did Kansans underestimate school spending levels, they did so for the state portion of school funding, and again for the total of all funding sources — state, federal, and local.

    Many people greatly underestimated school funding. For all sources of funding on a per-student basis, 43% of poll respondents chose a number that is less than half the actual number.

    On a question asking about the change in Kansas school funding over the past five years, 64% thought that funding had declined. Only 6% knew that funding had increased by over 15% during that period. The five year time period is significant, as it was in 2005 that the Kansas Supreme Court ordered additional school spending as a result of the Montoy case.

    When asked about their willingness to pay higher taxes to support mores school funding, 51% said they would, if per-pupil funding was down from five years ago. But when asked whether they would pay more taxes in per-pupil funding had gone up by over 20%, only 11% said yes. According to the Kansas State Department of Education, total funding per pupil increased by 26% over this period.

    The survey was conducted by The Research Partnership, Inc., a Wichita-based market research firm. The complete results may be viewed at the Kansas Reporter website at K-12 Public Opinion Survey, or here.

    Survey participants were asked if they would like to make comments regarding funding of Kansas public schools. There are 17 pages of these comments.

    Analysis

    The results of this Kansas poll are similar to recent nationwide results discovered by EducationNext, a project of the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. That study is summarized at Americans uninformed about school spending, study finds. Another study with similar findings is at Kansas school spending: citizens again are uninformed.

    It’s not surprising that Kansans are misinformed about the level of school spending and its changes. Even members of the Kansas House of Representatives and the Wichita School Board are sometimes uninformed, misinformed. It’s either that or we have to conclude they are lying to us.

    The school spending lobby in Kansas focuses on only one measure of school spending, base state aid per pupil. That number is approximately one-third of total school spending, and it has declined. As this study shows, it is in the best interests of the Kansas school establishment for average Kansans to be uninformed about the true levels of school spending. When presented with accurate information about school spending, Kansans are not willing to pay higher taxes.

    We can understand the motivation of schools to lobby for increased spending. But they should be truthful. It’s even worse when newspaper editorial writers don’t recognize the truth. An example is a recent Wichita Eagle editorial written by Rhonda Holman. She repeated the meme of the school spending lobby, writing: “… despite state per-pupil base aid having been slashed to 1999 levels.” Most people don’t know that “base aid” is only one component of Kansas school spending. It’s the starting point for the Kansas school finance formula. After weightings are applied, most school districts receive much more funding than the base aid figure. The Wichita school district, for example, received $6,511 per pupil from the state at a time when base state aid was $4,012. Also, look at the total spending picture: From 1999 to last year, Wichita school spending jumped from $336 million to over $604 million. State aid to this district increased from $200 million to $328 million over the same time.

    It’s also likely that the current school year will see record spending on schools in Kansas.

    So why don’t Holman and the Wichita Eagle use the total spending figures, or even the total state aid numbers? Focusing on one component of Kansas school finance that is not representative of the entire picture is a disservice to Wichita Eagle readers.

  • Kansas school test scores

    Kansas scores on the nationwide NAEP tests are unchanged or falling at the same time scores on Kansas tests are rising — “jumping,” in the recent words of Kansas Education Commissioner Diane DeBacker.

    It’s true that performance on the assessments that are under the control of Kansas are rising, as shown in the accompanying chart that shows the composite score for math and reading in grades four and eight. (Scores before 2006 are not directly comparable, as the state moved to a new assessment then.)

    But scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) for Kansas students don’t reflect the same trend. Scores on this test, which is given every two years, aren’t rising like the Kansas-controlled test scores.

    Dr. DeBacker would do Kansans a service by explaining the difference in trends between the two series of test scores. Not to mention the fact that the Kansas tests report that over 80 percent of Kansas students score at a level deemed “at or above standard.” On the federal NAEP test, the corresponding numbers — around 40 percent or less — deemed to be “proficient.” That’s quite a difference in standards. But no matter what level is deemed satisfactory or proficient, the trend of scores on the two tests don’t match up.

    Kansas schools establishment advocates like DeBacker will point to Kansas’ overall high scores on the NAEP. It’s true: Looking at the gross scores, Kansas does well, compared to other states. But you don’t have to look very hard to realize that these scores are a statistical accident. It’s an unfortunate fact that minority students do not perform as well on these tests as white students. When you combine this with the fact that Kansas has a relatively small minority population, we can see why Kansas ranks well.

    Compare Kansas with Texas, a state that Kansas school spending boosters like to deride as a state with low-performing schools. In Kansas 69 percent of students are white, while in Texas that number is 33 percent. So it’s not surprising that overall, Kansas outperforms Texas (with one tie) when considering all students in four important areas: fourth and eighth grade reading, and fourth and eighth grade math.

    But looking at Hispanic students only, Texas beats or ties Kansas in these four areas. For black students, Texas bests Kansas in all four. Texas does this with much less spending per pupil than Kansas.

  • Wichita teacher labor kerfuffle illustrates the problem

    A dispute over teacher working conditions in USD 259, the Wichita public school district, provides a window into the workings of the public school system and its problems. There is a way out, but it’s not happening in Kansas.

    Public school teachers want to be recognized by the public as professionals. But when Wichita school district management seeks to actually manage teachers, the union intervenes, and change must be negotiated.

    The issue, according to Wichita Eagle reporting, is that the school district “wants to start requiring teachers to write detailed lesson plans, file grades online every week and contact each student’s parent or guardian at least once per grading period.”

    This request was deemed “insulting” by United Teachers of Wichita, the union for Wichita public school teachers.

    Right away we can see some problems with public education, illustrated for all to see here in Wichita. First, why are the working conditions of Wichita schoolteachers a public matter? The answer is, of course, is that they are public employees, paid by tax dollars, and the public therefore has an interest and a right to know certain things.

    This interest — and controversy — was played out in some of the comments left to the online version of this story. Two controversial issues argued about include whether teachers are paid too little (or too much), and how many hours teachers work (or not).

    Both of these issues relate to professionalism. Most professional employees are paid based on performance or an agreement struck between the employee and management. That’s not the case in most public school systems, including Wichita. Here, teacher pay is based solely on two factors: longevity and education credentials earned. There is no opportunity for any teachers to earn more, no matter how they distinguish themselves. The reverse is true: the poor teachers earn the same as the outstanding. This lockstep pay scale is not characteristic of professional employees.

    Regarding how much teachers actually work, I’m sure some work long hours to complete their work. But the union contract for Wichita teachers is full of language like “The ending time of the school day in each building shall be seven (7) hours and ten (10) minutes after the beginning time” and “The teacher work day will be increased by forty (40) minutes one day per week for seventeen (17) weeks of the school year for PLC.” Again, union contract language like this is not characteristic of professional employees.

    But whether we call teachers “professional” or not is just a label. The real issue is that these issues are a matter for public discussion, and that they cause so much controversy and heated argument. This is characteristic of government institutions that have a monopoly or near-monopoly and are isolated from market competition.

    In Kansas, the public schools have a near-monopoly on the use of public funds for education. Unless a family wants to send their children to religious schools, not many have the financial resources to send their children to private schools.

    So we are left with a monolithic public school system, a system run by government. People are going to argue about how the system is run. People will resist paying for it. Some people will suffer the delusion that they can have an impact on the way the system is run, only to find out that the system protects itself very well.

    In many areas of human life, market competition has found to be the force that makes things better. Market competition doesn’t mean that people have to work harder and longer. Instead it means that there is a marketplace where consumers have a choice. It also means that people are free to enter the market as suppliers, as well as consumers.

    In the introduction to The Morality of Capitalism, Tom G. Palmer explains further how genuine capitalism — the system of market competition — is a system of innovation and creativity:

    The term ‘capitalism’ refers not just to markets for the exchange of goods and services, which have existed since time immemorial, but to the system of innovation, wealth creation, and social change that has brought to billions of people prosperity that was unimaginable to earlier generations of human beings. Capitalism refers to a legal, social, economic, and cultural system that embraces equality of rights and ‘careers open to talent’ and that energizes decentralized innovation and processes of trial and error. … Capitalist culture celebrates the entrepreneur, the scientist, the risk-taker, the innovator, the creator. … Far from being an amoral arena for the clash of interests, as capitalism is often portrayed by those who seek to undermine or destroy it, capitalist interaction is highly structured by ethical norms and rules. Indeed, capitalism rests on a rejection of the ethics of loot and grab. … Capitalism puts human creativity to the service of humanity by respecting and encouraging entrepreneurial innovation, that elusive factor that explains the difference between the way we live now and how generation after generation after generation of our ancestors lived prior to the nineteenth century.

    We don’t experience the benefit of this in Kansas and Wichita public education. Except for religious schools and a handful of private schools that few can afford, education is provided by a government monopoly isolated from the creative and entrepreneurial impetus of markets. We don’t benefit from decentralized innovation. We don’t respect and encourage entrepreneurial innovation. Government programs don’t have these features.

    Paradoxically, while supporters of public education are likely to describe capitalism as an “amoral arena for the clash of interests,” we can see that the Wichita public school system is where the clash between management and workers is happening, played out in public.

    Instead of the education of children being the responsibility of parents and the concern of those they choose to voluntarily associate with, we have a government program. We fight over it. We destroy civil society, turning over something so vital and important to government bureaucrats and unions.

    In Kansas, schools face very little market competition. The public school establishment vigorously beats back every attempt to introduce even small amounts of choice and competition. Instead we are left to fuss over phony reform measures such as Governor Sam Brownback’s current school reform proposal, which is really just small adjustments as to how the existing system will be paid for. The governor has yet to propose any meaningful reform.

  • Kansas school superintendents defend low standards

    Today the Wichita Eagle carries another op-ed that argues that a relatively low level of student achievement should be deemed proficient, and that Kansans should therefore be proud of our schools. This op-ed was signed by a number of Sedgwick and Butler county school district superintendents.

    As have other writers, the superintendents criticize the Kansas Policy Institute for placing a series of ads in Kansas newspapers. The superintendents claim that KPI “included data that was used out of context, completely misrepresenting the truth.”

    When Kansas schoolchildren are tested using the Kansas state tests, results are categorized into one of five categories: Exemplary, exceeds standards, meets standards, approaches standard, and academic warning. Each of these categories has a definition. In its ads, KPI chose to present the number of students who fall into the two highest categories. The Kansas school bureaucracy — including these superintendents — argues that KPI should have also included students in the third category.

    That’s what the disagreement is over: where to draw the line that we consider proficient. Where is the line that divides proficient from not proficient?

    As explained in In Kansas, public school establishment attacks high standards, we’ve learned that the Kansas public school establishment wants Kansans to be proud of the number of students who are sufficient, who usually understand, and are able to use some problem-solving techniques.

    KPI, on the other hand, wants to call attention to the much smaller number of students whose knowledge is well-developed, who are accurate, and usually use multiple problem-solving techniques.

    This is not taking data out of context. It is not misrepresenting the truth, as the superintendents claim. It is simply calling for a higher standard than what school administrators want to be judged by.

    And if we’re concerned about our national security, we need more students to be in the two highest categories of achievement. That’s right — a recent report by the Council on Foreign Relations concludes that U.S. schools are so bad that they pose a threat to national security.

    We also have to question the validity of the Kansas tests. The superintendents write: “As Kansas Education Commissioner Diane DeBacker wrote in a recent commentary, performance trends on state assessments show that we are moving in the right direction.” They’re right. On tests administered and controlled by the state, student scores are rising. But on other measures that the state doesn’t control, the same trend is not present. An example is on the federal National Assessment of Educational Progress. On that test, scores for Kansas students are largely flat over the past years. In some years small gains are recorded, and in some years there are declines.

    How can it be that one one series of tests scores are rising, but not on others? Kansas school administrators don’t have a good answer for this. But there is a good reason: The Kansas test scores are subject to manipulation for political reasons.

    It’s bad enough that these superintendents defend low standards on tests of questionable validity. But misusing data — in the same article that they accuse others of doing so — is another matter.

    The superintendents cite DeBacker’s recent opinion piece on the editorial page of the Wichita Eagle: “Since 2001, the percentage of students statewide who perform in the top three levels on state reading assessments has jumped from about 60 percent to more than 87 percent. In math, the jump has been from just more than 54 percent to nearly 85 percent.”

    There’s a problem here that DeBacker and the superintendents ignore: In 2006 Kansas implemented new tests, and the state specifically warns that comparisons with previous years — like 2001 — are not valid. A KSDE document titled Kansas Assessments in Reading and Mathematics 2006 Technical Manual states so explicitly: “As the baseline year of the new round of assessments, the Spring 2006 administration incorporated important changes from prior KAMM assessments administered in the 2000 — 2005 testing cycle. Curriculum standards and targets for the assessments were changed, test specifications revised, and assessed grade levels expanded to include students in grades 3-8 and one grade level in high school. In effect, no comparison to past student, building, district, or state performance should be made.” (emphasis added.)

    Despite this warning, DeBacker and the superintendents make an invalid statistical comparison. This is not an innocent mistake. This is an actual example of — turning the superintendents’ quote on themselves — “data that was used out of context, completely misrepresenting the truth.”

    It’s one thing for teachers union officials to distort facts to defend the current system of public education. Their job is to deflect attention from the truth in order to defend a system that is run for the benefit of adults, not children and taxpayers.

    But we should expect more from school superintendents and the Kansas Commissioner of Education. We should expect the truth — an honest assessment — and we’re not getting that.

  • Harm of NCLB to be eclipsed

    By Dr. Walt Chappell, member, Kansas State Board of Education.

    Recent ads in Kansas newspapers have told the truth about the unacceptable level of reading and math scores for Kansas students. Yet, for Diane DeBacker, the State Education Commissioner, and education lobbyists to continue to deny these documented results from Kansas schools is a disservice to our students, their parents and taxpayers. This massive cover-up has gone on for years and needs to stop.

    All outside indicators of how well our schools are doing show that the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) mandates have been a major disaster and a tremendous waste of taxpayer money. Our students are not dumb plus our teachers and school administrators are doing what they have been told. But, largely due to these bureaucratic regulations, most students who graduate from American’s schools have not been taught the employable skills needed to compete for jobs in the global economy.

    This is not just a Kansas problem. Anyone willing to look at the facts can clearly see that major changes must take place in what and how we teach America’s children the concepts and skills they need to be productive adults. Yet, the Federal and State education bureaucrats and their lobbyists keep claiming that there is nothing wrong with public education — just give them more money to spend.

    Since the Montoy court decision in 2005, the Kansas legislature has appropriated $1 billion more for schools. But for the past 10 years, NAEP, ACT and SAT test scores still show that only about one-third of our students are “proficient.” With this new money, Kansas school districts hired over 6,000 new employees. And, since 2005, they had accumulated $868 million in unspent cash balances — an increase of 90 percent. Clearly, spending more tax dollars is not the answer to higher student achievement.

    In Kansas and the nation, one in four students do not graduate. Of those who do graduate and go to college, over 30 percent need remediation. Only half finish college yet most end up with huge student loans to repay — whether they earned a degree, can find a job, or not.

    A national commission has reported that 30 percent of high school graduates do not score high enough on aptitude tests to qualify to join the military. And, since the NCLB emphasis is only on teaching and testing reading and math, few students graduate with knowledge or skills for any other career.

    Clearly, the NCLB mandates from federal bureaucrats are failing to prepare our students and putting our teachers in a “no win” position of “teaching to the test.” But, the majority of the State Board has “rubber stamped” Diane DeBacker, the Kansas Commissioner of Education’s request that Kansas schools comply with the new Federal mandate to replace the Kansas standards with something new called the “Common Core Standards,” or CSS.

    However, there is no research to show that CCS will improve student achievement or that they are more relevant to what students need to learn. Yet, like NCLB, they will force teachers in every school to focus primarily on just reading and math so students can pass computerized national tests — which will replace the state assessments. As a result, there will be less time to teach all other subjects such as science, technology and careers.

    CCS are an unfunded federal mandate which will cost Kansas taxpayers millions of dollars to implement. These “new” standards were written by unknown, unelected, and unaccountable academics who have close ties to private publishing companies which will make billions of dollars of profits at the taxpayers, students and teachers expense. As a result, no Kansas elected official will be allowed to make key decisions about what and how students are taught in any K-12 school.

    The Kansas legislature and local school boards need to be strong and say “enough of this nonsense.” NCLB has not worked and CCS will be more of the same — but worse.

    Our students and nation are at risk of losing much of what previous generations have worked hard to achieve. Let’s put an end to the federal NCLB and CCS in Kansas schools, and let our teachers teach the employable skills our students need to earn a living wage and keep America strong.

    More information that Chappell has gathered may be found at his website, Walt Chappell: Main Issues.