Tag: Wichita and Kansas schools
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Kansas Budget Problems Threaten School Bond Aid
Oops. When I wrote this article, I proceeded as though it was Rhonda Holman who penned the Wichita Eagle editorial I refer to. But the author is Phillip Brownlee. It just seemed like a Rhonda Holman editorial. Because the State of Kansas is short on money this year and the next few years, lawmakers are…
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Performance Inflation in Kansas Schools?
USD 259, the Wichita public school district, claims 11 years of rising test scores. They’ve got the data (I think so, anyway) to prove it. In fact, the test scores are rising fairly rapidly in Wichita and across the state. See Wichita Test Scores Largely Mirror Kansas for some charts I prepared of test scores…
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Construction Companies Line Up for Wichita School Work
The Wichita Business Journal reports the story Eby to bid on Wichita schools work with new bond underwriter. The story describes how a prominent Wichita construction firm has placed its bonding situation in order, and is now ready to take on some work for USD 259, the Wichita public school district. This company paid the…
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Charter Schools Can Close the Education Gap
We don’t have these, to my knowledge, in USD 259, the Wichita public school district, and there are very few in Kansas. Across the country, however, charter schools are making a difference, particularly in addressing the needs of urban and high-poverty students. Joel I. Klein, chancellor of the New York City Department of Education, and…
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Wichita Election Coverage Launched
With the March 3 primary election for Wichita city council and school board seats fast approaching, I’ve started a special page of coverage. The page contains links to news stories and candidate websites. If you are aware of news stories or candidate websites that I’ve missed, please send them to me by email at bob.weeks@gmail.com.…
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Wichita school bond contributors: self-interest gone wild
The campaign finance report filed by Citizens Alliance for Responsible Education (CARE), reporting on the campaign in favor of the bond issue to benefit USD 259, the Wichita public school district, contains information that should be of interest to Wichitans.
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Wichita school bond finance report omits a big contribution
Yesterday, Citizens Alliance for Responsible Education (CARE) filed their campaign finance report. This group was in favor of the bond issue to benefit USD 259, the Wichita public school district. There are some interesting details in this report, but there’s one glaring omission: there’s no mention of the campaign contribution made by the taxpayers of…
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Why don’t we have these in Wichita?
Just 12 years later, economically disadvantaged students — defined as those eligible for free or reduced-price school lunches — in secondary charter schools are twice as likely to score at advanced or proficient levels on math and reading tests as their peers in traditional public schools, based on federally mandated national tests. Wow. That sounds…
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In public schools, incentives matter
Last week (Wichita Public School District’s Path: Not Fruitful) I wrote about an article by Malcolm Gladwell. This article describes a method for evaluating and paying teachers. It’s not based on what public schools do now, which is to reward teachers solely on the basis of longevity and education credentials earned. That’s because we’ve found…
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KU Study an Embarrassment to Sebelius
In the first study to measure the result of pouring all that money on the noggins of schoolkids, the University of Kansas’s Center for Applied Economics has released a study poetically entitled, “The Relationship between School Funding and Student Achievement in Kansas Public Schools.” The verdict? So far, the funding has produced “little evidence of…
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Wichita public school district’s path: not fruitful
One of the issues discussed during the campaign for the bond issue for USD 259, the Wichita public school district, was class size. A major reason given by the district for the need for the bond issue is the desire to provide smaller class sizes. Some opponents such as myself argued that the evidence that…
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Schaefer Johnson Cox Frey Architecture Wins. Who Lost?
In what must be the most unsurprising news reported in Wichita this year, Schaefer Johnson Cox Frey Architecture was awarded the contract for plan management services for the USD 259 (Wichita public school district) bond issue. Their fee is one percent of the total of the bond issue, or about $3.7 million. If this contract…