Bring Out The Best

It has become fashionable to blame lazy, incompetent teachers, and the unions that protect them, for all the ills of public education.

As a lazy, incompetent teacher, I’m offended. Here’s why.

Let’s say, hypothetically, that you have a job in the food service industry. It doesn’t pay that well, but it’s steady work, you like the schedule, and it sure beats your last gig as Libby Mitchell’s campaign manager.

Your employer offers you a $15,000 bonus if you increase your productivity this year. You’d be willing to work a little harder for that, right? And maybe try some new ideas that might make you more efficient? Of course!

But how is your “productivity” going to be measured? Suppose your employer decides to base this awesome bonus on how well you can keep five tons of mayonnaise from going bad over the next 12 months.

As pallets full of economy-size jars of Miracle Whip begin to appear on the loading dock, you know there are obviously things you can do to keep the gooey white stuff as fresh as possible. Some fit nice and snug in your freezer. A few are loaded with special NASA chemical preservatives, and therefore would not go bad if you neglected them completely for ten years.

But plenty of others appear to have already been left out in the sun for a few days, and there are hundreds more whose history is unknown. You struggle all year, trying new ideas and doing the best you can, but at some point, no matter what, your workplace is going to smell worse than a dead skunk in a landfill.

(Feel free to stop here and go make yourself a tuna sandwich if you want. I’ll wait.)

Malaise sets in as you realize that keeping mayonnaise fresh has very little to do with your actual job, which is to keep customers happy. Condiment freshness is part of that, but there’s a lot more that goes into it, such as having a good memory, working quickly, and resisting the temptation to bring a sidearm to work.

And then you find out that Miracle Whip isn’t even mayonnaise. It’s “salad dressing.”

If you’re wondering where I’m going with all this, you’re not alone. Please bear with me.

Researchers at Vanderbilt University just released a study that shows offering teachers extra pay if their students’ test scores improve has absolutely no impact.

For three years, half the teachers in the study were given $5000 to $15,000 per year in bonuses if their students’ scores improved. The other half continued to work under the normal pay scale, without any opportunity for bonuses.

In the end, there was no difference between the two groups’ test scores.

This tells us one of two things: A) That teachers are already so loaded with cash that it will take a lot more dough than that to motivate them; or B) They’re all using the same mayonnaise.

Does this mean merit pay is a dumb idea? Maybe. But the study mostly illustrates a different problem: standardized tests do not give a complete measure of teaching and learning. They’re just one small part of the system of figuring out how well a teacher teaches and a student learns. If you’re going to track down “lazy” and “incompetent” teachers, do it with a system that actually works, and accounts for all the nuances and complexities of the job.

In other words, by all means, “Bring out the Hellman’s.” But if that’s all you feed people, you won’t be in business for very long.

Education Is Your Job (If You’re Not Too Busy)

Well, it’s the middle of August, when the air thickens with humidity and discussions about how the Red Sox are going to tank again (at least this time they have an excuse, and the health insurance bill to prove it’s a valid one).

Then there’s the various annual ads and articles about how best to outfit your child for “back to school,” as if that procedure has changed even slightly in the last 75 years.

Backpack. Binder. Pencils. Lunchbox full of crack cocaine and potato chips. Move on.

While the rest of the world changes rapidly, schools chug along like it’s 1961, and no one except a few consultants and activists seems to notice.

Why?

Well, those who post comments on the Bangor Daily News website seem to know everything. Let’s consult them. Just a moment...

Yup, I knew it: Every single problem with public education can be traced back to the teachers’ unions.

School violence? Blame the union. Decaying buildings? You can bet the NEA fed into it somehow.  Fights on the bus? The school board’s hands are tied.

Bad teachers? The Unions won’t let us fire them. Does anyone even know what a “bad teacher” looks like? If so, how many are there, really?

We can’t count them, apparently. Let me guess: it’s because the union won’t let us, right?

You may not like it, but I’m going to inject you with some actual facts:

Massachusetts routinely leads the nation in school performance. Teachers unions are very strong there.

Conversely, unions tend to be weak in Southern states, where test scores tend to lag behind the rest of the country.

Is it any coincidence that Massachusetts is one of the wealthiest states in the country, while people in the South, as I understand from listening to the radio, routinely have to eat something called “Poke Salad” for dinner?

This juxtaposition of obvious and readily available information has been brought to you by Diane Ravitch, former Assistant Secretary of Education under George W. Bush.

In her new book, “The Death and Life of the Great American School System,” Ravitch blasts the No Child Left Behind Act, which she once supported.

Ravitch claims the law puts unfair pressure on educators by not accounting for differences between schools in different regions.

You mean schools in the Bronx are not the same as ones in Skowhegan, and the kids from Skowhegan aren’t even the same as the ones from Kennebunk?

I am in shock.

The real problem with education is that it is run by politicians, who tend to favor lightweight reforms that look good in headlines, but don’t actually accomplish anything substantial.

Politicians answer to people with money, and people with money tend to have done alright for themselves with schools just the way they are.

Conservatives hold aloft the idea of privatizing schools. That’s not going to make anyone more interested in actual reform. Schools will still function the way people with money want them to, keeping kids busy and ranking them for success.

Real reform can only come from one place: Parents educating themselves about how kids learn and what really goes on inside classrooms.

A healthy quantity of informed and involved citizens can still get a politician’s ear, at least at the local level.

That is, if they’re not too busy blaming unions and talking about the Red Sox.

Finding a Condom Sense Solution to the Education Crisis

By Chuck McKay

In Wisconsin, which is a lot like Maine in terms of the number of crazed politicians per capita, one district attorney recently wrote a "friendly warning" to health teachers that they could be prosecued for "contributing to the delinquency of a minor" if they follow a new state law allowing them to teach about contraception.

"Contributing to the delinquency of a minor" carries a maximum sentence of two years to You've Seriously Got to Be Kidding Me.

According to the Associated Press, Juneau County District Attorney Scott Southworth warned that health classes would become "a radical program that sexualizes our children as early as kindergarten. This, in turn, will lead to more child sexual assaults."

Of course! The more a child knows about sex, the more appealing they become to older individuals who may want to victimize them. Obviously, perps mainly seek out kids who are well-educated about condoms and STDs.

"Wisconsin school districts aren't required to teach sex education," notes AP writer Todd Richmond. "But the new law, which took effect March 11, lays out requirements for those that do, including teaching the benefits of abstinence, criminal penalties for having underage sex and the benefits and proper use of contraceptives."

I could write all day about how virtually every study on this topic not funded by the Bush Administration finds that abstinence-only programs don't work, but that's not important. 

Instead, think back to when you were young and zitty. Were your decisions about sex even slightly impacted by what you learned in public school?

As a teenager, I learned that condoms can prevent pregnancy about 98% of the time, when used properly. I did not learn this in health class, I learned it from a condom package.

Now, at the risk of drawing the attention of law enforcement officials here in Maine, I am about to reveal, for the benefit of young people who may be uninformed, how to use a condom:

Read the instructions inside the condom box. It's not rocket science.

Please, Mr. District Attorney, don't send me to jail for providing the exact same information that is available to everyone for free on the Internet, or for a nominal fee in the pharmaceutical department at Wal-Mart!

The fact that an elected official thinks he can score points with the public by threatening to prosecute teachers for doing what their legislature and local school boards tell them to do makes Juneau County, Wisconsin the newest addition to my list of Top Ten Places to Stay the Hell Away From.

Also on that list: any Internet message board where people are discussing Maine's education funding crisis.

Prevailing opinion on many of these forums would indicate that teachers are the problem, particularly since their bloated salaries and benefits suck up 75% of education funding.

And what do we get in return? Armies of children who can't overcome their parents' inadequacies. If public education is going to hog two percent of the federal budget (Center for Budget and Policy Priorities), shouldn't we expect it, at the very least, to render generational poverty and other entrenched social patterns completely irrelevant? 

Why should we mind laying off teachers if they weren't doing their jobs to begin with?

Of course, if you're going employ cut teachers and expect better results, it's only fair to cut students, too. Maybe part of the problem is that there are just too many of them.

So, back to that condom thing...

Got Stoopid?

Chances are your child's school will hemorrhage dollars faster than a slot machine addict with six arms, as state aid to education is expected to plummet over the next couple of years.

While some cling to the vague expectation that schools will become more efficient, you can't escape reality: keeping the average classroom temperature above 60 degrees costs money. 

So does employing teachers.

Teachers are in the business of making people less stupid. Therefore, amount of stupidity in a society is inversely proportional to the number of teachers per capita.

In other words, more teachers = less stupidity.

Are you following me? Or was your k-12 education underfunded?

As newspapers begin to deliver tales of school budget catastrophe, keep in mind some of the following examples of colossal stupidity that could have been averted if only there were more teachers.

1)  The Maine Dairy and Nutrition Council is airing ads encouraging parents to give their children chocolate milk, claiming that it's "healthy." Okay, we ought to make sure kids get enough protein and calcium. But aren't these essential nutrients available in something that doesn't contain 30 or 40 grams of sugar per serving? 

The main ingredient in chocolate milk is high fructose corn syrup (you know what that is because of your amazing high school health class). 

The good news: once your child has diabetes, you can sue the Maine Dairy and Nutrition Council for false advertising.

2)  The University of Maine has decided to go entirely smoke-free by 2012. On the surface, this looks like a great way to promote public health and get rid of some of those pesky tenured journalism and philosophy professors. But five seconds of deep thought reveal how lame this initiative really is.

First of all, the enforcement method for this policy -- an army of omniscient fairies carrying little fire extinguishers -- will not come cheaply. 

Secondly, alcohol abuse threatens public health on campus much more ominously, as nary a weekend goes by when someone isn't busted for OUI, raped in a drunken stupor, or hauled off in an ambulance with alcohol poisoning. Let's see the university get serious about underage alcohol possession first before they go inventing new draconian rules.

Of course, they'll never do that, because the students would freak out, protest, and transfer to someplace more tolerant. After all, drinking is an integral part of the college experience, particularly if you're stupid.

3.  Lots of people are calling Central Falls, Rhode Island school Supt. Frances Gallo a hero for standing up to the teachers' union. Give me a break.

She wanted high school teachers to spend more time with students by extending the school day and adding more lunch duties. Fine. 

The teachers said they wanted to be paid for this extra time on the job. Such an outlandish demand left Gallo no choice but to fire the entire faculty. 

Now she gets to hire a bunch of new teachers who are willing to work more hours for less money (read: rookies, plus maybe some people who didn't make it through the probationary period at their last job). Now watch those test scores soar!

That's right, Junior. You live in one of the poorest communities in the state, but your school rates low because your teachers all stink.

Now, finish your chocolate milk and Lucky Charms so you won't be late for the bus.

Children: Priority or Nuisance?

Back in college -- probably the same semester a very attractive 22-year-old pre-law major asked if I wanted to visit her apartment to “study” together, and I said, “No, thanks, I’m pretty much ready for the test,” because I thought she actually wanted to study – I took a course in political theory, featuring Plato’s Republic, a text even more gargantuan than the sentence you’re reading right now.

In The Republic, Plato outlines his idea of the perfect city-state, where one “philosopher king” rules over everything, but nobody minds because he’s too enlightened to do anything wrong. Justice is always served, peace and prosperity are the norm, and the public bathhouses are open 24 hours a day for your man-boy loving convenience.

Plato’s vision abandons all possessions. No one would have spouses or children in his ideal world. Instead folks would apply their skills for the common good. Those who were adept with children would look after them in daycare-type environments, and the rest of us would do important things, like figure out where truth comes from.

Even as a college freshman who could never get a date because I didn’t know what one looked like, and was therefore eons away from enjoying a family life, I could see that Plato was on to something.

I could recognize, even in my late-teen stupor, that any society that treated children as a nuisance -- a biological necessity to keep the species going -- rather than a cherished responsibility would certainly advance and thrive.

Not convinced? Too bad, because we’re already moving toward Plato’s ideal. These days it’s fairly common for babies to enter daycare at six weeks old while both parents (if there are two parents) work. To wait until your child is six months old before returning to work is considered a long wait to return to the workforce.

This is not meant as a guilt trip. Putting a child in daycare can be an excruciating ordeal. We live in a fast society with a massive economy, and, in many cases, two or more incomes are required to keep pace.

In many ways, we live in Plato’s Republic right now, except that our leaders are far from enlightened. Observe President Obama’s education policy (yes, he does have one, though he doesn’t say much about it). It emphasizes expanding childhood education.

Yay.

True, studies suggest kids who start school earlier tend to do better academically. But so do those whose parents haven’t abdicated responsibility for educating their offspring.
If the choices are school or neglect, obviously, school is a better choice at any age.

I know senior citizens who remember when Kindergarten was an add-on. Now we have full-day kindergarten, pre-kindergarten, Head Start, Early Head Start, etc. Even responsible, attentive parents feel they have to enroll their kids so they can “keep up,” or not miss out.

No one questions the merits of early childhood education. But at what point is a child better off with a parent rather than an “expert?”

At this rate, you’ll live to see the day when children are whisked away from their parents at birth to enter some sort of infant enrichment program, not to be seen or heard from again until they graduate high school.

Ever wonder why children don’t respect their parents as they used to?

Maybe it’s because, after being shuffled from one adult to the next since toddlerhood or before, their parents are simply less important to them.

And vice-versa.

Accountability: Making Us Stupider Since 2001

It’s “back to school time,” and we also have a major election approaching. Seems like a great time to take my car out on the Interstate and make sure its air bags are working properly.

Ha! Just kidding. I actually meant to say that it’s a great time to evaluate the political candidates’ views on education, if they have any.

Candidates haven’t said much about education, which is weird, because the Bush Administration has spent the last eight years pelting public schools with spitballs.

Take the No Child Left Behind Act, which requires teachers to be “highly qualified” in a specialty field.

Unfortunately, “education” does not qualify as a “specialty field.”

So in order to be designated as “highly qualified” to teach high school English, I needed extra coursework or a bachelor’s degree in English (no worries – I found one in the dumpster behind Pat’s Pizza).

The only problem: an English degree teaches one a lot about which objective case pronoun one should use in one’s hypothetical sentences, but it does nothing to help one figure out how to teach kids to read.

Far too many kids walk into high school classrooms barely able to read. I need to help them with the basics before they can tackle Shakespeare.

But the President would rather make sure I can write a 20-page term paper on Moby Dick at 3 a.m. on the day it’s due without spilling black coffee on my keyboard.

This is just one example of how politicians make educational decisions that look fabulous in the headlines, but in the actual classroom make about as much sense as shoveling snow with a copy of Sports Illustrated.

Another example is the amount of testing (known as “accountability”) required by NCLB. Nowadays, teachers have to demonstrate accountability every six or seven minutes, which tends to squelch creativity and innovation in the classroom.

If students are learning half as much as they used to, at least we’re accounting for that half.

So what do the leading candidates have to say?

Let’s begin with Maine’s U.S. Senate. The Collins campaign lists a bunch of accomplishments for education on its web site, including establishing a special fund for rural schools to meet NCLB requirements, and a $250 tax write-off for teachers who buy their own classroom supplies (muchas gracias).

She also got an “A” ranking from the National Education Association.

What a nerd!

Meanwhile, Tom Allen’s website lists a grand total of 1 (one) accomplishment for education, which was to “vote for” an increase in college student aid funding. The NEA also gave him an “A.”

Allen is obviously the better candidate. He is so smart that he can slack off and still pull out a good grade.

On the Presidential front, McCain says schools “must have the resources and management authority” to provide a decent education. Judging from his support of NCLB and voucher programs, his idea of providing “resources and management authority” is to yank money away from poor school districts and threaten to fire principals.

Obama would rather “support schools that need improvement, rather than punish them.” He does not say how he would accomplish this, but outlined 15 ages worth of ideas for early childhood education, recruiting teachers, and other boring stuff that could, you know, do something about all those illiterate high school students.

Incidentally, Obama also got an “A” from the NEA.

McCain got an “F.” Maybe if they’d given him a few more doses of “accountability,” he would have done better.

Embrace the Chaos

My father, despite being a successful businessman and owner of the complete set of Clint Eastwood movies, is not the first person I look to for political insight.

Maybe I'm not giving him enough credit. His latest zany scheme would save the state umpteen millions of dollars with no more chaos than would result from a herd of paranoid elk stampeding through an MPBN membership drive:

Invert school vacation. Shut down classes for three months in the winter, and keep them going through the summer.

As heating oil prices soar to $19 a gallon by 2012, this unlikely idea will look more and more appealing. Still, the powerful summer camp/Little League baseball lobby will never let it happen.

But conventional wisdom has the Maine taxpayer reaching his or her breaking point relatively soon. Actual relief will probably require radical changes:

“... in other news, the legislature has passed an emergency supplemental heating bill that requires all cremation to occur in the state house lobby...”

Is Baldacci the man to turn things upside down? True, he's not afraid to be just a teeny bit unpopular. According to a recent poll of likely voters in my area (my area is the living room), the governor's approval rating is close to 50%, but his annoying little pipsqueak rating has skyrocketed to almost 90%.

In short, it's hard to imagine him with a menacing grimace, pointing his .44 magnum at the legislature, and asking, “Do you feel lucky, punk?”

He's more likely to do things the general population finds moderately irritating (SAT initiative, Sunday hunting, consolidation, telling that restaurant story again), but not bothersome enough to divert attention and resources.

Switching school vacation to the wintertime is a move too gutsy for the likes of our current governor. It would cause severe problems for huge numbers of Mainers, the most obvious of which is that summer jobs would have to become winter jobs.

Teenagers who save up for college (“college” is a popular euphemism for “first car”) by landscaping or by serving ice cream would have to start doing apprenticeships or job shadowing for the actual careers they might have some day.

The many teachers who earn second incomes by prostituting their dignity to the tourism industry would be especially put out. The would have to (ouch) get paid more from their regular jobs.

And it's hard to motivate students as they bake in the 90-degree heat, staring wistfully out the window at the beckoning sunshine, wishing they could burst outside and run home to their air-conditioned rooms to play video games.

Meanwhile, families who like to spend their summers “up to camp” would instead have to vacation “down to Florida,” or maybe even (gasp!) “over to Europe.”

Obviously, these circumstances are intolerable. Therefore, the $44 zillion it costs to keep our drafty old schools open while our end of the Earth tilts away from the sun is clearly well spent.

Never mind that the CEO of the second largest oil company in the world (Shell) has now admitted that in seven years, global oil supply will no longer be able to meet demand.

No big deal. We'll just install wood stoves in all our classrooms.

See, regardless about what the environmentalists say or what happens to your tax bill, we can keep our society running pretty much exactly the way it is forever and ever.

Or at least until the next election.

Message to Gov. Baldacci:

Go ahead. Make my day.

Consolidate This!

By Chuck McKay

If anyone thinks the Baldacci Administration’s plan to consolidate school districts will actually save money in the long run, please insert the following information into your brain and press “liquefy.”

Sure, they predict a savings of $250 million or so right off. But it won’t take long for the savings to become extinct (or, as we say in the education business, “to go the way of the lottery-proceeds-for-schools idea”).

The consolidation plan assumes that reducing the number of superintendents to 26 will mean 125 or so former superintendents wandering around looking for other work, rather than continuing to be relatively highly paid educators.

Right. Can you imagine your local superintendent of schools, sitting on a bench downtown, playing a guitar in hopes of passers-by dropping spare change into his cap, temporarily boosting his otherwise crushed spirit? That would be fantastic! I am suddenly 100 per cent in favor of consolidation!

Except that’s not what will happen. Instead, current school administrators will assume new, re-named assistant positions making almost the same amount of money. You’ll have giant school districts full of Assistant Curricular Coordinating Directive Superintendents and Administrative Special Education Director Liaisons for Coordinating the Curriculum, each with at least one secretary.

In ten years, these 26 districts will have engorged themselves in a gluttonous fit of hiring that will make each of them larger and more powerful than the entire state government. Or they will, God forbid, go on an uncontrollable binge of spending on resources for the actual children.

What stops them from doing this now is the angry mob that shows up at annual town meetings, fueled by rumors started by guys with no teeth named Bob or Earl who walked into the school one day and counted a few too many suits or newfangled computers for their liking. These periodic, indiscriminate tax revolts, more common in the smaller towns of Eastern Maine, keep local school boards honest (read: petrified) and frugal.

But once school districts consolidate, suddenly the angry mob may have to travel a ways to have its voice heard. Who wants to carry a torch and a pitchfork 30 miles? Sure, each town may have a local representative, who will have to limp his or her burned and bruised body to a meeting in some other town, where his or her vote may be one of dozens.

Adding a buffer between citizen and government action reduces accountability. (Augusta ought to be proof enough of that; people pay about as much attention to Augusta as they do to the new season of Survivor.) Less accountability means less incentive to keep taxes down and more incentive to hire a personal masseuse and budget it under “central office supplies.”

Meanwhile, Baldacci claims to be targeting the fat cat administrators; he’s less vocal about the fact that his plan calls for reducing the number of teachers in Maine. He wants to increase the statewide average student-teacher ratio to the national average of about 17:1. So instead of Sandy Ervin performing on the park bench, you’ll have a chance to hear the acoustical stylings of Little Johnny’s Favorite Science Teacher and his Quartet of Ed-Techs.

Another reason to feel great about the future of public education in Maine.

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