Olympia's budget woes delayed for another year

Last night the budget was adopted 3-2.

Board members Lehman and Bob Shirley voted against the budget. Board president Rich Nafziger, vice president Carolyn Barclift and board member Michelle Parvinen voted in favor.

“I’m sympathetic to the perspective that Bob and Russ have presented that we should be making as big of cuts as we can,” Nafziger said before Monday night’s vote. “But we need a strategic approach.”

Looming over the budget discussion was the $1 million or more in cuts the district faces in the 2008-09 school year, which all the board members agreed will hurt programs. But district officials hope that a strategic plan being formulated will guide those decisions.

$1 million seems massive, until you compare it to the size of the overall budget, $81-odd million. That $1 million represents just 1.23%.

Could every position and every program take a 1.23% hit? Or is "thinking small" just not politically feasible?

more math? more time?

Today's word: more. (In education, isn't that every day's word?)

More math is on the table for the Olympia School District.

School Board President Rich Nafziger has proposed changing the math-credit requirement for Olympia students starting with those who are in fifth grade and head to middle school this fall. He said he wants Olympia to require high school students to take either algebra II or applied mathematics. The latter is a course that uses a hands-on approach to teach algebra II concepts.

Adding algebra II or applied mathematics wouldn't automatically mean students would have to take a third year of math. But because students often take algebra I as freshmen and geometry as sophomores, the algebra II requirement would make a third year inevitable for many, Olympia educators have said.

Meanwhile, nationwide, schools are thinking about expanding the school day and the calendar.

While Massachusetts is leading in putting in place the longer-day model, lawmakers in Minnesota, New Mexico, New York and Washington, D.C., also have debated whether to lengthen the school day or year.

In addition, individual districts such as Miami-Dade in Florida are experimenting with added hours in some schools.

On average, U.S. students go to school 6.5 hours a day, 180 days a year, fewer than in many other industrialized countries, according to a report by the Education Sector, a Washington-based think tank.

One model traditional that public schools are looking to is the Knowledge is Power Program, which oversees public charter schools nationwide.

Those schools typically serve low-income middle-school students, and their test scores show success. Students generally go from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. during the week and for a few hours every other Saturday. They also go to school for several weeks in the summer.

That amounts to at least 50 percent more instructional time for students in such programs than in traditional public schools, according to the report.

The extended-day schedule costs on average about $1,200 extra per student, program spokesman Stephen Mancini said.

The best part of the plan: it allows the rebirth of electives, which many districts are squashing because of pressure to boost test scores in core areas.

Read both articles, and consider: do we need more math? More time? More?

Update: The Science Goddess says:

I will be interested to see if this idea catches on. It would require a significant amount of community support and state dollars to make it fly; but as we continue to assign greater value in educating the whole child (not just the parts that can read, do math, and think scientifically), perhaps taxpayers may be interested in pursuing this option.

The "we" in "we continue to assign..." being teachers and parents and students. Policymakers, wanna jump on board?

good news and bad

Good news: I'm finally over on the new Blogger. Expect categorization, improved referencing of past entries, and a whole new attitude. Guaranteed 24% more spunk.

Bad news: the WASL, as expected, is cutting into electives. Right as we're supposed to be experiencing a renaissance in vocational education--and no, that doesn't mean Shakespeare in shop class, although that might be a good thing--a villain of Shakespearean proportions, the WASL, crashes onto the scene. It's not stealing funding, but instead filling schedules, so the problem might be surmountable if schools get creative with their time allotments.

speaking of things that don't add up

Elizabeth Hovde's well-meaning editorial in The Columbian showcases some of the misunderstandings that plague efforts to improve education. A few clarifications and corrections are in order. First, though, the good part:

Entry pay for teachers is fine. Their pay beats a lot of industries' entry-level wages. But the pay scale tops out way too early and not high enough. Experienced, effective teachers should be rewarded.

Amen to that. Teachers' highest salary possibilities should equal administrators' entry points, at least.

Teachers must pay hundreds of dollars to the union each year. Mandatory union dues or fees should be banned.

Remember those teacher salaries? They're bargained for by the union. Non-union teachers could be paid less, if such a thing were possible for districts.

There are good and bad teachers, just as there are good and bad lawyers, retail clerks and accountants. The process for granting a raise should more closely resemble the process found in the private sector.

Administrators and peers would evaluate teachers based on their abilities and be paid accordingly. Right now, there is no incentive to be innovative or even qualified in one's teaching job.

First, I agree that automatic pay raises and no incentive for improvement are a dangerous mix. But in the absence of objective criteria, "performance" becomes an excuse for kiss-assery. (Later on, Hovde warns against linking salaries to test scores or grades, for good reason--but suggests no alternative measurement.)

Also, Hovde is wrong in claiming there is no incentive for qualification. Teacher pay is tied to coursework in several ways: "staff development" pay, different pay scales for teachers with advanced degrees, and bonuses for National Board Certification. I'm seeking the latter next year, because I want to improve my skills--and the annual bonus helps defray the cost of the assessment.

There isn't an easy way to reform the educational pay structure in a way that promotes excellence, instead of rewarding mediocrity. My plan: boost salaries significantly, attracting a larger pool of candidates. Simultaneously, require certification as rigorous as the National Board program, winnowing out the chaff. If you want quality, you have to pay for it.

with the proper motivation

Gregoire, flush with a 1.9 billion surplus, proposes dumping $197 million on extra math and science funding. The plan:

• Reduce class size. The state already is working to reduce elementary school class size via a citizen-approved initiative. Gregoire's new plan would send districts money to hire more middle and high school math and science teachers, with the goal of having one teacher per 25 students. Cost: $90 million.

• Recruit 750 more math and science teachers, including faculty who are teaching other subjects and didn't major in math and science in college. Additional college and teacher training would be available.

• Offer math and science scholarships to college students who agree to teach in those areas. Cost is $14 million.

• Pay annual bonuses of $5,000 to nationally certified teachers who teach in a "challenging" school and another $5,000 if they teach math or science. Currently, 900 teachers have this extra certification.

• Expand the alternative path to certification for non-teachers in the private sector who are experts in math and science, or paraprofessionals.

The professional development proposals total $62 million.

• Provide hands-on science learning for 1,000 K-8 classrooms, using the Leadership and Assistance for Science Education Reform (LASER) program. Cost is $12 million.

• Provide extra help to students who are struggling with the WASLs. Gregoire proposes $12 million.

• Standardize math curricula across the state.

I have a better solution. We teachers are always grousing about parental involvement, and wondering why folks can't be more accountable. Want to see test scores go up? Promise parents a $1000 tax break when their lovable lump passes the WASL, at an overall cost of $82 million per annum. In two years, math scores will rise like rent on Boardwalk.


[cross-posted here]