Florida Forward Conversations About the Future: Education Reform

Our own Kathleen Oropeza will be a panelist at the Orlando Sentinel’s event- Florida Forward. She will be joined by former Governor Jeb Bush, Orange County School Board Chair Bill Sublette, Tracy McDaniel, Founder of KIPP Reach, and James Gibbs, Hillsborough County Middle School Instructor. The will discuss education reform and the future of Florida’s public schools.

The event will be live streamed on the web at this link and will run from 11:30-1:30 p.m. on Tuesday September 20th.

The panelists will take prepared questions from Mike Lafferty of the Orlando Sentinel and questions from the audience. We’ve prepared links to research and studies that review the success or failure of many of the reforms of the past 10 years. Please review them below:

Learning From Finland, How one of the world’s top educational performers turned around, The Boston Globe, Pasi Sahlberg, December 27, 2010

The High Cost of Low Educational Performance, The long-run economic impact of improving of improving PISA results

Teacher pay for performance, Experimental Evidence from the project on incentives in teaching,  Vanderbilt University, September 21, 2010

School Voucher Students’ Scores Show No Significant Change, Study Reports, Huffinton Post, 7.28.11

Charter School Performance in Florida Credo, Standford University 2009

Multiple Choice:  Charter School Performance in 16 States Credo, Standford University

37 percent of Charter Schools Offer Inferior Education , Study Concludes , Ron Matus St. Pete Times

Evaluation of the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship Program Participation, Compliance, Test Scores and Parental Satisfaction in 2008-09; Figlio, David, Faculty Fellow, Institute of Policy Research, Northwestern University

Evaluation of the Florida Tax Credit Scholarship Program Participation, Compliance, Test Scores and Parental Satisfaction in 2009-10, August 2011; Figlio, David, Faculty Fellow, Institute of Policy Research, Northwestern University

Kids & Technology: The Developmental Health Debate,  Stephanie Buck, August 15, 2011

American Academy of Pediatrics , Pediatrics Vol. 107

Teacher Performance Pay Alone Does Not Raise Student Test Scores – New Vanderbilt Study Finds, Vanderbilt-Peabody News, Melanie Moran, September 21, 2010

Teacher Pay For Performance – Experimental Evidence from the Project on Incentives in Teaching, Vanderbilt University, September 2010

The Internet and Your Family, American Academy of Pediatrics

Florida Teacher Salaries Have Dropped

This week is bound to be rough.
 

This week teachers all over Florida will get their first paycheck of the school year.

Last session Florida legislators passed a law requiring every teacher to contribute 3% of their salary to the Florida Retirement System.

Hearing about a 3% to 5% cut is very different than seeing what that cut looks like.

The other side of the story is that districts all over the state have cut teacher pay on new-hires by as much as 15%. $44,000 is the average teacher pay in the state of Florida, but some districts pay $30,000 per year. Georgia’s average teacher pay is $53,000.

It’s common knowledge that Florida teacher pay, among the lowest in the nation, was based on the promise of employer-funded retirement.  For decades, teachers have accepted changes in their employment conditions based on this promise.  

A school district is often the largest employer in the county.  Cutting 3% from salaries in large districts like Orange, Hillsborough or Miami-Dade takes at least $50 Million dollars out of the local market. That’s a tangible loss to all of us.

On the most intimate level, teachers have been spending their personal money on classroom materials or more commonly, making sure their growing roster of homeless or at-risk students have what they need to thrive and learn.  

Teaching in Florida has always meant a meager paycheck.  Since there have been no raises for years, that small paycheck now means supporting families at near-poverty levels.  Teacher pay stopped being the source of “extra” family income a long time ago.  Florida politicians often talk about getting paid for 9 months as an amazing freedom.  They dismiss teaching as a “choice.”

It certainly is a choice.  Things have become so difficult, that staying reflects a level of job commitment most of us will never know. 

In Florida, the choice to teach after the 3% cut could mean the loss of home ownership and foreclosure.  Many of our best thinkers are being forced to choose between being able to pay the bills and the students they love.  

Lawmakers told us that they had “no choice” when they cut public education by $1.3 Billion.  Florida politicians should know that “choice” can cut many ways.  After all, elections are also about choices. 

The 3% teacher salary cut that the Florida Legislature eagerly imposed comes at a high price. Be honest. Does the level of teacher pay reflect the value we expect a dedicated teacher to bring to their students?  

Teacher Salaries a Victim of Budget Cuts
Lily Rockwell, News Service of Florida, wctv.tv- August 30, 2011

Stephanie Rothman has done the math. On her roughly $48,000 a year salary, the 15-year high school English teacher in Broward County barely gets by.

In the last year, Rothman has had to abandon a Boca Raton home she could no longer afford, moving into a room at a friend’s house and feels “cynical and hopeless” about her financial prospects.

“I love teaching, I was born to teach,” Rothman said. “But I feel there is no way I can sustain a living with just teaching. So that is why I decided to become a certified personal trainer and get a part-time job.”

Rothman is one of hundreds of thousands of teachers in Florida that have gone years without a significant raise.  Read the full article here.

NYC Tosses Failed Merit Pay Plan

Florida’s New Teacher Merit Pay Plan lacks both Merit and Pay

“It’s going to allow our teachers that believe in measurement to get paid better because they’re going to be the most effective ones, and the real winner here is the kids,” said Governor Rick Scott as he signed SB736/Teacher Merit Pay bill.

Last week, New York admitted that their teacher merit plan was an abject failure. After three years spent shelling out $56 million dollars, New York abandoned their Teacher Merit Pay Plan when a study from the RAND Corporation concluded that it does not increase teacher or student performance.

Florida’s Teacher Merit Pay Plan is an oxymoron, a Jumbo Shrimp. Where is the “merit” in a pay plan that state legislators, driven by national politics, hastily passed without providing a single red cent of funding? Teacher Merit Pay will cost Florida taxpayers $2 Billion dollars in start-up and $1.8 Billion every year.

Governor Scott’s pitch is that “the real winner here is the kids.” This is where the rhetoric of bold applause comes up short. Florida’s Teacher Merit Pay bill forces one high-stakes test to morph into thousands. The real winner is Pearson, the testing giant who has the exclusive contract to administer high-stakes tests to Florida children.

The facts speak for themselves:

· Massive expansion of expensive, unproven, untested high-stakes tests

· No pilot program or test group to determine the stability of this aggressive reform

· No funding whatsoever

· $2 Billion start-up, $1.8 Billion annual maintenance
Repeated studies that show Merit Pay does not work. One researcher even suggested that perhaps teachers don’t need a financial incentive to try as hard as they can.

The children of Florida deserve so much more than an ill-conceived, punitive law devised to destroy some of the most beloved and important people in their lives: their teachers.

Does any of this make sense?  What do you think?

Full story found here.

Scott and Rhee Push Charters Despite Fail Rate of 740%

Governor Rick Scott and his education advisor, Michelle Rhee, believe that billions of public school dollars are better spent on for-profit charter school management companies (CMOs).

“Who are we to deny a child, a low income child, who has the opportunity to take the same dollars and actually get a better education?” Rhee asked when she joined Governor Scott at Opa Locka Charter who recently earned an F.

Here’s the breakdown according to Miami’s CBS4 I-Team:

Florida Traditional Public Schools:     2,280 schools*- 17 FCAT Fs.  

Florida Charter Schools:                        270 schools*-  15 FCAT Fs.

Florida Charter Schools Failure Rate:  740% higher than that of public schools.
*Includes only elementary and middle schools. FLDOE will release high school grades in the fall.

These FCAT grades are clear: Charter students are at a dramatically higher-risk of attending an F school than their peers are at traditional public schools.

“Students at failing schools are more likely to drop out, which means they are most likely to have trouble keeping a job,” Scott correctly observed in the Orlando Sentinel last month. Yet, Scott is fixated on handing over taxpayer dollars to charter management companies for the chance to turn a profit on public education.

Even if Scott’s motivation isn’t about students, it might be about jobs.  Representative Erik Fresen’s brother-in-law and sister own Academica. a prosperous charter management company/CMO.  Fresen, the chairman of several powerful education committees, freely and repeatedly promotes and votes for legislation that favors the for-profit charter school industry.

“It certainly provides me a different perspective…that others perhaps don’t have,” Fresen said.  “But it certainly doesn’t influence the politics one way or the other.”

Rep. Fresen is the subject of two active ethics complaints and his colleagues in the Florida House receive a bounty of campaign contributions every year from the for- profit charter school industry.

So, maybe it is about jobs, after all.  It certainly doesn’t seem to be about students stuck in F schools. What do you think?

I-Team: Lawmakers React To Charter School FCAT Failures

July 6, 2011 Gary Nelson Reporting

MIAMI (CBS4) – When Governor Rick Scott visited Florida International Academy – a charter school –  in Opa Locka in January, he brought his special advisor on education, Michell Rhee, with him.

Rhee, the controversial former superintendent of the Washington DC school system, is a big believer in spending public money on privately-operated charter schools.

“Who are we to deny a child, a low income child, who has the opportunity to take the same dollars and actually get a better education?” Rhee asked.

The answer may in fact be that kids in charter schools aren’t getting a better education.

Full story found here.

Gov. Scott’s Prized Schools Earn F’s

Back in January, just two days after being sworn in, Governor Rick Scott and his advisor Michelle Rhee flew to Miami to enthusiastically praise what turned out to be an F school. “We have to make sure our system does exactly what you are doing here at Florida International Academy,” said Scott.

Last week Jacksonville’s KIPP School, the site of Governor Scott’s grandly-staged signing of SB736/Teacher Merit Pay, earned its first grade: F

Rhee said: …”charter schools can accomplish things quicker and at a lower cost than typical public schools because there is less paperwork involved.”

Less paperwork?  Lower cost?  Charter schools use a proprietary formula to deduct profits from each child’s per pupil funding allocation.  Charter students receive the same funding as any other public school student. Rhee and Scott have one thing right: charter schools and their for-profit management companies (CMOs) have found a great way to quickly rake in the cash with little or no investment.

What do you think?

Rick Scott, Michelle Rhee praised charter school that just got an F (partly)

Miami Herald Naked Politics blog, June 30, 2011When Gov. Rick Scott unveiled some of his education policy proposals with school-choice celeb Michelle Rhee this January, they paid a visit to a second-grade class at Florida International Academy in Opa-Locka to showcase the successes of school choice.

Oops.

The school rankings are out. And the academy’s new elementary school just got an F.Full story found here.

 

New Jacksonville KIPP charter scores at bottom in FCAT  

Jacksonville Times-Union, June 30, 2011

A charter school that opened this year with high expectations and wealthy, powerful backers scored at the bottom of all schools in all of Northeast Florida in School Grade score.

KIPP Impact Middle, a college preparatory school, earned an F in its opening year.

“We’re disappointed,” Principal Robert Hawke said. “We fell pretty far short of where we wanted to be.”

Full story found here.

Florida’s Self-Inflicted Budget Crisis

Slashing $1.75 Billion dollars is legislative shock therapy applied to Florida’s public schools.

Florida Legislators are on a mission to destabilize and cause great pain to our children, their teachers and their schools.  They have decided that giving away billions in corporate tax exemptions and loopholes is more important to them than funding public education.

Florida’s “budget crisis” is a wholesale deception designed to achieve a political goal.  Florida has the money to fulfill its constitutional duty to the children of this state but its political leaders have repeatedly failed in their duty.

It’s pretty simple:  $5 Billion dollars in yearly, out-of-state corporate exemptions means a $1.75 Billion dollar cut to our children’s schools.

Governor Scott and the Florida Legislature are wrong to inflict intentional pain on our children and their schools.  By cutting $1.75 Billion from public education, they are causing the crisis.  In addition, the legislature is siphoning away billions of dollars from Florida schools to pay for private voucher and charter schools that are not held to the same standards or requirements.  The result is separate, un-equal and profoundly unfair.

School districts across Florida are telling the truth:  4 day school weeks, firing school resource officers, losing art, music, critical high school electives and shutting down sports are just a few of the options.  Districts will no longer be able to afford transportation, hire substitutes or keep libraries open.

Florida’s proposed budget relies too heavily on Federal money and increased property taxes.  Once again, hardworking Florida taxpayers, meager teachers’ salaries and Federal Jobs money will be used by legislators to balance this shameful public education budget.

We are not getting what we paid for.

Click here to find your county and an easy, point-and-click list of your local legislators. Contact them and hold them accountable for their votes.

 

Tell Governor Scott and your legislators that we don’t like what they’re doing to our children’s public schools.  Tell them it is fiscally irresponsible and morally corrupt to impose deep budget cuts that harm our children and their schools.  Moving federal money around and taking money away from our school districts is not working for us.

Tell them that their budget “crisis” story wears thin when they give away $5 billion dollars every year to out-of-state corporations. Click here to email Governor Scott, Senate President Haridopolos and Speaker of the House Cannon.  Tell them to stop causing the crisis and start collecting the revenues that are rightfully owed to the people of Florida.  They work for us.

As parents we must ask the hard questions, demand action and above all protect our children from harm.

Sign our Education Petition and tell the legislators that you do not support cuts to Florida’s public schools.

HB 7019: Don’t Write a Check Florida Can’t Afford to Cash

Check_UnfundedMandate

 

Letter to Gov. Scott: Don’t Write a Check Florida Can’t Afford to Cash

To view the letter, click here:  LtrScott_SB736

Legislators: Don’t Write a Check Florida Can’t Afford to Cash

Who’s Going To Pay?

Sadly, the answer is our children and their schools.

The Florida Legislature wants big education reforms, but they don’t want to pay.  We teach our children that when we want something we can’t afford, we save up the money or go without.

When legislators write and pass expensive, unfunded bills, they are writing a bad check on an account they know is empty.  It’s fiscal suicide.

Legislators are rushing to pass  House Bill 7019 (Senate Bill 736) – a completely unfunded $2 Billion dollar initial taxpayer cost followed by recurring annual costs of $1.8 Billion.

This week the House will hear HB 7019 in session and a full vote for passage is scheduled this Wednesday, March 16.  The 2011 Legislative Session is barely a week old.

Passing a massive $3.8 Billion dollar cost to the general public is called raising taxes, even if it’s buried in a reform bill.  Concealing unfunded billions in a bill is the height of reckless spending.

There is a profound disconnect between Scott’s proposed $3.3 Billion dollar cut to public education and the extraordinary unfunded spending found in HB 7019/SB736.

Click here to sign our petition and urge House and Senate leaders “Do not adopt Governor Scott’s catastrophic budget.”

HB 7019/SB736 requires the creation of at least 1,000 new high-stakes tests for courses like art, music and P.E.  This bill represents an exponential increase in the power FCAT scores have over our children, their schools, funding and teacher pay.

The long-term ramifications of this unfunded bill are unsustainable.  Ten years of HB 7019 will cost Florida taxpayers $18 Billion dollars!

The hardworking people of this state do not deserve to be treated like a money tree.

The November elections were clear.  Taxpayers don’t want to pay $3.8 billion dollars for an unfunded bill stuffed with unproven reforms.  Even the current pilot reform program, Race to the Top with $350 million earmarked for districts falls far short of funding that effort.

Governor Scott asked Floridians to accept painful spending cuts. That means all Floridians, especially politicians.  Lawmakers must stop their own reckless spending.

Tell Governor Scott and Speaker Cannon that unfunded mandates don’t work for us.

Let every legislator from your county hear from you.  Click here to link to your county’s list of legislators and their contact information.

Lawmakers have to put their credit card away – it’s been declined.  Florida taxpayers don’t have the money for HB 7019/SB736.

Complete Email List for Florida House of Representatives

joseph.abruzzo@myfloridahouse.gov

janet.adkins@myfloridahouse.gov

larry.ahern@myfloridahouse.gov

ben.albritton@myfloridahouse.gov

frank.artiles@myfloridahouse.gov

gary.aubuchon@myfloridahouse.gov

dennis.baxley@myfloridahouse.gov

leonard.bembry@myfloridahouse.gov

lori.berman@myfloridahouse.gov

mack.bernard@myfloridahouse.gov

michael.bileca@myfloridahouse.gov

esteban.bovo@myfloridahouse.gov

jim.boyd@myfloridahouse.gov

jeff.brandes@myfloridahouse.gov

oscar.braynon@myfloridahouse.gov

jason.brodeur@myfloridahouse.gov

doug.broxson@myfloridahouse.gov

dwight.bullard@myfloridahouse.gov

rachel.burgin@myfloridahouse.gov

matt.caldwell@myfloridahouse.gov

daphne.campbell@myfloridahouse.gov

dean.cannon@myfloridahouse.gov

charles.chestnut@myfloridahouse.gov

gwyn.clarke-reed@myfloridahouse.gov

jeff.clemens@myfloridahouse.gov

marti.coley@myfloridahouse.gov

richard.corcoran@myfloridahouse.gov

fred.costello@myfloridahouse.gov

steve.crisafulli@myfloridahouse.gov

janet.cruz@myfloridahouse.gov

daniel.davis@myfloridahouse.gov

jose.diaz@myfloridahouse.gov

chris.dorworth@myfloridahouse.gov

brad.drake@myfloridahouse.gov

eric.eisnaugle@myfloridahouse.gov

clay.ford@myfloridahouse.gov

erik.fresen@myfloridahouse.gov

james.frishe@myfloridahouse.gov

reggie.fullwood@myfloridahouse.gov

matt.gaetz@myfloridahouse.gov

luis.garcia@myfloridahouse.gov

joe.gibbons@myfloridahouse.gov

rich.glorioso@myfloridahouse.gov

eddy.gonzalez@myfloridahouse.gov

tom.goodson@myfloridahouse.gov

james.grant@myfloridahouse.gov

denise.grimsley@myfloridahouse.gov

bill.hager@myfloridahouse.gov

gayle.harrell@myfloridahouse.gov

shawn.harrison@myfloridahouse.gov

doug.holder@myfloridahouse.gov

ed.hooper@myfloridahouse.gov

mike.horner@myfloridahouse.gov

matt.hudson@myfloridahouse.gov

dorothy.hukill@myfloridahouse.gov

clay.ingram@myfloridahouse.gov

evan.jenne@myfloridahouse.gov

mia.jones@myfloridahouse.gov

john.julien@myfloridahouse.gov

martin.kiar@myfloridahouse.gov

paige.kreegel@myfloridahouse.gov

rick.kriseman@myfloridahouse.gov

john.legg@myfloridahouse.gov

ana.logan@myfloridahouse.gov

carlos.lopez-cantera@myfloridahouse.gov

debbie.mayfield@myfloridahouse.gov

charles.mcburney@myfloridahouse.gov

seth.mckeel@myfloridahouse.gov

larry.metz@myfloridahouse.gov

george.moraitis@myfloridahouse.gov

peter.nehr@myfloridahouse.gov

bryan.nelson@myfloridahouse.gov

jeanette.nunez@myfloridahouse.gov

marlene.otoole@myfloridahouse.gov

mark.pafford@myfloridahouse.gov

kathleen.passidomo@myfloridahouse.gov

jimmy.patronis@myfloridahouse.gov

steve.perman@myfloridahouse.gov

keith.perry@myfloridahouse.gov

ray.pilon@myfloridahouse.gov

scott.plakon@myfloridahouse.gov

elizabeth.porter@myfloridahouse.gov

ari.porth@myfloridahouse.gov

steve.precourt@myfloridahouse.gov

bill.proctor@myfloridahouse.gov

scott.randolph@myfloridahouse.gov

lake.ray@myfloridahouse.gov

betty.reed@myfloridahouse.gov

michelle.rehwinkel@myfloridahouse.gov

ronald.renuart@myfloridahouse.gov

ken.roberson@myfloridahouse.gov

hazelle.rogers@myfloridahouse.gov

pat.rooney@myfloridahouse.gov

darryl.rouson@myfloridahouse.gov

franklin.sands@myfloridahouse.gov

ron.saunders@myfloridahouse.gov

robert.schenck@myfloridahouse.gov

elaine.schwartz@myfloridahouse.gov

irving.slosberg@myfloridahouse.gov

jimmie.smith@myfloridahouse.gov

william.snyder@myfloridahouse.gov

darren.soto@myfloridahouse.gov

cynthia.stafford@myfloridahouse.gov

kelli.stargel@myfloridahouse.gov

richard.steinberg@myfloridahouse.gov

greg.steube@myfloridahouse.gov

dwayne.taylor@myfloridahouse.gov

geraldine.thompson@myfloridahouse.gov

perry.thurston@myfloridahouse.gov

john.tobia@myfloridahouse.gov

carlos.trujillo@myfloridahouse.gov

charles.vanzant@myfloridahouse.gov

jim.waldman@myfloridahouse.gov

will.weatherford@myfloridahouse.gov

mike.weinstein@myfloridahouse.gov

alan.williams@myfloridahouse.gov

trudi.williams@myfloridahouse.gov

john.wood@myfloridahouse.gov

ritch.workman@myfloridahouse.gov

dana.young@myfloridahouse.gov