Assigned Reading

Diane Ravitch has created a list of 10 reasons why states should not participate in the Race to the Top. While I agree with some and disagree with others, it is the tenth reason on the list that, as I have repeatedly said, is most significant.

10. Race to the Top erodes local control of education by prompting legislatures to supersede local school boards on any issues selected by federal bureaucrats.

RTTT is the next giant step towards a federal school system. Only a fool would think this will better the education we provide our kids.

Rhode Island Commissioner of Education Deborah Gist continues to push for union support of the state’s Race to the Top grant application. A video released this week attempts to clarify for educators what the RTTT grant will do for teacher evaluations, and how our schools will benefit from the federal funds.

The commissioner explains that a new evaluation system is forthcoming, regardless of the RTTT results. Fifty-one percent of the new evaluation will rely on student performance. This time, however, Gist states any district that does not support RI’s application will be ineligible for a share of the funds, and will not be allowed to participate in developing the new evaluation system.

This “threat” is an example of how RTTT grant funds will strengthen the bureaucracy at the expense of local district control. Support our goals and put our plans into action, or get nothing.

Commissioner Gist’s intentions may be good, but local leaders should be leery of selling their souls for a capital fix. When the funds dry up, the bureaucratic control will remain.

Charters succeed because decision-making power is maintained by the shareholders. We need to allow such power at individual public schools as well. The RTTT grant will only weaken local decision-making, and empower state and federal bureaucracies.

Despite the appeal, I don’t think it’s worth the money.

H/T: Anchor Rising

In his ProJo letter, former teacher Fred Sculco of Westerly takes NEARI executive director Bob Walsh to task. He criticizes Mr. Walsh for refusing to sign on the state’s RTTT federal funding grant application. While I typically enjoy a fellow teacher’s challenge of the union’s leadership, the conclusion to Mr. Sculco’s letter left me speechless.

We desperately need access to $100 million in free federal funds.

Free federal funds? The money, of course, was taken from the states through federal income taxes. So it’s sophomoric to claim a return of these funds is “free” money.

But more frustrating is that Mr. Sculco appears oblivious to the federal mandates that will be attached to the grant funding. Local schools will be forced to cede more control to federal authorities, who know little about the communities and what their children need. These educrats believe their one-size-fits-all solutions will save public education everywhere. No Child Left Behind has done little to improve schools, and many leaders are already making its funeral arrangements. Yet these federal bureaucrats think their next idea will be the solution.

Requesting federal education funds is about as free as asking Don Corleone for a favor. Payback is very expensive.

My concerns about RTTT funding are mirrored by those of Robert Holland, expressed in an opinion piece in Friday’s Providence Journal. The feds are using the RTTT initiative to bride states into giving up local control in favor of a national curriculum.

Even charter schools, which RTTT supposedly encourages, will lose the autonomy that has made them successful.

School reformers have cheered the Obama administration for using RttT to pressure states to be more receptive to independently managed charter schools and use student test scores in evaluating teachers. But if the feds are calling the shots via standards-setting and enforcement, charter schools will be accountable not to local parents but to Washington power brokers, and teachers will teach to tests manipulated by national special interests and be held accountable for results having nothing to do with academic excellence.

Centralizing educational decision-making in Washington will spell disaster, further politicizing our schools. If Rhode Island was in better financial shape, it could chose, like Alaska and Texas, to forego RTTT funding and its accompanying mandates. Instead, our state will take the bribe, and hope the federal government can have greater success. Don’t hold your breath.

The teachers’ unions have expressed concerns about Commissioner Gist’s application for federal Race to the Top funding. I side with the NEARI and most RIFT affiliates, and would not sign on to the application, although probably for some different reasons.

The unions are critical of Gist’s plan to use standardized testing as the most significant factor in evaluating teachers. I am equally critical. Gist’s plan is the final straw in a plan to take away local control of public schools. RIDE defines the learning objectives for all students, designs tests to monitor these objectives, and now hopes to have the most significant role in determining which teachers stay and which will be replaced.

Why on Earth would a local district turn over such power to state government? The simple answer is cash. The state, over the past several years, has defunded local education; now it offers these financially desperate cities and towns federal money if they sign over more power to the state.

The federal bureaucrats are ponying up the money to only a handful of states which agree, not surprisingly, to mandates. The feds increase their power as well.

Those on the right seen so interested in slamming teachers’ unions that they will support anything the unions oppose. But do Republicans and conservatives really want state and federal education departments to have more power in their local school districts? Anyone familiar with federal special education laws knows what happens when big government gets too involved.

The increase in charter schools outlined in the application is a good idea. But it’s precisely the autonomy of charters that have allowed for greater success. Many charters are free of union entanglement and bureaucratic oversight.

Gist is allowing teams of community members, or “share-holders” at six consistently failing schools to overhaul their schools, to turn them into charters, or even to shut them down. Gist is taking the power out of the hands of bureaucrats and unions, and returning it to the parents, teachers, students, and other communities members. This is a great plan.

But the RTTT application, and its attempts to tie teacher evaluations to state testing results, is usurping power from the districts. It won’t help individual school communities to grow. It’s selling the future for cash now. And I’m afraid it’s selling souls to the devil. There will be no turning back.

Note: The grant application was submitted today. The commissioner’s website, however, has yet to provide the application online. The site says, simply, “under construction”.