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2001 ANNUAL MEETING FEATURES STRANGE
The following
letter was sent from a member of PARSS to its state representative I find the requirements for the Students Achieving Standards grant application ethically troubling for professionals, invasive to children and parents‘ privacy, and discriminatory to small school districts, such as ours. It is my understanding that to qualify for funding, districts must agree to an evaluatin process. A major component of this evaluation requires that districts submit students as a ”control group“ and/or an ”experimental group.“ An independent third party evaluator would assess these groups of children (experimental and/or control) to determine the effectiveness of the prescription (instruction via technology). As you know, experimental educational research is perhaps the most difficult methodology. The difficulties include, but are not limited to the following issues: A) controlling for internal and external validity; B) obtaining the necessary permission for the use of children as human subjects; and C) the ethical issues involved in using children as ”guinea pigs“ as a means of securing funds. If we were to agree, for the sake of obtaining needed funds, to the procedural and ethical requirements of this grant proposal, our costs for time and personnel would far exceed the money received. Moreover, we would be selling out the ethical and equal treatment of children to the blind acquisition of funds — taxpayer money — that should be otherwise directed toward the children‘s education, unencumbered by such unethical, inequitable, burdensome restrictions. Our district has a fine record of fiscal responsibility and respect for the rights of children. We cannot submit to such invasive, scientifically questionable, expensive evaluation requirements. Furthermore, we do not have the number of professional staff needed to satisfy the funding qualifications. (”An ideal team would include both a technology coordinator and a curriculum coordinator.“) Rather than simply turn down the opportunity to apply for funding, I believe it is my professional responsibility to alert influential people as to the mechanism being used to distribute taxpayer dollars to local schools for educational technology. Thank you for your attention to this matter. I am interested in your response to this issue. (If you would care to respond to this issue, please send letters to PARSS, 212 Locust St., Suite 400, Harrisburg, PA 17101 or e-mail to arnold@parss.org.)
JOE
SAYS. . . Show
Your Legislators You Really Care For a number of years PARSS has run a program for chief school officers and board members that goes something like this:• We ask a district,or group of districts (may or may not be an Intermediate Unit) if they would like to come to Harrisburg, visit their legislators, talk with any other state officials who are important to them, and get some insight into legislative possibilities from knowledgable lobbyists and legislative staff. • Arnie Hillman then puts together a schedule of visits and meetings tailored to the requests of the district, or districts. • We work with those planning the visit to brief them on issues, personalities and places to park. • The day arrives, the visitors arrive and it all goes like clockwork. I think it is fair to say that the assessments of those who have made these visits, and a number of them make it an annual event, have found it to be an extremely valuable experience for both the visitors, and the visited. No matter how well you may know a legislator, or how frequently you see him or her in the old home town, making the effort to come to their workplace to express your views and concerns has a lot of impact. The visitor leaves with a greater sense of how things get done in Harrisburg, and the feeling that, yes, they do have the ability to effect change. We think it is an important part of what PARSS can do for its members, and I have taken this space to tell you in the hope that more of you will take advantage of the opportunity. BALDRIGE
NATIONAL QUALITY PROGRAM “Education Criteria for Performance Excellence” by David J. Gondak From presidential politics and state legislative initiatives to local school board elections, public education has become a high profile issue that has been in the public spotlight over the past decade. During this time, many school reform initiatives have been proposed and developed. Some of these initiatives have been considered educationally sound and have been accepted by educators and administrators while others have been forced upon the educational system by legislative or governance decisions at various levels. No school reform effort stands out as a cure-all for the challenges facing public education in the new millenium. Vouchers, charter schools, home schooling, use of non-certified personnel and state takeovers are examples of government proposed solutions to “fix” the academic deficiencies which some believe are commonplace in all public schools. In order to meet the challenges presented by the school reform effort, educators have developed and promoted a variety of programs such as: The Coalition of Essential Schools, The New Standards Project and Success for All. These programs, as well as many others, are making a positive contribution to school improvement. However, according to the national education quality movement in the United States, all these projects are cosidered “non-coordinated random acts of improvement.” What is missing from all these efforts is an overarching system-wide improvement process that will make school reform efforts successful. A major national education quality moevement in the United States is the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Process. This Process is a system of alignment, which brings together curriculum, resources, students, parents, faculty and community in a well-coordinated effort to improve schools. The major goal of the process is emphasis on implementation of a strategic plan. This is relevant since strategic planning is now required for all public schools in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Process (MBNQA) consists of a series of seven performance criteria created through a public-private partnership and adapted to education in 1998. The process was officially offered to schools during the 1999-2000 school year. The criteria, although designed as a measure for achieving the national award, is a valuable tool that can be used to diagnose an educational organization‘s performance management system. The seven criteria used by a district or school are part of a self-assessment process. The results of the assessment identify areas of needed improvement. This is a Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) Process that involves identifying the areas of needed improvement, then planning, providing training and implementing to close the gaps between where the organization is and where it wants to be. Six of the seven Baldrige criteria deal with the Driver Triad and the Process or Work Core. The Driver Triad includes School Leadership, Strategic Planning and Student/Stakeholder Focus. The Process or Work Core includes an emphasis on Faculty and Staff Focus, Educational and Support Process Management and the Information and Data Collection system for the process. The final and most heavily weighted criteria deal with School Peformance Results. This area is broken down into four categories: Student Performance, Student/Stakeholder Satisfaction, Faculty and Staff and School-Specific Results. These categories have a critical role in identifying areas of success and needed improvement. Also, these categories are not limited to the more narrow academic results suggested as a measurement of accountability, but can include data from survey results, peer ratings and other measures available for comparison. Why Would a School or School District Adopt Such a Process? The greatest challenge of any organizational effort to improve our schools is the implementation of strategic or long-term plans. How many districts have developed a strategic plan which, once submitted for approval to the Department of Education, never left the shelf? The Baldrige Award Process helps a district or school focus the improvement effort on three criteria, Approach, Deployment and Results, for organizational improvement. The Process stresses a solid approach to improvement, how the approach is deployed throughout the organization and achievable results through the efforts of the program. The MBNQA process is not a once and done effort. The main goal of Continuous Quality Improvement requires that a strategic planning process be ongoing. The Baldrige Award criteria will help institutions to achieve their goals. Will the Baldrige Quality Award Process Help my District or School? As the organizational leader of your district or school, ask yourself the following questions: 1. Does my district/school have clear goals and objectives that will move us forward? 2. Do we have an implementation plan with clear assignments and tasks that will help us achieve the goals we have set for ourselves? The MBNQA Process may help your district or school answer these questions in a positive manner while resulting in a quality program of school improvement. For more information contact: David Gondak at 215-699-4403 or by e-mail at stratsrce@aol.com. STATE
BOARD CREATES A COMMITTEE ON TAX REVENUES WORKPLAN BACKGROUND — In September 2000, the State Board of Education voted to create a committee to explore the feasibility of Board study of tax policies designed to raise revenues to support education. The interest of the Board stems from growing concerns that our reliance on property taxes to support education has led to a number of disparities affecting our schools and our communities. That is, when established, property taxes relied on the strong connection between property owned and personal wealth; however, changing times have eroded that connection. As a result, an increasing number of inequities have emerged. For example, some citizens can pay 40% or more of their limited income in property taxes while other citizens often pay a small fraction of their resources. Many school districts are able to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars from a single mil added to the property tax, while many other districts raise only a few thousand from the same mil. Closer to the heart of the matter, there is often great disparity in monies available to support education, from less that $5,000 per student to more than $14,000 per student. While the relationship between money and quality in education is not perfect — what you spend and how you spend it are both important. The problems, however, are not limited to the schoolhouse. The polarizing effects of tax policy spread to the core of our communities. Old is pitted against young and rich against poor. Affluent schools are pitted against poor ones. Schools are pitted against the community colleges they created. And older neighborhoods are pitted against newer developements. More mobile and affluent taxpayers are able to maximize the quality of education for their children while minimizing tax burden. The reverse is true for the less mobile and less affluent. As a result, many cities and older suburbs witness a continuing decline in their tax base while the needs of the children they serve grow each year. Put simply, property taxes are often regressive — placing burden on those least able to pay — and in some cases insufficient to sustain quality education. ROLE OF THE BOARD — While the Board does not have a formal role in decisions about taxation, it does have the responsibility under statute to develop a master plan for basic education addressing, among other topics, school finance. Under that authority, the Board‘s Master Plan for Basic Education (adopted May 13, 1999) concluded: The present tax structure to support schools and other educational entities grows more untenable each year for more people and more communities. We are concerned that educational opportunity is being diminished for too many students each year. We encourage and support efforts of the General Assembly to explore solutions to problems in local tax structures and equity in the Commonwealth. Going forward, the Board recognizes the considerable efforts of the General Assembly, private research organizations, university-based research centers, and others in studying this matter and offering conclusions and recommendations. Moreover, we can look to other states, faced with similar problems, who voluntarily or involuntarily sought new methods and patterns of taxation to reduce reliance on property taxes. As a result, we propose to explore this issue deliberately but economically That is, we will draw on the expertise of knowledgeable individuals and from the research conducted to explore the issue. Our role will be to focus the issue, highlight essential findings, and energize the public discussions. PLAN OF WORK — FOUR STEPS ARE PLANNED: 1. Describe concisely the major issues in tax policy and their effects on schools, communities and individual taxpayers. This will require a careful review of current studies, current and previous proposals to change tax policy, and the experience of other key states who changed tax policy substantially. 2. Invite knowledgeable experts to speak to the Board. Over the next four or five meetings, experts will be invited to help facilitate Board discussion on the topic from a variety of perspectives. These individuals will include those familiar with other state strategies. 3. Identify multiple policy options. At the conclusion of the Board discussions and further informed by a review of research studies and policy papers, identify a number of policy options and their implications. 4. Prepare a white paper to serve as a call to action. The white paper will summarize the major concerns with current tax policy, define the principles that drive tax policies to raise revenues for education, and explain policy options clearly. The paper will be presented to the Governor and the General Assembly.
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