QOD: Diegnan Drops Charter School Law Requiring Local Community Vote

From today's NJ Spotlight, regarding news that Assemblyman Patrick Diegnan (D-Middlesex) has introduced his (flawed) charter school bill:

Diegnan chairs the Assembly’s education committee and is the lower chamber's most prominent voice on school policy, so his vision for overseeing charters carries a lot of weight with its Democratic leadership. His latest bill contains a few of the ideas he's been espousing for the better part of a year… It also pushes one of his more controversial positions: local voter approval of all new or expanded charters…[Senator Teresa] Ruiz [Chair of the Senate Education Committee and working herself on a highly-anticipated charter school law proposal] has shown no support for local approval of charters, and she has pressed for multiple authorizing organizations outside the state Department of Education.

Should the State Be Subsidizing Yeshivas and Seminaries?

The Christie Administration, reports the Star-Ledger, is “refusing to release copies of applications filed by two religious institutions set to receive public dollars for campus building projects.” Those two religious institutions are Beth Medrash Govoha, a men’s-only Jewish yeshiva in Lakewood that Jewish Week describes as “fervently Orthodox.” The other is Princeton Theological Seminary, a Christian coed school.

The schools are two of 176 that were awarded $1.3 billion in funds ($750 million from a taxpayer referendum) by the State Office of Higher Education. Beth Medrash Govoha received  $10.6 million to construct a library/research center and academic center. Princeton Theological Seminary received $645,313 for technology upgrades.

The yeshiva’s award is the second largest of all the awards. Seton Hall University, which has no discriminatory admissions criteria, will receive $11.7 million.

The Star-Ledger filed an Open Public Records Act request to the State Secretary of Higher Education to look at the applications. The request was denied. The awards have been challenged (unsuccessfully) by the ACLU. Ed Barocas, ACLU-NJ's Executive Director, said, "The public has the right to know how the determinations are made when you’re talking about spending $1.3 billion."

The $600K to Princeton Theological Seminary is a drop in the bucket. It’s the award to Beth Medrash Govoha that is inciting protest.  Should the State be subsidizing religious institutions?  How about schools that only accept men?  How about only Jewish men? How about only Orthodox Jewish men who have spent their lives studying Talmud?

And, of course, it’s hard to ignore the fact that the yeshiva is in Lakewood, home to a public school system that spends $20 million a year bussing yeshiva kids to private schools while providing a substandard education to public school kids, almost all of whom are Black and Hispanic.

Beth Medrash has no website. (Here's PTS's.) And here’s a few details from Wikipedia regarding admissions requirements:

Beth Medrash Govoha is a post-graduate institution and the general age of entry for new students is about 22. A level of analytic skill and comprehension in understanding the Talmud is required to the extent that a student is be able to study a subject from the starting point all the way to the most complex areas of that subject on his own. The yeshiva does not have a remedial program for weak or unprepared students, and reaching the level required to be a successful student at the yeshiva takes several years of intense, full-time study. As such, in general, only students that have already studied in an undergraduate level yeshiva geared for students aged 18–22, will be accepted.

NJ Legislature Update: Tenure Protection for all Public School Employees and Restrictions on Out-Sourcing

Today the NJ Assembly is scheduled to vote on A-3696, which would provide tenure-like protection to all public school employees, including teaching assistants, bus drivers, security guards, and food service staff. The bill has already passed the Senate. According to New Jersey School Boards Association,

The measure would give such non-teaching employees the right to submit to binding arbitration virtually any disciplinary action imposed on them, including reprimands, withholding of increments, lack of continuation of employment, or the termination or non-renewal of an employment contract. The bill includes language that grants employees the right to submit to binding arbitration, regardless of any negotiated or contractual provision to the contrary and irrespective of the reasoning behind a school district’s action.

NJSBA opposes the bill because it limits school districts' ability to “effectively manage employee conduct and performance.” Then again, NJSBA also opposes S-968, which the Senate also passed last week. This "union-backed bill" undermines "a public agency’s ability to subcontract services by imposing numerous restrictions and requirements on the process." It would require districts to bargain with unions over any subcontracting and disallow outsourcing during the life of a current contract.

New Jersey Education Association supports both these bills.The union rejoiced after the Senate Assembly Education Committee passed the proposed legislation:

Legislators were persuaded by the testimony they heard, as well as by the calls and emails from NJEA members.  “We keep hearing about savings as a reason to oppose the bill,” said Asm. Patrick Diegnan Chair the Assembly Education Committee. “Who knows better ways to find economies than the people who do the job? All this bill does is require the parties to negotiate.”

That sentiment was echoed by Asm. Herb Conaway, a primary sponsor of the bill.  “Those agreements are sacrosanct and should not be broken,” he said. “When privatization is considered, both sides should be able to sit down and negotiate.”

Asm. Ralph Caputo got right to the heart of the matter.  “Our kids have relationships with these people, and we have to understand that.  Safety and a quality education come from more people than the teacher.”

Charter School Models for NJ: Learning From Michigan

In today’s Wall Street Journal, Michael Van Beek from Michigan’s Mackinac Center for Public Policy looks at a recent study from Stanford University’s Center on Education Outcomes (CREDO), which analyzes charter school outcomes in Michigan. Writes Van Beek, “[o]nly 6% of charters are underperforming in math and only 2% in reading. Further, 82% of charters produced growth in average reading test scores and 72% did so in math.”

What’s different about Michigan’s model for charter schools?

Michigan allows a variety of public entities to authorize charter schools, the most common being universities and community colleges. This frees charter schools from needing school-district approval to operate, which is like requiring new businesses to ask existing competitors for permission to open. By allowing more charters than most states, Michigan has developed a functional charter-school market, so much so that lawmakers recently took the bold step of removing the charter-school cap altogether.

Van Beek also notes that some media have distorted this most recent CREDO study by claiming that the research doesn't include all charter schools in Michigan; "in fact, the study included 86% of all charter-school students in the state and remains the most comprehensive and rigorous study of Michigan charter schools.”

Outcomes were similarly positive in Detroit, where 47% of the adult population is functionally illiterate: “Of the 100 or so charters in Detroit, 47% did significantly better than conventional schools in reading and 49% did significantly better in math. Only one charter school in Detroit did worse in reading compared with the city's district-run schools.”

No doubt it’s helpful that Michigan’s charter schools aren’t subject to traditional tenure laws, like  the policy of retaining teachers during lay-offs based solely on seniority.

This piece is relevant to New Jersey, specifically the current debate about our charter school law reform. I wrote recently in NJ Spotlight about the (leaked) draft of new charter school legislation proposed by Assemblyman Patrick Diegnan. Assemblyman Diegnan would subject all aspiring charter schools to a community referendum, a model that doesn’t exist in any other state in the country. As Michigan shows us (and research confirms), a system of multiple authorizers provides students, particularly those in poor urban communities, with a shot at equitable educational opportunities.

Sunday Leftovers

NJEA has formed a super-PAC called Garden State Forward. The PAC will raise money for gubernatorial candidate Barbara Buono and other politicians of like minds. The union also just elected new officers.

Politi-Fact's verdict on the veracity of  Gov. Christie new campaign ad is mixed;  Christie is correct to say that education spending is higher than ever, say the judges, but it's only half-true that he’s managed to implement merit pay.

The Courier-Post: “Mayor Dana Redd has filled the last two remaining seats on the Camden Board of Education.Jose Brito Bueno will serve a three-year expired term held by Raymond Lamboy and Taisha Minier will serve a one-year unexpired term held by former board member Kathryn Ribay.”

NJ Spotlight reports that Commissioner Cerf has, for the first time, reversed a district’s decision that student misbehavior violated NJ’s anti-bullying act: “In a decision handed down in late April and posted last week, Cerf found that the Pittsgrove school district’s charge against an eighth-grade student identified as C.H. ran counter to the new law. The student had been accused of bullying after a February 2012 incident in which he shoved a piece of crumpled paper down a classmate’s shirt.”

Mike Lilley, Chief of Better Education for Kids,comments on Jersey City’s next mayor, Steve Fulop, who ran against the old Democratic machine (which includes the JC Teachers Union) and won:

“The voters have said yes to the positive change that Mayor-elect Steve Fulop will bring; yes to better schools; and yes to a brighter future for Jersey City,” the group’s executive director, Mike Lilley, said in a statement. “As mayor, we are confident Fulop will continue to work to improve the Jersey City public school system and make sure that every schoolchild has access to a great school and a great education.”

Here's some of the dirt from the Star-Ledger.

Laura C. Morana,  superintendent of Red Bank Borough schools, reflects on her district’s experience during the pilot of AchieveNJ, NJ’s new data-informed teacher evaluation system:

It is easy to say, “there is so much to do, there is so much to be learned,” and to simply throw our hands in the air. Recently I put myself in our teachers’ shoes in order to understand their perspective. I dug in with some of our best teachers and challenged myself to learn about how they would set the growth objectives for their students. While this forced me out of my comfort zone, I found the process to be meaningful, rewarding, and invigorating.

A new report out from Rutgers considers the effort involved in training administrators to implement the new evaluation rubrics. “The report's lead author, William Firestone, said in an interview yesterday that the report details the extensive amount of time needed to get all parties up to speed, both on the new procedures and on the broader concept of pinpointing the qualities of good teaching.”

A physically-handicapped student from Perth Amboy says she’s being deprived of opportunities to take honors classes at the district’s Science, Technology, Engineering and Math Academy because there are no elevators available.

Andy Rotherham at Eduwonk lists seven barriers to the Common Core actually providing equally rigorous course content across all the geographic regions of the U.S..

QOD: NJSBA Ex. Dir. on NJ's Special Education Costs

Dr. Larry Feinsod:

 In January, NJSBA formed a task force to review our state’s current process for funding and providing special education services. The study group will recommend changes to state and federal statute and regulation.  The goal is to reduce special education costs to local school districts without diminishing the quality of needed services. In addition, the task force will identify best practices.

As I’ve previously stated in this column, I began my career in education as a special education teacher.  The education of children with special needs will always be close to my heart.  However, there is a dire need to develop strategies that will maintain quality services, without negatively affecting resources for general education programming.

Trenton Hostage Follow-Up

On Monday I asked whether the horrible hostage situation in Trenton last weekend (mother and son murdered; four children held hostage) could have been resolved more quickly if Trenton Public Schools had more aggressively enforced its attendance policy.

Apparently I’m not the only one asking that question. Today’s Trenton Times reports that, indeed, the district did call the house where the family was imprisoned. Here’s what happened:

A female voice, believed to be one of the girls operating on instructions from Murphy [the criminal], took the phone and answered the questions about where she and her siblings were, Superintendent Francisco Duran said yesterday. 

She told the school representative that the children were sick, and could not come to school, Duran said. Truancy officers visited the home twice, but it was not until a relative sounded the alarm two weeks after Stevens’ death that police discovered the carnage that led to a 37-hour standoff with Murphy last weekend. 

Yesterday, Duran defended the educators’ actions. 

“We have a policy that we follow when the students are not coming to school,” Duran said.