@NJSenatePres 's @Path2ProgressNJ & the 800lb Gorillas In The Room

Expert analysis and witnesses are essential to the successful outcome of a trial, but in the court of public opinion, politicians often fail to enlist experts who may raise red flags about the policies they're trying to sell to the general public. In my little corner of the universe—education—it happens too frequently. Analysis is done by study groups and commissions that often lack any real, working K-12 educators. 

The latest example is Senate President Steve Sweeney's 'Path to Progress', which touts, among other things, regionalizing many of the state's school districts and slashing (yet again) retired public employees' deferred compensation. 

Here is the complete list of the commission's members: 

MEMBERSHIP

Co-chairs:

• Senator Paul Sarlo – Chairman, Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee
• Senator Steven Oroho – Senate Republican Conference Chair
• Assemblyman Louis Greenwald – Assembly Majority Leader

Legislative Members:

• Senator Steve Sweeney – Senate President
• Senator Dawn Addiego – State Senator
• Senator Anthony Bucco – Senate Minority Budget Officer
• Assemblywoman Eliana Pintor Marin – Chairwoman, Assembly Budget
• Senator Troy Singleton – Chairman, Senate Military and Veterans’ Affairs

Subcommittee Chairs:

• Dr. Ray Caprio – Rutgers Bloustein School of Planning & Public Policy; Bloustein Local Government Research Center
• Frank Chin – Managing Director, American Public Infrastructure
• Richard Keevey – Rutgers University Bloustein School of Planning & Public Policy and Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs
• Dr. Michael Lahr – Rutgers Bloustein School of Planning & Public Policy and Rutgers Economic Advisory Service
• Marc Pfeiffer – Rutgers University, Bloustein School of Planning & Public Policy; Bloustein Local Government Research Center

Non-Legislative Members:

• Dr. Henry Coleman – Rutgers University, Bloustein School of Planning & Public Policy
• Lucille Davy – Of Counsel, Mason, Griffin & Pierson
• Feather O’Connor Houstoun – Adviser for Public media and journalism at Wyncote Foundation
• Ray Kljajic – American Public Infrastructure Inc.
• Robert Landolfi – Business Administrator, Woodbridge Township (retired)
• Senator Raymond Lesniak – Chair, Lesniak Institute for American Leadership
• Jerry Maginnis – Rowan University, William G. Rohrer College of Business
• Dr. Donald Moliver – Monmouth University, Kislak Real Estate Institute
• Dr. Joel Naroff – President, Naroff Economic Advisers Inc.
• Peter Reinhart – Monmouth University Kislak Real Estate Institute
• Kurt Stroemel – President, HR&S Financial Services
• Ralph Thomas – CEO/Executive Director, New Jersey Society of Certified Public Accountants

While this list may read like a Who's Who of New Jersey public policy experts, notice the one highlighted name: Robert Landolfi. He is the only K-12 representative on the commission—and he's retired. There are no real K-12 voices here, and none from South Hunterdon Regional School District, the only district in the past 25 years to successfully consolidate.

While Sen. Sweeney exults in the plan's proposed successes at town hall meetings across the state, he and his cohorts fail to address the three 800 lb gorillas in the room: 

1. Public schools are not businesses:

While consolidation may bring about some savings in certain situations, we must not forget that school districts are not convenience store chains. We don't sell soda and lottery tickets; we teach children, each of whom comes with different needs, and each district strives to meet those needs. Before we go down this road, the study commission needs to understand that what may be good for one district, may not necessarily be good for all of them. Special services for low income, special needs and ESL students must be the same or better than what they currently have. And when consolidation means going from a district of approximately 3200 to a merged district with close to 10,000 students, as would be the case with my central Hunterdon County district, there will be no savings, and services will suffer. The commission should look closely at what happened in the southern part of Hunterdon County: 

In 2016, NJ Spotlight reported on the five-year process of merging four very small Hunterdon County districts into one regional district with a combined population of less than 1,000 students: 

South Hunterdon’s merger of four school districts in 2013 has proven to be an example of both the good and the difficult in school regionalization. 

The good news is that the merger appears to have worked... 

The more cautionary news is that this was a long and labor-intensive process in what was actually one of the simplest mergers: four districts that were essentially unified in practice, if not in name. 

There are no regrets, the officials said, but they acknowledged that it doesn’t happen overnight... 

[School Board President Dan Seiter said that] the process started as far back as 2008, with an initial resolution of all four boards of education to look at consolidation: South Hunterdon Regional High School, West Amwell, Lambertville, and Stockton. Each among the smallest districts in the state, they already served as feeder districts into the regional high school. 

It took five years and “meetings after meetings after meetings” that led to a referendum to move toward a feasibility study, Seiter said, where voters in all four communities voted to proceed. (emphasis mine)

Voter buy-in is essential or the process will fail. We've seen this time and again. Whether the disastrous One Newark, or the Urban Hope Act in Camden, or other education 'reforms', shutting parents, taxpayers and local school officials out of the decision-making process is a recipe for disaster. Town halls are one thing; making sure taxpayers have a seat at the table is completely different. 

2. Charter schools:

Back in 2014, when Sen. Sweeney and then Asw. Donna Simon (R-LD16) were clamoring for municipal and school consolidation respectively, I wrote about the false narratives they were touting, and spoke with one of the state's preeminent school funding experts, Dr. Bruce Baker of Rutgers University, who had this to say about charter schools:

If consolidation is such a great idea, whether to promote integration, remove administrative redundancy, etc., then it would seem utterly foolish that we continue to expand charter schools. These schools tend to operate at inefficiently small size, further segregate our students, and when they do grow to a size where they operate as districts within our districts, they create significant administrative redundancy — a whole layer of "management corporation" siphoning district funds passed on to charters.  

We know, for example, from IRS 990 filings, that the administrative structure of Uncommon Schools has plenty of well paid admins—including their "managing director" for Newark Uncommon at about $200k in 2012. No doubt much higher now in 2014. So, in addition to Newark Public Schools, we've added, through this structure, additional governing layers that siphon resources, but don't show up on the traditional books. 

So, Newark has a superintendent with a $240k salary, but now has districts within it which use funds generated by management fees skimmed from the charter allocation (which passed through the district) to pay several entire additional administrative teams. (emphasis mine)

Consolidation without plans to end this redundancy is hypocritical. If charter schools are real public schools—as their supporters claim—they will survive the process, but the process will not survive if they are not included in it.

3. Another blow to retired public employees' deferred compensation:

Since 2011, when Gov. Christie signed the bill known as Chapter 78 into law, tens of thousands of public employees have seen their take home pay decrease every year as health insurance premiums and additional pension contributions have risen. Many have had to take on not only second, but third jobs to make ends meet. Others have simply left public service to make more money in the private sector. NJ public employees now pay the highest individual insurance premiums and the 10th highest family premiums in the country while earning less than their private sector counterparts. They will also have to work longer to collect their pensions and get less in return—if there's even a pension system left when they do retire. 

When Gov. Christie signed that law, he also instituted a cost of living adjustment (COLA) freeze on all retirees' pensions, and with the system on life support, that's not changing any time soon. Retirees are hurting.

Now, Sen. Sweeney wants "all new state and local government retirees to pay the same percent of premium costs they paid when working." I'm sorry, but that's not only unsustainable, it's downright cruel. 

Instead of proposing public employees pay more, why isn't the commission recommending a push for Medicare for All or some other type of universal healthcare? Why isn't the commission doing anything about containing the always-increasing cost of premiums? It's just so much easier to make the people who can least afford it pay more while you close the door on your mansion and forget about their struggles. And they can't even move out of state to save some money because Gov. Christie signed a bill into law that basically makes public employees indentured servants. We can't leave. 

I am not naive. The state's fiscal future is bleak. We have a projected $5 billion revenue shortfall for this fiscal year, the pension fund will run out of money in about 10 years, our credit rating is in the toilet, and property taxes are eating most of us alive. But all this isn't merely the result of Gov. Christie giving away billions in corporate tax breaks and in the Exxon settlement. No, there's plenty of blame to go around, on both sides of the aisle, and it goes back decades. Yet, some elected officials continue to put the burden of fixing the system they broke squarely on the backs of the students they purport to help and those of us who have been continually ordered to give more, do more, and receive less in return, with little thought of how we will be able to make ends meet. It's always the little guy who pays.

So, if Sen. Sweeney doesn't like it when people show up to his town halls and challenge these draconian measures, maybe he needs to remember what it was like to be a rank and file iron worker worrying about how to pay bills and keep a roof over his head. 

Teachers in eleven states have gone out on strike to protest draconian cuts to school funding, low pay and terrible working conditions—things that are not only sacrosanct to collective bargaining, but also make for excellent public schools, of which NJ has an abundance. If this commission pushes forward with their recommendations, I believe New Jersey may be next. 

UPDATE & ACTION: @GovMurphy Promised To Ditch #PARCC. Is He Going Back On His Word?

Gov. Murphy promised to end PARCC testing. Tell him #KeepYourWord!

Update and Action Alert!

Last week I wrote about S-3381, Sen. Teresa Ruiz's bill to change the state's high school graduation requirements that, if signed into law, could have a devastating effect on thousands of New Jersey high school seniors. 

S-3381 now has a companion Assembly bill. A-4957 was posted by Assembly Education Chair Pamela Lampitt, although as of this writing, it has not been assigned to a committee. The Senate bill will be heard in the Senate Budget room tomorrow at noon.

All of this is moving very quickly, and for no good reason. Both bills are expected to be voted on by the full legislature this week, so quick action is needed (see below for specific action items).

Yesterday Save Our Schools NJ posted an extensive update. You can read the full text here. These are the main concerns: 

The NJ Appellate Court indicated that the current high school graduation testing requirements, which were imposed by the Christie Administration in 2016 and ruled illegal by the Court on December 31, 2018, will stay in effect until the Court rules on the Murphy Administration's request that all current juniors and seniors who had partially or fully met those requirements by December 30 2018 be allowed to graduate under the testing options specified in those requirements. In its December 31 ruling, the court had originally indicated that the Christie graduation requirements would be struck down as of January 31. Those testing requirements are available here.

...

If the Court does not grant the Murphy Administration's request regarding current seniors and juniors, there would need to be some other way for those students to meet the high school graduation testing requirements. If the Court grants the Administration's request to allow current seniors and juniors to graduate under the Christie 2016 regulations, that problem would be solved. 

... 

Currently, NJ law requires students to take a single 11th grade basic skills test of English and math in order to graduate. The Ruiz bill would require students to take as many standardized tests as imposed by the NJ Department of Education and for those tests to be a demonstration of "college and career readiness," even though many students do not intend to go to college and even though this terminology is vague enough to allow a gubernatorial Administration to abuse it. The Ruiz bill also requires students to take the college and career tests before they qualify for any other graduation options, which could force current seniors to take PARCC 10th grade ELA and Algebra 1 tests in order to graduate. 

... 

With the additional time granted by the Appellate Court, there is no need to rush this legislation through. These bills would be a substantial change that is likely to have a major negative impact on our children. They should not be pushed through with back room deals, as is currently happening. Parents, students and other education advocates should be able to testify and the legislature should understand the broad-reaching consequences of these bills before they vote to impose them on our children. (emphasis mine)

Here's why we need to fight the Ruiz/Lampitt bills:

• This would be a major change in our law with no study of the impact on kids or costs to districts
• Doubles down against the promise made by Gov. Murphy to end high school exit testing
• Leaves the class of 2021 and beyond without a clear path to graduation
• It's unclear if the bill actually protects the classes of 2019 and 2020. As written, they may have to take PARCC in order to graduate.

Here's why we need to support S-558/A-672, posted by Sen. Nia Gill and Asw. Mila Jasey respectively:

• They provide immediate relief to all current high school students
• They provide breathing room for the NJDOE to come up with a new assessment system. The current 40-year-old statute has never been reviewed.
• They provide time for the legislature to hold hearings on the use of high school exit tests. Research since the 1970's shows that exit testing is very bad for low-income students, students of color, English language learners and students with disabilities. 
• Only 12 states have some form of exit testing; it is not federally mandated
• More tests = more money spent 

Take Action Today!

Gov. Murphy's office does not believe there will be parent backlash on the Ruiz bill. But, people who've already called his office are reporting frazzled staffers on the other end of the line. 

• Keep calling the Governor's Office: 609-292-6000. Tell him #KeepYourWord: veto S-3381/A-4957 and support S-558/A-672.
• Tweet @GovMurphy. Tell him #KeepYourWord: veto S-3381/A-4957 and support S-558/A-672.
• Call Speaker Coughlin's regional office: 732-855-7441. Tell him to support S-558/A-672 and reject S-3381/A-4957.
• Tweet @SpeakerCoughlin. Tell him to support S-558/A-672 and reject S-3381/A-4957. 
• Call your state reps. Tell them to reject S-3381/A-4957 and support S-558/A-672. Find yours here.
• Share this post and encourage others to take action as well

Why @tomamoran 's Words Matter

On Saturday, Star Ledger editorial writer Tom Moran announced his latest column with this tweet:

Reaction from NJEA leadership and members across the state was swift and loud. Moran took down the tweet and apologized to the union's President Marie Blistan and Executive Director Ed Richardson. But I have to wonder if his fingers were crossed behind his back given this tweet the very next day:

In the past six weeks, we've experienced two mass shootings, one of which was the deadliest in US history. In June, a nut job with a political axe to grind shot Rep. Steve Scalise and and three others on a baseball field in Washington, DC. There have been 307 mass shootings in the US so far this year, and Congress is in no hurry to do anything about it.

Since Columbine and Sandy Hook, schools across the country practice regular, mandatory lock down drills where staff and students hide in a safe part of the classroom, turn off the lights, lock the doors, draw the shades and sit in silence. Far too often I have to remind students to stay quiet when they try to ask if it's a drill or if there really is someone with a gun in the building.  

If a child makes a comment about wanting to hurt or kill themselves or someone else, it's a big deal. There is a strict protocol that happens immediately. This is no joke. It doesn't matter if the child is 5 or 15, there is a process and there are consequences because no school, no child, no staff member should ever have to encounter another Dylan Klebold or Eric Harris ever again. 

Congress refuses to protect our children. Elected officials like Chris Christie and ed 'reformers' around the country have made us out to be public enemy number one. So, when someone talks about murdering teachers, we take it very, very seriously.

Threatening to murder the President or other elected officials is a crime. So is threatening to blow up a plane. But to Moran, murdering teachers is a figure of speech, no big deal, perfectly okay to put that word in someone else's mouth. Yea no, "especially in this day and age":

For whatever reason, Moran has a chip on his shoulder about the NJEA. Over the years, he has written so many pieces that range from the misinformed to the flat-out untrue (see here, here, here for a sampling), so it was no surprise that he attacked us about how and where we spent our PAC dollars (not dues money, in case anyone was wondering) during the election. But that's not the issue. As an editor and columnist for the state's largest newspaper, Moran has a responsibility to maintain a certain level of professionalism that upholds the Ledger's reputation, and—I would think—some sort of journalistic standards. If I want that kind of sleaze, I'll go read the NY Post. But I don't think they would even stoop that low.

So, the next time Moran wants to make a flippant comment like that about anyone, I will invite him to my classroom when we're practicing a lock down drill. Then he can tell my scared kindergarteners why it's no big deal. 

Words matter. As a journalist, he should know better.

The Star Ledger's #FakeNews On NJ Charters

I swore I wasn't going to do this anymore. I wasn't going to respond to irresponsible editorial boards that make grossly inaccurate claims about public and charter schools because they will never change their minds anyway. But then, this little tidbit dropped front and center on the Star Ledger's Sunday editorial page yesterday, and...




So, let's give this a go...

First, read Jersey Jazzman's piece that blows the roof off every single cockamamie claim made by the Ledger by presenting facts and figures:

• Students in Newark and Camden charter schools are less expensive to educate because they have fewer special needs than their TPS counterparts
• Newark and Camden charter schools enroll significantly less students who are Limited English Proficient
• Newark and Camden charter schools employ significantly less experienced teaching staff than their TPS counterparts
• Newark and Camden charter schools have much higher administrative costs than their TPS counterparts
• Newark and Camden charter schools do have access to public funds as well as private, philanthropic money

But facts and figures aren't the only things the S-L gets wrong:

In Newark and Camden, where parents have fled failing district schools by the thousands, charter schools have been one of the great social successes of the past decade.

I guess that's true if you count 'success' as discriminating and segregating. The S-L has reported countless times about those thousands-deep charter waiting lists with nothing more than charter cheerleaders saying so. But this isn't surprising in the era of fake news and alternative facts. 

The truth is that in Newark and Camden, thousands of students have been forced out of their beloved neighborhood public schools, communities up-ended, and families scattered because their state-appointed superintendents have deemed them as 'failing' or simply not worth saving. Or, as in the case of Newark, which has the one-two punch of being underfunded by Christie and bleeding millions to the charters, they have had to hold fire sales. This is state-sponsored destruction of democracy, and you are paying for it.

But the Ledger consistently supports this.

What about parents who want to save their local public schools? They vote with their feet, too—by marching in protest. But they still have no say. There are no billionaires lining up to write nine-figure checks to save their schools. And in both these state-run districts, their boards of ed are powerless. In Camden, the appointed board members are nothing more than head-nodding minions of the local Democratic political machine. In Newark, the board has been reduced to 'adivsory' status, with no real power. So much for government of, by and for the people.

Yet the Democratic candidates in our governor's race are all curiously skeptical about charter schools. Each is departing from former President Barack Obama's courageous support for charters that defied the teacher's union, which is a real threat to this progress in our cities.

Maybe because they're looking at the facts that say well-funded, neighborhood public schools that are open to every student, supported by the community, and employ highly-educated, well paid teachers do, in fact, succeed? 

I've said this before and I'll say it again: President Obama, the first African American president, whom I voted for twice, did more to segregate public schools than any other president in this modern era. He completely turned his back on the core Democratic Party principles of equality and social justice. And he wasn't alone. Many Democratic leaders, from the local to national level, have stood with him in supporting state-sponsored segregation. As Diane Ravitch reports in The New Republic: 

The Obama years saw an epidemic of new charters, testing, school closings, and teacher firings. In Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emanuel closed 50 public schools in one day. Democratic charter advocates—whose ranks include the outraged [former Newark mayor, now Sen. Cory] Booker [D-NJ] and [Sen. Michael] Bennet [D-CO]—have increasingly imported “school choice” into the party’s rhetoric. Booker likes to equate “choice” with “freedom”—even though the entire idea of “choice” was created by white Southerners who were scrambling to defend segregated schools after Brown v. Board of Education.

Whether they're in it for the 'reformy' donations (Booker, Bennett, Govs. Cuomo, Brown and Malloy among many) or just political revenge as is the case with NJ Senate President Steve Sweeney vs. NJEA, far too many democrats have turned their backs on their core base of supporters and their party's founding principles. The fact that the democratic gubernatorial candidates are taking another look at charter regulations is (maybe, possibly) a sign that they are looking at the facts instead of their campaign account balance sheets.

Oh yea, and while newspapers like the Ledger and others shill for the anti-union, 'reformy' elite, this has quietly been happening all across the country:

As the saying goes, 'If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.' And then make 'em better and stronger!

Adding...

My high school alma mater, Queen of Peace, in No. Arlington, NJ announced it's closing its doors come June 30. The S-L/NJ.com posted several articles about it. It's a Catholic school, and the lack of funds and declining enrollment made it unsustainable. I was sad. I have a lot of memories of that place, both good and bad, and some very dear friends still to this day. Back then, every good Catholic who could afford it—and many who couldn't—sent their kids to Catholic school. The area was solid middle-to-upper middle class White from Scottish, Irish, Italian and Polish descent. Everybody knew everybody. 

How must it feel for those current students and parents whose lives are now completely upended? Where will they go? What will happen to friendships? To their community? What will happen to academic goals and dreams? What about the staff? Where will they go? What must it feel like to suddenly have all that ripped out from under them? 

Now ask yourself how it must feel for the mostly low-income, Black and Brown students and families in places like Newark and Camden who live with this real possibility on a daily basis; who may have experienced this not once, but several times in their academic careers? What about their connections? Their neighborhoods? Their academic goals and dreams? Their futures?

Why don't you write about that, Star Ledger? 

Public Education: Death By A Thousand Retirements

Retirement dinners are bittersweet. We say goodbye to those who have worked for decades, but we also lose those decades of experience. Last week I hosted my county education association's annual retirement dinner. These were my opening remarks:

Tonite we are celebrating almost 800 years of educational excellence. Whether bus driver, maintenance, custodian, classroom teacher, instructional aide, administrative assistant or cafeteria aide, you are part of a learning community and you contributed to the education and advancement of students. And for that, we thank you. 

Albert Einstein, one of the greatest minds who ever lived— student and eventually teacher himself—once said, “Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.” 

In an era where educational success is measured more by what can be counted than what counts, your decades of experience can be counted, but they can never be replaced. 

So, while you all are enjoying your well-deserved retirement, your colleagues will—I’m quite sure—carry on the traditions, wisdom and experience that you passed on to them with their students. That’s what masters at their craft do. That’s what those at the highest levels of their professions do. We pass on our gifts, so they can be given to others, so that excellence can continue. 

I’m not talking about the best ways to prep students for PARCC or how to effectively collect data; I’m talking about what you learned about dealing with students of every make and model over the years. How, through all the chaos of No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, testing, budget cuts, the overall attack on our profession and our professional association, you preserved your dignity as well as that of your students. I'm talking about how you took in all the changes and insanity forced on you in your long careers, synthesized it all, and gave it to your students in ways that respected them as individual learners while maintaining your dignity as highly qualified education professionals.

As I was creating tonite’s program, I was looking at your numbers. Five of you passed 30 years, and one of you reached 42 years! You have taught, not just children, but generations of children. And oh how they have changed. And while you may have had to adapt to Pokémon, technology and social media, at your core, you always found ways to touch students’ hearts like no standardized test ever could. 

As a child, I remember laying in the grass in my backyard while my mother hung clothes out to dry, staring at the clouds, and wondering what they were, where they came from, were they were going, and marveling at the different images I saw in them.

I remember lazy summer afternoons with boxes full of random stuff, recycled this, bits of that, crayons, glue, spools of thread, scraps of fabric left over from my mother's sewing, and the uninhibited joy of mashing it all together and seeing what happened. 

Life was slower, kids could be kids.

Students today don’t have that luxury. In an era where they are ‘plugged in’ from the moment they wake up 'til the moment they go to bed—including far too much of that during the school day—you kept them focused on the really important things like kindness, respect, empathy and fairness. You taught them that it’s more important to see what’s in another person’s heart than what’s on their Instagram page. You reminded them that it’s not what score you got on a test, but how much you learned along the way. You taught them how to lay in the grass and stare at the clouds because sometimes we have to just shut off our minds and feel life happening all around us. 

Those things can never be measured, but boy oh boy, they sure do count.

So, thank you for your years of experience and dedication to the most important profession on this earth, and for choosing to practice it in the state that has one of the best public education systems in the country. Your efforts have made it such...

How much longer will we continue to see educators retire with 30 or 40+ years of experience? At the rate education 'reform' is going, not much longer. Our profession can't sustain the assault. 'Reformers' have brought the 'churn' of corporate America to our ranks. Teach for Awhile America markets education as a resumé padder instead of a career. ALEC-funded politicians write bills allowing people to teach without certification. Charters pay teachers less and administrators more. And all across this country, wages are down, workloads are up, and we are continually expected to do more with less. 

Oh yea, and Betsy DeVos is Education Secretary. 

This is what 800 years of education excellence looks like. Will we ever see it again? Not if we don't stand up and fight for it. I'm fighting. Are you?

Hey NJ! Whatcha Gonna Do About DeVos?

On January 11, the Senate will hold confirmation hearings on Betsy DeVos. Since Trump nominated her for Secretary of Education, a great deal has been written about how she has used her money, power and influence to destroy public education in Michigan, and advance her religious beliefs. See here and here. Jersey Jazzman wrote two important pieces within the past few days. 

My religion is right for your kids!

So, what can you do? Well, if you think 'Nothing', keep reading.

Yesterday, House Republicans ditched plans to eliminate the Independent Ethics Office in part because of all the phone calls they received from angry constituents. Heck, even Donald Trump wasn't thrilled:

So, if we can get that many people to jam the phone lines of our elected officials, there may be a chance. What can I say? I'm an eternal optimist.

I created this handy form to give to members in my district. Scripts were generated by the Network for Public Education. I included PA senators because a good chunk of them live there. Feel free to edit to suit your audience.  

And if you've already called your senators, call again. And again, and again, and again. Encourage every voter you know who cares about how public money is spent, who cares about public education and who cares about separation of church and state.

Doing nothing is not an option.

My open letter to @campbell_brown

Dear Campbell,

I hear you have filed another lawsuit seeking to do away with seniority rights for teachers. You've already got a suit going in New York, and your case in Minnesota was thrown out, and now you're coming after us in New Jersey. 

Why?

Are you aware that Gov. Christie signed a bipartisan tenure reform law that puts the responsibility of helping underperforming teachers squarely on the shoulders of administrators? Do you know that attaining tenure in New Jersey now takes four years instead of three? That there is a definite process and timeline that must be followed? That the evaluation process is now far more detailed and rigorous than before? So, exactly what do you hope to attain with your lawsuit? 

If you're trying to get rid of veteran educators, you're doing a good job. The power and money (and the influence they buy) behind the education 'reform' movement have seen to it that more veteran educators are leaving the profession now than ever before because it's becoming almost impossible to effectively do our jobs. And in urban districts—the very same ones you and your lawsuit avatars claim to want to 'fix'—new teachers are fleeing the profession within the first five years. 

As far back as 2003, education experts were sounding the alarm bells about the increasing teacher shortage. It has only gotten worse, and efforts such as yours, and the education 'reform' movement in general, have only added to the brain drain.

It continues to amaze me that those who seek to improve my profession and student achievement, but who lack any real knowledge of my day-to-day classroom existence, simply refuse to acknowledge the scholarly and vetted research showing the real causes of student and school underachievement, and best practices to help them succeed. Instead, you construct your agenda based on the fast food model: cheap, fast, loaded with unhealthy CCRAP (read it backwards) delivered by underpaid employees while the corporations selling this swill rake in billions.

But then, this does seem to be the American way, doesn't it? 

The education 'reform' movement's refusal to accept the facts and research puts you in the same category as climate deniers and birthers. 

And speaking of facts, here are a few from  a 2014 New York Daily News article authored by Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean of the UC Irvine School of Law, with additional research by Raymond Pryke, Professor of First Amendment Law at the university. They analyzed the case made by the Vergara plaitiffs' attorneys. Chemerinsky writes (all emphasis mine):

American public education desperately needs to be improved, especially for the most disadvantaged children. But eliminating teachers’ job security and due-process rights is not going to attract better educators — or do much to improve school quality.

In recent months, several respected progressive scholars and politicians have endorsed litigation, like a successful case in California, to weaken the protections afforded public school teachers. Former CNN anchor Campbell Brown is spearheading a suit in New York. Their goals are laudable, but their means are misguided.

The problem of inner-city schools is not that the dedicated teachers who work in them have too many rights, but that the students who go to them are disadvantaged in many ways, the schools have inadequate resources and the schools are surrounded by communities that are dangerous, lack essential services and are largely segregated both by race and class.

Taking the modest job security accorded by tenure away from teachers will address none of these problems.

The causal relationship alleged by the plaintiffs in these lawsuits — that teachers’ rights cause minority students to receive substandard educations — is belied by readily available empirical evidence.

If the plaintiffs were correct, similarly situated students in states with weak protection of teachers — such as Texas, Alabama and Mississippi — would have higher levels of achievement and the racial achievement gap would be smaller in those states. But there is no evidence that minority students in Houston, Birmingham or Jackson outperform those in Los Angeles or New York.

In fact, a study published in the Harvard Educational Review found a significant positive relationship between rates of unionization (and accompanying job security) and student scores on the SAT and ACT.

Every year, the states with the highest student performance are those with robust protections for teachers — places like Maryland and Massachusetts.

(... and, may I add, New Jersey) 

One of the key reasons they are successful is that these states do a better job at getting resources to the neediest students and creating a climate where teachers have the support needed to succeed and therefore stay in the profession.

Similarly, though there are some outstanding charter schools where teachers lack union protections, the lack of union protections never guarantees quality. New York State has plenty of schools where principals can hire and fire teachers at will. Many do not excel.

In the California anti-tenure litigation, the judge found that between 1% and 3% of teachers in the state are grossly ineffective. They, of course, should be replaced. But the evidence also showed that it is possible to do so while respecting basic protections teachers have under law.

The reality is that job security and protection against arbitrary treatment are terms and conditions of employment that, like higher wages, attract good people into teaching and keep them in the classroom.

And if that is our objective, it should be noted that teachers in the United States work more hours and are paid less than their counterparts in almost every other developed country — and their salaries have fallen dramatically relative to pay for comparable jobs in our economy since 1940...

We need to find better ways to attract talented people to become teachers. Every study, and common sense, supports the conclusion that teacher effectiveness improves with experience. I hope and believe that I am a far better teacher than when I began as a law professor 35 years ago. Thus, the lawsuits’ attack on consideration of seniority in assignments and layoffs is misguided.

One of the biggest challenges in education today is teacher retention... Getting rid of tenure and due process will not encourage more teachers to stay in the profession. It will drive them out and discourage other qualified people from entering the profession in the first place...

Cloaking the attack on teachers’ rights in the rhetoric of the civil rights movement is misleading. Lessening the legal protections for teachers will not advance civil rights or improve education.

So, the research (and this piece is only one in a large body of evidence) says that your lawsuits hurt—not strengthen—the teaching profession. And if teachers are hurting, how can they effectively teach? So, again I ask, What is your point? Other than trying to break the unions, what exactly are you trying to accomplish? The only thing you are doing is sucking the life out of us and driving highly qualified people from the profession—and that hurts students. 

Public school teacher Susan DuFresne sums up the crush of corporate 'reform':

What corporate reform is asking of teachers today is impossible for one human being to accomplish – even in a 24 hour period. With the start of each day at 5:30 am... I carry the burdens of exhaustion, the unfinished workload, the guilt of what reform does to young children... and the build-up of prior weeks of stress. 

I am not alone.  Other teachers in my district are ready to quit. At one school in my district 11 out of 14 teachers said they have thought about quitting – leaving their profession.  Our local union president notes we are at our tipping point. What will it be like when the uninhabitable death zone is the only place left in our public schools and all the creative passionate teachers have gone? 

In addition, our paychecks have shrunk. We're doing more test prep and data collection than actual teaching. We are held accountable for all the ills of society that plague our students. We are vilified in the press. Our pensions are disappearing. Heck, even our 403(b) plans suck. Enrollment in schools of education is down nationwide in part because young people simply don't want to go into a profession where they are attacked on an almost daily basis. There is absolutely nothing attractive about the teaching profession right now, and you want to make it worse—and that is supposed to somehow magically make it... better. 

Look, no one wants to work with an ineffective colleague. But whose fault is it that an ineffective teacher has been allowed to languish in the classroom for years? Not the teacher. The responsibility rests solely with the administrators. And yet, other than New Jersey's new tenure law, I have not seen one 'reform' that addresses administrators who turn a blind eye to ineffective teaching. 

If you win your case (and this is your case—not the avatar plaintiffs'), do you know what will happen to all the highly effective teachers who have 15, 20, 30 years of experience who lose their job? They will either never teach again or, if they do, they will have to take a drastic pay cut because, when push comes to shove, school districts simply can no longer afford to hire experienced, veteran educators. And that is a damned shame. But the blame for that rests squarely on the shoulders of the education 'reform' movement of which you are a large part, because your movement's efforts have resulted in billions of dollars being cut from public education all across this country. 

Don't believe me? Consider this scenario:

Teacher A has 25 years experience and a masters degree. During that time she has received outstanding observations and been considered an excellent teacher. Last year her summative score was 3.70—highly effective. She is at the top of the salary guide earning about $80,000.

Teacher B has 4 years experience. During that time she too has received outstanding observations for her excellent work. Last year her summative score was 3.72, also highly effective. She is toward the bottom of the salary guide earning about $48,000.

Due to a charter school opening in town, the district has to send 90% of its per pupil funding over to it with every student who enrolls, so the district is forced to lay off staff to fill the hole in the budget. 

If seniority rights are removed, Teacher A will lose her job. And she will never work again because no district can afford to hire her. If she were to be offered a job, it would be at a drastically reduced salary. This would be financially devastating—not to mention demoralizing.

If seniority rights are in place, the district would lay off Teacher B, who would have no trouble securing another job because because of her effectiveness and comparatively lower salary. She's a good investment for another district and has decades to earn more money.

Are you prepared for this? Do you even care that your actions could result in many excellent, veteran teachers losing even more take home pay than they already have? Have you thought about how effective a school with little to no teaching experience can truly be? Have you considered that all the 'innovation' you all love to demand from us first requires experience in what works and what doesn't? And that experience takes years to acquire? 

Teaching—the most important profession there is—is the only profession nowadays where experience doesn't matter.

And how do you justify nepotism and discrimination as educational best practices? I mean, they will no doubt play a huge role in many hiring and firing decisions if seniority is removed. I'm very serious. How will you combat that?

My guess is you won't because you seem to only care about ridding our schools of all those 'bad teachers'. Well, no teacher wants to work with an ineffective colleague. But, there are procedures for improving or removing them, and here in New Jersey that process has been greatly strengthened. But it's up to the administrators to make that happen. Teachers don't work in a vacuum.

Despite some of the snark in this letter, I truly, seriously welcome a response. After being beaten up by the press, elected officials, billionaires and education 'reformers' for the past six or seven years, I've grown weary of being polite to people who simply have no knowledge of what I do, how I do it and what my students are going through. 

The great irony of the education 'reform' movement is that, in your zealous demand for data, you refuse to acknowledge the data that is staring you right in the face: it's the poverty.