Should state be allowed to take over chronically failing schools?
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Should state be allowed to take over chronically failing schools?
Georgia voters are being asked to approve a new and controversial way to improve public education. The proposal would empower the state to take over chronically failing schools or convert them to...
Georgia voters are being asked to approve a new and controversial way to improve public education. The proposal would empower the state to take over chronically failing schools or convert them to charters or even close them.
It’s called Amendment 1 on the Nov. 8 ballot, and it’s called the Opportunity School District in the legislation that authorized it. The Georgia General Assembly passed Senate Bill 133 during this year’s session with the required two-thirds majority in both chambers. The referendum now needs a simple majority from voters to become law.
Then it asks voters this question:
“Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended to allow the state to intervene in chronically failing public schools in order to improve student performance?”
Gov. Nathan Deal’s OSD proposal, based on similar initiatives in Louisiana and Tennessee, would allow Georgia’s governor to appoint an OSD superintendent, separate from the Georgia Department of Education superintendent, who is elected by voters. The OSD superintendent could take over as many as 20 eligible schools each year and control no more than 100 such schools at any time. The OSD superintendent could waive Georgia Board of Education rules, reorganize or fire staff and change school budgets and curriculum. The state also could convert OSD schools to nonprofit or for-profit charter schools or close them if they don’t have full enrollment.
The state would use the College and Career Ready Performance Index to determine which schools are eligible for takeover. Schools that score below 60 on the 100-point CCRPI for three straight years could be included in the OSD. Those schools would stay in the OSD for no less than five years (or, if they are an OSD charter school, for the length of the initial charter’s term) and no more than 10 years before returning to local control. Opportunity Schools could be removed from the OSD whenever they are graded above an F in the state’s accountability system for three straight years.
Muscogee County had 10 of the 141 schools on the state’s original list of chronically failing schools released last year. Georgetown and Rigdon Road elementary schools, however, improved enough with other schools in the state on the 2015 CCRPI to move off the list. That leaves 127 schools in Georgia and these eight in Muscogee on the current list: Baker Middle School and Davis, Dawson, Forrest Road, Fox, Lonnie Jackson, Martin Luther King Jr. and South Columbus elementary schools.
The case for Yes
OSD proponents cite the number of chronically failing schools as the most obvious reason to try something drastically new. They also note the reduction in the number of chronically failing schools since the threat of state takeover became possible after Senate Bill 133 passed.
Deal says on his proposal’s website, “While Georgia boasts many schools that achieve academic excellence every year, we still have too many schools where students have little hope of attaining the skills they need to succeed in the workforce or in higher education. We have a moral duty to do everything we can to help these children. Failing schools keep the cycle of poverty spinning from one generation to the next. Education provides the only chance for breaking that cycle. When we talk about helping failing schools, we’re talking about rescuing children. I stand firm on the principle that every child can learn, and I stand equally firm in the belief that the status quo isn’t working.”
Alyssa Botts, spokewoman for the pro-Amendment 1 campaign committee Opportunity for All Georgia Students noted, “The graduation rate for students attending failing schools is an abysmal 55.7 percent,” compared to the most recent statewide figure of 78.8 percent in the class of 2015.
“A school that fails to properly educate its students perpetuates cycles of poverty and increases the likelihood of incarceration,” Botts said in an email to the Ledger-Enquirer. “For many students, educational opportunities provide the best chance to break out of these cycles. … Voting ‘yes’ for the Opportunity School District amendment is a vote to ensure that future generations of Georgians will have the best opportunities available. No child in Georgia should be forced by law to attend a failing school.”
The governor-appointed Georgia Board of Education and the Georgia Chamber of Commerce have endorsed the OSD referendum.
Michael O’Sullivan, executive director of the Georgia Campaign for Achievement Now, part of the 50-state CAN nonprofit organization advocating “a high-quality education for all kids, regardless of their address,” has successfully fought a similar political battle, helping to convince voters to approve the 2012 Georgia charter school amendment. And the OSD is the next logical step, he figures.
“What this has done is create a sense of urgency for districts to act,” O’Sullivan said in an interview with the Ledger-Enquirer. “Voters should be asking what’s being done now? What plans are in place to improve our schools? That’s the ultimate goal. How can we ensure that every student in the state has access to quality education? Right now, 68,000 students attend a school that has failed at least three years or more.”
The opposition is based on being “afraid of loss of control,” O’Sullivan said. “… It’s my hope that opponents would be putting as much effort into fixing their schools so they aren’t eligible for the OSD. I can tell you which option will be best for schools.”
O’Sullivan emphasized that state takeover is only one option for intervention in the OSD.
“There is the ability for the state to assist schools that are failing for one year or two years, and then, after three years, there is a multiple intervention model,” he said. “One is a joint governance structure, with the OSD and the local school district working together to turn around the school.”
Addressing concerns that OSD schools would receive less funding, O’Sullivan said, “Whatever amount that would have been dedicated to that school remains in that school.”
Louisiana enacted the Recovery School District in 2003. The RSD comprises 62 autonomous charter schools in Orleans, East Baton Rouge and Caddo parishes with a total enrollment of more than 32,000 students, according to the RSD’s 2015 annual report. The percentage of RSD schools considered to be failing has been reduced from 44 percent in 2011 to 19 percent in 2015, the report says.
According to the RSD’s 2014 annual report, the percentage of students performing at the basic level or above increased 29 percentage points from 2008 to 2014, while the state average increased 9 percentage points.
In New Orleans, 63 percent of the public school students are in the RSD. According to a June 2015 study by Patrick Sims and Vincent Rossmeier of the Cowen Institute for Public Education Initiatives at Tulane University, “the percentage of (New Orleans) students at the basic level or above has increased 15 percentage points over the past six years. That growth has largely come from the RSD, which has improved by 20 percentage points.”
In Tennessee, as of the 2015-16 school, there were 29 schools in the Achievement School District, enacted in 2010 with the goal of moving the state’s bottom 5 percent of school into the top 25 percent of student achievement. The ASD has made progress, according to its July 2015 report.
“Over a three-year period, ASD students have earned double-digit gains in math and science proficiency and have grown faster than their state peers,” the report says.
The ASD reading scores, however, declined along with the state average.
“We know from national research and our own experience that reading growth tends to lag behind other subjects in a school turnaround setting,” Malika Anderson, then the ASD deputy superintendent and now its superintendent, says in the report.
The case for No
Georgia Federation of Teachers president Verdaillia Turner, a retired Atlanta educator, has seen the statistics that indicate state takeovers improved student achievement, but her organization touts evidence that argues otherwise.
The federation says in its campaign literature that the Southern Poverty Law Center filed a lawsuit against the state-created school district in New Orleans on behalf of 4,500 students for denying appropriate services. A July 2015 SPLC fact sheet notes that, while an average of 19.4 percent of students with disabilities graduated high school in Louisiana, only 6.8 percent of them graduated in the Recovery School District.
A February 2016 report titled “State Takeovers of Low-Performing Schools: A Record of Academic Failure, Financial Mismanagement and Student Harm” from the Center for Popular Democracy, a liberal-leaning nonprofit advocacy group, found that state takeovers of schools in Louisiana, Michigan and Tennessee produced:
▪ “Negligible improvement — or even dramatic setbacks — in their educational performance.”
▪ “A breeding ground for fraud and mismanagement at the public’s expense.”
▪ “High turnover and instability” among staff, “creating a disrupted learning environment for children.”
▪ “Harsh disciplinary measures and discriminatory practices” for students of color and those with special needs.
Turner fears too much of the motivation for the OSD proposal is about creating profit opportunities in public schools for private charter school companies.
“The bottom line here is that this is a new business at the public’s expense,” Turner said in an interview with the Ledger-Enquirer. “The only thing public about these schools is our tax dollars.”
The federation notes the OSD may retain 3 percent of state funds for administrative operations, reducing the amount of money available for instruction.
“I love my state, and I respect the office of the governor and all of government,” Turner said. “However, this is still a democracy, and we believe that educators and the public need not be misled by what’s about to happen.”
That includes the OSD superintendent’s authority to “get rid of people at will” at any OSD school, Turner said. “The law says, the last line in Senate Bill 133 says, all laws in conflict with this act are repealed.”
Turner noted the state’s standardized testing system has changed the past five consecutive years. “Therefore, we know it’s not reliable,” she said.
In many chronically failing schools, Turner said, “children end up going to jail. But in many of these same schools, children go to Yale. So we need to have a real conversation about what makes schools work.”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has reported that a political group called the Committee to Keep Georgia Schools Local has a TV ad campaign opposing the OSD referendum. The group includes the Georgia Association of Educators, Georgia AFL-CIO, the Professional Association of Georgia Educators, Georgia Stand-Up, the Coalition for the People’s Agenda, Public Education Matters, Southern Education Foundation, Working America, Pro Georgia, Better Georgia, Georgia Federation of Teachers and Concerned Black Clergy of Metro Atlanta, according to the AJC.
The Georgia School Boards Association’s board of directors voted to oppose the amendment. School boards representing the counties of Bibb, Chatham, Cherokee, Clayton, Fayette, Henry, Richmond and Troup have expressed opposition.
The Muscogee County School Board was scheduled to join them last month, but the proposed resolution was deleted from the agenda between the Sept. 12 work session and the Sept. 20 meeting. Neither superintendent David Lewis nor board chairman Rob Varner has responded to the Ledger-Enquirer’s requests for an explanation.
Responding on their behalf, MCSD communications director Valerie Fuller also didn’t explain the sudden change in thinking, who proposed the resolution, who rescinded it and why. Here is her statement in an email to the Ledger-Enquirer:
“The Muscogee County School District is a public school system, which is supported by taxpayer money. All of our stakeholders (taxpayers, students, parents, teachers administrators and staff) have different opinions on this proposal. Although we believe, and the results indicate, that we are making progress with our challenged schools, to take a side could anger supporters, who might say the BOE is opposed to helping ‘failing’ schools.
“We don’t think it would be wise for a publicly elected body to pass a resolution in opposition of this amendment that might result in controversy, causing unnecessary distractions from the work being done on behalf of these schools. Because this could result in a change to Georgia’s Constitution, we do believe it is important for voters to read and be fully informed about the amendment and its implications.”
In a letter Tuesday to school district superintendents and Regional Education Service Agency directors, Georgia Department of Education deputy superintendent for external affairs and policy Garry McGiboney reminded public school officials that the Georgia Office of the Attorney General advised the GaDOE in 2012, “Local school boards do not have the legal authority to expend funds or other resources to advocate or oppose the ratification of a constitutional amendment by the voters.”
Regardless of whether the proposed OSD is good for Georgia, the referendum’s wording doesn’t accurately explain it, some folks insist. The Georgia PTA called it “deceptive.”
“If the governor and state legislators believe the best way to fix struggling schools is to put them under state control and either close them or turn them over to charter schools, then let the language on the ballot reflect this initiative,” Georgia PTA president Lisa-Marie Haygood said in a news release. “As it stands, the preamble, and indeed, the entire amendment question, is intentionally misleading and disguises the true intentions of the OSD legislation.”
To that end, a class-action lawsuit was filed Sept. 27 against the governor, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle and Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp. The three lead plaintiffs, all from metro Atlanta — parent Kimberly Brooks, First Iconium Baptist Church senior pastor Timothy McDonald III and Coweta County teacher Melissa Ladd — allege in the complaint that the wording is “so misleading and deceptive that it violates the due process and voting rights of all Georgia voters.”
Gerry Weber, an Atlanta lawyer representing the three lead plaintiffs, told the Ledger-Enquirer in an interview the Georgia Supreme Court ruled about 10 years ago that a challenge to the wording of ballot measures must be decided after the vote because the lawsuit would be moot if the proposal fails.
The Ledger-Enquirer asked Deal spokeswoman Jen Talaber Ryan for the governor’s response to the allegation about the referendum’s wording. Ryan replied in an email, “The opposition didn’t attend the publicly announced constitutional amendment meeting where the language was discussed and approved. Why don’t you ask them why? And the preamble and question say exactly what the OSD will do — provide a lifeline for children forced by law to attend a failing school. The only thing misleading here is the fact that national, outside special interest groups are spending money instead of local groups. After all, their go to line is about ‘local control.’ Hypocritical, don’t you think?”
Keep Georgia Schools Local campaign manager Louis Elrod told the Ledger-Enquirer in an email from media relations manager Michelle Davis, “It’s unbelievable that pro-school takeover advocates would make this charge. They are grasping at straws because they’re desperate and losing this fight.
“They know full well that many members of our bipartisan coalition of parents, teachers and public school advocates actively petitioned for changes to both the amendment and the ballot question at multiple hearings. The even more deceptive preamble language was drafted at a separate meeting in Deal’s office. Janet Kishbaugh of Public Education Matters Georgia says she and other opponents called and searched online daily to find an announcement of this meeting. It was later revealed that the preamble was written in Deal’s office in a meeting attended only by the three men who drafted the words.
“The pro-takeover campaign’s political maneuvering just confirms what we know about their intentions — this amendment is designed to silence parents and strip away local control.”
Do your homework and vote
The Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education has taken a neutral position on the OSD referendum, but the partnership’s president, Steve Dolinger, is advocating this:
“The important thing is Georgia voters do their own homework on this issue and make their decision based on solid research and fact-finding, not emotion,” Dolinger, who was superintendent of Fulton County Schools (1995-2002), said in an email to the Ledger-Enquirer from Bill Maddox, the partnership’s communications director. “Both sides make compelling arguments, but it should always come down to what the voter feels is right for the children of our state.”
BY MARK RICE
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Fed's Williams vows more transparency after meeting with Fed Up
San Francisco Fed President John Williams has promised more transparency after a rare meeting with a coalition of community and labor groups which also urged the U.S. central banker to keep...
San Francisco Fed President John Williams has promised more transparency after a rare meeting with a coalition of community and labor groups which also urged the U.S. central banker to keep interest rates low.
Williams largely dismissed their call to hold off on interest-rate hikes, repeating his mantra that monetary policy will depend on economic data. But he said the meeting earlier this week pushed him to "think a little more proactively" about how the Fed recruits and promotes top management.
"I want the Fed to be more transparent," Williams said in an interview. "We've learned along the way that this process of selecting presidents and other aspects of the Fed are not that clear to the public. We should make it more open."
While the San Francisco Fed is not searching for a president or first vice-president, "we want to make sure not only are we doing it right, but also in the future maybe to move the ball forward even further," he said.
He noted that the Minneapolis Fed's openness about its ongoing presidential search is one example to learn from.
The Fed's perceived opaqueness has drawn increasing fire in recent months, with Fed Chair Janet Yellen in testimony this week standing her ground against Congressional efforts to subject the Fed to more oversight. Regional Fed banks' executive searches are also under scrutiny for apparent insularity.
Williams said the meeting also reminded him that despite strengthening overall economic growth, there are "a significant number of people who are left behind and struggling."
One example is Ebony Isler, who ran a hairdressing business until recession-hit clients could not afford her services.
Now, as a part-time cashier at the San Francisco Giants' downtown ballpark, she relies on high-interest loans to bridge her paydays.
"I can't find a job that pays me enough to be self-sufficient," Isler said in an interview after she and a dozen other members of the non-profit group Fed Up met with Williams on Monday.
The group, which first grabbed national attention last summer when it crashed the Kansas City Fed's annual central bankers' meeting in Jackson Hole Wyoming, presented Williams a report arguing that as long as inflation and wage growth remains dull, the Fed should keep rates near zero. (/news/mind-gap-how-federal-reserve-can-help-raise-wages-america-s-women-and-men)
Williams regularly meets with bankers and chief executives.
Meeting with activists, he said, "helps you to think concretely about why are people out of the labor force, what are the problems they are facing."
The group has also sat down with Yellen, Kansas City Fed President Esther George and Boston Fed chief Eric Rosengren.
Source: CNBC
Housing advocates accuse Wells Fargo of damaging communities through foreclosures
89.3KPCC - March 13, 2013 - Wells Fargo writes the most mortgages in California. According to a ...
89.3KPCC - March 13, 2013 - Wells Fargo writes the most mortgages in California. According to a new report released Tuesday from a consortium of grassroots activists and housing advocates, 11,616 of those loans are currently in foreclosure, out of roughly 65,000 homes in foreclosure in the state.
The report accuses Wells Fargo of damaging both California communities and the state’s overall economy. It was produced by the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, the Center for Popular Democracy, and the Home Defenders League.
Ross Rhodes of the Alliance of Californians for Community Development said on a conference call Tuesday that Wells Fargo was singled out because the bank is "responsible for handling more delinquent loans than any other servicer."
He added that Wells Fargo is failing to live up to the terms of last year's mortgage settlement between the states and the country's biggest banks. Rhodes said that Wells is lagging behind both Bank of America and Chase in efforts to keep people in their homes.
In a statement, Wells Fargo said that its foreclosure rate in California is lower than its rate in the nation as a whole and that the report "appears to be an attempt to question Wells Fargo’s longstanding track record as a fair and responsible lender and servicer."
The bank emerged from the financial crisis relatively unscathed. But in recent years it has been called to task for past lending practices. It was was fined $175 million by the Justice Department in 2012 for steering minorities into costly subprime loans before the housing crisis.
The bank was also fined $148 million by the Securities and Exchange Commission for violations perpetrated by Wachovia Securities (Wells took control of Wachovia in 2008, at the height of crisis, when major U.S. banks were failing).
The report also argues that Wells Fargo’s foreclosures in the state are disproportionately affecting African American and Latino neighborhoods and could wind up costing the state $20 million in lost tax revenue.
The authors say that the solution is “principal reduction” — adjusting mortgages to reflect the reduced market value of homes in foreclosure.
Numerous economists support the idea of principal reduction, but the notion has been resisted at the federal level, most notably by Edward DeMarco, acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, which has overseen mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac since they were taken into receivership during the financial crisis.
DeMarco has supported principal forbearance, a method that would not reduce the amount of mortgages held by Fannie and Freddie but rather restructure them so that homeowners could see more affordable payments.
The report's consortium of advocates doesn't favor forbearance, arguing that it can't address the core issue of borrowers drowing in debt.
But as tempting as principal reduction might be in theory, in practice is doesn't always lead to the homeowner staying in the home.
Economist Stuart Gabriel is Director of the Ziman Center for Real Estate at UCLA. He said that principal reduction isn't a "cure all."
"For borrowers that are deeply underwater, a modest amount of principal reduction is going to make no difference the ultimate outcome, which would be default and foreclosure," Gabriel said.
In its statement, Wells Fargo called its principal reduction efforts since 2009 "aggressive." But the advocacy groups said that Wells Fargo is one of the most difficult banks to work with, and that it engages in "dual tracking" — undertaking loan modifications at the same time it moves forward with the foreclosure process.
The report also recommends that Wells Fargo disclose more data about its foreclosures, and specifically about the impact that foreclosures are having on minority neighborhoods in California.
Gabriel said that more transparency about lending practices and the racial and geographical makeup of loan portfolios is always a good thing because additional information improves markets.
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Groups demand recovery money for Puerto Rico
The Center for Popular Democracy and Make the Road CT plan to deliver postcards at the Bridgeport office of U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, D-4, demanding Congress "have a heart" and send an aid package to...
The Center for Popular Democracy and Make the Road CT plan to deliver postcards at the Bridgeport office of U.S. Rep. Jim Himes, D-4, demanding Congress "have a heart" and send an aid package to Puerto Rico with no additional oversight or austerity measures.
"The efforts also preview a larger mobilization on the 6-month anniversary of Hurricane Maria, when hundreds of activists from across the country will travel to Washington, D.C. to demand a comprehensive aid package for Puerto Rico that does not impose more austerity, oversight or privatization," said Julio López Varona, a spokesman for the group.
Read the full article here.
Arrests Made At Protest Outside UES Home Of JPMorgan Chase Exec
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Arrests Made At Protest Outside UES Home Of JPMorgan Chase Exec
Hundreds of people picketed outside of 1185 Park Ave. around 8 a.m. to deliver more than 100,000 petition signatures demanding that JPMorgan Chase stop financing immigrant detention centers and...
Hundreds of people picketed outside of 1185 Park Ave. around 8 a.m. to deliver more than 100,000 petition signatures demanding that JPMorgan Chase stop financing immigrant detention centers and private prisons, protest organizers said. The demonstration was organized by groups such as Make the Road New York, New York Communities for Change and the Center for Popular Democracy.
Read the full article here.
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