Federation Focus/The Central Region: Central Region states concerned with funding, student achievement
Minnesota
01/09—The Minnesota legislature will have to deal with a projected deficit of $2 billion when it convenes in January, which means local districts probably will have to trim their budgets, says Bob Meeks, executive director of the Minnesota School Boards Association (MSBA).
“It’s discouraging,” adds Kirk Schneidawind, associate director of governmental relations. “We’ve been facing budget deficits three of the past four biennial budget cycles. Unfortunately, we’re getting used it.”
MSBA is “bracing for more bad news when local school boards start looking at their budgets,” Schneidawind says. Most districts already have negotiated salary and benefit agreements. If they want to ask voters to support tax increases, they will have to wait until November 2009. He expects some districts will increase class sizes, cut programs, or even go into operating debt.
Fortunately, he says, “legislators believe K-12 funding is a priority, so cuts in education funding are politically off the table.” Instead, he expects education will be level-funded. “But we’d rather be talking about an increase.”
MSBA will ask state lawmakers to consider $2.5 billion in new revenue to cover inflation and reforms in the state financing system.
MSBA has joined with other state education groups to promote the “New Minnesota Miracle,” which would set the basic per-pupil formula high enough to cover districts’ basic instructional needs.
It also would fully fund the state’s share of special education costs, make the school property tax system more equitable, provide additional funding to districts that serve poor students and English language learners, and establish other reforms.
Illinois
State standards and assessments are among the major issues of concern to the Illinois Association of School Boards (IASB).
“Our standards have been suspect” since they were developed in 1985, reports IASB Executive Director Michael D. Johnson.
For example, he notes that the reading standards were initially developed by the Illinois Reading Council, a well-respected group. But the state board sought additional input and incorporated recommendations from about 30 interest groups, and the reading council ultimately disavowed the standards. The science standards went through a similar process.
An outside group hired by the state board to evaluate the standards predicted that test scores of elementary students would rise and scores of older students would decline. “That’s exactly what happened,” Johnson says.
It got worse after No Child Left Behind was passed, he says, when schools started teaching to the test. Many schools didn’t even teach the regular curriculum until the last few weeks of the year after the testing was completed.
Meanwhile, the state has been plagued with test scoring problems, including delays in reporting results and constantly changing cut scores. According to Johnson, the state board first decides what percentage of students should pass a test and then determines what score it takes to pass. As a result, he says the cut scores change from year to year depending on who is in charge and that person’s political motivation.
With performance goals continuing to be ratcheted up in Illinois (and other states) in an attempt to meet the NCLB goal of 100 percent proficiency by 2014, a growing number of schools and districts are falling short of their adequate yearly progress (AYP) goals.
Under the Illinois state board’s initial calculations, 80 to 90 percent of Illinois districts failed to make AYP in 2007-08. After the state adjusted its calculations, about a third of the state’s districts are falling short of their AYP goals.
A major factor in the low passage rate is the state board’s decision to prohibit districts from using a test for English language learners (ELLs) that assesses students’ acquisition of English language skills, Johnson says. During the past year, districts had to give ELLs the same test, in English, as everyone else, even if they had just started learning English.
IASB has been urging the state board to provide a test translated into students’ home languages or provide translators or interpreters to test-takers. “The state board has been unwilling to do that,” Johnson says, although state officials promised to look into providing translations for the 10 most common languages. But, he notes, more than 87 different languages are spoken by students in Illinois public schools.
Iowa
The Iowa Association of School Boards is in the process of scaling up the Lighthouse project.
The project, an initiative of IASB and the Iowa School Boards Foundation, has demonstrated what school boards can do to raise student achievement. During the first phase, in 1998-2000, researchers found boards in high-achieving districts had significantly different knowledge, beliefs, and actions than boards in lower-performing districts.
During the second phase of the project, 2002-07, IASB provided information and training to five Iowa school boards to help them implement the findings of the original Lighthouse research so the boards could provide leadership aimed at improving academic performance.
The training was aimed at creating conditions shown to have a positive impact on student achievement, such as creating a sense of urgency, developing a districtwide focus on improvement, monitoring progress, and developing a leadership continuum.
Preliminary findings indicate that four of the sites showed significant improvement in reading and/or math for at least two grade levels. One district made gains in reading comprehension at every grade level.
The third phase, now under way, is aimed at identifying and implementing best practices on a larger scale and includes nine state schools boards associations. The IASB Lighthouse team is working with 20 school boards and hopes to add 15 more by the end of the year, says Associate Executive Director Lisa Bartusek.
“School boards matter,” a Lighthouse report states. “Without effective school board leadership, systemic change becomes impossible and improvement of student achievement will remain episodic, with only ‘pockets of excellence’ sprinkled through public schools and school districts.” Highly effective leadership teams that understand and carry out their roles effectively “can build districtwide capacity to ensure every student succeeds.”
Michigan
The high cost of employee health insurance is leading to conflicts between school districts and teacher unions in Michigan, reports Jennifer Rogers, director of public relations and communications at the Michigan Association of School Boards (MASB).
The Michigan Education Association offers a good, but costly, health insurance program, and districts facing budget cuts have been asking for concessions, such as employee co-pay provisions in contracts that don’t have them or higher co-pays, Rogers says.
That has led local teacher unions to threaten illegal strikes or school board member recalls.
Public employees are not allowed to strike in Michigan. When teachers in the Wayne-Westland School District staged an illegal strike in October, they gained community sympathy by claiming their major concern was class size, when, in fact, the real issue was health care, Rogers says.
A judge ordered the teachers back to work after four days but didn’t impose a penalty on the union. That set a precedent that could encourage illegal strikes in other districts, Rogers says.
Seeking a court order to stop an illegal strike or impose fines on striking employees places huge financial burdens on school districts, while teacher unions maintain a reserve of funds to support striking teachers.
Noting that the Wayne-Westland teacher contract had just expired, MASB Executive Director Kathy Hayes says, “The collective bargaining process needs to be given adequate time so both parties can negotiate a mutually agreeable contact. An illegal strike doesn’t allow this process to work.”
“Union tactics are getting out of control,” Rogers adds, noting that the Grand Rapids teacher union demanded control over most of the district’s general operating budget. Before negotiations even started, the union sent a letter to substitute teachers urging them not to work if the teachers go on strike.
And in November, during a conflict over pay and health care in the Redford Union School District, 26 teachers at a middle school called in sick on the same day, forcing the cancellation of classes for 900 students.
MASB offers school districts training in labor relations and represents districts at the bargaining table.
Reproduced with permission from
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