Intercepts

Hello again, everyone. Mike here, signing in from Buenos Aires, where one gets -- as you might expect -- a completely different picture of the Falklands War.

Introspection and reexamination of the war does not seem to be common in Argentina, although obviously my own capacity for examining Argentine academia on the subject is extremely limited. By any objective measure, the invasion of the Falklands on April 2, 1982, was a cynical attempt by a floundering junta to distract the Argentine people from severe economic difficulties. And for a couple of months, it worked. Recapturing the Malvinas, as the Falklands are called here, was extremely popular. So everything was great until the Royal Marines showed up.

Once the Argentines were ejected and returned home without the millions of dollars of equipment and arms they brought to the islands, things changed rather rapidly. The junta was ousted, democratic government was eventually restored, and although the military still is an important political player, Argentina is certainly much better off having lost the Falklands War than if the junta had been victorious.

The war is a source of national pride, despite its origins, and it is clear even after spending only a short time in Argentina that the Malvinas is still very much a national issue (how much it concerns the average citizen, of course, is another question entirely). Just yesterday, the Argentine government rejected a British offer to participate in a joint commemoration of the soldiers who fell in the war. The Argentine ambassador said the event was too much of a "victory celebration."

It was a strange set of circumstances that set the Falklands War in motion 25 years ago. And it's a strange set of circumstances that keeps the island's sovereignty as an international flashpoint even today. When I return home next week, I plan to put together a fairly extensive piece on the issue - with photos. I'll post it on my personal blog - http://www.mikeantonucci.com.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 10:59 | Permalink | Comments

By Dr. Homeslice

I’ve read two articles regarding of online charter schools. In Indiana, BSU recently approved the state's first two online charter schools. The teachers' union is fighting the decision.

On the same side of the fence but in a different corner lies the Home School Legal Defense Association. Beware of the Wisconsin Virtual Academy, they warn, it’ll turn you into a public school student!

Online charter schools are the worst kind out there-- they are the "crack cocaine" of charter schools.

Tell an urban high school student that they don't have to show up to school anymore, “Just log in for several hours a week, do some work and you’ll graduate on time” and you’ve got yourself a new customer!

“What's that? No computer? No problem! Just fill these out and we'll loan you a free one!”

When student logs in, they realize -gasp- that there's work to do, and now there's no teacher to explain it to them. They call the help line for the school, get put on hold, hang up and trade emails with their instructor but still don’t understand how to do it.

Meanwhile, the e-school is getting state money and showing their students' attendance as perfect just because they've logged in once. Eventually, those students end up dropping out of the virtual school and re-enroll in (you guessed it) the public school they left for the e-school. They bring with them no skills, no credits and we as teachers have to pick up the pieces.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 00:50 | Permalink | Comments

By J3

What would a good merit pay system for teachers look like?

What should be considered?

My suggestions, in no order of priority:

It should be:

1) simple and easily understood by the public and the teachers. Not like the arcane school grading system in Florida.

2) perceived to be fair.

3) actually fair.

4) fundamentally subjective. The unions will object that no merit pay system for teachers can be objective because the quality of teaching cannot be measured; and you cannot use student achievement because of varying student ability. These are red herrings. Most of us in the private sector work under one form or another of pay for performance – and we usually only have one evaluator, “The Boss.” It seems to work.

5) supported by a merit system for every higher level of administrator. Everyone from the teacher through all the administrators to the superintendent should be rewarded for the quality of their work. Principals will be less likely to reward favorites for poor performance if their own paycheck is affected.

6) open-ended. Rewards should not be based on pre-determined goals but on ranked performance so that there is no artificial upper limit.

7) rewarding of both absolute levels of measure and improvements in those levels. That way teachers in high achieving schools will be rewarded but those in low achieving schools with higher rates of improvement will also be rewarded.

8) inducing cooperation within schools and competition between schools.

9) intrinsically inducing higher levels of parental involvement.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 13:02 | Permalink | Comments

By Jim Hollingsworth

Tough Choices or Tough Times has gotten a lot of press. It proposes a who new educational program for the United States. My objections are many; there is too much federal government in the proposal, they include children as young as three, and there is tremendous loss of local control.

Their proposal sounds good in part: They are fairly accurate in defining the history of the problem. But their program is doomed to failure just like A Nation At Risk and other programs since.

Achievement levels have gone down since the day in which the teaching of phonics was abandoned. If children do not learn to read by the end of the third grade they become bored and a discipline problem. Not only that, they will require a lot of remediation to ever learn to read.

Look at it this way: If children do not learn to read, then a whole bunch of teachers will have to be hired to help them learn. Thus the NEA and other teacher organizations are not likely to support a program that would trim the need for more teachers.

If we really want to see our children improve we need to start in the first grade and insist that phonics be used as the only method of teaching reading. And it wouldn’t hurt if we went back to basic math as well.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 01:01 | Permalink | Comments

Thankfully, the weather cooperated and indeed it was a gorgeous, sunny day in Stanley, capital of the Falkland Islands. We visited some battlefield sites, talked to some locals about the war, and were able to get some sense of what it must have been like in April 1982, when Argentine forces invaded this sparsely inhabited island on the edge of the world.

The war seemed bizarre then, and still does today. The culture of the Falklands - well, let's just say it's as if someone had carved off a slice of Scotland and deposited it in the South Atlantic. You can't go 20 feet without spotting sheep, the entire island of East Falkland looks like a highland moor liberally sprinkled with craggy hills, and there are an inordinate number of pubs per capita. Whatever the relative merits of Argentina's territorial claims, the place is about as similar to Buenos Aires as a jig is to a tango.

I've collected a pretty good assortment of photos, notes and unique sources about the war, and I hope to put something useful together upon my return home.

The Islanders have already begun their commemoration of the war's 25th anniversary, but it bears noting that most of the British Army's veterans of the Falklands War won't make it for the anniversary of the liberation in June. They have to wait until November... when the weather starts to improve.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 13:09 | Permalink | Comments

By Birch Walker

Education industry insiders are the ultimate conservatives, and they are highly skilled at preserving the status quo. No insiders are better at this than the teachers’ unions. Every focus group word they use can be translated as “higher wages, better working conditions.” Here are some other rules for propping up the status quo that I’ve learned from listening to industry insiders:

1) Blame the student first, the parent second, the taxpayer third. This rule applies in all situations involving accountability. For example: The reason test scores go down between 4th- and 8th-grade in “hormones” (blame the student). Never mind that they also have hormones in schools where test scores go up.

2) Understaffed, underfunded, lack of suitable facilities. This is used in all situations in which an outsider suggests a change to the status quo. Example: We do not have enough teachers for smaller classes and without smaller classes we can’t do that.

3) Due to cost savings, we are able to fund that project. This is used in situations where outsiders were just told there was no funding, but insiders want to proceed with a project. Example: due to savings from energy efficiency program, our heating budget has just enough left for new furniture in the teachers’ lounge.

4) We need to involve the stakeholders in the decision-making process. This works like a charm when the industry wants to make something more expensive but otherwise stay the same. Example: After meeting with stakeholders, we determined that the program needs (fill in the blank) and we are allocating funding for (higher wages, better working conditions).

5) We need to leave that to the education professionals and focus on the big picture. The big picture means: Help get higher wages and better working conditions. Get the picture.

Changes in the status quo will not come from inside the industry. Is it a lost cause? Not if you involve an outsider.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 00:55 | Permalink | Comments

By Ted O’Neil

People – especially teachers – are always surprised when they learn that my children attend public school. Since I work at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, a free-market think tank that advocates school choice, they assume I have something against public education. Truth is, our public school system has generally met or exceeded expectations for our first-grader and fifth-grader.

Our town is home to the headquarters of Dow Chemical and Dow Corning, as well as a large, regional hospital and several other successful businesses. If we lived where I grew up, near Detroit, or where my wife grew up, in Fort Wayne, Indiana, it’s likely our children wouldn’t come within a mile of a public school. Midland, Michigan, where we reside now, is different. Many people here make good money. Either consciously or subconsciously, the schools have responded to a Smithesque invisible hand that, in this case, represents unspoken competition. Many families here could afford to pull their kids out of public school tomorrow and enroll them in one of several top-notch private or parochial schools or in the local public charter school. So the public schools work hard to keep their customers.

What’s really unfortunate is that too many families can only afford to send their children to their assigned school districts. Too often, these schools know – and take advantage of the fact – that they’ll never have to respond to competition of any kind.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 01:03 | Permalink | Comments

Hey everyone! Mike here. We're currently working our way through the Straits of Magellan. Still hoping to get to the Falklands on Saturday but the weather and sea conditions are iffy. It looks as though things are going along swimmingly here on the blog, so have fun and I'll see you (figuratively) when I get back.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 07:15 | Permalink | Comments

By Ryan Boots

While the teachers unions are hardly new to criticism, they've recently caught flak from some unlikely sources. Überliberal Eric Alterman recently took a swipe (:09 - "I don't like the teachers union, but I like every other union"), and really dropped the hammer here. Mickey Kaus then took the baton: "Why does the pro-teachers' union blog read like something a General Motors executive might have written in, say, 1985? Our cars are as good as any in the world! The critics all have evil motives!" And then, of course, it was all downhill from there.

If notable liberals like Alterman and Kaus are joining the chorus, I'd say it's a sign that the nation's biggest organized labor organizations are fast wearing out their welcome. But while I look to the day when union clout becomes good and humbled, this school choice supporter doesn't think an irrelevant union is necessarily a good thing. As this guest blogger during Mike's vacation last year pointed out, teachers need a safety net in our litigious society. And merely being a good teacher won't necessarily protect one from a heavy-handed administrator, as illustrated by the firing of a beloved English teacher from a charter school by the alleged union-busting school founder last June.

But the operative word is good teachers. One way the unions can start rehabilitating their image is to begin visibly and aggressively supporting policies that support good teachers, even if--especially if--those policies come at the expense of their incompetent colleagues. I'd really like to see the union embrace tenure reform, but if this post from Edwize is any indication ("tenure is a line in the sand for us"), that's out of the question.

So how about merit pay? In nearly every other sector of our society, rewarding superior job performance is a fact of life. Given recent experiences in Little Rock, where teachers agreed in advance to the compensation formula, merit pay could easily be pitched as a win-win for schools and teachers, especially if struggling students are seen as an opportunity rather than a burden. And we've seen the unrest that can result when, as in Houston, teachers had no input in the design of the program, so the union could easily portray itself--accurately--as a partner in improving the process.

Alterman himself said he's fed up watching the teachers' unions oppose common-sense reforms. If the unions want to improve their public standing--not to mention mend fences with people like Alterman, who should be their natural allies--embracing merit pay wouldn't be a bad way to go.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 00:57 | Permalink | Comments

By John Stallcup

From the early days of the United States, with minimum regulation, over 1,600 state-chartered, private banks issued paper money. These bank notes, with over 30,000 varieties of color and design, were easily counterfeited, causing widespread confusion and mistrust. With no common national currency there was no confidence in the value of any given dollar.

After nearly 100 years the anti-federal-control politicians finally threw in the towel. Teetering on the brink of bankruptcy and pressed to finance the Civil War, the 37th Congress authorized the U.S. Treasury to issue paper money and the U.S. finally got what it desperately needed: a common currency.

What makes any currency (or diploma) valuable? The perception and confidence in it based on the belief that its exchange value is at parity at the time of the exchange. Today, one $10 bill has the exchange value of any other $10 bill – not so for a high school diploma.

In the United States, the power to define what standards a student must meet or exit exam they must pass in order to receive a high school diploma has been the responsibility of the states. With few exceptions the states have failed miserably. Until we have specific national content standards and a national high school exit exam the high school diploma will continue to be a counterfeit currency and an outright shame.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 01:02 | Permalink | Comments

By Steve Schuck

In September 2005, James Duncan Davidson introduced the idea of “management by fiction.” His premise – businesses, corporations, and organizations many times plan their strategies on lies even when truth is available.

For example: “Who would have thought that the levees would break?” For decades, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers presented scenario after scenario that a catastrophe of Biblical proportions could occur. However, the fiction seemed to be that disasters on that scale only happened in Third World countries.

We in the school choice movement seem to have applied the principles of management by fiction to our strategies in hopes of moving the needle. We love to gather and speak of choice, graduation rates, test scores, low-income students, and the like. We expend millions of dollars on scholarships, school board elections, and all types of lobbying efforts. Yet all of our strategies are based on the lie: Teachers’ unions don’t matter.

Is it just me, or isn’t there an elephant in the room? The single most formidable obstacle to improving education in America is the teachers’ union. When will we have the stomach to take them on? Unless we address the strongest protectors of the status quo in education, our efforts to help kids, particularly those who are poor, will be for naught.

Criticism was plentiful when NASA would not listen to its engineers concerning the shuttle’s O-rings. Will there be any less criticism for those of us who advocate educational choice but fail to deal with the teachers’ union?

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 12:59 | Permalink | Comments

By Gordon Jones

Twenty-five years ago I wrote an essay for the Institute of Political Economy at Utah State University on Utah and school choice. This year, the Utah House of Representatives and Senate passed a statewide voucher bill, which was signed by Governor Huntsman.

In my original essay, I thought that school choice was a no-brainer for Utah. The state was conservative (though not as one-party as it is now), and the student body relatively homogeneous.

How wrong could you get!

My basic error, I think, was in not realizing that Utahns essentially regard their schools as private anyway. For the most part, Utah parents were (and are) happy with the schools. The teachers are mostly Mormon, mostly teaching with the prevailing values of the community. School choice offered very little to the vast majority of Utah families. Few of them were going to use private schools no matter what happened. Private school enrollment in Utah is the lowest in the nation.

An influx of Hispanic students has demonstrated that there are problems in the Utah schools, and budget surpluses this year bought enough votes to get the bill through.

There will be lawsuits, no doubt, but after 25 years, the first definitive step has been taken.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 01:04 | Permalink | Comments

Bill: "Look, we left ourselves a note!"

Ted: "Whoah, that was nice of us!"

By Mike Antonucci of 18 months ago

No matter your position on the No Child Left Behind Act -- I happen to think it's a federal power grab but that many of its opponents are hypocritical -- you should read this piece by Linda Shaw of the Seattle Times.

The implicit suggestion in the article is that -- in Washington State anyway -- NCLB will neither work wonders nor utterly destroy public schools. In fact, school districts will simply do what they have always done without much concern about it one way or the other.

"I don't have the time to worry about it," said William Miller, superintendent of Wahluke, a small district in Grant County.

I believe this is the default position of any bureaucracy as large as America's public school system. The people who want reform institute it without federal insistence. The people who don't want reform won't institute it no matter who insists. If forced to reform, they will undermine it.

So, as with so many education issues, it devolves to winning or losing the political battle, without any regard for the ultimate outcome.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 01:10 | Permalink | Comments

By Greg Forster

As I write this, the Utah House has just passed a bill to offer school vouchers to almost every student in the state. That’s a huge breakthrough for Milton Friedman’s vision of universal vouchers.

Whatever the outcome of the Utah bill, the political landscape will never be the same. For years even the school choice movement has dismissed the prospects for universal vouchers. They’ve stuck to limited voucher programs which, while they do help, are too small to spur revolutionary market innovation.

Right up to the end of his life, Dr. Friedman was convinced that at least one state would pass universal vouchers before long. To those who said it could never happen, he argued that big policy reversals don’t come a little at a time. As a policy becomes increasingly dysfunctional, policymakers seek to preserve it – first by tinkering, then by stronger and stronger measures. Only after extended failure brings on a crisis do they look at other options. Then, if there’s a credible alternative it can be rapidly implemented.

It’s easy to see this pattern looking back on Dr. Friedman’s experience with the crisis of Keynesianism in the 1970s. A similar crisis is upon us in education. Right now people are doubling down on the government school monopoly, trying to save it. But you can’t keep doubling down forever – just as Nixon’s increasingly desperate wage and price controls couldn’t save Keynes. Eventually, at least one state was bound to see reality. Looks like Utah has chosen to be the winner.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 00:46 | Permalink | Comments

OK, everyone. I'm off to the South Atlantic, but stay tuned to these pages as EIA readers take over the blog. Starting tomorrow, we've got short essays on a variety of topics and perspectives. Enjoy!

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 09:29 | Permalink | Comments

Click here to read:

1) School Staffing Survey Provides Perspective
2) Card Check May Not Be the Panacea Unions Want
3) Washington Education Association Tosses a Hail Mary
4) Agency Fee Battles in Iowa and Maine
5) Teachers and Hourly Rates
6) Nevada Union President Hired as Executive Director
7) March Video Intercepts
8) See You Next Month
9) Last Week's Intercepts
10) Quote of the Week

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 14:44 | Permalink | Comments

I'll be away for the rest of the month, so you get next month's Video Intercepts two-and-a-half weeks early.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 12:42 | Permalink | Comments

Illinois lawmakers want to expand the state sales tax to include services as well as goods in order to "generate more state dollars for education."

The 44 service industries affected include dry cleaners, movie theaters, barbershops and salons, and dating services.

Since gas and alcohol are already taxed, a good night on the town will really support public education!

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 08:44 | Permalink | Comments

Barry M. Young has been “removed” as treasurer of the Delaware State Education Association and president of the Christina Education Association after being indicted by a federal grand jury on four counts of fraud.

The News Journal reports that union officials came to the decision after meeting yesterday.

What about Mr. Young's due process rights? Was he at this meeting? Was he permitted to call witnesses and present evidence? What about his right to appeal?

I'm kidding. Actually, I applaud the quick and decisive action of DSEA officials. Now let's see if they react the same way if the school district tries to fire Young.

UPDATE: Curiouser and curiouser. DSEA claims Young "had no direct connection" with the union's finances. The treasurer had no direct connection with the union's finances? Then why have a treasurer? And why fire him?

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 08:22 | Permalink | Comments

Bizarre story out of Christina, Delaware, has the local teacher union president indicted by a federal grand jury for lying about his income in order to avoid $164,000 in debt he apparently owes to the Student Loan Marketing Association. It doesn't seem that union finances were involved.

Christina Education Association President Barry M. Young also allegedly lied about his identity to federal investigators, telling them his name was "David Garvin" and that Garvin was the president of the air conditioning service with which Young has some sort of business relationship.

Contacted by The News Journal, Young said, "I don't know anything about it."

UPDATE: Turns out Young is also the treasurer of the Delaware State Education Association, and the union has called for his resignation.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 08:39 | Permalink | Comments

The Arkansas House approved a bill that would eliminate the state's obesity report cards on the grounds they are harmful to children's self-esteem. But others defend the practice, saying the letter sent home to parents is an important wake-up call.

"Some of them really don't know their child is overweight until they get the letter," explained Dr. Karen Young of Arkansas Children's Hospital.

Maybe the answer is eye exams for parents.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 08:41 | Permalink | Comments

Click here to read:

1) Arbitrator Rules in Favor of Madison Local vs. WEAC
2) Teachers and Pay: New Arguments Needed
3) These Cards Are Marked
4) Mommy, Where Do Administrators Come From?
5) NEA Resolutions and Greenhouse Gas: A Perfect Combo
6) Blame the Rich
7) Final Call for Essays
8) Last Week's Intercepts
9) Quote of the Week

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 15:13 | Permalink | Comments

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 08:27 | Permalink | Comments

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 07:51 | Permalink | Comments

A Florida Today story by Kate Brennan takes on the issue of teacher turnover and gets it even more wrong than most journalistic efforts on this issue. Let's start at the top:

1) The headline "Teachers head for the exits" is followed by the subhead "More than half of new teachers leave in 5 years." Neither the story, nor the misused statistics, nor any of the usual teacher retention myths claim "more than half."

2) In a sidebar, Brennan cites her source - a May 2006 NEA "study" that she quotes as saying: "About half of new teachers quit within the first five years because of poor working conditions and low salaries." There is so much wrong with that sentence it requires sub-paragraphs.

a) This statistic includes teachers who are non-renewed, fired, dismissed, whatever term you'd like to use, during their probationary period, not just those who quit.

b) The statistic includes teachers who leave for all reasons, such as relocation or pregnancy, not just "poor working conditions and low salaries."

c) NEA is not the source of the statistic.

d) The source of the statistic - Richard M. Ingersoll of the University of Pennsylvania - originally claimed it for urban, high poverty schools, then went on to claim a figure of 46 percent of all new teachers leaving the profession within five years, even though Ingersoll himself called the number "only a rough approximation," arrived at "by multiplying together the probabilities of staying in teaching" and not accounting for those who later reenter teaching, which "have been found to be as much as 25 percent of those who had earlier departed."

3) Brennan reports the separation rate for Florida is 40 percent, which she ascribes to the state Department of Education. But it's unclear what statistic she is using. This report lists a number of retention statistics, including: a) about 39.5 percent of all Florida teachers left the profession over a ten-year period, including retirees; and b) about 40.9 percent of teachers aged 20-29 left the profession over a five-year period.

Neither one is comparable to Ingersoll's "rough approximation."

4) Brennan reports that in the Brevard school system, which provides the local angle to her story, "Of the district's 5,300 teachers, about 30 percent have five years of experience or less." (emphasis added) She then quotes figures that, when computed out, show the district has had to replace 727 teachers over a two-year period (13.7 percent). A similar rate over five years would be about 34.3 percent. That's to replace all teachers, including retirees, not just new ones.

5) Finally, the point of the article is how much of a struggle it's going to be to hire and retain teachers in the state of Florida. But, as this table shows, Florida has been on a teacher hiring binge because of its statewide class size reduction law. As happened in California, expanding the labor pool so rapidly led to districts hiring applicants who would have been rejected in the past. It's little wonder that some of these recruited teachers don't make it through five years.

Other than that, it's a fine article.

Posted by Mike Antonucci at 08:19 | Permalink | Comments