Update

I am in Indiana. But this just happened.

Whoops. Maybe you want it in Eenglish

Resignation

I am finished as president. 

I took on the new charter full speed ahead so I will see that through as a non-officer, a non-public entity, and someone who doesn't have responsibility for such weighty matters as hiring and firing principals.

I am through with making decisions that no matter what you do, you anger someone.

I am finished with disagreeing mentally with people and then in the end deferring to the decision of the majority (because that is what good presidents do) and then taking the heat for a bad decision.

I am done with laws that are supposed to provide the public with more access to information but in the end force you not to work with people outside of meetings and therefore provide fewer opportunities for public collaboration.

I am no longer interested in having every word I say be seen as a public policy ("I don't think every teacher here is the best we could possibly find" turns into a witch hunt in which I have somehow marked people for termination while "you are amazing" turns into job security).

I have learned something about myself that I am really proud of, however, after this stint of very small time public office:  I have grit.  Daniel Pink refers to the science of motivation and suggests that people who are successful are not particularly talented, smart, or special. It turns out that what makes people successful is grit--the ability to stick with something.  So I did something that was really, really hard, and I stuck with it.  I think I will always feel good for the effort I put into saving the school and I hope I have a little more grit left in me to see this through to completion.  If you are smart, which doesn't do anything for you anyway, then you will click on that link and watch it.  Brilliant.  

Thanks for following the story, stay tuned.

Why Test Scores REALLY Matter

The superintendent of the school board came to our Governance Council (my kids school, Cesar Chavez) meeting this past week to let us know he recommended school closure to the board instead of renewing our charter (expiry date Oct 12). I recognize that the district is hoping for an increase in *revenue by eliminating the charter as it is perceived as skimming funds from the district budget first.

Putting aside the charter piece for just a minute, the argument that the Super has made to us is that our school has the lowest test scores in the district and therefore is low performing.

He is correct, the school has the lowest test scores in the district. Overall. BUT bilingual education research shows that students at the lower grades will NEVER get high scores. Why? Because half of the school is getting instruction in Spanish. These schools are designed to increase literacy in the child's first language and THEN they can transfer the skills slowly over time and begin to see pretty good numbers, say, around 6th grade. Because our school has a very small population of 6th graders, the very low scores at 2nd grade (again consistent with research) will never pull up the scores of the upper grades, capiche?

So... why am I blogging about this now? The school district is considering closing a school that is meeting the requirements as laid out in the charter and appear to be ignoring their agreement with the school (MOU) to look at data other than the state tests.

The MOU states that the district can look at other data (including STAR tests) to determine that we are academically consistent with other schools in the community. We can prove that by looking at our 6th grade scores alone (and comparing our 4-6 grades in general) but the district seems to be less concerned with the long-term positive effect and more concerned with how they look in terms of data. In other words, who cares what the long-term benefit is to my child on a continuum through 6th grade, we only care about the 2nd grade score of your child and make decisions based on discreet scores instead of looking at the big picture.

Scary.

I wonder what kind of world we have become that we care more about the short-term effects of data and ignore the long-term effect of employable skills, multi-language and literate populations, and critical thinking skills that are inherently pieces of the curriculum when students are learning to immediately apply a skill to the world around them.

*Many people don't realize that the only difference between a charter and a non-charter school is the way money is spent. The charters receive their funding directly from the property tax base. Let me illustrate:
For example, say the state has a formula of $5000 per pupil. In a charter school, the school gets the majority of this money to operate. If they have several young teachers, the overall salary might be less so they can spend that extra money on text books. Or perhaps school materials.
In a non-charter school, the district might say "okay so you have 100 students, you get 5 teachers." In other words, the district operates a budget by setting formulas. This works in a collective sort of way so that they can average a teachers salary so that a person who has been teaching for a long time won't be denied a job simply because their salary and benefits might cost the specific school more money, make sense?