Posts tagged PSBA
Board Members & Blogging
Jun 15th
As a follow-up to my post from April 30th, the article ”Board Members and Blogging” [below] appears in the June edition of the PSBA Bulletin — the bi-monthly magazine of the Pennsylvania School Boards Association.
A huge “thank you” goes to my fellow cyber-colleagues Dr. Fred Baldwin (Carlisle Area School District) and Mr. Jim Butt (Cheltenham Township School District). I greatly appreciate your constant support and encouragement — and eagerly look forward to November!
Reprinted by permission of the Pennsylvania School Boards Association, Copyright © 2010, All Rights Reserved.
Senate Bill 1192 – The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of SB 1192
Jun 5th
Like the namesake of this classic western – there is a showdown on the horizon.
The Pennsylvania Senate will reconvene on Monday, June 7, 2010. Their current agenda includes a second consideration for SB 1192, Printer’s No. 1871 (Sponsors: Picolla, Dinniman, Browne, Earlle, Rafferty, Williams, Boscola and Alloway).
Unquestionably, all eyes of an array of public education groups and advocates will be clearly focused upon Harrisburg; as deliberations begin to take place on this proposed reauthorization of PA’s Education Empowerment Act.
SB 1192 - An Act amending the act of March 10, 1949 (P.L.30, No.14), known as the Public School Code of 1949, further providing for definitions; and providing for empowering the Department of Education, school districts, schools and parents of school children to undertake measures necessary to improve the academic performance of students.
Scroll down to page 41 to the start of the major changes:
Pennsylvania Senate Bill 1192
The Good
- The bill attempts to deal with the schools and districts that are struggling the most.
- The bill includes charter schools and vocational-technical schools in the reform system.
- The bill contains long lists of education reforms that could help many schools and districts.
- The bill addresses options for parent and community involvement in improving public education.
- The bill allows districts to form their own charter schools rather than using outside companies.
The Bad
1. The bill does not provide any additional funding or resources to pay for and sustain reforms and does not fix the unfair property tax system. Most failing schools are in districts that have been under-funded for decades and have very high property taxes that drive away businesses. Ironically, revisions to the bill made in April now give extra funding for six of the current empowerment districts but ignore the fiscal needs of the hundreds of additional schools and districts that would fall under the control of the bill.
2. The bill would lower the standards and make it easier to place individual schools and school districts under the Empowerment Act.
- Currently, the Act uses a two-year average of both reading and math test scores and targets districts (not individual schools) with more than 50 percent of all students failing both tests (scoring “below basic”).
- SB 1192 would incorporate most of No Child Left Behind’s adequate yearly progress system of measuring school and district performance. The NCLB system looks at whether different subgroups of students – not just all students averaged together – score below state targets. A school would fall under the Empowerment Act if too many students failed the test – 44 percent failing in math or 37 percent failing in reading – by scoring at either “basic” or “below basic” levels.
- The U.S. Congress is expected to make major changes to NCLB in 2010 or 2011 that will impact these standards and requirements. Revisions to SB 1192 made in April would make it somewhat easier for the proposed empowerment system to interact with the expected changes to NCLB. But SB 1192 remains committed to using only student test scores to measure school and district performance, rather than multiple measures that better reflect student outcomes.
3. The bill would place hundreds of schools and dozens of school districts under the Empowerment Act. Currently, the Act only applies to whole districts, not individual schools.
4. The bill would look back in time and apply reform mandates based on past failures over many years. Schools and districts would be graded based on the number of years currently in school improvement and corrective action status under No Child Left Behind.
5. The bill would end the currently appointed boards for Chester-Upland and Harrisburg, return day-to-day management to the local elected school boards, and require all management and reform decisions to be initiated, amended, or approved by the new Statewide Control Board.
The Ugly
6. The bill would give state officials power over all of the schools and districts coming under the Act, even schools and districts failing for just two years.
- The PA Department of Education would have legal authority to order the reforms it wanted at hundreds of schools and districts under the Act. Local officials could not override the decisions of the Department.
- The improvement plans for schools and districts could be amended by the Department, without the consent of local officials.
- A Statewide Control Board appointed by the Governor and the Senate leader would write the reform plans for and have final authority to amend and approve the management decisions of locally elected school boards in districts failing for nine or more years (beyond the fourth year of “Corrective Action II”). The time period would start running based on NCLB status from 2001 to date.
- This means that the Senate leader and the Governor, who appoints the Secretary of Education and other Department officials, would essentially run all of the schools and districts subject to the Act.
7. The bill would treat Philadelphia differently than the rest of the state. No changes would occur to the current governance structure or reform systems.
8. The bill would strongly encourage the operations of failing schools and districts to be turned over to charter school companies or to private education management organizations. The Pennsylvania Department of Education and the new Statewide Control Board would have the power to impose these changes or even to close the school or district. This could have the immediate effect of taking many schools out of their districts and taking the teachers at these schools out of their unions.
9. The bill allows local school officials to hand-pick parents to participate on school improvement teams and does not allow parent elections. In contrast, teachers would be elected by their peers to the improvement teams.
10. The bill does not give students a voice or a role in the school reform process.
Source: Education Law Center
Earlier this week, I received a copy of the following letter [below] from several statewide education advocacy groups through a legislative email distribution group for school board members.
This document originates as joint statement from the AFT Pennsylvania, Education Law Center, Education Voters of Pennsylvania, Good Schools Pennsylvania, Media Area Branch of the NAACP, Pennsylvania Association of School Administrators, Pennsylvania Association of Rural and Small Schools, Pennsylvania League of Urban Schools, Pennsylvania School Boards Association and the Pennsylvania State Education Association.
The following spreadsheet of districts and schools and was prepared by the Education Law Center to illustrate the potential impact of SB 1192.
To Blog or not to Blog – That is the Question
Apr 30th
I’m not sure Shakespeare would approve of my paraphrase below – although his penning of Hamlet’s famous soliloquy offers a great perspective and parallel to using this form of modern communication.
To “blog” or not to “blog” – that is the question
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And, by opposing, end them…
I was recently interviewed for an upcoming article in the PSBA Bulletin on school board member “bloggers” along with cyber-colleagues Dr. Fred Baldwin (Carlisle Area School District) and Mr. Jim Butt (Cheltenham Township School District). In preparation for the interview, I revisited my convictions for starting this blog – along with the vivid memory of a retired educator’s quote that I shall always remember… “If you are fearful you will never be successful.”
This statement is very true in so many different ways – especially since great rewards are never derived from valiant efforts void of potential risks. Hence that’s part of the confident attitude in accepting a few calculated risks through the use of this blog.
Although it has been nearly 5 months since my first post, I remain firmly committed to continue sharing information and insight from this role in public service. As education continues to face many collective challenges ahead, the impetus for better and improved communications has never been greater. School districts (mainly administrative teams and board members) must continue to work at tearing down the real (and perceived) walls of communication challenges with all stakeholders.
Successful partnerships that continue to meet the growing needs of educating students will only flourish and be sustainable in an environment of increased collaboration, engagement, transparency, and accountability.
Suggested reading: Lamar Johnson, “Take the Plunge”, American School Board Journal – April 2010
[Part II of this post will follow tomorrow...]
Pennsylvania’s 2010-11 Budget Overview
Mar 14th
Pennsylvania has not adopted a state budget on time for the past 7 years – so can we really expect anything different out of Harrisburg this year? Unquestionably, the legislature has a ton of work ahead of it before the budget deadline — including a continued loss of projected revenues, addressing the PSERS & SERS crisis, and having to deal with the loss of ARRA dollars in 2011-12.
Unfortunately this is also an election year…so that might be the real top priority for many of them. In this video, PSBA Executive Director Tom Gentzel gives a brief overview of Governor Ed Rendell’s proposed 2010-11 state budget — including its early impact on the state’s 500 public school districts.
Governor Ed Rendell’s budget brief is listed below for your review:
What is a school board…and its purpose?
Dec 5th
I’ve been asked this a few times, so hopefully starting with some of the basics might be a perfect segue into future posts. The Pennsylvania School Boards Association outlines this definition:
A school board is a legislative body, called school directors, who are elected locally by their fellow citizens and serve as agents of the state legislature. Each board consists of nine members who serve four-year terms of office without pay. School directors, although locally elected, are really state officials, co-partners with the legislature. They are designated by school law to administer the school system in each district.
Source: www.psba.org
Constitutional mandatePublic education is fundamentally a state responsibility. A system of free public education is mandated under the state constitution, which states in Article II, Section 14: “ The General Assembly shall provide for the maintenance and support of a thorough and efficient system of public education. … ”Constitutional recognition of the public schools as a legislative function is further found in Article IX, Section 10, in which a school district is described as a “ unit of local government.”Public education thus enjoys special status under the state constitution and is the only public service so mandated by the constitution.To carry out this mandate, the General Assembly created school districts and school boards in 1834. It conferred broad legal powers to the local boards, making them autonomous in many of their operations. Therefore, the school board is a political subdivision of the state for the purpose of convenient administration of the schools.Legislative authorityThe General Assembly created the State Board of Education, the Department of Education, the intermediate unit structure and other state agencies. These agencies administer the state laws that control the state ‘ s public education system. There are, therefore, several governing influences upon a board of school directors.The School Laws of Pennsylvania is the primary compilation of the statutes enacted by the legislature having direct and pertinent reference to public education, its programs, its operation and its management. In addition, rules and regulation of the State Board, guidelines of the Department of Education, opinions and interpretations of the state attorney general and court decrees all influence local board operation.Effective school boards concentrate their time and energy on determining what it is the schools should accomplish and enacting policies to carry out these goals.
Our system of a free public education is mandated within Pennsylvania’s constitution as follows “The General Assembly shall provide for the maintenance and support of a thorough and efficient system of public education to serve the needs of the commonwealth.” Public education also receives special recognition as the only public service that is mandated within the constitution.
How school boards started
In 1834, the General Assembly of Pennsylvania created a system of school districts and school boards. It conferred broad legal powers to the school boards, making them autonomous in many of their operations. In its very essence, a school board is a “unit of local government” for the purpose of convenient administration of the schools.
The General Assembly also created the State Board of Education, the Department of Education, the intermediate unit structure and a vast array of other state agencies. These agencies administer the state laws that control our public education system.
The Pennsylvania Public School Code is the primary compilation of the statutes enacted by the legislature that has direct and pertinent reference to public education, its programs, its operation and its management. In addition, rules and regulations of the State Board, guidelines of the Department of Education, opinions and interpretations of the state attorney general and court decrees all influence school board operation.
Source: www.psba.org
Needless to say, the landscape of public education has changed dramatically over the last 175 years. And we’ve just scratched the surface. Obviously, we can’t forget our Federal government wants their input in this process too. Although that is another whole story we’ll mention along the way.
The role of a school board
Effective school boards concentrate their time and energy on determining what schools should accomplish and enacting policies to carry out these goals. In essence, school boards have three functions: planning, setting policy and evaluating results.
Planning — Boards are required to engage in strategic planning by regulations of the State Board of Education. Appropriate reports of the results of such planning must be filed with the Department of Education.
Setting policy — The central responsibility of a board, both in theory and in law, is to be the policy-forming body. Policy means actions of the board that set written goals and objectives for the school and parameters for actions.
Evaluating results — The board must evaluate the results of planning. Evaluation “ completes the loop ” and, in fact, leads inevitably to more planning. Evaluation occurs all the time, both formally and informally. As a group, the board is not an administrative body; neither should it be a “rubber stamp” for professional educators. The selection of competent administrators who understand their role is to carry out public policies established by the board is one of the board’s most important functions.
Some required duties:
- Adopt courses of study in consultation with the superintendent.
- Establish the length of the school term.
- Adopt textbooks.
- Elect superintendents and hire necessary employees.
- Enter into written contracts with professional employees and into collective bargaining agreements.
- Adopt the annual budget.
- Levy taxes; appoint a tax collector under certain circumstances.
- Provide necessary grounds and school buildings.
- Prescribe, adopt and enforce reasonable rules and regulations regarding school activities, publications and organizations.
- Provide special education for children with mental or physical disabilities.
Source: www.psba.org
Additional information
PSBA also published this great resource of quick and easy-to-understand information on this topic.
In this video, PSBA Executive Director Tom Gentzel discusses the various services PSBA offers to newly elected and veteran board members. I highly value this organization for the incredible amount of information, resources and tools they provide to school board members.
Earlier this week, the National School Boards Association released this video to promote public awareness and advocacy for the collaborative roles of school board members and all stakeholders.
Disclaimer: PrideandPromise.com is not affiliated in any way, shape, or form with PSBA or its Pride & Promise public outreach initiative.
