Author Archive: SCORE Staff

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist doesn’t plan to make “hasty” decisions about a controversial measure to boost the Sunshine State’s chances in Race to the Top, reports the St. Petersburg Times. The bill, which was officially passed by Florida’s legislature in a late-night House vote last week, eliminates teacher tenure and closely ties student achievement to teacher compensation. Crist, who’s running for U.S. Senate, has until Friday to veto or sign the legislation – or do nothing and simply allow it to become law. “I think it’s too important to do anything hasty,” Crist told the Times. “So I want to take as much input as I can and review it, get fully briefed on it again.”

While the bill is bitterly opposed by teachers’ unions, it is garnering praise nationally. The Chicago Tribune editorial page applauds the Florida legislature’s “conviction to shake up the status quo,” and urges Illinois lawmakers to follow suit.

In a congratulatory news release, the national Business Roundtable applauds the Obama administration for engineering bold change with Race to the Top, adding that Delaware and Tennessee, as the first two winners, “have clearly demonstrated their commitment to world class education.” Looking ahead, education blogger-gadfly Nashville Jefferson thinks a post-mortem analysis released by the New Teacher Project could be instructive for determining next steps in Tennessee.

National education reformers are keeping a close eye on Florida, where a messy fight between the legislature and teachers’ unions is coming to a head as the Sunshine State readies itself to make a run for Race to the Top funding in Round Two of the competition. The Florida House is due to vote today on a merit pay bill that would eliminate teacher tenure and closely link compensation with student achievement tests. Teachers’ unions are bitter, but merit pay backers like the Fordham Institute’s Chester Finn Jr. say the legislature is right on target.

Meanwhile, Washington, D.C., schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee has settled her longstanding feud with the District’s teachers with a new compensation plan that’s already being debated as a possible national model.

Clearly, “the Race” continues.

Most Nashville high school students – about 86 percent – say they plan to go to college, according to a survey of 1,083 public and private school kids ordered by Mayor Karl Dean. But only 24 percent of survey respondents say guidance counselors are helping them move toward that goal.

A column from The Tennessean’s Gail Kerr highlights other results of the survey, which Dean will use to guide city-wide goal-setting. Now that students have responded, a survey for adults is available as well.

Ed Secretary Arne Duncan blogs that Race to the Top winners Delaware and Tennessee brought to the table “a combination of a successful track record, bold reforms, broad buy-in and statewide impact.”  The two states built upon existing strengths – a value-added data system in Tennessee’s case, and the 2015 Blueprint in Delaware’s. “Broad support” combined with policy changes were also critical.

“It is easy to be bold if no one buys in and it is easy to get buy-in if you are not bold,” Duncan writes. “To win Race to the Top you need it all and that requires courage, commitment and capacity.”

Duncan’s post includes a spreadsheet with the scores and rankings of the 16 finalists.

With school districts strapped for cash this budget season, it’s no wonder that Tennessee’s $500 million Race to the Top purse has education stakeholders statewide seeing dollar signs. But the federal funds can’t be used to plug budget holes. Broadly, the winnings will be doled out over four years for professional development, school leadership, data-driven instruction and troubled school turnarounds – not buses and custodians.  John Thompson at This Week in Education has blogged that Nashville budget cuts will continue despite the federal funding influx, and the Fordham Foundation’s Flypaper posted a faux memo to that effect in honor of April Fool’s Day.

While district leaders can’t use the money to navigate revenue shortfalls, they are getting to work on expenditures that qualify. The Chattanoogan reports initial plans to use the funds for a Principal Leadership Academy and professional development at Hamilton County Schools. Kriner Cash, director of Memphis City Schools and a SCORE steering committee member, writes for the Tri-State Defender that MCS will use the money for programs including pre-K, extended school time, and principal leadership initiatives complementary to Bill and Melissa Gates Foundation spending. The Cleveland City Board of Education is starting to plan as well. Half the money will be spent on statewide efforts and the other half portioned out to school districts, and Nashville Public Radio notes that high-poverty school districts stand to receive the most money per student.  

Many analysts of Race to the Top have attributed Tennessee’s victory in part to the level of stakeholder buy-in. An editorial from the Knoxville News-Sentinel highlights the high degree of collaboration that allowed Tennessee’s Race to the Top application to be successful.

“Tennessee’s application was controversial and required bipartisanship from the governor’s office and a Republican-majority Legislature. It also required cooperation from the Tennessee Education Association, the organization representing the state’s teachers,” the editorial reads. “May the same focus and spirit of cooperation that guided the state’s application continue in finishing the race and staying the course.”

This “spirit of cooperation” was also noted in the most recent edition of the School Board News, a publication of the National School Boards Association. Tammy Grissom, a member of Tennessee SCORE’s steering committee and executive director of the Tennessee School Boards Association, told the publication that school boards statewide participated in the Race to the Top application.

“For more than a year, all of the major stakeholders involved in Tennessee public education have worked collaboratively to put our state in the best position possible to be competitive in the RTTT process,” Grissom said. “These efforts involved both public and private groups, and their collective dedication to moving public education forward in Tennessee made this day possible.”

SCORE Chair Bill Frist has been tapped as a vice-chair of First Lady Michelle Obama’s anti-childhood obesity foundation, Partnership for a Healthier America. Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic calls the appointment of Frist, as well as that of Frist’s fellow vice-chair Newark Mayor Cory Booker, two “inspired choices.”  James R. Gavin is board chair for the effort.

The foundation has already launched Let’s Move!, a national public awareness campaign.

Forty-one Race to the Top applicants minus just two winners – Tennessee and Delaware – equals plenty of soul-searching on the part of states nationwide.  The latest round of Race to the Top analysis finds “unions attacked” in Colorado, office furniture-related political fire in New York, arguments for more school district support in Ohio, and a call from a San Francisco school board member for better data in California. The mood is more positive in Kentucky, with the Louisville Courier-Journal reflecting on all the state has accomplished in the last few years, and in Minnesota and Hawaii, as education boosters gear up for the competition’s second round.

Meanwhile, in Florida – which was a heavy favorite before winners were announced – competition results are fueling a controversial public debate over teacher compensation. A divisive bill just passed by Florida’s Senate would eliminate tenure and tightly align teacher compensation and evaluations with standardized test scores. The state teachers union isn’t buying it, though Florida education commissioner Eric J. Smith says the bill must be passed for Florida to have a crack at Race to the Top Round 2. The St. Petersburg Times contends that folks had better find a way to get along if the state is to seriously compete. Valerie Strauss at the Washington Post thinks the situation there should be monitored not just by Floridians, but by everyone with an interest in education reform. Diane Ravitch and Deborah Meier at EdWeek’s Bridging Differences blog seem to agree.

The Houston Chronicle’s School Zone blog contrasts Bill Frist’s positive views on Race to the Top with Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s negative outlook on the competition.