Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Pre-K Overhaul plans

In our society, when we hear the words, "Scientists say.." then we take whatever follows as gospel truth. This drives me nuts. I have five scientists in my extended family, and once you get past Newton's laws of physics, you can't get them to agree unequivacably on anything.

In the education world, it goes like this: "Studies show..." and whatever follows is taken as gospel truth. And no one asks questions! Nuts!

It happened at the May Board Briefing. Studies show that full day Pre-K programs better prepare children for success in school than half day Pre-K programs do. So, the Administration wants to convert all the half-day Pre-K programs into as many full day programs as it can afford and as it has facilities for.

The upside - the participating kids would get a better education. The downside - to fund this, 500 or more fewer students would be able to attend Pre-K, and 330 Teacher Assistants would have to be laid off in order to hire enough new Pre-K teachers.

Discussion from there went around topics such as
  • whether or not to put 4 year olds in portables
  • which is more important - not laying off adults or providing better education for the children
  • working parents who can't participate in half-day Pre-K could put their kids in full day (yeah, I know - the math of serving 500+ fewer students doesn't really work for that argument, but don't get sidetracked by that)
  • whether a 1:18 teacher/student ratio for Pre-K was acceptable, etc.

All the time, I am sitting in the overflow room fighting the urge to yell at the monitor - Study? What study? Go back to the study! Ask about the study!!!

Sadly, no one asked about the study. Luckily, the Administration is very good about posting their PowerPoint presentations with the Agenda (thank you) and so I looked it up later.

From the footnotes, here is the primary study that I think they are referencing, "Is More Better? The Effects of Full Day vs. Half- Day Preschool on Early Achievement (2006) (PDF, 220 KB, 22pp) NIEER working paper". You can read it yourself here.

Sociology 101: no study is a one-size-fits-all cure-all. You have to look at the parameters of a study to see how much of it can be applied to the problem-solving of your own situation. To do otherwise is to set yourself up for disappointment and confusion.

The study (conducted in New Jersey):
Number of children participating - less than 100 in the test group, less than 200 in the control group.
Class size - 16 students to one teacher and one teacher's assistant in the "Wave 1" study group and 13 students to one teacher and one teacher's assistant in the "Wave 2" study group.
Test Group Sample Source - although entrance into the test group (the full day program) was by lottery, it was part of a magnet program and the parents had to register for the lottery. It created a good cross-section of the local demographics (arguably similar to DISD's), but it was not a true random sample because of the parent-initiated registration process.
The Control Group - the half-day Pre-K program with very similar adult/student ratios.

My personal opinion of the study: It shows that with all other factors being equal between a half day vs. a full day Pre-K program, the extra hours of instruction do indeed result in children having more academic skill and knowledge without any observable difference in student fatigue or stamina levels.

How much of the same results can Dallas expect? That would depend on how much our deviations from their program would affect the final result. Our biggest deviations are class size and adult/student ratios.

DISD Pre-K Class size - current full day (226 classes) and half-day (106 classes) programs have a maximun adult/student ratio of 2:22 (Teacher & a Teacher's Assistant). The proposed change would make all Pre-K full day with a 1:18 ratio. Both where-we-are-starting-from and where-we-are-going-to are significantly different from the study, and from each other. (When class size was under discussion, it was brought up that other Texas cities have big Pre-K ratios, specifically Austin (1:18) and Houston (1:22). Nobody asked if these cities were in the study. They weren't.)

Whoa - wait a minute! Did you catch that we already have our own comparable full day and half day programs? Have we done our own study? Can we compare the academic performance our own kids in our own program? Has Austin or Houston done any tracking or comparisons of their programs? Before we fire 330 people and stop serving 500+ kids, let's have a little more Dallas data, or at least Texas data. If we want to be like New Jersey, we would have to hire more T.A.'s, not fire them.

BUT WAIT! THERE'S MORE...
The Administration's report referenced two other sources.

A Texas House of Representatives study that is an interesting primer on the Pre-K program in Texas. It starts with the history of how the federally mandated (and state funded) Pre-K program came to be, and goes through the current debate on whether state and federal agencies should require full day Pre-K. Views from both sides of the debate ore presented in this report.

Before anyone thinks I'm trying to make anyone look bad for not reading the study more closely, check out this out. An NEA report on Pre-K policy. It references the landmark HighScope Perry Preschool Longevity Study, which you can read about at HighScope's website. POSSIBLE ERROR ON THE FIRST PAGE OF THE NEA REPORT - Well, if not an error, it's at least misleading. It claims the Perry project found that individuals who were enrolled in a quality preschool program ultimately earned up to $2,000 more per month than those who were not. What the study's site says is that at age 40 the group who received high-quality early education had median annual earnings more than $5,000 higher than the non-program group ($20,800 vs. $15,300).

See? Even the Experts need to make it a habit to actually look at the studies.

Check out the Perry report. It's very interesting. The program those kids went through is the gold standard, and changed the destiny of some of those kids. Hopefully, the day will come when Dallas can give all of our kids - one way or another - the same level of education. From the site: "Our teachers were well-qualified, they served no more than eight children from low-income families at a time, they visited these families as part of the program to discuss their child's development, and the classes operated daily for children three and four years old." Click here to read it in context on the site.

That brings it back to our community. If we want that kind of nurture for our young children, we in the community have to help the District and the Board to provide it. When parents are banned from the campus, though, it makes it hard to participate... but that's a discussion for another time.

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

The Board needs a Master List for spending prioritization

UPDATE:  In January 2012, the Board passed a list of priorities that can be found here.

Original post from 2010:

I had an epiphany at the May Board Briefing. After listening to sometimes heated discussion over the span of three hours and only two topics, it came to me.

The Board gets programs pitched to them like it is the only new thing on the table. Every month. Where's the Master List of all these new or expanded programs? How can the Board prioritize expenditures if there is no Master List to prioritize?

Maybe they do have one. I have never heard it referenced. They need one, and they need to refer to it at every expenditure discussion. Larry Throm is fond of saying (rightly so), "You can have whatever you want - but the dollar you spend on that is going to have to come from somewhere else. What are you going to take it from?" If the Board does not prioritize, the Administration will - by default or by design, or a little of both.

If they had a priority list, then comments like this from Dr. Hinojosa would not go completely unquestioned:

"Well, as we talked to people about the needs for an OverAge High School, we got a lot of feedback saying, 'Hey, we could really use this type of program for middle school, too.' So we are going to do a middle school as well... We plan to move forward unless the Board is opposed to it."

That one just sailed right on by. No questions, no discussion about where those dollars are coming from. Zip. Nada.

If there were a Master List, someone could have said, "Okay - what are we going to bump down the list in order to make that happen? The dollars have to come from somewhere."

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

As we move into the final weeks of School Board elections, here’s a sum up of some of my own opinions and observations about DISD's challenges:

1. DISD Magnet programs are among the best in the nation. There is a lot we can learn from our own programs. Are we taking advantage of that?

Not historically, but that may be changing. The plans to create four new High School magnet programs will definately help us learn how to do this better. However, there are huge bias challenges to overcome.

A trustee told me that a TEA PhD’d expert reported to the Board that school-within-a-school magnets are better in the long run than stand-alones. Really? I would love to see the details of whatever study she based her opinion upon - the survey parameters, the sample pool size, and the raw data. Dallas’ experience has been quite the opposite.

I personally think what “makes the difference” in a school is a combination of expectations, curriculum, teacher morale, and parental involvement. I believe stand-alone campuses tend to get better results because they tend to have higher teacher morale and more parental involvement than the school-within-a-school programs. There is more optimism about program preservation at the stand-alones. The parents complain louder when the programs are threatened by new District policies.

2. The four high schools with below-par graduation rates should continue with plans to create school-within-a-school magnet programs.  WITH safeguards!

There is cost involved (ties into #3) but if it can be funded, magnet programs will bring up graduation rates. BUT, remember the concerns of point #1? In the last sweeping budget cuts, almost all the school-within-a-school magnet programs were severely cut and the core programs altered. Part of the motivation to do this was budgetary, and part was a desire to end the Learning Center programs. Some trustees believed that the Learning Center programs were not cost effective and did not have consistent academic results, meaning some performed well in testing and others didn’t. They thought the money should be redistributed more evenly throughout the District, since some of the schools near Learning Centers had the same demographics, but not the same budgets.

However, in the process of cutting the Learning Center program, the Board and DISD damaged well-performing magnet programs. There was very little discussion (due to time constraints and the very dysfunctional communication system in place between Board and Community) about how to save what did work (both magnet and Learning Center) and trim what didn't.

The point? If the Board approves creation of new magnet programs, they must also create safeguards to protect those programs.

3. The School Board should ditch the $300,000 per year newsletter and use the money to drum up more donations for the District.

Larry Throm (DISD CFO) has told the Board more times than I can count, “You can do whatever you want to do. But for every dollar it costs, you have to take a dollar from somewhere else if you are going to build your Fund Balance.” The budget is finally balanced in real numbers (at least on paper) and Mr. Throm is holding everyone to it.

Income from traditional sources is not going up. There is no more money coming from the State for a while. Federal money has a spaghetti mess of strings attached. Dallas itself is going to have to solve this one. Dallas needs to invest more in its school system, especially new programs like magnets and career centers. Bonds aren't the answer this time - I think business partnerships are. But, businesses aren’t going to throw money down a drain, and they have to be convinced it’s a good investment. Every investor wants proof that their money is going exactly to the program they think it is going for.

(In a perfect world, the city should be able to fill funding gaps in the event Federal guidelines change and conflict with District priorities. The city should have the financial freedom to be able to say, “No, thank you.”)

4. Board members should constantly nag PTA’s to network and plan for the long-term.

There is an alarming drop-out rate that goes on under the radar - parent involvement in PTA. There is a big drop-out rate between elementary and middle school, and then again between middle and high school. The magnets run the highest percentages of parent involvement, but even they struggle. This is a trend that will take years to reverse. What better time to start that long road than now?

Every PTA ought to have a non-partisan Board Observer/Delegate, and every Board Member ought to be able to use the PTA’s to gather and disseminate info for them. I understand that there are legal issues that have to be considered, especially in campaign years. These issues should be evaluated and not violated. However, these issues should not stop the process of creating a strong PTA network for each Board District. There is a HUGE disconnect between the elected School Board member and the majority of their constituency. That has to change, or creative problem solving for our district from the public sector will continue to be hamstrung.

The School Board needs the public to help them do their job well, and the public needs their School Board members to be able to communicate effectively. There is no consistent system in place for either need. Each new Board member is forced to recreate the wheel, OR to depend upon the DISD Administration to do it for them. That creates serious institutional bias.

Friday, April 2, 2010

Add "Delegate to DISD Board Briefings" as a PTA/PTSA position

Here's a sum-up of the painful history between the Magnet/Learning Center communities and the Dallas School Board.

Once or twice a year, there is some crisis in policy that comes up that threatens critical components of how the Magnet/Learning Center programs work. The Magnet/Learning Center community hears about it, rallies parents and community members, floods Board rep inboxes and packs out Board Meetings.

This process has always had mixed success. This process makes everyone on every side feel like they being attacked in every conflict. This process leaves a lot of people bitter, suspicious and disenfranchised.

After sitting in on Board Briefings and Meetings for a year now, I think I know why the present process of "community feedback" is so painful. By the time an issue gets to a Meeting, it's a done deal 95% of the time. All Board members go into any given meeting knowing how they are going to vote on every single item. If it feels like a Herculean effort to get Board members to change their mind in a Meeting, that's because IT IS.

If parents wait to act until an issue is scheduled for a Board Meeting, they have waited too long. It's too late to change it.

Don't believe me? Every Learning Center and every school-within-a-school magnet program suffered severe, crippling funding cutbacks last year. They did not have reps talking to Board members IN THE FALL when all the plans were being made.

Here is a huge breakdown in the system - the Board is elected to represent parents and taxpayers in DISD issues. Parents and taxpayers are suppose to communicate to the Board what they want, but by the time the parents and taxpayers have specific opinions on specific issues, the Board has already made decisions and moved on.

In addition, each Board member is left to figure out how they want to communicate with their constituents. There is no budget for this to speak of (the DISD manufactured newsletter does NOT count) and Board members are part time, so they have to squeeze in "constituency communication" into already overloaded schedules, inventing the process as they go along.

I think that's crazy. We put people into jobs where they have to "re-invent the wheel" on mission-critical components every single time a new person takes the position. Who will fix that? Will you? Or will you wait for someone else to do it? Do you have opinions on this?

We elected the Dallas School Board to make decisions for us, and they will do that. I think if we want better communication with our Board reps, we the constituents need to figure out how to make that happen. If school communities are really, truly motivated to have input into policy while it is in the draft stage, they need to start by sending observation delegates to Board Briefings. Every new policy goes through two readings before it hits a Board Meeting for a vote. That's the time to talk about it.

Remember, if you wait until it hits the Board Meeting, it's too late.

If you and your fellow parents have reason to complain about DISD or the School Board, seriously consider this: Add "Delegate to DISD Board Briefings" as a PTA/PTSA position. It's the first step to having meaning input in the policy process.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

"what just happened?"

"So what just happened?"

My friend asked me this just after the Board voted to waive the reapplication requirement for 5th grade students in the Travis, Harry Stone, and Dealey magnet programs, and 8th grade students in the Irma L. Rangel program.

I told my friend (who is associated with one of the first three schools) "You got a one year waiver!"

"For what?"

"For re-application. Your sixth graders don't have to reapply this year. They get to stay. But it's only for one year - future policy hasn't been decided yet."

"We didn't ask for that! Rangel asked for that!" My friend was clearly irritated.

Huh?

I was confused - this was THE big topic at the affected four campuses when the policy of reapplication first took affect. Nobody I talked then to wanted that policy. Fast-forward a few years - has everyone really changed their opinion? I think it is more likely that the irritation comes from being surprised by big changes.

Jerome Garza mentioned in the meeting that he has been working for two years to get the reapplication policy changed. Perhaps in that two year interim, the constituents he was championing thought he had given up because the issue never made it to the monthly board meetings. I don't know, but it is another example of how the lack of effective communication channels undermines confidence in our representatives and in the system.

It also shows why more parents need to be sitting in on all the public board gatherings. PTA Board Nominations are coming up for everyone. Consider making "DISD Board Observation Delegate" as a new PTA Board position.