0 The Facts About Charter Schools That No One Tells You

There is a lot of talk about charter schools and raising the cap to allow more of them to open in Massachusetts. Boston is ground zero for the charter school "education reform" conglomerates, individuals and organizations, like the newly formed "Boston Forward" group, which are greedily counting the millions of dollars to be made off of our students if this is allowed to happen. This situation has led to a lot of questionable push-poll results being passed off by our larger media news sources as charter school "facts" which are further confusing the argument for the public even after those "facts" have been proven incorrect or unsubstantiated. 

Add in a Mayoral race filled with many candidates, most of whom are willing to sell out our students for campaign funds by spouting the "raise the cap" chant (only three are against raising the charter school cap), and you may understand one of the reasons why education has become a major focus of the elections in Boston. If you think the Mayoral and City Council races aren't a big deal right now, you may really want to start paying attention, because they are!   

Other than knowing that charter schools are an "alternative" to "regular public schools" most people do not fully understand: how they are funded, the student populations served, their actual graduation rates and the differences between them except for their separate "lottery" admissions procedures. This became more obvious to me through a number of conversations in several venues so my inner-educator-activist kicked in to write this article that I hope will help families and the broader community understand why so many people, education advocates and organizations that care about educating all of our students are saying "don't lift the cap" on something that, in theory, sounds good.

Funding:
Many people think charter schools are privately funded, which is false. The money that pays for students to attend a charter school comes out of the sending district's budget. Here in Boston, for each student that attends a charter school instead of one of the BPS schools, the charter school receives $15,527.00+ per pupil from the BPS budget, which is $4,000.00 more than the base per pupil funds allocated for BPS' own students. 

Then there is the transportation of charter school students per Massachusetts state laws which dictate that charter school students can be transported city-wide on BPS buses or vehicles paid for out of the BPS budget. Meanwhile "regular" BPS students are restricted to transportation only within their zone in elementary and middle school. In high school our BPS students are given MBTA passes and expected to get to and from school on their own. Exceptions to the zone-based and T-pass transportation for BPS students is generally for students with special needs when their IEP indicates the need. There will clearly always be busing in Boston even with a new "Home Based" assignment model as we must transport students with disabilities (SWD), charter school and private school students. The larger cost to BPS will be for transporting our own students with special needs according to my discussions with John McDonough, then CFO of BPS who is now our Interim Superintendent, but there is clearly an amount of funding which will be in our budget to pay for transporting charter school and private school students across the city. The only way to change this practice regarding charter and private school transportation is to lobby our state legislators to change it via the law.

Additionally, there are other funds which a sending school district may end up allocating to charter schools (at least the *"in-district" ones) such as: additional equivalent per-pupil cost of a service if the charter school chooses not to purchase a discretionary central support service from the sending district. A sending district may also end up agreeing to provide non-discretionary services as BPS often does (including but not limited to: transportation, employee benefits, facilities, payroll, safety, food service, and other central office services) as *"in-kind" support for the charter school. *Though "in-kind" means that no money is given directly to the charter school, instead the sending district provides personnel/services/benefits, the costs for those in-kind services are paid for out of the budget of the sending district. This also means that certain district personnel or services are at least partially, if not totally, unavailable to do their job for the district itself.

In addition to all that I outline above, in the recent agreement with Unlocking Potential (aka UP a self-described "school turnaround organization" which is taking over the Marshall) that the Boston School Committee members voted to approve on November 7, 2012, BPS will provide the following:

• BPS agrees to identify which centrally-funded supports would typically be provided by the Office of Special Education and Student Supports (OSESS) to a BPS school with UP’s projected enrollment, including but not limited to any allocation of staff and service providers. The full value of these supports will be added as non-restricted funds to UP’s budget annually. Non-restricted funds mean that UP may use those funds for anything, not necessarily special education services. 


• UP shall establish and maintain a separate bank account under its exclusive control which BPS agrees to transfer any funds not allocated or budgeted for salaries or stipends into at least two times a year. The transfer will be based upon the difference between the total Lump Sum Budget provided by BPS to UP Academy and an estimate of the amount of funds UP Academy anticipates spending on stipends and salaries.


• UP has the sole discretion to select the staff for any and all positions at the school. UP may select staff without regard to seniority within the particular union or past practices between the Boston School Committee and any bargaining unit. 


• UP, through its board of trustees, shall manage its staff independent of the school committee. Except as outlined in the Application and Charter, UP is exempt from the provisions set forth in the applicable collective bargaining agreements.  Staff shall execute an election to work agreement containing the working conditions every year. UP may develop its own staff evaluation guidelines and evaluation instrument(s) in accordance with all current laws and regulations. 


• UP may involuntarily excess members of the BTU, Guild, and BASAS bargaining units as well as any other staff members and the provisions in any relevant collective bargaining agreements regarding excessing, seniority and transfer shall not apply to UP except that members of the collective bargaining units shall continue to accrue seniority.


• UP shall be operated and managed by its Board independent of the Boston School Committee. As written in the agreement: "The parties expressly acknowledge that UP is an entity independent of the Boston Public School Department and that Boston Public School Department shall not be liable for the acts or omissions of UP, the Board, its officers, agents or employees except to the extent consistent with the law, including the provisions of M.G.L. c. 71, §89 and regulations promulgated in connection therewith."

In addition to all of the above, charter schools also get millions in venture philanthropy dollars each year. So, as you can see, charter school funding has a huge impact on our BPS budget that goes well beyond just the base per-pupil and transportation funds.

Also, through the above information, you can clearly see that though many people believe that "In-district charter schools" are controlled and overseen by the public school district in which they are operating, this is false. According to the agreement with UP, even if the BPS Superintendent or School Committee believes that UP is not serving the best interest of BPS students, they must go through a complaint procedure first with the Board of Trustees of UP, and if dissatisfied with the Trustees' findings, then initiate a complaint to the Massachusetts Commissioner of Education. It does not sound like BPS has any more control over the "in-district" charter schools than they do over the Commonwealth charter schools to me!

Admissions:
Charter schools state that they have a "lottery" system regarding admissions. When applying to schools for my oldest daughter we did apply to a couple of charter schools because they had sent us literature. During my discussions with the admissions personnel I revealed that my daughter had special needs and would be going through the normal evaluation process. Why did I do that? I wanted to be sure they could handle her needs as I was fairly certain she would need some minimal special education services and supports. I was then politely but firmly "discouraged" from completing the application process by the admissions personnel. Though my inner advocate wanted to respond a totally different way, in the end I chose to refrain from submitting the applications, which those who know me may find shocking. For me it came down to this: if they don't want my daughter because she might have special education needs, then they don't deserve to have her as their student at all. (FYI - she tests as post-graduate grade level in everything except math which is her disability area and her IQ is 148 - only 2% of world population has an IQ of above 140).

I soon found out from several other parents that the experience I had was not an anomaly as they had similar experiences. As I had also started asking questions about the lottery process, I learned that the "lottery" consists of charter school personnel reviewing student data and records to select those students who, though they may not have high MCAS scores, are children with high-average to superior intelligence according to other measurements including IQ scores when available. Those students then emerge as the "winners" of the "lottery" and are invited to attend the charter school. Additionally, through record reviews personnel are able to determine which children with special needs have high or *low-incidence disabilities or language needs which also determines which of our ELL and special needs students "win" the "lottery".

In the world of special education, "High-incidence" are the most common special needs which are primarily able to be addressed in a general education classroom with possibly a second staff member assisting the student in the classroom or some pull-out services; "low-incidence" are the more significant disabilities with more educationally intensive and costly needs and can mean they need more pull-out services, substantially separate classes, though if done right a true full-inclusion program can educate both types of students together.  

Which leads to the next difference between charter schools and our "regular" public schools: populations.

School Populations: 
It has become clear through several sources, such as the 2012 Charter Schools and Students with Disabilities Preliminary Analysis of the Legal Issues and Areas of Concern prepared by The Center for Law and Education (CLE) with the Council of Parent Advocates and Attorneys (COPAA), our own BPS district numbers and Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (MADESE), that despite claims to the contrary charter schools are not educating the same population of students as the Boston Public School District does. 

As noted above, charter schools are able to select which students they will educate and multiple sources of information including utilizing the raw data from school profiles on the MADESE site without any interpretation, have and continue to prove that the charter schools claims of serving the same students as BPS does is false. Utilizing the raw data from the MADESE site which has profiles of every "public" school in the state, my friend and I put together a snapshot of the top 5 (who has highest #s) and bottom 5 (who has lowest #s) for each type of school in Boston (BPS, In-District Charter, and Commonwealth Charter schools) based strictly on MADESE data not "selective choice" as some may suggest. There is no interpretation of this data at all, we are just showing the actual numbers themselves for comparison. There is more to come very soon and every school WILL be included!

Our major news media outlets are constantly hyping that charter schools are much better at educating students than the "regular BPS schools", but now you can clearly see that the information they have been stating as "fact" are actually "spin". Hopefully, if you hung in this far, by now you can clearly see for yourself that the pro-charter groups and reporters are spreading misinformation, as there are drastic differences between the types of students who are being served in charter schools versus regular BPS schools which makes a huge difference in comparing who does a better job.

Here are a few other little known facts about charter schools which should be extremely concerning to us all: 

• Charter schools have a worse graduation/retention rate than our BPS schools do! As it has already been laid out quite well in an article by another blogger in March, until the school by school comparison my friend and I are preparing is finalized, I will direct you to that article: Charter School Attrition.


• Charter schools have a higher rate of suspension that our BPS schools do, see the article here: Raise the Cap on Traditional Public Schools.


• Charter schools' "teach to the MCAS" method of educating students does not set the students up well for SATs as proven through MADESE data again: Charter School Achievement Gap. 

Recently, Boston students organized a press conference and rally at the state house which I will write a bit more about in another article, but if you would like to see a brief synopsis of the press conference and rally despite the lack of credit given to those awesome students, please check out this article. This was a student initiated movement, contrary to the title and focus on what the adults had to say. The students of the Youth On Board, Boston Student Advisory Council, and other groups give me great hope for the future, and should not be ignored as they are the true experts on all of this right now because their education depends on them.

I will be writing much more on this topic as the battle, and yes, it is a battle, to save our public schools is heating up. In the meantime, if you would like to read more about the truth behind education "reform", check out some of my favorite bloggers:

Edushyster: Keeping an eye on the corporate education agenda, in Massachusetts and beyond. "Ed" combines facts and wit throughout the articles.

Mommy On the Floor: has just started writing about charter school issues, but has many great articles beyond charter schools!

I would love to connect with those of you who are as concerned as I and others are about the charter school cap being raised, so please contact me via email bpsnightmare@gmail.com or Twitter @bpsnightmare.

0 Boston "School Quality Working Group" Members Announced

On Wednesday, May 1, 2013, the Boston Public Schools' (BPS) School Quality Working Group (SQWG) held their first meeting. This meeting was primarily to announce and introduce the members of the group. The SQWG was created out of the recommendations approved by the Boston School Committee (BSC) as part of the new student assignment plan (Home-Based A) in March 2013. The entire list of recommendations are available here.

According to the BPS bostonschoolquality.org website: 

Boston School Committee member Meg Campbell and Boston University School of Education Dean Dr. Hardin Coleman will co-chair the new School Quality Working Group, which is modeled on the External Advisory Committee on School Choice, which Dr. Coleman also co-chaired. The Working Group includes BPS parents, academic experts, and business and community leaders. It will continue to engage the community in the conversation on school quality that took place during our process to improve school choice. Their tasks include:

• Helping to develop a better way to measure school quality for the Home-Based school choice model, which takes effect for the fall of 2014. Currently the Home-Based model uses MCAS Tiers, which are based on a combination of overall performance and growth as measured by MCAS.

• Analyzing the implementation of the Home-Based school choice model, including measures of equity and school quality improvements

The members of the committee are:

Ron Ancrum- Executive Director, The Learning Center at Bromley Heath

Meg Campbell (co-chair) - BSC member, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Codman Academy *Charter Public School

Kathleen Colby -  BPS Ambassador, former BPS parent & EAC member

Hardin Coleman (co-chair) - see above

Michael Curry - President, NAACP Boston Chapter

Rahn Dorsey - Evaluation Director, the Barr Foundation & EAC member

Betty Francisco - EVP and General Counsel of Millenium Sports Club Management, wife of Paul Francisco (EAC member)

Denise Gonsalves - Director of Youth Leadership Development at Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative (DSNI) 

Dr. William (Bill) Henderson - Former BPS teacher, principal of O'Hearn (now the Henderson) inclusion school, author of The Blind Advantage

Carolyn Kain - Current Chair, BPS SpedPAC & EAC member

Craig Lankhorst - former BPS principal & EAC member

Daniel Linsky - no confirmable information found

Meredith Liu - Chief Financial Officer of Match Charter School

Elaine Ng - Executive Director, Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center & BPS Parent

Myriam Ortiz - Executive Director, Boston Parent Organizing Network (BPON) & BPS parent

Marchelle Raynor - former Boston School Committee member and Program Director, Gertrude E. Townsend Learning Program

Marinell Rousmaniere -  Vice President of Strategic Initiatives at EdVestors & BPS Parent

Mariah Smith - no confirmable information found

Anh Vu - no confirmable information found

Rev. David Wright - Executive Director of the Black Ministerial Alliance of greater Boston

Josh Weiss - BPS parent who submitted a school assignment proposal to the EAC, took part in many of the EAC meetings as a community member, as well as blogging throughout the school assignment process at bpsworkshop.com

The above information regarding the members are not the official "bios" which BPS has requested from each of the members, but information obtained via prior BPS, EAC, BSC bios, through personal knowledge and relationships and with the help of others who know some of the members and was verified prior to writing this article. Once the official bios are available I will add a link to this post! 

In addition to the above tasks outlined on the new website, the group will most likely have some say in how to address quality issues in our Boston schools. The SQWG group, along with the BSC, holds the future of our students, the individual schools and the district as a whole, in their hands as they are charged with monitoring and assessing the new plan and the recommendations which may become district policies. 

As the families and advocates for our students and schools, we have an even more important role in this process: to monitor and assess the work of both the BSC and SQWG to ensure that all of our schools become quality schools and that access to those schools is equitable. I urge everyone, whether a current or potential BPS family, to follow this group and the work they do. When possible, attend the meetings (still TBA), ask questions, make suggestions and if concerned, let them know that too. 

"Learning is not attained by chance. It must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence." —Abigail Adams

I can be contacted at bpsnightmare@gmail.com and please consider following me on Twitter: @bpsnightmare.

0 BPS Will Present In-Depth Analysis of New Assignment Models Wednesday

Tuesday afternoon BPS released three new proposals in advance of the External Advisory Committee on School Choice (EAC) meeting scheduled for Wednesday night:

The 10-zone Proposal

Home-Based Proposals A & B

Only elementary schools are highlighted on these maps, but elementary schools will feed into middle schools under BPS' proposed "middle school feeder pattern", much like the Roslindale K-8 pathway does already, if incorporated into whichever proposal is finally selected by the EAC for recommendation to Dr. Johnson.

Also, if incorporated into whichever proposal is finally selected by the EAC, there could be changes to how and possibly where Students with Disabilities (SWD) and English Language Learners (ELL) will attend school per the overlay maps.

Also, please check out the information on the "School Quality" page, specifically the second set of bullet points, as it is extremely important and leads to several questions (I will delve into those tomorrow)!

Many of you are probably wondering where these latest proposals came from and rightfully so because even for those of us who have been attending the meetings and asking questions daily of BPS, the above new proposals were unexpected. What we expected to see Wednesday night was the in-depth analysis of the models selected by the EAC members in October 2012, not completely new models by BPS.

A lot has taken place since BPS presented their original proposals in September, so for those who have not been consumed by this process as I have, or were unable to attend the meetings or maybe are just becoming more aware of what is going on, below is some background to catch you up to where we are now.

The External Advisory Committee on School Choice is a 27-member group of BPS parents, educators, community and business leaders that the Mayor appointed in January 2012 to help BPS develop a student assignment plan that puts a focus on equity, school quality and helps students attend school closer to home. It would be implemented for the 2014-15 school year if approved by the Boston School Committee. 

Please note that the original timeline to accomplish the above, inclusive of presenting a recommended assignment plan to BPS and the Boston School Committee (BSC) voting on it was December 19, 2012. This timeline was extended, yet the implementation timeline has not changed.

After the original March - June 2012 community meetings, the EAC went to work to assess all of the feedback from families and community members regarding what was important to them when it comes to education for their child(ren). Originally BPS and EAC members were focused on the "close to home" emphasis outlined by Mayor Tom Menino during his State of the City 2012 address. After months of reviewing and incorporating the data into draft proposals, finally on September 24, 2012, BPS released their five proposed assignment models along with three "overlay" maps which they hope will be incorporated into whichever model is finally chosen. 

Immediately after the release of the BPS proposals, community members, families and groups started speaking out due to concern regarding the lack of accessibility and equity to the few "quality schools" within BPS and how the proposed models would impact all students. Also, there were formal analyses of the proposed models by a team at Harvard Graduate School of Education and one by the Metropolitan Area Planning Committee as well as more informal analyses by other groups and individuals like myself via blogs, websites and testimony at community and BSC meetings.

As the above was taking place many individuals and groups submitted alternative assignment proposals to BPS for consideration by the EAC. Two of these alternative plans were very popular from their initial submission: the Quality Choice Plan presented by a group of Boston and state politicians and the Family-Centric School Choice Model with Meaningful Choices and Guaranteed Equal Access to Quality aka "Grouped Schools Model" by Peng Shi and Itai Ashlagi of the MIT Operations Research Center.

Since the original BPS and community proposals were made to the EAC in September 2012, at the October 27, 2012 EAC meeting, after a presentation of the revised "Grouped School Model" by Peng Shi which had garnered support with the members, the EAC stated that they needed more data on the impact of the proposed models on Students with Disabilities and English Language Learners and that analysis of these groups should be built into the model revisions, including capacity data. The EAC also asked for data on an AWC analysis, and how it would work with various models as well as more information regarding the Middle School Feeder proposal. As this was happening, we also noticed a shift from the "close to home" focus toward "quality schools", which was more in sync with what the community was saying was important to them.

Taking the above into account, the EAC requested the following models undergo an in-depth analysis by the BPS technical team working with MIT & Harvard personnel: 

• the 23 zone model with paired zones, factoring in socioeconomic diversity; 
• the 6 zone model with assignment interventions to maximize equitable access to quality seats; 
• the no zone model with school pairings; 
• and the grouped-school model. 

The EAC requested an analysis from BPS similar to the analysis that Mr. Shi presented to the Committee during the October 27, 2012 meeting, which should include: 

• Equitable access to quality
• Diversity - socio economic diversity and race/cultural diversity
• Proximity to home
• Choice and predictability
• Transportation savings
• Racial diversity impact - both with current models and in accountability reporting in future
• Backwards assessment of impact on current neighborhoods as well as race, culture, and socioeconomic impacts.
• Analysis on students with disabilities and English Language Learners 

At the November 13, 2012 meeting BPS made some preliminary presentations on the requests by the EAC, but due to questions from the EAC members which highlighted issues with it, the modified 6-zone model was removed until BPS could analyze it in an "apples to apples" sort of way. Also, because MIT has the ability to use their super-computer programs (I do not know the exact name lol), the EAC asked for the models to be run through the software with the requirements above, which was agreed to by the MIT personnel in attendance.

On November 29, 2012, Mayor Menino announced an extension to the original deadline for the EAC which states:

Mayor Thomas M. Menino's External Advisory Committee on School Choice will continue its work through January as it creates an improved student assignment system for the city's children and families. The Mayor's decision supports Superintendent Carol R. Johnson's recommendation that her technical team work with Professor Parag Pathak, director of the School Effectiveness and Inequality Initiative (SEII) at MIT, and experts at Harvard's Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston.  Together, the team will conduct an in-depth analysis on zone-based and non-zone-based models to simulate how families would choose schools under a new system. The analysis is based on several years of assignment data and used to project choice patterns in the future.

The technical team will present analysis of models to the EAC in mid-January. After the models are presented, the EAC will continue its community process and make a final recommendation on a new school choice system to the Superintendent. 

With the extended timeline given to the EAC the implication was that due to the time it would take to produce the requested data and analysis, the EAC members and community at large would have more time to review the in-depth analysis of the proposals selected which continued to be modified by the EAC, as well as the "overlay" proposals by BPS for Middle School Pathways (MSP), Students with Disabilities (SWD) and English Language Learners (ELL). 

I was at the November 29th where the EAC requested further data and an in-depth analysis per above criteria of the assignment proposals utilizing previous enrollment data to predict how parents may choose schools under the selected models. I also attended subsequent meetings where discussion among the EAC members, with regard to a recommendation letter they are drafting, led to several of them agreeing that the in-depth analysis of the models may lead to them deciding NONE of the models they have narrowed the choices down to may work, so effectively they would need to reevaluate all of the proposals again. At least we knew that mid-January we would receive the models of the proposals generated through MIT and the in-depth analysis of same.


Over the past two months all of the models continued to be modified, so maybe these new models by BPS should not be as surprising as they are to us!  

On Monday, January 21, 2013, I received the weekly "BPS This Week" newsletter which included the following announcement:

External Advisory Committee on School Choice to receive 'best of the best' model options this week
After more than 50 community meetings, input from more than 4,000 voices, dozens of External Advisory Committee meetings and proposals from the community, the EAC is ready to examine the "best of the best" ideas for an improved school choice system. The BPS technical team will present updated model options at the EAC meeting Wednesday night.
The models were created in an attempt to emphasize equitable access to quality schools, increase predictability for families and offer great choices closer to home when compared to the current three-zone system, which has been in place for nearly 25 years. You can keep track of our progress and get involved by visitingbostonschoolchoice.org. Also, please join the EAC for a community meeting Monday, February 4 at 6:00pm at Orchard Gardens K-8 School, 906 Albany St., Roxbury.

I and other community members were glad to hear that there would not be another delay in finally seeing the anticipated in-depth analysis and seeing the projection maps of the selected proposals. 

Much to our surprise, many of us received the news Tuesday morning that BPS would "unveil three revised student-assignment proposals Tuesday that would allow more children to attend schools closer to their homes, as an advisory committee prepares to make a final recommendation in the coming weeks."  

Don't get me wrong, on some level we realized that the projection maps may be a bit different and lead to further tweaking of the selected proposals, but most of us truly did not foresee this amount of difference in what would be presented and what was expected. In effect, though I can see pieces of the proposals the EAC had selected within these latest models, they are really brand new to the general public.

Which leads to the following questions:

Was the EAC aware of this level of change by BPS to their selected proposals?
    I suspect the members were aware on some level.

Will we still receive true in-depth analysis at this Wednesday's meeting of these new proposals utilizing all of the criteria outlined by the EAC?

Will we still receive clear data regarding our most vulnerable populations (SWD and ELL students) and how the assignment changes will impact them?

Did BPS present these models to the EAC members prior to unveiling them for all of us?
   Historically this has not been the case, so I would guess not.

How do the EAC members feel about these new proposals?
    We will find out tomorrow evening for sure!

As the three proposals BPS unveiled Tuesday are basically new to everyone, will the EAC push for more meetings to truly assess the response of more voices in Boston? 
    I hope they do as it may help to quiet the rumblings of the community that they are being pressured to accept one of the proposals and present to the Superintendent within the next month!
    So far there is only one meeting scheduled for community feedback, questions and input - on Monday, February 4, 2013 at 6:00pm at Orchard Gardens K-8 school (back to where it all began!). I did ask one of the EAC members if they have considered also holding a meeting on a Saturday, in the early afternoon, to allow for more feedback and she let me know she had passed on my suggestion and would bring it up at Wednesday's meeting. 

Pursuant to the above, I have to ask: is the EAC being pressured to complete this within the next month or two? 

I admire the amount of time and dedication each of the EAC members have put into this entire process so I am hopeful that they are not being pressured by a political or assignment round deadline (2014-15 registration) in addition to the exhaustion they MUST feel! I also agree that BPS NEEDS a new assignment plan and want to help accomplish this goal. 

We absolutely need deadlines and without them would not be where we are currently, but I believe we may need to allow the EAC, community and the Boston School Committee until April or May to finalize this process.  

Mayor Menino, I have known you since I was 16 when you approached my youth group to help you create a teen center in Hyde Park, since then as a neighbor, working with you as Chair of the BPS SNPAC & as an advocate for public education, so I know that you have always had high standards for our students just as I and other Boston parents have. 

Now Mayor Menino, I am coming to you and my plea to you as my education Mayor is this: 

Even if it means delaying implementation of a new assignment plan by one year, please allow all of us the time to ensure that the proposal which is chosen will truly give our students equitable access to the highest quality education we can provide for them.   

The race for quality has no finish line!

0 The Quality Choice Plan: Some Answers to Questions Asked

For parts 1, 2, 3 & 4 of this series regarding the Quality Choice Plan, please go to October 2012.

Yesterday, during the Roslindale Day Parade, John Connolly asked if I had received the answers about the Quality Choice plan yet. At that time I was unaware that his assistant, Ann Walsh, had just emailed them to me. I finally saw the email this morning and am including it here, with permission, for everyone to review. First, I would like to thank John, Matt, et al, and of course Ann, for responding.

My thoughts regarding certain responses will be indicated by KKM: as just in reviewing it I had further thoughts and questions.

Hi Karen,

Thanks for your questions regarding the Quality Choice Plan.  I have provided responses below.  Feel free to contact me directly with any additional quesitons or concerns.

Best,

Ann

Responses:

AW:   The financial solutions definitely won't be easy, but can happen.  Transportation cost savings will be limited at the outset, since grandfathering will continue and the plan would be implemented gradually, beginning with kindergarten students in September of 2014.  Over time, the savings will increase as more students attend schools closer to home. 

KKM: 1) When do you project busing of "grandfathered" siblings to end absolutely? We need this date to estimate when any savings, if any, from transportation might be allocated for other pieces of the plan.

          2) You are saying the plan will be implemented "gradually" starting with the children who enter Kindergarten in 2014:

              a)  Specifically, which pieces will be implemented first?

              b)  Can you give me a list of dates of implementation for all the suggestions in the priority you plan to implement them and your deadline for full-implementation of your plan?

              c)  Does this mean that the majority of children currently in BPS will see little to no benefit from this plan? If you do think current students will reap the benefit of this plan despite not being part of the Kindergarten class of 2014, please explain with specifics and details.

AW:   By converting more schools to Pilots, Innovation, or In-District Charters, we are encouraging more site-based management of funds at schools.  Current pilot schools and charters have this autonomy and most are demonstrating academic outcomes ahead of the district average while managing their own per pupil budgets.  Site-based management of funds is a critical element of implementing a truly effective Weighted Student Funding formula, and we hope the district will do more of it and allow schools to efficiently spend their funds.  We are continuing to do financial analysis, but with a $1 billion annual budget currently, we strongly believe that this is feasible with some creative re-allocation and strategic partnerships with universities, hospitals, libraries, health centers, and community-based organizations.

KKM: Site-based management of funds does not answer the question of where funding would come from for the conversions, additional supports, etc. No matter what type of school it is, more funds than are currently allocated for the majority of our schools (who have consistently had budget cuts each year), will be necessary under this plan. Creative re-allocation may help with some portion of the funding for your plan, but what assurances do you have that the rest of the funding necessary will be approved by the city council, state, feds, etc?  

Have you sought the input of the BTU on the proposal to convert so many schools to pilot, charter, innovation? As the newest BTU contract, if accepted by SC, is through 2016: what is your expectation that a proposal like this might keep another contract from being ratified? Are you aware that according to BTU rules, 2/3 of the BTU voting members at a school would have to vote to approve the conversion to one of the models you are suggesting? 

At a time when universities, hospitals, etc are cutting their partnerships, pro-bono work etc are you sure this can be accomplished? Do you have written assurances of such from our biggest and best of the types of organizations listed?

Something to think about: if you are planning on utilizing hospitals to provide some of the support services you suggest, this generally means utilizing residents/post-docs. etc with little experience. How will you ensure that our students needing these services will get the quality services they deserve? IEP objectives and goals are constantly rolled-over year-to-year with little to no improvement for the students as families are not always able to sufficiently measure progress or advocate effectively for what their child needs. 

AW:    Please note that all of the "new" schools listed (with the exception of the downtown school) would be the result of transforming existing schools, so cost increases would be minimal.  Those schools are serving students already and  in 2014, we would propose that the new magnet programs begin with the entering kindergarten children.  If school leaders and staff are ambitious and want to extend programming to upper grades, that would be fantastic, but this plan is intended to be phased in over time.  Our ELLs and students with disabilities are currently in schools across the city, so the creation of these magnet schools will require reallocation of funds, but not an enormous investment of new dollars.  The same is true for AWC or Honors, which can be done in place with strong differentiated instruction or some level of separate classrooms, at the discretion of each school community.  In the case of providing a quality baseline at all schools and additional resources and supports at high-need schools, a reallocation of funds through adjustments to the Weighted Student Funding formula would be required to get those resources to the schools with the highest needs as soon as possible.

KKM:  Even transformation of current schools = more funds necessary (usually):   What is your projected cost/savings and "reallocation" of funds for each of the schools you propose "transforming"? Would you please share the exact numbers/budgets you are projecting?

Are you proposing moving special ed strands again after BPS just did so? Same question re: BPS' ELL changes over the past year. Also, how do you propose ensuring Least Restrictive Enviroment (LRE) pursuant to special ed laws are not violated under your plan? How will you ensure that our SWD & ELL students are not segregated?

Please see Part 3 of my QC analysis for earlier thoughts pertaining to AWC proposal., but additionally, some of our older schools have no space availabile for modular classrooms (or will you take playgrounds away?) or building higher i.e. - Mozart (as the neighbors would lobby against it - ask Carleton Jones re: roposed Bates-Mozart merger issues that squashed that plan), which means those schools would not have the ability to have AWC or Honors classes. How do we ensure those students have the same quality education? (Personally I wouldn't trade our 5th grade tchr for AWC anyway - she is even better than AWC)

AW:    Please realize that cost cutting is not why we created this plan.  Our goal was to draft a plan that would finally give all parents and students access to quality schools.  If giving every child access to a quality school ends up costing a little more money, then we can’t think of a better thing for the City to be spending its money on.  This isn’t about cost; this is about values.  If we truly value giving every parent and every student access to quality schools, then we need to fund it appropriately.

KKM:  Personally, I don't care if we have to increase the budget 100% as long as the $$ is actually impacting our students DIRECTLY instead of non-school personnel, consultants, research, etc, that is not the issue I have. The issue I have is that no one can guarantee that you can fund this plan or any of the others proposed right now.  Yet, families are stressing out over the thought of their children possibly going through upheaval and losing schools THEY feel ARE quality schools while also being asked to "vote" for a plan (QC, BPS or other) without any guaranteed funding which could lead to disaster if the economy tanks due to all the turmoil at fed level with tax cuts up in the air. How can anyone get behind a proposal without a funding plan clearly laid out? 

Does anyone remember that they appropriated funding from special education to fund NCLB years later because it was passed with no funding plan and was failing? This cut special ed funding which means families have an even harder time getting their children the help they need now. And then there is the issue of expecting BPS to run the numbers for this proposal instead of working on actual school business (as it currently stands), which the proponents should have done prior to releasing it.

Questions I have:

          1)  Realistically, by what year do you expect all BPS families will be able to access quality schools district-wide? 

           2) With the possibility of Education cuts at the Federal level of about 8.2%, which will trickle down to state/city level, how will you fund everything that is needed?  

           3)  Do you have the commitment of entire BCC & Mayor to add additional funds to the BPS budget, no matter which plan is passed?

AW:   Regarding grandfathering, ALL current students and their siblings would be grandfathered using the same sibling priority in place at BPS right now.  Currently, a child receives sibling preference at a school if a sibling will be attending the school at the same time.  If the first child has graduated from the school before the second (or third, etc.) would arrive, sibling preference does not apply.  That is current practice and would remain.  The goal of sibling preference is to keep children together, so when that can be done, it should be done.

AW:   Since we are calling for the guarantee of a K-8 school or pathway (in which schools are paired to cover grades K-8, similar to the Beethoven-Ohrenberger or Roosevelt Schools,  NOT multiple schools feeding a middle school without capacity alignment), and an AWC or honors program at every school, cases of older siblings leaving a school "early" are less likely.  The premise of a sibling "bumping" a new student from having a seat at one of his or her four closest schools is unrealistic because the plan guarantees a seat, even if that means using modular classrooms, much in the same way suburban communities manage short-term enrollment increases.  If families in other communities can count on that level of predictability for their children, the families of Boston deserve no less.

KKM: Please see Part 4 of my QC Analysis regarding the question of who might end up in modular classrooms.

I respectfully disagree regarding the likelihood of "bumping" seats - saying that it has to happen because the plan guarantees a seat does not make facilities appear (pleas see above re: Mozart example of not having space for mod classrooms or adding floors to the current school building) and if this premise were true, wouldn't every child who has special needs get everything they are supposed to instead of only what a school will give them? Talk to myself, Carolyn Kain and other special ed attorneys and advocates about this premise, because if this truly did happen at any level, then we would all need other jobs. 

I do agree that families in Boston deserve no less than other communities, the problem is most of those communities have higher income brackets and also more space for their schools.

AW:   The suggested schools for citywide magnet status were selected using a variety of criteria, including proximity to a language-specific community, capacity, and potential for academic and programmatic "renewal" through citywide status.  Providing school leaders and teachers the opportunity to work towards an innovative curriculum with an infusion of energy can provide a "fresh start" for many schools and may increase enrollment at those that are currently underselected.

 KKM: Please see questions above re: converting schools.

AW:   Parent compacting DOES happen already and can happen more often with the guarantee of this plan.  Families want their children to attend school with friends from their neighborhood, house of worship, childcare center or nursery school, etc.  They often don't pursue parent compacting because the risk in the current model is too high that some children will not be assigned together.  By compacting, they apply together and only get assigned to the underselected school if there are enough seats for all of their children.  Otherwise, they will be assigned to one of their four closest schools or a citywide school, via their preferences.  Schools including the Trotter, Hurley, and Murphy have all seen some type of compacting in the past and this plan allows more families to make this choice without the current risks.

KKM: Can you show me concretely that parent compacting has happened through the normal BPS lottery process? I would like to see how BPS handled it as that means BPS gave special priority to certain families, which we all thought was impossible.

AW:    Most importantly, The Quality Choice Plan is based on an entirely different premise than the existing models.  We do not accept the premise that equitable access is enough, but instead are working towards equitable quality for all.  Sections II and III very deliberately outline what we think must be done to ensure that every school is providing quality, especially those who serve high numbers of children living in poverty.  If we only ensure equitable access to a limited number of quality schools, there will always be children going to low-quality schools and that is unacceptable.

KKM: I agree with the premise of your plan absolutely, John knows it aligns with my decades long battle. I just think it is important to not only have a premise and propose a plan, but also outline in detail how it will become a reality. So, show myself and everyone else how this will become a reality, with facts, figures and detailed specifics and I am sure we could all get behind this plan.

I have sent the above back to Ann Walsh, as soon as I have answers I will make them available for everyone.

My final thoughts regarding the Quality Choice Plan.