PA: A Bad Teacher Transparency Bill

Pennsylvania Republicans want to jump on the teacher transparency train, motivated no doubt by nothing but good thoughts and in no way pandering to the mob currently demanding that we root Evil Indoctrination out of schools. HB 1332 requires districts to post a bunch of instructional stuff on line; it has just passed the House, and will probably sail through the GOP-controlled Senate as well, but it's a particularly bad example of this sort of bill, and it deserves to die on the statehouse steps. Let's talk about why.

First, the bill is both redundant and vague. Here's exactly what the bill requires districts to post:

...all curriculum, including academic standards to be achieved, instructional materials, assessment techniques and course syllabus for each instructional course offered...

Curriculum is publicly adopted by school boards. Academic standards are adopted by the state and already available on line (perhaps the law wants to see which standards apply to which parts of which courses, but the bill doesn't say that). Instructional materials can mean virtually anything a teacher ever uses in the classroom; does the bill want a list of textbooks (again, publicly adopted by the board) or every worksheet and handout, text of every lecture, pictures of stuff drawn on the chalk/white-board, homework assignments--the list can go on forever, but it doesn't even start here. Assessment techniques--so the school just has to say "there will be tests and worksheets and an occasional pop quiz" and that's it? Also, how do copyrights and IP rights factor into this? This is a bill that says, "Put up some of the stuff that is already publicly available, and throw in some more whatever-ya-got."

All of this must be posted within thirty days of the adoption of a new curriculum. It does, at least, apply to both public and charter schools. Private schools get a pass.

But in addition to being vague, the bill has also skipped over the important "or else" part of any law. It says absolutely nothing about how compliance will be judged or enforced.

Let me tell you a story. Back in 2002, I was the president of our local, and we went on strike. In Pennsylvania, there's a law that says the school year must be finished by a certain date, meaning that a strike must end by a certain date in order for the school to get its full lawful year in. The teachers and the district wanted to determine what that date would be early on and, just for fun, to find out what the consequences would be if we went over. Both the district and the union made calls to Harrisburg. Not only could we not get answers to any of our questions, but we couldn't even find a department in Harrisburg that would admit to being responsible for overseeing the rule and compliance with it. We finally had to just settle on a date between ourselves; it was one of the first things we settled in that strike. 

So for this bill--which is only 17 lines long, and that includes definitions of terms and the "this act will take effect in 60 days" part--who is going to decide whether or not a school district has complied fully and accurately? Will there be some sort of accountability if a district doesn't actually follow the syllabus of record? Will someone check to make sure that the online material is complete and accurate and enough to satisfy the law? 

And if the districts is found--somehow, by somebody--to have failed to comply, which department in Harrisburg is going to scold them, and what will the penalty be, exactly?

Mind you, I don't particularly want to see these things in a bill, but the fact that they aren't there suggests that this is not so much a serious bill as just a stunt.

And being just a stunt would be okay, except that this is going to create a crapload of electronic busywork for a bunch of teachers. In some districts, the work required by the bill is more or less done already, but in some districts, a bunch of teachers will now be required to use their copious free time to pull together the whole mountain, chapter, and verse for their courses.  The bill specifies that chief administrators are responsible for getting this stuff put up, but that task will simply be delegated. And these days, don't teachers just really need One More Damn Thing to do. The best response of schools will be to not take this requirement seriously and just quickly post whatever, but educators are too often good soldiers and rules followers--some districts are going to take this seriously and demand a bunch of extra time from teachers, or, worse yet, spend taxpayer dollars to compensate teachers for extra time spent on this.

In Pennsylvania, districts are regularly required to craft Strategic Plans, which often involve big committees and lots of meetings (I participated in every one of these when I was a teacher) and in the end it generates a large, complex planning and steering document that sits on a shelf somewhere and is never viewed again by a single living soul. It's thousands of person-hours building a bridge to nowhere. This smells like more of the same. 

Democrats in the House smelled something else as well.

“This bill will drag education right into the middle of the culture wars,” said Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Allegheny County, “Your neighbor, her grandfather in Florida, your crazy uncle and his best friend in California can all weigh in on what the schools are teaching your child. Let’s be clear.”

“This bill isn’t about transparency for parents,” Frankel said. “It’s about bringing the fights that get started on Fox News to the kindergarten classroom near you. ... This legislation is an invitation to the book burners and anti-maskers to harass our schools and our teachers.”

GOP Rep Aaron Bernstine countered the fear that this will fan the lies about what teachers are doing in classrooms because the Truth will be there on line. Except that A) as noted above, there won't necessarily be much of anything on line and B) the crowds getting whipped up about Indoctrinatin' have shown that they can find Evil Naughtiness in just about anything that teachers do. 

I'm a big fan of transparency in schools; taxpayers and parents deserve to know how their money is being spent and their kids are being taught. Schools cannot fight off the current mob by simply trying to hide their work. But this is a transparency bill without any transparency, creating a huge pile of busywork that won't even help people who are sincerely interested in finding out more about what the school is up to (though lots of them use antiquated techniques like Emailing The Teacher and Asking Their Child). It let's the GOP tell the mob, "See, we made those public schools 'fess up" and it let's the mob do online searches to see if anything turns up from that List Of Evil Books they got from their favorite anti-mask anti-"CRT" pro-open school anti-a bunch-of-stuff group. 

In short, this is a bill that doesn't do anything useful, a not-really-a-solution in search of a problem, a political stunt whose only concrete result will be a bunch of extra work cutting into teachers' teaching time. This doesn't serve anyone but some politicians and the mob. 

OH: Protect Our Children From Everything

You may have seen the opt out form floating around education-related social media, and it appears to have come from a special group in Ohio. Meet the Protect Ohio Children Coalition, "putting daylight on the darkness of Critical Race Theory (CRT), Comprehensive Sex Education (CSE), and Social Emotional Learning (SEL)." Their mission is stated plainly on the site

Children have a legal right to an academic education that protects their innocence, free from comprehensive sexuality education and radical indoctrination. We will not tolerate the radicalization of children in our schools. We will equip and support individuals who are monitoring and evaluating school boards. We will assist in replacing radical school board officials through the election process.

I'm not familiar with the "protects innocence" clause in education law, but their point is still clear. Their goals are clear, too--drive this stuff out, and drive out anybody who supports it in any way. The front page of the site offers an easy link to their anonymous tip form--well, actually it's a "mailto" link, so you'll be sending them an email with your eddress on it, so not exactly anonymous. 

There's a map and list of districts with "confirmed" indoctrination going on. And a reminder that Ohio now gives parents the right to demand that schools and teachers drop everything to let parents examine almost all materials (I say almost because even though the Ohio law lets parents inspect every survey or questionnaire before its given, and every bit of instructional material, somehow--somehow--the Big Standardized Test escaped demands for transparency). 

There are tips on how to make public records requests, and an explanation of the "tsunami strategy," a method for swamping school board meetings and legislative hearings. 

There are also guides to each of the objectionable indoctrination things. The CRT page cites Hillsdale College and Trump's 1776 Report, and explains how BLM came from CRT and CRT came from Karl Marx, plau an anti-CRT article from Christopher Rufo, the OG of anti-CRT noisemaking. The CSE page reminds you that CSE includes strong components of pedophile grooming techniques. And the SEL page is mostly a reminder that this argument is not new (see also "values clarification" and the "soft skills" portion of Outcome Based Education). It's bad because it's an attempt to change students' beliefs and values--that's an old issue, rooted in the not-unreasonable fears that hit a parent when you realize you are entrusting your child to the care of someone who may or may not share your own values. They did manage to surprise me with their article linking SEL to "occult roots." 

And they have a link to the infamous opt-out form. The list of things the teacher may not expose a child to is long. There's a big list of "divisive concepts" and materials that the child must not be exposed to, from "revisionist history" to Edgenuity. No personal analysis or attempts to affect the "child's attitudes, habits, traits, opinions, beliefs or feelings concerning: political affiliations; religious beliefs or practices; mental or psychological conditions; or illegal, antisocial, self-incriminating or demeaning behavior." That is a really, really broad net to cast. Also, no advertising groups that have anything to do with sexual orientation or gender identity, even if you try to sneak it through "under the guise of 'bullying.'"

The sex stuff opt-out form is separate, and includes everything from every group associated with LGBTQ+ that you've ever heard of. Also, no instruction about abortion, birth control, sexual activity of any kind, sexual orientation, or transgenderism, etc etc etc.

The form requests "alternative academic instruction" for the child, and that the form be put in the child's permanent file, and ends with the warning "Any instruction contrary to this notice will be the subject of further action to protect my child."

Who are the folks behind this? 

Top of the crew are Diane Stover (Program director) and her husband John. The Stovers have long been active in Ohio conservative circles, including Ohio Value Voters, another group they created and led. They've got a background in IT and real estate; plus, she's a Sunday School teacher and he's a Baptist deacon. The Stovers were also among the witnesses testifying in favor of Ohio's anti-teaching naughty stuff law; she urged the legislature "to protect children from the indoctrination of harmfulk ideology in our schools."

Other board members include Cathy Pulz, who headed up the Upper Arlington Education Coalition that, among other things, fought back against gender neutral bathrooms in school (she also testified in favor of the gag bill). Also, Linda Harvey, president of Mission America, a Christian pro-family organization. Mission America hosted a podcast about the dangers of CRT, with Johnathan Broadbent, another board member, as guest. The final member is Jen Burr, who testified in favor of open, maskless schools as a board member of Ohio Parents for Traditional Education (they have a Facebook page that has gone private). There are connections to the Tea Party, Citizens for Free Speech--the usual crew.

CRT continues to be a catch-all for every complaint about public education ever, while also trying to generate discontent with public education, the better to fuel new attempts to simply get rid of it and replace it with a good-luck-you're-on-your-own marketplace even as taxpayers send money to religious schools. From complaints about critical race theory (which came after complaints about closed schools and mask mandates) we've moved on to the old refrain against everything that schools might teach that some conservative christianists disapprove of. 

It would be a mistake for public education to take the stance that parents should shut up and sit down, but it would also be a mistake to let a small, vocal, albeit well-organized group intent on turning the clock back to a whitewashed version of 1955 decide what schools should do. The notion, as expressed by Mike Pompeo, that "parents should decide what their children are taught in school" is one more dismissal of educator expertise and a sure recipe for educational stagnation. I absolutely get the visceral fear of having your children grow up to be something foreign to your own beliefs and experience, but I don't get the notion that "don't let me children learn anything that I don't know myself" is a solution to anything. This is not freedom; this is a clumsy attempt to tie freedom up and gag it. Plus, I'll bet dollars to donuts that even as I type this, children are online googling items from the list of forbidden subjects. Good luck with that opt out thing.

OH: One More Push To Defund Public Education

Ohio is once again making an effort to surpass Florida in its hostility to public education. This time, it's the Backpack Scholarship Program, yet another voucher bill intended to have tax dollars "follow the child" and not fund the public education system. 

This bill (HB 290) is the education savings account super-voucher approach, providing $5,500 for elementary and $7,500 for secondary students, with the family having the option to spend the money on a wide variety of education-flavored goods and services (those amounts are set to grow at the same rate as the statewide average goes up--see here to see why that's a tasty dodge for privatizers). It applies to  any and all students, including those already enrolled in non-public schools, so that right off the bat public schools will lose money without any commensurate drop in student population. And I repeat--there is not even the pretense of "this is just a small program to help rescue The Children from being trapped in failing zip school codes." This is "free government money for everyone!"

The proposal calls for the treasurer of the state to run the program. There are no accountability or oversight rules in the law--just a requirement that the treasurer come up with something, later.

The list of eligible areas on which the voucher can be spent looks like the assortment that come up in these bills in other states-- tuition, tutoring, testing, industry credentialing course, educational services, textbooks, curriculum, fees for summer school. And as always, the law contains an explicit "just cause you're taking government money, that doesn't mean the government can tell you how to run your school" clause.

There are some convoluted money items, allowing for various rollovers of voucher funds, like passing unused voucher money from Child A on to Child B.

But the real poison pill can be found in line 258-- (Sec. 3310.25 C), which says that if a family is at or below 200% of the federal poverty line, the children cannot be charged a tuition higher than the voucher amount. Meaning that your Lexus-level Private Schools will still have plenty of motivation to keep Those Peoples' Children out of their school. 

You can learn more about the bill here at its very own website, where one of the things that you'll learn is that the website "is brought to you by the Ohio Christian Education Network and the Center for Christian Virtue." That makes sense--the Ohio Christian Education Network helped write the bill (though truthfully at this point all these bills require is a little cut and paste from the last batch).

Backers of the bill are barely managing to muster the usual talking points. “Will it put more pressure on public schools? Probably,” said Rep. Riordan McClain (R-Upper Sandusky). “Will it make [public schools] more accountable to parents then they are today? Probably.” That's pretty lukewarm, but hey-- conservatives who want to get rid of public education get what they want, and private religious schools get the access to public tax dollars that they want, and off in to the side, the usual crews are raising a ruckus about masks and CRT and everything else they can use as a means of discrediting public schools. 

Call it a voucher or a backpack or an ESA--it allows the state to say, "Hey, we gave you some money to go get an education, so we're done. It's all your problem now" as another shared common good is gutted. Not good for Ohio or any other state.

A Handy Guide To SCOTUS, Schools, and the Wall between Church and State

When I first met Dallas Koehn, he was approaching the end of his rope with education in Oklahoma. Now he's in Indiana, but when he moved, he took with him a background in history, teaching, and consulting (imagine--hiring a consultant who actually works in a classroom). Koehn has been blogging for years at Blue Cereal Education, where he applies a nice combination of insight and sass. 

All of those qualities--the deep knowledge of history, the writing skill, and the sass--are on display in his new book A Wall of Education: What the Supreme Court Really Says (And Really Doesn't) About The Separation of Church and State in Education). It's an extension/collection of his regular "Have To" History posts on the blog, where the history teacher him just has to break down significant historical stuff.

The book is a chronological collection of every SCOTUS case related to the long-storied wall between church and state where it runs through schools. That may sound like a tough row to hoe, but Koehn makes it tolerable--even entertaining--through a couple of devices.

For one, each section lets you go as deep as you like. Koehn starts with Three Big Things--the basic "what you need to know about this case" boiled down to three bullet points. Then there's the background (how we got there), the arguments, and the decision, plus why it mattered, all clearly labeled so that you can skim as you wish. At the end, he gives you the opinions and dissents from the judges themselves. With each case, you are free to dig as deeply as you wish (or not).

This is all aided by Koehn's relaxed, plain-language voice. It's pretty easy to imagine these capsuled explanations as class presentations. Take this paragraph, selected by me pretty much at random, from his discussion of Lee v. Weisman:

Justice Antonin Scalia, joined by Chief Justice William Rehnquist and Justice Clarence Thomas, had a number of problems with the majority decision, most of which centered around--wait for it-- the focus on "coercion." Being Scalia, this wasn't the only problem with the decision. Everyone participating in it was a big stinky dumb doo-doo head. But coercion came up the most in his mocking, sputtering rebuttal. (Quote from Scalia follows)

There's a lot of scholarship here, and a lot of understanding conveyed in ways that don't require you to be a legal scholar, but which makes the musing of legal scholars a bit easier to follow. Reading the volume through, in order, one gets a real education on the ubiquitous "Lemon Test," and you can see, almost in real time, the slow erosion of the wall as folks on the religious side keep probing and pushing, sometimes more honestly and sincerely than others. 

Koehn divides cases into major in-depth chapters and quicky "worth a look" sidebars. It makes a great reference book for those of us who aren't lawyers, like having easy access to a legal historian who speaks regular English. I know I'm eventually going to be irritated at the lack of a table of contents or index, but there is a very handy grouping of cases by subject area in the back, as well as a list of further resources. 

Koehn's own inclinations are easy to spot, but he is fair and even-handed in his treatment of the various parties in these cases (kind of like any experienced well-read professional educator handling a controversial topic). The book is self-published, but available at plenty of on-line outlets. It's a hefty 400-ish pages, but reads quickly and provides a quick look-up source for all the cases you'd want to know about. I recommend this book as a worthwhile addition to your education policy library.

The Missing School Choice Argument

Sometimes it's what people don't say that tells you a lot about their position.

Proponents of school choice rarely-if-ever talk about one of the great obstacles to school choice.

Private school admissions.

For instance, private schools that explicitly or implicitly forbid LGBTQ students (and faculty). Or private schools that resist admitting students of color. Or private schools that have religious requirements. Or private schools that have erected barriers of price, thereby blocking poorer families from access. (And that's before we get to a whole other class of obstacles, like the parochial school that told my divorced friend that her children would probably be better off in a more suitable surrounding--presumably one better-equipped for children from a "broken home.")

When the private or charter schoolhouse door is locked, it is most often the people inside who have locked it. Why are choice fans not after them to open their doors?

When cries go up that students have to be rescued from their "failing schools" and must be released from being trapped in their zip code, why do none of these complaints ever address the people who already have lifeboats in the water, calling on them to carry more children to safety?

Why not demand that the pricey privates use their endowments to extend more scholarships? Why not insist that the Catholic Church use its billions of dollars to welcome more students into its huge chain of private schools? Why is nobody giving Eva Moskowitz grief about the families she chases away from Success Academy? Why is there so little talk from choicers about all the seats going empty because charters refuse to backfill and replace students who leave? We know most of the tricks that schools use to make it "school's choice"--why aren't choicers who are in it For The Children out there hollering, "Knock that off right now"?

Why do so few voucher systems include any safeguards for students and families, so few guarantees that when they find the school that's the "best fit," their "right" to make that choice will not be violated by the school itself? 

Heck, why not demand better wages for American workers so that more parents could afford to keep one parental unit out of work to home school instead?

School choice is, after all, widely available right now--except for the barriers of school's admission policies and tuition price tags. It is within the schools' power to fix both of those so that school choice would be more readily accessible to families. And yet, nobody in the school choice movement raises their voice to make this argument. 

I don't know, but I can guess at some of the arguments. 

"Even if private schools open their doors wider, we'd still be asking parents to pay for school twice." But nobody pays for school twice, because nobody pays the full price to send their child to school even once. I pay my property tax, and some other undefined amount of school tax through state and federal channels. It does not remotely add up to the price per pupil--even less so if we're talking about more than one. And if we accept this argument, then we open the floor to folks who want to argue that their kids are grown and why should they be paying any money at all for school taxes?

"It would cramp the school's style to just fling open the doors." Sure. But either we are in favor of a system that takes responsibility for educating all children, or we don't. If private schools want to exist outside of that all-children system, they don't need to take the money that's paid by taxpayers to maintain that system. That makes no more sense than saying, "I want to build a nice private park, but I want the government to give me public tax dollars to help pay for it." 

But here's the thing--if actual choice were the main concern here, advocates could argue for vouchers etc at the same time they lobbied for more open access to private schools. But for many, it's not about choice- it's about taxpayer-funded choice, or transforming a public system into a privately owned-and-operated system. It's not about access to choice for students; it's about access to tax dollars and the education market for entrepreneurs and vendors. In the most extreme cases, it's about ending tax-supported public education.\

There's a whole world of ways to provide more choices to students (including choices within the public system itself). Why do choicers insist that we should only talk about one particular approach?

ICYMI: Applefest Edition (10/3)

 Once a year, my small town closes the streets, brings in a ton of vendors, runs a whole passel of events, and calls it a festival, and it's pretty cool. Like the Harvest Homes of a century ago, it serves as a city-wide homecoming. It's not quite the same this year (the apple pancake breakfast was take-out only), but it's something. In the meantime, here's your reading list for the week.

Fighting back in Arizona

Trevor Nelson at Public Voices for Public Schools tells how activists are fighting back against the folks in Arizona trying to use the pandemic to sow more chaos, disruption and destruction of public schools.

What 150 studies have to say about motivating students

Jill Barshay at Hechinger looks at a meta-study of student motivation, Surprise--students are motivated by the same things as other humans.

How for-profit charter schools open the door for private investors to exploit public education

Jeff Bryant has been digging again. Here's a pretty appalling look at how some loopholes are being exploited by some shady actors in the edu-biz world.

Teaching children and teenagers philosophy and social justice

An intriguing and unusual slant on teaching the thinky stuff. From the blog of the APA

Why charter schools are not as "public" as they claim to be

Kevin Welner has a new book about charter schools coming out--here's a piece of what his research discovered about how charters actually enforce school's choice, not school choice.

Teach two years, climb ed ladder, score $5 mill contract

The indispensable Mercedes Schneider with an astonishing story of corruption amongs the TFA grads in Rhode Island

Racism matters to our students, so it must matter to us

Jaty Wamsted doing a guest turn at Maureen Downey's spot on the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, talking about the real place of critical race theory in the classroom.

Behind the teacher shortage, an unexpected culprit: covid relief money

From NBC news. Some folks think that covid money is being used to poach teachers from other districts.

Koch-backed group fuels opposition to mask mandates

The Washington Post got its hands on some leaked documents, and you will be shocked--shocked--to learn that the Kochtopus is doing a new version of its Tea Party fueling work in the world of anti-maskers.

Junk Mail Yet Again

The Koch-backed Freedom Foundation wants to once again encourage teachers to quit the union. Grumpy Old Teacher breaks it down.

How America screwed up the great school reopening

The New Republic tells the tale of how we came up short.

PA: Another "Mom" Group Involved in School Board Elections

Today PennLive reports that an Open Schools group is throwing big bucks into school board races in the state.

Back to School PA is a PAC that intends to drop a ton of money all over the state to back school board candidates who want to make sure that schools are open for in person learning. The money behind the group comes from Paul Martino, a venture capitalist who has been busy mostly in the world of sports and gaming, but on the subject of opening schools was just an angry parent. If watch him talk, he has swallowed the entire Learning Loss panic.

Nope.

Martino is teamed up with Clarice Schillinger, who previously organized Keeping Kids in School PAC, which grew out of Parents for In Person Education. That PAC backed 94 candidates in various primary board races (mostly in the southeastern corner of PA) and 92 of them were successful. Schillinger also helped float a multi-family lawsuit against a school district in an attempt to force it open (that was under "Voice for Choice--Open Our Schools")

If it seems as if they know how to play this game well, that may be because of Schillinger herself/ Although she is invariably described as a "mom," her last full-time job was as a staffer for a Republican Senator. Previously she worked as an executive assistant for the county housing authority and for Delamor Enterprises, a company that operates some McDonald's in the Chambersburg area. She just finished a BA in human resources from Penn State (Class of '20). These days she works as a system administrator at Charles River Laboratories.

In short, Schillinger has not been sitting around the house in her apron baking cookies to sell in order to raise money for her cause. Like most of the "moms" in front of these groups, she's politically seasoned and well-connected. The "mom" nomenclature is an odd journalistic choice, as if Bill Gates were routinely described as a "dad interested in helping schools."

The story of this latest group is that Schillinger and Martino just kind of bumped into each other on line, discovered a shared passion for forcing schools to be open. Just a mom and a rich guy who happened to connect.

The Open School movement might be easier to support if that passion for open school buildings resulted in demands that school districts put appropriate safeguards in place, upgrade ventilation, cut class sizes to ease social distancing--all the kind of stuff that makes it possible to open schools safely. But that never seems to be the case, and it's not the case here. Teacher requests for adequate ventilation are dismissed as an unfair moving of the goalposts.

If it seems like there are a ton of these groups, well, there are. Back To School PA Pac has a whole page you can use to contact the group in your county. And if it seems to you that schools in PA are actually mostly open already, Schillinger hints that they might all close right after the election in November. 

So one more mom group. It's hard sometimes to tell whether this keeps happening because women are routinely stripped of their professional role, or because these groups want to use the word "mom" as cover, masking professional well-organized activism with the notion of nice homebodies who are just trying to make some nice, sincere amateur grassroots noise. But whatever you believe about such groups, Pennsylvania has another of them, and they are coming for a school board election near you.