Response to MidCoast mom

First, thanks to Midcoast mom for writing - she articulates many of the questions many PARENTS have about charter schools and choice in general. Second, apologies for the more than week-long delay in responding - some irony in the fact that the work that has kept me from the blog for the past week is putting together a proposal for the very district in which she lives. So here goes - her writing in italics.

Hello – I’m a Mom in the Mid-coast area. I’ve been following this blog. I do feel that it would be nice for parents of children with special needs to have an option for their children in your school. I purchased my home in Woolwich specifically because we had high school choice, which we have since lost. We are now part of RSU 1.

Loss of school choice was one of the many deeply felt losses in the consolidation process - in fact, many communities essentially refused to combine unless the state approved a continuation of choice. AOS 93 and SVRSU 12, just up the coast from Woolwich, are two such districts.

For my children, I want a traditional education (grammar taught as a “subject”, traditional letter grades, standard math algorithms, traditional 45-50 minute high school classes, etc). My administration disagrees with me and tells me that “traditional education” doesn’t work in the 21st century. I don’t agree.

The beauty of true PUBLIC school choice is that families can, from among available options, send their kids to the school that works best for them. (That can also be a danger - more about that later.)
I have one daughter who thrives in a traditional learning environment, and one who thrives in a more experiential environment. In my ideal world, we no longer build one size fits all schools that try to be all things to all people but don't pull it off. Rather, as in many large cities now, families should be able choose among schools that produce similar results - consistently high achievement on agreed upon standards - but use a variety of approaches to get there. Portland residents choose among Deering (seen as the most "traditional"), Portland High (seen as the most "diverse"), and Casco Bay HS, which is both much smaller and has an affiliation with Expeditionary Learning.

I’d like to send my three young children to a high school where at least 60% of the students to “meet the standards.” Does this sound unreasonable?

I'd like to send my children to a school where all students meet HIGH, meaningful standards, and I can attest from experience that nearly ALL students can do so - including many students who get various labels attached to them (special ed., ADHD) and are effectively denied the opportunity to try. But I think I disagree with at least one of the assumptions of the writer - that schools that by current measures have the best numbers are necessarily better schools.

The third rail of school reform is socio-economic status. (It's also the third rail of almost any meaningful policy conversation in the US.) What makes a school "good" is NOT raw numbers - the fact is that school achievement in the US almost direct mirrors socioeconomic status, and the numbers below are indicators of that. Students who enter schools with advantage - especially high school - tend to leave with advantage, and vice-versa.

The holy grail in education is outperforming the predictive data. An urban school that serves 90% free and reduced lunch students and graduates 60% of entering freshman is a MUCH better school than one in a wealthy community that sends 90% of kids to 4 year colleges. Schools like the former exist - but more often than not, they are the start-up small schools, sometimes charters, that can, as I've written elsewhere, get serious about teaching individuals rather than teaching subjects.

% of students “meeting or exceeding” the 11th grade standards (2009-2010) – source Maine Department of Education Morse High (RSU 1): Math – 39% Writing – 41% Reading – 44% Science – 30% Greely’s (Cumberland): Math – 80% Writing – 77% Reading – 74% Science – 72% I’m comparing these two high schools because you mentioned both superintendents. As you can see, there is a large gap in proficiency between the schools.

Are you implying that if I provide transportation, I should be allowed to use my $9,066 per child to send my children to Greeley instead of Morse? Are the superintendents in support of this? Will I also be allowed to use these funds to send my children to Brunswick High or Cheverus, if I feel that their curriculum better meets the needs of my children? If there is some sort of lottery, how does one guarantee that all of their children are placed in the same school?

With a couple caveats, my answer to all but the last question is NO - for reasons both practical and philisophical. The practical reason is that existing schools serve defined communities and have physical capacities - and those that produce the best numbers are often serve the few communities in Maine that are already growing in enrollment or can reasonably expect to post-recession. One of the most spectacular failings of the No Child Left Behind law was the provision that allowed parents in schools given failing grades to send their children to nearby, "better" schools. In most cases, the space was not available or the distance too far to make that practical.

The philosophical reason is that allowing parents to take their vouchers and drive their kids to the nearest suburban school system would increase the very inequities that we're trying to address - if for no other reason that that it would limit that choice to those families who could afford the time and gas to drive their kids 60 or so miles round trip each day. And, as much respect as I have for Cheverus, I would eliminate provisions (including the one that benefits my own daughter) that enables public school money to subsidize private school tuition. Not because I'm against private schools - but because such vouchers compound existing inequities - in this case by enabling a family that can afford private school education to take themselves, their kids, and a hefty chunk of taxpayers money OUT of the public system.

The caveats: while I can't speak for the superintendents, I know at least one who currently has excess capacity in his high school who not only would love to open those slots to voucher students, but believes that serving kids of more varied backgrounds than the mostly white, mostly well-off students he currently serves could produce benefits for all. If such slots existed, however, I would advocate they be allocated in such a way as to prioritizes student need, rather than parental desire. With plenty of exceptions, affirmative action (remember "busing?") WORKED...and in many communities across the country that have kept programs from that era, still does.

This is where the writer's last question comes in. I wrote in the last entry about the "banded lottery" concept, which seeks to ensure that schools "replicate the demographics of the sending area." Most lotteries also give preference to family members - if one child in a family gets in, siblings get preference - for reasons that are obvious and that I support.

I would love to have options to give my children what I feel is the best curriculum and methodology to prepare them for college. Colorado has “out of district” school choice. Canada has a voucher system. These vouchers can be used at public and religious schools. Some states are considering a tax abatement program. Which system to you endorse?

Of those named, the only one I know enough about to comment on is Colorado's, and I'm OK with it. I am also OK with a truly PUBLIC dollars follow the student approach - which can be shorthanded as "vouchers." And while I am adamantly opposed to sending public school money to schools with any kind of proselytising religious purpose, I am not opposed to schools that are affiliated with religious institutions or non-governmental organizations being part of the effort to educate all children well. The details would be tricky; based on the experience of some early-adopting states, I would want a swift and sure process to delicense a school that crosses well-established church state separation boundaries.

And I do NOT think tax abatement programs in general are the best way to achieve desired public policy outcomes. Sorry, tax-haters, but the countries that achieve BY FAR the best results for the most young people are those that tax heavily and invest that tax money wisely - see, for instance, the recently released data from Program for International Student Assessment. From where I'm sitting, the clearest sign of the abject failure of our existing system is that many folks - including plenty who graduate from "good" schools like Greely and go on to elite colleges like Harvard - are so willfully ignorant of some fairly established cause and effect relationships.

As a culture, the US needs to figure out how break from two opposing, and increasingly detrimental mentalities. The first says that"the tax collector is taking MY money" and has resulted in 25 years of increasing impoverishment of individuals and of valuable shared social institutions like schools. The second says that any attempt to re-allocate existing money is taking an entitlement away - in this case, educators who block all meaningful change, putting themselves and their fear of change ahead of the very kids they're being paid scarce public funds to educate.

So "which system do I endorse?" Here's where my answer is not likely to satisfy the Midcoast mom, who sees her kids as stuck with a set of available options that may not meet her children's needs or be consistent with her values. If we look at cause and effect, we have a pretty clear body of evidence that says pouring more money into the system we have is increasing inequity, meeting the needs of fewer and fewer students, and draining our economy of vitality. The system I endorse, then, is one puts the very few available resources into what we KNOW works - smaller, more community centered schools that link what kids are learning to what matters.
Therefore I can't endorse a system that makes it easier for parents to voucher kids to the kind of factory model schools that - despite the talent and dedication of the folks who work there - are ultimately more part of the problem than part of the solution.

I do not mean this in a flippant way, but for parents who want what an existing public school can offer, I can only suggest moving to where she can take advantage of such as taxpaying member of that community (as I've done twice.) I can, however, easily see a small "Great Books" school in Bath or Woolwich - not part of our network, but perhaps part of another public small school network that has figured out how make such schools work well. On Friday, I'll post a specific set of parameters that I think can produce that outcome - and that can save the writer some gas.