State School Board

This election season has seemed particularly divisive and nasty.  Not just on the national level, but even on the local level.  And so I have put off making decisions about some candidates.  I have to vote early this year since I am serving as a poll worker on Election Day, so I have to face my procrastination head on.  One race in particular that I have been unsure about is my representative for State School Board.  I know both women who are running and both are very passionate about education.  But neither one is completely representative of my views.  So, I had to do some digging and figure out which candidate was the better fit.

I spoke with Erin Preston this morning.  She spoke to me for close to 45 minutes.  Erin has gotten a lot of heat for being endorsed by the UEA which funded several candidates through NEA funds.  But that shouldn’t be a big deal, right?  Don’t we want our school board candidates supported by our teachers?  Here is where things get dicey.  NEA is a union and they definitely have a political agenda.  NEA has several positions that I vehemently disagree with.  I will outline the 2 that I specifically addressed with Erin this morning.

First, the NEA claims to support charter schools that “drive innovative educational practices,” but then spends the rest of their webpage talking about charters involved in fraud and waste.  (You can see the webpage here- http://www.nea.org/home/16332.htm).  Every article linked on their supposedly supportive charter school webpage links to articles about abuses about charter schools.  That would be like me saying I support teachers and then linking to every article about teachers who have had sexual relationships with their students.  Are there some charters who abuse the system?  Absolutely.  But they are not the norm, they are the exception.

In addition to their webpage, NEA took a position on charter schools.  You can find their positions at this site- https://www.nea.org/assets/docs/Policy_Statements_2016-2017.pdf.  NEA states that “a charter should be granted only if the proposed charter school intends to offer students an educational experience that is qualitatively different from what is available to them in mainstream public schools, and not simply to provide a “choice” for parents who may be dissatisfied with the education that their children are receiving in mainstream public schools.”  If a parent is unhappy with the education their child is receiving, that is why we need charters.  To limit charters and limit “choice” is a horrible mistake in my opinion.

But the next one is where NEA completely lost me.  “There also should be an absolute prohibition against the granting of charters for the purpose of home-schooling, including online charter schools that seek to provide home-schooling over the Internet.  Charter schools whose students are in fact home schoolers, and who may rarely if ever convene in an actual school building, disregard the important socialization aspect of public education, do not serve the public purpose of promoting a sense of community, and lend themselves too easily to the misuse of public funds and the abuse of public trust.”

I am not really sure where to start dissecting this.  The socialization argument is so outdated that it is laughable.  Apparently no one at NEA has read any research on homeschooling in the last 30 years.  The accusation that homeschoolers do not promote a sense of community is ridiculous at best and malicious at worst.  I have seen homeschoolers in my community planting trees at parks, volunteering at our local library, doing food drives for the food bank, and participating in community orchestras.  Let’s just leave it that the NEA has no idea what they are talking about when it comes to homeschoolers.  And by the way, we have some phenomenal online charters in Utah.  I am constantly recommending Mountain Heights when people ask about online schooling.  NEA has an agenda when it comes to charters.  We have magnificent charters in Utah like UCAS, AMES, Providence Hall, and Mountain Heights, just to name a few.

So, obviously I am not a fan of the NEA stance on charters.  I am a strong believer in school choice and that may look different for every family.

Second, and this one is a doozy, folks-NEA has a completely negative view of homeschooling.  Here we go…” The National Education Association believes that home schooling programs based on parental choice cannot provide the student with a comprehensive education experience.”

Feel free to read that last statement again.  Parents cannot provide their children with a comprehensive education experience.  So, yeah, the NEA is not a fan of homeschooling.  But it gets better.  The NEA wants every child who is homeschooled to be given a yearly assessment and instructors (parents) should be “licensed” and all curriculum should be state approved.  Because we have to protect kids from their parents.

But this last one was the icing on the cake.  “The Association also believes that home-schooled students should not participate in any extracurricular activities in the public schools.”  That’s right.  Thank you for your tax dollars to support local schools, but we’ll be damned if homeschoolers are allowed to use the band program or participate in sports.  So, now the NEA is supportive of denying children access to resources.  OK.

That is where a lot of the concern about the money coming from NEA is about.  I believe in giving people the benefit of the doubt.  I asked Erin about these issues and whether or not she agreed with these NEA positions and if she would support them as a State School Board Member.

Erin and I had a great, open conversation and while we disagree on several issues, I feel she respects and will defend my rights as a parent to opt out of SAGE, protect the options of charters while weeding out any who are misusing funds, and protect a parent’s right to homeschool how they see fit while allowing students to access public schools for extracurriculars.

Erin has played an integral role in creating some amazing charters, so I feel her experience with alternative options for education is not just political talk.  When she sees an opportunity to create something that will improve education, she goes after it.  Erin has extensive experience in starting, building, and running charter schools.  Erin founded Providence Hall, the only IB program in the state.  In addition to her work with charters (some that have worked with specialty populations like rural students, students with autism, and English Language Learners), she has friends who are homeschoolers and is willing to listen and learn from other perspectives.  Her view on homeschooling has been enriched as she has seen friends homeschool successfully.  Another interesting thing that I learned about Erin is that in the past, she has often stood in opposition to UEA positions.  But UEA endorsed her, in spite of those differences.  Her track record of standing on principle is something I truly value.

I have seen our State School Board at work and at times, it feels extremely contentious.  One of the things that stands out about Erin is that she is willing to listen to differing opinions and I feel that she will build bridges.  Please make an informed vote.  Don’t take my word for it.  Research the candidates and ask questions.  It is usually our local leaders who make the decisions that impact us the most.  Make sure that in all the noise of the election season that you know who you want to represent you and our children when it comes to making decisions about our local schools.

GRIT

Part of what I have learned in being involved in education is that there are always new buzzwords popping up and GRIT has become one of them.  Some people are referring to grit as an individual's ability to stick with something, perseverance.  But another group has actually turned the word "grit" into an acronym-GRIT stands for Guts, Resilience, Integrity, and Tenacity.  And then, a rubric was actually created to assess a student's GRIT.

Why does it matter that teachers in Alpine School District are using a GRIT rubric for grading?

Because instead of grading a child in math as to whether or not they are mastering the material, they are being graded on personality traits.  Instead of grading a child in English as to whether or not they can define onomatopoeia, they are being graded on their integrity or their guts, completely subjective ideas that are almost impossible to measure. 

One of the rubric pieces that chaps my hide is under Resilience:  "I put my absolute maximum effort into every single thing I do."  I want you to think about that for a minute.  That's a pretty tall order-maximum effort.  Honestly, there are days when I am phoning it in.  Days when I am tired or dealing with heavy stress or worried about medical test results, and I am just doing what I have to do to get through a day.  And I am an adult with resources.  Now imagine having a child who is homeless fill out that survey and have their grade be contingent on their responses.  Maybe they are not giving their maximum effort because they are hungry or worrying about where they are going to sleep.  Now what about the child whose parents are getting divorced?  Maybe she is finding her thoughts drifting in class because she is wondering what Christmas will look like and will she have to deal with 2 families and step-parents.  Or what about the child who is living with a parent dealing with substance abuse issues.  Maybe instead of maximum effort, he is worried about getting home before his younger siblings in case mom has overdosed.

When did we worry about measuring everything?  The idea that one child is worth more, valued more, scored higher because of personality traits teeters into seriously dangerous territory.

Some of the rubrics are tainted against introverts.  Should a child get a lower grade because they are more introspective and less likely to demonstrate leadership skills?  Should a child be punished for not demonstrating a "strong sense of self?"

One of my concerns with the GRIT movement is that it takes kids who are in difficult situations, kids who are at risk, and puts them at greater risk.  By penalizing them for their circumstances through their grades, we are setting up these children to receive lower grades, fail, and drop out of school.  Because we don't see "maximum effort."  School should be a safe place to fall for traumatized kids, not another place where they are seen as less than.

At first glance, we could even say that encouraging the aspects of GRIT like resiliency and integrity are great-of course we want our children to develop those attributes.  But those traits are extremely subjective.  It is one thing for a child to score poorly because they are struggling with mastering exponents or diagramming sentences.  But it is a completely different thing for a child to get a lower grade because who they are at their core is lacking.  I am not getting a poor grade because I cannot master subject-verb agreement, but because I lack integrity.  What a powerfully damaging message to send to our children.  Who should decide if your child has integrity?  A rubric?  

In this age of high stakes testing, accountability at all costs, and school grades, we are forgetting that our goal is educating children.  We are giving them resources to be successful in life, to pursue their passions, to become lifelong learners.  Accountability systems like the GRIT rubric are ways in which we are separating out children and telling them who they are is not good enough.  And we are breaking them.

There are lots of bills that have come up during this legislative session that I have been involved in, whether sending e-mails, testifying, texting legislators, or helping to spread more information on.  There is another one, coming up in Education Committee tomorrow that I am asking you to read and then write to the Education Committee.  You can find the full text of SB91 here. (http://le.utah.gov/~2016/bills/static/SB0091.html)

Here is what I don’t like about the bill.  It gives too much power to the Utah State Office of Education (USOE) and the State Board of Education and takes away local control.  As stated in line 51 and 52 of the bill, “the state board of education has general control and supervision of the state’s public education system.”  The way I see it, the state school board is supposed to work as a type of checks and balances with the USOE.  This bill allows the state board to give their statutory (read:  legal) responsibilities over to staff, meaning your elected officials can give up their duties you elected them to perform to someone else.  Sorry, nope.

Another issue is that it gives the state board the ability to fine schools.  Why?  Where does the money come from?  When we fine schools, we are taking more taxpayer dollars.  How does that help schools by forcing taxpayers to foot the bills for these penalties?

But here is the piece that really chaps my hide.  This bill gives the USOE the power to hire a private attorney (lines 106-107).  Why is that a big deal?  The USOE already has access to an attorney through the Attorney General’s office.  When Senator Osmond passed his opt out bill (SB122) in 2014, Judy Park and the AG’s office “interpreted” the legislation so that parents were unable to opt out of testing, even though that went against the very intent of that bill, resulting in the February 2, 2015 memo from USOE.  (You can see the memo here- http://schools.utah.gov/CURR/gifttalent/District-Coordinators/2015FebruaryOutPolicy.aspx). 

When parents submitted a GRAMA request, specifically asking for e-mail communication between Judy Park and the AG’s office that included the words “opt out,” the GRAMA was denied due to attorney/client privilege.  I thought that argument was garbage because if everyone is supposed to be working together to educate children, and Judy Park’s pay comes from taxpayer funds, why is she extended attorney/client privilege?  Especially about decisions that impact my child’s education?  Wouldn’t the real client be the students?  If the USOE is able to hire a private attorney, they could deny any GRAMA request about a subject the attorney has access to due to attorney/client privilege.  Basically, the USOE would create a shield where transparency would cease to exist.  Want to know the state opt out rate?  Denied.  Want to better understand the rubric used for teacher evaluations?  Denied.  Are stealth assessments being utilized?  Sorry-that is attorney/client privilege.  USOE would have carte blanche to make decisions with no public transparency.  And giving that much power with no oversight to any individual or agency is seriously dangerous.

If you believe that USOE and the State School Board have a duty to be transparent in their work and not delegate their duties to other individuals, please write the Education Committee and ask them to vote no on SB91.

blast@le.utah.gov
vlsnow@le.utah.gov
lavarchristensen@le.utah.gov
kimcoleman@le.utah.gov
brucecutler@le.utah.gov
seliason@le.utah.gov
justinfawson@le.utah.gov
fgibson@le.utah.gov
ehutchings@le.utah.gov
dlifferth@le.utah.gov
dmccay@le.utah.gov
csmoss@le.utah.gov
mnoel@kanab.net
mariepoulson@le.utah.gov