Rather than get behind these reforms, NYSUT assumed New York’s senior U.S. Senator, Chuck Schumer, could flex enough political muscle in Washington so that the state would win a grant without instituting any genuine reforms such as these (see FERA president Thomas W. Carroll’s Huffington Post blog story “Schumer’s Role in “Race to the Top”: Is the Fix In?“).  Secretary Duncan and the Obama Administration followed through on the promise to require states to adopt real reforms in order to earn the federal grants, however, New York was shut out when the winners were announced.  When the U.S. Department of Education released the official reviewers’ comments on New York’s application, it became clear that the state’s policies limiting the expansion of charter schools and the ban on the use of student achievement data when evaluating teachers ended up costing the state $700 million.

Following New York’s loss in round one, NYSUT wisely recognized that it needed to end its opposition to these reforms high on the Obama administration’s priority list or risk being widely viewed as standing in the way of a generous federal grant during historically tough budgetary times.  As a result, and facing school district spending cuts at the state and local levels across New York, NYSUT packaged and sold a rather breathtaking 180-degree turnaround, noting how it now supported student performance data-based teacher evaluations and an expansion of charter schools, all in the name of meaningful reform.

Now that New York is cashing in what turned out to be a strong round two application, few seem to remember that NYSUT was the primary force in getting a state law passed in 2008 that banned the use of student test scores as one of the multiple factors used for evaluating teachers for life-long tenure.  As the union touts on its website (here), it played a “leading role in securing language that bars the use of student test scores as a yardstick for tenure” and a statement by NYSUT president Richard Iannuzzi himself claiming that “student assessments are designed to assess students, not teachers.”  So much for that.  Now it can claim to have played a leading role in reversing the policy it previously fought for.

When the debate to lift the cap on the number of public charter schools heated up to make the state more competitive for a round two Race to the Top grant, NYSUT struck a new tune, claiming that it hadn’t opposed charter schools.  One only has to see their public comments dating back to 1998 that demonstrates there opposition to the implementation and expansion of these high-quality public schools and union leaders’ routinely mischaracterizing them to turn public opinion against them (see “New York Teachers Unions: A History of Opposition to Public Charter Schools,” May 21, 2010).

New York is doing right by its students and as a result is now reaping the rewards, despite previous positions of the state’s teachers union.  One can only hope that NYSUT is now truly serious about getting behind these reforms, willing to work with superintendents and school boards to implement the new teacher evaluation systems at the local level and once and for all ending efforts to stop charter schools from opening in underserved communities.  Hopefully, Secretary Duncan and other education officials in Washington will keep tabs on the promises New York’s key stakeholders have made in their Race to the Top plans to ensure that NYSUT continues to play nice.

B. Jason Brooks is director of research at the Foundation for Education Reform & Accountability and may be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/bjbrooksNY.

The Albany City School District board of education last week set the property tax levy for the current school year, 2010-11, in the amount of $107.1 million – an increase of nearly 3.9 percent over the last school year.  This rate increase is certainly not out of the ordinary for school districts, especially given the first year-to-year decline in state school aid in a generation.

Amazingly, this $4 million increase in the property tax levy was approved at the same meeting where it was announced that the school district anticipates an $8 million budget surplus from last year, or 4 percent of the more than $200 million district budget, based on the independent audit being finalized.

The upshot of all this is that the Albany school district is awash in cash.

With an $8 million surplus in the bank, it is questionable why the board raised property taxes by an amount half-again as much, rather than use at least some of this surplus to offset the drop in state school aid.  According to district documents, the rationale for the board to leave the surplus untouched is “to cope with the variable (charter school tuition, loss of State-aid) this year and prepare for the large funding deficits looming in the upcoming budget cycles.”

One key factor in the size of the district surplus for the last school year, 2009-10, was the state put a “freeze” on charter school funding levels at lower 2008-09 amounts, which effectively provided an additional $3 million windfall to the district by denying the funds to charter schools.  This freeze ignored the fact that the district spends one-third more per student than charter schools receive.

Gov. David Paterson proposed the state continue to freeze charter payments at 2008-09 levels, now two years out of date, but this has not been enacted.  Legislation was passed in June that included the charter funding freeze, but the Governor ended up vetoing this bill for other reasons.  The state legislature has yet to take up this funding freeze since the veto and it’s not clear whether it will when it resumes session, which is expected next month. 

In addition to Gov. Paterson’s freeze proposal, state Senator Neil Breslin, who represents Albany, has recently proposed his own funding freeze bill to affect just charter schools in Albany.  This bill was criticized on the Chalkboard blog (here) as demonstrably unfair to charter students who already receive less funding than district students, even as they are disproportionately at greater educational risk.

The absence of the charter funding freeze would mean more than $5.5 million in higher payments to charter schools for 2010-11 above the funding levels from two years ago.  The higher charter payments are tied directly to higher school district operations spending in Albany, which totals more nearly $22,000 per student (after removing charter expenses) compared to the $14,000 charter students would receive this year.

With a second charter funding freeze uncertain, it is reasonable to assume the Albany school district is hedging its bets against another charter school windfall that it was gifted last year.  Clearly, with $8 million banked from last year’s budget, the district is in a healthy enough financial position to absorb the higher charter school expenses, especially since the district also requires fewer resources from the ongoing exodus of students to charter schools.  Credit the Albany school board and Superintendent of Schools, Ray Colucciello, for fiscal prudence.  Moreover, the district also will reap additional resources from the $600 million in just-approved federal money for education for New York State. 

Imposing another funding freeze on charter schools would allow the Albany school district to “bank” millions of dollars that properly belongs to its resident students attending charters.  With $8 million in district funds available from last year, someone needs to inform Sen. Breslin that his charter funding freeze bill is not only unfair and harmful to Albany’s charter students, it is financially unnecessary for the school district.

(August 24, 2010)

B. Jason Brooks is director of research at the Foundation for Education Reform & Accountability and can be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/bjbrooksNY.

The New York State United Teachers (NYSUT) is in an all-out effort to find some muscle to flex during this year’s political campaign season.  Most prominently, it has refused to endorse the Democrat nominee for governor, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, along with a number of other lesser officials running for office (here).

Mr. Cuomo probably isn’t losing much sleep over this lack of teacher-union endorsement for several reasons:  1) NYSUT surely shows no indication whatever to endorse his Republican opponent, whether it be former Congressman Rick Lazio or businessman Carl Paladino; 2) Cuomo has plenty of other union support, including prominent private-sector unions such as the AFL-CIO; and, most importantly 3) Cuomo has taken the responsible positions for the state’s future of advocating a 2 percent growth limit on property taxes and supporting the growth of public charter schools, both of which are inimical to NYSUT’s agenda.

The NYSUT-Cuomo relationship used to be much warmer.  Just two years ago, the Attorney General embraced NYSUT as a big reason for his election to that office (here).  But being Governor is not the same as being Attorney General, as Mr. Cuomo has demonstrated he knows, and so he has taken bold and detailed positions on key issues that are designed turn around the state economically.  There is no way to do that effectively without upsetting some of the largest political interests that hold the “business-as-usual” philosophy, which he seems quite willing to do.

NYSUT also is trying to throw its weight around in on other election races.  One prominent example is that of state Senator Bill Perkins of Harlem, who at NYSUT’s behest and with its backing attacked the charter-school movement in a crazed attempt to block the increase the limit imposed on the number of public charter schools allowed across the state.  Sen. Perkins finds himself in a stiff primary challenge, in large part because of this position.  Seeing its political ally in trouble, NYSUT then went to court asking to break legal campaign donor limitations so it could give Sen. Perkins more money to fund his campaign (here).  NYSUT’s spokesman complained of a lack of a “level playing field” because some private individual investors who favor reforms such as charter school have backed Sen. Perkins’ challenger, Basil Smikle.  A surreal position, when you think about it, since those individuals also face all legal campaign donation limits the state has in place.

It’s nice to see NYSUT invoke the 1^st amendment to the U.S. Constitution regarding lifting limits on campaign donations, and I personally am quite sympathetic with that position.  But the court properly rejected the union’s argument to avoid the truly unfair position of changing the rules in mid-stream of an active election.

With its voracious embrace of Sen. Perkins and its break with gubernatorial nominee Andrew Cuomo, NYSUT reveals its view of education reform.  It supports charter school opponents and opposes charter school supporters.  It supports big-spenders and limitless property-tax increasers, and opposes government reformers and property tax-capper.  This trend is replete in NYSUT’s other endorsements, including its withdrawing of support for several Democratic state senators, as reported by the Albany Times Union (here), for their “votes to lift [the] cap on charter schools” along with supporting the property tax cap.

Do NYSUT endorsements really matter?  Perhaps not, as several former legislators could attest.  In the last four years, the Senate Republican Majority disappeared as it lost several elections in spite of their candidates receiving NYSUT’s support.  Considering NYSUT’s refusal to control costly teacher pensions, its opposition to limiting school taxes, and loathing of anything that smacks of education reform, the teacher union’s endorsement may actually prove to be more of an albatross than an advantage this year.

Brian Backstrom is vice president of the Foundation for Education Reform & Accountability.

by NY Ed Reform guest blogger Peter Murphy

The state Education Department recently concluded reviews of several district schools in Buffalo labeled as “persistently lowest achieving” and the results are not pretty.  The Joint Intervention Team was appointed by Commissioner David Steiner and included members selected by the Buffalo district.

The Buffalo News reported on the Team’s devastating findings this week (here).

The schools investigated were: Lafayette HS, International School 45, Riverside Institute of Technology, Burgard Vocational HS, Bennett HS, South Park HS and Martin Luther King Jr. Multicultural Institute.

Among the findings in the Department Team’s report are:

• Chronic absenteeism of students and teachers;
• Students suspensions are rampant for seemingly minor infractions, and suspended students often do not return to school;
• Direct instruction was not observed and was not a constant theme;
• Test data from assessments is not shared among staff to help guide instruction as needed;
• Insufficient textbooks to support a curriculum;
• Too few parents involved in their children’s education;
• Animosity is manifest between the district and Buffalo Teachers Federation; and
• Teachers need more professional development to be effective.

Does anyone doubt that if these criticisms were the stuff of charter schools instead of district schools, the State Education Department would move quickly to shut them down?  In fact, the state already has closed two charter schools in Buffalo (Sankofa and Steppingstone) for reasons that could have just as easily appeared in this report about district schools.

Rather than respond boldly and outline a dramatic course of reform, however, Buffalo Public Schools Superintendent James Williams – even now after five years on the job – offers a bevy of excuses, including the ol’ shift-the-blame game: it’s Albany’s and Washington’s fault.  Dr. Williams thinks the problem of ineffective instruction and school management stems not from ineffective leadership, but rather that the district has to focus so much on compliance issues that it must “chase the money” from the state and the federal government.

This excuse-making is breathtaking.

Not only does Dr. Williams oppose some of the major reform recommendations in the reports, he acknowledges to the Buffalo News that the state’s review simply “verified what we already knew,” and that there were “serious teaching and learning problems” and “leadership problems.”  He claims to have known all this already but simply stood around and did nothing that corrected the problems?

Dr. Williams did call for concessions from the Buffalo Teachers Federation to free up money for more professional development.  Fat chance.

While on that subject, there interestingly was no reaction to the state’s investigation from long-time teachers’ union head and reform opponent Philip Rumore about why teachers weren’t teaching properly and why so many were chronically absent.

Sure to make the likes of Dr. Williams and Mr. Rumore even more uncomfortable, while the report is certainly eye-opening and useful, it still doesn’t go far enough.  For example, replacing the principal of International School 45 or recommending the principal of Riverside “be given a schedule detailing where he needs to be” is not the stuff of turning around persistently low performing and dysfunctional schools.  Even the recommendation to have an outside management company replace the administration at Lafayette High School is not enough to cure the ills there.

Superintendent Williams is certainly not the only one responsible for this educational malpractice.  And the State Education Department needs to stop playing “small potatoes” by ignoring the elephant in the room:  Buffalo has no real accountability since no one gets fired for these glaring problems.  There are no consequences thanks to a rigid teachers’ contract agreed to over the years by a majority of city school board members that kowtow to union demands.

The state’s report has made a good start, but reforms in Buffalo need to get far bolder and leaders need to become far more forthright, as the Buffalo Public School District seems to be beyond feeling embarrassed.

So who are the students actually supposed to count on these days?

Maybe the answer is to keep developing more charter schools in Buffalo – if the folks entrenched in the district are unwilling to admit their mistakes and the resulting problems and take the actions necessary to truly overhaul these schools. The students there deserve not some 10-year cycle of discussions and unfulfilled promises, but rather a whole new choice in a school.

Peter Murphy is policy director of the New York Charter Schools Association and also writes for that group’s blog, The Chalkboard.

Earlier this month the U.S. Congress passed a bill to appropriate $10 billion in new education spending for states to mitigate teacher layoffs throughout the country (here).   This bill will back fill cutbacks by states and localities due to the weak economy and diminishing one-time funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, a.k.a., the “Stimulus Bill.”

This education jobs bill (“edujobs”) came under fierce debate, with President Obama saying, “we can’t stand by and do nothing while pink slips are given to the men and women who educate our children or keep our communities safe.  That doesn’t make sense.”  Opponents of the bill contend that the new spending, which amounts to $26 billion in total spending, adds still more debt and fattens public sector payrolls while private sector job growth remains anemic.

During the enactment of this education jobs bill, President Obama prevailed on Congress to remove offsetting cuts in funding to his education reform proposals that were also contained in the bill.  These cuts were originally proposed by the House of Representatives at the behest of Appropriations Chairman, David Obey (here).  The bill signed into law preserved funding for planning and implementation grants for the Charter Schools Program and left funding levels for the competitive Race to the Top program unchanged.

Still, federal funding to offset teacher layoffs for this year is not all good news for states and localities. New York stands to gain $608 million which will offset the $1.4 billion school aid reduction imposed by Governor David Paterson this year.  The state legislature is expected to return to Albany by the end of September to appropriate the new federal money for school districts.

States have a choice to distribute funds either based on existing distribution of Title I funding, which is targeted mostly at low-income, urban school districts; or through traditional school aid formulas.  It would be surprising if New York failed to adopt the latter method so that all school districts share in the funds, allowing incumbent state politicians take credit for helping “bringing home the bacon” for schools close to election day.

Beware the Lure of One-Shots

One-shot revenues always bring a downside, that is: here today, gone tomorrow.  With the burgeoning federal deficit, it is highly unlikely Washington will be able to afford to continue subsidizing state and local budgets this way.  That means New York’s budget for next year will have an added $600 million hole unless the economy improves and state tax revenue with it.  The current funding cutbacks are in part due to the temporary one-shot funding provided by the 2009 federal Stimulus bill.

Additional concerns raised with this new money include whether school districts actually need the funding.  As the Empire Center for New York State Policy recently documented, school district payrolls have increased substantially in the last decade while student enrollment has declined.  Furthermore, school district budgets were already adopted in May and largely factored in Gov. Paterson’s $1.4 billion in education funding cuts.

With school district budgets settled and district downsizing implemented, it’s worth questioning if this new money is really necessary.  In fact, arguably the best use of this new funding would be for districts and states to deposit in a “rainy day” fund or reduce annual interest costs by retiring debt.  The problem is that both actions are expressly prohibited by Congress in the new bill.

New York should take all the federal money it can get, but the state and school districts cannot and should not put off right-sizing their budgets and payrolls for lean economic times to continue.

B. Jason Brooks is director of research at the Foundation for Education Reform & Accountability and may be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/bjbrooksNY.

by NY Ed Reform guest blogger Peter Murphy

The U.S. House of Representatives on July 1st followed through on cutting Race to the Top funding by $500 million, and another $300 million between the Charter Schools Program and Teacher Incentive Fund, thanks to Rep. David Obey, the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, who led this action.

It’s fitting that a congressman with 41 years seniority (that being Mr. Obey) would ram through cuts in reforms programs to help finance this “edujobs” bill to subsidize teacher salaries of local school districts.

National and state education reform organizations strongly opposed this action (e.g., here), and this fight is far from over.

The Obama administration opposed the House amendment to the education appropriations bill to switch funding (here) by stating that if these cuts in reform programs remain, “the President’s senior advisors would recommend veto.”

This is a nice first step from the administration, but it’s not enough. The President is sounding equivocal by supporting both the edujobs and his reform programs, wanting it both ways. The climate in Washington, however, has turned sour on higher and higher spending, and Congress is under pressure to make choices and prioritize without adding to the federal budget deficit.

Chairman Obey should not be confused with being a fiscal hawk when it comes to spending, and he’s certainly no education reformer. But his actions to shift funding around are a step in the direction of tacit fiscal prudence.

President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan need to remind everyone that their education priorities matter more than David Obey’s. As the appropriations process advances to the U.S. Senate and then conference committee, the White House will need to come out more strongly to protect against this kind of congressional tampering to preclude Congress from calling his bluff.

Draw the line in the sand, Mr. President: whatever funding amout is agreed to subsidize district teachers must not come out of your education reform agenda – period.

Peter Murphy is Policy Director of the New York Charter Schools Association

It’s that time of year again on the legislative calendar when the labor unions try and get the state legislature to mandate higher costs on building projects by mandating so-called “prevailing” wages be paid by more public and private entities. The AFL-CIO and building trade unions already by law get “prevailing” or higher union wage rates on most publicly-financed projects, which is one reason taxes and the cost of living are so high in New York compared to most other locations.

The New York Post today contains an article yet another “prevailing wage” bill to impose these higher construction costs on charter schools. This bill, being pushed by several unions, already passed the Senate Labor Committee this week. I pointed out several obvious objections, primarily the fact that charter schools do not get public funding for construction and facilities costs, unlike school districts which do. In addition, charter schools already have their operating funding frozen at 2008-09 school year levels, leaving even less money to operate the school or finance capital expenses.

In the absence of a state mandate for prevailing wage, what happens? Does the laborer get cheated and ripped off and denied a living wage? In a word – no. In fact, any and every construction project not subject to prevailing wage, including those by charter schools, is paid based on a mutually agreed upon contract by both parties – the charter school and the company or companies doing the work. It’s called negotiation in the marketplace. Imagine that.

Racist Roots of Prevailing Wage Laws
New York is one of at least 41 states that impose prevailing wage laws on most publicly-financed projects, along with the federal government (the “Davis-Bacon” law). Prevailing wage laws, in fact, have an racist history to them as they were used to steer projects to white-dominated unions at the expense of minority workers that were not members of unions. This ugly history has been documented by George Mason University Law Professor David Bernstein and others. Prof. Bernstein also wrote specifically on New York’s dubious prevailing wage law, which was published in a 1997 article in the Civil Rights Law Journal.

Diverting Charter Funding from the Classroom
The bottom line is this: a state imposed higher cost from “prevailing wage” has to come from somewhere. In the case of charter schools, it would come from scare operating funds that would be diverted from regular educational expenses; or, with higher costs, the planned facilities project may not get done at all and no one would benefit no one, including the unions pushing this bill.

Even the teacher unions are pushing prevailing wage mandates on charter schools, notwithstanding that it would mean less money for the classroom and teachers in particular. Such misplaced priorities from NYSUT and the UFT only demonstrate that union corporate (oops, I mean “solidarity”) matters more even if it means less funding for the very individuals they purport to care about.

With cutbacks in state education funding and continued lack of facilities funding for charters, it is the worst possible time for the state legislature to advance a bill that would substantially raise costs in order to appease the labor unions. The difficult fiscal climate faced by charter and all public schools unfortunately hasn’t given the unions any pause from trying to profiteer no matter how much it harms the ability of charter schools to educate students.

Peter Murphy is Policy Director of the New York Charter Schools Association

While praising the release this week of draft national education standards by the National Governors Association and Council of Chief State School Operators, the New York Daily News (here) and other news outlets should have at least offered the caution deserved and the caveats necessary to put this effort, and its potential results, into proper perspective.

The effort of 48 states (Alaska and Texas are not participating) and the District of Columbia to set common, high-quality learning standards is indeed praiseworthy on many fronts: it seems just and fair to say as a nation that we hold a student in Arkansas to the same educational expectations as a student in Maine, for example.  Being able to evaluate each state’s progress toward these common learning standards using a common measuring stick would be nice, too.

This first public release of the proposed voluntary national learning standards raises many questions that need to be fully addressed, however, before we rally every school child, parent, and teacher in America around them.

First, the jury is still out on how rigorous the proposed standards are and if the strength of these standards will be increased or watered-down after the public comment period.  Claims by some that the national standards will set “a bar higher than even the highest standard currently set by any single state” simply aren’t true; while education officials in Minnesota commended (here) the standards in English language arts, they noted that the draft math standards would represent a step backwards for that state, for example.

A recent New York Times story (here) notes that implementation of national standards could face resistance from states that already have high-quality standards and assessments.  Massachusetts, for example, is widely regarded as having world-class learning standards and assessments, and that state’s consistent top-ranking performance on the federal National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) tests lead to justified questions about what lesser national standards would offer there.  Additionally, previous drafts of the voluntary national English language arts and math standards have fallen well short of the top state standards in these subjects once all stakeholders weighed-in.  This latest effort could suffer a similar fate without sufficient vigilance and dedication, both commodities too often lacking when the policy reforms meet the political world.

The push for national standards must accommodate the desire by states to implement even better learning standards, as Minnesota, Massachusetts, and several others already have.  This important issue unfortunately seems to have been side-stepped.

Second, the virtuous new way of thinking about education created by the No Child Left Behind reforms – specify what children need to know and then measure if they have learned it – is not guaranteed, at least not yet, by this week’s announcements on national learning standards.  Even if the standards are acceptably high, a similar collaborative and cooperative effort will need to occur to develop assessments aligned to these standards and set thresholds for passing scores that ensure students will be held to high expectations.  It remains to be seen if governors and state education commissioners will have the courage to follow through and implement rigorous assessments.  The well-regarded NAEP exams – commonly referred to as the “gold standard” in assessments – reveal that a whopping 68 percent of the nation’s 8th graders score below proficient in math and 70 percent fail in writing.  Will similarly embarrassing failure rates – the hard truth, actually – be allowed by states’ political leaders, or will they work to soften the exams or the passing thresholds to achieve the desired appearance?  This tricky work, the heated discussions, and the difficult decisions are a ways down the road yet, though they will play a significant and fundamental role in the overall success or failure of the national standards effort.

Third, the proposed standards covered only English language arts and math (encouragingly, the proposed English language arts standards included literacy skills needed to understand scientific and math-based concepts and activities).  By avoiding the development of standards for science and social studies, the common-standards movement may have avoided being derailed by so-called “culture wars.”  Standards-development efforts in the past showed that deciding on when to begin teaching algebra is less controversial than whether to teach about multiculturalism and evolution or creationism.  As such, states are likely to maintain their own standards in science and social studies for a long time, regardless of whether these standards are any good.  Where the new standards would increase a state’s expectations in math or English language arts, progress will have been made.  But folks need to understand that this isn’t the complete fix-it solution.

While the national standards reform movement currently shows promise, a great deal of work and political courage will be necessary in order for it to create the rising tide that will lift all boats.  The standards need to not only be on par with the best state standards currently in use, but would do well to represent world-class expectations.  Common assessments, to be used on all students nationwide, need to be developed that comprehensively measure student learning of these standards.  And states will need to have the courage to accept rigorous cut scores despite the potential of widespread failure rates.  If these all fall in place, then we can celebrate. For now, there is much more work to be done.

B. Jason Brooks is director of research at the Foundation for Education Reform & Accountability and can be followed on twitter at http://twitter.com/bjbrooksNY.

Last month this NY Ed Reform Blog commented (here) on the decision by the Superintendent of Schools in Central Falls, Rhode Island, to fire all teachers, administrators, and counselors at its chronically low-performing high school.  Superintendent Frances Gallo, with the state’s backing, was making good on her threat to fire all 93 staff positions for the teacher union’s refusal to work an extra 25 minutes at the pay rate offered for that extra time.

This story, spotted early by NY Ed Reform, subsequently became a national sensation for the simple reason that it’s so rarely – if ever – occurs in public education.  Abysmal graduation rates and 7 percent of 11th grade students meeting math standards doesn’t normally get anyone fired in public schools.  It’s much easier to finger-point at something else like poverty or bad parenting.

Randi Weingarten, head of the American Federation of Teachers, said the firings at Central Falls High are “a failed approach.”  In fact, every prior approach tried by Supt. Gallo was rebuffed by the recalcitrant teachers union, which called her bluff.  But the superintendent wasn’t bluffing and she’s gotten national praise for her actions, including from President Obama himself (here).

The president stated that while such firings should be a “last resort,” he backed the decision, saying “if a school continues to fail its students year after year after year, if it doesn’t show any sign of improvement, then there’s got to be a sense of accountability.”  Education Secretary Arne Duncan reacted to the firings by praising the Rhode Island Commissioner of Education and Supt. Gallo for “showing courage and doing the right thing for kids.”

There’s the rub.  Putting students first, if it means anything, has to include putting adults other than first.  That’s what the Obama administration’s school turnaround strategy is about for dealing with the worst 5 percent of schools in each state.

No one should be surprised by President Obama’s reaction to the Rhode Island firings.  One year ago today, in his speech to the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, the President make clear his education agenda included real accountability measures to support teachers while also holding teachers accountable in the interest of students:

[J]ust as we have to give our teachers all the support they need to be successful, we need to make sure our students have the teacher they need to be successful. That means states and school districts taking steps to move bad teachers out of the classroom. Let me be clear: if a teacher is given a chance but still does not improve, there is no excuse for that person to continue teaching. I reject a system that rewards failure and protects a person from its consequences. The stakes are too high. We can afford nothing but the best when it comes to our children’s teachers and to the schools where they teach.

Superintendent Frances Gallo got the message.  So, apparently, did the Central Falls High School faculty that was headed for the exits.  The teachers have since relented and accepted the new rules, including spending more instructional time with the students.

Things in a school – even a really bad school – shouldn’t get to the point where the only way to enact a turnaround plan is to fire everyone who works there.  Hopefully, Rhode Island’s Central Falls High School will serve as an instructional model, and it will become commonplace rather than the exception that the adults in school buildings put themselves and their needs after those of the kids.  In that way only will genuine reforms be able to be instituted by administrators and teachers working together – all in the genuine interest of the school children.

B. Jason Brooks is director of research at the Foundation for Education Reform & Accountability and may be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/bjbrooksNY.

New York State’s inclusion in the 16 Race to the Top finalists announced today by the U.S. Department of Education was the big surprise of Round 1.

New York’s inclusion is a testament to the high-quality application developed by State Education Commissioner David Steiner and Regents Chancellor Merry Tisch.

But, the goal here is to win, not nearly be included among the finalists.  A staggering $700 million is at stake.

The only thing standing between New York being a mere finalist and a winner are two issues: New York’s “data firewall” and the need to raise the state’s charter-school cap.

The winners will be announced in early April 2010.

The obvious play here is for quick legislative action on the two outstanding items.  Admittedly, this will not be easy, given the state of political chaos in Albany at the moment.

Also, it’s unclear whether legislative action now will be considered in a Round 1 decision.  But, at a minimum, taking action now would position New York State for an almost guaranteed win in Round 2.

Those who urged no action — on the theory that New York would never win anyway — are contradicted by today’s announcement of New York as a finalist.

New York is in shooting range now.  Let’s not shoot blanks.

(For my prediction of the likely winners in Round 1, see my recent analysis in City Journal.  Six of the seven states I predicted made the list of finalists.  These six states very likely will be the eventual winners.)