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Nearing victory on charters

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President Obama and U.S. Education Secretary Duncan changed the conversation on charter schools with their call for urgent action to lift arbitrary caps on charter public schools and promote good schools via the Race to the Top competition. The conference committee agreement on the education bill does a lot that builds on the proven performance of the Commonwealth charter school model. And the addition of 27,000 new charter school seats is vitally important. There are two problematic provisions. The RTTT calls for states to scale up proven charter providers, such as the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP) and SABIS networks. Yet one provision in the final compromise requires non-high schools to backfill open positions in the first half of the […]

NEA: $26M to Advocacy Groups

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From our man in Havana (the Education Intelligence Agency) comes an analysis of NEA’s financial disclosure report for 2008-09 fiscal. What did our EIA agent find? The national union contributed almost $26 million to a wide variety of advocacy groups and charities. The total more than doubles the amount disbursed in the previous year… In this list, EIA has deliberately omitted spending such as media buys, or payments to pollsters or consultants that have no obvious ideological component… All of these were paid for with members’ dues money (the union’s federal PAC is a separate entity funded through voluntary means): A Smarter Colorado – $87,000 ActionAid UK – $5,000 All Stars Helping Kids – $5,000 Alliance for Justice – $7,000 […]

Pleading For A Naked Display of Public Power

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Ok, not a typical request from these pages, but the ongoing delays in moving the Fort Point Channel Post Office and General Mail Facility boogle the mind. Having spent a summer working out of another local GMF, I can assure you there’s no business case to be made for having the facility in this location (that can’t be met by hundreds of other available locations in the city). The building itself is a constructed in the manner of a giant shed, with no architectural or historical significance. The utility of a 24 hour retail location is clear but, again, could be met by hundreds of alternative locations. And the potential value of alternative uses are crystal clear — South Station […]

Spinbusting — State Workforce Numbers

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Rejoice, rejoice, the 2009 CAFR is out and with it, a consistent, 3rd party source of numbers on the state workforce. Here is the data itself. You may recall some back and forth between various parties — see here and here — about how many folks have been added to the rolls of state government during the Patrick Administration. Part of the problem has been semantics — the Administration insists on using the construction “positions eliminated”, which is really HR-speak for changes in an administrative database, but sounds good. What really matters is headcount. And the data shows that from June 30, 2007* to June 30, 2009, state government added 844 employees, net of layoffs, positions eliminated, etc. To be […]

Confused by Menino's Inaugural

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He hits the right note early on in the speech: The right bill for our children increases the charter cap, but also provides turnaround capacity for districts in three places: One, the authority to create in-district charter schools. Two, the flexibility to assign the best teachers where they are needed most. And three, the ability to bypass lengthy arbitration at persistently under-performing schools. It’s this combination — the entire mix — that makes good on the promise of education reform in the first place: to help ignite a transformation within districts and bring innovation to scale. But then goes on to say: If real reform wins, we can look to a day with one system of education in Boston. When […]