- D.C. charters need a moratorium on use of the PMF [Septima Clark, Imagine Southeast, Howard Road Academy, Rocketship, and Friendship PCS mentioned]
- Next D.C. teacher contract could yield longer school days and year, Henderson says
- DC Public Schools seeks longer school day, school year [KIPP DC mentioned]
D.C. charters need a moratorium on use of the PMF [Septima Clark, Imagine Southeast, Howard Road Academy, Rocketship, and Friendship PCS mentioned]
The Examiner
By Mark Lerner
March 4, 2013
Charter schools, like many educational institutions across the United States, recoiled against being designated failing schools for not meeting Annual Yearly Progress under the No Child Left Behind Law. Many expressed the point of view that, especially in the inner cities, AYP does not account for improvement in standardized test scores for populations of students that are extremely difficult to teach. So it comes as an unpleasant surprise that D.C.’s charter movement has begun the process of replacing AYP with the D.C. Public Charter School Board’s Performance Management Framework.
Recent examples of actions taken by the PCSB seem to demonstrate that qualitative decisions have been relegated to a thing of the past. The first clue was the unanimous acceptance by the board of the decision of Septima Clark’s trustees to close the school in the aftermath of the facility moving from PMF Tier 3 to Tier 2. As I pointed out at the time, the PMF was designed for stakeholders to know where a school stands academically and, by making these scores available publically, providing a strong incentive for charters to improve their performance. It was not implemented to terminate programs that were not Tier 1.
More evidence flowed from the recent PCSB February meeting. At this session Imagine Southeast PCS was threatened with being shuttered if specific PMF scores were not obtained in coming years. For the 2012 to 2013 school year the charter must hit within one point of 41, for the next term it must be within one point of 54. The Tier 2 range is from 35 to 64.9. So I guess the PCSB is saying that just being within the middle category is not permissible. Watch out 35 charters that in 2012 landed in this group.
A similar stipulation was placed on Howard Road Academy. Besides being forced to jettison most of the grades that it currently serves, the institution must now rate among the top 45 percent of all Early Childhood Performance Management Framework schools in order to go beyond Kindergarten. Why not 50 or 35 percent?
Rocketship was approved to open two schools for the first time in the nation’s capital. If these are performing at the Tier 1 level then it will be allowed to continue on its path to create eight schools teaching over 5,200 students. By now you get the idea. Already, I’m hearing word that at least one Tier 2 school may terminate serving particular grades in the drive to gain membership in the elite category.
Charter schools were created to provide children and their families with innovative methods for educating pupils that were an improvement over the regular classrooms. However, with a singular focus on PMF results we are coming dangerously close to reducing options for kids. A lack of top tier quality seats means we may end up sending the most vulnerable students back to the same schools charters were meant to supplant.
Let me close with the final paragraph from my 2011 interview with Friendship CEO and board chair Donald Hense:
“When I asked him how his schools were doing he answered this question very different from other charter leaders I have met. Consistent with his humility he did not flood me with test score data, graduation rates, or teacher and parent satisfaction scores. All he said, in a soft yet reassuring voice, was that he and his few hundred employees have struggled to get it right. He added that they will never give up trying to improve the public education of inner city kids. They have worked extremely hard to train teachers and obtain access to resources that will lead us in the right direction. He concluded by saying that extremely high quality schools are those that are excellent year in and year out. Right now we are good and, he said, it is preferable to be good compared to the status quo.”
The Washington Post
By Emma Brown
March 1, 2013
The next D.C. teachers union contract will give principals and teachers greater flexibility to choose longer school days and a longer school year, Chancellor Kaya Henderson told the D.C. Council’s Education Committee on Friday.
The chancellor called additional class time a “key strategy” for boosting achievement and one that has been used at many high-performing public charter schools in the city. Committee Chairman David Catania (I-At Large) agreed that extended school time is necessary to put the school system on an even footing with charters.
The rapid growth of nonunionized charter schools has been an important backdrop to teacher contract negotiations, which have intensified since the previous contractexpired in September (although that contract remains in force).
While charters have the flexibility to design their own schedules, traditional public schools are bound by the terms of a contract that says that the year may not exceed 185 instructional days and that a workday must be limited to 7.5 hours.
Washington Teachers’ Union President Nathan Saunders said that although details remain to be worked out regarding longer school days, the union acknowledges “changes that are necessary to make [traditional public schools] competitive in light of the dynamic education environment” in the city.
“But no contract is going to be implemented without the teachers understanding, signing off on and believing” in it, Saunders said.
The last contract was approved in 2010, after a mediator helped end two years of contentious and sometimes bitter talks led by then-Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee and then-WTU President George Parker.
Henderson and Saunders have struck a more genial relationship. They said several months ago that contract negotiations were going smoothly and were expected to wrap up by the end of 2012.
But several weeks after the school system proposed contract language, there are still outstanding issues to be worked out, Saunders said.
Class size is one of them. Education Resource Strategies (ERS), a nonprofit group that advised the school system, recommended raising some class sizes, such as art or music, to concentrate resources in math, reading and other core areas.
“How are larger class sizes better for students?” Saunders asked. “Our members tell me they want smaller class sizes, and, therefore, I advocate for smaller class sizes.”
ERS also recommended ending automatic raises for teachers based on experience and education credits, a move that Saunders said could lead to stagnant salaries and lower pensions for some teachers.
“We need to do some more work on compensation. I’m not happy,” Saunders said.
The school system must find savings somewhere, however. If it meets a goal of having 90 percent of its teaching force rated “effective” or “highly effective” by 2017, it will have to find an estimated $38 million to fund additional merit raises and bonuses for teachers, according to ERS.
Saunders did not offer a timeline for presenting the contract to the council for approval, saying that his priority is to arrive at an agreement that his members will support.
After changes in the Rhee-Parker contract that effectively did away with tenure protections, Saunders said, teachers will “evaluate this contract harshly.”
DC Public Schools seeks longer school day, school year [KIPP DC mentioned]
The Washington Examiner
By Rachel Baye
March 1, 2013
DC Public Schools is negotiating with the Washington Teachers' Union to extend students' time in class, according to Schools Chancellor Kaya Henderson.
"We are creating more flexibility within the teachers union contract so that we can actually implement a longer school day and a longer school year," she said.
DCPS spokeswoman Melissa Salmanowitz said the school system is not ready to release the details of the proposal.
Though Washington Teachers' Union President Nathan Saunders was similarly reluctant to reveal details before the contract is finalized, he said any proposal that lengthens the school day would need to include additional pay and professional development for teachers.
Many public charter schools in the District already offer longer school days.
KIPP DC, for example, touts an extended school day, Saturday school and mandatory summer school, resulting in 40 percent more classroom time for students at KIPP schools than students in DCPS schools. The organization operates 10 high-performing charter schools in the District, with more than 3,000 students across three campuses in Wards 2, 7 and 8.
KIPP co-founder Mike Feinberg has attributed the organization's strong academic performance largely to the extended days.
KIPP is not an anomaly, said Ward 3 D.C. Councilwoman Mary Cheh. Studies have shown that more instruction time improves academic performance.
Henderson said she has been seeking advice from charters such as KIPP in developing changes to school schedules.
In 2010, Cheh introduced a bill that would have added 30 minutes to the school day, but the bill didn't go anywhere. Now, though, with Henderson onboard, Cheh said she is hopeful the change might happen.
Teachers unions have been known to fight extensions of the school day or year because they say the changes affect teachers' family lives and abilities to hold second jobs over summers. Cheh suggested combating this by letting teachers volunteer to work longer hours, offering more pay in return.
"We have to, maybe on a pilot basis -- probably on a pilot basis -- let schools apply for being the schools that will have longer days or possibly Saturday classes or a longer school year," she said. "[We should see] whether an increase in time in school instruction can really help raise scores."
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