Feinstein objects to cuts in K-12 jobs bill
California stands to get $1.2 billion for K-12 schools, enabling 13,300 teachers to keep their jobs, according to calculations by the Education Commission of the States, if the U.S. Senate approves – and President Obama signs – a $10 billion education jobs bill that the House passed a week ago.
But the president is threatening to veto it, even though the administration once backed a jobs bill three times as large, because the “Keep Our Educators Working Act” also contains $800 million in cuts to his reform initiatives, including a whack out of the $4.35 billion Race to the Top fund.
Last week, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein joined a dozen other senators in a letter objecting to the bill as well , which she and the others criticized for creating “a false choice between supporting teachers and supporting these critical reform efforts.” Senators must now come up with alternate cuts in federal spending for the K-12 jobs bill to have any chance of passage before school starts.
Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa and Democratic U.S. Rep. David Obey of Wisconsin had proposed a $23 billion bill to restore K-12 jobs, but conservatives’ concerns about the already huge federal deficit doomed that bill. So Obey opted for a smaller bill with offsetting cuts to the federal budget. But angering Obama and delighting the National Education Assn., it included $500 million out of the $4.35 billion Race to the Top, $200 million from the Teacher Incentive Fund, which promotes performance pay for teachers, and $100 million from the Charter Schools Program. Obey was unapologetic, saying there will would be plenty of money for Obama’s pet programs.
But the cuts would have significantly reduced money available for the second round of Race to the Top, which states already had applied for and, in some cases, had taken significant actions – changes to charter laws, teacher tenure and evaluations – in hopes of being competitive. Obama saw the Obey bill as a frontal assault on reform initiatives that comprise only a few percent of federal spending on education.
The California Teachers Assn. had predicted 26,000 teachers would lose their jobs under the state budget that Gov. Schwarzenegger proposed. But that was before unions in many districts agreed to larger class sizes, furloughs and pay cuts. It’s unclear how many teachers will still lose their jobs, though it’s still well in their thousands.
The Obey bill would save many of those jobs and enable some districts to restore arts and science programs and smaller classes.
Some education reformers had called for tying a jobs bill to requiring states to eliminate layoffs based strictly on seniority. But the Obama administration, already on the outs with the NEA, hasn’t lined up behind that demand.
Feinstein and the other senators have it deeply, disastrously wrong. Veteran Washington Post education reporter Valerie Strauss explains why in a blog post: “the argument that was made in this letter is flawed. The letter, written to Rep. Daniel K. Inouye (D-Hawaii), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, says that:
*The targeted programs are “vital” and have driven “state- and local-level improvements for students across the country.”
*Race to the Top “has given education stakeholders the leverage they need to reform systems and policies that for too long failed too many students.”
*Cutting the funds as Obey’s bill proposes would be “pulling the rug out from under the efforts of thousands of communities around the country working together to improve their schools.”
Well, not really, no, and not actually.
Race to the Top is a contest in which states compete for federal grant money by promising to take reform measures that are favored by Education Secretary Arne Duncan.
For one thing, there is no research behind some of the initiatives that win points for states on their application. Expanding the number of charter schools is just one.
For another, researchers have determined that the 500-point system created to decide “the best proposals” for reform was created arbitrarily. …
It would be useful to remember that there is nothing scientifically sacrosanct about the amount of money initially deposited in these funds. And it would be useful if policymakers would look back nearly a decade ago, when they approved No Child Left Behind, certain that all of the changes that it forced upon public school systems were the best way to fix ailing schools and close the achievement gap. If they had been correct, legislators wouldn’t be in such a panic to fix public schools today.
It has unfortunately not dawned on many of them that Duncan is adopting some of the same damaging approaches that doomed No Child Left Behind, including a reliance on high-stakes standardized tests.
When exactly will Congress learn from its mistakes?” Again, those are the words of veteran Washington Post reporter Valerie Strauss, not mine. http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/race-to-the-top/senators-confused-about-cuttin.html
John, what would it take to do whatever to your blog/site so that paragraphs could be inserted in comments? Or is there some complex techie way to do this?
Larger class sizes still mean teachers lose their jobs. Furloughs and pay cuts do save jobs, but a class size increase means fewer teachers.
Regardless, there is something very disturbing about performance pay being regarded as more important to education than teachers. It suggests a real disconnect from reality. California’s K-3 standards more or less require 20:1, particularly for students who have low school readiness.
Tell you the truth, Caroline, I don’t know but will look into it. The lack of paragraphing is annoying