School for Naught

Most developed countries have a national school district that sets policy and runs consistent educational standards across the land. Education ministers come and go, but senior bureaucrats in most of this top-end educational environment insure that the system operates outside of political whims that micromanage textbook lessons for reasons that have little to do with learning, and a lot more to do with getting elected to school boards to promulgate regional priorities, often at the expense of education. Funding does not depend on which district you are in.

Not so the United States with approximately 13,000 school districts, individual state mandates and tons of local control. Compounding this exorbitant chorus of divergent American voices is the massive and exceptionally duplicative layers of administrators and bureaucratic staff needed to support these thousands of school districts. Money spent on staff not education. All of which goes to explain why we have fallen, among the top nations on earth, from first in each of the following categories to 17^th in scientific proficiency, 25^th in math and 16^th in the percentage of our population with college educations. The numbers are getting worse as public school budgets face national and regional budget deficit reduction policies that are increasing class size, eliminating programs and deferring much-needed maintenance on many schools that are literally falling apart.

But there is an anger festering in a nation of unemployed and those who have given up trying to find work. They see bad teachers with tenure, summer vacations of significant length, and lucrative pensions – most insufficiently funded by the way – while so many other Americans are suffering. As elections move elected officials from left to right to center and back again, as school districts are shifting with each election, and with each new administration vowing to clean up the mess with a new program, the cacophony of “here’s the latest and the greatest new proposed solution” to this quagmire has resulted in zero consistency, changes in direction at every turn such that no new program has a chance and confusing in the ranks as each new direction requires undoing the old and implementing the new… until the new becomes the old in the next election, etc., etc., etc.

I have blogged about our failed “tenure as seniority” system not rewarding the best teachers and protecting the bad, the fact that defined benefit retirement programs are no longer sustainable in expected economic times, and in some states (like California), the power of the teachers’ unions is almost unstoppable. Our children are not prepared for the future, our schools are producing “graduates” (and a lot of dropouts) whose skills are falling in a globally competitive universe. The system has so unraveled that public education no longer provides the bridge of upward mobility and opportunity enjoyed by every prior generation. The playing field is no longer leveled by public education, except in the richest local school districts.

The Chicago teachers strike is a case in point. Though it last just one week, the issues that surfaces also plague the nation. With 25,000 teachers impacting almost 400,000 students, the new mayor, Chicago political powerhouse mayor Rahm Emanuel, fighting for a massive reform of the system, staring down Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) president, an equally recalcitrant Karen Lewis with 90% support from her union for the strike, this third largest school district in the United States was, and despite settlement remains, a key battleground for the issues that mar almost every public school district in the nation.

Teachers in Chicago, according to the school district, averaged $76,000/year. The teachers wanted, as they always do, smaller class size, more pay and very little in the way of change in the way they operate. Emanuel wanted “comprehensive reform” including potential changes to health benefits, a new teacher evaluation system based partly on students’ standardized test scores, a longer school day, but conceded an offer that included a whopping a 16% pay raise over four years. Facing a $665 million deficit this year and more the next, the pressures were and are immense.

The last time the Chicago teachers went on strike – for 19 days – was 1987. But the force of two powerful personalities suggests the battle was fierce. “While negotiators handled the private talks, Chicagoans watched what appeared to be a contentious, sometimes personal fight between two blunt and resolute personalities: Mr. Emanuel and Ms. Lewis, who has described the mayor in recent days as a ‘bully’ and a ‘liar,’ and in a recent interview added, ‘I think the whole idea of an imperial mayoralty where you wave a magic wand or cuss someone out and things happen is untenable.’” New York Times, September 9^th.

The big sticking points – basing employment on how principals want to govern their schools, removing under-performers (based in significant part of their students’ test results) and opening the doors to new blood with the hopes of “better” – were exceptionally difficult to resolve. “[During the strike,] Emanuel has stressed repeatedly that principals should have the right to choose the teachers they hire. ‘It's essential that the local principal who we hold accountable for producing the educational results not be told by the CPS bureaucracy ... and not be told by the union leadership who to hire,’ Emanuel [said when the strike began].

“But under the contract, that's not how things would work. According to CTU, the agreed upon contract would require principals to choose from a pool composed of an equal ratio of new teachers and laid off teachers. According to a source close to the situation, the contract does not specify in which order they must be called back.” Huffington Post, September 16^th. We can expect these battles to replay across the United States in the coming years, and somehow the kids and the school district’s ability actually to fund its benefit packages have not reach the priority levels required for long term sustainability and increased quality.

Repeating: The victims in these struggles, from this massive waste, this archaic system, are our children… who seem to get lost in translation. Whatever our priorities, the children themselves must return to the top of the list. Almost nothing about our public educational system is working smoothly, and very little about our schools seems to be getting better. Our global competitiveness cannot stand too much more of a system in dire need of ground-up overhaul.

Update: The CTU is submitting a tentative list of settlement terms to teachers prior to a formal vote. Dissatisfaction from the rank and file suggests that passage of the negotiated settlement is anything but certain, as the strike moves into its second week. Mayor Rahm Emanuel is seeking a court action against the striking teachers, a gesture that many are saying is throwing gasoline on simmering coals.

I’m Peter Dekom, and this system is broken… but is it beyond repair?