Ann Arbor Schools Musings

Chance Encounters and All-Day Kindergarten

2012-02-20T23:24:00.000-05:00

Finally, the Ann Arbor schools have joined the other county school districts s in the rush to create all-day kindergarten--if the districts didn't make the switch, they would lose more state money. Of course, all-day kindergarten costs money too.

I don't like the state requiring schools to provide all-day kindergarten without providing more money for it, and I do worry about kindergartens being too academic, but the trend toward an academic kindergarten has been very evident for years. There was a big change in the tenor of my oldest son's kindergarten class and my youngest son's kindergarten class. (There are seven years between them.) My oldest son's kindergarten class was much more play-based. Sure, skills are important, but little kids acquire skills through playing.

But on the other hand--I am very happy that the schools are going to offer something that private schools have been offering for years. Half-day kindergarten was a pain in the neck. After years of full-day day care, it seemed like almost nothing, and I still had to pay for almost full-time day care. For many years, some other schools had used alternate-day kindergarten--but not Ann Arbor.

At the time that I was looking for a school for my oldest son, I was very attracted to a local, private, parochial school. There were two key attractions--the immersion language program (which was only a true immersion program beginning in first grade), and the full-day kindergarten. I was really struggling with the choice, and even though my husband had his heart set on public school, I was thinking. . . well perhaps for kindergarten. . . and then we could switch.

In a chance encounter one day, I ran into a colleague who had three older children. In the course of catching up, I described my dilemma, and Cheryl said, "Ruth, when you make your decision, you really have to look beyond kindergarten. Kindergarten is only eight months long!"

Cheryl was right. But for that chance encounter, I might not have realized how fleeting kindergarten is. At the time, it seemed like a huge step!

I know now that a lot of parents initially choose a private school for a full-day kindergarten option, and some of them never leave those private schools. But for that chance encounter, I might have had three kids go through private school, at least for their elementary years.

Therefore, I'm glad that in this area, at least, the public schools have leveled the playing field. I hope this will allow more families to start their kids' academic careers in public schools. And perhaps. . . one can hope. . . that full-day kindergarten will also allow more time to play, and do project-based learning, and still allow teachers to cover those academics.

MIFA Theater "One-Acts" This Friday and Saturday

2012-02-13T23:04:00.000-05:00

This year, the MIFA One-Act State Competition is being held at Dexter High School on Friday and Saturday, February 17th and 18th. You can come watch if you like--and perhaps cheer on our hometown schools of Skyline and Pioneer. (No other county schools advanced to states.) The shows are 45 minutes long and the shows are free. (Many of these shows are abridged from longer shows. For instance, Sweeney Todd was just the full-length musical at Huron High School last week. . . the version that John Glenn High School is doing, like all of these one-acts, cannot exceed 45 minutes.)

[Update 2/16/2012: There is a really nice writeup of last week's regional competition at Skyline High School in Community High School's newspaper, The Communicator. The Communicator is an award-winning paper that engages in serious journalism. I think you will enjoy the article.]

Here is the tentative lineup.

Friday, 2/17/2012:

10 a.m.          Holland--The Diviners
11:20 a.m.     Avondale--The Fall of the House of Usher
1:35 p.m.       Olivet--Property Rites
2:55 p.m.       Skyline--Amadeus
4:15 p.m.       Anchor Bay--Children of Oedipus
6:20 p.m.       John Glenn--Sweeney Todd
7:40 p.m.       Lakers--The Charge is Murder

Saturday, 2/18/2012:

9:00 a.m.       St. John's--Parade
10:20 a.m.     Groves--The Ice Wolf
11:40 a.m.     Pioneer--Spring Awakening
2:10 p.m.       Chesaning--World War Z
3:30 p.m.       Grand Rapids Christian--Dancing at Lughasa
4:50 p.m.       Midland--Quilters

About that state budget proposal. . .

2012-02-12T22:07:00.001-05:00

Bridge, News and Analysis from the Center for Michigan, reports that school funding is not actually increased, but cut:

Let’s start with the way funding for K-12 was described. The description in the budget document is that the recommendation for FY 2013 is a 2.5 percent increase, and the “planning budget” for 2014 is a 0.8 percent increase. The problem with that description is, when you add up what the figures for this year, for FY 2013 and for FY 2014, total spending for K-12 declines from $12.74 billion in 2012 to $12.69 billion in FY 2013 — and declines again to $12.6 billion in FY 2014.
So how is a recommendation to spend less an increase?

Read the rest here. (The blog has some other interesting articles too.)

Steve Norton of Michigan Parents for Schools notes:

I'm doing a line by line comparison of the governor's budget proposal to the current year budget. Finding some interesting tidbits in the Senate Fiscal Agency summary of the current appropriations...

Want a gauge of what kind of funding might be necessary to offset the impact of poverty on our schools? The budget provides additional funding to each "at risk" student, defined as those who qualify for the Federal free lunch program. (Hold-harmless districts are not eligible for this, regardless.) The budget funds this with $318 million. Theoretically, districts could receive an extra 11.5% of their foundation allowance for every qualifying student.

BUT, fulling funding this program this year would cost nearly $497 million [yes, that is half a billion dollars] during the current fiscal year. So qualifying districts get a small fraction of the theoretical total. Yes, you read that right: giving districts an 11% bump just for kids who qualify for free (not reduced price) lunch would cost us half a billion dollars as a state. Not only does this say a lot about the number of children in poverty, but it puts in perspective the resources we would need to commit if we were truly trying to counter the impact of poverty. [The original post said $5 billion but in Steve's comments he notes that was based on a typo in the state budget--still , half a billion is a lot of money, and is less than is budgeted.]

If you wish, you can join their facebook group here.

Note also that the governor's proposal continues to fund colleges out of the School Aid Fund.

Transportation Lessons: 2010-2012

2012-02-08T00:42:00.002-05:00

Preface

In ninth grade, I had an algebra teacher who always wore cowboy boots (I grew up in New York! That was not usual). About mistakes, he had this to say, "It's okay to mistakes. But it's preferable to make a different mistake every time."

That story is meant to say: I know that hindsight is perfect, and foresight is imperfect. So the point of this lesson is to use that knowledge to improve decision-making in the future.

Transportation Lessons: What Can We Learn? (Or: More Proof of the Importance of Evalutation)

Our object lesson is the transportation consolidation that took place over the past two years. You may recall that back in 2009-2010, the Ann Arbor schools (and Ypsilanti and Willow Run) each had their own buses and bus drivers. And all of the county's districts were looking for ways to save money--including on transportation. After much thought, Dexter went to a "one-tier" bus system (all schools start and end at the same time of day, so they can do one run through a neighborhood instead of two or three). Lincoln bus drivers took major pay cuts in order to avert consolidation.

Ann Arbor bus drivers also offered major concessions as an alternative to consolidation. But remember--Ann Arbor is the biggest district in the county, and it is right in the middle of the county. I think the school board felt that if Ann Arbor didn't choose consolidation, then consolidation couldn't work. That, by itself, brought some additional pressure to the Ann Arbor schools.

However--the biggest incentive, by far, was the money savings that were promised. As described by deputy superintendent Robert Allen in April of 2010, in an annarbor.com article that David Jesse wrote,

Hiring a private company to run the district’s busing operations would cost $7,019,214, said Robert Allen, the district’s deputy superintendent for operations. Joining with five of the county’s other traditional districts to form a consolidated busing system would cost the district $6,578,274.

Both those options are cheaper than the district’s current busing system, which costs $8,718,669, Allen said.

In other words, the savings were estimated to be over two million dollars! [I think it was understood that the savings would be a little bit less if fewer districts joined in--which was, in fact, what happened--and in a later article (October 2011, Ann Arbor Chronicle) Robert Allen says the final savings were estimated to be closer to $1.5 million. Still, that is nothing to sneeze at.] It was understood that the bulk of savings would come from reduced staffing costs, despite the fact that the estimates were based on the idea that service levels would remain the same. The reduced pay for bus drivers was ostensibly based on a market rate study.

So on the one hand, I don't blame the school board officials and the school administrators for getting a little bit starry-eyed at the thought of saving all that money!

On the other hand, there were some warning signs that promises from privatization and consolidation don't always turn out all that well.

Somebody Evaluated Food Service Privatization, But Did We Pay Attention?

Food services had been privatized in Ann Arbor a few years earlier. Had the savings from that approached the promised savings? Not according to University of Michigan researcher Roland Zullo, who is also an Ann Arbor Public Schools parent. Prompted in part by the specter of privatization of Ann Arbor schools custodial and transportation staff, he undertook an evaluation of the food services privatization. (Earlier he had done a larger study of food service privatization.) According to this (very interesting) New York Times article (12/3/2011),

Roland Zullo, a researcher at the University of Michigan, found in 2008 that Michigan schools that hired private food-service management firms spent less on labor and food but more on fees and supplies, yielding “no substantive economic savings.” Alarmingly, he even found that privatization was associated with lower test scores, hypothesizing that the high-fat and high-sugar foods served by the companies might be the cause. In a later study, in 2010, Dr. Zullo found that Chartwells was able to trim costs by cutting benefits for workers in Ann Arbor schools, but that the schools didn’t end up realizing any savings.

[An aside: this, by the way, is consistent with the findings of the AAPS Privatization History blog post that I wrote in March 2010.]

In Zullo's March 2010 review of Ann Arbor food service (read the full report here), he reported that there were initial savings the first year, but the savings evaporated after that. And he says,

By losing their AAPS employment status, food service workers lost their state pension benefits, had their health insurance co-pays skyrocket by 500%, and lost union representation. New employees are offered wages at about $9.00 per hour.

It Was Consolidation, Not Privatization

But wait--the Ann Arbor school board did not choose privatization. They chose consolidation with another public entity, the Washtenaw Intermediate School District. Employees who chose to apply for jobs with the WISD would--if rehired--be able to keep their state pension benefits, and they would be able to unionize if they wanted (in fact, they have voted to affiliate with the Michigan Education Association, or MEA). In fact, one thing that the board appears to have taken away from the food services privatization discussion is that many people lost their pensions, and that was a bad thing. I know from conversations with board members that they saw consolidation as different from privatization, although I'm not sure that the bus drivers saw it very differently. Just read, for instance, my interview with Andy Thomas when he was a school board candidate earlier this year.

So How Has Consolidation Worked So Far?

The first problem was that only three districts agreed to consolidate.
There were quite a few service problems in the beginning, and in fact Ypsilanti ended up giving a private bus company, Trinity, a $180,000 contract in the first year, because the WISD couldn't keep up. (I still see a lot of Trinity buses in Ypsilanti, so I assume that they still have some kind of contract.)
I have heard alleged--in other words, nothing that I have substantiated--that bus drivers who were active in their unions were not re-hired.
And the WISD reported to the Ann Arbor school board, in October 2011, that turnover rates were astoundingly high--over 40%.
Most of us know that even with lower staffing costs, high turnover is going to increase costs and probably reduce service quality. High turnover requires increased training and recruiting, makes it more likely that drivers will make mistakes on routes (because they are new), and means that students are always seeing new drivers and/or substitute drivers.

Partly because of the complaints, the Ann Arbor school board asked the WISD for an evaluation of the first year (2010-2011), and it took the WISD several months into the 2011-2012 school year to provide it. If you want, you can read the full report here.

But here is the summary:
Total savings were not quite $619,000--just over 40% of the expected savings.

According to the WISD, unemployment compensation costs; higher than expected gas prices; workers' compensation claims; and a retirement rate increase were the primary reasons that the savings were so low. Aren't those things that should have been expected and included in the initial budgeting plan? It looks like we got the "pie in the sky" budget (hence the starry eyes) when we should have gotten the plain pie budget.

The report also makes clear that whereas before, many people were school bus drivers as a primary job, that has changed. For most people, these are secondary jobs now--and when they find a better job, with more hours/no-split shift/more pay, they take it and leave the school buses behind. Remember--the bus drivers did offer concessions to the district. They simply were not deemed to be enough.

The projected savings for the Ann Arbor schools for 2011-2012, according to Robert Allen, are about $1 million. But those savings are largely a function of all of the cuts that they made to busing schedules at the beginning of this year, and not of consolidation.

More recently, Ypsilanti and Willow Run have said they may completely pull out of the WISD consortium, leaving Ann Arbor as the only district in the consortium, making it not a consortium at all. I assume that is because they are not getting the savings that they expected. Should this be a shock? No.

So I was glad to see the Ann Arbor Chronicle report that in light of these changes, on January 25, 2012 the school board directed the administration to

...examine and make a recommendation on the following transportation options: improving busing within the current framework of the WISD; consolidating busing with Ypsilanti and Willow Run outside the WISD consolidation; bringing busing back into the AAPS budget with bus drivers remaining public employees; bringing busing back into the AAPS budget but privatizing bus drivers; eliminating busing entirely; or collaborating with the Ann Arbor Transportation Authority (AATA) to transport AAPS students.

Hindsight is Perfect

If we go back to the preface--hindsight is perfect.
Looking back, do I think it was a good idea to privatize? No. I think we could have gotten those same savings with salary concessions from the bus drivers and revamping the bus schedules--with much less disruption to both the school district and to the employees' lives. (I admit it--I was always skeptical, and I wrote about that here.)

In fact, on June 24, 2010, I wrote that:

Regarding the teacher contract, kudos to the negotiators. It really is a creative collaboration. However--the teacher contract makes the vote to consolidate bussing--which means that workers lose their jobs with no guarantee of re-hire, or even of seniority preference in hiring--all the more disappointing. . . It is disappointing because it is clear--based on the teacher contract--that the district has the capacity to develop creative agreements that serve workers well. Yet in the case of the transportation workers, they chose not to do so.

As I read back over my notes though, I think I know why they chose not to do so. It's not simply because transportation is not considered a "core service." I think it's because transportation departments have a reputation for being difficult to run. They've got all those buses with maintenance; lots of parts, supplies, and gas; and difficulty scheduling multiple routes, special education needs, and staffing. Maybe they thought the WISD could actually do a better job--even though that turned out not to be true!

It's Better to Make a Different Mistake Every Time

And since it's better to make a different mistake every time, as we look forward to another round of budget cuts, what should be done differently?

If privatization comes up again (and I will bet that it will), what questions should the school board and administrators be asking that they didn't ask last time? Let's articulate those questions now.

Coda
One good thing that did come out of this--although the Ann Arbor schools did not ever have a major problem with buses passing state safety inspections, the Ypsilanti and Willow Run schools sometimes did, and their pass rates have improved dramatically, as I note here. They sold the buses to the WISD for $1, and the agreement is that they will be sold back to the districts for $1 if they leave the consortium.

What Can We Expect for School Aid Funding Next Year?

2012-02-06T16:16:00.000-05:00

As usual, Steve Norton of Michigan Parents for Schools has a very cogent analysis of the upcoming budget possibilities. (His summary, as noted in the title: Will schools get more money? Don't hold your breath.)

I like it so much I'm just cutting and pasting the first paragraph, and then linking to the original.

The latest projections show that revenue to the state School Aid Fund, which supports K-12 education in Michigan, will increase 2.7% next year, compared to a 4.3% drop this year. But will local public schools get a funding increase? There will be a lot of politics at work between now and the start of school next fall, and little can be taken for granted. While Governor Snyder is likely to use any school aid surplus to make one-time “pay for performance” payments, there is significantly less money available to do that this year.

Keep reading more here.

Theatre. . . Competition?!

2012-01-31T00:11:00.002-05:00

Without much notice or fanfare, high school theater* groups around the state prepare one-act plays for a theater competition--the Michigan Interscholastic Forensic Association competition, or MIFA, as it is known--throughout January and February.

In the theatre competition, actors and crew operate under time constraints, as well as the requirement that the play be portable--and they get feedback from judges. They present at "districts," then at "regionals," and then--if they are lucky--to "states."

One year the requirement is to pick a comedy, and the next year the requirement is to pick a serious play. Directors can choose a musical or a straight play; a play that was written as a one-act, or cut a play down.

This year, at least four local schools are participating, and in fact, a regional competition is occurring at Skyline and a state competition is occurring at ~~Chelsea~~ Dexter High School, although Dexter has not submitted a MIFA play. (This year, Community and Huron are not performing one-acts, but Huron will be doing Sweeney Todd the weekend of February 9th and look for Community High School's PG-version of Avenue Q in the spring.)

This coming weekend (February 3d and 4th, 2012), both Skyline and Pioneer high schools are doing public performances. Both of them are on Friday and Saturday nights at 7:30 p.m.

Pioneer High School is performing Spring Awakening, a play following the lives of ten teenagers as they move from adolescent to adult.

Skyline High School is performing Amadeus, about Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri.

Chelsea High School and Milan High School are also performing.

Update 2/6/11: So is Lincoln High School. Lincoln High School is performing J. M. Barrie's Half an Hour.

You may recall that Milan High School had four students die over the last year, and at least a couple of the deaths were suicides. The play that they have chosen is called The Bright Blue Mailbox Suicide Note, and I understand--from someone who saw the play at districts--that the play opens with projections of news stories about the students who died. Intense? Yes. But also an important memorial to them. I've never seen the play but I think using the arts as a way to work through emotional issues is a terrific idea.

As for Chelsea--well, I'm still looking for the title of their play--and I will hope to update this.

As far as I can tell, neither Milan nor Chelsea has public performances, but I could be wrong about that.

If you get a chance to go to one of the public performances, they're short and you will probably find that the way the set and crew are integrated into the performance makes the experience more interesting. The theme for this year is "serious drama," and the topics are. They are appropriate for high school students, but these are probably not the right plays for your eight-year old.

Update 2/6/11: The current schedule for the regional event at Skyline High School has Skyline, Pioneer, and Lincoln performing there, but not Chelsea or Milan.

*theater or theatre, I can't decide which to use. Read more here.

Highland Park: The New Kalkaska?

2012-01-26T00:01:00.000-05:00

The other day I was surprised to hear, on NPR, that Governor Snyder was telling the parents of students in the Highland Park, Michigan school district, that the district might run out of money and have to shut its doors even before the end of the school year--and/or he might appoint an emergency financial manager. (Snyder has already determined that there is a financial emergency.)

Maybe I shouldn't have been surprised. This is a road that Willow Run could be going down as well, as I described a few days ago. Just a few short weeks ago Highland Park got an emergency loan from the state to cover payroll.

According to this Detroit Free Press article,

The [emergency financial review] team found that a financial emergency exists based on factors including ending the school year on June 30 with an $11.3-million deficit, a 51% increase from the previous year.
The district had an operating deficit in excess of revenues for five of the six years evaluated and an average operating deficit of $2.3 million over seven years, [Michigan Department of Education Deputy Superintendent] Wolenberg said in her presentation on behalf of the review team.
The district saw a decrease in enrollment from 1,858 students in 2010 to 1,331 in 2011. There are currently 969 students enrolled, and about 40% of them live in Detroit, Wolenberg said. (1/21/2012)

Based on this determination, Governor Snyder sent out a letter to parents of students in the district. According to district officials,

the letter sends a deceptive message and could be taken as a warning to parents to get out of the district.
"If you were a parent this would be intended to scare you," said Highland Park school board secretary Robert Davis. "This is unprecedented communication with the parents. Why wouldn't you notify district officials?"

That's not the governor's perspective.

Sara Wurfel, a spokeswoman for Snyder, said the letter was meant to address the anger, fear and frustrations of the district's parents.

(Both quotes taken from a 1/24/2012 article in the Detroit Free Press, Highland Park schools 'in jeopardy of closing,' Snyder tells parents.)

Do you even know where Highland Park is? It is a small, impoverished urban community (fewer than 12,000 people) completely surrounded by the City of Detroit.

It also happens to be nearly 93% African-American. Just like many other communities that either have had emergency financial managers assigned to them or have the threat of them being assigned hanging over their heads.

And the city of Highland Park itself has been under emergency management for most of the decade of the oughts (as the 2000s can be called).

Do you even know where Kalkaska is? It is a small, poor (but not as poor as Highland Park) rural community with a population of under 2300, located in Kalkaska County in the northwestern part of the Lower Peninsula. The school district is geographically (and populationally--yes, I know that is not a word, but I like it anyway) larger than the village of Kalkaska, with something closer to 13,000 residents. (I'm not sure of the boundaries so I can't be too exact.)

Oh, and Kalkaska happens to be over 96% white.

So in some ways, Kalkaska is a mirror image of Highland Park. But they also have a lot in common. This article from the Ludington Daily News of March 6, 1993, "Kalkaska system on brink of early closing as funds run out," explains it nicely.

Kalkaska (and other districts, too, like Ypsilanti!) was under a lot of financial stress--and the district famously closed three months early, at the end of March, in 1993.

And this "shot heard round Michigan," (if not the world) created a lot of impetus for the development of Proposal A. And as we see now, Proposal A solved some problems, but it created a whole host of others.

In 2012, Highland Park is not the only school district faced with the possibility of closing. Only this time, rather than the decision being made by the people who live there, the decision would be made by the state.

And I wonder, will any of this be the necessary catalyst for change? And if not, why not? Would race have anything to do with it?

Forsythe Has...

2012-01-25T21:27:00.001-05:00

Many cool murals, done by students over many years.
Here is a piece of one!

Willow Run Deficit

2012-01-23T00:01:00.000-05:00

I know a little bit about the Willow Run deficit and student counts. That's because I requested the powerpoint presentation that was made to the Willow Run board at the beginning of December. The presentation has quite a bit of information in it, and it's too bad that nobody is regularly covering the Willow Run school board meeting, because Willow Run's meeting minutes are extremely terse. As in,

Bert Emerson gave a presentation and PowerPoint update on the financial standing of the District. He stressed the necessity of financial change within our district. (Quote taken from the 12/1/11 meeting minutes.)

Yes, that's it. No details at all about the finances--although the minutes do note that district employees would be getting the information the following week. Which means what? That they get to worry about additional concessions? The teachers have already made concessions that are approximately 10% of their salaries!
Willow Run has already closed schools, reconfigured the whole flow of students in the district, and asked teachers for very significant concessions. What kind of "financial change" can possible be created?

The short story is that, although Willow Run's initial budget (which, like Ypsilanti's, was part of an approved deficit elimination plan) showed higher revenues than expenditures (positive by over $411,000), by mid-November the district had figured out that things looked much, much worse--their expenses are going to exceed revenue by $1,165,017. School fiscal years start in July, so this analysis was done about 1/3 of the way through the school year. Obviously, the further you get into the school year, the harder it is to reduce the deficit.

As you might suspect, a big part of the problem is in enrollment:

There are fewer kids enrolled in the following grades: K, 1, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, and 12. There are a lot of kids in the Washtenaw Alternatives for Youth Program, and a few in the Washtenaw International High School and Early College Alliance--but a lot of the funds that come in for those students then has to go out to pay for the kids.

So overall, they lost 66 students, which is over 4% of their student body, following a trend that has been true for over ten years. (Honestly though, considering that a new charter high school opened nearby, I thought they might have done worse than they did.) Like everyone else, Willow Run also lost a big piece of their foundation grant from the state, $530/student, which is almost 7% of their foundation grant. And--again, like everyone else--their retirement costs have gone up again and are ridiculously high.

Here is the summary of the last slide of Bert Emerson's presentation:

Problem = Cash

• 1. State Aid is cut: out of business in 2 weeks
• 2. Keep spending = drawn out insolvency
• a. We could not get the State to authorize increased borrowing w/
August State Aid note.
• b. Can’t get “bridge loan” approved w/o approved Deficit
Elimination Plan.
• c. If we cut spending enough to get renewed approval of DEP, cash
problem diminishes.

You can take a look at the powerpoint presentation yourself here.

Did I mention that cutting $1.165 million would mean cutting about 6% of their budget?

Did I mention that they have lost students every year for more than ten years?

Did I mention that they now have high school grades of fewer than 75 students?

Willow Run did such a good job of restructuring over this past year. If they had restructured three or four years ago, instead of sticking their head in the sand then, maybe they would still be viable now. I do believe that their school board is much more focused, and willing to work together, then it was a few years ago.

It's my opinion (I know, most of what I write is opinion, but I really want to call this out now as opinion) that they shouldn't be talking about transportation consolidation with Ypsilanti. First of all, that is not going to solve Willow Run's problems, and second of all, the two weakest districts in the county coming together is just going to weaken both of them.

Of the two districts, I've always had more faith that Ypsilanti can pull through than Willow Run. Historically Ypsilanti has dealt with their financial issues more quickly than Willow Run. (See my last post for an example--I have not yet heard of any layoffs in Willow Run.) Second of all, Ypsilanti has a real downtown, and many community boosters. In other words, although both districts are financially weak, Ypsilanti is by far the stronger district.

It's my opinion that Ypsilanti should not be partnering with Willow Run for transportation. Ypsilanti should look for a stronger partner.

It's my opinion that the pro-active thing for Willow Run to do would be to close their district down--whether by splitting it into pieces or by merging with another district. To me, it would make more sense to split it into pieces--it's surrounded by other districts--Van Buren, Lincoln, Ypsilanti, Ann Arbor, and Plymouth-Canton.

But--I haven't seen Willow Run be truly proactive yet, so I don't hold out much hope for them to take my advice. To wit, action on the finances wasn't even on the agenda for January 5th, 2012. In fact, in print, I have not yet seen any of their board members even float the idea of closing the district. I'm hoping that in 2012, their school board will be proactive.

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all

(Emily Dickinson)

Ypsilanti Mid-Year Teacher Layoffs

2012-01-22T22:34:00.001-05:00

I was very sad to hear that several Ypsilanti teachers were given layoff notices last week. The precipitating event is that based on count day, Ypsilanti lost about 118 students, or about 3% of their student population. The Ypsilanti schools are currently operating under a deficit elimination plan from the state, and there's a lot of pressure to act quickly to avoid the possibility of an emergency financial manager. I haven't seen the numbers, but I assume the bulk of the losses were at the high school level if that is where the cuts are targeted.

On annarbor.com, commenter ironyinthesky2 writes,

4.5 teachers, but 3 of those are coming from RCTC, where 3 programs (one full) are being shut down.

I don't know if it's true that RCTC is being targeted. In fact, I don't know anything about the Regional Career Technical Center except what I read on the Ypsilanti schools web site. RCTC has auto, building trades, and food programs, and is available to high school students from Ypsilanti, Lincoln, and Willow Run.

Does this mean that class sizes will get even larger?

Ypsilanti now has quite a few high school options, so it's understandable that they would have an "Exploring High School Options" event on 1/24/12 at 6:30 p.m. at Ypsilanti High School.

Anyway, the layoffs are not a done deal until the board votes on this. The Ypsilanti school board meets Monday 1/23/12 at 7 p.m. at Ypsilanti High School.

This Week's Observations: Banned Books, Technology, and Charters

2012-01-20T00:13:00.001-05:00

Plymouth-Canton Schools (which actually do draw a small number of students from Washtenaw County have banned two books from an AP English class. The books? Toni Morrison's Beloved, which won a Pulitzer Prize, and which the New York Times called ""the single best work of American fiction published in the last 25 years." The second book is Graham Swift's Waterland, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize.
This whole kerfuffle came about because a couple of parents complained about the books. It's unclear to me whether proper procedure was followed. Did the interim superintendent follow procedure? Is there procedure? (I don't know the details though, so I can't say for sure about that. I understand that some of the school board members are very conservative.) In any case. . . speculation aside. . . the ACLU of Michigan has written the district a letter. According to the ACLU's press release,

the ACLU of Michigan reminded the district that although schools have broad discretion in setting curriculum, the U.S. Supreme Court has held repeatedly that banning books because they offend some runs afoul of the First Amendment. While parents have the right to guide their own child’s education, that right does not extend to restricting other students’ educational opportunities. (Emphasis added.)

In addition, I'll just note the tremendous irony of banning books in a high school AP class because of "mature subjects." I mean, AP classes are supposed to be like college. College is all about reading books that challenge us! In case you're wondering about the reasons that we shouldn't be trying to create colleges out of high schools, I think you just saw one reason in action--it makes some parents too uncomfortable.

Christine Stead, Ann Arbor school board member, has started a blog of her own. I'm planning to link to it in my blogroll, and you should take a minute to check it out at k12christinestead.com. She tells me she's new at blogging, so if you have ideas of subjects that you hope she will cover, or reflections about what she writes, feel free to let her know in the comments. (Bloggers love comments. :) By the way, do I think it is competition? No. I'm a parent, not a school board member. It's more like have several restaurants on the same street--the more the merrier--that way you can choose if you want Chinese or Italian. There are, by the way, a gazillion education blogs out in the world. I've only linked to a few of them on my blogroll.

The Ann Arbor schools have joined the twitterverse! Follow them at @a2schools. Follow Saline schools at @salineschools. Follow Dexter schools at @dexterschools. And follow Ypsilanti schools at @ypsischools. Saline schools also have several sub-twitter feeds (the high school principal, the athletics department, etc.) Oh, and follow me at @schoolsmuse.

Some interesting things have been going on at the first charter school I ever profiled, Ann Arbor Learning Community, and they illuminate some of the issues around charter schools, even for schools that are locally organized, non-profit charters. Annarbor.com has an article, Parents fight for reinstatement of teacher at Ann Arbor Learning Community, which describes how a well-liked teacher was put on administrative leave. In examining this issue, let's leave aside the question of whether the administrative leave was the right decision--I don't know anything about their personnel matters.
The first thing that struck me has to do with teacher turnover--something that is often mentioned in critiques of charter schools. Not only has the "dean" of the school, Ticheal Jones, just left (in the middle of the school year!) for "personal" reasons, but according to the article, "Parents say the teacher’s forced absence is the third instance of this nature that the school has experienced in less than a year."
The second thing that struck me has to do with control of hiring and firing. In a typical public school district, the ultimate authority for hiring and firing would reside with the superintendent's office, but there would generally be a human resources department. And really, what is more important than the personnel you have teaching and working with the students? Here, it turns out, the hiring and firing is done by a group called Michigan Educational Personnel Services.

Carlie Lockwood, the vice president of human resources for MEP stressed that MEP works very closely with the dean, who is responsible for conducting teacher evaluations. But wait. . . didn't the dean just leave? I'm not sure why, or where that leaves things. There is an interim dean, and he was also recruited by MEP.

According to the article,

While AALC is a self-managed charter school, it contracts with Brighton-based MEP for its teachers and staff, said Malverne Winborne, director of Eastern Michigan University’s Charter Schools Office.
“MEP hires and places the employees,” Winborne said.
EMU is the authorizer of AALC, a K-8 school that was founded in 1997.

This is a typical arrangement for charter schools, particularly smaller charter schools--the schools hire someone else to do the hiring and firing of teachers (the teachers aren't really working for AALC, they are working for MEP) because the school (board) doesn't believe they have the skills or resources to do the hiring themselves. And by outsourcing this critical role, the school board gives up much of the local control that they ostensibly wanted in the first place.

And what does EMU's Charter Schools Office have to say about this? Not much, at least not publicly.

As much as we complain about the "transparency" issues with our local public district school boards, next to the charter schools they look crystal clear, and the charter school boards' transparency looks very muddy. In fact, that may be because as it turns out, those local charter school boards have precious little power or control. At least, right now, that's the way it seems to me.

Three Years

2012-01-17T23:31:00.000-05:00

January 18, 2012 is the three-year anniversary of my first blog post.
Although I don't think I paid attention to this factoid at the time, I started this blog two days before Barack Obama's 2009 inauguration. It's a good thing that I don't have to run for re-election!

Where does the time go?

Have some virtual cake with me!

If you like this blog, consider subscribing via RSS feed (link on the right).
You could also follow my twitter feed (you will find me @schoolsmuse)
You could also share individual posts with friends.

And if you want to be a guest blogger, I'm open to the possibility.

Anyway--

I've been thinking about the people I'm proud of (besides, obviously, my family).

I wrote about a few of them the other day. I'm proud of the teachers who are plaintiffs in the ACLU suit about domestic partner benefits.
And I'm also proud of the Wisconsin activists who have collected about 1,000,000 signatures in the Recall Scott Walker campaign--and I'm proud of all the people who signed the petitions.

And then it occurred to me that if they were willing to put their names out there, maybe I should be willing to put my name out here--something I wasn't willing to do when I started.

So, I asked my family, and they had some funny things to say about the idea, which basically referenced the ways in which this blog is a blockbuster. . . a bestseller. . . a breakout success. In other words. . . would anyone who didn't already know even notice? Put differently, they thought it was fine.

So--it's a little bit anti-climactic, but I'm Ruth Kraut, and I approved this message.

MLK Day and the 99%

2012-01-16T22:10:00.004-05:00

When a people are mired in oppression, they realize deliverance only when they have accumulated the power to enforce change. The powerful never lose opportunities-they remain available to them. They powerless, on the other hand, never experience opportunity-it is always arriving at a later time. (Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., June 11, 1967, emphasis added)

I came across these three interesting articles today--two of them from my twitter feed. (I love twitter for the interesting links that come my way.)

My Kids Are Too Good for Public School, and Other Messages I Wish Wealthy Parents Wouldn’t Telegraph

And yes, Governor Snyder does send his kids to private school. I'm so glad you asked!

Martin Luther King Jr. and Education Reform: What Would He Say About the Attack on Teacher Unions and Class Size?

(I'll give you three guesses. Nah, don't guess. Read the article.)

Among the Wealthiest 1 Percent, Many Variations

This is an interesting New York Times article about perspectives on taxation from the top 1%, and you might like the interactive sidebar where you can determine--based on your income--on "what percent" you are.

MLK Day and the Emergency Manager Law

2012-01-14T21:32:00.001-05:00

By now you may have heard that a group of African-American pastors is organizing a protest at Rick Snyder's house on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. And you probably know that Rick Snyder lives in Washtenaw County.

What you might not understand is this--

Why schedule this protest on MLK Day? What does the emergency financial manager law have to do with civil rights or racial justice?

In this article in the Ann Arbor Chronicle, Brit Satchwell (the head of the Ann Arbor teachers' union) explains the relationship very well:

Satchwell urged everyone to advocate for the repeal of PA 4, and pointed out that the state is considering sending emergency managers to Detroit and Inkster. “If those two cities fall,” Satchwell pointed out, “over half of the African-Americans in this state will have lost their vote and be under authoritarian rule – no mayor, no county commissioners, no school board … If you’re an American this has to bother you.” (emphasis added)

In an interview with Chris Savage of Eclectablog and Blogging for Michigan, Pastor David Bullock (one of the event organizers) said it was even worse than that.

“If Detroit gets an Emergency Manager,” he told me, “over 75% of the African American elected officials in Michigan will be essentially useless” as the Emergency Manager pushes them out of the job they were elected to do.

So. . . If you are looking for something to do. . . If you want to put your principles into action. . . if you want to have a real discussion with your kids about what, why, and when it is worth protesting. . . and (naturally) if your schedule permits. . . I would encourage you to show up at this protest. (And yes, DO bring your kids.)

NOTE: Snyder lives off of Geddes Road, and there's no parking on the road. You can park at Washtenaw Community College, and buses will take you to the protest. The march starts at 4 p.m. Get there a little bit early to get a shuttle.

For more information, you can visit the event's facebook page.

P.S. I know that a lot of people say, "Well what was Snyder supposed to do? The old emergency manager law was a mess!" Just remember that somebody can correctly identify a problem, and yet not find the right solution. In my opinion, that's what happened here.

Occupy the Suggestion Box!

2012-01-10T21:35:00.000-05:00

I get questions about the schools all the time, and often they are of the "why" or "when" variety.

In the last week, for instance, I was asked:

1. Why is my child forced to take an online class for 10th grade English because the school messed up her schedule and then there was no room for her in a regular class? (Note: this student did not want to take this class online.) [I don't know.]

2. When is kindergarten roundup? Have the times been posted yet? [Not to my knowledge. But Community and Skyline orientations have been posted.]

3. Why do the Skyline announcements come out in an email at 7 p.m., when many events are already over? [I don't know. But my guess is that nobody has thought of adjusting the time the automated email goes out to an earlier time of day.]

4. Why is it so hard to figure out how to access the school board packets? [I don't know. Somebody thought it was a good idea to embed it in the web site's google calendar, but how would you guess you need to click "details" to find it.]

And for all of these, if there was an easy communications link. . . a way to reach somebody. . . but who? how?

School board member Christine Stead pointed out to me that there is now a virtual "budget suggestions box" on the Ann Arbor schools home page. You're forgiven if you hadn't noticed it. I'm not sure how long it's been there, but I know that I hadn't noticed it despite looking at the home page several times.

It's tucked away on the left side, as can be seen in this screen shot.

And really, it's a good start.

DO share your budget ideas! (They say they will post suggestions and responses on the web site, but I don't see them yet.)

But let's not stop there.

What we need is a real suggestion box--virtual, and maybe the old-fashioned kind in the schools as well.
We need a place for questions, and suggestions that might improve things even if they don't save money.

So what I suggest is this:

OCCUPY that suggestion box.

USE that suggestion box.

INFILTRATE that suggestion box.

SHARE that suggestion box.

Use it for all kinds of questions and ideas--not just about the budget.
(But just to be perfectly clear--do use it for your budget ideas!)

And if you want a direct response, leave your name and email address, and ask for a response.

Here is a link to the suggestion form.

My first suggestion? To create a multi-topic suggestions box!

Save the Golden Frog! A View of the Ann Arbor Open Multicultural Fair

2012-01-08T21:30:00.001-05:00

Sure, there's lots of hard-hitting news to be written, but I thought I'd start off, post-winter break, with a look back at the last week before winter break, and a peek at my favorite school event of the year. My favorite school event of the year is Ann Arbor Open's Multicultural Fair.
What do I like about this event?
To begin with, it is the culmination of several weeks of project-based learning for each and every class in the school.
Second, it begins with a gigantic potluck that enhances the sense of community.
Third, it is a fundraiser for the library. Families are asked to bring a potluck dish and a $10 donation, but nobody is turned away. A lot of people come, and the event raises a couple thousand dollars for the Ann Arbor Open library every year.
And last--but not least--I really appreciate the timing of the event. Since the Multicultural Fair takes place the week before break, the entire focus of the school that last week is on the Multicultural Fair exhibits. That's right. The focus is not on Christmas. As a Jewish parent, I find this to be a huge relief--even when the fair itself takes place on one of the nights of Chanukah. (After all, there are eight nights of Chanukah.) I've been in other schools just before Christmas and the Christmas fever is a little bit overwhelming.
So this year I took some pictures (with a cell phone). They are not going to win any awards, but they will give you some of the flavor.

Some of the first and second graders were studying Malawi, and they built a village.

All of the seventh and eighth graders worked together on a spectacular exhibit around Africa.
During the event, the students took turns drumming. I did take pictures of them drumming, but since I didn't ask permission to use their photos, the only one I'm posting is where everybody is blurry:). On the far left is Papa Tito, who is an African drummer by training and who came in and worked with the students.

Here you can see the baobab tree that some students built.

I have to say that the Africa exhibit made me realize how terrible my African geography is. I do have a basic grasp of the larger countries, and I did know a lot about a few of the countries. But had I heard of Sao Tome and Principe? No, I had not. Did I know that the Second Congo War has been the deadliest war since World War II? It sounded familiar, but I couldn't tell you the reasons for the conflict. Yes, I did learn some things from the students' exhibits.

The third and fourth graders studying Panama decided to do something about the demise of the golden frogs of Panama. There were students sitting at a table collecting donations. I took a picture of the sign.

I made a donation and I got one of these really cute bookmarks in return. Do you notice the pink tongue? And I love how that is a "corner" bookmark.

I'm Proud. . .

2012-01-05T22:05:00.002-05:00

I'm proud of the brave teachers who are plaintiffs in the American Civil Liberties Union suit over the ban on domestic partner benefits. The American Civil Liberties Union and ACLU of Michigan filed a federal lawsuit today asking the court to strike down a new Michigan law that bans many public entities from providing health care insurance to the domestic partners of their employees.

Two of the plaintiffs are teachers, and they are both teachers in the Ann Arbor public schools. I'm so proud of Peter Ways (Ann Arbor Open teacher) and Theresa Bassett (Slauson Middle School teacher)--and their families. (The other plaintiffs work for the City of Kalamazoo and Ingham County.)

Ways is quoted as saying, in the ACLU press release,
“This is not about politics or ideology for us,” said Peter Ways, an Ann Arbor Public Schools teacher whose partner will lose his benefits. “This is about real families who are facing the real consequences of discriminatory laws. Just like our colleagues whose families will continue to receive health insurance, we want to care for our families.”
Kary Moss, the ACLU of Michigan executive director, said, “Although justified by the Governor as a cost-cutting measure, the numbers don’t hold up,” said Kary L. Moss, ACLU of Michigan executive director. “The reality is that the legislation was intended to disenfranchise LGBT families."

According to the ACLU web site,

Peter Ways and Joe Breakey of Ann Arbor have been in a committed relationship for more than 20 years and have a nine-year-old daughter. Peter works for Ann Arbor Public Schools. The district extends insurance coverage to his partner Joe who is self-employed as a licensed therapist. Being self-employed gives Joe the flexibility to be home for their daughter after school. Due to the added expense that comparable individual coverage will cost, Peter and Joe are considering a move back to Washington so that Peter could take a job that provides family benefits.

Theresa Bassett and Carol Kennedy of Ann Arbor have been in a committed relationship for 25 years and have six kids ranging in age from six to 20 years old. Theresa has worked for the Ann Arbor Public Schools for 28 years and currently teaches 6th grade and 8th grade math. Theresa’s employer extends health insurance coverage to Carol who is self-employed as a daycare provider. Because of Carol’s family history of breast cancer, individual comprehensive insurance coverage will be extremely expensive. In fact, Carol estimates that purchasing comprehensive coverage on her own will cost the family an additional $800 a month, putting considerable pressure on their finances, which are already strained by a mortgage and the cost of sending two children to college.

If you see these teachers, tell them you're proud of them too.
And if you have some change to spare, support the ACLU's work by donating now.

2011 High School Sports Summary

2012-01-01T20:47:00.004-05:00

There's a very nice summary of the important prep sports (high school sports) stories of 2011 by annarbor.com reporter Pete Cummingham. The story that I missed was this one:

Whitmore Lake cross country coach Larry Bostwick was ousted for soliciting teen sex online.

Read the rest of the stories here.

A Wish for 2012: To Be More Like Finland (in Education)

2012-01-01T08:00:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago, a friend sent me a link to an article from annarbor.com: Nathan Bomey's Why does Michigan have 77,000 unfilled job openings?

What interested her--(and me!) was this comment from Carrie Houtman, a senior analyst at Dow, that was right on the money:

Houtman said universities need to design training programs that meet industry needs and public schools need to prioritize “project-based learning.” At the elementary level, that means book reports, science projects and field trips, she said.
“The reality is these experiences get fewer and farther between as the student progresses, and this shouldn’t be the case,” she said.

I have many years of experience with students at Ann Arbor Open, which has always focused a lot of time on project-based learning, and my observation--comparing my oldest child's experience and my youngest child's experience--is that we've been getting less and less of it lately. More and more testing, less and less hands-on learning. And that's everywhere, not just at Ann Arbor Open. It's not the teachers' fault. It's the fault of testing, which a) takes time from the day--lots and lots of time and b) prioritizes certain types of learning (not the project-based type) over others.

Rick Snyder, your own business experts say that's the wrong way to go about things.

The Atlantic has an article, What Americans Keep Ignoring About Finland's School Success (by Anu Partunen), which says:

Finland's schools owe their newfound fame primarily to one study: the PISA survey, conducted every three years by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The survey compares 15-year-olds in different countries in reading, math, and science. Finland has ranked at or near the top in all three competencies on every survey since 2000, neck and neck with superachievers such as South Korea and Singapore.

And then...

Compared with the stereotype of the East Asian model -- long hours of exhaustive cramming and rote memorization -- Finland's success is especially intriguing because Finnish schools assign less homework and engage children in more creative play.

And then...

So there was considerable interest in a recent visit to the U.S. by one of the leading Finnish authorities on education reform, Pasi Sahlberg, director of the Finnish Ministry of Education's Center for International Mobility and author of the new book Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn from Educational Change in Finland? . . .

Yet one of the most significant things Sahlberg said passed practically unnoticed. "Oh," he mentioned at one point, "and there are no private schools in Finland."
This notion may seem difficult for an American to digest, but it's true. Only a small number of independent schools exist in Finland, and even they are all publicly financed. None is allowed to charge tuition fees. There are no private universities, either. This means that practically every person in Finland attends public school, whether for pre-K or a Ph.D.

And last but definitely not least...

For starters, Finland has no standardized tests. The only exception is what's called the National Matriculation Exam, which everyone takes at the end of a voluntary upper-secondary school, roughly the equivalent of American high school.
Instead, the public school system's teachers are trained to assess children in classrooms using independent tests they create themselves. All children receive a report card at the end of each semester, but these reports are based on individualized grading by each teacher. Periodically, the Ministry of Education tracks national progress by testing a few sample groups across a range of different schools. As for accountability of teachers and administrators, Sahlberg shrugs. "There's no word for accountability in Finnish," he later told an audience at the Teachers College of Columbia University. "Accountability is something that is left when responsibility has been subtracted."

For Sahlberg what matters is that in Finland all teachers and administrators are given prestige, decent pay, and a lot of responsibility. A master's degree is required to enter the profession, and teacher training programs are among the most selective professional schools in the country. If a teacher is bad, it is the principal's responsibility to notice and deal with it.. . . As Sahlberg continued, his core message emerged, whether or not anyone in his American audience heard it.
Decades ago, when the Finnish school system was badly in need of reform, the goal of the program that Finland instituted, resulting in so much success today, was never excellence. It was equity.

Since the 1980s, the main driver of Finnish education policy has been the idea that every child should have exactly the same opportunity to learn, regardless of family background, income, or geographic location. Education has been seen first and foremost not as a way to produce star performers, but as an instrument to even out social inequality.
In the Finnish view, as Sahlberg describes it, this means that schools should be healthy, safe environments for children. This starts with the basics. Finland offers all pupils free school meals, easy access to health care, psychological counseling, and individualized student guidance.

Read the rest of this article here.

As for us, I wish for 2012:
Less testing, more project-based learning
More emphasis on equity, and less corporate, for-profit, fake educational reform
More support of teachers, more support of students
More parents speaking out.

I realize that I'm not likely to get my wishes, but hey--a woman can dream, right?

Welcome to the world, 2012!

Books I Liked in 2011

2011-12-31T13:20:00.002-05:00

I knew it! You were just dying to know what books I really enjoyed this past year.

My favorite piece of adult fiction that I read was City of Thieves by David Benioff. It's a story about a Jewish boy during the Siege of Leningrad during World War II, and given that they are all starving, you wouldn't think it would be funny, but it is. (Funny in the way that Catch-22 is funny--a lot of absurdity!) In high school went through a period where I read a lot of Holocaust literature, but that is not the same as World War II literature, and I really knew nothing about the Siege of Leningrad.

My favorite piece of non-fiction that I read this year--alright, to tell the truth, I'm still only half-way through it--was (is?) The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. Through the lens of one woman's cells, and one woman's family, we learn about: her family history, as well as ethics and racism in medical research. Maybe that doesn't sound too scintillating, but it is really engrossing.

Update 1/1/12: I forgot to put in my favorite graphic book of the year. That book would be Feynman, by Jim Otavianni (author) and Leyland Myrick (illustrator), about Nobel prize-winner (quantum physicist) Richard Feynman. And Otavianni is an Ann Arbor resident!

As for children's books:

The best children's book that I read this year--and I just read it last week--is an older book, a Newbery Award winner from 1998. The book is Karen Hesse's Out of the Dust, about the Dust Bowl. It's written in free verse, and the sparing, short lines make the book a very quick read. (It is quick, but also there are some parts that are [mentally] difficult reading.) This children's literature site suggests that you could pair Out of the Dust with reading the book (and/or watching the movie) Grapes of Wrath.

I'll also mention four other children's and/or young adult authors:

Tamora Pierce has a newer book out, Mastiff, that I enjoyed. It's part of a young adult fantasy trilogy about Beka Cooper, a policewoman (Dog) in Tortall. I have pretty much enjoyed all of Tamora Pierce's books--although I will say that my daughter found them boring. But then, she doesn't like fantasy at all.

E. Nesbit is an author I keep coming back to. This summer I listened to The Phoenix and the Carpet (well, part of it--can you tell I sometimes stop in the middle and pick up the book again later?). However, my favorite book by E. Nesbit is The Railway Children. Here is a 1964 essay by Gore Vidal about E. Nesbit, in case you are interested.

Rick Riordan is in the middle of a series about Egyptian magicians, and my son has insisted that I read this series, as well as the Percy Jackson series (about the gods on Mt. Olympus). I have to admit that I give these series kind of middling grades (they are okay, but not fabulous). My son, however, disagrees and so I am sharing this with you because you might have an elementary- or middle-school child who would like to read these as well. Looking at Rick Riordan's biography (see the link above), I was surprised (but maybe I shouldn't have been) to see that, "For fifteen years, Rick taught English and history at public and private middle schools in the San Francisco Bay Area and in Texas. In 2002, Saint Mary’s Hall honored him with the school’s first Master Teacher Award." He also writes adult mysteries. Maybe I should try those.

John Feinstein must be one of the most prolific writers ever. If you've heard him on NPR, you might not know that he has a very interesting mystery series that is targeted at the young-adult, sports-loving audience. He's got two teen reporters--a girl and a boy--covering big sports events like the Final Four (Last Shot) and the World Series (Change-Up), and solving mysteries along the way. Both my son and I agree the whole series is quite good.

I don't get to spend much time with illustrated story books anymore--and I miss them--which is perhaps why I have found myself thinking about these two "vintage" books recently:

Lore Segal's Tell Me A Mitzi
Brinton Turkle's Rachel and Obadiah (and others in the Obadiah series like Thy Friend Obadiah and Adventures of Obadiah)

Testing and the Emperor's New Clothes

2011-12-19T14:26:00.000-05:00

This history of testing in New York State is both funny and terrifying. . . and it could just as well be Michigan.

10 Years of Assessing Students With Scientific Exactitude by Michael Winerip (New York Times article)

PS The comments are good too.

$1.4 Million Dollars: School Medicaid Revenue

2011-12-18T01:28:00.002-05:00

One of the items that I missed in the action-packed Ann Arbor school board meeting last week is Pat Green's announcement that she had found $1.4 million dollars for the district. That savings is approximately 10% of the projected cuts needed--nothing to sneeze at--and comes from Medicaid reimbursals that we should have been getting.

I have to admit that when I heard about this, I shouted to my friend, "I had that idea first!" And seriously, I did.

On January 24, 2010 I wrote a piece called Revenue Side, where I stated,

4. Medicaid Reimbursement: Some of the district's special education expenses are Medicaid billable. Currently, that billing brings in about $1 million each year, and is largely handled by social workers. I believe that this is an area where the school district needs to be absolutely sure it is maximizing its billing, and if the billing is spread out, it is likely that it has not been maximized. I don't have local statistics, but a study in New York State of 8 districts found that they were only being reimbursed for about 1/3 of the Medicaid monies that they should be reimbursed for. In the study, some of the reasons that the districts did not get reimbursed included: a) not checking students' Medicaid status regularly (so they would be kicked off Medicaid, and not get back on even though they were still eligible, and the districts would not know); b) waiting too long to send in the claims; and c) not appealing claims that were denied, even if they believed that denial was in error. In those districts, the estimate was that they could triple their reimbursement level! The Medicaid claims submission process should be reviewed from the point of service onward, even if the increase would add $100,000 and not $2 million to the AAPS budget. (And this is true for every district in the county.)

I also mentioned it again a week later, on January 31, 2010, in a post called The Rest of the Story: AAPS Budget Part II (remember, we were doing budget cuts that year as well), where I wrote:

I think I addressed the largest chunk of the budget with my recent post on personnel costs and my post on revenue enhancements, including a look at whether we can increase Medicaid reimbursement.

At the first of the fall budget forums this year, I mentioned Medicaid reimbursement again to Robert Allen, who told me the WISD handled it (which they do, but apparently they weren't handling it well)--and I'm pretty sure that I wrote something like "maximize Medicaid reimbursement" as a suggestion at both last year's and this year's budget forums.

In fact, the only reason that Medicaid reimbursals were on my radar screen at all is really a fluke. Several years ago, my son was on a baseball team where a few of the players' moms were either speech therapists, occupational therapists, or physical therapists at various school districts. Given that it was May and June, they spent a lot of time discussing how time-consuming the Medicaid billing was for them. Before that, who knew that schools even billed for Medicaid?! Not me.

I'm not really a cynic. Well, sometimes I think my family is full of cynics, but my husband nicely points out that we are optimistic cynics. So by writing this up, I in no way mean to imply that Pat Green (or other school staff in finance or special education) didn't come up with the idea of looking into this on her (or their) own. (In other words, I'm not looking for credit.) It's very plausible to me that Pat Green has had experience with Medicaid revenues in other districts, and in fact may have read the same research study about Medicaid reimbursals that I had read. It's also likely that the Medicaid problem was much more bureaucratic and difficult to untangle than just increasing billing. So that's the optimistic part.

But here is the cynical part.

I did bring up the idea of looking at Medicaid reimbursement nearly two years ago. And perhaps I wasn't the only one to bring it up. For two years, the district has been collecting ideas for budget savings from parents, teachers, and taxpayers. I wonder if they ever looked closely at the items people wrote down? Did they just ignore them? At the fall budget forum I went to, someone suggested scrutinizing the comments on budget saving in annarbor.com, and yes, I am fully aware of how squirrelly those comments are! But there are likely a couple of diamonds in the rough on those budget articles, and I know that I myself have lots of ideas in this blog. No, they are not all good ideas. Some of them are impractical or lousy. But some of them are good!

I just wonder--did anybody really look at all of those ideas that have been collected at the budget forums? In other forums? [Here, by the way, is an obvious plug for the school district leadership to read this blog regularly. It's super easy to become a regular subscriber by clicking on the "Subscribe" RSS feed on the right.] My first recommendation to the school district for budget cuts this year is to go back and read the data and ideas they have already collected.

And by the way, when it comes to Medicaid reimbursement, it could be that other school districts in the county should follow Ann Arbor's lead and be able to increase their Medicaid reimbursement revenues--Saline, Ypsilanti, Dexter, Whitmore Lake, etc. . . are you listening?

Is It Time for AAPS to Raise Top Administrative Salaries?

2011-12-14T12:39:00.000-05:00

Tonight, the Ann Arbor school board is being asked to raise the salaries of three of the district's top administrators.

The salaries that are up for a vote relate to the following four administrators, two of whom are new to the district (so the ratification is for contracts that Patricia Greene, Superintendent, and Deb Mexicotte, School Board President, have already signed):

Deputy Superintendent of Instructional Services Alesia Flye, hired in at a salary of $140,000. The former Deputy Superintendent of Instructional Services, Lee Ann Dickinson-Kelly, had a salary in 2010-2011 of $132,000.
Assistant Superintendent for Elementary Education Dawn Linden, hired in at a salary of $117,900.
The former Assistant Superintendent for Elementary Education was also Lee Ann Dickinson-Kelly (prior to taking on the interim appointment of Deputy Superintendent of Instructional Services), and in that capacity her salary was $122,399 in 2010-2011. It should be noted that Lee Ann Dickinson-Kelly also had 38 years in the Ann Arbor district. (This is not an increase in salary.)

The other two are current staff people:
Deputy Superintendent of Operations, Robert Allen
and
Deputy Superintendent of Human Resources and Legal Services, David Comsa

In 2010-2011, Robert Allen's salary was $130,556 (before he was interim superintendent, where he earned the same salary as our former superintendent, Todd Roberts).

In 2010-2011, David Comsa's salary was $124,524.

The proposed salary modifications for Robert Allen and David Comsa bring their salaries to the equivalent of the new deputy superintendent Alesia Flye, on the grounds that they should all be equal.

The percentage increases, relative to 2010-2011 salaries, for the three deputy superintendent salaries are 7.2% (Allen); 12.4% (Comsa); and 6% (Dickinson-Kelly/Flye). Overall, this is an additional expense to the district of nearly $33,000. (If you include the fact that Dawn Linden is getting less pay than Dickinson-Kelly was, the cost is just over $28,400.)

I know what the superintendent is thinking...it's a big budget...it's not a lot of money.

Wrong! That is the wrong way to think about it! It's hugely symbolic.
The school district has to cut $14 million dollars,
and says to parents, "You need to pay more for x and y."
They say to teachers, "You are going to have to give concessions of x and y."
They say regarding using local and/or unionized companies, "We are going to go with low-ball bids." (Tonight there is also a discussion/resolution about contracting with a non-unionized, west side of the state company called DM Burr for heating and cooling.)

And then they say, "Oh, but let's raise our salaries."

THERE IS SOMETHING HUGELY WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE!

Please join me in asking the Board of Education to oppose this resolution. Email: boe@aaps.k12.mi.us or go to tonight's meeting, December 14, 2011, 7 p.m. at the Ann Arbor District Library.

Read the details about the salaries and the DM Burr contract in the board packet, here:
https://docs.google.com/a/aaps.k12.mi.us/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B_EsmHYDB0_hNGRmODlmMzAtMWQxZS00MThhLWExYTMtNTdkZTVhZDViNGNm&hl=en&pli=1

Read the last board meeting's discussions about salaries, and about the DM Burr contract, in this Ann Arbor Chronicle article.

Update Thursday 12/15/2011: Early this morning, at about 1:30 a.m., the salary resolution was brought back onto the agenda (at 10 p.m. my friend was told it would be voted on at the next board meeting, and had been taken off the agenda for this meeting) and it was approved 4-3, with trustees Baskett, Lightfoot, and Thomas voting against the raises. That is very disappointing to me. And what is even more disappointing is that I wonder now, if I had realized a little bit earlier that it would be on the agenda tonight, could we have changed the outcome of that vote? It only would have taken one more school board member to vote against the resolution. I'll say this: It will get ever more difficult for the administration to convince teachers to take cuts, and to get parents to vote for the tech millage, when they are raising their own salaries.

Time and Time Again

2011-12-13T12:00:00.000-05:00

Lately my son has been getting a lot of bar and bat mitzvah invitations. A bar mitzvah or bat mitzvah (bar mitzvah for a boy, bat mitzvah for a girl) is a Jewish ritual rite of passage marking the transition from being a Jewish kid to a Jewish adult (ritually speaking). (My son has not had his bar mitzvah yet.)

As you might or might not know, generally when kids have a bar or bat mitzvah they get presents. And then they have to write thank you notes. When I had my bat mitzvah, the thank you notes seemed endless.

Which led me to the following recent conversation.

Me: "Joe got his thank you notes out really quickly! His bar mitzvah was just last week!"
Son: "Well, it takes less time if you do it quickly."
Me: "It doesn't take less time. Whether you do it quickly or slowly, it takes the same amount of time."
Son: "No, if you get them done in a week instead of two weeks, it takes less time."
Me: "But if every thank you note takes 5 minutes, and you have to write 20 notes, it takes 100 minutes altogether, whether you write 2 a day for 10 days, or do all 20 in 1 day!"

[We'll leave aside the fact that you might achieve efficiencies if you do a lot of them at once. Because you also might get writer's cramp.]

The math on this--which my son did understand--goes like this:
5 minutes/note x 20 notes = 100 minutes
2 notes/day x 10 days = 20 notes/day x 1 day
And yet, my son insisted: "No, it takes less time, because it's a shorter amount of time."
And here, my son is referring to the difference between 10 days, and 1 day. In other words, he was thinking of time as a spatial entity, and I was thinking of time as a quantity. [Mathematicians might have different words for that, by the way.]

I know, you're thinking, "That's a cute story, Ruth, but what does that have to do with schools?"

When I was in elementary, middle, and high school, we had to go to school a minimum of 180 days/year. So school was scheduled for 183 days/year, in order to account for snow days and other unforeseen events.

But now, school is scheduled with a minimum number of minutes as a requirement. A few years ago, when the legislature increased the number of minutes that students had to go to school, most districts just distributed those minutes over the school days, rather than add days to the school year. Typically, just a few minutes a day really added up. All of which led to the following exchange that I thought was very funny with an elementary school teacher.

That year, we were chronically late to school with our oldest son, and the teacher commented on it.
Me: "I guess I had the time school starts wrong. What time is the bell?"
Teacher: "Well, the first bell is at 8:08."
Me: "OK, what time is the second bell?"
Teacher: "It used to be at 8:14, but now we don't have a second bell any more."

Does it make a difference, minutes or days? Is time a quantity or a spatial entity? You be the judge.

Update 12/13/11: Honestly, I did not know when I wrote this that annarbor.com had just published an article on the idea of using a balanced calendar at Scarlett and Mitchell. Nothing has been decided yet, and you can read the article here. As I've written about before, I myself am not interested in a balanced calendar for my kids. I know that other people are. I think the balanced calendar would be fine if people can opt in or out of it. So if Scarlett/Mitchell becomes a K-8 magnet with a balanced calendar, I'm sure some people will want it. Others won't, and they should be able to go elsewhere.

Proud Music

2011-12-12T22:15:00.000-05:00

I spent much of this evening at the Ann Arbor Open winter band and orchestra concert. For middle schoolers, they sounded pretty good! The improvement between the intermediate and advanced groups is very noticeable. It's so nice to really see the difference, and understand that they are really learning!

As a parent, it is always a "kvell moment" when your child is performing, and there are not enough opportunities for performance in many types of school work. (Kvell--a Yiddish word that roughly translates to "swell up with pride.")

While I was sitting there in the audience, I was thinking about a couple of conversations I had with my sister and sister-in-law over the past few months. They both have middle-school-age kids, and they all go to "very good public schools" (in other words, comparable to Ann Arbor). But do their kids play instruments? Not anymore. "She tried it for a week..." "After two weeks she decided she didn't like it..." "She wanted to play the flute but she could barely get a sound out of it."

Two things stand out here. First, in the Ann Arbor schools, nobody tries instrumental music for a week. Everybody has to try it for at least a year! Second, students spend a few weeks at the beginning of fifth grade trying out different instruments, and if it's hard for a student to get a sound out of a flute, the teacher will probably not assign flute to that student.

So those conversations--and tonight's concert--really made me appreciate the Ann Arbor Public Schools music scene...especially in the elementary and middle schools, before it gets super competitive. The start that AAPS gives kids in music is awesome!

Or perhaps I should say that the AAPS music program...

Is jazzy.

It's snazzy.

It rocks and

it rolls.

It's classy and

it's brassy!

It boogies and

it bounces!

Thanks, music teachers!

P.S. I would put in a plug here for Horns for the Holidays, but I'm not sure it still exists. Does anybody know? If you have an instrument in good condition, many of our local school districts would probably welcome the donation.