Last week, the Davis School District learned that they would need to cut an additional one million dollars from their budget as the Davis Teachers Association President Ingrid Salim announced that DTA would not be accepting one million dollars in budget concessions in order to avoid further job losses.
In a letter to parents, Superintendent James Hammond announced that this was not the end of the bad news as the Governor’s Budget proposal released on January 8 would result in additional cuts.
“That is not the end of the bad news. On January 8, Governor Schwarzenegger released his proposed budget plan for 2010-11. If these proposals are adopted, preliminary estimates indicate that DJUSD revenue will be cut another $2 million, widening our budget gap to $5.7 million in 2010-11. Our budget plan must incorporate these proposals, so I will move to identify additional cuts in this amount as well.
It’s important to remember that the Governor’s budget plan contained little good news for any sector. While we can hope that schools will see some relief as these proposals move through the legislative process, we understand that would be at the cost of other important programs and services.”
Back in October, the Davis School District announced that there would need to be 3.5 million dollars in additional cuts as a means of absorbing budget reductions from the state. The idea at that time was that there would be 2.5 million dollars in budget reductions which would anticipate a reduction of 43 employees in the coming year.
Superintendent James Hammond had hoped that employees would accept the additional million dollars in employee concessions as a means of avoiding further layoffs. But that would require agreement from the DTA.
Said DTA President Ingrid Salim:
“We are split almost right down the middle on the idea of employee concessions. Because of that, we probably would not have enough votes to ratify a contract change, and truly do not want to introduce the kind of fragmentation that would result if a slight majority voted in a change of such magnitude and wide effect. However, I hope to revisit the issue in a few months, after some articulated uncertainties have been visited.”
As a result, Superintendent Hammond told the school board that the district would need to layoff of an additional 16 employees meaning at least 20 people would be noticed.
Dr. Hammond laid out the problem in his letter:
“As you may know, in October, in response to decreased funding from the state, I recommended that the Board of Education reduce 2010-11 expenditures by $3.5 million. Due to additional cuts imposed by the State, this deficit grew to $3.7 million by the time we submitted our 1st Interim budget in mid-December. In addition to identifying $2.5 million in program cuts and spending of reserves, I made the difficult recommendation to ask our employees to consider granting $1 million in salary concessions (a 2.5% salary reduction) in exchange for furlough days.
Following a poll of their membership, the Davis Teachers Association recently indicated that they do not wish to negotiate concessions at this time. With more information about our district’s growing deficit coming forward in the weeks ahead, my hope is that the Davis Teachers Association will give this request consideration at a later time (before layoffs notices are administered.)
Though we will continue discussion in hopes of reaching agreement, I am obligated at this time to identify $1 million more in cuts for the Board’s consideration. Unfortunately, this will mean additional layoffs and fewer educational services for students.”
The result of these two pieces of bad news coming around the same time is that the district will have to find a way to cut $3 million in additional money from the budget. We might estimate that if $1 million meant 16 employees laid off and 20 noticed, that $3 million means an additional 48 employees laid off and 60 noticed.
The district having had to make budget cuts in 2008, twice in 2009, and now in 2010 is not in a position to absorb more budget hits without laying off core employees.
It is unfortunate because at least some of this could have been avoided had the teachers been willing to step up and take a short-term hit to save the jobs of some of their colleagues.
In general I believe that teachers are paid far too little for the importance of the job that they perform. However, these are not usual circumstances. California in general now faces a crisis in education.
The news is actually worse than it was on January 8, 2010 when the Governor announced his plan.
California’s Legislative Analyst Mac Taylor has schedule the governor’s plan and ability to secure the money needed from the federal government to cover the budget gap.
“The Governor proposes $19.9 billion of budget solutions in 2009-10 and 2010-11 to address the budget shortfall and create a $1 billion reserve. While it is reasonable to assume the state will secure some new federal funding and flexibility, the chances that the state will receive all of what the Governor seeks from Washington are almost non-existent. The Legislature should assume that federal relief will be billions of dollars less than the Governor wants—necessitating that it make more very difficult decisions affecting both state revenues and spending.”
If that’s the case, education figures to take an additional hit above and beyond what has already been projected.
There is no end in sight to this. Californians at some point are going to have to decide what is most important to them and insist that those goals are funded some way and some how.
In the meantime, the children in districts far worse off than the students in Davis will suffer and we can see how much students in Davis has already paid for this current crisis.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
Based on 2007 data (probably the latest available for all states), California is 46th in per student spending.
Source: [url]http://educatedguess.org/blog/2010/01/15/now-46th-in-nation-in-per-student-funding/[/url]
Note that recent ranking is before all the cuts were put into effect in California.
The school districts all follow California’s cockamamie budget process, which includes looking at a budget comprised of WAGs until the ‘May revise’ after the State gets a fairly accurate number for it’s accounts receivable. Local district’s budgets are likewise filled with WAGs, so I’d wait until the ‘revise’ to scream the sky is falling. I suspect that’s why DTA’s members are waiting for ‘more information’.
Neutral: Normally I would agree with that approach, the problem is here, the sky has already fallen.
Neutral: “WAGs” I’m not familiar with that acronym.
The trend for the past couple of years is downward revision, and in the long term, the proposed cuts each year haven’t appeared to be enough.
[i]It is unfortunate because at least some of this could have been avoided had the teachers been willing to step up and take a short-term hit to save the jobs of some of their colleagues.[/i]
Sure, except that they have every right to want to get paid. And this phrase “short-term hit” is not trustworthy. At least they aren’t comparing the establishment to AIG and Enron.
David: Extremely difficult decisions to be made, but with the amount of money the district has, not a falling sky. Bankruptcy, now *that’s* a falling sky.
wdf1: [url]WAGs[/url]
[quote]Sure, except that they have every right to want to get paid. [/quote] They have every right. But does that make their position right?
Greg, it seems like your position on the stance of teachers who are unwilling to sacrifice a small portion of their own income to save the jobs of their junior colleagues conflicts with your scolding of homeowners in Davis who vote no on new housing. In each case, the established groups are (in your view, I presume) acting selfishly and not for the greater good. Yet you seem to be lauding the teachers for doing so, while objurgating homeowners for doing the same.
Rich, it’s a fair question, but I don’t think that I’m truly inconsistent. First, I’m not exactly “lauding” the teachers, I’m just not ready to blame them. But yeah, I do blame the anti-growth faction in Davis, so it deserves more explanation than that.
Up to a point, it’s reasonable for people to vote in their self-interest. I draw the line based on two criteria: (1) Do they demand cushy, benighted privileges? (2) Is their argument hypocritical? If the answer is yes and yes, then I feel like blaming them.
I am a Davis homeowner, and I do feel that it has been a cushy privilege to live in Davis for better than free. I actually have somewhat more respect for the motives of someone like Greg Sokolov, since he at least had to pay the current price for his house. On top of that, the way that people couch opposition to growth in progressive jargon really bugs me. It isn’t any more progressive than fighting against the wind farm off of Cape Cod.
I’m also a UC faculty member, and I feel totally the opposite about my financial stake in that. I’m not going to plead poverty or say that I’m a victim of a crime. But UC faculty compensation truly is a sinking ship, compared to public universities in other states.
I don’t see that DJUSD teachers have voted for anything other than ordinary compensation. They also didn’t disenfranchise the teachers who would be laid off; it was a vote that represented both sides. Besides, the expectation that they should take pay cuts doesn’t come from sympathy for unemployed teachers. The real concern among Davis voters is getting more labor for the same cost. And (as far as I know) the teachers did not defend their position with defiant leftist cant, like comparing the establishment to Enron.
If it were the firefighters, it would be different. I suspect that Davis firefighters shouldn’t be singled out, but it does seem that California firefighters in general have a pretty cushy deal.
Besides, the expectation that they should take pay cuts doesn’t come from sympathy for unemployed teachers.
Or maybe it does if you personally know someone affected.
[i]Or maybe it does if you personally know someone affected.[/i]
Fair enough.
There is no end in sight to this.
So, let’s start talking about real solutions.
1.Raise property taxes – Can’t imagine the political will to do this will ever develop. There is too much real downside with commercial and residential real estate and new business development. It also releases a budget pressure valve that insures continued overspending by the state.
2.Raise other state and local taxes – Again, California is already at the very top of the list for high state taxation. How much further can we go taxing CA businesses and residents? (see below).
3.Reduce education services – Can it get much worse? Maybe we will find out. This approach seems to be the favorite of the unions hoping it will develop the political will for raising taxes. Theirs’ might be a miscalculation though as more middle class parents start to home school and pursue alternate education in droves, or leave the state… leaving CA poor to fall even further behind.
4.Focus on developing the CA economy while cutting all less important state social programs – This means lowering business taxes and eliminating other business-hostile regulations at a time where the popular hobby of the dominant left in the state is to demonize business. Again – a political will challenge. However, I think necessary (see below again).
5.Innovate education using technology to lower the per student cost – Note that kids don’t need teachers to teach them complicated cell phones, computers and video games. The current labor-intensive public education model may have reached the end of its road. Private companies have been improving efficiency and productivity with technology for years. Maybe it is time for the same in public education. The problem is that this takes an initial investment. Can innovation for efficiency coexist with union labor?
I think long-term we need to completely transform the delivery and management mechanisms for public school education. We need far fewer administrators and fewer traditional teachers and more counselors and facilitators. Common instruction can be delivered statewide to a much larger audience per teacher with webinar and video conferencing technology. Kids can carry book content and lessons on inexpensive net-books. There are endless best-practice for efficient teaching delivery and methods in the corporate world. We know what works and it can be used in public education.
To fund this transformation, we need to reduce state spending on other non-essential programs while significantly boosting private tax contributions through increased economic activity. This will require we reverse the business-hostile climate and transform it into the most business-friendly state.
From a 2009 study: “COST OF STATE REGULATIONS ON CALIFORNIA SMALL BUSINESSES” by Sanjay B. Varshney, Ph.D., CFA, Professor of Finance and Dean – College of Business Administration and Dennis H. Tootelian, Ph.D. Professor of Marketing – College of Business Administration
California State University, Sacramento
The authors report:
California total cost of business regulation—direct, indirect, and induced—is $492.994 billion, which is almost five times the State’s general fund budget, and almost a third of the State’s gross product. This cost of regulation results in an employment loss of 3.8 million jobs which is a tenth of the State’s population. In terms of labor income, the total loss to the state from the regulatory cost is $210.471 billion. Finally the indirect business taxes that would have been generated due to the output lost is $16.024 billion. These indirect business taxes lost could have helped fund many of the state’s departmental budgets.
For people that argue that our state business regulatory burden is reasonable and results in comparable overall benefits to the state residents, I challenge them to find any other example proving it. The reasons for California’s budget woes can be directly attributed to a lack of business development commensurate with our population growth and social funding needs. We had two unsustainable (read: false) economic boom cycles that masked this fact (tech stocks and real estate). We don’t need higher taxation of existing business; we need more business.
[quote]I don’t see that DJUSD teachers have voted for anything other than ordinary compensation.[/quote]I agree with you here. Insofar as K-12 teacher salaries are compared with City employees, they are not requesting too much. But I suspect — though I might be wrong — that, adjusted for the regional CPI, Davis teachers are now making substantially more than their counterparts were 25 years ago*. [quote]They also didn’t disenfranchise the teachers who would be laid off; it was a vote that represented both sides.[/quote]True, but … this really is similar to the inequities you have pointed out with a Measure J vote. The established groups (homeowners and senior teachers) have a perpetual majority and can stop any changes which don’t serve their interests; while the minorities (newer teachers or teachers not yet hired and Davis renters who would like to buy a house here or future residents) have no way to stop them at the polls. [quote] Besides, the expectation that they should take pay cuts doesn’t come from sympathy for unemployed teachers. [/quote]Speaking for myself, it sure does. I feel the same way about City staff (and private industry for that matter). I don’t see why a handful of individuals ought to take a 100% pay cut and others keep 100% of their jobs, if that can be avoided. [quote]The real concern among Davis voters is getting more labor for the same cost. [/quote] You mean the same labor for less cost. Tax rates (statewide) have not gone down, but tax revenues have. In Davis, though, tax rates have gone up substantially in the last 2 years for libraries and schools. We have also passed a large number of new City taxes (public safety; sales tax; parks tax; open space tax) in the last 10 years; and city utility rates have gone up substantially**. Added together, Davis is not undertaxed and I don’t think it is reasonable to ask residents (most of whom are not making more money) to approve another hike in their taxes, now.
——————–
* If that is right, it doesn’t mean the big increase in pay is undeserved. Maybe 25 years ago they were seriously underpaid. However, it’s worth noting that California teachers (K-12) are the second highest paid in all 50 states ([url]http://www.employmentspot.com/employment-articles/teacher-salaries-by-state/[/url]).
Note 1: I think that website is out of date. I read last year that the average salary in K-12 in California was $66,000. Compare that with $106,000 for some secretaries working for the City of Davis; and the PV of other compensation for those secretaries is worth another $50,000 a year!
Note 2: I found a different website ([url]http://teacherportal.com/teacher-salaries-by-state[/url]) (also with dated figures) which categorizes teacher pay adjusted for the cost of living. That puts California at No. 44 among the 50 states. Of course, California has vastly different costs of living ([url]http://www.dqnews.com/Charts/Monthly-Charts/CA-City-Charts/ZIPCAR.aspx[/url]), depending on where one lives.
**I don’t know, in inflation adjusted dollars, how much more (if any) our utility rates have increased.
Jeff Boone: “I think long-term we need to completely transform the delivery and management mechanisms for public school education. We need far fewer administrators and fewer traditional teachers and more counselors and facilitators. Common instruction can be delivered statewide to a much larger audience per teacher with webinar and video conferencing technology.”
Have you ever taken courses via television? I have, and it is awful, especially for students who are having any kind of trouble. It is much akin to the frustration people feel at trying to call for help at a gov’t agency or private company, and only getting a phone menu of pre-taped messages and information.
Live teachers/college profs are most definitely needed in public schools and colleges – there is no good substitute for them. One of the reasons I am convinced of this is having taught in a junior college math lab. Invariably students would miss some basic concept, then get stuck and could not move on to the next step. Then there would be a tremendously long line asking for assistance at the math lab office.
It would have been far more efficient had I just had a once a week math class, where I could have taught those students, and if they had questions they could have asked me during class. Math labs are a good tutoring device for those having problems, but not the way to initially learn a subject. Technology has its place, but it is not a substitute for good teaching live, in person.
That said, I’m with you Jeff on your take on creating a more business friendly climate in CA. The more business we can invite to CA, the more business entities we will have to pay taxes, to spend on all those social programs folks hold near and dear to their hearts…NO BUSINESS, NO BUSINESS TAX REVENUE.
Agenda for next school board meeting this Thursday is up. It’s all relevant to this article. See
[url]http://davis.csbaagendaonline.net/cgi-bin/WebObjects/davis-eAgenda.woa/wa/showMeeting[/url]
Have you ever taken courses via television? I have, and it is awful, especially for students who are having any kind of trouble.
Yes. I have taken a lot of complex technical training over the Internet. The social networking facility within the delivery systems allows me to post questions and answers with my classmates and helpers. It doesn’t have to be the teacher answering the question in this case… and many times I learn more getting an explanation from someone with a slightly different perspective. I have also taken college-level courses over the Internet with the same positive result. The video stuff you had experience with was awful. However, video conferencing technology has improved quite a bit over the last few years and will continue to do so. Don’t think small old television in the corner, think HD on a large screen… maybe even 3D. Also, think of a course that weaves in movie-quality graphics and content with the lecture. Ever watch the Discovery channel or the History channel? The kids are frankly bored with the old teacher-in-front-of-the-class model. You need to consider that these kids are already used to getting information delivered through a small screen. Education outcomes are not increasing at a time we need an education revolution. Think “edutainment”. Your concern about the long lines of students needing help would be mitigated with enough counselors and assistants. The assistants could be older students working part time to fund their college education.
One of the reasons I want to see vouchers is that it will spur this type of thinking outside of the box. Somebody will develop a new model of efficiency and high quality outcomes that becomes the rage. The reason we are stuck in our old inefficient and expensive ways is because teachers unions have a vested interest in keeping education a labor-intensive endeavor.
[i]Ever watch the Discovery channel or the History channel?[/i]
I have. It is indeed spoon-fed edutainment. It makes me feel like shooting myself. The world would go to hell in a handbasket if there weren’t any better form of education than the Discovery Channel.
[i]You need to consider that these kids are already used to getting information delivered through a small screen.[/i]
Okay, if you had said Wikipedia, then I would agree with you up to a point. Wikipedia is a fantastic resource which is available on a small screen.
[i]One of the reasons I want to see vouchers is that it will spur this type of thinking outside of the box[/i]
Two of the reasons that I don’t want to see vouchers are: (1) They are a scam designed to bankrupt public schools and overthrow free education. (2) To the extent that people even have faith in them, they spur thinking outside of the brain.
[i]he reason we are stuck in our old inefficient and expensive ways is because teachers unions have a vested interest in keeping education a labor-intensive endeavor.[/i]
Actually, the reason that we are stuck in our inefficient ways is that, if you could replace teachers by robots, then you could replace the students by robots too.
[i]But I suspect — though I might be wrong — that, adjusted for the regional CPI, Davis teachers are now making substantially more than their counterparts were 25 years ago.[/i]
This suspicion is irrelevant. You’re expecting the cost of a [b]worker[/b] to rise no faster than the cost of a [b]widget[/b]. This expectation doesn’t make sense, because it takes a lot less work to make widgets today than it did in 1985. (But adult supervision of children takes just as much work as it ever did.)
[i]The established groups (homeowners and senior teachers) have a perpetual majority and can stop any changes which don’t serve their interests; while the minorities (newer teachers or teachers not yet hired and Davis renters who would like to buy a house here or future residents) have no way to stop them at the polls.[/i]
That’s a wild exaggeration of the union’s situation. Many unions have voted for wage concessions, and the DTA members who wanted that almost did prevail. There is an enormous difference between the wage concessions losing with 45% support, and Measure P losing with 26% support because prospective residents have no vote at all.
[i]Added together, Davis is not undertaxed and I don’t think it is reasonable to ask residents (most of whom are not making more money) to approve another hike in their taxes, now.[/i]
The right way to look at it is, we Davis residents can spend more on DJUSD, or not. If we want to keep the teachers, all we have to do is pay for them. Whether wage concessions are fairer than layoffs is up to the DTA to decide. We have no business lecturing them for being greedy or for not caring about children, any more than Tiger Woods should lecture me for not giving enough to charity.
[quote]You’re expecting the cost of a worker to rise no faster than the cost of a widget.[/quote]Ordinarily, the (real) cost of a worker rises with a rise in productivity. It’s possible teachers are more productive today than they were 25 years ago. It’s probably they are on average about equally productive. [quote]This expectation doesn’t make sense, because it takes a lot less work to make widgets today than it did in 1985. (But adult supervision of children takes just as much work as it ever did.) [/quote] If it takes “just as much work” and that was the only consideration, then teachers should make in real wages today the same amount teachers made 25 years ago. But (I am fairly sure) they make much higher real wages.*
That said, that is not the only consideration. Real wages perhaps had to rise to attract new capable teachers into the profession who, had wages not increased, would have gone into more lucrative jobs in other arenas. For that to be true — and I think it is — that suggests that compared with 1985, say, there were a lot more options for a college graduate to make good wages elsewhere in the economy in 2005.
*I don’t know this for a fact. However, maybe 5 years ago for a column I checked the real wages for a handful of positions in the public sector (including the Superintendent of Public Instruction for the DJUSD) and found that most, adjusted for the CPI, were making 2-3 times as much as their counterparts had made in those same jobs 20 years before I wrote that piece.
[i]Ordinarily, the (real) cost of a worker rises with a rise in productivity.[/i]
This is just bad economics. The cost of a worker does not rise with the productivity of what you want him to do. The cost rises with the productivity of what he could be doing otherwise.
[i]Real wages perhaps had to rise to attract new capable teachers into the profession who, had wages not increased, would have gone into more lucrative jobs in other arenas.[/i]
Duh, that’s exactly the point.
[i]For that to be true — and I think it is — that suggests that compared with 1985, say, there were a lot more options for a college graduate to make good wages elsewhere in the economy in 2005.[/i]
The number of options is not the point. The point is that the wages of those other options rise faster than inflation.
Anyway, since we don’t have time machines to travel back to 1985, this side discussion has nothing to do with how much teachers need to be paid now. They cost what they cost. DJUSD has enough trouble finding qualified teachers, if they cut wages they’ll have even more trouble, and the union hardly needs to prod the district to keep wages steady. Gas in 1985 was also 2/3 of its current price in constant dollars, but so what; no one will sell it to you for that price now.
The Sunday (1/17) Enterprise’s editorial supports the teachers taking a 2 1/2 percent cut.
There is no end in sight to this.
So, let’s start talking about real solutions.
It probably feels like things will never get better, and that is a possibility. More likely I think the economy will pick up and state revenue will go up. It seems like a reasonable expectation within the next couple of years.
When the district starts receiving more money, I suggest they build in a bigger reserve in their budget. Every school district in California is affected by this bad economy, but some districts have been better able to cushion their cuts by spending into their reserves.
DJUSD hasn’t been as conservative as some districts in budgeting this way, in part because we have a community that is very demanding of its schools. If there is money to be spent, then there is no end of ideas and programs that parents and community members want to see funded.
It means we that we in Davis have to be more disciplined. Unless things change at the state level, it’s clear that the state will short-change K-12 education on a rather frequent basis. A bigger reserve fund means that we may not get to have everything, but it means that we can smooth out the extremes of the funding cycles.
This is just bad economics. The cost of a worker does not rise with the productivity of what you want him to do. The cost rises with the productivity of what he could be doing otherwise.
I wish this made sense to me because it sounds profound. I think, though, it misses the primary connection between the cost of a worker and productivity. Productivity is a measurement of output per unit of input. Efficiency is the monetary metric. In the private sector, all industries have had to improve efficiency and productivity to stay competitive. For most of these, real wages for a given role have increased faster than the rate of inflation. The reason: the job requires greater skills and performance. However, improved efficiency results from the overall reduction in employee expense per unit of production. Basically there are fewer, but more highly compensated, employees in a more efficient and more productive operation.
The basic service delivery model for K-12 education has not changed since public schools were conceived. It continues to be an inefficient, single-dimensional labor-intensive operation. Also, the teaching business mindset is too labor-centric – meaning we generally associate service challenges and opportunities only to the number of teachers per student and the amount of pay to hire and retain teacher talent – and not value-centric enough. This situation is the typical inspiration of unions because their business model seeks greater membership irrespective of the value they produce. Because of this, there is a continued problem of too low return for every additional dollar invested. It is why DC schools, even though costing twice as much per student as California, do not deliver any better education outcomes.
We need to blow the doors off this old model… leverage technology and best-practice learning innovation. Higher compensated teachers will require fewer teachers delivering better outcomes. The unions will hate it, poorly performing and burned out teachers will hate it, people with a stasis mindset will opine against it. Everyone else will love it.
[quote]This is just bad economics. The cost of a worker does not rise with the productivity of what you want him to do. The cost rises with the productivity of what he could be doing otherwise. [/quote] Those are (usually) the same thing, if [i]what you want him to do[/i] is what he would be doing otherwise (and it very likely is what he would be doing otherwise).
For example, consider a plumber. If his productivity (MPl) increases, you will (barring some unusual circumstance in the labor market) pay him more. Why? Because if you don’t, someone else (who employs plumbers) will profit by hiring him away from you. So unless you are a monopsonist (in the plumber-labor market), the distinction you draw is without a difference.
Jeff Boone: “We need to blow the doors off this old model… leverage technology and best-practice learning innovation. Higher compensated teachers will require fewer teachers delivering better outcomes. The unions will hate it, poorly performing and burned out teachers will hate it, people with a stasis mindset will opine against it. Everyone else will love it.”
Jeff, I understand your desire to enhance cost savings through technology, but have you ever taught a group of students who are say math challenged? I have, at both the junior high, high school and junior college level. There is no substitute for an in-person teacher. I’m with you, if you want to institute some sort of system that rewards good teachers and gets rid of the bad ones. I frankly have no problem increasing class sizes – I taught Math in a portable classroom with 42 students in it. But no amount of spoon feeding education through the boob tube, be it a computer screen, HD television screen or whatever, is going to substitute for a live in-person teacher. If you have ever worked with learning disabled students or ones with math phobia, you would better understand this.
Do I think there needs to be some educational reform? Absolutely! I actually think vouchers are a good idea. Competition is the only way we are going to get our schools to change the way they do things. Vouchers have worked very successfully in some inner cities, where poor students were getting an abysmal education, then transferred and did remarkably well.
There must be a nurturing environment, where teachers do not give up on struggling students. My first day of teaching, I had a more experienced teacher on my team (we had team teaching in those days) actually give me a list of students that she assured me would fail, so she advised me not to bother with them. I threw the list in the garbage after she left, and allowed every student to start fresh and prove to me whether they could learn the material or not.
My third year, 82 out of 84 of my 8th grade “slower” students tested, scored high enough to go onto Algebra. The other teachers were outraged, and would not share their student scores with me, even tho they knew mine. I was essentially blackballed from math meetings for being too effective a teacher. That is the kind of thing that needs to be changed. Clone my effective teaching methods, but don’t put me on a boob tube!
Because of this, there is a continued problem of too low return for every additional dollar invested. It is why DC schools, even though costing twice as much per student as California, do not deliver any better education outcomes.
It’s easy to pull out the DC schools as a favorite whipping target every time the topic of fiscal inefficiency in education comes up, but improvement is a work in progress. Since Michelle Rhee has taken over more than two years ago, scores have improved; she was brought in to address your very critism. They still have further to go. I want to see her have more time to see if her policies continue to move things in a positive direction, particularly for the younger grade level cohorts.
I don’t believe optimal results of education reform are seen overnight.
My take on California schools is that it’s impressive they even produce the results they do on inadequate funds.
[i]Those are (usually) the same thing, if what you want him to do is what he would be doing otherwise (and it very likely is what he would be doing otherwise).[/i]
That’s true, Rich, they usually are the same as each other, but they aren’t the same as the cost of a basket of goods. As technology improves, widgets get cheaper compared to workers in general, which is another way of saying that workers get more expensive compared to widgets.
For all of Jeff’s talk of the superiority of the private sector, a plumber is a perfect example. Yes, we have invented superior machines to pluck chickens better, press plastic chairs better, etc., but a plumber is still just a plumber. These days, home plumbers are really expensive, because they have to solve a problem that doesn’t scale.
So do grade school teachers. Yes, technology can improve grade school education in some ways; for example, it would be really nice if more district teachers posted their homework on the web. But at the end of the day, people still want actual human teachers to watch over their children. They do not want technology to be an excuse for larger classes.
Therefore K12 education, like home plumbing, is a job category that doesn’t get more efficient over time. It has nothing to do with private versus public employment. If anything, private schools scale up less and are less efficient than public schools. The only reason that private schools are ever better is the socioeconomic status of their students. When public schools are allowed entrance exams, they do better than the private schools.
Jeff is also not correct that better technology requires more talented workers. Maybe on average it does, but it’s often the opposite. For instance, when Ford and GM started making cars in huge factories, highly skilled mechanics who understood the whole car were replaced by menials who only understood one small part.
[i]Vouchers have worked very successfully in some inner cities, where poor students were getting an abysmal education, then transferred and did remarkably well.[/i]
It’s a scam, Elaine. There have been three general outcomes for voucher programs: (1) Some of them are a showcase subsidized by the school that only succeeds for a few students. (2) When the private schools are pushed to scale up or keep going, they have often opted out and refused to take the vouchers. (3) When special charter schools have been set up to run the whole show just with the vouchers, they have often fallen apart and disrupted the education of their students.
Vouchers are the product of an ideology that equates choice with privatization. The reality has been the worst of both worlds, a hit to public accountability without the creation of better choices. There are much more useful ways to create choices within the public system, and some of these options already exist in Davis. But the committed voucher advocates are bored with these solutions, because what they really want to do is destroy public schools by carving vouchers out of their hides.
[quote]Yes, we have invented superior machines to pluck chickens better, press plastic chairs better, etc., but a plumber is still just a plumber. These days, home plumbers are really expensive, because they have to solve [u]a problem that doesn’t scale.[/u] [/quote] What does that mean, a problem that doesn’t scale?
Last week, as it happens, I employed a plumber. For $98, in about 20 minutes (plus whatever time it took to drive to my house) he cleaned out an exterior sewer pipe (which alas was impacted with roots). Before calling (his company), I tried “root killer” and my own snake. Both operations (after hours of trying) failed. He was far more productive, having far better tools and knowledge of how to use them. One of the cool tools I had never seen before was a snake-camera that went into the pipe and showed (on a TV monitor) the blockage and later showed the pipe cleaned out.
So obviously, plumber income is in part a function of plumber productivity which is a function of his tools and skills at using those tools. But that’s not the whole story. His income is affected by the demand curve — that is, how much money his clients have to pay for plumbing services. A plumber in a poorer region either won’t be able to charge as much or won’t invest in newer, better, more expensive tools, because his customers can’t afford to pay him enough to make that investment pay off. Further, his income is affected by the supply curve — that is, how many other plumbers have his same tools and skills.
Over time, the supply side of the equation should wash out — that is, if there is oversupply, wages will fall and fewer plumbers will enter the field; and if there is a shortage, wages will rise and attract new entrants.
Thus, it seems to me (having given this now 7.31 seconds of thought) plumber income will track fairly well over time with productivity of labor — his own and others. If that is right, plumbers today make much more in real income than plumbers of 50 years ago, because they are more productive and so are the people who are employing them.
[i]Thus, it seems to me (having given this now 7.31 seconds of thought) plumber income will track fairly well over time with productivity of labor — his own and others.[/i]
Right, [b]and others[/b]. That’s been the whole point all along.
His own productivity hasn’t really changed all that much. Yes, plumbers have a few fancy new tools that make some difference. But even in 1985, they were much more practiced and better equipped than the customers. They knew how to clear roots out of pipes. Then as now, the cost for this particular job was dominated by the time to drive to your house. And look at how much you paid him. For about an hour of work counting the drive, the cost is as much as two full days of school for one student in DJUSD. Do you think that in 1985, one Roto-Rooter trip would have paid for four days of school?
Also, it’s feeble to switch from 25 years to 50 years to maintain your point. Yes, plumbers were really expensive 150 years ago, in 1860, but eventually the technology is fairly stable. This idea that everything is revolutionized by technology in every decade is wrong.
For instance, when Ford and GM started making cars in huge factories, highly skilled mechanics who understood the whole car were replaced by menials who only understood one small part.
Greg: you have to go back to before assembly line manufacturing to make that point. Let’s stay within a century if you don’t mind. Assembly line manufacturing enabled Ford to build cars with low-skilled labor because they only needed to understand one small part. Compare that to today’s computer-controlled robotic manufacturing and you need far less workers, but they require higher technical skills.
There is no substitute for an in-person teacher.
ERM: I get your point, but I think it is too broad a view. First, what if the teacher is a poor teacher? Might a student do better with a fabulous teacher delivering a polished and refined set of lessons via technology? I am not advocating we go completely mechanized; I am suggesting resource optimization. I agree that learning-challenged and struggling students will need more personal help. However, when my son was struggling with Algebra, we hired a male college age tutor who helped him more than his Jr. High math teacher could. I am suggesting we do away with the one-size-fits-all approach… that all teachers have the same job, same mix of skills, and the same performance expectations… and should make the same pay.
I think we would be more successful leveraging the economies of scale and technology to deliver the same friggin’ Algebra class to all state students while the individual school districts focuses more on hiring full-time and part-time counselors and tutors. Think about it… the subject is the same, the testing is standardized, yet we pay how many Algebra teachers to develop their own syllabus, content and teaching style? I can see the need for this in an art class, but Algebra? Yes, maybe we need an onsite teacher to handle the special-needs and struggling students, but do we need local teachers to teach the same class to every student in the state?
[i]you have to go back to before assembly line manufacturing to make that point. Let’s stay within a century if you don’t mind.[/i]
Jeff, it is certainly true that across the entire economy, higher skills generally become more important over time. I agree with you that much. But even within this century, you can find specific jobs in which training actually becomes less important.
For instance, 25 years ago, in 1985, there were a lot of knowledgeable people who sold audio equipment. They may not have had PhDs in engineering, but they could talk to you like people who sell bicycles in Davis. But now, you don’t need to know anything to sell stereos, and you certainly won’t be paid for any expert knowledge. The reason is that the expertise has been sucked into the equipment itself. Computers have actually caused the shift in this case.
[i]I think we would be more successful leveraging the economies of scale and technology to deliver the same friggin’ Algebra class to all state students while the individual school districts focuses more on hiring full-time and part-time counselors and tutors.[/i]
But the thing is, Jeff, the economy of scale is already there. You can already read or gaze at a thousand different explanations of algebra for free. There may be some lingering frustrations with the standard-issue textbooks, but their explanations aren’t going to get much better and they are typeset beautifully. The reason that we still need as many teachers is that they ARE the counselors and tutors. A book can’t leap up and figure out your mental blocks, neither can a video, and even a computer can’t do that. That’s what teachers are for.
In fact, since there is an ocean of great explanations in cheap books and on the Internet, more people than ever truly don’t need teachers to learn things that once required teachers. But as you say, the general need for skills goes up, so no matter how much children do learn on their own, their parents still want teachers to teach beyond it. Expectations at the top have gone up; this is one reason that for the proliferation of AP courses.
For that matter, I know that it’s quite common to blame the DC school system for low achievement, but I strongly suspect that the blame is misplaced. Yes, Michelle Rhee looks like she is doing a good job and I’m sure that she can improve the school system, but [b]considering the socioeconomic pattern of the students[/b], I bet that the DC schools have always been at least okay. You were saying, Jeff, it’s easy to for teachers to just teach to the top students and they shouldn’t just congratulate themselves for that. I partly agree with you: If children from certain backgrounds do well on standardized tests, it isn’t necessarily because of the teachers. But by the same token, the DC school district has the most difficult job imaginable. If the teachers there looked at Davis, they would say that the entire district has it easy. I’d have to look for a reputable comparison, but I bet you that DC actually does better than many other districts with the same challenges.
[i]Yes, maybe we need an onsite teacher to handle the special-needs and struggling students, but do we need local teachers to teach the same class to every student in the state?[/i]
What you seem to be saying here is that if a kid can learn algebra on his own by 9th grade, then let’s not even give him a math teacher. You’re saying that it would be coals to Newcastle, because he’ll cross the pass line on his own with books and videos. Well okay, that’s a consistent standard, but consider what it would mean. It would mean a massive funding cut to the Davis school district, with resources transferred to places like Winters and Oakland. The accepted goal of public education is to lift all boats, not just those that are low in the water.
You can already read or gaze at a thousand different explanations of algebra for free
Yes, and I’m sure these are helping students. However they are passive resources. I am talking about active teaching over a wire to a screen and interactive collaborative resources for students, teachers, counselors, helpers and tutors. This stuff works… just think about how much you have learned from me from this blog! =)
What you seem to be saying here..
I am saying use any and all best-practice methods to teach the material to the students. Give each student what he/she needs to have the best opportunity for learning at lowest possible cost. Throwing more money at the same model doesn’t work (see DC). Why is my suggestion for change so difficult to understand or why is it so argumentative?
I think you might be discounting advances in technology and the acceptance of it for younger folk. I agree that it is not the answer for everything, but what if it reduces the overall cost of education so we can afford resources working at the local level to help the students that need it? Is not that a good thing? I am suggesting a “do more with less” idea. The alternative you seem to be peddling is “do the same with the same or more”… or maybe “do a little more with a lot more”. None of these approaches are acceptable to me. Also, they don’t work (see DC).
Many school districts are abandoning class size reduction (CSR) as an educational strategy with these restrictive budgets. DJUSD is currently proposing to take K-3 classes from about 20 to 28 students next year, and maybe even more with the additional cuts that have to be made.
It will be interesting to see what affect it has on student performance. Maybe some of Jeff’s ideas will get tested in the process.
My sense is that K-12 education, like raising kids, is labor intensive by nature. The alternative to that would be something like the dystopian, [u]Brave New World[/u]. Maybe some kids would do just fine left to their own means. But I think most benefit from the human contact and attention of teachers. Teachers ideally serve in providing specific feedback and evaluation, adjusting explanations and assignments if the concept isn’t understood, facilitating peer interactions.
You could get away with having 300 students in a class in an auditorium in college, but I don’t see that working the same way with 1st graders.
wait a minute, we’re talking about robots teaching kids already???
why doesn’t the dta just completely avoid that by making small salary concessions. this way they can keep their memberships and jobs.
end of story
as far as vouchers are concerned where the kids can get private education or tutoring or something, that’s a great idea, but the teachers union is against it because it would prove just how bad they are doing as teachers and prove that public education is not all that…
it would also take money away from the institution and this is exactly what they are fighting for. it’s all about the benjamins.
but I don’t see that working the same way with 1st graders
I agree. I would never advocate this for younger students. In fact, I would take the savings gained from this concept to hire more day-care teachers for the K-6 grades. But, for some subjects it would work fine for middle school through high school. Again, I am not advocating leaving the little darlings to run free, nor am I advocating less help for the higher grades.
I think the human “attention” argument is a bit of a fantasy. From Junior High on the best we could get from my kid’s teachers is to report grades at a reasonable time. Rarely did we hear from the teacher that Johnny was struggling until Johnny got his grade. Then it was up to us, his parents, to schedule time with the teacher and hire a tutor. The value proposition for those teachers was only to teach the subject, and frankly many were not very good at it from my perspective and observation. Given that, I doubt many kids and their parents would miss the teacher’s human touch. I would rather staff the school with counselors and tutors – both local and remote – and move the “teaching” to a less expensive, technology-enabled model.
This stuff works… just check out all the much respected graduate-level college programs delivered using computer technology.
There is a weird cultural resistance for advancing the business of public education. It is like we are all wrapped in tweed and cannot escape. A good example of this is the ancient and overly-expensive process for delivering text book content. We constantly wring our hands over costs and pay and never discuss ways to do more with less. Michele Rhee has to fight too hard with too many with a vested interest in keeping it status quo. I say we need an education revolution to significantly increase education outcomes at a lower cost.
There is a weird cultural resistance for advancing the business of public education. It is like we are all wrapped in tweed and cannot escape.
I don’t think it’s tweed. It’s parents wanting reassurance of an individualized positive experience for their kids; that’s just how a lot of parents are. You can disparage it, but you still have to address it or you won’t get the needed buy-in.
Be careful what you are addressing — public education in general? Davis schools specifically? DC schools specifically? Graduate-level education? You tend to conflate them all; DJUSD is not necessarily the ideal poster child in order to advocate for education reform. Each situation has a different context that may not apply to the other.
As to my experience as the parent of a JH student, we were able to access our child’s grades online in real time through Parent Connect. When we saw grades go down, we were there at school almost the next day. To me that’s an example of a positive implementation of technology that you advocate.
And if you are “squeaky” enough, teachers and administrators will oblige. It costs everyone too much time and stress to prolong vocal parent dissatisfaction.
I am more with you on the textbook issue. Textbook companies have come very close to hurting themselves if they haven’t already. There is now enough “open source,” public domain teaching material to make some textbooks useless. When a publishing company is revising its lower division introductory college level textbook every single year, you can readily see that it’s not to keep up with the latest advances in the field. This current economic downturn is probably enough to make some teachers abandon textbooks.
[i]This stuff works… just check out all the much respected graduate-level college programs delivered using computer technology.[/i]
I teach graduate math courses and I don’t know what you’re talking about. Computers have been very useful in some common-sense ways: Posting homework and solutions on the web, Wikipedia, free PDF copies of books. Online grades are very nice too, for undergraduate courses. All of that does help, and I wish that DJUSD did more of it. But I haven’t seen any sweeping efficiency revolution in math grad school that would let us teach much larger classes.
One thing that is weird about your position is that, when you imagine an efficiency revolution, you really are asking for larger classes. Most of the district’s operating budget is salaries for teachers. So it comes down to the simple arithmetic of salary times students divided by class size. If you think that efficiency is the big solution, and if you want to shift employment from teachers to tutors and tech support, then it means larger classes. Is that what you want?
Consider what efficiency gains have meant in retail sales. An old-fashioned store like James Anthony Men’s Wear probably doesn’t even have 1/5 as many customers per sales clerk as a big-box store like Target.
The other thing that you should realize about mathematics is that the medium isn’t the message. It is true that technology uses mathematics and math benefits from technology. But to a great degree, mathematics is a very human, very traditional subject similar to classical music. Most of the mathematics taught in regular grade school was known 400 years ago, and even most of AP calculus was known 300 years ago. In this respect, the auto shop class at DHS is much more modern than any of the math classes.
[i]When a publishing company is revising its lower division introductory college level textbook every single year, you can readily see that it’s not to keep up with the latest advances in the field.[/i]
Actually, wdf, in math classes it has nothing to do with advances in the field. There have hardly been any advances in calculus proper in the past 150 years. The explanations have gotten more polished and foolproof over time, but in calculus that hasn’t changed much either in the past 40 years or so. Publishers issue new editions of calculus books in order to flush out the used textbook market and, lately, the pirated Internet copies. The most important step is to change the exercises so that the old editions are no longer compatible.
I teach graduate math courses and I don’t know what you’re talking about
Greg: go here and see for yourself: http://www.guidetoonlineschools.com/
Are you telling me that you have no knowledge of online college courses?
You said it yourself… calculus has not changed much for 150 years. Why not take the very best teachers and instruction and film it and add high-end graphics as learning aids and produce something very sophisitcated that can be replayed to every student. Include all the breaks for assignments, review and testing. Keep facilitators in the room to ensure the kids behave. Give the kids access to live help (both online and real) when they need it. The online help can be made available 24×7.
Why do we need several thousand teachers re-performing their live interpretation of this show every semester?
Why do we need several thousand teachers re-performing their live interpretation of this show every semester?
Online and TV courses can work well for certain self-disciplined students; others can’t seem to treat the resource more seriously than another cable channel or website on par with everything else out there available for entertainment. Others appear to need live interaction and personal contact; the ability to consult with a live person in real time.
[i]Are you telling me that you have no knowledge of online college courses?[/i]
You said graduate-level, Jeff. Almost nothing on your site is graduate-level, none whatsoever is graduate-level mathematics, and a lot of it is outright remedial.
[i]Why not take the very best teachers and instruction and film it and add high-end graphics as learning aids and produce something very sophisticated that can be replayed to every student.[/i]
Because it’s already been done, that’s why “not”. The people who actually use this stuff are the ones who know that it isn’t enough. It may be good enough for the Food Network (sort of), but it isn’t a good way to learn mathematics.
You should have some respect my professional experience, and Elaine’s too. Professional mathematicians are as happy learn a new math topic from a book or from the web as anybody. I never took many of the courses that I’ve taught at UC Davis; instead I learned the material your way. But even though I do this all the time, the limitations are obvious.
You said graduate-level
There are graduate-level programs using online teaching. For example, you can earn a Masters in Education from USC.
The virtual classroom concept is well underway. It will only get better with time.
Here is an example of a college with online math classes: http://online.rit.edu/about/newsletter/one_article.cfm?which=70
Here is an article about a teacher’s experience teaching math online in 2005. Technology has come a long way since then: http://mathdl.maa.org/mathDL/4/?pa=content&sa=viewDocument&nodeId=1057
It is already available here:
http://www.k12.com/cava
And here:
http://www.cyberhigh.org
Here is a private college offering virtual high school classes:
http://www.nuvhs.org
Forgot about this one:
http://www.iqacademy.com/