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Sen. Piccola: Race to the Top loss shows problems with local control

Sen. Jeffrey Piccola, the chair of the Education Committee, is not one to hold back his opinion.

So when he was asked about Pennsylvania not being named one of the Race to the Top grant money winners (Delaware and Tennessee won), he had a straight-forward reply on why he thinks the state lost.

“It shows the glaring weaknesses of this concept called local control,” said Piccola, who represents part of northern York County.

In Pennsylvania, local control means 500 school districts, with 16 in York County alone. Compare that to a state like Maryland, which has a countywide school district approach. With so many districts in Pa., there were too many school boards and local teachers’ unions blocking support of Race to the Top participation. In Delaware and Tennessee, Piccola pointed out, they had 100 percent support from all districts and unions. In Pennsylvania, it was just 25 percent, hardly a show of “we’re all in this together.”
“It’s the proverbial tail wagging the dog,” he said. “We have a public education system that is bloated and unaccountable in many respects.”
Piccola said he thought the state did the best it could to get support, and maybe in the second round of applications for the $3.4 billion in federal money remaining, more districts will jump on the bandwagon.

He also thinks the Empowerment Act update he’s proposed will help. That’s the doozy that calls for York City School District to undergo state takeover in about two years if it doesn’t immediately meet state standards, as it has failed to do for six years in a row (that’s called Corrective Action Year 2). The act will bring increased accountability for failing districts, he says, and maybe that will convince the Obama administration to take Pennsylvania more seriously; the state finished seventh out of 16 finalists in the first round of Race to the Top.

“I’m unhappy that we didn’t win it. There’s a silver lining to this cloud. It exposes our weaknesses,” Piccola said.

As for just paring down the number of districts, you might as well wish to win American Idol. Gov. Rendell briefly suggest the idea of getting the state down to about 100 districts, and was promptly rebuffed.

Consolidating districts means superintendents and administrators, among others, losing jobs, and school boards losing power, so there would be a strong fight there. And that’s not even to mention the opposition of teachers’ unions.

York City teacher contract talks come to a head next week

With only Delaware and Tennessee being named winners of the first round of Race to the Top grant awards, Pennsylvania was left out in the cold along with 14 other finalists.

The York City Education Association has been left without a contract for nine months now. Race to the Top, which is federal money targeting education reform, was supposed to be the catalyst that led to some form of agreement with district’s and union’s negotiation teams.

The state’s Race to the Top application required all participating districts to say the administration, school board and teachers’ union would support changes such as new teacher evaluations and longer school days. Those things also happened to be part of the discussion in the contract negotiations.

But even though the Keystone State is out of the running for now (they can apply again in June), the union’s UniServ representative, Clinton Gibbs, told me that state setback shouldn’t slow down negotiations.

Both sides received a fact finder’s report yesterday. A fact finder’s report is made through a state-supplied mediator who considers both sides’ proposals and offers what he or she believes is a fair compromise. It’s the second time the sides have been through the process; last time, the district decided not to submit a proposal and so it went nowhere. District officials said at the time the decision was because the union wanted to talk salary first, while the district wanted to talk about things like teacher evaluations.

If both the union and school board agree to the findings this time, that means the negotiations are basically over. If one side doesn’t agree, it’s back to the negotiating table; Dover Area School Board recently turned down a fact finder’s report despite the union’s support of it, so those sides are back to negotiations.

“The fact finder’s report should give us a springboard to do some serious negotiations,” Gibbs said.

The key date in all of this: April 6. Both sides will take a vote on the report, with the school board holding a special meeting at 6:30 p.m. for their vote.

Looming over all of these talks is the fact the union already authorized a strike, meaning that it’s now a possibility. Just as in Dover’s case, if the school board votes down the report, that’s another step toward a strike.

And with two votes of support, it could be a step toward a resolution.

Bellwether Central?: Expect other districts to follow Central’s laptop lead

Few things reflect that old saying, “Keeping up with the Joneses” (which is much different than Keeping Up with the Kardashians, a much less noble cause) than education.

And with Central York School District’s push to get a laptop in the hands - or laps - of every high school student, we may soon get another example of that. (Here’s the story)

Central administrators hope to convince the school board to buy 1,900 laptops at $1,000 each as a natural progression of its Learning with Technology initiative that’s been in place for years. If these laptops are bought, textbooks would become as yesterday as MySpace, which is to say, you’d be hard-pressed to find textbooks being the primary method of information in any Central York High School class.

Already, the school has 900 laptops (they would be given to younger grades) that are kept at the school. Many students told me they primarily use laptops in about half of their classes, and much prefer those ones to the textbook-driven courses. Superintendent Michael Snell firmly believes this is a necessary step to get these kids ready for life after high school.

A town hall meeting will be held Tuesday night at 7 p.m. at North Hills Elementary, so you can debate all you want there about the merits of what’s often called a 1-to-1 initiative.

But there’s little debate other districts are itching to follow Central’s footsteps. Make no mistake: Money and resources, not desire, are holding back York County districts from getting more laptops. It’s a big financial commitment, although it’s offset some by reduced textbook purchases.

Dallastown may be next in line, assuming Central approves its program. School officials told me they are considering introducing a similar laptop idea next year, as Dallastown, like Central, has always loved the merger of instruction and technology (they recently started holding summer tech camps for teachers).

And once a few districts start rolling out 1-to-1, it’s only a matter of time before the rest follow suit, usually in the “We need this for our children to be competitive” fashion. Whether that’s the right attitude or not is up to the publicly elected officials and trained school officials.

But the examples are already out there of why this will likely become York County’s next trend: Artificial turf. New schools with all the latest modern amenities. Everyday Math. Full-day kindergarten. All have been acquired at least in part because of the “Keeping up with the Joneses” attitude, because who wants to be the school board that doesn’t get students what all the other districts seem to have?
Will York County schools see laptops as the next “must have” item?

No band? No sports? Not yet, but it is always a possibility

In most years, South Western School District trims about $200,000-$250,000 from its proposed budget before it’s finalized.

This year, administrators have proposed trimming about $1.3 million, mostly from putting off building repairs and cutting back on each building’s budget.

“This is extreme,” said business manager Jeff Mummert. “It’s quite substantial.”

But it could have been much more drastic. On South Western’s Web site, there are a list of possible program cuts that, while not being strongly considered by South Western, have been presented to the community as a reminder of things the district offers that aren’t required by the state.

Some of the programs:

• Athletics
• Band
• Driver Ed
• Kindergarten
• Field trips
• Computer purchases

Now South Western most definitely would never eliminate or greatly reduce all of those, lest they become the victims of many pitchforks and angry mobs. But the point they are making to the community is that many parts of their budget are state-required and can only be cut back so much (special education, for example).

If taxpayers really want to see a reduction in taxes and/or if South Western really needed to make drastic budget cuts, it’s these types of popular items that could get cut back.

When a Dallastown Area school board candidate, Larry Wolfe, so much as mentioned last year having athletes “pay to play,” there was a big backlash by people wondering why anyone would think students should have to help pay for the cost of sports.

In a tight budget year, there’s nothing saying any district couldn’t decide to scale back its sports offerings, band or driver education program. None are required by the state, not even kindergarten.

“You don’t want to scare people,” Mummert said, adding he and the district aren’t advocating to cut back on these popular programs. It’s more of a reminder of areas that aren’t usually looked to for budget reductions.

Mummert is always frank about what’s going on in South Western’s budget, as forthright as any business manager in York County’s 16 school districts. And when he talks about their $53 million proposed budget, he talks openly about how this budget year, more than others, has been difficult.

The state limits how much a district can raise taxes - South Western has a 3.6 percent cap, and has a special exception that would let it raise taxes up to 5.25 percent.

No one wants to raise taxes by 5.25 percent, Mummert said, but it’s a possibility, even with the already “extreme” budget cuts. There’s also the chance the school board could heed the pleas of taxpayers and keep the tax increase to a minimum.

School districts around York County are faced with these same kinds of decisions as they finalize their budgets over the coming weeks.

Do you keep a more bare-bones budget to have a low tax increase, even if that means not offering some extras (Central is making that kind of decision about whether to buy a laptop for every high school student)? Or do you raise taxes up to the cap and try to get everything you think students and teachers will need?

Draconian cuts of something like band don’t seem likely this year at South Western or elsewhere, but that could change in a few years. In 2013, pension costs are predicted to quadruple, and that’s not to mention healthcare and salary costs rising. Expect extracurriculars and perks to come under the microscope.