The Pueblo Chieftain reports that Pueblo County School District 70 has combined its two union bargaining agreements into one:

The district’s board on Tuesday night approved a single contract with the Pueblo County Teachers Association and the Association of Classified Employees.

In at least one respect the move makes sense, because the two contracts contain a similar unjust and burdensome requirement. Both the district’s non-union teachers and classified employees have to file a written form each year within a narrow time frame to opt out of paying a full year of union dues. As a 2008 Independence Institute op-ed points out, the onerous policy affects real people: Continue Reading »

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Update, 6/16: Teacher Beat blogger Stephen Sawchuk notes that both Colorado’s own Harrison School District and now the Pittsburgh School District have fashioned pay plans that make master’s bumps “a thing of the past.”

It’s summertime. The Internet isn’t exactly brimming with exciting new developments in the world of education to write about. So instead I point you to a new blog post from Dr. Eric Hanushek at Education Next about the irrational policy of awarding teachers automatic pay increases for earning masters degrees:

What does this bonus do? It induces many teachers to want to have a master’s degree. (Over half of all teachers have an advanced degree now.) Getting a master’s degree is frequently something done concurrently with a full time teaching job, so the last thing these teachers want is a challenging academic program that requires real work. As a result, schools of education are willing to sell master’s degrees that require minimal effort. Master’s degrees become a very profitable product.

A profitable product that, as research has shown time and again, does absolutely nothing to benefit the learning of students. And as the Center on Reinventing Public Education showed in 2009, 2 percent of all K-12 operating expenditures here in Colorado and nationwide are spent on the inefficient “master’s bumps.” Continue Reading »

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Harvard University professor Dr. Paul Peterson, along with colleague Carlos Xabel Lastra-Anadón, has unveiled some new research that underscores one of the top untold Colorado education stories of recent years. The issue is how high are states setting the bar to measure student learning in the basic subjects of reading and math–also known as “performance standards.”

The findings? Since 2007 states have raised the bar a bit on reading performance standards but have made no improvement with math. Essentially every state “deems more students ‘proficient’ on its own assessments than NAEP [the National Assessment of Educational Progress] does.” The researchers measured the strength of a state’s performance standards by how well the state’s proficiency ratings in various subject tests match up with the “gold standard” NAEP test. Continue Reading »

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I sure hope no schools in Colorado are doing this sort of thing. It’s a story told by a New Jersey mom, via the Washington Examiner’s Mark Hemingway (H/T The Union Label):

I am looking for your opinions and insights based upon a very distressing situation my youngest daughter brought to my attention last week involving a school fundraiser.

Continue Reading »

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How embarrassing! Apparently my friend Democrats for Education Reform turned 3 years old a few days ago (H/T Eduwonk), and I missed it altogether. Think of all the great advice I could offer to someone who just turned 3! Anyway, DFER executive director Joe Williams offered his reflections on the growth and influence of the Democratic Party’s go-to advocacy voice for reforming public schools:

Just three years ago, today’s conventional wisdom (that the political tide is beginning to turn in favor of reform) would have been laughable. Trust me, I heard the laughs and saw the eyes roll in state after state when I told people what we were trying to do. Good luck with that, they told us.

Yep. DFER has come a long way, baby. It’s a great thing to see strong voices for education reform in both major political parties. But to celebrate now, I’m going to have to send a belated birthday card. What kind of card do you think: Snoopy? Dora? Lightning McQueen? Maybe DFER’s still into Winnie the Pooh….

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Last night my Education Policy Center friends went to see the Colorado premiere of The Lottery. Ben DeGrow has written up a review over at Ed News Colorado.

While it was past my bedtime and I didn’t get to stay up and watch the film, the story about kids like me who live in Harlem and whose parents hope and pray that they win the lottery to get into a successful charter school is something I look forward to watching. If you don’t get what I mean, this trailer should help you see it:

What are you waiting for? Find a theater near you to go see The Lottery, and then get involved in fighting for the cause. You could do it as a favor for your all-time favorite junior blogger, but the four kids who are the stars of the film are even better reasons!

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Last week I introduced you to a new iVoices podcast with Peggy Littleton from the State Board of Education raising legitimate concerns about Race to the Top and a slide toward national standards.

Last week, Littleton joined state senator Michael Johnston on an episode of Jon Caldara’s show Devil’s Advocate to discuss both Senate Bill 191 and the Race to the Top requirement to sign on to Common Core standards. Check out the YouTube playlist for a great debate!

The compelling give-and-take on Devil’s Advocate is a microcosm of a larger national debate playing out. Checker Finn from the Fordham Institute is all for the reform, saying the newly-released Common Core Standards are “better than ever.” But education experts from the Heritage Foundation disagree, saying it puts us on a path to standardizing mediocrity, while the venerable Dr. Jay Greene continues his strong compelling case against Common Core.

What can I say? Tune in, get informed and get involved in the debate to determine who sets academic standards for Colorado.

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Good Monday morning (if there is such a thing… well, it’s more likely during summer vacation, anyways!). I spend plenty of time blogging about how Colorado can do a better job in providing education. But to be honest, our problems don’t match up with New Jersey’s.

Thus, I have to compliment New Jersey Governor Chris Christie for his courage, common sense and commitment in taking on the powerful teachers union lobby in his state. Consider the nearly five minutes watching this video time well spent (H/T Matt Ladner): Continue Reading »

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Little Eddie’s Florida-thon blogging continues. And today’s edition could be the most exciting yet. From Matt Ladner and Greg Forster (both writing on Jay Greene’s blog) comes word of a new research study by David Figlio and Cassandra Hart, who conclude:

We find evidence that public schools subject to more competitive pressure from private schools raised their test scores the most following the introduction of Florida’s voucher program, and that the gains in test scores appear to generalize to students ineligible to participate in the voucher program.

In other words, the competition of school choice through tuition tax credits helps to lift the boat of academic performance even for public school students who come from families with incomes too great to take advantage of a scholarship. Wow!

Forster notes that top-notch empirical studies are 18-0 in showing positive competitive effects from school choice programs, then calls out detractors for their weak attack on the findings: Continue Reading »

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Years after changing the way they pay teachers with ProComp, Denver Public Schools finally has the first round of research in showing how well it has worked. Ed News Colorado yesterday reported on the University of Colorado evaluation:

– Student growth on state reading and math exams was higher after the implementation of ProComp in 2005-06. Researchers used a measure similar to the Colorado Growth Model to analyze DPS test results from 2002-03 through 2008-09. They found all teachers’ median growth percentiles – essentially, how much teachers are moving students – increased about 4 points after ProComp.

– Teachers hired after ProComp appear to outperform those hired before ProComp. Teachers hired after Dec. 31, 2005 are required to join ProComp; it is voluntary for those already employed by DPS. Those hired under ProComp demonstrate higher first-year achievement, between 2 to 4 points in median growth percentiles, and the differences persist through the first three years.

– High-poverty schools with high levels of ProComp participation are seeing fewer teachers leave. Retention rates in schools designated “hard to serve,” which yields a $2,344 annual bonus, are still not as high as retention rates in more affluent schools. But those high-poverty schools where most teachers are in ProComp have seen a sharp increase in retention since 2006-07.

A long, long time ago — like almost three years ago!! — my Education Policy Center friend Ben DeGrow published a paper titled Denver’s ProComp and Teacher Compensation Reform in Colorado (PDF). It’s a handy reference, a milepost if you will, because much has happened since Ben wrote things like this: Continue Reading »

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