What else can I say? Brief comments on the omnibus fiasco, positive developments, and some live-blogging of the final 1:15 of the Senate floor debate

As I said last post, I'm just sad. I was talking to some people earlier when I was mad, but I just don't have the energy to express my anger adequately right now after 12 hours of teaching and attending my own class. So I'm copying two comments I made on other blogs and some wonderfully sarcastic comments from a UEA observer of the Senate debate on SB 2 and SB 281 yesterday.

The comments are on a couple of Republican blogs that are pretty open to constructive criticism if you keep the ranting to a decent tone. Here's my comment on the Senate Site, minus the name of another commenter I was responding to:

[T]he legislature does not practice what it preaches in terms of local management. The recent audit of class size reduction money specifically found that the districts were using the money correctly, but that the money just hadn't kept up with growth.

The point is, the Republican leadership is playing games and pushing a corporate agenda rather than responsibly legislating. Senator Valentine calls the American Board program "tried and proven" in the press conference when their own website explains that it is a pilot program. It's a fly-by-night outfit that sells online courses. What lobbyist even put this organization on the radar? Maybe all the pro-voucher people on the board? It's just weird. That million dollars could go towards WPU which had been appropriately and efficiently used by districts.

Senator Stephenson pushes software as an alternative for class size reduction and family reading--the originally rejected HB 200 bill that gives laptops to preschoolers!--because he uncritically accepts what industry lobbyists tell him. Pushing these bills in a conglomerate is an attempt to avoid public and legislative scrutiny. Claiming that we or they can adequately evaluate all of the pieces of SB 2 in two days is a self-serving lie.

The Senators complain about "media bias" at town meetings and tell themselves that is why the public mistrusts them. Can't they see that it is their determination to push their corporate priorities over sound education funding that alienates us?

The next comment is from Representative Steve Urquhart's blog. I'm hoping he'll be blogging more after he recovers from tonight. My comment was on a post where Rep. Urquhart explained his democratic method of running the House Rules Committee, which was changed, apparently at Speaker Curtis' command, halfway through the session.

Wow. In my opinion, your amendment to HB 473 was one of the few sane things done by a Republican in the last week of the session. I saw you acting as Speaker for awhile today.

I'm still interested in anything you can say about the rules changes.

I'm even more interested in your opinion of the omnibus bill, especially the inclusion of three bills that had been voted down in committee. As a "process guy," why did you vote for the bill?

I am disillusioned and angry. I feel like the talk about moving on from vouchers was just talk and that the legislative leadership is pushing their agenda over good government. Even someone who supported all 12 of those bills should be angered by the lack of respect shown to the process and to public input.

The following description comes from a UEA staffer attending the Tuesday, Mar. 5 Senate debate on the omnibus bills. I'm underlining some more interesting bits and adding a comment or two in brackets. A lot of villains and good guys here:

SB 2, “Omnibus” Bill # 1, (Stephenson)

Sen. Stephenson introduced the bill as the “much heralded” omnibus bill which contains twelve separate education bills. He acknowledged that is it “unusual” for this many bills to be packaged together like this, but claims the purpose is to “reduce the confusion” that would result from the “coordinating clauses” that would be required were the bills to be run separately. (One has to wonder how it has been done in past years).

Sen. Jones pointed out that she has worked on her bill, (SB 61, Financial Literacy), for nine months, marshalling it through the entire legislative process, only to see it now sitting next to other bills that were rolled out late in the game, some not even having passed out of committees. “Next year, should I just wait until the last few days and hope that the ‘powers that be’ put my bill in an omnibus bill?”

Sen. McCoy offered an amendment that would eliminate the $3.5 million for HB 200, Early Childhood Learning (Last), because it failed in a House vote 31-37-7, saying, “I don’t think it’s right to ‘bootstrap’ bills that have been killed with other good bills”. Sen. Stephenson argued against the amendment, saying that it was a “close vote” in the House, and that if we can approve funding for Head Start, we can approve this bill”. (Never mind that he voted against Lou Shurtliff’s $100,000 appropriation bill for Head Start, as Sen Romero pointed out). The amendment failed along party lines. [What?! It was a close vote? So we shouldn't have had to waste all that time and money defeating the voucher bill because it only passed by one arm-twisted vote?]

Sen. McCoy then spoke out against going down the “omnibus bill road”, much like the federal government does, and expressed the “utmost confidence” in the ability of legislative staff to “coordinate” the different bills as they have successfully done for years.

Sen. Romero then offered an amendment to take the $5 million from SB 35 (Differentiated Pay for Teachers), and use it to fund Rep. Morgan’s HB 194 (Class Size Reduction). “We already have $6.9 million for math and science teachers . (HB 270), but my constituents overwhelmingly want smaller class sizes. This way we can do both, and this is a better policy decision”. Unfortunately, the amendment failed, but Sen. Romero requested a “call of the Senate” so that all senators had to vote to support class size reduction, …or not. Only Senators Greiner and Van Tassell joined the Democrats and voted to support the class size amendment.

The bill ultimately passed, with Senators Davis, Dmitrich, Fife, Goodfellow, Greiner, McCoy and Romero voting “No” in protest. Sen. Romero explained his vote by saying, “Yesterday we patted ourselves on the back for how well our state is managed, and today we pass an omnibus bill that contains seven bills we haven’t even discussed. I’m disappointed”. [Over half of the twelve bills stuck into the omnibus weren't even debated on the Senate floor. That is disgusting. Way to go Republican leadership!]

(Note: If you are the local contacts for the senators listed above, please thank them for their efforts to bring some common sense to this omnibus mess.”)



SB 281, “Omnibus” Bill #2, (Stephenson)

Sen. Stephenson introduced this bill by saying, “We’re asking school districts to develop ways to distribute money based on merit”. The bill also provides $5 million for “signing bonuses”, as well as $1 million for teachers who pursue American Board Certification of Teacher Excellence, or ABCTE. (Not to be confused with National Board Certification, or NBC)

Sen. Jones offered an amendment that would make those gaining NBC eligible for financial rewards as well, pointing out that there are 64,000 NBC teachers across the country compared to only 100 ABCTE “pilot program” teachers, and that NBC is recognized in all 50 states where ABCTE is not yet recognized by any state. (Perhaps the reason they came to Utah)

Sen. Stephenson argued against the amendment, claiming that ABCTE is focused on “student performance gains”, where NBC is “too focused on teacher training”. Sen. Madsen chimed in, saying that the ABCTE bill was “completely vetted”, and that, “I wouldn’t want this program watered down”. [Vetted by who? How do you "water down" a pilot program from a shady online teacher course provider? See my posts below.]

Even Sen. Hillyard asked, “Why not open the bill up to both NBC and ABC teachers?” Sen. Stephenson argued that, “NBC doesn’t look at student test scores. Only the ABC program does”. [So screw the taskforce and poor schools. We'll just push through payments for test scores with that determination made by out-of-state, voucher-supporting corporate donors.]

Positive Developments

I was not a big fan of Rep. Daw, but he showed some grit today in the SB 2 debate. He's a charter school supporter, but he called BS on the state's attempt to unethically resurrect another defeated bill, HB 278, via the omnibus bill and to pawn off the cost of charter schools on local school districts. The bill in effect said "We want to require charter schools, but we want the school districts to be the bad guys and raise taxes to actually pay for charter schools." Rep. Daw wasn't able to completely get rid of the bill, but he cut the impacts down to 1/4 of the original cost to districts.

I was listening to the live Senate session and lo and behold, Sen. Stephenson stood at 10:45 and announced that the house had substituted SB 281 and gotten rid of the million bucks for the ABCTE funding. Sen. Stephenson expressed an eagerness to secure the 20 million dollars in top-down merit pay, so he was willing to let go of the ABCTE for now. The bill eventually passed. I looked at the substitute and it was Representative Dougall who proposed it. The $20 million was still a surprise insult to teachers and Rep. Last's taskforce, but at least they will work with/lean on the districts in conjunction with how that money will be spent. The elimination of ABCTE is a victory against corporate crap disguised as "merit."

At 11:25, Senator Hickman inadvertently revealed the utter hypocrisy of the education omnibus bill when he commented how "disturbing" it was to see a bill that his committee had designated as a low priority, HB 3, pop up at the last minute. Where was his anger about Stephenson ramrodding three defeated bills into the omnibus bill? Senator Hickman was so mad that he really surprised me with a reference to the "black baby" controversy. He said something like "I won't quote Senator Buttars, but, uhhh, this is an ugly bill." Huh? As I type this, he is announcing that he won't run for re-election, so maybe he doesn't give a hang what people think.

An example of bad government:
The Senators were rushing through bills in the last few minutes when they received an amended SB 327 from the house. Sen. Neiderhauser requested an immediate vote concurring with the amendments. Another senator asked for clarification on the fiscal note because he had heard it had increased by millions. (Was this the millions for the bid by Speaker Curtis' client?) Sen. Neiderhauser had no idea... no idea, but he wanted it passed anyway. The second senator froze the process when he demanded the fiscal note. Ten minutes later, he waived his request, apparently in a concession to time, and then voted for the bill having no idea how many millions it cost. That's disappointing.

And the final bill that passed, literally at 11:59, was...dang, I think it was SB 41. The amended version... It was something about education from Senator Stephenson. Well there's what I think was maybe the last bill.

Clearing up "potential misconceptions" and one bald-faced lie about the education omnibus bill

Over the last week and a half, every member of the family has taken repeated turns being extremely sick. (I don't know if JM Bell and Jeremy were contagious through the internet or what....) So I haven't posted in nine or ten days and the session ends in two days. Luckily, President Valentine has wrapped up all of the remaining education bills into one omnibus bill that he claims has a little something for everyone.

I often disagree with the Senate Site, but they post a lot of good information and acknowledge criticism fairly well. Earlier tonight, my wife and I listened to the audio of the "Education Press Conference" featuring Senators Valentine, Stephenson, and Dayton. It's a little over 18 minutes long and the Senate Site states that the purpose was "to clear up potential misconceptions about education funding that seemed to be swimming around." Let me give you a quick summary:

We have put a lot of money in public education this year.
We are including a lot of the Republican "reform bills," including the American Board program because of its "track record" (see below), in one, gigantic omnibus bill.
We love merit pay and we are going to "experiment" with lots of merit pay proposals. Of course we're not interfering with Rep. Last's merit pay taskforce.
We're putting it all together into an omnibus bill. Of course this is not a plan to ram through unpopular, right-wing, Senate-Caucus-devised-and-Eagle-Forum-approved legislation sprinkled with token Democrat bills so we can accuse no votes of being "obstructionist." The fact that some of these proposals were already voted down individually just shows how diverse and "experimental" the education omnibus package of fun will be this year.
Senator Dayton briefly speaks for no apparent reason, answers no questions, thanks the governor, and tells us that she hopes Utah will become known as "the feeder state for NASA" through differential pay.
Omnibus is good. Omnibus is good. Omnibus is good.
Individually considering the bills isn't actually as good as throwing them all together. If you don't like it, make an amendment.
Omnibus is good. Omnibus is good. Omnibus is good.

My comments on "potential misconceptions":

At about 1:10 in, President Valentine estimates that funding is up 50% from last year. He's serious too. Take off the 0 and I believe a 5% increase would be closer to the mark. But I will grant him, it's a good increase overall. I understand why it's less than originally proposed.

BLATANT LIE COMING... At about 2:35 and again at about 3:50ish, Senator Valentine specifically praises the American Board program as having been "tried and tested" and having a "track record." Did he even read the original bill? It's like Senators Dayton and Peterson on the IB program all over again. Except a simple web search here would give you the openly acknowledged fact that the "Distinguished Teacher" award from American Board is a less-than-a-year-old "pilot" program. You can become "one of the first teachers in the nation to earn this prestigious certification" and they are so desperate that you do so that they will pay you $1000 dollars to earn their award. I honestly wonder how the legislature grabbed onto this random program from a profit-seeking headhunting company that claims they can turn you into a teacher with "a classroom of your own in less than a year!" all for $850 bucks. My earlier post on the subject reveals the organization is tied to national voucher advocacy groups and testing companies. I've been too lazy to hunt down the campaign contributions, but I can't figure out another way this random program gained traction to be funded with one million taxpayer dollars. Maybe they Googled " corporate teacher award" and threw a dart at the results? Why not put money towards teachers who earn the truly proven and well-known National Board certification? This is the organization whose name American Board is trying to copy and for which Rep. Moss has already written a bill, HB 84.

At about 7:10 into the audio, Senator Stephenson defends the proposals as "research based" right after he and President Valentine talk about how they're all experimental too.

It is hard to hear the reporters, but around 9:45 a reporter asks a long question about why so many bills that have already been voted down in committee or on the floor are included in the omnibus bill. Senator Stephenson assures him around 10:20 that many of these bills were going to be revoted on anyway because they had just been "misunderstood" during their initial defeats. Just like vouchers, right?

At 12:15ish, Senator Stephenson apparently reveals that they are taking out the original "critical shortage" criteria (lines 12, 17, 40-41, 45-49) for the extra $5000 bucks for math and science teachers. So instead of paying teachers extra to teach in Dugway or Juab, which I could support, all math and science teachers will make more money.

And to finish off, President Valentine assures us at about 18:05 that despite the fact that many of these proposals wouldn't pass by themselves, "we can look at the total and say that this is a good plan."

Does any of that sound suspicious to you too? I want to see the text of this omnibus bill immediately. I wonder if it will be available online at all before it is debated or passes...

Speaking of Merit Pay, How About a “Teacher Test” Delivered Under False Pretenses by Voucher Supporters?

The next few posts will be fairly critical of some legislators and their philosophies of education. My last post talked about the Merit Pay Task Force and my hopes and fears for what it will accomplish. Merit pay proposals may indeed bring some sort of positive effect, but there are LOTS and LOTS of real questions about how to evaluate, who to evaluate, who evaluates, standards, remediation, paying a certain percentage of teachers or paying for meeting certain requirements, etc. Merit pay proposals are seen by many as a veiled attack on the value of teachers in general, and specifically as retribution for their opposition to last year’s voucher bill. Rep. Last says the task force was created to bring together legislators and educators to try and reach "consensus" on the standards, alleviating some of those concerns about top-down regulations.

So why is Senator Mark Madsen running SB0091, a bill that institutes merit pay under the guise of a teacher qualification, instead of contributing his input to the task force as they consider all the alternatives and ramifications of merit pay? I’m afraid the answer is that it’s about retribution and corporatization of education, as well as another attempt to weaken the bargaining role of the UEA in teacher compensation.

The bill proposes paying for teachers to obtain a special certification and then paying them more salary afterwards. At first glance, while still puzzled as to why the proposal wouldn’t be wrapped into the Merit Pay Task Force, I thought the bill was just recognizing the merit of a widely respected teacher training program, know as the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS). This organization was founded by education professionals in 1987 and is known for its broad, rigorous requirements for showing classroom mastery. Teachers have to demonstrate mastery of the subject matter and an understanding of classroom and community principles through extensive evaluation and a portfolio of their work. Here are the standards for a Junior High English Teacher.

But the bill is about another organization, The American Board for Certification of Teacher Excellence. The similar sounding name is just a coincidence of course. Founded in 2001 as a “bargain” teacher headhunter, the organization tries to address the national teacher shortage by recruiting applicants, “certifying” them as teachers through the rigorous, yet quick and easy, $850 online text and test offered (see Utah’s special page and how easy it is! “Become a teacher and have a classroom of your own in less than a year!”), and then aggressively shopping them as “better” than normal teacher applicants to school districts desperate to fill positions. Because of course, one online course is all you need to be a teacher. Now, ABCTE is trying to offset this inherent cheapening of what the teaching profession requires by offering a “Distinguished Teacher” certification, which is the subject of SB0091.

This distinguished award is less than a year old and “is being piloted right now in several school districts in order to ensure the requirements will be measured in a valid and reliable way.” That certainly inspires confidence that our tax money will be well spent. Currently, they are so anxious to establish their award as legit that they will actually pay you to go through the process. (I would assume that Sen. Madsen knows this and just proposes paying for it because he knows the company will charge hundreds of dollars once they’re off the pilot program...) The process consists of 1. Passing an online test on the subject matter. 2. An evaluation by the principal. 3. An evaluation by someone else using a rubric that is similar to what Utah already uses, but must specifically come from another for-profit education corporation. 4. The test scores of your students.

In other words, almost a carbon copy of some of the merit pay proposals, but under a different name to fly under the radar and avoid any input from concerned educators. I see this as ideology over integrity. The program is voluntary, but Senator Madsen is hiding its true intent. But how did Senator Madsen even hear about this company and formulate the bill? The national, corporate “school reform” web strikes again! I need to find the campaign donor records of Senator Madsen and check them out. I wonder how much he received from large educational testing companies or pro-voucher organizations. The big corporate money and pro-voucher connections are everywhere.

The President of ABCTE, David Saba, is a businessman who spent much of his career working for Kaplan, another expensive testing and tutoring company. He takes quite a few potshots at the union in his blog and makes it very clear that he supports No Child Left Behind, especially the provisions about shutting down schools. Wouldn’t that worry Utah Senators who constantly worry about federal encroachment, especially one who actually sponsored a bill rejecting NCLB money? (Senator Margaret Dayton heads the Senate Education Committee and already passed the bill out of committee with a favorable recommendation.) Apparently not if big money and vouchers are involved.

The Board of Directors of ABCTE contains some impressive looking names and titles, but also some revealing ones. One director is the president of the Texas Institute for Education Reform. “Education Reform” is the rightwing codeword for pro-voucher, pro-merit pay, pro-privatization. Another director was actually hired away from the Alliance for School Choice and holds a simultaneous position doing research at the Goldwater Institute, another rightwing, explicitly pro-voucher advocacy group. Another lady works for ETS, the “non-profit organization” (I know it’s Wikipedia, but the NY Times article and blog quoted are solid.) that has “non-profit” monopolies on the SAT, TOEFL, GRE, and others including the CRAPI…I mean PRAXIS. The PRAXIS is ETS’s response to the “highly qualified teacher” requirement of NCLB. This test is the easiest way for a state to claim their teachers are “highly qualified” while spending no money and exerting no effort. Instead, teachers pay close to $300 to take two multiple-choice tests that “prove” they know both their subject matter and how to teach: a. Work with your student to find solutions to the problem. b. Belittle your student each time he misbehaves. c. Blame the government. d. All of the above. ETS makes a killing, the state checks off a box on their NCLB form, and the prospective teacher jumps through the hoop, rolls over, sits up, and begs for mercy. The American Board “Distinguished Teacher” test is almost identical: 4 hours of torturous bologna consisting of 5% multiple-choice questions about Instructional Knowledge and Professional Skills.

It would appear that Senator Madsen and the other members of the Senate Education Committee had to answer for themselves two basic questions about this legislation. Should we in good faith commit resources, information, and proposals to the Merit Pay Task Force…or try to pass an arbitrary, one-sided proposal via a deceptive out-of-state mechanism? And second, should we define merit as a rigorous examination of all aspects of teaching by a well-known and respected teacher organization…or as passing a multiple-choice test and receiving a “pilot certification” from a front organization for “education reform” groups? Apparently, the answers come pretty easily if money and vouchers are involved. I wonder what the simple, multiple-choice test to become a legislator looks like?