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Northjersey.com - The Record - Court ruling could mean N.J. budget scramble
Star Ledger column - Say goodbye to some good superintendents in New Jersey (This column focuses on Paramus superintendent and GSCS Board member Jim Montesano, who will be leaving that post for a similar in Nyack N.Y. He will be missed by his students, and his community at home and at-large.)
Star Ledger - N.J. Democrats say bill offering vouchers for students in failing public schools is too costly
Njspotlight.com -1) Abbott Preschools Continue to Be Bright Spot, and, 2)Opinion: Stay the Course on Education Reform? Fuggedaboutit
Northjersey.com - The Record - Court ruling could mean N.J. budget scramble
Northjersey.com - The Record - Court ruling could mean N.J. budget scramble
Star Ledger column - Say goodbye to some good superintendents in New Jersey
Star Ledger - N.J. Democrats say bill offering vouchers for students in failing public schools is too costly
Njspotlight.com - Abbott Preschools Continue to Be Bright Spot
Njspotlight.com - Opinion: Stay the Course on Education Reform? Fuggedaboutit
Northjersey.com - The Record - Court ruling could mean N.J. budget scramble
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Last updated: Sunday April 10, 2011, 11:47 AM
The Record
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
TRENTON — Governor Christie is warning that if the state Supreme Court rules the way it usually does on a long-running school funding case, it could doom other state services.
The build-up about the immediate consequences gives the chapter of the court case known as Abbott v. Burke even more significance than many of the 20 other decisions in the case dating back to the 1980s.
The question now before the court is whether the state's cuts in aid to schools for the current academic year were so deep that New Jersey didn't live up to its constitutional requirement of providing a "thorough and efficient education" to all students.
It's not clear when it might be decided.
But lawyers for the state and for children in the poorest school districts filed legal papers last week laying out their sides. Oral arguments are scheduled for April 20.
Over the long history of the case, the state Supreme Court has consistently ruled that New Jersey should provide more money to the state's poorest school districts.
The rulings have led to free preschools for 3- and 4-year-olds in those cities. Those programs are often cited as national models and given credit for improving test scores of grade-school students. The infusion of money has also brought replacements and repairs for many of their decrepit school buildings, extra help for teaching key areas such as reading.
But they've rankled opponents in multiple ways. First, they're a scourge to people, like Christie, who say judges shouldn't make laws. The rulings have a direct effect on the state's budget. And Christie cites this case as the main reason he wants to change the makeup of the Supreme Court.
School officials in the state's suburbs often complain that their districts get relatively little state aid because schools in the places with special help from the state get so much.
Also, as Christie points out frequently, the changes ordered by the court have not brought the educational outcomes in the urban districts close to those in the rest of the state — even though the low-income districts now spend as much on education as the state's wealthiest districts — and in several cases, more.
Cities like Camden and Newark remain plagued by high dropout rates and low test scores. Christie often tells audiences that less than half the students in Newark graduate from high school, and also notes that 95 percent of those who do graduate and go onto community college need remedial classes.
"The high school diploma they got was worthless," he said last month in a town hall meeting in Hammonton. "Worthless."
Christie says more money won't fix the problems. Instead, he wants to be able to more easily remove ineffective teachers and expand schooling options by offering more publicly funded charter schools and giving some students scholarships — funded by tax-deductible gifts from corporations — to go to private schools. He's also called for bonuses for top educators who go to work in troubled schools.
Last month, a lower-court judge given a fact-finding assignment by the state Supreme Court calculated that the difference in state aid to local schools between a plan that the court previously found constitutional and what was given for the current year was $1.6 billion.
The Education Law Center, an advocacy group that represents children in low-income cities, says the 2011-12 state budget should restore that amount to schools, and that the state should be required to fund fully its school aid formula for the two years after that.
The advocacy group says that achieving educational equity is so important that a tough economy shouldn't be a major consideration.
"The history of school funding litigation in this State demonstrates that adequate funding remains the touchstone of constitutional compliance, and that compliance with this court's decisions has never been entirely excused," it says in legal papers, "as the state seeks in response to the present enforcement motion, because of year-to-year changes in fiscal conditions."
The state argues that the executive and legislative branches should be trusted to come up with a fair way to subsidize schools. For the current year, the state sent nearly $7 billion to local school districts. Christie is proposing an increase in state money to districts of about $250 million for the upcoming academic year. That's nearly $1.4 billion less than the Education Law Center says is needed.
In its brief filed with the state Supreme Court this week, the state argued that last year's budget cuts struck an appropriate balance between the disparate state Constitutional requirements providing a "thorough and efficient" education and balancing the budget, even in a time when revenue was declining.
The state's lawyers argue that Christie's approach was fair because it cut about 5 percent of the total budgets of every school district in the state. That meant that wealthier schools lost a higher proportion of their state aid — and all of it, in some cases. The cuts meant layoffs of educators and cutbacks of programs across the state, resulting in bigger class sizes, cuts to summer school and extracurricular activities.
Christie says he's confident the state won't be ordered to add that much funding to school aid in the upcoming year. But he's also increasingly using that figure as a worst-case scenario for budgeting.
The governor said money would be diverted from other programs if the court orders more education spending. Christie opposes tax increases, though Democrats in the Legislature have previously pushed for a higher tax level to be restored for the state's highest earners.
Christie identified several possible sources for the additional school aid, none of them palatable to lawmakers especially in an election year. Christie said $1 billion would be made available by eliminating all property tax relief, including aid to senior citizens and veterans. The state could reduce aid to towns, currently at $1.4 billion, or aid to higher education, including county colleges and scholarships, now at $1.25 billion, he said.
And, the governor said, more than $900 million would be freed up if all hospital aid and charity care was eliminated, an extraordinarily unlikely situation brought up to emphasize the potential magnitude of the high court's decision.
State Assemblyman John Wisniewski, who is also chairman of the Democratic State Committee, said the education cuts made last year — which were adopted by the Legislature — should not have been made. He said that the court may bring consequences to the governor for the decision.
"Because of a worldwide financial crisis, we cannot be so shortsighted to deny children this year and next year the kind of education they deserve for the rest of their lives because it fits this governor's conservative talking points," he said.
Star Ledger column - Say goodbye to some good superintendents in New Jersey
Published: Sunday, April 10, 2011, 6:29 AM
Imagine that your boss gave you a rave review, and then cut 25 percent from your salary, and no one else’s.
Many of us would follow the path of Jim Montesano, the superintendent of schools in Paramus. He quit and will soon take another job doing the same thing just over the border in Nyack, N.Y., with a small raise.
“I know people will criticize me and say I’m making a move for money,” Montesano says. “I’m not going to argue that. But I also feel real resentment about the fairness of this. And the manner it was presented.”
Count Paramus among the first handful of school districts to lose an effective superintendent because of the new cap on their salaries imposed by Gov. Chris Christie.
Others will follow. Executive search firms are now turning their gaze to New Jersey, offering superintendents better deals in New York and Connecticut. Montesano was approached by two search firms and wound up with three job offers.
If he had stayed in Paramus, his salary would have dropped from $232,000 to $175,000.
Hank Gmitro, president of HYA and Associates, was one of the recruiters who called him. Several other superintendents have reached out to Gmitro recently because of the cap, he says.
“Why would anyone earn $35,000 or $40,000 less for the same work,” he says. “It’s going to be hard for New Jersey to attract the strongest candidates into that environment.”
Maybe some will stay for sentimental reasons. But if that didn’t hold Montesano, it’s not likely to hold many others.
He is a Jersey guy, a native of Hackensack whose father was a Jersey superintendent. Three of his brothers are Jersey superintendents, or were. He loves the state and its diversity, and his roots run deep.
But now that he’s leaving, Montesano is free to say what so many educators only whisper: He can’t stand the governor.
He doesn’t want to work for a guy who calls educators “greedy” and focuses relentlessly on school failures in a state where students score near the top of the nation in every test.
“It’s absolutely insulting,” Montesano says. “And classroom teachers feel demoralized by it. I always held the governor’s office in high regard. I think of Gov. (Tom) Kean. There was a sense of dignity there. But the conversation from the governor’s office now reminds me of the “Jerry Springer Show.”
“All of us realize that changing benefits and salaries are conversations that need to happen. But it’s the lack of human decency. People who entered this profession, their motives are being questioned. And these are hardworking people. I just hope that parents, who have the largest stake in this, are paying attention.”
Because of the high cost of living, the impact of the salary cap will land hardest in the state’s northern counties, home to many of its highest-achieving schools.
In Bergen County, 62 of 65 districts exceed the cap. In Gloucester County, only 2 of 20 do.
If that seems arbitrary, there is more. The cap doesn’t apply to charter schools, for example. And why should the president of a community college be allowed to earn more than a district superintendent? What about the many bureaucrats in the Port Authority who cash bigger paychecks? Rutgers football coach Greg Schiano is paid $2 million a year, win or lose. Enough said.
The idea behind this cap, the governor says, is to save money and reduce property taxes. Let’s take a look.
The cap will save just under $10 million a year, according to the governor’s office. That compares to $24 billion in school costs. With luck, your property taxes might drop by a dime.
This isn’t about money; it’s about politics. The governor is a wedge politician who needs a steady stream of enemies to kick around and demonize. Superintendents had to take their turn, even if that disrupts some of the state’s best school systems.
Tony Feorenzo, president of the Paramus school board, says Montesano has saved the district much more money than is at stake under this cap. He’s reformed the district’s curriculum and kept teachers focused on student performance.
“He’s done such a good job,” Feorenzo says. “He embraces people. He has an open door for teachers, students, parents. He’s a real communicator. It’s going to be a hard loss for our district, it really is.”
There is one bright note. The cap expires in 2014. Until then, brace yourself for more departures.
Tom Moran may be reached at tmoran@starledger.com or (973) 392-5728.
Star Ledger - N.J. Democrats say bill offering vouchers for students in failing public schools is too costly
Published: Sunday, April 10, 2011, 6:36 PM Updated: Monday, April 11, 2011, 11:22 AM
TRENTON — When an Assembly committee recently advanced a bill offering scholarships for students in failing public schools to attend private schools of their choice, proponents said the legislation had enough votes to land on Gov. Chris Christie’s desk within weeks.
Two months later, Democrats now say the bill lacks their support and may not make it out of the lower house or the Senate. Assembly Budget Committee Chairman Louis Greenwald (D-Camden) said the legislation, which includes 13 target districts, needs to be scaled back in scope and cost.
"There is no support for the bill in the caucus at its current size," Greenwald said. "Thirteen towns is not a pilot program, it’s a cultural shift."
Assembly Majority Leader Joe Cryan (D-Union) said the bill (A2810 in the Assembly and S1872 in the Senate) is not manageable in its current state and requires "extensive reworking."
"If it moved forward at all, and I would emphasize ‘if,’ it would move forward as a much-scaled-down version," Cryan said.
The Opportunity Scholarship Act would offer vouchers to as many as 40,000 low-income public school students in the 13 districts — which include Newark, Jersey City and Lakewood. Elementary students would get up to $8,000 a year and high school students up to $11,000 for tuition at private and parochial schools.
An estimate of the Senate bill by the nonpartisan state Office of Legislative Services pegs the program’s cost at $840 million for its first five years. That money would come not from state coffers, but rather from donations made by businesses that would then be eligible for tax credits in equal amounts.
A recent U.S. Supreme Court decision affirming the constitutionality of school vouchers funded by tax credits led Christie to again call for swift passage of the bill in hopes that eligible students could enroll in new schools by the fall.
Christie accused legislators who do not support the scholarship act of being "owned by special interests" and likened opposing the program to "a sin." If the bill ever reaches his desk, Christie has pledged to sign it without delay.
"Basically what they’re saying to poor people in failing districts is ‘Hang in there; it might get better someday,’" Christie said. "But in the meantime, day after day, week after week, year after year, those students are failing."
Since clearing the Assembly Commerce Committee in February amid predictions it would soon go to Christie, the bill fell out of favor with some Democrats because of the "toxicity" surrounding the often impassioned debate over private school vouchers, said Assemblyman Albert Coutinho (D-Essex), who chairs the committee.
"It was wishful thinking of supporters to say it was a done deal," he said.
The Assembly’s version of the voucher legislation would offer smaller scholarships than the Senate version and cost less, yet Greenwald said the program would still need to be capped at five or six failing school districts to gain the support it needs to move forward.
Opponents of the bill, including the state’s largest teachers union, said they were glad the legislation has stalled, according to New Jersey Education Association spokesman Steve Baker. Following the bill’s approval by the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee in January, the NJEA launched a campaign to educate legislators and the public on why vouchers are "not the right policy for New Jersey."
Baker said the teachers union would also oppose a scaled down version of the bill, because it would also be an ineffective use of public tax dollars.
"We talk to a lot of legislators about a lot of issues, and this is an issue we addressed with a number of legislators," Baker said. "We made sure they were aware of the bill’s cost, how it worked, and the impact of vouchers in other parts of the country.
Research conducted by the University of Indiana Bloomington and the University of Arkansas on voucher programs in Cleveland, Milwaukee and Washington, D.C., show students in those programs did little better than their public school counterparts on state tests.
Students in the Washington voucher program did, however, have a 12 percent higher probability of graduating from high school, and their parents reported feeling their children were safer at voucher schools.
One of the bill’s prime sponsors in the Senate, Minority Leader Tom Kean Jr. (R-Union), said the ills of chronically failing schools will take so long to fix that if the state doesn’t offer an immediate alternative, "we risk allowing these children to move forward in life without the tools they need to succeed as adults."
Senate Republican spokesman Adam Bauer urged lawmakers to post the bill for full votes in both houses of the Legislature in spite of waning support from the Democrats. But even some Senate Republicans are still questioning the merits of the bill.
State Sen. Diane Allen (R-Burlington) said she does not support the bill "at the moment," in part because of concerns about whether it’s constitutional, a question for which she has turned to attorneys for advice.
"Our New Jersey Constitution says, as I recall, that we promise a thorough and efficient education through public schools. This (bill) would be doing something other than that, so I’m just not clear that it’s constitutional."
Staff writers Matt Friedman and Chris Megerian contributed to this report.
Njspotlight.com - Abbott Preschools Continue to Be Bright Spot
Court’s mandates for full-day pre-K win both in research and politics
By John Mooney, April 11 in Education |Post a Comment
For all the debate over Abbott v. Burke and how much New Jersey's urban schools should receive in funding, one topic is seeing less argument these days: the value of the state’s court-ordered preschool.
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Gov. Chris Christie’s proposed budget for next year has left untouched the funding for two years of full-day preschool for more than 40,000 children in the 31 Abbott districts. The program is now in its 10th year by order of the state Supreme Court.
Beyond that, acting Education Commissioner Chris Cerf has openly called the state’s preschool push a success that should be left alone. His staff last week gave a presentation to the Board of Education (BOE) that provided new research as to the benefits and quality of preschool in districts like Newark, Camden and Paterson.
In one of several studies presented, more than 700 students attending two years of full-day preschool were followed into elementary school and compared with students who didn’t attend preschool.
By second grade, according to one of the findings, they were half as likely to need to be repeat a grade.
"That is huge," said Ellen Wolock, the state Department of Education’s director of preschool education. "The whole rest of their lives can be impacted by having to be held back."
Open to Debate
That’s not to say there is no debate at all. Some Assembly Republicans this winter pitched a plan to scale back the state’s commitment to the Abbott preschool and use some of the money for suburban districts. As Christie’s budget continues under review, they are not giving up, either.
Meanwhile, new early childhood centers for the Abbott districts that were once planned under the state’s school construction program have been largely put on hold.
Six new early childhood centers in places like Passaic, Keansburg and Jersey City that were on the state’s priority list two years ago are now under review, along with 100 other projects.
Officials of the Schools Development Authority (SDA) have only said they are looking at "alternative delivery" methods, which could include relying on some of the private providers that already make up a good portion of many district programs.
Protecting Preschool
When Christie administration lawyers went before the state Supreme Court and a fact-finding hearing to argue against providing additional aid for at-risk students, preschool was noticeably absent from the discussion. The case is slated back before the court next week.
"It’s really hard to argue against a program that you can prove is successful," said Ellen Frede, co-director of the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers and the architect of much of New Jersey’s program under then-Gov. Jim McGreevey.
"I don’t know why anyone talks about it any more,” she said. “We have something really winning here."
The central tenets of the programs are that all teachers are certified, class sizes are limited to no more than 15 students, and programs follow research-driven curriculum. And the research of Frede and others found that the programs consistently meet quality benchmarks.
For example, the study looked at whether programs in teaching early literacy highlighted a variety of print materials in the classroom or made students aware of the sounds they use in words.
In 2003, the average score of programs across the state was below 3 in a scale of 1-5. In 2009, it was just below 4.
At the presentation last week, board members said this is one of the inarguable success stories of the Abbott court that otherwise continue to be so hotly debated.
"New Jersey is really at the forefront in early childhood education nationally," said Dorothy Strickland, a Rutgers professor in literacy education and a member of the state board. "And in terms of the long-term costs, the benefits are obviously great for dropout prevention and other areas.”
Still, she and others said the challenge continues to be in maintaining that progress and extending the program to other at-risk students, as well as up into the earliest grades of elementary schools.
"We’ve come a long way, but we need to keep moving forward," Strickland said.
Njspotlight.com - Opinion: Stay the Course on Education Reform? Fuggedaboutit
Between extreme and incremental, there is a way to help poor students in troubled schools
By Laura Waters, April 8 in Opinion |Post a Comment
New Jersey, America’s wild child, is once again acting out. While some states choose a dignified scholar to offer words of wisdom to their college graduates, we choose Snooki, the wanton star of Jersey Shore.
While some unions and governors maintain diplomatic relations, the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA) leaders disseminate death threats against Gov. Chris Christie, who in turn calls them "political thugs" on national TV.
And while some states articulate plans to improve the academic lot of poor students in failing schools, they’re largely opting for an incremental strategy -- a dash of accountability here, a pinch of data-driven evaluations there -- with the emphasis on collaboration among stakeholders.
Jersey? Fuggedaboutit.
We dabbled in incrementalism way back when Bret Schundler was commissioner. Now we’re all about that grand, sweeping gesture, which carries with it a whole host of risks.
But read on. Maybe we can have it both ways: keep our grand gestures and still adopt a kinder, gentler approach to problem solving.
Living LIFO
First, an example of the incrementalist approach to education reform, best exemplified through the concept of LIFO, or "last in, first out."
When local districts have to lay off teachers or other tenured staff due to budget cuts or shrinking enrollment, LIFO dictates that they must disregard teacher quality and eliminate staff members in the order of seniority. The last one hired is the first one fired.
It’s a big target for those interested in improving education in our worst schools. No other factor in a child’s education looms as large as the quality of the teacher in front of the classroom, and no other industry makes it harder to fire ineffective employees.
A relic of the industrial era that has sculpted America’s teachers unions, LIFO was intended as a bulwark against cronyism (now effectively barred through nepotism laws) and ageism (now barred through age-discrimination laws). It’s obsolete and runs contrary to growing piles of research that show that teacher quality rises for the first few years and then plateaus.
In addition, LIFO unduly hammers poor districts, which tend to have a young, mobile and low-seniority teaching staff. In Los Angeles, for example, the ACLU has filed a civil rights class action suit against public schools because a recent set of lay-offs completely preserved teaching staff in high-income districts while decimating as much as 72 percent of staff in poor districts.
So is the best strategy the chainsaw approach, a bold elimination of LIFO? Or is change best accomplished incrementally, through a gentle pruning of past practices?
Other states are opting for the gentle approach. Changes meant to upgrade both the status and quality of the teaching force, they’ve concluded, are best accomplished in little bites, instead of bold changes to contracts and statutes.
In New Haven, for example, the much-trumpeted innovative teacher contract preserves the sway of seniority when determining lay-offs.
Was LIFO discussed? Absolutely, according to union chief Joan Devlin, and the new contract will link teacher evaluations to student growth.
But not LIFO. "We’ll get there," she said. "But not yet."
New York, New York
In New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg has derided LIFO’s obsolescence. Yet his rhetoric fell short when Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York legislature bowed to intense union pressure (although NY is currently examining a proposal that would combine elements of seniority and student achievement in lay-off decisions).
Last year in Florida, a bill that would have put teachers on annual contracts and tied evaluations to student growth was backed by Gov. Charlie Crist.
But after the bill passed the Florida legislature, Crist vetoed it due to push-back from the Florida Education Association. Now the bill’s back in the House, where it may pass in a weaker form.
Meanwhile New Jersey, always the dilettante, has experimented with both strategies. We’re in recovery for incrementalism. We recognize that compromise is a failure of nerve and that the virtue of collaboration with stakeholders undermines the urgency of rescuing children trapped in substandard schools.
Think back to the national education reform competition called Race To The Top. Commissioner Schundler talked tough on LIFO with the leaders of NJEA, standing firm on our commitment to eliminate quality-blind lay-offs.
But a last-second (unsanctioned) huddle produced a proposal that maintained tenure rules and offered incremental changes to our public school system. Of course, we reversed course yet again, submitting the original proposal to the federal government. But that’s another story.
Times change. In February acting Commissioner Chris Cerf dismissed collaboration and produced a tenure reform proposal as sharp as a Wisconsin cheddar, including the elimination of LIFO.
Relations with the teachers unions? Not so good.
So where do we go from here? Remember this: New Jersey has a long history of distinguishing poor underperforming districts from wealthy high-performing ones, most notably through our noble experiment in education equity known as the Abbott decisions.
Let’s take those districts -- or some similar list -- and pilot a new system of teacher compensation and job security. Offer higher salaries (the task is more formidable than in cushier districts, right?) and implement quality-based lay-offs.
Surely there’s an acceptable metric for teacher evaluations that combines student growth, teacher proficiency, and, yes, seniority.
Here’s an opportunity to restore amity with union leaders yet act with fortitude, maturity and urgency. We can reward our best teachers, inject the industry with much-needed professionalism and be a national model for answering the exigent needs of our poor urban students.
This is the Garden State. Let’s have it both ways.
