Out of Control

Your "First Five" dollars working for poor children?

NOT.

From the "you can't make this stuff up files," the San Francisco Chronicle reports on some San Francisco parents benefiting from some dubious First Five grants.

Scores of savvy San Francisco parents have tapped a pot of taxpayer dollars for everything from children's ice skating lessons and Monterey Bay Aquarium field trips to supplies for Halloween parties and chartered buses to the Jelly Belly factory in Fairfield.

Last year, about $564 million in Prop. 10 revenue was distributed by the state and its 58 county First 5 commissions, which have wide discretion over how the money is used. San Francisco's commission receives about $9 million annually and uses $200,000 each year to fund its unique Parent Action Grants program, which began in 2001.

A sampling of the grants:

-- "Families of La Piccola Scuola Italiana" included holiday party space rental and the purchase of a Babbo Natale (Italian version of Santa Claus) costume.

Check out these "savvy" parents justification ...

While she was grateful for the grant and its positive impact, she did feel uncomfortable knowing the funding came from a cigarette tax, which is regressive.

"Even though we're well-educated enough to apply for the grant and carry it out doesn't mean we have the financial resources to do this on our own," she said. "Families that are willing to go through the process - regardless of income - should be allowed to have it."

Two great new additions to the education blogosphere.

First, education scholar and economist Jay P. Greene from the University of Arkansas Department of Education Reform and Manhattan Institute fame has an appropriately self-titled education blog. Today, he looks at the "more money myth," riffing off of a Sunday LA Times story that bemoans the lack of state funding and the need of private funders to fill the gap in California.

Greene writes:

But the LA Times article suggests that private giving can (and must) make a big difference. It cites the example of the Irvine Public Schools, which receives $3 million annually from a community foundation. it also quotes the head of that foundation saying, “The only way to take good districts and make them great is to do private fund-raising. But it’s even more urgent now with the terrible budget cuts.” Nowhere does the article mention that this $3 million represents less than 1% of the total spending by the district. Numerators always feel bigger without denominators.

The only way the money myth will fade is if reporters and newspapers are held accountable for repeating it.

The second new blog, Flypaper, is a group blog by the Fordham istitute's multiple education scholars, including Chester E. Finn and Mike Petrilli. Petrilli looks at how collective bargaining ideas are flowing backwards in a reverse commute from K-12 to higher ed.

But now one of public education’s worst features—its hyper-unionized workforce—is finding its way into higher ed. At least that’s the intent of a bill introduced yesterday by Senator Edward Kennedy and Representative George Miller (respective chairmen of their chambers’ education committees) that would allow graduate students who serve as teaching or research assistants to bargain collectively. This is only likely to drive up tuition and drive down quality.

Colleges and universities: we feel your pain. But maybe this is some sort of Karmic payback for all the damage you’ve done to our elementary and secondary schools.

Meanwhile, Chester E. Finn takes Cato Institute to task for being too libertarian on education reform:

You gotta give it to purebred libertarians, they never let their vision of how the world ought to work be distorted by any realities about how it actually works. Nowhwere is this clearer than in K-12 education, where the CATO crowd, indistinguishable nowadays from the “separation of school and state crowd,” basically doesn’t believe in any form of public education. They believe in private education, purchased in the marketplace by parents who want and can afford it for their kids from schools that are not accountable to anybody for anything except keeping those tuition payments rolling in the door. The heck with everybody else’s kids.

The horror of it all.

Much, much more at both blogs. As the saying goes, "read the whole blog!!!!"

Michelle Rhee moves forward on her plan to use outside providers and charter schools to restructure DC's low-performing schools. Rhee seems to be taking an approach that includes parents in the discussion.

Via today's Washington Post.

D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee plans to hire up to six nonprofit educational companies to help run the city's 10 comprehensive high schools and has invited parents to meet with her tonight to discuss the details.

For months, Rhee has discussed hiring firms as one of five options she could use under the federal No Child Left Behind law to fix 10 high schools and 17 elementary and middle schools. Students there missed academic benchmarks on the system's standardized test for five consecutive years. Rhee's plan applies only to the high schools.

Rhee's plan names six nonprofit organizations: Bedford Academy High School in New York; Friendship Public Charter School in the District; Institute for Student Achievement in Lake Success, N.Y.; Mastery Charter Schools in Philadelphia; St. HOPE Public Schools in Sacramento; and Talent Development High Schools in Baltimore.

Sol Stern's feature article that claims that an instructionist approach to education works better than incentives and competition continues to flow through the news cycle--this weekend it was in my local paper the Riverside Press Enterprise. Stern claims that Massachusetts is a good model to follow for school reform. I take on Stern's arguments in this Reason feature.

Here is more evidence that Mass. may not represent an instructional miracle.

From today's Boston Globe:

Thousands of Massachusetts public high school graduates arrive at college unprepared for even the most basic math and English classes, forcing them to take remedial courses that discourage many from staying in school, according to a statewide study released yesterday.

The study raises concern that the state's public schools are not doing enough to prepare all of their students for college, despite years of overhauls and large infusions of money.

Competition works and fast. I love JetBlue.

Via today's Los Angeles Times:

Even as rising fuel costs are grounding weaker airlines -- including three this month -- airline competition is heating up for travelers flying the Pacific coast.

"You've got a lot of competition out there unlike the East Coast where subpar service allowed JetBlue to make inroads by treating customers well," said Michael Boyd, an aviation consultant in Evergreen, Colo. "Alaska and Southwest are also known for treating customers well."

If only schools had a real orientation towards customers.

Reason’s Lisa Snell examines concerns that thousands of California teachers will soon be laid off and says, “Education officials at the state, county and local levels need to seriously look at reducing the number of professional educators who are not in classrooms. When revenues are tight, spending reductions need to be made outside of the classroom first.”

Congress set aside a record $2.3 billion in pet projects for colleges and universities last year for research on subjects like berries and reducing odors from swine and poultry, according to an analysis by The Chronicle of Higher Education to be published on Monday.

Despite recent calls in Congress for a moratorium on the home state projects, known as earmarks, the sum was $300 million more than the last time The Chronicle conducted its survey, in 2003, when the total was $2.01 billion. When the publication first analyzed earmarks in 1990, legislators set aside $270 million for colleges and universities.

Congress approved 2,306 earmarks last year for higher education, compared with 223 in 1990, The Chronicle said.

Full fatty story at theNew York Times.

Failing schools in Bay state get euphemism for their euphemism.

Via Boston Globe

To soothe the bruised egos of educators and children in lackluster schools, Massachusetts officials are now pushing for kinder, gentler euphemisms for failure.

Schools in the direst straits, now known as "chronically underperforming," would get the more urgent but still vague label of "priority one."

Reason on "failing schools," I mean "underperforming schools," oops I mean "priority one schools" here.

Reason Foundation's Joanne Jacobs reports, "More than a thousand Catholic schools have closed since 2000 and more are being lost every year. Enrollment, which peaked at 5.2 million in 13,000 schools in 1960, has fallen to 2.3 million students in 7,500 schools...While parochial schools are much cheaper than most private alternatives, they are having trouble competing against tuition-free charter schools, which are expanding rapidly in urban areas with low-performing schools."

Jacobs concludes, "If poor children are going to be liberated [from failing schools], private philanthropists will have to take the lead...Ninety-nine percent of Catholic high school students graduate and 97 percent of graduates go on to college, says the National Catholic Educational Association. That track record has drawn support from donors of all religious backgrounds. For donors who want more brains for the buck, the Catholic schools are a good investment."

Full Column

Reason Foundation's Education Research and Commentary

A new survey of high school students points to troubling trends in our nation's schools according to "Still at Risk: What Students Don't Know, Even Now" released by the American Enterprise Institute.

Among the discouraging statistics on history from the 1,200 students surveyed:

*just 43% correctly knew the Civil War was fought between 1850 and 1900;
*about half knew that communism was the focus of Joseph McCarthy's investigations in the 1950s;
*abotu half knew that Orwell classic 1984 was about dictatorship and collectivism.

Yet,

*97% knew Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote the "I Have a Dream Speech"
*88% knew Pearl Harbor prompted the US's entry into WWII

Perhaps most troubling is the following comment in the USA Today story reporting on the study:

In all, students earned a C in history and an F in literature, though the survey suggests students do well on topics schools cover.

Checker Finn, Jr. of the Fordham Foundation had the best summary when he told USA Today:

"School has emphasized Martin Luther King, and everybody teaches it, and people are learning it," says Chester Finn of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, an education think tank. "What a better thing it would be if people also had the Civil War part and the civil rights part, and the Harriet Tubman part and the Uncle Tom's Cabin part."

Take the 6 question on-line test at AOL News.

Both Hillary and Obama list "universal preschool" as their number one education policy.

So if Hillary wins her education platform is universal preschool:

From her website:
Currently, less than 20 percent - only 800,000 out of four million - of four year olds and 120,000 three year olds are enrolled in state pre-K programs, according to the National Institute for Early Education Research. Hillary’s proposal would ensure that every child who needs pre-K would receive it by providing universal access to high quality pre-K for four year olds in five years through a federal-state partnership. Her proposal also provides flexibility to allow states to serve younger children once they have provided pre-K to all four year olds who need it.

Of course she only counts the 20 percent in state care, failing to mention that 80 percent of four year olds have been through some kind of pre-k. Those mom co-ops and Christian pre-schools don't count. Neither does the YMCA or that high-priced KinderCare...

If its not state-run it must not exist.

If Obama wins, he's also for, you guessed it, universal preschool.

From his website:

Zero to Five Plan: Obama's comprehensive "Zero to Five" plan will provide critical support to young children and their parents. Unlike other early childhood education plans, Obama's plan places key emphasis at early care and education for infants, which is essential for children to be ready to enter kindergarten. Obama will create Early Learning Challenge Grants to promote state "zero to five" efforts and help states move toward voluntary, universal pre-school.

Key difference, Obama would fund those kiddos sooner...

Also, he still likes Head Start as the main provider. Forget those state-run programs, let's go for the federal-run programs instead.

Considering California already has a $14.5 billion deficit (and counting) now does not seem to be the time to tie up even larger portions of the state budget with constitutional guarantees.

One of the state initiatives with the most significant impact on the state budget in California is proposition 93. If passed this proposition would create a mandatory funding minimum for California community colleges similar to the K12 mandatory funding-- proposition 98.

This is another example of ballot box budgeting where special interests lock in funding guaranteed by the state constitution. This is a trend that gives legislators less control over the state budget and contributes to future deficits as the legislature cannot reduce spending on constitutionally-guaranteed programs.

The community college initiative would also limit the amount of fees that could be charged to community college students to $15 per unit (less than a new CD or DVD!) and limits future fee increases. California already charges some of the lowest fees in the nation for community college courses.

To see our analysis of why proposition 98, which guarantees 40 percent of the budget to education, is a disaster go here.

Boston.com reports on Super Tuesday pork, listing just a few of the projects being sought for states where primaries are happening today. Included are national "imperatives" such as:
• Alaska: $487,000 to the Galena City School District for a boarding school for low performing native students from remote villages across Western Alaska.
• Arkansas: $679,150 to the Criminal Justice Institute of Little Rock for a law enforcement education and training program.
• Delaware: $390,000 to the Delaware Education Department for the Starting Stronger Early Learning initiative.
• Idaho: $292,000 to the Lee Pesky Learning Center in Boise to provide educational materials for literacy programs.
• Massachusetts: $235,000 for a weather buoy for Nantucket Sound.
• New Jersey: $624,000 to Rutgers University Law School in Camden for student scholarships and loan repayment, internships and public interest programming (because New Jersey doesn't tax its citizens enough!).
• New York: $243,000 to the Onondaga County Public Library in Syracuse for technology upgrades.
• Tennessee: $4,875,000 to the University of Tennessee in Knoxville for the Baker Center for Public Policy.

Via Center for Education Reform

You could knock me down with a feather: New York's Democratic Governor Eliot Spitzer – a big government liberal best known for using dirty tactics to terrorize political opponents and company CEO’s – proposed a bold new plan to cap property taxes in his recent state-of-state address. The plan, which seeks to impose a "fair and effective cap" on school taxes in New York, is remarkable for two reasons: One, it has been proposed by a big government liberal. Two, it will drive teachers unions, a key Democratic constituency, totally bonkers. But the governor seems unfazed. He insists that though the cap is a “blunt instrument,” it is necessary to force “hard choices and discipline when nothing else works” to rein in wasteful spending by schools.

Ronald Reagan couldn't have said it better!

Read New York Post columnist, E.J. Mcmahon’s, take here: http://www.nypost.com/seven/01102008/postopinion/opedcolumnists/eliots_excellent_idea_804389.htm?page=2

Via the Washington Post

Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine on Thursday scrapped his campaign promise to provide universal access to pre-kindergarten, announcing that he will instead push to more than double the number of underprivileged 4-year-olds eligible for early education at the state's expense.

"We're coming at it a little differently, because the experience of other states has convinced us to work within the existing system we already have," Kaine said in announcing his proposal at a day-long education forum....

Preschool programs that meet certain standards -- public, private or religious -- would be eligible for state funding to serve underprivileged children. Currently, only public schools participate in the Virginia Preschool Initiative.

While still an expansion of government into preschool, this is a win for two significant reasons.

1. He canceled his universal preschool program. While he is still offering more spending on preschool (like Schwarzenegger in Calif.), it is not targeted at middle and upper class families and will not be $300 million a year--to replace the private early education market with public school provision.

2. In a change from the previous program targeted to low-income children, which was provided only in public schools, Kaine is now letting non-profit and for-profit private providers, including religious schools, compete for the money in a more voucher-like system. The fact that he is not choosing the Oklahoma public school model is a significant loss to universal preschool advocates.

This is a huge change for Kaine who in his campaigning for Governor and even his response to President Bush’s State of the Union address touted access to prekindergarten for every family.

“There's a better way. … (than No Child Left Behind)

Many states are working to make high-quality pre-kindergarten accessible to every family.” State of the Union Response,” January 31, 2006.

It still a government expansion, but a slower one…

One of the little published but obvious facts about universal preschool is that when you make programs universal, there is less money for poorer more disadvantaged children. And parents and policymakers who represent communities who are not as disadvantaged are more savvy about directing resources to their children first. And even in disadvantaged communities, the most disadvantaged families are the least likely to benefit from these new preschool programs.

Ironic, I know.

Case in point, this radio program from Chicago Public Radio. Title says it all.

"Latino Children Shortchanged on Preschool for All"

When Illinois lawmakers voted last year to increase early education funding, they proudly labeled the plan “Preschool for All.” The extra $45 million last year—with a vow to add $90 million more by 2008—made headlines nationwide, and it’s already opened classrooms to thousands more kids. But a new report says many of Illinois’ poorest children are being shut out of the plan.

Another great study from Harvard's Caroline Hoxby that shows New York City charter schools scoring higher and with more disadvantaged kids.

Via Education Week

Students in New York City charter schools are, on average, posting higher gains in reading and mathematics than they would have had they attended the city’s regular public schools, a federally financed study concludes.

More than 90 percent of the charter applicants in the study came from low-income families, far more than in the 1.1 million-student school system as a whole, the authors say. Sixty-four percent were black, compared with 32 percent of students citywide.

I think it is terrible for individual students that UPrep charter school in Oakland cheated and lied about rising test scores. However, the school board's quick move to close the school after reviewing the evidence is to the board's credit and is the great benefit of the accountability of charter schools.

No one ever writes headlines like this one in the San Francisco Chronicle, "Students' stolen dreams:
In surprise meeting, board votes to shut Uprep after Chronicle reports that grades, test scores, attendance figures were changed" about the "Stolen Dreams" of regular public school students who attend low-performing schools for their entire public school career.

Yeah, it is sad that these kids have to enroll in new schools and it is disappointing/revolting that the adults at the charter school failed them in so many ways. Too bad that other schools that fail students do not face such a stiff sanction as closure. Those kids could benefit from a change as well.

No governing body has any plans to shut down Paterson, NJ school district or offer those 28,000 kids some relief.

Despite the Abbott school adequacy lawsuit, universal pre-k, state intervention, and a $15,000 + per-pupil investment,

Paterson district still failing in every way.

The 28,000-student Paterson district, which has been under state control since 1991 because of fiscal mismanagement and poor academics, failed to show satisfactory progress over the last year in any of the five main areas being evaluated: instruction and programs, school board operations, personnel, building maintenance and school safety, and budgetary issues.

Paterson is really a poster child for everything we know at Reason Foundation: state takeovers of school districts seldom help; more money does not guarantee performance; universal preschool is no panacea; and last but not least you need competition and choice to create more capacity for quality schools--vis-a-vis New Orleans.

Many folks have been very skeptical of the school choice based charter system in New Orleans. The charter schools seem to be working out for the kids that choose them.

Via the Times Picayune

In a ranking of the city's schools by percentage of students scoring at basic or above in English and math, the state's barometer for acceptable performance, 17 of the top 20 New Orleans schools are charters.

In the high school graduation exam, six of the top-10 schools are charters.

Many of the schools posting higher performance were lower-performing public schools before they were given the autonomy that comes with the charter school contract.

In some cases, the highest-scoring schools have selective admissions and scored high before they became charter schools. But Wright and Martin Behrman Elementary, which is part of the Algiers Charter School Association, showed striking improvement under the new charter model after years of posting failing or below-average scores.

This year, just 12 percent scored unsatisfactory; 46 percent scored approaching basic; and 37 percent scored basic.

The success of Recovery District charters is particularly encouraging, Jacobs said, because none of those schools has selective admissions, unlike some of the magnet schools chartered by the School Board. They're succeeding in educating students who likely arrived at their doorstep needing intensive help. "I am excited that we have already turned around some failing schools," she said.

I looked at New Orleans move to a choice-based school system here.

Via the Alliance for School Choice press release:

In a significant victory for Keystone State families, the Pennsylvania legislature last night approved a $16 million increase in the state’s Educational Improvement Tax Credit (EITC) program, the largest increase in the program’s history.

The program provides tax credits to companies that contribute to scholarship-granting non-profit organizations. Last year, more than 33,000 Pennsylvania children benefited from EITC-related scholarships. In a vote that passed by significant margins and with bipartisan support, the legislature increased funding for the program from $59 million to $75 million. The program’s new funding levels are: $44.7 million for scholarships, $22.3 million for innovative educational programs in public schools, and $8 million for pre-Kindergarten scholarships.

Via the Alliance for School Choice press release:

In a significant victory for Keystone State families, the Pennsylvania legislature last night approved a $16 million increase in the state’s Educational Improvement Tax Credit (EITC) program, the largest increase in the program’s history.

The program provides tax credits to companies that contribute to scholarship-granting non-profit organizations. Last year, more than 33,000 Pennsylvania children benefited from EITC-related scholarships. In a vote that passed by significant margins and with bipartisan support, the legislature increased funding for the program from $59 million to $75 million. The program’s new funding levels are: $44.7 million for scholarships, $22.3 million for innovative educational programs in public schools, and $8 million for pre-Kindergarten scholarships.

This should be out of an Onion story.

But alas, it is another chapter in the ongoing saga of sudents and parents versus dumb school board policies.

Via the Dallas News

At least the school board for Dallas Unified came to their senses and rescinded the policy. But as reported below, there are school districts in America that require students to use clear or mesh backpacks to fight violence and crime in their schools. Oye. My kids started school on Monday and I did not notice a selection of clear packbacks at Target and Staples.

Clear-backpack policy rescinded by DISD

Administrators had favored the clear backpacks, saying they would help make campuses safer and student security checks faster. Campuses around the country, including some in Royse City and Garland, have outlawed backpacks that are not mesh or clear.

The scariest thing is that four school board members voted for the policy, meaning they really believe that clear backpacks will have a substantial effect on school safety.

VIA the Los Angeles Times

The Belmont Learning Complex was envisioned as one of a kind. It would combine the city's first new high school in nearly 30 years with housing and retail development — extras that could raise money to help cap construction costs at about $45 million.

For all the money spent, "they probably could have built three more high schools, maybe four," said City Councilman Ed Reyes, who represents the area. "That's a very painful reality. I think 70% of the cost was not necessary."

My take on the dismal state of California's school construction process here.

More than $1 Billion in federal spending on nutrition programs has NOT reduced childhood obesity.

The federal government will spend more than $1 billion this year on nutrition education:

But an Associated Press review of scientific studies examining 57 such programs found mostly failure. Only four showed any real success in changing the way children eat.

From a public school near my house in Northern Virginia...

Isn't this something we should, um, take for granted? Keep in mind, my city spends around $15,000 a year per student.

For more info, check out Lisa Snell's excellent study on improving low performing schools.

Those fighting to ban race-based admission policies in public schools and colleges won a big victory today. The Supreme Court just struck down Seattle and Kentucky school districts' practice of matching students to schools by race. For years, hundreds of kids have been denied admission to schools of their choice in their own neighborhood in favor of worse ones much further away. Why? Because their skin tone threatened to disrupt the delicate racial balance district authorities were trying to achieve.

The court’s 5-4 decision in these cases effectively reversed its ruling three years ago when it gave the University of Michigan’s race-based admission policies a thumbs’ up. Outraged Michigan voters last year overturned that decision when they overwhelmingly approved a ballot initiative spearheaded by black California businessman Ward Connerly to ban the use of race in government admission and hiring. Connerly is launching similar petition drives in five more states in time for the 2008 November elections.

Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., writing the majority opinion in the Kentucky and Seattle cases, noted that school authorities had failed to meet the heavy burden of demonstrating why such race-based policies were necessary. “The best way to stop discrimination by race,” he said, “is to stop discriminating by race.”

Amen!

Here are the links to Reason’s coverage of the Michigan ballot initiative:

http://www.reason.org/commentaries/dalmia_20061026b.shtml
http://www.reason.org/commentaries/dalmia_20061107.shtml

And here is the Wall Street Journal story of the latest Supreme Court ruling:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118303957086351501.html?mod=djemalert

I love this.

This has the exact theme of my Reason story How Schools Cheat.

The Evergreen Freedom Foundation has won a huge legal battle today.

Today the United States Supreme Court announced it has overturned the Washington Supreme Court’s ruling in Washington v. Washington Education Association and Davenport v. Washington Education Association (WEA). The cases are the culmination of a decade’s worth of work by concerned teachers and the Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF), a Washington state think tank. The Court's ruling could potentially affect millions of union-represented workers nationwide.

The Court held today in Davenport that because a public-employee union possesses nonmember feepayers' funds only because of special state- conferred privileges, the state can place a content- based condition on the union's use of those funds -- namely, that the union obtain the feepayers' consent before using the funds for election-related activity.

Several states have passed paycheck protection laws in recent years, including Washington, Michigan, Idaho and Utah. In each case the laws came under relentless legal assault by unions desperate to protect their power to force members to fund their political agenda, regardless of the member's personal views.

This ruling has serious implication for choice-based school reform. In Utah for example, the recently passed universal school voucher legislation has now been held up for a popular vote in a November 2007 intitiative. This ruling should make it more difficult for local unions to divert dues to fight this school voucher program without specific teacher consent. Obviously, national unions will still direct large amounts of money to fight choice in Utah.

Similarly, local union dues are used in every kind of political campaign against choice-based reforms from opposing pro charter school school board members to fighting any state legislation that has choice implications.

In a potentially strong form of public school choice and competition, Georgia has passed a new law allowing entire school districts to seek charter status. This law would allow districts to opt-out of work rules and credentialing mandates and state mandates like class-size reduction in exchange for fiscal and academic accountability.

A plan that could give Georgia school systems a wider range of freedom to educate students was signed into law by Gov. Sonny Perdue on Tuesday.

The bill, which was pushed through the Legislature by Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, would eventually allow school boards to apply for the same flexibility for their entire systems that are already granted to charter schools.

The plan creates a pilot program in which five systems would be allowed to pursue charter status as early as next year.

More than 13 states have considered legislation to offer school vouchers to special education students in 2007.

Georgia becomes the first state in 2007 to actually approve vouchers for special needs students.

Read the details below from the press release from the Milton Friedman Foundation:

Special needs voucher bill sent to Georgia governor.

“The legislators in Georgia worked tirelessly to make this happen for the parents of special needs children,” said Gordon St. Angelo, president and CEO of the Friedman Foundation. “When elected officials listen to the demands of their constituents, the result is amazing.”

See Alliance for School Choice Press release here.

Similarly, Nevada is also close to passing a special needs voucher. Check out Alliance for School Choice coverage here.

Nevada families with children with special needs are one step closer to having a choice when it comes to their child’s education. The Special Needs Scholarship program, which will allow children with disabilities to attend the public or private school that best meets their complex educational needs, passed the Senate Human Resources and Education Committee on April 12. The bill will be heard in the Senate Finance Committee on Wednesday, April 25.

This was an historic moment for Nevada, as a school choice-related bill has never progressed this far in the state. SB 158 is sponsored by Sen. Barbara Cegavske. The program would allow parents of students with disabilities to send their child to the out-of-district public school or private school of their choice, if the parents are dissatisfied with their child’s progress under their Individualized Education Program (IEP). The amount of the scholarship would be less than or equal to the amount the student receives for his or her education in their assigned public school. Participating private schools must demonstrate financial viability and meet state nondiscrimination and safety requirements.

In 1960, there were 1.55 males for every female undergrad, but by 2003 there were 1.3 females for every male undergrad. What happened?

In The Homecoming of American College Women: The Reversal of the College Gender Gap (NBER Working Paper No. 12139), authors Claudia Goldin, Lawrence Katz, and Ilyana Kuziemko offer some explanations for the change.

Summary here.

Queensbury, a small town in the Adirondacks, spends less money on each student than any other public school district in the state. Bridgehampton, a resort town in Long Island, spends six times as much. But when it comes to statewide test scores, it's hard to tell the difference between the two.

In Queensbury, which spent $8,553 per student in the 2004–05 school year, more than 80% of fourth-graders passed state reading exams that same year and more than 90% passed the math tests. The same is true of Bridgehampton, which spends $51,828 on each student, according to a July 2005 state report to the governor and the legislature.

Demographically speaking, we don’t know if we have an apples-to-apples comparison. But, if anything, it seems like the kids from swanky Bridgehampton would have the advantage there.

Back to the bigger question: Does money matter?

"What we've found over time is that money is neither necessary nor sufficient to ensure high performance," a senior economist at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, Eric Hanushek, said. He is the editor of "Courting Failure," a book coming out Monday …

"Some schools spend a lot and get good performance and some spend a lot and get bad performance," he said. "If you go ahead and try to adjust for what the kids look like. … It doesn't help the picture, you get the same picture."
…
An analyst at the Manhattan Institute, Sol Stern, who is a contributor to "Courting Failure," says that even as spending per pupil doubled in New York City over the past decade, performance hasn't improved.

"If you watch what happened in New York City education budgets, you'll see that pupil spending went up," he said. "And eighth grade reading scores are as flat as they ever were."

Article here.

What could be worse than having a government monopoly run schools? Perhaps having “outsiders” run them.

NYT headline: City Considers Plans to Let Outsiders Run Schools

In what would be the biggest change yet to the way New York City’s school system is administered, officials are considering plans to hire private groups at taxpayer expense to manage scores of public schools. …

The move would further Chancellor Joel I. Klein’s earlier efforts to tear apart the traditional bureaucracy of the nation’s largest school system, giving principals greater autonomy and increasing the role of the private sector. It could put private entities like the College Board, the Urban Assembly and Expeditionary Learning-Outward Bound on contract to manage networks of schools as soon as the 2007-8 school year.

One unnamed education official says such talk is “a way to crush public education.”

How could New Yorkers trust those outsiders?

Under the new arrangement, the groups would oversee the schools and be held responsible for their results. They would be locked into contract terms and could be fired if student achievement lags.

Compare that to the status quo. For example, good luck firing an incompetent teacher.

One of the most hotly debated questions is whether the city would hire profit-making companies like Edison Schools Inc., which manages more than 20 schools in Philadelphia and has expressed interest in bidding on a city contract.

More here.

With more than one million students enrolled in charter schools nationwide, some individual communities are seeing large numbers of students enrolled in charter schools. Via a new study on charter school market share from the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools:

While charter schools enroll a modest percentage of students nationwide, some communities far exceed national and state averages to enroll high percentages of charter school students. In fact, 19 different communities educate over 13% of their public school students in charter schools (and ties account for 19 different communities being represented in our top "ten").

New Orleans leads the pack with 69% market share, due primarily to the post-Katrina reconstitution of the schools. Ohio has FIVE different communities in the top ten, with Dayton leading the pack at the #2 spot on our countdown with 28%. Alliance home base and our nation's capital, Washington D.C., comes in at #3 with 25%. And the largest community on the list is Detroit, with 18% of its nearly 160,000 students in public charters.

Too bad it took a hurricane to offer students real choice over their education and an exit from failing schools in New Orleans. However, every urban district that suffers from years of failure might consider New Orlean's school restructuring model. Start from scratch and make the schools compete.

From the New York Times:

More than 40 other public schools are scheduled to open by mid-September for an estimated 30,000 students in what is planned as a rebirth of one of the nation's worst school systems, which had about 60,000 students before the storm. . . .

There are no geographic requirements in the revamped system. Any student, living anywhere in the city, can register for any school on a first-come, first-served basis or by lottery, placing schools in competition for students and state funding, which is based on attendance.

Why not? Just look at the University of Texas - Austin; the Wall Street Journal reports today that Computer billionaire Michael Dell and his wife will give $50 million to the University of Texas for a pediatric research institute, a computer-sciences building and a center for healthy living.

This type of private academic funding is much preferable to the method of rent-seeking that university lobbyists have been relying on more and more over the years; they focus more on (often taxpayer-funded) free football tickets than free thinking. By requesting so-called "directed grants," or academic earmarks, universities are subverting the time-honored process of academic competition to garner research funds. In short, earmark-seeking academic researchers are becoming welfare queens in white coats.

Directed grants are academic ersatz; they fundamentally undermine scholarly competition and the peer review process that ensures quality in academia. Instead of relying on their academic acumen, universities must rely on connections to members of the powerful appropriations committees in Congress, which set the budget, to obtain earmarks. For example, New Hampshire, the only state with no earmarks in 1995, leapt to seventh among states in 2001. Why the jump? Because in 1999, one of the state's senators, Judd Gregg, a Republican, became the chairman of an appropriations subcommittee and began working actively to secure the funds.

Apologists for academic pork have long held that the dollar amount dedicated to it pales in comparison to the government's spending on peer-reviewed research; however, if spending on earmarks continues to rise sharply, that gap may soon narrow. What is more, the practice of rent-seeking instead of truth-seeking far outweighs any monetary incongruities. To put it simply (if not a tad dramatically) academic earmarks threaten the very fabric of competition and free thinking in the academic world.

Yet supporters of the grants also say that without the earmarked appropriations, some worthy projects wouldn't get through the difficult and highly competitive process of review. The government's competitively awarded research grants go to a disproportionately small group of elite institutions, the supporters say, and the agencies' spending priorities are too narrow.

To that I say, so what? If the project is so worthy, it'll get funded by someone. Good ideas don't languish in a healthy and competitive culture; however, they will if such ideas have to compete with sky-box tickets to a championship game.

So back to the question: Can universities survive without academic earmarks? If they can't, they shouldn't.

A new Reason Foundation study finds that even though preschool enrollment has increased from 16 to 66 percent since 1965 the massive growth in preschool attendance has not resulted in increased student achievement, with U.S. test scores rising only very slightly since 1970 when standardized national testing of fourth, eighth, and twelfth graders began. The full study, by Lisa Snell and Darcy Olsen, is available here (.pdf).

Other Reason studies and columns on universal preschool:

Policy Brief: The Case Against Universal Preschool (.pdf)

Wall Street Journal Op-Ed: Taxing and tactics should be questioned in California universal preschool debate

Wall Street Journal Op-Ed: California's universal preschool plan will hurt businesses, teachers

San Francisco Chronicle Op-Ed: Reiner's plan is failing in Quebec, won’t work in CA

[Maya] Ramirez is blind, yet she and dozens of other visually impaired sophomores in Chicago's public school system are required to pass a written rules-of-the-road exam in order to graduate...

Article here; via Fark.

This fall I gave my students grades for the first time. Of course, my students have received grades from me before, but I was always of the philosophy that those grades should be the ones they had earned.

This semester, that changed. I began giving A's like gifts. Why? I need to get tenure.

Interesting tale here.

It took just a few paragraphs in a budget bill for Congress to open a new frontier in education: Colleges will no longer be required to deliver at least half their courses on a campus instead of online to qualify for federal student aid.

That change is expected to be of enormous value to the commercial education industry. Although both for-profit colleges and traditional ones have expanded their Internet and online offerings in recent years, only a few dozen universities are fully Internet-based, and most of them are for-profit ones.

The provision is just one sign of how an industry that once had a dubious reputation has gained new influence, with well-connected friends in the government and many congressional Republicans sympathetic to their entrepreneurial ethic.

The Bush administration supported lifting the restriction on online education as a way to reach nontraditional students. Nonprofit universities and colleges opposed such a broad change, with some academics saying there was no proof that online education was effective. But for-profit colleges sought the rollback avidly.

More here.

Just weeks away from a primary election, [Gov. Rod Blagojevich] will propose a five-year "Preschool for All" initiative that recommends spending an additional $135 million in the first three years. It is one of several marquee programs Blagojevich has rolled out as the election draws near, raising questions from critics about where the money will come from.

…
"The whole idea behind funding education is to make sure we help our kids learn, and the evidence is very persuasive that if we invest in early education, children will learn better," the governor told the Tribune.

And the benefits of preschool will carry them all the way through the spring of first grade. Maybe all the way to third grade.

Shikha Dalmia and Lisa Snell break it all down here.

More on the Illinois plan here.

Look for universal preschool to be a key initiative for Democrats in the next couple of years. Perhaps federal universal preschool will be something that Dem. candidates choose to run with in 2008.

From Virginia's Gov:

There’s a better way. ...Many states are working to make high quality Pre-Kindergarten accessible to every family.

Please. Better than what. The government's current performance with K-12 schools? The performance of Head Start? Name one large-scale universal government program that is functioning well.

My colleague, Shikha Dalmia, and I looked at the unintended consequences of universal preschool here and here.

Before we vote for another preschool initiative, perhaps we should ensure that the taxpayer dollars funding childcare actually helps disadvantaged childen. From today's Los Angeles Daily News:

Rampant fraud is costing California taxpayers as much as $1.5 billion a year - half of the welfare money it pays to needy families for child care, officials say. . . .

"It's shameful," Cosper said. "There is so little regulation. The Legislature is either unaware or indifferent to the tremendous losses. It's a completely broken and dysfunctional system."

We need to see that the $3 billion California already spends on early childhood education actually reaches children before voting to spend another $2.4 billion on state-funded preschool.

Its not always just individual families that want to escape a low-performing school district. The Los Angeles Times reports on an entire community desperate to escape. Of course their home district is holding them and their money hostage.

The move also would have meant that Ladera residents no longer would help pay off Inglewood school bonds — although they would have been required to chip in for those in the Culver City district.

Many send their children to private schools or get permits to let them attend campuses in other districts. According to school district records, fewer than 350 students from Ladera Heights attend Inglewood schools.

States are always trying to spend more on education. Recently, however, there has been a push to distinguish education spending between instructional and support -- and identify savings in the support side to drive more money into the classroom. The so called 65% solution has been introduced in a number of states, including Virginia.

In The Wall Street Journal today, Reason's Shikha Dalmia and Lisa Snell detail how Rob Reiner's universal preschool initiative in California will devastate existing preschools and force current daycare teachers to make tough career choices.

Full column here.

Dalmia and Snell in Sunday's San Francisco Chronicle on how Quebec's universal preschool plan has cost 33 times original projections - and yet isn't producing academic improvements - here.

In the San Francisco Chronicle Reason's Shikha Dalmia and Lisa Snell detail how Quebec's preschool system has cost 33 times more than was projected - while failing to improve student achievement.

Full Column

Snell: Don't Give Them Our Preschoolers

Snell: Government-run Preschool Is Costly Failure

In South LA, charter school operator Steve Barr continues his crusade to take over one of LA's lowest-performing high schools.

Armed with about 10,000 signatures from South Los Angeles parents, students and other residents, hundreds of marchers converged on school district headquarters Tuesday, calling for the district to relinquish control of struggling Jefferson High School and transform it into six independent charter schools.

The school district offers its counter plan:

Los Angeles school district Supt. Roy Romer countered with his own plan to reform the troubled, overcrowded campus, proposing to remove 800 students next fall in order to return the school to a traditional, two-semester calendar and divide it into six "small learning communities."

The school would still have more than 3,000 students after the district plan. If the school district turns down Barr's charter proposals, he can apply directly to the state board of education.

The Sacramento Bee's Daniel Weintraub has an interesting take on this struggle:

Pretty soon a smart politician, could be from either party, is going to see that there is a massive groundswell building against ineffective, bureuacratic control of our public schools. The groundswell is strongest in the poorest communities where the schools, for whatever reason, are doing little more than warehousing the students on their way to a dysfunctional adulthood. When are the Democrats who claim to represent these people going to see that running the schools from Sacramento or downtown Los Angeles is not working, and that they need to do everything they can to tap into the energy of these parents who are desperate to create a better life for their kids? Republicans get this, but, unfortunately, won't act on their good instincts because they fear that decentralizing the schools will only further empower the teachers unions that have fought against reforms and accountability. As these Los Angeles parents realize, charter schools remain the best option for cutting through this knot and returning control of the schools to parents and the communities where it belongs while retaining oversight and accountability at the regional and state levels.

From today's Denver Post: If you are not satisfied with your current school district, build a new one.

Rather than waiting for a troubled school district to fix itself, nearly a dozen housing developers in Aurora are taking matters into their own hands, proposing a network of specialized schools - maybe even their own district - to lure tens of thousands of suburban homeowners.

And while most of the developers say it would be nice to cooperate with Aurora Public Schools in this venture, they're fully prepared to take this as far as they need to get what they want - including creating a charter school district.

Via education blogger extraordinaire, Joanne Jacobs.

Funny

Teaching Ebonics to school kids is indeed very controversial, but there’s no denying that it helped familiarize countless middle aged white guys with the internet and email. When the Ebonics issue surfaced round about ’96, Ebonics jokes quickly clogged inboxes everywhere.

Prepare for a second wave:

Incorporating Ebonics into a new school policy that targets black students, the lowest-achieving group in the San Bernardino City Unified School District, may provide students a more well-rounded curriculum, said a local sociologist.

The goal of the district's policy is to improve black students' academic performance by keeping them interested in school. Compared with other racial groups in the district, black students go to college the least and have the most dropouts and suspensions.

Blacks make up the second largest racial group in the district, trailing Latinos.
A pilot of the policy, known as the Students Accumulating New Knowledge Optimizing Future Accomplishment Initiative [nothing Ebonics-like about that name], has been implemented at two city schools.

Meanwhile Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) has busied himself with this:

Tucked into a massive appropriations bill approved without fanfare late last year by Congress is the requirement that every one of the estimated 1.8 million federal employees in the executive branch receive "educational and training" materials about the charter on Constitution Day, a holiday celebrating the Sept. 17, 1787, signing that is so obscure that it, unlike Arbor Day, is left off many calendars.

That's not all: The law requires every school that receives federal funds -- including universities -- to show students a program on the Constitution, though it does not specify a particular one. The demand has proved unpopular with educators, who say that they don't like the federal government telling them what to teach …

Yeah, the whole thing seems kind of anti-states' rights and not exactly in the spirit of the Constitution. Maybe Byrd is trying to be ironic.

(Via Sploid.)

Apple Computer Inc.'s CEO Steve Jobs told Stanford University graduates Sunday that dropping out of college was one of the best decisions he ever made because it forced him to be innovative, even when it came to finding enough money for dinner …

Jobs, 50, said he attended Reed College in Portland, Ore., but dropped out after only eight months because it was too expensive for his working-class family. He said his real education started when he "dropped in" on whatever classes interested him, including calligraphy.

Whole article is here.

And for more on the innovation-wary climate of higher education, check out Dan Klein’s take on the incestuous world of academic economics.

A new report examining the performance of charter schools in CA found,

California’s classroom-based charter schools were 33 percent more likely to meet student performance goals in 2004 than were regular public schools. . .

This is particularly notable since charter schools often get the short end of the funding stick.

Bush's No Child Left Behind policy is admirable for trying to force schools to be accountable for results. Like most efforts to get government entities to focus on outcomes rather than how hard everyone is trying, it has its problems.

Lisa Snell dug into how schools report violence and crime and test score results under NCLB, and no surprise, found plenty of cheating.

NPR this morning did a story discussing how NCLB provides funds for low-income kids in crappy schools to get tutoring, and looked at questions about how well the money is being used.

They began looking at the boom at Sylvan Learning Centers, which from all I have seen do a fantastic job of helping kids who have trouble learning.

But, of course, the story soon slipped into a discussion of how all the federal money and relatively little regulation of tutoring services has led to "a wild-west atmosphere." Members of Congress are criticizing states for not bet tight with controlling the tutoring business, etc.

No discussion of where the decision point is here. It is not the schools or the state that puts these kids in tutoring, it is the parents. They are in a pretty good position to look at their kids grades and test scores and see if the tutoring is working. They don't get any other benifit for sending their kids there, so they likely take a real interest in the result. (Snell looks at tutorings role in kid's reading performance here.)

I wish Congress would take as much interst in creating real consequences for school officials that cheat on statistics reported to parents as they do in slavering over discovering a type of business they haven't got their regulatory hooks into yet.

Perhaps you’ve seen that ad that shows a kid growing up, making all the right life choices.

Drugs? No thanks. Drop out of school? No way!

Then, at the end, we learn that this well-adjusted member of society has preschool to thank for his well-adjustedness.

The real story might be quite different:

...early education does increase reading and mathematics skills at school entry, but it also boosts children's classroom behavioral problems and reduces their self-control. Further, for most children the positive effects of pre-kindergarten on skills largely dissipate by the spring of first grade, although the negative behavioral effects continue.

That’s from a new NBER study.

(Via Tyler Cowen).

Utah's first.

Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. today signed the Carson Smith
Scholarships for Students With Special Needs Act. The first school
choice program to be enacted in 2005 authorizes the distribution of
scholarships for Utah's special needs children to attend private
schools.

For more info. go to Alliance for School Choice.

According to Education Week:

The Carson Smith Special Needs Scholarships legislation would provide $1.4 million in voucher money to help parents of students with disabilities send their children to private schools, both secular and religious, that place particular emphasis on helping such students.

About 50,000 students in the state would qualify for the scholarships, Ms. Peterson said, but only a few hundred would be able to receive the funding under the current amount of money allotted for the program. Students with disabilities that range from brain injury to speech or language impairments would be able to apply for the scholarships, which could pay out nearly $5,500 per student annually.

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

Interesting contrast in how much money is spent by the lowest and highest performing high schools in Houston. The three lowest performing high schools rank first, fourth, and thirteenth in terms of per-pupil spending in the school district. Parents and teachers at these schools have argued that they are low-performing because of a lack of resources.

Yet as the Houston Chronicle explains:

In contrast, HISD will spend from $500 to nearly $2,000 less per student this year at three of the school district's highest-performing schools: Lamar, Bellaire and Westside. Those schools, where more than three quarters of all seniors score above 1,000 on the SAT, occupy the three lowest spots on HISD's per-pupil funding list.

Of course, these low-performing schools have more money because they serve a higher percentage of low-income and minority students. Yet, up to $2,000 more per pupil is a huge bonus for working with low-income children. Just how much more money do you give low-performing schools before expecting student achievement to increase?

This shocking story about wasting school construction dollars in New Jersey demonstrates how centralizing school resources in the name of "oversight" can often cost big money.

The state agency overseeing New Jersey's massive school construction project paid $5 million to relocate a company from a Newark industrial park nine months after scrapping plans to build on the firm's site. . . .

Spencer said the corporation will have future properties fully in hand before paying relocation costs.

And here is the key shocking paragraph:

Last month, Acting Gov. Richard Codey directed the state's new Inspector General to review the corporation's activities after a Star-Ledger analysis found schools built by the corporation have cost, on average, 45 percent more than schools erected by local school boards during the same period without the agency's oversight.

The state agency must really be wasting a lot of money, because when local school boards build schools it already costs significantly more than the private sector.

This shocking story about wasting school construction dollars in New Jersey demonstrates how centralizing school resources in the name of "oversight" can often cost big money.

The state agency overseeing New Jersey's massive school construction project paid $5 million to relocate a company from a Newark industrial park nine months after scrapping plans to build on the firm's site. . . .

Spencer said the corporation will have future properties fully in hand before paying relocation costs.

And here is the key shocking paragraph:

Last month, Acting Gov. Richard Codey directed the state's new Inspector General to review the corporation's activities after a Star-Ledger analysis found schools built by the corporation have cost, on average, 45 percent more than schools erected by local school boards during the same period without the agency's oversight.

The state agency must really be wasting a lot of money, because when local school boards build schools it already costs significantly more than the private sector.

This shocking story about wasting school construction dollars in New Jersey demonstrates how centralizing school resources in the name of "oversight" can often cost big money.

The state agency overseeing New Jersey's massive school construction project paid $5 million to relocate a company from a Newark industrial park nine months after scrapping plans to build on the firm's site. . . .

Spencer said the corporation will have future properties fully in hand before paying relocation costs.

And here is the key shocking paragraph:

Last month, Acting Gov. Richard Codey directed the state's new Inspector General to review the corporation's activities after a Star-Ledger analysis found schools built by the corporation have cost, on average, 45 percent more than schools erected by local school boards during the same period without the agency's oversight.

The state agency must really be wasting a lot of money, because when local school boards build schools it already costs significantly more than the private sector.

This shocking story about wasting school construction dollars in New Jersey demonstrates how centralizing school resources in the name of "oversight" can often cost big money.

The state agency overseeing New Jersey's massive school construction project paid $5 million to relocate a company from a Newark industrial park nine months after scrapping plans to build on the firm's site. . . .

Spencer said the corporation will have future properties fully in hand before paying relocation costs.

And here is the key shocking paragraph:

Last month, Acting Gov. Richard Codey directed the state's new Inspector General to review the corporation's activities after a Star-Ledger analysis found schools built by the corporation have cost, on average, 45 percent more than schools erected by local school boards during the same period without the agency's oversight.

The state agency must really be wasting a lot of money, because when local school boards build schools it already costs significantly more than the private sector.

This shocking story about wasting school construction dollars in New Jersey demonstrates how centralizing school resources in the name of "oversight" can often cost big money.

The state agency overseeing New Jersey's massive school construction project paid $5 million to relocate a company from a Newark industrial park nine months after scrapping plans to build on the firm's site. . . .

Spencer said the corporation will have future properties fully in hand before paying relocation costs.

And here is the key shocking paragraph:

Last month, Acting Gov. Richard Codey directed the state's new Inspector General to review the corporation's activities after a Star-Ledger analysis found schools built by the corporation have cost, on average, 45 percent more than schools erected by local school boards during the same period without the agency's oversight.

The state agency must really be wasting a lot of money, because when local school boards build schools it already costs significantly more than the private sector.

This shocking story about wasting school construction dollars in New Jersey demonstrates how centralizing school resources in the name of "oversight" can often cost big money.

The state agency overseeing New Jersey's massive school construction project paid $5 million to relocate a company from a Newark industrial park nine months after scrapping plans to build on the firm's site. . . .

Spencer said the corporation will have future properties fully in hand before paying relocation costs.

And here is the key shocking paragraph:

Last month, Acting Gov. Richard Codey directed the state's new Inspector General to review the corporation's activities after a Star-Ledger analysis found schools built by the corporation have cost, on average, 45 percent more than schools erected by local school boards during the same period without the agency's oversight.

The state agency must really be wasting a lot of money, because when local school boards build schools it already costs significantly more than the private sector.

This shocking story about wasting school construction dollars in New Jersey demonstrates how centralizing school resources in the name of "oversight" can often cost big money.

The state agency overseeing New Jersey's massive school construction project paid $5 million to relocate a company from a Newark industrial park nine months after scrapping plans to build on the firm's site. . . .