Originally posted April 4, 2010
Here in our state, the latest crisis is our education budget. In a nutshell, we've been spending more money than we have, and the governor's solution involves significant cuts to the state funding our public schools receive. By significant, I mean that my own district is now $4M short of funding its $55M budget for the 2010-11 school year.
It's a real problem, and our Board of Education has given us the choice of eliminating 29 teaching positions and 30 paraprofessionals, most of our sports programs, almost all capital improvements, and various other cuts; or raising property taxes to the tune of about $200 for the average resident.
But that's not what I'm writing about.
To me, the most incredible, counterproductive, and debilitating factor is that, faced with a community crisis, each of the stakeholders has become secretive, defensive, and self-righteous, rather than working together to find a viable solution. I can't remember the last time I witnessed this much finger-pointing and slinging of empty statistics¹.
I've unwittingly acquired a very personal understanding of just how broken our system is. It all started with the introduction of our Everyday Math program into our elementary schools....
The Everyday Mathematics program was developed by researchers at the University of Chicago with the intent to help young students see that math is all around them, that they already understand more math than they realize, and that math can be both creative and personal. The program is also designed to teach kids that they can understand math on a visceral level: math is far more than a set of rules that must be followed precisely, and there are many ways to go about solving a problem. Being an engineer who loves both teaching and math, I happen to think Everyday Math could be the best thing that's happened to math in the way of public relations since Bing Bang Buzz. It could be.
But when the publisher's representative—who had been a principal in our own school district—presented the program to a room full of parents, it was as if a chill fog had descended on the room. Over a hundred pairs of eyes began to glaze over, hands were raised, and timid voices asked, "Does this mean we learned it wrong?" "Why did it change?" "How can I learn this to help my kids?"
Having taught math to adults myself, this response didn't surprise me. The representative tried to be reassuring, as I'm certain she'd done many, many times before. And, ever unable to stop myself from trying to help when I should probably just shut up, I prompted her:
"Can you tell us why this program is better?"
"The researchers at the University of Chicago studied this a lot and found that this is the best way to teach math."
"I know that, and I agree. But what is it about it that makes it better?"
"Well, a lot of very smart people put a lot of thought into it, and they developed this program as a result."
That's when I felt the room get smaller, and the air get thicker, and the whole system come crashing down. And I got scared, because everyone else acted as if that was the right answer! The representative, the principals, the supervisors ... everyone! Could I possibly have been the only one thinking, "If the publisher's representative can't articulate the program's value, then how will our teachers get it? And if the teachers—who were presented with the program only about a month before school started—didn't get it, then how deep a break with reality would it take to even hope that they would be able to teach it to our kids, who can smell fear-of-math from across the playground?
After the presentation, I approached the representative, our principal, and our math/science supervisor. I told them that I've had experience teaching, and that I'm a hopeless math geek. I explained what I'd observed, why I thought Everyday Math was doomed to fail if we continued the way we'd started, and I offered whatever help they could use: I'd be happy to work with the teachers and parents to help them understand the program, and to figure out how to teach it to the kids effectively. They agreed that it was going to be a struggle, thanked me profusely, and took my contact information.
Several months later, with the school year in full swing, you'd think the Everyday Math program was the Source of All Things Evil. The parents hate it. The teachers are frustrated with it. And instead of enjoying a new level of understanding, the kids now have to learn—by rote—not just one, but four different ways to solve every problem, none of which makes sense to them.
So I wrote an email to our math/science supervisor. Reminded her of my offer earlier in the year. Suggested again that I'd be happy to work with the parents and teachers, or to help in whatever way she thinks would be most effective. She replied and politely suggested I join our District Technology Committee.
So I wrote to our technology supervisor, again explaining my background and offering to help with his committee, in any way he thought would be most useful. He replied a few days later, saying I'd be welcomed on his committee, which met on Thursday at 3:15. Have I mentioned that I'm lucky enough to still have a full-time job?
Fast forward to our Board of Education budgeting meeting. The one that had parents complaining that our taxes are too high and the teachers' benefits are outrageously rich. The one that had teachers complaining that we have too many administrators, and that they're overpaid. The one that had the administrators explaining their budgeting decisions and offering statistics to defend them, and to show how much better we are than other districts. The one that left most of us with a sense that our children might have more wisdom and maturity than we who are supposed to be educating them.
I think I made enemies of some of our supervisors at that meeting, because I approached our superintendent, privately, after the meeting and told her this story. I asked her, "What's the message here?" I also suggested that, instead of posting budgets and statistics on the BoE web site, she consider asking the parents for help, and providing avenues for us to do so. I found myself asking her to "please make it easier for us to help you." You'd think from her reaction that, in 37 years, no one had ever done that before. Ouch.
On another note, I later approached the principal of our high school and told him that our babysitter, whose name he recognized, had graduated from his school and is now enrolled in a community college. And that my daughter, who is in elementary school, is helping her with her English because her assignments were returned without corrections. To his credit, he immediately asked if I'd volunteer to tutor, and I agreed enthusiastically.
Unfortunately, the tutoring sessions are typically held at noon on weekdays. That works for my wife, who also volunteered, but not for me. I'm hoping to find an email in my inbox when Spring Break is over, with an alternative. I'll let you know².
¹ How to lie (or at least stretch the truth) with statistics:
- CLAIM: The state is cutting 5% of our funding.
REALITY: The state is cutting an amount equal to 5% of our total budget, not 5% of the funds we receive from the state. This equates to 10% of our state funding.
- CLAIM: The governor is cutting only our surplus.
REALITY: In anticipation of this year's cuts, we raised additional money and cut spending last year. This year's budget depended on that money to offset our loss of state funding; it's not "free" or "extra" money that we can afford to lose.
- CLAIM: According to our local government, if it weren't for the budget cuts, our property taxes would have gone from 5.5% in 2008 to 2.7% in 2010--in other words, they'd be cut by almost 50%!
REALITY: It's true that we'd be paying about $400 less, but that's about 4%, not 50%. The rest of our "savings" are due to the town's reassessment of its properties at twice their previous value.
- CLAIM: According to the latest Comparative Spending report from the state Dept. of Education, our district's administrative costs are only 6th out of 70, ranked lowest to highest.
REALITY: We have 7 supervisors who do not teach, but the DoE calculations consider them to be teachers, not administrators. Recalculating with the supervisors in the administrators' group puts us in 40th place.
- CLAIM: Our superintendent and two of her administrators are taking a voluntary pay freeze to help offset administrative costs.
REALITY: Our superintendent's salary is $205k; the assistant superintendent's is $160k. Our highest paid teacher earns $87k and the average teacher's salary is $55k.
- CLAIM: As the highest-paid superintendent in the state, ours is grossly overpaid.
REALITY: Our superintendent has 37 years of experience, 15 of which are in our own district. I've seen no information about what she does for our district, or how much she saves or costs us each year. How can anyone make a judgment without this information?
