Teachers' Unions Harm Education

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned a book I’ve been reading: Standing Up to Goliath, by Rebecca Friedrichs. She was the mother/teacher at the center of the Friedrichs v. California Teachers’ Association case that went before the Supreme Court in 2016, which was about to be ruled on when Justice Scalia died suddenly, leaving a 4-4 ruling, which reverted to the appellate decision favoring the union.

It took an extra couple of years, but the Janus case, ruled on last June, finally won against the labor unions. Workers who are not members of the union no longer have to pay fees for bargaining rights, because unions engage in politics even at the bargaining table.

This will apply also to teachers’ unions, which reduces their revenue and thus their power. It’s a start. Teachers’ unions need to have their power reduced. Curtailed. Abolished—even better.

Today I’ll go through some of the points in the book, and then we’ll cover the good news of the Janus case.

Unions Are about Power, Not Education

The book’s main question was, “Why were teachers being forced to support policies against their own consciences?” (p. 13).

Contrary to popular belief/propaganda, teachers’ unions are not about improving the educational experience or conditions for teachers, students, or parents; they are about gaining and wielding power for the union.

For Rebecca Friedrichs, that was a lesson that took years to learn thoroughly, from both inside and outside unions. It started when she was doing student teaching with a master teacher. Their classroom was great, and she learned so much there. But the classroom next door had a monster teacher, whom she refers to as the “witch,” continually yelling, screaming, belittling, and bullying students. “She would grad them, yank them into their places in line, and scream right into their little faces” (p. 12).

These were first grade classrooms. Friedrichs wondered why something wasn’t done to rescue these children:

As the Master and I were grading papers one day, I found the nerve to ask her how a mandated reporter like me could file a complaint about a teacher. The Master slowly turned to me, removed her glasses and locked into my eyes preparing, it seemed, to tell me a hard truth about life. “Today’s the day,” she said, “you learn about teachers’ unions” (p. 13).

The “witch” had tenure, so the union protected her, not the kids. Unions enforce a seniority-based LIFO policy (last in, first out), so that when layoffs are needed, newer teachers, no matter how good, are let go, while older teachers, no matter how bad, are kept.

Friedrichs tells the story of a California teacher, Bhavini Bhakta, who had been “Teacher of the Year” in 2012. Despite her effectiveness as a teacher, she had been laid off four times because of union-imposed rules (p. 17).

Another story was of a teacher with extra qualifications, teaching AP Statistics, Algebra II, and Pre-Calculus. No other teacher in the school had his accreditations. But he was laid off after his second year—despite heroic efforts by his principal to keep him—leaving the school unable to meet the needs of the students (p. 18).

Meanwhile bad teachers were moved around. It’s called “the dance of the lemons” (p. 25). One egregious example was inflicted on principal Eileen Blagden in a Southern California elementary school.

A teacher in the district had been on leave after a 2008 arrest for indecent exposure and lewd and lascivious behavior, and a subsequent charge of trespassing for which he pled guilty. Though he was found not guilty of the sex-related charges, a restraining order forbade him from going within one hundred yards of public parks, beaches, schools, and bathrooms in the city of Long Beach.

In 2009, Eileen’s employer, a school district located in a neighboring city of Long Beach, allowed the man back into the classroom but transferred him to Eileen’s school as a kindergarten teacher. Eileen was not permitted to know the man’s history, but could tell from the start that he was emotionally unstable, and he was even falling asleep during class (p. 26).

Other teachers were worried. In 2010 the man talked to colleagues about suicide and a desire to kill other teachers. Eileen asked the district to remove him. Instead, they sent a union representative who did nothing. And the district warned her against reporting to the police, which she was required to do as a mandated reporter of threats to children.

She nevertheless reported him to the Sheriff’s Office, along with the threat from her administrator about reporting.

Three days later, she was placed on five months administrative leave for not following a district administrator’s directive. There was an eventual trial concerning the retaliation for whistle-blowing, settled before trial—which included a confidentiality agreement. Fortunately, Blagden had told her story beforehand. Still, she was demoted, reprimanded, and eventually resigned.

Union Positions

Here are some of the union positions that probably differ from what you would want from anyone related to educating our children:

·         They’re against school choice—even, or especially, when it means protecting students from failing schools, bad teachers, or bullies. They do not believe parents are capable of making decisions in the best interests of their children.

·         They work diligently against charters, vouchers, education savings accounts, or anything beyond the status quo, which they control.

·         They’re in favor of diagnosing and drugging wiggly children who have a hard time sitting still in a desk all day—with less recess and play time than past generations.

·         Unions donations go to between 87% to 100% Democrat parties and candidates, and 100% to liberal outside groups (pp. 76-77).

·         They insist on sex education that is pro-promiscuity, pro-homosexual, pro-transgender, pro-experimentation, but anti-abstinence, anti-family, and anti-parental involvement—and anti-parental approval or ability to opt out of what’s being taught. Further, they withhold critical knowledge that would protect students from sexually transmitted diseases (p. 93). Lessons can be so disturbing that teachers protect themselves by paying for substitutes, but are unable to protect their students from the vile material.

·         They promote the LGBT agenda, and bully anyone—including any student—with a different opinion (p. 94).

·         They do not tolerate free speech of any sort that doesn’t coincide with their views. They use four psychological manipulations against anyone who steps out of line: fear, intimidation, isolation, and ignorance (p. 82).

·         They are anti-science, deleting the need for science education to be based on empirical evidence derived from valid scientific experimentation and verified by using the steps of the scientific process (p. 102).

·         They are unequivocally pro-abortion. They do not explain what this has to do with educating our children, but they work to make abortion available to children without their parents’ knowledge or consent.

·         They control the politics surrounding school board elections, by controlling teachers, so school boards end up being more pro-union than pro-student education.

·         The PTA stands with the unions; any parental or teacher input on policy is ignored, but if PTAs support education by filling classrooms during a walkout, they are punished by the unions (chapter 11).

·         Unions do not protect teachers from severe, dangerous discipline problems, particularly when the perpetrators are black, because of “racial equity discipline policies” (chapter 12).

·         They focus on race, indoctrinating students with “white privilege” guilt, and are against informing parents of this political indoctrination in the classroom.

If there’s something bad about public schools, there’s probably a union policy making sure it stays that way.

Take Away the Money, Take Away the Power

Could teachers opt out of paying the unions? Only partially. Until this year, they would still be forced to pay “Fair Share Fees,” which were automatically deducted from their paychecks, purportedly to cover the benefits they get from collective bargaining, along with the union teachers. The difference ranges from 0% to 30%. In those early days of the author’s career, the difference was about $50 a year out of around $1000 annually (p. 14).

Teachers were bullied into paying the full amount. One woman who was the lone holdout refusing to join the union in her school, was working on papers late in the evening when four men showed up and pressured her to sign on. The first time she was able to get them to leave by saying she would think about it. Then they cornered her alone a second time, and she believed they would not leave, or allow her to leave, and might do her physical harm, so she gave in and signed. It looks like a protection racket—organized crime. I believe that’s what it is.

About 50% of dues go to the state union. About 30% go to the national union, the NEA. Only 20% will stay with the local union. As bad as state and national unions are, which get 80% of the money, many teachers are happy with their local unions, which get only $1 out of every $5 paid in (p. 173).

If there’s one thing that would vastly improve public education, it would be the abolishment of state and federal unions. Possibly local unions too, but at least they are in touch with actual teachers and their issues. Leaving union dues in teacher paychecks would be an automatic $1000 raise for most teachers.

Mark Janus, center, who sued his public sector union, outside the Supreme Court
June 27, 2018, with Gov. Bruce Rauner of Illinois, right.
Photo credit: Andrew Harnik/Associated Press. Found here. 

While the Friedrichs v. CTA case favored the union, after the death of Justice Scalia, there is a possible better future on the horizon. The Janus v. American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees case, decided in June 2018, went against the unions 5-4. Justice Alito, writing for the majority, said, “We conclude that this arrangement violates the free speech rights of nonmembers by compelling them to subsidize private speech on matters of substantial public concern.”

This case affects teachers’ unions as well as other public sector unions. They can no longer collect fees from nonmembers, which reduces their money—and thus their power—considerably. It also means they have less leverage to practically enforce membership. Predictions are that they could lose as much as a third of membership. 

It may be that it’s even better than that. There is nothing in the ruling to say this is only from now going forward; unions may have to repay those fees they took by force from nonmembers, going back years, which could bankrupt them. We can only hope so.

If we are ever to find solutions to our public schooling, it will be in a free market, which brings innovation, and better outcomes for less money.

Education Conversation Continued

I wrote on education on Monday, and there was a thought-provoking comment I’d like to respond to.

lease April 3, 2017 at 6:09 PM

Hey! I've got a couple genuine questions for you, knowing that you've spent much of your life focused on education. As long as parents have the ability to homeschool their children, how does public education usurp power from the people? Is the main issue with spending tax dollars on education or are there other ways you feel power is being taken? And 2.) while it's admirable that the general population was relatively well educated in the early 1800s, what of the slave population during the same time period? What of the many immigrants and non-English speakers who have come since? And what of the increasing number of households who need two incomes to provide for their families, and even then still can't get by? These are issues that have increased dramatically, and they are issues public education *attempts* to address. Totally imperfectly to be sure. But I can't see how a free market or philanthropy alone would do any better. As of 2011, one in five kids live in poverty--what is the incentive to supervise/educate/feed these kids, relying on philanthropy alone? It would be wonderful if parents were able to take full responsibility, but that is not the reality for most households. Help me to see what should be done.

These are good questions, and worth taking some time to respond to, in the ongoing conversation about education.

photo source

To begin, I agree with Lease that the problem looks overwhelming. And I agree that, with things as they are now, suddenly switching to a system of “pay for your own kids’ education” plus “we’ll use philanthropy to pay for the education of the poor kids” is an idea that brings on a panic attack. I’m not advocating for anything sudden, or anything that will leave a generation of kids without what they need.

I do believe in educating every child, including those whose families can’t provide. But I think right now there is a generation not getting what they need—because of the public schools.

Texas is big enough to generalize from. So let’s use some numbers from a piece I wrote in January:

[T]here are about 5.2 million K-12 students in Texas. That means 10% of kids in the US are going to school in Texas.

More fun facts: there are 130,000 students on wait lists for charter schools—which are proliferating in Texas, but can’t meet the need. Meanwhile there are 100,000 empty seats in private schools….

Also, there are 900,000 (17% of that 5.2 million) attending 1,032 failing schools in Texas. That means the school didn’t meet the minimal yearly progress (a pretty low bar) for three years in a row.

If you’re worried about 1 in 5 students being below the poverty line, a bigger worry ought to be that nearly 1 in 5 students is stuck in a school that does not educate them, but they are trapped there by the public school system with no way out—with the exception of a lottery for the lucky few who might get into a charter school.

Failing schools are most likely to be located where the poorest students live: inner cities and rural areas.

And remember, to be just above failing is a very low bar. That means huge numbers of children are trapped in public schools that do not offer them an adequate education—let alone an education tailored to help that child reach his/her potential.

Every time the school choice movement begins to get the word out, for even tiny, incremental changes, there is a huge outcry claiming this takes money away from the kids. This is during a period during which real money per student has increased manifold with no measurable increase in education outcomes.

This is, again, from my January piece, about my highly rated school district that failed my children:

·         Student enrollment has grown 30%, with a population explosion.

·         Teacher ranks have grown 50%, which is well above that population growth.

·         Non-teaching staff has grown 102%.

If you really care about educating children, why would you spend so much education money on something other than educating children?

Let me repeat the Spherical Model axiom:

Whenever government attempts something beyond the proper role of government (protection of life, liberty, and property), it causes unintended consequences—usually exactly opposite to the stated goals of the interference.

To apply that to education, if the stated goal is to provide an education for every child, the unintended consequence of government institutionalized education is less education, especially for poor children.

This is assuming that a quality education leading to an educated next generation is actually the goal; I suspect that the real, unstated goal of government institutionalized education is control of the populace and the inculcation of radical post-modernist ideas. I wrote about John Dewey, a founding father of modern public education here.

So, in answer to Lease’s first question, there is a problem with taking my tax dollars for public education while failing to provide my children with the education they need. And there’s also a problem with the government’s attempts to control the minds of children. There are attacks by CPS, as though homeschooling your own children is equivalent to neglecting them. There are attempts to control what is taught, attempts to “approve” of curriculum, attempts to enforce dissemination of certain messages and exclusion of other messages.

In Texas we have a lot of homeschool freedom—but we have that because of constant vigilance to prevent the (relatively conservative) legislature from encroaching on parental rights to see to the care and upbringing of their own children.

Daughter Social Sphere, citizen lobbying at the
state capitol, one of our homeschool adventures

I do believe the only antidote must consist of free market plus philanthropy. But Lease asks, with the overwhelming numbers of children whose families can’t afford to educate them, how can free market and philanthropy possibly fill that need?

As things are now, maybe they can’t. But I’m not in favor of keeping things as they are. The market for educational options needs to grow. We need more choices, better quality, and lower prices—which are the usual and expected results of innovation in the free market.

And we also need some family changes. In order for a society to support the exceptions to families providing for themselves, there needs to be a critical mass of families with married mother and father taking care of their own children. I’m guessing a critical mass is somewhere north of 75%. If nearly all children are born to married parents, and no more than 25% are then raised by single parents, poverty is greatly reduced. We know the way to avoid poverty in America:

1.      Don’t have sex before age 20.

2.      Don’t have sex until after marriage.

3.      Stay married

4.      Obtain at least a high school diploma.

That’s a pretty low bar. But we’re not meeting it. Only a few of us are teaching it.

Economic and social spheres interrelate. If we don’t value and preserve marriage and family, then we get the calamities we see in inner cities today. If we don’t have schools—and families—getting this message through, we’re stuck in a downward spiral, and I have no answer other than changing direction.

Meanwhile, here are some direction-changing ideas worth acting on:

Idea 1: Get rid of the US Department of Education—and have the money that has been sent there be given back to the states for use on education. My concern here is that, simply getting rid of the Department of Education wouldn’t be combined with a cut in US taxes (or spending), and the money counted on now for education would simply disappear into the abyss of national debt. That must not happen.

Idea 2: Have all education money attach to the child. If the goal is to educate every child, then it is obvious that is not equivalent to funding public schools. No family should be forced to pay taxes for public schools and then also pay for their child’s education when the public schools do not provide for their needs. That’s true for poor families as well as the families able to make the huge sacrifices to educate their children no matter the odds.

Idea 3: Allow the parents to use the money attached to their child’s education as they see fit: for public school, for private school (including parochial), for private tutoring, for private lessons, for alternative therapies (equine therapy, for example), for online courses, for homeschool curriculum, or any combination thereof.

Step 4: Encourage businesses, through tax credits, to offer scholarships to supplement or replace the per child allotment for certain students based on need and/or merit. This is being put forward by both my state representative and my state senator in the current Texas legislative session.

Step 5: Encourage any and every form of educational choice: charter schools, ESAs, use of public school buildings for private education business uses, and ideas we haven’t thought of yet.

Everywhere it has been tried, allowing parents to control the money for their child’s education costs less than the per child cost of public education, with better outcomes. Allowing that money to stay with the child—for future years and even for higher education—encourages wise use of the money for the particular child. And simultaneously it encourages market answers to educational needs.

Already, in large part because of the growth of homeschooling, we’re seeing online educational resources proliferate. Many of these are free or low cost.

For example, I wanted to use a particular math program for homeschooling my daughter that my boys had used in a gifted school in another state. I contacted my boys’ teachers and asked what the program was. I happened to ask why, if the program was so good, it wasn’t used for all students, but only the gifted classes. The answer was that it was too expensive. I bought the teacher’s edition, everything I needed, grades 3-6, for around $350. It was one of our bigger curriculum purchases. It was intended for an entire classroom; I used it for one child. There were a few consumable pages, but otherwise you’re looking at under $100 per year per classroom. I can’t figure out why a typical classroom, spending $1100 per year per child, couldn’t afford that. By the way, the program is now available online for free.

At some point we can look at the internet as a higher education alternative to astronomically expensive college tuition. MIT has free courses online. Many universities have online courses at lower per credit hour costs than on-campus tuition. YouTube is mostly free. There’s a lot out there. What we need is a way to free ourselves from the cost of entry into society that an ever-less-valuable university degree program provides.

Meanwhile, in some third-world countries, very poor people are successfully building private schools to get the education the government schools are failing to provide. We’re told it can’t be done, but it’s happening.

I don’t know that I’ve fully answered all of Lease’s questions. I didn’t touch on the history of slaves not being educated (wish it hadn’t happened, and that no one had been deprived of their life, liberty, and property). Or immigrants (my grandfather immigrated in 1906, at age 16, speaking no English, and went on to be successful in various businesses—no government intervention needed).

The biggest hurdle is how do we get to the ideal I see from where we are. I don’t know. But I believe that recognizing that education is a parental right, not a government responsibility, is a first step.

We ought to encourage parental control of education wherever possible, allowing the market to meet growing demand for alternatives.

And we need stronger families, which will lead to less poverty and less societal need beyond what parents must provide for their own children.

Do I foresee the ideal happening? Sometimes I’m hopeful; sometimes I’m discouraged. All I can really do is what is in my power: see to the education of myself and my children, and share good ideas in hopes others will make good choices.

I know this is already long, but if you want fuller answers and more details, follow the links in the copy.

Thanks, Lease, for engaging in the conversation. I welcome respectful feedback like yours.

Education Collection

This past month, upon reaching the 400^th post milestone, I did a collection of “best of” posts (part I, part II, part III), mainly related to the three overlying spheres of the Spherical Model. That left out some specific topics. So I followed up with the Defending Marriage collection. Today I'd like to add the Education collection.

If you know me, you know I spent ten years homeschooling my children. When I first started homeschooling, I felt so strongly about the decision that I thought it would probably be right for everyone who could possibly do it. I’ve modified somewhat over the years. Homeschooling is a lifestyle choice, and it takes energy and organization. Mostly, though, it requires a personality that gets excited about learning and helping others learn. That was natural for me, which made homeschooling amazingly fulfilling to my life—while it was also exhausting. I’m so glad we did it. But if someone knows about themselves that they don’t have the personality for it, what they really need to do is recognize their responsibility to see to the upbringing and education of their own children and see to it they provide the best opportunities they can manage. So I don’t as a rule proselytize toward homeschooling, although I’m often a resource for people thinking about trying it.

My friend Paige shared this homeschool field trip photo from 2008

However, after the election last fall, I came to recognize a greater urgency about parents seeing to their children’s education. Some of that comes from the intrusion of the federal government into every aspect of our lives, and the needed resistance to Common Core or any other centrally planned curriculum. Some of the change comes from the real frustration we face locally. Here in one of the most conservative states, in a part of town where conservatives dominate, where schools are considered (by someone else’s standards, not mine) to be high performing—here, of all places, you would expect the school board to reflect the parents and their values. But this election completed the turnover so that seven out of seven board members are moderate to liberal. They consider their constituencies to be the teacher organizations and the businesses that benefit from school spending (builders, curriculum providers, for example).

If in such a place we cannot guarantee that parents are the ones to respond to, then I have no hope for the efficacy of the public school system. Alternatives must take a greater role: private schools, charter schools, homeschools, online schools. Maybe there are alternatives we haven’t even discovered yet. But I do say, louder than I used to, that the federal government has absolutely no business sticking its nose into the education of my children and grandchildren. And state and local public schools have failed to prove that public school has a better purpose or outcome than providing the minimum skills for those whose parents can’t or won’t provide basics necessary for functioning in society.

So, I’m collecting the posts I’ve written related mainly to education. This includes a series of related posts this past March:

3-28-2011 What Works for Schools 

4-7-2011 Commencement  

5-7-2011 Public School Economics Lesson    

5-10-2011 New Paradigm for Education    

7-20-2011 What Make IQ So Racist?  

10-26-2011  Parental Rights   

10-2-2012 Local, Local, Local  

10-3-2012 The Priorities Question, School Board Part II   

11-12-2012 Paradigm Shift Underway  

3-15-2013 Natural Feeding and Teaching   

3-18-2013 Education vs. Indoctrination   

3-20-2013 Skeptical of Accreditation  

3-22-2013 Parental Right to Educate  

3-25-2013 Oppression through Education  

4-5-2013 More on CSCOPE  

4-15-2013 Homestyle Education, Part I  

4-17-2013 Homestyle Education, Part II  

4-20-2013 Homestyle Education, Part III  

4-22-2013 Homestyle Education, Part IV  

5-17-2013 You Might Be Living Under Tyranny If…, Part II (Romeike update)    

If you’re Texas local, and you’re even considering the possibility of homeschooling, Texas Home School Coalition is holding its annual convention next week, August 1-3. Full info here: http://thsc.org/events/convention/   The theme this year is Standing Firm. It will be, as usual, at the Waterway Marriott in The Woodlands, about an hour north of Houston, just off I-45. The most it will cost is $35 per adult for non-THSC-members at the door. A good deal. I feel nostalgic thinking about the good things I’ve learned at past conventions, and some of my favorite book and materials shopping as well.

Skeptical of Accreditation

After the basics of the last couple of posts on education (that parents need to be in charge of education choices, and choice means no far away entities imposing curriculum or textbook choices), you probably thought the bases were covered. But you’d be wrong. We’re here to define yet another overlooked and underscrutinized word: accreditation.

The online dictionary starts out with this not-so-helpful definition: “The act of accrediting or the state of being accredited….” Thank you for that circular pretend definition. It does go on to add, “especially the granting of approval to an institution of learning by an official review board after the school has met specific requirements.” OK, that’s closer to what we’d been thinking all along—as far as we did think about it.

I keep an old dictionary, Webster’s New World, last updated in 1982, although older would have been better. Word meanings change, and sometimes it’s helpful to just have something solid and old. (Hint to family members looking to give me a gift sometime: I’d love to have in my library a dictionary from the mid-1700s, something our founders might have used. Or maybe a complete Oxford Unabridged, where they keep every version of every word and just add to it.) Anyway, the word accreditation only appears in my 1982 dictionary as a version of the word accredit. And even then, it isn’t until the fourth definition that it begins to mean what we think of today as accreditation.

 

If you’re a parent looking at a school, and you’re told the school is accredited, you probably think, “That’s a good thing. At least there are things I can count on.” But what are the things you can count on? That your child will receive the subject matter you want, presented in the best way for your student, at the pace best suited for her? No, no guarantees of that. You will only know that teachers have gone through a certification process, there are a certain number of books in the library, and the school holds classes on a required number of days for a required number of hours. There may be some specific curriculum requirements, but these may or may not coincide with your priorities.

To know more, you’d need to know:

·         Who does the accrediting?

·         What criteria do they use for accrediting?

Those are big questions. If someone has put themselves in a position to judge the educational practices of everyone in the country, what makes them experts? And what is their agenda? Undoubtedly they have one. My agenda is to get the best education for my own children. Their distance from my child automatically means, at best, “positive educational outcomes for the highest percentage of children,” and could be only “making sure no child gets a better opportunity than all other children,” which amounts to “no child gets ahead.” We are at cross purposes.

Assuming you can find out the answers to these questions, you still won’t know anything about whether this school will (or even can) effectively teach your child.

There is no correlation between accreditation and educational outcomes. Let me repeat that, with emphasis:

There is no correlation between accreditation and educational outcomes.

Most private schools are unaccredited. That usually has nothing to do with how well they educate, but hinges on something like spending per student or certification of teachers. (There is no correlation between certification and teaching ability, we might add. Many people with real world experience could be part-time teachers, or switch to the teaching profession, but the onerous certification process boxes them out, protecting the unionized teachers.) Private schools, you’re probably aware, have a very good track record, in general, of good educational outcomes.

Some of that has to do with parental involvement. If a parent is willing to pay a hefty sum for tuition (in addition to the tax money they’re already paying for educational purposes), that parent is already showing they care about the child’s education. So they’re more likely to do follow up with a student, and have a home environment and schedule that allow for study in the home.

Some private schools are accredited, usually larger, more expensive ones. Their outcomes, while significantly better than public schools, are not significantly better than unaccredited private schools.

In Texas, homeschools are considered unaccredited private schools. On the whole, they have excellent outcomes compared to public schools—with more and more evidence appearing as more families jump into the experience. If parental involvement is a key indicator of student success, you’ve got that in a homeschool. You have a low teacher/student ratio and a lot of one-on-one learning time. You have many more opportunities for field trips and hands-on experiences that are just not doable in a mass-production public school setting. And you have curriculum and resource materials customized for the learner.

You don’t always get to know the track record until after the fact, so as a parent you’re taking a risk any direction you take. In my case, as an unaccredited teacher in an unaccredited private school (homeschool), I had a 100% success rate in college acceptance. (The two that graduated from college already are both involved in post-graduate education.) Yay me! Was it a risk? Yes, I could have failed. But failure was not an option, because of how much I cared for each of my children. So I had the right to ask God for help in accomplishing my mission. That’s a much safer risk than leaving my kids’ education to “the professionals.”

While I’m not against the idea of accreditation in all cases (in many fields, credentials are quite meaningful), I think putting our confidence in it concerning public schools is misguided at best, and possibly harmful. And it should never be forced on private schools, including homeschools. Accreditation can be, and is, used as a way of controlling indoctrination of students.

One example has stuck with me, told to me by a friend who taught Constitutional Law for many years in a very good law school. In order for the school to retain its accreditation, the school was required to teach that certain Supreme Court decisions, including Roe v. Wade, were the right decisions. I was stunned by that. Everyone knows that was a bad decision. You can disagree about the outcome desired, but the way the court went about it was just bad judgment based only peripherally on the law. (Even Ruth Bader Ginsburg has admitted that.) My friend couldn’t do it. He quit teaching rather than do it.

Accreditation at higher education levels is the subject for another day, but it remains true that, “Trust me, I’m an expert,” ought to be a red flag.

All education decisions of minor children are best left to parents, and to the most local entities possible. To that end, abolishing the federal level of education is entirely appropriate. If the federal government has any contribution to make (and even this I believe could be done better privately), it would be as a clearinghouse of ideas. It would be nice to have a place to go to compare studies, compare practices, read various first-hand reports of how certain things worked. Give as much information in as open and unfettered a way as possible to allow local entities (down to individual parents and teachers) to make informed choices. Accreditation doesn’t provide informed choice; it prevents it.

The Priorities Question: School Board Part II

This is part II of information about a local school board election. I hope the thought process is valuable beyond the very local area.

I left off part I with this question for school board trustee candidates, about priorities: You have three constituencies in your elected position as school board trustee: taxpayers, students, and teachers. How do you prioritize these constituencies, and why?

I’ll introduce each of the three candidates, along with their order of priorities. I do think there’s a right answer, but almost no one ever gives it. I’ll cover my reasoning below.

Darcy Mingoia is the PAC candidate, running in tandem with Kevin Hoffman for the other open position (we didn’t hear from candidates for that position yet). She sees herself as conservative. She works in fundraising for the community college system, and even worked with the local chamber of commerce some years back to start the community college system. She has lived in the district for 34 years. She has been a small business owner, and served as president of the chamber of commerce for ten years. She went through school on scholarship (from a private foundation) and believes the community needs to help students get through school. Her kids went into engineering. She worked as a PTO and library volunteer, and then stayed connected as a volunteer representing the business community. She was instrumental in getting the access channel on cable so the community could view school board meetings.

She has a good resume. However, reaction to questions about the PAC showed her bristling, feeling adversarial to us Tea Partiers. I learned more about the PAC at this meeting, and I feel less knee-jerk rejection of anyone they put forward. Still, what I see is that the PAC has been detrimental to our district, regardless of their possibly well-meant intentions.

·         She answers the priorities question in this order: students first, then teachers, then taxpayers.

Bill Morris is the incumbent, and is probably best known for his vote against that big pay raise (discussed in part I). He’s been targeted for removal based simply on that vote, but he has fairly frequently stood alone or nearly alone against the rest of the board. He says he frequently puts forward ideas, but they do not get brought up for discussion, let alone for vote. It’s a tough position to be in. For a while, he was undecided about whether to run again, but in the end decided that he needed to keep standing firm; we needed someone who would.

He works for food services in HISD (Houston Independent School District), so his work lets him handle large portions of school budget, but without a conflict of interest within our district.

He is a man of few words. I would have liked to hear more details from him, more positive. He seems frustrated by the situation and mentioned a number of negatives. For example, a controversial issue has been the use and upkeep of a huge facility the district built (pretty much against the will of the people), with a football stadium, basketball arena, and theater areas. It is shared by various high schools in the district, but the rest of the time should be rented out to the community to mitigate costs. Some of that does happen, but there has been discussion about “thinking outside the box.” Renting out for events that would like to serve alcohol, such as weddings or some conventions, have been prohibited. Bill Morris is against that particular type of use; it is, after all, a high school facility. If alcohol were allowed, even under these specific circumstances, it would be the only such facility in the state to allow it. Not a good precedent to set. So, whether you agree or not, he is clear and firm in his position.

He pointed out that the head of the PAC had a school named after her, after the PAC got a particular candidate elected to the board. There’s an appearance of cronyism. Again, an apparent complaint. But, as a positive, he did give us an update on the efforts to push for parity among funding per student. Nearby Tomball district, for example, gets several hundred more per student than CFISD students. There has been pressure on the legislature, without effect. So now there is hope that pressure through the courts will have success. That case is coming up October 22^nd.

·         He answers the priorities question in this order: students first, then taxpayers, then teachers.

Lillian Wanjagi is a young mom, involved in higher education for 16 years, previously at Rice, and now at University of Houston Clear Lake. She has a third grade daughter at a school not far from me, who is her inspiration to get involved. She is working on her PhD, and her research topic is related to student success. I probably learned most from her during the Tea Party meeting (and conversation afterward). She grew up in Kenya, going through a British school system, so she at least has views beyond what has always been done here. I have seen school function better than here, so I like that there’s an outside view.

Her main points included giving choice to parents, who are “the main stakeholders in a child’s education,” and in setting priorities within a budget that will best affect quality for the student. She brought some interesting data. For example, of the $5000 per student spent in this district, $403 goes to ESL (English as a second language). That is the highest per student cost for a program. (Making sure you understand, this isn’t $403 per ESL student; it is $403 per student in the district in order to have an ESL program for those that need it.) For comparison, $82 per student goes to having sports programs; $55 goes to gifted and talented programs. (I can attest that the GT program is sub-par, as you’d expect if you’re spending seven-to-eight times more for ESL.)

Someone asked if we know how much of our budget goes to paying to educate and provide food and other services for children of illegal immigrants; we don’t have that data, although there were efforts in the last legislative session to try and obtain the data. The ESL program is, in theory, intended as a way to give a start to new immigrants (and schools don’t ask if the immigrants are legal or not) to get educated while learning the language. Many of these are certainly legal. But all the children of illegals will fall in this group as well. As Wanjagi said, we are required to educate all students, including illegals, but we’re not required to spend more on them than on our own students. So it’s about how you prioritize the spending per child, so that you get the quality we all want.

·        She answers the priorities question in this order: students first, then teachers, then taxpayers. However, more than once she said, “Parents are the most important stakeholders.” That comes very close to being a better answer.

In reality, the school board is hired for a specific purpose by the taxpayers and are not accountable to either the students or the teachers. But people hear a different question than I’m asking: “Who is most important to you?” Anyone involved in education who doesn’t answer that the students are most important is in the wrong place. But believing you’re accountable to students isn’t helpful. Students are likely want easy grades and fun classes—not necessarily things we know will lead to the outcome of best educated students. So saying you’re “for the children” isn’t very informative. So sometimes you have to look at the priority order between teachers and taxpayers.

In very fact, the trustees’ job is to carry out the mission of educating our children to the level we taxpayers request and expect, for the money we have contracted to provide. If they can’t do the job to the satisfaction of the taxpayers, they should be replaced with someone who can. What the students and teachers think of the trustees is irrelevant.  If they are faithful in their stewardship to the taxpaying community, the students will receive a good education—better than we’re seeing. And I don’t mean to imply that teachers are irrelevant. It is important to hire, retain, and compensate the best teachers we can get, in order to meet the mission. If trustees are being accountable to the taxpaying community that hires them, they will do what it takes to meet the mission. Teacher skill and satisfaction will be the result.

When a trustee mistakenly bows to the will of teachers (teacher unions/organizations), they may be betraying the taxpayers who hired them. That we have such resistance to merit-based pay and other performance related issues means someone is protecting ineffective teachers—which benefits neither the students nor the good teachers, and certainly not the taxpayers in their educational mission.

All three of our candidates were glad Texas has refused to accept federal money that came with strings attached. Texas is a rarity in this decision. But we believe we’re better off without submitting to yet more federal mandates.

All three of our candidates said they were in favor of keeping control as local as possible.

The priorities question is an indicator to me about how a person will decide issues. I’d have to look at my past notes, but I believe every PAC member has placed teachers ahead of taxpayers.

Which means we have to rule out Darcy Mingoia, even though she would probably not be a disastrous choice. But we have two candidates who seem to understand better than she does about the commitments being made to the people doing the hiring. It is parents, and broader than that, all taxpayers, who are paying for a particular outcome. We don’t want loyalties to some other constituency standing between us and the people we’ve hired.

Between Bill Morris and Lillian Wanjagi, I’ll let you choose. If I’m valuing fresh ideas, I’d probably go with Ms. Wanjagi. If I’m looking for ability to stand strong against difficult opposition, I’d go with Bill Morris. While I’m technically still undecided, I think I’m leaning toward the incumbent, because we need a guarantee right now that this one position on the board will stand firm.