Looking Deeper Into Obama Education Pick's Accomplishments

It's hard not to think of incoming president George Bush's 2000 pick of Houston superintendent Rod Paige right now. Like Paige, Arne Duncan comes from a big city with a success story that the national press failed to figure out was mostly a mirage. Like Paige, Duncan will soon find out that he will be a figurehead who answers to instructions from campaign veterans who are already installed inside the D.P.C. Like Paige, Duncan may find himself frustrated and outflanked by powerful stakeholders (Congress, Republicans, national teachers unions) he hasn't really had to deal with before in Chicago.

Looking back at Duncan's record, the specific moments that concern me the most include (a) last year year when Duncan went along with a cynical and failed Mayoral effort to link citywide gang violence with the school system -- even though little of the violence was taking place in school, (b) Duncan's stubborn resistance against N.C.L.B. transfers, tutoring, and accountability requirements that he will now be enforcing, (c) Duncan's insistence on closing buildings down for a year to turn them around, and (d) his failure to revamp the teachers' contract, which gives annual raises but still calls for an extremely short day and short year.

The bottom line is that, given sweeping powers over schools and a powerful political patron, Duncan's efforts failed to convince more white and middle class parents to send their kids to public schools, and failed to convince downstate legislators to revamp the state funding system despite Democratic control of the legislature and the Governor's mansion.

Duncan wasn't just a caretaker of the school system, but he certainly wasn't really all that bold or inspiring. He was a safe choice. A mayoral appointee in a one-party town, there's not that much in Duncan's record to suggest he has been able to wrestle diverse factions into concerted action. [Note that the local teachers union is having a press event at 12:30 local time -- no word from them yet about what stance they're going to take.]

That being said, Duncan is a hard-working, good guy, non-confrontational and non-ideological by and large. I'm glad the selection process is over -- it had gone on too long. Duncan doesn't make people crazy. He's avoided stepping into unnecessary side debates, by and large. And he's an underdog -- always being underestimated and usually exceeding expectations. So maybe he'll surprise us all.

In the meantime, I hope that the national press will look a little bit deeper into the Chicago miracle, and take a moment to ponder why the folks they're quoting are saying such nice things about him. No one's looked at Chicago's lame N.A.E.P. scores or anemic charter program. Most of the folks who are gushing about him don't really know him (or Chicago) that well, or hope to work for him in the near future, or are approving of him because they think that they can beat him in D.C.

Next up: wondering whether Duncan, who currently sends his daughter to public school, will transfer her to a D.C.P.S. school or to a private one.

Comments

[gdanea]

As a teacher, I am particularly amused by the short day, short contract comment. This is just another example of how misunderstood the teaching contract had developed in post-agricultural times.

Teachers would gladly teach more -- and longer days, but the agricultural basis for education meant students needed to be off for the summer to help at the farm. This has changed, but the standard contract of limited days per year hasn't kept pace.

A proposal was floated in my state for about 3 minutes to go to a year round school year. If you do the calculations, salaries would have to be raised by 40 percent since teachers don't have paid vacations or holidays. Many people average about 230 days of work per year when you take the fifty-two weeks times 5 workdays in a week (260 work days) -- then subtract paid holidays (about 20) and paid vacation (maybe 10 days). If you increase my contract by 40 days, you have to increase my salary by 30 to 40 percent to pay for the days off most people take for granted.

Check out how many students are enrolled in public schools compared to private schooling (48,985,888 in public schools compared to 5,375,897 in private schools), and you'll see why programs like Every Child Left Behind affect many more teachers and students than anyone could have anticipated. People with public school experience is a good start.

[wendynyc]

Obama administration looks like Clinton 3 - that is a good thing??

Dont forget that Clinton had a Republican Congress for 6 of the 8 years and had to pass legislation that was mainly pro Republican That's how we got NAFTA and the current fiscal crisis. It was this group that repealed the Glass Steagal Act!

Vilsack is a really Bad Choice and it shows that Obama does not understand the problems that the USDA and Dept of Agriculture are facing.

www.stopvilsack.org - please sign

[MagisterLudi]

The guy from Los Angeles Unified ( LAUSD) just became available. He knows his way 'round big budgets. Added bonus: he's black AND a rear-admiral (retired).

[Camel54]

None of those things gives him experience in education. Budgets? Military leader? How does that give a person any understanding of what goes on inside a classroom? Same with Duncan.

[milo h minderbinder]

Duncan has been working in education since 1992. I don't get the notion that only a former teacher could understand education.

[bobsmith]

And it isn't just Duncan. In Iowa the network affiliates are reporting tonight that Obama has appointed former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack as Agriculture Secretary. Vilsack, a Democrat, was governor here for 8 years. This is the guy who couldn't muster ANY support in his own home state for his bid for the presidential nomination. The only reason he won the governorship here was the dismal quality of the two opponents the Republicans fielded against him. So he threw his support (which was completely worthless) to Hillary. Vilsack was Chairman of the DLC, a Republican-lite, a corporate stooge, and a complete sell-out. This guy is the mid-west version of Joe Lieberman (with a duller personality than Joe). It had appeared that Vilsack's nomination as Ag Sec. was scuttled due to an outpouring of objections by those who knew him to be in the pocket of agri-business (like Monsanto). Yet Obama appointed him anyway. The people have been sold out by Obama yet again.

[fflambeau]

Bobsmith, I agree with you that when looking at Obama's overall cabinet picks, "The people have been sold out by Obama yet again." Salazar (Interior pick) looks much like this Duncan guy. Not the most progressive choice and progressive only in pr. Only in his energy choice do I think Obama has shown the kind of appointment that many of his supporters thought would be the norm. His pick there won the Nobel Prize, is highly regarded as a scientist, and is not from the Clinton years. More and more, Obama's team looks like Clinton 3.

[MagisterLudi]

"Obama's team looks like Clinton 3."
This is a good thing.
Considering Clinton left the country in a great financial shape and is greatly admired by the world and majority of Americans.
It is more important that Obama's leadership of Democratic Party doesn't begin to resemble Carter's disaster.

[milo h minderbinder]

Duncan didn't really bother me that much, but Vilsack certainly does. The USDA needs reform at least as much as education does, and now it looks like it's not going to get much if anything.

[lj9283]

Foreclosures will ruin the property tax funding system that keeps school system barely funded, while soaring unemployment may create a class of people moving from place to place on a regular basis as they follow job markets while the economy resets.

I believe that saving school systems will be a major concern of the first years of this administration. Innovative funding methodologies will need to be developed in order to save both school systems and the teachers who breath life into those school systems.

A safe choice may be the best bet for keeping the ship afloat.

[OliverTwist]

The property tax funding system for public education also enables in some states a very segregated public school system. New Jersey, for example, actually has the fourth most segregated public school system in the United States - right there with Alabama. People know that this is what comes of property tax funding for small independent school districts.

It may be desireable to ban property tax funding for public school systems - although I would imagine it would be political suicide to make such a proposal.

[Deidroni]

Hey, he's a good basketball player. Check out his height

At least he won't call the NEA a terrorist organization like Rod Paige stated.

Obama has it right on education, it starts from the bottom up. Parents need to support their children and teachers will be able to educate their children.

PS. Urban schools are doing well and should be commended.

[milo h minderbinder]

"Obama has it right on education, it starts from the bottom up. Parents need to support their children and teachers will be able to educate their children."

Amen to that, there's one facet where I strongly agree with Obama.

[ESerafina42]

Greg Palast has a pretty scathing indictment of this guy.

http://www.gregpalast.com/update-obama-slam-duncans-education/

Obama wasn't my first choice, but I did think he would end the era of cronyism.

[LFB1]

As for PATina's criticism...

Yes, he backed the gay school proposal, which was not his idea but has his support. Sure CPS should be able to provide safe environments to all its students, but gay kids were being severely targeted by students (and teachers). Recognizing that these kids experienced greater and more severe bullying and had higher suicide rates, he was willing to back a controversial proposal that was intended to provide immediate relief to these kids instead of having some more committee meetings about it or expecting a finger-wagging from the principals at the next teacher's institute day to fix it. He often worked with religious leaders on his projects, but in an instance like this he also wasn't afraid to piss off the religious right by supporting using tax dollars to support gay kids (gasp!) So I applaud him for taking a stand on that issue.

[LFB1]

To address your concerns, (a) the gang problems tend to be after school. As you say, "little violence was taking place in school" but as someone who had to routinely smuggle my students home out the service entrance of a public middle school in Chicago and walk them home, I can assure you gangs are a real problem. Schools need wrap around services. If kids can't go to/from school b/c of gangs, that's still a school problem, even if they aren't shooting each other in the halls.

b) Mr. Duncan's resistance to NCLB was a good thing. He favored actual accountability, not NCLB's crap vision of it.

c.) Closing schools down to restart them was not ideal, but it takes time to create change, and the turnaround projects were better than they were, and generally better than the other options available in most of those situations. Having worked directly with both him and his office on a few of these, I admired his handling of most (but not all) of these situations.

d.) Teacher's contract revamping. Sadly, I think he never mastered the internal politics of the teacher's unions here. I'll have to grant this point.

[tentray chicago]

It is a fallacy to say that Arne Duncan improved the high school graduation rate in Chicago for a number of reasons. The first is just four years ago Chicago Public Schools did not have any data whatsoever about how many children graduate, nor did they have data on how many students go on to college. Second, the schools are so bad and so aggressive in weeding out children that do not test well is that you now have the phenomenon of "middle school" dropouts. There are no truancy programs so children are allowed to fall through the cracks. So percentage wise more kids may be graduating because fewer are entering high school. Third, failing schools were closed and then reopened with smarter kids. I love Barack Obama. But this pick is favoritism. Arne Duncan does not have one education credential, no classroom experience, no curriculum development experience. His experience comes from watching his mom and listening to his mom. Who is a world class educator. He is not fit to run a tutoring program.

[orangepetal]

Mmm, I was hoping for someone from a great school district so he would have a vivid vision of programs that work well with ideals, techniques, programs etc. to spread around. I'm not in education, so I do not really know. I reeeaaly hope he will be good, he could be. I do believe the parent / school effort is often what really counts at the end of the day. Many parents can't give, for whatever reason. I was under the impression his child went to private school.

[pinky1232]

Amen! Preach tentray_chicago! Preach!

[larry278]

Is this all that we may expect of a Secretary of Education in the Obama administration? A Secretary Duncan might resign if he becomes Obama's puppet or a constant target & scape goat for the endemic failures of American schools. Would Duncan's replacement be any better or would his replacement be much worse? Being Secretary of Education looks like a career killer. He could end up as a university president or dean of a school education. Mencken's words on university presidents & academic(sp?) administrators & bureaucrats still remain accurate. Few are so sadistic & cruel to wish such an occupation on anyone, not even Donald Rumsfeld.

[ElBruce]

Sounds more like a bunt than a home run...

We'll see what policies Obama brings to bear on education. It sounds like he wants to take point on Educational policy anyways, which means he'd just need an executor in the position, rather than an idea guy. Still, this doesn't really back up how much Obama talks about education. But every Presidential candidate always talks about education. We have yet to see anybody walk that talk.

[KQuarksSuperKollider]

There is always some mixed results in success stories but you cannot argue Duncan did a good job considering the situation he was in and for the record Chicago is the only one of the top 5 school districts that even has a high school graduation rate of over 50% (actually 55% now and 47% when he started). The next highest big city school district graduation rate is about 8% less. So yes some is good media but he has made some real progress as well.

[TopProf]

Oh yes I can argue whether he did a good job. The 50% figure is cooked. You have to start keeping track of enrollment NUMBERS at grade eight and compare that figure with the NUMBERS who graduate --ever. I think you would find the discrepancy disturbing, just as was found in TX, and for the same reasons.

[skunky93]

So you are against annual raises because you believe teachers should work more hours than those already set? Do you realize that teachers work well beyond their school day? Do you realize that teachers sacrifice their personal lives to plan the detailed little moments that make up a child's education?
Do you realize that a teacher is a teacher day and night, day after day, weekends and vacations the whole year?
What possible raise could ever equal the dedication that teachers pour into their work?

[JLSwift]

I agree. Thank you!

[buckbuck11]

I wish we had a Secretary for ALL schools and not just urban schools.