Next week, voters in the District of Columbia will go to the polls to pick their Democratic mayoral candidate, and nothing short of the future of D.C.'s public school system -- a major step forward or setback for reforming America's education system -- is staked on the outcome of the election.
Over the past three and a half years, the District of Columbia Public School system has undergone radical changes, and for the first time in decades, D.C. students are beginning to gain access to a high-quality education. That progress is attributable directly to the current mayor, Adrian Fenty.
However, despite the major strides forward, polls show that Fenty may be thrown out, and along with him all the progress that has been made. That would be a giant mistake.
Such a loss would condemn District students to a future filled with poor schools and ineffective teachers. Moreover it would also send a signal to the rest of the nation that voters are not willing to stand by those who push for full-scale (and sometimes unpopular) education reform, and embolden those forces that resist any change.
Since coming into office in January 2007, Fenty has made improving the DC public school system his number one priority, and over the last three and a half years his administration has made several major accomplishments that were once thought impossible.
For years, DC students performed abysmally on District and national assessments, and the gap between DC students and their more affluent peers across the Potomac seemed insurmountable.
Yet, under Fenty's watch, student achievement has begun to go up dramatically. DC middle and high school students in testing grades have improved their performance on the District's assessments by an average of 17 points in Math and 14 points in Reading. While there is still along way to go before every student is excelling, students are moving in the right direction.
The administration also was successful in negotiating one of the most progressive contracts with the Washington Teachers Union. The contract rewards teachers with top-in-the-nation salaries, offers teachers top-of-the-line development programs, and helps ensure that there is a quality teacher in every classroom by ending the "job for life" mentality that has pervaded many districts. The contract is quickly becoming a model other districts around the country want to emulate.
Finally, Fenty's commitment to reforming DC public schools was the fundamental reasons why the District was one of 10 winners in President Obama's Race to the Top competition. Washington will get up to $75 million in needed education dollars. Those much-needed funds wouldn't be coming to the District without Fenty's aggressive approach.
Yet just as the reforms instituted under Fenty are beginning to take hold, they are at risk of being completely unraveled. Fenty's challenger does not share the same enthusiasm for transforming the D.C. public school system, and there's a real risk that the system will revert to its previous state should Fenty lose the primary.
That would be tragic for Washington's students, and it shouldn't be allowed to come to pass.
Mayor Fenty was elected on a promise to transform the D.C. public school system and give Washington's students the type of high-quality education they deserve. Doing so has not been easy, and during his tenure Fenty has made some tough choices that have not always been popular.
But they were the right choices, and they have yielded strong results for Washington's students. Changing course now would be amount to a rejection of that progress.
Moreover, it would seriously undermine other reform efforts around the nation. President Obama's Race to the Top competition has encouraged lawmakers around the nation to undertake challenging legislative efforts, particularly around charter schools and teacher tenure. While these initiatives are in the best interests of students, they are fiercely opposed by teachers unions and other forces opposed to changes in the status quo. A loss will only embolden these forces to stand firm, knowing that voters won't support candidates who want to improve the system on election day.
We must ensure that doesn't happen and that D.C.'s public schools continue on the path toward great schools for all children. Mayor Fenty is the right choice to keep the system going in the right direction.
Joe Williams is Executive Director of Democrats for Education Reform.
Having worked at DCPS, I've come to clearly understand that Fenty actually makes few to NO decisions regarding the direction of education. He leaves it to Rhee who leaves it to her chiefs, who leave it to their senior staff - such is a large organization. Fenty is briefed on what has been done and has little knowledge of the happenings of DCPS. If you hear HIM speak, this is evident. The success that has been made has come as a function of limiting the bureaucracy via mayoral control; something both candidates supported. The problem is that TOO MANY hurdles were eliminated, which means that there are not sufficient "checks and balances" to make sure that progress is going in the BEST direction possible.
PROPAGANDA:
"Fenty may be thrown out, and along with him all the progress that has been made."
"Such a loss would condemn District students to a future filled with poor schools and ineffective teachers"
"Fenty's challenger does not share the same enthusiasm for transforming the D.C. public school system, and there's a real risk that the system will revert to its previous state should Fenty lose..."
"...it would seriously undermine other reform efforts around the nation."
Unfortunately for both candidates, this is not a respectable article.
Unfortunately for the youth of DC, DCPS has made some significant mistakes with questionable integrity (e.g. prioritizing modernization of upper income/gentrified neighborhood schools and recruiting higher-income parents).
Not this Democrat--and certainly not these reforms.
As a nearly 30-year resident of one of the pro-Fenty wards in DC, my vote in this mayoral contest will be the most difficult I have thus far ever cast in an election. But, if anything, rather than bolstering the arguments in defense Mayor Fenty, Mr. Williams has made it much easier for me to jump off the fence and vote for Vincent Gray.
The reason? Mr. Williams' claim that, "Changing course now...would seriously undermine other reform efforts around the nation."
Would that such could be so!! Despite Mr. Williams' claims, the approaches most commonly put forward by the education marketeers (who frequently and smugly refer to themselves as the "real reformers") offer quite little toward the goal of delivering high-quality public education, especially for low-income students. In fact, many such reform models lend themselves toward taking the very "public" out of public education altogether.
The voters of DC are profoundly aware of what it means to have full participation in this democracy circumscribed by other powers. Instead of selling themselves short, might DC voters be setting the stage for the means by which local people can take control of the definition and the quality of their public schools instead of handing these over to a clique of self-defined "reformers"?
Perhaps?
"...the District of Columbia Public School system has undergone radical changes, and for the first time in decades, D.C. students are beginning to gain access to a high-quality education. That progress is attributable directly to the current mayor, Adrian Fenty."
Seriously? Radical changes...Rhee fired over 200 teachers and lied about why she did it (budget deficit and then came to the council and said it was a budget surplus). She closed neighborhood schools and was featured on the cover of Time Magazine with a broom because she was "cleaning house." Its hard to turn over any school system over night and I can honestly say as a vested resident of the District that Fenty and Rhee HAVE NOT turned this system into a "high quality" school system. Implementing a highly flawed evaluation system and over testing kids is not an indicator of "high-quality." In addition, anytime reform efforts are tied to one person - Fenty, then you automatically set yourself up for disaster.
Both have brought down the rath of the municipal and teachers unions, both of whom have done nothing but take incredible amounts of money and WASTE IT. Angry displaced incompetents and no show jobs are much of the discontent behind the effort to defeat Fenty.
Michell Rhee must also get much of the credit for the good things Fenty has done for the kids!.
Even more amazing is that Fenty is wildly popular with whites, but despised by blacks in DC (over 30% according to NPR), despite education being one if the issues blacks in DC rate as very important. Trying to figure out why he is seen so differently by different races would be a very interesting study, but I fear that no journalists will touch it out of fear of seeming racist.
http://dferwatch.wordpress.com/
More great reads:
First, Bash the Teachers http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=4144
Master of Myth http://zhaolearning.com/2010/09/03/master-of-myth-what-arne-duncan-says-and-does/
Big Banks Making a Bundle on Charter School Construction http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2010/05/07/2010-05-07_albany_charter_cash_cow_big_banks_making_a_bundle_on_new_construction_as_schools.html
Reformer political machines in NY http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/2010/08/new-revelations-and-timeline-of.html
Rhee's Hypocrisy http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2010/08/rhees-hard-data-or-single-data-points.html
The Myth of the Heroic Chancellor [Rhee] http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/guest-bloggers/rhee-in-dc-the-myth-of-the-her.html
Charter School Scandals: http://charterschoolscandals.blogspot.com/
The Myth that Charter Schools Have Saved NOLA http://www.theroot.com/views/myth-charter-schools-have-saved-new-orleans
School Board voice of reason: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/school-turnaroundsreform/school-board-president-ed-refo.html
Again. READ the research. Ask yourself why would DEFR recommend actions that are NOT research based? Who benefits? It's not students.
http://charterschoolscandals.blogspot.com/
http://www.stickwithanose.com/2010/02/17/charters-real-estate-speculation/
http://www.stickwithanose.com/2009/12/06/hedgistan-charter-schools/
First, The single most predictive factor of poor school performance is poverty. That fact trumps all other factors, including poor teaching, inadequate curriculum materials, and class size. All research supports this fact. Look at the schools that are successful. They do not subscribe to merit pay and mass firings that DFER, Fenty, & Duncan endorse for inner city schools.
Second. Children from inner city schools need to have some hope that education will lead to a prosperous future. When they leave the school building, their communities have nothing to offer in the way of employment. Their economic mobility is severely limited by business practices that refuse to pay wages that would lift people above the poverty level.
Business needs to take some responsibility for the poverty in communities. They lobby against tax increase, leverage their influence to eliminate workers protections, refuse to pay pensions or health insurance to part time and low wage earners. Their practices created the impoverished conditions in communities that contribute to student school failure.