It might take some time, Tamara, for your shared truths on APEX to reach KNS readers. Could be sometime after the vote the pour to pour millions into an unscientific, unfair, and damaging scheme for teacher pay that has an established research base that says RUN THE OTHER WAY.

Mayor Dean in Nashville recently ignored the needs of public schools in Nashville by pushing through a plan to spend almost 10 percent of the 5 year capital outlay budget for schools on a single project--$16 million for a KIPP, Inc. school. This, as one one the best publics, Hume Fogg Magnet, has children eating lunch in hallways, no functioning gym, and rain coming in.

Plan to find the story at Forbes and post on it. They have been very receptive to the truth on some issues in education. I guess you will find out how that goes locally.

Merit pay schemes for teachers are a waste of money. Merit pay has NEVER been effective in education. Every independent research study has shown no effects on child learning. The latest study was conducted at Vanderbilt in which the teachers could earn up to $15,000 for the highest test score gains and $10,000 and $5,000 for lesser gains. There was NO significant effects. Why? Teachers were working as hard as they can.

Teachers teach because they have a strong service ethic and a desire to make profound differences in the lives of children and families; kind of like ministers or nurses. Teachers, ministers, and nurses don't expect to get rich.Rather, they prefer stability and a fair wage- why else would they choose to work with some of our most challenging students?
Teachers are not driven like businessmen or entrepreneurs who have a profound need for risk-taking.

Merit pay distorts the incentives of the teaching profession.Do we want people in the teaching profession who prefer to spend their days knee deep in the company of children or those who are driven get bonus pay? Why not simply pay teachers for all of their extra work?

The excesses of Wall St's obsession for profit (i.e., greed) caused systemic cheating and fraud that bankrupted the world economy. Is that the ethos we want to impose on our teachers and schools?

The Mrs. and I were talking about the Maryville paper's editorial department. The opinion editor (who had called about publishing one of her letters) has been there for about a hundred years and we rarely agree but he readily gives voice to opposing views. A family-owned, community newspaper publisher in Greenville bought them a couple of years ago and setup a separate local subsidiary to run the paper. The long-time publisher retired, and was replaced by a guy from one of their other Tennessee papers. The executive editor and managing editor are both East TN State graduates.

Contrast that with the News Sentinel, which has an out-of-town corporate owner, an editor not from around here by way of Arizona and Colorado, and a publisher who is not from around here by way of Kansas, Ohio, New York, Texas and who also oversees newspapers in Indiana and South Carolina.

"Not from around here" is often a good thing in business because you get new blood with fresh perspectives. With a newspaper, though, it seems like you ought to have management a little more connected to the community, and not just through the Chamber of Commerce, United Way and local PR firms.

If the powers that be et al., think that the APEX formula has any statistical validity, they are mistaken. If they continue to ignore educators and assessment experts their failed experiments on our kids will eventually be revealed for what it is- statistical phrenology.

We need to spend money on proven methods - lowering class sizes, giving teachers more time for creative projects, and on adequate resources for classrooms and schools.

Instead, we've been starving our public schools for years and are now wasting money on evaluation schemes developed by third parties that have no real connection to learning outcomes.

Tamara,

Yes, the KNS editorial page is guilty of agenda-setting. That's what editorials do. Unlike news stories, which are written to tell the public what's going on, our editorials are written to influence public opinion. Sometimes they do just that. Sometimes they don't.

This particular editorial speaks for itself. We are pleased Knoxville and Tennessee as a whole are doing better economically and are perceived as being good places to do business. But we also believe that to maintain that momentum we need to invest in education. Other communities are doing that - which is why we included the bit about Nashville Mayor Karl Dean's proposal - and we cannot afford to get left behind.

Perhaps you were a little unclear on what a meeting with the editorial board is all about. A meeting with the editorial board is an opportunity for people to persuade the board to take a position on a particular subject. It is not a guarantee the board will adopt that position, nor is it a guarantee that the board will write an editorial on the subject at all. I don't discuss specific editorial board meetings in public forums, though I'm happy to discuss editorials and explain editorial positions once we have publicly taken them. If you would like to discuss our recent meeting, send me a private email.

A meeting with the editorial board also has nothing to do with news stories. People who want news stories need to contact reporters. I have nothing whatsoever to do with news stories that appear in the paper.

I have extended invitations to you and to the KCEA to write guest columns in which you can express your opinions without the opposing viewpoints that come with news stories. So far, no one has taken me up on the offer. The offer still stands.

For the record, in November we advocated for a one-year trial period for the new teacher evaluations to see how they work and to improve them before merit raises were based on them. State officials apparently did not see the wisdom of that position.

What a joke the Sentinel is about this school budget. Barker and his editorial board are selling the worst plan since Ragsdale wanted to bond the Sheriff's Pension. Everyone knows you don't bond a pension because over time you end up adding a third to the cost. But what did the Sentinel do back then? Thought it was a great idea. Because they were told to by the brain trust.

Now the Sentinel is selling the idea that we should have a big tax increase forever that only capitalizes buildings and a technology plan for four years. What a deal. Four years of benefit but we pay for it for the rest of our lives. The interest on the bonds would end one day. But not this brilliant plan. It keeps taking forever.

The four year capital and technology total is $70 million dollars. $27 million of that is for the so-called technology plan. $43 million for buildings. Why on earth would we pay 35 cents forever for such a scheme? We already screwed up once with the Sheriff's Pension. What does it take to learn around here?

The Sentinel is a paper that can't understand basic finance. They only understand what they are told by the brain trust. They refuse to consider anyone other than the brain trust.

We need a new brain trust and a better paper.

Yes, the KNS editorial page is guilty of agenda-setting. That's what editorials do. Unlike news stories, which are written to tell the public what's going on...

My objection is two-fold: KNS has not adopted any editorial stance cognizant of a larger trend in education nationally to privatize its public schools, nor have its reporters "told the public what's going on."

In fact, I strongly suspect its reporters may not even know "what's going on."

Fault me if you must for becoming the banshee intent on telling the public "what's going on."

Fault me for doing that now, as this budget request hangs in the balance.

I do it now for a couple of reasons, though:

One is that the impetus to reach a local audience exists now, while public attention is focused on this local budget request. True public school supporters would be foolish not to adopt the same strategy that's worked so well for the privatizers:

At the most recent (National Summit on Education Reform, headed by Florida's Jeb Bush), held in San Francisco in mid-October, a group of more than 200 state legislators and state education department officials huddled in a ballroom over education-technology strategy...Throughout the day, lawmakers mingled with education-technology lobbyists from leading firms, like Apex Learning and K12 Inc. Some of the distance learning reforms were taught in breakout sessions, like one called “Don’t Let a Financial Crisis Go to Waste,” an hourlong event that encouraged lawmakers to use virtual schools as a budget-cutting measure.

If that acknowledgment for the timing I choose sounds cold and calculating to your ears, though, the other reason for my timing is purely altruistic:

I care far more deeply to be of some modest impact in helping to stop this wave of public school profiteering than I care to impact adoption of a single school year's local budget--especially given that the local budget in question only serves to further entrench this public policy to which I so adamently object.

Let the chips fall where they may.

In other words, you disagree. OK. Lots of people disagree with our editorial positions. I have invited you to write something for our pages. That offer stands. You can write about the five-year (not one-year) budget proposal or you can write about the national trend you see. I don't care. It's your opinion. If you don't take advantage of the offer, though, you can't complain that we're not putting your views into the paper.

Not sure if this is the right place, but it's the most recent post on the topic so I'll ask here.

Who is Battelle for Kids? I mean, I've googled who they are and what they do and how they're funded (including the Gates foundation and $8.6 million from the State of Tennessee by way of federal Race to the Top grants in 2010 and other sources.)

But are their methods effective? The APEX documents and graphics at the KCS site appear to be produced by them. They are pretty and dense, so they are at least good at that. It appears most of their revenues come from consulting with local and state school boards on strategic compensation, value added testing and the like.

It looks like they developed their products and methods for Ohio and they are now being spread across the U.S. as templates for a fee. They sound like the ALEC of education.

Their executive director makes about $300K and they have several other well-compensated executives, not that there's anything wrong with that.

How much as KCS paid them? Or was it all from Race to the Top funds?

(Sorry if this has already been discussed.)

Sigh.

I'd love to enter this discusion - and I'm sure I'd learn something - but I just can't handle the nastiness right now. I'm getting it in too many other places.

For those of you southern born and bred - flies, honey, vinegar, etc.

Preamble

Members of the Society of Professional Journalists believe that public enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues. Conscientious journalists from all media and specialties strive to serve the public with thoroughness and honesty. Professional integrity is the cornerstone of a journalist's credibility. Members of the Society share a dedication to ethical behavior and adopt this code to declare the Society's principles and standards of practice.

Seek Truth and Report It

Journalists should be honest, fair and courageous in gathering, reporting and interpreting information.

Journalists should:

— Tell the story of the diversity and magnitude of the human experience boldly, even when it is unpopular to do so.
— Examine their own cultural values and avoid imposing those values on others.
— Support the open exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.
— Give voice to the voiceless; official and unofficial sources of information can be equally valid.
— Distinguish between advocacy and news reporting. Analysis and commentary should be labeled and not misrepresent fact or context.

Rachel, Scott, and Scott--

This has nothing whatsoever to do with a newspaper's freedom to editorialize, which right I certainly acknowledge.

In his examination of this new "accountability measure" for which the school board is seeking massive funding, Jack McElroy sat across a conference room table from me and used a calculator to determine what percentage of "test-less" teachers' so-called "performance evaluations" determined by the measure would, in fact, rely on student test scores generated by some teacher other than the one actually being "evaluated."

He announced the percentage displayed on his calculator screen.

Then he made a conscious decision to sit on his finding so as to manipulate available public information pertinent to an upcoming vote of a local elected body.

Per his profession's code of ethics, he has thus far failed to "distinguish between advocacy and news reporting."

I doubt very much that his underling, John North, can override his boss's decision.

Rachel--

One should certainly try to "persuade" an officeholder to vote one way or another.

One should not need to "persuade" a news agency to print news.

Not only is a news agency bound by its own code of ethics to print news, it's also the job they're paid to do.

See the difference?

Then he made a conscious decision to sit on his finding so as to manipulate available public information pertinent to an upcoming vote of a local elected body.

Told you his motivation, did he? Or are you reading his mind?

Rachel--

Deductive reasoning.

What reason do you deduce for his having thus far sat on available public information pertinent to an upcoming vote of a local elected body?

This story just up at KNS tonight:

Powell High's Coach Inman and Coach McGill resign.
Fulton High's Coach Skeen resigns.

From the article:

"I've been doing it off and on since about 1983," said Skeen. "Really, the difficulty of teaching at one school (Spring Hill Elementary) and going to coach at another school — with all the requirements being put on teachers with the new evaluation system — it's just getting harder."

Just because a news story doesn't appear one or two days after an editor or reporter gets one tidbit of information doesn't mean a journalist is not looking into it. You need to get realistic about how the news business works.

Well, why didn't you just say so, Scott.

All I've had to go on is this dearth of coverage on the topic over the last two days, Friday's (second) editorial urging adoption of this budget, and your very first comment here:

A meeting with the editorial board also has nothing to do with news stories. People who want news stories need to contact reporters. I have nothing whatsoever to do with news stories that appear in the paper.

I realize you have nothing to do with news stories, but Jack does and he was present at the meeting.

I'm vastly relieved to think KNS is making an inquiry, which is all I've asked.

And I'd give you some bacon if you turned up on my doorstep, too.

(link...)

Do the clowns in Nashville and downtown really believe our kids don't have access to national media? They know the tactics being instituted don't work, they know that evaluations are a game of "Let's be good while they're watching," and they know that they're being treated as political ping pong balls. In short they know that administrators and politicians aren't doing their job.

(link...)

And their solution is this? Talk about prima donna assholes trying to turn the table on people holding them accountable. I suppose I could take time away from helping with the fundraisers I participate in because our leaders are too gutless to stand up and do the right thing by our schoolchildren and properly fund our schools to prove to a mindless twit that I'm a competent parent, but he's still going to be a mindless twit just looking for another excuse to keep from doing his job, so I don't understand what this is actually going to help.

Bacon, bacon, bacon. I'll be on the porch, slobbering.

I would love to sit down with you and Toby and Rachel and Randy and bizgirl and Tamara and Redmoniker (sp?) and I'm sure one or two others for a long afternoon of beer-drinking and problem solving. Just for fun and sport.

Time is such an issue in this day and age though.

As are designated drivers who don't lecture. I have no problem being driven home drunk, I just don't want to hear about how drunk I am. I already know. I'd just as soon do my drinking at home, where there's bacon.

The issues we discuss ARE important but it is more important that we set an example of civil discourse with a bit of humor and common respect so those that follow the discourse can join in and add to the discussion. I know I have been hard on the folks downtown, but they have earned that, and most know that they can easily redeem themselves by doing the right thing in support of ALL children within our system. It's not as hard to do as some would lead you to believe.

Education is a people task. Invest in people. It's pretty basic really.