"Virginia youngsters encounter SOL exams for the first time in third grade, and it's a pile-on. No other elementary grade undergoes four exams, and no other students are tested on cumulative knowledge as third-graders are. They must recall history and science facts gathered from kindergarten on. Every other grade is tested solely on the knowledge gained that particular year."
Testing third graders like we do goes against EVERYTHING in which I professionally believe and understand. If test proponents could see what a third grade class looks like on the first day of school, maybe they'd begin to understand my fury. These are worldly innocent children; ego-centric and self-absorbed; yet delightful, creative and unique. That's the way it is with children this age, as it has always been. For some reason, we, as a society, have deemed third grade as THE YEAR OF RECKONING in life. We demand that these innocent souls shed their innocence and dress-up in adult clothing. We are demanding more, pound-for-pound, of our eight and nine year-olds than we are of grown adults in high-pressured work environments. It makes me furious and makes me more determined to be a buffer, one who interprets this alien world to and creates a safety zone for these wonderful people.
But even that's getting harder and harder to do.
Make no mistake about it. Third grade teachers are feeling piled-onto as well. Then again, all teachers are under assault from all sides right now. These attacks (teacher contracts, accountability, evaluations, test scores, salary, pensions, pointless mandates, etc) are brain-numbing, maddening, and just plain sad.
We teach for the children. We choose to care.
Many times, I think the rest of the world operates under a different broad understanding, "We CHOSE to care."
Imagine that you are the average citizen of Virginia and you read the most recent article in The Roanoke Times. Would you understand what the heck is going on? $330 million this, $1.9 billion that. $731 million this, $240 million that. Freezing, unfreezing, making harmless, GIANT TSUNAMI's.
So what does it all mean? So what's real?
Here's what's real. State support for public school education is about to take a nose-dive. Historically, Virginia already under-funds schools. With this new effort, we may even take the gold medal over Mississippi in the under-funding championship.
This weekend, our friends in Orange County, Virginia are spear-heading a "Rally In Richmond." Educators and our friends will meet at the bell tower in front of the capital building between 11am and Noon. It's time to stand up...even louder than we stood up in 2004. We can't sit quietly by the wayside and let our school children be robbed. We need to MAKE OUR VOICES HEARD.
Check back on this blog for more information or join our Facebook group, "Roanoke County Education Association."
It's time to make time.
thom
PS A longer, more personal version of this commentary and call to action exists on my private blog. If you'd like to read it, visit Swimming Upstream.
Virginia’s Constitution says “The General Assembly shall provide for a system of free public elementary and secondary schools for all children of school age throughout the Commonwealth, and shall seek to ensure that an educational program of high quality is established and continually maintained.”
The Virginia Constitution has strong language related to public school education. Very directly put, the state has the legal OBLIGATION to ensure that public schools are adequately funded. Lately, we've heard that the state wants to cut ANOTHER $720 from the education budget. The impact would be devastating to public schools in our state. In Roanoke County, we're staring at over $9 million in cuts from the state. Such cuts would destroy what we've come to expect from public school education in our locality.
VEA has launched a blog that will address important General Assembly legislative issues.
Hot off the press is VEA's Rob Jones' first look at the various bills that, if passed, will drastically reshape VRS for educators. The legislative attack on VRS is serious and should be of great concern to all educators who plan to make education their life's profession.
Rob Jones, VEA's Government relations director, sent an email out today calling attention to a dire threat facing every one of Virginia's educators during the next General Assembly session.
In the General Assembly session ahead, one thing we can count on is that the benefits offered by the Virginia Retirement System will be under attack. In these tough times, legislators will be looking under every rock to find ways to cut costs.
Thanks to a Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission(JLARC) report released a year ago, seven proposals are up for consideration, including eliminating the current traditional pension plan and replacing it with a 401(k) personal risk account.
According to Rob, many of our members simply do not understand the true benefit and promise of our current system. Why? Perhaps they haven't experienced the real ebb and flow of investment life. More likely, they have never invested at all.
Do you realize that before Roanoke County Schools revamped our 403-b investment program last year, about 18% of our employees took advantage of the program? When we switched over to the Hartford management team after an intense selection process necessitated by IRS tax law changes, participation has dropped to 9.6%. Folks, the industry average for 401-k (similar to 403-b) participation in the business world is 79%. Given time and a strong effort by our Hartford representatives, Kyle Scully and Rob Mangano, this percentage should slowly grow back.
As a career educator, I fully understand why it’s easy to let retirement thoughts slide. We face so much in our daily PRESENT lives serving others that it's hard to carve out time to think about our own futures.
My wife and I are that unique educator couple. We both teach elementary school and have been investing in 403-b's since the mid-1980's. We began investing simply because we wanted a full retirement option when we decided that teaching was over for us. We wanted the ability to live comfortably and maybe travel a bit.
We were confident to develop an investment plan because we knew that we had two components in place already, the defined benefits offered by Social Security and VRS.With that security in mind, we scrimped and saved pennies from our meager salaries (I started at $10,500 a year) and strode out into the investment world. We developed a relationship with a financial planner in whom we have grown to trust implicitly.We knew that, between VRS and Social Security, we could expect a constant sum of money that would allow us to live.Our 403-b’s would just be icing on the cake and allow us to experience life.
Like many others, the 403-b dream has been mixed.We’ve invested faithfully for over 20 years in solid funds but the inherent risky nature of the product doomed us in the down times.The technology bubble burst bashed our accounts and the recent crash sank us.
Here’s what I’m getting at.We knew the risks and were willing to take them because we had security in our hip pocket.Now, some legislators want to take my security away.They want to turn my DEFINED BENEFIT RETIREMENTPLANinto a PERSONAL RISK ACCOUNT.
On top of switching VRS from a defined benefit plan to a personal risk account, the General Assembly is eyeing the giant pile of money being held by VRS in our name.They covet these billions.Even though these billions were earned by us and were kept in guarded trust for us, sometimes in lieu of salary increases, this money is a very tempting pot of gold that could cure the state of what ails it in the short-term, so they believe.
According to Rob’s analysis of JLARC’s report,a retiring teacher can expect a 48% REDUCTION in benefits from VRS.48% .I’m trying hard to understand why someone could possibly think that idea is acceptable or advised.Perhaps such people are taking advantage of Math SOL 4.5 (Front End Estimation).48% written as a decimal would be 0.48.Using the front-end method, underline the front digit and drop the rest 0.48.Hence 0.48 can accurately be estimated as 0 or 0% using front-end estimation.Of course, most of the rest of us would simply round off 48 to 50 and advertise the 50% reduction in benefits (Also Math SOL 4.5).
That’s right, there are people who don’t care and may even be blind to the fact that educators will endure a 50% cut in benefits if we go to Personal Risk Accounts.I fully expect Rob to share more information in the coming weeks of how exactly these accounts will impact us.
We need to educate our colleagues about both the benefits of the current system, which provides a guaranteed benefit for life following retirement, and the shortcomings of the 401(k). The current issue of Time magazine includes an excellent article entitled, "Why It's Time to Retire the 401(k)."
This article was lifted from theVEA website. If you're a member, stop by the VEA website and vote in our special run-off election. You'll need your membership number to vote.
Weigh in on Proposed Change to SOL Testing Program
At the last Virginia Board of Education meeting, a proposal was made to eliminate the third grade social studies SOL test. Social studies testing is not required under NCLB, and most states do not have a required social studies test. If the third grade social studies test is eliminated, students will continue to take other required third grade tests. Additionally, annual testing in history will still occur in the other currently tested grade levels. Last year, there was a 93 percent pass rate statewide on the third grade social studies test. The state superintendent has proposed that the third grade reading test be modified to include passages based on the social studies SOL content standards as a means of ensuring that the content be taught.
Proponents of eliminating the test argue that removing the third grade social studies test will allow teachers and schools to focus both time and resources on literacy. Teachers will be given greater flexibility to embed social studies content into their reading curricula. Proponents also suggest that the $380,000 savings will allow the state to update and improve tests required under NCLB. The proposed elimination of this test is in response to a request from school superintendents to reduce the testing load.
Opponents of eliminating the third grade social studies test include the Virginia Consortium of Social Studies Specialists and College Educators. This advocacy group acknowledges that the current method of multiple choice testing is flawed, but is concerned that if the test is dropped, social studies will be under-emphasized in elementary school curricula. They worry that social studies instructional time will be reduced, and that ultimately, student performance in future grades will suffer. Additional concerns have been raised that the elimination of this test will simply make the fourth grade test even more broad and difficult to prepare for by adding four more years of content to this test.
The Board will make a final decision at its June 25 meeting. The VEA is currently formulating a position, and needs input from teachers. Please clickhereto participate in a short survey to help us in this effort.
This letter came from Rob Jones of VEA regarding the upcoming gubernatorial primary in June and election in the fall.Rob gave his blessing for this work to be shared here.
Dear Members,
I have carefully watched gubernatorial candidates in Virginia weigh in on education issues since Miles Godwin narrowly defeated Henry Howell by 15,000 votes.
Not since Governors Robb and Baliles have I seen any real effort on the part of Virginia Governors to keep their promises to Virginia's educators. Wilder, Warner and Kaine all promised to bring us to the national average teacher salary but not one of them made any significant progress in moving us in the right direction. Kaine told us fully funding the Standards of Quality was his top priority, and now he is working to permanently change the formula by reducing funding by $340 million dollars a year. (Incidentally, not one of the four gubernatorial candidates embraced this plan when asked about it by Dr. Boitnott.)
So, I take the candidate promises with a grain of salt. Nonetheless, we have little other than what they have done and what they say they will do to guide us as we decide how to cast our votes.
The VEA Fund (formerly known as VEA-PAC) has not recommended a candidate, so I find myself in the delightful position of being able to discuss the positions the candidates are taking from a policy rather than a political perspective. I won't judge the candidates, but I will tell you where they stand, with an emphasis on those areas that offer a contrast. I am fortunate to have our questionnaires from all four candidates and the tapes of our forum in which all four participated (http://www.veanea.org/vea-on-your-side/gov-forum.html).
First, if you examine the candidate's VEA voting records you will see that Deeds, McDonnell and Moran have a clear history based on many sessions. Only McAuliffe lacks legislative experience and, hence, a legislative history. In 15 regular and 2 special sessions Deeds VEA voting record is 93.5%. In 11 regular sessions and 2 special sessions, McDonnell's VEA voting record is 52.4%, and in 13 regular sessions and two special sessions, Moran's voting record is 91.8%.
The most obvious contrast in positions is over the issue of public funds to private schools via vouchers or tuition-tax-credits. All three Democratic candidates oppose vouchers and tuition-tax-credits, while Bob McDonnell supports tuition-tax-credits. While he alludes to Constitutional concerns regarding vouchers, he will not say that he opposes them.
All three Democratic candidates promise to oppose efforts to eliminate or weaken Virginia's continuing contract laws. McDonnell refuses to answer "yes" or "no" to the question and alludes to Michelle Rhee in Washington, D.C., who is "making comprehensive reforms in the school system ...."
While the three Democrats all support expanding the retiree health care credit to educational support professionals, McDonnell says he "will need more information on the fiscal impact and our current budget situation."
All three Democrats support permissive meet-and-confer legislation, while McDonnell opposes.
Perhaps, McDonnell's strong support for "performance based incentives," too, is a matter of contrast? I just heard him espousing linkage of test scores and pay at an event this morning and he lists this item as one of his top priorities on his questionnaire, but I have not heard the Democrats react to a question on that topic.
When every candidate has a dear relative who is a teacher and all see public education as the "top priority" it is difficult to determine "Who's for kids, and who's just kidding?" I hope this overview is helpful as you begin to decide which candidate deserves your support. If you are a Democrat, I urge you to vote in the June 9 primary. I urge all to vote on November 3.
Thank you,
Robley Jones
VEA GR
FYI Rob has worked for VEA as the person in charge of our legislative agenda. Before that, he was one of the most popular VEA presidents of our generation. There is no greater expert on Virginia education legislation.
Cast Your Vote for a Candidate for NEA Director, April 25-May 8
Voting this spring for the position of NEA Director will be conducted online for the first time in VEA's history. It's a secure, efficient process set up by our partner, Votenet.
You'll be voting for one of three candidates. Here are the full details on our new procedures. Print ballots will be available for members who prefer that option. Online voting will be open beginning at 8 a.m. on Saturday, April 25, and run through May 8. Election results and procedures for any runoff election will be posted in the "VEA Election Central" area on the right-hand side of www.veanea.org.
Cast your online vote in three easy steps:
Make sure you know your individual NEA membership number. It is printed on your VEA membership card and on the first line of your address label for the VEA News or Virginia Journal of Education.
Do your research on the three candidates. Candidate biographies and statements are linked below; videos of their speeches at the VEA Delegate Assembly will be posted shortly after the convention's conclusion.
When you're ready to vote, click the "Vote Now" link below to cast your vote at the Votenet site.
Governor Tim Kaine of Virginia officially released his proposed budget amendments today. The details on how his budget amendment proposal would impact our beloved county is still to be understood, but it's impossible to cut money out of a budget without there being an impact. Brace ourselves, we must. (I don't know why I just wrote in Yoda-talk.)
According to Rob Jones of VEA, there are supportable details found within the Governor's amendments. Tackling an announced $2.9 Billion deficit will not be easy. Rob passed along the following notes this afternoon.
He cut education less than any other area.
He looked at both sides of the ledger, and raised the cigarette tax, tweaked the land-preservation tax credit and eliminated the “dealer discount” (paid to merchants for collecting the sales tax) to reduce the harm to essential state programs.
We have grave concerns regarding the fact that:
He made $400 million of the cuts to education permanent cuts that will be with us even when the recession is over ($400 million in SOQ funding reductions partially offset by $60 million in loss mitigation for the 2009-2010 school year). The impact on next year is $340 million. The impact into the future is $400 million per year. This eliminates the state share of funding for 13,000 positions including custodians, finance officers, HR directors, assistant superintendents and central office personnel).
What we know about the cuts for the next school year?
$340 million SOQ cuts to support and administrative components of the formula $78 million in teacher salary $82.5 in school construction
Total = $500.5 million, or slightly over ½ billion
No doubt many of you will want to know what can be done faced with the reality of the budget shortfall (could end up being larger than $2.9 Billion). I can almost say with complete certainty that the budget will be amended. What we must do is help direct the amendments in a positive direction for public school education.
On January 9, I plan to join our education coalition partners in Lynchburg at a state budget hearing. At that hearing, I will no doubt push for examination of different revenue generating plans that would soften the blow. Re-instituting the estate tax, along with the cigarette tax increase, is one idea that is being considered (tax on estates valued over $2 million).
Most importantly, we must fight hard and strong to keep any cuts that happen from becoming permanent. This is paramount! Any cuts made in the remainder of the biennial budget must remain temporary. Virginia is already ranked 37th in support for public schools in America. That dubious ranking would slide further if these cuts were to become permanent.
President Boitnott will present a petition at the budget hearing in Richmond on January 19 that all members, friends of members, relatives, parents, and citizens are invited to sign. The petition clearly speaks to the issues we care deeply about. Please sign this on-line petition and urge your colleagues, family and friends to sign on as well. Our battle is to prevent permanent cuts to education funding.
Penny Hodge, Assistant Superintendent of RCPS, is working on getting a clear picture of how the proposed amendments may affect Roanoke County. Right now, this early in the budget process, it's really too early to tell. However, brace ourselves, we must.
On a side note, I'm experimenting with a new service on this blog. I realized that from time to time, I want all of you to be able to see documents that relate directly to a specific topic. Meg Swecker, master of all things technology, pointed me to a site called, Drop.io. With Drop.io, I can upload all kinds of documents, sound, and pictures and have you access them at your leisure. You can view and download the files as you wish. So far, I've added all of the back-issues of the RCEA News from this year, Governor Kaine's press release from today, and a few other documents that will be related to future blog entries. You can test out the service by clicking on the link in this article for proposed budget amendments or you can visit the whole RCEADistrict4 site.
Hard Times honors one of my personal heroes, Studs Terkel, who passed away earlier in the month.
Robley Jones sent out another Budget-gram today...For those who follow the budget, the news is rather ominous. Folks, the budget shortfall in Virginia keeps growing. Back in the summer, it was predicted to be $1 billion. Then it eeked-up to $2.5 billion. Now..$3.2 billion. I've even heard whispers of more earth-shattering deficits. Times remain serious and uneasy.
Here's the full text of Rob's letter today:
The two day Senate Finance Committee Annual Retreat immediately followed the House retreat. This time the setting is the FredericksburgHospitalityHouseConferenceCenter.
Four straight days of reports of doom and gloom have me paring my Christmas list.
Chairman Colgan’s opening remarks were shocking and courteous. Shocking in that the size of the budget hole has grown to $3.2256 billion. The Chairman was courteous in his emphasis on a desire for a bipartisan approach to the crisis. In my time as your lobbyist, exceptional individuals have chaired this most powerful committee in the Virginia General Assembly. Colgan maintains the high standard set by Andrews and Chichester.
Staff analyst, Becky Covey, said we have been in a “slow motion recession – probably since the beginning of 2008.” She asserted that, “A deeper recession lasting several quarters in now the likely scenario.”
When the discussion shifted to education, Education Committee Chairman Edd Houck pointed out that, “There really has not been a percentage change for K-12 since 1998. It has remained basically constant.”
What was most interesting is that staff presented the Compound Annual Average Growth from FY1998 to FY2010. Listed were the state programs that increased more than the 5.85% annual growth in revenue. What follows in a list of the programs and their growth:
Car Tax 14.7%
Child Support Enforcement 13.9%
Debt Service 11.0%
Comprehensive Services Act 10.2%
Aid to Localities – Police Dept. 9.8%
Indigent Defense 9.2%
Medicaid 7.5%
MHMR Grants to Localities 7.0%
Student Financial Aid 6.6%
Total General Fund Budget 6.0%
Why isn’t education on the list? The compound annual average growth of public education’s share of the budget was less than that of the growth of the budget – despite enrollment growth, expansion of pre-school programs, and new burdens on public schools such as NCLB. The growth for public education was slightly less than 5.85%. This refutes the claims of our enemies that education spending is out of control.
Given the size of the budget hole, there appeared to be consensus among those present to cut public school funding. VEA will fight cuts, but if they must be made, we will fight to make them temporary rather than permanent, with an eye on restoration of funding as we come out of the recession. We will also work to ensure attention to pupil equity.
Cuts presented to the committee included increasing class size, decreasing state support for school employee health care insurance costs and reducing the state share of SOQ funding from the current 55%.
In contrast with the House, the Senate seems willing to look at the revenue side, possibly revisiting recent tax cuts, to lessen the severity of the cuts to public education. While support for permanently reducing state support for public education seems broad in the House, the Senate leadership is resistant to that method of addressing the current budget shortfall. Hopefully, the Governor will align himself with the Senate in this regard.
Please encourage any non-members at your school join us. it's not too late. While we can't guarantee a future job, we can guarantee support and strength during these difficult times.
Each year at the NEA Convention for long time now, NEA delegates have gathered to complete a Habitat for Humanity project in the convention city.For most or all of those years, Bud McWhorter has represented the RCEA and VEA.
The Habitat for Humanity project this year was held on Wednesday, July 2.This year the group, organized by Karen McInnis of Minnesota, was sent to work at the Habitat Restore in South Alexandria.Bud McWhorter and Thom Ryder were two of the three Virginians on the crew.By far, most of the volunteers were from Delaware with a few volunteers from other states.
At the ReStore, a place that sells donated home materials at greatly reduced cost, the band of NEA volunteers were sent out into the store to straighten the place up.Sounds easy…but it was anything but simple.
One crew set about organizing miscellaneous nuts and bolts.Another crew rearranged cabinets.Still another crew straightened rows of furniture.One guy even set fixing up an electrical light fixture display.
Most challenging was the incredible tile aisle.Before the crew was unleashed upon it, ceramic tile was strewn haphazardly all over the place up and down the aisle.Different sizes and styles were all mixed up.The intrepid team of plucky volunteers knelt and began sorting and organizing.In a couple of hours, the aisle was a beautiful testament to organization.When the store manager inspected the work, he was most impressed…so impressed in fact, that he immediately ordered several pallets stacked high with mixed and mismatched ceramic tiles to be fork lifted out to the aisle.When those were done being dealt with, more were brought…it almost didn’t seem to end.Eventually for the Team NEA, the job was done, and they were returned to the comfort of the Convention Center.
In this fast-paced world, taking time to serve those in need is both rewarding and the right thing to do.
{Click Photos to enlarge}
Group leader, Karen McInnis talks with Convention Staff
The NEA Convention was held this year from June 30 through July 6 in WashingtonD.C.The RCEA was represented by a trio of members; Bud McWhorter, Linda Hogan, and me.
It’s hard to describe how amazing this convention is.The WashingtonD.C.Convention Center takes up about three square city blocks.The NEA set up shop inside virtually the whole complex.It was like a miniature city.Delegates from around the United States and territories all came, along with education dignitaries from across the world.Ex-NEA and VEA President, Mary Futrell, sat with our delegation during one stretch.
All told there were about 10,000 delegates in attendance plus another 4,000-6,000 visitors.Each convention session was filled with debate over education issues brought forth from members in every state.The debate was frequently spirited, but in the end democratic principles reigned supreme and discussion gave way to decisions.
You may have been told that NEA is a liberal organization or perhaps you remember when the former Secretary of Education Bell referred to the NEA as a terrorist organization.Well, I can give testament to the fact that the NEA was most concerned about the education of our country’s children and the working conditions of our educators and support staff.Much of our discussion centered on dealing with the constraints of NCLB.I left feeling assured that NEA will work diligently to revamp the in such a way that the act accomplishes its challenging mandate.
One of the highlights of the convention for me was the address by North Carolina Governor Mike Easley.Governor Easley was the recipient of the first “America's Greatest Education Governor” award from the NEA.Governor Easley understands it.He gets it.He knows what needs to be done, and he has a plan.It was delight to hear him speak.If you have a few minutes, watch the video (you may need to register on the NEA member site) of his presentation, you will be invigorated.Senator Obama also spoke to the convention delegates after the delegates voted (electronically) to endorse his candidacy, and there was a lot of dancing in the aisles.
There was dancing in the aisles after Obama spoke.
Each morning of the convention, the Virginia delegation would meet in the ballroom of our MarriottWardmanPark (across from the National Zoo) and hash out our state positions on the issues of the day.We even had entertainment by our own Virginia Delegate choir (Bud of course sang in that).They were incredible.
The highlight for our delegation was the election of ex-VEA President, princess Moss to the NEA Executive Board.Her election was no small feat.We campaigned hard for her at all public functions.I personally held a sign and screamed “Vote for Princess for several hours as delegates entered the convention hall on Election Day.Princess was the top vote getter and was one of two members elected to that prestigious position.As a person who has known Princess Moss for over twenty years dating back to when we were both presidents of tiny locals in Central Virginia, I can honestly say that the NEA delegates made a sound choice.
There was fun to be had in D.C.I was fortunate to pull some family strings and get access to a July 4thcelebration on the roof of the WillardHotel and Office complex right beside The White House.The WillardHotel is a Washington landmark.In fact the term “Lobby” is said to originate there. According to local lore, U.S. Grant would step across the street to the lobby of the Willard for beverages and cigars with his high-powered Washington friends.These encounters soon became known as “lobbying.”Anyway, the fireworks were awesome, and I enjoyed meeting people I would have never dreamed of meeting.
By far the most important thing I did at the NEA Convention was to join Bud in the annual Habitat for Humanity project.I will share that story in a separate article.
If you ever get a chance, you should really consider attending an NEA Convention.You will leave on fire for your profession.
