Vol. 4, No. 49
December 3, 2002

* FEDERAL POLICY: Just in time for the New Year, the U.S. Department of Education issued final regulations concerning the implementation of No Child Left Behind, and because the Administration stuck to the intent of the law -- i.e. TO LEAVE NO CHILD BEHIND -- many school district administrators are reeling. Because they accept federal funds under Title 1, school leaders must offer parents options when their school has been deemed failing after two years. While this has been so since the early part of this year, school district officials have been able to get away with offering only a handful of options to parents in need. The honeymoon is over, the regs basically declared: from now on, capacity is no longer an excuse. The new federal law requires school leaders in states and communities to provide options, which means they'll no doubt have to get creative in order to ensure that no child indeed gets left behind. The New York Times leads the pack in coverage of these important issues. For more background and analysis, go to http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/27/education/27EDUC.html and http://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/28/education/28EDUC.html.

* ELECTIONS: We've just barely gone a month from the last election and already candidates for '04 are tooling their education platforms. One such potential presidential candidate is John Kerry, Democrat from Massachusetts, whose new Governor embraces a wide variety of school choices. Not Kerry. On NBC's "Meet the Press" this past weekend, Kerry fudged what appeared to be earlier support of school choice, including the successful and growing charter school movement. He said, "Ninety percent of America's kids go to school in public schools. You couldn't have enough vouchers or enough charter schools created fast enough, and there aren't enough seats at the table of charter schools to cure the problem of America's educational system. There is only one way to do it. And that is to empower every public school in America to be as good as any charter school or any other school, and you have to make a commitment." Which leads us to ask -- what about parent empowerment? Should only schools be empowered?

* CHARTERS: Lawmakers in Ohio are poised to vote tonight on a compromise bill that will revitalize the state's charter school movement. As summarized last week, the bill addresses issues such as charter facilities financing, adding an additional authorizer, raising the cap, and expanding the scope of where charters can be formed in the state. The bill will allow for more diverse schooling options as well, such as single-sex schools and schools for gifted-students. Charter opponents fought hard to restrict the current law even further, by limiting sponsorships only to local districts and by tightening the cap. The bill may be passed against the backdrop of a union-driven lawsuit that seeks to void the whole law on fabricated notions of what constitutes public accountability.

* UNIONS: Recently it was revealed that the Washington (D.C.) Teachers' Union overcharged the district's teachers by more than $700,000 this year, taking $160 per-teacher in "back" dues -- instead of the $16 it was allowed to deduct -- from a retroactive pay raise it helped secure. In reporting the story, the Washington Post published interesting information showing just how much incompetence costs these days. Every two weeks union members have $24.75 taken from their paychecks to support the union. Worse yet, non-union teachers have to contribute 85% of that, or $21.04, supposedly to cover collective bargaining costs. That means every year each non-union teacher is being forced to give $547.04 to a union that the teacher not only does not want to join, but that at best seems to need remedial courses in both math and bookkeeping.

* PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS: Last week Edison Schools, Inc. got the word from the Wichita school board that they were terminating Edison's contract to run two Wichita district schools. The reason? In large part, the district's action is owing to the fact that Edison taught the district how to take care of itself. Wichita Superintendent Winston Brooks admits, "I think they are one element of several that started the district's achievement climb." As evidence, several district schools now use the popular and effective Success for All reading curriculum brought in by Edison, and have instituted Edison's longer-school-day and extended-school-year programs. Edison's opponents are using this to declare Edison's further demise. In reality, it should not be forgotten that imitation is still the sincerest form of flattery.

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