Commonwealth Magazine is a terrific read for anyone with a taste for state/local wonkery. The general tone, as such, tends to be relatively polite. On its blog, however, Associate Editor Michael Jonas has been critical of Tom Menino's education record, and really lays it down today:
But the real knock on Menino's record isn't actually the dismal performance of the city's schools; it's his lack of a plan for fixing them that has the ambition and sweep to match the size of the problem. Add to that the fact that a call for bold change at this point would look like the mayor is running against his own 16-year record, and it's easy to see why the four-term incumbent has often leaned heavily on a mix of cheerleading, obfuscation, and denial.
In the school debate, that has led Menino to sugar-coat the situation as much possible, even if it means playing loose with the facts, chalking up shortcomings to some sort of vague the-deck-is-stacked-against-us unfairness, and most recently, in what has been the mayor's most ambitious feat of fabulation, claiming that the same problems are seen everywhere, including places like Weston and Wellesley. Anyone buying that one would, as the saying goes, be a good target for those marketing swampland in Florida.
Ow! It goes on. I don't know … I don't think the sense that the deck is stacked against urban school districts is “vague” — there are a lot of big challenges. And it's easy to criticize “change only at the pace the bureaucracy can handle” from the outside — harder when you have to actually engage that bureaucracy as its partner. There's no magic wand.
The question is whether that's to be made an excuse for failure, and whether the failure should/can be whitewashed in the midst of a mayoral race. Elections should go to those willing to be accountable. Well, the Mayor said he would be accountable, and this election is the reckoning.
Mayor Menino earns Tip O’Neill Award for public education leadership
Massachusetts Association of School Committees (MASC) lauds improvements in BPS
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p>October 19, 2009
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p>Mayor Thomas M. Menino has been selected to receive the 2009 Tip O’Neill Award in recognition of his significant and longstanding contributions to public education. The Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees (MASC) selected the Mayor for the award and will present it to him at their annual conference next month.
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p>”It’s truly an honor to be selected as this year’s Tip O’Neill Award recipient,” said Mayor Menino. “Tip O’Neill taught us all never to forget our mission and that all politics is local. And for me, education is the most important part of maintaining that mission. With the help of Superintendent Carol Johnson, we’ve been able to ensure that our students receive a high-quality education and continue learning into college.”
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p>Past winners of the award include the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Bradford Washburn, President of the Museum of Science, and several elected officials who worked to reform education in the Commonwealth.
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p>MASC highlighted Mayor Menino’s appointments of highly qualified members of the Boston School Committee and his support of their efforts and those of Superintendents to improve educational opportunities and performance for students in Boston Public Schools.
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p>”Mayor Menino’s commitment to the children of Boston is centered in his core belief that all children deserve a quality education,” said Rev. Gregory G. Groover, Sr., Chairperson of the Boston School Committee. “The Mayor knows that good schools are vital to a thriving community. More than anything, he knows that educating our students is a critical mission that must draw on the resources of community partners and families. Mayor Menino’s dedication to education is transforming the lives of Boston’s children every single day.”
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p>In 2006, BPS won the Broad Prize for Urban Education as the top city school district in the country.
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p>Recent BPS initiatives include Community Learning, which links schools, libraries, and community centers to provide a continuum of education resources, Thrive in Five, a program that emphasizes early childhood education to prepare children for classroom learning, and Success Boston (“Getting Ready, Getting In, and Getting Through”), a collaborative to promote college success and to double the college graduation rate among graduates of the Boston Public Schools.
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p>MASC is a member-driven Association whose mission is to support Massachusetts school leaders in their increasingly complex governance role. Through a wide range of programs and services including training workshops and institutes, policy development and administrator search services, legal and advocacy support, and as an information clearinghouse, the Association provides important guidance and expertise to its members and serves to communicate the school committee perspective to government leaders, the media, administrative agencies and other education-related associations.
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The schools are awful and you spit back this bullshit. Most improved —- from horrible to just bad. You don’t care about the city, just saving your guy. How can you look at yourself in the mirror? You’re disgusting.
…definitely gets a zero from me:(
If he thinks the schools are good, he doesn’t know jack-all. If he knows the schools and still says they’re good, then that’s just public self-abuse. Sometimes you just have to call it like it is.
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p>Howard’s back and forth over the usual financial prostitution around the city is one thing. It’s one leech against another leech and I couldn’t care less who wins. But these are children who are spending their young years in a system that has never made a concerted move to get out of the bottom tenth. They don’t stand a chance.
Nothing does, IMO.
Some people don’t deserve chart and graph refutations. Obviously HowardJP is a Menino automaton who would say anything to blunt an attack on his guy. If that’s not an offense against “reality based” then what is? I get angry and express it, that’s worse than using your platform to set up a little p.r. minefield?
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p>My kids are doing fine in the schools through no fault of the schools. However most BPS students will come out unprepared for life, and somebody has to say it.
Everyone gets angry, but that is no excuse to misbehave. If you cannot control your anger, especially here where you have a chance to take a breath before posting, then you have an anger management problem.
Howard has made many positive contributions while you have contributed little here. And what you have written here is less than worthless.
Let’s look at some schools in HowardJP’s neighborhood. Here is a normal mcas path for BPS child in JP:
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p>Agassiz School
3rd English 831 of 980
3rd Math 879 of 981
4th English 884 of 967
4th Math 933 of 967
5th English 866 of 896
5th Math 878 of 897
5th Science 878 of 897
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p>Irving Middle
6th English 441 of 565 (includes the Advanced Work class)
6th Math 472 of 565
7th English 441 of 466 (awc gone now…)
7th Math 435 of 466
8th English 412 of 464
8th Math 427 of 464
8th Science 450 of 464
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p>English High
10th English 338 of 353
10th Math 328 of 351
10th Science 333 of 341
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p>So thanks for log rolling and condemning these kids to a few more years of the same.
I was reacting to your bad behavior, not excusing bad performance of our schools.
You recognize bad performance and yet haven’t posted a thing on this thread about the actual schools in Boston. Look away.
threatening to delete my account. My offense was saying “you’re a fu@%ing joke” and the charge was merited.
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p>What gives?
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p>I’ve done my research, and this is what I’ve found…
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p>The state and federal government classify 77% of Boston schools as “in need of improvement.” [Boston Municipal Research Bureau, 8/21/09]
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p>100 out of 143 schools in Boston are FAILING; Up 32% from previous year. [Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, 9/27/08]
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p>Report said that 70% of Boston’s public preschool and kindergarten programs were unable to prepare children for first grade, specifically minorities or low-income children. According to the Boston Globe, “Boston’s public preschool and kindergarten programs are hobbled by mediocre instruction, unsanitary classrooms, and dangerous schoolyards, according to a first-ever study of the programs. The quality of instruction and facilities in 70 percent of the classrooms, the Wellesley Centers for Women study said, is inadequate to achieve the school system’s primary goal: To get the children, most of whom are black and Hispanic and from low-income families, up to speed by first grade so they are as prepared as their white and Asian peers.” [Boston Globe, 4/07/07]
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p>From 1994 to 2008, a total of 23,396 students failed to graduate from Boston high schools. [Boston Herald, 8/26/09]
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p>Boston’s dropout rate has remained unchanged throughout Menino’s tenure. The Boston Public Schools website states that the dropout rate in 2007-2008 was 7.2%. At the start of Menino’s tenure, the dropout rate was 7.0% in 1995-1996. Menino is trying to compare the dropout rate of Mayor Flynn’s administration to his own – which is a false comparison. In fact, the dropout rate has even risen to 9.4% twice in his tenure (1998-1999 and 2005-2006). [Boston Public Schools, Dropout Report, 2007-2008]
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p>Now to me, it doesn’t seem like Menino should be getting any awards.
but Howard, your all around the blog/comment world promotion of the Mayor as a progressive, avant-garde game-changer does not alter specific facts on the ground.
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p>Menino’s (Fenton) grandchildren were at the O’Hearn, one of the ‘high demand’ schools in Boston, and left BPS to take coveted seats at the Boston Collegiate charter school. One can only surmise that a) one or more children got advanced-work seats but not at schools they wanted, or b) one or more children did not qualify for AWC, thus leaving the parents with a lack of options. If option (b) exists, the parents then considered the possibility that their children might not get into an exam school, and, assessing the implications of such limited choice, opted out of the BPS system over the long-term. How many families struggle with similar scenarios, but lack the access Menino’s children have to the intricate machinations of the system? And what should we tell those parents while you tout awards that suggest the work is done here in Boston?
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p>Those in-district charter schools the Mayor supports are exactly what pilot schools were intended to be–15 years ago–so where is the progress? With all the tools available the Mayor has squandered an incredible opportunity to guide our schools into the state-of-the-art urban models they might have become over the past decade plus.
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p>While I am a BPS parent who agrees with the Mayor that too often families don’t recognize the great work that happens in our public schools, it is not lost on me that the choices his own children have made reflect a dissatisfaction with the system. And advancing the recognition of outsiders or whatever else it is you think will best spin your man, you are complicit in avoiding the very simple truth that, the most inside of players, his own children, have abandoned the game, leaving the public schools for a better option.
the Boston Public Schools, but I disagree with the premise that the problem is “lack of a plan for fixing them that has the ambition and sweep to match the size of the problem.”
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p>When faced with long-term, complex problems, incrementalism might be a better approach than sweeping, allegedly transformative action.
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Menino’s attitude bothers me almost as much as the state of the schools.
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p>I get that Menino’s unhappy about the media attention the Mayor’s race is drawing to the failures of the BPS. But he could have used it as an opportunity to step up an develop a comprehensive plan to get our school system back on track. Instead, he’s playing classic defensive politics and denying the problem exists at all.
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p>In response to criticisms that 100 out of 143 BPS schools are under-performing, he said, “that’s the case for half of the schools in Massachusetts”.
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p>Setting aside the fact that 100/143 is over two-thirds, not half (maybe Menino took his math classes in the BPS?), I find that excuse insulting. “No one else is up to snuff either” should never be a justification for a failure to provide quality city services.
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p>Instead of shirking responsibility because of state-wide problems, we should set higher standards for Boston. We should ensure our children are given the best educational opportunities we can provide. We shouldn’t let ourselves off the hook because we’re not the only ones with failing schools. I think Boston has the potential to lead Massachusetts in progressive education reforms and get our state out of this slump. Why not step up to the plate instead of shrinking away?
So, in fact, he has stepped up to the plate. I can remember years after years when previous mayors claimed no responsibility for the schools, and that is, in fact, what is happening in most cities across the nation as mayors generally do not have responsibility for the schools.
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p>But let’s look at the record, we now have 24 pilot schools including specialties such as Boston Arts Academy, Tech Boston, Health Careers Academy and many others. We have programs to help dropouts earn needed credits and English Language learners pick up needed skills. We have early education programs such as Thrive by Five. We had one computer for 62 kids when Tom Menino took office, we now have one for 4/5 students, and many community-based techology centers for after-school work. We have Read Boston and Write Boston to give kids more help in those categories. Schools like the Burke which were faced with loss of accreditation have been turned around, with a new library available to the community as well.
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p>From the bad old days of Superintendents who lasted an average of 1.5 years, hardly adequate for reform, we’ve had two nationally regarded leaders make long-term commitments to reform. Boston won the Broad prize in 2006 after several years of being recognized by that premier foundation, and as posted above, Mayor Menino won an award from the Massachusetts Association of School Committees recently. Must be doing something right …
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p>In any case, his opponent gave the Mayor an “A-” grade for the schools in 2005, a “F” at a recent debate and a “C” in an interview with WBUR this week. Maybe that’ll change again after this week.
Kudos to Menino for taking on greater reaponsibility with the schools. But it’s what he does with the system once it’s in his hands that I’m concerned with. With 16 years of direct intervention in the BPS, it’s easy to tote a handful of programs implemented in his tenure. (As an aside, increasing the number of computers from 1993 to 2009 is pretty much a freebie, don’t you think?) But has he done enough?
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p>The bottom line is, the majority of Boston’s schools are still under performing. We’re facing a massive dropout crisis and the students who do graduate aren’t prepared to compete at the college level. There’s a huge achievement gap between English-language and ELL students, and the city just cut funding for early education programs. Despite the documented success of charter schools right here in Boston, the mayor opposes lifting the charter cap and replicating those successful programs where they’re needed most.
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p>So yes, Boston is lucky to have a Mayor with the power to take a more hands-on approach with the public schools. But I’d rather see a Mayor use that opportunity to make real changes and significant improvements, instead of the incremental progress we have now, which obviously isn’t enough.
I see a long list of hard won incremental changes — not a handful— that all add up to significant improvements that have been won through long negotiations (actually a sort of non violent hand by hand combat) with key stake holders protecting their own personal and professional self interest always in tense competition for scarce resources.
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p>What do you cut to fund a middle school program to spot candidates for dropping out? or a street program to recruit kids to come back into school to get the degree? — advanced placement? gym? music? repairs for a leaky roof? special ed? free breakfast? school buses?
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p>How do you decide which anti drop out or reach out to drop out programs work? When can you tell it’s worked? Who does that evaluation and who pays them?
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p>aurgh………………..nobody said it was going to easy and it sure ain’t.
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p>But it easy to say it’s not working well enough. (DUH) Nobody know that better than Tom Menino, and thank God he’s still devoting a considerable amount of his time and energy to working with a huge coalition of businesses, educators, private foundations who are helping to fund and test a continuum of anti=drop out programs.
of the “sort of vague the-deck-is-stacked-against-us unfairness” is not dismissing “the deck is stacked against urban school districts”, but rather a more specific vagueness in the Mayor’s fall-back sound bites on urban education…i.e., he has spent much of the campaign saying there are challenges to educating urban children (you don’t say). I think what Jonas is calling out as vague is Menino’s inability to identify specific challenges and how he might confront them differently given yet another four years to do so, as well as a woeful lack of assessment of the missed opportunities in tried-and-failed policy of the past 16 years.
My friends howardjp and Judy Meredith make good points about some of the really worthy initiatives and signs of progress in the Boston schools under Mayor Menino. The mayor has clearly brought desperately needed stability to the school system, and I don’t think anyone who follows the issue closely can say he doesn’t care deeply about the state of the schools in Boston and, more importantly, the students enrolled there.
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p>The point of my piece on CWUnbound was that with all that has been done – much of it owing to the mayor’s commitment to school improvement – thousands of students in Boston are still being left behind. Many drop out. Most who go on to higher education do not succeed there. The teaching and learning going on in Boston remains woefully inadequate if the goal is preparing kids for college success and the path out of poverty that it represents. All of this suggests that much more aggressive reforms than have been adopted to date are needed if we’re serious about achieving equity in educational outcomes.
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p>I couldn’t disagree more with Mark Bail, who suggests above that incrementalism may be the best approach to big, complex problems. That might be case if we have no idea what sort of stronger measures might help. But when we have an idea of the kinds of bigger moves needed and still fail to act, incrementalism then is really just a safe course taken to accommodate change-resistant adults. The kids in the system only get one shot at an education. For students from low-income households in Boston this represents their one real chance at escaping the ravages of poverty – dead-end low wage jobs in the best case and gangs, violence, incarceration in the worst case.
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p>Rather than opposing more charter schools, as Mayor Menino has done while thousands of Boston families are on waiting lists desperate for a slot there, mayors and superintendents in New York and Washington DC have welcomed charters, both for the added educational options they present to low-income families and because the competition from these schools provides leverage in pushing reforms within their districts. The pilot schools in Boston that howardjp rightly touts were a direct response to the emergence of charter schools, which were authorized in the state’s 1993 Education Reform Act.
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p>Leaders elsewhere are also focusing intently — and publicly sounding the call for greater urgency — on reforms aimed at identifying, rewarding, and cultivating effective teachers, who are increasingly seen as the linchpin of school success. In Washington, schools superintendent Michelle Rhee has raised the idea of substantially increasing teacher pay in exchange for getting rid of tenure. She is also completely revamping the district’s teacher evaluation system so that teachers will be much more accountable for student learning. As explained in our cover story in the new issue of CommonWealth magazine (and also in a condensed version of the story in today’s Boston Globe Ideas section), despite broad consensus that effective teachers are the key to successful schools, nothing about the way we hire, evaluate, pay, or assign teachers to schools is designed with this mind. This conflict is at the center of many of the reforms being pushed by President Obama and his education secretary, Arne Duncan. These efforts represent an enormous challenge to the education status quo, and they are getting a lot of attention in part because they are coming from a Democratic administration. The President and Secretary Duncan are showing a willingness to work with union leaders who are ready to rethink many of the industrial-model practices in our schools – but they’ve also made it clear they are willing to challenge and take on those who insist on clinging to outmoded systems that are not serving children well.
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p>It is that sort of willingness to step outside one’s comfort zone that we need from Mayor Menino and Boston school leaders. Boston’s teacher contract expires in August. Contract discussions will probably begin early next year. There is a lot the mayor can do there to push for significant further reform. Also sorely needed is leadership that will push these issues much more visibly into the public square, so that people understand what’s at stake and can get behind efforts to move the system forward through reforms that are single-minded in their pursuit of change that has the interests of students, not adults, foremost in mind.
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p>Michael Jonas
CommonWealth magazine
Yes, Michael you are absolutely 100% right/left on correct in your analysis that
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p>I wonder if this debate within this re election campaign will prompt civic leaders and community opinion leaders in the dozens (hundreds?) or civic organizations in our city to debate, decide to support and adequately fund the innovative reforms that are going on now. Even if they are “only” incremental and experimental pilot “outside the box” reforms.
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p>Then we can all work together with a strong Mayor like Menino and a empowered school committee to build the public and political will to welcome some serious institutional changes that need to take place in the school administration and the classroom.
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p>I know this electoral campaign, has made me realize that the two neighborhood associations and two neighborhood boards I participate in do not have public school reform on the top of their list. And maybe we should.
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p>Glad it’s on top of yours as a involved parent as well as a journalist.
CW is a center of charter advocacy. It’s their loudest issue, and they don’t hesitate much to distort the facts to push that agenda.