Go Ohio – Gov. Kasich’s Budget – No Taxes, School Vouchers Increased, Ends Estate Tax, Adds 2% to Public Employees Pension Contributions.

Kasich Leads Ohio Forward with New Budget: image Cincinnati.com


FromThe Columbus Dispatch: Governor John Kasich signed Ohio’s new budget yesterday, after it passed the state’s legislature strictly along party lines – with zero Democrats voting with their Republican counterparts. The budget which includes increases in vouchers for school choice, and includes a requirement for school districts to evaluate teachers based on performance. In addition, school districts that receive Federal “Race to the Top” dollars are to use that money for merit pay for teachers – a novel idea that suggests teachers who teach and excel be compensated!
The Race to the Top Program includes 4 billion dollars in grants, was applied to ten states (New York Times):

The 10 winners of the competition’s second round were the District of Columbia (which was treated as a state for its application), Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and Rhode Island.
Mr. Duncan has distributed all but about $75 million of the $3.4 billion that remained to Tuesday’s winners, and was still deciding what to do with the remaining money, he said.
Mr. Duncan apportioned the latest awards according to the number of students in each state. New York and Florida each won $700 million; Georgia, North Carolina and Ohio won $400 million; Massachusetts and Maryland won $250 million; and Rhode Island and the District of Columbia won $75 million.

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Massachusetts, who recently released their MCAS (standardized test) scores, is the poster child for why one should not throw money at a problem, rather find real solutions to fix the problem. Ohio found solutions – although one could argue that only time will tell if these tweaks to the Ohio Education System might work, the fact that creating a competitive business model environment, offering incentives to employees who excel, generally increases productivity all the way around – competition is a good thing – (See District of Columbia.)

The Ohio Budget available here at www.lsc.state.ohio.us/fiscal/bid129/budgetindetail. The Govenor, using line-item veto, rejected 7 provisions according to the Dispatch:

Kasich also executed line-item vetoes of seven items, including a provision that would have canceled a voluntary body-mass-index screening program in schools.
Among the other six items vetoed was a provision related to the sale of five state prisons. Kasich struck from the budget a provision that if the buyer of a prison wanted to later put it up for sale, the state would have had the right of first refusal to buy back that prison at the original sale price. Kasich said the provision would have dramatically decreased the prisons' sale value for the state.

According to the American Federation for Children 40 of the 50 states and D.C., have some sort of school choice/voucher program in the state assemblies, with 20 states currently offering either school voucher or tax credit programs . The website offers a handy state by state reference as to achievement and programs offered: How does Massachusetts (who leads the nation in education) fare? a few statistics from the site: Massachusetts spends approximately $13,000 per student, with the end result that 57% of eighth graders are not proficient in reading!! This is an average for all municipalities in Massachusetts, however, speaking from personal experience: To educate a child in a elementary private parochial school in Western Massachusetts, the cost is approximately $3,000, those students enter either college prep schools (parochial with tuition costs of approximately $9,000), or public school systems after the 8th grade level. Those going into the public school system generally are placed in honors programs, while those going into the parochial system, at those costs, are basically guaranteed graduation, with acceptance (the majority) to 4 year colleges, and the minority to 2 year colleges – at a 100% graduation rate – the local public high school’s costs are approximately $12,000, with a graduation rate of 60%. Unfortunately, Massachusetts does not have a voucher program, rather they offer charter schools – normally those schools have a waiting list for enrollment.

It is no wonder then that those States that offer better education incentives to parents, lower taxes in general are a magnet for those who would prefer to live tax free while ensuring a better chance for their offspring, which, in effect, will have an impact on the next census: considering that states such as Massachusetts lost a seat, along with other Blue States, in the 2010 census due to individuals fleeing to more reasonable environments north and south of the border (of Massachusetts.) One has to ask, how many residents will be left in those states that do not offer taxpayers relief and how many more “Red States” will pick up additional congressional clout in a mere 9 years?

The Midwest is leading the pack with budgets that are both “controversial” (if one is a mainstream journalist or teachers or public employees union spokes mouth), and offer tax cuts as well as school choice, and increases in union members contributions to health and pension plans (modest at that). Inviting refugees from states that do not!

The exception to the Midwest rule of course, is New Jersey’s Tax and Slash, Budget Wise Governor, Chris Christie.

Obama 2012 PollsLags: Rasmussen Any Republican Bests by 4 Points, Public Policy Polling: Obama Trails 3 GOP Candidates - Huge Loss with Redistricting

Romney and Bachmann currently most likely to best Obama in 2012 - image NY Daily News

As the summer of 2011 hits mid-stride, and only seven months to go before the first primaries are held, President Barack Obama’s polling indicates one-term is more probable as the weeks go by. Rasmussen’s latest poll on the President’s electability against a “generic” Republican candidate now stands at 46% (Any GOP Candidate) to 42% for the President. The survey uses a larger than average sample of 3500, giving a smaller margin of error – plus or minus 2 percent. Considering that Obama bested McCain in 2008 by 7.2% (no incumbent), Bush bested Kerry by 2.46 in 2004 (July of 2003 Bush job approval at 60% (Gallup), with the highest “mandate” given to Nixon garnering 23.15% over McGovern in 1972 (no incumbent), and Reagan besting incumbent Jimmy Carter (job approval 29%), by less than 10 points in 1980, (Source for general election statistics: Dave Leip’s Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections), notes that those incumbents who are historically below the 50% approval trending incumbents against job approval ratings from the previous July, lost the election with a varied margin, those above the 50% approval were re-elected (again with a varying percentages). Therefore, the likelihood of a recovery for Obama from this point forward is dimming.

With redistricting taking place, and Texas being one of the prize states, Public Policy Polling’s latest on the Lone Star State indicates Obama would lose both the popular and increased Electoral College votes: now rating at 42% approval. GOP candidates that lead Obama are: Mitt Romney, Michelle Bachmann, Tim Pawlenty and Ron Paul (Paul’s home state), he is tied with Herman Cain and leads the non-announced Sarah Palin by 1 point. Given the fact that the pollster trendsDemocrat, and in all press releases accompanying polls makes no secret of the fact they are pulling for Obama, makes these numbers doubly troubling for the President.

In the last Gallup 2010 state by state poll on Obama’s job approval, the President broke 50% in only 10 states, including California, Massachusetts, New York, Illinois and Vermont. should Gallup’s 2011 survey (due most likely 3rd week of July) show no improvement, coupled with the continuing decline against “Generic” GOP candidates nationwide, the election eve map will look eerily familiar to either Nixon’s or Reagan’s, even if he manages to continue to hold onto those 10 states.

One suggestion to anyone who wants a voice in who the next leader of the free world may be (of any political leaning:) start looking at which one of those GOP announced candidates one might prefer over the other as the probability that (as of this survey) Romney or Bachmann (the two leading most state polls in early primary/caucus states), would be the next President. Either one or actually any one of the announced candidates previously mentioned that would have the best chance of winning the GOP nomination – would, based on statistics, go on to best Obama in the general.

Massachusetts Teachers to Face Limited Grading on Student Test Scores – 2011 MCAS Results Speak to Deficiency in Public Schools Statewide

From: The Boston Globe: “In a dramatic departure from past practice, students’ MCAS scores and other achievement data will become key barometers in evaluating the performance of their teachers and administrators, under new criteria the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education approved yesterday.”

In reading the article, The MCAS Scores and “other achievement data” will be used in determining a teachers overall ability; and warnings will be issued with lack of improvement, with a four warning levels, as well as the use of an “evaluator” who will factor in the teachers “pedagogical or management skills.” (Boston Globe). Those evaluators will have the ability to negate a teacher’s inability to teach, keeping them in the classroom based on management skills? No wonder the teachers unions weren’t marching in the streets, banging bongo drums!

In addition, the program will ‘phase’ in, beginning with ten districts evaluating teachers in underperforming schools, the balance of the Bay State systems have two years to institute this system.

One wonders why the Teachers Unions agreed to allow those teachers to be so judged on performance, with the caveat that management skills would override a “failing teachers” fate of “firing”. – The Globe explains completely in the last paragraph of the article:

“Our first step is to identify teachers who need additional support and ratchet up efforts to identify outstanding teachers,’’ Johnson said. “What we don’t want are students to suffer multiple years from ineffective teachers. We want them to have effective teachers every year.’’

(Boston Globe)

What this tells the casual reader or concerned parent is that a failing teacher may not be totally incompetent; rather, they may just need “additional support”. – In other words, nothing will change.

With the results of the latest MCAS assessment available at the Massachusetts Department of Education, it is evident that the board might have put more “teeth” into the teacher assessment program – in effect, firing those that did not achieve a class with at least a 70% total score, instead of allowing them to be judged on their “art of teaching” and “management skills”, getting a passing grade, while their students sink into oblivion.

The scores are based on three categories: English, Math and Science and Technology: One may download the excel sheet with scores for individual Bay State High Schools here at the Dept. of Education Website.

Taking one example: New Bedford: All students combined for the class of 2012 had a mean grade of 27% passing on the three tests combined: Females fared better than their male counterparts, with 30% passing, to 24% of males passing the test. Of course, one has to further break down the test, to be fair, as 40 of the students have limited English proficiency, 145 are described as students with disabilities, and 399 of the 795 enrolled are “white” – in other words, regardless of ethnicity, disabilities and the inability to speak English – only 27% of the 795 enrolled students passed. (Based on the data available)

The grade 10 student English Language Arts Test here in PDF Students read a selection from a book entitled Candy Freak (no Tolstoy), and multiple chose questions assessed their reading skills.

(Taken from the PDF)
The first question:
In paragraph 1, what does the repetition of the word “actual” suggest about the author?
A. He hopes to have access to alot of free candy.
B. He wants to be employed by a candy company.
C. He wants firsthand experience with the candy business.
D. He regrets the disappearance of so many candy companies.

The paragraph is available for readers here at Amazon.com

One might suggest there has been a serious decline in the expectations assigned to the English Language and our students’ ability to read and comprehend.

If one cannot, for some reason, speak English, the tests are also available in Spanish. The balance of the MCAS questions for all grades are also available at the Mass. DOE website. If one finds these tests difficult it is a good bet one was educated after 1970.

If teachers (to be fair, not all teachers), were less concerned with pleasing one of two unions, their pensions and salaries, and more concerned about the success of their students, then these grades might be a tad better.

The facts are that standardized tests have been administered for eons, in the 1950’s and 1960’s there were both IQ and Achievement Tests, which ranked students, those who passed with flying colors (and you can best the house it was more than 27% of a class) continued to learn and improve, those that did not were put into “special classes”, which allowed them to learn at their own pace.

At that time America ranked among the most educated nations in the world. In the 1970’s the first teacher union was introduced in Philadelphia, and the test scores plummeted from that point forward – over a period of 30 years, also known as the “dummying down of America”.

Fix the problem: realistic goals for both students and teachers, with an emphasis on aiding the teachers by giving them the respect due, with consequences for those students and their parents who would prefer to disrupt the process and sue the municipality in question, allowing their children to run rampant. It is, to be fear, difficult to teach if one is surrounded by students who have neither respect for the teacher, and the teacher has no recourse as far as discipline is concerned. Perhaps, just perhaps, parents who support inappropriate and disruptive behavior should be sued by the school, student suspended, and a list of nice private schools given to them on their way out the door.

In other words, roll back the process to the 1950’s. When teachers were respected, disruptive students were sent home, or Juvenile dentition (another sadly missed aspect of that time), and the balance of the students excelled. Parents who’s student was sent home, soundly dealt with them, rather than suing the Town or Municipality. This may sound nostalgic, however, it is common sense, with some slight modifications, (updated texts and tests for example), would better serve our children and generations to come, rather than the system that states employ today.