Maybe David Garcia will pull together enough votes to beat Diane Douglas, but it’s looking doubtful. Most likely, Arizona passed over the most qualified Ed Supe candidate in decades in favor of the least qualified. But the person sitting in the state’s top education seat is only one factor in the larger Arizona education picture. We’ve got a Republican governor a few shades more conservative than Brewer and a few more Republican legislators than we have now. No matter who is Ed Supe, the crusade to dismantle and privatize our system of education will continue. Here are some of the things we’re likely to see in the way our schools are funded and run over the next few years.
Let’s start with funding. If the total dollar figure budgeted to schools increases $317 million by court order, the legislature is likely to slow-walk the procedure as long as it can. If there’s another court to appeal to, the decision will be appealed. Nothing better than spending the money on court battles instead of kids, right? And if the legislature can figure out some other way to screw schools out of the money, it will.
There’s more to the funding question than the total pot of dollars. There’s also the question of how it will be allocated. For years, Republicans have been planning to change the funding formula to allow them to give more money to “successful” — read “high income” — schools through a combination of general funding reallocation and “performance funding.” They’ve also been trying to give more money to charter schools. I don’t see much in the way of impediments to stop them. Then there’s vouchers. All the legislature has to do is pass a few bills increasing eligibility and funding for private school tuition tax credits and “Education Empowerment Accounts” to put more dollars in the voucher pot, which, of course, will come out of public school funds. It should be an easy sell. Just keep shouting “Failing schools!” and “We just want to help the poor and the disabled! You got a problem with that?” Works like a charm.
So. Less dollars for school districts with kids from low income families who need the most resources and more dollars for higher income school districts, charters and private schools. Those are givens. The only questions are when it will happen and how much they can get away with.
Common Core is going to continue to be a big issue in the state, more so if Diane “Kill Common Core” Douglas is superintendent. The business community will try to prevent major changes — it likes the Common Core standards — and so will less conservative Republican legislators. The powers that be will try to “talk sense” to Douglas, but that’s going to work about as well as trying to “talk sense” to Pima County Supervisor Ally Miller. Both are blinded by the light of their ideology. Expect Douglas to do her best to wreak havoc on Arizona’s version of Common Core.
Douglas also shares the Tea Party’s hatred of “big data.” Huppenthal is a wonky guy who’s been working to update the Department of Ed’s computer based data collection system. I don’t see Douglas putting much effort into continuing the process, especially when it comes to collecting data on students. I’m not sure if that will be such a bad thing.
Finally, if Douglas becomes superintendent, expect her troops to be out there fighting curriculum wars at the district level with support from the Department of Ed. She thinks the International Baccalaureate program, which is used in schools around the state, is an anti-American, international plot, which gives you some idea of her jingoistic view of what should be taught in school. History/Social Studies classes will be her main “patriotism” target, though I imagine books used in English classes will be scrutinized for anti-American and anti-Christian tendencies, not to mention any plot lines involving sexuality which might give students ideas. Also, expect teaching about contraception and abortion to become even more of a battleground than it is now. I haven’t heard Douglas talk about evolution, but I have a sneaking suspicion I know where she stands.
In other words, it’ll be business as usual in Arizona education, only more so. The power of the Ed Supe is limited, but when you combine the growing conservatism in the legislature and the governor’s office with the fervor of the extreme right, which has to feel empowered right now, it’s likely to be an exceptionally destructive few years for Arizona education. In Arizona, that’s saying something.
This article appears in Nov 6-12, 2014.
“Education Empowerment Accounts” to put more dollars in the voucher pot, which, of course, will come out of public school funds.
No kids=no money
You guys have all the money you need. It’s results they are after.
Vouchers/Tax credits can get the pubs down to a manageable size. If you were competitive you could attract students.
A poor quality public education need not be a birthright.
P.S. I thought you liked diversity.
Education is the best place for it.
Now wise up.
Pretty grim scenario – Safier’s got it right. As the state’s system of public education circles the drain so will the economy. Why would any corporation offering decent work, salaries and benefits even consider starting up or expanding in Arizona?
If we can get TUSD down to about half its current size, it’s problems will become much more manageable. Betts can then implement her brilliant idea to pay for smaller class sizes by installing solar panels on school property.
How the hell did this happen? I have absolutely no faith in the intelligence of the people of this state.
David Garcia was not the most qualified candidate for SOPI Arizona has seen for decades. Penny Kotterman was a far more qualified candidate than Garcia. She was an actual classroom teacher and not a university professor masquerading as a classroom teacher. She sent her own kids to district public schools…not charter schools. She understood the workings of K-12 schools…rather than the insider struggles within collegiate education departments or the state bureaucracy. The bottom line is that she was a real teacher, and he is a real bureaucrat.
The new governor poses a far greater threat to public education than any SOPI possibly could. Unlike Jan Brewer, who did not allow the worst privatization excesses of the neanderthals in the legislature to become law, Ducey will lead the charge back to the “happy days” of the 1950s. Of course, what Ducey and his cohorts will forget is that the 1950s were happy days because we still had good paying jobs for blue collar workers and the social safety net that was created during the New Deal and was strengthened in the aftermath of WWII was working well to keep most Americans from homelessness and chronic unemployment.
Garcia is nothing more than another Common Core proponent. Douglas will get us back to the basics where we used to be when our kids were more than just a bunch of blubbering idiots that can’t even spell the word constitution much less, describe it.
So how do we explain people, like our soon to be S of E, who claim to believe in local control of schools, but once elected to statewide office, they want to dictate what and how to teach to local democratically elected school boards?
How to we explain people, like our soon to be governor, who think state spending per student is more than adequate, but send their own children to really good private schools with tuitions north of $15,000?
And this doesn’t even address what’s going to happen to the puny crumbs provided to higher education in Arizona.
You guys are living in a bubble. Come on outside and join reality.
It’s very easy to explain when you are open minded.
Public education is NOT working. You let it be hijacked by radical leftists.
The unions fooled you.
The country is asking for you to become negotiable.
Bob Beckel is the face of the democratic party. This is why you lost everything you lost.
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/11/06/see-what-made-liberal-tv-host-so-mad-that-he-actually-flipped-off-guest-live-on-the-air/
Minorities have figured out that they are being used. Even Obama used them. Hispanics are next. They get it. Amnesty is not happening.
This one video explains the whole election:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wB_hjqZQ1UY
“In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible….All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred and schizophrenia.”
from George Orwell’s 1946 essay, “Politics and the English Language”
How does this quote apply here?
It is schizophrenic to advocate BOTH for elected officials who will properly fund public education at the state level AND for the continued control of our largest public district locally by a network that has provided such poor governance and leadership that the term “TUSD” has become synonymous with waste, dysfunction, dishonesty and malfeasance.
Take you pick, Safier: Do you support public education, or not? If you do, stop writing in “defense of the indefensible.” While we have these local politicos running a district that serves 49,000 students into the ground, it is hard to make the case to the electorate that public education should receive more funding. There are any number of things opponents of public schooling can point to within TUSD as evidence that “public schools don’t work”: procurement scandals, hiring scandals, too much spent on administration and too little in the classrooms, constant lying to the public,…I could go on. Until the district undergoes serious REFORM — something the candidate you supported who has just been re-elected will never undertake — what we see locally will continue providing ammunition for those who support candidates that want to de-fund and dismantle public education.
The bottom line: schizophrenic writers like you who “defend the indefensible” and express the opinion that the type of leadership we’ve seen in TUSD is worth supporting and perpetuating are partly responsible for giving “liberals” and “progressives” a bad name. You are partly to blame for the debacle we just saw at the state level.
A TUSD Parent said: “Until the district undergoes serious REFORM — something the candidate you supported who has just been re-elected will never undertake — what we see locally will continue providing ammunition for those who support candidates that want to de-fund and dismantle public education.
The bottom line: schizophrenic writers like you who “defend the indefensible” and express the opinion that the type of leadership we’ve seen in TUSD is worth supporting and perpetuating are partly responsible for giving “liberals” and “progressives” a bad name. You are partly to blame for the debacle we just saw at the state level.”
Amen, amen, amen!! So long as the neanderthals in the legislature have TUSD to use as the poster child for a failed school district, there is precious little chance of successfully fighting against privatization, vouchers and the resegregation of our schools based on race and class. This truly is defending the indefensible, and we have seen the tip of the iceberg of consequences for such actions. When Steve Montenegro and Steve Yarbrough put together legislation providing vouchers…oops, opportunity scholarships… for ever more students to go to private/religious schools, the debate will surely include the way TUSD squanders an ever-increasing portion of its revenues outside of the classroom. If TUSD spends its money so poorly…less than 50% goes into TUSD classrooms…why should the state deny more families the funding to send their kids to private/religious schools.
“A TUSD Parent” is correct, David. The continued existence of TUSD as it is being run gives the privatizers excellent material to use in their campaign to destroy public education. Many of us who voted for DuVal and Garcia also voted for the reform-oriented candidates in the TUSD board election. We do not agree with Ms. Grijalva that the election results show support for her leadership and Sanchez’s. To us it looks like the results show that she and her daddy have a strong political machine and that a large portion of the electorate either does not understand what is going on in the district or does not vote. This unfortunate situation provides the people who voted for Ducey and Douglas — people who don’t think schools should be under local democratic control — with an excellent talking point and example of why this form of governance is unworkable. (Of course, those of us who have seen high-functioning public school systems know that the problem is the corruption of a form of governance that CAN work, if it is properly tended by a well-informed and involved electorate.)
The pressure for reform won’t stop just because the election is over. And some day, once the district has put an internal auditor reporting to the Board and other much needed reforms in place, perhaps looking at our local school system will provide enough voters with tangible reasons to support public education that we’ll actually be able to get people like DuVal and Garcia into office.
Oh, my goodness! There seems to be so many angry people commenting here today.
How could they be possibly angry on such a gorgeous, cool, sunny afternoon?
As for “Rat T?”
Well, from my point of view, he/she/it has to be one of the most brilliant and funny comedians since Milton Berle.
I’m almost positive that Comedy Central will soon be offering he/she/it a billion dollar contract.
I do, though, hope I’m wrong.
Mr. Calmness, if you find yourself, three days after an election that is one of the grimmest in recent memory in terms of its potential consequences for education in our city and state, able to enjoy your afternoon — more power to you. I’m guessing that whoever you are, you don’t have children ensnared in the TUSD / Arizona nightmare of dysfunctional / underfunded schools. Comment streams dealing with educational issues that seriously impact the quality of education in Tucson and in our state should perhaps be left to those of us with natures made “angry” by direct experience with the malfeasance and injustice of this inexcusably poor public school system.
Marty, thank you for your comment here and your comments elsewhere. I enjoy your posts and generally agree with the greater part of what you write. The intelligence and the passionate concern of many of the commenters on Safier’s recent posts have given me hope that if those of us who care about public education don’t give up, reform could eventually be accomplished in the district — and, perhaps even in this backward and embarrassing state.
I suggest Marty, Rick Spanier — and other public education advocates who have commented on these blogs under pseudonyms — take a page from Betts Putnam-Hidalgo and Lillian Fox’s playbook and start showing up at TUSD board meetings and speaking regularly. The public’s ability to participate in the “call to the audience” portion of the board meeting to put pressure for reform on elected officials is one of the great advantages of the public education system, as opposed to the private / charter one. Let’s make better use of it than we have done to date in Tucson.
I applaud you for begging to reform public education, but you are crying in the wilderness.
This is who the NEA and public education are partnered with:
http://www.arizonadailyindependent.com/2014/11/07/bill-ayers-and-brother-rick-discuss-corporate-evils-in-education-at-hilton-el-conquistador/
…and you will not be able to change it.
Rat T — I know how you feel about the public school system, but I’m curious to know what your position is on this: do you support private schools governed by boards whose meetings constituents are not allowed to attend or the fact that governance meetings in charter schools are not subject to Arizona’s Open Meeting Laws?
If a private or charter school needs reform and is not meeting the needs of its students, what recourse do parents have? Pull their kids out and put them in another school. But when “choice” is the only real option, it’s damaging to the continuity of relationships children are able to build. Parents need effective mechanisms to require school administrators to be responsible and to provide quality services. They do not have these in privates and charters. These under-regulated schools can do what they want and there is no way to hold them accountable. Some of them are responsible, others are not. Parents who do not have degrees in education and teaching experience have a hard time, when approaching these institutions, discerning whether what they are offering is a valid form of education.
In this context, what if parents are forced try multiple privates and charters and find them all irresponsible, which is quite possible in a state where these schools are insufficiently regulated, insufficiently transparent in their governance, not required to provide high quality academic support to children who need it, and not required to hire certified teachers? What happens to children who bounce from one school to another as their parents try desperately to find one that meets their children’s needs?
The situation in Arizona which will only get worse under the newly elected governor and state superintendent (if it is Douglas): underfunded public schools, some of them in the control of political machines who are not running them responsibly + insufficiently regulated charters and privates = disastrously low quality of education available to the populace overall, with a few exceptions here and there that do not in any way mitigate the sad consequences for our state: inability to attract businesses to the state who can provide residents with economic opportunity, inability to produce an educated electorate that can see through the BS pitched at them by candidates who have no idea what a good educational system is or how to formulate policy and law that will build an infrastructure to support it.
Readers interested in the state’s education policy should consider attending the 11/15 forum from 9:30 a.m. until 12 noon at the downtown library. The panelists will be an official from the AZ Dept. of Ed, a public school superintendent, and a Catholic school superintendent, and the discussion will focus on ESA’s. Should be interesting.
Rat T’s comments, that call Tucsonans radical leftists and blame unions in a right to work state, are culled from FOX News and Glen Beck. They may be entertaining, but they lack original thought and have no basis in reality.