Gene Caldwell’s guest column makes for excellent reading today for anyone — parents, taxpayers, politicians — interested in education.

I find it interesting that he, like his predecessor, David Coffey, cites the research of Dr. Bill Sanders — a nationally-recognized expert in evaluating the gains made by students, and the architect of Tennessee’s Value-Added Assessment (TVAAS) program.

Both Coffey and Caldwell served on the Education Committee in the Tennessee Legislature. Coffey is a Republican; Caldwell, a Democrat. However, their comments on improving education are remarkably similar.  Teacher quality has more impact than any other factor.

The Sentinel carries a couple of education articles this morning: an opinion piece on Oprah’s investment in a South African school (as opposed to an inner-city school here at home), and a news report on a poll conducted last month about Tennesseans’ grading of education, and our willingness to do something about it.

Why did Oprah choose not to invest here at home?

Oprah made her few billion on her own, and she runs her own philanthropy program. It’s her money, and it’s her business how she chooses to give it away.

It’s also eminently clear, as her defenders already have pointed out, that Oprah has given tons of money away in her own backyard.

And, frankly, it’s hard to question the fundamental instincts of a self-made billionaire when it comes to investment decisions.

“I became so frustrated with visiting inner-city schools that I just stopped going,” she says in a Newsweek story about her new school. “If you ask the kids what they want or need, they say an iPod or some sneakers.”

In an interview in USA Today, Winfrey says, when she has tried to help kids in this country, “I have failed.”

Over at Domestic Psychology, Cathy notes a therapist’s opinion of two skills for success:

…children need to learn two skills in order to be successful. They must learn delayed gratification and to do things they don’t want to do. Is it really that simple?

It’s not quite that simple, but those are certainly two skills that must be mastered. The iPod or sneakers response is so indicative of a larger problem that pervades not only inner-city schools, but schools and society in general.

Closer to home, the Peabody poll found that Tennesseans are not satisfied that we’re doing a good job of educating students, but are unwilling to pay more in state or local taxes, despite the fact that most believe that teachers are inadequately paid. The majority said that the problem is not one that can be solved by funding:

Even though poll respondents were unhappy with the state’s job, they blame parents most for the failures in education, with 71 percent saying parents’ lack of commitment to their children’s education is the largest problem.

While there are measures that can compensate, to some degree, for the students’ home environment, they require both local and state investment.

What is different between today and, say, schools of 50 years ago? One is that we cover much more material today than we used to — the problem of the curriculum being “a mile wide and an inch deep,” as some say. Another difference is that in a world where it was acceptable to leave some children behind, parents tried harder to ensure that it wasn’t their child kicked out for atrocious behavior or simply refusing to work.

To be sure, economic disparity existed as much 50 years ago as it does today. Expectations are different though; we live in a world of instant gratification and aversion to effort. In school as in life, some can coast through with less effort than others.

Fixing the problem requires more than money, but to get results quickly (as the public desires and NCLB requires), it will absolutely require more money.

This year, Governor Bredesen is again expected to add significant funding for Pre-K education efforts, to the point that we would be able to add another class or two.  Unfortunately, we have no place to put them.

The Oak Ridge Preschool exemplifies his reasoning behind the Pre-K effort: for over 40 years, we have been able to demonstrate consistently that a carefully focused preschool curriculum can virtually erase the achievement gap that exists between at-risk students, sometimes even students with learning disabilities, and children in higher socioeconomic groups, two-parent families, etc.

At that early age (our preschool is both three and four year olds), the brain is still physically developing.  The right kinds of interaction and stimulation help to develop the brain in ways that later schooling simply cannot — it increases their learning potential.

AT’s comment on the mouse post sums up the feelings of many:

Netmom, there are few people I respect more than Dr. Phillips. I’ve had quite a few chances to talk with her, and I’m mighty impressed. She’s an asset.
Its really a shame this [mouse publicity] is on the preschool, realistically, it could happen anywhere, but it really sucks that the reason the place is on the news is this crap, and not the fact that its done TREMENDOUS good for many kids in Oak Ridge, including both of mine.

It’s true that Oak Ridge is ahead of the state in early childhood education, but it’s also true that there are always more children in need than we are able to serve.  Expanding the preschool to meet the actual need will require some investment of local funds, but the payback is extremely generous — the most commonly-cited in is 13:1, which includes lifetime stats of improved future earnings along with reduced welfare and incarceration rates.

Even without considering the lifetime impacts, pre-k reduces the need for remedial and special education services in K-12.  The Reading Recovery program utilized in all of our elementary schools is very expensive, but we continue to practice it because it works.   If we could reduce the need and utilization through pre-k, we could raise the performance level for all of our students, while reducing later expenditures for catch-up services.

The most immediate need is for capital funding to renovate and expand the 60-year old facility.  Unfortunately, the City is not in a capital improvements mood at the moment, so significant change will have to occur before we can fully take advantage of the Governor’s pre-k initiative.

Response to the public when something goes horribly wrong is critical; handled poorly, it can make matters much worse.

Yesterday, there was an incident in our preschool that’s bound to evoke a predictable response — one of fear and revulsion. However, I feel that our Superintendent, Tom Bailey, is to be commended for following the most basic rule of crisis communications:

If handled correctly the damage can be minimized.

One thing to remember that is crucial in a crisis is tell it all, tell it fast and tell the truth.

Faced with a situation that no one wants to be part of, immediate action was taken to mitigate the potential for harm. Then he gathered all the facts, conferred with the appropriate sources to determine potential impact, notified the personnel involved and affected, established a mechanism for contacting parents, and then notified* responded to the media.  *Edit: I ran into Bob Fowler today, who indicated that the Sentinel learned of the incident via the letter that went home to parents.  I told him I’d note the correction.
Something like a mouse in the green beans isn’t going to remain a secret, so it’s better to get the facts out than to wait for the rumor mill to create a bigger problem. Like a story about possum in the meatloaf.

Without question, it’s gross to think about. But knowing that proper cooking procedures were followed, that the health department deems it to be “minimal if any risk,” and that a process has been established to ensure that information can be collected and disseminated in an efficient manner to ensure the safety of students and staff, is the best possible antidote to a bad situation.

There are a few people hanging out in a forum I used to visit who will undoubtedly use this to cast blame, but there are some folks who simply can’t be satisfied.

After several years with a public relations firm, I’ve been part of a number of crisis communications plans (though I was not at all involved in this one). Dr. Bailey handled this one absolutely right.

UPDATE:

After seeing the coverage on WATE this evening, let me add my admiration for the calm and straightforward way that Dr. Phillips (principal at the preschool) handled the interview, along with several parents who indicated their understanding of the situation. It seems that the mouse arrived canned along with the green beans, meaning it could have ended up anywhere.

Note to Bill: No, I don’t know what brand they were. I think you’ll be fine without throwing away all your green beans. Myself, I eat the home-canned kind. No mice, but maybe a cat hair here and there.

A pair of cases before the US Supreme Court this week may yield a whole new interpretation of Brown v. Board of Education, as parents in two states have sued to put an end to racial preference in school assignments.

Coverage of the arguments and justices’ comments can be found in this morning’s Commercial Appeal, Tennessean, and the WSJ.

It seems that the real disparity is not a question of race, but of socioeconomics. The socioeconomic issue is masked to some degree by the fact that African-American and Hispanic students are overrepresented in the lower socioeconomic bracket, leading many to still consider race as the primary issue.

The Tennessean says;

Since the end of desegregation, the [Metro Nashville] district is home not only to more single-race schools, but also to more schools with a high poverty rate. And with a high poverty rate comes inequality, Smrekar said.

Race, class linked

Schools with high poverty rates also tend to have a disproportionate number of teachers teaching outside their field, according to Smrekar’s research. There’s also a higher percentage of inexperienced teachers and a higher rate of teacher turnover.

Typically, more experienced teachers opt for schools with more affluent student populations, experts said.

Students in the lower socioeconomic group are termed “at-risk” in edu-speak. One answer to the problem of teacher quality in schools with high “at-risk” populations is to offer an economic incentive for the best teachers to teach there. I realize that there is tremendous resistance from the teachers’ unions (not just in Tennessee, but all over the US) to any form of differentiated compensation, but if we are to ask some to do a significantly more difficult task in a less enjoyable work environment, there has to be some reason for the best in the profession to choose those schools.

The most obvious incentive from the private sector would be compensation.

No, public schools don’t follow the “run it like a business” model very well, since businesses do have the choice of rejecting raw material that isn’t up to their quality standards. A business has the right to set the fee for its product or service based upon the cost to produce or provide it, where public schools do not. But in terms of personnel performance, there are lessons to be taken from the private sector.

It is my observation that the “socio” part of socioeconomic is probably the greater challenge. Certainly, students from low-income families may have fewer resources (encyclopedias, computers, even nutrition) at home, but much has been done to address that disparity through schools, public libraries, and public assistance. It’s the child whose parent(s) may be absent in the evenings, drunk or on drugs, or who just doesn’t care that faces the greater challenge.

And yes, a superior teacher can make a difference even in the child whose home life is abysmal.

We’re lucky in Oak Ridge… our elementary school with the greatest number of at-risk students is also the one with the lowest teacher turnover, and a staff that I would hold up against any other, in any school system. We’re also fortunate in that, as a relatively small city, our demographics are pretty evenly distributed — not perfectly, but much more so than in most places.

I would tend to agree that school assignment based on race should end. At the same time, I would argue that it’s in all of our best interests to find a way to address the “socio” disparity as quickly and effectively as possible… if we do not, it will not only be self-perpetuating, but will snowball out of control.