Bacon's Rebellion

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Budget Actions to Implement the Methods of the Nation’s Most Successful Educators of Poor, Minority and Special Needs Kids into Virginia Public Schools

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by

sherlockj
in

Ex-Curry School at UVa

by James C. Sherlock

I am a graduate of the University of Virginia. I am not a proud one on this subject.

I have just completed yet another review of the centers, labs and projects of the UVa School of Education and Human Development (ex-Curry School).

The review highlighted two major issues.

  1. UVa’s School of Education has shown an utter absence of scholarship in ignoring the most proven effective methods for improving public education of poor, minority and educationally handicapped kids, upon whom it claims to be centered. Those methods are the ones employed in public schools by the nation’s most successful non-profit charter management organizations (CMOs), starting with New York City’s Success Academy. Shriveled by dogma and fear of the Twitter mob, UVa will not even mention their names.  Yet that school of education is called out by name and disproportionately rewarded in the budget in front of the General Assembly.
  2. We need to study and implement the methods of the CMOs, which specialize in educating poor and minority kids and accept special education kids without any barrier, into all of Virginia’s public schools, not just charters.

I will offer specific fixes for both issues that the Governor and the General Assembly can implement in the budget before them.

I reviewed for this story every one of the UVa ed school’s centers, labs and projects including:

Ignoring Charter Management Organizations.

The phenomenal success of the best CMOs in teaching economically disadvantaged and minority kids, English learners and students with educational disabilities is the story in that field.

Yet my review indicates that the ed school at the state’s flagship university cannot bring itself to admit the existence of, much less study, organizations that have produced the nation’s best educational results for children whose best interests the school claims to be centered on in its programs.

CASTL conducted a six-year study of nine “core knowledge (CK)” charter schools in Colorado under a federal grant. CK is a curriculum, not a uniform educational methodology. The Colorado Department of Education was a partner. A glimmer of hope you say?

Few studies have focused on the decisions of high-income, suburban families. In a sample of Core Knowledge charter schools in a predominantly White and socioeconomically advantaged set of suburbs in Denver, Colorado, we are able to examine both the closed- and open-ended responses of parents who reported the importance of various factors in the decision-making process.

The results paper was School Choice Decision-Making Among Suburban, High-Income Parents.  

Thanks for nothing.

The failure to study the methodology of the most successful CMOs represents dogma run amok. Under Virginia budget sponsorship, that dogma directly endangers the education of poor, minority and educationally handicapped Virginia children.

Where are the civil rights organizations, the General Assembly Black and Hispanic caucuses and the special education lobby on this issue? Where are the teacher’s organizations?

What to do. The state should withdraw funding support and special recognition from UVa’s ed school and get started down a road to implement the methods of the best CMOs into Virginia public schools with amendments to the budget in front of them.

  1. Go to the Budget Bill – HB30 2022-23 Budget, Office of Education, Central Office Operations, Item 129. Go to paragraphs H and I. Strip the University of Virginia School of Education of all of the directed funding in that paragraph. Move it to other state-supported ed schools with budget language that directs them to include in their work study of the kindergarten instruction methods of the most educationally successful public charter school charter management organizations.
  2. Move $3 million annually from the $1.7 billion annual funding for the University of Virginia to the Superintendent of Public Instruction. Use budget language to instruct her to study and report on the methods and results of the most educationally successful K-12 public charter school management organizations in the instruction of poor and minority children and the introduction of those methods into Virginia public schools.

The Governor can threaten to veto any budget that does not include those changes.

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8 responses to “Budget Actions to Implement the Methods of the Nation’s Most Successful Educators of Poor, Minority and Special Needs Kids into Virginia Public Schools”

  1. George Walton Avatar
    George Walton

    This should be the Number 1 priority for all Black leaders and politicians. Expanded opportunity serves little purpose if the young Blacks are not educationally prepared to take advantage of those opportunities.

    1. James C. Sherlock Avatar
      James C. Sherlock

      Thank you George. I absolutely agree. I have been writing about these subjects centered on improving public school educations for poor and minority children for years and gotten nowhere.

      I have offered very specific, executable recommendations like these and it is like talking to a brick wall precisely because the Black and poverty lobbies won’t participate. I have no idea why. I honestly don’t.

  2. Nancy Naive Avatar
    Nancy Naive

    “Black students at VMI were expelled by the honor court at a disproportionately high rate, according to data obtained by The Washington Post for the three academic years between the fall of 2017 and the spring of 2020. Though Black cadets made up about 6 percent of the student body, they represented about 43 percent of those expelled for honor code violations. Twelve out of the 28 VMI students dismissed in those three academic years were Black. When students of color were included in the count, the number of expelled rose to 15, or about 54 percent of the total, even though minorities made up about 21 percent of the student population in that three-year period.”

    Crickets…

    1. James C. Sherlock Avatar
      James C. Sherlock

      Worthwhile subject. Just not the one about which I wrote. But now you have. Congrats.

      1. Nancy Naive Avatar
        Nancy Naive

        Can’t wait forever.

    2. George Walton Avatar
      George Walton

      Might also have something to do with the upbringing of the Black cadets. Maybe honesty is not a prized virtue in some homes. Libs claim that honesty is a racist virtue that only the privileged can afford to pursue. Unequal outcomes do not always mean unequal treatment.

  3. Dick Hall-Sizemore Avatar
    Dick Hall-Sizemore

    I admire your campaign and passion for the improvement of the education of poor and minority children. Therefore, I am sorry to have to tell you this, but your proposals are out of touch with political reality.

    Most importantly, the Governor has proposed using higher ed institutions to set up charter schools (called “lab schools” in his proposal) and wants to give them $150 million in the next biennium to do it. Of that amount, UVa. is likely to get the lion’s share. So, instead of cutting the budget of UVa.’s School of Education, the Governor wants to increase it.

    Second, the Democrats in the state Senate have made it clear that they will block any attempt to make it easier to set up charter schools at the local level.

    There is another way to skin this cat. It is not flashy politically, nor will it produce results right away.

    There is nothing to stop the Superintendent of Public Instruction from undertaking on her own initiative the study you recommended. She could direct the Ass’t. Supt. for Data, Research, and Technology to conduct such a study. She could hire some consultants. She could even contract with one of the state’s Schools of Education to conduct the study. VDOE’s Central Office has a GF appropriation of over $400 million. Surely, her astute budget director could “find” $3 million to finance such a study. Also, there are grant sources available, both from the feds and private foundations.

    Even if state law is not amended to make it more attractive for a CMO to set up shop in Virginia, she could do what the Dept. of Corrections did several years ago: take what the study showed as the strong points of the private sector and apply them to Virginia public schools. She could do this by encouraging local school divisions to adopt the proven methods. If changes in state regulations such as those governing teacher licensure are needed to accomplish these new approaches, she could work with the Board of Education to modify those regulations to allow local schools to use innovative methods.

    From what I read of Balow, the new superintendent, she has the background and experience to tackle this. But, it is going to take some governance from the Youngkin administration and deemphasizing confrontation over masks and “divisive” concepts and calling for 200 charter schools (which they view as a threat) and, instead, reaching out to local school divisions in an effort to cooperate with them in improving education for poor and minority kids.

    1. James C. Sherlock Avatar
      James C. Sherlock

      I agree. Thanks. I have already suggested this to her directly.

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