HB 1234: The Morning After

"It takes a backbone to stand up and say we aren't just throwing more money at something if doing so historically has proven to not be the answer."

"Status quo vs. change."

We are repeating history by throwing money at indoctrinating teachers with Common Core Standards and then setting up a system to test students THREE TIMES A YEAR and give the teachers who are the most effective at indoctrinating their students with UNESCO's pantheism. How much more money is that going to take?

HB1234 is about continuing the status quo. The only thing different about this is that it gives more control to the international central planners and less control to teachers, parents, and the local school boards. As if the central planners don't already have enough control. That is the real source of poor student academic performance versus the costs. That is how you increase administration 65% when students drop 28.5%. Adding an advisory Council will only make that ratio worse and is just another example for throwing more money at bureaucracy.

I gave you the research, but I have not received reasons why you decided to ignore it. Expect your ratings to drop on the 2012 scorecards.

"This bill is now packed with local control - a district can opt out, design their own plan, etc, etc."

Saying do our plan, or do one that meets our approval, or you do not get the taxpayers money is not local control. It is bribery.

"the state is writing the check"

You are forgetting the taxpayers. It is their children that this issue is about. How much difference is the current system to Baptists paying the Church of England taxes and then still paying for their own churches. That was what the First Amendment was all about. Hope you are not saying that Republican means forgetting about the Constitution. Tornow's argument rested on the Constitution.

[…] probably getting a lot of emails and phone calls today. Rep. Steve Hickey (R-Sioux Falls) wrote a blog post today explaining his reasoning to constituents. For the sake of his typing fingers, I hope he can […]

HB 1234 provides "movement" ? Really ?

Does it take the burden of supporting public schools off the shoulders of those taxpayers who send their kids to private schools or choose to Home-School ? Nope.

Status Quo preserved.

Does it do anything to reduce educational bureaucracy ?
Nope. Status Quo preserved.

Does it provide for the implementation of charter schools in our state? Nope. Status Quo preserved.

Does it set up any system of tax credits so as to help increase the possibility of increased school choice for parents ? Nope. Status Quo preserved.

To summarize: HB1234=MASSIVE FAIL

At no point did I declare the sun would not come up. My mention of the gas chamber is an apt analogy: I was speaking less to the merits of HB 1234 (which are paltry) and more to the speciousness of Rep. Brunner's argument that we should pass HB 1234 because the Legislature was passing other bills to do nice things for us.

Making Rep. Brunner's argument even more specious: the fact that he voted against the very one-time money in HB 1137 that he was complaining we teachers ought to be thanking him for. To quote Rep. Brunner, "What's up with that?"

Claiming the Rep. Lust's "change for change's sake" argument is the best summation of yesterday's debate proves the utter paucity of logic and evidence in the case for HB 1234. This bad bill won on wishes, slogans, lies, and strong-arm tactics from the Governor.

Problems with your thought process:
1. You say that you "believe most who teach in South Dakota are heroes who'd show up and teach if they were paid nothing", but the legislation you voted for only benefits a select few. What about the rest of the "good" teachers? I agree that there are probably some less than effective teachers out there, but how about you champion your precious local control ideal and let local school districts take care of their own problems? Incidentally, I'd imagine lots of the problems with "bad" teachers would go away if the districts had enough money in the formula to attract "good" teachers. Bonuses for inexperienced teachers isn't going to attract more good teachers. It's going to drive away the qualified, experienced teachers who can't stand the policies forced on us by the state government.
2. "To suggest this is some sort of affront to teachers or an attack on education is just false." Actually it isn't. It is direct attack on teachers and everything for which we stand. Since you're not a teacher, how about you let us speak for ourselves on this issue. Better yet, how about you listen to all of the negative feedback you received from this bill instead of just ignoring it as "over the top rhetoric"?
3. There is absoultely no data to support any of these mandates. If you can't show ANY evidence that this will help, why would you vote for this bill? Oh yeah, "…status quo vs. change." That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard, and if you quoted someone saying that as someone saying it best - you're deluded. Change just for change sake is pure ignorance. I support meaninful change that is based on evidence. Not this sham of a bill.

I've a lot more to say, but I have to go do my day job. More than anything, I hope I can instill in my students an understanding of the true value of public education. Then, I hope they run for public office in SD.

Seth - How long have you been a teacher? I've been married to one for 23+ years. There isn't money to give raises to all teachers, so these are targeted salary bonuses. Did you notice we just put an extra 9 million into this years ed formula? Please also notice that historically extra millions toward ed doesn't result in higher teacher pay. That's an issue down at the district level. Please write them too. There IS data that shows merit pay works, some say it has never truly been tried. What we have tried is more money as I explained above. I can appreciate you are mad. I'll ignore your insinuations that you, but not I, understand the true value of education. I'm guessing I went to school longer than you and have been around it longer and all three of my kids went all the way through SF public schools. Seth, we may be looking at a 56 MILLION dollar shortfall next year depending on federal funding. Let's see if this one cent tax increase passes on the ballot in November. All indications here it won't. What should we do next year when the public says no tax increases and the federal govt $$ we depend on don't materialize? The big picture is entirely left out of SDEA propaganda.

"There isn't money to give raises to all teachers, so these are targeted salary bonuses."

There is approxiamtely a $150 million surplus in the 2012 budgert, so there is plenty of money. It is going to wealthy special interests (including wind energy and other utilities) or used to contol us with strings attached programming such as Common Core Standards.

But Steve, you are making a smart political move by doing what is popular among the monied fascists running the SDGOP and throwing conservatives under their bus. You are certain to make it into leadership.

Steve,
The fact that you've been married to a teacher for 23+ years is even more reason you should have voted this bill down. I did notice that you put one-time money in the formula. That is a band-aid fix that doesn't help any district in the long term. It's money we can't count on in the future.

Where is the data that shows merit pay works? I can't find any. I can however point to several studies that show it doesn't work. Here are a few for you to start reading.

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/teacherbeat/2011/03/nyc_schoolwide_pay_program_sho.html

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/Bridging-Differences/2011/03/thoughts_on_the_failure_of.html

http://her.hepg.org/content/36264448513xp4t5/ (secured link, but I'm sure you can access it from a public library like I did)

A couple of these articles summarize several other articles, so there is a wealth of evidence here. I'd be happy to read anything you have showing merit pay works. I would especially like to see any that tie merit pay to increased student achievement - which is what supporters of the bill claim it will do.

In regard to your issue about next year - I would be more than happy to pay more taxes if our legislators used that money wisely.

Overall, your response underlines the real problem with people that support this bill. You see education as an expense instead of an investment.

Seth

WHO WAS THE DRUNKEN TEACHER IN [redacted]

I edited my comment about the location of the drunk teacher in our state because I don't want to insert myself into or add further fuel to a personnel matter that I've been told the district superintendent has already addressed. I don't know the name of the teacher but I inserted this example into my article merely to illustrate we do hear about bad teachers. Me expressly stating the county, in this small state, was probably too specific.

Steve,

You have been friends to Kathy and I for a long time. I will have to disagree with you on this issue. As you know Kathy has taught and is currently teaching in the SF school district for 23 years. It would be 29 years had she not lead worship for 6 years. But if you want you could say she has been a teacher for 29 years. She is not a member of the teachers union because of her/our conservative values.

She is one of the most even keeled people as you and I both know. She has deep concerns and issues with this bill and is totally against it.

Why? Because it's totally unfair. I don't think you see that. Only a certain few will qualify. It DOES increase competition among the teachers, in fact it's already there and this will take it to another level.

"This bill addresses the number one concern in South Dakota education - low teacher pay." No it doesn't.
South Dakota cuts teachers pay 10% across the board last year and this year only wants to reward a few. This bill does not address low teacher pay.

"If is not fair or right for a teacher who works her/his tail off to get the same as the teacher across the hall who barely does the minimums." I think we can all completely agree with this. This bill however will cause those teachers who don't qualify for a bonus (and most won't and not because they are not good teachers) to look like the teacher down the hall doing nothing.

"If you ask teachers if they think there ought to be a better way to get rid of the bad teachers they say yes. There is due process in HB1234." At first glance getting rid of tenure sounds good. But when you think about it's really going to be a way of removing teachers who have been teaching 20+ years, who love what they do and are great teachers but are at the top of the pay scale. So when the numbers are being crunched and dollars need to be found, out with the old and in with the new. Don't tell me it won't happen because it's happening all the time in the corporate world. I know of 3 people in my immediate circle that this has happened to. Because it's all about the bottom line.

"There were good questions raised as to whether or not this bill will actually drive student achievement. I'm convinced it will as student achievement is directly related to good teachers." While we need "good teachers" it helps, but really much (not all) of how a student achieves begins at home. When you have parents involved with their child it makes a huge difference. Kathy see's it all the time. As I'm sure many teachers will attest to the same. Teachers can only do so much. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make them drink.

"The bill calls for a South Dakota Education Reform Advisory Council that consists of three members of the Senate, three members …………That's what I wanted to see all along and that is now in this bill… there are a couple years now intervening where all these players will be hands-on in South Dakota education reform."
What? As Conservative Republicans I thought WE stood for smaller government? Not more bureaucracy and red tape. And I'm assuming these people are payed for their services and time? Bigger government?

"Rep. David Lust said it best yesterday, "It comes down to inertia vs. movement" Seems like movement in the wrong direction to me.

"The sun did come up today despite all the over the top rhetoric about how bad the passing of HB1234 would be for our state." The rhetoric goes both ways, always.

I guess what troubles me is how this will 'really' help the education of our children. In fact, existing studies show that it doesn't work. Again I'll come back to the parents. You as a Pastor Steve, know the importance of a parents involvement in a child's life, they make a greater impact on a child's life for better or worse. And the parents involvement in their child's life will produce better results in school.

And then there are teachers like Kathy who are well liked (and a great teacher) and over the last 4 weeks has had 2 students confide in her because they had no where else to go. They even gave her cards thanking her for "being there." That will never result in a pay increase but the eternal value if priceless.

The bottom line for me is that the bill is flawed and unfair not to mention increased the size of government. All from Republicans, my party. It can be spun 'anyway you want it' to be (did we just have a Journey moment?) I don't see it as the right thing for education or teachers.

"The easy vote would have been no." The easy vote was yes as it pertains to political capital. From a political perspective I do see a "towing the party line" for the most part, not all I understand.

While I don't see it as a personal attack on teachers I do see it as a bad bill.

Right, wrong or otherwise those are my thoughts.

BTW, I'd be against an additional "penny tax" if it comes up regardless of where it is "supposed" to go.

Thanks Bret for your comments. A couple clarifications, no one cut teacher pay 10% last year. Ed funding last year (not teacher pay) was cut 6.8% and near 2% of that was restored. School districts had to absorb big budget cuts but it wasn't like teachers statewide took a payroll cut of 6.8%. if we can't get a bonus to all, I happy we can get a bonus to some. This does go directly to teacher pay. Also, I don't get the big govt connection. The last thing people want is us deciding things here without input from those involved. I agree on the penny sales tax failing this November but consider the dilemma that remains, next year 56 million govt dollars are likely not going to materialize in SD. That means more cuts. Unless the economy improves and I'm a real pessimist on that one, we are no where near out of the woods and,,,, adding 60000 new people on our medicaid roles (thanks to Obamacare) will mean education gets an even greater squeeze. That's reality. Democrats can scream about the conservative fiscal course we are on here right now but had we listened to them last year we'd be making cuts this year and not putting 9 million back into the ed formula like we did yesterday. SD doesn't even have enough reserve dollars to fund our state for 3 months.

Steve,
Again I am left shaking my head. I had believed you to have common sense.

Definately there is waste in educational spending, you just helped vote for more of it.

How will this improve education in SD? Look at our reading scores! Reading is the backbone to all other education, perhaps while you were throwing away money you should have given it to reading teachers.

You've essentially pitted teachers against one another in a comparing apples and oranges. You've also made it to where a new teacher two or three years in the system will be pulling more money than experienced teachers.

Let's hand these kids money to buy a new car. You really think they'll apply it to student loans? If they do, then they need only teach a few years in SD to pay the loans off while making more money than the experienced teachers. Suddenly their "incentive" is gone which is the same as a pay cut to these new hires. They're not going to stay on then, they're off to the business world in places beyond the borders of South Dakota with the help of the state of South Dakota.

When will we wake up?

Our tax dollars continue to go toward stupid things that help people get out of this place. We send money to a state Univ. that has the slogan: "You can go anywhere from here!" What message does that send? Not, stay here in the great state of South Dakota, no, get an education at the expense of those of us who have spent our entire lives here in paying every tax that the State Legislooters come up with, while putting up with poor pay. Our taxes will help some kid to make more money than I'm making after thirty years and then in a few years they'll skip out of here.

Now explain to me how education has been helped? Only the education of the one receiving the money. Of course we have to comfort ourself with that while we are taxed on everything from rowboats to auction sales, we don't have a state income tax. Tax the poor, who spend every penny they bring in just to stay afloat and let our legislators spend it foolishly.

Let's put a special tax on legislators that make stupid decisions. At least on this one, I can say I'm extremely proud of our reps. in dist. 19. I hope your elected officials in your district don't forget your record.