Menino links proposed school system changes to potential economic growth by Marjorie Arons-Barron
The entry below is being cross posted from Marjorie Arons-Barron’s own blog.
Boston Mayor Thomas Menino this morning delivered one of the best speeches of his political career, and it brought the crowd of several hundred at the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce breakfast to their feet in an enthusiastic ovation. In it, he laid out a compelling vision for a comprehensive overhaul of the Boston Public Schools. In the process, he said things that have needed to be said for a long time.
He strongly backed Superintendent Carol Johnson’s plan to close a $60 million budget gap and simultaneously improve the quality of education. There are 5600 empty seats in the city. The Boston School Committee tomorrow night will vote on Johnson’s proposal to close nine schools and merge eight into four, saving an estimated $20 million a year. But this isn’t just about bricks and mortar.
Menino’s and Johnson’s vision is that every classroom will have a highly skilled teacher whose salary, in part, will be tied to performance. He wants a teacher contract that will allow principals across the city hire the teachers whose skills best meet the needs of their students. He also wants to reform the teacher evaluation system. Noting that Boston has the shortest school day in the Commonwealth, he wants to extend the school day. Outdated contract rules will have to change.
And that’s not all that will outrage the unions. The school system’s health insurance has doubled in the last decade, meaning that one in eight dollars goes for employee health insurance. Millions could be saved by joining the Group Insurance Commission plan that covers state workers. Resistance to this reasonable change among municipal workers is virtually statewide. Menino will ask the legislature to approve a home rule petition that will enable Boston to make the change.
Boston’s 61 percent graduation rate is “one of the highest in urban America,” but, he said, we “can’t accept that more than a third don’t graduate.” He understands that quality education is the foundation of economic growth and prosperity, not to mention competitiveness.
I asked the Mayor how, in light of the need to enable principals to choose their own teachers, he is actually going to get agreement on modifying the bumping rule, where those teachers in closing schools could actually displace other, sometimes better teachers elsewhere solely because of seniority. He acknowledged the challenges presented in upcoming union talksAsked where the preliminary talks are, the Mayor said they’re still “in the on-deck circle.”
More than one observer mused that the strength of this speech and the force of its message could well signal that Tom Menino may not be planning to run for yet another term. He didn’t mince words, and he indicated a willingness to go head-to-head with the teachers union on issues where it has been largely intransigent. But, as he well noted, education is “the issue of our time,” and, even if he doesn’t get 100 percent of what he wants, he has definitely raised the bar on what is needed well into the future.
Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below.
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I always wondered our education system would improve, if we change how students saw their own education.
It’s understandable that we can’t hold children truly accountable for themselves, but I always found amazement in the Sudbury Valley schools, or colleges that held no curriculum/grade structure. When it does work, why does it? Maybe if students felt they actually had control within the education would they take the self initiative.
There is also a new documentary coming out called “Race to Nowhere” that deals with the opposite problem of students who are overworked, with no meaning behind their efforts. http://www.racetonowhere.com/about-film
We have two groups of students, the top 20% who are over achievers, which is fine as long as it is self-motivated and not solely done to please the parents and the rest of us. I’m one of the ‘rest of us’ and so are my children. Someone has to be in the 42th percentile.
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While this may seem completely contradictory to just what I wrote above, I still believe classroom structure/grades/exams can be a good thing. Some people need clear lines of when it’s time to work/learn and when it’s time to be social. When they begin to blend those, we can become easily distracted and will just be social. We need a form of measurement and the constraint to get what we need out of the learning process/work task.
Even at school the distractions are present. We’re humans and we like to be social. The sole reason why so many students go to school is simply to be social with their peers. If I was to reform education, I would make the school day actually shorter, with little down time and no activities. Instead I would make the social need for students more integrated within the community, so they socialize with a more diverse group and not just their peers. A school is a part of the community, not a community within itself.
I realize off topic, but it’s frustrating to hold teachers, who are dealing with people in the same way we hold engineers.in how they make an inanimate product.
“”Menino’s and Johnson’s vision is that every classroom will have a highly skilled teacher whose salary, in part, will be tied to performance. He wants a teacher contract that will allow principals across the city hire the teachers whose skills best meet the needs of their students.””
…I think I was surprised that this is not currently the standard. How did we go so off course that salary is not tied to perforamnce?