Thursday, November 14, 2019

PA Ed Policy Roundup for Nov. 14, 2019 Taking a page from Betsy DeVos’ book, PA House Ed Cmte planning a vote on voucher bill next Monday – and it could see a full House vote next week.


Started in November 2010, daily postings from the Keystone State Education Coalition now reach more than 4050 Pennsylvania education policymakers – school directors, administrators, legislators, legislative and congressional staffers, Governor's staff, current/former PA Secretaries of Education, Wolf education transition team members, superintendents, school solicitors, principals, charter school leaders, PTO/PTA officers, parent advocates, teacher leaders, business leaders, faith-based organizations, labor organizations, education professors, members of the press and a broad array of P-16 regulatory agencies, professional associations and education advocacy organizations via emails, website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.

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PA Ed Policy Roundup for Nov. 14, 2019
Taking a page from Betsy DeVos’ book, PA House Ed Cmte planning a vote on voucher bill next Monday – and it could see a full House vote next week.


Legislative Alert: House Education Committee to push voucher bill next Monday
On Monday, November 18,The House Education Committee is scheduled to vote on voucher legislation under House Bill 1800 (Rep. Turzai, R-Allegheny). House Bill 1800 establishes a voucher program for students in the Harrisburg School District, which entered state receivership in June. The legislation sets a precedent for expansion in other districts – and in fact, using the definitions in the bill there are 13 school districts that would qualify for the voucher program if they enter receivership. Enactment of House Bill 1800 sets the stage for the eventual rollout of an expensive statewide voucher program. Adding tuition and transportation outlays, House Bill 1800 is estimated to cost the Harrisburg School District $5.5 million to $8.5 million. Could your district be next?  Once this bill is reported out of the House Education Committee, it is expected to quickly be pushed on the House floor.
There are no fiscal or student performance accountability requirements in the bill.
Please contact your representatives ASAP and ask them to please remain focused on ensuring that every student in every community has equal access to an excellent system of public education, and to please oppose HB 1800 or any other bill that would create a taxpayer-funded voucher program. Tell them to reject vouchers and vote NO on HB1800.
House Ed Committee members list:
https://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/CteeInfo/index.cfm?Code=12&CteeBody=H
House member contact info:
https://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/home/member_information/contact.cfm?body=H

“Across Pennsylvania, pensions are one of three main cost drivers often identified by school officials, with the others being special education and payments to charter schools. The district’s PSERS costs equaled one-third of its payroll costs in 2018, up from 5% in 2010”
Pension costs continue to burden Philly School District, report says
Inquirer by Maddie Hanna, Updated: November 13, 2019- 4:30 PM
Though the Philadelphia School District’s finances have improved in recent years, the district is still confronting mounting pension costs that will continue to burden its budget. That’s the message from a Pew Charitable Trusts report released Wednesday. It details how the district’s contributions to the state-run Pennsylvania School Employees Retirement System (PSERS) have soared — costing the district $154 million last year, up from $28 million eight years earlier. Those costs have leveled, but are expected to grow over the next decade, the report says. Across Pennsylvania, pensions are one of three main cost drivers often identified by school officials, with the others being special education and payments to charter schools. The district’s PSERS costs equaled one-third of its payroll costs in 2018, up from 5% in 2010, according to the report authored by Seth Budick, an officer with the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Philadelphia Research Initiative. Through 2026 — which is as far as PSERS makes projections — the district’s pre-reimbursement contributions are expected to climb to 37% of payroll. Uri Monson, the district’s chief financial officer, said that “every personnel decision we make” is impacted by pension costs, because hiring a new employee requires a steep payment into the system.
https://www.inquirer.com/news/philadelphia-school-district-pension-teachers-psers-pennsylvania-pew-20191113.html

Editorial: Consolidate state pension investing
Times-Tribune by THE EDITORIAL BOARD / PUBLISHED: NOVEMBER 13, 2019
Pennsylvania’s two big pension plans continue to bleed the state government and school districts, due to an accumulated unfunded liability of $75 billion. According to Republican state Rep. Garth Everett of Lycoming County, chairman of the House State Government Committee, that means each state taxpayer is “on the hook for $17,100” for pension costs alone. Like its predecessors, the current Legislature does not intend to tackle the sweeping reforms that would be necessary to cure the problem — which was created by the Legislature that was in office in the early 2000s — that now costs the state government more than $4 billion a year and devours school budgets at a rate equivalent to a stunning 34% of each district’s payroll. Everett’s committee has approved a measure that would help to whittle down the liability, however. It would consolidate the separate investment offices of the State Employees Retirement System and the Public School Employee Retirement Systems. It should be an easy call. Multiple analyses of the system have exposed excessive investment fees for mediocre performance. Consolidating the offices would diminish those fees at no cost to investment performance and commit more money to the plans
https://www.thetimes-tribune.com/opinion/consoliate-state-pension-investing-1.2558814

Brian O'Neill: City and schools in a fight over money
Mayor Bill Peduto is throwing down the gauntlet on Pittsburgh Public Schools
BRIAN O'NEILL Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Columnist boneill@post-gazette.com NOV 14, 2019 5:00 AM
No backsies. Mayor Bill Peduto didn’t put it quite that way. But the old playground rule that made all deals final was the gist of his argument when he was asked about that slice of the wage tax that the Pittsburgh Public Schools used to get but the city gets now. That’s not going back to the schools, Mr. Peduto told the media after his budget address Tuesday morning. Not only that, he thinks the best thing that could happen to the schools is the same sort of state oversight the city worked under for 14 years. That ended only in February 2018. The dispute is over one-quarter of 1 percentage point. The schools/city split had been 2%/1% until 2004. Then it became 1.75%/1.25%. You don’t have to be a math major to deduce that works out to millions of dollars more going to the city instead of the schools each year.
https://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/brian-oneill/2019/11/14/Pittsburgh-schools-money-fight-Bill-Peduto/stories/201911140056

“Pennsylvania is home to the widest per-pupil spending gap in the nation between wealthy and poor school districts,” the report notes. “This gap has a very real impact on students. Pennsylvania’s wealthiest districts spend 33.5 percent more than its poorest school districts, a gap significantly higher than the national average of 15.6 percent.”
Retired military leaders say Pa. schools need more money
PA Post by Ed Mahon NOVEMBER 12, 2019 | 12:01 PM
A group of retired military leaders says too many young Pennsylvanians don’t meet standard eligibility requirements for serving in the armed forces, and the country’s “thriving economy” makes the recruiting challenge even more difficult. “Gaps in workforce readiness threaten our country’s future economic success and national security,” the group, Mission: Readiness, asserts in a new report released Tuesday. The group’s proposed solutions include more funding for schools, high-quality care for infants and toddlers, and for pre-K programs. Stressed in the report is the need to do more to level the funding gaps between Pennsylvania’s richest and poorest school districts.
https://papost.org/2019/11/12/retired-military-leaders-say-pa-schools-need-more-money/

Philly school knew about toxic lead in drinking water but kept parents in the dark
WHYY By Avi Wolfman-Arent Ryan Briggs November 13, 2019
It was a display of kindness that should have been heartwarming. Instead, Frederick Douglass Elementary School teacher Alison Marcus just felt queasy. In 2016 — while headlines blared about the water crisis in Flint, Michigan — Marcus’ North Philadelphia charter school raised money to buy bottled water for residents of the distressed Midwestern city. But as she watched students at the charter, run by Mastery, toss change into a large plastic bucket, she felt a pang of guilt. “I just remember thinking, ‘We should definitely be testing the water here,’” she said in an interview this month. That’s because Marcus says she and other teachers feared the drinking water at the school wasn’t much better than Flint’s. That same year, for roughly a week, some hallway fountains and sinks spurted a brown liquid that looked more like apple cider than water, according to nine former and current staffers. Administrators say they were unaware of the issues. However, Marcus says she and others complained about the brown water in 2016 to school leaders. No one ever formally notified parents.
https://whyy.org/articles/philly-school-knew-about-toxic-lead-in-drinking-water-but-kept-parents-in-the-dark/

Who’s Trading Public School Funding for a Tax Credit?
Gadfly on the Wall Blog by Steven Singer August 18, 2019 stevenmsinger 
Ever wonder why our roads and public school buildings are crumbling?
Ever wonder why schools can’t afford books, buses and nurses?
Ever wonder why classroom teachers are forced to buy paper, pencils and supplies for their students out of pocket? Because businesses like Giant Eagle, American Eagle Outfitters, and Eat’n Park aren’t paying their fair share. It’s a simple concept – you belong to a society, you should help pay for the roads, bridges, schools, etc. that everyone needs to keep that society healthy. After all, as a stockholder, CEO or business owner, you directly benefit from that society. If it didn’t exist, you wouldn’t have nearly as many customers – if any. Many of us learned this kind of stuff in kindergarten or grade school. But ironically programs that allow businesses to avoid paying their fair share are being used to short change many of those same kindergarten and grade schools. In Pennsylvania, one such program is called the Educational Improvement Tax Credit (EITC), and everyone from local banks to Duquesne Light to UPMC healthcare providers are using it to lower their taxes while stealing from the public school cookie jar.
https://gadflyonthewallblog.com/2019/08/18/whos-trading-public-school-funding-for-a-tax-credit/  

Letter: Lehigh Valley arts school will raise your taxes
Pocono Record Letter by Merlyn Clarke, Stroudsburg posted Nov 8, 2019 at 5:39 PM
Thomas Lubben, founder of the Lehigh Valley Charter School for the Arts, a branch of which he plans to open in Tobyhanna, proclaimed on these pages that “we cannot raise taxes. We cannot go out and build new buildings and charge it to taxpayers.” If this is the kind of metaphysical legerdemain Mr. Lubben plans to teach in his school, parents should think twice about sending their children there. Let’s start with some simple arithmetic—a required subject by the way. If 100 students register in the school, they will take from the district schools from whence they come something like $2,000,000—on average $20,000 per student. Where does he think this money comes from? Here’s a hint: taxpayers. This is money that school districts will have to replace. Their expenses won’t be reduced by a nickel. Their buildings still have to be maintained. They still have to run a bus fleet—in fact they will have to bus Mr. Lubben’s students. Most importantly, they won’t be able to reduce their staff by a single person. So Mr. Lubben has just raised your taxes by two million. Lubben projects 400 students. That’s an $8,000,000 hit. And here’s the irony: Monroe County schools have been nationally recognized for their arts and music programs. When will politicians—the loudest complainers about school property taxes—acknowledge that the school choice craze is a hoax, driven by rent seekers who are transferring money from taxpayer pockets to their own, all with legislative sanction? There are broken school districts in this state. They need to be fixed. They are usually hugely under-funded. The existing fair funding formula, if implemented, would go far to alleviate these problems. Why doesn’t the legislature implement it? Enough is enough. The next school tax increase will have a name: The Charter School Tax.
https://www.poconorecord.com/opinion/20191108/letter-lehigh-valley-arts-school-will-raise-your-taxes

Blogger note: No question that cyber education works well for some students. However, many school districts now offer cyber education either directly or through intermediate unit programs, without having to pay inflated cyber charter tuition, which takes resources away from all students in the district.
Guest column: Lawmakers should stand up for charter students like my son
Delco Times By Susanna Reilly Guest columnist Nov 13, 2019 Updated 10 hrs ago
Susanna Reilly writes from New Castle in Lawrence County, Pa.
I am a true believer in traditional public education. My father taught in California’s public school system for 30 years, and I attended traditional public schools myself. But I chose a different avenue for my son: cyber school. Surprised? Let me explain. My son is a special needs child with Autism and ADHD who was both suffering and failing to learn in our local district school. In a traditional classroom with 20 children, he just couldn’t focus on his schoolwork. Due to his major audio sensitivities, classroom noises we all take for granted — fluorescent lights humming, chairs and desks scraping the floor, and students talking — made focusing on what the teacher was saying impossible at times. He was frightened and overstimulated to the point of immobility by things like fire drills and noisy students on the bus. My son is bright but isn’t a fast worker. So, he was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of homework assigned by the school. After school he had zero free time to just be a kid. Almost every day he’d get upset when he got off the bus, knowing he’d be trying to finish homework until 9 or 10 at night. He felt like he couldn’t possibly succeed, hated school, and wasn’t interested in learning. I was devastated and desperate for options. That’s why my husband and I tried something different. Three years ago, we started my son at cyber school, using the services of PA Distance Learning Cyber Charter School in our own home. It was hard for me to tell my father about this decision: charter schools have always been the “enemy,” and now his own grandson was attending one. But the results have been worth it.
https://www.delcotimes.com/opinion/guest-column-lawmakers-should-stand-up-for-charter-students-like/article_db44c02c-ab19-505e-baaa-78e47b19a3f7.html

High school students can become certified first-responders through the Octorara program
Daily Local By Ginger Rae Dunbar gdunbar@21st-centurymedia.com @GingerDunbar on Twitter November 13, 2019
OUTH COATESVILLE — Could you imagine graduating from high school as a hireable first-responder? That’s what the Octorara Area Career and Technical Education Homeland Security and Protective Services Academy offers to Chester County students. Students graduate with 64 total certifications in the three main fields of emergency medical services, firefighting and law enforcement. Students learn from those in the respective career fields on a daily basis. Most of the students already give back to their community by volunteering as a firefighter or EMT. “They are currently running calls now to assist the fire department or EMS,” said Lisa McNamara, director of Career and Technical Education Octorara Area School District. Several of the high school students helped to resuscitate a woman in cardiac arrest, and others have assisted at vehicle accident scenes. “They are out there making a difference,” said instructor Mark Barto, a Navy veteran with a background in the fire service. The program enables the young adults to help their neighbors and help taxpayers because serving as volunteers keeps costs down. It also helps students who continue their path as an active volunteer while attending college by being a part of a live-in program and living in a firehouse at no cost. Some colleges offer a tuition break to those who actively serve. The incentives help recruit first-responders as volunteerism has declined over the years.
https://www.dailylocal.com/news/high-school-students-can-become-certified-first-responders-through-the/article_c393cb9a-0628-11ea-8200-b392f2f51451.html

Volunteers, educators work to revitalize school rain gardens
They save water and provide learning opportunities for students.
The notebook by Joseph Staruski November 13 — 11:16 am, 2019
The Philadelphia Water Department and the federal Environmental Protection Agency have been seeking to transform Philadelphia’s stormwater infrastructure by building rain gardens at schools, which help with stormwater management.  But the capacity for professional gardening for the School District is limited, so enterprising students have tried to step in. Beau Greisiger, 16, an 11th grader at Harriton High School in Lower Merion, has been working with some of his friends – Finn Kent, 16, at Friends Central, and Alice Zehner, 16, at the Baldwin School – to help Philadelphia schools maintain their rain gardens. They have combined forces with Lois Brink at the nonprofit organization called The Big Sandbox and Javier Dominguez, a science teacher at Nebinger Elementary School in South Philadelphia. Beyond the overall goal of increased sustainability, the rain gardens project could potentially save the District hundreds of thousands of dollars on its water bills and give elementary school students an opportunity to tend a natural habitat. There are about two dozen rain gardens at schools now, and a group of landscape architects is working on a project to build a rain garden at the Tanner Duckrey Elementary School in North Philadelphia.
https://thenotebook.org/articles/2019/11/13/volunteers-educators-work-to-revitalize-school-rain-gardens/


PSBA New and Advanced School Director Training in Dec & Jan
Do you want high-impact, engaging training that newly elected and reseated school directors can attend to be certified in new and advanced required training? PSBA has been supporting new school directors for more than 50 years by enlisting statewide experts in school law, finance and governance to deliver a one-day foundational training. This year, we are adding a parallel track of sessions for those who need advanced school director training to meet their compliance requirements. These sessions will be delivered by the same experts but with advanced content. Look for a compact evening training or a longer Saturday session at a location near you. All sites will include one hour of trauma-informed training required by Act 18 of 2019. Weekend sites will include an extra hour for a legislative update from PSBA’s government affairs team.
New School Director Training
Week Nights: Registration opens 3:00 p.m., program starts 3:30 p.m. -9:00 p.m., dinner with break included
Saturdays: Registration opens at 8:00 a.m., program starts at 9:00 a.m. -3:30 p.m., lunch with break included
Advanced School Director Training
Week Nights: Registration with dinner provided opens at 4:30 p.m., program starts 5:30 p.m. -9:00 p.m.
Saturdays: Registration opens at 10:00 a.m., program starts at 11:00 a.m.-3:30 p.m., lunch with break included
Locations and dates

UPDATE:  Second Workshop Added Thursday, November 14, 2019 9:30 am to 3:00 pm: Adolescent Health and School Start Times:  Science, Strategies, Tactics, & Logistics Workshop in Exton, PA
The first workshop on November 13 sold out in less than 4 weeks.  Thanks to recent additional sponsorships, there will be a second workshop held on Thursday, November 14. Register HERE.
Join school administrators and staff, including superintendents, transportation directors, principals, athletic directors, teachers, counselors, nurses, and school board members, parents, guardians, health professionals and other concerned community members for a second interactive and solutions-oriented workshop on Thursday, November 14, 2019 9:30 am to 3:00 pm  Clarion Hotel in Exton, PA. The science is clear. Many middle and high schools in Pennsylvania, and across the nation, start too early in the morning. The American Medical Association, Centers for Disease Control, American Academy of Pediatrics, and many other major health and education leaders agree and have issued policy statements recommending that secondary schools start no earlier than 8:30 am to allow for sleep, health, and learning. Implementing these recommendations, however, can seem daunting.  Discussions will include the science of sleep and its connection to school start times, as well as proven strategies for successfully making change--how to generate optimum community support and work through implementation challenges such as bus routes, athletics, and more.   
For more information visit the workshop website www.startschoollater.net/workshop---pa  or email contact@startschoollater.net

Congress, Courts, and a National Election: 50 Million Children’s Futures Are at Stake. Be their champion at the 2020 Advocacy Institute.
NSBA Advocacy Institute Feb. 2-4, 2020 Marriot Marquis, Washington, D.C.
Join school leaders from across the country on Capitol Hill, Feb. 2-4, 2020 to influence the legislative agenda & shape decisions that impact public schools. Check out the schedule & more at https://nsba.org/Events/Advocacy-Institute

Register now for Network for Public Education Action National Conference in Philadelphia March 28-29, 2020
Registration, hotel information, keynote speakers and panels:
https://npeaction.org/2020-conference/

Any comments contained herein are my comments, alone, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of any other person or organization that I may be affiliated with.



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