Not all on board for president's Race to Top

Marietta Daily Journal:

As the state finalizes its initial application for the federal Race to the Top grant, state Superintendent of Schools Kathy Cox and the two Cobb County candidates running for her seat spoke to the Journal about where they stand on the grant.

Race to the Top was created by President Barack Obama. Through the distribution of $4.35 billion, the administration hopes to highlight and replicate education reform strategies in four areas: standards and assessments, data systems to support instruction, great teachers and leaders and turning around struggling schools.

The money is awarded on a competition basis, and Georgia could be eligible for between $200 million and $400 million.

The state must submit its application by Jan. 18, and Cox hopes to know by May whether Georgia has won any money.

Retired educator and former state Rep. Roger Hines of Acworth, a Republican vying for Cox's seat, said he does not support the grant.

"The reason I oppose Race to the Top is that it is another example, as was (No Child Left Behind), of the federal government dangling money in front of the states to get them to do certain things, like adhere to national standards and even a national curriculum," Hines said.

Money is tempting for states and local school boards, but Hines said no amount of money should change the local nature of education.

"The thought of a national curriculum horrifies me," Hines said.

"Mathematics being an exact science, I am not too bothered about national standards there, but social studies and literature? No. I see no evidence that the federalization of education would help anyone. Nationalized healthcare is bad, nationalized General Motors is bad, and nationalized education would be worse," Hines said.

The first federal intervention in education was in 1965 with Lyndon Johnson's Elementary and Secondary Education Ac, Hines said, and George W. Bush's No Child Left Behind modified that law. Obama's proposal will be a further modification, he said.

"I just have to ask if all the federal money has heightened educational quality in America, and I think it has not. It has fed some hungry children, and I'm glad of that, but it hasn't served its educational purpose of keeping Americans educated," he said.

But retired Cobb educator Dr. Beth Farokhi, who is running on the Democrat ticket for the state school superintendent's seat, said a national assessment is an important component if the state is serious about measuring how students in Georgia are doing compared to others across the country.

"Currently our intensive Georgia testing system does not do this and does not effectively measure our student's learning," Farokhi said.

Cox said in comparing the state's strategic plan for the last few years with the objectives of Race to the Top, they match.

"And that's why we feel really good and excited about our chances of getting this, because it's the work we're already doing," Cox said.

Half the funding would go to pay for statewide activities and half would go to local systems, Cox said. One way the state wants to use the money is to create a leadership academy to train principals in turning around low-performing schools, she said.

In a Jan. 4 memo to the Cobb school board, Superintendent Fred Sanderson recommended the district wait to find out more before seeking any of the money.

"As of right now, given the ambiguity of the grant's application and the long-term consequences a commitment of this degree may have on our district, my recommendation is to not submit a (memo of understanding) to the state for the Race to the Top grant," Sanderson writes the board.

Marietta City Schools Superintendent Dr. Emily Lembeck said her system wouldn't be applying for the grant because it's not eligible. After the state submits its application this month and finds out if it is awarded the grant or not, local school systems that qualify as "low performing" will be contacted to participate. While Marietta has its share of economically disadvantaged students, the system is not considered a low performing district and therefore, "We do not qualify," Lembeck said.

Cox said she understands some of the reservations to the federal grant.

"There's just a lot of what ifs and a lot of unknowns," she said. "I think that some of the strings that concern me the most is just the burden of the reporting."

Whenever it comes to spending a dime of federal money, she said, the paperwork and documentation required is extensive. Another reservation Cox has is the potential deterioration of local control.

"So they're going to be very prescriptive about how you turn around a local school. And they're going to be very prescriptive about how we pay teachers, and they're going to be very prescriptive about what kind of system we set up to implement the common core standards. So you know it's the federal government getting into a lot of the nuts and bolts and in the running of schools," she said.

What will it look like if the state shifts to a performance pay system for teachers, she wondered.

"One of the fundamental things I think is not answered yet is, as we go to a performance-pay system for teachers what that's going to look like, how that's going to track out, and how much pay for performance is going to be dictated by this Race to the Top. Those are some of the unknowns that I think some of the superintendents are nervous about. There's a lot of what ifs about what'll happen to the whole pay structure of your personnel if you enter into this contract," she said.

Farokhi said it is unacceptable to require states to link student achievement data to individual teachers, which Race to the Top mandates.

"Our students need to be assessed on how they improve over a year in multiple ways, not just one test score. An evaluation of a teacher also cannot and should not be determined based on the test scores of their students," Farokhi said.

Hines, a Republican, recently denounced the grant as the federalization of education.

Cox, though, said she believes in the goals of Race to the Top.

"What we're trying to do and what this program is trying to do for our country are the right goals. And they're the same goals we've been working on in Georgia: Getting rid of the achievement gap that has hindered our state for so long. Trying to get better quality teachers in that classroom and taking on that tough challenge, that's saying the only way we're going to do that is to fundamentally restructure the way we pay teachers.

"It's scary, it's different, but it's something we've got to be willing to look at and tackle. And again I'm a person that wants to be part of the solution not just keep criticizing and keep talking about the same worn-out old problems. We've been talking about teacher quality for 40 years," she said.

Posted via email from Jim Nichols for GA State House