Division I regional track finals
Fenwick graduation 2012
Ponitz graduation 2012
Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2007 > February
February 2007
Why an income tax won’t work for Dayton
(Troy school superintendent Tom Dunn and business manager Marion Stout with WHIO-TV’s Steve Baker on election night last November.)
I’ve been getting this question a lot. Smaller nearby cities like Troy and Piqua are trying earned income taxes to fund their schools. Why doesn’t Dayton try one? For one thing, it would take the bite out of the tax hike for retirees.
But for Dayton, such a tax doesn’t make sense. It simply wouldn’t raise enough money and it would hit the bread-and-butter taxpayer/voter — middle income workers — the hardest.
And that’s just the start. My colleague Martin Gottlieb explores this issue in a column on Wednesday’s editorial page that you can preview here.
Martin’s helpful explanation should clear this issue up for those who like the idea of an income tax.
NOTE: I’ve corrected a typo so the third paragraph now says an income tax WOULDN’T raise enough money.
Permalink | Comments (11) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
Local boy (sort of) done good
Tyler Hicks
About a decade ago, I was the police reporter at the Troy Daily News and a talented young man named Tyler Hicks was the paper’s chief photographer. We spent a lot of time chasing around car accidents and crime scenes in Miami County back in the day.
His photos were great even then, but today Tyler is literally one of the best photographers in the world. For the New York Times he has taken important pictures in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Indonesia, Africa and seemingly every other hot spot around the world. He has a unique combination of brains, guts and guile required for the kind of dangerous work he does. And now he’s won a big international award.
Tyler, just out Ohio University’s graduate program back then, went on to work at a North Carolina newspaper before just deciding to go for it as a freelancer. He began traveling the world and selling his photos to wire services and big newspapers and magazines before the Times hired him.
Officially, Tyler is a native of New York and went to college at Boston University. But with the graduate school connection here in Ohio (note the link to my topic — education) and with him having started his career here in the Dayton area, I think we can claim him, too.
(Image credit: The Daily Free Press)
Permalink | Comments (3) | Categories: Journalism
Who decides what shots your child gets?
(The E2 transactivator, a protein that helps HPV replicate)
In today’s paper, a Ohio lawmaker from Toledo says she will introduce a bill requiring every sixth grade girl be vaccinated for human papillomavirus (HPV), a sexually transmitted disease that is the leading cause cervical cancer.
Rep. Edna Brown, D-Toledo, says the vaccination would prevent many girls from getting cancer later in life. But critics argue the vaccination is expensive ($360) and is being pushed by Merck, the drug company that makes it (even Brown acknowledges that she learned about the vaccination from Merck’s awareness campaign).
You can see this issue is ready made for a controversy — it’s got sex, money, politics and drugs.
Still, the core question is a valid one — should we immunize our girls against the danger of HPV and later cervical cancer?
UPDATE: Mary McCarty speaks to local doctors about the HPV vaccinne. They largely describe it as a great boon for women’s health. But interestingly, some still are not ready to say it should be government mandated for all girls.
If you read this blog, you know I am one of the “X-Men,” fathers with all daughters (so named because it is us men who provide the X chromosone instead of the Y that determines gender). I have three girls.
My gut instinct says that my wife and I should get to make this decision about our daughters, not the state. The vaccination is new and therefore there are unknowns, even if the chances of side effects are likely low. Still, we’ve had this conversation with our pediatrician in the past when new vaccinations, treatments or drugs have become available. Together we’ve gone over the plusses and minuses each time and together came to a decision about how to proceed.
Again, my gut says that the way these decisions should be made. On the other hand, I see Rep. Brown’s point. If we have a cure that can help many girls avoid cancer later on and we are reasonably sure of the vaccination’s safety, why not apply it to all kids? That would guarantee all girls are protected, not just the children of conscientious parents or parents with the best health insurance and fattest wallets.
What’s your take on this issue?
(Image credit: University of California, Berkeley)
Permalink | Comments (25) | Categories: Student Health and Safety
Not all rules are bad
It was one of the central ideas of charter school movement — public schools are immobilzed by red tape from which they need to be released. Rules, rules, rules block true reform at every turn.
I think many public school folks would agree that there are too many rules. But some rules are there for a reason. And in my mind one of the most important rules for public institutions, schools or otherwise, is transparency. When the public is spending its money, it should be able to see how that money is spent and how the structures that money funds are operating.
In my experience covering charter schools in Dayton for the past nine years, transparency has been a concern. It’s not necessarily the case that charters are trying to hide anything. Most often, what I’ve seen is simply that charter school operators don’t know the rules when it comes to public access to documents and meetings.
Case in point — City Day Community School.
Meetings of public boards — school boards, library boards, city councils, etc. — are open to the public under Ohio law. Those boards can only meet behind closed doors if they meet very specific conditions for exemption from the state’s “Sunshiine Law” that requires openness.
These rules apply to the governing board of charter schools, just as they do to all public school boards. If there is one school in the city that should be familiar with the rules by now it’s nine-year-old City Day — one of the state’s oldest charter schools. Governing boards must advertise their meeting times and allow anyone who wishes to attend.
But when I went 10 minutes early to City Day’s 6 p.m. governing board meeting on Dec. 14, I found the board already discussing business. They were surprised to see me (I don’t think they get many visitors to their meetings) when I entered the closed room. I looked at my watch and asked if they had started the meeting early. No, they said, they were just finishing up and would begin the formal meeting at 6 p.m.
Well, I said, I’ll just sit down in the room while they finish up. When they asked me to wait outside, I pointed out that a majority of the governing board was in the room discussing board business and that constituted an official meeting under state law that must be open to the public.
“He’s right,” one member of the group said. They broke up while just two members stayed in the room to continue the discussion.
Then there was Thursday’s meeting of the City Day board. This time, interim board president Clinton Brown motioned that the board go into executive (closed) session to discuss “personnel and finances.” State Rep. Clayton Luckie, who was in attendance, immediately objected. “Finances” is never a permitted reason for a closed meeting under Ohio law.
Neither is “personnel,” I pointed out. To discuss a particular employee, the board had to state the reason for the closed meeting, such as to discuss the employee’s possible suspension, discipline, promotion, demotion, firing, change in compensation, etc.
Brown tried again, saying the board would go into executive session to discuss, “hiring, firing or promotion of employees.” It was close enough to be permitted under the Sunshine Law.
When I attend meetings at which things like this happen, I have an advantage in that I am pretty well versed in the state’s open meetings and open records laws because of the nature of my work. The average teachers, parent or community member who might attend such a meeting would have a hard time understanding how the school operates and how public money is spent if the board were to go into closed meetings for the sorts of reasons they stated.
This can also be a problem when it comes to documents. At times, I’ve asked Dayton charter schools for routine documents that are indisputably public — budget documents, employee salaries, etc. — only to find the schools unresponsive.
The only avenue to remedy these violations of state law it to go to court and sue the violators. The Dayton Daily News has done this in the past. We’ve sued the Dayton Board of Education twice since I’ve worked for the paper — once over documents and once over meetings. We won both times and the court ordered the board to comply with the law.
The newspaper does not file such lawsuits without careful consideration of the costs and benefits both to the paper and to the community. It’s an easier case to make that we need to enforce the law with a large school district. An individual charter school affects fewer people. For serious cases, I think the paper would take action, but the decentralized nature of the schools means opening a potential can of worms. We can’t sue every individual school in every case of violating the Sunshine Law.
This is where I think it’s time the state considered the need for educating charter schools about the open records and open meetings. Before charters are awarded, the potential operators should demonstrate understanding of the Sunshine Law and perhaps even be required to show it had legal counsel with First Amendment expertise.
I think this would be a good step toward ensuring public accountability.
Permalink | Comments (10) | Categories: Charter Schools and School Choice, City Day Investigation, My Favorite Posts
New taxes: Dayton is not alone
(A levy sign following a recent successful Centerville campaign.)
Dayton school leaders have insisted since the beginning of their talk about a May levy that much of the problem is underfunding from the state that is forcing the district to the ballot earlier than the school board had hoped. Superintendent Percy Mack has been telling me for a couple months that the problem was not just affecting Dayton — that most of Montgomery County’s school districts would be on the ballot this year.
Well, the May ballot is out and he’s been proven correct. A majority — 9 of 16 Montgomery County school districts — are on the ballot. And we don’t even know yet who will seek a tax levy in November.
Dayton, with a 15.17-mill levy, isn’t the only district with a big ballot issue either — small, rural Brookville is on for 10.5 mills. I also noticed Miamisburg, cited in Tom Gunlock’s recent DDN op-ed column as a district with sensible spending, is on the May ballot asking voters to renew a fairly sizeable 6.81-mill emergency levy.
Others on the ballot — Huber Heights, Jefferson Twp., Kettering, Northmont, Oakwood and West Carollton. Most of those are seeking new money.
Five others — Greenville, Fairborn, Yellow Springs, Bradford and Piqua — are on the ballot in neighboring counties.
So, does this prove Mack’s point? Or does the number and variety of districts — urban, suburban and rural — on a May primary ballot not really tell us anything about the problems of school funding in the state?
Permalink | Comments (12) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools, School Funding
State to investigate City Day testing
By Scott Elliott Staff Writer
DAYTON — City Day Community School is investigating its own handling of Ohio Achievement Tests last year and a state school board member has promised a state investigation will follow.
The Dayton Daily News this month revealed similarities between practice questions used at City Day to questions on the actual state math exam. Students practiced on questions that were identical or substantially the same as top secret questions that appeared on the state exam.
On Thursday, the school’s interim governing board president, Clinton Brown, said City Day was conducting its investigation of the test preparation practices last year.
On Thursday, the school’s interim governing board president, Clinton Brown, said City Day was conducting its investigation of the test preparation practices last year.
The Ohio Department of Education’s usual process in cases of testing irregularities is to allow the school to conduct its own probe first and report the results.
State officials then decide if more investigation is needed.
Carl Wick, a state school board member from Centerville, said the state will follow up on when the school’s self check is complete.
“Yes, there will be an investigation,” he said.
State Rep. Clayton Luckie, D-Dayton, attended City Day’s board meeting Thursday and urged the board to have students re-take last year’s exam to prove if the results were correct.
“If there is still a question, then re-take the tests and put all doubts aside,” he said. “That would stop a lot of this stuff. If the kids score back where they were within 4 or 5 percent, the case will be closed.”
Luckie said the charter school had a responsibility to react as aggressively to test security concerns as any other public school.
“You’re just as responsible to make sure things are done right — that test administration is done right,” he said. “You have a big task ahead of you to prove your test scores are what they are.”
Brown responded for the City Day’s board: “I don’t think we’re in any position to answer questions at this point.”
Permalink | | Categories: Charter Schools and School Choice, City Day Investigation, My Favorite DDN Stories, Testing
Will Joe go?
Joe Lacey
He says no.
The DDN reported today that Dayton school board member Joe Lacey was one of five candidates screened by the Democratic Party as candidates to replace Montgomery County Treasurer Hugh Quill, who recently was appointed to a position with the state by Gov. Ted Strickland.
But when I reached him today, Lacey said he did not expect to earn the appointment, saying he believes Carolyn Rice of Wright State University will be announced shortly as the new county treasurer.
Lacey was elected to the school board in 2005 and has been serving for just over a year. He is an accountant by trade who works now as an assistant treasurer under Quill and formerly worked for Montgomery County Auditor Karl Keith.
Lacey said his commitment to the school board has not waivered, even thought he would have had to step down to take the treasurer post. “It’s just my day job and I was looking for a promotion,” he said.
He said with this behind him, he will refocus his energy on his school board work.
“I thought long and hard about my work on the school board and I’m looking forward to continuing that, especially supporting the upcoming levy,” he said.
Permalink | | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
The power of words
Paul Rusesabagina and Thomas Kamilindi
Words kill. They also save lives.
In Rwanda in 1994, journalist Thomas Kamilindi refused to say hurtful words — to call his neighbors, friends and even his own family cockroaches and worse — over the radio. But others did, inflaming ethnic hatred that led to thousands of death.
Later Kamilindi found himself at the side of Paul Rusesabagina in what we know from the movies as the “Hotel Rwanda.” (Thomas explained to me that this name is quite correct. Rwanda is known for its beautiful hilly countryside. In the Rwandan language, the word Rwanda means “miles of hills” and in French, the Hotel des Milles Collines also literally means “hotel of miles of hills.”)
It was Kamilindi’s words in a telephone interview with a radio station in France that alerted the world to the desperate state of affairs both at the hotel and in Rwanda in general.
And it was Rusesabagina’s words — his amazing powers of persuasion — that dissuaded soldiers who came to kill Kamilindi, just one of many examples of Resesabagina’s repeated courageous conversations in which he cajoled, threatened, begged, flattered and reasoned with killers to save lives.
I met Thomas in 2005 through the Knight Wallace Journalism Fellowship. He participated in the fellowship the year after I did, in his case through a special endowment intended to help journalists around the world who’s lives are in danger. He’s now been granted political asylum in the U.S. and lives in Michigan.
When we saw each other in September, I invited him to Dayton for Rusesagabina’s lecture Tuesday at the University of Dayton. (Follow the links for my colleague Stephanie Irwin’s stories about their reunion and Rusesbagina’s speech)
To both men, speech is an important freedom and a responsibility to be taken seriously. Rusesabagina urged his listeners to use their words for good and to make peace. He believes even in Rwanda there can be peace, if only the warring Hutu and Tutsi tribes could sit around the table and talk.
For journalists, the responsibility is great, and in many places around the world, reporting the truth brings with it real danger. I wrote recently about the Turkish journalist Hrant Dink’s murder for speaking out about the Armenian genocide in that country.
Thomas, who also met Dink through the Knight-Wallace program, said he is haunted by the thought of Dink dying of a gunshot in the very doorway to his office that Thomas crossed to meet him.
After the hotel experience, Thomas sent his family to Belgium but stayed in Rwanda training journalists in hopes of bringing change there until it became too dangerous. Today, he works with Rusesabagina to advocate for peace there in exile.
Rusesabagina, Dink and Kamilindi are men of conviction and courage. We should all learn the lessons they preach — think before you speak, but say the truth when it needs to be said.
Note: Ron Rollins summarizes Rusesabagina’s speech here.
(Image credit: Jim Noelker, DDN)
Permalink | | Categories: Journalism, My Favorite Posts
The childrens’ book says what?!?!
There’s a new blog here at DDN.com that I can’t get enough of. Vick Mickunas, one-time radio star and currently a book reviewer for the paper, has taken his “Book Nook” online as a blog. Mickunas is thoughtful, funny, prolific and I always learn something from him.
Sunday, I learned that librarians sometimes are in favor of banning books. As someone who makes his living off the First Amendment, and therefore opposes censorship, I was suprised to find I sort of see the librians’ point on this one.
Mickunas gets extra points for the killer headline — “What rhymes with totem?”
That’s right, folks. There’s a childrens’ book that uses the word “scrotum.” It’s called “The Higher Power of Lucky” and it’s a Newbery Medal winning book by a respected author.
My first reaction was simply this — “why?” Why use that word in a childrens’ book? In an interview with the New York Times, the author says the book is about coming of age and learning body parts parts and that it is aimed at children age 12. But some of the librarian critics point out that the main character in the book is 10 years old and say the artwork and style of the book is more typical of the “under age 10” genre.
The Newbery judges say the book is just fine for kids. But what is the appropriate age to learn about the srcotum?
My kids are ages 8, 6 and 4 and I think they are too young yet for that conversation. I guarantee at least the older two would immediately ask me what that word means if I were to read them this book. A couple comment’s over at Mickunas’ blog suggest the librarians are just being uptight. But I have to tell you, I would not read this book to my kids.
But if someone can tell me word-for-word how I could delicately explain what a scrotum is to a six- or eight-year-old, I will reconsider.
Permalink | Comments (26) | Categories: Teaching and Learning
Percy Mack fires back
Percy Mack
Dayton Superintendent Percy Mack sounds pretty angry about Thomas Gunlock’s observations regarding Dayton’s school levy.
Editorial Page Editor Ellen Belcher was kind enough to allow me to publish Mack’s comments here first. They will appear on the DDN’s editorial page later this week. But for Get on the Bus readers, here is an early look at Mack’s response to Gunlock:
“Re: “Dayton schools still have a long way to go” on Feb. 16:
Tom Gunlock did a great disservice to the hard-working teachers, principals, students and support staff who have dedicated themselves to improving Dayton Public Schools. It is troubling that someone who served on the Ohio Board of Education five months would misrepresent what we have achieved during the past five years.
Gunlock’s article contains disturbing and inaccurate assertions:
—It is highly misleading to say that Dayton’s “continuous improvement” ranking on the Ohio Report Card was somehow the product of a fluke and is not likely to be duplicated. Dayton Public Schools earned its ranking through demonstrated growth on state tests — one of several valid measures established by the Ohio Department of Education.
—Growth of our students’ performance has outpaced state and national averages. In fact, while students across Ohio improved 11.8 percent on state tests during the last four years, Dayton Public Schools students improved 21.8 percent — a rate nearly twice that of the state.
—As for the cost per-student, an urban school system will spend more than a suburban district, because of the social and economic challenges our students face. The percentage of our general fund budget going to instruction, once 47 percent, is now about 64 percent and has been for years.
We have invested those dollars in individual student attention, placing a heavy emphasis on reading, math and science. The results speak for themselves in higher test scores and graduation rates.
—To compare an urban district like Dayton’s cost per-pupil with Miamisburg’s, as Gunlock did, is blatantly unfair. The fact is that our student needs are vastly different.
The number of special education students alone tips the scales dramatically. For instance, one of every five children in Dayton Public Schools is a special-needs student.
That fact greatly increases per-pupil spending averages because educating special needs children is extremely costly. One severely challenged child with multiple disabilities can easily cost as much as $50,000 a year in professional fees and care.
—It’s interesting that Gunlock didn’t say one word about the fiscal reforms we have implemented — reforms that have saved tens of millions of dollars. We are constantly searching for ways to cut costs without compromising instructional quality. We have reduced personnel, closed buildings, and saved millions by careful auditing of workers’ compensation and other expenses.
I invite Gunlock to pay a visit to our school district. I will be happy to walk him through the $40 million in cost reduction that we have achieved. Our financial statements are audited by the state auditor. I would welcome the opportunity to explain to him the special needs of our Dayton Public Schools population. I also would welcome the opportunity to show him the data from the State Department of Education that validates our academic progress.
Daytonians deserve to be proud of their schools. The 10-year school rebuilding program is well under way, with new facilities opening or under construction across the district. Most important, the district’s academic progress is real.
As I speak to citizens throughout Dayton, there is a growing awareness that good things are happening. Have we completed the journey? No, but the trend lines are positive. Reform is not an overnight achievement; it takes patience and commitment. The road ahead is long, but the goal is in sight.
Permalink | Comments (14) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
Gunlock: DPS has a long way to go
Tom Gunlock
Another week, another suburban Republican raises questions about Dayton’s school levy.
Last week it was House Speaker Jon Husted, R-Kettering. This week it’s Thomas Gunlock of Centerville, a former Taft appointee to the Ohio Board of Education who was recently defeated by Susan Haverkos in the November election.
Gunlock and Husted made their comments largely in response to Terry Ryan, vice president of the pro-charter school Fordham Foundation, who endorsed the levy.
Gunlock’s view is interesting. I think the school district would argue that his take on their spending data is a little misleading. Dayton’s per pupil spending is inflated by expensive federal programs funded by grants rather than local taxes and it also has the region’s most extensive special education program (Superintendent Percy Mack told me once that three profoundly handicapped kids cost the district $45,000 a year each) that provides a service to many surrounding districts.
But it’s hard to dispute Gunlock’s core arguments. Dayton is still a very low academic performer, even if it is better than its complete bottom dweller status of a few years ago. And he’s right that they’d have likely not have gotten out of academic emergency under the old rules and that is may be tough for the district to maintain its “continuous improvement” status. Spending in the city school district is high compared to neighboring districts and it does have a larger administration, as Gunlock says.
Again, the district would argue at least some of those administrators and dollars are required by federal grants and not paid for by local taxes. And urban school supporters generally argue it just costs more to educate impoverished inner-city kids than it costs to educate wealthier upper middle class suburbanites.
It seems like Ryan is bowling alone from his side of the aisle when it comes to the school levy. What do you think of Gunlock’s take? Did it change your mind or influence your thinking about the May levy?
UPDATE: Percy Mack responds to Gunlock here. Also, I changed the first sentence to reflect the fact that neither Gunlock nor Husted is formally opposed to the levy. Both say they are simply raising questions.
Permalink | Comments (33) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
Video games: A boy’s curse?
I’ve got all daughters. The oldest one is eight. Not once has any of them every even asked me to get them a Game Cube, an Xbox or a Wii.
It’s just not going to be that easy if you have boys.
The other day a friend, I’ll call her M, asked me and another friend for advice. M’s soon-to-be five-year-old son wants a video game console.
The family doesn’t have any video games at home now, but all her son’s friends have them. And one day a week the child care center he attends allows kids to bring a game from home. His friends always bring video games and the son seems to feel his toys pale in comparison. He loves to play his friend’s video games and very much wants his own games.
So her M’s question to us — should they just get him video games of his own?
The two of us had the same reaction: hold off as long as you can.
Friend No. 2 said he believed his shy but smart son’s obsession with video games allowed him a reason to stay holed up at home instead of out interacting with other kids.
For me, I am just reminded of all the hours upon hours I wasted on video games between the ages of 12 and 20.
M ultimately decided to sit down and talk to her son about the problem. She explained why mom and dad were hesitant to have video games at home while he was still so young but told him he could still play the games with his friends at school.
The son considered the arguments. OK, he said, maybe I can them when I’m 10?
They all agreed, to mom and dad’s great relief. But M says she is more realistically hoping she can hold him off until about age 8.
I’m 38 and played Pac Man, Defender, Tempest and some of the other early arcade video games in my early teens at the Jersey Shore. But the gaming world has totally changed. Another close friend tells me her brothers, in their 20s, spend most of their free time gaming online. My 13-year-old extremely bright nephew will spend an hour just TELLING me about the video game he played last night if I don’t make him stop.
As much as I once enjoyed playing these games, I now view them as destructive. But boys love them.
This leads me to a few questions. First, how would you advise my friend M to handle this issue with her son as he gets older? How long would you make him wait? Will it be possible to set limits once he has a console? Should you try to discourage him from ever playing video games?
The other big question I have is this. Obviously, boys and girls are different. But why are they SO different when it comes to video games? The games are interesting, attractive and addictive. But why don’t they seem to suck girls in the way they do boys?
(Image credit: Chuck Currie’s blog)
Permalink | Comments (13) | Categories: My Favorite Posts, Teaching and Learning
Big education stories around the nation
Two big education stories broke this week elsewhere in the country that we should take note of.
First Kansas, the state that sparked the debate over intelligent design by including it in state science standards, has a new statewide school board that has completely dumped the concept, approving traditional science standards.
Meanwhile, Utah’s governor signed a law offering vouchers statewide in a huge new program. Before this, Ohio had the most expansive statewide voucher program after extending its Cleveland program to other cities last year.
The Utah case is interesting. The state has tough language in its constitution forbidding state support of religious schools. Both opponents and supporters of vouchers are talking like there could be a legal challenge. The program is also costly and funded outside of the state’s education budget with money from its general fund.
(Image credit: TheoryofEvolution.net)
Permalink | | Categories: Charter Schools and School Choice, Evolution vs. Intelligent Design
Does the kid in the middle count?
Hmmm. Who’d have guessed it would be a problem to do an enrollment count in February?
In today’s paper, Ohio Rep. Clayton Luckie, D-Dayton, says a second count week in February is stupid, unnecessary and a waste of everyone’s time and effort.
Lawmakers added the second count week, at least in part, because they believed some districts, especially urbans, were doing little to discourage dropouts once the October counts were done. That is a hotly debated view, but it’s clear the February count is not working out real well.
What’s your take on the February count week?
Permalink | Comments (33) | Categories: My Favorite Posts, Schools and Politics
Sandra Kidd’s story in her own words
Sandra Kidd is a nice person. That was the unanimous view of everyone I spoke to for today’s story about her removal as principal at Kiser Elementary School.
In fact, after the news broke in January that Kidd had been reassigned, nearly everyone I spoke to about the move declined to speak for attribution because nobody wanted their name in a news story that was in any way negative about Kidd.
Still, there were a lot of troubling questions about the change. Why was she reassigned? Why didn’t administrators ask her to agree to a voluntary move? Were any of the increasingly wild rumors — rampant vandalism, school board score-settling, involvement by the mayor — true?
With school leaders clammed up, I started requesting documents left and right — her personnel file, memos, correspondence. But then I remembered something — Sandra Kidd is nice person. Maybe she’d agree to an interview and explain the situation in her own words?
It took some time to make that happen, but today Kidd tells us her view of why she left Kiser.
Essentially, what Kidd said was that her leadership style was not conducive to the challenge of merging together a wide variety of kids — including students who were older than she was used to and kids who had not been nurtured for six years in the supportive atmosphere she built at Webster.
Her quote sums it up well — as a leader, Kidd is a shepherd. What the school needs is a cattle-driver.
Interestingly, Kidd maintains that she believes her style would have still worked given time. But administrators were anxious about the school’s test scores and they worried that discipline problems could worsen, making it harder to maintain order.
But what connected all the dots was the story of the videotape. When administrators saw what they thought was an injured Sandra Kidd on tape, they pulled the trigger on the principal change quickly and without discussion. The fight itself was disturbing enough, another sign that perhaps it was time for district-level intervention.
But the thought that Kidd, who is a head shorter than some of her students and has battled some personal health issues, might be at risk for personal injury was enough to tip the balance for immediate change.
Kidd told me she never felt she was at any personal risk and would have liked the chance to reassure her superiors that she was in no danger. But she also told me this was the only way should would have left the job. She’d have never stepped down, she said, but she does respect authority and didn’t fight the move. Today, she said feels no ill will toward the decision makers.
In fact, the upbeat Kidd said there were some great things about the painful end to her career as a principal. She was moved by the number of people who leapt to her defense — some of them were parents of her current students that she taught when they were in elementary school. Many people contacted her just to tell her how much they appreciated her work and what a difference she made in their lives and in the lives of their children.
Kidd said that was an unexpected gift that she will treasure.
Permalink | Comments (17) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
Kidd: “Kiser needs a cattle-driver”
By Scott Elliott
Staf Writer
DAYTON — Sandra Kidd thinks a videotaped fistfight got her removed as principal at Kiser Elementary School last month.
On the tape, one of 35 cameras in the new school captured the 5-foot Kidd breaking up a fight between two sturdy eighth-graders. It appears on the tape, Kidd was told, that she is struck and possibly injured.
“It looked like I was hurt,” she said. “But I wasn’t. Concern for my safety was not warranted. I wish this had been brought to my attention.”
The tape, Kidd said, was probably the tipping point that resulted in her removal as Kiser Elementary School principal and reassignment to a downtown administrative post with Dayton Public Schools.
But Kidd acknowledges she was struggling to adapt her leadership style to a larger school with older children. Kiser houses students in kindergarten through eighth grade. In her prior assignment as principal of now-closed Webster Elementary School, Kidd dealt with students in kindergarten through sixth grade.
Discipline was an increasing problem, with more than 100 suspensions for seventh grade alone. In the end, Kidd said she was disappointed to be reassigned but recognized that the school needed a new direction.
“I’m a shepherd. Cheryl is a cattle-driver,” Kidd said of interim Principal Cheryl Johnson, whom she described as her mentor. “What Kiser needs right now is a cattle-driver.”
Kidd, a 37-year educator and 15-year principal in Dayton, was hand-picked by Dayton Public Schools Superintendent Percy Mack last summer to lead Kiser Elementary School, the district’s first new building to open in more than two decades.
But Kidd, 58, said she had trouble adapting to a larger student body and older children. She had served as principal of the smaller, now-defunct Webster Elementary School. She now works in the district’s student assignment department in downtown Dayton.
The plan had been to keep most of the Webster kids together at Kiser, but ultimately, many of the new school’s students came from other schools and even outside the district.
“There is a lot to say about children growing up with people they are familiar with over a number of years,” Kidd said. “Students at grades seven and eight are very challenging. What I had at Webster was a trust level I didn’t have at Kiser.”
Rumors about her departure are largely untrue, she said. There was not widespread vandalism of the new building, as one story said, although Kidd said she has spoken with the construction managers about design issues that reduced visibility in some parts of the school and about some materials in the school she thought would not last under usual wear and tear.
The school board played no role in her removal, as was also rumored, Kidd said. Board member Mario Gallin’s son attended Kiser, but Kidd said Gallin was supportive and collaborated with her to seek solutions to some of the problems.
After the solid test success of Webster, Kidd said lower scores at Kiser also was a major concern for top administrators.
“I was spending so much time and attention on discipline in the building, there was not enough focus on instruction and achievement,” she said. “And test scores drive the district.”
In the end, some personal health concerns were exacerbated by the stress of running the school, and Kidd said she did not question the decision to reassign her. But she said she likes her new job and is thankful to supporters who demanded answers about the change.
“Their feelings about me have humbled me,” she said. “Words can’t express how deeply touched I was to know they cared enough to express a concern, and for the whole idea of people being concerned about my well-being. I can’t express my gratitude enough.”
Mack said he’s pleased with Kidd’s work in her new role.
“I think she’s really going to add to the organization,” he said. “She’s already doing a fine job there.”
Permalink | | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
City Day beats suburban test champ Oakwood
The City Day Community School testing saga continues in today’s paper as important state leaders react and we see even more clearly just how amazing the school’s change in scores was from year to year.
Check it out.
Permalink | Comments (2) | Categories: City Day Investigation, Testing
City Day scores raise questions about state monitoring
By Scott Elliott
Staff Writer
Last spring, City Day Community School in Dayton accomplished the academic equivalent of a shocking sports upset.
Seventh graders at the charter school, which had been in academic emergency, finished in the top 4 percent of Ohio schools on the state exam. A year after its sixth graders had finished behind 1,333 schools in math, its seventh graders beat six of the top 10 rated Miami Valley school districts, including Oakwood, Centerville, Vandalia-Butler and Springboro.
How could any school post such phenomenal gains in just one year?
The Dayton Daily News last week revealed similarities between practice questions used at City Day to the actual state math tests. Education department officials won’t comment about a possible investigation, but a state legislator and state board of education member this week said they are concerned about testing safeguards.
A spokeswoman for Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann said Friday his office has asked the Ohio Department of Education for more information and will consider taking action if the allegations are proven true.
State school board member Carl Wick of Centerville said he, too, wants to know more.
“I certainly need to know in my mind how this is being addressed and to what extent,” he said. “There has to be some accountability through the state board.”
How did a traditionally low-scoring charter school that ranked last in Ohio on one state math test in 2005 suddenly outperform perennial top-scorer Oakwood on a state math test in 2006?
That would seem to be a logical question, but until the Dayton Daily News last week reported on the extraordinary test scores posted by the Dayton charter school in last year’s state math tests, nobody at the state department of education office seemed to take notice. The episode raises questions about how well the state monitors school-to-school test practices, and if it is protecting the integrity of the tests given all public school students in Ohio starting at third grade.
The Daily News reported last week that the practice tests City Day students took prior to taking the state exam last March contained 44 questions that were identical or substantially the same as questions that appeared on the actual test.
“If they did that, they should lose their charter,” said Ohio House Speaker Jon Husted, R-Kettering, who promised to look into the matter.
City Day’s superintendent, Roseda Goff, said she doesn’t know how those questions appeared on the practice tests and asserts that the security of state tests delivered to the school last February was not compromised.
But Wick said, “Those wide swings are unlikely to happen unless something else is going on.”
Wick said the education department has had discussions about ways to “look at those wide disparities and flag them.”
“That’s going to be addressed,” he said.
A spokeswoman for Dann said he wants to know more about City Day’s test preparation.
“If they did violate state statutes he (Dann) definitely would take action against the school, if the department of education found they were really teaching the test basically,” said Dann’s spokeswoman Jennifer Brindisi.
Test score data obtained by the Dayton Daily News from the Ohio Department of Education demonstrate just how extraordinary City Day’s gains in 2005-06 were over the school’s prior year performance.
Consider City Day’s 2004-05 fourth graders. That class had an average score that ranked worst in the state — last out of 2,007 schools that reported scores for that exam.
But the next year, many of those same kids helped produce an average score on the state’s fifth-grade exam that outdid more than 640 schools — scoring better than more than a third of the 1,820 schools that reported scores.
At seventh grade, the change was even more dramatic.
City Day’s average score on the sixth-grade math test in 2004-05 ranked in the bottom 3 percent among 1,364 schools that reported scores. But in 2005-06, the average score on the state math exam for the school’s seventh graders ranked in the top 4 percent among 1,043 schools that reported scores.
City Day’s seventh-grade math results in 2005-06 bested such traditional Miami Valley high scoring districts as Oakwood, Russia and Cedarville.
State Rep. Clayton Luckie, D-Dayton, said City Day should have to provide other evidence to support last year’s scores, such as other standardized test scores and student grades, just as any public school would in a state investigation.
To clear the school’s name, Goff should offer to have students re-take the exam, said Luckie, a former Dayton school board member.
“If she’s so confident, have the kids take the test again and prove it. You have to have accountability. This is taxpayer dollars going to an unregulated public school with no accountability.”
While City Day was making amazing gains in math, its reading scores did not share in the good fortune.
City Day’s average score on the fourth-grade state reading exam in 2004-05 was seventh worst in the state out of 2,004 schools that reported scores — worse than 99.5 percent of all Ohio schools. And in 2005-06, the average score on the state reading exam for the school’s fifth grade ranked only slightly better — still falling in the bottom 3 percent among 1,822 schools that reported scores.
City Day’s average score on the state sixth-grade reading exam in 2004-05 was 26th worst in the state out of 1,339 schools that reported scores — in the bottom 2 percent. And in 2005-06, the average score on the state reading exam for the school’s seventh grade did better but still ranked in the bottom quarter of 1,024 schools that reported scores.
A consultant hired by City Day to help prepare students of the state tests, Rachel Armour, told the Daily News she created practice math tests using what she thought were sample questions given to her by Goff, the school’s superintendent. Goff said she only gave Armour traditional practice materials.
But copies of those practice tests include nearly four dozen questions that are strikingly similar to questions from the actual state exam. The state tests given in March 2006 were publicly released on a state education department Web site in July 2006 but questions from that test were top secret prior to the exam dates.
The Ohio Department of Education has a policy of not commenting on investigations into testing irregularities.
“We are monitoring the situation,” department spokesman J. C. Benton said.
Wick said he wants some quick answers.
“I’m going to talk to (state testing director) Mitch Chester about this,” he said. “I certainly need to know in my mind how this is being addressed and to what extent. There has to be some accountability through the state board.”
Wick also co-chairs a state school board subcommittee that oversees accountability for charter schools and has begun work on procedures for the privately run but publicly funded schools.
“What disturbs me about this is the fact that if there is cheating taking place, it impacts the kids,” Wick said. “The purpose of those tests is to provide benchmarks of where the kids and the schools are, but those tests are also designed (to identify) what interventions the students might need. That’s just shortchanging the kids.”
Permalink | Comments (1) | Categories: Charter Schools and School Choice, City Day Investigation, My Favorite DDN Stories, Testing
Makes me think off War Games
Remember the movie War Games? Perhaps you recall how an impossibly young Matthew Broderick tries to impress girl-next-door Ally Sheedy by breaking into the school’s computer and improving one of her bad grades? Broderick’s character uses a hysterically primitive computer and bat-phone modem, along with a ridiculously obvious password (pencil) cribbed from a list taped to a secretary’s desk, to gain access to sensitive school files.
Apparently, when these sorts of things happen in real life, the school doesn’t kid around.
It seems a couple of Edgewood High School girls are facing felony charges and expulsion proceedings for tapping into the school’s computer Monday and calling a snow day.
They changed a one-hour delay to a closing and at least one TV station displayed the wrong information.
Ouch. Seemed like a good idea at the time, I suppose.
Permalink | |
A science high school for the Miami Valley
Denver’s School of Science and Technology
It appears there is a real effort underway to establish a regional science and technology high school in the Miami Valley.
In his visit with the Dayton Daily News editorial board this week, Ohio House Speaker Jon Husted talked a lot about education, a subject in which he is well versed. Husted is unusually knowledgeable about education issues for a top political leader, many of whom give little more than lip service to schooling concerns.
It was clear from his comments that “High Tech High” is one idea Husted is most interested in.
Husted is convinced that Ohio need more math and science expertise. The state (and especially the Miami Valley) have high tech industries that need workers with those skills, he said. And high tech jobs are good jobs that pay well and return more cash to the state’s economy.
Plus, he said, the world is becoming more high tech and the Miami Valley will have to be well skilled in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (or the STEM disciplines as he likes to call them) to compete. He pointed to the success of a STEM-focused high school in Denver (I think he was talking about this school).
Husted said he didn’t have a specific vision for the new school here, but this much was clear — it would be a regional cooperative effort involving local universities and a variety of school districts (it wasn’t clear whether this would be Montgomery County only or on a wider scale) that would send top students interested in high-tech careers to the school. And he was confident the wealthy Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (which gave cash for the Denver school) would be financially supportive.
This conversation seemed to connect the dots to another story I recently wrote about a university-led effort to establish more coordination around math and science instruction in the region. That push is being led by Susan Bodary ex-Gov. Bob Taft’s top education adviser and a Kettering resident.
So Bodary is to organize a regional push for math and science and her job is funded by the University of Dayton, Sinclair Community College and Wright State University, among others. At the same time the speaker of the house wants a university-school districts partnership for a math-science high school. And the Gates Foundation, with money to burn and already deeply involved in Ohio and in a push for STEM high schools, is a potential funder. And by the way, both Husted and Bodary are influential political players in education who hail from the same city.
This sounds like something that could come together nicely.
A lot of questions remain. Would kids compete to get in or be selected by lottery (as in Denver)? And where would the school be? On that score, Husted said he preferred to see the new school built downtown and thought the inclusion of Sinclair as a big player made that a decent possibility. That’s an interesting proposition, since Dayton Public Schools has already begun building a showcase career technical center adjacent to Sinclair with a significant partnership planned with the community college (the school even has been named for David Ponitz, Sinclair’s retired president).
What do you think of the idea of a regional math and science high school for Dayton? What advice would you give the planners of such an effort?
(Image credit: /www.stapletondenver.com)
Permalink | Comments (9) | Categories: Teaching and Learning
Jon Husted: Terry Ryan’s evil twin?
Jon Husted
Or maybe it’s Ryan who is the evil twin, depending on your point of view. (The headline is meant in jest, folks. No offense, Mr. Speaker.)
Fordham Foundation Vice President Terry Ryan and Ohio House Speaker Jon Husted, R-Kettering, are allies. Both men are true believers in school choice. Both are strong advocates for charter schools. Both have, at times, been sharply critical of Dayton Public Schools.
So when Husted visited the Dayton Daily News to meet with its editorial board Wednesday, I couldn’t wait to find out what he thought about Ryan’s commentary in Tuesday’s Dayton Daily News endorsing the district’s 15.17 mill levy?
Husted jokingly said he left Ryan a message after reading Tuesday’s paper asking who had hijacked his keyboard.
To put it mildly, Husted is not ready to offer his own endorsement.
As I sat in on the meeting, Husted was asked if he were a city resident, would he vote yes for the school district’s levy in May?
“I don’t know enough to make a decision right now,” he said. “I don’t know if they’re lean enough. I don’t know if they have closed as many schools as they should have been closing. I don’t know how many teachers they have and if they’ve gotten rid of all the people who are underperforming.”
Husted said he might be more inclined to be supportive if the district had made significant changes, like instituting merit pay for teachers. And he said the levy’s chances would be greatly enhanced if the board promised it would allow all parents in the district to use the tax dollars raised for any school they wanted to send their child to — public, private or charter.
He also said he wanted to know what other options the district considered to raise taxes. Did it look at an earned income tax? Or did it consider asking for part of the money it needs through property taxes and part through an alternative sort of tax?
Husted also flatly rejected the Dayton school board’s argument that the state is partly responsible for its financial crisis. School leaders say there was a disagreement with the Ohio Department of Education about charter school enrollment last May and that the department had agreed to a settlement of the dispute that was financially palatable to Dayton schools.
But then lawmakers wrote new rules into legislative bill that allowed the state to withdraw from the talks by declaring the education department the “final arbiter” of enrollment disputes. Dayton school leaders say they had counted the settlement money into the 2006-07 budget and the loss of those funds caused a scramble to fill the shortfall and pushed up the need for a levy.
Husted said the enrollment debate was more about problems with enrollment reported by the school district than about charter schools. He said the education department absolutely should have the final say in disputes over enrollment and he rejected a recent court decision in favor of Dayton schools, saying “the judge is wrong,” and promised the state would appeal.
Husted said the education department stepped outside the law when it negotiated a settlement with Dayton schools and a couple other urban districts.
“I’m tired of people at the Ohio Department of Education interpreting the law based on what’s convenient for them,” he said.
His advice for Dayton schools on the enrollment dispute?
“Don’t make up students that don’t exist and then negotiate a number for people who aren’t there,” he said.
I guess the school board shouldn’t wait for Husted’s levy endorsement before printing up their campaign materials.
Permalink | Comments (9) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools, My Favorite Posts
Should DPS cuts go deeper on support staff?
In Tuesday’s DDN, I wrote a story that detailed the layoffs associated with the $5.9 million in cuts put in place in January by the Dayton school board to help the district’s bottom line for this year and next.
Altogether there were 60 job cuts — 30 substitute teachers filling year-long teaching positions were laid off and 30 non-instructional jobs were eliminated, including 13 custodians, three bus aides and one mechanic who were laid off.
Other non-instructional cuts were a groundskeeper and custodial manager who were moved to other vacant positions and several vacant jobs that were abolished, including six part-time food worker jobs, a budget inventory clerk, a bus supervisor, two bus drivers and a mechanic.
So it appears school leaders spread the pain fairly evenly among instructional and non-instructional divisions of the district. The question I’ve heard from some quarters is, should the cuts have been heavier on support staff rather than cut teachers and non-instructional staff evenly?
Then-board President Gail Littlejohn herself said late last year that the board had asked top administrators to consider pushing ahead to January 2007 other support staff cuts proposed for July 2007 in an effort to keep more of the academic program intact. That apparently did not happen.
You can look here to see the cuts for January as originally proposed and go here to look at the cuts that were proposed for July.
I spoke to Treasurer Stan Lucas about this on Monday. He said nearly all the cuts outside of personnel were put in place, except for $45,000 in cuts to advertising. That cut still is being debated. Only about half of the originally proposed personnel reductions were made, thanks to a $3.8 million windfall from the county’s tax lein sale.
But when it came to job cuts the district did make, Lucas said school leaders decided to spread the cuts in a way that would help keep things intact as much as possible in equal measure on both the instructional and support sides of the fence. Cutting deeper on support staff created other problems, he said.
“We would have had serious issues on the operations side,” he said. “We need time to structure ourselves appropriately. And it’s hard to make changes at mid-year and for those folks to find employment. For the cuts we made this year, I thought we did a good job and the difference was that $3.8 million.”
What do you think? Should the district have elimated more maintenance, custodial, food service or transportation workers in order to possibly avoid any teacher layoffs, even substitute teachers?
Permalink | Comments (7) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
Fordham’s Ryan: DPS did its part
Terry Ryan
A few people at Dayton Public School’s may have passed out into their corn flakes this morning when they turned to the DDN’s editorial page.
That’s because a photo of Terry Ryan, vice president of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, appeared with a column he wrote under the headline “DPS leaders did their part to turn schools around.”
Fordham and its leaders — including Ryan at times — have been among the most vocal critics of Dayton Public Schools and its school board over the last decade. But today Ryan is arguing the district’s leaders have done their best to turn the district around and earned a “yes” vote from Daytonians for the 15.17-mill operating levy on the May 8 ballot.
Wow.
Here’s the guts of Ryan’s view:
“… Dayton public schools have made slow but steady progress toward academic achievement. The reform team has adopted a cohesive academic strategy; increased the amount of money targeted at instruction to more than 60 percent; raised test scores; and last year moved out of academic emergency …”
He describes the district’s recent fiscal leadership as “both competent leadership and good stewardship of taxpayer dollars” and urges “to remain on its reformist course, the school district now needs help form the city’s taxpayers.”
It’s very close to a total endorsement of the district’s case for the levy from one of its sharpest critics.
What do you think of Ryan’s take? Are you as surprised as many district supporters were to learn of his (and Fordham’s) strong support?
Permalink | Comments (19) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
City Day’s practice tests
Want to see how closely questions from City Day Community School’s practice tests matched questions that appeared on Ohio Achievement Tests? Take a look at a few examples:
From City Day’s 7th grade practice test:
5) Mr. Munson asked Giovonte to draw a rhombus on the board. Giovonte drew a picture that looked like a slanty square. Ke’Nara went to the board and drew a square. Who was correct?
() Both, because a rhombus and a square must have at least four sides.
() Giovonte, because a rhombus must have one pair of parallel sides.
() Both, because a rhombus must have four congruent sides
() Ke’Nara, because a rhombus must have right angles.
From the 7th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
2) Coral was asked to draw a rhombus on the chalkboard. Coral drew a square. Ken told Coral that she didn’t draw a rhombus. Coral responded, “A square is a rhombus.”
Which statement supports Coral’s reasoning that a square is a rhombus?
A. A rhombus must have at least four sides.
B. A rhombus must have one pair of parallel sides.
C. A rhombus must have right angles.
D. A rhombus must have four congruent sides.
From City Day’s 7th grade practice test:
19) Aneyshia reduced her soda pop intake from 12 ounces to 4 ounces. What will happen to the volume of the soda pop can?
() The volume triples.
() The volume doubles.
() The volume is reduced to one half the original.
() The volume is reduced to one third the original.
From the 7th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
22) The Burton Company produces cylindrical barrels. If the height of a cylindrical barrel is reduced from 12 feet to 4 feet, what will happen to the volume of the barrel?
A. The volume triples.
B. The volume doubles.
C. The volume is reduced to one half the original.
D. The volume is reduced to one third the original.
From City Day’s 7th grade practice test:
7) Montasia surveyed 19 of her classmates about the hottest record labels. The graph shows the results.
Ice Age: 4
Cash Money: 5
So So Def: 10
Montasia’s class is representative of the whole City Day Community School. What is a reasonable estimate for how many of the 300 students in the school like Ice Age records?
() 65 students
() 100 students
() 75 students
() 125 students
From the 7th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
4) Manny surveyed 24 of his classmates about their vacation plans. The bar graph shows the result.
Visit Friends or Family: 10
No Plans: 6
Travel: 8
Manny’s class is representative of the entire school. What is a reasonable estimate for how many of the 300 students in the school have no vacation plans?
A. 50 students
B. 75 students
C. 100 students
D. 125 students
From City Day’s 7th grade practice test:
1) Bad Boy Records has a formula to determine the cost of producing records.
C = 3.15 + 0.25r
where C is the cost of producing a record and r is the number of records.
What is the cost of producing 12 records?
() $3.15
() $5.65
() $4.10
() $6.15
From the 7th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
A shipping company uses a formula to determine the cost of shipping a package:
C = 2.79 + 0.38p
where C is the cost of shipping and p is the number of pounds.
What is the cost of shipping a package that weighs 8 pounds?
A. $2.79
B. $3.04
C. $5.21
D. $5.83
From City Day’s 6th grade practice test:
20) What is the largest number that divides both 12 and 30 evenly?
() 2
() 3
() 6
() 12
From the 6th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
24) What is the largest number that divides both 12 and 30 evenly?
A. 2
B. 3
C. 6
D. 12
From City Day’s 6th grade practice test:
12) What number equals 0.20 x 0.4?
() 0.080
() 0.80
() 8.0
() 80.0
From the 6th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
1) Which number equals 0.25 x 0.3?
A. 0.075
B. 0.75
C. 7.5
D. 75.0
From the 6th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
17) Regina buys hair products and styling books at the store. She uses the expression 6h + 12b to find the cost of what she is buying, where h is the number of hair products and b is the number of hair books she buys.
Use the expression to find the total cost of 4 hair products and 5 hair books.
() $27
() $54
() $78
() $84
From the 6th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
19) Andrew buys books and videos in a store. He uses the expression 6b + 12v to find the cost of what he is buying, where b is the number of books and v is the number of videos he buys.
Use the expression to find the total cost of 4 books and 5 videos.
A. $27
B. $54
C. $78
D. $84
From City Day’s 6th grade practice test:
6) Estimate the area of a floor that will be covered by a piece of carpet that is 65 x 7 square feet.
() 75
() 350
() 500
() 450
From the 6th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
5) Square floor tiles will be put on a the floor of a school hallway. Each tile is 1 foot by 1 foot. The hallway is 85 feet long and 8 feet wide.
About how many tiles will be needed to cover the floor of the hallway?
A. 95 tiles
B. 100 tiles
C. 200 tiles
D. 700 tiles
From City Day’s 6th grade practice test:
Which expression shows the equivalent expression using the associative property? 6 x (a x 8)
(6 x a) + (6 x 8)
(6 + a) x (6 + 7)
(6 x a) x 8
6 x (8 x a)
From the 6th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
7) Sarah used the associative property to find an equivalent expression to 5 x (a x 7)
Which expression to Sarah use?
A. (5 x a) + (5 x 7)
B. (5 + a) x (5 + 7)
C. (5 x a) x 7
D. 5 x (7 x a)
From City Day’s 5th grade practice test:
15) Al-Maajid has a box of 30 Yugi cards. There are 15 red cards and 15 blue cards in the box. Al-Maajid pulls out a card, records the color and returns the card to the box. After pulling 10 times, he has recorded 6 red cards and 4 blue cards.
Which statement describes whether the results are reasonable?
() It is reasonable because both 6 and 4 are close to 5.
() It is reasonable because 6 is more than 4.
() It is reasonable because he will not always get 5 red cards and 5 blue cards.
() It is not reasonable because he did not pick enough cards.
From the 5th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
17) Janet has a box of 30 cards. There are 15 blue cards and 15 green cards in the box. Janet pulls out a card, records the color and returns the card to the box. After pulling 10 times, he has recorded 6 blue cards and 4 green cards.
Which statement describes whether the results are reasonable?
A. It is reasonable because both 6 and 4 are close to 5.
B. It is reasonable because 6 is more than 4.
C. It is reasonable because she will not always get 5 blue cards and 5 green cards.
D. It is not reasonable because he did not pick enough cards.
From City Day’s 5th grade practice test:
16) Shanise covered a floor with a rug. Which unit describes how large the rug was?
() Inches
() Feet
() Square feet
() Cubic inches
From the 5th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
19) Bob covered a floor with a carpet.
Which unit of measure describes how much carpet he used?
A. inches
B. feet
C. square feet
D. cubic inches
From City Day’s 5th grade practice test:
18) Stephanie writes each letter of her name on a separate index card as shown.
S T E P H A N I E
She puts all the cards in a bag and randomly pulls out one card. What is the probability that the card is an “E”?
() 1/2
() 2/7
() 2/9
() 1/9
From the 5th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
22) Beverly writes each letter of her name on a separate index card as shown.
B E V E R L Y
She puts all the cards in a bag. She randomly pulls out one card. What is the probability that the card is an “E”?
A. 1/2
B. 2/5
C. 1/7
D. 2/7
From City Day’s 5th grade practice test:
7) Kelly has $17. She bought a shirt that costs n dollars. She now has less than $2 remaining. What inequality represents the situation described?
() 20 - n > 2
() 17 - n < 2
() n - 17 < 2
() n - 20 > 3
From the 5th grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
2) Roberto has $20. he bought a soccer ball that costs m dollars. He now has less than $5 left. Which inequality represents this situation?
A. 20 - m < 5
B. 20 - m > 5
C. m - 20 < 5
D. m - 20 > 5
From City Day’s 3rd grade practice test:
8) Goldie Lock’s hair is 10 feet long. it grows 3 feet each week. how long will Goldie Lock’s hair be at the end of 3 weeks?
() 15 feet
() 16 feet
() 19 feet
From the 3rd grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
18) A tomato plant is 7 inches tall. it grows 2 inches each week. How tall will the tomato plant be at the end of 3 weeks?
A. 9 inches
B. 10 inches
C. 13 inches
From City Day’s 3rd grade practice test:
2) The chart shows the number of books Ms. Maurer’s class read during the week.
keiton 3
Shantaya 3
Ashley 2
Jamaris 3
Norman 4
What is the mode for this set of data?
() 4 books
() 3 books
() 2 books
From the 3rd grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
24) Nine students gathered data bout their fathers’ shoe sizes.
Shoe size: 8, 8, 8, 9, 9, 9, 9, 10, 10
What is the mode for the data they collected?
A. size 8
B. size 9
C. size 10
From City Day’s 3rd grade practice test:
7) A number minus 10 equals 25.
Which number sentence shows this?
() n - 10 = 25
() 10 - n = 25
() 25 - 10 = 15
From the 3rd grade math Ohio Achievement Test:
46) Monica has 18 books. She shared some books with a friend and had 12 books left.
Which number sentence could be used to find the number of books Monica shared?
A. 18 - n = 12
B. 12 - 18 = n
C. 18 + 12 = n
Permalink | Comments (22) | Categories: Charter Schools and School Choice, City Day Investigation, Testing
Lessons in test security
This much nobody is disputing — practice tests given at City Day Community School last year somehow contained questions that were based on the actual Ohio Achievement Test. In some cases questions from the practice test and the actual state exam are all but identical.
That should never happen. How it did happen is not yet completely clear.
But what we have learned suggests test security on at least four Ohio Achievement Tests from March 2006 was compromised.
It may take some more investigating to find out exactly where those questions came from. Officials at the school insist the state tests that were delivered to City Day in February 2006 were not tampered with. But somehow it seems a test somewhere was compromised.
And at least one expert in test cheating says the state could be doing more to keep those tests secure.
Greg Cizek is a professor of education measurement and evaluation at the University of North Carolina and author of the 2003 book “Detecting and preventing classroom cheating: Promoting Integrity in Assessment.” He also knows a thing or two about Ohio. Cizek is a former University of Toledo professor who serves on a panel of testing experts that advises the state on its standardized testing program. He was also once a school board member Sylvania.
Hearing the City Day story, Cizek had a couple of immediate suggestions. Ohio allows its testing company to deliver standardized tests to schools up to seven days before the test is scheduled. That is way to long, Cizek said. With today’s just-in-time shipping options, tests should be delivered much closer to the actual test date. There also should be much tougher rules for tracking test handling.
“The states that I am aware of in which test security is taken very seriously try to have the test booklets arrive with the smallest possible interval between arrival and test administration,” he said. “In addition, those states require and “chain of handling” sign-off procedure from the minute the booklets hit the district so that there is a clear record of exactly who handled the materials and when.”
If the state wanted to take it a step farther, it could follow the example of Texas, which is now using statistical methods to track unlikely changes in test performance by schools there in an effort to catch cheaters. Texans can thank the Dallas Morning News for the state’s new vigilance. It was the Morning News’ stories about cheating in that state which finally got state officials to recognize the need for change.
There are a lot of great new methods to root out cheating. One example — computers can now track erasure marks and record how often a student changes answers from wrong to right and vice versa. Too many erased wrong answers can point investigators to schools that may need more scrutiny. The head of the state testing program, Mitch Chester, told me in September that the state’s testing company this year is conducting an erasure study for the first time.
But up until now, Ohio has not employed new methods for catching cheaters. Chester told me in the past five years the only testing irregularities he knew about were self-reported by schools, which means they were likely small procedural mistakes.
Meanwhile, the Morning News is finding hundreds of schools with suspicious results in Texas. Is possible that Ohio is that much different than Texas? Or could more advanced methods employed here produce similar findings?
One other thing the state could do that might help us better understand whether cheating is a real problem here. It could tell us when it catches cheaters. Ohio Department of Education spokesman J.C. Benton told me recently that just this year the state put in place a new policy — it no longer discusses investigations into test irregularities.
In other words, the Ohio Department of Education will neither confirm nor deny when an investigation is underway. Even when an investigation is complete, the department will not release the findings or even acknowledge it ever investigated a school.
But when it comes to cheating, wouldn’t it be better if we knew more rather than less?
Permalink | Comments (3) | Categories: City Day Investigation, My Favorite Posts, Testing
City Day: Practice test raises questions
By Scott Elliott
Staff Writer
DAYTON — Last March, fifth graders at City Day Community School knew which unit of measurement Bob used to cover a floor with carpet.
Sixth graders knew that 6 — not 2, 3, or 12 — was the largest number that divided both 12 and 30 evenly.
And seventh graders knew that the square Coral drew was a rhombus because it had four sides.
The question is, how did they know?
In each case the students had seen these questions — or questions that were nearly identical — on practice tests they took the week before the school administered the Ohio Achievement Tests.
In all, a Dayton Daily News investigation found 44 questions on practice tests taken by City Day students that were identical or substantially the same as questions that appeared on the actual state exam they took just days later.
And when state report cards came out last year, huge gains in the percentage of students who passed the test helped propel the chronically underperforming school out of the state’s lowest rating category of “academic emergency.”
Ohio has specific procedures for the handling of state achievement tests, but trusts each school to maintain the security of the exams. Practice questions are available on the Ohio Department of Education Web site, but they aren’t drawn from the actual tests, and in many cases don’t closely resemble the real test questions.
City Day Superintendent Roseda Goff said a consultant hired by the school used traditional testing preparation materials to drill the students prior to the test, and that no state procedures were violated.
But Carl Robinson, who joined the charter school as principal last summer, said he questioned the scores, particularly after he had assessments done on some of the students who did well on the tests. Robinson said he was fired in November, one day after approaching Goff about his concerns.
The test results seemed too good to be true, Robinson said.
The sixth-grade class at City Day, 318 S. Main St., didn’t have a single student pass the math portion of the Ohio Achievement Test in 2004-05. A year later, 100 percent of its seventh graders passed the state’s seventh-grade math test.
Similarly, no one in the school’s 2004-05 fourth-grade class passed the state math test that year, but a year later 59 percent of the fifth-grade class passed the state math exam. It now appears that those too-good-to-be-true results were just that.
“I said wait a minute,” said Robinson. “There is no way in the world to yield that kind of jump by doing what she explained to me. I thought, ‘did she have somebody come in and perform magic?’ It didn’t make any sense.”
The school did nothing wrong, according to Goff. A consultant she hired helped drill the students using traditional test prep materials, she said.
But the consultant, Rachel Armour, told the Daily News that all the materials she used to create the practice tests were provided to her by Goff. The newspaper obtained copies of practice tests she made for City Day and compared them to the actual state exams. In some cases, only names in the word problems or small details are different from the actual questions.
Robinson said an Ohio Department of Education investigator has interviewed him about the testing procedures at City Day. A spokesman for the board would not confirm that an investigation is underway, but Greg Cizek, author of a book on standardized test cheating and member of Ohio’s testing advisory panel, said, “f you have identical questions from a test that was not to be disclosed on a practice test, that’s against every testing regulation the Ohio Department of Education has.”
Robinson, who joined the charter school as principal last September, said he reviewed the practice materials used last year in hopes of recreating the impressive gains in this year’s tests. But Robinson, who has a doctorate in education from Miami University and left a university teaching job in North Carolina to take the principal job at City Day, said test preparation couldn’t account for the improvement made by the students last March.
Consider seventh grade math. In 2005-06, City Day’s seventh grade had an average score on the math test that was about 22 points above the average score for all Ohio schools. The prior year, the school’s sixth graders had an average score that was 45 points below the state average.
“If it’s largely the same kids, that’s a huge change from 45 points below to 21 points above the mean,” Cizek said.
Of the 14 City Day seventh graders who took the state exam in 2005-06, about 28 percent scored accelerated or advanced, the two highest of five scoring levels. The prior year, none of the 13 sixth graders tested even passed the test.
The fifth graders also made sizable gains from the previous year’s scores.
Of the 24 fifth graders who took the state exam in 2005-06, almost 17 percent posted accelerated scores. The prior year, none of the school’s 22 fourth graders passed the test. In 2004-05, the fourth-grade class at City Day was 54 points below the state average in math. A year later, the fifth graders were just seven points below the average for all Ohio students.
The Ohio Achievement Test in math last year was taken by every Ohio public school student — which includes charter school kids — in grades three through eight.
Overall, City Day’s 2005-06 test success improved so much the school shook off two years in the state’s lowest category of “academic emergency,” jumping two spots on the rating scale to “continuous improvement.” City Day, a K-8 charter school that opened in 1998, had consistently ranked among the worst performing schools in Dayton for the percent of students passing the state tests.
After he was hired, Robinson said he became suspicious enough of the results to ask a few teachers to conduct assessments of what their kids knew. After that, he said, he had no doubts.
“There was a blatant discrepancy in terms of what they (the students) were able to do,” he said.
Robinson later obtained a compact disc containing four practice tests created by Armour. He said a week after he was fired an anonymous caller asked to meet him in a parking lot. A car pulled up and a woman handed him the CD, he said.
A state investigator has asked him for the CD, Robinson said.
Armour, a Dayton-based educational consultant, said she was brought in for eight weeks last year to help prepare City Day kids to take the state exams. She acknowledges creating practice tests that included questions strikingly similar to those on the state exams. But she said she merely reworked and retyped what she thought were practice questions the Ohio Department of Education provides on its Web site as test preparation.
“Mrs. Goff told me they were downloaded from the Internet,” Armour said. “It just looked like it was something printed from a digital laser printer. I’m baffled by the whole ordeal. No principal has ever given me any type of secure test materials.”
Goff denied giving Armour real test questions.
“The test I gave her was a practice test,” Goff said. “Our (state) tests are kept under lock and key. They are taped, sealed and locked up. I don’t know how anybody could get anything.”
Ohio has very specific procedures for the handling of state achievement tests, but in the end the education department depends on school personnel at each site to maintain the security of the exams. Sealed, numbered copies of the exams must be delivered to each school no more than seven days before testing is scheduled to begin.
The label information on the computer files that contain Armour’s practice tests show they were created beginning at 6:35 p.m. on Feb. 27, 2006, seven days prior to the scheduled test at City Day. Other files from the following morning show they were created at 3:02 a.m., 3:21 a.m. and 5:03 a.m. Those documents have a copyright warning identifying Armour as the author.
Armour acknowledged she worked through the night after she said Goff gave her the sample questions. She said Goff told her she wanted the students to begin practicing for the tests the next day.
“That’s just how I work,” she said. “Mrs. Goff put a lot of pressure on me. I’m just a diligent person.”
Goff insists the security of the state tests wasn’t compromised. The tests were sent to the school and addressed to Juanita Barnett, the school’s part-time psychologist who also serves as its testing coordinator, she said.
Goff said she didn’t recall if she or Barnett received the tests, but in either case they would have been secured in a locked room. Barnett then typically locks the tests in a cabinet, she said. Only Goff and Barnett have keys to the room, Goff said, and only Barnett has a key to the cabinet. Goff said at one time there were two keys to the cabinet but Goff lost her key prior to February 2006.
“There is no way I could have given (Armour) any test,” Goff said. “I had not looked at a test. And I don’t see how she could have gotten it.”
Barnett declined comment. Armour’s attorney, David Williams, said his client is willing to submit to a lie detector test to support the truthfulness of her story.
Cizek said any test scores of a student who saw questions ahead of taking the test would be meaningless.
“The Ohio Department of Education has strict guidelines on what is and is not appropriate to do,” he said. “It’s flat out illegal to take secure test questions and expose them to students before the test.”
Armour, a Chicago native and Wilberforce graduate, is a former participant in the prestigious Teach for America program. She also served as an intern at the Dayton Daily News in 2003. Armour said she developed her own writing instruction program that she has taught in Illinois and Michigan, as well as in several local schools.
Armour said part of her approach to teaching urban kids is to put problems into a language they can understand. She said she commonly writes problems and questions for kids using brand names they know, such as Bad Boy Records, and proper names that may be familiar to them from popular culture, such as actress Raven Simone or NBA star LeBron James.
“What I do is take a problem and alter and change it so it reflects something the kids are interested in,” she said.
Robinson said he struggled throughout the fall to create a curriculum for the school, where he said books and materials were in short supply. He said his dismissal resulted from the questions he raised about the school’s test preparation procedures.
“I wasn’t going to stop asking questions,” he said.
Goff declined to discuss Robinson’s departure.
Investigations into cheating allegations on state tests are extremely rare in Ohio. Mitch Chester, who heads Ohio’s state testing program, told the Daily News in September that the state’s only cases of testing irregularities in the past five years came after they were reported by the schools themselves. The state does have the power to revoke an educator’s teaching license for violating the security of the tests. The normal process for an investigation of testing irregularities is for the school to first conduct its own internal probe and report its findings to the state, which decides if more investigation is needed.
As a charter school, City Day is sponsored by Education Resource Consultants of Ohio, a Cincinnati-based charter school authorizer with primary responsibility for oversight of the school. In December, ERCO Assistant Director Aaron Kinnebrew said he was not aware of any problems with state test administration last year.
“They are allowed to give practice tests,” he said.
Kinnebrew did not return repeated phone calls seeking further comments.
J.C. Benton, education department spokesman, said the state put in place a policy this school year not to discuss test security investigations, or even acknowledge when an investigation is underway.
Cizek said states like Ohio could discourage cheating by claiming copyright on all test materials.
“It seems to me that at least one way that the state should proceed on this matter is to sue the individuals involved for infringement of copyright,” he said. “I’m no attorney, but it seems like this is a pretty clear-cut case.”
Permalink | Comments (10) | Categories: Charter Schools and School Choice, City Day Investigation, My Favorite DDN Stories, Testing
Utah: First state to go all voucher?
Wow, this could be big news in the school choice world. Apparently, the Utah House of Representatives — by one vote — approved a bill that would allow all families to choose whatever sort of school, public or private, they prefer for their kids and use state money to pay at least part of the tuition. I don’t know enough about Utah politics to know how good the bill’s chances are to pass the state senate and become law.
This would be the first true voucher program consistent with the vision of economist Milton Friedman, who first argued that an unfettered market of parental choice would bring dramatic innovations that would improve instruction.
Before now, we’ve only see partial voucher programs in which only a few kids are eligible based on their income, what city they live in, whether they have certain disabilities. Ohio’s statewide voucher program is one of the nation’s biggest and it really only affects a few cities (especially Dayton).
Here is more from the Friedman Foundation, which advocates for school choice across the country:
For Immediate Release February 2, 2007
Utah House passes universal school choice Milton Friedman’s vision is one step closer to victory
INDIANAPOLIS—Today, the Utah House passed, by a vote of 38 to 37, what could become the nation’s first ever universal school voucher program. The legislation, House Bill 148, would allow every family in the state to have a choice in their child’s education and would become the first program to achieve Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman’s vision for universal school choice.
“ Utah is getting to the core of what education is all about — learning should be tailored to each student,” said Elisa Peterson, executive director of the Salt Lake City-based Parents for Choice in Education, which has led the local school choice effort. “ Utah parents want the freedom to choose education based on their child’s unique needs.”
HB 148, spearheaded by the tremendous leadership of Speaker Greg Curtis and bill sponsor Rep. Steve Urquhart, would establish the “Parent Choice in Education Act,” that would provide every Utah parent with school-aged children a voucher worth $500 to $3,000 that could be used at any eligible private school. Children currently enrolled in private school who meet the eligibility for free and reduced price lunch would also qualify for the voucher. The voucher amount will based on a families’ annual income.
“Utah’s children are smiling today…and somewhere so is Dr. Milton Friedman,” said Peterson. “How fitting that a bill giving choice to all of Utah’s children could be passed in the same week that Dr. Friedman was honored.”
On Monday, Milton Friedman, who passed away last November at the age of 94, was honored in cities around the country including Chicago, New York and San Francisco. Because of his 1955 essay on the role of government in education, Friedman is widely recognized as the father of the school voucher movement.
“This is the biggest step that has been taken toward achieving Milton Friedman’s dream of liberating children so they can reach their full potential,” said Patrick Byrne, president and CEO of Utah-based Overstock.com and Friedman Foundation board member. “This is the greatest social issue facing our country.”
HB 148 will now be sent on to the Utah Senate. In previous years, broad-based school choice programs have received much support in the Senate. Successful passage there would send the bill to Gov. John Huntsman, Jr., who signed the state’s special needs voucher bill in 2005.
“The victory today proves that in the end freedom always trumps fear,” said Robert C. Enlow, executive director and COO for the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation. “Over the past six years, we have been honored to work with so many dedicated Utah legislators and local leaders. Their passion for educational freedom is what has made this possible.”
(Image credit: www.legendsofamerica.com)
Permalink | Comments (7) | Categories: Charter Schools and School Choice
City wins spelling bee again
(City spelling bee winner Elleesha Moore of Van Cleve at McGuffey Elementary School)
Before Percy Mack came along as superintendent, most of the spelling bees I covered in Dayton were won by students from private schools. But after Mack’s first year, students from Dayton Public won the next two bees.
And on Thursday night, there was Elleesha Moore up on the stage with three private and charter school competitors as the competition heated up. And yet again, Percy Mack left Meadowdale High School a happy man. Elleesha fended off the others and captured the crown. Quite a turnaround for a kid who went out in the first round two years ago as a sixth grader.
Mack’s connection to this winning streak? Decide for yourself if there is cause and effect or it’s a coincidence.
(Go here for the complete list of participants in Thursday’s citywide spelling bee.)
I have to admit I enjoy covering spelling bees. The kids are smart and they compete hard. There are also some funny moments.
With all those words assigned randomly, every now and then word-and-kid are comically matched. Consider these from Thursday night:
— Enthusiasm. Went to a kid who practically dragged his feet to the microphone and seemed to stare into space in disinterest.
—Ridiculous. Assigned to a deadly serious speller who made it into the late rounds while never cracking a smile.
—Boredom. Went to a sleepy eyed kid kid.
—Carnivore. Spelled by a correctly by a heavy set speller.
—Fidgeted. Spelled by stoic student who hardly moved a muscle while two seats over sat a girl who spent the whole even wringing her hands and bouncing her toes.
—Diminutive. You guessed it. Went to one of the shortest kids in the competiton.
—Disciples. It almost seemed unfair that one of the Catholic school kids got to spell this one.
Permalink | Comments (23) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
The complete list of Dayton Spelling Bee participants
Here is the complete list of all the participants in the 57th annual Dayton city spelling bee and the schools they represented:
Chaneice Patrick Allen Elementary School (DPS)
Trey Bursey Richard Allen Edgemont Campus (Charter)
Brittany Davis-Rowe Belle Haven Elementary School (DPS)
Samia Dudley Carlson Elementary School (DPS)
Jade Monroe Charity Adams Early Academy (DPS)
Janel Young Cleveland Elementary School (DPS)
Lucky Dedeh Cornell Heights Elementary School (DPS)
Koby Shepherd Dayton Boys Prep Academy (DPS)
Kayle Paul Eastmont Elementary School (DPS)
TaQuan Thompson Edison Elementary School (DPS)
Ashley Ollier Emerson Academy (Charter)
Kahli Smith Fairview Elementary School (DPS)
Joseph Jeffries Fairview Middle School (DPS)
Erica Harvey Franklin Elementary School (DPS)
Rachel Wynne Hillel Academy (Private)
Maria Chabali Holy Angels Catholic School (Private)
Sean Sibbing Horace Mann Elementary School (DPS)
Michelle Baker Immaculate Conception Catholic School (Private)
Lyric Fields Jefferson Montessori School (DPS)
Leola Lynch Kemp Elementary School (DPS)
Ariel Hawkins Kiser Elementary School (DPS)
Tamis Moser Loos Elementary School (DPS)
Conner Jordan Lutheran School of the Miami Valley (Private)
Day’von Leonard Meadowdale Elementary School (DPS)
Audrey Drewing Pathway School of Discover (Charter)
Zachary Rainwater Patterson Kennedy Elementary School (DPS)
Markita Cumming Mary Queen of Peace Catholic School (Private)
Jeremy Gambrell St. Anthony Catholic School (Private)
Christine Hoy Stivers School for the Arts (DPS)
Tre’ Donaldson Valerie Elementary School (DPS)
Elleesha Moore Van Cleve at McGuffey Elementary School (DPS)
Kia Davidson Wogaman Elementary School (DPS)
Jazmine Kidd Orville Wright Elementary School (DPS)
Patrick Laquaglia Wilbur Wright Middle School (DPS)
Mazzan Makupson World of Wonder School (DPS)
Permalink | | Categories: Dayton Public Schools
Teacher pay compared
My education writing colleague Megan Gidow at the Lebanon Western Star has an interesting story today about the difficulty suburban and rural school districts have attracting minority teachers. In Warren County, she reports, four of the eight school districts have no minority teachers at all.
A Central State professor in the story argues the problem is two-fold: minority teachers gravitate toward urban districts that have more minority students and urban districts tend to pay more.
The question is whether the pay side of that equation is true in the Miami Valley.
So I pulled the average salary from the Ohio Department of Education for Miami Valley school districts. Here’s how they stack up and here’s how the state’s 21 urban districts rank.
With Dayton going into a levy, it’s interesting to note its average teacher pay is in the upper half of the Miami Valley but somewhat low compared to some smaller other urban districts (although it ranks about the same as Toledo and well ahead of Akron, the two urban districts that are most similar to Dayton).
What surprises you from these lists?
Permalink | Comments (4) | Categories: Teaching and Learning
Urban schools’ average teacher pay
Here are Ohio’s 21 largest urban school districts ranked by average teacher salary:
Cleveland Heights-University Heights $61,241
Cleveland Municipal $60,688
Cincinnati $60,275
Lorain $59,968
Columbus $56,434
East Cleveland $56,068
Euclid $55,107
South-Western $55,072
Canton $53,705
Springfield $52,587
Hamilton $50,960
Middletown $50,871
Dayton $50,576
Toledo $49,862
Youngstown $49,534
Elyria $48,159
Warren $48,945
Mansfield $48,159
Akron $46,861
Trotwood-Madison $45,810
Lima $42,752
Permalink | Comments (1) | Categories: Teaching and Learning
Miami Valley average teacher pay
Here is every Miami Valley school district ranked by average teacher salary:
Graham $64,643
Oakwood $57,317
Kettering $57,219
Northridge $56,494
Clark-Shawnee $55,917
Kings $55,788
Fairborn $55,386
Centerville $54,710
Yellow Springs $53,548
Beavercreek $53,065
Lakota $52,969
Troy $52,963
Springfield $52,579
Brookville $51,903
Mason $51,844
Monroe $51,663
Sidney $51,617
Huber Heights $51,395
Anna$51,296
Piqua $51,281
Miamisburg $51,251
Hamilton $50,959
Fairfield $50,945
Versailles $50,894
Middletown $50,871
Talawanda $50,830
Tipp City $50,626
Dayton $50,575
Franklin $50,568
West Carrollton $50,476
Lebanon $50,421
Springboro $50,322
Cedar Cliff $50,255
Vandalia-Butler $50,166
New Lebanon $49,841
Northmont $49,553
Xenia $49,491
Ross $49,425
Northwestern $49,329
Northeastern $49,195
Tecumseh $49,061
Little Miami $48,858
Mad River $48,699
Southeastern $48,65
Eaton $48,654
Milton-Union $48,275
Carlisle $48,056
Franklin Monroe $47,803
Miami East $47,683
Greenon Local $47,085
West Liberty-Salem $46,975
Arcanum Butler $46,682
Covington $46,649
Sugarcreek Local $46,603
Fort Loramie $46,295
Greenville $46,047
Valley View $45,974
Trotwood-Madison $45,808
Tri-County North $45,404
Edgewood $45,391
Twin Valley $45,204
Jackson Center $44,431
Wayne $44,187
Bethel $43,991
Urbana $43,894
New Miami $43,140
Newton $43,025
Tri-Village $42,723
Madison $42,653
Greeneview $43,392
Hardin-Houston $42,362
Russia $42,257
Botkins $42,222
Mechanicsburg $42,170
Mississinawa Valley $41,855
Preble Shawnee $41,746
Ansonia $41,417
Jefferson $41,179
National Trail $40,958
Triad $40,890
Bradford $39,490
Fairlawn $35,922
Permalink | Comments (3) | Categories: Teaching and Learning
The floating Arch head
Some of you may have noticed sports columnist Tom Archdeacon’s head floating around under my picture on this blog. Tom recently launched a Super Bowl blog, and because of some strange technical malfunction, his head is appearing in lots of strange spaces around the DDN website. We’ve been joking around the office about the “Arch” virus, but I’d encourage you to think of it as a game — sort of a web-based “Where’s Waldo?”
Permalink | |
