Good substitute teachers aren’t babysitters or chair warmers — they’re teachers, who have the weighty responsibility to carry out lesson plans and inspire learning in students.
That’s why it makes sense that USD 259 is requiring all 800-plus substitutes to take the same kind of teaching aptitude assessment that regular teachers take.
The Gallup TeacherInsight Assessment, which measures intangibles such as motivation and love of teaching, has been criticized by some as incomplete.
It’s a valid concern. For instance, the test doesn’t measure subject matter knowledge — that’s also vitally important to teaching success. And with good teachers at a premium, the district can’t afford to write off any promising candidate based on a single test.
But with substitutes often taking over in a classroom for days, weeks or even months, it’s also important to ensure that they’re up to the job.
The test should be seen as just one of several tools used to gauge a teacher’s classroom readiness.
Congratulations to Wichita East High School, which ranks No. 464 in America’s top 1,300 public high schools, according to Newsweek magazine. The rating was based on a formula involving Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate and Cambridge tests taken by all students at a school in 2007, divided by the number of graduating seniors.
East was the only Kansas high school outside of the Kansas City area that made the list.
Especially as American education slides back toward “the basics,†one element of the landslide “American Idol†victory of David Cook deserves some notice — his gratitude to his Blue Springs, Mo., elementary music teacher, Fredalyn Gentry, who appeared on Wednesday’s finale. Asked what went through his head when he heard his name called, Cook said: “That my music teacher, Mrs. Gentry, made me sing in the Christmas pageant in second grade. Now I’m here. The ride has been pretty nuts.†Let it also be noted that Cook, now a cool rocker, appeared in high school productions of “The Music Man,†“West Side Story,†“The Taming of the Shrew†and “Singin’ in the Rain.†(His pratfall-filled “Make ’Em Laugh†from a 2001 “Singin’ in the Rain†can be seen, sort of, on YouTube.) Who says arts education is a frill?
Another embarrassing anti-evolution takeover of the Kansas State Board of Education could happen if voters don’t pay attention and if good candidates don’t step forward. Three mainstream science board members are not seeking re-election, including Wichita representative Carol Rupe (in photo). That gives social conservatives a good shot in November at retaking control of the board and once again weakening the state’s science standards. To prevent that, Kansans need quality candidates who understand the importance of basing science standards on mainstream science, not personal religious views.
Four local families have filed a discrimination lawsuit against St. Anne Catholic School, challenging a rule that students can speak only English during the school day.
We’re not inclined to wade into a private school matter. But before activists against illegal immigrants get up in arms, some points to consider:
The Spanish-speaking students in this case are U.S. citizens who are bilingual — English is their primary language. The parents aren’t asking that the students be allowed to speak Spanish in classrooms — at issue is whether the students should be able to speak Spanish outside the classroom, during recess or other free time.
It’s too bad that any American student would be dissuaded from being bilingual, when U.S. schools, public and private, actively promote the benefits of being fluent in more than one language. How does this “English only†school rule support that educational goal?
It’s been inspiring to read recent Eagle articles about Wichita’s outstanding graduating seniors, such as Ngoc Trang Nguyen, who four years ago didn’t speak English and today is among Wichita East High School’s 14 class valedictorians.
The prescription for her success: “I work hard,†she told The Eagle. One teacher described her as “inquisitive, deliberate, persistent.â€
Her favorite saying: “Impossible is nothing.â€
She plans to major in biochemistry and dreams of finding a cure for hemophilia.
Or consider Claudia Nieuwoudt of the Independent School, who also spoke little English when she came to Wichita as an eighth-grader. Three years later, she received the highest possible score on the Advanced Placement English test. She loves to volunteer, from helping rebuild hurricane-shattered homes in Louisiana to working as a translator in a hospital emergency room.
Fluent in four languages, she hopes after attending medical school to work with Doctors Without Borders.
What great role models for anyone, not just our young people. Wichita has reason to be proud of its academic stars. They’re clearly going places.
It’s not as pithy as “wear sunscreen†or “if opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door,†but Gov. Kathleen Sebelius’ worthy suggestion for graduating seniors, offered in a recent commentary, bears repeating: “Take a moment to be proud of your accomplishments and don’t forget to thank your parents, your teachers or that special person in your life who has helped you reach this milestone and who will be with you as you strive for more to come.â€
“Students enrolled in a $6 billion federal reading program that is at the heart of the No Child Left Behind law are not reading any better than those who don’t participate,†the Washington Post reported. The study released last week by the Education Department’s research arm found that students in schools that use Reading First, which provides grants to improve elementary reading, scored about the same on comprehension tests as their peers in schools that did not receive such money. Investigators previously found that some federal officials who helped oversee the phonics-focused program had financial ties to publishers of Reading First materials, the Post reported.
Seven Wichita public schools use the Reading First program. Has it been effective here? Yes, said Sue Farag, executive director of the district’s elementary learning services. She said that trend data shows significant gains in reading in each grade level from kindergarten through third grade.
However, the new study questions whether improvements in reading scores are because of the Reading First curriculum or because teachers are spending more time on reading instruction.
How could the Wichita school board vote Monday to sell the former Carter Elementary to the Catholic Diocese of Wichita at the same time the district proposes a $350 million bond issue to build new schools? Interim superintendent Martin Libhart acknowledged that was a “fair question,†telling The Eagle editorial board Tuesday that the decision was based on Carter’s small capacity (200 students), location, lack of air conditioning and cost of needed renovations. When the district closed Carter in 1996, Libhart said, “it was becoming costly to maintain and even more costly per pupil.†He also said the district’s overcrowding is such that new schools are needed in the core and on the perimeter, not on East 15th Street. And “as nice a facility as it is for its age and the purpose it would serve for the diocese, it would cost quite a bit to renovate it to our standards,†Libhart said. The diocese will acquire it through a lease-to-own deal for use by Holy Savior Academy, currently in the city-owned former Magdalen School at Woodlawn and Kellogg.
Amid all the talk about what students don’t know, there was a news item last week that gives me hope: Michigan fifth-grader Kenton Stufflebeam, on a recent trip to the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., noticed a mistake in a display about prehistoric time.
The exhibit identified the Precambrian as an “era,†but Stufflebeam remembered that his teacher had told him that the Precambrian was a dimensionless unit of time.
Did you know that? Of course you did.
Museum officials admitted the error and are correcting the display. At least some students, it seems, are paying attention in class.
With a growing number of schools around the country struggling to meet the demands of the No Child Left Behind law, many districts are willing to pay rock-star salaries and perks for the right turnaround artist, according to a Christian Science Monitor article.
A suburban Atlanta district considered hiring a superintendent who was asking for a $275,000 salary, along with a $2 million consultant budget, a Lincoln Town Car — and a personal bodyguard.
Who knew being a school superintendent was a ticket to riches and superstardom?But long hours, politicized school boards and near-impossible accountability goals are driving away many qualified school principals and bureaucrats who once moved up to superintendent jobs, according to the article.
As a result, the dwindling number of quality candidates can command bigger paychecks and more lavish perks: Average annual salaries have nearly doubled, from about $110,000 a decade ago to more than $200,000 today.
Let’s hope the Wichita school board finds candidates who will settle for more modest perks — like free passes to Old Cowtown Museum.
Good for the House Education Committee for shelving a Senate-passed provision to require teachers to submit materials that might be considered obscene to school boards for prior review. On the rare occasions when challenges to classroom materials come up, administrators and school boards can deal with them. But the proposal distrusted teachers and could have had a chilling effect on classroom creativity.
“What’s acceptable in San Francisco may not be in Kansas. Let the school board set the community standard,†state Sen. Karin Brownlee, R-Olathe, testified to a House committee Thursday, on behalf of a Senate-passed measure under which Kansas teachers would ask their school boards to review outside classroom materials that parents might challenge as obscene. As teacher and Rep. Judith Loganbill, D-Wichita, noted, school boards do not have time to review all materials that teachers might like to use. Teachers might play it safe, and perhaps shortchange students, rather than go through the review hassle. Can’t teachers be treated as professionals and trusted to pick their own materials? Besides, is classroom smut really a problem in Kansas?
During Winston Brooks’ nearly 10 years as Wichita school superintendent, he proved the right man for the difficult job of managing the big, diverse district out of a public relations nightmare and into a period of self-improvement and community support. That he now has been chosen as the right man to head the Albuquerque, N.M., schools, starting July 1, reflects well on the Wichita district and his two decades of service to it. Brooks deserves congratulations and thanks. That said, his departure can’t help but put a big question mark over the prospects for the May 6 election on a proposed $350 million bond issue. Will voters approve of such an investment without knowing who would oversee it?
From a New York Times Magazine article: “Separating schoolboys from schoolgirls has long been a staple of private and parochial education. But the idea is now gaining traction in American public schools, in response to both the desire of parents to have more choice in their children’s public education and the separate education crises girls and boys have been widely reported to experience.†The article explained: “Among advocates of single-sex public education, there are two camps: those who favor separating boys from girls because they are essentially different and those who favor separating boys from girls because they have different social experiences and social needs.â€
Police chiefs and prosecutors from three northeast Kansas counties got together in Topeka last week to promote early childhood education. “If you care about crime prevention, if you care about saving money and ultimately lives, then you must care about high-quality early education programs,†said Lenexa Police Chief Ellen Hanson at the event sponsored by Fight Crime: Invest in Kids. The crimefighters cited studies favoring greater investment in high-quality early childhood education, asserting that every $1 spent on such programs for at-risk kids saves $16 later on law enforcement, corrections and the like. Gov. Kathleen Sebelius included $30 million more on early childhood programs for at-risk kids in her budget proposal, a tough sell in the current economic climate. Meanwhile, Americans for Prosperity-Kansas proposed as part of its “model†state budget that lawmakers eliminate prekindergarten spending, because “a parent is a child’s most important educator†— which sounds good but ignores the many Kansas parents who are not.
Arizona’s Legislature is debating a bill that would allow someone with a concealed-weapons permit — limited to those 21 and older — to carry their firearms at public colleges and universities, the New York Times reported. The bill was prompted by recent university shootings but was originally intended to include K-12 schools. “I feel like our kindergartners are sitting there like sitting ducks,†said state Sen. Karen S. Johnson, the bill’s sponsor. Utah is the only state that now expressly allows people with concealed-weapon permits to carry guns on college campuses, but more than a dozen states are considering such legislation, the Times reported. Opponents argue that allowing armed students on campuses would create more danger than it would prevent.
Winston Brooks’ candidacy for superintendent jobs in Albuquerque, N.M., and Myrtle Beach, S.C., hurts the Wichita school district’s proposed $350 million bond issue — though it need not be fatal, our editorial today argues. After all, the bond issue is about the capital needs of the district and its students, not about the superintendent. Still, if it is going to pass, business, neighborhood and community leaders will have to step up and champion the bond. Small groups of supporters and opponents of the bond issue held organizational meetings this week.
As a former Wichita school board member, House Assistant Minority Leader Jim Ward (in photo), D-Wichita, should have known his vote against a bill to provide Wichita schools with an extra $1.1 million would raise eyebrows and even ire — especially because the bill failed by one vote. But he was thinking about “big picture stuff,†he told The Eagle editorial board today. “The policy’s absolutely right†— to put more dollars into high-poverty urban districts, as a state audit urged. But the bill would have yanked hundreds of thousands of dollars from rural districts, rather than cushion the loss. That isn’t how school-finance formula changes usually are made, he said. “It just wasn’t fair. Plus, we need those folks that were getting hurt to help us on some other stuff†— Wichita funding needs of as much as $50 million in state money related to medical education, airfares, aviation training and research.
The Wichita school board’s historic decision to stop forced busing for desegregation seems in step with the public’s mood. In a SurveyUSA poll this week for KWCH, Channel 12 in Wichita, 73 percent of those surveyed said the district should stop such busing, and 54 percent said they think that after forced busing ends, the schools will have the right amount of diversity. Such positive feedback affirms that the district is doing the right thing, 37 years after it began forced busing. Another wise move: Monday’s unanimous school board decision to hire a director of equity and accountability to watchdog the busing transition and other equity issues. The board also was smart to make that person report to the superintendent rather than to the board, as proposed.
It’s encouraging that the Kansas Board of Regents is finally raising concerns about university tuition increases, our editorial today argues. In-state tuition and fees have more than doubled since 2002 at K-State and KU and risen 58æpercent at WSU. Debt loads have increased dramatically across the state university system, too, with the average borrower in the 2006 graduating class owing more than $17,000 in student loans.
Affordability is not more important than educational excellence. But the regents must guard against tuition rates that end up denying Kansans’ access to their higher education system.
Congratulations to the Wichita school board for its historic unanimous decision Monday night to end busing for desegregation in the district by the next school year. Such forced busing was the rule for nearly four decades, during which some African-American children were bused across town for all 13 years of their schooling. But it has long struck many in the community, white and black, as unfair and unnecessary. The logistics of placing the 2,000 affected students in neighborhood and magnet schools won’t be easy, but “I believe in my heart we will make sure all of our kids will get an equitable education,†said board member Kevass Harding. That’s a promise the district now must do everything it can to keep.
The Kansas Board of Regents may not be ready to cap costs at state campuses, but it’s right to be talking about when enough is enough. The issue could come up at the meetings Feb. 13-14, in advance of the board’s traditional late spring approval of tuition hikes for the fall. Tuition and fees have more than doubled at the University of Kansas and Kansas State University since 2002, though other institutions have seen smaller increases. Meanwhile, the state’s share of support for university operations has been shrinking. “It’s a tax on kids,†said Jill Docking, the Wichita member of the board. And those kids who can’t pay it either must load up on student-loan debt or pass on college.
Want to raise test scores in high schools? Consider starting the school day later, author Nancy Kalish wrote in a New York Times commentary. Body clocks shift during teenage years, research has shown, causing teens to get sleepy later at night and become fully awake later in the morning. A number of schools that have pushed back their first bells from 7:30 a.m. to 8:30 or 8:40 a.m. have increased standardized test scores, reduced dropout rates and lowered the number of car crashes involving teenagers.
There is no shortage of finger-pointing in education, as many worry that some students are still being left behind. Texas teacher Susan Creighton wrote in a Dallas Morning News commentary that adding competition to the educational job track would improve teaching performances. School districts should reward excellent performance with promotion or bonuses, just as the corporate world does, she said.
Creighton wrote: “In order for teaching to become a profession of prestige and respect in our society, we teachers need to be held accountable for the effectiveness of our teaching, in return for which we need to be rewarded with a respectable living wage commensurate with our performance.â€
Good substitute teachers aren’t babysitters or chair warmers — they’re teachers, who have the weighty responsibility to carry out lesson plans and inspire learning in students.
