2017 Will Bring More Opportunity to Repeal Common Core in Iowa

It looks like there will finally be some opportunities in Iowa to pass legislation that will roll back Common Core and Smarter Balanced in my home state. Three events have taken place that are promising.

1. Republicans win the Iowa Senate and now control the Legislature.

We’ve had a split legislature that for the most part guaranteed status quo. That will not be the case for the next two sessions at least. Republicans not only won the Iowa Senate, but they won big flipping the Senate to a 29 to 19 majority (there will be a special election at the end of the month to replace State Senator Joe Seng who passed away). Not only that, but Iowa House Republicans expanded their majority in the House by two seats and have a 59 to 41 majority.

So while that doesn’t guarantee positive action it, at the very least, makes it a possibility.

2. Anti-Common Core legislators now chair the legislative education committees.

This is huge news because before any good bill was pretty much guaranteed to be assigned to a subcommittee to die. That should change in 2017.

State Representative Walt Rogers (R-Cedar Falls), who was a co-sponsor on all of the anti-Common Core legislation in the past, is now the chair of the Iowa House Education Committee. Complementing him State Senator Amy Sinclair (R-Allerton) will chair the Iowa Senate Education Committee. Sinclair also was involved in the anti-Common Core and Smarter Balanced legislation in the Senate.

This is an exciting development.

3. Iowa Governor Terry Branstad has been appointed U.S. Ambassador to China.

Iowa Governor Terry Branstad, who is pro-Common Core, has been appointed U.S. Ambassador to China by President-elect Donald Trump. He is likely to be confirmed. Branstad has been a significant roadblock to legislation addressing Common Core, the Next Generation Science Standards and Smarter Balanced. In fact the only related bill to make it to his desk, a delay to Smarter Balanced that was included in an appropriations bill, he line-item vetoed.

Lt. Governor Kim Reynolds who will be his successor when he resigns has not taken a public stand for or against Common Core, the Next Generation Science Standards, or Smarter Balanced.

On education policy there is certainly some uncertainty, but she has the chance to make her mark and differentiate herself from Branstad. There is promise she will be a more conservative governor than Branstad was. Let’s hope that includes education policy.

The timeline for Branstad’s departure is uncertain. He has said he will wait to resign his seat until he confirmed so we could be well into the new legislative session before that happens. If that is the case the 2018 legislative session may provide a greater opportunity than 2017.

Branstad’s Blueprint

Iowa Governor Terry Branstad announced his administration’s new education blueprint.  The blueprint was written by Jason Glass who is the Director of the Iowa Department of Educaiton, Linda Fandel who is Governor Branstad’s special assistant for education, and Byron Darnall who is Jason Glass’ policy assistant.  Some of the main points of the blueprint are these:

• Attract and support talented educators with an increase in starting teacher pay, more selective teacher preparation programs and improved recruiting and hiring practices.
• Create educator leadership roles in schools and develop a meaningful peer-based evaluation system that requires annual and multiple evaluations of all educators.
• Develop a four-tier teacher compensation system with Apprentice, Career, Mentor and Master levels and substantial pay raises for teachers who move up. Add other options for increasing teacher pay, such as work in extended day or year programs.
• Establish a definition of educator effectiveness and tie job protections to an evaluation system based on this definition.
• Free up principals from some managerial tasks to lead and support great teaching.
• Improve and expand the Iowa Core to put Iowa’s standards on par with the highest-performing systems in the world.
• Develop an assessment framework that includes measuring whether children start kindergarten ready to learn and high-stakes End-of-Course assessments for core subjects in high school. Have all Iowa 11^th graders take a state-funded college-entrance exam.
• Provide value-added measures for all districts, schools, grades and educators that take into account student background characteristics and consider student growth.
• Seek a waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind law and work with key education groups and leaders statewide to design a new accountability system.
• Ensure children learn basic literacy by the end of third grade with high-quality reading programs, supports for schools and students, and an end to social promotion for third-graders who read poorly.
• Nurture innovation with funding for transformative ideas, greater statutory waiver authority for the Iowa Department of Education and pathways to allow for high-quality charter schools in Iowa.
• Create a state clearinghouse of high-quality online courses available to any student in Iowa, and back the courses with licensed teachers and the best online learning technology available.
• Set goals for student outcomes, including a 95 percent high school graduation rate and top statewide performance on national standardized assessments.

Where’s the local control?  If hiring practices are determined, if new teacher/staff structures are dictated, and pay structures are determined by the state what is the purpose of the local school board?  I’m not saying all of the ideas are bad ones, but we need to be as concerned about the means as we are the end.  Not all pathways to reform are created equal.  It looks to me that any semblance of local control is on its last leg with the Branstad administration.  While school boards will still exist they will have essentially been stripped of their policy making ability.

That alienates parents as it is infinitely easier for a parent to bring concerns to their school board than it would be to bring them to an educrat in Des Moines.  The school board is directly accountable to their constituency, not so with staff within the Department of Education.

They want to address some of the right problems, and do have some creative ideas.  This blueprint represents the wrong approach.

You can read the blueprint below:

Iowa Governor Terry Branstad’s Education Blueprint //

 

HT: Caffeinated Thoughts

Iowa Governor Branstad and Lt. Governor Kim Reynolds to Hold Town Hall Meetings on Education

Prior to Iowa Governor Terry Branstad’s Iowa Education Summit on July 25-26th, he and his Lt. Governor, Kim Reynolds, will hold a series of seven town hall meetings.  They are:

• On Tuesday, July 12th at 10:00a they will be in Waterloo at the Waterloo Central Middle School Auditorium (1350 Katoski Dr., Waterloo, IA).
• On Tuesday, July 12th at 2:00p they will then be at Davenport North High School’s Auditorium (626 West 53rd St, Davenport, IA).
• On Wednesday, July 20th at 2:00p they will be at the Sigourney Jr.-Sr. High School Auditorium (907 East Pleasant Valley St., Sigourney, IA).
• On Thursday, July 21 at 10:00a they will be at the Sacred Heart Elementary Parish Hall (1111 Marshall St., Boone, IA).
• On Friday, July 22nd at 10:00a they will be at Corning Elementary School Gym (1012 10th St., Corning, IA).
• On Friday, July 22 at 2:00p they will be at the Carroll High School Auditorium (2809 North Grant Rd., Carroll, IA).
• On Saturday, July 23rd at 9:00a they’ll be at the Spencer Middle School Cafeteria (1400 10th Ave. East, Spencer, IA).

We encourage you if you live in the area to stop by and ask him a couple of questions:

• Why is the State Board of Education aligning the Iowa Core Curriculum standards with the national core standards?  Did we have a legislative vote to approve this?
• Does having U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan as a keynote speaker, and your comments that he is “a real reformer” mean that you embrace the national common core standards and you believe that the Federal government, not local school boards and their constituencies should have the ultimate say in our children’s education?
• We see that a lot of stake holders have been invited to this summit, where do parents have a seat at the table?  It seems like their voice isn’t being heard when control of education becomes more centralized at the state and federal level.
• Where do you see private school choice in your vision for education reform?

If you can, please video his answers.  If you do, please email me at svanderhart@americanprinciplesinaction.org.  I would love to see it.

Originally posted at American Principles in Action