In the news business, reporters have a saying for a boiler plate quote an editor can remove to tighten a story. It's "throw-away" and that's exactly what the governor's response to the Fordham/Paul Hill study deserves.
Strickland's spokeswoman talked of the governor's plan having components that have been shown to help students succeed. We should hope so. But, again, there's no applicable evidence that they will for all children across an entire school district, let alone across an entire state.
The governor continues to say his top-down, one-size-fits-all requirements are best for Ohio schools. Why does he think there is one, state-mandated solution for bettering education in every school in the state, let alone the inner-city classrooms crying out for innovation and change. Top district superintendents know this and are opting out of cookie-cutter education. In Cleveland, the district has opened an office of new and innovative schools dedicated to opening new schools, including charters. Gene Harris, the savvy superintendent of the Columbus Public Schools has pledged to open new single gender schools as part of that district's reform plan. In Dayton, the top performing schools are either stand-alone charters or district schools that have many charter-like freedoms. The governor's one-size fits all approach has been tossed aside by many working with our neediest children.
Education is crying out for more innovation and experimentation. Consider that only 36 percent of eighth graders in Ohio were rated proficient in reading in the National Assessment of Education Progress in 2007. The math results were similar and the data were far bleaker for poor and minority youngsters. It's laughable that giving teachers and school leaders a chance to innovate, while also holding them tightly accountable for results, would somehow violate fiscal accountability and transparency standards as the spokeswoman contends.
Now, let's free our school leaders and teachers to figure out what works and then reproduce it. Taxpayer education dollars should produce education for children, not just paychecks for adults.
