Campaign News

Georgia voters are being asked to approve a new and controversial way to improve public education. The proposal would empower the state to take over chronically failing schools or convert them to charters or even close them.

It’s called Amendment 1 on the Nov. 8 ballot, and it’s called the Opportunity School District in the legislation that authorized it. The Georgia General Assembly passed Senate Bill 133 during this year’s session with the required two-thirds majority in both chambers. The referendum now needs a simple majority from voters to become law.

Then it asks voters this question:

“Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended to allow the state to intervene in chronically failing public schools in order to improve student performance?”

Gov. Nathan Deal’s OSD proposal, based on similar initiatives in Louisiana and Tennessee, would allow Georgia’s governor to appoint an OSD superintendent, separate from the Georgia Department of Education superintendent, who is elected by voters. The OSD superintendent could take over as many as 20 eligible schools each year and control no more than 100 such schools at any time. The OSD superintendent could waive Georgia Board of Education rules, reorganize or fire staff and change school budgets and curriculum. The state also could convert OSD schools to nonprofit or for-profit charter schools or close them if they don’t have full enrollment.

The state would use the College and Career Ready Performance Index to determine which schools are eligible for takeover. Schools that score below 60 on the 100-point CCRPI for three straight years could be included in the OSD. Those schools would stay in the OSD for no less than five years (or, if they are an OSD charter school, for the length of the initial charter’s term) and no more than 10 years before returning to local control. Opportunity Schools could be removed from the OSD whenever they are graded above an F in the state’s accountability system for three straight years.

Muscogee County had 10 of the 141 schools on the state’s original list of chronically failing schools released last year. Georgetown and Rigdon Road elementary schools, however, improved enough with other schools in the state on the 2015 CCRPI to move off the list. That leaves 127 schools in Georgia and these eight in Muscogee on the current list: Baker Middle School and Davis, Dawson, Forrest Road, Fox, Lonnie Jackson, Martin Luther King Jr. and South Columbus elementary schools.

The case for Yes

OSD proponents cite the number of chronically failing schools as the most obvious reason to try something drastically new. They also note the reduction in the number of chronically failing schools since the threat of state takeover became possible after Senate Bill 133 passed.

Deal says on his proposal’s website, “While Georgia boasts many schools that achieve academic excellence every year, we still have too many schools where students have little hope of attaining the skills they need to succeed in the workforce or in higher education. We have a moral duty to do everything we can to help these children. Failing schools keep the cycle of poverty spinning from one generation to the next. Education provides the only chance for breaking that cycle. When we talk about helping failing schools, we’re talking about rescuing children. I stand firm on the principle that every child can learn, and I stand equally firm in the belief that the status quo isn’t working.”

Alyssa Botts, spokewoman for the pro-Amendment 1 campaign committee Opportunity for All Georgia Students noted, “The graduation rate for students attending failing schools is an abysmal 55.7 percent,” compared to the most recent statewide figure of 78.8 percent in the class of 2015.

“A school that fails to properly educate its students perpetuates cycles of poverty and increases the likelihood of incarceration,” Botts said in an email to the Ledger-Enquirer. “For many students, educational opportunities provide the best chance to break out of these cycles. … Voting ‘yes’ for the Opportunity School District amendment is a vote to ensure that future generations of Georgians will have the best opportunities available. No child in Georgia should be forced by law to attend a failing school.”

The governor-appointed Georgia Board of Education and the Georgia Chamber of Commerce have endorsed the OSD referendum.

Michael O’Sullivan, executive director of the Georgia Campaign for Achievement Now, part of the 50-state CAN nonprofit organization advocating “a high-quality education for all kids, regardless of their address,” has successfully fought a similar political battle, helping to convince voters to approve the 2012 Georgia charter school amendment. And the OSD is the next logical step, he figures.

“What this has done is create a sense of urgency for districts to act,” O’Sullivan said in an interview with the Ledger-Enquirer. “Voters should be asking what’s being done now? What plans are in place to improve our schools? That’s the ultimate goal. How can we ensure that every student in the state has access to quality education? Right now, 68,000 students attend a school that has failed at least three years or more.”

The opposition is based on being “afraid of loss of control,” O’Sullivan said. “… It’s my hope that opponents would be putting as much effort into fixing their schools so they aren’t eligible for the OSD. I can tell you which option will be best for schools.”

O’Sullivan emphasized that state takeover is only one option for intervention in the OSD.

“There is the ability for the state to assist schools that are failing for one year or two years, and then, after three years, there is a multiple intervention model,” he said. “One is a joint governance structure, with the OSD and the local school district working together to turn around the school.”

Addressing concerns that OSD schools would receive less funding, O’Sullivan said, “Whatever amount that would have been dedicated to that school remains in that school.”

Louisiana enacted the Recovery School District in 2003. The RSD comprises 62 autonomous charter schools in Orleans, East Baton Rouge and Caddo parishes with a total enrollment of more than 32,000 students, according to the RSD’s 2015 annual report. The percentage of RSD schools considered to be failing has been reduced from 44 percent in 2011 to 19 percent in 2015, the report says.

According to the RSD’s 2014 annual report, the percentage of students performing at the basic level or above increased 29 percentage points from 2008 to 2014, while the state average increased 9 percentage points.

In New Orleans, 63 percent of the public school students are in the RSD. According to a June 2015 study by Patrick Sims and Vincent Rossmeier of the Cowen Institute for Public Education Initiatives at Tulane University, “the percentage of (New Orleans) students at the basic level or above has increased 15 percentage points over the past six years. That growth has largely come from the RSD, which has improved by 20 percentage points.”

In Tennessee, as of the 2015-16 school, there were 29 schools in the Achievement School District, enacted in 2010 with the goal of moving the state’s bottom 5 percent of school into the top 25 percent of student achievement. The ASD has made progress, according to its July 2015 report.

“Over a three-year period, ASD students have earned double-digit gains in math and science proficiency and have grown faster than their state peers,” the report says.

The ASD reading scores, however, declined along with the state average.

“We know from national research and our own experience that reading growth tends to lag behind other subjects in a school turnaround setting,” Malika Anderson, then the ASD deputy superintendent and now its superintendent, says in the report.

The case for No

Georgia Federation of Teachers president Verdaillia Turner, a retired Atlanta educator, has seen the statistics that indicate state takeovers improved student achievement, but her organization touts evidence that argues otherwise.

The federation says in its campaign literature that the Southern Poverty Law Center filed a lawsuit against the state-created school district in New Orleans on behalf of 4,500 students for denying appropriate services. A July 2015 SPLC fact sheet notes that, while an average of 19.4 percent of students with disabilities graduated high school in Louisiana, only 6.8 percent of them graduated in the Recovery School District.

A February 2016 report titled “State Takeovers of Low-Performing Schools: A Record of Academic Failure, Financial Mismanagement and Student Harm” from the Center for Popular Democracy, a liberal-leaning nonprofit advocacy group, found that state takeovers of schools in Louisiana, Michigan and Tennessee produced:

▪  “Negligible improvement — or even dramatic setbacks — in their educational performance.”

▪  “A breeding ground for fraud and mismanagement at the public’s expense.”

▪  “High turnover and instability” among staff, “creating a disrupted learning environment for children.”

▪  “Harsh disciplinary measures and discriminatory practices” for students of color and those with special needs.

Turner fears too much of the motivation for the OSD proposal is about creating profit opportunities in public schools for private charter school companies.

“The bottom line here is that this is a new business at the public’s expense,” Turner said in an interview with the Ledger-Enquirer. “The only thing public about these schools is our tax dollars.”

The federation notes the OSD may retain 3 percent of state funds for administrative operations, reducing the amount of money available for instruction.

“I love my state, and I respect the office of the governor and all of government,” Turner said. “However, this is still a democracy, and we believe that educators and the public need not be misled by what’s about to happen.”

That includes the OSD superintendent’s authority to “get rid of people at will” at any OSD school, Turner said. “The law says, the last line in Senate Bill 133 says, all laws in conflict with this act are repealed.”

Turner noted the state’s standardized testing system has changed the past five consecutive years. “Therefore, we know it’s not reliable,” she said.

In many chronically failing schools, Turner said, “children end up going to jail. But in many of these same schools, children go to Yale. So we need to have a real conversation about what makes schools work.”

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has reported that a political group called the Committee to Keep Georgia Schools Local has a TV ad campaign opposing the OSD referendum. The group includes the Georgia Association of Educators, Georgia AFL-CIO, the Professional Association of Georgia Educators, Georgia Stand-Up, the Coalition for the People’s Agenda, Public Education Matters, Southern Education Foundation, Working America, Pro Georgia, Better Georgia, Georgia Federation of Teachers and Concerned Black Clergy of Metro Atlanta, according to the AJC.

The Georgia School Boards Association’s board of directors voted to oppose the amendment. School boards representing the counties of Bibb, Chatham, Cherokee, Clayton, Fayette, Henry, Richmond and Troup have expressed opposition.

The Muscogee County School Board was scheduled to join them last month, but the proposed resolution was deleted from the agenda between the Sept. 12 work session and the Sept. 20 meeting. Neither superintendent David Lewis nor board chairman Rob Varner has responded to the Ledger-Enquirer’s requests for an explanation.

Responding on their behalf, MCSD communications director Valerie Fuller also didn’t explain the sudden change in thinking, who proposed the resolution, who rescinded it and why. Here is her statement in an email to the Ledger-Enquirer:

“The Muscogee County School District is a public school system, which is supported by taxpayer money. All of our stakeholders (taxpayers, students, parents, teachers administrators and staff) have different opinions on this proposal. Although we believe, and the results indicate, that we are making progress with our challenged schools, to take a side could anger supporters, who might say the BOE is opposed to helping ‘failing’ schools.

“We don’t think it would be wise for a publicly elected body to pass a resolution in opposition of this amendment that might result in controversy, causing unnecessary distractions from the work being done on behalf of these schools. Because this could result in a change to Georgia’s Constitution, we do believe it is important for voters to read and be fully informed about the amendment and its implications.”

In a letter Tuesday to school district superintendents and Regional Education Service Agency directors, Georgia Department of Education deputy superintendent for external affairs and policy Garry McGiboney reminded public school officials that the Georgia Office of the Attorney General advised the GaDOE in 2012, “Local school boards do not have the legal authority to expend funds or other resources to advocate or oppose the ratification of a constitutional amendment by the voters.”

Regardless of whether the proposed OSD is good for Georgia, the referendum’s wording doesn’t accurately explain it, some folks insist. The Georgia PTA called it “deceptive.”

“If the governor and state legislators believe the best way to fix struggling schools is to put them under state control and either close them or turn them over to charter schools, then let the language on the ballot reflect this initiative,” Georgia PTA president Lisa-Marie Haygood said in a news release. “As it stands, the preamble, and indeed, the entire amendment question, is intentionally misleading and disguises the true intentions of the OSD legislation.”

To that end, a class-action lawsuit was filed Sept. 27 against the governor, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle and Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp. The three lead plaintiffs, all from metro Atlanta — parent Kimberly Brooks, First Iconium Baptist Church senior pastor Timothy McDonald III and Coweta County teacher Melissa Ladd — allege in the complaint that the wording is “so misleading and deceptive that it violates the due process and voting rights of all Georgia voters.”

Gerry Weber, an Atlanta lawyer representing the three lead plaintiffs, told the Ledger-Enquirer in an interview the Georgia Supreme Court ruled about 10 years ago that a challenge to the wording of ballot measures must be decided after the vote because the lawsuit would be moot if the proposal fails.

The Ledger-Enquirer asked Deal spokeswoman Jen Talaber Ryan for the governor’s response to the allegation about the referendum’s wording. Ryan replied in an email, “The opposition didn’t attend the publicly announced constitutional amendment meeting where the language was discussed and approved. Why don’t you ask them why? And the preamble and question say exactly what the OSD will do — provide a lifeline for children forced by law to attend a failing school. The only thing misleading here is the fact that national, outside special interest groups are spending money instead of local groups. After all, their go to line is about ‘local control.’ Hypocritical, don’t you think?”

Keep Georgia Schools Local campaign manager Louis Elrod told the Ledger-Enquirer in an email from media relations manager Michelle Davis, “It’s unbelievable that pro-school takeover advocates would make this charge. They are grasping at straws because they’re desperate and losing this fight.

“They know full well that many members of our bipartisan coalition of parents, teachers and public school advocates actively petitioned for changes to both the amendment and the ballot question at multiple hearings. The even more deceptive preamble language was drafted at a separate meeting in Deal’s office. Janet Kishbaugh of Public Education Matters Georgia says she and other opponents called and searched online daily to find an announcement of this meeting. It was later revealed that the preamble was written in Deal’s office in a meeting attended only by the three men who drafted the words.

“The pro-takeover campaign’s political maneuvering just confirms what we know about their intentions — this amendment is designed to silence parents and strip away local control.”

Do your homework and vote

The Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education has taken a neutral position on the OSD referendum, but the partnership’s president, Steve Dolinger, is advocating this:

“The important thing is Georgia voters do their own homework on this issue and make their decision based on solid research and fact-finding, not emotion,” Dolinger, who was superintendent of Fulton County Schools (1995-2002), said in an email to the Ledger-Enquirer from Bill Maddox, the partnership’s communications director. “Both sides make compelling arguments, but it should always come down to what the voter feels is right for the children of our state.”

BY MARK RICE

Source

The democrat gained her financial advantage mostly through small donors, but also recently received support from healthcare activist Ady Barkan, who launched a six-figure ad campaign supporting her bid for congress. Barkan’s group, Be A Hero plans on supporting Democratic candidates across the nation, starting with Tiperneni’s campaign in CD8.

Read the full article here.

New York Daily News - October 21, 2014, by Erin Durkin - City agencies are failing to do their part to make voter registration easier — even though they’re required to by law.

Legislation passed in 2000 mandates that 18 agencies give voter registration forms to visitors. But the Center for Popular Democracy and other non-profits found that 84% of those visitors were never offered a chance to register, according to a report to be released Tuesday.

In fact, 60% of the agencies didn’t even have any forms in the office. And 95% of the clients were never asked if they wanted to register to vote.

“This is an urgent problem which is leading to the disenfranchisement of many thousands of low-income New Yorkers,” said Andrew Friedman, the group’s co-executive director. “The city is failing to live up to its obligation.”

The group found that 30% of people who visited the city offices weren’t registered to vote, higher than the national average.

Mayor de Blasio’s spokesman Phil Walzak said Hizzoner has ordered agencies to step up their compliance with the law. “Mayor de Blasio is deeply committed to reducing barriers to voter participation, and making it simple and easy to register to vote is the first step,” he said.

Only one of the agencies, the Administration for Children’s Services, used a combined form that offers the chance to apply for ACS services, as required by the law, the report found.

Advocates say having city agencies help out with voter registration is especially important because most people nationwide sign up to vote at motor vehicle departments, but many city residents don’t drive.

Source

When Russell Miller worked at Abercrombie, one of his days each week had to be an on-call day.  He wouldn’t know if he’d have to show up to work until an hour in advance.

“You had to block out that time period as if you were working,” he says. One store he worked at was 45 minutes from his house. “We had to be ready to be there on time. With all the regulations about what we wear, how we look and how we present ourselves, I had to get fully ready for my shift and ready to walk out the door at the time I made the phone call to find out if they were even going to need me or not.”

For Miller,  this was more than an inconvenience.

“Having a second job wouldn’t work at a time when I was scheduled for an on-call shift. If they scheduled me for an on-call shift and they didn’t call me, that was real money lost and real time opportunity lost.”

On-call scheduling “means you have to put your life on hold,” says Rachel Laforest, director of the Retail Action Project, a division of the Retail Wholesale and Department Stores Union. “It becomes very difficult to lead full lives, so for example, if I’m a parent and I have to figure out arranging for child care, it’s impossible for me to do that” with such short notice, she says.

There isn’t good national data on the prevalence of on-call scheduling, but regional surveys suggest it’s widespread and not limited to retail, says Stephanie Luce, professor of labor studies at CUNY.  “We see it in fast food, airlines, beauty services,  domestic services, child care services," she says. "Smaller studies seem to suggest this practice really picked up after the recession, however, over the past couple of years, there’s been a real push back.”

After New York’s attorney general suggested Abercrombie and 12 other companies were potentially violating New York law through the practice, Abercrombie announced it would work to discontinue the practice.

The company responded on August fifth “...we understand – and share – the attorney general’s concerns about call-in shift scheduling. The attorney general’s letter helped focus our ongoing internal discussions about how to create a stable and predictable work environment as possible for our employees.”

Gap Inc. told Marketplace: “Each of our brands have made a commitment to evaluate their practices and determine where we may be able to improve scheduling stability for our employees, while continuing to drive productivity in stores.”

Gap also says it’s working on a pilot project with University of California, Hastings College of the Law “to examine workplace scheduling and productivity. Led by recognized expert professor Joan Williams, the goal of the Gap Hourly Scheduling Initiative is to use research and data to create solutions that will be sustainable and can be implemented across our company’s entire footprint and fleet."

Under pressure from a lawsuit, Victoria’s Secret discontinued on-call scheduling earlier this year. 

To the extent firms are reconsidering the practice, the reasons are both technological and monetary.  

On-call scheduling resulted from pressure to restrict the ratio of hours to sales and an attempt to more nimbly adapt to changes in demand, says University of Chicago associate professor Susan Lambert. It also results in companies “overhiring,” using many part time workers instead of fewer full time workers.  But Lambert says “the costs of managing this way do not enter the balance sheets of firms.”  Employees who work irregularly, for example, may not always be up to speed with the latest changes to the store or the layout, she says. 

“From a very engineering standpoint,...[on-call scheduling]  may look efficient but when you look on front lines of firms, you see all the opportunities costs there are in terms of people walking out because they can’t find something or can’t get help.”  

Another factor is technology. 

“New technologies give us now the ability to predict very well variations in demand,” Lambert says.

Companies don’t need to keep workers on hold; they can figure out pretty well whether they need to have someone show up to work far in advance of two hours before the shift starts, she says. Companies are so good at predicting demand that they tried to "overoptimize" down to the minute, keeping workers on call to cover even slight changes in demand.   

“You don’t need to do that micro-management,” she says. “Retailers are learning that."

So it may be, she says, that workers and firms are finding on-call scheduling is a headache for everyone.

Here are the responses from the 13 companies the New York attorney general wrote warnings to:

Ann Inc.: "Staffing guidelines do not include the practice of on-call shifts." 

Gap Inc.:  "Each of our brands have made a commitment to evaluate their practices and determine where we may be able to improve scheduling stability for our employees, while continuing to drive productivity in stores.  As part of our commitment to more sustainable scheduling practices, we are working on a pilot project with Gap Brand and UC Hastings College of Law to examine workplace scheduling and productivity."

J.C. Penney Co: "We do not utilize on-call scheduling, and JCPenney has always maintained a policy against the practice."

Sears Holdings Corp: "Sears Holdings does not use on-call scheduling for store associates. That said, we will fully cooperate with the New York Attorney General’s office’s requests."

Target Corp: "Target does not use on-call scheduling."

TJX Cos: "We don’t use on-call shifts at TJX and it hasn’t been our practice, i.e. nothing new since April." 

Williams-Sonoma Inc: "We actually discontinued [on-call scheduling] for the entire country."

Burlington Stores Inc., Crocs Inc., J. Crew Group Inc. and Urban Outfitters Inc. did not return requests for comment. 

Source: Marketplace