Dayton Daily News education reporter Scott Elliott writes about schools, kids, teaching and learning.
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Tuesday, December 19, 2006
No cuts until February
Dayton school Superintendent Percy Mack said today that he will not announce any budget cuts or layoffs until after school is back in session in January. This means nobody will actually be forced out of a job until February at the earliest, since union contracts require 30-days notice for layoffs.
We’re now expecting around 67 layoffs — Mack said the original plan for 135 job cuts would be reduced by half after the district got a $3.8 million wiindfall from a tax lein sale earlier this month.
The cuts were supposed to be revealed in early November, then by Thanksgiving and then by the holiday break but were delayed each time. More on this story in tomorrow’s Dayton Daily News.
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Does this guy influence your eduthinking?
Checker Finn
Education Week’s latest issue has a long look back at the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation and native Daytonian Checker Finn, who 10 years ago reshaped a local charity into a national powerhouse promoting choice and standards in education.
With the anniversary approaching, Fordham ordered up a couple of reports — a narrative written by a freelance journalist on the group’s most recent decade in education and a separate report from Education Week’s research arm looking and what people and groups are most influential in education. Ed Week’s story about Fordham was separate from the other two reports.
As for the influence rankings, Finn and Fordham unsurprisingly make both lists.
I’d love to hear you thoughts on who should, or shouldn’t, have made the list or how you would have ranked them. EdWeek apparently doesn’t have its Fordham stories (the package includes profiles of some of the Dayton charter schools Fordham now sponsors) online. It does have a story on the influential people and groups, but it might require a subscription to read.
Here’s the ranking for most influential people:
Philanthopist Bill Gates
President George W. Bush
Kati Haycock, director of the Education Trust
G. Reid Lyon, education researcher
Senator Edward Kennedy
Former President Bill Clinton
(tie) Richard W. Riley, Clinton’s Secretary of Education
(tie) James B. Hunt Jr., former North Carolina governor
Marshall (Mike) Smith, education director for the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
(tie) Linda Darling-Hammond, Stanford University education researcher
(tie) U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings
Rep. George Miller, D-California, chairman of the House Education and the Workforce Committee
Chester E. Finn, Jr., executive director of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation
Here’s the most influential education groups:
U.S. Congress
U.S. Department of Education
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
Education Trust
National Governors Association
American Federation of Teachers
(tie) Achieve, Inc.
(tie) National Education Association
Thomas B. Fordham Foundation
Center on Education Policy
The most influential education sources:
National Assessment of Education Progress (The Nation’s Report Card exam)
Education Week
National Center for Education Statistics
New York Times
U.S. Department of Education
Education Trust
Washington Post
(tie) Education Next education journal (a Fordham Foundation publication)
(tie) Public Education Network Weekly Newsblast
Education Gadfly (a blog-like weekly report from Fordham)
Eduwonk (Andrew Rotherham’s blog)
My own quick take:
—I think Gates is the right person for the top of the influential people list. He is throwing an incredible amount of money around (with lots more to come) and that has shaped education in big and little ways. Taking Checker and his Dayton ties out of the list, Gates is the one other person on the list who has had tremendous direct influence on the streets here locally. Dayton has developed small charter-like schools in the Gates model (DECA for example) and used the small schools approach as a blueprint for its new high school designs.
Although if you equate Bush with NCLB, it’s hard not to make him No. 1 as that law affected every single school in the country like no law before it.
Assuming this list is supposed to represent the most influential people in education today (and not of the last two decades or something), I’d have dropped Clinton, Riley and Hunt down the list and moved Darling-Hammond, Miller and Finn up. Also, if Rotherham’s blog is among the most influential information sources, I’d consider that and his work with Education Sector probably enough to get him on the influential people list.
I might be tempted to put someone involved in the state education systems of California, Texas and New York on the list, too. Those states have enormous influence on the national education scene. I also wondered about Jeb Bush, who certainly had influence with Florida’s significant reform efforts. From Ohio, I’d have considered charter school mogul David Brennan, House Speaker Jon Husted and the late Tom Mooney from the OFT.
—The organization list is pretty strong. I’m tempted to move Gates up, but its probably correct to put the foundation behind Congress and the Dept. of Ed. It’s interesting (and correct) that the smaller American Federation of Teachers is considered more influential than it’s much bigger cousin, the National Education Association.
—The information source list needs help. The New York Times and Education Week should be 1-2. I’d put the Washington Post a little higher and NAEP, a national test, seems a weird choice for this list, but the data from the exam is used for lots of research. It was interesting (and I’m not sure it’s correct) that a blog (eduwonk) and a pseudo blog (Gadfly) also make the list.
Alexander Russo has a different take on the lists here.
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