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Would DECA really have closed?

By selliott | Tuesday, October 7, 2008, 11:31 PM

Last week, Ohio House speaker Jon Husted was in for an endorsement interview with the DDN editorial board in his race for the Ohio Senate against Centerville school board member John Doll. (Husted earned the paper’s endorsement.)

In the course of the conversation, Husted used the Dayton Early College Academy as an example. Husted said he pushed to change Ohio law to allow DECA to convert more easily to a charter school and if he hadn’t done so, the high scoring high school would have closed.

You may recall that the University of Dayton, which ran DECA in conjunction with Dayton schools, wanted an exemption from the district’s teacher contract when the district moved to lay off staff, including 200 teachers, in 2007. The school wanted its staff kept outside the seniority rules for layoff. Otherwise the district’s cuts would have caused a chunk of the school’s teachers to be cut loose, replaced by displaced teachers from other city high schools.

Instead, DECA dissolved its contract to operate under the city school district’s direct control and became a charter school. The only problem was Ohio had a cap on charter schools that would not allow even one new school to open. Husted pushed through the change that allowed DECA in under the cap.

But would the school have actually closed without Hustead help?

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Editorial: Dayton must pass school levy

By selliott | Sunday, October 5, 2008, 11:36 PM

The Dayton Daily News editorial board Sunday endorsed the city school board’s 4.9-mill levy, saying the city cannot afford to see the levy fail.

This levy is considerably smaller than the 15.17-mill levy try in 2007. Take a look at the editorial and let us know in the comments here if you agree or disagree. Will you vote for the levy? Do you think it will pass?

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AG candidates spar over charter lawsuits

By selliott | Thursday, October 2, 2008, 11:21 AM

The recent decision by a local judge rejecting a lawsuit seeking to close low scoring charter schools has become an issue in the race for attorney general.

Visiting with the Dayton Daily News editorial board today, Democrat Richard Cordray and Republican Mike Crites staked out opposing positions on the suits, which were initiated by now-disgraced, ex-attorney general Marc Dann.

To refresh your memory, Dann pursued suits against perpetually low scoring charters by claiming they had failed to serve their legal purpose as “charitable trusts” under state law by failing to educate kids. A Montgomery County Common Pleas Court judge rejected that argument and dismissed one of the suits locally. Interim Attorney General Susan Rogers is considering an appeal.

Crites was very clear — he felt these suits were frivolous and would drop them if he were elected. Cordray said just the opposite. He believes the suits have merit and would appeal the case.

So for charter school supporters and opponents, their positions on this high stakes case gives a pretty good signal what sorts of directions these two candidates would go with regard to charter schools.

Stay tuned.

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Understanding Botkins vs. Jackson Center

By selliott | Wednesday, October 1, 2008, 10:20 PM

I’ve gotten a lot of interesting feedback about my column last week, which argued the state should consider how school districts perform relative to the wealth in the community when judging their test performance.

Online I listed the Miami Valley’s top overachieving and underachieving school districts.

There is one pair of districts that has puzzled me ever since I first began making this comparison two years ago — Botkins and Jackson Center.

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Charters win first round vs. Marc Dann

By selliott | Monday, September 29, 2008, 10:49 AM

Remember last year when then-attorney general Mark Dann began filing lawsuits to try to force low scoring charter schools to close? Well, the attorney general’s office is still pressing those initial lawsuits and on Monday a Montgomery County Common Pleas Court judge’s ruling dealt a stiff blow to the state’s argument for shutting charter schools down.

You may recall that Dann’s legal argument, which apparently was suggested by the Ohio Education Association, was that the schools had failed to serve their purposes as charitable trusts under Ohio law but failing to educate kids.

But in a ruling today in the case of Dayton’s New Choices Community School, Judge Michael Tucker ruled that New Choices does not meet the definition of a charitable trust and therefore the attorney general’s office does not have jurisdiction to close the school.

This is a pretty interesting legal debate and it could get interesting if the state appeals the decision. Don’t be surprised if this question eventually ends up before the Ohio Supreme Court.

I should have more information shortly.

UPDATE: Here is Columbus Bureau reporter Laura Bischoff’s story on this.

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This is where blogging came from

By selliott | Thursday, September 25, 2008, 09:48 PM

I stumbled across this story today about a new book that traces the history of blogging. The story begins farther back than I expected, dating almost to the birth of the World Wide Web in the early 1990s with Webmasters who were busy exploring the new only universe who kept reverse chronology daily lists of links to other interesting sites they found. If you’re interested, check it out.

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Here’s how Miami Valley districts rank for test scores, income

By selliott | Wednesday, September 24, 2008, 08:18 PM

Ohio report cards hold all schools to one standard and make no effort to determine what you might call the “degree of difficulty” for educating each district’s student body. We know from research that wealthier students score higher on average than poorer kids.

If that’s true, shouldn’t districts get extra credit, or at least get noticed, when their kids’ scores compare well with districts that have wealthier families?

That’s the question that prompted this ranking, which looks at where each of the 60 Miami Valley districts rank among 610 Ohio school districts for performance index score, which is the state’s measure of test performance for all students at all grades in each district, and for median income in the school district.

Districts that rank higher for test scores than their rank for income are “overachievers” in my view. Those that rank lower for test scores than for income are “underachievers.”

Here are the ranking numbers. The first number is the district’s state rank out of 610 for test performance. The second number is the rank for median income.

For a list that shows the difference between the two rankings for each district, go to the DDN’s opinion blog here.

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