D.C. Public Schools 2015 Year In Review

Review of 2015:
A revealing year in the governance of DC’s public schools

2015 opened with a new Mayor and a Council down by two seats due to the election of former Ward 4 Councilmember Muriel Bowser to the Mayor’s office, and the passing away of former Ward 8 Councilmember, Marion Barry. The 2014 election also changed the Committee on Education as the former chair, David Catania, lost his bid for mayor and his seat on the Council. At-large Councilmember and previous member of the committee, David Grosso, was appointed in his place.

10,000 students suspended or expelled from DC’s public schools in one year
A 2014 report by the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) revealed this number and that it included the youngest students in the schools, the 3 and 4 year olds in the pre-k programs. Bill 21-0001, The Pre-K Student Discipline Amendment Act of 2015, was introduced in the Council on January 6 to prohibit the suspension or expulsion of 3 and 4 year olds from school and became Law 21-0012, effective June 23, 2015.

“By fourth grade, nearly 50 percent of Black and Latino males are reading below grade level”
That is one point made in the press release of the Mayor’s launching of the Empowering Males of Color initiative on January 21. The press release goes on to reveal that “nearly seventy percent of all males in DC ages 5 to 24 are Black and Latino,” that “43 percent of the DCPS student body is composed of Black and Latino males,” that “Black males are the least satisfied with school, with satisfaction rates 16 percentage points lower than the district’s most satisfied students,” and that “despite recent gains, Black and Latino males are still graduating at rates lower than their peers: 48 and 57 percent respectively.” These points are not grouped in the press release as they are here but scattered throughout the document. www.mayor.dc.gov.

Politico puts Pearson in the spotlight
A report by Stephanie Simon in the Politico newspaper of February 10, “No Profit Left Behind,” revealed that Pearson, a British based for-profit education publishing company, has done very well during the years of the No Child Left Behind federal education law. By her account, “Half of its $8 billion in annual global sales comes from its North American education division.” She writes that it has a broad range of endeavors from K-12 through higher education. While much of it is in testing, it also includes “diagnosing and treating attention deficit disorder,” and writing on-line courses, including the assessments, for colleges, both non-profit and for-profit. It is involved with the Common Core State Standards and, she writes, “It co-owns the for-profit company that now administers the GED.”

DCPS chancellor receives pay raise
The Chancellor of the District Public Schools Salary Adjustment Act of 2015 was introduced in the Council on February 19 proposing to raise the chancellor’s salary to $284,000 a year. The measure was approved by the Council and became Law 21-0004.

Once more on at-risk funding
The At-risk Funding Temporary Amendment Act of 2015 was introduced on February 27 to direct the chancellor to allocate at-risk funds in consultation with principals and Local School Advisory Teams (LSATs) and to make an annual report “that explains the allocation of funds sorted by schools.” That became Law 21-0007.

The elected school Board lacks authority
The DC State Board of Education President, Jack Jacobson, who is also the Ward 2 representative on the Board, testified at an Agency Performance Oversight hearing on March 6 to several “Areas of Critical Need.” First he said is “the State Board’s lack of authority to initiate consideration and adoption of policy initiatives for issues already within the Board’s jurisdiction.” He stated that the Board is blocked in several policy areas, such as revising the district’s graduation requirements, due to that lack of authority, and concluded, “our current structure, [which is] unlike any other State Board in the country, should be changed” to “benefit students, families, and the over-all policy consideration process.” Read more of the testimony at www.sboe.dc.gov/testimony

Public Charter School Board recommends amendment to DC Code
On March 17, the DC Auditor’s office released a report, Oversight Improvements Must Continue to Ensure Accountability in Use of Public Funds by D.C. Public Charter Schools stating that “The audit was conducted as a result of the fiscal year 2013 annual risk assessment.” On page 13, the report says, “To assist in its oversight of public charter schools that contract with for-profit entities, the PCSB is recommending an amendment to the D.C. Code to require for-profit “charter management organizations” to disclose the same level of financial information as now required of other, not-for-profit management firms based on their exemption under state and federal tax law.” www.odca.org Report Number: DCA 162015.

Five year summary evaluation of PERAA finds positives and negatives
The Public Education Reform Amendment Act of 2007, the law that gave the mayor control of the schools, required that the law be evaluated after five years and that a determination about continuing or changing the law be made. The report, An Evaluation of the Public Schools of the District of Columbia: Reform in a Changing Landscape, was presented at a Committee on Education Roundtable on June 3. The study was conducted by a committee of the National Research Council which is a part of the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine. The reports of the Academies are published by the National Academies Press.

In the Summary of the report, the committee says “The D.C. Council asked the committee to assess
• whether the law’s expectations have been met and whether the changes have led to improved coordination, efficiency, and accountability;
• the extent to which the actions school leaders took were consistent with research and best practices; and
• changes in the conditions for learning in the schools and outcomes for students 7 years after the governance change.”

After they gathered as much information as possible to answer these questions, they analyzed the data and made a number findings. They also offered a number of recommendations. At the same time the report was presented to the Committee on Education, the National Academies Press released a Report Brief on-line showing the findings and recommendations. Those are shown below, but even more briefly than the Report Brief.

In their briefest form, the findings are:
• Some improvements in operations, but oversight and coordination fall short
• Efforts to improve teacher quality show progress, disparities
• Learning conditions and student performance show improvement, but disparities persist

And the recommendations are:
• Address disparities
• Develop a comprehensive data warehouse
• Support on-going evaluation of the DC educational system

The full report is online at www.nap/edu and is free to read or download. It can also be purchased at the National Academies bookstore on the first floor of the Keck Center at 500 Fifth Street, NW.

DCPS food service operations–an example of ‘poor oversight and coordination’?
On June 5 media reports of a settlement for $19 million between DCPS and its contracted food service provider, Chartwells, revealed longstanding problems with oversight and management of the contract. The settlement was the result of a whistleblower lawsuit brought by the former DCPS food Service director, Jeffrey Mills, who was fired in 2013 for bringing the contract’s problems to the attention of DCPS leaders. After it settled, Chartwells said it wanted to withdraw from the contract but DCPS was not prepared to replace them on the short notice Chartwells gave and decided to continue the contract until 2017, its original expiration date, saying that the problems in the contract had been solved. See Washington Post, June 5, “DC Schools vendor pays $19 million to settle whistleblower lawsuit” for more and links to other Post articles on the subject over the years.

“Currently, the District does not have a process in place for selecting schools for modernization.”
The above quote is from the July 1 DC Auditor’s report entitled The District’s School Modernization Program Has Failed to Comply with the DC Code and Lacks Accountability, Transparency and Basic Financial Management. Through a very detailed look at the operations of the Department of General Services (DGS) and its predecessor, the Office of Public Education

Facilities Modernization (OPEFM), during the school years from 2011 through 2013, this report shows that the program has moved far off course from its inception in 2006 with passage of the Schools Modernization Financing Act of that year. It raises concern about the relationship between these government entities and the private partnership of McKissack & McKissack and Brailsford & Dunleavey known as the DC Partners for the Revitalization of Education Projects, LLC (DC PEP), among other concerns. It clarifies that responsibility for writing the Master Education Facilities Plan is in the office of the Deputy Mayor for Education. It makes twenty-one recommendations that would improve accountability of public funds and provides information on the cost-per-school projects in FY 2010 through 2013. Report number: DCA 282015 at www.dcauditor.org

Mayor Bowser’s “6 Month Progress Report”
Mayor Bowser’s report on the first six months of her administration revealed much activity in all areas of the government. In the section on Education, the report says “Our schools are on an upward trajectory, but we know we can do more. That is why the Mayor is accelerating reform. 

• An additional $31.4 million for increased enrollment in traditional public schools and public charter schools
• $20 million designated over three years for the Empowering Males of Color initiative at DCPS. • $76 million over six years for neighborhood libraries
• Advanced $185 million by two years for a new, central library
• And invested $7 million to expand the Kids Ride Free program to Metrorail from the Mayor’s bus fare program.”

In a different section of the report, several other actions are listed:
• Launched dual enrollment program allowing Banneker Sr. High School students to take classes at Howard University
• Finalized Student Assignment Plan to allow for cross-park and cross-river school access • Launched the first DC Public Library at a charter school and at the DC Jail
• Planned two new Career Academies: Hospitality at Ballou HS and Public Safety at Anacostia HS

Summer reports shed light on student mobility and charter school finances
• In July: Mid-Year Student Movement in DC from OSSE’s Division of Data, Accountability, and

Research is an update and expansion of its first report on this subject to include school years 12/13 and 13/14. One of their findings is that 92 percent of students, traditional and charter, remain in the school they enrolled in at the beginning of the school year through to the end of the school year. The other 7.8% (6,118) move in five different ways. www.osse.dc.gov

• On August 5, the DC Fiscal Policy Institute issued A look At Public Charter School Finances: Revenue and Spending per Student by Thu Pham. This report analyzes the Financial Audit Review (FAR) that the Public Charter School Board conducts every year on the financial health of each charter school. The Far report is at http://www.livebinders.com/play/play?id=1720593 and the DC Fiscal Policy Institute’s analysis at www.dcfpi.org

“500 DCPS teachers replaced just this year”
In a departure from previous years, DCPS chancellor Henderson took to the stage at Dunbar High School on September 29 to be interviewed by Jim Vance of News Channel 4 about the “State of Schools” rather than giving an address. A publication of the Howard University’s School of Communications, District Chronicles, headlined its October 8 report on the event “A worthy school district; Despite statistics, Chancellor Henderson gives upbeat State of the Schools address” In the article, Sope Aluko writes that at one point, “Mr. Vance noted that one in four DC Public Schools got a new principal at the beginning of the year and DCPS hired 750 new teachers, replacing 500 just this year.” Ms. Henderson responded, “There is a paradigm where everyone works and stays where they are…that’s not always the case. We have had a number of people who go on to other jobs, some have been promoted or we told them that DCPS was not the right fit for them.” www.disrictchronicles.com

Charter school lawsuit concerning per pupil funding to continue
A Memorandum Opinion was issued on September 30 in case No. 14-cv-1293 (TSC) that was brought against the DC government by two charter schools and the DC Association of Chartered Public Schools in the US District Court for the District of Columbia in July, 2014. The Plaintiffs allege that the DC government doesn’t fund charter schools equally with the DCPS schools and they use three arguments to make their case. The Defendants responded with a Motion to Dismiss. In the Opinion, the Judge granted the dismissal of one of the three Counts but not the other two. The case will continue into 2016 when, among other things, a Status Conference has been set for February 16, 2016 at 10:15 am in Courtroom 2 before Judge Tanya S. Chutkan according to the Court’s online records database at the Courthouse.

A refresher on the meaning of ‘public’ is found needed, and provided
Posts on educationdc.net, a blog launched in early September by a parent and public school advocate, kept readers apprised on the filing of a complaint about the new Deputy Mayor for Education’s announcement on August 17 to establish a Cross-Sector Collaboration Task Force that would, among other things, hold meetings that would be “closed to the public.” The complaint was filed with the Board of Ethics and Accountability (BEGA)’s Office of Open Government on August 31. The OOG issued a “binding opinion” on October 7 clarifying that the task force is a public body as defined in the Open Meetings Act and must comply with the Act’s provisions. See http://educationdc.net for the posts and a link to the opinion letter or visit www.open-dc.gov Complaint #OOG-002_8.31.15 under the Complaints Resolved Category.

Are charter schools public or not?
The Committee on Education held a hearing on October 14 to receive testimony on B21-0115, the Public Charter School Fiscal Transparency Amendment Act of 2015. One member of the public testified that, “The first thing you could do is to classify these schools that are being funded with public dollars as public schools. I was astounded to read in the DC Code that:

(12) District of Columbia public school—

(A) In general—The term “District of Columbia public school” means a public school in the District of Columbia that offers classes:

(i) At any of the grade levels from prekindergarten through grade 12; or

(ii) Leading to a secondary school diploma, or its recognized equivalent.
(B) Exception—The term “District of Columbia public school” does not include a public

charter school.”

The above quoted part of the DC Code comes from Chapter 18 § 38-1800.02 Definitions. It makes a similar exception in defining the District of Columbia Government saying at (10)(B) “Exception.—The term “District of Columbia Government” neither includes the Authority nor a public charter school.” The DC Code can be read at www.dccouncil.us/dccode

Statement of caution on the use of Value Added Models

The American Educational Research Association issued a statement on November 11 advising caution “in the use of VAM for high-stakes testing.” The AERA, along with the American Psychological Association and the National Council on Measurement in Education, publishes the Standards for Education and Psychological Testing, considered the gold standard in guidance on testing. This statement followed a special issue of the AERA’s magazine, “Educational Researcher” in March 2015 focused solely on the topic of VAM. www.aera.net/newsroom

Washington City Paper finds a “Shadow Chancellor”
Jeffrey Anderson, in the December 11 issue, brought some of the background activity in school reform to the light of day and made a case that it is not the officially appointed DCPS chancellor who calls the shots in DC’s schools, rather District resident Katherine Bradley, head of the City Bridge Foundation and secretary of the Federal City Council, among many other activities, but is not an elected or appointed official in the DC government the author reports.

Long time, no contract see
The Washington Teacher blog reported on December 14, that DC teachers’ last contract expired in 2012. She writes that many were led to believe a proposal would be presented in December and disappointed when nothing materialized. www.thewashingtonteacher.blogspot.com

Editor’s note: Going forward, we will be looking into why it is that “By fourth grade, nearly 50 percent of Black and Latino males are reading below grade level.” If true, is it a failure in governance or something else? How can it be corrected, as it surely must be!

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Sarah Livingston, Publisher & Editor
202-207-8441
Ess.livingston@gmail.com
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