Duncan leads the charge
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NO ONE, and especially no teachers, should underestimate the significance of the presence of US Education Secretary Arne Duncan during Governor Patrick’s announcement Thursday of a major shift in education policy. Duncan’s sense of the state’s commitment to education reform will be key in deciding which portion, if any, of the roughly $4 billion in competitive federal grants ever reaches Massachusetts classrooms. And as the former head of the Chicago schools, Duncan knows precisely how teachers’ work rules can inhibit education.
It has been clear in recent weeks that Governor Patrick, Mayor Menino, and other leaders will no longer countenance chronically underperforming schools, even if it means warring with the teachers unions. Patrick is filing legislation that would raise the cap on union-free charter schools in the lowest-scoring 10 percent of school districts. The bill also creates a class of so-called Readiness Schools, where the state commissioner of education could waive collective bargaining provisions covering school schedules and staffing and other labor rules that could hamper a turnaround. Menino earlier filed a bill to create in-district charter schools that achieve the same goals while keeping the funding in the local school district. Currently, no more than 9 percent of a district’s net school spending can be transferred to support charters.
The precise configuration of the bills is less important than the fact that state leaders are focusing intensely on the low-income, bilingual, and minority students who badly lag their counterparts on statewide assessment tests. Duncan has been a ferocious advocate for such students. And a willingness to tackle the teachers unions has been his calling card.
Shortly before his appearance with Patrick at the Museum of Science, Duncan said he hopes to drive changes that will last for decades to come. Not everyone is on board. He noted he was booed during a July 2 speech to the National Education Association when he endorsed, among other reforms, some form of merit pay for teachers.
“Test scores alone should never drive evaluation, compensation, or tenure decisions,’’ Duncan told the group. “But to remove student achievement entirely from evaluation is illogical and indefensible.’’
Merit pay for effective teachers also deserves a place on Patrick’s education agenda.
Duncan met Thursday with several leaders of teachers unions. The meetings were cordial, according to Paul Toner, vice president of the Massachusetts Teachers Association. But Toner said union leaders still have “grave concerns’’ about any efforts to undo collective bargaining contracts.
Much graver, however, is the condition of the state’s poorest-performing schools.
