On Board Online • June 29, 2009

By Marc Humbert
Senior Writer

President Obama’s education secretary, Arne Duncan, has warned New York and other states they are at risk of losing out on funding from the $5 billion federal “Race to the Top” fund because they limit the number of charter school they allow.

In a conference call on June 8, Duncan said he wanted states to embrace charter schools. And, he said the 10 that didn’t have laws allowing charters and the 26 states with caps “put themselves at a disadvantage for the largest discretionary grant states have ever had access to.”

Duncan also said he would not look kindly on states that prohibit evaluating teachers based, in part, on student test scores. He singled out New York, California and Wisconsin which he said “have laws that create a firewall between student and teacher data.”

Not so, Regent Chancellor Merryl Tisch told On Board. “New York State has been very aggressive in outlining this as an outcome that we are moving toward, so I truly take exception to singling out New York State as dysfunctional,” she said. “I would encourage the secretary to become more familiar with what’s going on in New York State because I think he will be pleasantly surprised.”

Despite Duncan’s remarks, state Education Commissioner Richard P. Mills told On Board that he is confident New York is in a good position to win “Race to the Top” funds.

NYSSBA Executive Director Timothy G. Kremer is also optimistic. “New York has put high standards in place and been holding under-performing schools accountable,” Kremer said. “That puts us ahead of a lot of other states. We’re moving closer to a value-added data system that would look at student data broken down by teacher.”

In any event, New York shouldn’t be unduly influenced by Duncan’s remarks, said Mills, who is retiring June 30.

“The ‘Race to the Top’ is important,” he said. “I think New York should win, will win, but it is a temporary opportunity. A year from now, that will be all a settled matter. It’s worth $5 billion in total. New York spends $5 billion in a matter of weeks around here. We need to keep things in perspective.”

Regarding charter schools, Tisch said, “I would urge the officials in Washington to look at New York State not only as a pioneer, but as a state that has proceeded thoughtfully in opening of charter schools and in the expansion of the movement.”

She said it is unfair for Duncan to compare New York to states in which caps “are used to frankly prohibit charter schools.”

She noted that the Regents are planning a study of how charters have functioned over the past decade. “By the time we bump up against the cap, we’ll have data points by which to make a reasoned recommendation to the Legislature about how to move the cap.”

Since New York’s charter law was approved in 1998, the state has capped the number of charter schools allowed. The initial cap was 100, and grew to 200 in 2007.

There are still 49 charters that could be awarded within the 200-school cap, according to Peter Murphy, director of policy and communications for the New York Charter Schools Association.

Removing the cap would require action by the Legislature. Gov. David Paterson has indicated past support for eliminating the cap, and so have some key Democrats and many Republicans in the state Senate. But few expect change because the notion has not been embraced by Democrats who rule the state Assembly.

Richard Iannuzzi, president of New York State United Teachers, said state leaders would be making a mistake if they lifted the charter school cap.

“Right now the cap, in New York anyway, provides the only semblance of accountability,” he told On Board.

Besides, Iannuzzi said, recent comments from Duncan suggest that the secretary may be refining his position. In a June 22 speech to charter school advocates, Duncan warned that “the charter movement is putting itself at risk by allowing too many second-rate and third-rate schools to exist. Your goal should be quality, not quantity.”

On the issue of linking student performance to individual teachers, both Mills and newly elected Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch have said they favor some sort of linkage, although not necessarily for use in decisions about tenure and merit pay bonuses.

“To fail to link student achievement to individual teachers is to deny us a tremendous amount of tradecraft, practical information about what works,” Mills told On Board.

Iannuzzi of NYSUT said Duncan may have gotten the wrong impression about what is possible in New York in analyzing student data by teacher. “I think the secretary is misreading the language that he is centering on,” he said. “The language in New York dealt only with the granting of tenure and student test scores as the determining factor.”

Iannuzzi added: “When we get out of that language, there is obviously a lot to be said about the value of understanding data and interpreting data and realizing that data can identify quality teaching.”

State testing data could and should be used to identify good teaching practices that can then be replicated, Iannuzzi said. He said it should also be used to identify teachers that are struggling so they can get help to improve their performance.