Marcum Made his Mark in Marion

This from the Lebanon Enterprise:

Roger Marcum didn’t receive a very warm welcome when he was hired to be the Marion County Superintendent in 1999.

In fact, some people were downright cold to him.

Marcum vividly remembers the night the Marion County Board of Education hired him. At least 100 or more people had gathered in support of another candidate and the atmosphere was unpleasant, to say the least. His wife, Bobbie, came with him to the meeting, and as they drove home that night he noticed tears streaming down her face.

“They don’t seem to want us there,” she said.

But, a gut feeling told Marcum that Marion County was where he was meant to be. While he was a superintendent candidate finalist in two other counties at the time, Clark and Franklin, something was calling him to Marion County.

“This felt right,” he said. “I can’t explain it. But, I felt that this was a community that was hungry to move forward and they wanted the school district to help lead them.”

Under his leadership the Marion County School District’s student achievement has improved tremendously. Today, Marion County is No. 31 out of 175 school districts in the state, putting it in the top 20 percent of all Kentucky school districts.

So, as he prepares to leave Marion County and retire this year, it’s no surprise that many people don’t want to see him go...

CATS Reaction Across the State

Senate Bill 1 could be signed into law today as across the state folks are coming to grips with what all this means.

"I believe there are several positive elements that could represent an important step forward in our ongoing efforts to reform primary and secondary education. Most significantly, this legislation will create a new system for statewide accountability and assessment that will, for the first time, measure individual student progress over an extended period of time. That is critically important,” Beshear said in a statement.

Politically, some wonder anew if House Speaker Greg Stumbo's rookies should be faulted for the surprise abandonment of accountability over the next three years. Was this a phantom provision, dropped into the free conference report at the last minute? If so, how, and by whom? Or was it a provision that all conferees agreed to with eyes wide open?

"It's an outstanding bill that will make great improvements and will honor the input that we've received from our educators," Rep. Harry Moberly, D-Richmond [told the Herald-Leader].

Republican Sen. Dan Kelly of Springfield, a longtime proponent of changing Kentucky's assessment tools, said the bill would strengthen Kentucky's education system, not weaken it. "This is not the death of reform," Kelly said.

By all accounts, there was a great deal of input from teachers who had had enough....of something. Some clearly reacted to the amount of time they were being "asked" to commit to assessment at the expense of instruction. After all, you don't fatten a calf by weighing it. Some claimed that district personnel and principals had pushed teachers to the edge of some ethical cliff, and they pushed back.

Kelly's assurance that this does not mark the death of education reform in Kentucky is a welcome acknowledgement for those of us who believe a strong system of public schools is essential to our ability to compete as a state. But not all conservatives are buying it. Over at vere loqui, Martin Cothran declared that with the removal of the testing system KERA is officially dead and asked,

Will the last person out of Kentucky's Education Reform Headquarters please turn off the lights?

At KentuckyProgress, David Adams noted "the end of a disastrous episode in education 'reform'" and "got a kick out of "the Courier Journal referring to Bluegrass Institute as merely a "right-wing think-tank" (when everybody knows they are so much more). He thanked the Herald Leader for the "big laugh and free mention" when they referred to "conservative enemies" which Adams correctly assumed meant BIPPS, even though H-L didn't say.

None of the conservative groups came right out and said that Kelly was wrong. But they apparently believe he was.

The Herald-Leader lamented that as "lawmakers were dismantling Kentucky's school-accountability system last week, researchers were holding it up as a national model" citing Kentucky as one of five states that stand out for increasing high-school graduation rates while reducing schools that are "dropout factories." "It's impossible to not credit the Kentucky Education Reform Act for improvements in graduation rates," the H-L wrote.

Secretary of State Trey Grayson issued a statement voicing his dismay over the reduction of emphasis on social studies.

“By suspending the state accountability index and following the federal accountability requirements, we run the risk of marginalizing civics education,” he said in the statement. “With no accountability system in place for social studies, schools will naturally place a greater focus on those subjects that are part of accountability standards of No Child Left Behind.”

It now falls to the Kentucky Board of Education to guide KDE's response to Senate Bill 1. They start chatting on April 1st.

In the interim, some school districts, like Fayette County, are going to "make public its own 'academic index' based on this spring's testing, whether the state publishes a performance index or not." State education department spokeswoman Lisa Gross told the Herald-Leader the interim provisions in SB 1 might lead to widespread confusion until the new assessment system starts. Wayne Young, executive director of the Kentucky Association of School Administrators told H-L, "Some districts are going to go ahead and finish their portfolios. But you could get a bit of everything. There's no pattern that I would describe."

This morning outgoing President of the Council for Better Education Roger Marcum told state education leaders in an email message that Kentucky "chose the path of least resistance and the high risk of lower expectations for the immediate future."

His opinion echoed that of Prichard Committee head Bob Sexton who wrote an open letter posted on the Prichard blog,

It was decided that, for the next three years starting this spring, Kentucky schools should have no accountability except for student test scores on math and reading as required by No Child Left Behind. This means that the results of testing for writing (portfolios included) science, history, geography, economics, civics (i.e., social studies) and the arts won't be counted. The Kentucky Department of Education is also prohibited from publishing an overall school improvement score (accountability index) so schools won't know whether they are better or worse than the previous year - and neither will parents or other taxpayers.

Sexton quoted KEA President Sharron Oxendine as saying, "we should 'just give everybody a breather' from most accountability until we have a new system in three years."

The problems with that, according to Sexton include:

1. For the next three years schools won't have a way of telling parents and other taxpayers how they're progressing with student learning except in math and reading required by NCLB.
2. A likely result will be to de-emphasize writing, science, social studies (history, economics, geography, civics) and the arts.
3. Strong accountability ... and making the case for adequate or superior school funding are joined at the hip.

This last point has some serious legal implications for schools. Kentucky's constitution requires the General Assembly to provide an efficient system of common schools throughout the commonwealth. The Supreme Court has ruled that that means schools must be adequately funded to reach their goals. The absence of state accountability makes it very difficult, if not impossible, for a court to determine whether the General Assembly has fulfilled its obligation. How is a court to determine whether the system is sufficiently funded to reach its goals if the state has no justiciable standards by which the court might measure the efficiency of the system?

CBE REPORT: KENTUCKY IS NOT ON TRACK FOR HIGH SCHOOL PROFICIENCY

The Council for Better Education, based on testing results released today, has expressed grave concern that Kentucky is not on track to deliver proficient high school graduates and provide an efficient system of common schools by 2014.

In a report released today and available at http://www.kycbe.com/, the Council notes that average student performance declined at almost half of Kentucky high schools from 2007 to 2008. At another third, scores improved, but at a pace too slow to reach statewide proficiency goals by 2014. Only one high school in six improved student work enough to meet those state goals on schedule.

The Council also found that results by group either declined or improved too slowly to meet state goals. Female and white students showed weak progress, as did students who participated in the free-and-reduced-price lunch program. Results declined for male students, for African-American, Hispanic, and Asian students, for students who did not participate in the lunch program, and for students both with and without disabilities.

Roger Marcum, the Council’s president, addressed the results, saying: “These are very disturbing results. We urge all CBE members to take strong action to change these trends, and we call on the General Assembly and other state leaders, as well as the citizens of the Commonwealth, to ensure that our schools and districts have the resources and support they need to deliver student proficiency by 2014. Our children’s futures and our shared future as a state are in danger if we do not deliver for each and every child in the coming years.”

The Council for Better Education represents 168 of Kentucky’s 174 school districts in efforts to ensure full implementation of Kentucky’s constitutional commitment to our students and our common schools.

SOURCE: CBE press release

Last Year for CBE President Marcum

This from the Lebanon Enterprise:

Superintendent Roger Marcum

announces his intent to retire in 2009

Marion County Superintendent [and President of the Council for Better Education] Roger Marcum announced his intent to retire next year during the Marion County Board of Education's regular monthly meeting Tuesday evening, July 8.

The 2008-09 school year will be Marcum's 10th year of service as
superintendent and will conclude 34 years as a Kentucky public school educator.

"While those years have been rewarding and personally satisfying, they have also been very challenging with great demands physically, mentally and emotionally," Marcum said during Tuesday night's meeting. "Upon retirement, I plan to seek other opportunities to continue my career in education."

Marcum's retirement will become effective June 30, 2009.

"I'm very proud of what we've been able to accomplish together especially in a time of decreasing and inadequate resources," Marcum said.

Beginning immediately, the Marion County Board of Education will begin the process of selecting a new superintendent.

"With the turnover of 33 of the 174 superintendents in Kentucky this year and with much the same predicted to happen in this coming school year the demand for quality superintendents is extremely high and the supply is very low," Marcum said.

"By announcing my intent to retire tonight I am providing the Marion County Board of Education a full year to conduct their search." ...

Council for Better Education Budget Analysis

When adjusted for inflation, the costs associated with running Kentucky's schools eat into the 2008-09 budget leaving a net loss to the schools of $171 million. ($2 million less unadjusted) This from an analysis by the Counci for Better Education.

Districts see losses in buying power is several areas:

 The state share of the SEEK Base guarantee
 Transportation

 Vocational trans portation
 State-operated Vocational Schools
 Kentucky Teachers Retirement System (counting both line items)
 Preschool
 Professional Development
 Safe Schools
 Family Resource and Youth Service Centers (counting both line items)
 Textbooks Program
 Early Reading/Read to Achieve
 Gifted and Talented
 State Agency Children Program
 KDE Operations (estimated)
 ACT and WorkKeys Testing
 CATS Testing
 Mathematics Achievement Fund
 Commonwealth. School Improvement Fund
 Highly Skilled Educator Program
 Debt service
 KETS
 Joint Technology. Initiative (estimated)
 Education Professional Standards Board
 School Facilities Construction. Commission

That compares to several areas where buying power increases:

 The state share of Tier 1 equalization
 The state share of facilities equalization
 Nationally Certified Teachers
 Kentucky School for the Deaf
 Kentucky School for the Blind
 Health Insurance

The complete budget legislation is available for download at http://www.lrc.ky.gov/record/08RS/HB406.htm.

Click the blue link that says “HB 406” to download the Word Document. Search for “D. Department” as a shortcut to find the P-12 provisions.

SOURCE: Council for Better Education President Roger Marcum.

C-J calls Draud "pathetic" "wimp"

Here's the problem:

CATS is the right idea, sometimes done badly.

Keeping a reasonable amount of pressure on the schools to perform is a good thing for children. We need a uniform, accurate and stable accounting of student progress over time - including improved accounting of dropouts. There is a place for normative assessment within CATS, mostly because parents need it. But we should never surrender Kentucky's curriculum by outsourcing it to an out-of-state vendor. And, anytime schools have to derive one of their two scores from a concordance table - to see what they would have scored on a test their students didn't take - look out! CATS still needs work. There is much to talk about.

Senate Bill 1 doesn't fix the problem and should be scraped in the House.

C-J is correct to suggest that grandstanding against school reform has become a cottage industry in Kentucky. Citizens should remain aware that many critics of school reform have as their abiding motivation the desire to siphon off public funds for private school efforts like charter schools and vouchers. In that sense, they are anti-public schools. Every negative data point, no matter how minuscule, is apparently blown into grand proportions in their minds. Not exactly high-minded - it 's just their best chance to get their hands on the cash.

So, where does that leave the state assessment?

It needs study and revision - and that is exactly what Commissioner Draud (who cautioned against the partisan politics that has now emerged) advocated and gets taken to the woodshed for in today's editorial in C-J. They seem to like the idea of a "task force involving all the stakeholders," but it sounds like C-J would feel better if they knew the deck was stacked. The process should not be poisoned in advance.

We need a public conversation, but let's keep it real.

This from the Courier-Journal:

Stalwarts and wimps

What a difference a new administration makes. Does anyone doubt that Ernie Fletcher would have signed something like Senate Bill 1, if Majority Leader Dan Kelly and Senate President David Williams had managed to get the thing passed?

It's supposed to be the Senate GOP honchos' top priority, although they have treated it like just another opportunity to grandstand against school reform. It's a favorite of those who would like to discredit the public schools and de-legitimize teacher organizations, in order to open the way for publicly financed private school vouchers.

The good news is that Steve Beshear, not Ernie Fletcher, is governor now, and he promised to veto any such bill. He could have done a David Williams number and sniffed that he "found little interest" in SB 1. Instead, he laid out the specific reasons -- shared broadly in the education community -- for opposing this very bad bill.

Taking a stand with him was House budget chairman Harry Moberly, D-Richmond, who predicted after the Governor's press conference that the legislation won't make
it out of the House.

Also standing tall was Education Secretary Helen Mountjoy, a widely admired advocate whom Mr. Williams has treated shabbily. Alongside, figuratively, stood Robert Sexton, head of the Prichard Committee, who warned the Senate was heading toward "lower standards."

Also standing up against SB 1 was Roger Marcum, president of the Kentucky Association of School Superintendents, who sensibly says educators should be involved in solving any problems with the Commonwealth Accountability Testing System (CATS), which SB 1 would replace with cheaper, off-the-shelf, one-size-fits-all testing that isn't based on Kentucky curriculum, doesn't get at the range of critical
thinking skills and capacities, and would subvert the teaching of the all-important capstone skill, writing.

Teacher groups stood up, too, and a spokesman for the Kentucky Education Association would have testified strongly against SB 1 yesterday, but the committee "just ran out of time" to hear from the organization that includes most of the state's front-line educators. Just outrageous. Shame on Senate education committee chairman Ken Winters, D-Murray, and the leaders of his caucus.

Which brings us to Education Commissioner Jon Draud -- conspicuous in his refusal to take a position. He had an opportunity to show he's not a Senate leadership flunkie or a right-wing plant. Instead, he took refuge in an "on-the-one-hand, on-the-other-hand" wimp out. Just pathetic.

There are ways to approach improving the Kentucky school reform, such as House Joint Resolution 165's mandate for a study of teacher pay, or a gubernatorial task force involving all the stakeholders. But SB 1 is a joke, and that's how Senate leaders have treated it.

KBE still on the fast track, loses candidate

Raviya Ismail reports for the Herald-Leader...

Semifinalist for education post pulls out

MARION COUNTY SCHOOLS CHIEF CITES
ISSUE OF FAMILY TIME

Marion County schools Superintendent Roger Marcum has pulled out of the race for state education commissioner. Marcum, president of the state superintendents' association, was one of about nine semifinalists for the job...

...Marcum said he wanted to spend more time with his family and continue work as an education administrator on the local level.

"But (withdrawing) had nothing to do with the process or anything else. It was entirely about me," he said. "All my dealings with the Kentucky Board of Education on this have been very professional." ... ["I believe I was doing this because so many folks throughout the state encouraged me to do so, but it never felt right."]

..."There are still some very strong candidates," said board Chairman Joe Brothers, who was notified of Marcum's decision Monday....

Marcum's name was immediately mentioned by educators as a quality candidate once the board refocused their search on Kentucky candidates. But there were also rumors alleging that Senate President David Williams had declared him an unacceptable candidate because of his presidency of the Council for Better Education, which sued Williams and the General Assembly claiming the legislature had failed in its duty to provide adequately funded schools. It was unclear what impact Williams' concern might have had on a board of education appointed by Governor Ernie Fletcher, but it surely would have had some impact.

Meanwhile, the Kentucky Board of Education is still on the fast track and plans to name a commissioner before any change in the governor's office might occur. The current plan is to announce three finalists around October 28th and select a couple of weeks later, on November 13th.

Kentucky Association of School Administrators Executive Director Wayne Young regretted the loss of Marcum from consideration. He told H-L Marcum was "a top-notch candidate. ... I hate to hear that we lost one of our own from that search."

KSN&C regrets Marcum's withdrawal as well.

Education reform could be a challenge for state's next governor

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) - Longtime superintendent Jack Moreland ranks the state's 1990 education reform law as the “high water mark” for Kentucky public education. In more recent times, he said, the state's commitment to schools has wavered somewhat, which worries him.

“The powers that be, whoever that is, will have to take a strong look at revitalizing that commitment, or we're going to wind up being an also-ran,” said Moreland, superintendent of the Covington Independent school system in northern Kentucky.

Moreland and other educators say the winner of Kentucky's Nov. 6 gubernatorial election will face plenty of challenges to fully restore the momentum of the early and mid-1990s in those heady days when the Kentucky Education Reform Act was enacted and implemented.

Republican Gov. Ernie Fletcher, who is seeking re-election, and Democratic challenger Steve Beshear laid out their plans to improve education in responding to an AP questionnaire.

Moreland said the state should put more emphasis on early childhood education and review the school-aid formula and accountability system. Most issues boil down to money, and schools need more of it to meet lofty expectations for student performance, he said.In 1994, 48 percent of the state's general fund budget went to the kindergarten-through-12th grade public system, according to the state Department of Education. By 2002, the percentage of state assistance had slipped to 41 percent, but was up to 44 percent this year.

Fletcher, meanwhile, touts higher state education funding, improved teacher salaries and better student test scores as accomplishments during his first term.“This funding has not just gone blindly into the system, but to establish better tools of accountability,” Fletcher said, adding it will help parents track their children's performance and enable educators to intervene with struggling students “before it's too late.”

Beshear said his goal is to make preschool available to every 3- or 4-year-old Kentucky child on a voluntary basis. Currently, the state limits its preschool funding to those children meeting disability or family income guidelines.Beshear initially wants to raise income qualifications to 200 percent of the federal poverty level - or $41,300 for a family of four - so more Kentuckians can enroll their children in a state-subsidized, half-day preschool program. He eventually wants to make it available to children from higher-income families, which would pay fees on a sliding scale.Beshear also said he wants to “redesign high schools,” providing more opportunities for students to take advanced placement courses while enhancing education standards and developing early interventions for students deemed dropout risks.

“We need more kids graduating from high school, and with higher skill sets and more sophisticated levels of learning,” Beshear said.Beshear said he wants to help larger schools convert to smaller “schools within schools,” saying that students “learn better in smaller schools and smaller classrooms.”

Fletcher and Beshear disagree on whether to single out certain teachers for bonuses.“I have proposed additional teacher compensation that rewards teachers for doing additional work to improve student achievement,” Fletcher said.

In this year's General Assembly session, Fletcher backed legislation that would have provided cash bonuses to teachers whose students did well in AP exams in calculus, physics and chemistry, as well as incentives for such teachers with high scores on certification tests. The legislation failed to win final passage.

Fletcher said he supports tuition assistance for teachers going back to school to become accredited in certain subjects, or tuition forgiveness for teachers working in those subjects.Beshear took a different approach, saying that “valuing the subjects taught by teachers differently in terms of pay seems to create more problems than it solves.”

Beshear said he wants to expand distance learning and called for a comprehensive review to make the education system more efficient by updating and revamping outdated programs.

Fletcher also touted the “Read to Achieve” program championed by his wife, Glenna. He said the reading-assistance efforts are “creating wonderful success stories. The governor said another goal is for teacher pay in Kentucky to gain parity with surrounding states.There have been signs of improvement in Kentucky education in recent years.

Since 1999, Kentucky students have shown across-the-board improvement in reading and math, based on higher scores in the Commonwealth Accountability Testing System, or CATS.Kentucky fourth- and eighth-grade reading scores have been outperforming the national average. In math, the Kentucky scores have improved but lag behind the national average.“In math, we've got a lot of work to do, and we know that,” said Lisa Gross, a state Department of Education spokeswoman.Scores on the American College Test improved slightly for Kentucky high school seniors who started college this fall, but the state average of 20.7 was below the 21.2 national average.

Still, Marion County schools Superintendent Roger Marcum worries Kentucky has lost momentum of the early to mid-1990s, when he said KERA put the state at the national forefront.“Since that time, we have not been progressing,” he said. “And anytime you are not progressing, you're usually going backward.”

Marcum agrees the current state budget was the best in some time for education, but said much of the additional money went for salary increases, health care and retirement benefits.

Improved pay and benefits are important to retain and attract teachers, he said, but added, “To what extent does that provide services for children?”

Marcum said he considers education at a crossroads in Kentucky, and that policymakers need to restore state funding to levels in the years right after KERA was written.“We're either going to begin to move forward again, or we're going to continue to go backward. And we can't afford that,” he said. “Our kids have one opportunity at a quality education. Once they pass through school, if they don't get it, guess what, they never will.”

This from the Murray Ledger & Times.

Flash Poll #1: The results are in

The results of the first KSN&C Flash Poll are in. And what did we learn? Well, nothing really.

Disclaimer: Respondents were a subset of self-selected, opportunistic, non-random readers of Kentucky School News and Commentary who chose to offer an opinion. I'm not certain that visitors are limited by the program to one vote a piece. KSN&C visitors may not represent the average Kentuckian. (In fact, I have reason to believe they may be much more intelligent than the average human being.) This poll is so unscientific and insecure that the results shouldn't even be reported for fear that those who care about quality of research might run screaming from the room.

Fortunately for you, that's a risk I'm willing to take.

Drum roll please........

The question was:

"Who would you accept as the next Kentucky Education Commissioner?"

Respondents were invited to select more than one candidate. That allowed lots of wiggle room but was an attempt to allow for the possibility that more than one person might be both qualified and acceptable.

And the winner is...

None of them n=36 (53%)

Penny Sanders (OEA) n=14 (20%)

Roger Marcum (Marion) n=12 (17%)

Stu Silberman (Fayette) n=12 (17%)

Blake Heselton (Oldham) n=9 (13%)

Dale Brown (BG) n=5 (7%)

Leon Mooneyhan (Shelby) n=5 (7%)

Mitchell Chester (Ohio) n=5 (7%)

Linda France (KDE) n=3 (4%)

Fred Bassett (Beechwood) n=3 (4%)

Conclusions:

• Most people want somebody other than whoever you want.
• Most respondents prefer a candidate from outside Kentucky (or perhaps a Kentucky candidate who nobody's talking about and whose name did not make the list).
• Despite the first botched national search, most respondents seem to prefer risking another one rather than settling for the-devil-they-know.
• Among Kentucky candidates, Penny Sanders was acceptable to more respondents than other candidates....followed by Roger Marcum and Stu Silberman (who is not a candidate).

AP confuses quote - No change in Silberman status

This afternoon WKYT apparently picked up an erroneous quote from the Associated Press. I don't know if it made their noon news broadcast or not.

At 12:05 WKYT reported: "Superintendent Stu Silberman says he's not interested, but would strongly consider the post should it be offered."

Silberman told Kentucky School News and Commentary the quote IS NOT CORRECT.

Silberman believes his actual quote, and one from Roger Marcum may have become confused at some point in the reporting process.

Silberman told KSN&C, "I am going to stick to the commitment I made to the community...I do feel we are on the right track here but we still have a very long way to go."
~
The correction was made at WKYT at 3:08PM on a new link. Hopefully they will kill the old one.

Commissioner Chatter

Stu said No. Roger says maybe.

Board members met Saturday for a special meeting and decided they wanted a Kentuckian for the Commissioner's job. Fayette County schools Superintendent Stu Silberman is not interested in becoming state education commissioner, but Marion County Superintendent Roger Marcum said he would strongly consider it.

...Marcum, who is president of the state's superintendent association, said he was contacted during the first search but wasn't sure if he wanted to take on the task. But after watching the controversy with Erwin unfold, he's rethinking his stance.

"It just reaffirms to me that we've got some folks in Kentucky that are very capable of providing that kind of leadership," Marcum said. "I hope this time we find the right person."

Marcum also heads the Council for Better Education, a group representing most of the state's 175 school districts, which sued the legislature in 2003 for failing to adequately fund Kentucky schools. In February, a Franklin Circuit Court judge sided with the legislature. The CBE originally asked the case to go to trial, but recently dropped the lawsuit.

In addition to Silberman, Marcum suggested Warren County Superintendent Dale Brown and Blake Haselton, executive director of the Kentucky Association of School Superintendents, as noteworthy candidates.

This from the Herald-Leader.

Officials: School funding suit over

Superintendents won't appeal

As previously reported, the Council for Better Education - a coalition of 164 (of 175) school districts in Kentucky - has decided not to appeal a ruling by Franklin County Circuit Judge Thomas Wingate. This brings to an end the conjoined school funding cases CBE v Williams and Young v Williams.

Council President Roger Marcum said, however, that the group "will continue to lead efforts for adequate resources" for all Kentucky students.

"Our members continue to believe that Kentucky's academic progress is too slow," said Marcum, who added that the lawsuit kept "the issue on the front burner."

...Marcum -- superintendent of the Marion County school system -- left open the possibility of a future lawsuit...

The case was a followup to the Kentucky Supreme Court's landmark decision in Rose v Council for Better Education, in 1989, which has since been used nationally as precedent in more than three hundred cases. In Rose, inequities and inadequacies in the system prompted the court to declare the entire system of schools to be unconstitutional. That resulted in a re-working of Kentucky's school laws under the name, Kentucky Education Reform Act, or HB 940, which was signed by Governor Wilkinson in 1990.

But the Kentucky constitution contains particularly strong separation of powers language and the courts are reticent to direct the legislature to do anything in particular. This seems to be where Young v. Williams ran into trouble. When the Council asked the court to direct the legislature to use a “specific, systematic method to quantify the amount of money necessary to provide an adequate system of common schools,” Judge Wingate said they went over the line and he responded with a summary judgment for the defense.

After Wingate's ruling, the council filed a motion asking him to reconsider. He denied the motion May 30.

...He said it was not the court's role to dictate to the legislature a specific method for determining whether the schools are being adequately funded. And he said the legislature's method of using rising test scores as proof that schools are being adequately funded is constitutional.

As KSBA reported, the Council decided against an appeal since the best result would only continue the lawsuit.

“If we appeal, the result will not be for the Court of Appeals or the Supreme Court to say, ‘You win, you get more money.’ It would only be to rule in whether to have a trial,” attorney Byron Leet of Wyatt, Tarrant & Combs said. “A successful appeal would take at least two years to get back to Franklin Circuit Court through the Court of Appeals and Supreme Court.”

Leet and Marcum pointed to a bright side to Wingate’s ruling. “Judge Wingate said there is a genuine question about whether the legislature is meeting its constitutional obligation, and that’s a decision for a court to make,” Leet said. “He rejected the defendants’ argument that they were immune from being sued and left the door open for the council or someone else to come back to the court in the future.

Indeed, in the Rose case, the court ruled the system unconstitutional, but stopped short of telling the legislature how to fix it.

Wingate’s rejection of the Council’s legal theory in Young was, consistent with Rose, a stark refusal to step “onto the slippery slope by stipulating the manner by which the General Assembly must carry out its responsibilities.”

It now appears the only viable option for the Council for Better Education is to monitor the legislature to see if they will - despite a long history to the contrary - provide a level of support for the schools that will allow Kentuckly students to achieve the state's goals. Failing that, CBE may need to file a new case, with a new legal strategy.

In the meantime - despite widespread acknowledgement that the present system is underfunded by hundreds of million dollars - Wingate’s ruling will only reinforce the legislature’s natural tendency maintain the status quo.

What NOBODY wants to talk about is the legislature's other option. The General Assembly is empowered by the constitution to maintain present funding levels and simply lower the state's goals. If that were to occur, it would produce a crippling workforce circumstance that would harm the state for decades to come.

This from the Courier-Journal.

Big News on the School Funding Front

Did I mention it was bad news?

What follows are two articles on Judge Thomas Wingate's ruling in Franklin County Circuit Court...


KY. SCHOOL LEADERS' SUIT DISMISSED - SUPERINTENDENTS SOUGHT 'ADEQUATE' STATE FUNDING

Lexington Herald-Leader (KY)
February 14, 2007
Author: Raviya H. Ismail and Art JesterHerald-Leader Education Writers

A Franklin Circuit Court judge ruled yesterday that a group of school superintendents had failed to prove that the General Assembly violated the state Constitution by inadequately funding the state's public schools.

In the state's most important school finance case since the reform of Kentucky's public schools in 1990, Judge Thomas D. Wingate issued a summary judgment in favor of the legislature and said the issue of adequate funding should be resolved by lawmakers, not the courts. "Ultimately, increases in education funding must be the product of political will, not judicial decree," Wingate said in a 22-page opinion.Wingate said the plaintiffs, The Council for Better Education, had not provided "objective evidence of shortcomings in Kentucky's education system." Because the plaintiffs had not established that there was a clear constitutional violation, the court should not dictate how the legislature should appropriate money for the public schools, Wingate said."This court will leave the legislating to the legislature and hope that the citizens of Kentucky fortify it with the will to strengthen education for future generations of Kentuckians," he said.

The Council for Better Education had built its case on the historic ruling in the Rose case of 1989, which paved the way for the sweeping Kentucky Education Reform Act of 1990. In the Rose case, Kentucky's Supreme Court, led by then-Chief Justice Robert Stephens, concluded that the legislature's support of the public schools was inadequate and therefore unconstitutional.In the recent lawsuit, the plaintiffs, a group of superintendents, claimed that funding of Kentucky's schools is "inadequate and arbitrarily determined by the legislature." The plaintiffs based their claim on the Rose decision, where the Kentucky Supreme Court eventually ruled that "the General Assembly shall provide funding which is sufficient to provide each child in Kentucky an adequate education."

There are 164 school districts of a total 175 that belong to the Council for Better Education. The suit claimed Kentucky schools were underfunded from between $1.08 billion to $1.2 billion in the 2003-2004 school year, and underfunded in other years.

The legislature's two top leaders -- Senate President David Williams, R-Burkesville, and House Speaker Jody Richards, D-Bowling Green -- were named defendants in the suit."It vindicates our position that we have made an attempt to adequately fund education," said Richards. " Do I think it's funded well enough? No, I do not."

The defendants refuted the allegations and argued that the state's Constitution "prohibits the judiciary from dictating to the legislature what levels of funding are appropriate and what process to use to determine how much funding education requires."In the ruling, Wingate found that the Council for Better Education had no evidence "relating to the actual nature of school system inadequacy or poor student performance."

The ruling concluded that the General Assembly "has created a system of common schools with tremendously enhanced results" and "KERA has produced dramatic progress toward excellence in public education."

"The determination of adequacy must be based on objective outputs, such as the CATS testing scores and our performance relative to neighboring states," the ruling continued.

Marion County Schools Superintendent Roger L. Marcum, president of the Council for Better Education, said the ruling was disappointing and far from the outcome the group expected. The group wouldn't say whether they planned to appeal the decision."Kentucky has made a lot of progress in improving student achievement," he said. "We are ignoring the fact that a lot of that progress has been made from students that are least at risk. You're going to see that there are many subpopulations that we are not reaching and they are not moving forward toward proficiency. You can see that in a number of schools in the state, in a number of districts."

What surprised Bob Sexton most was the language of the ruling."Many of the legislative leaders are regularly claiming that (KERA) is a failure," said Sexton, executive director of the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence. "I'm surprised by some of the language (in the ruling) that essentially says the schools are doing so well. I just find this whole thing to be inconsistent to what I'm hearing from legislators."


Edition: FinalSection: Main NewsPage: A1
Copyright (c) 2007 Lexington Herald-Leader
Record Number: 0702140002


And this...

Courier-Journal, The (Louisville, KY)
February 14, 2007
Author: Nancy C. Rodriguez

State's neediest students ill-served, coalition says

A coalition of Kentucky school districts lost its legal bid yesterday to force state lawmakers to spend more money on public schools.But educators in the failed lawsuit said that their fight is not over and that without additional funding, they will never be able to serve some of Kentucky's neediest students.

The Council for Better Education filed suit in 2003, accusing the legislature of inadequately funding public schools. It asked the court to order lawmakers to direct hundred of millions more dollars into Kentucky classrooms.The state spends about $4.1 billion a year on education.

Marion County Superintendent Roger Marcum, the council's president, called the ruling "disappointing" and said the council might ask Franklin Circuit Judge Thomas Wingate to reconsider his opinion or appeal to a higher court."I can assure you this is not the end of the line for us," Marcum said.

In 1985, the council filed a similar lawsuit that resulted in the state's school-funding system being declared unconstitutional and paved the way for sweeping education reform in 1990.But unlike that case, which focused on funding inequities, the latest lawsuit focused on whether districts were receiving adequate funding to teach every student the skills and knowledge necessary to meet Kentucky's education standards.

Wingate ruled that funding for Kentucky's schools wasn't "so inadequate that it amounts to a violation ... of the constitution."He said it's not the court's role to tell the legislature the specific method to use to determine if schools are being adequately funded.And he said the legislature's method of using rising test scores as proof that schools are being adequately funded is constitutional.

Method questioned

Wingate said, however, that it was "puzzling" why the legislature has not developed a different method of determining whether eSchools Lose Suit to Boost Funding

ducation is adequately funded."We do not know why, despite over a decade of requests from interested citizen groups and the Office of Educational Accountability, the General Assembly has yet to commission a study of its own to determine whether its funding levels for education are adequate," Wingate wrote. "... Perhaps it is afraid of the results that study will produce."

Marcum said, "We feel the issue about adequate funding is still something that needs to be addressed. " He added that without additional funding it will be "difficult, if not impossible" for schools to meet ambitious student achievement goals by the state's 2014 deadline.

Marcum said it is unfortunate that schools are being "penalized" for making gains and argued that while progress has been made, the state's neediest students are still in dire need of additional services."The students that are most at risk are the ones we still have not reached," he said, noting test scores that show low performance among low-income, minority and special-education students. "The reform was about proficiency for all."

Legislative reaction

But Mark Overstreet, the attorney representing Senate President David Williams and House Speaker Jody Richards, said the ruling was "a well-reasoned decision.""And it recognizes the hard work that the General Assembly has done over the 16 years since" the state passed education reform.

Richards, who recently announced he is seeking the Democratic nomination for governor, said last night that he agreed with the ruling."We have made some great progress since the reform act was enacted," Richards said. "I don't think we've done well enough. It certainly is my goal and my intent to fund education better in the future. "

Richards said that cost increases for the Medicaid program and state prison system hampered the legislature's ability to fund public schools since the education reform act was passed.Asked why the legislature did not raise taxes to raise money for schools in that period, Richards said: "The citizens generally don't want taxes raised."

Marcum acknowledged the legislature's efforts last year to increase school funding, saying it was "better than it has been in some time ." But most of those increases went toward salaries, health insurance and retirements costs, he said."It does not provide additional resources for kids," he said.


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