Educators' Reaction Mixed to Reform Legislation

As of Saturday, April 28, 2012

If state Sen. Jerry Tillman has his way, tenure for public school teachers will end, the school year will increase by a week, and third-graders will be held back until they attend summer reading camps if they fail to meet reading requirements.

Tillman is one of two senators co-sponsoring a bill filed last week by Senate President Phil Berger that would include those changes and more.

The proposed legislation involves significant alterations in the way the school system operates. Known as Senate Bill 795, the act passed its first reading last week and was referred to the committee on education and higher education. Tillman, a retired school administrator, is one of three co-chairmen on that committee.

“Our schools have been languishing for years,” said Tillman, an Archdale Republican who will represent Moore County in District 29 following redistricting if he wins the May 8 Republican primary election. “I don’t mean to blame any party, but for 140 years, Republicans didn’t have control and had no chance to put any real imprint into education. Those of us who sponsored the bill said that we have to do something, since for years we have not been doing anything different to improve our schools.”

Last year the state was 49th in spending, Tillman said, “and this year we managed to move up to 42nd in per pupil spending. I’m not bragging on being 42nd, but at least we are doing something.”

The proposed legislation is written to:

Improve K-3 literacy
Adjust the school calendar start and end dates
End tenure for teachers and establish plans for pay for excellence
Fund five additional instructional days within the existing school calendar.

Moore County Schools Superintendent Aaron Spence said he looks upon the bill with “cautious optimism.”

“There’s a lot to digest, but quite a bit about the K-3 literacy issue aligns with our goals for the reading ability of third-graders,” he said. “What concerns me most is funding. A summer camp for third-graders who have not achieved grade level literacy is a good idea, but will the county be required to cover the cost? There are still many questions I have about the process.”

On making changes to the procedure of hiring and retaining teachers, Spence said that while “a good teacher doesn’t worry about tenure,” he questioned the timing of the bill.

“In this difficult period when we are asking the teachers to do more with less, with no raises for the past four years and with the constant worry over the budget, this doesn’t seem like the right time to attack tenure,” he said. “It’s a process that many teachers hold dear for the job security it offers.”

‘Complexity Involved’

Tracy Metcalf, Moore County Teacher of the Year for 2011-2012, said that dropping tenure wouldn’t bother her “all that much.”

“I worked in the New York school system for a couple of years, and it was sometimes im-possible to get rid of a tenured teacher,” she said. “I wouldn’t be opposed to a one-year renewable contract if it was based on the system in place now, but if that was changed to one based on standardized test scores, then that would be a real problem.”

The bill proposes that local school districts implement a merit-based pay system to replace tenure, but Spence takes issue with what he says could potentially create 115 different systems for employee pay if each district creates its own.

“First of all, to my knowledge there are no studies that show a merit-based pay system improves student performance whatsoever,” he said. “Second, the bill specifically requests that each local education agency develop its own system for merit pay. I can’t understand why 115 different districts should develop their own systems for paying when one that works well for all could be used. There is little clear guidance in the bill on this point.”

Metcalf said the merit-based pay system sounds good in theory but wondered how such a procedure would be evaluated.

“Education is not a business,” she said. “We’re not dealing with mechanical items, but with human beings. There are many variables to be considered, but sometimes I think the state fails to appreciate the complexity involved with being a classroom teacher.”

Use Days Better

Spence said that in regard to the addition of five days to the school year, the bill “did one thing” that made sense.

“Instead of having the school year begin and end on arbitrary days, it would start on a Monday and end on a Friday,” he said. “The flip side is that there would be less time for teacher professional development. We need more time for this, not less, and the extra five days would take away from that.”

Moore County has obtained a waiver for the past two years that has allowed for a 180-day school year rather than 185. The extra week off has enabled the system to avoid the financial burden of having to bear the costs of transportation, school lunches, and other expenses associated with the extra week.

But Tillman said that if funding can be procured to cover those costs, then waivers would be disallowed.

“Our students are being beaten by kids from foreign countries, so we need to use those days productively,” Tillman said. “We need to be fed up with the way things currently stand.”

The five extra school days would cost $11 to $15 million, Tillman said, with $40 to $50 million for the third-grade literacy program and reading coaches to assist the students.

‘Starting Point’

If the bill passes the Senate and House and reaches the governor, Tillman said he was unsure of how the bill would be received by Gov. Bev Perdue.

“She has vetoed 17 bills, and we have overridden seven,” he said. “The Chamber of Commerce and the business committee are behind it, and other than the North Carolina Association of Educators we have had a good reception.”

NCAE President Sheri Strickland has spoken against the bill.

“While it attacks virtually every aspect of public education in North Carolina, it is woefully short on knowledge and comprehension,” she said.

Perdue’s office also criticized the bill in light of Republican-generated cuts in education.

In a statement issued by the governor’s office, Press Secretary Chris Mackey said that Republicans in the General Assembly “made deep and unnecessary education cuts that have cost our schools thousands of teachers and teacher assistants.

“One school superintendent even called those cuts ‘a huge cancer’ in our budget. It’s not surprising that some politicians are trying to distract attention from their harmful cuts by calling for ‘education reform,’ rather than restoring the state’s investments.”

Tillman said that he is “open to any suggestions to move forward. We’ve got to have a starting point, and it’s time to step up and do something.”

Contact John Lentz at (910) 693-2479 or jlentz@thepilot.com.

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SmartMom 1 year ago

Dr. Spence is correct about no existing merit pay systems producing better testing results. A nationwide Google or scholarly journal search will produce links to reports about the dismal impact of merit pay. Even more importantly to taxpayers, once a merit pay system is mandated states struggle to find the funds to cover it.

Public education serves wonderfully unique children with unique families and communities. Our children are not products that can be accurately or fairly assessed through one brief data point on multiple choice tests that only test two subjects of their six- to eight-subject day.

If our legislators really want to reform our public educational system, they should look at creating stable employment for children's parents, at improving the social services network that stabilizes children without supportive families, at reforming the amount of money districts must spend on litigation and insurance, on reforming the nutrition payment system for students who cannot or will not pay their school breakfast and lunch bills, on reforming the attendance policies that allow students K—8 to miss an entire month of school or half of each school day without consequences (Students get credit for a full day if their parents take them out at 11:30 a.m.), on reforming the number of days spent in standardized testing throughout the school year (for some students as much as two or more weeks), on reforming the ever-burgeoning class sizes—some as large as 45 or more at the secondary level and teachers with class loads at the secondary level of 120 to 350 students each day. Children need as much interaction as possible with responsible adult mentors. The current ever-increasing budget cuts result in our children being educated primarily through other children.

Our national obsession with standardized, multiple-choice testing has created highly profitable private testing corporations, profitable private charter school corporations, and profitable private online educational alternatives – all at the taxpayer’s expense.

Yes, our children deserve better public education experiences, but Senator Tillman's proposal will make a bad situation worse.

ztech 1 year ago

One of John Marcum's supporters, a teacher in Tillman's home town, said this on Facebook:

"Hi, Mr. Marcum: I was so glad to see your signs in Archdale today (especially those near Tillman's neighborhood). It's been tiresome seeing all of the Tillman signs plastered over Archdale and Trinity for the past weeks. I've seen him in action in Raleigh and was not impressed. As co-chair of the Senate Education Committee, he has damaged our public school system with budget cuts. His statements that teacher positions have been fully funded are misleading and inaccurate.. He says "Public schools are going to be squeezed hard..... I also know that when there's dead wood, dead wood has to go. . .” I wish more people would question his comments." Sherrie Cannoy Archdale

tchr4lifeinNC 1 year ago

We need to restructure our current system where all levels that are responsible for educating a child are held accountable! This is from the Governor all the way down to the child themselves! Too much stress and unnecessary junk is place solely on the teacher and nothing is place on anyone else. When will parents be held accountable for their child's education? When will the child be held accountable? If the parents and children know that one test will be the basis of their teacher's salary, do you really think they will take it seriously if there are no consequences to their actions of throwing the test to get back at the teacher? How??

First, we need to fund our schools fully NOW. None of this, give money back to the state. When the school district had to give back discretionary funds back to the state, they had to cut teacher and teacher assistant jobs in order to keep projects, buses and other things running in the district. You can't expect Superintendent to balance their budget when you ask for money back and not have anywhere else to cut other than personnel.

Secondly, we need to figure out a way to keep them funded permanently and not touch K-12 schools ever again!

Lastly, we need to FIX the tax codes in NC where there are no loop holes in the tax codes for businesses who are not paying any taxes in the state. If I buy something online now, and there's a store in this state, I am paying sales tax. I am all for it. Now, it's time for corporations and other companies to step up and do the same. Maybe a flat income tax? Maybe a flat sales tax? Then, counties could do away w/ their floor taxes if the state would fully fund schools and not play a cat and mouse game with funding.

I live in a county with the highest county floor tax that has the highest unemployment rate and poverty rate. Our floor tax is crazy! HOWEVER, our schools need this tax b/c the state does not provide enough to keep our schools. Our LEA does not receive the same amount of Indian Ed money as two of the surround counties. So, we have to make up the difference somewhere. So, there has to be a way to FUND, FIGURE, AND FIX!

tchr4lifeinNC 1 year ago

As a registered Republican, I do not support this legislation and I do not support these attacks against teachers and the schools. Merit pay is not an option. Taking Career Status away is not an option. You're opening up a can of worms and the door for the good ole boys club to walk right back into education! That's why career status was put into place! There are administrators out there that do receive that vague permission to rid LEA's of those experienced, great teachers who cost the LEA $$ because of their years of experience. Sad but true! More of that will happen if you take career status away! If the administrators do their leg work, paper work, and documentation, ridding a LEA of a bad teacher is not that hard! However, is the administrator up for that challenge?? That's the question!! Ask a few teachers who have been victimized by a vindictive, vile administrator, who made them cry in front of students, who harassed them, who pushed them to the breaking point, who through e-mails, and memos caused so much stress in their life that the teacher had to take medical leave due to an ulcer. Ask those teachers who were thankful for career status! Then, see how important it really is to the good teachers too!

cmptrepair 1 year ago

speaking of facebook, visit tommy davis' page for nc state senator. he has addressed the issues of schools national rankings and funding. if teachers want a fair shake in this election, vote for tommy davis, he is in touch as a tutor and talking to teachers and professors who havent had a raise in 5 years. too much paperwork.

cmptrepair 1 year ago

btw, tommy davis has written about a fairtax on the blogs for about two years or so. he supports a fairtax and doing away with the present system for millionaires.

cantstandya 1 year ago

Like anything else you get what you pay for, if people want to insure that children are given a chance of a good education then it will dedicated,and fairly paid teaching staffs to insure that,between dicipline and other responsibilities that many of these teachers face I do not envy them,there are good and bad in every walk of life and if they are given the opportunity to govern themselves on a unbias level than the good ones will succeed and the others will fall to the waste side,just like the military they will have fitness reports but favoritism on personal levels will have to be done away with,friend or foe if you do not do your job you will have to go,I believe they do deserve more for their efforts if they are good educators and having to discipline the students who are disruptive yet get little support from the families of those that fall into that catagory,mine has long been out of the system but remember some of the events she would tell us about,teaching is not just a job,it's an adventure for these in todays world,I wish them luck.

native 1 year ago

We need to totally re=think schools. There is no reason to take summers off. Farmers do not need kids in the fields anymore. Utilize the buildings year round. Also, we could have two shifts each day and have one set of students in school 8-12 and another from 1=5. More use of technology with video classes. Each teacher would be able to teach more students. Why not allow classes from home via video. We could do so much more with what we have if we were not thinking in the past.

Bflat 1 year ago

Tillman is a sock puppet for the Art Pope political machine that is also causing problems in Wake County Schools. It's time to vote Tillman out. He has a history of campaign violations and plastered the area with political signs weeks too early.

Marcum has experience overseas and lost 2x in his run for Pinehurst Mayor. He is a "come lately" who uses other candidate's platform as though it is his own.

Davis tutors Math and English in the Project Promise. He is a Moore County native who thorougly and very carefully investigates and considers issues. He was in law enforcement and Moore Child Support, active in his church and community.. He is for cutting out wasteful spending in government and for the proper funding of education. He has not violated campaign rules or laws. Elect Davis.

truthmatterstome2 1 year ago

Merit pay is impossible to achieve in this arena. The pressure on administrators to rate a teacher high enough to receive a merit increase is just too great. I also agree that having 115 districts developing requirement for merit increases is not practical. I totally disagree that a true merit system would cost more than our current system, based solely on tenure. I would like to see research regarding the difference in student achievement based on tenure vs merit pay. I doubt that there is enough data to make an adequate assessment.

All studys show that US schools need to be open more days per year. We're falling further and further behind other nations. Teachers could (and should) earn CEUs during the time schools are closed. They should be paid a stipen for their time. Almost all professionals are required to have continueing education units to keep up with changes in their professions. Teacher "workdays" are generally misused, and are simply days without students.

It is simply time to make changes in the educational system. A survey would show that most of those opposed to changing the system are those within the system. It's understandable, change is difficult and personally risky. We can't rely on the NCAE, their job is to protect teachers and to lobby for better salaries and benefits.

How about contracting teachers! I don't mean contracting with the meaningless current system. Contracts are important only to untenured teachers. I'm talking about individuals contracting with the school system for a period of time, whether a year, 5 years, etc. Salaries would be significantly higher because the State would not pay retirement benefits. By paying better salaries the State would attract more qualified instructors. Because retirement benefits are not paid our longterm budget issues would improve. Let the screaming begin!!