There's more than miles between us and a new set of graduation standards

 (the above is an adaptation of a line from Lil' Abner that I cannot now find anywhere online)

As a blogger who started writing out of sheer frustration with local school district governance coverage, I have a certain amount of weary understanding of the misses that happen. This is particularly true given the undercutting of the Fourth Estate and the seemingly endless churn of local reporters (when we have them at all!) for local news coverage. 

I nonetheless was puzzled by coverage of the October 8 Worcester School Committee meeting, which appeared to take as given that the graduation report from last year was moving forward into implementation.

As we have discussed here before, more than once, this is not the case. The Department does not have the authority to create new required graduation standards. The authority to determine what a student needs to graduate remains with local school committees. The competency determination, as bound by the amended law under Question 2, is within the Department's authority, and districts now all have policies that align to that. That is, though, the full extend of the authority of the Department.

Now, I'm pretty sure--I think?--that those running things here in Worcester know that, but I remain concerned that some writing for the Department might not. Recently, every superintendent received a communication from DESE that gave a deadline of late November for a report on where individual high schools were on their graduation requirements relating to the graduation report. It referred to this Companion Guide for information. 

And nowhere in any of this was there any mention of the fact that the Department cannot simply implement the graduation report, lacking utterly the authority to do so. It takes the graduation report as something that is being implemented, and this, despite the report itself--though only v-e-r-y subtly!--noting that the Legislature would need to act for implementation.

And if you think the Legislature is simply going to pass the graduation report as issued into legislation, well, I wouldn't advise putting money on that. 

While I have come to expect this sort of confusion of local reporters who often just got there, I am troubled to see it from the regulatory agency. 

UPDATE: The backup for Tuesday's Board of Ed meeting now has this memo, which continues the "the report is a recommendation which we are working to implement" without mention of the Department not having the authority to do so. 

exploding a few myths of the coming Massachusetts school year

•  We do not have new graduation requirements. The council created to submit a report has done so. Those are, as I noted in my post about it, recommendations, most of which will take new legislation to implement.
  I know there are timelines in the report, but what the timelines don't take into account is the authorities necessary to fulfill the requirements. 
  Not only is that not happening for this coming school year, I would suspect that it unlikely to happen for next school year, either, as the Legislature will begin a new term in the spring. New term means new committee assignments, and so things won't get moving until spring at least.
  
  
• We do not have a state-mandated cell phone policy in schools. Yes, both the House and the Senate passed cell phones in schools bills, but they are wildly different. While that did go to conference committee, the Legislature ended formal sessions on July 31. We will only see non-controversial legislation passed in informal session, which is what remains.
  If you're seeing a new cell phone policy in your district, that is something your district is choosing to do; it is not required by state law. 
  
  
• We will not see a major revision of the school funding system ahead of the next budget. The new Foundation Budget Review Commission's report is not due until October 2028. 
  Sorry, but the next budget--the first post-SOA budget--is not going to be assisted in this fashion.  

keeping an eye on that $100M

 Regarding the $100M of Fair Share Governor Healey filled a supplemental budget to spend, a smidge of insight yesterday from Colin Young at State House News Service (here being interviewed by NEPM): 

Relatedly, yesterday, both the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education¹ and the Department of Revenue sent out this letter from Healey addressed to "municipal leaders," praising what the letter terms "a total of $200 million" coming to them in Fair Share, of which the $100M which she has requested is half; in other words, there isn't $200M yet. And there is a LOT of credit being taken for how much the executive branch is "partnering" with local communities. 

Does this strike anyone else as an untoward use of departmental communication to municipalities and school districts? While there is not an overt "call your legislator" included in the letter, it's strongly implied. 

We look forward to continuing to work with the Legislature to secure this important investment for schools and to building on our partnership with cities and towns as we continue working together to strengthen communities across the state. 

This, about $100M in non-formula funding requested in the summer of an election year, is all feeling pretty icky. 
And again, this is not funding being distributed in a way that meets the highest needs, nor is it funding we have, nor is it a thoughtful consideration of the needs of districts in the current context.

¹which, despite it continually escaping at least this and the last governor, does not work for them. The Governor appoints the Board, which has, save one member, non-conterminous terms with her, and THEY oversee the Commissioner who runs the Department. She cannot fire them. She does not oversee them. I wish we saw more evidence than anyone knew that legally, this is how this is outlined to work.

Skunk at the garden party time

They're kind of cute, though, aren't they.

Though it is, of course, not the done thing to express anything but enthusiasm for additional funding…It is time again for one of my periodic skunk at the garden party posts.

I read the state graduation council report

 ...I am not going to say "so you don't have to," because I think if you have an interest in education, you probably should at least skim the report, which is online here.
As always, this is me writing as me on behalf of me only. 

This image deserves more space than it gets in the report, as it isn't bad thinking and it's a solid try at an outline. 
How is it, though, that they managed parallel structure for all but ONE of the items?
The upper left one is crying out for a noun!

I was going to write up something on the literacy bill

 ...but instead I am going to tell you to read this, from someone in Connecticut, because we could learn from their example!

You can do whatever you want creating (blue) hills of paperwork for teacher prep programs to prove to you that they’re doing what you already require them to do. But when it comes to fascism masquerading as curriculum reform, that’s a Yeah-No. Friends don’t let friends.

You’re like: all schools need to have high quality curriculum. I’ve BEEN SAYING there is no such thing, but it’s like you guys are stuck at a rotary and can’t find the damn exit. You’re Charlie on the MTA never getting off. You’re like trying to find ya clickah and coming up with bupkis.

There's Matt Damon, there's Dunkin', you should read it.  

Some days are like that

 We had a one-two punch of "who's in charge of this, anyway?" around public education late yesterday:

• The Trump administration announced that they are moving special education and civil rights enforcement out of the Department of Education; special education is going to Health and Human Services and civil rights to the Department of Justice. This has of course something that this administration been warning of/planning for some time, but it appears they now are rolling forward. 

  The change will move some of the most essential and integrated functions provided by the federal Education Department to two separate agencies and further accelerates the dismantling of the department without congressional approval. Senior department officials said the changes would not reduce or affect students’ rights and would instead lead to more effective services for students and families. But many details are still being worked out.

  I think it's fair to say, given what we have seen of this administration, that this is not going to work out well for students and families.

• The conference committee working on the literacy bill for Massachusetts came out with their joint work, which can be found here. DESE is now going to have a list of what curricula a district may use, and districts have to choose from the list unless they can get a waiver to use curricula that they can prove works (no room, note for new curricula there). No curricula included may include:
  

  implicit or incidental instruction in word reading, visual memorization of whole words or guessing from context and picture cues, also known as MSV or three-cueing, as a substitute for identifying a word.

  
  Words mean things and barring "implicit or incidental instruction in word meaning" from reading instruction may be the silliest inclusion I have read recently.
  Already, it has been asked if barring "guessing from context and picture cues," which is a large reason we actually use picture books with children, would bar the use of picture books:
  

  "Does it mean you can't show a student a picture? Of course you can. Children's books are always illustrated."

  That isn't a ridiculous question, and that it isn't well understood how VARIED are the methods by which children gain access to the quite complex skill of reading underlines that this is not a decision that should have been made by the Legislature. 
  Oh, and they stripped out the $25M fund for implementation. 

good Globe follow-up on the House social media bill

I'm impressed by the follow-up article from the Boston Globe on the House's disaster of a bill passed last week.*

Civil liberties groups and organizations in favor of tech privacy — including some that are backing the bills — warn the proposals could backfire and make online activity even less private by requiring users to submit personal information to verify their ages or parental status.

Some restrictions, experts argue, would also face First Amendment challenges by limiting young people’s speech and vulnerable groups’ abilities to find community online. 

They also note that this means we're not fulfilling our responsibility to students:

 “Children need to learn how to use social media so they aren’t using it irresponsibly, and we need to learn how to use our phones,” said Max Nash, a junior at Mashpee High School who formed the Coalition for Student Mental Health to lobby for alternative tech policies. “But that requires education and not a ban.”

I appreciate Rep. Gordon in general, but this is such an odd thing to own up to: 

Representative Kenneth Gordon, who chairs the education committee, said lawmakers shaped the bill to closely follow a similar law in Florida, whose under-14 social media ban has faced court challenges for two years. 

Florida + court challenges seemed like a good path to follow?

And all of this here:

 Both the Healey and House proposals would require age verification measures that civil liberties groups and privacy experts say are excessive. All users — not just minors — could be required to give tech companies more personal information, such as photos of government IDs, to prove their age, they warned.

Healey’s proposal, for instance, would require social media companies to provide a host of age-specific data that could require checking users’ ages.

People who don’t have such IDs, or might be hesitant to provide them, could then be unable to access a wide range of online content. The bill includes a broad definition of social media sites, including nearly any platform with personal accounts and user-generated content, which opponents argue could encompass sites such as the popular information forum Wikipedia.

That ID hurdle has formed the basis of First Amendment challenges in many states, according to Paul Taske, co-director of the NetChoice Litigation Center, a tech industry-funded group that has successfully sued to have the law set aside in several cases.

“Ultimately, the laws suffer from the same core constitutional infirmity: They block or restrict access for users, particularly minors, but also adults when it comes to speech that is lawful for everyone,” Taske said.

Cybersecurity experts warn that children could bypass the checks, and hackers could seek to steal data collected. Parental consent requirements could present further security issues, with little way for parents to reliably prove their relation to a user, opening the door for nefarious actors who abuse online reporting systems.

More than 400 cybersecurity experts, including from MIT, Tufts University, and Boston University, issued a public letter last month calling for a moratorium on online age verification laws they said “might cause more harm than good.”

“This policy will inevitably massively reduce privacy online by forcing users to reveal more information to service providers than they do nowadays,” the group wrote.

The age verification measures could also run counter to the goals of a separate date privacy bill the state Senate passed last fall and is backed by the ACLU of Massachusetts and other groups. That legislation would allow companies to collect only “reasonably necessary” personal data and permit consumers to opt out of data collection. Companies would also be barred from selling children’s data.

Plus, of course, there are those who have positive uses for social media that would be barred by this bill: 

Advocacy organizations also raised concerns about other First Amendment violations, including for users who might face the most repercussions from verification measures and social media restrictions.

Such a law, some argue, could limit teenagers’ abilities to organize political activity, hear the latest news, express themselves creatively, or find community online.

Teddy Walker, a 21-year-old Bostonian who is trans and a leader of a group organized to protect trans rights, said he was isolated and depressed as a teenager until he found solace in Instagram and YouTube trans communities.

“It really helped give me the language and understanding for who I am,” Walker said. The proposed parental restrictions could “lead to trans youth and trans kids being less safe, being less able to access that content online that was so life-saving and life-affirming for me.”

Sing it with Noah Kahan, all: 

you're a mess, you're a mess, good God, you're a mess!

__________________________________________________________________

*And how often do I say that? 

Four things I would have preferred the House do this week

1.  Move forward the bar on religious exemptions for vaccinations. Just this week, the West Virginia bar withstood a federal appeals challenge. Just today, the AP is noting that babies too young for the MMR vaccine become "sitting ducks" in an outbreak. Given the anti-vaccine push by the federal government (as much as the courts are doing what they can), we cannot afford cracks in our community immunity. 
   
   
2. Do literally anything at all about Massachusetts being the only state in the country that has Democrats in charge of both chambers and the Governor's office and has a 287(g) contract with ICE. 
   Seriously. Anything at all. You could even pass a bill to make it illegal, like Maryland or Virginia, as that's the whole reason we have a legislature: making laws. 
   
   
3. Pass legislation protecting our immigrant neighbors from being preyed upon by the federal government, like the PROTECT Act, which passed out of committee two weeks ago, yet somehow was not seen as being as urgent as that bill on cell phones. I have been told they passed this? That missed my radar. One hopes it receives half the urgency from the rest of the process that this appears to have
    
4. Move forward the legislation that updates how inflation is calculated in the foundation budget, and make it effective for FY27, better aligning the foundation budget with district costs (and perhaps keeping us from the mistake of digging even bigger hold harmless aid holes).
   
   

please enjoy these pansies from my walk to work in Boston

The House passed the most draconian social media ban in the country

From State House News Service this evening:  

The House on Wednesday put Massachusetts on track to join a handful of other states in placing restrictions on children’s social media use – an issue that is playing out in courts across the country. The House passed legislation on a 129-25 vote, largely along party lines, prohibiting social media use for children under 14 and requiring that social media platforms obtain parental consent for users aged 14 and 15. Representatives said the legislation closely follows a similar law in Florida, which is still being challenged in court two years after it was passed. The legislation leaves many of the regulatory decisions surrounding how to enforce the policy amid an ever-evolving online landscape up to Attorney General Andrea Campbell. Reps added language to the bill that limits some parental monitoring of social media usage "to protect certain vulnerable populations," Rep. Peisch said on the floor, and adds further protections for 14- and 15-year-olds related to the "addictive nature" of some platforms. The bill also bans students from using their cellphones throughout the school day. The House dispensed with almost all of the 29 amendments filed on the legislation through two consolidated amendments.

"on party lines" means it was Democrats who voted to violate young people's privacy, Democrats who voted to make them less safe in school, Democrats who voted to require that we all turn our information over to social media companies.  

I cannot even.

Update: here’s the vote:

Three takeaways from this week's Board of Ed meeting

 Three things that stuck with me from this meeting: 

1. Both the Commissioner and CFO Bell gave a "yikes*" when it comes to federal grants during the budget update. While the federal entitlement grants were level funded by Congress, they're reallocated by state and then by district each year by demographic information. The state and districts may see less money this year.
   
   
2. Depending on what language the conference committee on the literacy bills comes out with**, the Department may end up in the awkward position of enforcing something that doesn't exist. In the literacy discussion, they were careful to note that their standard for "high-quality instructional materials" isn't "evidence-based" because "very few materials on the market have evidence of efficacy." This is, of course, more evidence (hmph) that the Legislature shouldn't be involved in this, but should be leaving this to the level of authorities who are doing the actual reading on this.
   
   
3. Speaking of not doing the reading, it was alarming to hear, in response to a question posed during the interpretation and translation regulation discussion, that the only guidance or recommendation coming from the Department on the use of AI in translation was that translations be checked by a person. So we're okay with teachers and others just dumping, say, an IEP into a chatbot where it then becomes part of the universe on which everything draws?
   FERPA, people.***
   Let's please do more reading about how this stuff works before turning our core responsibilities over in such ways.

__________________________

*not actually; my interpretation 
**assuming it comes out at all? Is it possible this terrible idea will just die there?
***when it comes out for public comment--it hasn't yet--this would be a very good comment to offer

This is not really related to the above but I thought it was funny.
source

Wise words from South Dakota on state oversight and cell phones

 Excellent commentary piece from South Dakota: 

....passage of the bill flies in the face of local control for school boards. While SB 198 leaves it up to local boards to decide on discipline and what constitutes a school day, it takes away their power to decide on the use of cellphones in a one-size-fits-all policy.

The beauty of local school boards is that they reflect the wants and needs of their communities. Some have students squirrel away their phones all day. Others give students access to their phones during lunch. Still others use the freedom for students to have a phone during the school day as a lesson in responsibility.

Banning student cellphone use in schools sounds good on the surface. So did substituting ag classes for science classes and allowing athletes to substitute sports participation for a gym credit. Whenever the Legislature gets into the business of micromanaging school districts, there are pitfalls aplenty.

What is freaking me out about funding right now

 I'm at the ASBO conference this week in Fort Worth--ASBO is the Association of School Business Officials--and one of the "must attends" for me is always the federal policy update jointly done by ASBO and AASA (that would be the superintendents). This stems from that presentation yesterday.¹

Setting aside for a moment:

1. that we do not currently have an operating federal government
2. because we do not have a federal budget or continuing resolution
3. and that some of the proposals for the federal budget have been alarming

I want to talk here about something that is actually going to happen because it is actually law and appears to not be in what is being planned for, at least from what I have seen in Massachusetts.

Dearest Legislators: on the charter reimbursement override

Dearest Legislators,

It has come to my attention that you plan to override Governor Healey's July veto of nearly $20M in charter school tuition reimbursement. As this represents millions of dollars to some of the most needy districts in the state¹, this is very helpful. Thank you!

Many of you are no doubt under the impression that this money goes, as is intended by state law, to the school districts themselves. This is, however, is the case only for regional school districts. For municipal school districts, because charter school tuition reimbursement isn't designated as going to schools "without additional appropriation," the money goes to the city or town general fund.

Cities and towns have long since passed their budgets. Unless someone takes additional action, these funds you intend for schools will not go to schools.

Were it possible for you to pass these funds with language so designating them, that would be most useful. 

If not, perhaps you could ensure that the Department of Revenue generates updated cherry sheets, and you could ensure the cities and towns in your districts are aware of where the money should go?

With very sincere thanks,

Someone who wants to ensure the Worcester Public Schools gets their $2M

¹As a reminder, here are all the amounts over $1M:

What I really hope the education universe jettisons over the summer

Early azalea in New Hampshire

While there are obviously some very big things--bombing countries! kidnapping people! removing rights and harassing people! returning epidemics of diseases for which we have vaccines! defunding large portions of the government! lying, ongoingly, about nearly everything!--there are also some very 'education universe' things that I'd* love for us to jettison over the summer: 

Attorney General Campbell does not have time for this nonsense

Please note that the above post title is very much my paraphrase.

Attorney General Andrea Campbell, who is busy suing the Trump administration more than a dozen times* in the first 100 days of this administration, weighed in on the regulations regarding vocational admission in a letter to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education. The letter, dated April 18, was released today via State House News Service, which covers it here (which is paywalled and so far no one seems to have picked it up).

She opens right up with her own reason to be at this table: "As Attorney General, I am committed to upholding equal educational opportunity for all students in Massachusetts." This is, of course, literally part of her job.

Some things I really hope we get right in 2025

Let there be goblin hordes, let there be terrible environmental threats, let there be giant 

mutated slugs if you really must, but let there also be Hope. It may be a grim, thin hope, an Arthurian sword at sunset, but let us know that we do not live in vain.

Terry Pratchett, "When Children Read Fantasy"

As the turn of the calendar gives one of the "looking back/looking forward" opportunities, I thought I'd put together some hopes I have of this coming calendar year, if only, as the great Pratchett put it, to "know that we do not live in vain."

Checking in on some major stories

•  Sure seems like it was a wise decision for the Worcester City Council and Worcester School Committee to remove police from the Worcester Public Schools back in 2021 on the recommendation of then-City Manager Augustus during the superintendency of Maureen Binienda, doesn't it?
  
  
• Barring action (or lack thereof) by the Governor, Lawrence, which hasn't had an empowered school committee since 2011, is on its way to no longer having a fully elected one, as the Senate passed the mayor's planned takeover of seats last week, after an 11th hour effort by Senator Fattman (who represents Southbridge) to stop it; cheers to Senators Jehlen and Elbridge who spoke in opposition as well. 
  We're well accustomed to blaming lack of local control of DESE; this one sits squarely on Lawrence City Hall collaborating with the state legislature. 
  
  
• In this same "we're past extra innings" time, we also saw the school bus camera ticketing bill emerge from the Senate, and it's on Governor Healey's desk. It'll now be up to local districts to actually implement it (please take this as a hint to get ready to do so). 
  
  
  
• The Education Law Center's 2024 "Making the Grade" report on school funding equity by state (using 2021-22 data) again demonstrates that Massachusetts isn't what it thinks of itself as:
  
  
  Yes, that's a D in both distribution and effort.
  
  Read the report itself for what those mean, but the ability of local communities to raise any kind of money they vote for just their school plus the Massachusetts devotion to increasing funding without any attachment to need, enrollment, or local ability to contribute combines to come home to roost here. We're perpetuating inequity, and far too much of the advocacy is pushing for more the same sort of increasing of disparities. 
  
  

MA Literacy bill is dead for this session

 And with the official end of formal session of the Legislature, it appears that the well-intended (I think?) but way out of the Legislature's lane literacy bill which would have mandated that districts pull curricula from a DESE-approved list is dead. 
The Boston Globe, who of course had turned this into a crusade this year, have coverage here. The award for 'measured quote which makes the point nicely' goes to Co-Executive Director of MASS Mary Bourque: 

Mary Bourque, executive director of the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents, said that the bill was a “top-down” approach, leaving little room for teachers — the education experts — to make the calls for their students.

“But what we feel about the Literacy Launch is it’s more of a partnership with districts,” Bourque said. “Districts that are ready to engage in this and recognize they need help with this work are able to get the funding to get it off the ground.”

...with the 'award for random person quoted' going to the tutor in the middle of the piece. 

The Legislature passed a compromise $20M for funding literacy materials and professional development in the FY25 conference committee budget, in what the Governor is calling "Literacy Launch." Collaboration...now there's an idea.

I live in hope that we won't have to fight this again this coming legislative cycle.

Some hard truths on the FY25 Worcester Public Schools budget

The Worcester School Committee begins budget deliberations on Thursday at 4 pm. 

As they start these deliberations, I did want to lay out a few hard truths ahead of that.

Twenty-two million dollars is a lot of money. 
As I have said every time I have said this, I don't mean to point out the obvious, but $22M is a lot of money. This is not solved through grant funding. This is not closed through administrative cuts. This is not going to be closed without position cuts in schools. 
I am absolutely certain that we are going to hear the School Committee spend a lot of time on slivers of the budget (and in some cases, probably self-righteously defend it as budgetary oversight), but unless you are actually grappling with the actual scale of the issue, you're not solving the problem. 
Don't bikeshed the budget gap.

This wouldn't have been an issue if the inflation rate was higher. 
I've heard some rather odd framing of the Worcester School Committee decision to front SOA increases with ESSER funds during the duration of ESSER, as if somehow the district was shocked that ESSER was gone and that was what was causing the gap. 
That isn't the case at all.
We in Worcester have known how much the SOA increases were due to be since SOA was passed; the only pieces of the puzzle missing have been enrollment changes--the enrollment for WPS this year was essentially flat--and the inflation rate.
And yes, everyone has known since ESSER III was passed that FY25 was the year it would be gone.
It is the inflation rate (as some of us started noting at the end of last year) that was the issue for this budget. 
With a 4.5% inflation rate, paralleling the past two years of inflation?
Worcester would be receiving $25M more in chapter 70 aid.

There's no more money coming ahead of the School Committee making allocations. 
I've recently seen some social media action decrying the proposed budget cuts, and while I entirely sympathize, the fact of the matter is that position cuts are coming, because the state chambers both passed budgets without meaningful increases for Worcester, and the Worcester City Council passed the WPS budget that is below net school spending. It is too late now to influence additional funding for the Worcester Public Schools for FY25 to stave off position cuts. 
There's a $22M budget gap. The School Committee has to deal with that, and we're going to live with the consequences.

The Worcester School Committee has to pass a balanced budget. 
Were I a betting person, I'd bet that there will be at least one, if not more, stirring "I refuse to vote for a budget that cuts [fill in the blank here]" before a split committee vote on this budget. This is not brave if you have not done a single thing to change the bottom line. The Worcester School Committee, like every school committee and municipality in Massachusetts, must pass a balanced budget. 
That means that this budget is going to involve cuts. And, as I've already noted elsewhere, the only place there is $22M in this or any like sized school district is in positions. 

Make no mistake: this is a lousy budget year.