Political Lies / Political Truths - Texas Senate Version

The Texas Senate has passed Senate Bill 4 (the bill still must be approved by the House if it is to become law).  This bill allows Texas businesses to receive a tax credit it they contribute to private school scholarship funds that can be used by students enrolled in public school. Bottom line, the Texas Senate has sent a voucher program to the Texas House for approval.  This is historic, because rarely to Senators expose to the general public what they truly believe.  This vote stripped away the veil of political double speak and allows the citizens of Texas to really get to know their Senator.

Let’s examine the lies our Senators have told us:

1. They will uphold the Constitution. A lie. Unless they were unaware of the pesky clause relating to the separation of church and state.

2. They believe in providing for better schools. A lie. Unless they believe that reduced funding is a form of support.

3. They believe in school accountability. A lie.  Unless they believe that no accountability (which is what the Senate requires of private schools) is a form of accountability.

4. They believe the Common Core is evil. A lie.  Unless they believe that an “evil” curriculum resource used by a private school makes the “evil” resource... good. 

5. They believe in reduced government spending. A lie.  Unless spending state tax funds on brand new expenditures is really doesn't count as spending money.

Now let’s examine the truth, as illustrated by the voting record of our Senators:

1. The Texas Senate believes that creating subsidies for the affluent is good policy.

2. The Texas Senate believes that segregating children based on wealth, gender, creed, and geography is good policy.

Now to be fair, not all members of the Texas Senate believe this.  Only Lt. Governor Dan Patrick and the 18 Senators who voted for Senate Bill 4, which are:

Senator Paul Bettencourt (Houston Area)

Senator Brian Birdwell (Waco Area)

Senator Donna Campbell (San Antonio Area)

Senator Brandon Creighton (Beaumont Area)

Senator Kevin Eltife (Longview Area)

Senator Craig Estes (Wichita Falls Area)

Senator Troy Fraser (Belton Area)

Senator Bob Hall (Rockwall Area)

Senator Kelly Hancock (North Richland Hills Area)

Senator Dan Huffines (Dallas Area)

Senator Joan Huffman (Houston Area)

Senator Lois Kolkhorst (Brenham Area)

Senator Eduardo A. Lucio, Jr. (Brownsville Area)

Senator Jane Nelson (Grapevine Area)

Senator Charles Perry (Lubbock Area)

Senator Charles Schwertner (Georgetown Area)

Senator Larry Taylor (Pearland Area)

Senator Van Taylor (Plano Area)

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference; Illinois ASCD Fall Conference (Multiple Presentations) 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook

A Superintendent Writes... A Crazy Idea - Part 1

In response to the 4/9/15 post, “A Crazy Idea for Accountability Sanctions (Secondary Model),” a LYS Superintendent writes:

SC,

You are right. Your plan will never work. It just makes too much sense.  

Here are two other plans, again much too reasonable, that correlate with your research when you worked for the state. 

THE HARD WAY PLAN

Year 1 Low Performing

A TEA representative and the campus' State Representative and/or Senator go to the campus and conducts a meeting with staff and parents explaining the accountability system in a manner the common lay person can understand. 

1. Included in that discussion will be the fact that the politician (or his/her peers in the House and Senate) believe, validated through their actions, that the best way to create great schools is to cut funding and stay mostly silent on matters of guidance and support. The politician must also explain to parents that the best way to assure that a campus become great is to administer ever evolving, one shot, high stakes tests. And if a campus does poorly on even one test, with just one disaggregated student group, the campus gets a poor rating and is dragged through the mud publicly while the State Representative and/or Senator yells, "All schools are failing and we need to take even more money away from them to fund private schools with public money."

  

2. The TEA representative admits to the parents and teachers that TEA has no practical expertise in how help schools become models of best practices and they really only excel at creating forms that take administrators hours and weeks to complete, even though these forms in no way, shape, fashion or form actually improve schools. Therefore, the state will send a team of successful campus administrators from high performing schools that match the numbers and demographics of the school in question to work with district and campus leaders to put systematic best practices in place.  This team will also analyze instructional materials, curriculum, and technology and make recommendations. All at the state’s expense. 

3. The state commits to fund the support team’s recommendations.

4. The state will provide a staff development grant to train teachers to adequately implement the support team’s plan. 

5. TEA will publicly celebrate the progress made in the effort towards building exemplar practices.  

6. Should the campus is question be a secondary campus, all schools in the feeder pattern will be included all improvement activities.

Year 2 Low Performing

There probably will not be a year 2, but if there is...

1. Change, not shorten, the school day for students.  Time to be spent in four core areas first and all extra-curricular moved to end of the school day. Elective teachers and coaches who don't have core, fill in as team teachers/support.  Students love their extra-curriculars, so let’s not punish them. Let’s just get our priorities straight.  

2. Once students go to their extra-curriculars, teachers go to their PLC and plan for instruction, while non-core staff teach and coach.  Any coach that teaches a core class works with his/her PLC until the end of the school day. He/she can coach at the after school practices.  

3. No student leaves for any event, before the four cores are completed.

4. Continued state funding of the support team’s recommendations.

5. Continued state funding of the staff development grant to train teachers to adequately implement the support team’s plan.

6. TEA will publicly celebrate the progress made in the effort towards building exemplar practices.  

7. Should the campus is question be a secondary campus, all schools in the feeder pattern will be included all improvement activities.

THE EASY WAY PLAN

Year 1 Low Performing

1. Implement The Foundation Trinity, district-wide.

2. Implement the Fundamental 5 in every classroom, in the entire feeder pattern. 

Year 2... Problem Solved 

SC Response

I would pay money to see the Hard Way Plan presentations.

On the other hand, your Easy Way Plan is pure genius.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference; Illinois ASCD Fall Conference (Multiple Presentations) 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook

Top Tweets From the Week of April 12, 2015

A number of you in the LYS Nation are now Twitter users.  If you haven’t done so yet, we want you to join us.  To let you see what you are missing, here are the Top 10 LYS Tweets from the week of April 12, 2015.

1. Despite rejection of vouchers in 28 referendums, legislators continue to ignore the will of their constituents. (By @waltxyz)

2. Several Texas Senators beholden to those who feel Texas public education is a "wasteful government bureaucracy." No wonder they seek to destroy it. (By @pastors4txkids)

3. If your teachers aren't learning, your school is not getting better. (By @vhsaldana) 

4. I've taught many different approaches to writing, including the traditional workshop. Nothing compares to writing and reading every day. (By @Sam__Weller)

5. The Texas Politician who protects us from the Common Core is like the police officer that protects us from giraffe attacks. It's a made-up issue. (By @LYSNation)

6. Responsibility of government is to guard, protect the public interest. But, this can't be done by those who think "government" and "public" are evil. (By @pastors4txkids)

7. In US, 3 out of 10 college students drop out. Many colleges have embarrassingly low graduation rates. Discourage students from going there! (By @tgrierhisd)

8. Arrogance is forgivable. Ignorance is understandable. But together they are a dangerous combination. (By @JWCrowder)

9. Ms. Merki (Goliad ES) closed the lesson in her math class with a critical writing activity! (By @LYSNation)

10. Excited to hear that The Fundamental 5 (Cain & Laird) is being in used in the University of Michigan M.Ed. program! GO BLUE!!! (By @LYSNation)

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5 
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference; Illinois ASCD Fall Conference (Multiple Presentations) 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook

Texas Superintendent Search

LYS Executive Search

~ Superintendent ~

Culberson County-Allamore Independent School District

A West Texas school district is searching for its next Superintendent of Schools

The successful candidate will have

• Demonstrated leadership success as a principal and/or district level administrator
• Demonstrated success educating diverse student populations
• Firm understanding of school finance
• LYS training and experience, preferred

Information of note

• Enrollment - 450 students
• Rural setting
• Two campuses
• Competitive salary and benefits

Qualified and interested candidates submit the following to Search@LeadYourSchool.com

• Letter of interest
• Resume
• Administrator’s certifications
• List of references
• Recent campus/district performance data 

Search Consultant: Robert 'Bob' Brezina

LYS Executive Search

(832) 477-5323

LYS Nation, once again a school district wants YOU!

Think. Work. Achieve.

LYS Executive Search

~ Junior High School Principal ~

Spring Hill Independent School District

A LYS Superintendent in East Texas seeks a like-minded principal to turn a good neighborhood school into THE showcase for public education. 

The successful candidate will have

• Demonstrated leadership success as a campus administrator.
• Demonstrated success in increasing staff effectiveness and student performance.
• LYS training and experience, preferred. 

Information of note

• Enrollment - 450 students
• Beautiful East Texas suburban setting
• Competitive salary and benefits

If you are ready to lead from the front and work to win, submit the following to Search@LeadYourSchool.com

• Letter of interest
• Resume
• Administrator’s certifications
• Recent campus performance data

Application Deadline: April 27, 2015

Search Consultant: E. Don Brown

LYS Executive Search

(832) 477-5323

LYS Nation, once again a school district wants YOU!

Think. Work. Achieve.

A Reader Asks... Sharing the Results of a Single, Quick Observation

A new LYSer asks the following:

SC,

I have begun utilizing the PowerWalks Instructional Observation System. I like it... a lot. I do have a quick question... How does the teacher view the survey?  When an email is sent, they only seem to have access to the Notes section not the entire survey.

Thank you.

SC Response

Not sending a completed observation form to the teacher is by design.

A single, three-minute walk-thru is too short of a time frame for in-depth feedback.  Even the best observation will have more unchecked items on the observation form than checked items.  Additionally, there are some items, if only checked 10% of the time, would represent exemplar performance.  Due to this understanding, PowerWalks is not designed to overwhelm teachers with minutiae.  It is designed for coaching and trend-based adjustments.

How this is done: 

1. The report building feature of PowerWalks allows the coaching team to build, for teachers, trend reports that illustrate observed instructional practices.  It takes 15-20 observations to have a relevant sample size of practice to share with an individual teacher.

2. If the observer witnesses exceptional practice during the observation, the system will alert the observer and generate a “Powerful Practice” notice.

3. The observer can send an email note to the teacher.  However, it is never appropriate to send a negative comment or pointed question by email.

Finally, just sending teachers a copy of their observations and not actually talking to them is not efficient practice.  It is lazy practice. I hope this provides some clarification.  We do recommend a training day that addresses appropriate use and the power and versatility of the PowerWalks system.

I hope this helps.

Think. Work. Achieve.

Your turn...

• Call Jo at (832) 477-LEAD to order your campus set of “The Fundamental 5: The Formula for Quality Instruction.” Individual copies available on Amazon.com!  http://tinyurl.com/Fundamental5
• Now at the Apple App Store: Fun 5 Timer (Fundamental 5 Delivery Tool); PowerWalks CLC (Networked Formative Observation Tool) 
• Upcoming Presentations: TASSP Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); TEPSA Summer Conference (Multiple Presentations); NAESP National Conference; Illinois ASCD Fall Conference (Multiple Presentations) 
• Follow Sean Cain and LYS on www.Twitter.com/LYSNation  and like Lead Your School on Facebook