What Sports Are Safe?

 

 

There have been numerous indicators that some sports that are played by school children are not safe. Football, soccer, lacrosse, ice hockey, martial arts, wrestling, boxing, and other high impact/contact sports are known for blows to the head and resulting in concussions and sub-concussions. Helmets do not protect the brain inside the head from jarring back and forth inside the skull. The NFL is now settling lawsuits and funding research on the effects of head injuries, concussions, brain damage because players who no longer play the game are experiencing the effects of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Namely, CTE causes depression, anxiety, problems with movement, speaking and other cognitive deficits. Some high profile deaths and suicides of former NFL players have been linked to CTE.

 

Just what are the symptoms of sub-concussions? Sub-concussions come from less forceful hits that don't cause an observable concussion. There aren't any visible symptoms or signs of injury until the cumulative effect of brain injury occurs. For example, Dr. Michael Lipton, Associate Director of the Gruss Magnetic Resonance Research Center at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine found that over time the brain cannot repair itself from repetitive hits to the brains of soccer players who 'head' the ball. Brain scans of soccer players who frequently 'head' the ball reveal brain damage to the white matter of brain tissue. The brain could not adequately repair itself from these hits to the head and after 1,800 headers the brain is permanently damaged resulting in memory and attention problems. I wonder how many practices and games does it take before this threshold is met?

 

What are the symptoms of a concussion? We likely can all say we have seen the physical act of a blow to the head or body that would shake the brain inside the skull. But can we see the brain injury that occurs with the naked eye? Probably not. Some who have experienced a concussion may pass out or forget what happened right before the play. There may be confusion, dizziness. But some people who experience a concussion may not have clear symptoms. Most will recover from a concussion within a few hours to a few weeks to a few months. While this recovery is taking place, the brain is more susceptible to damage.

 

Why do we continue to idolize these high impact/contact sports? Why do we go out of our way to introduce elementary age children to these sports, and the exposure to brain damage, just so they will be prepared to play JV and varsity level sports. And if they make these teams, continue their exposure to brain damage?  Somethings wrong here. Can't we learn from the mistakes of the NFL football players?

 

 

Time for Vouchers for Educational Choice?

 

Is it really time for an expansion of government sponsored vouchers to promote school choice? We all need to become informed about vouchers, education savings accounts, and tuition tax credits - all variously named, but all related to vouchers. And there will be a push for the often heard phrase, tax reform, to include diversion of public monies from the public schools into the private pockets of so called education reformers. Each of these 'education reforms' continue to erode funding for traditional public schools and harm the programs offered to all students, but especially harm students from disadvantaged backgrounds.

 

Here is a question to ponder at the outset: What if the amount of money that is, and will be, dedicated to vouchers, either federally and/or at state levels,  PLUS the dollar amount the billionaires and millionaires donate to this effort, PLUS the tax break dollar amounts the billionaires and millionaires receive, were all allocated to the public education system?

 

In the proposed federal education budget, President Trump and Betsy DeVos have highlighted school choice, with a plan to spend $1.4 billion to expand voucher programs in public and private schools, with a long-term goal of spending $20 billion a year. The breakdown: about $250 million would be earmarked for private school choice programs and about $168 million will be for charter schools. Where do these dollars come from?  Cuts from existing educational programs. Additionally, the Trump administration advocates all federal, state and local dollars to follow students to the school of their choice. More dollars flowing out of public schools.

 

Already, in other states, we see draconian measures being employed to approve vouchers. Consider Texas where Lt. Governor Patrick 'led' their State Senate into a proposed 0 dollar budget for state education funding unless he also received an approved voucher bill. Yes, you read that correctly - ZERO dollars. How can that be, you may wonder? These blackmail, starvation tactics sound all too familiar as the Maine Legislature just completed its budget process, during which Governor LePage simply and unilaterally eliminated all funding for system administration in all schools across our state. LePage's real primary targets were to eliminate Superintendents and local School Boards with whom he regularly clashes. His demand was for a statewide teacher contract and the creation of regional entities that will allegedly perform system administration functions more cheaply. Unlike the Texas Senate, there were some Maine legislators who saw that his proposal was detrimental to schools. LePage succeeded in eliminated funding for system administration, but not the statewide teacher contract. Once the regional entities are up and running, the push for statewide contracts will be back. The topic of this blog is school vouchers, but the same strong arm tactics slowly attempting to privatize education across the nation are rearing their ugly heads here in Maine. Do you hear echoes of President Trump's words: 'We will withhold payments to insurance companies and just let the health insurance markets implode, and then we will get real health reform'. LePage: 'I will withhold all the funding for Superintendents and School Boards and just let the public education system in Maine implode' (my words, his thoughts).

 

Questions to ponder as I end this blog: What is the tuition, fees, and incidental costs of attending a private school? Much more than the amount of an individual voucher, I suspect. Much more than the value of a tuition tax credit, I speculate. Will ALL students have equal opportunity to access a private school by using a voucher? Will ALL private schools accept ANY student who applies regardless of ability to pay? Will all private schools, when they accept pubic tax dollar voucher money, be accountable to achieving the same (unrealistic) achievement results as public schools? We need to gather the facts about public school funding, vouchers, education savings accounts, education tax credits rather than base our actions on suspicions and speculations, as I just did. The facts that I know so far are not encouraging.

 

Political pushes for vouchers (and charter schools) continue to erode public schools. Call it a slow and painful starvation. Look around our country, the same political goals and strategies for 'education reform' will soon be playing at a legislative committee meeting near you. Or at least, at those meetings that are open to the public.

 



Who Wins - No One





     In March I wrote about a controversy brewing in Brunswick. Brunswick had acquired a parcel of land on the ocean for nonpayment of taxes. Along with several town councilors, a vocal group of citizens monopolized the public comment period during many town council meetings insisting that the land should be retained and owned by the town and made into a public waterfront park. The town council spent many hours hearing from town residents; received many written comments/emails from town residents. A group of citizens gathered signatures on a (on-line) petition 'requesting' the council to put the decision out to citizen referendum. 'Request' is an understatement. Their voices grew louder and more insistent. The newspaper articles grew nastier. In the end, the council voted to put the property up for sale. The citizen group sued the town saying the town council did not follow municipal law and should have heeded their petition request for a referendum.

This group was very sure that a court would agree with their position, ie. that the town council vote to sell the land not only did not follow municipal law, but their action had a 'chilling effect on the citizen right to petition their government.'

This week the court ruled in favor of the town. Sometimes elected officials have hard decisions to make that don't necessarily please the constituents who elect them. Sometimes constituents make hard decisions harder. No one really won in this case. There was a lot of animosity surrounding this issue and has further divided this town. The same animosity has existed with the school board. Hard decisions have had to be made. The townspeople are further divided. 

Charter Schools, Vouchers, Scholarships



"Civilization is in a race between education and catastrophe. Let us learn the truth and spread it as far and wide as our circumstances allow. For the truth is the greatest weapon we have."  HG Wells

"Education is for improving the lives of others and leaving your community and the world better than you found it."  Marion Wright Edelman

"Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world."  Nelson Mandela

"Whenever people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government." Thomas Jefferson

     These are quotes from people from different times and circumstances. Their messages echo through time and place and inform the present. Our public education system is being systematically dismantled, here is Maine and across the United States. Let us all know that there are businessmen and women systematically chipping away at the public institution created to benefit EVERYONE; created to help EVERYONE reach their highest potential; created to promote our democratic way of life for EVERYONE.

Politicians are helping drain what precious few dollars are left from supporting public education, sometimes knowingly, sometimes unknowingly (I will give some the benefit of the doubt). Here is an example:

-The Maine Legislature approves the operation of charter schools in Maine. The Maine Charter School Commission is created and political appointments are made to this body to approve and monitor charter schools in Maine. Two of those charter schools are Maine Virtual Academy and Maine Connections Academy, another virtual school.

The most recent evaluation/review of the Maine Virtual Academy is summarized on the Maine Charter School Commission website as:

1. Meets Contract agreement for: recurrent enrollment from year to year; financial performance & sustainability (although I noted they are in process for arranging for an audit so this lacks independent verification); governance board performance; adequacy of facilities maintenance (which is an office suite used by faculty for online learning delivery); and transportation (it is hard to determine what exactly the determinants of success are - MeVA reports having no costs for student transportation, ..... but there were field trips..... mmmm);
2. Partially meets Contract agreement for: Student Academic Proficiency; Student Academic Growth; Addressing Achievement Gaps between major student subgroups; post-secondary readiness; school social and academic climate; parent & community engagement (as an online school, it would be interesting to know what 'community' this school is going to engage?).  Arguably, these are the most important success indicators of a school and peppered throughout the report is that MEVA 'did not collect this data'. Why? All other public schools are required to. One of the last recommendations in this report is "increase attention to special eduction enrollment and the provision of FAPE for students with disabilities."
3. Does not meet Contract agreement: Student attendance. Maine's public school average daily attendance is 94%. MeVA average daily attendance rate is 85.6%. This likely affects the student academic proficiency and growth indicators. The last recommendation in the report is "address systemic truancy issues with particular attention to students with disabilities."

While the oversight of the Maine Charter School Commission is positive, the performance of this online charter school mirrors that of others in other states. Part of the application and review process to operate in Maine includes providing evidence of readiness and willingness to operate according to Maine law. It appears to me that the Maine Charter School Commission granted permission to an entity that either was not prepared to comply with Maine law the first day of operation or it was unwilling to comply with the law as it opened its doors to students and families. Why else would this school not collect the very data that is required to determine their level of compliance/success?

The most recent review of the Maine Connections Academy is also summarized on the Maine Charter School Commission website:

This charter school meets all of its contract agreements with the exceptions of:
1. Student Academic Proficiency is noted 'unknown due to unavailable state test scores'. This is no fault of Maine Connections Academy.
(My editorial: All public schools had to wait until spring to receive this state achievement test score data, making the use of the data useless for that school year. Why did most public school children spend upwards of 6-7 hours completing a test whose results would not be available for most of the following school year? My view: millions of taxpayer dollars wasted when these same dollars could have been spent on activities at the local level that could have directly positively improved children's educational experience during that year school spent waiting for the data from the state.)
2. Student Academic Growth in both reading and math is noted as decreased (as measured by the LEAP, a federal achievement test) from the previous year.
3. Student Attendance contract agreement is partially met.  Daily average attendance did not meet the state average daily attendance rate.There are three other interesting target goals, which were met, in addition to meeting the average daily attendance rate.  They include a 'retention rate of 70% of students during the school year (they don't want students dropping out during the school year),  a 50% re-enrollment of eligible students from one year to the next, and a continuous enrollment of students for multiple years. These are not only for the benefit of students, but it is for the bottom line profit margin, too. One might ask: is a 30% drop-out rate during the school year acceptable? Is a 50% drop-out (or 'not invited back') rate acceptable? This is the real eye opener - even though this virtual academy met most of their performance targets. Nationwide, this is the pattern with virtual schools resulting in less and less student diversity enrolled.

Recently, the entire Little Rock, Arkansas school district was taken over by the state. The elected board was removed. In swooped the Walton family (yes, the Walton family who owns Walmart) to buy Little Rock Garland School. The school will likely be converted to a charter school. Walmart donates millions to Teach for America. Charter schools then cozy up with Teach for America and use new inexperienced graduates who will work for much lower wages to staff  charter schools. Considering that most regular public school teachers are on probation and mentored for 2-3 years to prove, and continuously improve, their skills, these Teach for America pre-professional staff only stay for a few years in the charter schools and then move on. There is no union to support them. There is a never ending supply of cheap (inexperienced!) labor for charter schools. Where does the money saved go - a lot of it goes into 'owners' wallets as 'profit'. Taxpayer, public monies siphoned away from the public school to 'follow the child' to the school of their choice. Then the 'profits' of the charter school go into the pockets of private businessmen, who donate millions to political efforts to continue the drain on the real public schools and resulting strain on taxpayers.

Chicago public schools are in similar disarray, being closed and converted to charter schools with the same financial consequences. Arkansas and Chicago schools are but a tiny fraction of public schools across our country experiencing this hostile takeover. Mississippi has more students attending charter schools than regular public schools. Maine can learn many preventative lessons from the stories from other states. 

Let us all be well informed about charter schools, in Maine and across the US. Let us all know the truth about charter schools. Let us all learn about the charter school movements in other states. Let us "all spread the information as far and wide as our circumstances allow." We will then know what to look for and guard against in Maine charter schools, current and those to come in the future.


Next up: The hot topic: school vouchers; 'scholarships' created using public/taxpayer dollars and other political moves to drain away money from public schools.

I Hate to be a "I Told You So", But.....

     Here we are in the beginning of a new fiscal year and the end of another contentious state budget process. What was accomplished during this budget development process? The Governor and both Republicans and Democrats claimed they were held hostage (via a state shutdown that no one wanted) by the 'other side'. Winners and losers. That's the way our society views success now. Pitiful.

     In an Oct. 29, 2016 post, I expressed my doubt about the success of the then pending vote on Referendum Question #2 which would levy a surtax on the wealthiest Mainers and dedicate the use of that money to public education, specifically money to be allocated to direct classroom instruction. To be clear, I supported, and still do, the notion that public education should be adequately funded.  The PICUS report, which I detailed in that October post, concluded that Maine underfunds public education by millions of dollars. Further, Maine citizens passed a previous referendum calling for the state to fund 55% of public education. I questioned whether passing another referendum would make any difference since future legislatures and governors can choose to ignore voters' wishes when developing the budget.

     So here we are in July of 2017, eight months after Maine voters supported Referendum Question 2. And after the current legislature voted to again ignore the will of the voters regarding funding of public education. Governor LePage offered a draconian education budget in which he simply would not fund ANY system administration costs statewide. Luckily, there were a majority of both Republicans and Democrats who recognized that fatally flawed plan and worked to restore some of the funding public schools need to operate. However, many school districts' budgets were reduced. And the 55% state funding of education costs? Not yet. The surtax on wealthy Mainers which would have been dedicated to classroom needs? Ignored. Many school departments statewide have had to year after year make difficult choices about what to fund and not fund in their schools. Many towns/cities held their breath while developing a budget with no idea of the amount of state funding coming their way, causing great conflict between local property taxpayers; pitting those who could afford to pay more property tax against those who truly couldn't afford rising taxes. Turmoil at the state level. Turmoil at the local city/town level. Turmoil within the schools when parents and kids realize a program, a service, an extracurricular option has been defunded or eliminated.

     Please tell me who was really held hostage during this legislative session?  Governing by referendum is not ideal. Governing with the ideology that taxes should be done away with is not conducive to promoting the 'common good', which public education is an example of. Everyone benefits from public education. And everyone loses when public education is further eroded.

    

 

 

Stability

  

 

Recent news accounts reporting the deportation of a respected coffee farmer illustrates the hardship some children face in public schools. This adult farmer had been brought to the US by his parents from Mexico when he was a child. In the interim, he married and had two children. He built a respected coffee farming business in Hawaii. He has been cooperating with immigration officials and  waiting for 10 years for his citizenship paperwork to make its way through our court system. There is no reported evidence that he has committed any crimes while in the US. But his time in the US has come to an end, he involuntarily left for Mexico and his family has been torn apart. Why? How will his children fare during this time of separation? When will they be able to see their father in person again? He is not allowed back in the country for 10 years. This just seems cruel.

Recently, the Supreme Court ruled that President Trump's travel ban can be applied very narrowly, but also the justices ruled that people with close ties will be allowed in this country. Doesn't this send a message about immigrants already in this country? How can having 2 children with American citizenship not qualify for 'close family ties'?

Children learn best when their lives are stable. Many factors can negatively affect children's lives and learning- poverty, illness, learning challenges, moving from place to place, family instability to name a few. Let's think about this farmer's deportation order. Our government has initiated an action which could very well challenge these children's education. How will the family make their living? Can they continue to operate their coffee farm as efficiently without their father? Will this cause a slide into poverty? Will the family need to move and thus necessitate the children to leave their current schooling situation and begin anew somewhere else? Schooling transitions usually produce academic challenges. Most importantly, we all hope the family can weather this stormy time of instability and continue to maintain the ties that bind them together.

     Where will Trump's policies, and those politicians who help pave the way, lead us?  

  

???

 

     By now we have all seen the photographs of the world leaders at the recent G20 summit meeting. One was very revealing. It showed all the leaders lined up. Our President Trump was on one end, with an awkward distance between him and all the others. His facial expression and body language was totally different from all the other leaders. It appeared that there was just no emotional connection that he was 'left out' of this important group of men and women. It seemed like he was out of his element. The 'art of the deal' mentality was not going to be an effective tool for him during this meeting. His superficial charm hasn't seemed to win over any of these leaders. Has he, or will he, just shrug off the real reason he was disconnected - he has said and done things that have made interacting with these leaders difficult. He really is personally responsible for the things he has said and done that have been upsetting to world leaders, but it doesn't seem like he is disappointed. He will just continue on his path. He will not admit any guilt, never has. In fact, it is likely he will concoct some fake news story (lying seems to come easy to him) that will lay the blame on someone else and probably display a bit of an angry tantrum while tweeting out the lie. But he will continue on his narcissistic way as if he is the center of the world that will again reveal his true nature.  The US had made a commitment with the Paris Climate Agreement, but Trump seems unmoved by commitments.

 

     Here's to hoping the good citizens of America can salvage our world reputation.