|
Been there, done yet?
By John Young
 We have hard evidence that during his time as governor, Rick Perry has spent time in public schools. It is true that photographs can be altered, but the body of work appears convincing. After all, in each run for re-election he stocks up for autumn’s harvest with stock images, particularly the made-for-television kind. It shows he’s been there and he cares.
Otherwise, one would wonder.
It’s no prerequisite of his office that he darken the doorway of a public school. To be honest, in reviewing his contributions thereto, one might assume he hasn’t gone inside to find out what schools do and how.
Consider Exhibit A: Perry’s so-called 65 percent rule, a bewildering directive that, reports say, is about to become history. This requirement that 65 percent of school expenditures be on “classroom instruction” has been a waking nightmare for many, including the commissioner of education. The only people who benefited from this measure were pencil pushers at the Texas Education Agency who were given a reason to show up at work — elucidating what “classroom expenditure” really means, as opposed to all those other things that make schools work: getting children to school, keeping them safe, keeping them fed. You know, everything else schools could not do without.
Recently State Rep. Rob Eissler, chair of the House Public Education Committee, said that the rule is on its way out as the state reconsiders its accountability system. Perry, to his credit, says he won’t put up a fight.
I’m thinking that if Perry were to do what Eissler and members of the Select Committee on School Accountability do between legislative sessions — which is to sit down and really listen to the people most directly affected by school policies — the governor would do a lot of things differently. That’s certainly what the committee now is saying Texas must do.
The committee is saying that Texas needs to deemphasize the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills. Despite pleading from parents and teachers, that notion never has gotten so much as a blink from Perry, even with overwhelming evidence that Texas’ test-heavy system stunts a lot of intellectual growth. For one, it makes teachers prisoners of a stifling cubicle built around what academicians call an “outcome measure.” And that measure isn’t an elevating one. It’s the state’s attempt at defining academic adequacy.
Listening to the members of the select committee discuss their proposals in Austin last October, I was stunned by the clearly apparent fact that they had listened. They had actually heard teachers’ complaints about how TAKS has warped and dragged down education. Texas’ system, the committee members acknowledged, is not geared toward tracking individual growth or institutional improvement. It is too punitive toward schools. It does little to alert teachers to the needs of anyone but the lowest achievers, while narrowing the curriculum.
The most telling line came from the glib Eissler about the insane drum-roll moment that causes so many to stress out about the TAKS. Do what the panel proposes, said Eissler, and we’ll have “less Valium dispensed in lower grades.”
It’s a crime when a child has a headache because of a test that’s not really meant to help him or diagnose his needs. It’s really meant to hit school officials over the heads with a salami, much like the soon-to-be-late 65 percent rule. Who really benefited from it, Mr. Governor?
I’m thinking this was more about raw politics than anything that would advance the ball down the field toward excellence. But, then, so are campaign photo opportunities on campus.
JOHN YOUNG is the opinion editor and a columnist for the Waco Tribune-Herald. He also is the author of “Ghosts of Liberals Past.” He can be reached at jyoung@wacotrib.com.
|
