Cutting through red tape in the classroom
The idea of slashing bureaucratic red tape has an appealing quality, even if it is overly simplistic, and few areas of life in Florida are as heavily regulated as public education. It has been this way for decades.
But now, 25 years after Jeb Bush became governor and revolutionized K-12 education in Florida, the Legislature is taking steps to get out of the way of the state’s 67 school districts — to the dismay of the former governor.
But times change, and in a revolving-door Capitol made much worse by term limits, fewer and fewer lawmakers know much of anything about the Bush-era reforms, which introduced concepts such as Florida’s practice of grading schools; the expansion of school-choice options and the expanded use of standardized testing as a major factor in school funding and teacher evaluations as well as student progress.
The Florida Senate, which is leading the charge to deregulate public schools, makes an effective case for changes, but it doesn’t go far enough. The Legislature needs to get out of the way and let school districts govern themselves, and it needs to do more to help teachers stay in classrooms.
Three separate bills (SB 7000, 7002 and 7004) are already on the fast track to passage in advance of the start of the legislative session on Jan. 9. The “Learn Local” agenda is a priority of Senate President Kathleen Passidomo, R-Naples, who’s entering the final year of her presidency.
The modest and long-overdue steps toward deregulation follow legislative passage last year of a universal taxpayer-funded school voucher program, a major policy overreach. In that regard, lawmakers have taken an element of Bush’s plan much too far.
It’s a welcome shift in philosophy for a Republican-dominated Legislature that for too long has micro-managed public education, while allowing private and religious schools to evade the same level of accountability.
Doubting ‘retention’
The biggest changes include ending the Bush-era requirement that third-graders must pass a reading test before advancing to fourth grade, and the repeal of a provision that high school students must pass two exams to receive a diploma. Seniors also would no longer have to pass Algebra I and a language arts exam to graduate.
Retention is overused. The changes are being driven by a belief that holding back a student in the third grade is too late in a child’s development and can do more harm than good and that public schools are not well engineered to produce enough workers for tomorrow. Young students can still be retained in the same grade with their parents’ approval.
“Let’s fix the system. Let’s stop piling on additional regulations for our families that don’t lead to employment,” said Sen. Corey Simon, a Tallahassee Republican who’s helping to steer the changes through the Senate. The first-term senator recently hoisted a three-and-a-half-inch thick book of state education regulations, some of which he argued were no longer necessary, to amplify his point.
It’s a challenging assignment for a freshman lawmaker, but Simon, a former Florida State University and pro football standout, shows a command of the subject matter. A forceful debater, he has spoken of his own son’s eagerness to enter the work force and earn a good living after high school, rather than attend college.
“We’re holding back a whole generation of kids that can enter the work force that have no intention of going into our traditional post-secondary institutions,” Simon said at a hearing Tuesday in the Senate Fiscal Policy Committee, where all three bills passed unanimously.
One closely-watched issue involved school recess. After criticism from PTA leaders and parents known as “recess moms,” senators dropped a proposal to give school districts more leeway in allocating recess time, which must be 100 minutes weekly.
Support from teachers
The changes have drawn support from teachers and some teacher union locals, who support greater flexibility in rewarding highly effective teachers and allowing advanced degrees to be calculated in providing pay raises.
Gordon Longhofer, president of the Palm Beach County teachers’ union, testified in support of the changes, noting that his county has more than 600 current teaching vacancies, double the normal number, and that teachers must work second and third jobs to make ends meet.
“Clearly they need better compensation,” Longhofer testified.
Bush, Florida’s “education governor” two decades ago, is the most prominent critic of the Legislature’s proposals.
In a recent op-ed essay in the Sentinel, Bush expressed strong opposition to the biggest changes and called them “a step backward.” After leaving office in 2007 following two terms as governor, Bush became a national authority on school choice, standards and accountability.
“If we expect less, we will get less. This cannot be the future we want for Florida,” Bush argued in the essay. “Now is not the time for lawmakers to get weak-kneed on policies that have played key roles in contributing to two decades of educational progress.”
But today’s employers looking to fill jobs aren’t interested in Algebra scores, Simon argued — they want to see the diploma.
In what sounded like a clear reference to the Bush era, Simon told fellow senators: “We’re looking forward to the work force of the future, not the policies of yesteryear.”
The Orlando Sentinel Editorial Board includes Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson, Opinion Editor Krys Fluker and Viewpoints Editor Jay Reddick. The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Editorial Page Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Editorial Page Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writer Martin Dyckman and Anderson. Send letters to insight@orlandosentinel.com.