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Home > Blogs > Get on the Bus > Archives > 2007 > February > 08 > Entry
Jon Husted: Terry Ryan’s evil twin?
Jon Husted
Or maybe it’s Ryan who is the evil twin, depending on your point of view. (The headline is meant in jest, folks. No offense, Mr. Speaker.)
Fordham Foundation Vice President Terry Ryan and Ohio House Speaker Jon Husted, R-Kettering, are allies. Both men are true believers in school choice. Both are strong advocates for charter schools. Both have, at times, been sharply critical of Dayton Public Schools.
So when Husted visited the Dayton Daily News to meet with its editorial board Wednesday, I couldn’t wait to find out what he thought about Ryan’s commentary in Tuesday’s Dayton Daily News endorsing the district’s 15.17 mill levy?
Husted jokingly said he left Ryan a message after reading Tuesday’s paper asking who had hijacked his keyboard.
To put it mildly, Husted is not ready to offer his own endorsement.
As I sat in on the meeting, Husted was asked if he were a city resident, would he vote yes for the school district’s levy in May?
“I don’t know enough to make a decision right now,” he said. “I don’t know if they’re lean enough. I don’t know if they have closed as many schools as they should have been closing. I don’t know how many teachers they have and if they’ve gotten rid of all the people who are underperforming.”
Husted said he might be more inclined to be supportive if the district had made significant changes, like instituting merit pay for teachers. And he said the levy’s chances would be greatly enhanced if the board promised it would allow all parents in the district to use the tax dollars raised for any school they wanted to send their child to — public, private or charter.
He also said he wanted to know what other options the district considered to raise taxes. Did it look at an earned income tax? Or did it consider asking for part of the money it needs through property taxes and part through an alternative sort of tax?
Husted also flatly rejected the Dayton school board’s argument that the state is partly responsible for its financial crisis. School leaders say there was a disagreement with the Ohio Department of Education about charter school enrollment last May and that the department had agreed to a settlement of the dispute that was financially palatable to Dayton schools.
But then lawmakers wrote new rules into legislative bill that allowed the state to withdraw from the talks by declaring the education department the “final arbiter” of enrollment disputes. Dayton school leaders say they had counted the settlement money into the 2006-07 budget and the loss of those funds caused a scramble to fill the shortfall and pushed up the need for a levy.
Husted said the enrollment debate was more about problems with enrollment reported by the school district than about charter schools. He said the education department absolutely should have the final say in disputes over enrollment and he rejected a recent court decision in favor of Dayton schools, saying “the judge is wrong,” and promised the state would appeal.
Husted said the education department stepped outside the law when it negotiated a settlement with Dayton schools and a couple other urban districts.
“I’m tired of people at the Ohio Department of Education interpreting the law based on what’s convenient for them,” he said.
His advice for Dayton schools on the enrollment dispute?
“Don’t make up students that don’t exist and then negotiate a number for people who aren’t there,” he said.
I guess the school board shouldn’t wait for Husted’s levy endorsement before printing up their campaign materials.
Permalink | Comments (9) | Categories: Dayton Public Schools, My Favorite Posts
Comments
By James
February 14, 2007 8:55 PM | Link to this
Now we understand why so many Ohio educators have dubbed Husted as “Public Education’s #1 Enemy)By stressed DPS teacher
February 9, 2007 10:14 PM | Link to this
“Great”(?): You have a very simplistic solution. And for the record, the real world does not always reward performance. Look at the sports figures who command huge contracts, then either underperform or become injured and unable to fulfill their contracts. What about the overpaid corporate executives who make billions? Do you really think they are earning their astronomical paychecks? As for teachers getting the extra weeks off, we certainly don’t have more time off than sports icons or politicians. Besides, why do people care how much time we get off? We don’t get paid for that time and with the year-round schedule, we can’t get a summer job or take required professional development classes at the local universities because they are usually held during the day and overlap the new starting dates. As for doing your job and being rewarded- I have seen too many DPS workers who have given their all and then were anything but rewarded. The days of loyalty and being treated well by your employer are gone in almost all segments of the workforce, including DPS. That is the real world. I don’t know any teacher who could work harder than my coworkers. Unlike the “real” world, you won’t find teachers taking an extra long lunch break, going to get a cup of coffee or soda a dozen times a day, sitting on the phone talking to friends at work, playing games at the computer or placing merchandise orders on company time, having rubber band fights with coworkers or any of a number of other activities I have observed at places of business and been told by friends. Many of my coworkers arrive at school nearly an hour early and most stay an hour or two beyond the work day. And I will add two more things you might not have thought about. How many “real world” jobs expect their employees to routinely pay for their own required continuing education and on their own time. And in how many “real world” jobs is it just a given that employees will spend large amounts of their own money to purchase work related materials just to do their jobs? The average teacher spends between $500-$1000 per year of their own money buying materials for their classroom.By Oldprof
February 9, 2007 8:17 PM | Link to this
Mary has one thing right: keep the kids ignorant and it will make it easier for politicos to mislead the public. Husted either shows an abysmal ignorance of the issues for an elected official, or he’s misleading us intentionally. The settlement that the BOE entered for attendance counts was NOT due to miscounting by the public schools but by his pet projects, the abysmal charter schools. Husted can continue to play the blame game, but he’s term limited and will have to answer to a larger district if he goes for a term in the state Senate—one that will include some voters in a school district that so far has not had a chronic black mold problem. Perhaps his ears are open enough to consider remaking himself in more of a Voinovich mold and less in the Republican-as-wealthy-critic habit.By Great
February 9, 2007 4:19 PM | Link to this
Merit pay is the best way - just like the real world folks. Do your job, and do it well, you shall be rewarded. Those who don’t want to follow such potential policies are the one who lie and cheat, slack-off and hurt the DPS. Most teachers are doing an average job, b/c they have less than average students. There should be an incentive to work harder and longer. Teachers have more weeks off than anyone else I know.By Mary
February 9, 2007 8:04 AM | Link to this
I agree with parts of all the above comments. However, when it come to lawmakers, we can also blame uninformed and disengaged citizens. Schools are part of the problem in generating and enabling uniformed and unengaged citizens. Schools have been a major source of “poor little entitled me” attitudes from students and families. I prefer an attitude like the sign I saw in front of Stebbins some years ago, something like, “Go into learn, go forth to serve”.By Anne
February 8, 2007 9:25 PM | Link to this
Stressed Teacher - good idea! Let’s pay the legislatures based on merit/performance. We can start with how many of the people have good paying jobs, and decent housing and take away pay based on high taxes, unemployment, and homelessness. Then when they all only want to work in the affluent areas, they might understand what it’s like to work in Dayton and be rated based on the scores. Well, at least for those of us who don’t cheat! By the way - those who are not IN education but make LAWS about it - please try to think for just a minute. The charter schools get the students, keep the smarter ones and those who behave. They send back all of the low performing students along with the students who cause extreme classroom disturbances. The students are being put through a sort of sifter and the public schools are suffering. We don’t get to pick our students, but you fund the schools that can select whom they take, or keep. YOU ARE WORKING TO DESTROY THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. Are you too short-sighted to see this, or too far removed to care?By Keith
February 8, 2007 8:52 PM | Link to this
I love Husted’s comments. They’re ripe. Have we gotten rid of all politicians in Columbus who are underperforming? I voted a few out this time with my one vote added to bunches of others. Too bad I’m not in his district. And we could use performance pay and retirement for those legislators. Those who solve the funding problem get retirement pay; those who don’t, go out and not wonderful retirement program for them. They can just go back to being whatever real job they used to work—what did Husted used to do? I’m going to be back to vote against the non-performing republicans next election. They can find fortunes for pet goals around bustling Columbus, but none for their hinterlands and or school funding. I especially resent the idea of adding an earnings tax because it’s often easily voted in by retirees and nonworkers who won’t be taxed. No solutions—just tax more. And destroy the schools because they have unions and require money to educate the State’s children. Instead let’s let them go to underperforming charter schools who waste state money and have auditor findings against them like one school in the news for $83000 recently.By stressed DPS teacher
February 8, 2007 7:49 PM | Link to this
So Mr. Husted wants to institute merit pay? Just how does he plan to ensure that all teachers are working on a level playing field? How does he plan to ensure that individual teacher’s classes are not stacked with more than their share of academically and behaviorally challenged children? How does he plan to rate the teachers? Will it go only on test results? How will he ensure that they are valid scores? Will teachers be observed and rated? Who will do this? Will there be ways to eliminate bias and discrimination by the observers or others in the administrative areas? What level of expertise will the evaluators be required to have? Will teachers be held accountable for the behavior of students who have documented or undocumented behavior problems? Will teachers who work for a lousy administrator be held accountable for decisions they disagree with but are forced to comply with? Will extra points be given for teachers who purchase their own materials and supplies to suppliment what the board doesn’t have or won’t spend the funds for? Will we tie it in to attendance? Do teachers get bonus points for coming to school sick or do we take points away for infecting everyone else? Oh, and, when do we pay our legislatures based on merit pay??By Mary
February 8, 2007 6:13 PM | Link to this
I agree with the part about allowing parents to use the taxes raised to send their children to public, private or charter. I think that kind of customer oriented environment could ultimately improve and refocus education.