Changing Michigan's Schools / Detroit News Editorials

Changing Michigan's Schools
Sunday 2-11-2007

Local school districts balk at education reform

Michigan is already stepping back from its new commitment to education reform, just as it is trying to catch up with other states and the world.

Less than a year after Michigan passed much-heralded statewide curriculum reform for high schools, school districts are balking at fully implementing it, saying they will teach it through trimesters rather than semesters, allowing them to keep more elective courses as well as teachers who aren't qualified for the tougher classes.

In doing so, they are sabotaging students' access to the content they most need to prepare for college and the work world.

"It makes a mockery out of these high school graduation requirements," says Sharif Shakrani, co-director of Michigan State University's Education Policy Center and one of the country's foremost experts in student achievement. "Unless the legislators do something about this, it will be really hard to correct later on. Otherwise, it's a sham."

Today, The Detroit News kicks off a weeklong series on Michigan education, exploring how the state can dramatically improve students' K-16 success if it is willing to stand up to the special interests controlling the schools.

Never before has education mattered so much to our future well-being.

Yet at the school and district level, many administrators, teachers and union leaders are proving reluctant to follow state leadership on the high school curriculum reform passed last spring.

At the state level, both Democrats and Republicans resist or do not initiate reforms, using the respective excuses of union rights and local control to protect their core supporters.

These so-called traditions are holding the state back from educational and economic progress.

"I really am a local control guy," says Mike Reno, a Republican member of the Rochester Community Schools Board of Education. "But at this point, local control is out of control."

The problem is not ignorance. We know what to do. Other states have shown us.

Nor is the problem simply funding. Money helps, but it has not driven successful reforms elsewhere.

Texas, Virginia and North Carolina and other states have undertaken bold state-level reforms to effectively boost their students' academic success. As a result, they are increasingly closing their socioeconomic achievement gap.

By contrast, Michigan did not pass a statewide assessment until April 2006. The state has not improved its college attendance rate significantly, and its student achievement is continuing to fall behind compared with other states' performance growth.

"We need another approach," Shakrani says. "Other states have taken another approach, and it is bearing fruit."

This week, we'll look at how Michigan can -- and must -- take another approach to K-12 education.

If Michigan is to regain its educational edge, both political parties must put children before their partisan supporters and embrace a more open-minded, 21st century interpretation of their core beliefs.

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About the series
How Michigan must reform the state's K-12 education system to catch up with the rest of the world.
Today: Opponents use excuses of union rights and local control to frustrate school change.
Monday: Why Michigan's student achievement is falling behind, and what we can do about it.
Tuesday: We explore the special interests that fight reforms to turn around the state's dismal dropout rate.
Wednesday: How other states have overhauled teacher management to improve student performance.
Thursday: Michigan must cut its skyrocketing administrative costs to save money for the classroom.



Changing Michigan's schools
Monday 2-12-2007

State must play stronger role in education reform

Just 10 years ago, Michigan students significantly out-performed the national average on achievement. Today, their performance is barely average compared with other states -- and fails miserably compared to other countries.

Michigan students didn't grow worse; they just didn't grow at all. While our state's performance stagnated, other states' students blossomed under careful cultivation.

Years after other states launched dramatic changes to improve their schools, Michigan is just trying out overdue education reform.

Last year, Michigan implemented a sorely needed statewide curriculum reform. While we applaud this new mandate, we realize that schools need further state leadership to guide instruction, textbook policy, teacher management and other issues to ensure the educational system leads the country once gain, and the world.

Other states have embraced bold statewide reforms. They are seeing real results. Yet Michigan clings to outdated, rigid traditions of local control and union rights that need to be modernized.

We have always believed that government works best when it is closest to the people. But Michigan's local school boards have proven incapable of breaking the stranglehold of education unions and implementing common sense reforms. We cannot deny what is working in other states.

Experts and activists agree the state must take the lead on improving student performance by providing more guidance on instructional methods, and addressing school structures and educators who resist reforms.

Michigan can wipe out its education deficit if the state:

Provides more guidance on instruction. Many school districts are struggling to figure out how to implement the new state curriculum.

Overhauls middle school instruction and structures to better prepare students for high school.

Recommends textbooks, if not mandate them, to reflect the needs of the new global economy. Michigan instruction is based on textbooks. If the books change, the teaching will follow.

Michigan's rigid teacher bargaining agreements and interpretation of local control has continued to thwart reform.

"This is a state that has prided itself for many, many, many years that the decisions of education are made at the local, local, local level," says Sharif Shakrani, co-director of Michigan State University's Education Policy Center and one of the country's foremost experts in student achievement.

Mike Reno, a businessman and Rochester school board member, adds, "With local control comes responsibility to make sound decisions. Look at most school boards: I don't think they make bad decisions; they just don't make any decisions. If they had done their jobs, we would not have needed the state to lead reform. But we do."

Michigan's cultural attitude must also change. North Carolina upended its old belief that "not everyone is meant to go to college" and mandated that middle schools eliminate tracking. Now, every middle school student is taking rigorous college preparatory classes and they are closing their socio-economic achievement gap.

Michigan needs a similar comprehensive reform of education that starts with taking the schools back from special interests.