Voice For Liberty

Tag: KASB

  • Let’s just ignore this Kansas school spending

    SchoolThe reaction to a survey regarding Kansas school spending is useful for two reasons: It lets us gauge the level of knowledge of the public, and it also tells us the extent to which school spending advocates will go to justify and excuse spending.

    The latest example comes from Kansas Association of School Boards (KASB). It’s in response to a survey commissioned by Kansas Policy Institute which asked the public a series of questions on schools and spending. (See Citizens generally misinformed on Kansas school spending.)

    A key finding is that most people think that schools spend much less than actual spending, and by a large margin. Further, most people think spending has declined, when in fact it has risen. These findings are similar to other research commissioned by KPI, and additional surveys by other organizations at the national level.

    Not surprisingly, when citizens and taxpayers learn the true level of school spending, their attitude towards school spending changes. That’s dangerous to school spending advocates. It diminishes their most compelling arguments for more school spending — “it’s for the kids.”

    So the school spending lobby has to explain — rather, make excuses for — the high level of spending. In this case, the school board association would like you to ignore employee pension costs and the costs of buildings and equipment. Here’s what KASB explains as part of a document titled Questions about recent Kansas Policy Institute survey:

    Finally, districts received $690 per pupil in KPERS contributions for district employees, and districts spent $2,320 for capital costs such as buildings and equipment, payments on construction bonds for new schools, and other local revenues like student fees. None of these funds — almost 25 percent of total revenues — can be spent for regular education operating costs.

    That’s right. The Kansas Association of School Boards recommends that Kansas taxpayers discount school spending by 25 percent. Why? Because that spending is for pensions (KPERS) and buildings (and swimming pools, tennis courts, and artificial turf for athletic fields).

    This argument is disingenuous, to say the least. Pension costs are part of the cost of having employees, just as are salary, the employee portion of payroll taxes, and health insurance. That is, unless schools want to stop providing pensions for their employees, in which case they might have trouble recruiting employees, or they might have to pay more in salary so that employees could provide for their own retirement.

    These personnel costs are indeed “regular education operating costs,” despite the claim of KASB.

    Then, KASB wants you to ignore “payments on construction bonds for new schools,” as these are not “regular education operating costs.” KASB is correct. These costs are capital, not operating.

    But when campaigning for new bond issues, school districts tell voters that this spending is absolutely necessary. The kids must have new buildings and facilities, say the school spending advocates.

    But when it comes time to pay off the bonds — well, just sweep that spending under the rug, say school spending boosters.

  • Kansas school spending excused

    Kansas public school teachers and the education bureaucracy want taxpayers to trust them as a reliable source for facts about Kansas schools. But the record doesn’t inspire trust.

    At a recent meeting of the South-Central Kansas Legislative Delegation with citizens, teachers jeered when a legislator cited the spending numbers for USD 259, the Wichita public school district. A comment left to a KAKE TV news story claims that spending numbers presented by the legislator are “misrepresented,” because he included every single dollar. In fact, the numbers presented were correct, as explained in In Kansas, don’t mention the level of school spending.

    kansas-school-funding-comment-2013-03-02

    The writer seems to believe that “bond money” shouldn’t count as school spending. This is a common stance taken by public school spending boosters. They argue that spending on buildings, or perhaps on teacher pension costs, shouldn’t count as money spent educating students.

    Part of the reason for this deflection is that when people learn the true level of school spending, they’re usually astonished at how much is spent. So the school spending lobby has to explain — rather, make excuses for — the high level of spending. Recently Kansas Association of School Boards (KASB) recommended Kansans ignore employee pension costs and the costs of buildings and equipment. Here’s how KASB explained this as part of a document titled Questions about recent Kansas Policy Institute survey:

    Finally, districts received $690 per pupil in KPERS contributions for district employees, and districts spent $2,320 for capital costs such as buildings and equipment, payments on construction bonds for new schools, and other local revenues like student fees. None of these funds — almost 25 percent of total revenues — can be spent for regular education operating costs.

    (See Ignore this Kansas school spending, please.)

    Should teacher pension costs and the cost of buildings and equipment be included in school spending? Of course — unless you’re arguing for more school spending.

    The comment writer also claimed that lawmakers have “cut education funding consistently.” As shown on the nearby chart, it’s true that spending on Kansas schools, on a per-pupil basis, fell slightly for two years running. It then rose a small amount last year. Spending from all sources, individually and collectively, is much higher than ten years ago. I don’t see how you can make an argument for consistent cutting — unless you decide to ignore parts of spending.

    Kansas school spending per student, adjusted for CPI

  • Winners and losers in Kansas school finance lawsuit

    Who are the winners and losers now that the decision in Gannon vs. Kansas — better known as the Kansas school finance lawsuit — has been reached?

    The decision reached by the court is that Kansas schools are unconstitutionally underfunded. While it is most commonly reported that the decision requires Kansas to spend an additional $440 million per year on schools, the actual amount of increased spending will be $594 million per year. This is because of the mechanism of the local option budget, according to Kansas Policy Institute. The decision is being appealed to the Kansas Supreme Court.

    The winners are the Kansas school spending establishment. These are the people who are devoted to spending more on Kansas schools — without regard to need, or whether the spending increases student achievement, or whether the spending is harmful to the Kansas economy. The main cheerleader for this team is Kansas National Education Association (KNEA), our state’s teachers union. Although not a party to the suit, Kansas Association of School Boards (KASB) is a winner, too. Kansans should remember a story told by Kansas House of Representatives member Arlen Siegfreid of a conversation he had with KASB lobbyist Mark Tallman: “During our discussion I asked Mr. Tallman if we (the State) had the ability to give the schools everything he asked for would he still ask for even more money for schools. His answer was, ‘Of course, that’s my job.’”

    An obvious group of losers is Kansas taxpayers. Obviously.

    The people who truly lost, and who will suffer the most from the court’s decision, are Kansas schoolchildren. That’s because most people believe the problems with Kansas schools — whatever they are — can be solved with more spending. Certainly that’s the position taken by school system bureaucrats and others who benefit from increased school spending.

    These advocates for spending conveniently ignore that school spending has been on a long upward trajectory, while at the same time test scores are steady or even falling in some cases. But school spending is an easy issue. Appeals that tug on heartstrings — “It’s for the kids” — are easy to make. And it’s easy to spend more on schools — at least easier than the real reforms that will help Kansas schoolchildren.

    The relevant part of the Kansas Constitution states: “The legislature shall make suitable provision for finance of the educational interests of the state.” It’s a good thing for the state’s education bureaucracy the Constitution doesn’t say “the state shall provide a suitable education.” We’d be in a lot of trouble.

    The state of Kansas schools

    Those who think Kansas schools are doing well should compare Kansas NAEP scores with those of Texas. See Kansas school test scores, in perspective for an explanation of why Kansas test scores seem to be much better than other states.

    Kansas Commissioner of Education Diane DeBacker has written that she is proud of student achievement in Kansas: “Since 2001, the percentage of students statewide who perform in the top three levels on state reading assessments has jumped from about 60 percent to more than 87 percent. In math, the jump has been from just more than 54 percent to nearly 85 percent.”

    This rise in performance, however, is only on tests that the Kansas education establishment controls. On every measure of student performance that I know of that is independent, this rising trend in student achievement does not appear. In some measures, for some recent years, the performance of Kansas students has declined.

    How can it be that one series of tests scores are rising, but not others? Kansas school administrators don’t have a good answer for this. But there is a good reason: The Kansas test scores are subject to manipulation for political reasons.

    In 2006 Kansas implemented new tests, and the state specifically warns that comparisons with previous years — like 2001 — are not valid. A KSDE document titled Kansas Assessments in Reading and Mathematics 2006 Technical Manual states so explicitly: “As the baseline year of the new round of assessments, the Spring 2006 administration incorporated important changes from prior KAMM assessments administered in the 2000 — 2005 testing cycle. Curriculum standards and targets for the assessments were changed, test specifications revised, and assessed grade levels expanded to include students in grades 3-8 and one grade level in high school. In effect, no comparison to past student, building, district, or state performance should be made.” (emphasis added.)

    Despite this warning, DeBacker and Kansas school superintendents make an invalid statistical comparison. This is not an innocent mistake. This is an actual example of — turning the superintendents’ quote on themselves — “data that was used out of context, completely misrepresenting the truth.”

    On other tests, only 28 percent of Kansas students are ready for college-level work in all four subjects the ACT test covers. While this result was slightly better than the national average, it means that nearly three-fourths of Kansas high school graduates need to take one or more remedial college courses.

    School spending advocates also take advantage of the fact that citizens are generally misinformed on Kansas school spending. When asked about the level of spending on public schools in Kansas, citizens are generally uninformed or misinformed. They also incorrectly thought that spending has declined in recent years.

    Kansas school standards

    Last summer Kansas schools received a waiver from participating in the No Child Left Behind program. KSDE reported: “Another key component of the state’s waiver is related to evaluating teachers and school leaders. Among the criteria for achieving a waiver request was implementing an evaluation system that includes student achievement as a significant factor in the evaluation. The Kansas plan calls for appointing a commission to identify the most effective means of tying student achievement to teacher and leader evaluations and building that into the existing Kansas Educator Evaluation Protocol (KEEP).”

    Many people would be surprised to learn that student achievement has not been the primary factor used in evaluating teachers in Kansas. This is one of the reasons why Kansas has been found to rank low in policies on teacher quality.

    Last year Kansas school superintendents wrote an op-ed proclaiming the high standards and performance of Kansas schools. But what Kansans ought to take notice of is the superintendents’ claim in this sentence: “Historically, our state has had high-performing schools, which make Kansas a great place to live, raise a family and run a business.”

    The truth is that when compared to other states, Kansas has low standards.

    The U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) has analyzed state standards, and we can see that Kansas has standards that are below most states. The table of figures is available at Estimated NAEP scale equivalent scores for state proficiency standards, for reading and mathematics in 2009, by grade and state. An analysis of these tables by the Kansas Policy Institute shows that few states have standards below the Kansas standards.

    This table is from KPI’s report in 2012 titled Removing Barriers to Better Public Education: Analyzing the facts about student achievement and school spending.

    The conclusion by NCES is “… most states’ proficiency standards are at or below NAEP’s definition of Basic performance.” KPI, based on simple analysis of the NCES data, concluded: “Kansas is one of those states, with its Reading Proficiency standard set lower than what the U.S. Department of Education considers Basic performance. Math Proficiency levels are above what NAEP considers to be Basic but still well below the U.S. standard for Proficient.”

    Should we spend more on Kansas schools?

    Education is vitally important, school officials tell us. They’re right — and that’s why the education of Kansas schoolchildren is too important to be exclusively in the hands of government.

    The school finance lawsuits illustrate this. Suppose that the court is right, and that increased spending will fix the problems with schools. How many years will pass before the solution is implemented? And even if we immediately start spending more, do we really think it will improve student outcomes, in light of our past experience?

    The solution for Kansas schoolchildren is increased school choice, through charter schools and either vouchers or tax credit scholarships. This is what we are missing in Kansas. With greater choices available to students and parents, there will be less need for government oversight of schools and all the bickering that accompanies decisions made through the political process.

    This is the reform that will most help Kansas schoolchildren. It will cost less and improve outcomes. It doesn’t require fleets of education bureaucrats and stacks of plans and regulations. But it does require the school establishment to give up some power and their stranglehold on the use of public funds for schools.

    Unfortunately, we’re not moving in that direction in Kansas. Recently in Wichita, Kansas Governor Sam Brownback had two opportunities to promote school choice in Kansas. On the Joseph Ashby radio program he was asked about school choice, but wouldn’t commit to it as a priority.

    Later that day at the Wichita Pachyderm Club a similar question was asked, and again Brownback wouldn’t commit to school choice. The focus right now is efficiency and to get fourth grade reading levels up, Brownback said. He added that about 28 percent of fourth graders can’t read at basic level, which he described as a “real problem. If you can’t read, the world starts really shrinking around you.”

    It’s a mystery why Governor Brownback hasn’t made school choice a priority in Kansas. Many governors are doing that and instituting other wide-reaching reforms.

  • Ignore this Kansas school spending, please

    The reaction to a survey regarding Kansas school spending is useful for two reasons: It lets us gauge the level of knowledge of the public, and it also tells us the extent to which school spending advocates will go to justify and excuse spending.

    The latest example comes from Kansas Association of School Boards (KASB). It’s in response to a survey commissioned by Kansas Policy Institute which asked the public a series of questions on schools and spending. (See Citizens generally misinformed on Kansas school spending.)

    A key finding is that most people think that schools spend much less than actual spending, and by a large margin. Further, most people think spending has declined, when in fact it has risen. These finding are similar to other research commissioned by KPI, and additional surveys by other organizations at the national level.

    Not surprisingly, when citizens and taxpayers learn the true level of school spending, their attitude towards school spending changes. That’s dangerous to school spending advocates. It diminishes their most compelling arguments for more school spending — “it’s for the kids.”

    So the school spending lobby has to explain — rather, make excuses for — the high level of spending. In this case, the school board association would like you to ignore employee pension costs and the costs of buildings and equipment. Here’s what KASB explains as part of a document titled Questions about recent Kansas Policy Institute survey:

    Finally, districts received $690 per pupil in KPERS contributions for district employees, and districts spent $2,320 for capital costs such as buildings and equipment, payments on construction bonds for new schools, and other local revenues like student fees. None of these funds — almost 25 percent of total revenues — can be spent for regular education operating costs.

    That’s right. The Kansas Association of School Boards recommends that Kansas taxpayers discount school spending by 25 percent. Why? Because that spending is for pensions (KPERS) and buildings (and swimming pools, tennis courts, and artificial turf for athletic fields).

    This argument is disingenuous, to say the least. Pension costs are part of the cost of having employees, just as are salary, the employee portion of payroll taxes, and health insurance. That is, unless schools want to stop providing pensions for their employees, in which case they might have trouble recruiting employees, or they might have to pay more in salary so that employees could provide for their own retirement.

    These personnel costs are indeed “regular education operating costs,” despite the claim of KASB.

    Then, KASB wants you to ignore “payments on construction bonds for new schools,” as these are not “regular education operating costs.” KASB is correct. These costs are capital, not operating.

    But when campaigning for new bond issues, school districts tell voters that this spending is absolutely necessary. The kids must have new buildings and facilities, say the school spending advocates.

    But when it comes time to pay off the bonds — well, just sweep that spending under the rug, say school spending boosters.

  • Another Kansas school efficiency task force

    Why is this news? “The association representing Kansas school boards Wednesday formed a committee to analyze options available to local district officials to maximize educational return on investments in K-12 public schools.” (KASB creates panel to study K-12 school efficiency, Topeka Capital-Journal.)

    KASB is the Kansas Association of School Boards. One might think that their prime mission is to “maximize educational return on investments.” What could be more important when considering the lives of Kansas schoolchildren and the plight of taxpayers?

    It’s likely that this panel has been formed in response to a school efficiency task force created by Kansas Governor Sam Brownback. That task force has been criticized by the public school establishment for lack of educators in its membership.

    So now a panel of educators has been formed to examine efficiency in school spending. Does anyone notice the irony: Those already running the Kansas public school system have had the power to implement efficiency measures. They don’t need permission or a task force.

    The governor’s task force met this week. The presentation from Kansas Policy Institute is here.

    Some highlights of the presentation include slides 10 and 11, which show that the ACT composite score didn’t really decline in 2012. Instead, the demographic weighting shifted. In fact, says KPI president Dave Trabert, “The composite score has been flat for several years and the last time it dropped (applying the 2012 demographic weighting to actual scores) was in 2009 when K-12 funding per-pupil (total and state) peaked. So much for the KASB theory that budget cuts caused ACT scores to decline.”

    As Trabert noted, demographics play a large role in understanding student achievement. See my article Kansas school test scores should make us think for an explanation of how Simpson’s Paradox masks the problem with Kansas student test scores.

    Slides 13 and 14 compare state assessment scores and state aid, again demonstrating that there is no correlation (let alone causation) between achievement and spending changes. Slide 17 shows that despite the claims of massive cuts to education, taxpayer funding of public education set a new record in 2012. Slide 18 breaks down state aid into several components, proving that simple comparisons of base state aid are quite deceptive.

    Slide 42 tells a particularly compelling story: The less that districts spend per-pupil on administration, the more they spend on student and staff support (except for the five largest districts, but even there, higher spending per-pupil is associated with a wider gap on support spending). This shows that efficiency is not just about saving money. It’s also a way to put resources to more productive uses.

    Kansas K-12 Efficiency Task Force: Spending Facts and Efficiency Opportunities

  • Kansas school test scores should make us think

    A publication by Kansas Association of School Boards (KASB) touts “Kansas student proficiencies in reading and math have increased 40 percent over the past decade and exceed 80 percent at every level.”

    Kansas public school officials also boast that Kansas does well compared to other states on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), called the “nation’s report card.”

    But the confidence of Kansas public school leaders has been shaken a bit with the recent release of test results for the recent school year. Results are down. The Kansas Commissioner of Education will form a task force to investigate. Already excuses are being proffered, with some officials saying they always knew that scores would reach a plateau.

    (Later it was discovered that the reported decline was due to a mistake in tabulating results, and that overall, test scores were mostly unchanged.)

    While Kansas Education Commissioner Diane DeBacker is conducting an investigation, here’s two questions she ought to ask.

    One: Why have scores on Kansas assessments risen, while scores on the NAEP haven’t? Some know the answer, but it would be refreshing to hear the bureaucracy admit it: The Kansas State Department of Education has lowered standards on the tests it controls. When a state board of education member tries to ask questions about this, he isn’t allowed to have his questions answered.

    Second question: Let’s understand why Kansas NAEP scores are high, relative to other states. Here’s a table comparing Kansas with Texas (shaded cells indicate the state with the highest score):

    Notice that for all students, Kansas has the highest scores, except for one tie. But when we look at subgroups, all the sudden the picture is different: Texas has the best scores in all cases, except for two ties.

    How can this be? The answer is Simpson’s Paradox. A Wall Street Journal article explains: “Put simply, Simpson’s Paradox reveals that aggregated data can appear to reverse important trends in the numbers being combined.” (When Combined Data Reveal the Flaw of Averages: In a Statistical Anomaly Dubbed Simpson’s Paradox, Aggregated Numbers Obscure Trends in Job Market, Medicine and Baseball.)

    In this case, the confounding factor is that the two states differ greatly in the proportion of white students. In Kansas, 69 percent of students are white. In Texas it’s 32 percent.

    Texas, by the way, spends much less per student, and has a higher pupil/teacher ratio.

    Kansas liberals and those who support more spending on schools say we don’t want to be like Texas. I wonder if they are aware of Simpson’s Paradox.

    Will DeBacker and her task force will be interested in the answers to these questions? Kansans should be, especially as we wait the verdict on the school finance trial.

  • Steve Rose defends Kansas school spending

    Attitudes toward Kansas public schools, or facts about them: Which is most important? For boosters of the Kansas school spending establishment, attitude is all that matters. The actual facts about Kansas schools — if we were honest enough to recognize and confront them — need not be considered.

    Kansas City Star columnist Steve Rose is a case in point. His recent op-ed Negative attitude toward public schools is scary is scary itself for its vigorous and misinformed defense of a system that isn’t working very well for Kansas schoolchildren.

    Kansas Policy Institute president Dave Trabert left this comment to Rose’s article:

    It’s quite telling that your basis for saying schools operate very efficiently and spending has only kept up with inflation is a lobbying group that advocates for more spending rather that actual figures from the Dept. of Education of the state budget office.

    Here are the facts according to official government data for the period 2001 to 2011:

    • Inflation was 24.2% (Bureau of Labor Statistics, Midwest Urban Cities)
    • FTE enrollment increased 1.8% (KSDE)
    • Taxpayer support of public education increased 55.8%; state aid +37.6%, federal +155.4% and local +67%. (KSDE)
    • 2012 is expected to be a record-setting year for taxpayer support of public education, at $5.672 billion (KSDE)

    Here are a few more facts that, like those listed above, are not generally known to the public and are routinely denied by education officials.

    • $402 million more in state and local aid was not spent between 2005 and 2011 but was used to increase operating cash reserves (KSDE)
    • Instruction spending per-pupil increased 84% between 1999 and 2011 (KSDE) while inflation was up only 32% (BLS)
    • Taxpayer support of public education in Kansas increased from $3.1 billion in 1998 to $5.6 billion in 2011 (KSDE) yet student proficiency levels are well below 50% (US Dept. of Ed.)

    Telling parents the inconvenient truth is not attacking schools, teachers or anyone else. It is giving them the facts they need to make fully informed decisions about what needs to be done to improve public education.

    Kansas Senator Mary Pilcher-Cook was mentioned in the Rose op-ed and offered this response:

    In his commentary on my response to a candidate survey from Americans for Prosperity at www.afpks.org, Steve Rose used the term “hogwash” to describe this statement, with which I agreed: “Parents, teachers, and taxpayers should have a transparent system so they know how much money is being spent in each school and school district.” He stressed that I had put the statement in bold-face type.

    It’s a bold-faced belief. Repeatedly, I have heard frustration from parents, teachers and taxpayers who say they do not know how tax money is being spent. This is especially true in education, which represents a huge investment by the taxpayers of Kansas. I agree with Mr. Rose that “how much” is being spent at the school district level is a matter of public record. However, what is not known is how much is being spent at “each school,” and more precisely, “how it is being spent” at each school. Individual schools have substantial budgets. How much ends up in the classroom? How much goes to fund lobbying for more money by the school administration? How much goes to fund activities and programs that are more properly described as something other than education?

    It is important to remember that school based budgeting not only exposes inefficiencies and problems but it also highlights positive areas, as well. However, without the information, we are not fully equipped to make informed decisions regarding our schools. Parents, teachers, and taxpayers should have a transparent system so they can have more input over local school decisions. Mr. Rose thinks that kind of information is “hogwash.” This will come as a surprise to many of his readers, no doubt.

    On the bright side, it is amusing that Mr. Rose quotes “facts” from the Kansas Association of School Boards, a lobbyist group that continually insists on tax increases and demands more funding without any accountability for public education, while at the same time saying that my figures “came right out of the conservative propaganda.” Actually, the data I used came from the Kansas State Department of Education.

    Maybe Mr. Rose forgot that just a few years ago the Shawnee Mission School District dropped its membership with the KASB because the KASB uses taxpayers’ money to continually lobby against local control, something many taxpayers think is urgently needed for schools in Johnson County.

    Mr. Rose’s bogeymen-of-the-moment, “ultra-conservatives Charles and David Koch of Wichita,” have never lobbied the state of Kansas for any special interest money that would benefit only themselves, their companies or their industry. In my experience, their interest is advocating tax policies that would be beneficial to every Kansas citizen.

    I typically bold-face responses in questionnaires and surveys to help distinguish between my response and the questions offered. It’s a formatting choice, not a rhetorical weapon. But in this case, let me use boldface to reiterate a very simple point: I believe parents, teachers, and taxpayers should have a transparent system so they know how much money is being spent in each school and school district.

    If Mr. Rose believes otherwise, he can boldface his “hogwash” as much as he likes. After all, it’s his ink — and his hogwash.

  • Kansas and Wichita quick takes: Monday April 23, 2012

    This week is … Administrative Professionals week in Kansas. Kansas Governor Sam Brownback issued this proclamation, so evidently time spent on things like this is a proper and valid function of government. We ought to end these proclamations by government at all levels. … At Wichita City Council meetings there have been cases where the meaningful business of the council has not started until nearly one hour after the start of the meeting. The hour has been consumed by proclamations, awards, remarks by council members, etc. While this happens, citizens with business before the council wait. And wait. They’re wasting their time and money. Their attorneys, representatives, or employees may be there with them, racking up legal bills and wasting time and money while listening to the mayor or other official read proclamations. … These proclamations are also more about promoting the wholesomeness and goodness of government than anything else.

    Taxpayer-funded lobbying. It’s one thing when private citizens or groups ask for more government spending. But when Kansans’ tax dollars are being spent to ask for more spending — that’s another thing, and a practice that should end. Here’s an example from the Kansas Association of School Boards (KASB). According to IRS Form 990 filings, KASB receives over $2 million in membership dues from school boards each year, money raised through taxation. Astonishingly, those same filings indicate that KASB spends no money on political lobbying. Astonishing because Mark Tallman, officially described on the KASB website as “associate executive director/advocacy,” is always described as “lobbyist” everywhere else.

    American Exceptionalism to be topic. This Friday (April 27th) the Wichita Pachyderm Club features Dr. Malcolm C. Harris, Sr., Professor of Finance, Friends University, speaking on “The Open Minded Roots of American Exceptionalism, and the Decline of America’s Greatness.” The public is welcome and encouraged to attend Wichita Pachyderm meetings. For more information click on Wichita Pachyderm Club. … The club has an exceptional lineup of future speakers as follows: On May 4th: United States Senator Jerry Moran speaking on “A legislative update.” … On May 11th: Gary Oborny, Chairman/CEO Occidental Management and Real Estate Development, CCIM Designated member of the Storm Water Advisory Board to the City of Wichita, speaking on “What is the economic impact of EPA mandates on storm water quality in Wichita?” … On May 18th: Paul Soutar, Reporter for Kansas Watchdog, speaking on “The evolution of journalism and how the new media empowers citizens.” … On May 25th: Ron Estes, State Treasurer of Kansas, speaking on “A report from the Kansas Treasurer.”

    Kill the messenger. The Kansas government school establishment rallies: “Last Wednesday, April 18, the Wichita Eagle editorial page made an outrageously false claim about Kansas Policy Institute, saying we were ‘playing fast and loose’ with the truth. Our crime? We have a fact-based opinion with which they disagree! We asked for an immediate meeting to make our case and request a retraction, but the Opinion Page Editor, Phillip Brownlee, said he wasn’t available until next week but didn’t a meeting was really necessary, saying ‘It’s just that The Eagle editorial board (and the Kansas Dept. of Ed., school districts, and many other observers) thinks the ads are misleading.’… The Eagle editorial board, KSDE, local districts and others don’t like the ads because they disclosed that proficiency does not require full comprehension of grade-appropriate material.” More from Kansas Policy Institute at Attempting to Kill the Messenger .

    The Kansas Policy Institute advertisement. Since the Wichita Eagle editorial board did not think it necessary to meet with its representatives, on Sunday the Kansas Policy Institute placed an advertisement in response to a Rhonda Holman editorial. An important fact that Kansans need to understand is that school spending is increasing, despite the claims of the Kansas public school establishment: “And while you may have been told that total funding for schools was reduced this year, the truth is that KSDE estimates that 2012 spending will reach a record $5.7 billion. Some people would have you believe that the growth in total spending is deceptive because not all spending goes into the classroom, but the truth is that Instructional spending has increased at an even faster rate than total spending! Instructional spending increased 87% between 1999 and 2011; that is more than double the combined rates of increase in inflation and enrollment.” The advertisement may be viewed here: One Goal — Different Views.

    Holman on Kansas school spending. Here’s a sample as to just how bad the Rhonda Holman editorial is on the facts. She writes: “… despite state per-pupil base aid having been slashed to 1999 levels.” Most people don’t know that “base aid” is only one component of Kansas school spending. It’s the starting point for the Kansas school finance formula. After weightings are applied, most school districts receive much more funding than the base aid figure. The Wichita school district, for example, received $6,511 per pupil from the state at a time when base state aid was $4,012. Also, look at the total spending picture: From 1999 to last year, Wichita school spending jumped from $336 million to over $604 million. State aid to this district increased from $200 million to $328 million over the same time. Why doesn’t Holman uses the total spending figures, or even the total state aid numbers? Answer: These facts are inconvenient for her.

  • Kansas school establishment defenders: the video

    A video criticizing the Kansas Policy Institute for placing a series of ads in Kansas newspapers claims KPI “conceals” and “ignores” facts and statistics. But I didn’t have to work very hard to find many gross and blatant mistakes, distortions, and coverups in the video — the same problems found in much of the communications of the Kansas public school spending bureaucracy and establishment.

    One slide in the video says this: “The numbers in those expensive, state-wide ads from the KPI only count ‘A’ or ‘B’ levels of performance as passing. KPI’s numbers conceal the wide range of students who score ‘proficient.’ By KPI’s logic, ‘C’ = FAILURE.”

    First, the KPI ads don’t claim that Kansas schools are failing. KPI called attention to the actual level of achievement in Kansas schools, and chose to use a different measure of what is acceptable than does the Kansas public school education establishment. But instead of defending their low standards, public school defenders attack KPI.

    But the real problem with the claim made in this portion of the video is a blatant misuse of the KSDE data: The performance levels KSDE uses do not correspond to letter grades. A document on the KSDE website says this: “When assigning performance levels for the State assessment, please consider the following suggestions … The performance levels do not correspond to grades (i.e. A, B, C, D, F).”

    Despite this warning, the video mischaracterizes KSDE data.

    Another claim made in the video mistakenly applies Kansas state assessment data. Here’s what the video says: “Actual achievement data from the KSDE shows that since 2003, 27% more students in Kansas have become proficient or better in reading; 36% more students have become proficient or better in math.”

    The problem is that in 2006 Kansas implemented new tests, and the state specifically warns that comparisons with previous years — like 2003 — are not valid. A KSDE document titled Kansas Assessments in Reading and Mathematics 2006 Technical Manual states so explicitly: “As the baseline year of the new round of assessments, the Spring 2006 administration incorporated important changes from prior KAMM assessments administered in the 2000 — 2005 testing cycle. Curriculum standards and targets for the assessments were changed, test specifications revised, and assessed grade levels expanded to include students in grades 3-8 and one grade level in high school. In effect, no comparison to past student, building, district, or state performance should be made.” (emphasis added.)

    Despite this KSDE warning, the video makes the invalid statistical comparison. By the way, so does Kansas Commissioner of Education Diane DeBacker, when she recently wrote this on the editorial page of the Wichita Eagle: “Since 2001, the percentage of students statewide who perform in the top three levels on state reading assessments has jumped from about 60 percent to more than 87 percent. In math, the jump has been from just more than 54 percent to nearly 85 percent.”

    A criticism the video makes several times is that KPI statistics do not present the entire story. For example, several times the video points with great pride to the performance on Kansas students on the ACT test, proclaiming “Kansas’ teachers consistently prepare their students for college, more so than most states in the US.” The video then presents several slides of statistics.

    Missing, however, is this sobering statistic: Only 28 percent of Kansas students who take the ACT are ready for college-level work in all four subjects the ACT test covers. While this result is slightly better than the national average, it means that nearly three-fourths of Kansas high school graduates need to take one or more remedial college courses. This statistic was not reported in the video, and we can easily see why the Kansas public school establishment doesn’t want you to know this. See Kansas students, while improving, are mostly not ready for college.

    As another example, the video reports on the scores of Kansas students on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Looking at the gross scores, Kansas does well, compared to other states. But you don’t have to look very hard to realize that these scores are a statistical accident. It’s an unfortunate fact that minority students do not perform as well on these tests as white students. When you combine this with the fact that Kansas has a relatively small minority population, we can see an explanation as to why Kansas ranks well.

    But compare Kansas with Texas, a state that Kansas school spending boosters like to deride as a state with low-performing schools (the video does not make this claim). In Kansas 69 percent of students are white, while in Texas that number is 33 percent. So it’s not surprising that overall, Kansas outperforms Texas (with one tie) when considering all students in four important areas: fourth and eighth grade reading, and fourth and eighth grade math.

    But looking at Hispanic students only, Texas beats or ties Kansas in these four areas. For black students, Texas bests Kansas in all four.

    By the way, the video relies on NAEP data to compare the achievement of Kansas students with those in other states. But the video doesn’t address this very important issue: Kansas NAEP scores are largely unchanged at the same time scores on Kansas tests are rising — “jumping,” in the words of the Kansas Commissioner of Education.

    Another problem: “Kansas teachers will continue to help their students succeed. … Even though Base State Aid Per Pupil hasn’t kept up with cost increases.” The implication is that Kansas schools are not funded adequately.

    The problem here, again, is failing to look at the total picture. It’s true that base state aid per pupil has declined. Looking at total spending, however, the same trend does not apply. Total spending by schools in Kansas has risen rapidly for many years, but has fallen flat and declined slightly the past two years. In 2001 spending was $3.7 billion, while in 2010 it was $5.6 billion.

    Considering state spending only: $2.2 billion in 2001, increasing to $3.0 billion in 2010. State aid had reached a high of $3.3 billion in 2008. See Kansas school spending facts ignored by many for charts.

    This deception when discussing school spending is widespread, so it’s not surprising to see it repeated in this video. See Kansas school spending: the deception for a discussion of how Mark Desetti, who is Director of Legislative and Political Advocacy at Kansas National Education Association (KNEA), our state’s teachers union, uses these numbers to be accurate and deceptive, all at the same time.

    We expect this deceptive behavior from union officials. Newspaper editorial writers, however, ought to be held to a higher standard. But: A recent Lawrence Journal-World editorial contained “In the last four years, per-pupil state funding for public schools has declined by about 14 percent, from $4,400 per student to $3,780.” And writing in the Wichita Eagle, Rhonda Holman complained of “several years of cuts totaling $653 per pupil.” (Reason to be wary, December 16 Wichita Eagle) Actual facts do not support these claims.

    And teachers? They ought to held to an even higher standard. So Kansans might be surprised to learn that this video — replete of the same problems it purports to expose — was created by a Kansas schoolteacher: Cheryl Shepherd-Adams, a teacher in the Hays public schools.