Voice For Liberty

Tag: Wichita and Kansas schools

  • Kansas teachers union compliance instructions released

    Kansas teachers union compliance instructions released

    If you’re running for office in Kansas and want the support of the teachers union, here are questions you’ll need to answer their way.

    Kansas National Education Association (KNEA), our state’s teachers union has a questionnaire for candidates running for elective office. It’s really not a series of questions; instead it is a list of things the union wants. Candidates seeking union backing are expected to comply.

    Following are a sample of questions with some commentary. The full questionnaire may be viewed here.

    Question: “Do you support requiring that bonuses and/or incentive pay including any form of ‘merit pay’ be a mandatorily negotiable topic under the PNA given such plans would have the impact of reducing the earning potential of other teachers?”

    Teachers unions oppose merit pay because, they say, it may not be fair to some teachers. But opposing teacher merit pay based on fairness issues isn’t being fair to students. Instead, it’s cruel to students. If we retain the worst teachers and pay them the same as the best teachers, we aren’t being fair to students. But here we see the union’s interest is teachers, not students. 1

    Question: “Do you support high standards for entry into the profession of teaching including comprehensive training and licensure upon recommendation of an accredited degree-granting institution of higher education? Will you oppose legislation that would grant access as teacher of record to the classroom by persons without a license granted by the State Board of Education?”

    One of the main effects for occupational licensure is to reduce competition for people who already hold the license. This is also the main thrust of labor unions: fewer jobs, but with better pay and perks for those who have unionized jobs.

    Question: “Do you support the stabilization, maintenance, and improvement of the KPERS defined benefit pension system for all educators including paying back with interest all monies diverted from KPERS?”

    Defined-benefit pension plans like KPERS are incompatible with elected politicians, as they can’t resist delaying required funding until some future year, and a future generation of taxpayers. 2

    Question: “Do you support state funding for student support services in public schools including counseling and nursing services, social workers, and physical and occupational therapists?”

    Questions like this make it seem as though the state does not fund these functions.

    Question: “Do you support a safe and secure working environment in which educators can teach and children can learn without fear, including allowing local units of government to enact reasonable restrictions on the carrying of firearms?”

    There is not much evidence that local restrictions on firearms will do anything to increase school safety.

    Question: “Do you approve of and support the actions of the 2017 legislature that repealed the ‘march to zero’ income tax plan?”
    Question: “Do you approve of and support the actions of the 2017 legislature that repealed the LLC income tax loophole?”
    Question: “Do you approve of and support the actions of the 2017 legislature that restored the third income tax bracket?”
    Question: “Do you support the three-legged stool of income, sales, and property taxes as foundational to a balanced and fair tax system?”
    Question: “Do you support the establishment of an additional income tax bracket for high-income earners?”

    These five questions point to one of the most important priorities of teachers unions: More taxes and higher spending on schools.

    Question: “Please explain your position on the use of public monies to support students in private schools. Include tax credits, vouchers, and scholarships.”

    Any form of school choice is anathema to teachers unions. They want no competition. Plus, schools without labor unions reveal just how harmful the union is for children trapped in their schools.

    Question: “Do you support a school finance formula that addresses the needs of all student populations including bilingual students, at-risk students, students in poverty, and students with special needs (special education)?”

    This is another question that makes it seems as though there is no support for these needs. But the Kansas school finance formula provides extra funding for these.

    Question: “Do you oppose all efforts to divert funding from public schools through voucher or ‘scholarship’ plans, tuition tax credits, and the expansion of unaccountable charter schools?”

    Again, a question that exposes the union attitude towards school choice. By the way, charter schools are accountable in ways that public schools are not. For example, students can’t be forced to go to charter schools. Also: Until recently, Kansas schools rated themselves using standards that were among the weakest in the nation, but were telling Kansans that standards were high and schools were good. 3

    Question: “Do you support efforts to adopt an inflation measure appropriate to public education on which to base annual increases in funding?”

    For many years the school spending establishment has contended they face a “special” rate of inflation that is higher than other industries.

    —
    Notes

    1. Weeks, Bob. Merit pay fairness is not about teachers. Available at https://wichitaliberty.org/wichita-kansas-schools/merit-pay-fairness-is-not-about-teachers/. ↩
    2. Weeks, Bob. This is why we must eliminate defined-benefit public pensions. Available at https://wichitaliberty.org/kansas-government/we-must-eliminate-defined-benefit-public-pensions/ ↩
    3. Weeks, Bob. Kansas school standards remain high. Available at https://wichitaliberty.org/wichita-kansas-schools/kansas-school-standards-remain-high/. ↩
  • Wichita property tax still high on commercial property

    Wichita property tax still high on commercial property

    An ongoing study reports that property taxes on commercial and industrial property in Wichita are high. In particular, taxes on commercial property in Wichita are among the highest in the nation.

    Click for larger.
    The study is produced by Lincoln Institute of Land Policy and Minnesota Center for Fiscal Excellence. It’s titled “50 State Property Tax Comparison Study, June 2017” and may be read here. It uses a variety of residential, apartment, commercial, and industrial property scenarios to analyze the nature of property taxation across the country. I’ve gathered data from selected tables for Wichita.

    In Kansas, residential property is assessed at 11.5 percent of its appraised value. Commercial property is assessed at 25 percent of appraised value, and public utility property at 33 percent. (Appraised value is the market value as determined by the assessor. Assessed value is multiplied by the mill levy rates of taxing jurisdictions to compute tax.)

    This means that commercial property faces 2.18 times the property tax rate as residential property. The U.S. average is 1.67. Whether higher assessment ratios on commercial property as compared to residential property is desirable public policy is a subject for debate. But because Wichita’s ratio is high, it leads to high property taxes on commercial property.

    For residential property taxes, Wichita ranks below the national average. For a property valued at $150,000, the effective property tax rate in Wichita is 1.22 percent, while the national average is 1.39 percent. The results for a $300,000 property were similar.

    Of note is the property taxes on a median-valued home. In this case Wichita is a bargain, due to our lower housing prices. A home at the median value in Wichita pays $1,513 in taxes, while the nationwide average is $3,343. (The median home value in Wichita is $124,400, and for the nation, $262,772, according to this report.)

    Looking at commercial property, Wichita taxes are high. For example, for a $100,000 valued property, the study found that the national average for property tax is $2,319 or 1.93 percent of the property value. For Wichita the corresponding values are $3,261 or 2.72 percent, ranking ninth highest among the 50 largest cities. Wichita property taxes are 41 percent higher than the national average, for this scenario.

    For industrial property taxes, the situation in Wichita is better, with Wichita ranking near the middle of the 50 largest cities. For an industrial property worth $1,000,000, taxes in Wichita are $29,681. The national average is $32,264.

  • Kansas school standards remain high

    Kansas school standards remain high

    Kansas school assessment standards remain at a high level, compared to other states. This is a welcome change from the past.

    To evaluate the performance of their schools and students, states have their own assessments or tests. Some states have rigorous standards, meaning that to be considered “proficient,” students must perform at a high level.

    But some states are less rigorous. They rate students “proficient” at a much lower level of performance.

    How can we tell which states have high standards, and which states have low standards? There is a test that is the same in all states, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The U.S. Department of Education, through the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), administers this test every other year. Known as “The Nation’s Report Card,” it is “the largest nationally representative and continuing assessment of what America’s students know and can do in various subject areas.” 1

    By comparing scores on NAEP and a state’s own tests, we can learn about the state’s standards. Does a state have a large percentage of students score “proficient” on its own test, but have a much lower percentage score “proficient” on the NAEP? If so, that state’s standards are weak.

    After NAEP scores are released, Education Next, a project of the Program on Education Policy and Governance at Harvard University, compares state and NAEP results and assigns letter grades to each state. 2

    It’s important to know that this analysis does not tell us how well a state’s students perform on any tests, either state tests or NAEP. Education Next emphasizes:

    To be clear, high proficiency standards do not necessarily reflect high student performance. Rather, good grades suggest that states are setting a high proficiency bar — that students must perform at a high level to be deemed proficient in a given subject at their grade level. Grades gauge “truth in advertising” by indicating the degree to which states inform parents of how well their students are doing on an internationally accepted scale. 3

    Kansas

    The good news is that Kansas grades well in the analysis of its state proficiency standards for 2017, earning an overall grade of A (A in grade 4 math, B+ in grade 4 reading, and A in both grade 8 math and reading). This is the sixth highest score among the states and means Kansas assessments have a high degree of “truth in advertising.” These grades are nearly unchanged from 2015.

    This high grade has not always been the case for Kansas, however. In 2013 the state received a grade of D+ and ranked forty-first. That was a little better than 2011, when the grade was D and rank was forth-forth.

    Does this mean Kansas students are doing better on tests? No. NAEP scores are mostly unchanged, or changed very little. Instead, between 2013 and 2015 Kansas adopted more realistic and rigorous standards for its tests. It raised the bar for what students needed to know to be called “proficient.”

    Here is an example of how low a bar Kansas once set: In 2009, 87.2 percent of Kansas students were judged “proficient” on state tests in grade 4 reading. But only 35.1 percent were judged “proficient” on the NAEP. For that year the average difference between “Kansas proficient” and “NAEP proficient” was 45 percentage points.

    Despite this large difference, Kansans were being told the state’s schools are doing very well. In 2012, Kansas Commissioner of Education Diane M. DeBacker wrote this in the pages of The Wichita Eagle: “Kansans are proud of the quality of their public schools, and a steady and continuing increase in student performance over the past decade has given us ample reason for that pride.” (Diane DeBacker: Pride in Kansas public schools is well-placed, March 20, 2012.)

    Bragging like this was common, and it was unfounded. It was a lie, and a harmful lie. Being told our schools are top quality based on state standards, when those standards are very weak, is politically expedient but untruthful, and the case for needed reform is dismissed as unnecessary.

    —
    Notes

    1. National Assessment of Educational Progress. About. Available at nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/about/. ↩
    2. “To generate these letter grades, we compare the percentage of students identified as proficient in reading and math on state assessments to the percentage of students so labeled on the more-rigorous NAEP. Administered by the U.S. Department of Education, NAEP is widely considered to have a high bar for proficiency in math and reading. Because representative samples of students in every state take the same set of examinations, NAEP provides a robust common metric for gauging student performance across the nation and for evaluating the strength of state-level measures of proficiency.”
      Education Next. Have States Maintained High Expectations for Student Performance? Available at http://educationnext.org/have-states-maintained-high-expectations-student-performance-analysis-2017-proficiency-standards/. ↩
    3. Education Next. After Common Core, States Set Rigorous Standards. Summer 2016. Available at http://educationnext.org/after-common-core-states-set-rigorous-standards/. ↩
  • What is the real problem at Wichita Southeast?

    What is the real problem at Wichita Southeast?

    There is likely a different explanation for problems at a Wichita high schools from what we’ve been told by the school district and our newspaper.

    Recently the Wichita Eagle editorial board opined about problems with Wichita Southeast High School. That editorial was based on Eagle reporting in the article The new Southeast High is bigger and better. So why is its graduation rate dropping?

    Sociologist Chase Billingham offers commentary and insight in his piece Southeast’s grad rate more about discipline:

    The Wichita school district officials and The Eagle Editorial Board said the slipping graduation rate was partially attributable to the relocation of Southeast from its previous location to a new building at the far eastern edge of Wichita. According to these claims, students needing bus service when they could once walk to school have resulted in declining attendance, which in turn has led to the low graduation rate.

    The falling graduation rate is real, and it is troubling. However, it was not caused by the school’s relocation.

    Billingham proceeds to cite statistics from the Kansas State Department of Education and concludes, “Rather, it is more likely that the school has become more strict in applying formal disciplinary sanctions to student behavioral problems that may previously have resulted in informal reprimands.”

    I wonder if school district officials knew of these statistics. They should have, as those officials compile and report them to KSDE. I also winder if Eagle reporters and editorial writers looked into this.

    (By the way, the Eagle doesn’t disclose the membership of its editorial board.)

    This episode is another troubling revelation about Wichita schools since the departure of the oft-praised and rewarded superintendent John Allison. Today the Eagle editorial board wrote, “Hiring Thompson as superintendent proved to be a good move at a time when Wichita schools were languishing — poor teacher morale, stagnant student achievement results and a district in need of a spark.”

  • Does School Choice Kill Public Schools?

    Does School Choice Kill Public Schools?

    Does School Choice Kill Public Schools?
    By Lori Graham

    Recently, I asked Kris Kobach, candidate for Kansas Governor, if he supports school choice. His answer was “Yes,” and he gave an idea of how that would work. The liberal media pounced on his idea and twisted his answer in a way that perpetuates the fear that allowing parents to choose what is best for their child’s education will kill the public school system. Conservatives and liberals alike are fearful about this, but will it really kill the public schools?

    To answer this, we need to first look at the problem. The real problem of meeting the needs of every student so that they achieve their potential. The Kansas State Department of Education (KSDE) has a new program called “Kansans Can – Kansas leads the world in the success of EVERY student.” This is a lofty goal, because it is a fact that the public schools will never meet every need for every student even with all the money in the world. In 2017, only 34% of the students had an “effective” or better understanding of Math, Science and English skills to enter the workforce. This is a frightening statistic and knowing that all of the additional funding each year over the last 10 years, which has reached record levels, still has not improved student success.

    When we speak about “School Choice,” it means we focus the educational dollars on every student in the state of Kansas. I would think this is what the KSDE means with their Kansans Can program. If neighborhood schools are not meeting the needs of their children, parents should be able to select a different school that does meet their needs. Right now, that right only belongs to the wealthy or the very poor. Those in the middle are stuck with their government assigned-school, and only one-third of the students succeeding proves this is a flawed method of educating the next generation.

    There are many different models of school choice around the country. Kris Kobach’s idea of grading each school building sounds logical on the surface and uses current Kansas state tests to do so. What he proposed is that schools with test score improvement from year to year will get pay increases for the staff, and those that fail will give vouchers to the students to choose another option. While the performance-based initiative is a good start, it only meets the needs of children of failing schools. What about the other students that may be in a good school, but their needs are not being met? In addition, this puts more focus on the testing that has proven to be a failure with No Child Left Behind and other legislation.

    The best school choice option is for every parent/guardian to choose the best school to meet the needs of their child. This solution is great for public schools, great for teachers, great for students, and great for the Kansas economy. The best system for students is the best system for everyone. When our students get their individual needs met, whether he is high-achieving where challenging work is best or he is special-needs and focused therapies are best, our teachers will be able to actually teach, have more opportunities, and thus better pay; our schools will be less taxed with the overbearing challenge of meeting so many different problems our children face; and our economy will be strengthened with better prepared graduates and growth.

    In states that have enacted school choice for all students, the public schools are flourishing! The free-market system encouraged new schools to pop up to meet the full spectrum of student needs, from autism to college-prep. Not all students will flock to the new schools, because public schools still have a lot to offer. The value of attending school with your neighbors, great sports, and great teachers will still appeal to the majority of parents.

    What it does mean is that public schools will be required to focus on the students, not the administrator’s salary. The teachers and staff will need to be paid better so schools have the best teachers. The student’s parents will be the judge of their child’s success instead of the government tests. Teachers and administrators alike will be encouraged to work with the parent to ensure the success of the student. My experience as a public school employee and as a public school parent was that teachers only speak to parents for less than 10 minutes, twice per year, as required, at Parent-Teacher Conferences. This might work for a few students, but it certainly doesn’t work for the majority.

    If the parents prefer their child not sit through the social engineering classes that teach values in conflict with their own, they will now have the opportunity to go elsewhere. If the school is great, but the environment is a problem with the student like drugs or bullying, the parent will be able to move the student to a new environment. If the child is struggling with new teaching methods like Common Core, the parent can move he/she to a more classical learning option.

    Until every parent is allowed to choose what is best for their child, our student success will be sub-par, the funding will continue to go through the roof, and our children will be sacrificed in the process. School choice for all students levels the playing field for poor, rich and middle-income students alike. As soon as conservatives and liberals stop arguing long enough to learn about the proven benefits of school choice, our children, every child, will finally get the education they so deserve and our public school system will also thrive.

  • Reestablishing a Fundamental Principle of Democracy

    Reestablishing a Fundamental Principle of Democracy

    Reestablishing a Fundamental Principle of Democracy
    Alan Cobb, Kansas Chamber President & CEO

    The words of a recent guest editorial in the Lawrence Journal-World about the Kansas Coalition for Fair Funding were not surprising. It was a continuation of the intellectually shallow, fact-short screed about taxes, school finance, and the Kansas budget. Certainly, reasonable people can disagree about these issues, but partisans rarely adhere to that theorem. And thus, I thought I was reading something from a partisan staffer.

    Alas, it was from a well-respected Wichita State University professor emeritus who I have known for decades.

    I’ve not always agreed with Dr. H. Edward Flentje, but even when I disagreed with him, I found his arguments well-founded and reasonable. Not this time.

    Now to the point. Dr. Flentje, probably intentionally, conflates with the 2012 tax cuts with the current and ongoing school finance litigation. They have absolutely nothing to do with each other. The current litigation was filed around the day the Sam Brownback was elected Governor. To say the focus of the current coalition is part of an effort to maintain those tax cuts is fanciful, to be charitable.

    The 15-word clause in the Kansas State Constitution that is the center of all of this was enacted in 1966. It took only a few years for the first lawsuit to be filed, and Kansas has been in court ever since. This is madness. Brownback was not governor when the original litigation was filed some 30 years ago. The Kansas Legislature developed the current finance formula in the early 1990s under the duress of a Shawnee County District Court judge. Sam Brownback would not be governor for another 18 years. To continue to enact Brownback’s name must mean the author simply can’t argue the merits of the issue we currently face. This is disappointing.

    Last December, the Kansas Chamber Board of Directors approved the following language to be a part of our 2018 Legislative Agenda:

    Support a constitutional amendment for the democratically elected legislature to have exclusive authority to determine funding for schools in an effort to eliminate endless litigation over school funding.

    In my role as President and CEO of the Kansas Chamber, I’ve traveled the state visiting business of all sizes. The consistent refrain I hear from business owners and managers is that the constant litigation has diminished the effectiveness of our educational institutions and their ability to prepare Kansas students for post-secondary careers and post-secondary education.

    In addition, I’ve had multiple conversations with educators, teachers, superintendents, and building principals; many embarrassed about the constant litigation. They know that Kansas courts are the not the place to set our state’s education policy.

    Ultimately this is about the process of how Kansas sets and finances education policy. We are competing not just with our neighboring states, but all 50 states and many countries across the globe. There is a worldwide competition for jobs.

    Because we are in a constant struggle regarding how much Kansas spends on K-12 education, we have not had substantive conversations that we should about the effectiveness and efficacy of our education systems and how we properly prepare Kansas students for their lives after high school.

    Improving our education systems takes place because of conversations between employers, students, parents, educators and those setting education policy: the legislature, the Governor, local boards of education and the State Board of Education.

    These conversations simply cannot take place between all the interested parties mentioned and the state’s judicial branch.

    The Chamber’s board of directors and members across the Kansas business community recognize the importance of a well-educated and trained workforce. But they also desire a competitive business climate. The endless litigation over school funding places the state at risk of being able to a balance of a competitive tax climate and providing for the essential services required outside of the K-12 education system.

    The framers of our national and state constitutions understood that the power to tax and appropriate funds must be placed in the hands of the legislature-the governing body of the people. The Kansas Coalition for Fair Funding supports a constitutional amendment that will reestablish this fundamental principle of democracy and will end the continuous cycle of litigation.

  • NAEP results for 2017 available in interactive visualizations

    NAEP results for 2017 available in interactive visualizations

    When properly considered, Kansas often underperforms the nation in the most recent assessment of “The Nation’s Report Card.”

    The results for the 2017 administration of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP, were recently released. I’ve prepared interactive visualizations of some of the results. To access the visualizations, click on National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).

    When considering NAEP results, it’s important to consider subgroups, such as race/ethnicity and school lunch status, which is a proxy for poverty. It’s important because states vary widely in the composition of subgroups.

    For example, consider an accompanying example from the visualization. We see that when considering all students, Kansas does better than the national average in percent of students performing as basic or better. This is true in all four combinations of grade and subject.

    Looking at black students alone, however, we see that Kansas underperforms the nation, except in one instance where there is a tie.

    For Hispanic students alone, Kansas does better in all instances except for one tie.

    For white students alone, Kansas underperforms the nation in three instances, and outperforms in one.

    This statistical anomaly is known as Simpson’s Paradox. It may appear when comparing subgroups to aggregated data when the proportional composition of subgroups varies between populations, in this case the states. For grade 4 reading, 64 percent of students in Kansas were white. For the nation, it was 49 percent. This is a difference in composition that must not be ignored.

    The relatively low proportion of minority students is why Kansas appears to perform better than the nation. The apparent superior performance of Kansas melts away when looking at subgroups.

    Kansas and the nation, percent at basic or better. Click for larger.
    Kansas and the nation, percent at proficient or better. Click for larger.
  • WichitaLiberty.TV: Kansas Senator Ty Masterson

    WichitaLiberty.TV: Kansas Senator Ty Masterson

    In this episode of WichitaLiberty.TV: Kansas Senator Ty Masterson, a Republican from Andover, joins Bob and Karl to update us on happenings in the Kansas Legislature. View below, or click here to view at YouTube. Episode 192, broadcast April 14, 2018.

    Shownotes

    • Senator Ty Masterson at Kansas Legislature
    • Ty Masterson campaign website
    • SB 424: AN ACT concerning education; establishing the office of education inspector general within the office of the state treasurer; providing the duties and functions thereof.
    • SB 393: Legislative committees; all votes of each legislator on motions or other action recorded in minutes.
    • SCR 1611: Making application to the U.S. congress to call a convention of the states.
    • HB 2753: Review of tax credits, tax exemptions and economic development programs.

  • NAEP 2017 for Kansas, first look

    NAEP 2017 for Kansas, first look

    A look at National Assessment of Educational Progress test scores for Kansas and the nation, grade 4 reading.

    Today the National Center for Education Statistics released the main NAEP scores for 2017. NAEP — National Assessment of Educational Progress — is known as the “Nation’s Report Card.” 1 It is a test that is the same in all states, and is the primary means of comparing states. 2

    The main NAEP tests two subjects, math and reading, in two grades, fourth and eighth. For grade 4 reading, the average score for students in Kansas in 2017 was 223. NCES says this is not significantly different from the state’s average score in 2015 (221) and in 1998 (221). 3

    Looking at the scores using achievement levels for fourth grade reading, we see that 30 percent were at the “below basic” level of achievement. 70 percent were at “basic” or better, 37 percent at “proficient” or better, and 8 percent at “advanced.” All of these numbers are within two percentage points of the 2015 levels and are not significantly different, according to NCES. 4 (Clicking or tapping on charts may produce larger versions.)

    Comparing Kansas schools with the nation, we see that Kansas has an edge — sometimes — over the nation. For example, 70 percent of Kansas students are at basic or better, compared to 68 percent for the nation.

    Looking at Kansas and national schools broken down by eligibility for the school lunch program, we see that Kansas does better than the nation with students eligible for the lunch program. (Students who are eligible for the lunch program are those from low-income households.) But for students who are not eligible, national schools do better.

    Considering test scores by race/ethnicity, there is good news and bad news. (Again, these results are for grade 4 reading.) First, Kansas does better than the nation with Hispanic students at all achievement levels.

    For Black students, Kansas does worse than the nation at all achievement levels.

    For White students, Kansas also underperforms the nation at all achievement levels.

    This is a look at reading for grade 4 only.

    —
    Notes

    1. United States Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics. Available at https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/. ↩
    2. NAEP Overview Available at https://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/about/. ↩
    3. 2017 Reading State Snapshot Report, Kansas, Grade 4, Public Schools. Available at https://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/subject/publications/stt2017/pdf/2018039KS4.pdf. ↩
    4. Ibid. ↩