Patterico's Pontifications

What was it BA Baracus used to say?

daleyrocks (ae76ce) — 3/6/2011 @ 6:56 pm

” I pity the fool’

narciso (bcb6cc) — 3/6/2011 @ 7:04 pm

Iowahawk does it again!!

When will they ever learn? You don’t mess with Texas and you definitely don’t mess with a graduate of Ottumwa Body & Fender!

Bill M (f7d54c) — 3/6/2011 @ 7:07 pm

Some Texas schools do extremely well in test scores and graduation rates. Others do not.

Regardless, Texas has some intrinsic challenges. First, it is huge. Only California in the 48 comes close. Schools in Texas are also supported by property taxes within each district. To assure a semblance of equality between rich and poor districts, a federal judge back in the ’80s said that rich districts had to contribute a portion of their assesments back to a pool to be distributed to poorer districts.

Without arguing whether this was a good idea or not, the result is exactly what you would expect. Rich districts continued to perform well while poorer districts did not.

So, of course, the answer was to turn to standardized testing to assure academic excellence. So, teachers, with guidance from the state, began teaching for the tests. Anyone seeing a trend here.

Then, my fellow conservatives decided that we Texans deserved a tax break, which I agree with wholeheartedly. They reduced state property taxes for all and froze the rates
at 2006 levels. To maintain school funding the legislature increased fees and taxes on business and taxable activity. Unfortunately, the economy slowed down and funding for schools has not been able to keep up with 2006 tax rate.

The result is high-performing, economically efficient schools are faced with huge funding cuts from the state. At the same time low-performing, hugely inefficient schools are facing the same cuts.

There is a lesson there. It may have something to do with the government’s best intentions, regardless of which party you happen to like.

Juan (efea1d) — 3/6/2011 @ 7:11 pm

Wisconsin spends twice as much on education as Tennessee as well, scores only 1 pt higher on the ACT with Tennessee’s higher participation rate

EricPWJohnson (5cc53e) — 3/6/2011 @ 7:11 pm

Wow, I haven’t posted since Friday? Juan is me, Ag80. Sorry about that.

Ag80 (efea1d) — 3/6/2011 @ 7:27 pm

ag80

Actually since 2006 rates were frozen this has happened in Texas

All districts implemented full day Kindergarten – where before two classes ( morning and an afternoon session) shared a classroom and a teacher now each elementary had to hire 2 to 4 new teachers (oh and build more classrooms)

Then they added pre-k which is now almost state wide adding another 2 to 4 classrooms to each elementary and adding 2 to 4 more teachers to each elementary

Then they added back in to the elementary system art and drama (it had been dropped in the 90’s) now two more teachers and rooms were needed

So just in eductional changes – not costs to actually meet educational goals but decisions to spend money and increase capacity 10 teachers were needed per elemetary schools and more classrooms which is why if you go to the bond buyers magazine – Texas school funds are the hot investment worldwide, because they are backed by the Texas government.

Thats when Perry said enough.

10 teachers per elementary school 4 kindergarten, 4 pre-k and 1 art and 1 drama teacher.

There are alot of elementary schools in Texas

EricPWJohnson (39ee95) — 3/6/2011 @ 7:48 pm

Ag80 – did you used to post as Juan? There used to be a Juan that used too post here , and has not done so in a while.

JD (d4bbf1) — 3/6/2011 @ 7:56 pm

No, I posted on the sock-puppet thread under that name as a joke.

Ag80 (efea1d) — 3/6/2011 @ 8:05 pm

Just checking. Haven’t seen Juan in way too long.

JD (d4bbf1) — 3/6/2011 @ 8:07 pm

JD,

Would that be Juan who unbelievably instructed us how a role-model woman would and should react to being groped? That Juan?

Dana (9f3823) — 3/6/2011 @ 8:20 pm

Percentage of union teachers in Wisconsin – 98.2%

Percentage of non-union teachers in Texas – 98.2%

Obviously, having a majority of union teachers does nothing for the graduation rates. And one has to ask: if Wisconsin public schools are so damn great, why do 14% of students attend a private (or parochial) school in Wisconsin?

And a little information on those [underpaid] Wisconsin teachers:

Milwaukee Public School (district) [Mps]

Average teacher salary – $46,390.00 (does not include benefits)

Median family income – $37,885.00

Per-capital income $16,180

See a little discrepancy there? The average teacher makes almost $10K/yr that the average family in the Milwaukee School District. Mps is also the school district that has the largest percentage of black students.

Something is rotten in ~~Denmark~~ Milwaukee.

retire05 (63d9af) — 3/6/2011 @ 8:21 pm

retire05

Most of the teachers in Texas belong to the TSTA which is a branch of the NEA. The Problem for the TSTA is half their union membership are Republicans

Thts why they havent had a vote to belong to the NEA or be independent in 40 plus years because they will loose

Each school has severa TSTA Reps each district has their own branch of the TSTA=NEA

EricPWJohnson (39ee95) — 3/6/2011 @ 8:36 pm

lose not loose

my brain is loose so I have nothing to lose, said the master typist

EricPWJohnson (39ee95) — 3/6/2011 @ 8:37 pm

I also would be remiss to say that construction of new facilities at the parochial level in Texas have to come from local bond issues, not the state.

Any bond issue has to be used for facilities, not pay. Those monies are completely separate.

Ag80 (efea1d) — 3/6/2011 @ 8:40 pm

However, Texas is a right-to-work state. The TSTA may be part of the NEA, but the teachers are not literally union members.

Ag80 (efea1d) — 3/6/2011 @ 8:45 pm

Ag80

The state is on the hook for bond issues 5 to 40%

Local bonds are passed but based upon a formula monies also come from the state, and a 80 million dollar high school needs 3 to 5 million in maintenance with comes from the operating budget.

The operating budget funds are shared by contributions from the state. The debt service sometimes is equivalent to the operating costs if you add in transportation – in other words a 5 million dollar bond note for a school costs the entire state taxpayers paying sales tax about 2.5 million to 4 million almost the debt service.

EricPWJohnson (39ee95) — 3/6/2011 @ 9:01 pm

Ag80

You cant get hired in Texas without memebership in the TSTA as a practical matter

EricPWJohnson (39ee95) — 3/6/2011 @ 9:02 pm

Dana – I do not recall that, but trust your memory.

JD (d4bbf1) — 3/6/2011 @ 9:02 pm

I’m wondering whether black students would have performed better on standardized tests with the Afro-Centric curriculum Obama and Bill Ayers were pushing through the Annenberg Challenge during the 1990s here in Chicago.

That’s probably a racist thought. I denounce myself.

daleyrocks (ae76ce) — 3/6/2011 @ 9:19 pm

EricPWJohnson, according to the TEA, there are 320,000 teachers in Texas plus 70,000 support staff (principals, administrators, et al). And according to the TSTA, it is 67,000 members strong.

So for you to say that “you can’t get hired in Texas without membership in the TSTA as a practical matter” is bull.

Most of my friends are teachers, and NONE of them belong to the TSTA. Their objection to the TSTA is that it only supports Democrats, as in the TSTA’s endorsement of Bill White.

retire05 (63d9af) — 3/6/2011 @ 9:56 pm

retire05

67000 belong to the state level

the rest belong to their individual membership in the larger ISD’s

those I believe are NOT included in the state level membership

You are correct about the TSTA supporting democrats and the leadership avoids votes as they realize the membership levels are increasingly Republican

EricPWJohnson (39ee95) — 3/6/2011 @ 10:17 pm

Here is a fun stat:

States that spend the most money per student are among the worst in test scores and those spending the least are among the highest.

Utah vs. Washington, D.C.–can you guess which?

Arizona Bob, posting from Tucson (f2ecb9) — 3/7/2011 @ 7:08 am

The most reliable indicator of a student’s achievement is the father’s occupation. Nothing else comes close. School districts with a high proportion of high achieving fathers produce the highest achieving students. Them’s the facts.

You can spend all the money you have, you can employ only the best graduates as teachers, you can adopt traditional or modern methods and instructional materials, you can bus, and you can attend PTA meetings, but nothing you do will displace the children of successful fathers at the top of the honor role.

ropelight (86f07b) — 3/7/2011 @ 11:42 am

EPWJ:

What part of the state do you live in?

Ag80 (efea1d) — 3/7/2011 @ 3:30 pm

@ ropelight:

I think you’ve highlighted the absence of fathers on students’ performance.

Brooks (5a0c96) — 3/7/2011 @ 3:41 pm

3/6/2011

iowahawk on Wisconsin vs. Texas: A Follow-Up

26 Responses to “iowahawk on Wisconsin vs. Texas: A Follow-Up”

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