Lansing Rotary Club Speech Outline

1. Rotary talks: hope to earn something new and something to think about. Public schools are something we think we know about and have strong opinions. Questions: a. Any part of k-12education in public schools? b. Now or ever employed in the public k-2 eduction system? 2. Not wade into complexities of public school finance laws. More numbers you use, less you are understood. Get numbers out of the way up front. a. Michigan spends $20 billion annually to provide education services to more than a million young Michiganders. b. 330,000 people make their living in public schools. c. Not as good as we think. Not as good as we need to be to rebuild Michigan's economy. More facts: i. 300 plus schools with zero college ready college graduates. ii. Percentage college students needing remedial courses. 3. Public schools face real challenges i. Declining enrollment from demographic changes ii. Collapse of property values iii. State revenue collapse causing cut in school funding iv. Transition from monopoly model to more options for parents in other districts, charter schools, cyber schools, etc. v. Diversity of students and more from troubled situations. vi. Increased demands from federal and state governments and some, not all, parents. vii. Perceived lack of respect for teachers. viii. Focus on testing , not learning. ix. Always: not enough money. 4. Lesson: it's all about the money, it's only about the money, whenever the argument turns to "it's about the kids," it's really about the money. 5. Governor Snyder's 2011 proposals to reinvent public education. Recognize establishment says now is not the time, not the way, not the pace. a. His goals: i. graduates of Michigan public schools that are globally competitive in the Information Age. ii. Public education that moves students seamlessly from high school to post-high school education, both college and career training.

iii. Paying for performance, not just attendance. b. Talk about three ideas. Will they benefits kids and ultimately the state of Michigan? i. Allowing students to learn any time, any place, any way, any pace. ii. Should Michigan move to a performance based payment system for public education? iii. Should public libraries play a larger role in educating Michiganders? 6. The Anys. a. Way of contemplating new approach to replace the batch processing industrial model that is the basis of public education today. b. For example: i. Any time. 24/7/365 vs 1080 hours per yer. ii. Any place. Anywhere learning takes place vs. 900 sq. ft. Classroom. Includes flipped classrooms, online education, iii. Any way vs. traditional classroom model. Includes flipped learning, gameification, individual learning plans. iv. Any pace vs. 4 years. Includes open retry/open exit, early graduation, individual plans for slow and fast learners. c. Happening now in some schools. Issue is whether to reduce barriers. Issue is largely economic. Schools focus on revenue and any alternative is seen as loss to institution even if it benefits student and state. d. Fundamental policy issues. Does district of residence "own" the student and have a right to the money vs. parent ability to decide. e. Governor says: money should follow the child, stop paying for mere attendance in a district school f. Districts say: it's our money. Every time a students opts for a different approach, it takes money from us and diminishes ability to serve all students. g. Secondary issue: making sure what courses are taken are appropriate. h. Third largely bogus issue. For profit corporations. Private for profit vendors have always sold to schools school busses and school books, insurance, teacher pensions invested in stocks, school architects and builders, food for cafeterias, even lawyers. 7. Performance based funding. Never truly measured performance. Never linked funding to teacher or school performance. My assessment: not ready for prime time. a. Building blocks are not in place for effective, fair performance based funding system.

b. Whose performance? Assume basis is whether students are successful. So performance is of teachers and schools. c. What are you measuring? Is Common Core curriculum the answer? Reading and math only? How do you measure art class?physical education? d. What is performance measure? MEAP is junk science. Measure just growth or growth and proficiency/mastery? Are the metrics meaningful? 8. Role of libraries in reinvention of education. Fear by school districts that libraries will "take our money." a. In education article of constitution that says "means of education...." b. Are helping with the digital divide: go to any library on weekends and see families at computers. c. Michigan Electronic Library - MeL - is a great resource nd is not well known. Provides curated information to all michign citizens. MeL may be a way to deliver educational content in an unbundled system. d. Libraries are open longer than schools, help meet the ny time goal. e. Like public schools, libraries are open to all. Thy re a public service we all pay for.