TCUnation
social network for conservatives
Election may change education in Oklahoma, Sandy Garrett will not run for 6th term
BY JULIE BISBEE
Published: August 30, 2009
Major changes could be made at the state Education Department after next year’s election.
Republican leaders say they’d like to see more local control and performance pay, while educators say teacher pay raises and data to measure individual student performance is on the top of their list.
The state agency that oversees common education will have a new leader for the first time since 1990. State schools Superintendent Sandy Garrett, who has held the office for five terms, announced this past week she would not seek a sixth term. The office is on the ballot next year. The winner of the race would take over in 2011.
During the last legislative session, ranking Republican lawmakers were critical of the department and how testing data was evaluated. This past week, lawmakers spent two days discussing possible changes to student achievement standards and improving the state’s dropout rate.
"Philosophically, there has been more discussion on improving education today than we’ve had in many, many years,” said Sen. John Ford, R-Bartlesville, chairman of the task force. "We’re talking about concepts that in the last two or three years may have been off the table. But we’re all wanting the same thing, to enhance the system to better educate the children.”
GOP seeks changes
Sen. Clark Jolley, R-Edmond, said he expects major changes at the Education Department.
"It’s going to be a huge change, no matter who gets in office, Democrat or Republican,” Jolley said. "Superintendent Garrett has been active in education ever since I was an education student. Her tenure has been molded by her philosophy. She has embraced several education reforms, and there are some she hasn’t. When the next person is elected, we will have a new generation of leadership who may have been in education way less time, but will be a little more open to innovation.”
Jolley has advocated for changes to state testing and how scores are evaluated. He is in favor of requiring all students to take the ACT college entrance exam as a requirement to graduate from high school.
Rep. Earl Sears, R-Bartlesville, a retired educator, said he’d like to see fewer standardized tests and teachers given performance-based pay.
"We need to increase the salaries, but there should be performance-based pay for those teachers going above and beyond in the classroom,” Sears said.
Looking for better pay
Educators have their own wish list for a new leader of the state Education Department. That list includes pay increases for teachers, testing data that compares individual student data and a leader who supports teacher coaching programs, said Linda Hampton, vice president of the Oklahoma Educators Association.
Hampton said it would be helpful to see individual student data to determine progress, rather than evaluating teachers based on the scores for an entire grade of students.
"Testing is such an issue for us,” Hampton said. "Testing for testing’s sake is not useful. But testing to get data that a teacher can use makes it worthwhile. I don’t know any teacher in the state that minds being accountable, but we have to look at all the factors that play into student performance.”
Published: August 30, 2009
Major changes could be made at the state Education Department after next year’s election.
Republican leaders say they’d like to see more local control and performance pay, while educators say teacher pay raises and data to measure individual student performance is on the top of their list.
The state agency that oversees common education will have a new leader for the first time since 1990. State schools Superintendent Sandy Garrett, who has held the office for five terms, announced this past week she would not seek a sixth term. The office is on the ballot next year. The winner of the race would take over in 2011.
During the last legislative session, ranking Republican lawmakers were critical of the department and how testing data was evaluated. This past week, lawmakers spent two days discussing possible changes to student achievement standards and improving the state’s dropout rate.
"Philosophically, there has been more discussion on improving education today than we’ve had in many, many years,” said Sen. John Ford, R-Bartlesville, chairman of the task force. "We’re talking about concepts that in the last two or three years may have been off the table. But we’re all wanting the same thing, to enhance the system to better educate the children.”
GOP seeks changes
Sen. Clark Jolley, R-Edmond, said he expects major changes at the Education Department.
"It’s going to be a huge change, no matter who gets in office, Democrat or Republican,” Jolley said. "Superintendent Garrett has been active in education ever since I was an education student. Her tenure has been molded by her philosophy. She has embraced several education reforms, and there are some she hasn’t. When the next person is elected, we will have a new generation of leadership who may have been in education way less time, but will be a little more open to innovation.”
Jolley has advocated for changes to state testing and how scores are evaluated. He is in favor of requiring all students to take the ACT college entrance exam as a requirement to graduate from high school.
Rep. Earl Sears, R-Bartlesville, a retired educator, said he’d like to see fewer standardized tests and teachers given performance-based pay.
"We need to increase the salaries, but there should be performance-based pay for those teachers going above and beyond in the classroom,” Sears said.
Looking for better pay
Educators have their own wish list for a new leader of the state Education Department. That list includes pay increases for teachers, testing data that compares individual student data and a leader who supports teacher coaching programs, said Linda Hampton, vice president of the Oklahoma Educators Association.
Hampton said it would be helpful to see individual student data to determine progress, rather than evaluating teachers based on the scores for an entire grade of students.
"Testing is such an issue for us,” Hampton said. "Testing for testing’s sake is not useful. But testing to get data that a teacher can use makes it worthwhile. I don’t know any teacher in the state that minds being accountable, but we have to look at all the factors that play into student performance.”
Tags: Education, Garrett, Oklahoma, Sandy, Teachers
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by jqpamerican (Shane) on
-
I hope that we can get in someone that does want to rectify alot of the problems in our current educational system. Oklahomans would like to have more control of our childrens education, not the Federal Government dictating what we should be doing. I think that a voucher system is a great idea, this would make the public system compete with the private schools and our children would be the winners. I see this as being no different then Obamas idea of a public option to Healthcare. The difference is that we would be taking alot of the power away from the Federal Government and Teachers Unions and returning it back to the parents and local communities. The American education has been come nothing more then a joke in my eyes. we spend more money per student than any other Industrialized Nation, and our children seem to get the worst education for it.
-
-
Permalink Reply by Cindy Crenshaw on -
The best way to get control of our children's education is to get the unions out! We need teachers who themselves know how to read and can add and subtract. The unions have pretty well dug themselves in, but we need to dig them out!! When teachers' pay is based on what certificates they have and not on what they do, then, we will continue to send kids out without a good education. I wonder if we stand a chance? My father says this generation is lost, and we have to start with kindergartners, teach them to love this country, let them start singing patriotic songs again. I sure am glad I got the education I did! These days, students don't get taught the truth, and it sure shows in their behavior.
Anyway, let's see if the new head of education in Oklahoma will try to get the unions out. -
-
-
Very true Cindy. I am only 35 and the people younger than me, scare me. They have been so indoctrinated by Liberal Union Teachers, that is all they know. Busting the Unions would be easy, if it was done right. Set up the Union teachers in one school and non-union teachers in another. Set up too seperate pay scales. Union Teachers all get paid the same, so the ones that do a good job will get fed up when they see that many of the non-union teachers are making more then they are due to their Merit pay system. Once all the good teachers jump ship out of the Union, their stanglehold on the education system will be squashed. We are a Right-To-Work state. so it would not be hard to do. Would just take someone with the stones to stand up to the Unions and tell them to get bent.
-
-
Permalink Reply by Rainah Ness on -
Shane,
Utterly brilliant! Can I post this to my journal? -
-
Permalink Reply by Humble Infidel - Twana on -
Shane thank you so much for posting this important information. Deana White and myself are starting a Blog Talk Radio show specifically for the state of Oklahoma. We are going to use the platform for Constitutional Conservatives running for any Oklahoma elected office from school board, city council, etc., up to US congress. We also intend on having guests who can direct us towards the information on our judges that will be voted on to retain their seats.
If you know of any constitutional conservatives running for any office please get their contact info and what office their running for, to me.
And please come to the show and help us get all constitutional conservatives involve. I hear we have progressives moving into our state just to change the outcome of our elections. We cannot allow that to happen. -
-
Permalink Reply by Rainah Ness on
-
Education reform. (these are old notes from an old file - not necessarily a direct response to the first post in this thread.......)
IMHO, we need to establish various standards at the state level:
1) educational law actually has long been recognized and understood. Quintillian in Rome, and more recently, Charlotte Mason, and currently Nanci Bell have all established the fact that there are 'educational laws', just as there are physical laws.
These educational laws should be the standard by which we assess any curriculum choices and any teacher's efforts in teaching lessons (yes, educational law addresses any concerns underlying philosophies such as 'learning styles' etc, but in a much more foundational way....).
[this would include the solution to reading/spelling lessons: both phonics and sight word reading should be taught at the same time - this process is discussed to some extent in the Charlotte Mason series, in the first volume - the section on reading/spelling - this is also expressed in greater detail (making the process more accessible to the educator), though with a couple of compromises to the Charlotte Mason approach (and here I think Charlotte Mason's approach is better).]
It is recognized that more curriculum is being developed with attempts to merge the sight reading lesson with the spelling lessons, however, there is not a program developed to date to my knowledge that incorporates all of the protections for children prone to struggle (due to various issues, e.g. developmentally young eyes, or visual motor skill glitches, etc.)
I have been pulled from the development of a more complete reading/spelling program to become a political activist, but I am hopeful that I'll be in a position to support specific political action without leading it, and that doing so will free my conscience to get back to work on said reading/spelling program.
Said reading/spelling program is just one example of the type of curriculum reform needed in schools in order to combat efforts to 'dumb U.S. down.'
2) Curriculum must indeed teach the history of our nation without the revisions that have corrupted the minds of our youth, leaving many graduates vulnerable to support those wishing to bring about the loss of the graduates/all-citizens own freedoms. (to my understanding, the John Birch Society has been developing curriculum to address these issues - something I look forward to viewing as soon as it is available)
3) Natural law should be a major corner stone of that reformation of curriculum.
There are indeed absolutes in this world, and when we recognize them, it is harder for individuals in the private sector or the public sector to encroach on others.
Natural law can be summed up as:
1) do what you say you will do
&
2) do not encroach (keeping in mind that any governmental action is an encroachment, so it is the job of the citizenry to limit governmental power to encroach)
When natural law is disregarded, neglected, and/or abused, then there are natural consequences of the negative variety.
The founding fathers knew that we had to be a moral people in order to govern ourselves in light of natural law, and they believed that religion was an important part of the development of a moral people.
Another tangent which intersects this last idea is that natural law is a set of absolutes observable in nature, and that every human is subject to those laws and answerable to them.
As no man has ever been able to establish, authoritatively beyond all question, the exact and precise parameters of natural law, and as heads of state must be answerable to a law above them, then man's mere reason is not a reliable standard by which the citizenry may judge governmental officials' efforts, legislation, judicial responses, and/or administration of law.
Allowing man's mere reason to set the standard is actually yet another form of 'might makes right' - whether the might comes from numbers of votes (as in the oppression of blacks in the south when the blacks were denied the vote after they had received the right - this led to tyranny), or whether the might comes from financial power to influence (e.g. - the corruptions discussed at ourcaucus.com GO WATCH THESE VIDEOS!!!!!!!!! - this is only a portion of what needs to be reformed in the government, bringing the legal standard for the processing of legislation back to pre-1970 standards/processes), or whether the
might comes from other forces (e.g. - the factual manipulation of the Constitution by FDR when he threatened to pack the Supreme Court with additional justices via a constitutional amendment if need be to stop the Supreme Court from doing their job - and another e.g. - the ALLEGED manipulation of Congress,
some members having allegedly been told that if the stimulus package did not pass, martial law would be called into play as a response).
Since we cannot rely on man's mere reason, there must be a higher authority to define natural law.
The authoritative guide to natural law in the United States started out as the Holy Bible. No one was required to be a Christian, though they were expected to tolerate laws which were in line with the PRINCIPLES established in the Bible.
The rejection of this authoritative guide as THE guide to the principles of natural law has led to a situation in which 'might makes right' in the following way:
Whoever has the power to stomp on the Constitution - thus living 'above' the law, has 'might' enough to determine for himself what he will or will not do.
This is a classic case of 'might makes right', which is classic tyranny.
There is yet time to stop this tyranny, and we must stop it.
If we fail, then liberty upon earth will fail.
We will not only fail ourselves and our children, but the hopes of the whole world.
We must not allow that to happen.
Are you with me?
Can we do this?
Yes, WE can! -
© 2013 Created by Earl B.
