Sound Politics Public Blog: Bill Gates wants accountability

November 16, 2006

Bill Gates wants accountability

A fantastic Bill Gates editorial on education appears in the Times today, which advocates just about everything the WEA opposes. Starting with math and science standards for public schools, comparing our pitiful requirements in Washington with those of Texas. Yes Texas, that bastion of liberalism where they actually require four years of math and science to graduate - the horror!

While he does not come out and say that the unions are responsible for the failure and lack of accountability in public schools, it is fairly easy to infer:

Once we've set high standards, we have to assess whether those standards are being met, and be able to take action when they're not. Yet, today the state has no power to intervene in failing schools. No matter how badly the students are being served, state officials cannot replace a principal, put higher standards in place, or bring in new teachers. All they can do is sit and watch.

It goes on to criticize the standards for hiring quality teachers and most importantly that our state refuses to allow alternatives like charter schools even when certain public schools have repeatedly failed. Gates is basically saying that their foundation would give millions toward this program, but cannot because of the union monopoly in this state.

Our foundation works with an innovative group called KIPP -- the Knowledge Is Power Program. KIPP is active in 16 states and has become one of the most accomplished school-reform organizations in the country. It operates the highest-performing middle school in Washington, D.C., and the eighth-graders in KIPP's Newark, N.J., academy score in the 91st percentile in math.

KIPP would like to work in Washington state, but it can't. Unlike 40 other states in the country, Washington does not allow charter schools -- so the government can't give KIPP permission to run its model here.

So what will Gregoire do? Listen to one of the richest men in the world who has a proven method for improving education, and the money to help fund it, or cave to her union funded campaign contributors.

Posted by Palouse123 at November 16, 2006 10:12 AM | Email This

Comments

1. Come on, your question is too easy. The answer is:

"cave to her union funded campaign contributors."

Posted by: Obi-Wan on November 16, 2006 11:54 AM

2. Gregoire and other government union fans will run this country into the ground. The thing they fear more than anything else is honest competition. Make teacher pay linked entirely to performance and student / parent evaluation and you'd see change. Even better, make Administrator pay linked to efficiency and you'd see change. As it is now, it's all based on seniority and decrees handed down on high from unions and academic elites at left leaning educational policy think tanks and universities.

Struggle if you have to and send your kids to private school, they'll have an infinite advantage over all the dolts that go the Gregoire route. The investment will pay off down the line.

Posted by: Jeff B. on November 16, 2006 12:31 PM

3. I think that letting public employees belong to unions is a terrible idea, now the people who carry out the directives of the legislature have a vested interest in union friendly policies.

Unions breed corruption, mediocrity, and plain laziness. I would support an initiative prohibiting a publicly funded agency from negotiating with a collective bargaining organization.

Posted by: Dan on November 16, 2006 12:47 PM

4. Gates III was a dropout.

Posted by: Michael in Seattle on November 17, 2006 03:46 AM

5. A dropout from Harvard because he saw an opportunity and knew if he waited it may not last. Michael Dell of Dell Computers didn't finish college either for the same reason. So we didn't "drop-out" he left to pursue a much more lucrative opportunity. Clearly, his instincts served him well.

Posted by: modmilq on November 17, 2006 07:51 AM

6. The problem with Washington's public schools is primarily administrative and parental.
Far too much money is wasted on redundant bureacracies at the district and state levels. The other problem is that far too much teacher time is spent dealing with the 10% of students who just won't or can't "get with the program."
They drag the academic progress of the other 90% of students down with them. Unfortunately the parents of these dysfunctional 10% are usually the most vocal of students' parents. The other parents are usually too busy working and commuting to complain or advocate for their children's needs.
Trey Gates was able to drop out of Harvard after two years because his father earned enough as an attorney to afford to send him to Lakeside School for High School. I wish I could have afforded to have done that for my two sons.

Posted by: q8dhimmi on November 19, 2006 01:25 AM

7. The problem with public schools is purpose--the union leaders have not yet decided what purpose they serve. Should they educate all equally, or involve themselves with the newest social scheme?
Most importantly, it has become quite clear the the unions want schools to indocdrinate rather than educate. They want complete control over an individual from birth to death. The saddest thing that has happened here in WA, and I presume in the other liberal states, is the elevated levels of lying and deceipt that have been developed around the "No Child Left Behind" process. Determined, actually obsessed with, the need to make Bush look bad, our legislators, and teachers have shown no bottom to which they will not crawl to appear the victims, rather than the reason for their own failure.

I was a single mom in the 1960-70, no child support. Just my mom and me working multiple jobs to keep our little girl in private schools--as a truly devoted parent you have two choices--homeschool, or private school.

Posted by: anonymous on November 21, 2006 08:44 AM