Mike Falick's Blog

Exploration of the 65% Rule Continued: Why are there so Many Principals?

In my previous posts on the 65% Rule, I have noted that the definition of "in the classroom" being used by the groups advancing this concept was created by the NCES in 1980 and has not been updated since.  Among the expenses not included in the Rule are high school principals.

In discussing this recently with one of the legislators who represents Spring Branch, he stated that having a building principal and grade level principals for each grade was unnecessary and supported the NCES exclusion of these administrators.  It occurred to me that most people including many of our elected state legislators don't understand the difficult job these people do every day.  One of our principals has provided me with the information below which I believe clearly shows the importance of these education leaders to the success of our students, and why it is foolish not to include them (as well as counselors, nurses, etc.) in the definition of classroom expenditures.

__________________________________

SBISD high schools are staffed with 1 administrative assistant principal, and 4 grade level assistant principals.   On average, high school administrators have 2-3 late nights per week. 

Day to day responsibilities include:

1.   Minimum of 2.5 hours per day of direct student supervision before school, during lunches, and after school.

2.   Discipline management for an average of 500 students per grade level.  this includes parent conferences, referring students to attendance officers, attending meetings required by state and federal guidelines such as STAT, 504, LPAC and ARD meetings.

More Insight into the 65% Rule: Defining Our Children's Education through the Nostalgic Prism of 1980

What do you remember from 1980? Jimmy Carter, stagflation, K C and the Sunshine Band, Raging Bull Michael Jackson, Ordinary People, Pink Floyd, Robert Redford, the Cold War? I bet you don't know that that is the year the NCES decided on what would be included with the definition of "in the classroom."

I received a tremendously informative email today from Sandra Poth, the Director of Testing and Evaluation for San Antonio's Northside ISD. Rather than paraphrase, her entire comment is below.

It is no wonder that the 65% Rule doesn't work as a template when its basis is a definition developed 25 years ago. In 1980 Paul Allen and Bill Gates were still working to develop what would become DOS. Wordperfect 1.0 and the Commodore 64 were still 2 years from being launched, Dell was still 4 years from being formed, Microsoft's IPO is still 12 years away, and Time pronounced the coming Jetsons-esque Robot Revolution. If we're going to use that timeframe to define the educational future of our 21st century students, Thomas Friedman will be proven right and India, China, and many other countries that value education will far surpass us within our children's lifetimes.

We should neither accept nor tolerate buzzwords and catch phrases in place of thoughtful decision making.

And the Wait Goes On.....No Decision from the Texas Supreme Court

And the wait continues......The Texas Supreme Court's weekly orders have been posted, and there is no decision on the West Orange-Cove (school finance) lawsuit.

The Quorum Report reported the following yesterday:

In any case, people who think they know how the Supremes will rule say the following:

• The Court will concur with Judge John Dietz that the absence of discretion in setting tax rates combined with most school districts at the $1.50 cap adds up to a de facto statewide property tax which is unconstitutional and must be addressed by the Legislature
• The Court will find for the State on Dietz's ruling that inequities in facilities is unconstitutional.
• The Court will remand the issue of "adequacy and suitability" back to Judge Dietz for further fact-finding.

A new deadline of September, 2006 will be set for the Legislature to resolve issues. Under this scenario, only the dealing with the statewide property tax issue would be ripe for legislative action. The thornier adequacy and suitability issues would be punted until Dietz would conduct the new fact-finding hearings.

Blink: Malcolm Gladwell

I am currently reading Malcolm Gladwell's fascinating new book called Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking.  Using such disparate evidence as sociological and psychological field research, observations of speed-dating, art historians, tall people, horse track betting, heart attack exams, war games, tennis, and the killing of Amadou Diallo, Gladwell asserts that often and unknowingly people make decisions and that we should trust our intuition, the first 2 seconds, the "blink" moment. 

He describes this rapid cognition as "thin-slicing," and, with example after example demonstrates that by distilling decision-making to less information rather than more, better decisions will result.  Gladwell cautions though, that as was the case in the Amadou Diallo shooting, rapid cognition requires recognition that the blink moment be accurately interpreted.

The premise is very interesting and Gladwell's writing style is engaging.  I highly recommend this book.

I also highly recommend Gladwell's first book The Tipping Point.

Representative Bohac Visits Our Schools

School tours with our legislators continued . . . .

As many of you know, I am once again serving as the Board’s Legislative Liaison for the 2005-2006 school year. Dr. Jackson and I suggested several initiatives to the Board in August which the Board adopted. One of these initiatives has been to bring our Legislators into our schools to see the students and the educators their decisions most directly impact.

On October 26, Dr. Jackson and I had the privilege of showing Representative Dwayne Bohac two of our fine schools – Northbrook High School and Spring Woods Middle School. Both of the school’s tour included classroom visits and full tours of the facilities. I think Representative Bohac concluded the day with a full understanding of how hard our students, teachers, and administrators work every day, and how important the Legislature’s future work on public education and school finance is to the ultimate success of our students. On behalf of the Board, a special thank you to the Principals of each school (Mr. Randolph Adami and Ms. Cynthia Chai) for a job well done!

We are scheduled to visit additional schools with Representative Bohac next week and with Representative Farrar on November 11.

We are continuing to work to schedule tours with Senators Whitmire and Janek, and Representatives Woolley and Nixon.

Google Base: A Case Study in How to Go from Zero to $100 billion in 14 Months

It is being widely reported today that Google is about to launch a service to compete with eBay called Google Base.  Rumored to be a service that would allow users to sell items on Google.  It is also rumored that in conjunction with Google Base, a PayPal type service will be offered.

Google has gone from its IPO to be valued at $100 billion in 14 months.  At $100 billion, its market cap equals that of eBay and Yahoo combined.

Regular readers of this blog know that I am a huge fan of Google because I believe it is a world-changing company.  For more, see these previous posts here and here.  Other bloggers have posted this screenshot:

Vision Time: Spring Branch Goes 20/20 with Ian Jukes and Ted McClain

Last Friday and Saturday (10/21 and 22) the Board had what I feel is the tremendous honor of participating in the first 9 hours of the District’s Visioning process. The goal is for Spring Branch to complete the development of Five Year Educational, Long Range Facilities, and Technology Plans by June 2006.  The Visioning process involves the Board, staff, community members and students (over 60 people) looking at ways to define what we as a District want for our students.

So you wonder why I’d be energized by spending 9 hours on a Friday afternoon and Saturday morning on this? Well, under Dr. Klussmann’s leadership, we were able to bring in educational futurists Ian Jukes and Ted McClain. When these two gentlemen speak of the future, they aren’t talking about the 22nd century – they are talking about today’s kindergarten students – the Class of ’18.

I have felt a sense of urgency on the issues Jukes and McClain discussed since I read Tom Friedman’s The World is Flat which I have discussed previously in several posts you can review here. What I learned on Friday and Saturday transforms my sense of urgency to a sense of immediacy. I invite you to get energized the way I have by visiting Mr. Jukes’ site.

Included on his site are a number of handouts that can be downloaded including this one that is an extension of Windows on the Future written by Jukes and McClain.

Another Week without a Decision from the Texas Supreme Court

And the wait continues......The Texas Supreme Court's weekly orders have been posted, and there is no decision on the West Orange Cove (school finance) lawsuit.

As I said last week, with no opinion yet, and the March primaries getting closer and closer, it now appears extremely likely that any decision will not require the Legislature to have a special session until late Spring or Summer.

Herceptin: "Stunning" Advance in Breast Cancer Treatment

It is being widely reported today that Herceptin, made by Genentech, has shown "stunning" results in the treatment of a particularly aggressive form of metastatic breast cancer.  This combined with last week's news of the development of Gardasil, Merck's vaccine that is 100% effective in preventing cervical cancer, is wonderful news and should save the lives of tens of thousands of woman every year.

_________________________________________________________

Oct. 19, 2005, 11:03PM

For some women, breast cancer drug could equal a cure

'Remarkable' findings show Herceptin halves relapse risk for 1 form of disease

By TODD ACKERMAN
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle

A targeted drug already approved to treat an aggressive form of advanced breast cancer has proved remarkably effective at preventing tumors from recurring in early-stage patients.

The drug, Herceptin, cut the risk of relapse in half, a breakthrough that prompted experts to predict thousands of American women will be cured of breast cancer annually. Experts called the study results "stunning."

"This is probably the biggest evidence of a treatment effect I've ever seen in oncology," said Richard Gelber, a Dana-Farber Cancer Institute biostatistician who led the analysis of most of the trial participants. "It is quite remarkable."

Representative Vo Visits Our Schools

As many of you know, I am once again serving as the Board’s Legislative Liaison for the 2005-2006 school year. Dr. Jackson and I suggested several initiatives to the Board in August which the Board adopted. One of these initiatives has been to bring our Legislators into our schools to see the students and the educators their decisions most directly impact.

On October 17, Dr. Jackson and I had the privilege of showing Representative Vo three of our fine schools – Nottingham Elementary, Spring Forest Middle School, and Stratford High School. Each school’s tour included classroom visits and full tours of the facilities. I think Representative Vo concluded the day with a full understanding of how hard our students, teachers, and administrators work every day, and how important the Legislature’s future work on public education and school finance is to the ultimate success of our students. On behalf of the Board, a special thank you to each school for a job well done!

We are scheduled to take Representative Bohac on school tours on October 26 and November 2, and Representative Farrar on November 11.

We are continuing to work to schedule tours with Senators Whitmire and Janek, and Representatives Woolley and Nixon.