Education Matters

Details: 13 May 2013; Published Date

By Larry Lee

We all remember as kids looking at a sheet of paper with what seemed to be random numbers on it. Then we would take a crayon and draw a line from 1 to 2 to 3 to 4 and so on.

Suddenly, to our delight, the outline of a house or a boat or a horse or a doll would appear. It was our first experience at “connecting the dots,” at seeing “the big picture.” Unfortunately, this process seems to have eluded policy makers in Montgomery recently and we end up with too many decisions with unintended consequences.

The Alabama Accountability Act is a prime example.

We have been told repeatedly by those who concocted this bill making major policy changes in education that it is all about helping children and schools that are considered “failing.”

On May 10, 2013, Senator Del Marsh, who engineered the accountability act told AL.com, “This is about helping parents and children in the state of Alabama. That’s exactly what this is about. It’s about those failing systems finally having a chance.”

But is it really? Time to connect some dots and see. Let’s look first at these failing schools.

There were 180 schools on the original failing list. (But since the definition of failing has been a moving target, who knows how many will be on the final list.)

Of these, 156 of them have at least 70 percent of their kids on free-reduced lunch. That’s 87 percent that are high poverty schools. This concurs with the long determined reality that poverty is a great indicator of school performance.

So one of the dots is poverty.

Where are we most likely to find these failing schools?

If we look at the ten counties with the highest rate of unemployment in March 2013, we see they have a total of 80 schools with 31 percent of them failing. Free-reduced lunch rate for all 80 schools in 82.9 percent. (Since March 2010, these counties have only gained 1,133 new employees, a 2.2 percent increase.)

By comparison, there are 330 schools in the ten counties with the lowest unemployment rates in March. Only eight percent are failing and only 42.4 percent of all students receive free-reduced lunches. (In the last three years, these counties have gained 47,085 new employees, an increase of 8.3 percent.)

So poverty plays a huge role in how well the students in a school do. And the rate of poverty is much, much greater in smaller, more rural counties with a stagnant economy.

So another dot is a struggling local economy. Our poorest counties with the least resources to support education are the ones most likely to need the most help.

But what does the Alabama Accountability Act do? It tells failing schools in poor counties that the answer to their problem is less resources. The state department of education believes that the tax credits set aside by this act will cost school systems $94.27 per student. This means the 80 schools (with 28,346 students) in the 10 counties with highest unemployment will lose $2,684,933.12.

That’s $2,684,933.12 less to use to buy textbooks and diesel fuel, pay the electric bill, hire reading coaches, etc.

In other words, while our legislators wring their hands about the plight of failing schools and their students, they ignore the realities that connecting some dots would show them.

They have twisted the old adage, “When you’re in a hole, stop digging,” to mean “When you’re in a hole, get a bigger shovel.”

Somehow, the declaration that, “This is about helping parents and children in the state of Alabama. That’s exactly what this is about. It’s about those failing systems finally having a chance,” just doesn’t sound sincere.

Larry Lee led the study, Lessons Learned from Rural Schools, and is a long-time advocate for public education and frequently writes about education issues. This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Another Lost Opportunity to Debate the Accountability Act

Details: 07 May 2013; Published Date

By House Minority Leader Craig Ford

I learned a lot of values from my dad. He served in the legislature 26 years, and one of the most important values he practiced as a legislator and that he passed on to me is that our government should operate honestly and out in the open so that the taxpayers can see what they are getting for their money.

So you can imagine the heartburn I feel when the Republicans in the Alabama legislature have – not once but twice – rammed through major educational reform legislation without public input or meaningful legislative debate.

We all know the story: On February 28th, the Republican Supermajority in Montgomery replaced the educational reform bill that had passed both houses of the legislature with a new bill that was three times longer than the original bill and included a new voucher system. Legislators had only one hour to read and debate this new bill, and we still do not know how much it will cost, but that cost will be paid from the state education budget.

Last week, we could have had the opportunity to have the debate on the Accountability Act that we were not allowed to have back in February.

We could have had that debate, but we didn’t.

Once again, the Republican Supermajority used their power to ram through a new change to the Accountability Act. This was the first of the Republicans’ “fix” bills meant to make the Accountability Act better.

Of course, this bill doesn’t actually fix anything. All this new bill does is allow “non-failing schools” to deny admission to students trying to transfer out of “failing schools.”

The Accountability Act was sold to the public as giving kids “trapped in ‘failing schools’ a way out.” But the very first “fix” bill the Republican Supermajority rammed through the legislature would make it more difficult for children in the so-called “failing schools” to transfer to “non-failing schools.”

I guess all that talk about “school choice” was just empty rhetoric meant to pull the wool over our eyes.

But aside from the fact that this “fix” bill doesn’t actually fix anything (in fact, it just makes this already terrible law even worse), once again the debate on the Accountability Act was shut off.

After only two Democrats got to speak on this bill, the Republicans shut off debate and rammed this bill through.

There are two reasons why the Republicans shut off debate. First, the Republicans knew that Democrats had an amendment to offer that would have prohibited legislators and constitutionally elected officers like the governor from receiving vouchers to send their kids to private schools.

As Democrats, we believe it is dishonest for elected officials to financially benefit at the expense of the children of Alabama. These vouchers will take $50 million out of our schools this year alone. Why should legislators make a profit while our children have to make do with out-of-date textbooks and old computers or deteriorating school buildings?

But we did not get to offer that amendment. The Republicans who wrote the Accountability Act want to get the voucher for their families, and they don’t want to go on the record voting against an amendment that would prohibit them from receiving it. So they chose two Democrats whom they knew did not have an amendment and only let them speak.

The second reason the Republicans shut off debate is because they do not want to shine the light of day on what the Accountability Act is or how it will impact public education.

The President Pro-Tem of the state senate, Sen. Del Marsh, R-Anniston, has said publicly that if they had tried to pass the Accountability Act through the normal legislative process it would not have passed.

And that brings me back to what my dad taught me about how our government needs to be open and honest in how it operates and especially in how we spend the taxpayers money.

The Accountability Act does not improve our schools; it abandons them. It does so by giving up on struggling schools and taking money away from successful schools. It is so bad that now even some Republican senators are joining with Democrats and calling on the legislature to repeal the Accountability Act.

All of our children deserve access to a quality education. The taxpayers deserve to know what their government is doing and how their tax dollars are being spent. Until we have an honest and open debate on the Accountability Act, we cannot provide either.

Representative Craig Ford is a Democrat from Gadsden. He has served in the Alabama House of Representatives since 2000. In 2010, Representative Ford was elected House Minority Leader by the House Democratic Caucus. He was re-elected Minority Leader in 2012.

Attempts to “Fix” Accountability Act Only Make Bad Law Worse

Details: 30 Apr 2013; Published Date

By House Minority Leader Craig Ford
This week, the Alabama House of Representatives once again has to vote on legislation that is meant to “fix” a bill that was rushed through the process and not thought-out before it became law.

If there has been a theme for the past three years since the Republican Supermajority took control of the state legislature, it has been unintended consequences.

Unintended consequences that have lead to long lines at the DMV and the possibility of innocent good Samaritans and churches facing criminal charges for giving a ride to an illegal immigrant.

Now the Republican leadership in Montgomery is asking the legislature to “fix” the Alabama Accountability Act.

Of course, there is no fixing the Accountability Act. There are too many problems with this law and the way it was passed. No amount of new laws or regulations will change the fact that the Accountability Act steers millions of dollars away from our public schools and puts them into a voucher program.

And the proposed “fixes” that Republicans in the Alabama legislature are offering don’t address any of the concerns that have been mentioned by the public. The Republicans’ “fixes” do not protect funding for public schools, or address the issue of the fairness of the vouchers. These “fixes” do not do anything to help the “failing schools” perform better or answer the question of whether it is even proper to divert millions of taxpayer dollars from public schools to private schools.

Instead, the first of the Republicans’ “fix” bills is a bill that would allow “non-failing schools” to deny admission to students from failing schools.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t the whole point of the vouchers to give students a choice in what schools they attend?

Now we see what the true intent of the so-called Accountability Act really is. School boards, educators and administrators are put under extreme pressure for their students to perform well on standardized tests. There is no motivation for a “non-failing school” to accept a student from a “failing school”. So this fist “fix” bill actually makes it harder for students to transfer to better performing schools.

But this is not the only “fix” Republicans are offering for the Accountability Act. A second proposal would increase the tax credit for those who donate to the scholarship fund. The tax credit would double under this proposal and be paid for out of the statewide education budget.

A third “fix” bill would guarantee that the vouchers would be given to those who already send their children to private schools, even if their children never attended a “failing school.”

The chairman of the House Ways and Means – Education Committee has said that he expects at least 25 percent of the 61,0000 children currently enrolled in private schools to be eligible for the tax credit.

Now we have only budgeted $50 million for the vouchers. But if 25 percent of the 61,000 children currently enrolled in private schools receives a voucher, it would cost the state over $53 million next year alone. That is already more than we have budgeted, and not one penny of it going to help a child currently enrolled in a “failing school.”

Now how do any of these proposals from Republican Supermajority in the Alabama Legislature “fix” the Accountability Act or improve the quality of education in “failing schools”?

As Democrats have said all along, the Accountability Act cannot be “fixed” or repaired. And the so-called “fixes” that Republicans are offering only make a terrible law even worse!

This is not leadership, and it certainly is not responsible. There is only one solution for how to deal with the Accountability Act: repeal.

The right thing to do is to repeal the Alabama Accountability Act and go back to the original, responsible education reform proposal that was supported by educators, school boards, and the superintendents and passed unanimously by Republicans and Democrats in the Alabama Senate.

The Accountability Act is a terrible law that passed in an unethical and ugly way. The “fix” bills being offered by the Republican leadership only make this bad bill worse. It’s time to do the right thing; the responsible thing. It is time to repeal the Accountability Act. That is the only solution.

Representative Craig Ford is a Democrat from Gadsden. He has served in the Alabama House of Representatives since 2000. In 2010, Representative Ford was elected House Minority Leader by the House Democratic Caucus. He was re-elected Minority Leader in 2012.

Southwest Alabama Speaks During Town Meetings

Details: 06 May 2013; Published Date

By Congressman Jo Bonner
Last week, I had the pleasure of visiting with and hearing from several hundred people from all walks of life who live in Southwest Alabama. They came out to speak their mind on a wide variety of issues spanning from federal involvement in local education to illegal immigration to the budget deficit. I want to thank everyone who attended one of my 14 town meetings and in some cases braved heavy thunderstorms to give their views.
Beginning last Monday, my staff and I spent four days on the road visiting city halls, volunteer fire departments, senior centers and community halls from Wilmer to Brewton and northward from Perdue Hill down to Gulf Shores. Whether it be seniors, veterans, business owners and community leaders or young people, all shared concerns about their country and our future.
We began the week with a moving presentation of a Bronze Star to World War II Army veteran James Philpot, who waited some 70 years to receive the high commendation for his “meritorious achievement in active ground combat against the enemy on December 1, 1944” while serving with an anti-tank unit in the Rhineland of Germany. Philpot spent most of his life after his military service unaware that he was eligible to receive one of the military’s highest honors until he inquired with my office several weeks ago. We helped to confirm his eligibility for the Bronze Star and secured the medal and certificate from the Secretary of the Army for presentation to him during the Wilmer town meeting.
Whether in Bayou La Batre, Satsuma or Gulf Shores, folks expressed their dissatisfaction with the direction of political decisions in Washington, from the unsustainable national debt to ridiculously tight Red Snapper fishing limits in the Gulf. I noted the House of Representatives, in which I serve, has offered up and passed budget blueprints for three years in a row that actually cut federal spending – unlike the Senate and the White House. Unfortunately, the House does not have the constitutional power to force its will on the Senate, which, until recently, has refused to write and pass its own budget plan. However, the House has been able to cut our own operating budget by some 20 percent over the last three years and we continue to hold hearings and write legislation to reduce federal spending. We will not approve a budget that expands the size of government.
Obamacare and the growth of government were also common topics during the town meetings, as most urged Congress to continue to press for the repeal of the unpopular health care law. I have opposed Obamacare since it was first written, and I have voted several times to repeal and defund it. One gentleman in Fruitdale compared the growth of government benefits and their expense on the taxpayer to the carrying capacity of a mule. A mule can only hold so many people before it is forced to lie down. Rather than working to promote economic opportunity and the creation of new jobs, the president has chosen to place further burdens on the backs of employers and taxpayers. He prefers growing government to growing jobs, and expanding benefits rather than expanding employment.
The House has passed dozens of bills to stimulate business investment and create new jobs, only to see them die in the Senate. Of course, we will continue to fight for a halt to senselessly onerous federal regulations that kill jobs. This fight includes my legislation to open up more areas in the Gulf of Mexico to reef fishing – transferring control of more reef fisheries along the Gulf Coast from the feds to the states. Washington has totally botched its management of reef fish, including Red Snapper, and I am encouraged by the growing support my legislation is receiving from coastal fishermen.
Federal efforts to grant amnesty to the more than 11 million illegal immigrants already in this country as well as proposed curbs on gun ownership and Second Amendment rights were equally hot topics of discussion. I have opposed and will continue to oppose amnesty for those who choose to break our country’s immigration laws, and when I was sworn in as your congressman in January, I took an oath to protect and defend the Constitution. I cannot and will not oppose the Second Amendment, which was placed in that vital document for a reason – to protect the remainder of our rights.
I want to close by again thanking everyone who came out to talk to me and my staff over the last week and I always look forward to hearing your views – whether in person or by phone, letter or email. It is an honor to represent you in Congress and I will continue to do my best to make sure your views are heard in Washington.

Workers’ Memorial Day

Details: 29 Apr 2013; Published Date

By Al Henley
On April 28th, Alabama workers are encouraged to join the AFL-CIO is recognizing Workers’ Memorial Day. Each year on Workers Memorial Day, working people throughout the world remember those who were hurt or killed on the job and renew our struggle for safe workplaces.

Each and every day in this country an average of 13 workers die on the job as a result of workplace injuries—women and men who go to work and never return home to their families and loved ones.

In 2011, the last year statistics were compiled for Alabama, 74 of our hardworking sisters and brothers in Alabama left for work one day and didn’t come home to their families. That’s 74 people whose deaths could have been prevented if their employers followed job safety requirements and put needed safeguards and protections in place.

Working people are suffering on the job due to workplace injuries from combustible dust explosions or exposure to well-known hazards like asbestos and benzene. These occurrences are all too common, leaving workers powerless and affecting thousands of families.

There are still debilitating lung conditions like silicosis, caused from exposure to silica dust. Despite the fact we know how to prevent this and can easily implement straightforward
protections, a new OSHA standard to protect workers from this harmful chemical is being blocked by industry opponents and continues to languish.

Four decades ago, the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) law and mine safety law were enacted, promising workers in this country the right to a safe job. Since that
time, we’ve made great progress in making workplaces safer and protecting workers. Workplace fatalities and injuries have declined significantly. Exposures to job hazards and toxic chemicals like asbestos and lead have been reduced. Far fewer workers are dying from trench cave-ins or from being caught in unguarded machinery.

This progress didn’t just happen because the OSHA law and mine safety law were passed. It happened because workers and their unions organized, fought and demanded action from employers and their government. Virtually every safety and health protection on the books today is there because of working men and women who joined together in unions to win these protections.

When working people in Alabama come together through unions and collective bargaining, workers are given a voice and are able to have a say in safety and health on the job. These efforts to make the workplace safer have come under widespread attack by the corporate community that wants to silence the workers who speak out against safety violations.

False claims from business groups and the far right say safety regulations kill jobs, and subsequently, enforcement has been weakened and budgets for safety measures have been slashed. Sadly, our fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters in our communities here in Alabama continue to be at risk.

Corporations and their million-dollar lobbyists direct a laser-like focus at taking away workers’ rights and weakening the role of government in protecting the public and its workforce.

The Alabama AFL-CIO proudly recognizes Alabama’s workforce on Workers’ Memorial Day.   Al Henley is the President of the Alabama AFL-CIO.

Hey Senators: An agency exists; reconfirm its director!

Details: 02 May 2013; Published Date

Shay Farley
Legal Director, Alabama Appleseed

For the first time in our democracy, the Senate is blocking a Presidential reappointment because a minority disagrees with the agency’s mere existence. This temper tantrum shall not abide.

Richard Cordray must be confirmed as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) without further delay or gamesmanship. The CFPB’s urgent mission far outweighs the procedural criticisms cited by Senators Shelby, Sessions, and others as grounds for blocking a vote on this obviously well-qualified nomination.

As the fight to reform Alabama’s payday lending bill gained momentum this legislative session, we witnessed the pressure placed on the bill’s sponsors and other legislators by the lenders’ lobbyists to make major concessions and we witnessed the readiness of many legislators to defend unscrupulous lending practices. Given the situation, Alabamians need a strong, independent federal regulator to protect financial consumers across the nation.

Predatory lending, principally in the home mortgage industry, was a major cause of the 2008 financial crisis and its ongoing damage to the U.S. economy, aided by the detrimental impact of payday lending has cost Alabamians and our state’s economy millions year end and year out. An effective CFPB is the first line of defense for consumers.

Created in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, the CFPB’s role is to establish basic rules of fairness and transparency for mortgages, credit cards, student loans, auto loans, debt collection and other banking and lending products. Without a confirmed director, the CFPB could lose a critical piece of its authority over payday lenders, check cashers, and other nonbank lenders. That’s a risk Alabama borrowers cannot assume.

Senators must choose to stand up against Wall Street lobbyists and predatory lenders who, after failing to prevent the CFPB’s creation, now seek to block the director’s reconfirmation in an attempt to derail the CFPB’s progress and undermine its value as a consumer watchdog in D.C.

Senators face a simple choice: allow an up/down vote on this nomination, or open the door to more of the problems the CFPB is trying to prevent – abusive and deceptive banking and lending practices like those that, in all too recent memory, helped bring about an epidemic of foreclosures, saddled millions of Americans with unmanageable debt, and triggered a financial and economic calamity from which the nation is still struggling to recover.

Director Cordray has drawn wide praise. Business and financial leaders as well as consumer, community, civil rights, labor, and faith groups have commended the bureau for its openness, thoughtfulness, and balanced approach under his leadership. Nevertheless, 43 Senators – including Sens. Shelby & Sessions - are threatening to keep his nomination from coming to a vote unless the agency’s funding and authority are undermined.

While reasonable people can have different views about the best way for any particular agency to be organized, no one could plausibly claim that the CFPB’s governance rises to the level of a national crisis, justifying a game of political brinksmanship that is already creating uncertainty that will further delay the economic recovery, undermine consumer protection and leave families at risk. That prospect may help explain why opposition to Cordray is no longer coming from banks, but rather, in large part, from lobbyists and extreme political partisans whose own business model thrives without meaningful and effective regulation.

Alabamians need the CFPB, and the CFPB needs stable leadership, without further delay.

Alabama Appleseed recently delivered to the offices of Senators Shelby and Sessions petitions which call on the Senate to confirm Richard Cordray to a full term as director of the CFPB bearing the signatures of 809 citizens of Alabama.

No one disputes Richard Cordray’s fitness, character or experience. It’s time for an up or down vote on his confirmation; leave the Dodd-Frank revision or repeal attempts at the door.
*****
Alabama Appleseed is a non-partisan public interest legal advocacy organization working for systemic policy reforms that achieve justice and fairness for vulnerable populations that usually have little, or no, voice in developing or changing policies that impact their lives. Shay can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Education Matters

Details: 26 Apr 2013; Published Date

By Larry Lee

Hell froze over.

That’s the only conclusion one can reach as they see our leaders in Montgomery, the same people who loudly claim how conservative they are, support legislation that would make Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid swell with pride.

These are the people who talk incessantly about “Alabama values” but turned their back on Alabama input when they came up with the Alabama Accountability Act, the most far-reaching education legislation in the state’s history. Instead of seeking advice from Dr. Tommy Bice, state superintendent of education, and the elected members of the state board of education (six of whom are Republicans), they turned to a Washington, DC think-tank known as the American Legislative Exchange Council.

Senate leader Del Marsh told AL.com that he was not in contact with ALEC at any point when the Accountability Act was being crafted.

But thanks to the work of a class of doctorial students at Auburn University, Marsh’s statement doesn’t hold much water. The class spent hours dissecting the bill. More than 80 percent of the wording comes straight from model legislation cranked out by Washington.

A true conservative would not listen to Washington when there are more qualified folks in Alabama. It would be hard to be a better representative of “Alabama values” than Dr. Bice. The son of textile mill workers in Alexander City, he went to Auburn University before taking his first teaching job at the Talladega Institute for the Deaf & Blind.

But obviously our legislative leadership believes folks in Washington are smarter than people in Alabama.

The Accountability Act offers other examples of how liberal thinking has taken over the Statehouse.

Conservatives don’t try to tear down traditional institutions such as public schools, which have been part of Alabama’s fabric since before we became a state in 1819. When early communities wanted to tell the world they had “arrived,” they built churches and schools. The first school in Clarke County had students in 1809 according to Dr. David Mathews, former president of the University of Alabama and a native of Clark County.

But the Accountability Act is more about harming public education than helping it. How else can you describe legislation that singles out “failing schools” and then takes resources away from the very schools that need them the most?

Conservatives know that in a democracy everyone plays by the same rules--but not in the Accountability Act. It has two sets of rules. With public schools we point out failing schools and hold them up for all to see. But we don’t do that for private schools. If we rank public schools and say the bottom 10 percent are failing, shouldn’t we do the same for private schools? Maybe a liberal thinks we should have different rules for different folks—but not a conservative.

Conservatives believe that in a democracy everyone pays his fair share. Yet the Accountability Act allows businesses to take tax dollars that would be used for education, roads and bridges, corrections and the overall common good and divert it dollar for dollar into scholarships for private schools. Instead of repairing a road, let’s help a private school recruit a new quarterback.

Talk about liberal elitism. It would be difficult to find a better example.

And what makes all of this even more incredible is that the same legislators who turned to Washington for the Accountability Act screamed to high heaven that we should repeal the course standards claiming they came from Washington.

If this isn’t classic liberal doublespeak, then what is?

But it’s when you did into the details of the Accountability Act, that you really see why Nancy and Harry would be happy.

For example: I thought conservatives were against more government and more bureaucracy. This bill increases both. In fact, some of the money designated for scholarships for kids will be sent to the state department of education and the department of revenue to defray their costs of policing all the new regulations.

Revenue will create new rules. ALSDE will create new rules. Revenue will get into the education business by hiring a private, independent researcher to study private schools to see if they are up to snuff. Test results from private schools will be sent to revenue—not education.

Scholarship organizations will have to have criminal background checks on employees and board members. Private schools will have to post bonds with scholarship groups, not to mention the bill sets up the most generous entitlement program to ever hit the state.

You just can’t put enough conservative lipstick on this pig to make it what it ain’t.

Larry Lee led the study, Lessons Learned from Rural Schools, and is a long-time advocate for public education and frequently writes about education issues. This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.