Gadfly Bites 10/19/20 – Catching up with the clips

COMPILER’S NOTE: Hah! I’m back from vacation, you gluttons for punishment. We’ll start today with a catch-up of all that we missed while I was holed up in my basement relaxing afield. Normal thrice-weekly service will resume on Wednesday, heaven help you all.

1. We’ll start with some really old stuff. To wit: Chad Aldis’ September testimony opposing a state testing moratorium this coming spring. It came up again as lots of folks (you know who I mean) called a press conference to push for the opposite a week ago last Friday. (Gongwer Ohio, 10/9/20) That same testimony from Chad was referenced in this piece also. It is on the more-specific topic of in person testing for third grade reading, which by law is to be conducted much sooner (between today and November 6) than the other stuff. Folks quoted here seem a bit more reasonable about the whole thing to me. (Columbus Dispatch, 10/9/20)
    
2. In case you missed it last week—and if you did, how on Earth did that happen?—Fordham released a new report looking at the impact of brick-and-mortar charter schools on student outcomes. Hint: largely positive. You can check out coverage of the report in Gongwer… (Gongwer Ohio, 10/14/20) …and in the Dispatch… (Columbus Dispatch, 10/15/20) …and in Crain’s Cleveland. (Crain’s Cleveland Business, 10/14/20) Thanks to the Dispatch’s Cathy Candisky for attending our first ever virtual report release event, along with lots of other folks. We really appreciate it. For all the rest of you, a blog summary of the event is here and a recording of the Zoom video is here.
   
   

3. Back to pandemic news, which I rudely interrupted: ODE last week reported that charter school enrollment in Ohio is up more than 8 percent this year as compared to last fall. And this is driven by a 38 percent increase specifically in online charter enrollment. Chad is quoted in this piece, ever the data-head, wondering how these boosts will affect academic outcomes for students, schools, and the sector as a whole. Good questions among many. (The 74, 10/14/20)
    
4. The reason for all this is, speculationally, the parental search for certainty amid…well, you know. For example, Willoughby-Eastlake City Schools abruptly returned to fully-remote learning last week (and cancelled all extracurriculars) after several students and teachers were reportedly exposed to SARS-CoV-2. (WKYC-TV, Cleveland, 10/10/20)
   
   

5. Up in Canton City Schools, “no specific incident” supposedly prompted the elected school board to review its minimum GPA for student athletic participation, but review they did. And they found it to be the highest in the land. And lo they are now looking to lower it in the interest of “keeping students engaged” in school. (Canton Repository, 10/11/20) Canton commentator Charita Goshay has got some very fiery thoughts on this topic, including: “Proponents…say it’s a means by which marginally committed students will stay in school. If that’s the case, the fault is ours for not making education more relevant.” And there’s more where that came from. (Canton Repository, 10/14/20)
    
6. While LeBron James and the I Promise School in Youngstown are both namechecked in Ms. Goshay’s sermon commentary above, it is entirely another support system for Y’town students being lauded by HUD Secretary Ben Carson in this piece. (Youngstown Business Journal, 10/14/20)
   
   

7. We don’t have any explanation here as to why interdistrict open enrollment was cancelled in Tipp City Exempted Village Schools last spring, but it was. (Subsequent research shows that the discussion, voting, rescinding, and revoting on the matter—on April 1, just to add some piquancy—was quite the foofaraw) Fallen afoul of that change is senior Michael Bittinger, who has appealed to be allowed to finish his high school career at Tippecanoe High School. He has so far been denied. (Dayton Daily News, 10/9/20)
    
8. Speaking of appeals: last week we learned, very briefly, that the State of Ohio is appealing that recent Franklin County Common Pleas Court ruling that said the state improperly calculated funding tied to charter school enrollment in three large urban districts more than fifteen years ago. We found this out, it seems, because Dayton City Schools’ elected board voted to spend more money to pursue the case which has gone on for a decade. Hope they win enough money to pay all those lawyer fees! (Dayton Daily News, 10/17/20) In another long-running case, the state will also be appealing the ruling related to Ohio’s school district territory transfer law, ruled as unconstitutional back in September. While the law itself is new, the specific territory transfer effort in Stark County which gave rise to the law goes back nearly 16 years. (Canton Repository, 10/13/20)
   
   

9. Finally in our marathon clips catch-up, we were privy to an interesting difference of opinion among state school board members last week. Members were discussing their advice on education spending—to be given to the governor and the General Assembly prior to the start of biennial budget negotiations—when they hit a snag related to voucher spending. Specifically, whether to advise the executive and legislative branches to “limit growth or reduce the appropriations for the EdChoice Expansion program” in favor of more spending on public schools. The discussion and the final vote (which saw that caveat ultimately struck from the document) were enlightening, to say the least. Thanks, Gongwer! (Gongwer Ohio, 10/14/20)

Did you know you can have every edition of Gadfly Bites sent directly to your Inbox (when someone is actually doing them, that is)? Subscribe by clicking here.