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Remarks as Prepared for Delivery * December 8, 1999 Thank you Clair for that nice introduction. I am excited about the spirit of unity that exists among you and the entire State Board, Education Commissioner Bill Moloney, and myself in seeking to improve Colorado’s system of public education. That is, after all, why we are all gathered here this morning. Friends, there is nothing more important for the future of Colorado than the proper education of our children. Children are the future. Speaking at Harvard more than half a century ago, Winston Churchill said: "The empires of the future are the empires of the mind." Prophetic then, it is truer now than ever. America and the world are entering an age when success and wealth and a high quality of life are more dependent than ever, not on what one produces with muscles and physical labor, but what one produces with the mind. We must ensure that our children are taught the skills and knowledge they will need to succeed in the information age. For many children in Colorado today, our public school system is preparing them for the future. As Clair mentioned, Frances and I send – and have always sent – our three children to public schools. As parents, we fully believe that the public education system is capable of providing a quality education for all children. However, we are convinced that today we are in danger of leaving too many children behind. I only need to recite the most recent CSAP scores to remind us of the depth of the problem facing public schools:
When hundreds of thousands of Colorado’s children cannot read and write at grade level, it is a matter of the gravest concern. That is why I am announcing today that I will make my number one priority in the next legislative session Putting Children First: A Plan for Safe and Excellent Public Schools. Public education in Colorado is doing a good job in educating many of our children. I know there are wonderful and dedicated teachers in our public schools. And I know that hundreds of public schools provide a good education – including the three public schools my children attend. But I also know that illiteracy and high dropout rates plague too many children from low-income families. I know that too many children from middle-class families are faced with an education that rarely challenges them to excel. And everyone from the inner cities to the suburbs is concerned about school safety. Friends, it has been only seven months since Colorado and the whole nation shuddered at the horror of the Columbine tragedy. Since then, we have all searched our souls for answers and ways to prevent further school shootings. I believe that much of the blame lays on a culture that is less Little House on the Prairie and more The Terminator. Why is it that a survey in the 1940s listed the top five disciplinary problems in public schools to be talking, chewing gum, making noise, running in the halls, and getting out of turn in line, while a more recent survey listed the top five discipline problems to be drug abuse, alcohol abuse, pregnancy, suicide, and rape? Why is it that education today is all too often about fear, not hope? The only thing children should fear when they walk into their school is their next exam. All across Colorado, schools are taking steps to become more safe and orderly. Schools have learned that they cannot turn a blind eye to how students dress or anything else that would sow fear and intimidation in the hallways. Most of the decisions about school safety and security must be made at the local level. What works here at Ebert Elementary may not work at Campo Elementary in Baca County. However, the State does have an important role to play in ensuring that every child in Colorado has a drug-free and crime-free school. That is why I continue to support and want to strengthen zero-tolerance policies for weapons, drugs and violent behavior in schools. I have read the news reports in recent weeks that are attempting to undermine zero-tolerance policies by pointing to the examples where an innocent child inadvertently brings a Swiss Army Knife to school and is unduly punished. But friends, zero-tolerance means zero tolerance. Everyone knows you do not bring a weapon anywhere near an airport. In fact, everyone also knows that if you even joke about a weapon or violent act at an airport, you will be detained, questioned and most likely miss your flight. Our schools must reflect that same attitude. Children must know without any doubt that the same rules apply to everyone. That is why I am proposing to enhance State accountability for school-led enforcement of zero-tolerance policies. For every incident involving substance abuse, weapons, violence or other violations of the Code of Conduct, a school must take action. If they fail to do so, they will be held accountable by the State through the use of financial sanctions. We must also strengthen the ability of schools, law enforcement agencies, and other government agencies to share information about disruptive children. Thus, I want Colorado to have the most aggressive and open sharing of information that is allowed under the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. We must make it clear that a school can communicate with any law enforcement jurisdiction in the state – even across county lines. We must require that school officials be informed when students with a history of violence are enrolled in their schools. We must allow a school to disclose information on a student’s behavior problems – without the parent’s prior written consent – to officials of another school where the student seeks in enrollment. We must require law enforcement agencies to notify a school in which a student is enrolled if that student has been arrested, and the reason for the arrest. Several months ago I read an article about the rescue and rehabilitation of the Chicago Public Schools. One school official summed up the district’s attitude toward school and law enforcement cooperation like this: "A child arrested on Saturday night is just as capable and likely to misbehave on Monday morning. Our entire community – schools, law enforcement, county social service agencies – must share information and work together to ensure that no child falls through the cracks." I know everyone would agree that no teacher should be subject to verbal or physical harassment. Students should not be kept from learning because of a disruptive student. Therefore, I am proposing that teachers be given enhanced powers to remove troublemakers from their class. I sponsored such legislation as a state senator and it was vetoed after school administrators objected. Yet I continue to believe that we must provide the means for our teachers to maintain order in their classrooms. In addition, it is time to establish a clear policy of "three strikes and you are out" for disruptive behavior. We all know teenagers occasionally act up – it is part of adolescence. But it is the responsibility of adults to set boundaries and at some point have the authority to say enough is enough. Thus, every student in public schools will be subject to a streamlined process of "three strikes and you are out." This raises the question: What do we do with the disruptive students who have been expelled? Let them roam the streets? No. We must provide suitable alternatives for them. Principals and teachers across Colorado have told me that we need to have more schools capable of dealing with high-risk students, potential dropouts, and those who are disruptive. Today I am proposing the creation of a new form of charter school, Alternative Charter Schools, for high-risk and expelled students. Colorado may need as many as eight of these Alternative Charter Schools around the state – in places such as Durango, Pueblo, Fort Collins, Grand Junction and several in Metro Denver. Under my plan, the Commissioner of Education will issue a Request for Proposals for public, private, non-profit or for-profit entities to establish and run these Alternative Charter Schools. The Commissioner will negotiate the contract with school districts under which Alternative Charter Schools will operate. These charter schools will require principal and parental recommendation or a court order for admission of high-risk and expelled students. Because these schools for high-risk students can be expensive, I am also proposing that the state invest in these Alternative Charter Schools by using state capital construction dollars to fund the start-up capital costs of these schools. One of the most important things the State can do to help our public school teachers and principals increase safety is to remove disruptive students from regular classrooms and enroll them in these Alternative Charter Schools. When I think about school safety, I know how I feel when I tuck our youngest son Brett into bed at night. I know so many parents who, after kissing their child on the forehead and shutting off the light, before walking out of the door pause, turn around and make that final glance back to see that everything is O.K. That sense of comfort is what we need in every classroom in the state. Children cannot learn in schools that are not safe and orderly – that is why I have emphasized this issue first in my remarks. Next I would like to address an even more fundamental question: How can our public schools do a better job of educating every child? I believe we can improve education by always remembering that education is first, last and always about the children. That is one reason I am investing significant new dollars in Colorado’s public schools. Last year I signed a School Finance Act that, for the first time in years, fully funded public schools. In the budget I submitted to the legislature several weeks ago, I again put education first and proposed $111 million new dollars to once again fully fund public schools. In addition, every reform I am outlining here today will be fully funded and will impose no unfunded mandates on local schools. I have made it a priority to secure at least $25 to $30 million dollars from the tobacco settlement to fund literacy programs. And, I am proposing significant new dollars for more teacher professional development. While this is a solid first step, money isn’t everything. For example, Washington, D.C. public schools spend more per student than almost anywhere else in the nation – yet they have one of the worst academic achievement and school safety records in the nation. I believe in investing in public education. But like any good investor, I expect a return on my investment which is why we must have a testing and accountability system that ensures we put children first. I believe that the cornerstone of our accountability system must be a strengthened set of state testing and School Report Cards. The State originally put in place the Colorado Student Assessment Program to serve as a snapshot of school performance, and to serve as a measurement tool for accreditation. The CSAPs do this well. But in the past year, everywhere I go I hear from teachers, parents and school officials who are asking that the CSAP do even more. Today I am proposing several new steps to give Colorado a more useful and workable student assessment system – changes that will make CSAPs work for teachers. First, I believe that nothing is more important than teaching children the basics of reading, writing and math. Without these skills children will never be able to learn and master history, literature or science. Therefore, to monitor student achievement, the CSAPs should be expanded to test reading and writing each spring in grades three through ten. And math should be tested each spring in grades five through ten. The state should pay for these assessments – my budget has the money to cover the costs of these tests. With high academic standards and regular assessments of the basics, we will take a major step toward ensuring that every child is receiving a year’s worth of education for every year’s worth of schooling, regardless of from where a student starts. In fact, that is one of the most important benefits of yearly assessments. Schools, teachers and parents will be able to better measure student progress year after year using longitudinal analysis. Schools are responsible for our children for seven hours a day and they must be held accountable for using that time to educate students. We can no longer afford to blame society’s influence, poverty, race or family structure on poor student achievement. Every child can learn. We must therefore test in order to ensure that teaching is translated into learning for every child. I have also spoken with school districts across the state that administer their own assessments, in addition to the CSAPs. These districts want to fill in the gaps for non-CSAP testing years as well as provide diagnostic data for teachers and parents. Today’s CSAP will record if a student scored below proficiency in writing, but will not break out where the child needs specific help. Thus I am proposing that the CSAPs provide this type of diagnostic analysis for every student. Furthermore, the CSAPs may need to be modified, with fewer open-ended answers and constructed response in order to ensure a quicker turn around time. Teachers and parents need the results back sooner so they know how best to help a student. Also, because the state will require and pay for CSAPs every year in reading, writing and math – and provide diagnostic analysis – school districts will no longer have to pay for their own supplemental assessments. Currently every one of Colorado’s 176 school districts administer supplemental tests at costs that run into the millions of dollars. They can save this money and use it for such things as reduced class sizes, as well as reducing the number of days that students are required to take assessments. I have called for CSAPs through grade ten. That does not mean I believe our high schools do not have an obligation to require high academic standards and educational excellence in grades eleven and twelve. But we must acknowledge that by this point in their K-12 careers, many students are looking toward college. And that means national college entrance exams. Therefore, I believe that we should require every 11th grade student in Colorado to take – at State expense – the ACT college entrance exam. I believe that every student should have the opportunity to go to college. By requiring every student to take the ACT we send a strong message that we believe our high schools must prepare students in the reading, writing, math and science skills they will need to qualify for higher education. Currently more than 60% of Colorado’s 11th grade students take the ACT – I want to make that 100%. Using the ACT will provide Colorado with a national comparison on how well our high school students are doing. And we will be the first state in the nation to both require and pay for every student to take a national college entrance exam. I would like to discuss for a moment an initiative that is at the heart of solving Colorado’s literacy crisis. Read to Achieve is based on a simple goal: by the time every Colorado child enters the fourth grade they should be reading at grade level or above. My plan calls for providing up to $1,100 per pupil for every third grader in public schools who fails the state reading test. Individual public schools would be able to use these grants to implement proven reading programs such as after school tutoring, summer school programs, in-school reading clinics as well as one on one tutoring throughout the school day. This is critical because it has been shown that children who cannot read by fourth grade will, in all likelihood, fall further behind in school and become more at-risk for eventually dropping out of high school. Let me tell you a story about a man named George Dawson. Mr. Dawson was the grandson of slaves who never learned how to read. Knowing the cost of illiteracy, he made sure all seven of his children learned how to read. Then, when Mr. Dawson turned 98, he decided he wanted to learn to read too because, as he said to a reporter, "I just figured if everybody else can learn to read, I could too." Mr. Dawson learned the alphabet in a day and a half. He learned to write his name in a month. Now, two years later, he can read at third-grade level – good enough to read Bible verses in church and good enough to read the many birthday cards he received on his 100th birthday. We could all learn from Mr. Dawson. Despite all of the challenges in his life, he made sure his children succeeded in school. And despite his advanced age, he learned to read. If a 98-year-old man can learn to read, so can a nine-year-old child whose mind is nimble and ready to learn. Friends, we are in danger of having two groups of children in Colorado – one that can read and one that can’t; one that dreams and one that doesn’t. I want all of Colorado’s children to be able to read and I want all of Colorado’s children to be able to dream. We must settle for nothing less. Therefore, I want to help our teachers. It was Henry Adams who said: "A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence ends." I know that the vast majority of teachers in our public schools are dedicated, hard working professionals. That is why my plan will put four million new dollars into professional development for teachers. My plan also calls for grants of $10,000 to be given to individual public schools for professional development. Principals know which of their teachers need a little extra training. These grants will go to individual schools for the principal to use in the most effective way to ensure that teachers are prepared to teach the basics of reading, writing and math. But to further increase the supply of quality teachers will take more than just professional development dollars. Teachers are the only profession in America that does not reward merit. A good doctor, a good mechanic, a good computer programmer can all earn more. Why is it that when it comes to our children, we don’t reward excellence? Why do we reward time served rather than performance? I believe school districts should be free of any state law that would prevent them from hiring the best and the brightest, and should have the flexibility to pay them what they deserve. When I talk to school board members, superintendents and principals, more than anything else they ask: Why is it next to impossible to weed out the few ineffective teachers that we know should no longer be in the classroom? Since we are talking about our children here, let me be blunt: Teachers who cannot teach should not teach. Principals who cannot lead should not lead. For all the many thousands of dedicated teachers we have, I remain convinced that there are some who should find careers more suited to their talents than teaching. Therefore, my plan calls for replacing teacher tenure for all newly hired teachers. While I would personally like to eliminate tenure all together, currently tenured teachers most likely have a legal property right to their job and thus we are legally limited. But I believe that in the future, all new teachers should be hired on contracts that give school districts more flexibility in the retention and dismissal of teachers. I would now like to discuss School Report Cards and the need to truly hold public schools accountable for their performance. One of our most important goals in improving public education must be to bring parents back into the schools and back into the day to day education of their children. That is why the School Report Card is a key to the plan I am laying out today. It will equip parents with the knowledge they need to make an informed decision as to which school is best for their child. My plan calls for the State to issue annually a School Report Card on every public school. It will report on a school’s academic performance, its safety record, teacher qualifications, and use of taxpayer dollars. Most importantly, it will provide parents with an easy to understand letter grade on a school’s overall academic performance, as well as a separate letter grade on a school’s overall safety record. Just as students receive grades of A, B, C, D or F, so will Colorado’s public schools. Academic performance will be measured using the ACT and the CSAPs, examining each school on overall scores, year-to-year growth and how well all students – including minority and low-income – perform. School safety will be measured on how well a school enforces the Code of Conduct. I know that some will say that grading schools is insensitive. They say it is wrong to use the letter F because it signifies failure. In my mind, that is exactly why we need the rating system. Seeing that a child’s school has failed would certainly serve as a wake-up call to parents – it would motivate them to get more involved in their child’s school. In addition, no community wants to be saddled with a failed school. The local chamber of commerce cannot attract new businesses to a community with an F school. Realtors cannot sell homes around an F school. Thus the community would quickly become involved in making a school better. And that will remedy one of the biggest complaints of many educators – not enough parental and community support. Effective reform must start with accountability. Someone should be praised when schools succeed, and someone must be responsible when schools fail. We must blow the whistle on failure. If schools fail, we must be bold enough to challenge the status quo. Our children deserve at least that. I believe that we should reward excellence. Those public schools that are successfully educating our children deserve more than just recognition, they deserve substantive rewards to encourage them to continue on the path of excellence. Therefore, I would suggest that we award annual grants to the top five percent all around best academically performing schools in Colorado. But we must also recognize the strivers, the schools like Bessemer in Pueblo, which, in just three years, raised its third grade reading scores from 12 percent proficiency to 74 percent proficiency. As a result, the top five percent of schools that have shown the most overall academic improvement against the previous year will also get reward grants. Both the top performing and most improved schools will receive grants ranging from $5,000 to $15,000, depending on the size of the school. Now, to some this may not seem like a lot, but the principals I speak with assure me it can still buy quite a few books, improve the computer science lab or hire a reading aide. These will be no-strings-attached rewards. It will be up to the individual school principal and that school’s advisory committee on how best to use the money. I also want to reward our top performing schools by providing them the option to be free of rules and regulations that stifle innovation. Public schools that have proven they can chart the path of education excellence should have be allowed to get waivers from state red tape that sometimes hinders their ability to excel. While rewarding excellence, we must also work to prevent public school failure. President John Kennedy said: "A child miseducated is a child lost." Friends, we cannot afford to lose even one child – let alone thousands of children. But when one out of every two Hispanic students who enters the first grade drops out of school before graduating from the twelfth grade, we are losing too many children. Therefore, I am suggesting several steps today to deal with those public schools in Colorado that are failing students. First, any low-income parent whose school’s overall academic performance is graded a D or below on their School Report Card will become eligible for a transportation token. The parents will be able to use these transportation tokens to help offset the cost of transporting their child to a better public school. In this country, the rich can afford private schools. The middle-class can afford to move into communities with good schools. But all too often the poor are left with whatever schools are in their neighborhood – even if these schools are unsafe and do a poor job of educating students. These transportation tokens will allow Colorado to leverage a new federal program to help low-income parents whose children are in a failing school send their child to a better public school. These tokens will not be cash payments, but will instead provide a coupon-like system to help parents pay bus fare, arrange a van or car-pool, use a taxi or some other form of transportation. These tokens will help to finally make public schools of choice a reality in Colorado. What I have been talking about is providing tokens to parents with children in D or below schools. But what should be done for those children in truly failed schools? What should we do with that handful of schools across Colorado that will get an overall academic grade of an F? We are not talking hundreds of schools, but perhaps ten to fifteen out of more than 1500 public schools. These are the schools where more than 80 or 90 percent of the students fail to read and write at grade level. To quote a report of the Democratic Leadership Council, we can no longer allow "citadels of failure and despair masquerading as educational facilities to abuse kids year after year." That is one reason more and more communities are providing opportunity scholarships to poor parents of children in failed schools. These scholarships provide a poor parent with the choice and the means to enroll their child in a private or parochial school. And frankly, I believe that opportunity scholarships have a lot of merit. If the state fails to provide a decent education for a child, then I believe it has not only a legal obligation, but a moral obligation, to help parents find a decent school for their child, be it public, private or parochial. As the rest of the nation explores the use of opportunity scholarships, I believe Colorado may wish to explore this option as well. Today, I am proposing something even bolder. Scholarship programs, for all their merit, continue to allow failed schools to stay open under the same management while a few children escape to a better school. I believe if even one child is left in a failed school, we are not doing right by all children. I want an education system where every child has the opportunity to receive a quality education. Some states have tried to address this issue by placing failed schools on remediation and giving them three or five years to improve or risk state takeover. Three years for improvement may be just fine in the life of a school – but it is not fast enough for the life of a child. Let me tell you why. At the Colorado Teacher Quality Summit we heard from Professor Bill Sanders of Tennessee. He has incredible evidence that shows if a child receives a poor education three years in a row, that student will never catch up. While even one year of bad teaching hurts a child, they can recover. But to say to a child: "We know your school has failed but we are content to wait three, four or five years for it to improve," is to risk condemning that child to a lifetime of failure. Therefore, I am proposing today that Colorado should no longer leave even one child in a failed school. Any poor child in a failed school will be able to use transportation tokens to transfer to a better public school. And for those who choose to remain, the state will convert the failed school into an Independent Charter School. For those truly failed public schools in Colorado, the Commissioner of Education will select – through a competitive bid process – public, private, for-profit or non-profit groups with proven track records to come in and implement proven management, academic and operating programs in the failed school. To do this, the Commissioner will negotiate a contract with the school district that will convert a failed school into an Independent Charter School. This will free the new management to swiftly put in place whatever reforms are necessary – including staff changes, curriculum changes, school hour changes. There will be no grace period for failure. I believe that school districts right now know which of their schools are failing. And I think our message is clear – improve these failing public schools or the State will itself make the changes in management that are so necessary. Friends, four principles have guided me in putting this plan together:
I look forward to working with the all of you, and with the legislature, to see that every child in Colorado has a safe and excellent school. I am excited that we are expanding parental options and choices by creating three new forms of charters schools and providing transportation tokens. Working together, we can provide every child in Colorado with the education and opportunity to make their dreams come true. Thank you. *Please note: When delivering his remarks, Governor Owens often varies from his prepared text.
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