Failing schools? Consider the source
Count us among those anxious to see improved Santa Fe Public Schools. For years, we have called for better teaching, more parental involvement, fewer dollars for big bosses and more spent in classrooms, a focus on reading, writing, math, the arts, improved engagement to keep kids in school and off the streets — all the elements that would add up to what former Superintendent Joel Boyd termed a “world-class education for a world-class city.”
A snappy saying, however, doesn’t always lead to snappy results.
The news last week that most Santa Fe school are now at a D or F level under the state Public Education Department’s grading system is proof of how hard it is to translate aspirations into desired reality. Public Education Secretary-designate Christopher Ruszkowski went so far as to call Santa Fe a “district in crisis.”
In the news release, PED stated, “Amongst other large districts across New Mexico, the performance of Santa Fe Public Schools is most concerning. Santa Fe now has a majority of D and F schools — 56 percent Ds and Fs. By contrast, districts that have improved their performance over the past five years — such as Farmington, Gadsden, and Hobbs — have very few schools earning failing grades.”
In comments to New Mexican reporter Robert Nott, Ruszkowski blamed current Superintendent Veronica García, saying, “For Santa Fe, the trend is not good. … when a district is not doing well, you have to look at its superintendent.” Stop right there. This is the man who was ready to water down science standards for public school students, so much so that New Mexico became the temporary laughing stock of the nation. The proposed standards — had they been adopted last year — would have eliminated the age of Earth (4.6 billion years) and downplayed the role humans play in rising global temperatures. The state backed down after near-universal outcry from teachers, scientists, parents and the community at large. But in the process, New Mexico appeared foolish and unwilling to embrace scientific principles.
Ruszkowski then created a new, unnecessary controversy, linking the growth of the state’s charter schools to the controversial principle of Manifest Destiny, the idea that America was destined by God to grow west no matter who got moved out in the process. With comments at a charter school conference, it became clear that Ruszkowski did not understand how offensive that concept is. Here’s what he was quoted as saying: “This is a country built over the last 250 years on things like freedom, choice, competition, options, going west, Manifest Destiny — these are the fundamental principles of this country.
“That’s why charter schools make so much sense — high-quality options — in the context of where we are as a country.”
We offer those examples as reasons not to disregard the report card, but to encourage people to take the “grades” with more than a grain of salt. It is obvious that Santa Fe’s grades are being used as a cudgel against the superintendent from a leader who is more than suspect himself. Santa Fe was the only district so singled out. Yes, this is political.
Santa Fe, after all, has been a trailblazer in demanding that the state of New Mexico fund its schools adequately. Our district was part of the successful lawsuit asking for the state to meet its constitutional obligation to schoolchildren; PED is appealing the decision by Judge Sarah Singleton for the plaintiffs, including Santa Fe. On top of that, García and the district have led protests against education cuts at the Roundhouse, in direct opposition to Gov. Susana Martinez and her PED.
That does not mean that Santa Fe schools do not need to improve. Of course they do. However, as we have said before, a report card is only as good as the metrics used to determine the grade. The state’s report card has been suspect almost since the beginning, when Los Alamos scientists determined they could not figure out how the state got to its results. Schools go from D to B to D, or B to F, and it’s almost impossible to discern why.
And that’s the problem with an A-F report card for the state’s public schools. Not giving a letter grade, simplistic as it is, but one determined in such a way that students — in this case, our state’s schools — don’t know what they have to do to earn better grades. The bar is always moving, and often, it is hidden. That’s no way to truly improve education, a goal all New Mexicans share.