2003
ArchPundit
Chicago Test Scores: Much Adieu about Nothing
The Trib argues that the mild decreases in test scores for the Chicago Public Schools is nothing to get in a tizzy about.
Even in the era of higher accountability, there’s no need to panic over the slightly surprising dip in reading scores among Chicago public school children.
Not yet, at least.
Comparing one year to the previous doesn’t yield all that much wisdom. It’s the longer term trend lines that count. If scores continue to drop next year and the year after, then it’s time for a serious talk.
Here’s the more useful perspective:
The latest scores from the Iowa Test of Basic Skills show that 41 percent of elementary students scored at or above the national norm in reading comprehension. Compare that to five years ago, when only 36.9 percent of 3rd through 8th graders did as well. And compare that to a decade ago, when far fewer students met national norms in reading.
Any testing expert knows that plateaus in standardized test scores are typical. Early gains often follow serious reform efforts, with the most significant jumps made by the lowest-performing students.
Simply placing more importance on the test itself has a psychological effect on students to take it more seriously, and therefore, to perform better on it. Teachers also start adjusting their lesson plans to make sure they cover material they know will appear on the test. Those gains tend to level off, however, after a few years.
That phenomenon continued with the latest scores released Monday by Chicago Public Schools Chief Arne Duncan. The more than 10 percentage point drop in children scoring in the lowest-achieving quartile in both reading and math is significant and heartening. So is the more modest historic increase in those achieving at the top quartile.
Test scores can, in the aggregate, go up or down significantly in any given year without being representative of individual results. It is one of the ugly truths of testing that many don’t fully grasp. Tests are reasonable approximations, but any given test should not be focused on too much. The trend line over time is still excellent for Chicago. If it were to continue there would be a problem, but one-year’s results aren’t that important.
The real problem may start when LNCB starts hitting districts for small yearly differences.
Where Democrats can be Democrats
Nathan Newman (via Matt Yglesias cites the accomplishments of the Illinois Lege under unified Democratic control with a Democratic Governor.
# Raising the minimum wage to $6.50 per hour by Jan 1, 2005.
# Investing in 195,000 jobs through funding expansion of O’Hare airport.
# Passing the Equal Pay Act against disparities of pay on basis of gender.
# Right to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for victims of sexual or domestic violence.
# State Lawsuit Immunity Act- this legislation waives Illinois’ 11th Amendment immunity to federal anti-discrimination laws, essentially nullifying recent "states rights" Supreme Court decisions in Illinois. This gives state workers rights to sue under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, and the Fair Labor Standards Act.
# New law that permits public employees to form unions based on card-check recognition, meaning when a majority of workers signs cards, the union automatically comes into existence.
# Amended Illinois Human Rights Act to recognize a civil rights violation for employers adopting or implementing so-called "English-only" work rules.
# Illinois Prohibition of Goods from Forced Labor Act- state procurement contracts cannot use foreign-made goods produced by forced, convict, or indentured labor.
# Amendment to the Employment of Strikebreakers Act and the Day and Temporary Services Act- prevents employers from contracting with day and temporary labor service firms to replace workers during a strike or a lockout. Bill bars labor service agencies from sending workers to job sites where a strike, lockout or other labor problem exists.
# Illinois Whistleblower Act- bars employers from creating rules or policies preventing employees from disclosing violations of law to state or federal law enforcement agencies.
Most of these are unequivocally good if you are a Democrat and don’t really raise the ire of many. But as with most achievement posts it leaves out some of the ugly.
1) SBC! This should be count for about five bad things. Instead of having the ICC look at the issue, the Lege and the Governor caved.
2) one-time gimmicks to balance the budget. While not as bad as I expected, it is still problematic. Overall the budget was an improvement over recent years, but it still relies on too many gimmicks. Pate and G-Ry can’t be blamed anymore.
3) Absolutely no movement on school consolidation or even the decreasing the costs of Regional Superintendents.
4) Subsidies continue for horse tracks and ADM
5) The appointment of another tollway authority Board Member with shady dealings.
6) an ethics bill with no teeth
That being said other good things include,
1) Lisa Madigan taking on Rosemont and Don Stephens over the Emerald Casino license. Rosemont wants a bail out for the deal, she says no way.
2) movement on civil rights regardless of sexual orientation
Overall, not a bad session. While pork still got through, it wasn’t as much as I expected. The budget isn’t entirely rational, but it is improved. The Democrats didn’t go crazy and go overboard–with no money there was only so much that could be done.
I believe that two strong competing parties provide the best overall outcomes. However, the biggest development in state politics is the movement of the Republican Party rightward. As they do so they are less competitive and barring major scandals, Democrats face less pressure to check themselves.
New Blog and Rumors for Topinka
I’ll be adding three new blogs to the blogroll that are Illinois-centric. The first is Jeff Trigg, the Exec Director of the Illinois Libertarian Party. The blog is his personal one to make it clear. I recommend you take a look around–he has some great stories and a very good understanding of Illinois politics. And truth be told, Illinois Libertarians have a great sense of humor.
Let me also recommend his post on the Drug Czar getting the power to spend tax money defeating drug decriminalization/legalization referendums.
Dog Bites Man:Payday Lenders Skirt Rules
In one of the least surprising elements it turns out that payday loan companies are skirting recent regulations in Illinois by increasing the length of loans by one day,
Illinois regulations aimed at reining in the fast-growing but controversial business of payday lending have proven ?virtually irrelevant? as the lenders find ways to skirt the rules, a draft study by state financial regulators says.
The preliminary report by the Illinois Department of Financial Institutions (DFI) shows that the state?s more than 800 licensed payday-loan locations are avoiding state-imposed limits on how much they can loan to an individual and how many times they can refinance a loan.
The rules apply to loans with terms of 30 days or less; lenders are dodging the restrictions by writing loans of 31 days, the report says. Before the rules were instituted, the standard payday loan?designed to tide over strapped borrowers until their next paycheck?came due in 14 days.The regulations, issued in 2001 by the DFI over industry objections, were hailed at the time as the first substantial oversight of Illinois? payday lenders. They barred lenders from ?rolling over,? or refinancing, a loan more than twice and required that at least 20% of the outstanding principal balance be repaid when a loan is refinanced.
But today, the industry operates nearly as freely in Illinois as it did before the rules, the DFI report indicates.
?They were dead on arrival once they were promulgated because of what the industry did in reaction,? says Alan Alop, deputy director at the Legal Assistance Foundation of Metropolitan Chicago, which gives free legal advice to indigent Cook County residents. ?I?ve never seen a payday loan since those rules were issued that fell within the purview of the rules.?
The Good Sports News
The Bears are locking up Brian Urlacher for his career.
I don’t talk about first place Chicago baseball teams that are not the Sox when they are in 1st Place. Ever. It is bad karma and I’m extremely superstitious.
Later, but…
Check out Ted Barlow who is back…
New postings tonight or tomorrow morning.
And one More
Does anyone know if Success-N-Life by Bob Tilton plays in St. Louis? It looks like it was pulled from BET–meaning the only entertaining show is gone.
It’s One of those Days
Jim Bakker is back!
When Bakker told CNN interviewer Larry King shortly after his release in 1994 — the original sentence having been reduced — that he would not do television again, "I meant what I said," Bakker said. "When you put your hand in a fire and get burned, the body reacts to that, and it remembers that. What I had been through had been so painful that I could not imagine doing it again."
He added: "For years I set about to do a number of other things, but I could not get away from what I feel God called me to do, anointed me to do, and that’s Christian television."
"The New Jim Bakker Show" has been made possible largely due to one benefactor whose marriage was healed at Heritage USA — Bakker’s former Christian resort — years ago. Dee and Jerry Crawford own the studio-café, the small hotel across the street and the home where the Bakkers live.
But there are still financial struggles. "I had hoped I could do this without raising money on the air, but airtime is so expensive," Bakker said. "Many stations gave us a few months for free or at a reduced rate to get us started, but now we have to generate the money needed to keep us on the air."
For former PTL producer Gene Bailey, a media consultant for the new show, "it’s like going through a time warp. Everything that was good about the old ‘PTL Club’ is back — without the hype and the glitz."
I’m just unsure what the good was besides the hyperbolic hype and glitz.
Speaking of the Religious Right
CalPundit already got a sneak peek of this week’s Kevin McCullough column.
McCullough argues that conservatives are too accepting of homosexuals and seems to pay an awful lot of attention to gay people. In Kevin’s comments a couple shots are taken at McCullough’s knowledge that normally I would find distasteful. First, there is nothing wrong with being gay so if McCullough was gay, that really is more of an embarrassment to gay men. On another level it sounds childish, sort of like if a columnist made fun of Steve Neal being a drunk.