Call It A Comeback
I’m not even dealing with the other guy–there’s no news in saying Obama is popular in Illinois.
Durbin’s numbers are the highest he’s had in the last year with 54% approval
This is despite being a lightning rod for criticism from the administration and Republicans. Or given the President’s standing, perhaps because of such criticism.
Blagojevich 43%
Topinka 37%
and a very unhappy electorate:
Other 15%
Undecided 4%
Weirdest number with women: G-Rod 47%, Topinka 30%
I’d say both have problems with their respective bases from the cross tabs, but Judy’s is more pronounced. Actually G-Rod’s would be bad news for him if her problems weren’t greater (sensing a theme here?)
Amongst Republicans 18% are supporting other, and 10% G-Rod. Amongst Dems it’s 9% Other and 15% Topinka. 23% of conservatives are supporting other. Liberal numbers are lower, but still high.
African-Americans support G-Rod with 84% (remember Meeks was still probably in when this was done) with 6% to Topinka and 6% to other. It’s not the Meeks challenge drawing away African-Americans. It’s the social conservatives angry at Judy and then Rod’s problems with many Dems driving the relatively high crossover numbers.
It’s only May so these people may migrate to some degre.
Those poor relatively well off suburban districts are getting screwed under the plan by the mighty downstate districts.
My ass. Places like Unit 5 might qualify under this complaint, but not the vast majority of Districts downstate.
ut Blagojevich has a political price to pay as well: At first blush, this plan does nothing to address fast-rising property taxes that enrage many voters. And it appears that relatively few of its benefits would go to the suburban school districts that state funding already short-changes. Blagojevich may have just torpedoed the suburban support he’ll need against Topinka.
If Illinois schools receive more funding, some of it should go to teaching the rudiments of economics. That’s where this plan really falls short. Blagojevich argued Tuesday that accountability is a big part of his plan. But mostly it’s about spending more money. As is, many Illinois school officials (especially Downstate) cry poor rather than convince their property taxpayers to shoulder a heftier burden. They cry poor rather than consolidate districts to shrink the number of highly paid local officials. They cry poor rather than show anyone that their real priority is spending smarter, rather than spending more.
Downstate rural schools don’t have tons of administrators and, frankly, in many cases could use more so there is some actual curriculum reform. The best way to pay for that is through consolidation where possible. Too many downstate districts create a situation that is unsustainable.
The inner ring districts in the suburbs are hurt by the current system because their property values are largely stuck without new development, but it’s hardly a crisis across all Districts. Suburban districts can vote for the schools they want for the most part–they actually have the resources to tax. While a property tax-income tax swap might make good sense as a horse trade, it isn’t because of those poor poor people out there in relatively well off communities.
Many downstate Districts that are rural in character don’t have the wealth to tax. Unit 4 and Unit 5 are perfect examples of what the Trib might complain about, but frankly they are the exception. Take even District 87 in Bloomington that is exactly like inner ring suburban districts which are landlocked and face relatively little growth in assessed valuation. Other rural districts don’t even have that.
Consolidation helps the problem, it doesn’t solve it for most rural districts. They need a higher foundation level and they desperately need technical help in the areas of finance, curriculum and help in building modern buildings.
The Trib gets the finance end correct
If you’re wondering how, in prior decades, Illinois governors and legislators created the state pension funding crisis that so cripples their successors today, grab a front-row seat. This school funding plan rests on the same philosophy: Today’s needs are so pressing that it’s OK to take money from future generations of schoolkids.
It’s the same old story of selling off assetts and then using the proceeds up in the short term while not dealing with the need for increased taxes or cuts in services. Given the general voting patterns in Illinois increasing taxes is a permissible position under the right circumstances, but Blagojevich long ago punted on that idea. Perhaps most frustrating is that the current tax system is regressive and so keeping it as it is hurts the poor the hardest.
Unless Judy is going to face up to that reality, it’s another four years of one or the other lying about state finances. No one has been honest since Dawn Clark Netsch and unfortunately, a lot of bad campaign choices led that to be a cautionary tale.
This should be one of the less contentious issues and not tied to structural spending so the boost is a positive.
Small schools is a great idea–while I don’t believe it’s entirely a strong finding, there is a lot of evidence they can improve educational completion. Again, this is not a continuing cost so boosting spending in the short term is fine.
I’m skeptical of identity schools, but there is a lot of support for them and as long as local districts are making the decision, fine. Again, transition funding doesn’t create an ongoing category in the budget.
Consolidation is good, though still voluntary. The point of curriculum allignment is a big deal and shouldn’t be overlooked. Again, this isn’t an ongoing expense so it is a reasonable expense for short term expenditures.
Special ed funding–great idea and necessary, but the transition will be far longer than the projections.
Mentoring for teachers is probably one of the more effective ways to improving teaching quality. The key point here is to align requirements at all levels which is often difficult to do.
Improving Educational Colleges is all correct in the generals, but the details are incredibly difficult to address. I think this is an area that is going to be far more vexing than people think.
Performance Pay–eh. Whatever. Not a horrible idea, but difficult to effectively implement.
My personal feeling is that teachers need to better understand how to relate test results to pedagogical style and student needs. When teachers get test results they are often not well trained in using that to evaluate how they teach and so self-evaluation suffers.
The textbook plan is solid in general–and once on the new schedule, that funding should be continued making this a structural change in education funding. I believe the attempt is to sell it as a catch-up, but realistically, the need is always there and the state has skipped out on it for too long. What is extremely positive is the means test of the funds for Districts.
The technology bit is fine–I tend to think we oversell technology in the classroom so the devil is in the details. Students should have access to decent computers and reasonably up-to-date software so while I think there is probably too much in this category, it’s not an unreasonable position. If the tutoring for math and reading is done electronically, a lot of the results can better be tracked by school personnel.
Library and other financing is important for poorer districts especially. Libraries should be fun, vibrant places in schools and improving them potentially improves literacy.
Absolutely critical–revamping the state career and technical education curriculum. While this one won’t get much press attention, it should.
Extending the school year is another critical point of the plan and whether there is adequate funding is a good question. Ultimately, it’s a step toward year around school which is a far more effective calendar than one based on agricultural cycles.
The parental involvement piece is nice, but no one has solved that riddle yet so I’d don’t take it that seriously. Nice try though and perhaps something good will come out of it.
The real questions are probably on the financial end. While I have some serious reservations, the real position to critique it from is what are the new programs that are worthwhile in the plan? And from there, then fight over how to fund it or if it can be funded. The cheap answer is to simply say it’s a bad financing plan–that might be the case, but is it better to not have the programs or to find another way to finance it–I’d argue the second, this is a strong proposal on the merits even if the financing has many issues.
Some of the money is one-shot, other is structural spending that will have to be supported over time. Looking at page 52, here are some of the categories that are structural:
Foundation Level: $250 Million
Special Ed Funding: $200 Million
The rest may be structural, but some of it is simply transitional and as such, a few years of funding may be adequate.
After those 4 years, there is a huge question as to how it would continue to be funded.
Centralized Procurement and construction concerns me given the experience at CMS. Health Insurance makes sense.
Policy Wise A
Okay, I was gearing up to bitch about it, and after getting through the unnecessary crap about previous Governors, much of the plan is innovative and quite strong. There are a few quibbles here and there on substance, but it is very, very good.
The financial end–I’m not quite there yet.
Eric is far more disapproving of the policy towards internet postings, here is the Unit 5 Athletic Code that has been updated in recent years, but is substantively the same one I signed in 1985 with the exception the 1985 one forbid sex as well–which I imagine figuring out the enforcement on probably led it to be dropped since.
Misbehavior after a season was and is relevant to such codes. Eric would probably argue that is a bad idea, but the idea isn’t new. The story is overblown. I remember one faculty member seeing students out at a restaurant and being served alcohol. He reported that since he was a coach and some were athletes. They were then stripped of eligibility for 1/4th of the season. Treating math team members differently than athletes seems a bit strange to me.
However, all this policy does is point out that publishing information in a public forum means the information is just as fair game as running into the students at the local restaurant. It’s sort of a no-duh point of fact that students should have figured out already.
While I worry about codes being used to restrict speech or after school activities such as political action, the general notion that illegal activities are a cause for prohibition doesn’t seem to out there.
More to the point, it isn’t taking away parental authority to ask students to obey the law and basic human decency as a requirement of participation in activities–in fact, it’s part of making students responsible for their own behavior as they age. There are consequences to beating up others. There are consequences to illegally consuming alcohol even if many of us feel the current state of the law is somewhat irrational.
The strange thing to me is that pointing out that posting information about illegal activities can bring disciplinary action for such behavior gets more attention than attempts to ban books and teach creationism in districts.
While hiding out from George Bush, Topinka attacks Blagojevich for higher education funding.
At what opportunity cost? Seriously, this is what’s frustrating. Even in endorsing Blagojevich in 2002 I pointed out he was being dishonest about spending. Now, Topinka is offering up a free lunch for the universities. Where does the money come from?
I think the cuts, especially to ISU which is a quality school for students who don’t go to U of I, are horrible, but I’m not sure how Judy thinks she can solve that and every other problem without a tax increase.
ArchPundit