Board Members sad? 

Much Improved?

As they base this on a report that hasn’t even been released yet.  We all know about the phenomena  of combing schools and report cards looking better temporarily.

Enrollment

Lorain has lost even more students while Elyria is edging up to almost the same size of a district.

Administration CostsLorain remains the highest even after closing multiple schools and consolidating the high schools.  Many  cities are going to a centralized  administration so only one superintendent is required  for a whole county, consolidating the system and lowering the cost to taxpayers.

Graduation Rate

Lorain remains the lowest, still struggling with academics and getting kids to graduate.

Median Income by District

A glance at this proves income levels don’t have a whole lot to do with outcomes.  Clearview has a lower median income then Lorain but out performs on every level.

State Report Card by District

Lorain’s shameful performance with 1 parameter met really shows where the focus isn’t; on our kids.  Take note, invert the cost of administration and this graph lines right up with cost compared to results.

Please go to the polls informed!

We have a superintendent that got a $5,000 bonus, for what nobody is quite sure.  When she took the district it was in Continuous Improvement she has since received Academic Watch two years in a row from the State while each year achieving less of the state standards.

The district has done a great job of trying to snow the public into thinking things are better while avoiding the subject of the state report card as if it doesn’t matter to our property values and the overall opinion of the “education” received my Lorain graduates to the outside world including employers.

In the last year the Superintendent got a raise and  her contract was altered so she didn’t have to actually live in our district.  If we recall she said she  couldn’t find a house in  Lorain that “fit her lifestyle”.  She lives in an estimated $750,000 home owned by the District’s legal council, funny isn’t he the one who took the residency clause out of her contract?   No conflict there.  We guess a continued rent check isn’t a a motivation to change a contract.  Her package is about a quarter of a million dollars and wow is that a price to pay for a high priced Public Relations person.

The recent threat of a combined high school could all be stopped if the administration was brought down to a reasonable level.  Lots of high paid chiefs hardly any warriors on the front lines (teachers).  We need more chiefs I guess and less warriors.  Wait that isn’t right!

Do what you do best, reign this district in, the best way to stop corruption is stop giving it money.  We have the power of the pocketbook.  Tell them what’s important this May.  Start educating our kids then come to us for more money!

State report cards released last week showed mixed results for charter schools, which enrolled about 88,000 Ohio children last year.

Much like the eight big-city districts from which they draw most of their students, charters overall still had low test scores, though many of their students learned more than expected over the school year.

But there were also some dazzling bright spots, including the performance of three Cleveland charters: Citizens Academy, Cleveland Entrepreneurship Preparatory School and the Intergenerational School.

Their 800 students, largely poor and black, tested better than the state average for white students by an average of 11 percentage points, according to the schools’ analysis.

That’s “powerful proof” that the achievement gap can be closed, said Perry White, executive director of Citizens Academy, which was rated excellent by the state.

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Like all Ohio charters, the three receive state money, but their boards are not elected. And since their teachers generally are not unionized, charter school leaders have more flexibility to fire people who aren’t working out or to try new things such as longer school days and school years.

They can even carve out a niche for themselves, such as the Intergenerational School’s approach of pairing students and adults of various ages.

Brooke King, the school’s executive director, said students move at their own pace, so classes may have a range of ages, with older children often serving as role models. Senior citizens from the community regularly participate in activities in which they can both teach and learn from the children.

The approach seems to be working. Intergenerational earned an excellent rating from the state, the fifth time that’s been achieved in the past six years. And all the grades have waiting lists except for kindergarten, which has a few open slots.

“We’re happy, but we still have a lot of work to do and a lot to learn — that’s what keeps us good,” King said. “Until every child is able to compete at a global level, we’re not going to consider ourselves excellent.”

The Constellation group of charters — with schools on Cleveland’s West Side, and in Parma, Elyria, Lorain and Mansfield — also celebrated good report cards.

Four of the 15 schools were ranked excellent. The one that landed in academic watch now has a new principal, said Constellation’s president, Richard Lukich.

The key has been figuring out which methods and materials work and then quickly replicating them in the rest of the schools, he said. Tutoring starts at the beginning of the year so children who need extra help get it early on.

“To think of what we do with so much less money — it’s amazing,” Lukich said, echoing the lament of charter operators who receive thousands of dollars per student less than the Cleveland district.

Hardly all charters are making the grade, however. An analysis commissioned by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute found that 65 percent of Cleveland charter students were in schools ranked in academic emergency or academic watch — mostly because of low test scores — compared with 71 percent of district students.

“Performance has flatlined for the past three or four years for both,” said Terry Ryan, Fordham Ohio vice president for programs and policy. “It’s that way nationally, too.”

At the same time, 80 percent of elementary charter students in Cleveland met or exceeded the state’s expectation for academic growth over a year, compared with 91 percent of their district counterparts.

The academic growth recorded in Ohio’s big-city schools is encouraging, Ryan said, “but it’s in the context of these children being so far behind — two, three, four years or more.”

Statewide, charter performance has gotten a boost from seven online schools that draw students from across Ohio. Collectively, they have almost 24,000 students, more than a quarter of the state’s charter enrollment.

Five of the seven have a ranking of continuous improvement, the equivalent of a C grade. Among them is the Electronic Classroom of Tomorrow, the state’s largest charter with close to 9,000 students last school year.

“Parents choose ECOT because it works, and our academic ratings prove that,” said William Lager, who founded the school in 2000.

At the other end of the spectrum, 16 charters are slated to be shut down by the state at the end of this school year because of continuing poor performance.

Three Cleveland schools on the list — Academy of Cleveland, Greater Achievement Community School and Greater Heights Academy — have already suspended operations.

Other local charters on the closing list are Lion of Judah Academy and New Day Academy Boarding and Day School.

To find information about individual charter schools, go to cleveland.com/datacentral and look for the school building database under the category of “new school report cards.”

Lorain, it seems there are no more excuses, it can be done!  If it isn’t working do something different.

Link

Avon Lake Excellent with Distinction 30 out of 30 State Indicators

Avon Excellent with Distinction 29 out of 30 State Indicators

Wellington Effective 28 out of 30 State Indicators

Amherst Excellent with Distinction 28 out of 30 State Indicators

Keystone Effective 28 out of 30 State Indicators

Columbia Local Excellent 27 out of 30 State Indicators

Midview Effective 25 out of 30 State Indicators

North Ridgeville Effective 23 out of 30 State Indicators

Sheffield/ Sheffield Lake Effective 23 out of 30 State Indicators

Firelands Local Effective 23 out of 30 State Indicators

Clearview Continuous Improvement 16 out of 30 State Indicators

Oberlin Continuous Improvement 15 out of 30 State Indicators

Elyria Continuous Improvement 14 out of 30 State Indicators

Lorain Academic Watch 4 out of 30 State Indicators

Lorain is dead last in the County in academics and the only district in the County on Academic Watch.  In the Real Estate industry, Realtors give this report to prospective home buyers with school age children to help them find a home with good schools.  This is a very important issue for Lorain homeowners as it determines if their homes will sell and also determines the price of homes as homes that sit on the market have to be re priced lower and lower until they sell.

The citizens of Lorain must tell this superintendent and school board members to address this issue.  They don’t talk about it nor do they explain how they are going to get us out of Academic Watch.

Academic Watch is a slippery slope.   There are only 9 Districts in the whole state on Academic Watch.  Lorain has been on Academic Watch for the last two years.

Lets look at the most current graduation rate available for  each district for 2006-2007 school year.  We will keep them in the same order as above.

Avon Lake 96.2%

Avon 98.3%

Wellington 95.1%

Amherst 99.7%

Keystone 90.2%

Columbia Local 96.5%

Midview 95.9%

North Ridgeville 100%

Sheffield/ Shefield Lake 92%

Firelands Local 98%

Clearview 96.8%

Oberlin 94.4%

Elyria 91.5%

Lorain 78.5%

In looking at these stats, where would you want to send your kids?

Lets look at ACT /SAT Scores by District, these are taken by college bound students.  This is the portion of students who pursue higher education.

Avon Lake ACT-24, SAT-1118

Avon ACT-23, SAT-1124

Wellington ACT-22, SAT -N/A

Amherst ACT-23, SAT-1080

Keystone ACT-21, SAT N/A

Columbia Local-ACT-21, SAT-1052

Midview-ACT-22, SAT-1018

North Ridgeville-ACT-22, SAT-1098

Sheffield/ Shefield Lake-ACT-21, SAT-1000

Firelands Local-ACT-22, SAT-N/A

Clearview-ACT-21, SAT-N/A

Oberlin-ACT-20, SAT-954

Elyria-ACT-21, SAT-1100

Lorain ACT-19, SAT-978

We can assume these are kids that have grades high enough to get into college so for the sake of argument, the highest achievers in the district.  Does it look like our kids might not have the advantage or educational tools to compete or even be prepared for college?

N/A=not available

Source:  ODE

Enrollment is down 340 students

06-07-8,897

07-08-8,557

Administration is down 2.8 million

06-07- $13,844,686

07-08- $11,044,077

Building Operations & Expenditures down $504,889

06-07-$16,982,691

07-08-$17,487,580

Staff Support Expenditures down $1.8 million

06-07-$4,334,624

07-08-$2,494,758

Pupil Support Expenditures down $1.2 million

06-07-$9,456,429

07-08-$8,240,720

Instructional Expenditures down 5.8 million

06-07-$51,357,667

07-08-$45,509,194

These cuts are a start in the right direction!  Our hope in the next school year, we can get the administration down to $8 million.  The trend has been while enrollment has steadily dwindled, administration was rising in contrast.    But in order to see the big picture, lets look at the trends for the last 12 years.  Yes, more charts…

Administration from 1995-2008 (Click on for a closer view)

• A good start in reducing, but a long way to go.  It should never have gotten that high in the first place.  Dropping what was way over spent isn’t an accomplishment it’s what should be expected.   Would like to see this at 2001 spending levels at which point we still had almost 2,000 more students.

Enrollment from 1995-2008

• Steadily dropping with no end in site.  Strange that the above chart moves in the opposite direction of enrollment.

Revenue per student from 1995-2008 broken down by sources:

• Local money in red has held steady, Federal and State has risen.

Educational Expenditures from 1995-2008

• Current totals look more like 1995 totals (42:45).  Maybe a reason for our low academic performance.

Staff Expenditures from 1995-2008

very strange spike in 05-06 $6.2 mill, held pretty steady until then and is leveling back off.

Pupil Support Expenditures from 1995-2008

• These are totals not per student with almost 2,000 less students from 1995

Source

The Board of Education is pushing out misinformation that there is a connection being made to grant money and administrators.  Apparently if you write a grant in Lorain you automatically get stuck with a crap load of administrators; only this phenomenon isn’t happening anywhere else in the county.  Here are Elyria’s charts.  Enrollment and Administrative costs.   They’ve some how figured out how to write the administrators out of grants and still get the money.  Maybe we need to call them and see how they are doing it… or stop making this ridiculous connection.

Enrollment 95-08

• It’s been falling but has been steady for the past 6 years

Administrative costs 95-08:

• It’s growing but overall pretty steady for the last 8 years

Part 1

Part 2

1. An excel spreadsheet of every current employee of Lorain City Schools including janitors, teachers, administrators, security, maintenance, lawyers, secretaries and anyone who receives money for services that I have not included. Along with their name, We would like the position they hold, their classification i.e., teacher, administrator, support staff etc., and their annual salary. This information should be readily available.
2. Meeting agendas with more than 6 hours notice of a school board meeting   Currently on the school board website these are not available until noon of the day of the meeting. Citizens are not given enough time to plan or research prior to board meetings happening. Because of this they are unable to prepare questions or voice their opinions over issues because they are given so little time to prepare.  It is our understanding that this is a school board policy.  This needs to be removed if the school board truly wants parents and citizens to participate in the process.
3. Student enrollment figures from 1990 to 2008. If you could provide a breakdown of every year in the above date range that would be great.
4. A breakdown of what has been spent on administration from 1990 to 2008. The Ohio Department of Education provides some of this data, but we would like to see your numbers.
5. The proper legal name and address for the all of the labor unions the District negotiates with. Since a portion of employee salaries are paid to these unions we would like to know who they are.
6. In the Board of Education agenda dated July, 17, 2008, Under IV.  Item 1, Gary Brantley was appointed to Chief Information Officer annual salary of $98,800.00 Rate Group A, Step 1 of Senior Administrator Staff Salary Schedule. Please provide the Salary Schedule for all levels of ALL employees in the Lorain School System including Administrators, support staff, teachers and anyone we have not mentioned.  In addition, an explanation of the procedure employees have to follow to move up in the salary schedule.

If citizens have any other requests, please put them in the comments.