Financial Crisis or House Cleaning for Greeley District 6 Schools

Cutting budgets is never easy. Particularly when you are talking about cutting out two hundred jobs in an already economically ravaged town. Yet, there are better approaches and poorer approaches. It isn't clear yet just what approach Greeley District 6 is applying but it already doesn't look pristine. What is certain is that the School Board and Superintendent Lang of Greeley Schools District 6 are facing a serious financial reworking of the District or they are being cagey about cleaning house (restructuring/downsizing).

Maybe a little of both, eh? An interesting question isn't it.

After having read through the school district's audited financials report and the budget for the upcoming year, as posted on the District's website, I've been crunching some figures and noting some things that leave me with a lot more questions about the approach the long troubled District has taken.

(Before you keep reading, for those of you who like to skip the pertinent informational numbers--the conclusion is in the bottom three to four paragraphs. So is the District Administrative Organizational Chart.)

First of all I'd like to note that only 39.1 percent of students in this district tested proficient last year in math. 39.1 percent, grades 3-10 from the CASP scores according to an October 2009 budget presentation that Mr. Wayne Eads prepared for the board (it is available on the D6 website). I'll come back to Mr. Eads, Chief Operations Manager, later on in the article but for now let's concentrate on the numbers. This leaves a bit over 60 percent of the students as nonproficient.

Writing: 45.4 percent tested at or above proficiency. Well if we use the bell curve it doesn't seem too bad but I don't recall the theory behind education stating that more than 50% of students will not need to be proficient.

No doubt there are those that will blame the writing and reading issues on immigrant children. That argument is a whole bucket of water complete with holes. If true then the proficiency rate trend would hold similar in all districts with nonnative language speakers. ESL learners tend to be convenient political scapegoats. But we will give D6 administrators the benefit of the doubt on reading and writing simply because they have enough problems without that one.

But math? Math? The universal language. Come on people. There are more than just financial problems in the District.

Okay, let's move on to the next area. Ms. Lang cites up to $16 million in cuts may be needed in her letter delivered to staff last week through email. Shocking isn't it. No, not that Ms. Lang didn't have Mr. Eads write the letter, but that $16 million is a whole lot of money to most folks.

But that $16 million it isn't so big when you put it up against the total budget (revenues in the audited financials in 2009: $162,618,011) and examine the other budget figures for District 6 as prepared by, not the Finance Officer, not the Superintendent, but Mr. Wayne Eads, Chief Operations Manager. If you take a quick peak at the organizational chart at the bottom you'll see finance, oddly, falls under his dominion.

In 2009 budgeted reserves are $3,443,442. That is down from 2006 when reserves for general purposes (restricted reserves can not be used for general purposes) was $11,232,259 *Mr. Eads notes "We have been spending our reserves on instructional tools." The State of Anti-Education Colorado isn't too happy about the "state" of the reserves. Mr. Eads declares "This is a clear warning from the state that we are spending more than we are getting in revenue."

Or would that be that the District is making poor spending choices? Flip-a-coin.

The District is actually seeing a 2.97% revenue increase this year after restrictions the School Finance Act puts on the money reducing the overall increase. Student growth needs have already been calculated into the budget, again, according to Mr. Eads, the custodian turned Operations Director turned District Teacher Contract Negotiator turned Budget Analyst turned District Spokesperson turned School Board Advisor.

What does Ms. Lang do for her $180,000 + salary+ perks besides manage a grouping of Principals?

Mr. Eads total revenue column lists $134.3 million (this comes from Mr. Eads presentation on the current budget rounds not the audited financials quoted above from 2009). This is an increase of $5.9 million from the previous year. The audited statement, of 2009, if I am reading it correctly has a total of $165 million as actual revenues received by the District. I have no explanation for the difference. I imagine a possibility is unanticipated revenue that came in during the year (a windfall), increase in federal funding for that year, Mr. Eads is eliminating restricted funding, or the State cut that amount from the District. Take your pick or make up your own reasoning.

The district maintains eight different governmental funds. The major funds are the General Fund, the Capital Reserve Fund, Designated Special purpose Grants Fund, and the Bond Redemption Debt Service Fund. (p. 14 of the Annual Audited Financial Statement for 2009)

Mr. Eads goes on in the slide presentation to list new funding items expected in the upcoming year to cost $1.65 million. He then goes on, in October, to talk about hearing about a 10% shorfall and ponders, "What are the consequences of an actual 10% reduction in the District's budget?"

Now it starts getting more interesting, well at least for me, as Mr. Eads 'brilliantly' reduces a grossly complex budget into two simplistic categories so, I am assuming, the Board, made up of common Greeley folk, can grasp it better. Expenditures are 87% People (note Ms. Lang changes this in her letter to employees as PERSONNEL COSTS) and 13% All non-salary items which are listed as Utilities, Fuel, Textbooks, Computers, Office Supplies.

Okay so where are all the other expenses such as insurance, consultant fees (who are not personnel), maintenance, grounds keeping, etc? Did Mr. Eads leave these out or figure they were just too complex for the Board to grasp things other than certain types of expenditures? Are they in restricted funds (which would maybe explain the above referenced thirty million dollar change in revenues)?

Mr. Eads then goes on to advise the Board, "If a 10% reduction were imposed among all employee groups we would have to lay off at least 200 employees. Class sizes would increase. Programs and services would be reduced." He goes on to give slight scenario examples, advise to the board on broader economic consequences to employees and the community, and lays out criteria and a timeline for how to proceed.

Gee, and I thought the Superintendent did all this work with the support staff. Guess not. So an Operations Manager is left to decide or recommend the cuts to the budget which will threaten learning outcomes for 19,300 students? Why are we paying Ms. Lang again? Public Relations? Fundraising? Oversight of the Teacher's Union? Um, I don't see any evidence of activity in these areas. She has the equivalent of a CFO, an Operations Manager, a Public and Community Relations Manager, a Human Resources Person, a Security Advisor, and an Assistant Superintendent plus more.

I'd like to see Ead's resume and both Mr. Eads and Ms. Lang's job description please... thank you very much.

Let's visit the number relationships now. $16 million, the maximum predicted shortfall of revenue is, rounding numbers, right at 12 percent of Mr. Eads $134 million dollar budget. It is about 10 percent if you use the $165 million dollar budget figure (rounded up) from the audited return mentioned above (available on the D6 website).

So here are my thoughts. Do with them as you wish. I am not an accountant and there is certainly room for reasonable explanations in rebuttal here. If we could only get Ms. Lang present to answer questions.

The 10% figure does not sound as significant as $16 million dollars when put in the context of the whole budget. Although I can understand why they would put the shortfall out in concrete terms rather than a percentage. After all math proficiency in the District isn't great. If all areas of the budget receive a universal 10% reduction what would the effects be?

Why not go to the public and ask for specific help in raising funds to save specific favored programs? Why not make cuts in the "upper-crust" schools as deeply?

Here is another radical idea, if 87% of the costs are personnel based then why not encourage those able to do it to take a 10% reduction in compensation for a period of one year. Hence saving a little over $14 million with 100% participation and saving 200 jobs (according to Mr. Eads). It is a radical idea and rather a pushy one. Those making $180,000 a year, like Superintendent-What-Does-She-Do Ms. Lang would be sacrificing $18 thousand while a custodian like Eads-Used-To-Be, probably paid $18,000 a year or so would be sacrificing $1,800. On the flip side of the argument, the $1,800 would probably bite into essentials a lot more for the custodian than the $18,000 that wouldn't go into Ms. Lang's savings account. Alternative or future year benefits could be promised if better solutions develop. Although the Board's "promises" haven't proven to worth squat in contract negotiations.

So, why all the hoopla about consolidating schools, closing off buildings, selling buildings, and major changes? Hoopla is easy to create when there are other economic crisis in play throughout the State of Colorado and the Nation. Sometimes people have the tendency to overreact. Of course if you are one of the two hundred employees who have now been told job cuts are on the way a big reaction should be on the table. The sky is falling, the sky is falling, said Chicken Little.

But what if it's not. What if the crisis is only a 10% crisis, as compared to say a "huge" crisis. Let's put Chicken Little away for a moment and play out another scenario.

Greeley has a school district which has had some very hard times and made some very poor financial decisions in the past. In my own personal view the main issue in the district is poor hiring choices (see my prior posts on the topic) that have left the district riddled with semi-skilled ideologues and a "good old boy" network. They've made some improvements in the last couple of years with some minor administration changes and new Board members. But more changes are needed.

So I have to ask myself if I am a board member and have spent a couple years researching the problems and have identified the need to drastic changes to correct previous errors of judgment, how would one do that? Politely ask people to leave so you could replace them with more qualified staff and downsize the facilities? Somehow I don't think that would go over well.

The problem becomes clearer. How do you make the needed changes when faced with 87% of your costs in personnel and most of that backed by a Union--where you have to have a substantial and documented objective reason for firing someone? Laying someone off due to economics is an easier route. Additionally firing classified staff gets even easier if the Union has been substantially weakened through failed contract negotiations and faces little public sympathy in an era of recession in a working-class town. In fact, considering the District has forced contracts onto the teachers that are only one year in duration, for this current school year, it might be substantially easier. So easy that teachers may have almost no recourse at all. Political enemies are next on the list.

And then, finally, the house is clean and ready for a fresh start and the people mainly responsible for the problems in the first place get another turn at another go at fixing things without direct accountability or consequences for the initial errors.

Okay, I am not an attorney. I wish I had stayed awake during my fund accounting courses. The above is a conspiracy scenario and a rather scary one to consider. I have been through a restructuring myself and I have also been in charge of restructuring a couple of smaller corporations. I know how the strategies in management can be played out. It doesn't mean, they are playing out. But appropriate questions should be asked of the Board and their employee, Ms. Lang. Or perhaps Mr. Eads is the one to be questioned. I also know that there are presentations I haven't seen and documents I haven't read. I do not have any experience at management levels in a government supported organization. I also don't know the true legal ramifications of the contractual failures. And, truly, the Board is in a very difficult place any way you look at the situation.

Fixing both past and present errors in judgment and shortfalls with an open and forthright agenda would be the humane approach. Well, maybe not for the Board but certainly for the employees and community. Hiring highly skilled people to complete the downsizing would be sensible.

Establishing a written criteria for selecting people to be laid off based on a combination of actual performance, tenure, job duties, etc., would go a long way towards ensuring that the above scenario has not one bite of reality in it. A preliminary plan for educational quality recovery might be the next best comforting thing. How does the District go forward after the debacle.

Other things on my mind, where is Ms. Lang when the community needs to hear her professional assessment of the state of education in Greeley? Is direct oversight of the Principles and Associate Principles a good use of her time and skills during this crisis? Why is Mr. Eads signature on the cover letter of the Audited Financials in lieu of Ms. Lang's? Did Ms. Lang purposely not sign the audit? Is there another signature somewhere? Why is Mr. Eads, on the organizational chart, the supervisor of the finance officers in lieu of the Planning and Accountability Manager supervising this department? Maybe an ex-custodian has the qualifications, experience, and skills required to be in this position over a $134 million dollar budget. Maybe not. Personally, I'd feel a whole lot better if the information was coming out of Ms. Lang's mouth and not Mr. Eads'. At least I'd have a more complete picture of whether she has a handle on this mess.

There are 19,300+ students counting on us to get it right.

The District 6 Organizational Chart--from the Audited Financial Report

(If you double click on the chart it might open up into a bigger window. If not the chart can be found inside the audited financials on the District 6 website linked above.)

Is Greeley District Six School Board Going Union Busting?

A little excitement with your prairie coffee? There are disturbing things going on between the Greeley Colorado District 6 School Board and the Teacher's Union--Greeley Education Association. Could the District 6 School Board be working a strategy to bust the Teacher's Union? There are contracts being placed in teacher's school mailboxes and at least some teachers feel they are under pressure to sign or they will be fired. Both Trimberger and Broderius of the Greeley District 6 School Board have their stamped signature on the contract.

Please say it isn't so District 6.

The School Board has stated at its most recent meeting that it has adopted it's last contract offer to the Teacher's Union. Ninety percent of the GEA turned that contract offer down prior to this meeting. There is a statement posted to the District 6 School Board's website on the topic. The release is dated October 26, 2009. In it the school board cites that other staff will need to be laid off if the board honors what its previous promises and also grants current cost of living increases.

At its regular business meeting Monday evening, the District 6 Board of Education voted to render a final decision on the financial compensation items of the teachers union contract for the 2009-10 school year.
The Board approved the following compensation package for teachers for the 2009-10 school year:
• The district will pay the increased cost of contributions to the state retirement system (PERA)
• The district will pay the increased cost of health, dental and vision insurance
• The district will pay for educational advancement on the salary schedule for teachers (often
referred to as “lane” raises or “horizontal movement” raises)
• The district will increase the per-hour pay rate for teachers’ non-contract work to $25 per hour
(currently is $18)
The master agreement contract between District 6 and the Greeley Education Association calls for the Board of Education to make the final determination on matters that have not been resolved through the regular negotiations process or through meditation (Article 5-e-3). Mediation between the district and the union was held on Sept. 25, with the assistance of a federal mediator, but ended without an
agreement on salaries and benefits.
“This was a difficult decision to make, because we do care deeply about our teachers and hold them in high regard. But these are very difficult financial times for the district and also for our local communities and our state,” said Board President Bruce Broderius. “Financially, this is the best we can do. As disappointing as it is for all of us to be in the situation that we are, I truly hope we can still develop a partnership with the union to preserve jobs, to avoid layoffs, and to do what we can to lessen the fiscal crisis that will strike at the heart of our district in 2010.”
Salaries and wages for all of the district’s administrative and support staff employees were frozen at the beginning of the 2009-10 school year, remaining at last year’s levels.

The above statement tries to place the Board's decision into the context that it is acting under the current contract to make the final decision. I have not seen that current contract. It makes sense that some formal resolution in the case of an impasse to keep every one operating could be contained in the contract. And I certainly do not have the legal background to constructively comment that what the Board is doing is legally questionable. I think though from a humane perspective, from a public relations perspective they, the Board, just put the bus in a ditch.

However, currently, there is a contract being dispersed throughout the school district in teacher's mailboxes and some teachers are under the belief that if they do not sign this contract they will be fired. This document is dated October 19, 2009. Other teachers, I hear, are packing their bags, if not now, then at the end of this year.

Here is a link to the contract teachers found in their mailboxes this week. I've posted a photo copy of a contract with personal information removed.

If the Board is continuing to operate underneath the old contract then what is this "other" contract all about? Why does it come without clear instructions on intent to the teachers? It has at-will employment law clauses in the new contract and it labels a long-standing teacher as a non-probationary employee. This would be, my assumption, bad faith actions if it was handled while active mediation was ongoing. That is at a minimum. If negotiations have now formally ended, and if the current contract is null and void because there wasn't any consensus reached, then is the Board indicating that it will fire any teacher unwilling to sign this new document or is the Board just trying to edge out the Union by breaking off chunks of the membership and getting them to sign independent of the Union while things are in transition? Certainly newbie young teachers without anything to gain in experience ratings or salary increases might be tempted to sign this contract under the duress of losing their job.

Where is the District's highly-paid Superintendent in all these matters? Why hasn't the Superintendent addressed her staff and the public?

My hope is that the Union is seeking to call a meeting ASAP for the teachers. That meeting needs to give teachers the ability to ask Union lawyers some good questions. For example, what does it mean if I sign this contract with the School District (union teachers say they have not been asked to personally sign a contract in years--the Union negotiates their contracts for them). Does this mean I am bound to a contract without representation of my union? How can I be forced under duress of losing my job into signing a contract? Those are just beginners.

It seems a wonderful coincidence that the Board has danced this long with this Union until right up before the election cycle. Perhaps the Board has confidence that the Greeley public will not be supportive of the teachers considering the voters may turn away the Mill Levy Override. Even if the Mill Levy Override passes the District Board will be sitting pretty because they have strongly emphasized through out the Mill Levy Campaign that certified staff (teachers) will not receive any pay benefits from Measure 3A. So the District won't be needing to go back and revisit their current decision to abort negotiations and render a nonconsensual contract on their teachers.

A nice pickle to put the Union in. A nice pickle for the Union to get itself into.

A scenario: If the District 6 Board pushes teachers into a panic mode and gets several teachers to sign these contracts what does that mean to the Union and their representation of the teachers. Is the Board trying to alienate teachers from their Union with this dog and pony show?

That isn't the only benefit the Board might receive. If teachers get upset and walk off the job they can be replaced with newbies. If teachers sign the contract being shoved under their pen and then leave at the end of the year when public rancor has died down--the Board will get to hire "newbies".

It doesn't get more corporate than the above scenario folks. Public education is not a business for a reason. Making teachers into manipulated widgets does not build the type of experiential investment needed to produce the results necessary for Greeley kids to compete in the big world. All efforts should be made to retain experienced talent and to mix in new and rising talent along the way. It is all part of a good human resources personnel. Teachers are the productive asset in any education system.

With the Tribune trumpeting the Board's position and the District Superintendent Ms. Lang nowhere within the common public reach and Mr. Eads being allowed to be the district spokesperson it is going to be up to the teachers and the public to demand real answers to the budgetary questions. It is a very easy time frame in which to manipulate public opinion against the teachers.

Unfortunately there are a lot of other scenarios that could be at play here. Parties within negotiations and mediation often are tongue-tied for good reason. Contracts can have some funky clauses on "what happens next". Hence stories and rumors coming to the outside world can get very distorted. Both the Board and the GEA will need public support as this gets touchy. It would nice to think that one or the other group will play fair and openly with the community. Public relation manipulation is yesterday's game plan. Today it is all about being honest and transparent. It is only fair that the Board be allowed to clear up their actions by better informing, clearly and meaningfully, the strategic purpose of their plans.

This Board appears to have little credibility based on past performance--perceived or actual. That image problem, in and of itself, regardless of the source which began the problem, has put the Board in a poor position on community leadership. Credibility is essential in your governmental systems and this Board's credibility is on the line. Will the Board obfuscate and make the situation worse? Or will they be forthcoming and transparent with their teachers and begin taking some steps toward healing. Poor press management and poor spokesperson choices is likely just to darken the skies ahead.

Certainly the Board, and the Board's employee Superintendent Lang, would have known for a while that by keeping experienced teachers around there would be step increases and other associated rise in labor costs. The bottleneck is a sign of long term poor planning. It can't all be about the economic downturn.

Previous Articles:

http://greeleyville.blogspot.com/2009/06/parity-and-greeleys-district-6.html

http://greeleyville.blogspot.com/2009/07/greeley-district-6-performance-check.html

http://greeleyville.blogspot.com/2009/09/greeley-school-district-six-mill-levy.html

http://greeleyville.blogspot.com/2009/09/part-ii-greeley-school-district-latino.html

http://greeleyville.blogspot.com/2009/10/part-iii-greeley-school-district-six.html

New Contract Offerred to Greeley District 6 Teachers

The following are scans of a contract document placed within a Greeley Colorado District 6 Schools envelope and placed in the mailbox of a long time Greeley Colorado District 6 teacher who is also a member of the Greeley Education Association Union. To enlarge these documents for viewing click on the document icon and it will expand into the window. I have referred to these documents in the next posting.

Greeley School District Six Mill Levy Blues

Writing about the Mill Levy Override in Greeley Colorado's District 6 makes me really uncomfortable in my own skin. Mostly because I believe anything the community of Greeley can do to help District 6 schools improve should be done. When a community creates a climate of education good things happen. When it doesn't stagnation sets in. People create divides and develop cultural barriers to success. Children with great potential go undeveloped and unrewarded. Children who desperately need support and help get shuffled off to the corner. Yet, before I can simply just vote yes, I still have some lingering doubts and questions about just what this Mill Levy is designed to produce other than additional assets like textbooks and security systems.

Of course the exaggerated claims about the Mill Levy, from various sources, having been pouring out about how classroom size will grow or not depending on the vote. How Kindergartners will be left adrift after tea time every day. How miserable it is for social tweeners and teens to share books and learn cooperative time management skills. How, even though there really isn't a growing gang problem in District 6, we need security cameras so the parents feel safer. And how the heaven and stars can start falling but not one teacher will get one dime of the Mill Levy but teacher's aides, without the real-deal teaching credential, will be hired to help lower the teacher's burden.

As someone likes to say, "You get what you pay for."

Or do you?

What no one really seems to want to talk about is whether or not this Mill Levy will produce better learning results for our kids. Isn't that the operative goal we are all striving for as a community? Perhaps it is my reality that is skewed but it looks to me like we've basically drawn a 2 inch target on a huge red school barn and are standing ten miles away with shotgun in hand trying to hit it.

Sounds ludicrous? That is my point. Every one is shooting at something but no one really wants to talk about whether or not they are hitting that 2 inch target. Just as long as they get their shot off everything is handy-dandy. The School Board is hollering "Trust Us". The Administration is hollering "Support Us". The media arm is hollering "Fire-pay to put it out." Parents are hollering "Fix it" while the community grouses "Make Us"!

Greeley is caught up in the idea of improving education but not in the action of improving education. That action begins with the community idea that education is THEE priority.

Education takes a lot more than one kid in a classroom with a book in hand and a teacher calling home every time the kid looks out the window. We all know that by now, right? We've heard for years how parents should get involved. Yes, somewhere between working fourteen hours a day, taking the dog to the vet, doing community service for that overdose of Prozac, pasting up flyers for next city council election cycle, baking treats for the girl scout meetings, ballet lessons, soccer practice, trading playtimes and babysitting out with the neighbor, cooking that eight course organic nutritional meal, refurbishing the caulking before the next storm, making sure the lawn stays a pretty shade of green for the neighbors, and listening to the spouse grouse about those little lines starting to bag under the eyes, you, yes YOU, are supposed to make sure you are reading to your child at least a half an hour every night and that the science project you know you'll being doing most of, gets done on time and turned into the teacher, and that your kid gets up every morning to eat a healthy breakfast on time, gets dressed in the designer jeans without resident gang colors anywhere to be seen, plus makes it to school with a happy-sunny face every single day. Only then can you truly earn the badge of "responsible parent" according to the education community.

But I digress into reality. Back to my point.

What hasn't been fully addressed is the role community plays in building a healthy respect for the education process. And by community I don't just mean grandma and grandpa with aunts and uncles and anyone else your kid drags to the play at the local schoolhouse. I mean everyone--the business owners, the workers, the retirees, the unemployed, the illegals, the legals, the pseudo human beings, and the real human beings. Those who wear Prada and those who don't. Those who play poker and those who don't. Those that go to church on Sunday and those that show up just for the Hail-Mary at the end of the show. The dregs under the bridges and the all-mighty sitting in the resident temples. Single, married, unmarried, sort-of-married, married-until-last-night, divorced, over-the-hill, and under-the-hill. Yes, even the corporate executives at the slimy snail-snotting JBS Swift company are included here.

Everyone.

Education is an investment. It is an investment in the future. Today's Greeley District 6 kids are our future. All of us have a stake in this game. If Greeley expects to have good community leaders in the future who can handle the world of technology, the world of climate change, the world of energy crisis, the world of ever expanding population, then it needs to create these leaders. They don't create themselves.

This is the REASON to pay money for education. It creates a return on your investment. Alone, few but the most elite, would ever put forth the money to educate their children. This is why you get societies where only categories and groups of kids (usually by gender) get sent to school. Collectively, by uniting our resources, we create benefits for the individual AND for the group--our future.

One of the things I commonly overhear is "My kid goes to a Charter School." "My kid goes to the Christian Center." "My kid goes ....." Fill in the blanks. The problem with this type of thinking is not the selfish myopia so much but the selfish consequences we all pay for this single-minded mentality in the future.

If YOUR kid becomes a civic leader and all he/she has to work with are candy-crunching gang-banging cheering Prada-clothed undereducated semi-achievers there will be a problem. Maybe, just maybe, if your house is built high enough on a hill with gates around it you might not have to pay the consequences. But you can bet sooner or later one of your relatives will. It won't matter a lot if your kid came out of Harvard. Trust me. America may have been built on rugged individualism but now we are all in it together. You can cross America by yourself but one person can't fix a broken education system.

Which brings me to another point. What is really wrong in District 6? Is anything really wrong? Okay I mean besides the fact that the school board candidates running are looking like fresh ditzes out of a Cracker-Jack box.

These are all things that make me indecisive about the Mill Levy.

I've done some investigation. I know that the District is trying to change things around. They have a new math series coming online for example. They've hired a new (maybe not so new any longer) administrator and have brought in some new teaching talent. They have worked on developing a governance plan for the Board. They are looking at new testing series and how to perform better on old ones. They cleaned up their act by the State levels and received a brownie badge for doing so.

In the meantime they are stifling District 6 teachers on pay negotiations (there was a lock-out when the Union made an attempt to talk to their own teachers today), pushing a Mill Levy tax onto a public unready to receive it, and to my knowledge are pretty entrenched in the idea of not letting the public know just how bad the gangs are getting inside the schools. I won't even go into the rah-rah cheerleading tag-team District 6 and the Greeley Tribune are running together.

I've also combed through District 6's strategic plan (note: that is not the Governance plan). It is a nicely formatted, Susie-let-me-put-the-sunshine-here, kind of plan. It did not inspire me that the Administration has any more grasp on what the remedy may be for the problems showing up on the test scores than I do.

So I ask myself the following question. Why can't Greeley District 6 perform up to par with other similar school districts in the State of Colorado?

• Is the performance problem related to the notion that Greeley is a unique district?
• Is the performance problem related to the collective IQ of the students?
• Is the performance problem related to the collective IQ of the parents?
• Is the performance problem related to the collective IQ of the community?
• Is the performance problem related to a lack of support materials?
• Is the performance problem related to the transitory immigrant population?
• Is the performance problem related to ineffective administration?
• Is the performance problem related to wages and quality of people hired?
• Is the performance problem a direct correlation to money?

I plan on answering these questions throughout the next week. In the meantime readers thoughts are welcome. Janepaudaux@gmail.com

In the meantime, let me add, I know of at least one excellent teacher that is talking about leaving District 6. She is not excellent just by my standards but by the standards of her students, peers, and parents of her students. Her test scores also give her the red tape for us to affirm her greatness as well as if we needed it.

She is burnt out. Between the stress of the classroom gang bangers, the general challenges of teaching, the District wage non-negotiations, she had the poor timing of overhearing two local women talking to their kids about how horribly they were treated by teachers. Too much homework! Too strict on time demands! Over paid! Undereducated!

For me, I have always been a firm believer that kids model after their parents. If the parents and other adults in the community do not show respect for educators, let alone the idea and concept of education, then is it reasonable to expect that kids will be showing up in the classroom ready and eager to learn? In today's society what does respect cost? It costs a big fancy house, lots of designer clothes, a fast sleek new sedan, and membership at the local country-club. You don't get that on a teacher's salary. You get that on an administrator's salary.

We make our own beds and then we complain when we have to sleep in them.

This is why it is so hard for me to write about the Mill Levy. Good blankets make for a nicer, warmer bed. It is much easier to get out of bed in the morning after a good night's sleep. I'd really like to vote for the Mill Levy--because it does provide a couple of warm blankets for the local students. But first, I think, I need to answer the questions above and figure out just how much money or time it is going to take to pull this District into full performance and/or clean up its poor image on the streets of Greeley Colorado.

Greeley Colorado's Future--the SAT's Are In

Greeley Mill Levy Override Requires Trust

The Parable of Biting the Prada Apple: Math Reform

Greeley District Six Mill Levy: Jane's Thumb Critique

A Handy-Dandy New Tool For Greeley Citizens

A Review of Greeley's New School Data Tool

Jane's Beginning Thoughts on the Mill Levy

District 6 Teacher Union Negotiations

Greeley District 6 Performance Check

Is Walter Cronkite's Ghost Living in Greeley Colorado?

Frank Rich hits it out of the ballpark, again. While nurturing our memories of Uncle Walter he slowly, and diligently, brings up the curtain and exposes the media elite as one of the "good old boys".

Journalistic integrity and the media industry has long been an interest of mine. The power of the media is absolute in a society where information has become competitive. So many untrained cooks in the kitchen giving out half-baked information makes the gourmand chef all that more powerful. Of course the key is finding the Gourmand information source.

Access to information (including education) is a public good in my noneconomist viewpoint and the free market is known to experience inefficiencies when access to information is limited or controlled--asymmetrical information. Essentially, minus the geeky economic stuff, creating scarcity in any market creates market power and concentration (read: monopolies). The more control any entity has over sources of information, with the intent to limit that information or create scarcity, the more attractive that entity becomes to other powerful influences trying to corrupt (or control) the spread of information. When authority figures wade into the picture it becomes a raw tit-for-tat power exchange. "You allow me to control you and I'll allow you to continue to have your power and make a profit."

Thus, again in my view, the power of the media in few corporate hands is absolutely corrupt. The small guys do not have the capital to grow and cannot get the capital to enter the game (big assets are needed) as long as those who hold the scarce information will not share it with the small guy. Instead those holders of the information give it out in watered down segments as performance rewards for the big guns--in return for brokering the survival of their financial and power kingdoms. Who said the feudal system was dead?

Hence one of my concerns I have about settling in Greeley. Centralized control of information distribution and special interest control in local government. However I admit to little understanding of the people history behind the situation--the driving factors. I have had people tell me it is all about the good old white boys and land power brokers out of the sixties. Then another has mentioned missed sustainable economic opportunities which have pulled skilled workers into other local cities and left Greeley essentially a bedroom community. Political interests aren't at home--they are being directed to other growth oriented areas with more long term potential for a high quality of life. But as I sort through these ideas I still come back to the all-mighty power of the voter. Who is voting in this town and what future are they voting for?

I am getting a sense that most productive young families are not thinking about hanging around. Their future is somewhere else. This is a temporary stop. Which, of course, doesn't bode well for Greeley twenty years from now. It is kind of like how the poor always vote middle class because they vote what they believe their future will be rather than voting the realities of their interests now.

My big question though remains "Why isn't the local media talking about this stuff?" I see lots of fluff. Lots of reports on crime to keep people feeling like those they elect are keeping them safe--regardless of real accountability. Frank Rich's column gives some insight into the killing of the kind of debate every community needs and the type of job integrity it takes to overcome the killing field power brokers. In my view, until guts are rewarded more than a fat wallet again, integrity will continue to take a seat on the back shelf. How many parents ask of their children's date "Are you a good and honest person" before "What do you do for a living and how will it benefit me and mine comes out of their mouth"?

"And that's the way it is..."

Personal Note to fellow geeks* What I don't fully understand is communications theory, or maybe math theory, about how the interactions between news source A with infinite other variables--consumers plays out. The Internet is fascinating in its capacity for changing the oligopoly power broking in the news media industry. Instead of being point A, or B, or C, interacting with thousand of variables now there is peer to peer exchanges. There are thousands of variables interacting with thousands of variables. So if there is another geek out there who thinks of systems in terms of math equations or diagrams--please phone home. Or email at least. I'd love to know more about it.

Op-Ed Columnist - And That’s Not the Way It Is -NYTimes.com

What matters about Cronkite is that he knew when to stop being reassuring Uncle Walter and to challenge those who betrayed his audience’s trust. He had the guts to confront not only those in power but his own bosses. Given the American press’s catastrophe of our own day — its failure to unmask and often even to question the White House propaganda campaign that plunged us into Iraq — these attributes are as timely as ever.

That’s why the past week’s debate about whether there could ever again be a father-figure anchor with Cronkite’s everyman looks and sonorous delivery is an escapist parlor game. What matters is content, not style. The real question is this: How many of those with similarly exalted perches in the news media today — and those perches, however diminished, still do exist in the multichannel digital age — will speak truth to power when the country is on the line? This journalistic responsibility cannot be outsourced to Comedy Central and Jon Stewart.

Greeley District 6 Performance Check

When community issues start bristling with perceptions rather than factual data I have always been convinced the best way for the public to perpetuate a good outcome for all parties is to become educated on the facts. It makes it less easy for either side to manipulate public emotional opinion for their gain. Note the use of the word "facts" rather than information. Information in the age of the Internet has become lost to a sea of half-rowed boats. Then again my nickname may be Pollyanna Jane but I figure it is worth a try to link to the facts.

I started doing some research on the NCES site. I couldn't find this link on the local District 6 website. It would be nice, if it is not there, to include it.

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is the primary federal entity for collecting and analyzing data related to education.

I am also beginning to lament not taking my statistical analysis class more seriously so criticism of my analysis here is certainly welcomed and can only add to the debate.

Interestingly I found a few tables on teacher salaries and peer parities for the area but the most recent data set is for 05-06. A lot can happen in three years when the District tends to renegotiate almost every year.

You can skip reading this paragraph unless you want to recreate the same data chart or want to comment on potential comparison errors. I chose the 150 miles radius from zip 80631 for my comparison under the peer tools menu. I went through the advanced search information and simply entered Colorado and the zip 80631. It also helps to know that District Six is classified as MSA-Central City and a Regular School District. Also, Greeley's NCES District ID:0804410. Several of these labels are selections at the bottom to help define the comparisons. I left all other comparative criteria blank. I am sure the comparisons the Union and District have agreed upon are much more tightly controlled for various financial factors. How comparisons are selected can give huge advantage to one party or the other. This may even be why mediators are called in--to do this selection if there is any question on the established process. Oranges need to be compared to oranges not tangerines. There were 10 districts automatically selected for the comparison averages below from my search--including Greeley District 6.

For my own information I am particularly interested in the comparison between dollars for admin to dollars for teachers. The percentages below are what came up. Remember data is for the 2005-06 school year. I have heard that teachers have been negatively hit the last two sessions and also that the Greeley Board earned an award from the State last year for cleaning up a deplorable situation. Confirmation on these would be welcomed.

Peer Averages
Instruc. Expend. 56%
Student & Staff Support 11%
Admin 17%
Food Service, Operations, & Other 16%

Greeley's individual data returns

Peer Averages
Instruc. Expend. 60%
Student & Staff Support 12%
Admin 11%
Food Service, Operations, & Other 17%

These are the possibilities I see in the statistical relationships (remember stats aren't people but they can point the focus to appropriate areas to begin the search for remedies).

First off Greeley is spending more on teachers and less on administrative salaries. It is a probability that the decrease in administration spending results in the slight uptick in Student & Staff Support. I am not interested in the 4th category.

The student teacher ratio returned is 17.1 for Greeley compared to the average 17.0. Hence teachers are pretty close here. There is an average of 1 teacher for every 17 students in the District. This stat however says nothing about the effective distribution of teachers or their workload. We know that classes have 30 or more children in them frequently. Special education courses (remedial and gifted) may be a part of that skew.

However it should be noted that on the profile school district data I looked up on the same site it says 16.8 students per instructor. I do not know why this discrepancy would exist for the same district on the same site unless the comparisons I pulled up for expenditures does not have pre-kindergarten included. *I'd like to measure Greeley without the PK data simply because I think the abundant religious based nonprofits in the area skew the demand for services but I couldn't get the data unless I included it.

I think it would be rather common to conclude the teachers are already near parity and the administration under-paid but it is never that easy. First of all I didn't find any raw data on a ratio for administrators per student--we have just the percentage. So the workload of admin and exactly what is going into the comparison statistics on admin are reported differently from the profile stuff. I could try to come up with a stat but the risk of error would be huge unless I put a whole lot of time into sorting it out--so I won't go there. Going back to the produced statistics in the comparison, this could mean fewer administrators are being paid larger salaries or administrators in general are paid less.

For me, I'll address this more at the end, the question is what is the Admin workload and if there are lesser administrators is this more effective or less. The answer lies in the quality of personnel not the abundance. Also the job duty distribution has an effect. Considering the problems in the past the latter conclusions have some clout. Performance should be closely examined.

As for teachers, depending on what the performance issues are locally, they are above state parity and just below national parity if I read it correctly (and I am sure someone will nail me if I got that wrong). Greeley should be competitive in the labor market considering these stats. Of course that doesn't take into consideration the current trend in rise of cost of living and the cost-of-living increases they have been denied. Workload, due to regulations, or other budgetary cuts may have increased too.

My quick assumption is that it is likely, but I do not have that information, the teachers have fallen behind on parity issues during the last three years and are now facing another cut next year.

The question unanswered is what has happened to management and admin salaries in the meantime. If faced with incredibly poor performance (depending on the issues cited), if I were sitting on that Board of Directors, I'd have been pumping money into improving the quality of administration. What price did that cost the district?

Over all I see a three-fold big picture issues. One is "Is the Greeley area attractive for teachers to make their homes in and raise their families here. Are their pay standards high enough to sustain the quality and status expected for teachers to be role models in the community." Secondly, "Is management failing to give enough support to teachers and if so is it due to inadequate distribution of resources--what is the quality of management decline for minimizing admin dollars." Third, "Are teachers being rewarded for quality performance and held accountable for poor performance. Are performance problems based on lack of support from management, failure to successfully screen, plan, and to acquire funding for high quality personnel." The last of the third issues is a long term strategic visioning problem (directly the responsibility of the Board of Directors).

In my view, as a board member, I'd go looking at the qualifications of teachers and management, in particular, review the human resources policies and hiring procedures independently without any subjective involvement from the district superintendent.

Of course this will not make the negotiations go any smoother at all. Pointing fingers at everyone just indicates the system is broken and we already know that.

My personal point is I think the public at large needs to be held accountable for the broken system because they are the check and balance on any democratic system. Negotiations aren't going to remedy the situation unless the Board of Directors have a better long term plan or are given more funds to work with (if proven they are effectively using the resources they have currently).

The Board of Directors are elected locally. Do they have the skill set needed? Are they puppets for an overzealous administrator? Local and State politicians often play on public perceptions about education to get re-elected on supporting education but then abandon that support when policy and legislation is written. The Jellyfish always rise to the top when times are good. Nationally same thing--we elect those who budget for and structure the public system.

Personally I think that teachers should be paid on the value they produce rather than simple parity and experience. Unfortunately I think it is easy for the public just to calculate value as the need of the moment rather than the future. Senior citizens for example may be looking forward to living on a fixed income in the future and want to control tax increases or are shocked at the rising price tag on education but our children are looking forward to a promising future and if the "whole" is not well educated then we have already sunk the kids' ship before it leaves port. America's competitive advantage has always been fueled by its level of organization and education. You have to have the infrastructure before you can have the performance. Education is the best investment you can make.

I'd be asking my local teachers union what their expenditures of effort are all about when local, state, and federal education legislation comes up. Are they really stepping up to bat?

Enough of the soapbox.

Here is another great site for facts. These are figures on the comparison internationally.

EDUCATION INDICATORS: An International Perspective / Indicator 40

EDUCATION INDICATORS: An International Perspective

Indicator 40: Teacher Salaries

Teacher salaries are a measure of teachers' standard of living and reflect what society is willing to pay for the direct work of education. Expressed in units of a common currency, they reflect the cost of teachers in an absolute sense, irrespective of a nation's wealth and the resources it can devote to teaching.* Teacher salaries relative to GDP per capita allow for comparisons among countries with wide income disparities. A simple index is created by dividing a teacher salary figure by a country's GDP per capita and multiplying by 100. If the index equals 100, a teacher is paid the same as the per capita GDP. Expressed in this manner, the indicator examines what each country spends on its teachers relative to its ability to pay for their services. For example, a poor country with lower teacher salaries than those of other nations may actually be devoting a larger share of its available resources to teachers than wealthier countries.

Sidebar: Teacher salaries are not a clear-cut marker of teacher compensation /*

* At both starting and maximum salary levels, primary and lower secondary school teachers in the United States had among the highest average salaries of all countries for which data were available when salaries were viewed in absolute terms (in constant U.S. dollars). To illustrate, the 1992 average salary of the primary school teachers at the maximum salary level was higher in the United States than it was in all of the countries reported except Japan, Austria, and Portugal. At the lower secondary level, the starting salaries of U.S. teachers were among the highest in absolute terms, at $21,787, along with those of teachers from Spain ($22,964) and Germany ($27,444).

* However, U.S. primary and lower secondary school teachers did not fare as well when the salary was viewed relative to GDP per capita. All of the G-7 countries with available data equaled or exceeded the United States on this measure (at both starting and maximum salary levels), as did most of the remaining countries.

* The ratio of teacher salary to per capita GDP varied considerably across the countries presented. To illustrate, the ratio of starting salary for primary school teachers to per capita GDP ranged from 84 in Sweden to 188 in Turkey.

*The statement is accurate as long as currencies are converted using purchasing power parity (PPP) rates rather than market exchange rates. PPP rates isolate the current, relative domestic purchasing powers of different currencies and are the rates used to convert the figures presented here.