Some final (for now), personal reflections about the Kentucky Board of Education

As an idealist and reformer, I'm never one to give up the fight for a good cause until I feel I've done everything in my power. For the last two months I've devoted a considerable amount of energy to resisting Gov. Andy Beshear's illegal executive order removing me and other members from the Kentucky Board of Education. I've served as spokesperson for the group, responding to lots of media inquiries, and attending numerous meetings with state officials and interested parties trying to explain why this executive order was different than any previous board reorganization, to restore the independence of the KBE, and to reclaim the appointments of ousted board members.

At this point, I think I've exhausted all my reasonable efforts. Our lawsuit, initiated in partnership with the Bluegrass Institute, goes on. And we have called on state lawmakers to provide a statutory remedy to address this issue, hopefully retroactively (not looking likely), but definitely for the future. It is now in the their hands, and the hands of the court, and except for whatever role I need to play in those efforts, I'm ready to turn my attention toward other avenues of education reform and improvement.

As a teacher, school administrator, professor of education leadership, and activist, I have devoted my career to improving schools and education policy. I did that long before I was appointed to KBE in 2016, and I'll continue when my time on KBE is over. I assume that, for now, it is. If the courts or the legislature deem otherwise, I'll happily return and complete my service until my term naturally ends in April 2022, at which time I imagine Gov. Beshear will select someone else to represent the 2nd district. In the meantime, I will focus my energies elsewhere, including my day job training the next generation of public school leaders, which I truly love. I'll still write about state education policy, of course, including the activities of KBE as they seem relevant, but don't expect to have much more to say about the Governor's executive order.

In this post, I want to offer some personal reflections about my time on the board, and what this all means for the state going forward. When I described my plans for this post, one of my fellow KBE members, whose company I will deeply miss, called it my "closure blog." And perhaps it is.

As always, let me be clear that what I write here represents my views alone, and not necessarily those of any other board member, or anyone affiliated with Western Kentucky University.

Board member or translator? An unlikely appointment

Serving on the state board of education was never an aspiration for me. In fact, it had never occurred to me. Even as a professional educator, I did not even know the names of KBE members other than the board chair. Ironically, I regularly discouraged my education administration students from paying too much attention to the state board, as I believed (and still do), that what happens on the local level has far more impact on student learning than state policy.

So I was surprised when representatives of the Bevin administration contacted me to gauge my interest in a board appointment. I had only met the Governor once for a few minutes in 2015 when he was running for U.S. Senator and I went to one of his campaign events out of curiosity. We had never had a personal conversation. But I knew his policy advisors from my long-standing advocacy of school choice, and even though KBE had no control over whether Kentucky accepted charter schools or scholarship tax credits, their function as a regulatory body would be important if such policies were ever implemented. My knowledge of those policies would be valuable, but even more so would be my long career as a teacher, principal, and university professor.

I accepted the appointment, and serving on KBE turned out to be the greatest professional honor of my life.

It was hard work, at least the way I approached it. There was so much to learn, even after a decades' long career in K-12 education. Decisions were complex and navigating the intersection of ideologies, personalities, the competing interests of stakeholder groups, and the ever-present backdrop of partisan politics was all tricky. Great preparation and discernment went into every meeting, every decision.

I found myself often serving as a kind of translator. In my first two years I was among a minority of board members appointed by Gov. Bevin. I spent lots of time explaining to the Beshear-appointed majority and members of the education community why the administration and new KBE members had such a sense of urgency about improving our education system, and how fresh ideas about policy could help us accomplish our commonly-held goals. After the board was made up of members all appointed by Gov. Bevin, I found myself often translating for them on behalf of the education community, explaining how the local nature of education makes it difficult to impose sweeping policies that actually accomplish their intended goals.

What we accomplished, striving for urgency and humility

I began to think about the work of KBE as exploring the creative tension between urgency and humility, pushing the system beyond the status quo while respecting the limits of state policy and exercising great deference for the wisdom and authority of local actors (parents, students, teachers, and community members) to effect the most powerful education improvements.

Understanding that creative tension between urgency and humility, and approaching people with differing points of view with respect and a desire to seek compromise and common ground, was key to several of the most important, nonpartisan accomplishments of KBE/KDE during my tenure, including both with a mixed board under Commissioner Stephen Pruitt, and with a Bevin majority under Commissioner Lewis:

• When the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act was reauthorized as the Every Student Succeeds Act in late 2015, Kentucky had the opportunity to revamp its school accountability system. That work was initiated under previous Commissioner Pruitt, and the foundation for a new system was approved by a state board made up of a majority of members appointed by former Governor Steve Beshear and a minority of members appointed by Governor Bevin. The accountability system was further revised and reached full implementation last year under Commissioner Lewis’ leadership. No accountability system is perfect of course, but I believe what we created through this rich, stakeholder-invested process is the best framework for transparency and school improvement Kentucky has had to date.
• Updating high school graduation requirements was a key priority for former Commissioner Pruitt. KBE/KDE undertook that work during his tenure and brought it to completion under Dr. Lewis’ leadership, creating a new framework of graduation requirements that simultaneously injected more rigor into the high school diploma while giving schools and students much more flexibility in personalizing pathways for individual needs and interests. 
• While charter schools have not been implemented in Kentucky due to statutory uncertainty about how funds should flow with students, KBE/KDE nevertheless faced the obligation of developing a regulatory framework for implementing the 2017 charter school law. Again that work was first initiated under Dr. Pruitt’s leadership and initially approved by a board made up of a majority of Governor Beshear appointees, with minor revisions carried out under the leadership of Dr. Lewis and the current board. I believe the result is the most rigorous system of charter school oversight and accountability of any state in the U.S.
• Senate Bill 1 of 2017 mandated a much-needed review of Kentucky’s academic standards. Again that work was started under Dr. Pruitt’s leadership and came to fruition under Dr. Lewis’ administration of KDE, with new standards now implemented for reading, math, social studies, health and PE, computer science, and career studies. As chairman of the Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment Committee, I tried to facilitate approval of these standards, which were developed by Kentucky teachers through a rich process of collaboration and stakeholder involvement. I frequently responded to criticisms of the standards or the process both from members of the community and sometimes from members of the board itself, but through the hard work of KDE staff, the standards were unanimously approved by the board and have received positive feedback from teachers. The Kentucky Council for the Social Studies honored me last year with their Meece Award for Leadership in the Social Studies for my involvement, one of the most special recognitions of my career.
• I want to also point to the greatly renewed emphasis by KBE/KDE on Career and Technical Education. Again, this focus began under Dr. Pruitt but reached a high point under Dr. Lewis’ leadership, with the creation of a General Assembly task force, requested by KBE, to review the needs of CTE and how CTE programming can be improved. Dr. Lewis conducted a statewide tour of state and district career-tech centers and I had the privilege of joining him for many of these visits, along with several other members of the board.
• Finally, I want to point toward the initial budget request made by KDE/KBE in December, which included a call for full-day kindergarten funding, expanded transportation funding, restored funding for teacher mentoring, professional development, and school improvement. The board recognized that our education goals cannot be accomplished without more resources and prioritized that need in our request to the General Assembly. It is telling that the newly-appointed Beshear members of KBE largely endorsed the same legislative agenda approved by the ousted Bevin appointees.

If Governor Beshear or militants in the education establishment want to call the Bevin appointees to the Kentucky Board of Education "anti-public schools," I simply call bullshit, and point to what we actually did. The truth is we advanced an ambitious, non-partisan agenda that made great strides toward the kind of education system this state truly deserves. Only a small-minded, intellectually dishonest partisan could frame our work as anti-education. We disagreed often and we wrestled with the most pressing policy issues facing the state, but I never doubted my fellow board members' commitment to better public schools. No matter our occasional disagreements, I have come to respect, admire, and love all of them. Some will, I hope, be my life-long friends.

 

The shadow of Stephen Pruitt

Sadly, though, KBE labored under the impression that it was driven by some kind of politicized agenda, in large part because of the ouster of Commissioner Stephen Pruitt in April 2018. This was a pivotal moment in my tenure on the board, and I'd like to make some observations about what happened, for the first time here publicly.

First, because so many people have mistakenly equated this incident with Governor Beshear's executive order terminating board members and effecting the removal of Commissioner Lewis, it's important to clarify how those were fundamentally different events. I've already discussed the legal differences between Beshear's executive order and previous reorganizations under Governor Bevin. But the most important distinction is that in April 2018, when Governor Bevin appointed six new members to the state board of education, it was at the conclusion of previous members' terms, as prescribed by law.

Five of us had been appointed by Governor Bevin in 2016 and served in the minority until the terms of a majority of members appointed by Gov. Steve Beshear had expired. This is the normal process by which power is gradually transferred on KBE, helping shield the education system to some extent from the more brutal elements of partisan politics. Every new governor gets a majority of appointees in this way, but only two years into his/her term.

What was drastically different in April 2018, however, is that a special session of KBE was called to immediately swear in these new members (rather than wait until the regular June meeting), and to negotiate the resignation of Commissioner Pruitt.

Let me be clear that all of this was perfectly legal. The Commissioner serves under contract with KBE, and at any point the board can seek to negotiate a change in that contract and remove him/her. But it was a terrible idea.

I think that the majority of board members sincerely believed that the Kentucky Department of Education would be better served, and that our agenda would be more effectively advanced, with a different commissioner. And I should be clear that Dr. Pruitt was my friend, and I was proud to call him as much, and still am. He had growth areas like every leader, but my personal affections for the man notwithstanding, I believed his removal would do permanent damage to the credibility and effectiveness of the board.

In closed session I argued (sometimes more loudly than I probably should have), that removing the commissioner on the first day these new members were sworn in would make it look like we were doing the bidding of Governor Bevin rather than acting on our own good judgment, and that it would do lasting damage to the trust of the education community, where Dr. Pruitt was widely admired.  I believed that we could work with Stephen, and that if we couldn't it would be evident in time and he could leave on a less dramatic timetable and, perhaps, on his own terms. I warned that whatever we might accomplish by changing commissioners would be undermined by the hurt and anger and confusion on the part of educators without whom we could not possibly accomplish any of our goals.

The second thing I should point out about this process is that the new "Bevin" board was not unified in this decision. I voted "no" to the agreement that led to Stephen's resignation. Rich Gimmel abstained. And newly-appointed board member Laura Timberlake, the daughter of a retired public school teacher and mother of public school children, was not present. She was not sworn in until June and had nothing to do with what happened.

I was very pleased that Dr. Wayne Lewis, also my long-time friend and one of my education colleagues I most admire, became the Commissioner as a result that day. I believe Dr. Lewis was possibly the most effective commissioner of education in my memory. But I also believe that my warnings were accurate. The ouster of Stephen Pruitt cast a shadow upon the board from which we never recovered. It wasn't the only reason so many people cheered our removal by Governor Beshear's executive order, but it was one of the most important.

The Bevin stink

Even bigger than the shadow of the Stephen Pruitt ouster, though, was the difficulty of being associated with an extraordinarily unpopular governor with many self-inflicted political wounds.

I am grateful to Governor Bevin for the chance to serve on KBE. I actually agreed with him on the vast majority of policy issues and objectively speaking I believe Kentucky prospered under his leadership. But his deliberately divisive rhetoric and bombastic style left a stink on everything connected to his administration. Conscientious conservatives in both the executive and legislative branches found it much harder than necessary to do good work in areas like pension reform, education, and a host of other issues, in no small part because the Governor's penchant for nasty and bizarre pronouncements undermined what they might otherwise have accomplished.

Of course the Governor was also often misrepresented by an openly hostile media, and unions and other militant ad hoc groups associated with the education establishment ginned up anger and resentment on the part of teachers through demonization, misinformation, and falsely presenting  pension reform and school choice as "anti-education." But the Governor made all this easier for his opponents by being so tone deaf to the way his language offended not just these radical establishment elements, but also ordinary, mainstream voters, especially those connected to education.

Andy Beshear was all too eager to pander to these groups, promising in exchange for their support not just a new gubernatorial administration, but a blood sacrifice of Bevin's "allies" in the state board of education, and ultimately, Commissioner Lewis. When he made good on that promise, a great many people across the political spectrum knew it was a bridge too far, a bad precedent for education in Kentucky. Many superintendents and leaders of various stakeholder groups said so privately, and some publicly. But no one wanted to be associated with the Bevin stink. And so for the most part those same key leaders, and certainly the media, have been largely silent about the grave offense of Beshear's executive order. They may think it's wrong, but they don't want to be associated with the Bevin stink either.

The dangerous road ahead

All of this leaves me with deep worries about the future of education policy in Kentucky.

The decay of civil discourse and the hyper-partisan politics of negative polarization we see in the larger public realm has now thoroughly taken over education as well. No longer do we see people with different policy ideas as well-intentioned fellow citizens who should be persuaded to another point of view; rather, we see them as the enemy, and as bad people. No longer do we seek common ground, collaboration, and compromise; rather, we seek raw power to simply eliminate those who disagree with us from the conversation.

I'm prone to these extremes of thinking myself sometimes. We all get sucked into the vortex of negativity. I'm trying to repent and do better, and I've tried hard to model patience in the face of many personal attacks and to persuade with reasoned arguments rather than character assassination. I'm sure I've stumbled a few times.

I do wish the "new" members of KBE well. But at risk of making the mistakes I've just described, I am deeply skeptical about the direction they will take the Kentucky Department of Education. I fear that they will serve as defenders of the education status quo and decline to push the system to greater levels of student learning, blaming poverty and insufficient levels of education funding for our on-going achievement woes. Already there are small but concerning signals in their decision to eliminate the board's finance committee, which was doing excellent work in trying to bring more transparency and consistency in the way education spending is reported, and in the framing of the desired qualities of a new commissioner as being a defender of "KDE's vision," rather than as the leader and articulator of that vision, along with KBE.

I've joined the call numerous times for greater levels of education funding, but there appear to be far too many who believe that all our schools need are billions more taxpayer dollars, but not fundamental structural reforms. Without changes in teacher training and pay, more rigorous curriculum and instruction, greater autonomy for local school leaders to break up bureaucratic mindsets and traditions, and yes, more opportunities for every family to select a school that is the best fit for their child, I see little reason to believe simply pouring more money into this system will by itself change much of anything.

Of alarming concern is a bill proposed by Republican state Senator David Givens that represents a huge retreat from transparency, accountability, and urgency to improve student outcomes. It undoes tons of work undertaken by KDE over two different Commissioner administrations involving thousands of stakeholders. Between KBE and this kind of thinking on the part of lawmakers, the future for rapid improvements in student learning does not look good.

I hope I'm wrong about the new KBE. I know some of them professionally and know they are devoted servants of public education. But I am eager to see how ardently they will challenge the education establishment with meaningful structural and policy changes, and if they will accept that people can disagree about policy and still be a supporter of public schools. If they don't, then we will simply perpetuate the power struggle that has soured all thoughtful discussion about education policy in Kentucky.

My first allegiance, and why I have hope

Despite these grave concerns, I remain as committed as ever to serving and improving Kentucky schools. Despite the rhetoric you'll hear from groups purporting to represent educators, there is no well-organized constituency for major education reform policies and no well-funded lobby to advance them. Affluent parents are always able to make sure their children are taken care of and in the best schools for their needs. Low-income families, whose children reap the greatest benefits from school choice and education reform policies, typically lack the time and definitely the resources to advocate for major changes in the system. Meanwhile the education establishment, which often focuses on the professional interests of adults, opposes greater accountability, and seeks to wring more resources out of tax-payers, is the most powerful and one of the best funded lobbies in Frankfort. While I have tremendous respect for educators, and have been proud to count myself among their ranks, my first allegiance is to the kids and parents who don't have a voice. And so I'll continue my work in the policy realm, and in my daily duties training the next generation of school leaders.

Above all, this is my source of hope. I'm most encouraged by my daily interactions with teachers and school leaders who are fighting valiantly against complacency and bureaucracy to do their absolute best by the children they serve. Wherever growth in student learning takes place, it will be because of empowered and innovative parents, teachers, and students. And so I will continue, as I have my entire career, to support and encourage their work, whether in Bowling Green, or Frankfort, or wherever the fight may take me.

Comments

[Pete Moss]

“ I believe Dr. Lewis was possibly the most effective commissioner of education in my memory.” You would have to search the state from end to end to find a dozen teachers who agree with you on this.

[Gary Houchens]

I don't think that's true, but I also don't care if it is. I don't make my judgments based on what's popular. It's quite possible for the majority - even a majority of teachers - to be mistaken.

[Jan Casada]

I was at KDE the day of Dr. Pruitt’s removal. Our meeting had to be moved to the conference room that adjoined his office due to the nearby board meeting and the need for provide room for the press. It was a somber day as KDE staff went about their business in light of so much uncertainty.

I appreciate your dedication to improving student learning in the Commonwealth.