Tut is right, public school accountability is broken

September 4, 2008 by dave

Yesterday I learned from this Desert Sun story that the California public school Superintendent with the most unfortunate name, Foch "Tut" Pensis, has announced his retirement. "Tut", along with his wife, has worked for the Coachella Valley Unified School District for 30 years. He's been the Superintendent for the last eight years.

During his time as superintendent, the school district struggled to meet federal benchmarks in standardized tests that measure whether students are proficient in, or have mastered, grade-level materials in subjects such as English and math.

Schools that fail to meet federal expectations face sanctions that include curriculum or staff reorganization and state takeover.

Pensis had offered his resignation earlier this year to stave off the appointment of a state trustee.

Statewide, Coachella Valley Unified is one of 97 districts assigned a District Assistance Intervention Team, or DAIT, and the only to be assigned a trustee.

Pensis said his decision to retire was, in part, because of a “broken” accountability system marred by high-stakes testing.

“It's hard beating your head against the wall,” said Pensis, 57.

“When you use data to compare schools without looking at the population of the school, it's unfair to those it's supposed to help. We have some third world conditions in our school district.”

Coachella Valley Unified has faced stiffer corrective action because it accepted a voluntary $1.9 million grant in 2005 with harsher penalties if students failed to improve.

Gee, where to begin. Coachella Valley is one of 97 districts in the state that have failed to meet targets for getting kids to to grade level for more than 5 years. Check out these charts from Just for the Kids - California.

Language Arts:

Mathematics:

"Tut" contends that these test scores simply ignore the "third-world conditions" at his schools. What did he do with that extra $1.9M he got for promising to raise student achievement if he wasn't eliminating those third-world conditions?

He contends that when you look at test scores without looking at the student population, it is unfair to those that you're trying to help. I might agree with "Tut" if every other similar district had the same poor test scores. That simply isn't the case. For example, let's look at Alum Rock Unified in San Jose. This district has basically the same level of English Learners and students in poverty. Both districts are predominantly Hispanic. Yet, Alum Rock Unified is improving. It isn't improving fast enough, they have a long way to go, but it is improving. If Alum Rock Unified can do it, why can't Coachella Valley Unified?

Language Arts

Mathematics

Further, let's look at Martin Van Buren Elementary in Desert Sands Unified, which is less than 10 miles from "Tut"'s district. Here is a school with a similar demographic make up and yet this school is showing some real improvement.

Language Arts:

Mathematics:

Why wasn't "Tut" learning from this school? Here is a school with the same student population, that is getting a dramatically higher percentage to grade-level. Instead of trying to improve his district, he convinced his board to file a lawsuit against the state claiming that if only he could give tests to his students in Spanish, they would do better. Of course they would do better, but when your purpose is to teach them English, that's measuring the wrong outcomes.

In the end, I think that "Tut" is a perfect example of our how California's system of public school accountability is broken. Here you have a 57 year old man, who earned over $170,000 a year failing to accomplish his responsibilities, who whined about how hard it was and who has done damage to the futures of the students with which his district was entrusted. This man will now be retiring and probably collecting over 90% of that salary in retirement without any sanctions or even the requirement to explain his failures. I agree "Tut", that's a broken accountability system.

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