by John McClaughry
First published June 27, 2006
Like the appearance of seventeen year locusts, the subject of education governance has again arrived on the public agenda. The instigator of a renewed dialog on this subject is Education Commissioner Richard Cate. His concern is spurred by his belief that the present public education structure is unwieldy, inefficient, and excessively costly, and falls short of producing the best possible educational outcomes.
The public education system for Vermont’s 95,000 pupils consists of 284 school districts. Every town or city school district either has its own supervisory district (11, in the larger towns and cities), or belongs to one of 51 multi-town supervisory unions. Supervisory union board members are elected not by the voters, but by and from the local boards. Because the boards choose them indirectly, the one-man one-vote rule does not apply.
These supervisory union boards select the Superintendent who must meet state-prescribed qualifications. Originally, the superintendent was charged with the selection and training of principals and teachers. Since each town raised the property tax dollars to pay for its own schools, the supervisory union had no role in school finance.
Today – and especially since the enactment of Act 60 in 1997 – the superintendent’s role is quite different. His or her main job is to see that the schools and districts comply with the ever-growing volume of state and federal education laws and regulations. Chief among these are those controlling school finance, assessment, and special education. The superintendent is the resident authority for citizens elected to school boards, who can hardly be expected to navigate the thicket of education laws and court decisions on their own.
The superintendent’s job is powerful, exhausting, but well-paid. Though selected by local supervisory union boards, superintendents have increasingly become emissaries and agents of the state Department of Education.
In 1964 Gov. Phil Hoff proposed to convert some 60 supervisory unions districts into 24 administrative districts. The legislature and public dismissed the proposal out of hand. Twenty three years later, Gov. Kunin’s commission on school governance, co-chaired by Hoff, proposed 65 unified districts, each with a K-12 system and a single board. That proposal aroused such an outcry that Gov. Kunin was forced to disavow it a week before it was to be made public. The fact that the report was ridiculously and dishonestly titled “Strengthening Local Control” didn’t help its reception.
Commissioner Cate has now put on the table a similar proposal. There would be 63 unified school districts made up by combining current local districts. The state would make education payments to the new districts, not to the component towns.
The new district’s board members would be elected by voters in the towns, but their votes on the board would be weighted to meet the one-man, one vote requirement. The new board would hire the superintendent, who would have full control over all public education in the district. Cate later added that parents would be able to choose among the public schools within each new, larger district.
The Cate proposal would solve the real problem of frazzled superintendents having to deal with as many as fourteen local school boards. It might – but would not necessarily – achieve some efficiencies in administration and purchasing. But there are a lot of arguments on the downside.
Citizens will quickly learn that the new, large districts don’t belong to them, but to the state Board and Department, which as a result of Act 60 already wield enormous control over the personnel, curriculum and financing of public education.
Consolidation of governance in the name of efficiency inexorably leads to consolidation of schools in the name of efficiency.
Superintendents with greater responsibilities will demand more money and more staff assistance.
Organizing taxpayers across town lines to resist large-district spending excesses will be next to impossible. Organizing Vermont-NEA teachers’ union members across town lines to defend higher spending and more generous union contracts will be easy.
With a public high school in every large district, the parental choice system, now practiced in 90 tuition towns, will evaporate.
It may be instructive to look at the experience 300 miles away in New Brunswick, Canada. In 1967 that province enacted its own version of Act 60. In 1997 the government concluded that “the current layers of administration and decision-making, together with the competing forces of many interest groups, are formidable barriers to improvement in the system.” In other words, the provincial government had gotten tired of paying for too much of the empty shadow of “local control”.
The perfectly rational result was the abolition of the powerless local school boards, and the formal centralization of all power in the provincial Ministry of Education.
With Act 60, Vermont has already gone a long way down that path. “Governance reforms” may take us the rest of the way.
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The author, a Kirby resident, is founder and former vice-president of the Ethan Allen Institute. With his permission, VDC gratefully re-publishes commentaries written in years past but still spot-on today.
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Categories: Commentary
This is all kabooki theatre, a huge scam.
They say our school system is reasonable.
They say we can’t make changes.
They say the teachers are only getting paid fairly.
They say the system will collapse with school choice.
They say there will be big sacrifices to just meet the status quo.
They say families don’t \aren’t moving to Vermont.
How about this? How about we treat parents as good as out teachers.
Pay parents, with 4 kids $110,000 to home school their kids!
We’d be flooded with new people.
If we even did 1/2 that amount we couldn’t accommodate all the people wanting to move to Vermont!
Mothers and Fathers would be the highest paid people in the state!
What they are proposing is another huge scam, what the forth now? We won’t get better schools, we’ll ha e less control, and out taxes won’t go down. That’s why it’s a hard sell, it’s another moving of deck chairs on our disastrous school system.
Stop the grift!
I would have loved $27,000 or even $14,000 per child to homeschool, but because we had to pay for it out of our own pocket, we spent MUCH less than that! It’s fun to spend other people’s money! When it comes out of one’s own pocket, people are much more accountable to how they spend.
Interesting maneuver to get conversation going. Don’t post a reaction to the present proposal, but look back to when there were even more school districts and comment on that.
Whatever is ahead, it is wise to hang onto to local control. Maybe there’s 5 districts with paid assistant districts superintendents (rather than a partially paid district school board,) but hold on to local school boards with some local oversight and decision making boards. Vermont’s towns have long had their schools as a significant piece of their local identity and character. That should not slip away under a blanket of a large school district. WE the People should have a strong sense of say in their school for the children of their town.
From 50,000 foot view, Montpelier is of the government, by the government , for the government, directed by 10 people who set the agenda prior to session.
Who are these people and who gives them the agenda?
This is not the plan of the founding fathers, btw.
First published in 2006? A generation ago? How are USA students doing these days in comparison to their counter-parts in other countries? The fact our government wants to import smarter people into the USA might be a clue. When USA educated graduates can’t cut the mustard, calculate simple equations, or formulate a complete sentence, what are we paying for again? Why are we supporting an education system that means graduates from other countries are priorized for higher education scholarships and those high paying jobs? We voted for it. We put the clowns into the seats who manifested a few generations of obedient and compliant serfs, who are now passed over for better, smarter people from other countries. No honor among thieves or reprobates.
STUDENT ENROLLMENT MISINFORMATION:
Mr. McClaughry’s critique of consolidation efforts exposes one primary fact that Vermonters should see, be they parents, taxpayers, or community activists, – Vermont’s public education system is in a state of utter chaos. Even the data presented is muddled.
The first point I want to make is that there aren’t 95,000 students in Vermont’s public school system. Even counting 8000 or so Pre-K students (aged 3, 4, and 5 years old) who attend school parttime and are usually served by private schools –even counting the 4300 students tuitioned to independent schools – there are only 84,256 students under Agency of Education (AOE) management.
But more importantly, there are only 72,093 K thru 12 students in Vermont’s public schools. And, according to the AOE, the education system costs $2.7 Billion. Even citing the highest enrollment data, that’s $32,045 per student.
DUBIOUS EMPHASIS ON SCHOOL CHOICE:
Of equal concern is the understated benefit of a School Choice system by Mr. McClaughry and Richard Cate.
Yes, under consolidation efforts “… the parental choice system, now practiced in 90 tuition towns, will evaporate.” So what?
Consider this; as the tuitioning governance now stands, for every Vermont student qualifying for it and choosing an independent school in those 90 school districts, there is the potential for a $10,000 per student cost saving when compared to the cost per student in the public-school monopoly.
In fact, Vermont’s tuition programs are the most popular educational programs with parents. Why? Because education outcomes improve dramatically with comprehensive School Choice. The problem is that not all Vermont students have access to Vermont’s popular and cost-effective School Choice system – never mind that it is the oldest, most time-tested School Choice system in the U.S..
THE PUBLIC SCHOOL CHOICE CHARADE:
“Cate later added that parents would be able to choose among the public schools within each new, larger district.”
In other words, parents can choose the schools they believe best meet the needs of their children, as long as they choose a one-size-fits-all public school.
Government officials often attempt to make a silk purse from a sow’s ear by characterizing policies with euphemistic titles. ‘Public School Choice’ is a perfect example. One need only consider the ‘Affordable Care’ Act (how’s that working out?). Or the ‘Inflation Reduction’ Act (Really?). How about the Vermont ‘Clean Heat’ Standard?
“Look beneath the surface; let not the several quality of a thing nor its worth escape thee.” ― Marcus Aurelius,
ONLY ONE SCHOOL GOVERNANCE REFORM WILL WORK:
Yes, it is the comprehensive School Choice ‘tuitioning’ some Vermont families have enjoyed for more than a century. The problem is that not all parents have access to it. And there is a bill, recently resubmitted to the House Education Committee, H.89, that will remedy this deficiency by making School Choice ‘tuitioning’ available to all Vermont parents and their children.
Please write to your local representatives and ask them to pass H.89.
Yup! Notice nobody is even suggesting a salary cut! How about we get the undocumented people who have a right to vote in Vermont, the brown people from India and Mexico to become teachers, we could do it for 70% less money, just like big tech does!
Our taxes could go down 70%! What’s fair for farmers, tech and construction should be fair for all enterprises, no?
Funny we had a better school system in 1850, it was greener, kids walked to school, now with Star Link we could have one room and two room schoolhouses giving quality education in small towns for 50 cents on the dollar with remote teachers.
Vermont had right the first time, they’ve been screwing with it ever since.
Re: “Yup! Notice nobody is even suggesting a salary cut!”
Neil, you’re confusing the overall issue.
Salary cuts aren’t necessary. When my kids took advantage of tuitioned School Choice, we calculated that a teacher’s salary could be doubled, and then more than offset by entrepreneurial instructional innovations. It’s not only the parents and students who are penalized by the one-size-fits-all public-school monopoly, so too are the teachers. The teachers don’t realize that their union, the VT NEA, is gaming them. If any teacher out there wants to know how and why the VT NEA does this, let me know.
There are multiple issues Jay; some like the schools and the only issue is expense.
If we had affordable excellent schools in Vermont, there would be no issue. Problem is we don’t.
If I had kids today, they would not be in a public school here in Vermont, I would move if needed.
I agree with what you are saying. If we had government truth in expense/benefit reports, like we do with loans, the teachers would revolt. They don’t understand how much of their salary is wasted.
Truth be told our teachers are highly, highly paid, and they know it. There are few jobs in Vermont with the benefits and salary, there are few jobs in the united states with such benefits and salary. It’s not unreasonable to talk about the function of salary to work, it’s no different than, why would you pay $500 for a toilet seat?
I’m willing to suggest that we could have state run schools that are cost effective and a good curriculum. You are perhaps more accurate in suggesting that it would never happen, and school choice is the only answer. I realize my accepting of this is perhaps only a 20% probability at most, but it’s not impossible. It also allows for modifications in the meantime and an active involvement for those on the other side.
We have many protected government monopolies; this is one of them.
Which is why I’ve been suggesting we tackle this one town at a time with donations. Then expose and demonstrate what you suggest, as I know they are true and work from there. More of guerilla war, vs. tank and air warfare, to which they have more tanks and air support (money, lobbyists and press).
Rome was not built in a day.
If our schools went bankrupt, we could ask for nothing better, but that too may not happen.
We could prove your theory in one small town. That would remove us from the argument, from the control and get something done. They would have no laws against it, they could do nothing. Kindness, toward one town would be all it would take.
TGBTG
Whatever happened to those basic competencies all high school graduates had to master? What is a curriculum? What is a syllabus? What is it that employers need for skill sets that used to be the norm for graduates who chose a profession or just simple basic, common knowledge? Who is responsible for making sure students hit the appropriate marks for the approriate grade level?
It all went out the freakin’ window decades ago. Who allowed that to happen and why? Until parents and taxpayers alike hold those responsible for the dismal results we all pay for – the despots will only enact more money to be thrown into the bottomless, resultless pit known and called “education.” What it really relects is “indoctrination” and legalized theft of labor, money and young malleable minds.
Re: If we had affordable excellent schools in Vermont, there would be no issue.
Affordable? By whose standard?
Excellent? By whose standard?
If IFs and BUTs were candy and nuts, oh what a merry X-mas we’d have.
Re: “Until parents and taxpayers alike hold those responsible for the dismal results we all pay for – the despots will only enact more money to be thrown into the bottomless, resultless pit known and called “education.”
Again, folks… there is only one way to allow parents and taxpayers to hold anyone responsible. They first have to hold themselves responsible.
How do they do that?
How do they do that? Stop gaslighting themselves, snap out of the programming, and be a responsible, engaged, and protective Mama or Papa Bear for our children. Protect the children – a concept many don’t comprehend anymore. I guess that is why 300,000 have gone missing and no one seems to care.
119 school districts…… 119 CEO’s. 119 CFOs 119 staffs …. Are you even kidding …. It’s beyond brain dead ….. a bunch a lazy ass seat polishers getting big fat salaries for doing little to nothing…..
This article was written 18 years ago. Our world and society have changed incredibly since then. The context for looking at “consolidation” is completely different in 2024 vs 2006. Further, the current proposal is nothing like the plans and approach advocated by Mr. Cate. Why is this piece being reprinted? C’mon Chronicle, can’t we have some analysis that is contemporary and forward thinking for the world of the 2030’s?
This re-published article is an excellent history lesson in how the Brigham decision, and the resulting Act 60, changed the job description of superintendents from selecting and training principals and teachers – for the benefit of students – to managing compliance to ever-increasing state education laws. We lost local control with Act 60, more loss with Act 127, while leftists claim we have local control at the ballot box. Here’s what local control looks like at the ballot box: you have a choice to vote either “yes” to a school budget built according to tyrannical state mandates, or “no” to a budget built according to tyrannical state mandates. I’m sick of the gaslighting from legislators and leftist media outlets that we have local control. Real local control would be a variety of independent schools to which parents would choose which school their children would attend, or homeschool.