Tom Sparks Going To Orangeburg

Tom Sparks, former Teacher/Coach/Assistant Principal at Rock Hill's Northwestern High School, and Assistant Superintendent at Lexington 3 for the past 6 years, has taken a job in Orangeburg 4. You can read the newspaper account by clicking here.

Get Up To Speed On Technology

Do you want to help your child to stay current with today's Web 2.0 technology? Then visit this site and start using the 12 essential new technology devices.

Some Interesting SC Education History Facts

From the Lucas Blog:

1811 – The SC General Assembly first passed a law establishing free public schools in the state.

1895 – The SC Constitution established a 3-mill levy on various properties to finance the schools.

1921 – Compulsory attendance laws required children to attend school. Interestingly, compulsory attendance was repealed in 1955 because of the Brown v. Board of Education decision. Compulsory attendance laws were restored in the state in 1967.

1930s – SC took on more of a responsibility for education and required a six-month school year (a doubling of the previous days required for schooling).

1977 – SC approved the Education Finance Act and established a defined program for public schools. The state was to assume, on average, seventy percent of the funding for local schools.

1984 – SC approved the Education Improvement Act with the sales tax going from 4% to 5%. The extra penny was dedicated to raising student performance.

1998 – SC approved the Education Accountability Act which established the “report card” system of school accountability.

1994 and 2006 – The SC General Assembly passed laws to provide relief in property taxes for homeowners which substantially altered the funding for schools. The 1994 legislation provided relief on the first $100,000 of property value, and the 2006 legislation (Act 388), created another one-cent sales tax increase to remove owner occupied property from school operations taxes.

Rock Hill Schools Honor Volunteers

The Rock Hill School District held an Awards Luncheon to honor our 2008-09 school volunteers. Awards were presented as follows:
Belleview Elementary
Clemson Extension 4H, Jodie Cherry
Central Child Development Center
Teacher Appreciation Committee
The Children's School at Sylvia Circle
Morton Amusement
Ebenezer Elementary
JoAnne Rankin, Rock Hill Coca-Cola
Ebinport Elementary
Williams & Fudge, Inc.
Finley Road Elementary
Winthrop Athletic Department
Independence Elementary
Bojangles, Family Trust Federal Credit Union
India Hook Elementary
India Hook Parent Teacher Association, North Rock Hill Church, The Williams Family
Lesslie Elementary
Rebecca Culp
Mount Gallant Elementary
Kimberly Thompson
Mount Holly Elementary
Hope Vinson
Northside Elementary
Krista Mullaney, Sherry Pruner
Oakdale Elementary
Jo Ellen Smith
Old Pointe Elementary
Patsy Blair
Richmond Drive Elementary
Patricia Shipman
Rosewood Elementary
Rosewood Parent Teacher Organization
Sunset Park Elementary
Karen Boyd, Christ Deliverance Church, South Pointe International Baccalaureate Students
York Road Elementary
Vanessa McLamb
ParentSmart
Early Learning Partnership of York County
Dutchman Creek Middle School
Dutchman Creek PTSA, Judy Larkins, Leslie Miller
Rawlinson Road Middle School
Donato's Pizza, Rawlinson Road Office Staff, Rawlinson Road Parent Teacher Organization
Rebound
Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity
Sullivan Middle School
Dan and Victoria Freeman, Katrina Wilkerson
Applied Technology Center
Captain Rusty Myers, Chief Michael Caudiff, Material and Handling, Education Foundation
Northwestern High School
Brad and Cindy Caldwell, Damien Ward
Rock Hill High School
Jane Southwell
South Pointe High School
Jeff Nicholson, Oakdale Baptist Church, Frank Zebidis
District Administration
David Guyton, Master Sang K. Pak
Back the Pack Program
Allen Tate Realtors, Carolina Floors, Inc., Amy Cassidy, NPHC of Rock Hill, Rock Hill Youth Service League, Williams & Fudge Employees, Donna Richter, Snowber-Marini Family, Sullivan Middle School Leadership Academy, Winthrop Student Clubs & Organizations.

When Times Are Tuff, What You Protect, Is What You Value Most

This will be my last post on National Board Pay. If you believe the Rock Hill School District's supplemental pay of $3,000 for National Board Certified teachers helped encourage teachers to become certified, or encouraged Board Certified Teachers (or those wanting to be certified) to pick our school district over other districts, then you were not satisfied with the Board's decision to drop the pay for future qualifiers. If you believed the opposite, or you believe that National Board Certification does not mean anything, then you are happy with the decision which will save about $66,000 per year or $700,000 over ten years. (10 teaching positions at the end of ten years will be saved as a result).

The Arguments:

- We are in a budget crunch and must find ways to reduce expenses in two years when the stimulus money runs out. We are currently $8 million dollars short. Now we will have to find an additional $7.8 million to balance the budget in two years.

-We have a lot of good teachers who are not certified and they don't get the pay. True, but they can get certified and get the pay. Why shouldn't we put in a system to pay for results?


-New Teacher surveys do not indicate National Board Pay is a recruiting tool (stated by district employee at meeting). This is the question that was asked: "What peaked your interest in becoming an employee of the Rock Hill Schools? (Check all that apply)." Top response was location (69%), second was availability of jobs (52%), third was reputation of district (50%), and fourth was salary/benefits (39%). There was no question which specifically identified board pay. Feelings about board pay could have been reflected in "reputation of district" - and because we can't move the district, or offer jobs we don't have, board pay could have been the biggest "controllable" reason teachers move into the district. An interesting item, the district had been paying $100,000 (without board action) for signing bonus and relocation allowance - both of these items showed up near the bottom of their survey.

-I know some National Board Teachers who are not very good teachers, or who said they only did it for the money and it didn't make them better teachers. I think this can be said about every position and title in the district. If we have a national board teacher, or any teacher, that is known to be bad, they should be removed - that's what principals are for - don't penalize everyone because of a bad principal. The fact is, all the state finalist for state teacher of the year were nationally certified (that should indicate something).

Board discussion lasted about 40 minutes. That discussion can be viewed below (in 5 parts):






A Cynic is someone who knows the cost of everything, but the value of nothing!

Judging Teachers By Test Scores

The Public Agenda web site has some interesting information on evaluating teachers by test scores. Read the summary and click on the links below for more information:

Judging Teachers By Test Scores

The Obama administration's "Race to the Top" on education has a lot of hurdles ahead of it, and one may be the fact that the administration is embracing one of the ideas that teachers have seemed most skeptical about: judging teachers by test scores. To be precise, states can't get funding under the $4.3 billion initiative if they have laws that bar the use of test scores to evaluate teacher performance. That includes some big states like New York and California. The administration argues that using test data to evaluate schools is essential for reform. "You cannot ignore facts," President Obama said. "That is why any state that makes it unlawful to link student progress to teacher evaluations will have to change its ways." Perhaps so. But it's worth noting that Public Agenda research has consistently found that out of all the players in education, teachers are the most doubtful about the value of testing. In 2006, we found 71 percent of teachers said students were required to take "too many" standardized tests, compared to 59 percent of superintendents. Teachers are also less likely than other groups to see standardized testing as valuable, with 62 percent of teachers calling them a "necessary evil," compared to 37 percent of parents. But these are also the very same people whose support must be enlisted if education reform is to have an impact: nothing happens in a classroom unless the teacher makes it happen. Our great challenge is holding teachers accountable while keeping them enthusiastic - - at the same time. To learn more about this critical issue, including details from our research on this subject, see the full story, "Room At The Top For Test Scores?" on our blog. And for more on education reform, check out Education Insights at PublicAgenda.org.

Rock Hill School Board Gives Superintendent Very Positive Evaluation, Gives National Board Pay The Ax

At the July Business meeting of the Rock Hill School Board, the Board voted 6-0 (Rentschler absent because of business) to extend the Superintendent's contract one year (until 2014) and to give a very positive evaluation of her performance. The "very positive" evaluation triggered an automatic 2% increase in annuity payment and a step increase (2%) in salary as spelled out in the Superintendent's contract. Total increase in compensation will be around $6,600. The Superintendent has pledged to donate $3,225 to the Rock Hill School District Foundation.

In other business, the board voted to eliminate future National Board Supplemental pay by a vote of 4-2, with Norwood and Vining against. This came after a vote to table the motion failed 3-3 with Silverman, Norwood, and Vining voting to table.

This was the motion as presented by the Administration:
Administration's Recommendation for National Board Teachers' Local Supplement

July 27, 2009
We recommend discontinuing the local supplement of $3,000 per year for
teachers who receive National Board certification on or after Jan. 1, 2010.

Current NB certified teachers will continue to receive the $3,000 supplement until the end of their first ten-year cycle.

The supplement will also be discontinued for teachers achieving renewal for the second 10-year cycle, effective September 1, 2009.

Teachers who transfer here during the middle of their first ten-year cycle will receive the $3,000 supplement, if they achieved certification prior to January 1,2010.

Anyone who receives National Board certification after January 1, 2010 is not
eligible to receive the local supplement.

The above recommendation is subject to annual budgetary appropriations by the
Rock Hill Board of Trustees and may be altered by majority vote of the Board.

Total savings will be about $60,000 a year (equivalent to saving one teaching position a year). I'll have more comments in a later post.

The board approved 6-0 the following administrative personnel changes as recommended by the administration:

• Jacob Moree as Assistant Principal @ Old Pointe
• Stephanie DiStasio as Assistant Principal @ Rosewood
• Transfer Robert Smalls from ATC to Rawlinson Road as an Assistant Principal
• Transfer Marc Swygert from Rawlinson Road to Independence as an Assistant Principal

The board approved 24 new hires by a vote of 6-0 (included within the Consent Agenda)

The board approved the recommendation to use Build America for our recent bonds to be sold - vote was 6-0

The board approved Ann Reid to attend the School Law Conference in Hilton Head by a vote of 5-0 (Ms. Reid is a member of the state board and her attendance is important for the board - Ms. Reid did not vote)

The board took no action on a recommendation for a long term lease of the Central Child Development Center Annex and suggested the administration investigate options of selling the property.

Board yearly compensation is also about equal to one teacher's salary - no action was taken on this.