While the Governor fiddles

By Jim Stergios
September 19th, 2008

The Governor has a nice way about him — and he was out in the Greater Springfield area petting horses, my favorite animal, and talking up Springfield, one of my favorite cities. The Republican’s Angela Carbone and Jim Kinney report that the Governor, at a meeting of the Berkshire chapter of the Young Presidents Organization, said that, “I happen to think Springfield is ready to burst, to blossom.” Nice sentiment.

Problem is that 20 months into his administration, nothing has happened in education except for a bunch of boxes getting moved around in the org chart (they’re good at that), and the undoing of accountability. Then, of course, there were all the task forces, and lots of arm-waving. Hardly a success.

As the Governor fiddles around, the Republican ’s Jeanete Deforge reports that the city’s schools are in deep trouble, as are those of urban districts across the state.

Half of all public schools in the state have been listed as needing improvement after students failed to meet federal achievement goals on Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment Systems tests taken this spring.

The failure rate was up markedly from last year’s 37 percent…

Districts or schools are identified as needing improvement if they fail to make Adequate Yearly Progress goals set by the federal No Child Left Behind law two years in a row. After four years of missing goals they are moved into corrective action and if they continue to fail they are moved into restructuring…

This year 828 schools and 88 districts were cited for failing to meet targets. Last year, 672 schools and 82 districts did not meet the goals.

In total, seven districts in Western Massachusetts have been listed as needing improvement or in the more serious corrective action category. There are 88 districts in the state on the list.

Springfield and Holyoke have been cited for corrective action in the aggregate for both subjects.

This is decidedly not the education governor, and perhaps we are looking for the wrong thing if that is our hope. The city has a very inspiring new superintendent Alan Ingram. This is an opportunity for Mayor Sarno to emulate lots of other great mayors across the country — Bloomberg, Booker, Fenty and others — and to focus all attention on the schools.