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By Jennifer Hiller, Advertiser Education Writer
The Honolulu Advertiser, April 20, 2003 —
Hawai'i has long been recognized as having one of the most equitable
school systems in the country, but while local educators often point
to that as their biggest asset, it might also be their biggest downfall,
according to a University of California-Los Angeles management expert.
The single, statewide school district that is unique
to Hawai'i has meant a system of essentially equal and fair funding
at schools across the state. But William Ouchi, a UCLA management
professor, said that along with its system of school financing,
Hawai'i has centralized much of its school decision-making and authority,
adding layers of bureaucracy on top of school principals.
A recent study that Ouchi will publish in the fall-and
that Hawai'i's leaders have been talking about for weeks —
indicates that school districts perform best when principals control
their school budget and are accountable for student achievement.
The less centralized the district, the better student
performance becomes, his study found.
The other school system in the country that nears
Hawai'i in its level of centralization is California, Ouchi said.
Both systems rank near the bottom on many measures of educational
achievement.
Hawai'i and California public school students have
consistently scored below national averages in math, reading, science
and writing since the early 1990's on the National Assessment of
Educational Progress, a measurement that is also known as the nation's
report card.
“It's not a pure coincidence that Hawai'i and
California are both last,” Ouchi said.
Suddenly en vogue with Democrats, Republicans, education
officials and union leaders, a plan promoted by Ouchi would essentially
hand financial control of the schools to Hawai'i school principals.
Now, the state provides money for positions and programs
at schools. But principals do not have the freedom to spend all
money as they choose.
The House Education Committee has approved a resolution
that asks the state Board of Education to give them a plan before
the end of the year to move the schools to what is called “weighted
per-pupil funding.” Lawmakers plan to introduce legislation
next year to make the new formula law.
If the idea maintains its momentum, it could mean
the most radical change for Hawai'i public schools in decades.
From his home in California, Ouchi, a Hawai'i native,
detailed what the plan has meant in other school districts.
The weighted per-pupil formula gives money to schools
based on the make-up of their student population; poor, special
education or non-English speaking students would bring extra money
to a school, for example.
Parents could choose whatever public school they
wanted their child to attend, and the money would follow the child.
Superintendent Pat Hamamoto, who has advocated moving
to a per-pupil model, says the weighted student formula might represent
the final piece of the standards and accountability movement for
the DOE. In the past several years, the department has been trying,
somewhat fitfully, to send more money to the schools.
“It empowers decision-making at the schools,”
Hamamoto said. “This is truly a partnership between principals,
teachers and the community.”
Sen. Norman Sakamoto, D-15th (Waimalu, Airport, Salt
Lake), is pushing the DOE to at least get a pilot program going
in the new school year to test the per-pupil model.
But Hamamoto isn't sure how she can undo the DOE's
budget program only part of the way. “You cannot have half
the system on the old or half the system on the new,” she
said. Hamamoto wants to see the per-pupil method start with the
state's 2005-2007 biennium budget to give the department time to
train principals and sell the idea to the public.
There are other hurdles. Union contracts, especially
the one for principals, would have to be reworked under a weighted
student formula because of the changes in responsibility.
Hamamoto said reaction so far from principals has
been mixed. “There are parameters to the current system,”
she said. “It's very comfortable. We know what it is.”
Hamamoto also said principals would have greater
control over hiring, and would have to use more of their budget
to hire experienced teachers. “Communities that have highly
paid faculty may lose them,” she said.
Rep. Michael Kahikina, D-44th (Nanakuli, Honokai
Hale), pointed out that the present system is unfair because schools
on the Leeward Coast and on the Neighbor Islands have trouble keeping
experienced teachers on staff. Moving to a weighted formula might
give those schools enough resources to attract seasoned teachers,
he said.
Rep. Roy Takumi, D-36th (Pearl City, Palisades),
also said that schools such as Lana'i High and Elementary, the only
school on that island, suffer because of a lack of cultural programs
and field trips. “Right now they don't get anything extra,
but there's no doubt that they suffer for their geographic isolation,”
he said.
Ouchi, who met with several lawmakers and the governor's
staff when he was home in March for a family visit, is a former
student of the University of Hawai'i Lab School and a graduate of
Punahou School.
His book “Making Schools Work: A Revolutionary
Plan to Get Your Children the Education They Need” will be
published in September and argues that heavily centralized school
systems such as those in New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles
have lower student achievement and often spend more money per pupil
than most decentralized systems.
Principals in Edmonton, Alberta — the decentralized
model Seattle and Houston schools have copied — control about
92 percent of the district's total budget. Private schools in Edmonton
have gone out of business or have merged with the public school
system because of its excellence.
Cincinnati public schools also are moving toward
a weighted per-pupil model.
Ouchi said the weighted student formula causes all
schools to compete for students, develop specialized programs and
become like magnet schools.
In Seattle, for example, one school specializes in
homeless students. The additional money attached to those children
has helped the school lower class size and hire more teachers. One
school teaches students in a foreign language for half of the day
and has a waiting list of a 150 students, Ouchi said.
But also in Seattle, the superintendent recently
resigned and the district faces a $35 million budget shortfall,
which is being attributed to their system of small, expensive-to-operate
schools, and an elaborate bus system to ferry students to their
school of choice.
Good student performance has followed the weighted
per pupil model, Ouchi said.
In Edmonton, 90 percent of the children read at or
above grade level, he said. Houston outperforms Los Angeles by 10
points at every grade level on the Stanford Achievement Test since
moving to the weighted-student formula, while Seattle outperforms
Chicago on the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, the standardized test
that those systems use.
If Hawai'i follows the model of Edmonton, Seattle
and Houston, some say the endlessly debated issue of what to do
about school governance might become irrelevant.
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