Cyber School Choice

Cyber schools are public charter schools that offer education to students Online. Students who received the bulk of their education online have varying reasons for making this choice. These reasons could justify the creation of an individualized education program (IEP) for each student. For example some students travel because of their passion for an extra curricular activity. Some students feel unsafe, or are bullied in the traditional setting. Some students just need extra time to work at their own pace. There are about as many reasons as there are students to choose an Online option for education. Today 15 of my students are traveling to Harrisburg to meet with legislators to tell their story to legislators. I hope legislators will open their doors and listen to these students.

Travel is one reason students choose cyber school. For example, one student, a gymnast, has a rigorous travel schedule that keeps her on the road 60% of the time. Six of my students just returned from China where they were able to log into lessons in Pennsylvania while traveling to the other side of the world. Another six of my students went to Panama earlier in the month. These students were able to complete service learning projects while they traveled and stay current on their lessons back home. Travel is one reason that students choose cyber education.

Unfortunately, many of our students who choose a cyber education option have been bullied in the past. Bullying is a growing problem in traditional schools. Cyber Bulling is also a problem, but in Cyber School students are taught to be responsible cyber citizens. In brick and mortar schools social media is avoided or ignored. Cyber education has provided a safe refuge from bullying for many of our students. Whether it is more familiar face to face intimidation or cyber bullying, most students engaged in online education do not find predatory behavior in this setting.

Flexibility is a key component for many of our students. Many of our students like to work at their own pace. With asynchronous lessons that have realistic deadlines; students can choose to schedule tasks that are more difficult over a longer period of time. This helps our students to budget tasks in a way where they can succeed. Mastery is a goal of modern education, and online learning is a process of learning that maximizes this goal. Schedules in traditional schools are not flexible. They do not accommodate snow days or differentiated instructions well. Cyber school does a good job accommodating differentiated instruction and even snow days. When the traditional schools close, cyber students can continue to work on asynchronous lessons.

In conclusion flexibility and safety are cornerstones of online learning. In addition not every cyber school is the same. There are large cyber charter schools and much smaller ones. I work for one of the smaller schools. A cut of 5-15% in the funding of our school will have a much bigger impact than the same cuts on a school five times larger. If the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania cuts funding for cyber schools, then they must realize that different schools that are providing a different innovative emphasis may be significantly affected by these cuts. Cyber charter schools are providing a flexible and safe alternative for many students in Pennsylvania. If funding is cut then the results may be unpredictable for different sized cyber schools across the state. The State's investment in cyber education is a commitment to the innovation necessary, to provide differentiation, flexibility and a safe education to the students who choose to pioneer this style of learning.

The latest threat on Cyber Schools.

I read an interesting article today on Cyber School in the State of Indiana. They have recently followed the lead of Pennsylvania and began to roll out internet based learning in their state. After I read the article I realized that all internet based learning is not equal.This cyber charter school was significantly underfunded at $5000 per student.

I am a teacher of Leadership electives at the Pennsylvania Leadership Charter School. I can see significant differences between our school and other state wide cyber charter schools in Pennsylvania. Our lessons are different from the other cyber schools in the state. Our teachers have embraced the mission of pioneering a new education platform and have designed their own lessons. Many of our sister schools in the state have opted for a different system. K-12 and Commonwealth Connections have created a school based curriculum that can be transferred easily from school to school. This model works very well to recreate their learning in other schools; however, it does not follow what is happening using the best practices available. The best educational practices follow models where students can apply their learning to the real world. When I went to a traditional schools in the 1960’s and 70’s we had independent instructional approaches where students could work at their own pace, and it worked great for independent learners. It was called SRA. My wife, the visual learner excelled at this. She reached the ultimate color achievements while I was stuck at the lower level because my learning style was more social and auditory. “Hey at least I wasn’t aqua,” would be in the back of my mind. Many of the systems that are transferable follow this SRA independent instruction style. There are now off the shelf lessons that you can plug into online schools to get you up and running quickly, and less expensively. These independent instruction learning models are targeted to raise achievement test scores, but they generally do not teach how to think critically or solve problems. When I was in China on our annual international exchange the students complained to me that they memorize much information, but do not know how to apply it. Is this were our educational system is heading? The school that we exchange with had us complete a mock peace conference at the Chinese school. I saw much critical thinking and problem solving happening in the classroom that day. Students came up to me at the end of class and asked, “What is this new method of teaching called?" I told them we call it role play. 

The Charter school movement is being is being attacked by special interest groups right now. Charter schools are facing funding cuts by as much as 20%. If these funding cuts happen, then many innovative practices will be stripped from schools. The Charter School movement has its enemies. The School Board Association and Teacher’s Union of Pennsylvania feel threatened because they have little input into the way charter schools are governed. The proposed cuts will cause all charter schools to be reduced to the common denominator of independent instruction. The opponents of charter school education are calling the “per student” funding that is being transferred to charter schools an unfunded mandate. Is it an unfunded mandate, or is it the cost of innovating education? Everyone knows that we must compete on a global level.  This is driving change. Innovation is the process of change, and if we are going to have it, then we must fund it.

The latest challenge to our funding is coming in the form of a Special Education cut. I have included a letter from Representative Daniel Truitt about this problem. Dan has been a real hero in the fight for educational innovation on the state level, and I hope that every PA Legislator will read his note below.

This is the second day in a row (and at least the third time overall) that this organization has distributed bad data to legislators on this issue and I feel compelled to respond.

The $350M figure that they are calling “Charter Special Education Tuition” includes approximately $177M in regular education tuition.  So, the assertion that charter schools are getting a windfall of $200M per year is a lie, just like the assertion that we cut $1B from education is a lie.  We should all be offended by this organization and its representatives for attempting to mislead legislators who are tasked with making very important decisions that will affect the children of this commonwealth.

I have the spreadsheet that is the source of the data provided below and would be happy to provide it to anyone who is interested.  It shows that school districts paid charter schools $917,767,997.07 in non-special education tuition for 100,351 students (student count from a different source).  That’s an average of $9,146.00 per student (much less than school districts spend on their own students).  The spreadsheet also shows that school districts paid charter schools $350,562,878.63 in special education tuition for 19,114 special education students.  That’s an average of $18,341.00 per special education student to cover their regular education expenses AND their special education expenses.

So, the $350M figure below includes only $9,195.00 per student to cover special education expenses.  PASBO distributed a letter on April 29th which stated that charter schools” spent—on average—only $8,500 per student on special education instructional costs”.

Given that PASBO has overstated the revenue that charter schools receive, I would not be surprised if they also understated the costs and I’m looking into the cost-side numbers as well.

Please note that the end result of HB-2138/SB-1316 would be that the “average” charter school would receive only $4,664.46 (51% of $9,146.00) to cover the $8,500.00 expense mentioned above.

The bottom line is that this is a complex mathematical issue.  While the underlying concept behind HB-2138/SB-1316 (3-tiered funding formula) makes sense for the distribution of state funds to school districts, that entire portion of the bills is neutralized by hold harmless provisions that really make these bills nothing more than charter school funding bills.  Unfortunately, the charter school section of the bills is deeply flawed and needs extensive rework.

I realize that this subject is about as fun as watching paint dry, but, I would be happy to sit down with anyone who is interested and go over the math and the spreadsheets.

Remember, we are talking about special education students here.  Getting this wrong could easily lead to lawsuits and a PR nightmare.  Of course, the fact that we’ll be screwing 19,114 special education students should be enough of a reason to go back and get it right.

Regards,


Dan Truit

Unions want to kill cyber schools. Here is one teacher's story.

Why I Left Teaching: Union Politics

Guest commentary by Bill Frye
I taught science full-time for more than two decades and enjoyed a rewarding career educating a generation of public school students in Westmoreland County. I retired from teaching earlier than I wanted, though, and I’d like to tell you why.
As a union member for most of my teaching career, I never disguised the fact that I disagreed with much of the Pennsylvania State Education Association’s political dogma. The union promoted values and ideals that I not only disagreed with, but also routinely had no relevance to education.
Before you jump to conclusions, let me assure you that I’m not anti-union. I’ve been generally happy with the local union in my old school district. I’ve also been a member of the farmers’ union all my life. Unions have an important place in society.
It is the state and national teachers’ unions—the PSEA and the National Education Association—that I grew to resent. Their use of my union dues to support political causes I disagreed with ultimately led me to leave education.
Case in point: A school year’s first teacher in-service day usually consists of the administration welcoming teachers, introducing new staff and outlining goals for the year. But in the fall of 2012, PSEA sponsored a pep rally and played a video for the entire school staff to encourage us to help re-elect President Barack Obama. Normally, events like this happen after the school workday—when attendance is voluntary, not when teachers are a captive audience.
What’s more, the PSEA’s magazine The Voice—which is sent to 180,000 members and paid for with our dues—regularly featured ads praising President Obama while denigrating and lampooning his opponents. Teachers paid for this political activity no matter which candidate we personally supported—and every other taxpayer paid for it as well.
How? Pennsylvania allows government unions to use taxpayer-funded payroll systems to collect their members’ dues—as well as optional political action committee contributions that can be sent directly to politicians.
But aren’t unions prohibited from using members’ dues for politics? Take it from the PSEA itself: Last year, their magazine featured a notice that 12 percent (which amounts to $7 million) of teachers’ dues would be used for political activity and lobbying. That’s in addition to millions in PAC money.
Unions use teachers’ money to advocate for policies that will leave teachers, students and all of us poorer. The main example is how the PSEA is advocating against reforming our deeply indebted public pension system.
One incentive for me to continue in public education was the pay and working conditions for educators. I looked forward to what, at least in my opinion, is a very generous retirement—which I will credit the unions for helping to achieve. But I’m also a landowner and property tax payer. I’m told the pension systems are $50 billion in debt and will require huge property tax hikes if nothing is done.
I feel sorry for people on fixed incomes—like some of my teacher colleagues who retired years ago—who will have to struggle to pay these rising taxes.
Everyone agrees the pension system, as it currently exists, is not sustainable. There are solutions to bring economic viability to the system. But the PSEA, using members’ dues money, is one of the main roadblocks to reasonable reform. In a recent “alert” email to members, the union called the latest compromise proposal a “pension attack” that “targets women and new employees” while offering no solutions except to raise taxes.
I couldn’t take any more of PSEA’s fear-mongering and divisiveness on political issues, so I spoke out. As a result, the personal attacks I received (from union members!) made me choose to retire and focus on my farm business.
But, as a taxpayer, there’s no escape: I’m still forced to help PSEA collect its political money.
Legislation called paycheck protection would stop PSEA and other government unions from using public payroll systems to siphon their political money from teachers’ pay.
I think if legislators truly support teachers, they should pass this effort to give them a bigger say over how their money is spent in the political world. Government unions might then engage in productive negotiation instead of political lobbying.

# # #

Bill Frye is a retired public school science teacher from Westmoreland County.

Reforming the funding of cyber education in Pennsylvania

I recently read this article in The notebook by Dale Mezzacappa.

According to this article Philadelphia Charter Schools received 175 million for special education, but only spend 77 million for that purpose. State wide charters collect 350 million and spend 156 million.  The article goes on to say that there is a faulty state funding system. For example, Cyber charters schools get paid varied figures based upon where the child lives instead of based upon their needs. Charter schools also contradictorily, get paid an average for special education students within the district instead of the actual funding for each individual special education need.

Pulling the rug out from charters now is changing the rules in the middle of the game. It is simply unfair and punitive to change funding formulas after a charter financial system has been set up. Since charter schools special education students are reimbursed based on averages instead of the actual money following the student, the state is already acknowledging that a tier system of special education payments does not make sense. Charters have more special education students in the less expensive categories because the traditional school district has already developed the resources to care for these extreme needs. Parents can easily see that, and choose the district that provides the best services.

Charles Zogby is a former Cyber School K-12 executive. He is now budget secretary for the Corbett Administration. He is a former state education secretary. SB 2013 has a six year phase in. Philadelphia School Reform refuses to adopt an un-sustainable budget by the end of May. The State Representative Bernie O’Neil and Sen. Patrick Browne in the article complain that cyber schools were invited to discuss these reforms as they were being formulated. It will be interesting to see the kind of funding reforms that Zogby recommends, since he was at one time at the point of the charter reform movement. Which The PA School Board Association considers, Cyber Charter schools the most disruptive.

Perhaps the best way to end this discussion of Senate Bill 1316 is to ask the question that parents are asking in the article. ‘Why do they [the charters] get an art teacher and my school doesn’t?’ The author says... “They get a chunk of special education money that they don’t have to spend on special education services.” Charter schools typically grant more flexibility, and support than traditional schools.  They can do this because of less regulation, and flexible systems.

Here are the questions that are not asked in Dale Mezzacappa’s article …

1. Why to special needs parents choose to place their children in charter schools?
2. Does the district spend its special education funding with less effectiveness?
3. Do school districts spend the dollars they receive for special education funding for their students with severe needs in an efficient way?
4. Do traditional schools ever divert funds?
5. Do the charters use the special education funds with more parent satisfaction than non charters?

When these questions are answered we may have better answers to help us reform the educational funding of our public schools. Traditional schools all over the state have been starting cyber charter schools. I do not believe this would be happening if the charter school movement did not exist. In the mean time it does not make sense to cut funding on innovation before change has taken place.

PA Charter School Legislation & Day on the Hill 2014 #edchat, @PALCS, #Student Leadership

One of our students has something to say about cutting cyber charter school funding. #edchat, @PALCS, #Student Leadership

PALCS China 2014

2014 China Video

Earth Quake, Los Cangilones, and Dinner with Jose

In these pictures you are seeing some great shots of one the wonders of the Gualaca, Panama Area. It is called Los Cangilones. It is a miniature canyon with cliffs 20 feet high and water over 15 feet deep. After I tested it, some of our braver students were willing to jump off at the higher points. The students really enjoyed this outing, but that is not all what happened today. Today when we were in our final Spanish Class, we felt an earth quake. It was 5.8 on the richter scale, and it is believed to be an aftershock from the large earth quake in Chile last night. We ended our day by having a traditional Panamanian meal in a home of an old friend. The students enjoyed seeing American TV for the first time in three weeks. Jose treated us to a cassava based soup dish and bread. It was muy deliciouso.
Tomorrow we leave for the Beach and three more performances. I hope to talk to you soon.

Spanish Class with Maria in El Explorador

Today we visited The Explorador Garden in Jarmillo. Jarmillo is the mountain side that faces Boquete on the southern side. When you look to the north you can always see Vulcan Baru the inactive volcano that towers over everything.  Today we held our Spanish class in a Japanese Garden. It was beautiful. The students enjoyed the sun and beautiful temperatures.  I enjoyed the flowers. The owner of the garden took a personal interest in us this year. She was very attached to Cierra. She invited us into her house for some fresh avocado. We were greeted at the door by two Yorkshire terriers. One was just a baby and really cute. The garden had swings and home made gymnasium equipment. The lady placed many philosophical signs all over the garden to stimulate interest and the learning of Spanish. If I had a garden, I would make it very similar to this.  It was like walking around in someones dream, and enjoying it with them. She gave us samples of many of the fruits in her garden. We even ate hot peppers.

Later on that day we were able to arrange our return stay in The Panama House in Panama City. We will be there April 5th and 6th.  I was also able to drop off some coloring books to Casa Esperanza. My colleague, Sarah Aungst has done service projects with this private school in the past. They were appreciative, and I hope we will still be able to work with them in the future.

Tomorrow we will go to the miniature canyon of Panama, Los Cangilones to swim. We will have our last full day in Boquete, our last Spanish Class, and we will prepare to leave for San Felix and the beach.  Thank you for following our BLOG! Please feel free to share it on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Tumbler or Instagram.

5 Mime skit performances today in Boquete, Panama

Today is performance Day in the Boquete Area. We did 5 performances to over 200 students today. We completed performances in Boquete, Palmera, Baha Mono, and Volcancito. What a surprised look we got from the Ngobe when they heard me speaking their language. It was also very cute when one of the little girls ran to back of the classroom when Keon the Jaguar came out to his lair. Today was a major success!

Visit our Panama Excursion for #PALCSPanama2014. This post is Day 7 but there is much more.

Our crew!

Keon our leader

 

What a group

Our most photogenic member

It is hard to believe it has been one week since we arrived in Panama. So far the trip has gone extremely well. We were able to book 8 performances and we should be able to distribute all 300 coloring books and crayons. We did a team building activity on our day off today. We went zip lining at 8 AM. It was very exciting. One of the lines was the longest in North and South America. The guides had to literally throw us as hard as they could from the platform so we can reach the next station. There were 13 platforms and 12 zip lines.  People would not reach the platform on the longest line because they would use their hands to slow themselves with a braking action. When the students got stuck before they reached the platform, the guides would yell Amarillo into their walkies. Olivia was the first to complete the long zip line without stopping.  She did amazing well for her first time zip lining. Keon led the way and was the first to jump off the platform from the entire group. He is the youngest member of the group, but he showed real courage today.
In the afternoon we visited Caldera and went on a hike on a very rocky road. Our guide, Mr. Parris choose, “the road less traveled,” but unfortunately unlike Robert Frost he got us all lost instead of being, “all the better for it.” We doubled back and earned our right to jump into the naturally hot springs. They were very therapeutic and a number of us felt light headed when we got up out of the water heated by the vulcanism of the earth. It was really nice except for the sulfur smell. Some of the students thought that it was gas, but it was actually the natural smell of geothermal heat.

Time for bed. Tomorrow is our first performance! For more post and to talk to our students post here!

Day 7 Zip line, The Hot Springs, and our dress rehearsal

PA SB 1085's Impact on Cyber Charter Schools

When I first read SB 1085, I was encouraged that the bill attempted to reform Cyber Charter Schools in a way that would reform all schools. Education reform is valuable and is needed in our nation as well as in Pennsylvania. In a recent BLOG post, Ali Carr-Chellman, a Penn State Professor and former critic of Cyber Charter Schools,  suggests that Cyber Charter Schools are not a bad thing,  "I'm very much in favor of  local and district-level innovations. This is really pushing them to do some innovation. That's not a bad outcome." She is, however, against the diverting of monies into corporate non-profits with unethical vendor arrangements. She calls this a "Gold Rush" for these schools. She also thinks that we are currently in a state of detente, allowing local cyber charter schools to develop.

I believe that SB 1085 is meant to correct problems, however, the legislators have added a 5% cut in funding to Cyber Charter Schools. This cut is meant to correct the pension double dip. HB 618 was meant to do this last year. It was not passed because many legislators want school choice, and realize that there is a price for innovation in school reform. This price is never less money at the development stage. Traditional schools who choose to use snow days this year to teach Online would never have attempted that 5 years ago. This year SB 1085 has been revised to include a 5% cut in Cyber Charter Schools to pay for the pension double dip. Here is some of the reasoning from Dr. James Hanak, CEO of Pennsylvania Leadership Charter School, about why HB 618 and the revised SB 1085 are a bad idea. 

1. All charter schools begin with only 70 cents on the dollar from the home sending school district.  Despite this, charter schools are held to higher standards than their traditional counterparts, and Cyber Charter schools are graded with more stringent requirements than their equal brick and mortar counterpart.
2. The bill (618) will hold cyber charter schools more “accountable.”  This argument was a diversion designed to draw attention away from the real purpose of the bill – to cut Cyber Charter funding.  Most of the so called “accountability” factors contained in the bill have already been put in place in law, and all Cyber Charter Schools are already carefully complying with these accountability requirements.
3. The only thing this bill does is further cripple Cyber Charter Schools by 5%.  It cuts cyber schools’ funding dramatically but only saves local school districts .02% of their budget (two tenths of one percent).  It saves the State nothing.

What will happen if Cyber Charter funding is cut by 5%?

1. Those schools that are growing (most of them) will...
1.   simply hold off raises for their teachers / staff.
2.   increase class sizes, or purchase less education software or the like. 
3.  create an environment encouraging staff to look for more stable job opportunities
2. Those schools that are not growing will...
1. make layoffs
2. create an environment encouraging staff to look for more stable job opportunities

Teachers are not entrepreneurs. They generally do not like risk. When Cyber Charter Schools are perceived as experimental, then many teachers will search for safer employment in the brick and mortar world. If fewer teachers choose to work for Cyber Charter Schools, then there will be less innovation. Is a.02% gain in revenue the reason HB 618 or the revised version of SB 1085 have traction? I do not think that this is driving the argument. The enemies of Cyber Charter Schools are. Innovation is needed in education. The enemies of Cyber Charter Schools include the teacher's union, and the school board association. Their gain is their windfall from SB 1085. This could easily result in the tax payer paying more money for less innovation in traditional schools.

Please join us in Harrisburg this year for the PA Families Cyber Day on the Hill on May 6th 2014. The permission slip and BLOG where you can make payment can be found here. 

Cyber School PALCS Teens for Jeans Drive.

How do you involve cyber school students from all over the state on a
service project from  #MLK to #GYSD Day? PALCS student government figured it out.

Asian Invasion Exchange with PALCS

Recently our school, PA Leadership Charter School hosted 10 students and two teachers from our partner school in Hebie Province, Shijiazhuang, China. The students and teachers were here for a jammed packed week filled with unrelenting snow, activities, and plenty of warmth from our host families. I have come to the conclusion that the hosting end of the exchange is all about the host families. These videos and post are dedicated to them. After the students left to go back to China, many of the host families thanked me for talking them into providing a home for them to stay in. I do a much better job with the exchange when I keep the needs of the host families in the forefront of my priorities. :)

On Monday one of my co-teachers, Jason McLead and I picked up the students from 30th street station in Philadelphia, We met the host families in the school parking lot, and they quickly dispersed to their new homes. On Tuesday we visited West Chester University. I think the highlight of this visit was giving the students the opportunity to help teach Mandarin in a University Class. On Wednesday we escorted the students to the historic sites of Philadelphia. They visited the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, Betsy Ross's House and Elfreth's Alley. We did some shopping in China Town and had dinner at Tai Lake Restaurant. On Thursday we were snowed in by a storm that dropped 15 inches in our area. The students spent the day helping to shovel snow, baking chocolate cookies, and dumplings instead of shadowing students at our school and participating in a ping pong tournament. On Friday we visited the Amish area of nearby Lancaster. We started off that day in culture classes, making valentines and art projects, and then tasted home made jams and did shopping at the outlets. On the weekend the host families included our students in their families for a variety of American experiences. On Monday we visited NYC which was a highlight of the trip. We came back to my house which is close to the airport, and woke early in the morning to catch their flight. I want to thank the following colleagues who made this week easier for me. Dr. James Hanak, Dr. Joyce Good, Scott Van Vooren, Kim Edwards, Julie Kaplan, Lynn Parris, Noele Huie, and Angela Owarzani.

If you would like learn more about either end of this exchange you can check out our BLOG site here. If you would like to be a host family next year, then please consider taking this short survey.

Here is an overview video of our week together

One of my students, Micah Byler made this video of our NYC trip.