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School Board News Bulletin
January 1997

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Innovative school funding plan released

The plan is designed "to raise the foundation level to provide every school with the financial resources to provide a high quality education," meanwhile ensuring that no school district would face cuts under the formula. Other guiding principles include: reducing the resource inequities from district to district, moving the state towards the goal of providing 51 percent of school funding, and guaranteeing substantial property tax relief.

The plan, "The one percent solution-A proposal for fair school funding" was hammered out by an unprecedented coalition of statewide education organizations, including the Illinois Statewide School Management Alliance (Alliance), Illinois Education Association (IEA), Illinois Federation of Teachers (IFT) and Illinois Parent Teacher Association (PTA).

The coalition's plan calls for simplifying the General State Aid formula to enable every school district to receive funding from the better of two calculations made each year-either a flat grant or a guaranteed foundation level calculation.

Calculation 1 - flat grant:

Flat grant calculation would be made for all districts. The grant would be equal to a district's general state aid (GSA) entitlement per average daily attendance (ADA) for the 1997-98 school year, adjusted by the percentage increase in Per Capita Income (PCI), as reported by the Illinois Department of Revenue. The calculation works this way:

Minimum Qualifying Rates refers to the tax rates to qualify for Calculation 2. As mentioned above, districts would be required to levy a combined tax rate (exclusive of Bond and Interest) of $1.50 (for dual districts) or $3.00 (for unit districts) to qualify for Calculation 2. Districts levying in excess of these rates would generate greater local revenues without being penalized for their efforts by a General State Aid Formula that used actual rates.

Average Daily Attendance will continue to be the attendance average for the best three months of the preceding school year or the average of the prior three years, whichever is greater.

School districts would be funded under whichever of the two calculations in this proposal provided the greater general state aid. Funding on the basis of the better of these two new methods, supporters say, ensures that all Illinois schools would receive increased per pupil funding every year under the new system. This is a benefit not guaranteed by the current system.

Another major component of the plan is property tax relief. Advocates of the plan said Illinois needs a new funding mechanism for schools which would inhibit the need for future property tax hikes, and reverse the rising reliance on local-rather than state-taxes to pay for good schools. "This proposal does both," they said.

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Schools may exchange problem students' records

New Education Department regulations implementing changes made by Congress in 1994 to the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) expand the circumstances under which schools can share student records. The rules were published in the November 21 Federal Register.

Schools always have been free to share student records with other schools when students transfer. Now they can release a districtwide notice to inform other schools of a problem student. The new rules also allow schools to release records to state juvenile justice agencies without a student's or parent's consent.

Schools no longer need to maintain a formal student records policy. But they do have to notify parents and students annually about their rights under FERPA.

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Bond issue results

These results were roughly on par with the success rate for building bond issues in recent years, but below the success rate for the past few elections (63 percent in March 1996, and 56 percent in November 1995). The high-water mark for the success rate of building bond issues (73 percent) was reached in March 1994. That high level was nearly reached again in November 1994, with a 67 percent success rate for building bond questions.

Boasting successful building bond referendums this time around were: Mt. Carroll C.U. District 304, Calumet District 132, Sandridge District 172, Winnetka District 36, Cumberland C.U. District 77, Effingham C.U. District 40, Fremont District 79, Hartsburg-Emden C.U. District 21, Virden C.U. District 4, Woodstock C.U. District 200, Dunlap C.U. District 323, Shiloh Village District 85, and New Lenox District 122.

Besides winning bond questions, the Woodstock and Dunlap districts also won voter approval on tax increase propositions, while Prairie du Rocher C.C. District 134 won just a tax increase.

Other important issues on the November ballot included a defeated proposal in Des Plaines C.C. District 62 to elect board members from board member districts, and three proposals to abandon township representation requirements (which must be approved in every township). The latter, at-large election proposals included: Momence C.U. District 1 (passed), Odell C.U. District 435 (passed), and Oakland C.U. District 5 (failed).

Finally, an advisory question was adopted in favor of the continued existence of a school district in central Illinois, Bradford C.U. District 1.

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Governor names new State Board members

The list of newly appointed members also includes four individuals with experience on their local school boards, and one former district superintendent.

The nine members appointed to the State Board of Education-all of whom will begin serving upon confirmation by the state Senate-are:

• Louis Mervis, Chairman, Danville. Mervis is a former member and chairman of the State Board of Education who previously served on his local school board.
• Sharon Gilliam, Chicago, is a member of the Chicago School Reform Board of Trustees.
• Bill Hill, Charleston, has previously served 25 years as a district superintendent and a past president of IASA. He is a current member of the State Board.
• Harry Litchfield, of Coal Valley, is a Deere and Company executive who has served on the State Board since 1993.
• Marilyn McConachie, of Northbrook, served 12 years on the Glenbrook school board.
• James Palos, of Chicago, a member of the current State Board and head of the Midtown Educational Foundation.
• Sandra Pelligrino, of Peoria, an attorney and former teacher with experience on the current State Board since 1995.
• Connie Rogers, of Buffalo Grove, who served 17 years on the board of Kildeer-Countryside Elementary District.
• Vince Seritella, of Lombard, an executive with Motorola who has served on the education committees of both the State Chamber of Commerce and the Illinois Manufacturer's Association.

Crimes don't bar school hire

So says the October 1996 publication Core Issues, a newsletter from the law firm of Miller, Tracy, Braun & Wilson, Ltd.

What should boards do? The newsletter suggests adopting a board policy that bars the employment of persons convicted of any serious crime.

Contact the law firm at 217/762-9416.

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Treasurer's office extends school program

"Bank At School" is a joint effort of the Treasurer's office, elementary schools, and financial institutions throughout the state.

"Our office encourages all schools statewide to participate in `Bank At School,' said the letter from program administrator John Cieslik. "And a perfect time to incorporate `Bank At School' into your curriculum would be in January and February.

To learn more, contact either Joan Zalewski or Bernard Considine in the State Treasurer's Chicago office at 312/814-1700 or Janet Dobrinsky, in Springfield, at 217/782-6540.

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Research Reports

Most teachers favor using Internet in class

Teachers give themselves mediocre grades on their knowledge of the Internet, and only a small number of teachers are using it to help them in teaching, the study found.

While only one-third of teachers (34 percent) are currently taking advantage of the Internet as a resource and teaching tool, most say they would like to use it a good deal more.

"Teachers want access to the Net," said Scott McNealy, chairman of Sun Microsystems, Inc., a California computing firm that markets hardware, software, support and training to teachers. "They recognize the rich resources the Internet can offer the classroom and see the Internet as an invaluable teaching tool. Yet too many teachers do not have access," McNealy said.

Other key findings from the survey:

1. The nation's teachers overwhelmingly endorse the use of the Internet: over half (53 percent) say using it in classrooms is an "excellent" idea and four in 10 (40 percent) say it is a "good" idea.

2. Wiring the schools is a good step because Internet access provides students with "more" and "hard-to-find" information, as well as teaching them the technology they will need to compete in the job market.

3. Similarly, when asked how they would use the Internet, teachers say they are most likely to use it to locate "hard-to-find" resources and information, to teach students technology, and to obtain information on current events.

4. A majority of teachers (58 percent) say they can connect to the Internet at school now. Only a third of teachers (34 percent) are currently using it to help them with teaching.

Teachers feel they and their students need to learn more about the Internet, the study found. Most teachers (53 percent) gave themselves a grade of "C" or "D" on their knowledge of the Internet, and 19 percent gave themselves an "F."

A copy of the report, "Teachers Overwhelmingly Favor Internet in Classrooms" is free from Meredith Hammans, Burson-Marsteller, 125 University Ave., Palo Alto, CA 94301; phone 415/463-4012.

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Kids with online access score higher

In 28 elementary and middle school classes in seven large cities, both experimental and control classes studied a common unit on civil rights and worked in groups to create project portfolios. On this common unit of study, the online information-using classes scored higher in completeness, demonstration of "best work" efforts, effectiveness of presentation, and more.

Teachers reported that those students also found more information more quickly, viewed the material as more relevant to their lives and were more engaged in the topic. The study, sponsored by the Council of the Great City Schools and Scholastic Network, is available on the Web at http://www.cast.org.

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Top teens worry a lot, some consider suicide

It seems the main cause of their distress is the pressure of growing up too fast.

Today's high-achieving teens worry about their personal safety in the halls at school and report a huge increase in the drug problem among their peers. Teens confront sexual time bombs such as date rape and pregnancy, and worry about their financial and educational futures, the study said.

"The most devastating thing we've learned is that too many of these kids see suicide as the only way out of the morass of problems," said Paul Krouse, publisher of Who's Who Among American High School Students.

"Too many adults often dismiss the notion that being a teenager is hard. After all, what could young people possibly have to worry about? Well . . . much like adults, today's teens have a lot weighing on their minds-affording college, crime and drugs, sexual violence, their economic futures, not to mention their family life."

Selected results of the survey are as follows:

• Suicide: one-quarter (26 percent) have considered committing suicide and four percent have tried.
• Parental influence: students say their family problems-a fight with parents (40 percent) and divorce/family problems (20 percent) -are among the reasons they have considered suicide.
• Divorce: students whose parents have divorced were more likely to have considered suicide (32 percent versus 24 percent) or tried to commit suicide (7 percent versus 3 percent) than those with married parents.
• Sex: those teens who have had sex were more likely to have considered suicide (38 percent versus 23 percent) or tried to commit suicide (10 percent versus 3 percent) than teens who have abstained.
• Rape: 31 percent of those who have been forced to have sex by a friend or acquaintance-and 19 percent of those who have been forced by a date-have tried to commit suicide.
• Stress and depression: more than half of the students (51 percent) say they often or always feel stressed out, and 15 percent say they often or always feel depressed.
• Drugs in school: one in three students (33 percent) believe drugs and alcohol are the most serious problems facing their high schools (more than double the 16 percent found in last year's survey).

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Tools for Schools

Grants to aid technology-based projects

Applicants can propose projects that improve computer-aided learning and training for teachers and educators teaching with technology. Proposals should show the potential for replicating the project.

Applicants are asked to send initial letters of interest before full proposals.

For more information, contact Marti Branch, Compaq Computer Corporation, Box 692000-040511, Houston, TX 77269-2000. Phone: 713/514-0527.

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State Board offers directory designed to be user friendly

Individuals faced with a thorny problem or issue requiring more immediate attention may call the State Board's problem resolution office at 800/215-6379.

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Focus on the brain

Scientists have learned a great deal in recent years about how the brain develops, how language is acquired, the existence of critical periods for different types of learning, and more. Much has been learned, as well, about how children display different kinds of intelligence, and how various kinds of memory function.

Yet neuroscientists rarely talk to educators.

The Education Commission of the States (ECS) attempted to redress that problem in a workshop held last year that brought together neuroscientists, cognitive psychologists, education researchers, practitioners, and policymakers to explore recent neurological research findings and their implications for education. Among the recommendations from the workshop:

• Undertake a major national study to develop education policies based on what is known about how children learn.
• Encourage state programs that address impediments to brain development, such as prenatal care and maternal nutrition, smoking, and drug use.
• Require schools of education to expand their teaching of early childhood development.

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Federal Update

U.S. Education Secretary to stay

President Clinton announced December 20 that Riley will continue to serve as U.S. Secretary of Education.

In a statement accepting the position for four more years, Riley said: "The President laid out a very bold mainstream education agenda for the second term...from improving literacy, to connecting up to the Internet, to greater access to college for many more Americans."

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Clinton clarifies position on vouchers

He said he always thought states and cities should be allowed to provide vouchers to let parents pay for tuition at private schools and supports Milwaukee's right to have such a program, "but I am not going to encourage or discourage it."

The President said he opposes a federal program for private-school vouchers. "Our aid is too limited, as it is too targeted," he said. "And if I were at the state or local level, I would not be in favor of it because I think the schools are underfunded."

But Clinton said he believes state and local governments have the legal right to enact private school voucher programs and he doesn't support "any action to take that legal right away from them." If local and state leaders "think that the situation is totally out of hand and they want to try what they did in Milwaukee, I think they ought to have the right to do it."

When asked whether he had "any initiatives or programs in mind that can reform, if not rescue, the public schools of America," Mr. Clinton responded that "the rescue of the public schools of America will have to be done by the people who are in control of them"

"We do fundamentally have local control of our schools," Mr. Clinton said.

The President also said he supports "the establishment in every state of national standards of excellence and means of ensuring it."

Now that we have National Education Goals, Mr. Clinton said, "the next step is plainly to devise-not federal government [standards]-but national standards of excellence." Then, there has to be "a nationally recognized means of testing kids so that we know, by some more or less universal standards, whether our kids know what they're supposed to know."

"Unless we're prepared to hold all of our kids up to the light of real measurement," he said, "we'll never succeed in having a genuine national education system."

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Board members may take tax deduction

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Illinois FRN delegation lobbies

The FRN is a nationwide organization of local school board members, coordinated by the National School Boards Association.

The theme of this year's FRN Conference is "New Election, New Congress, New Agenda." Three priority issues will be emphasized: 1) continuing efforts to improve special education; 2) passing new legislation to curb mandates and regulations on schools; and 3) drawing the line against taxpayer-funded vouchers.

A full day of lobbying on Capitol Hill is planned for January 28. Prior to that, FRN delegates will get briefings on major education issues that will be considered by Congress this year.

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Workshops & Meetings

Workshop dates set on building support

The presentation, conducted by Jamie Vollmer & Associates, is designed to offer entertaining and practical suggestions to halt the erosion of public trust, and promote community-wide approval for school plans for the future. It will:

• Survey the causes and implications of the rift between the American public and public schools.
• Present the reasons why community groups resist proposed changes in their schools.
• Challenge the conventional wisdom regarding the need to increase community involvement.
• Explain the importance and mechanics of asking for community permission.
• Provide immediately useful print and video materials with a schedule of activities.

The registration fee is $385 ($65 for additional attendees from same district). To register call the Local Control Project Office at 515/472-1558.

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Business & education conference set

The 1997 national conference will allow local school leaders to meet with business leaders to exchange ideas, build effective and practical solutions, and initiate or strengthen policies and programs that support family and employee involvement in education.

Conference organizers say speakers will describe how they:

• achieve bottom-line benefits and results
• sell programs and involve management and employees
• manage programs effectively in a period of scarce resources
• measure and make programs accountable
• collaborate with education partners to support school reform efforts.

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NSBA yearly conference set for April 26-29

A special workshop curriculum designed to help new school board members face the challenges of school board service will be taught by several of the best board development facilitators in the country. Pat Fitzwater, consultant and long-time board development director for the Oregon School Boards Association, will lead the workshops.

Details on registration, housing, speaker biographies, seminar descriptions, and Anaheim dining and attractions are available from the NSBA Annual Conference fax-on-demand system. Phone 800/934-3967 for a complete listing of conference documents.

For additional Conference information, or to register, call NSBA toll-free at 800/950-6722.

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The National Scene

Grant launches NSBA foundation

The grant will fund a policy makers tool kit that will include a broad range of strategies and techniques for utilizing technology to improve student achievement. The tool kit will be delivered to school board members and other decision makers electronically as well as in more traditional formats.

The kit will cover a range of technology-related topics, including models of successful school programs that use technology, research findings on the value of technology, effective strategies for staff development as well as advice on funding and involving the entire community in bringing technology to the classroom.

Information in the tool kit will be available without charge to school board members throughout the United States via the World Wide Web on the NSBA's Institute for the Transfer of Technology (ITTE) home page (www.nsba.org/itte).

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Count shows 4,000 school web home pages in U.S.

The total number of sites is more than three times greater than one year ago:

American School Directory creates web sites

Each site in the American School Directory (ASD) will display the school name, colors, mascot, basic information, a daily announcement board, a wish list seeking contributions, space for student work, and more. Also included will be an alumni registration page, an ASD search option and links to a map showing the school's location and to teacher and student home pages.

Schools that choose to tailor material to their needs will also feature a link to a "School Store" selling books, magazines and education software, with part of the proceeds to be applied to school acquisitions of technology. Computers for Education operates a similar arrangement with schools based on students' sales of magazine subscriptions.

For more information, see the ASD beta test Web site, http://204.146.213.157; contact ASD, 180 Freedom Ave., P.O. Box 7003, Murfreesboro, TN 37133-7003; 800/444-4488; or contact Elijah Collard, vice president of marketing of Computers for Education, at 615/896-3800, http://www.cfe.com.

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Recent mailings from IASB

January 6: IASB Constitution and Position Statements booklet, mailed to district superintendents.

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Illinois School District Liquid Asset Fund Plus

More than $608 million was invested in the Certificate of Deposit program, at rates ranging from 5.15 percent for a 30-day certificate to 5.73 percent for a one-year certificate. For more information about ISDLAF+, call, toll-free, 1-800/221-4524.

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Classified ads

FOR SALE: 400 student lockers-Republic Steel brand, combination locks, good condition. Size: 12" x 15" x 36". One library circulation desk. One complete science lab with lab tables, sinks, gas jets, electrical outlets, fume hood, and storage. Also six dissection/lecture tables with slate tops, good condition. All available June, 1997. Contact Dr. John Metzger, Superintendent, Johnston City School District. Phone 618/983-8021.

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IASB School Board News Bulletin
Illinois Association of School Boards