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School Board News Bulletin
March 2000

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Lincoln Foundation conference offers opportunity to
jump-start schools towards greater excellence

IASB to join IASA in filing court brief in support of Decatur

Boards urge High Court to affirm racial diversity policies; NSBA & IASB file court brief

ISBE hires high-priced lobbyists in bid to boost federal funding

Submit nominations for Those Who Excel awards

THE NATIONAL SCENE

Investigative reporter finds teacher supply problems overstated

"Alternative" schools gaining popularity

NEWS FROM IASB

Law books are due in May

Satellite workshops coming this spring

Five-state project focuses policy on student learning

RESEARCH REPORTS

New poll shows parents like their public schools

Education is uppermost in voters’ minds

Teacher quality strongly linked to achievement

Smaller schools can overcome poverty effects on student achievement

FEDERAL UPDATE

Senate considers tax break to help parents pay for private schools

TOOLS FOR SCHOOLS

School financing study offered

Song contest tunes up drug prevention effort

Plan in works to launch a C-SPAN for Illinois

Video training series offered on "discipline with dignity"

WORKSHOPS & MEETINGS

School public relations seminar set

Integrated pest management is topic of seminars

2000 business & education conference is May 3-4

LEGISLATIVE ACTION

Private school funding proposed

School breakfast program incentives discussed

DEVELOPMENTS IN SCHOOL LAW

The Lincoln Foundation is a non-profit association dedicated to helping Illinois organizations of all sizes, including school districts, improve their performance excellence. The Best Practices Conference 2000 offers an opportunity to:

• Hear and network with managers and executives across a range of sectors
• Discover their real-life best practices and success strategies
• Learn how they have focused their organizations' resources, overcome cultural barriers and involved their entire work force in a concentrated effort to reach new levels of performance excellence
• Learn about the Baldrige in Education Initiative: Raising Student Achievement (BiE IN)
• Learn about Lincoln Foundation Award recipients own "best practices"
• Return home with dozens of realistic strategies and tactics you can implement immediately

The Best Practices Conference 2000 will offer a forum to identify - and share - the best practices across five sectors of activity: industrial enterprises, service providers, health care organizations, educational institutions, and government agencies. Over 24 information-packed breakout sessions are planned, featuring leaders from award-winning organizations such as AC Nielsen, W.W. Grainger and SwedishAmerican Health Systems. The registration fee is $279 per person for the conference to be held Tuesday, May 2, 2000 at the Sheraton Chicago Hotel and Towers. To register or for more information, log on to the Web site at http://www.lincolnaward.org, or call 312/258-5301.

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IASB and the Illinois Association of School Administrators (IASA) will file a brief with the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in support of Decatur District 61 over a heavily publicized case involving expulsion of seven students for fighting. The local district's expulsion decision has drawn national attention because of a series of protests lodged against the school board by the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition.

"The locally elected members of the Decatur Board of Education, representing the community and students' interests, developed the student discipline rules and enforced them," said Melinda Selbee, IASB General Counsel. "This is a democratic means for the community to have a voice in the governance of education. To protect this local voice, we will urge the Court to limit its scope of review.

"We will ask the Court to limit its review to whether fundamental fairness was provided and whether the board's action was supported by reasonable justification. We are confident that the Court will answer both inquiries affirmatively," Selbee stated.

On January 11, U.S. District Judge Michael McCuskey upheld the school board's action in expelling the students, finding that courts have little authority to interfere in the disciplinary actions of local boards of education. The federal judge rejected all the arguments advanced by the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson and his attorneys, who said they would appeal the case.

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NSBA, IASB and 15 other organizations have urged the U.S. Supreme Court to recognize the authority of local school officials to make decisions considering race or ethnicity as a factor in making student transfers and other building assignments.

The case, Montgomery County (MD) Public Schools v. Eisenberg, challenges a transfer program developed by the Montgomery County Maryland school district to avoid racial isolation and preserve diversity within the district. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled that the district's transfer policy was unconstitutional because it violates the 14th Amendment's equal protection clause. NSBA's amici curiae (friend of the court) brief encourages justices to examine the matter and to leave educational decisions about diversity to local school officials.

School districts need guidance about how race can be considered when assigning students in elementary and secondary schools, the brief contends.

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In a rare move designed to obtain a bigger share of federal education funding for Illinois schools, the State Board of Education (ISBE) recently agreed to pay over $120,000 to hire the sixth-largest Washington D.C. lobbying firm. The board of higher education and the state's community college board agreed to help fund a five-month contract with the Washington law firm of Barbour, Griffith & Rogers, together contributing roughly $60,000.

"Given the amount of federal funds in the balance, it would be irresponsible for us not to have a significant presence in Washington," said Illinois Superintendent of Education Glenn W. McGee.

The state's share of federal funding recently has increased at a lower rate than for other large states, according to U.S. Department of Education statistics. Federal funding to Illinois schools has increased by 14 percent over the past three years, rising to $1.28 billion in fiscal year 2000 from $1.12 billion in fiscal year 1998. Meanwhile, Florida and California funding from federal sources grew by 18 percent and 20 percent, respectively.

Source: Education Week, February 23, 2000.

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School districts should be receiving nomination forms and instructions for the ISBE's annual Those Who Excel Awards program within the next three to four weeks. The deadline for submitting nominations this year is July 12. School leaders are asked to nominate those, including board members, who have made outstanding contributions to their local schools. For more information call ISBE's public affairs office at 217/782-4648.

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THE NATIONAL SCENE

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Investigative reporter finds teacher supply problems overstated

A March 1 report by Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Alan J. Borsuk says concern is overblown about the two million additional teachers experts suggest will be needed nationwide in the coming decade. "The issue is really misconstrued and overblown because we've been hiring teachers at the rate of about two million every decade for quite a long time now," an expert on teacher hiring trends told Borsuk.

Moreover, of the roughly 200,000 teachers hired every year, only about 25 percent are truly new to the profession. The statistics were provided by C. Emily Feistritzer, president of the Washington-based National Center for Education Information, and an authority on teacher hiring tendencies.

"Finding a way to attract teacher candidates to places and subjects that haven't been sufficiently appealing is where the challenge of dealing with the teaching shortage really lies," Borsuk summarized. He noted there remain problems finding teachers in inner cities, and in mathematics, science and special education subject areas.

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"Alternative" schools gaining popularity

A growing number of American families are choosing alternative schools, according to a study by Policy Analysis for California Education. The report shows eight million students in grades K-12 now attend some kind of alternative to neighborhood schooling. That represents an increase of 2.5 million students since 1993.

Between 1993 and 1997, the number of students taking part in public school choice programs -- such as open enrollment, charter schools, and magnet schools -- has increased from 5.3 million (11 percent of school-age children), to 7.8 million (15 percent). The ratio of school-age children attending private schools has remained at 10 percent for the past three decades.

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NEWS FROM IASB

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Law books are due in May

Both the 2000 edition of the Illinois School Code and Related Laws and the Sixth Edition of Illinois School Law Survey are in preparation and should be available by early May.

Both books, published by IASB, will be current with changes in the law as of January 1, 2000.

This year for the first time, each copy of the Illinois School Code will come with a computer version--a CD ROM bound into the back of each book. The disk will contain both PC and Apple Macintosh compatible versions of all of the statutes contained in the publication plus complete annotations covering court interpretations, legal history, and related references. (The print version does not include annotations.)

The CD is licensed to run on one computer.

Regular price of the 2000 Code (including the CD) will be $27 each, ($22 for IASB members) plus $4 per order for shipping. Licenses for using the CD on networked computers will be $5 for each additional workstation.

Prices for Illinois School Law Survey, Sixth Edition, will be $25 each ($20 for IASB members).

A complimentary copy of the 2000 Illinois School Code will be mailed to each district superintendent, along with a form for ordering additional copies.

Watch your mail for details and ordering information.

SPECIAL THANKS to the district superintendents who responded so promptly to the IASB survey regarding the Illinois School Code on CD ROM. More than 80 percent said they favor getting the Code on disk as well as in print. Including a disk with every print copy makes the cost a fraction of what it would otherwise be.

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Satellite workshops coming this spring

IASB and Western Illinois University (WIU) have announced they will offer a series of four satellite workshops this spring. The workshops will be aimed at assisting board members and other school leaders in developing a greater understanding of proper roles, responsibilities and relationships in local schools. These sessions, to be downlinked at numerous locations around the state from Star-Net and KU-Band satellite transmissions, will explore:

• Student discipline (April 6), featuring David Turner, Executive Director of the Illinois Principals Association

• School finance for board members (April 19), featuring Randy Dunn of Southern Illinois University

• Board/Superintendent (May 10), featuring Walt Warfield, Executive Director of the Illinois Association of School Administrators

• Leading change (May 17), featuring John Allen, Field Services Director of the Illinois Association of School Boards

The workshops will be offered free of charge to interested participants. To learn the location of the downlink site nearest you, contact the Illinois Regional Superintendent of Education in your area.

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Five-state project focuses policy on student learning

Five state school boards associations, including IASB, recently unveiled the results of a two-year project designed to refocus school district policy-making efforts on issues that most directly impact student learning. This joint effort aimed to determine how policy content and processes can be improved to better support education reforms at the national, state and local levels.

The resulting publication, Targeting Student Learning: The School Board's Role as Policymaker, contains material to assist boards and superintendents in focusing on student-learning issues while maintaining a comprehensive approach to policy. The publication urges school leaders to re-examine the processes they use to develop, adopt and implement policies, and clearly explains how to make policy work in local districts. More specifically, the 85-page booklet calls for a policy process that is closely linked to the district's vision for its schools, as well as its budget, planning approach, and other practices.

The booklet is available from IASB for $12, plus $4 shipping. To order phone Tammy Skaggs at either IASB office, ext. 1108.

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RESEARCH REPORTS

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New poll shows parents like their public schools

Those who really know the local public schools--parents--have a positive view of them, according to a recent survey conducted for the Pew Center for Civic Journalism. The great majority of Americans, 84 percent, also said they feel safe in their local schools.

Those findings, contained in the report Straight Talk from Americans 2000: The Nation, echo a recent American Association of School Administrators poll and other surveys. Specifically, 52 percent of parents with children under 18 say they are very satisfied with the schools their children attend and another 35 percent say they are somewhat satisfied, the Pew survey found. Just 10 percent say they are not very satisfied or not at all satisfied.

For more information, visit the Web site at http://www.pewcenter.org/doingcj/research/r_ST2000nat2.html .

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Education is uppermost in voters' minds

A new report published in American Demographics magazine titled "Mixed signals in education" indicates the top national issue for most voters in this election year is education. Specifically, surveys indicate roughly 80 percent of Americans agree that an extremely significant factor in choosing a Presidential candidate is the candidate's view on school improvement. The report also notes that many more Americans still say that they have a great deal of respect for public schools (36 percent) than that they have little or no respect (26 percent). Source: American Demographics, March 2000.

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Teacher quality strongly linked to achievement

According to a new study by Linda Darling-Hammond of Stanford University, student demographics are less influential in predicting achievement levels than variables associated with teacher quality. The study, published in Education Policy Analysis Archives, also says teacher quality appears to be more strongly related to student achievement than factors such as class size, overall spending levels and even teacher salaries. For more information, visit the Web site at http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v8n1 .

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Smaller schools can overcome poverty effects on student achievement

Smaller schools are conducive to higher achievement, according to a new study by the Rural School and Community Trust. Specifically, the study found smaller schools can limit the damaging effects of poverty on student achievement. The study also found that smaller schools in impoverished communities help narrow the achievement gap between their students and the students from wealthier communities. For more information visit the Web site at http://www.ruraledu.org or phone Rural Schools and Community Trust at 202/955-7177.

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TOOLS FOR SCHOOLS

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School financing study offered

A new book from the National Research Council discusses various aspects of school financing and how they relate to student achievement. The book, Making Money Matter: Financing America's Schools, covers topics such as legal and legislative efforts to reduce spending, the shift from "equity" to "adequacy" as the standard to measure fairness in spending, and strategies for using school finance to support broader reforms in an effort to raise student achievement. For more information or to purchase the report, visit the Web site at http://www.nap.edu/catalog/9606.html .

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Song contest tunes up drug prevention effort

Last year the state kicked off a substance abuse prevention campaign called "Illinois…Get in the kNOw." The effort, part of the Futures for Kids program, informed thousands of people about the dangers of drug use. This year, that same campaign is inviting students, ages 10 to 17, to voice their views on how substance abuse impacts their lives, by writing original lyrics for a songwriting contest. Entry forms and information are available by phone at 312/895-4747.

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Plan in works to launch a C-SPAN for Illinois

Illinois may be getting its own version of C-SPAN, and school leaders could help determine what appears on the air. The Institute for Public Affairs at the University of Illinois at Springfield is conducting a comprehensive study of just what would be involved in starting a statewide public affairs television channel. To register your suggestions visit the study's Illinois Channel web site, http://www.uis.edu/illinoischannel and click on the button marked Feedback. That leads to a short, online survey where visitors can register their ideas.

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Video training series offered on "discipline with dignity"

Schools are increasingly faced with "students whose behavior is angry, hostile, even violent," according to Jeneen Conway, principal of an alternative high school in Niles, Michigan. Conway's high school is one of over 700 schools in the United States and Canada that have begun to tackle the problem of aggressive and violent youth, using research-based strategies presented in the video series titled As Tough as Necessary. Copies of the four 20-minute videos are available from the National Educational Service for $395, plus shipping and handling; copies of the Discipline Toolbox, a four-book set, are available for $66 plus shipping and handling. For more information, contact Amy Royer at 800/733-6786 or e-mail amy.royer@nesonline.com .

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WORKSHOPS & MEETINGS

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School public relations seminar set

July 9-12 will mark the 47th anniversary of the national seminar on school public relations of the National School Public Relations Association (NSPRA). This year's seminar, to be held in San Antonio, Texas, will focus on emerging and new approaches to communications. With the theme, "NSPRA 2000: Innovative Ideas for the 21st Century," the seminar will cover the explosive growth of instant telecommunications devices for schools and homes, the impact of "new media" and "e-community relations," and how these new tools can help save money and increase communications effectiveness. Participants will save $60 by registering and paying before May 26, 2000. For more information, phone NSPRA at 301/519-0496.

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Integrated pest management is topic of seminars

Did you know that a new state law, Public Act 91-525, requires that public schools notify the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) in writing if they cannot adopt integrated pest management because it is too costly? And that an integrated pest management program meeting IDPH guidelines must be adopted by schools by August 1, 2000? The text of this statute is available online at http://www.ilga.gov/.

IDPH will be hosting a series of one-day free seminars around the state in April on integrated pest management for school leaders, particularly those in districts where in-house personnel conduct the school pest-control program. The department is urging one school administrator and one buildings and grounds employee to attend. Seminar dates and location are: April 13 in LaSalle at the Illinois Valley Banquet Center, 920 2nd Street; April 14 in Willowbrook at the Holiday Inn, I-55 & Rt. 83; April 26 in Springfield at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, 3000 S. Dirksen; and April 28 in Mt. Vernon at the Holiday Inn, I-55 & I-64.

For more information, contact IDPH staff at 217/782-5830.

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2000 business & education conference is May 3-4

With the theme, "Building strategic partnerships that work--from the inside-out," employers, educators and other community leaders have announced plans for the 2000 Business and Education Conference. The event will be held May 3-4 at the Hilton Hotel & Towers in New York City.

Conference organizers say speakers will describe how businesses with measurable results are partnering with other business, education, government and community stakeholders to:

• develop a strategic plan for educational involvement with business strategy
• identify and recruit additional partners and develop a strategic plan for the partnership
• measure and evaluate their partnership's results
• use results for program improvement and decision making in the future

The conference registration fee is $1,195 ($375 for educators). To learn more visit the Web site at http://www.conference-board.org/fus&ed.htm or phone the Conference Board customer service line at 212/339-0345 from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. weekdays to register.

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FEDERAL UPDATE

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Senate considers tax break to help parents pay for private schools

The U.S Senate is debating action to expand education savings accounts to allow tax-free expenditures for K-12 tuition in public, private and religious schools. The proposal, Senate Bill 1134, the Affordable Education Act, would cost more than $2 billion over the next ten years, according to the Congressional Joint Tax Committee. Critics say that expanded education savings accounts would be used predominantly by affluent families and would provide little benefit to lower and middle income families. NSBA is opposed to this legislation, suggesting that Congress should instead fulfill the federal government's current unmet obligations to public schools by fully funding special education, for example. For more information, call Kathleen Branch of NSBA at 703/838-6735.

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LEGISLATIVE ACTION

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Private school funding proposed

The Catholic Conference of Illinois announced in a March 8 press conference a proposal to give private schools approximately $50 million in state funding. The plan, which has not yet appeared in bill form, would provide the non-public schools $200 per student to pay for "required" duties such as building safety, report filing, standardized testing and the hiring of certificated teachers. Although non-public schools are not required to meet most of the state mandates that public schools must follow, supporters of the proposal claimed that most private schools meet the same standards in order to compete with the public schools.

House Speaker Michael Madigan has indicated he supports the funding proposal. Senate President "Pate" Philip has expressed concerns about its constitutionality. Governor George Ryan has stated that the proposal is "under consideration." The Illinois School Management Alliance and the statewide teachers' unions immediately declared their opposition to any such plan.

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School breakfast program incentives discussed

The ISBE proposal to encourage districts to offer a school breakfast program is still being discussed, but statehouse insiders say there will be no state mandate on the subject. At the insistence of the Illinois School Management Alliance, proponents of House Bill 2379 have agreed to drop the provision requiring certain school districts to offer breakfasts. Statehouse lobbyists say a bill may be adopted this session to create financial incentives encouraging school districts to establish a school breakfast program.

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DEVELOPMENTS IN SCHOOL LAW
by Melinda Selbee

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Despite finding that a teacher created a gender-hostile environment, the State Board of Education's appointed hearing officer ordered him reinstated. According to the hearing officer, the school board should have dealt with the teacher's misconduct with a notice to remedy and corrective discipline, not dismissal. The school board, taking a no-tolerance approach to a staff member's creation of a gender-hostile environment, appealed the hearing officer's decision; however, the appellate court affirmed it.

Recognizing its role as an appellate court, rather than as a fact-finder, the Court of Appeals first addressed whose decision should be given deference - the school board's or hearing officer's. The school board urged that its decision concerning whether conduct was irremediable should carry greater weight than the hearing officer's. This argument, however, was unpersuasive. The Court paid attention to only the hearing officer's findings. Thus, the Court began its second step of the review process -- reviewing the hearing officer's ruling to determine if it was factually against the manifest weight of the evidence or legally erroneous.

The Court found that the hearing officer's conclusion that the teacher's conduct was remediable was not against the manifest weight of the evidence. The record supported the hearing officer's finding that the teacher did not engage in overt sexual harassment, immoral activity, or sexual solicitation. Creating a hostile environment - while serious - is remediable. When conduct is remediable, the failure to give a written warning requires a reversal of the teacher's dismissal. Shreve v. Board of Education of Mount Vernon High School District No. 201, 4th District, Court of Appeals, December 1999, No. 4-99-0132.

The International Insurance Company sold a school district two property insurance policies that provided coverage from April 1, 1981 to March 31, 1986, for "all risk of physical loss or damage." In 1983, an architectural firm hired by the school district found "friable" asbestos in three of its schools. The inspector opined that the building materials were releasing harmful fibers into the air, thereby creating a significant health hazard to the schools' occupants. The school district incurred over $2.6 million in asbestos removal and restoration costs between June 1994 and July 1996.

The school district sought a declaratory judgment that the policies covered the damage resulting from the friable asbestos and toxic fibers. The circuit court, however, granted the insurance company's plea for a summary judgment; the school district appealed.

The insurance company maintained that the presence of friable asbestos does not constitute "physical loss or damage." Instead, it urged, the presence of asbestos-containing products resulted in an economic loss and resulting diminished market value of the buildings. The Court of Appeals, relying on Illinois Supreme Court precedent, found that the asbestos fiber contamination met the policies' property damage definition.

The insurance company also disputed that there was factual proof of asbestos fibers in the buildings. The Court rejected this contention stating that the school district, as a non-moving party in a summary judgment case, is not required to prove its case but only present some factual basis to support its claim. Here, the inspector's testimony about the presence of friable asbestos constituting a significant health hazard was sufficient to withstand summary judgment.

The Court also rejected the insurance company's argument there was no physical loss or damage during the period the policies were in effect. The insurance company, in other words, asserted that the asbestos use predated the policies' issuance and, thus, the school district could not claim coverage under them. The Court of Appeals found that the trigger period for coverage purposes begins with the installation of the friable asbestos materials and ends when those materials are removed or contained. As there was evidence that the materials were present in the buildings since at least 1983, the insurance policies in effect at that time were triggered.

The insurance company finally argued that it should not have to pay for the asbestos removal costs incurred after the policies expired. This argument was flawed, however, because the analysis rests on the trigger period, not on the policy period. Asbestos property damage is an ongoing, continuous process, triggering every policy in effect during the period beginning with material's installation and ending with its removal or containment. Board of Education of Township High School District 211 v. International Insurance Company, 1st District, Illinois Court of Appeals, December 1999, No. 1-98-0084.

To be covered in next News Bulletin: Illinois waiver law survives challenge.

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IASB ARCHIVES HOME

Illinois Association of School Boards

2921 Baker Drive
Springfield, Illinois 62703