Superintendent Randy Dorn’s 2012 Legislative Priorities

Superintendent Randy Dorn will spend much of the 2012 legislative session fighting to retain basic education funding. He will also focus on helping to improve ineffective teachers and writing rules for what to do when a district is financially insolvent.

Retain basic education funding.

It’s in our Constitution as the state’s “paramount duty” to amply fund basic education. I plan to hold the Governor and the Legislature to their responsibility. There can be no cuts to basic education. I don’t believe cutting days from the school year is the answer; doing so is a cut to basic education. A number of one-time savings are possible: delaying when schools receive their levy equalization money by two months, delaying when districts receive some of their apportionment money by two weeks and delaying depreciation payments for school buses by nine months. Adding those would save the state about $600 million dollars.

Improve or remove ineffective teachers.

The Teacher/Principal Evaluation Pilot program, which was tasked by the Legislature to create a new, uniform evaluation system for teachers and principals, is proving to be a successful pilot. What members of the pilot program are doing now is the best in the nation. There’s a lot of support for their work, both from teachers and administrators. Once the system is fully functional, it will better help districts to recognize outstanding teachers and principals as well as identify those who need additional support.

I remain concerned about how to deal with ineffective teachers. The first step is to help them improve. If that’s not possible, districts need more flexibility in dealing with them. My proposal is this: teachers who receive the lowest rating in their evaluations will be put on a plan of improvement. If they receive the lowest rating again the next year, they will be placed on provisional status.

Write rules to address district financial insolvency.

If education continues to suffer more budget cuts, school districts could be faced with bankruptcy. That happened in 2007, when the Vader Schools District failed to pass levies and dissolved. Unfortunately the rules on what happens if a district can’t pay its bills are unclear. Make no mistake, though: I am not proposing that districts consolidate. I hope all 295 districts remain solvent. But we do need clear rules in case they aren’t. I plan to introduce legislation that will clarify the process of insolvency.

When he took office in January 2009, Dorn created a set of five priorities that would guide his tenure. With the exception of education funding, Dorn said that measurable success can be found in each of his priorities.

Improve academic achievement for all students and reduce dropout rates.

This year, the state’s extended graduation rate—which includes those students who take longer than four years to graduate— topped 80 percent for the first time. We want that number to be higher, but it’s going in the right direction.

Our schools and our educators should be applauded for their efforts in this area. We’ve made a targeted push in this area by expanding and adding a number of dropout-prevention programs, including Navigation 101, Building Bridges, Jobs for America’s Graduates and the College Success Foundation.

Promote early learning opportunities.

I am particularly proud about the progress made in early learning. Early learning is a dropout retrieval program. It is also a high school graduation program. Investment in early learning pays off throughout a student’s education: a student entering kindergarten with the required skills for that age will tend to stay in school and eventually graduate. Accomplishments in our state include the expansion of schools offering all-day kindergarten and the development of the Washington Kindergarten Inventory of Developing Skills (WaKIDS), which gives teachers an understanding about where students are, socially emotionally and congitively when entering kindergarten. State funding for full-day Kindergarten was increased by the Legislature in 2011.

Expand career and technical education and STEM opportunities.

Expanding career and technical education programs and Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) opportunities give students a chance at applied learning. And certification pathways, such as the Microsoft IT Academy, and aerospace pathways designed in conjunction with Boeing Corp. and other partners can help students see what those careers will look like earlier in their education. Students need to know math concepts but also how to use those concepts in their daily lives. They also need those opportunities in elementary school, not just at middle and high school.

I also favor getting teachers and faculty members more involved in public/private partnerships. One way this can happen is through internships. For example, giving teachers the opportunity to intern at a company for a summer would not only help that teacher’s professional growth, it would easily filter to the teacher’s students.

Increase online participation in statewide assessments.

To reduce the costs of our assessment system, all schools will eventually need to be online. In spring 2012, the grades 3-8 Measurements of Student Progress will be offered online in reading, math and science. In addition, the state is part of the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium, which is developing an online testing system that will assess the Common Core State Standards in math and English-language arts. Moving online not only saves costs, it increases efficiencies within the testing system.