Kentucky Education Commissioner Terry Holliday is taking a realistic, and optimistic, outlook about what Kentucky’s education system now will need to implement Senate Bill 1 (2009 Regular Session) after the announcement two days ago that Kentucky had not won any money in Race to the Top, Phase 2.
The commissioner told yesterday’s meeting in Frankfort of the School Curriculum Assessment and Accountability Committee:
“So I am saying everywhere as loud and clear as I can be heard, that I don’t think we need new dollars. I think we need redirected dollars in the state budget because new dollars are going to be difficult to find.
But, this is not a popular statement.
The state board last October started looking at ‘flow-through dollars’ – there’s $125 million that flows through the department of education for special programs that are great programs – love every one of them – but you cannot continue to run the small pilot programs for just a handful of districts when every teacher in the commonwealth needs textbooks.”
The commissioner is going to need support from legislators, who will need to refrain from loading down the education department with a lot of unfunded mandates and special, limited benefits pork projects while the education department works to bring Senate Bill 1 on line in an economical and effective manner.
Regarding the commissioner’s comment that he can make it work with existing resources, this is exactly the common-sense, frugal approach to government spending that we need to hear a lot more about in Frankfort, and not just from state educators.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Education commissioner adopts realistic outlook following Kentucky’s Race to the Top failure
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2 comments:
Compare Holliday's wishy-washy kinda-firm statement with the "quote of the century" from Tony Bennett in the previous blog. Bennett was clearly on the side of meaningful, and effective, reform. All Holliday does is talk. He even said he's not a supporter of charter schools. He's nothing more than a politician. Bennett, Holliday's counterpart in Indiana, is, by contrast, a real, effective and courageous leader who says what he thinks and means what he says.
RE: Anonymous Aug 27 at 9:43 AM
Thank you for taking the time to share your opinions with us.
I agree that Tony Bennett is a class act. I also am hearing from others who say they have been getting confusing messages from Commissioner Holliday about his real position on charter schools.
However, I absolutely do not share the opinion that Kentucky's education commissioner is nothing more than a politician.
Holliday has spoken out quite forthrightly on a number of issues like the finance one mentioned in the main blog. For example, he has been very direct about pushing some local education leaders who have endemically under-performing schools.
He is also pushing a much better plan for the state's new assessment and accountability system than anything I would have expected from any of his predecessors.
Holliday deserves a chance to show what he can do with Senate Bill 1, especially since he must do it now without the Race to the Top money.
And, I suspect he will work on making his charter school position much clearer now that it is becoming obvious that citizens in Kentucky are unsure about what he really is thinking in this area.
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