Garrett questions education report

OKLAHOMA CITY -- While she said she "holds the same interest" as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, state school superintendent Sandy Garrett Wednesday questioned a report by the chamber which gave Oklahoma schools a failing grade.

Garrett's statement came one day after a joint legislative committee reviewed the U.S. Chamber's report, "Leaders and Laggards."

That study, released in February, criticized Oklahoma's education system in eight of nine areas and assigned school-like grades to those areas. The report gave the state a "D" overall and listed eight other areas which were below average.

Garrett was not asked to attend Tuesday's joint legislative meeting, her spokesman, Shelly Hickman, said.

"We certainly recognize the tie between education and economic vitality," Garrett said in a statement e-mailed to The Transcript Tuesday. "I'm proud to say we've had a strong working relationship with business leaders for more than a decade."

However, the U.S. Chamber's report, she said, was based on methodology that "is far from statistically sound."

"This report," Garrett said "uses data from 2003 and 2005 and does not take into account the efforts of Gov. Henry, state lawmakers and the State Board of Education during recent years. We've done much, including implementing the Achieving Classroom Excellence law, establishing early reading programs and expanding pre-kindergarten education, to name a few."

Earlier this week, state Sen. Kathleen Wilcoxson, R-Oklahoma City, described the chamber's report as "a wake up call for this state."

Wilcoxson, co-chair of the state Senate's Education Committee, said the report offered state leaders a "national perspective" on Oklahoma's educational system.

"If we really want to be competitive in the quest for attracting high-paying jobs to Oklahoma, we need to know the national perspective of our educational system. Education is an essential component to economic development and growth, and we can't ignore what the national research says about how Oklahoma compares with the rest of the nation," Wilcoxson said.

Garrett said the Council of Chief State School Officers also questioned the report, saying it did not take into account regional differences and demographics.

The state's system, Garrett said, looks like this:

The state is slightly below the national average in average ACT scores, which many believe is a much more reliable measure for comparing states in terms of college and workforce preparedness.

The state also is slightly below the national average on the National Assessment of Educational Progress in fourth grade reading and math, though it is above the national average in fourth grade science.

Oklahoma has reached the national average in eighth grade reading and eighth grade science and is slightly below the average in eighth grade math.

The state is significantly below the national average in its per pupil expenditures, ranking 47th nationally and next to the last among neighboring states.

The state is significantly below the national average in what it pays its teachers, ranking 48th nationally and dead last in its region. Arkansas ranks 36th, Texas 33rd, New Mexico 40th, Colorado 23rd, Kansas 41st and Missouri 43rd.

Students' test scores improved from 2005 to 2006 on all state tests in grades three through high school that are used for federal accountability purposes.

During Tuesday's meeting, former Republican gubernatorial candidate Burns Hargis called the report "disturbing."

"This report is frankly a knife in the heart of our economic development efforts," Hargis, a banker, said. "It's disturbing because we may think that this is just a tree that falls in the forest and nobody hears, but the fact is when you get into the recruiting business ... your competitors are bringing all this to the forefront."

Arthur J. Rothkopf, senior vice president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said Oklahoma was one of only 10 states to receive an "F" in academic achievement. He said the entire nation is falling behind other countries when it comes to academic achievement.

"What's at stake is nothing less than the continued success and competitiveness of the American economy and the continued viability of the American dream," he said. "Despite decades of reform efforts and many trillions of dollars in public investment, U.S. schools are not equipping our children with the skills and technology that they and the nation so badly need. Statistics don't lie, and the story they tell is appalling."

Dr. James Davis, Region 6 executive director of the U.S. Department of Education, said Oklahomans "need to know the truth" about public education.

"The educational leadership, the political leadership of the state of Oklahoma, need to take an honest look at what's happening with education in Oklahoma.?You can't be saying things just to make people feel good," Davis said. "You cannot allow leaders to mislead the public about what's happening in Oklahoma public education. If you do that, the day will come when the state is going to suffer a great deal."

Others, however, question the report's validity.

In an guest editorial published in the Washington Post, author Gerald W. Bracey described the "Leaders and Laggards" report as "scare techniques."

"If you can batter people into believing the schools are in awful shape, you can make them anxious about their future -- and you can control them," he said.

Bracey, an associate of the High-Scope Educational Research Foundation, a fellow at the Education Policy Studies Laboratory at Arizona State University and a fellow at the Education and the Public Interest Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder, said the report was similar to anti-schools techniques used in the 1980s.

"In the 1980s, the 'schools suck' bloc used such numbers to make us fearful that Japan, now emerging from a 15-year period of recession and stagnation, was going to take our markets; today, India and China play the role of economic ogres," he said.

Wilcoxson disagreed, and said the state needed to use the information presented to the committees to make critical improvements in public education.

"We cannot afford to gloss over the truth," she said. "Having the facts is an important first step. With enough political will, we have the opportunity to be a model state in moving from a laggard to a leader in education."

Garrett said the state must spend more on its schools and school teachers.

"Oklahoma's lack of financial investment relative to the rest of the nation in the areas of student expenditures and teacher pay obviously has a direct impact on its schools' ability to expand innovative programs and educational offerings," she said. "This negatively impacts their ability to be nationally and internationally competitive. To reap dividends, expand capacity and achieve long-term success, businesses must make investments in their employees, facilities and delivery systems. The same is true for schools."