Education reform group forges voucher-like plan for Michigan
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Lansing — A secret work group that
includes top aides to Gov. Rick Snyder has been meeting since December
to develop a lower-cost model for K-12 public education with a funding
mechanism that resembles
school vouchers.
The education reform advisory team has
dubbed itself a "skunk works" project working outside of the government
bureaucracy and education establishment with a goal of creating a "value
school" that
costs $5,000 per child annually to operate, according to meeting
minutes and reports obtained by The Detroit News.
The records show designers of the "value
school" are in talks with Bay Mills Community College about opening a
technology-centric charter school by August 2014. The school would seek
to maximize
the roughly $7,000 annual per-pupil funding regular schools get from
taxpayers by applying "concepts familiar in the private sector — getting
higher value for less money."
Other records distributed to group members
indicate they want to explore using fewer teachers and more instruction
through long-distance video conferencing. Each "value school" student
would receive
a "Michigan Education Card" to pay for their "tuition" — similar to the
electronic benefits transfer used to distribute food stamps and cash
assistance for the poor.
Students could use leftover money on the
"EduCard" for high school Advanced Placement courses, music lessons,
sport team fees, remedial education or cyber courses, according to an
outline of the
advisory team's agenda.
Snyder confirmed Thursday the existence of the work group, but told The News "there is not a specific outcome" for the project.
The Republican governor has urged changing
how education is delivered by having tax dollars follow the student
instead of locking them into a traditional classroom setting and school
year.
"It wasn't a directive of the governor,"
Snyder spokeswoman Sara Wurfel said, "but he's always interested in
seeing what people can come up with" in education innovation.
The group's minutes indicate members
planned to pitch their concept to Snyder this month ahead of the
Governor's Education Summit on Monday in East Lansing.
But Snyder's chief information officer,
David Behen, who leads the group, said it has experienced "a bunch of
false starts" and is not ready.
"It's in line with what he wants to do, though," Behen said of the project's focus.
The initiative is "very unnerving" given
the history of Lansing lawyer Richard McLellan, a work group member, in
pursuing vouchers, said John Austin, president of the State Board of
Education,
who was unaware of the "skunk works" project. A voucher system lets
parents use tax dollars to choose between private and public schools —
something prohibited by the state Constitution.
"This is disturbing to hear of secret
group meetings," Austin said. "That reflects the ideology and political
agenda of the creation of a for-profit and parallel enterprise market
for schools.
Part of its goal is to take down the education establishment:
superintendents, school boards and teachers unions."
The panel's quiet proceedings began in
mid-December after GOP lawmakers abandoned controversial legislation in
the lame-duck session that would have allowed corporations,
municipalities and cultural
institutions to run charter schools.
McLellan helped draft the legislation and
proposed sweeping changes in November to the way Michigan schools are
funded. The plan was developed at Snyder's request by the Oxford
Foundation, of which
McLellan is a director, but has not been delivered to the governor.
Records obtained by The News show the
education reform team got a $20,000 "initial grant" from the Oxford
Foundation to assist "the Team in creating the technology intensive
school." McLellan asked
to be the group's treasurer, according to notes from a Jan. 10 meeting.
'Special kind of school'
The group consists of nearly 20
individuals, mostly from the information technology field, including
Behen and the state's chief technology officer, Rod Davenport. The group
includes employees
from the software and tech companies Vectorform in Royal Oak, InfoReady
in Ann Arbor and Billhighway in Troy. Also involved is Tim Cook of the
Huizenga Group, a Grand Rapids firm that owns and operates West Michigan
manufacturing companies.
One of the original members, Judy Wright
of the accounting firm Plante & Moran, quit the project because of
"potential client conflicts," said Dan Artman, the firm's spokesman. The
accounting firm
works for public school districts across the state.
The group had one educator, Paul
Galbenski, an Oakland Schools business teacher and Michigan's 2011
Educator of the Year, but he left the group.
"It really kind of looked like for me that
they were discussing a special kind of school being created outside of
the Michigan public school system," Galbenski said. "That's when I
started questioning
my involvement."
Records show the group has strived to
remain secretive, even adopting the "skunk works" alias, which dates to
defense contractor Lockheed Martin's secret development of fighter
planes during World
War II.
In January, participants were instructed
in a memo to use "alternative" email accounts. Records show Behen,
Davenport and two other Department of Technology, Management and Budget
employees have
since used private email addresses to correspond.
A Department of Education official, Bruce
Umpstead, joined the group after the private email directive and has
used his government email, records show.
A different approach
Behen said he and the other four state
employees are mostly working after-hours on the project with Friday
evening and Saturday meetings.
"Why are we using private email addresses?
Because it's just easier," Behen said. "There's nothing secret or
anything about this."
McLellan said the other participants are
justified in using private emails. "Well, they should," he said. "It's
not a government project."
"Isn't a skunk works by definition unorganized, backroom?" he asked rhetorically.
Behen said he formed the group after
meeting with McLellan and Rich Baird, a close adviser and friend of
Snyder who called the governor's "transformation manager" on a staff
list.
One memo crafting the group's mission said
it wanted to avoid working with education consultants who "are so
wedded to the education establishment that pays their bills and to the
existing paradigm
that an outside team of creative thinkers has a much better chance of
succeeding."
Behen said he "purposely didn't put a
bunch of teachers on (the panel)" to generate a different approach to
delivering K-12 education through rapidly changing technology.
"Just like if I was going to do something new with law firms, I wouldn't bring a bunch of lawyers in," Behen said.
Patrick Shannon, director of charter
schools at Bay Mills Community College, said the Upper Peninsula tribal
college that charters 42 public school academies across the state is
"very interested"
in helping launch a "value school." Shannon has attended one of the
group's meetings as has an official with the Educational Achievement
Authority in Detroit, records show.
"We're very much into the online and digital type of oversight as well. Let's try something different," Shannon said.
Staff Writer Jennifer Chambers contributed.
