No. What you'd find is, you 63 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 know, under the arrangement, we would be the manager of the school. Children have entitlement dollars, so I'm not exactly sure -- and the entitlement dollars, the dollars follow the kid. We can't take or give away those dollars; it's a federal entitlement.
What credence do you put into independent studies, independent research?
Okay. I mean, it's clear that there's a lot of skepticism about Edison, given your very scattered -- personal opinion -- scattered track record of success, be it teacher turnover, be it cost overruns. And you say, in response to a number of questions, that we should disregard what we see on the Internet and we should disregard what other newspapers across the country have had to say about it in cities where you are currently located. Is that an inaccurate statement? 64 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642
And I would add to that -- let me finish. I would add to that that what you should do as well is talk to some of the people, you know, the schools, the districts, our clients.
And here's the response. In schools in Macon, Georgia, Wichita, Kansas, San Francisco, California, school boards are trying to end Edison's contract because of poor student performance and rising costs. Even many of the schools Edison claims are successes, like those in Miami, Florida and some in Illinois, have failed to show improvements and are at the bottom of the states' assessment tests. Should we not rely on that kind of independent assessment when school boards like the City of Philadelphia are having to make a judgment on whether or not we should embrace you?
I think we've got to get down on the level of the detail. If I could just take 65 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 your statement again, 'cause it's a general statement. Well, let's talk about, for example, we've been cited in Illinois for teacher turnover in Chicago. I've heard people say, Well, you've all these teachers turn over in Chicago. Let me give you some background on Chicago. We were brought in to Chicago to take over a school that wasn't an Edison school. It was actually being run by another management company, Sabus (ph.) and they were actually fired after the first year. We were brought in. And many of the teachers that were working in that school didn't want to work in the Edison system. They signed up for Sabus system, so there should have been turnover. In other words, some of the folks who work in that school shouldn't have been in an Edison school 'cause that's not what they signed up for. That helps to explain some of that. In Macon, Georgia --
In Macon, Georgia, we classified in our Fourth Annual Report we're unsatisfied with their performance, and they are two of the -- 66 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642
In Macon, Georgia, that's a school where we just didn't perform. If you take percent and multiply -- there's about of our 7 schools that aren't doing well. I mean, we can go 8 blow by blow there. We've said that these schools 9 are either flat or non-performing. 10 The two schools in Macon, Georgia, fall 11 into that category. We got to get our act together 12 on those two schools. It's important -- and it's 13 outlined in the report. It's not like we hid it. 14 In the report that we just gave you, we say, These 15 schools are flat and we didn't do a good job. I 16 mean -- 17
In your 18 report, what do you say about York County? which 19 is, for us, close to home. 20
The data wasn't available for York at the time of the report. And that's a first-year school, so we would consider the first-year scores for the PSSA baseline. That's listed as incomplete.
And in San Francisco, if you 67 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 don't mind --
And in York, just to finish there, that's a school that we've had nine months of operations in, and so we'd like to at least get another year under our belt before we're judged on how fast. Now, the point about some of our schools being at the bottom, that's why we were asked to come in. They were at the bottom when we walked in the door. So if you're moving a school system -- I'm using a hypothetical here -- from a 21st percentile to a 30 percentile, you still may be at the bottom.
Well, let's, move in the continuum. Cite two or three examples where you came in and there's a remarkable increase from where the school was at the point that you came in.
I can gave you three. There's a school in Baltimore, Montebello Academy. We've been cited for our record in Baltimore. Two out of the three schools in Baltimore that we took over. In one school, there were marginal gains, you know, five (indiscernible) and serious significant gains. 68 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 If you can do that every year, over five years, you turn the school around. This is first year now. These schools are in their second year. In one school, we took the school from being one of the worst-performing elementary schools to being the top performing elementary school in a year. Now, what I want to say to you is, doing that in a year is not something we do all the time. For some schools, it takes one, two, three years to really see that school turn around. Dallas -- there's a school in Dallas, Medrano, that we took, you know, in a year. And let's talk about the population in Baltimore. Very similar to the population of students in terms of demographics here in Philly -- primarily African-American. In Dallas, primarily Latino population, school near the bottom of the performance curve, and you might want to --
In Medrano, it was this year, I believe the highest gaining elementary in Dallas ISD.
Are you currently working with any high schools?
We currently work in seven high 69 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 schools.
That's new information. Okay, let me close with -- I do have an independent study, an evaluation of student achievement in Edison schools that was performed by Western Michigan University, and I need you to respond to this, recognizing that your response to the question was, it depends upon who does the independent study. And I quote: "Our findings suggest that Edison students do not perform as well as Edison claims in its annual reports on student performance." The next table -- and it cites several indices here. "Of our numerical ratings for the ten cases and the ratings Edison gave to these cases in its third annual report were" -- scratch the last sentence. Let me repeat the one that matters to me. "Our findings suggest that Edison students do not perform as well as Edison claims in its annual reports on student performance." 70 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 So given that and given your belief that we should not pay attention to quotes given by school boards across the country, then what should we rely on in terms of the accuracy of what you're reporting?
I'd like to address three points on that. One, just to clarify, I don't believe Tom meant to say that you should disregard any type of report. I believe that Tom wanted to say that you should be -- consider the source of the report just basically to clarify --
Secondly, West Michigan, we believe, is a -- it was a study funded by basically somebody who opposes us. But the substance of the point is -- the largest part is if you look at the methodology, the way they consider whether or not a school is successful is by looking at absolute measures of gains -- or absolute levels of achievement versus gains. We focus on gains. In all of the reports that we do when we discuss our schools, we talk about how much they have gained. If you give us a 71 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 school that is performing at the percentile and we take it to the 20th percentile, so they've gained 10 percent, when you compare that to a school that is at the 60th percentile and goes from 60 to 62, well, clearly that school at 62, in one sense, did better than the school at 20, but it certainly didn't outgain us.
Finally, 10 should we as a body look to that you respect whom you believe best represents the track record of Edison? Whom should we look to since all of those cited do not matter?
No, ma'am, we're not saying that the Western Michigan report --
I think you should look at Western Michigan, but I think we've got to get into the details. If you ask a question about methodology and you say -- they said they disagreed, we're talking about apples, they're talking about oranges. If we're talking about gain raits and they're talking about achievement, then we've got to have a fair discussion about. Let's 72 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 compare apples to apples and really talk about what we've done. And on that, we're willing to stand. We're not saying that we disagree with, you know, everything that's written about us, but we're saying that if you're telling me that a school that started off, you know, times better 8 than our school and is doing better than us a year 9 later, you're probably right, to use a 10 hypothetical. You know, we should talk about these cases of Edison not performing and look at how, you know, how this -- what folks are saying and look through to the details.
Mr. Wade, citing two pretty good sources -- if I could ask a follow-up on that by citing two pretty good sources: One being Mr. Whittle, the other being the Philadelphia Inquirer. On November 9, the Philadelphia Inquirer, a story written by Sue Snyder and Dale Mezzacappa said, and I quote: "Whittle, joined by 10 members of his team, including the teacher and principal, said 84 percent of the company's 136 schools nationwide were showing significant gains." Let me repeat that, 'cause I want to give you a chance to say whether that's accurate. 73 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 Again, Mr. Whittle's quoted as telling the Inquirer that 84 percent of the company's 136 schools nationwide were showing significant gains. Was that -- if you know -- I don't know if it would be fair unless you were standing there to say whether that was accurately reported or not, but if --
That 84 percent of our schools are up significantly? Yeah, in terms of how we define schools, yeah, I think that's --
The quote was that 84 percent of the company's 136 schools nationwide were showing significant gains. Would that be accurate?
Yeah. And significant is 5 percentage points or more on a national norm and 6 percent on a criterion reference, if I'm not mistaken. That's on average across our system.
How many of your -- of the 100 -- how many of the schools are counted in that Fourth Annual Report? 74 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642
That's a good question. Here's the point of confusion. When we talk about a site -- what we've detailed here are the sites. Sometimes you have schools -- when we count a school -- and we can talk about the situation. I think it's K through 4.
We just need to clarify between 136 and 80. For instance, a K-12 school would be considered, in our system, three schools -- elementary, middle school and a junior. I believe the Fourth Annual Report looks at schools as one case. So a K-12 school in the report counts as one.
It would actually be something like 86 of sites. Again, we're talking misdefinitions here. What we do is we report it by site because that's how the states would look at it and report the scores out. When we talk about a school, if we've got a K-12 charter, that's one school, but you'd have middle, elementary, and high, which is why we have fewer sites listed there than the schools that we talk about. That's the 75 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 difference. we haven't excluded any of our sites. We've captured all of our children that we were managing at that time. We didn't exclude anything. What we do do, though, is our definition of schools. And if you look -- in our 10K, we kind of talk about that. Our definition of school and site that's being used. Part of the problem is we're operating in different states so -- 11
According to your 12 report, how many schools do you have enough data on 13 to report on whether they've made progress? 14
Is it a hundred percent 16 of all your schools or all of your sites that -- 17
We reported on a hundred percent 18 of the sites that we had data available. 19
How many schools did you 20 have data for at the time of the report?
So it sounds like it was less than all of it 'cause when the reports went out, the data wasn't there. Maybe the state authority 76 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 had to issue the report. So we took -- Our annual report is set up to go out at a certain time, so if the data's not available, we don't report on it. It's not that we're hiding it; it's that it's not available. And if it's not available there, you can certainly probably get it from a state Website. These are state schools, these are public schools.
Right. I'm trying to just trying to understand the statement made in the report because, at least from my understanding -- and I may be wrong work and maybe you can work backwards from this and explain it -- is that, in fact, the Fourth Annual Report refers to 113 schools, not 136, and that according to your criteria, you've seen positive gains in 62 schools that you operate. So if you could --
No, there would be 62 sites. That's where the difference is. So 62 sites could have been -- you know, call it 70-some-odd, 80-some-odd schools. That's where the -- that's probably where the difference would have been accounted for. These are methodological issues, and I 77 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 think if have a chance to actually -- I mean, this is good because we can sort of -- (Addressing colleague at table) Okay, but he's counting up the, quote/unquote, schools.
In your annual report, are the schools categorized by the length of time you've had them? Is there something that indicates how long Edison has had a contract with that particular school or site?
We have a copy but we haven't certainly had a chance to read it. Okay, Representative Horsey. REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: I just have one generic question and it's a part of Mr. Ramos' question. Is this assessment done by your organization to an objective or are these test scores on a state level?
All of the test scores reported in the Fourth Annual Report were the primary means of accountability. 78 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642
It's state data reported by us. REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: It's a state data report from all of the different states on Edison schools?
That's correct. REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: Okay, that's all. Thank you.
Sir, in response to your question, I believe we reported on 74 schools in the Fourth Annual Report.
I'm just looking at something that -- Exhibit 5. (Unintelligible; parties talking over each other.)
That's 62 schools on the positive list and 4 schools in the no-gain list.
That's 62 out of how 79 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 many?
Out of 74. You'll -- 62 schools are reported in the positive side and there's 4 schools that are in the no gain-side, and there are schools reported in the negative-performance 7 side. 8
And that's what 84 is based on? (Unintelligible; parties talking over each other.)
I didn't make up the wording; I'm just quoting Mr. Whittle.
And what I think he may have been doing Pedro -- Mr. Ramos, I'm sorry. But, you know, what we were doing here was, some of the data that was in the report wasn't available, so we've gotten updated stuff on our schools as states release the results. So I think what he referred to was right. It would include this information here, plus anything that would have been available -- that's 80 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 been available. And a lot of reports have come out since we -- we go to press with this or we compile the data over the summer, right?
This report was released, I believe, the first week of October, and we looked at all schools that were -- all schools that were available as September 1st.
So the bottom line is that, you know, if you were to take his statement literally, his statement was inaccurate?
Yeah. And 136 schools is how many schools we're running this year. The report only focuses on the schools that we had last year. So that would be incorrect.
Can you read back the statement? Was it that we have 136 schools? I mean, I think the point that he was making was two points here. One is, we run 136 schools, and some of them are first-year schools so we don't have data, right? And some of them are second-year schools and we only have a benchmark. But of the schools that we have had where we have the data, it's an 84 percent record, and that's what's outlined, and, you know, on average, 81 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 it's about 84 percent. That's what's outlined in our report.
I'm still a little confused. Is the report based on -- as of last year, you had been saying that you had 113 schools, schools that you were operating. And that report, then -- I'm assuming the Fourth Annual Report would be based on those 113 schools.
No, it is not based on 113 schools; it is based on 74 schools.
Sites. It's 74 schools or sites. We're using "school" two different ways. Okay, it's 74 schools that we had data available for.
A distinction is not made in the report between schools and sites. So either you are missing data for some number of your schools or --
Okay, okay, I got it. Here's the -- the new schools aren't there. Anything that's new, would have been new last year, wouldn't be there. So there are a bunch of the 113 that were first-year schools, so those schools wouldn't 82 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 be in because that's a baseline year. Then there are some schools of 113 where the data wasn't available because the state hadn't released it. So everything that we had data for we released in our report.
That we had data on, plus anything we've gotten since that time.
So, again, the assertion that there's been -- that 84 percent of your schools have shown significant gains is really based on then 74 of the then 113 schools. And it's not 136 schools. I'm trying to understand what this claim is based on if it's only based on 74 of 113. Is that correct? (Unintelligible; parties talking over each other.
Okay, 113 schools is how we count schools. We count a K-12 school 3 times. What the report -- what the report is -- what the Fourth Annual Report is based on is if you just look at sites and not schools, there were 90 sites last year, which was the same as 113 schools. Out of those 90 sites, the report focused on 74 83 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 sites that we had available. So there are sites that we didn't have the data available for at the time of the report and those are footnoted in footnotes 2 and 3. I think that answers the question.
That the claim of the 11 84 percent improvement is based on. 12
Okay. And I think 14 that's important distinction because the impression 15 is when you're speaking of these 136 that you 16 operate.
Right. We get confused when we talk about sites and schools too. REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: Madam Chairperson, one more time for clarity sake, the same question. These are schools that have taken their local state test?
That's correct. These are not Edison tests; these are state tests. So it's the 84 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 (indiscernible) in Texas, it's the MCATs in Massachusetts, it's the MEEP in Michigan. It's different every place that we're in.
But I assume that when Mr. Whittle speaks, he doesn't speak to the state departments of education when he makes statements like 84 percent of 136 schools.
Yeah, he was just wrong. I mean, I think he was just inaccurate, it was a misstatement. But the point was 136 schools and we have 84 percent -- of the data that we have available, our schools are showing 84 percent significantly positive. And we've got -- like Mr. Le said, of the 74 -- of the 90 sites that we have, we included 74 of them in the report because that's the data that was available at the time.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I will say that we find it very disappointing that there is a plan to educate children and we're having a problem communicating 85 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 here. It's very disappointing when we can't talk about figures or when there's a dispute over the validity of data we received and that's available on the Internet. It's very, very disappointing. We fought long and hard in this Council for the right to debate the School District, the superintendent, and others about education. For a long, long time, we were told that all we could do was vote for money and we had no say. And technically from the charter, that's true, but we fought to change that. And the gains that we have we certainly are not prepared to lose. We want an open dialogue and discussion. But where we are now is one where we don't trust the information we receive. I want to feel comfortable that if these are the ground rules, this is the measuring stick, this is the information we get. It's very disappointing when we don't feel that way. I don't like to feel that for some reason it's not an open discussion and that the information we get is somehow skewed in one way or another. Very, very disappointing. In fact, I talked to the union who said that if 20 percent of their -- they're just behind 86 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 you. If 20 percent of their workforce, as you mentioned, turned over, that would be 800 people. And that's absolutely impossible. They couldn't function with those kind of numbers. How can you say --
I'm not sure what you're talking about. Who couldn't function, us or the District?
Well, this is information, ma'am, that we didn't make this up. This is what the District told us. They told us that these -- in certain areas, they gave us the turnover rates for different classifications of employees, and we reported it. We didn't make it up. We didn't go and count people and look at personnel files. They --
The School District is here. I doubt -- we haven't seen those kinds of figures. I doubt they said that they got 800 people turning over.
Councilwoman, it's funny because every time somebody -- every time somebody 87 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 asks a question about analysis, the answer is that the data comes from the School District, but it's not addressing the analysis. The question that she just asked, I heard, was about how feasible is making percent cuts? And that's an 7 analytical -- 8 (Unintelligible; parties 9 talking over each other.) 10
He said 20 12 percent of the labor force turned over, 20 percent. That means 800 employees, and they couldn't survive at those kinds of figures.
Let's start with your teachers. My understanding is you turn over about 1300 teachers a year. REPRESENTATIVE WASHINGTON: Well, we weren't talking about teachers. That was a question I asked you about the union workers.
Right. REPRESENTATIVE WASHINGTON: The PFT, the bus drivers, the maintenance, those kind of people, custodians.
And their 88 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 president is right behind you. We could bring him up and have this discussion openly if you would like to do that, but he just told me percent 5 would be 800 people. You said 20 percent; we 6 didn't make up that figure. 7
We were advised that in your 8 custodial services, we were advised by the District 9 that there's a turnover rate of about 20 percent 10 among your custodial staff. 11
Madam President, 12 could we ask Mr. Doyle to come up and verify or 13 reject that figure? That's only one thing -- 14
That's a District figure, 15 ma'am, that's a District figure. You have the 16 board president here; he should be able to verify 17 what the turnover rate is for their employees. 18
Mr. Ramos just 19 said that the Board is continually referenced in 20 this way. We have Mr. Doyle here who knows --
We have not had a chance to get underneath the hood of Edison's numbers because despite the commitment to the Mayor that that analytical information would be available to him, not until last night after the agreement 89 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 between the Mayor and the Governor was it said again that that that information would be provided, so we have yet to compare notes to figure out the basis of their numbers or even to correct any significant problems, because despite the commitment by Mr. Whittle to Mayor Street, that information has not been forthcoming during the last few weeks.
Thank you. Mr. Doyle, maybe you can shed some light on this issue, the issue that percent -- there's 13 a turnover of 20 percent of your members. Would 14 you also say who you represent for the record, 15 which workers and identify yourself for the record. 16
My name is Tom Doyle, and I'm 17 president of Local 1201. We represent all the bus 18 drivers, maintenance, mechanics, engineers, 19 cleaning personnel, warehouse personnel, print shop 20 personnel, all of the blue-collar workers in the School District of Philadelphia. The figure of 20 percent turnover in our bargaining unit per year is absolutely impossible. That would be 800 people per year. The District couldn't function with our bargaining unit down 800 90 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 people with the cuts that we already are under right now because of no hiring in the District. It would be impossible, it just can't happen. I personally receive a report from Human Resources once a month. They send over a list of all terminations, retirees, deaths, alien takeovers, whatever it maybe. I get a report once a month of every person in the School District that leaves the system. And I check off my people and then I send it out to the girl so they can delete it from the computers. I personally highlight the names and Social Security numbers, then put my stamp on it and put it in the file. There's no way we could lose 800 people a year.
What might it be, what would be more realistic, Mr. Doyle?
More along the lines of 5 percent. In negotiations last year, in '99, we came up with the figures between 5 and 8 percent a year, and the 8 percent is really pushing the envelope, 5 percent is a little conservative. So it's probably about 6 percent a year
How large is your 91 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 membership?
Ma'am, can I clarify something? I didn't say percent of his members, that's not 6 what I said. I said we were advised that 20 7 percent of certain areas, and I specifically talked 8 about custodial workers, which don't make up all of 9 his members. So we're not talking about 800 10 people. I mean, I was very specific in the data. 11 I said that we were advised that 20 percent of the 12 custodial staff. So maybe that's wrong, but that's 13 what we -- is that true or is that wrong? 14
No, 20 percent of the 15 custodial staff does not turn over a year. 16
Okay? No segment of my 18 bargaining unit, whatever department it may be -- 19 engineering, maintenance, cleaning, transportation 20 warehouse or print shop turns over at a rate of 20 percent a year, it just didn't happen.
And 6 percent is a big difference from 20 percent, a big difference. this is what I'm saying about this hearing. I've been to so many Edison hearings, I'm 92 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 "Edisoned out." And, you know, it's important and I'm so tired of the conflicting information. I'm tired of hearing about the record is bad or about hearing -- you said today you're in four schools and we want to ask what that is because we were told that you have no experience in any high school. But after this round, Madam Chair, if it's okay, Rosita Youngblood, Representative Youngblood wanted to follow up on this question, then I want to complete my questioning. But certainly, you know, I wanted to get to the bottom of this. But 6 percent and 20 percent, we're in two different universes.
Our problem is, Edison sits here and asks us to believe the numbers that they're putting out that they're basing their analysis on, and then when someone questions that analysis, it's the School District's fault, Oh, we got those numbers from the School District. But they're basing their analysis on the number that they got from the School District. You can't have 93 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 it both ways, you can't have it both ways
That's how we had to do it. We couldn't go through and count (indiscernible), so I'm sorry. We had 60 days, 60 days to do our analysis, and we're supposed to have a collaborative analysis and get the District -- AUDIENCE MEMBER: (Inaudible.)
Well, maybe you should have asked for 120 days instead of 60. (Unintelligible, parties talking over each other.)
For that price tag, give me 2.7 mill and I'll give you an analysis, forget 60 days. (Applause.)
But I think the real question is, why don't know that and why are we told something different? From my standpoint, it's actually frustrating for me to sit here and have folks saying, Well, you guys are basing -- we have -- we still don't know -- can you guys tell us what the turnover rate is of your custodians? That 94 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 would be wonderful, because I thought we had that already. REPRESENTATIVE WASHINGTON: Okay, we're asking the questions, not you guys.
And I still have questions but I wanted to yield on this union matter to Representative Youngblood, if that is okay, Madam President. REPRESENTATIVE YOUNGBLOOD: One of the concerns that I have is that most of the schools in Philadelphia were built probably in the 1920s, '30s, '50s, and '60s. And I have found that in entering schools that if we don't have the proper custodial force as far as maintenance -- any day in the winter in a Philadelphia school, and I've witnessed this, the children are sitting in schools where the furnace doesn't work, there might be something wrong with the electrical fixtures. And we're saying that we're going to limit what we consider our maintenance force. And if we do that, then what is going to happen to the upkeep of an already-crumbling infrastructure? I mean, those are some of the questions that I'm concerned about. I don't know if you got 95 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 answers from the District on how we're going to continue to maintain and who are going to be the people that are going to support this?
We would assume that it would be the same people that are here now. REPRESENTATIVE YOUNGBLOOD: But if we're losing some of the workforce and we don't have enough people at it is to maintain, as far as I'm concerned, our school district adequately as far as maintaining the heating systems -- we even need new furnaces, the electrical part as far as -- a lot of these schools need to be totally rewired.
We would agree, we would absolutely agree. REPRESENTATIVE YOUNGBLOOD: And that's what I'm basically asking. Have you put this in your analysis on how -- or did the School District give you information on how this was going to be done?
Well, we didn't get into capital budgeting here, so if you look at the report, we don't get into the capital budgeting part of it. We understand there's a lot of work and what we said is we relied on stuff that was 96 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 done particularly around some of the support areas. What we focussed on was how people are being managed and how the work is getting done. So we didn't just go in and say -- I mean, for example, you know, we may have five people on a job that you need three people to do. I mean I've heard anecdotally that, you know, and directly from senior members of the union even that, you know, in places -- and sometimes we go into a neighborhood and we do bring people in to do a job and we keep one guy outside to watch the car. Well, I mean, you know, is that appropriate? Should you get a security person to watch the car and maybe have the workers in the union actually in the building? I mean, that's the kind of stuff that we were focusing on and trying to get resources to the service point, not just doing away with people. And, you know, we didn't advise that the District reduce its -- REPRESENTATIVE YOUNGBLOOD: Well --
I'm sorry, go ahead REPRESENTATIVE YOUNGBLOOD: No, I know what you're saying as far as the capital project. I also look at that as an operational entity 97 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 because without having the proper support personnel, you cannot operate a school, period. And that's why I'm asking these questions. Will we have in the operational end -- I know about the capital and operational budgets, but this to me is just in the operational end so you can operate the schools so that the children can attend the school.
Our view is that the quality of the services that the schools and children get, both instructional services and support services, can be improved significantly, that you can't have schools -- I walked into a school where, you know, it had 500 kids and 2 janitors and the principal is using her extra money to get another custodian. That's a problem. I mean, that is a problem. That's not a problem of not having enough custodians, by the way; it's a management and organizational problem. I think you said "operational issue." Now, I'm not trying to -- I don't want to beat up on any class of employees. I think everybody here in the system cares about kids and wants to do it right. Most people want to do a great job. What 98 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 we have said is that there are some management techniques and some practices some and ways of organizing the work that would increase the service level so that we get what -- so that the taxpayers are getting what they're paying for in those areas.
But the issue is the bottom line is, you can't lay off a workforce and think these old schools can run, it's impossible. And that is what we're saying. We are saying that we want a legitimate response to legitimate questions. That's not a legitimate response. Let me move on. Seven schools, these high schools that you said you operate in, where are they? Can you name them?
We have a high school in Flint. Northwestern is a high school in Flint, Michigan. We have a high school in Chicago, a K-12 school, so it's part of that. We have a high school in Mt. Clemens, Michigan, Mt. Clemens Secondary and Junior Academy. We have a high school in Trenton, New Jersey, Grandville Charter High School. We have a high school in Washington, DC, Edison Friendship Charter School, Woodson Campus. We have a high 99 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 school in Kansas City, Missouri, Westport Senior High School. And then the last high school is Chester.
What is your record there? We have heard you have no experience in any high schools, which is one of the reasons that we -- I guess citywide everybody rejected your application. We have 264 schools, and without showing us that you have the experience in making schools improve, we're afraid to entrust all of these schools and these kids to you. We don't have any -- we don't see anything that says you have a good high school record. And another thing Representative Youngblood was asking as well is, what academic program will you be using? We've had the City criticized, and most of us agree that we can't have so many programs. We understand that we have to have a few -- maybe two maybe three maximum of reading and math programs. What is your program of choice?
Give us all three 100 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 levels. REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: Excuse me, Madam Chairperson, may I ask a question before they answer? And that is, what is their professional expertise in the area of education? Are any of them educators?
I have a Ph.D. in government. Upon completing my Ph.D. at Harvard University, I have spent two years -- (Unintelligible; parties talking over each other.)
I helped found a school in Washington, DC that is a middle high school, college preparatory school, which I was the head of for three years. REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: Excuse me, that's not my question.
Okay. REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: My question is, does any of these four gentlemen have an education degree? Not educational experience, 'cause your agency does have education experience. Do any of you have education degrees?
No. 101 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: Who is Piaget? Who is Montessori? Now, you've got the Ph.D. Who is Piaget and who is Montessori? (No immediate response.) REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: They're the foundation of American education. Okay, excuse me. You can go ahead and.
We understood the question, but this is the -- REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: Piaget is the founder of developmental education. The whole grade structure of 1st to 12th is based on Piaget's, a Frenchman's theory on developmental psychology. It's the foundation of American education. Okay, excuse me, go ahead.
But these are the reasons why we have so many problems with hearings. Frankly, I was not looking forward to a hearing -- 102 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 and I've been very quiet about and I've hosted many Edison meetings in my district as well. But we have to have reasonable, legitimate responses to questions so that we can have faith in some role that the Mayor and the Governor seem to indicate you might perform, but you don't give us anything to hang our hats on. We have people who put us here, who vote for us, who expect us to come to them with some responses. You don't give us any responses. We feel that we're getting a double talk on your record 'cause I've seen, if I'm not mistaken, where approximately 50 percent or more of your schools do not improve or are not performing well.
But you say not to believe the information we get.
But yet you sit here and you say -- they mentioned three schools and you said the record wasn't clear. Then you say you made a mistake. Come on, please, please don't insult our intelligence up here. All of us work too hard. I'm a former educator, I worked hard. I 103 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 was Chair of the Education Committee until I assumed Finance Chair and Vice Chair of the Education Committee for City Council. I worked hard to read the Governor's report, hard to go through your stuff, work with my charter schools, published the first charter school newsletter, and on and on and on. Many people back here have done many things in this field. We care, we're committed people. But you have to treat us legitimately. Don't insult our intelligence with ridiculous answers or duck it. I would prefer that you say you didn't know. I would prefer that you say the Governor and the Mayor you're not sure what the ramifications are or the implications are for your organization, but don't give us foolish answers. Everybody's too busy. (Applause.) REPRESENTATIVE HORSEY: Madam Chairperson, may I -- REPRESENTATIVE WASHINGTON: Okay, the next person for questions is Sondra Dungee-Glenn.
Thank you, Madam Chairperson. 104 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 I wanted to start by trying to get clarification on some statements that were made earlier. We were spending a lot of time talking about Edison's performance with some of the school districts that you had previously been in, and we were cautioned because you had only been in some of these schools a short period of time, one or two years. But just in terms of clarification on a couple of districts that had been brought out by name, one in Sherman, Texas, where we were talking about the termination -- or, excuse me, the non-renewal of your contract. This was not a short-term relationship, as I understand it, in Sherman, Texas. You had been in that school -- in that school district a number of years, I believe, at least five years. Is that correct?
And so, therefore, the lack of performance was not based on one or two 105 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 years of Edison's experience there but it really had been over five years.
Also, the issue of San Francisco, again, as I understand it, it is a state chartered school now maybe for one year or less, but that you had previously operated in the San Francisco School District, and that relationship had ended and it had been given a state charter, but it was the same school continuing to operate, and that those test scores had also not shown any improvement. Is that correct?
No, it's not correct. I'll explain the situation in San Francisco. San Francisco is a city, like several cities in the United States, that was not very open to charter schools. Edison was invited by a local group to come in and consider developing a charter school, which it did. It was a very controversial matter, because in San Francisco, in order to receive a charter, the local group has to submit its application to the board of education. At the time, it was as a nine-member board. Five members 106 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 favored, four members did not. Edison received a charter with its local partner. A year later, there was an election. The balance of power shifted from 5 to 4 to those who oppose charter schools. That particular board called Edison in with this local partner and basically challenged Edison's performance in the first year. If you read the record in San Francisco closely, parents supported keeping Edison there. The state stepped in because it appeared the board of ed and the parents in particular reached an impasse about whether Edison should stay or not. The board stepped in and concluded that, in fact, the student performance was improving and that the board of ed did not make a valid argument for terminating the relationship. The board also discovered that the school also had some other needs in which it made -- excuse me, the state made an investment particularly in the area of facilities. The state decided to take the charter from the city in order to avoid the controversy and make it a state charter, but it was the parents that fought to keep Edison there based on the performance that they had 107 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 witnessed in their children's development.
They had, no matter how you looked at it, before or after the state charter?
That's correct. Those test scores are available on California's Department of Education Website, and if you compare Edison's scores to the District of San Francisco from Spring of '98 to the year before we took over, if you follow those 2nd graders to the 5th grade where they are this year, you'll found that we've outgained the district.
In that school. So if the district criticizes us, it's a criticism on themselves.
Okay. Let me ask you, the final case was in York County where, as I 108 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 understand it, the PSSA test scores for this year were lower than they were prior to Edison's -- excuse me, they were higher prior to Edison's coming in and taking over that school than they had been in the first year that Edison operated the school. In other words, the test scores went down once the school was turned into an Edison school. Does that follow with your --
Okay, all right. I just wanted to get that clarification because there's a lot of information here
And, excuse me, those test scores aren't reflected. My colleague has corrected me, that they are not reflected in the annual report because it's a first-year school.
It's a first-year school, it's not in your annual report.
All right, now I just 109 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 two other areas of questioning. Councilman Nutter was questioning you about what potentially may be your consulting relationships with our school district if things go forward. Now, apart from the $2.7 million consulting contract you've had with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, can you identify and describe for us what consulting services Edison provides to school districts currently?
Okay, so currently, you don't provide any consulting services --
Okay. This will be a new type of relationship the, a new business for you.
Other than in a district where we are going to do, I think, Affiliates, our Affiliates Division. Similarly, we take our intellectual property and we go in and they will 110 11/21/01 EDUCATION COMMITTEE - RES. 010642 install our systems in their schools, small school district. We typically -- you can call that consulting but it's not the same kind of thing we'll be doing here. So we don't have anything like Philadelphia anyplace in the country
Are there any other school districts that have purchased your "intellectual property" from Edison?
We just started that business unit and we're now capitalizing it. We have a first customer that has signed up. We have not actually -- we're just in the early stages. By next fall, it will have been installed, but we just got that business started in the last six months. Our first customer's not on line now.
Georgia. They're using one of our pieces of intellectual property, they're testing out our Edison benchmark assessment system currently.