Did Teachers Win the Election for Gregoire?

Probably not, but they did get a shoutout from Kelly Evans, Gregoire's campaign manager:

Women’s groups, the environmental community, labor organizations, the education community – everyone was focused and took nothing for granted. And we saw the results in our polling. Four weeks before the election, we were losing public school parents by 11 points – two weeks prior, we were winning by a point. Same is true for union households, a move from +12 to +27 in just three weeks. Add this to the voices of Native Americans, children’s and health care advocates, leaders from communities of color, veterans’ organizations and law enforcement groups all organizing and communicating about Gov. Gregoire’s record of results for the people of Washington.

The WEA-Eastern affiliate office in Spokane had a great, great phonebanking operation set up that turned out nearly 18,000 phone calls for the Gregoire campaign, and we were only one of dozens across the state. Dino only won Spokane County by 8,000 votes, which wasn't nearly the margin he needed to make up for the hole he was facing in King County, where Gregoire won by 230,000. The road to office may run through King, but you've got to run a statewide campaign, too, and the Governor did that very effectively.

(via Brad Shannon at the Olympian)

Randy Dorn defeats Bergeson

The Seattle Times--and Bergeson's camp--think it's too close to call.

In the race for the state schools chief, Terry Bergeson was disappointed to be trailing challenger Randy Dorn but was not ready to give up.

Given the number of ballots yet to be counted, "Friday is about the earliest we could make a reasonable decision," said Alex Hays, her campaign consultant.

I'm going out on a thick mathematical limb to say that Randy Dorn will be your next Superintendent of Public Instruction.

Here's why.

The counties where Bergeson holds a lead have about 135,000 outstanding votes. Bergeson, overall, trails Dorn by about 35,000. So, she'd either have to win a ridiculously high majority in the counties she's already winning (over 66%) and hold steady elsewhere, or win a solid majority in those counties, and majorly turn around the trends in all the others. That would include King, which is slightly Dornish at 50.4% (293,000 votes left), and Snohomish, which is strong for Dorn at 54.5% (with 100,000 votes left). Snohomish alone wipes out any potential advantage from the smaller counties where Bergeson leads.

Looking at the overall picture, she needs about 53% of the remaining ballots--706,000 in all--to win, and barely. It's just not going to happen.

Mark my words: Dorn is it.

Update 5:30 Wouldn't you know it, Bergeson has conceded a day earlier than her staff predicted. Could it have been due to the astute mathematical analysis found on this blog?

No.

Anyhow, adios, WASL. What will replace thee?

Bergeson trailing; Gregoire lead seems solid

This is a bit of a surprise to me: even though not-Bergeson won the primary, I was never sure that not-Bergesons would line up for Randy Dorn. Turns out they have.

However, with the most populous county still tabulating results, and with a slight lead for Bergeson in that county, she may still eke out a win.

In the other widely-watched race, Christine Gregoire seems to have locked up a victory over Dino Rossi. Snohomish and King counties, the bulk of the outstanding votes, are solid Gregoire.

the state of Washington education in two sentences

OSPI's Jennifer Priddy:

“I have other bad news to share with you,” she said. “I don’t think it’s disputed that the state is underfunding basic education.”

1. Lots of bad news.
2. An underfunded system.

Are those going to be the final grades of the Bergeson era?

lesser of two WASLs

The News-Tribune's Peter Callaghan explains why Randy Dorn isn't quite the candidate WASL foes hoped for. Which is no surprise, really; if Semler hadn't dropped out, Dorn wouldn't even be in the race. He was hardly anyone's first choice.

video voter's guide: Bergeson vs. Dorn

Watch Bergeson defend her record and tell of her plan to, among other things, reform education at the national level. Watch Dorn go into attack mode, especially when it comes to the WASL.

It takes 11 minutes of your time.

the predictive value of the 2008 Washington State primary

Somewhat silly predictions aside, it's time to look at the results of the primary. A few observations.

1. Voter turnout was way below average in King County--around 20%, compared to 27%+ statewide--which may have artificially inflated Rossi's overall performance. Rossi's camp is probably praying this trend continues into the general election, since King County went 60% for Gregoire this time around.

2. As David Goldstein notes, there's no comparing this primary with the previous primary in 2004, in which voters had to choose a party, not any old candidate. The best comparison is between this primary and the general election of 2004. Provisionally, I agree with him that this is a "straw poll" for Gregoire, and that her win is a genuine win. In other words, since voters were free to choose any candidate, just as they can in the general election, the predictive power of the "top two" primary is considerably stronger than some, like David Postman of the Seattle Times, have claimed, even if Gregoire still isn't a sure thing.

3. Considering #1 above, and the natural incumbent advantage, and the fact that Gregoire's people are probably concerned that their candidate didn't top 50%, I'd predict that this primary motivates and mobilizes Democrats. Watch for a flurry of spending and campaigning, even more than last time, to secure Gregoire's lead.

4. Terry Bergeson has to feel great that she outpolled Randy Dorn. She has to be nervous, though, that "anybody but Bergeson" was the clear winner. If even David Blomstrom could siphon 4% of the vote, the electorate is clearly displeased by the current administration. Whether Dorn can rally all the opposition, though, remains to be seen. Blomstrom's probably going to call me a media whore no matter what, but I wasn't horribly impressed by Dorn's approach and his sketchy past--and partly due to Blomstrom's own efforts to raise tough questions about Dorn's past. Dorn seemed like the least worst option. I miss Rich Semler.

Washington state primary predictions

1. For Superintendent of Public Instruction, Randy Dorn will outpoll Terry Bergeson.
2. David Blomstrom, despite finishing fifth, will live to run another day.
3. Turnout will be lower than expected.
4. For Governor, Dino Rossi will trail Chris Gregoire, 47-49 (the remaining 4% split among the others).
5. For Congress, Darcy Burner will outpoll Dave Reichert.
6. No one on either of these lists will win.
7. Washington state's servers will crash as the punditocrats hit "refresh" on their election results screens, over and over until their fingers bleed, while the rest of the world watches Olympic beach volleyball.
8. Democracy will survive another primary.

Dorn Outpolling Bergeson?

Buried in this Politicker Washington story about the tight Gregoire/Rossi race was this rather startling tidbit about the OSPI contest:

The same poll asked voters about the superintendent of public instruction race. Respondents chose Randy Dorn 43 percent of the time, compared with incumbent Terry Bergeson at 32 percent. 16 percent were undecided and 9 percent chose other.

Given that Dorn's campaign started late, and that Bergeson is a 12 year incumbent, for him to be up 11 points in any poll seems like a small miracle.

I didn't think Dorn had it in him; the winds of change may be blowing harder than anyone could have anticipated.

David Goldstein on the OSPI Race

Blog neighbor David Goldstein of Horse's Ass covered the contest between Randy Dorn and Terry Bergeson during the most recent Podcasting Liberally show. The OSPI piece is about 46 minutes in; apparently at a 37th legislative district meeting this week Representative Sharon Tomiko-Santos spoke to recommend the district endorse Dorn; she then laced into Bergeson, with the good Doctor sitting right there in the room with her.

I had a nice conversation this week via email with a friend who works closely with the legislature, and he brought up something that I've been thinking about as the OSPI race has evolved: the level of disrespect directed from legislators to Terry is troubling. She's made her mistakes, sure, but the level of vitriol really seems pretty awful between elected officials. I don't know what to read into the whole thing, but it feels like there's something there.

The Parts Become the Whole

This morning, on the last day of school, one of the parapros comes into my room and drops off a flyer about Randy Dorn. She'd volunteered at the State Democratic Convention here in Spokane, where Dorn was endorsed by the state Democratic party; she mentioned too that she was angry at Bergeson because of some maneuver she'd tried to keep Dorn from getting said endorsement.

Just now I read a blog post from the News Tribune covering the convention, and they mention a fight over whether the party should even be making recommendations in non-partisan races.

Then add in this from David Postman of the Seattle Times:

I ran into Randy Dorn, the former Democratic lawmaker running for superintendent of public instruction, and he said the party's executive committee endorsed him today. He says that will make it easier for him to win an endorsement from the Washington Education Association.

And finally consider this piece, which comes from an email that I received:

Despite a last minute attempt by Terry Bergeson to avoid the
embarrassment of not getting the party's endorsement for the first time in her political career, the State Democratic Party also declared it was time for a change at OSPI.

From the looks of it Terry worked hard to get the endorsement for herself, and when that didn't happen she did all she could to keep it from going to Dorn. She's a pro when it comes to this game of politics, and the effort that she's expending makes me believe that she thinks she might be in some jeopardy.

It could be a more interesting summer than I thought.

Rich Semler Quits OSPI Race

The Tri-Cities Herald has the story of how Dr. Semler is quitting the race because of health concerns involving his wife, Ginny. Political blogger Chris Mulick has additional commentary here; you can also listen to his last radio interview as a candidate, which is the post right before this one.

This is a shocker. He addressed the WEA Rep Assembly last week, talked to the State PTA the week before that, and seemed to be good to go the distance. Semler dropping out of the race leaves only PSE Executive Director Randy Dorn as a serious candidate; a candidate whose business website touts his experience as an entertaining motivational speaker. If you dig deeper his bona fides look good, but with three months to go until the primary can he get the message out effectively enough to take this race to a general election?

Could any other candidate join the race today and still be able to get enough of a statewide profile to make a difference?

I doubt it. I think that Terry Bergeson just won the OSPI race by default.

Rich Semler sounds good on the radio box

I caught Rich Semler's appearance [mp3, 20:00 in] on the Dori Monson Show (Frank Shiers filling in) on KIRO this afternoon, and was impressed by his good humor, quick wit, and overall amiableness. I liked how Semler stressed the difference between being anti-WASL and anti-assessment. We can use less expensive, just as reliable instruments to get the results we need.

In an important interchange, Shiers asked Semler how he'd reform the WASL. A few steps:

1. Smarter use of multiple choice.
2. Get it back to teachers in 2-3 days.
3. 2-3 hour test, instead of days.
4. Testing complex thinking without taking 12-14 questions per student.
5. "Mime" systems like Delaware's.

It didn't help so much that Shiers, who's otherwise well-versed in educational issues, wasn't aware that Terry Bergeson is actually in the running, which perfectly illustrates the primary problem Semler faces. The Superintendent of Public Instruction just doesn't register on the average voter's radar.

If Semler can overcome that hurdle--and here, the ongoing publicity efforts by the WEA should help--he has a decent shot at an incumbent whose popular support, such as it is, weakens daily.

Ryan endorses Rich Semler

Our own Ryan, that is.

In short, I think Richard Semler would make a hell of an SPI. I like the knowledge base he showed, I liked his specific suggestions for improving the system, and I think he can bring a perspective to the job that would benefit education as a whole.

Semler faces incumbent Terry Bergeson and a couple other challengers--David Blomstrom and Donald Hansler. So far, given the beating Bergeson's policies have taken lately, I like Semler's chances.

Dino Rossi on the WEA Ad Campaign

Because I am fairly unbalanced, here's a post from Sound Politics criticizing the WEA for their recent attack ads on Dino Rossi, and here's video from the man himself defending the decision:

still need a majority

Ryan is right: by and large, the simple majority measure boosted schools all across the state.

Makes losing even harder for those who still couldn't muster the requisite 50.01%. Blame it on underwhelming electioneering, rising property values and taxes, or, in some cases, the lingering effects of the deluge. Sorry, Rochester, Centralia, and Yelm. (Oh, and let's not forget Lacey, home to the North Thurston district, another victim of booming development, I'm guessing.)

Update: Centralia passed. In my haste, I forgot to check the Lewis County results, where most of that district's constituents live. Good for them, and duh for me.

How About That Simple Majority!

Why was it important? The Seattle PI has the story:

Numerous school levies that would have failed in the past appeared to be passing after Tuesday's elections thanks to a new law that dropped the requirement for 60 percent approval in favor of a simple majority.

In November, Washington voters approved a constitutional amendment lowering the "yes" vote percentage required for approving levies from 60 percent to 50 percent plus one. This was the first election to test the new system.

"Clearly, for many districts, that vote last November has made a huge difference," said Chris Korsmo of the League of Education Voters, which pushed the idea.

In the Yakima Valley, 12 local levy measures all passed, but only about half had 60 percent or more approval.

A big win for the schools in November begets several other wins the following February. How about that?

Update 3/23: The Tacoma News-Tribune on how the Simple Majority helped March elections, too.

Dino Rossi Speaks Out on Education

Hot diggity damn. I wrote before that I wanted to hear more about Dino’s education platform, and he goes out and makes it the first item in his own state of the state address at DinoRossi.com. It’s good to hear him get some of his ideas out there. I don’t agree with a lot of them, but there is food for thought.

(An aside to the Rossi campaign: transcripts are a good thing, especially for bloggers!)

The italicized sections below are all from the education portion of Rossi’s speech. The commentary is mine. As always, I'll be endorsing John Kiester for Governor, so I don’t have a horse in the race.

2/3rds of our tenth graders are not passing all parts of the WASL.

While true, it also has to be noted that better than 80% of our kids are passing the WASL sections required for graduation. The big stumbling block is science, even more so than math: only 36% of 10th graders passed the science WASL

16,000 students dropped out of high school in 2005.

A startling number indeed, but in 2005 Washington State was singled out by the Department of Education for being one of the few states honest about how many of their kids drop out. If you believe OSPI stats, that year was also dramatically better than the years that proceded it, which is a sign of progress. I'm also worried about Mr. Rossi's call for stiffer standards; in California that made the dropout problem worse.

Education Week just ranked Washington’s education system 34th in the nation. We shouldn’t settle for being in the bottom half.

I believe that he's referring to the Quality Counts 2008 report that made the big splash last week. If you follow this link there is indeed a state-by-state ranking where Washington is 34th.

Dig a little deeper into the numbers, though. The absolute lowest score they gave the state was in the School Finance: Spending subcatagory, where we're 43rd in the nation in per pupil expenditure (PPE), 41st in spending on education, and 42nd and 44th on two comparisons of PPE to national averages. The quickest way to raise this number, and thus the overall score, would be to put more money into the system. Is that a plank that Dino really wants to push?

And, Quality Counts isn't a universally accepted measure.

(Speaking of Washington Learns) They spent 18 months and $1.7 million in taxpayer dollars, only to decide they need to study the problem further.

This one sticks. Anyone looking for tangible change that came out of Washington Learns is going to be left wanting, and while I have a lot of faith in Dan Grimm I'm getting a nagging sense of pessimism towards the Basic Education Financing Taskforce he's running. The left is tiptoeing around an income tax without wanting to actually say it out loud; the right tends to get so focused on teacher's unions and charter schools that they forget 1000 other areas that could be improved.

(That's why I love ya, JL. Big picture!)

I have one simple test when it comes to education: what’s in the best interest of our students?

Uh-oh.

First, we must reward success and take action when we see consistent failure. When teachers and principals succeed on a regular basis, I want them to be paid more. But when I see consistent failure, from our teachers, schools, and school districts, I want to make it easier for principals and parents to step in and take necessary action.

I'm not anti merit pay. I'm against how they're thinking about doing it in Idaho, while Houston sounds like it's getting good teacher buy-in.

That said, Rossi's getting trumped by No Child Left Behind on this one. You'll find no tougher measure than closing a school and firing a staff, and while those sanctions don't start until year 5 they're still there, and I can't imagine moving them up so they happened any faster.

For the three levels where he indicates failure could occur, he'd need a different legislative action for each:

• Teachers: More money for the Office of Professional Practices at OSPI, a revision of the existing WACs to extend the provisional time teachers spend, and money to support districts that actually begin the process of firing bad teachers.
  
  
• Schools: The authority to override local control and take control of a school, the ability to step outside of that district's CBA and make staffing decisions, and the political will to deal with the blowback from the community.
  
  
• Districts: Frankly, I don't think it can be done. What would you do? Dissolve the school board? Force more state intervention, and the money that would have to come along with it?

He has a lot of faith in principals to identify bad teachers and know how to turn things around--I wonder what he's basing that on.

Second, we need to prepare students to succeed in math and science. The first step is to focus the money where the need is the greatest. We need more college graduates with math and science degrees to join the teaching profession. Our current system doesn’t give school districts a flexibility to pay math and science teachers more salary.

That just irritates me, because there is absolutely nothing to stop local districts from giving their math and science teachers more money, as long as its collectively bargained beforehand. And if you tell me that the union would never allow that to happen, consider this: many teacher contracts have provisions that allow for extra money for special ed teachers vis-a-vis extended year contracts. Who's to say that couldn't be done for math and science teachers as well?

In his speech there’s a piece here on the math standards report that came out last summer and how he hopes this back to basics approach will be good change. He might be going after the coveted “Where’s the Math?” endorsement.

Finally:

Third, I want to make it easier to bring talented people into the classroom. We are surrounded by people in our state with tremendous skills in math, science, and computer science, many of whom would love to teach in our schools. Unfortunately, that is not allowed under the current state regulations. Bill Gates would face a lot of state regulations if he wanted to teach computer science for a day or two a week in our public high schools. We need to change the rules on alternative certification to bring new talent into the classroom. This is what’s in the best interest of our children.

The theme that Rossi is putting forward here is similar to what Nicholas Kristof proposed in 2006, which made big waves in the blogosphere (see The Stopped Clock and (one of my favorite posts ever) NYC Educator.)

The trouble with the idea is this notion that there are hundreds of capable and enthusiastic people out there who would swarm the schools if only it wasn't for the onerous requirements in the way. There's also a difference between having the knowledge and being able to communicate it; think of some of the most technically inclined people you've known in your life who are amazing with the machine but lacking in people skills.

Dino does have an opportunity here. Make the certification requirements for existing teachers easier, and it'll be just like giving them a raise. As is I need 10 credits or 100 clock hours every few years to even keep my license, and that costs money. The Professional Certificate is putting our newest teachers through a grinder right when they should be most focused on the classroom; eliminating it would make everyone who's graduated since 2001 happy.

It's on!

David Blomstrom: take out the clowns

David Blomstrom: Terry Bergeson's "chief opponent," or just another quixotic candidate a-blowin' in the wind? You make the call:

You're right...but you forgot to mention that that was probably the most scr*wed up election in state history. There were certain counties that had information about just one or two SPI candidates - or no candidates at all - on their websites. The Secretary of State posted a link to my website that led to a different website (not one of mine).

As usual, the corporate media scarcely mentioned any candidates aside from their favorites. In that particular campaign, they focused on the three women candidates, scarcely mentioning any of the male candidates. I was invited to just ONE forum.

So, yes, I fared rather poorly against candidates with far more money and corrupt endorsements, in the midst of a virtual media blackout and a political election that was nearly wrecked by the folks in charge.

To put it another way, the last election was just another free ride for Terror Bergeson. Which isn't to say the current election will be any less corrupt. Ultimately, the ball is in the public's court. Will teachers, parents and taxpayers care enough to get involved this time around?

Will people ask questions about Bergeson's bizarre relationship with Seattle attorney Judith Lonnquist and right-wing education assassin Don Nielson? Will people finally recognize the fact that public education is being privatized and take a stand?

Oops, sorry to bore you with ISSUES, something Terry Bergeson likes to ignore. You sound like one of the clowns who like to vote for establishment candidates with no issues but lots of money (and corrupt endorsements).

P.S. You might want to do a little research on the candidates I ran against last time around. What were their issues? How about their track records? Are they still fighting the good fight?

You might find the results illuminating.

I can sympathize with a Ron Paul type who is "scr*wd" by the established media just because of his outsider-ness. I have a much harder time sympathizing with a petulant rabble-rouser whose message is drowned out by his antics. (Media blackout, eh?)

Playing the educational village atheist might earn Blomstrom 6th place just by pulling out the protest vote, but it sure doesn't make him Bergeson's "chief opponent," unless we're using froth as a metric. Even Ron Paul is smart enough to know that publicly calling his opponents "whores" would doom his chances.

So complain away, Mr. Blomstrom, about "corporate media" (which you mostly ignored or avoided in the school board election, so no more whining about "media blackouts"), make up more clever nicknames for your opponents ("Tricky Dick" Semler? Richard "Dissembler?"), and by all means keep churning out amusing websites. If you somehow manage to reach the general election, I'll personally contribute $100 to your campaign.

Now, excuse me while I go strap on my clown shoes.



Sidebar:
If it weren't for the internet, David Blomstrom might win friends and influence people. Blomstrom, if you didn't know--and chances are you didn't--is running against Terry Bergeson. Sadly, his positions on the issues--the WASL sucks, education is being privatized and corrupted--get obscured by his rancor. At least, when he's sitting at the keyboard.

It doesn't have to be this way:

His appearance on the program — by phone — was absent any of the name-calling and ranting that characterize his Web site (he refers to his opponent as "Whorium") and he gave thoughtful answers to questions from the host and callers.

If the medium is the message, maybe Blomstrom just needs a better medium.

Dr. Bergeson Goes to Olympia

Terry Bergeson made it official today, announcing that she would pursue a rare 4th term for Superintendent of Public Instruction. From the Seattle PI:

Terry Bergeson says she'll run for a fourth term as state superintendent of public instruction - a job she thinks no one else would want because "It's a scary job right now."

Bergeson said in a recent interview that she still has work to finish: "This isn't the time to leave."

The former teacher has held the nonpartisan post for 12 years. She has been praised, especially by business leaders, for raising the state's education standards, but has also drawn sharp criticism for her strong and continuing support of the Washington Assessment of Student Learning.

One of harshest critics of Bergeson and the WASL has been the state teachers' union, the Washington Education Association, which she once led.

At the bottom of the article there's a link to Terry's campaign website, which frankly is pretty terrible right now. I hope she gets more content in there, stat.