Lingle says panel report shows need for local school boards

By Derrick DePledge
Advertiser Education Writer

Gov. Linda Lingle yesterday accepted a report that sets the foundation for her education reform proposals, and used the occasion to drive home her belief that a key component — a new student spending formula — will not work unless the state Department of Education is broken up into local school districts with elected boards.

"Without local school boards," Gov. Linda Lingle said, "the weighted student formula will not be successful, cannot be implemented."

In discussing the report at a news conference in her chambers, the governor acknowledged important differences with Democrats who control the Legislature, but said they were not significant enough to stop progress on education reform next year.

Democrats have indicated they would support a new student spending formula but are not ready to back local school boards. As an alternative, key Democrats have suggested expanding the state Board of Education from 13 voting members to 17 to make the board more geographically representative of the state. Each board member would cover three state representative districts.

But Lingle said local school boards would be more accessible to the people and could be held accountable for a large share of the $1.9 billion the state spends on education each year.

"Without local school boards," she said, "the weighted student formula will not be successful, cannot be implemented."

The new formula, modeled after an approach perfected over three decades in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, would base spending largely on student need instead of enrollment. The CARE committee recommended yesterday that the formula be neutral for the first year, meaning school administrators would receive about the same amount of money per student as they do today, then adjusted eventually and possibly divert more resources to low-income, English as a Second Language and special-education students.

CARE recommended that the DOE be split into seven local school districts with locally elected school boards that would oversee schools and hold school principals accountable for test scores and finance. A process would be established for communities to create additional school districts and boards, including charter school boards.

Principals would have more responsibility and work year-round instead of the current 10 months, and CARE recommends that principals get a pay raise.

A new state education standards board would replace the existing BOE. It would develop the spending formula, set academic standards and release annual report cards on the performance of local school boards. Members of the state board would be appointed by the Legislature and confirmed by the governor.

CARE also recommended that parents be able to send their child to the public school of their choice, although area students would have preference, open seats would be determined by lottery, and parents would have to provide transportation. William Ouchi, a University of California at Los Angeles professor and a consultant to Lingle, said school choice is a goal that would develop over time, and most likely be limited at first to schools within a school district.

Laura H. Thielen, a BOE member who serves on CARE, said the DOE had resisted decentralization in the past, and questioned whether it could be relied on to dismantle its own bureaucracy. The DOE has supported a new student spending formula, but opposes local school boards.

Lingle selected the two dozen members of her committee in October from the education and business communities, deliberately leaving out state lawmakers and current DOE officials, which led some to criticize the committee's work as partisan. The governor made it apparent from the start that she wanted the committee to build public support for a weighted student formula and a ballot question on local school boards for November 2004, and the final report reflected those ideas.

CARE held 10 forums across the state in November to listen to public suggestions and concerns, and found no substantial support or opposition for local school boards. Some members of CARE have told the governor more detail will be required for the public to get behind reform.

Roger Takabayashi, the president of the Hawai'i State Teachers Association, was the only member of the CARE committee to disagree publicly with the report. The teacher's union is interested in a new student spending formula, but has come out against local school boards, and wants any new state board to be elected instead of appointed.

"We will be lobbying against it," Takabayashi said.

The committee found that reform could happen as soon as the 2005-06 school year, but Lingle said it would depend on whether she could reach an agreement with Democrats to put the school board issue on the ballot.

CARE member Mike O'Neill, CEO of Bank of Hawaii, said he supports the advisory committee's recommendations. He said there may be some midcourse corrections or tactical changes to the reform plan as it moves forward.

"The diagnosis is pretty clear," he said of the need for education reform. "Is this the cure?"

Reach Derrick DePledge at ddepledge@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8084.

Correction: A previous version of this story said Mike O'Neill believed that Gov. Linda Lingle and her education advisory committee would consider compromise, which O'Neill said mischaracterized his position.