Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, July 16, 1995 TAG: 9507170086
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: D-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOEL TURNER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Long
They dominated the Governor's Conference on Education this past week.
Gov. George Allen touted his proposed education reforms and blasted the Democrats in the General Assembly for killing most of the reform that dealt with academic standards, local control and safe schools.
The Republican governor framed change in education as a partisan issue.
Allen criticized the Democrats for making "a defiant, party-line defense of the status quo" when the legislature met this year.
Others tried to defuse the political tension.
James Jones, president of the state Board of Education, talked about the state's newly adopted Standards of Learning - and the need for changes to preserve public schools and help them hold together a society that is breaking apart.
Jones, a former Democratic state senator who was appointed by former Gov. Douglas Wilder, said the board was able to approve the new academic standards because it put aside politics.
Jones said the board split along party lines on seeking federal funds under the controversial Goals 2000 reform program.
Board members who were appointed by Democratic governors wanted the state to seek $1.8 million in federal funds for the first year of the program. Allen's appointees opposed the move, and the governor blocked the board's plan to seek the money.
But Jones said the new academic standards were approved unanimously after long debate.
"We need to emphasize what brings us together - not what divides us," he said. "We did that on the Standards of Learning."
Fairfax County Superintendent Robert Spillane, the keynote speaker, decried the partisan fight over national education reform.
Education, he said, has become an ideological battleground.
Goals 2000 grew out of an education summit in Charlottesville during the Bush administration. Some Democrats wanted no part of a GOP reform initiative, he said.
Now some Republicans discount Goals 2000 as a program of President Clinton and the Democrats, Spillane said.
"Education reform does not belong to any political party," he said. "It belongs to us." That includes school superintendents, teachers, administrators, school board members, students, parents and businesses.
The conference, which was sponsored by the Virginia School Boards Association, Virginia Association of School Superintendents and the governor's office, focused mostly on educational changes that are not linked to politics.
It featured workshops on dozens of innovative programs and projects that have been implemented by school divisions across the state - from block scheduling to school choice to the use of the Internet in the classroom.
Several programs by school systems in the Roanoke Valley and Western Virginia were spotlighted. They included:
nRoanoke County's "Natural Helpers" program that provides training for students and school staffs to help others solve problems and deal with crises. It is based on the premise that, within every school, there is an informal "helping network" and students with problems naturally seek out other students and staff whom they trust. The program makes use of this network and provides training to students and staffers who already are serving as informal helpers.
The renovation of elementary and middle schools in Roanoke, and the planning process that has been used to help build community support for the projects. The city has renovated seven elementary schools and begun the modernization of four middle schools. School officials and architects explained the procedures they have used in designing and overseeing the projects, which will cost nearly $40 million.
Montgomery County's efforts to educate children with disabilities in regular classes in their home schools. Montgomery has a policy of including special-education students with regular students whenever possible. Academic adaptations are made that allow children with disabilities to participate at their own level of ability. Test scores for disabled children have increased.
Lexington's "Roots and Shoots" program that builds closer ties between children and adults. It pairs second-graders, who are called "shoots," with older community volunteers, called "roots," as garden friends. They share the experience and knowledge of gardening based on a natural science curriculum. These friendships are designed to foster positive attitudes about aging as well as youth.
Buena Vista's program to identify and provide special tutoring for first-graders who are behind in literacy development. Once eligible first-graders are identified, they receive one-on-one instruction for 30 minutes per day until they are able to read at the primer level.
The conference also included a workshop focusing on the selection of William Perry Elementary School in Waynesboro as one of13 schools in the nation to participate in a new comprehensive plan for elementary schools that was developed by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
The so-called Basic School plan is based on four priorities: the school as a community; a curriculum with coherence; a climate for learning; and a commitment to character.
The Carnegie Foundation calls the plan "basic" because it takes the push for school reforms back to the beginning, to the first years of formal education.
The staff at the Waynesboro school is making plans to implement the new plan this fall, said Dudley Reaves, the principal.
The conference also highlighted a school choice plan that has been developed by Henrico County to enable high school students to specialize in certain subjects or areas.
Henrico has established nine specialty centers, in such areas as the arts, math and technology, where students can concentrate their studies during their high school years. There are also centers for communications and foreign languages.
Thomas Bailey, director of secondary education for Henrico, said the centers offer "rigorous academic courses," but they are not strictly programs for gifted students. Students enroll in the centers as freshman and remain for four years. The centers are not magnet schools, he said, although they have some features of a magnet program.
"They offer to interested students unique opportunities currently unavailable at any high school - real choice for those who want it," Bailey said.
The conference attracted nearly 1,000 school officials, school board members, and local and state governmental officials. It also featured workshops on alternative schools, discipline, student religious speech, school reorganization, parental involvement, test scores and site-based school management.
Nolan Yelich, president of the Virginia School Boards Association, said the one-day event was designed for school systems to share ideas and to focus on key issues facing education. It attracted nearly 1,000 school officials, school board members, local and state governmental officials.
Spillane, Fairfax County's superintendent, urged the school officials to capitalize on the increasing attention being given to education by politicians.
"We are the ones who have to reach out to the community and seek support for education," Spillane said. "We need stronger advocates for the children."
by CNB