INDIANAPOLIS — Already-sour relations between Indiana’s chief education policymaker and the state’s largest teachers’ union seemed to reach a breaking point Thursday morning.
Blaming a lack of support from teachers’ unions, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Bennett said the state is ending its pursuit of as much as $250 million available through a competitive grant program funded by the federal stimulus package.
After missing the cut the first time, Indiana won’t submit an application in the second round of selections for the $4.4 billion Race to the Top program intended to help states advance ambitious education reforms.
Bennett, a Republican, said Indiana would not have stood a chance since its application would have lacked union support.
“I received notice yesterday that the Indiana State Teachers Association is unwilling to join me for an open and transparent discussion regarding union support for vital components of Indiana’s Race to the Top application,” Bennett said in a statement Thursday.
He was referencing a meeting he proposed for April 27, in which he would sit down with the leaders of Indiana’s two largest teachers’ unions to try and hash out their differences and agree on what to include in the Race to the Top application. Media were invited to attend, but Department of Education and teachers’ union staffers were not.
“Without support from the union that represents more than 90 percent of Indiana’s school districts, our application will not be competitively positioned. Therefore, Indiana will not apply for Phase 2 funding,” Bennett’s statement concluded.
ISTA President Nate Schnellenberger reacted with a harsh rebuke, saying Bennett failed to extend the professional courtesy of checking with him first before announcing the meeting to the press. He said he would not attend the meeting.
“We didn’t slam the door shut on Race to the Top. We said that we wouldn’t attend the media circus he wanted to have next Tuesday. We’re not going to walk into that ambush,” Schnellenberger said.
Bennett’s meeting proposal, and Schnellenberger’s decision to decline the invitation, came after a week of bickering about Race to the Top between the two via e-mails sent to all of the state’s 60,000 teachers.
The bottom line: the trust between two of the state’s most powerful forces in education policy is broken.
“He was elected to be the superintendent of public schools, not the dictator of public schools. If he’s going to try to dictate to me his terms and conditions, then we’re not going to have a good relationship,” Schnellenberger said.
The dispute in the Race to the Top application was largely over the extent to which teachers’ jobs would be linked to student test scores.
Indiana’s situation is not unique. In Florida, the Republican-led state legislature recently passed a bill that would have eliminated the traditional tenure program and instead tied teacher pay to student performance on tests.
However, Republican Gov. Charlie Crist, a Senate candidate who is rumored to be considering a break from the GOP in favor of campaigning as an independent, vetoed that bill after strenuous opposition from teachers who said standardized tests are problematic measures of student achievement.
Schnellenberger echoed that argument Thursday, saying such a requirement makes little sense for those who teach subjects such as art, music and special education. He added that teachers face intangible challenges as well, such as students whose home lives are not conducive to learning.
“There’s just a myriad of problems with that that need to be thought through,” he said. “That was the stumbling block that I don’t think we ever got over.”
Schnellenberger said schools should base teacher evaluations in part on student test scores, but should factor in measures such as administrative observation and community involvement, as well.
The dispute between Bennett and the ISTA is likely to spill into campaign season. The union finds its strongest allies among Democrats who control the Indiana House with a narrow 52-48 margin. Meanwhile, Bennett has joined other Republicans in pushing for a GOP majority.