David Safier

The basis for the BASIS edge over Edge schools

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by David Safier

Tim Steller creates a dramatic illustration of the failings of Arizona's school grading system and the inherent unfairness of the proposed Performance Funding for schools in a column in today's Star.

On the one hand, we have BASIS, with its thrice-selected student body composed of the most able and motivated students in the area. It receives an A grade from the state and no end of praise locally and nationally. If Performance Funding ever kicks in, it will also get extra state funding to give more assistance to its already top performing students.

On the other hand, and the main focus of Steller's column, we have Edge High School in Tucson.

Edge High School in Tucson takes in students from difficult backgrounds – about one out of 10 is homeless, many are parents or pregnant, some are sixth- or seventh-year seniors – and helps them graduate.

Last year the state recognized each of Edge's three charter high schools – with a D grade. Two more years of D's and the schools will be on the road toward a failing status.

This is the first I've heard of Edge High, but it sounds like it's performing the important mission of trying to help students who are the most likely to be cast aside by schools and end up underemployed, unemployed or residents of our prison system. It's part of what one of my ed profs called the U.S. education system's policy of infinite second chances, where anyone can decide to get serious about education at any time and find a school willing to lend a helping hand. And yet, for its efforts, it's in jeopardy of being labeled a failing school. If it survives and we get Performance Funding, it will have some of its state funds taken away, funds which will then go into the coffers of "successful" schools like BASIS.

New local cable show on education

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by David Safier

Ann-Eve Pedersen and I have created a new half hour cable TV show, Education: The Rest of the Story (apologies to Paul Harvey). Our goal is to look deeper into education issues than what you usually see and hear in the mainstream media, correcting misimpressions and adding information to the discussion. The first episode hasn't aired yet, but we've put it on youtube, divided into three 10 minute segments. I'll be putting them up one by one.

A regular segment will be Myth Busting (apologies again, this time to those wonderful Myth Busters on the Discovery Channel). The first segment explores the myth, Our Public Schools are Failing. While are schools aren't everything we want them to be and have lots of room for improvement, the myth of Failing Schools suggests our schools are worse than they once were and are far worse than schools in the rest of the world. Both suggestions are false.

You can watch the 10 minute video below the fold, but here's a little cheat sheet to give you some of the facts explored in the segment.

  • The average I.Q. of children today is 10 points higher than it was 30 years ago. They've had to adjust the scores downward to keep the average score at 100 points. If the scoring were the same as 30 years ago, today's average would be 110.
  • According to the NAEP test (National Assessment of Educational Progress) which has been administered since the 1970s, the average math score of today's 9 year olds is equivalent to the average scores for 11 year olds 30 years ago. While the other NAEP scores haven't gone up as dramatically, they've held their own or improved slightly.
  • The achievement of African American and Hispanic students has increased more quickly than the achievement of Anglo students, narrowing the racial/ethnic gap.
  • On the 2011 international test, TIMSS, the U.S. scored 6th in reading, 10th in math and 9th in science, surpassing most European countries. Massachusetts, which has the same population as many European countries, was 2nd in the world in science.

You can watch the video below the fold.

Sometimes teachers are the first First Responders

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by David Safier There's the story out of the Oklahoma town devastated by today's tornado of a teacher who took the six children in her charge into a bathroom and laid on top of them so any falling or collapsing debris would injure her first. She put her body on the line to protect her … Read more

Malpractice litigation helps reduce medical error

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by David Safier

The NY Times has a good op ed by UCLA law prof Joanna C. Schwartz on the value of malpractice litigation in reducing medical errors. Contrary to the notion that malpractice suits result in people hiding problems, she says it encourages improved practices.

New evidence, however, contradicts the conventional wisdom that malpractice litigation compromises the patient safety movement’s call for transparency. In fact, the opposite appears to be occurring: the openness and transparency promoted by patient safety advocates appear to be influencing hospitals’ responses to litigation risk.

[snip]

[W]hile hospitals historically took an adversarial and secretive approach to lawsuits and error, that has begun to change. In recent years, hospitals have become increasingly open with patients: over 80 percent of hospitals in my study have a policy of apologizing to patients when errors occur. And hospitals are more willing to discuss and learn from errors with hospital staff.

What accounts for these changes? Several factors appear to have overcome historical resistance to transparency, including widespread laws requiring disclosure to patients and confidentiality protections for internal discussions of error. Hospitals have also found that disclosing errors to patients and offering early settlements reduces the costs and frequency of litigation.

My study also shows that malpractice suits are playing an unexpected role in patient safety efforts, as a source of valuable information about medical error. Over 95 percent of the hospitals in my study integrate information from lawsuits into patient safety efforts. And risk managers and patient-safety personnel overwhelmingly report that lawsuit data have proved useful in efforts to identify and address error.

My knowledge on this issue is minimal. When I have questions, my usual go-to guy is Barry Kirschner, a friend and local lawyer. He sent me an email expanding on the op ed.

One of many reasons people have an incentive to drive more carefully is the cost of insurance and the threat of accountability should they be responsible for an accident. There is less irresponsible drinking and driving and risky conduct because of this civil liability.