Ross Unveils Education Priorities

Saturday, Mike released his comprehensive education plan. Ross' key priorities as mayor would be working toward universal pre-school starting in the communities that need it most, turning Madison Park into the best technical/vocation school in the state, and extending the school day with more enrichment activities like art and music.

“For my entire career I have brought parties together in search of the best ideas. I have brought together developers with community groups, the fire union with management, and gang leaders with police – all the while convinced that we are stronger when we resolve our problems face to face,” said Ross, “This is how I will approach our schools. I will take the best ideas and innovations offered by charter schools and by Boston public schools and use those best practices to bring all our children forward.”A complete copy of the plan can be found here: http://bit.ly/16G7Y4c

Yesterday, Ross previewed part of his plan in front of Boston students at the Madison Park school. Ross is making improving technical/vocational education, especially with more high-tech and in-demand career fields, a key part of his education agenda.

"Not all of our young people will be going on to college, and we need to ensure that these youth get the job skills they need to succeed. There’s no reason Boston can’t have the best technical and vocational school in the country," said Ross.

Ross’ education plan uses public/private partnerships with the business community, nonprofits, and educational institutions to achieve many of Ross’ goals, like extending the school day and increasing vocational education.

Some of Ross’ educational priorities include:

• Dramatically improve vocational education, which is currently offered at only one school. Kids who won't be going on to college still need to get the job skills they need to succeed. There’s no reason Boston can’t have a tech/voc school to rival Worcester Tech, if not have one of the best tech/voc schools in the country. Madison Park needs to be overhauled and we should tap into public/private partnerships with the business community to increase programs in computer coding and technology, high-demand manufacturing, and clean tech industry skills like solar panel installations.

• Expand Early Childhood Program in the most high-need areas and create an Early Childhood Family Education program. Boston Public Schools currently guarantees a full-day kindergarten seat to every five-year-old in the city. By identifying those communities in greatest need for early childhood education – those with struggling schools and those with few private pre-K options – BPS can prioritize selective expansion of K1 and K0, with a long-term goal of guaranteeing availability to all applicants to schools within their neighborhood.

• Lengthen the school day by 2-hours for all our schools for every family that wants to utilize it. That doesn’t mean an extra 15 minutes for each subject, but extending the day with access to art, music, physical education and other enrichment activities. And we’ll begin with schools in the communities that need it most.

• Kindergarten to College savings accounts. Give every student upon starting school a College Savings Account (CSA) containing a $50 deposit from the City and County of San Francisco. Children with a savings account are up to seven times more likely to attend college than children without an account, according to a 2010 study from the Center for Social Development at Washington University in St. Louis

• Expand two-way bilingual education – currently in Spanish in only four schools – to more schools and more languages. We also need to bring heritage language education programs to communities with Cape Verdean, Chinese, Vietnamese, Haitian, and Latino populations.

• Encourage local food procurement – particularly for our school children – instead of shipping school food in from New York and Pittsburgh in styrofoam containers, as we do currently.  We can provide incentives and help in connecting producers with institutional consumers.

• Authorizing public schools to stay open over school holidays and/or weekends to provide meals to eligible children.  Keeping a portion of schools open in the most needed communities will enable many children, who would otherwise face food insecurity over school holidays and weekends, to access critical nutrition.  Pairing meals with enrichment activities during school vacations can be doubly beneficial for students and can serve as an incentive for families to transport their children to the programs.

• Ensure that BPS implements a comprehensive multiple-measure teacher evaluation system to improve both evaluation and teacher development.

• Bring School-Based Health Centers to all of our underserved neighborhoods. The Boston Public Health Commission currently operates School Based Health Centers (SBHC) at eight Boston high schools. These services help provide students with needed preventive care that can  care

• Require schools to transition to spending textbook budget on on-line content rather than books within two years – and 100 percent within the decade.

• Push to expand the Family and Community Outreach Coordinator program to all district schools. Currently, there are FCOCs in just about 20 percent of the district’s 127 schools. Expanding this program district-wide will have a profound impact on parental involvement, and thus student achievement.  

• Appoint a School Committee, and seek a Superintendent, who believe in delegating over budget, personnel and curriculum decisions to individual schools. Most recent studies conclude that school control over the budget is a key element of successful school-based management and restructuring. Giving schools the power to decide how to restructure themselves and how to allocate the budget means they can decide, for example, to have more classroom teachers and fewer non-classroom specialists.

• Encourage competition in our public schools. In Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, parents could send their child (along with the child’s share of funding) to any school in the city, including private schools, but within a few years there were virtually no private or even parochial schools left in the city: The public schools, faced with competition, became so good that they were a better deal than private education. Public schools should have to compete – with each other, and with alternative approaches within the public school system.  But our objective is to improve public education – not undermine it.  

Mike Ross is running for mayor to use innovative ideas to create jobs, improve our schools, and modernize government. Some of those ideas include increasing pre-K education, building the best technical/vocational school in the state, and building more police substations, starting in the neighborhoods that need them most.

Mike has represented District 8 on the Boston City Council since his election in 1999. The district includes Back Bay, Beacon Hill, West End, Fenway, Kenmore Square, Audubon Circle, and Mike’s neighborhood of Mission Hill. His commitment to innovative leadership has strengthened the diverse communities he serves—and the entire city—over the past decade.