Posted on 02/18/2004 7:08:57 AM PST by ReleaseTheHounds
America's education system needs a Bill James, and a Billy Beane. Together, James and Beane — the focus of Michael Lewis's recent bestseller Moneyball — revolutionized Major League Baseball by demonstrating how maximizing efficiency can leverage limited resources to create a successful outcome.
Bill James, author of the comprehensive Historical Baseball Abstract, spent three decades challenging the national pastime's conventional wisdom, applying rigorous statistical analysis to determine the traits most associated with a player's true value to his team. James's findings didn't square with most baseball experts' opinion, and his research was ignored for years.
Until, that is, Oakland A's General Manager Billy Beane embraced James's philosophy, and put it into practice. Since the A's have one of the leagues lowest payrolls, Beane used James's findings to maximize his team's efficiency, focusing on players with the traits James found most important for winning ballgames, rather than those with flashy statistics. The strategy worked: Over the past five years, Beane's A's have been near the top of the league's standings despite being outspent by nearly all their competitors.
American education could use a healthy dose of Bill James's rigorous analysis and Billy Beane's courage. For years, discussions about improving America's schools have focused on adding resources. Politicians promise to fix our schools the same way the New York Mets or Texas Rangers try to improve their franchises: spending more money, rather than focusing on efficiency. And the public schools, like the Mets and Rangers, have little to show for their extravagant spending.
According to the Department of Education, inflation-adjusted education spending per pupil grew by 92 percent between 1972 and 2002, now totaling more than $9,300 per child. Yet there's been no evidence of significant academic improvement. Test scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress have been flat for three decades and graduation rates have slipped slightly from 75.6 percent to 72.5 percent. Little research supports the contention that more education spending improves outcomes.
Unfortunately, taxpayers can no longer afford Yankee-sized budgets. Most state governments currently face budget deficits. According to the National Governor's Association, total state spending is expected to remain flat in the year ahead. That should leave policymakers, much like the A's GM Beane, desperately searching for ways to maximize the resources they've got.
Who, then, is the Bill James of education policy? A good candidate is Jay Greene of the Manhattan Institute. For years, Greene has used statistical analysis to uncover creative solutions to improve the performance of America's schools. Much like James, Greene's findings challenge conventional wisdom.
For example, in 2001, Greene concluded that a state's academic achievement was positively correlated with how much freedom parents have to choose their child's school. The bottom line: More school choice begets better test scores. As Greene observed: "Where families have more options in the education of their children, the average student tends to demonstrate higher levels of academic achievement." Greene has also found that school-choice programs in Milwaukee, Charlotte, San Antonio, and Florida have significantly increased student performance with less financial burden on taxpayers.
But who has the courage to be the education system's Billy Beane, putting into practice Greene's unconventional findings?
So far, Florida Governor Jeb Bush has been most willing to introduce competition into his state's school system. Since 1999, Governor Bush has signed three major school-choice laws: vouchers for students in failing schools, a corporate-scholarship tax credit, and the McKay scholarship program for special-education students.
Another leading candidate is Colorado Governor Bill Owens. Last year, Gov. Owens approved the nation's newest school-voucher program. The program is currently stalled due to a Denver District Court's injunction, but that hasn't stopped Owens from promoting competition in education. He embraced Rep. Nancy Spence's effort to provide school choice to Colorado's special-education students during his recent State of the State Address.
Governors Bush and Owens aren't alone. Already this year, three governors have proposed school-choice legislation. Embattled Connecticut Governor John Rowland recently proposed a voucher program, as did New Hampshire Governor Craig Benson. South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford will soon outline a universal tax-credit proposal. With Congress's recent passage of a school voucher-program for the nation's capital, it's likely more politicians will begin to stand up for school choice.
As for Greene, like Bill James, he plans to continue challenging conventional wisdom. The data that Greene and his associates generate about what really improves education provide the ammunition for these bold governors to adopt meaningful and cost-effective reforms.
Following this path could ease pressure on state budgets while providing better education for students. For American children, that's better than the hometown team winning the World Series.
— Dan Lips is president of the Arizona Dream Foundation and an associate scholar with the Goldwater Institute.
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http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/lips200402180917.asp
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In the 1970s I envisioned a school system where each school competed for students. Very similar to the way higher education works.Making the schools compete would necessarily improve their teaching ability. Improve or die.
Naturally, the NEA is 100% in favor of this idea :)
I won 34 games with him that season, and would royally tee my brother off every time I started him. That big, fat 5-10 homerun would seemingly never come up when it was wanted. ;-)
Oh, yeah - stats are the thing, all right.
I've never done a ping list before - just starting this one. Please let me know if you'd like to be on (or off) the list.
The Oakland A's assign a value to the specific contribution of each player. These are the people who are actually tasked with playing baseball, and whose efforts decide whether the team wins or loses.
Imagine if a similar formula was applied to each individual teacher, or if you will, each player in the education game whose effort decides the success or failure of the school.
Imagine that: measuring every teacher's contribution, paying them accordingly, and weeding out those who don't help the "team" win.
But before this becomes a teacher-bashing thread (we already have enough of those here on FR), I should tell you that I am a public school teacher in a middle school in the northeast. And I like my chances of making the team.
Being a FREEPER, I'm sure you would "make the team".
There are some other "Moneyball" analogies that I think can be drawn: Focusing on how parochial schools get so much "bang for the buck"... How certain states (I think New Hampshire is one) get strong relative performance with relatively low $/pupil budgets...
The real value of "Moneyball" is looking at the micro-side of baseball: certain statistics and characteristics are far more likely to generate wins than other perhaps more heralded statistics. The great example of Marva Collins getting spectacular performance from her under-privileged inner city kids because of her tough methods and high expectations. Now that's "Moneyball" performance!
As I read the article above, I was disappointed when it morphed into an infomercial for school vouchers...I was hoping for a different application of the MoneyBall analogy.
As was I...was just thinking today that school systems tend to ignore all the research on what works and doesn't work in education and instead always implement whatever the latest fad is. This is generally to the detriment of the students, since it takes several years to "discover" the "latest & greatest" doesn't work after all - which could have been discovered by doing a good literature review before it was ever implemented. (Then it takes a while longer before they'll quit doing it, because no one wants to admit they made a mistake....)
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