THE SOUTH American spider monkey is easily captured. Simply drill a hole in an anchored coconut large enough for the monkey to get his hand in but too small for him to get it out, when he makes a fist around the bait. The monkey, refusing to let go of his precious bait, is now captured. All the hunter has to do is sweep up the monkey, and start making monkey stew.

Grasping for short term gain often leads to long term disaster.

The states are in deep financial troubles and many are desperately clawing for small federal money from Race to the Top education grants. While federal officials brag about the “massive” federal funds, the $4 billion is well less than one percent of the nation’s annual education spending. To get a piece of this money, Vermont must promise to adopt 19 federal prescriptions for education. This means a new set of mandates which will likely cost us more money than we receive.

More troublesome is that many of the mandates are demonstrably failed strategies or simply have no record of success. Turning around low achieving schools is certainly a necessity except that the methods the feds require

such as firing the principal and teaching staff) have just not worked. The independent and highly respected Center on Educational Policy has bluntly said “Don’t do it.” Despite ideological claims, the scientific consensus on charter schools is that they do no better, and often worse, than traditional schools. “Alternative pathways” to become a teacher or principal has some appeal but entrusting our children to untrained people should cause reasonable folks to pause.

Another darling of the federal administration is evaluating teachers by test scores. This was in vogue in the 1980s and 1990s but, almost without exception, these programs faded away. Basically, states and districts did not fund their new systems. The biggest problem is that the teachers with the most demanding students (economically deprived, special education, etc.) could not post the gains shown by teachers with advanced placement students. The Texas Department of Education just released a report on the failure of their pay-forperformance system.

Developing a statewide data base and uniform high standards are laudable goals. However, when asked how these efforts will improve learning, the answers are vague.

Yet, the Vermont Department of Education is sticking its hand in this coconut filled with faint and failed formulas. Is it worth it? Let’s look at the numbers.

The amount of money Vermont would get would be somewhere between less than one-half of one percent and 1.4% of Vermont spending for four years. Then, the continuation of the new mandates would have to be funded by Vermonters.

This assumes that the federal domestic budget is not cut along the way. In light of the announced expansion of our war efforts, the national debt, the economic situation and health care, this requires considerable faith in the federal government.

Sadly, in order to fund the Race to the Top initiative, the Obama administration proposed that school funds targeted for our economically deprived children be cut. Instead of funding the maligned No Child Left Behind law, monies would be reduced. Proposals are not final allocations but Vermont taxpayers may have to pickup the costs or cut teachers for our neediest children.

In applying, the most likely outcome is that Vermont would take on new mandates and obligations and not receive any money at all. Only 12 to 15 states will be given grants in the first round. All else being equal, that gives us a 25-30% chance of getting any money. Since we don’t have a charter law, our probability of success is even less. If we did win, the amount of money given to each supervisory union would support about one teacher with benefits and supplies. The state would pocket half the money for a data system. Even these meager gains could be wipedout by the cuts in federal grants for the needy and the disappearance of the ARRA stimulus money.

As the state department of education reaches into the coconut, the bait is small, the taste is sour and there isn’t much nourishment. Most likely, we would simply end up captured. We teach our children to make wise decisions and beware of immediate gratification that will cost us more in the long run. Else, we may end up being monkey stew.

WILLIAM J. MATHIS

Goshen