By Glenn Mollette, Op-Ed Contributor

Every American must have the opportunity to pursue college or vocational training. We are living in an era during which even previously trained persons need to sharpen their skills or retool for the future.

Too many people are completing their education facing a massive dilemma of debt. Their next dilemma is trying to break into the job market saddled with backbreaking debt.

We must make education within reach of all American citizens. The following will help make college possible for all:

Colleges and all institutions of higher education must work as all businesses to guard against escalating costs.

The government should provide low interest college or vocational loans to students who must borrow money for their education.

Graduates should be given a three-year grace period before the payback begins.

The government should forgive up to 20% of the loan if paid back in 10 years.

Colleges should be encouraged to develop three year college programs which could cut as much as 25% of the cost of education. Everyone who has attended a four-year college knows they had four or five courses along the way they did not need for their degree program. This would also save tremendously on housing, food and fuel costs.

Colleges are throwing extra courses at their students and keeping them longer to make more money. This means the students borrow more and end up financially crippled. Schools like all businesses must be financially competitive and non-traditional in their programs in order to survive this new era. The number of struggling colleges is growing.

Already I hear someone screaming, “How are we going to compete with the Chinese, Japan and other foreign countries if we are cutting classes from education?” Most college programs have required approximately 30, four-hour classes or 40, three-hour classes. Everyone’s degree program will vary as they add additional courses. I like education as well as the next person. Hurrah for anyone who has the luxury of spending the time obtaining a 150-hour degree! This means a much greater expense, but if you can afford it, then so what? School can be fun and with that many additional classes you are surely learning a lot! My beef is that most American families cannot afford the luxury of a four-year degree being crammed into five, six or more years. We must keep the general college experience to four years to complete. If the college can help students complete the degree in three or three and a half years it saves students, the families and even the government a lot of money.

College trustees, administrators and faculty you are being served notice. Start doing your part to be part of America’s solution and not a central part of our problem. The people in America do not need another dilemma.

Glenn Mollette is the author of American Issues, Every American Has An Opinion. He can be reached at gmollette@aol.com. Illustration courtesy of occupyforaccountability.org.

The Hartford Guardian values diversity of thought and therefore fosters and advance conversations about issues relevant to Greater Hartford residents. We  present opinions from all perspectives, including opinions NOT shared by our editorial staff.

By Jonah Harris

As a recent high school graduate, I have a lot of options when it comes to higher education.

There are big colleges and little colleges, urban campuses and rural campuses, liberal arts colleges, trade schools, community colleges, research universities, and non-research universities. Now there’s the new trend in higher education, Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs, which proponents say have the potential to revolutionize the college experience.

For me, the more pertinent question is: Can they replace it?

MOOCs are online college courses that ultimately aim to make elite education available to all. Unlike most online colleges, they generally do not give credit or confer diplomas, but make up for it with courses of quality and prestige not found in any other form of distance education.

Coursera, perhaps the most prominent company offering online courses, was founded in 2012 by two computer science professors from Stanford. It offers courses from 33 universities, including Stanford, Brown, Caltech, Columbia, Johns Hopkins, Princeton, the University of California system, and many other top-tier universities. Edx, another Palo Alto-based company, founded in 2011, offers courses from MIT, Harvard, UC Berkeley, and Georgetown, among others. You can study hundreds of different subjects; most deal with technology, science, or math, but you can also take courses in philosophy, ancient Greek history, and a multitude of other humanities subjects.

Statistics show that some 60 percent of Americans aged 25 to 34 years old do not have a college degree; many are hindered by the cost. Online courses could offer hope to millions of people who cannot attend traditional colleges.

The lofty objectives and practical benefits have a clear draw. Coursera attracts 70,000 new users a week and reached its millionth member faster than Facebook. The industry as a whole has attracted tens of millions of dollars of investment capital from universities and private investors. The lack of prerequisites, age cutoffs, or price tag has attracted millions of users who would otherwise not be able to take college courses from top universities.

And the State of California has its own interest in the phenomenon. Both Governor Jerry Brown and state Superintendent Tom Torlakson have supported increased investment in online education and implementation across California’s university system. As part of this push, Silicon Valley-based Udacity is partnering with San Jose State University (SJSU) and local community colleges to develop a mix of in-house and online courses that – for the first time ever – will offer credit.

But what about me? I ask myself whether I am willing to replace a traditional college with a MOOC. And the answer is, not yet.

First of all, if higher education’s overarching objective is to mold a teenager into an adult, the peripheral aspects of the college experience — living away from home, forming new communities, and taking part in the traditions of a unifying experience — are just as important as advanced instruction in a particular field.

Even if MOOCs perfectly replicate classes, they can’t replace the growth that comes with independence and the challenge of gaining new experience.

Second, in strictly economic terms, it comes down to prestige. The difference when it comes to quality of instruction between top and middle-tier universities may be small, but the prestige of a Harvard diploma can make all the difference when it comes to job offers and salaries.

And that is precisely the problem with MOOCs. Even if an MIT student takes exactly the same course as an independent MOOC learner, employers will ultimately see that one student worked hard enough to gain entry to one of the most prestigious institutions in the world and the other simply logged onto the course from his computer. It would take a radical shift in how society views college to make a MOOC certificate of completion as impressive as a college degree.

Ultimately, I can’t help but think the benefits of a degree from a relatively less prestigious institution would serve me better in the job market than one from an online course.

So while I will continue to root for the success of this great experiment, which seeks to make premier higher education available to everyone, for now I remain unconvinced. College is more than classes. For the tens of millions of full- or part-time college students across this country, it serves as a place and a time to build new social networks, to foster intellectual risk taking and greater independence, things MOOCs cannot provide.

Jonah Harris is a recent high school graduate from San Francisco.

New America Media, Question & Answer, Khalil Abdullah,

Editor’s Note: On October 10 the U.S. Supreme Court will hear Fisher v. University of Texas, a case that could upend affirmative action policies nationwide. The plaintiff, Abigail Fisher, is suing the state over her rejection for admission into the University of Texas, which considers race in allotting a percentage of available seats after the top 10 percent of high school seniors are admitted. Fisher, who is white, did not place in the top 10 percent. She contends the race-based portion of the institution’s admission policy is a violation of her constitutional rights. Veteran education reporter Scott Jaschik spoke with New America Media’s Khalil Abdullah on the potential ramifications of the hearing and what it could mean for minority college students across the country. Jaschik was the editor of the Chronicle of Higher Education from 1999 to 2003 before co-founding Inside Higher Ed, where he now serves as editor.

New America Media: How will this decision affect college admissions policies throughout the country?

Scott Jaschik: I think this will have a large impact in different ways. There are places like the University of Texas, other flagship universities and also elite private universities that consider race in admissions. These institutions are very hard to get into, places that typically make their admissions decisions based – in large part – on test scores and course grades. On average — and it’s very important to say on average because there are exceptions to this — if they eliminated the consideration of race, most of these institutions would admit fewer black, Latino, and Native American students. Many of them might see an increase in Asian-American students. In fact, when affirmative action was eliminated in California, there were initial spikes in Asian-American enrollments more so than white enrolments.

So, first of all, the decision will be important for the highly competitive admission institutions, but it [may have] other impacts. It could well affect the way many colleges, and not just the elite institutions, administer financial aid or how their summer programs operate.

NAM: Could you give an example of how a financial aid formula might be affected?

Jaschik: Scholarships that are based on income level are race-neutral and wouldn’t be affected, but some campuses have scholarships in which race and ethnicity are considered for certain awards, and you also have some summer programs and outreach programs that use race as a criteria.

NAM: How else could a ruling upholding the suit change a school’s demographics?

Jaschik: There were very interesting briefs filed with the Supreme Court by community colleges, for example. At first glance, you would say, community colleges are open admissions, so why would they be concerned? But community colleges want some of their students to transfer into flagship universities. In that process, race and ethnicity are sometimes considered … If affirmative action is radically scaled back, some [non-flagship] institutions might see an increase in black and Latino students. The impact of the court’s decision could really be quite broad, but we don’t know what the court will do.

NAM: What’s your sense of where court is headed?

Jaschik: Most experts think the current court isn’t generally sympathetic to affirmative action. The court could scale affirmative back partially or fully. You really don’t know until the decision comes out. Even then, if it’s a decision that drives a major change in current policies and the colleges start to adjust accordingly, there will probably be more lawsuits and court decisions. I think the ramifications of this decision could be quite dramatic over a period of time.

NAM: What is some of the possible fallout given the court’s timing in hearing this case? 

Jaschik: Because this case is going to be argued in October, in the middle of a presidential election … you’ll see a lot of campus debates. Generally when affirmative action becomes a hot issue, it can create difficulties for minority students on campuses who feel that people are raising questions about whether they are welcomed there or not, or whether they deserve to be there or not. If the court rules against Texas, anyone who has been admitted [under the current policy] wouldn’t be kicked out, and remember that not all of the minority students on that campus were admitted under affirmative action criteria. But it could be a very difficult time for people who are already on campuses.

NAM: With Justice Kagan recused from this case, what’s your read on the eight justices who will be voting?

Jaschik: A tie vote would mean that the University of Texas wins, but a tie doesn’t have the same precedential value as a majority five-three decision. Likely to back Texas would be Justices Ginsberg, Breyer, and Sotomayor. I think these three are fairly safe predictions. As the court’s health care decision shows, you can never be sure what’s going to happen. Nobody expected Justice Roberts to be the savior of Obama’s health care. So you don’t want to say you can be sure, but if you look at what the justices have written in the past, the remaining justices are skeptical of affirmative action. Sometimes people vote for what they’re skeptical of, but one of those five would have to change for Texas to win [by getting a four-four vote].

NAM: California and Florida are among the states with policies guaranteeing admission to high school students in the top-percentage of their class. Can you share some thoughts about Texas’ Top 10 Percent (TTP) admissions policy?

Jaschik: Texas has a fairly highly segregated system of high schools. [The state] knows, with a TTP, there are a number of high schools that are overwhelmingly black, so it will get some African-American students. It knows it has high schools that are almost all Latino, so some Latino students will get in. Now, obviously Texas [is] not de jure segregated like before Brown v. Board of Education, [it’s] de facto segregated. The question a lot of people have is whether this is the best way forward for American society.

A key criticism of the top TTP plan is that it doesn’t encourage high school districts to improve. They know the top 10 percent is getting in, whether they offer AP courses or not; whether they offer advanced calculus or not. Historically, one way in which flagship universities can promote quality education in a state is by having certain admissions standards. A TTP policy sort of takes them away from that.

NAM: If Texas loses the suit, what might be some short-term outcomes?

Jaschik: State universities would have to look to other approaches if they wanted to get a decent number of minority students. Some advocates of race neutral policies urge using economic status as an alternative. You could give a preference to a low-income student. This would still be legal if the Supreme Court said you couldn’t do affirmative action admissions. You’d get some black and Latino students and the benefit would also go to low-income white and Asian students. But I think most colleges would say that this approach and others would not add up to the level of diversity they have no

New America Media Commentary  by Kelly Goff

That seems to be the topic on everyone’s mind as millions of American students head toward graduation this month. And by everyone, I don’t mean my classmates, the ones who have scrimped, saved, borrowed and begged to pay for their degrees. I mean the professors, parents and education reporters who just can’t stop talking about how bleak the job market is for new graduates.

According to a recent Associated Press analysis of government data, 53.6 of bachelor’s degree-holders under the age of 25 are unemployed or underemployed. News flash: the job market is tough for everyone. It has been since before we entered college.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate in 2000 was at a 30-year low at 4 percent. We are now hovering around 8 percent, and that’s pretty positive. Still, in 2000, 41 percent of bachelor’s degree-holders under the age of 25 were unemployed or underemployed.

It’s not just college students being hit hard by the economy, or even being hit much harder, but it seems we are just a focus group that has been spotlighted. Maybe because we know this, and because we know that it’s going to be difficult, none of my classmates are asking each other where they’re going to be working after graduation, but rather we are asking each other what we’re going to be doing.

For some, it’s time to decompress, travel and start exploring the world. After navigating the labyrinth of paperwork and red tape of completing an ever-more-challenging requirement list, it’s time to take some time.

For others, yes, it’s time to work. And this may be at our retail, waitressing or freelance jobs. But if it pays the bills, then it’s ok for the time being.

No college degree can ever guarantee a job. And even if it does, it can never guarantee a job you’ll love. In a good job market or a bad job market, an education has more worth than the monetary value that a Gallup poll places on it, and the more I think about it, the more I begin to resent this monetization of the college experience.

Thirteen years after graduating high school, I’m about to finally obtain my bachelor’s degree. Perhaps because I took time off, went out there in the “real world” and found positions that were well-paying and didn’t require a college degree, it doesn’t feel like I’ve wasted my time or my money to get this degree. Those jobs might have paid the bills, but they didn’t make me happy.

As cliché as it may sound, the degree is about learning, about gaining knowledge and skills that will serve me well in any job that I do end up obtaining. Critical thinking, multitasking and the expansion of my worldview cannot be measured in a starting salary.

Yes, I might have to wait tables a little longer than I’d like, but if there’s anything that the last decade has taught me, it is that my degree holds more value than the dollar amount someone is willing to pay me just to see it on a resume.

It has also taught me that for those willing, able and determined, there is a place in the workforce. It may not be in their field of study, but it may be something that they love even more.

Those graduates who will get jobs are either in one of the few fields that have lots of openings, or the ones who are willing to try, try, and try again no matter how many rejections – or worse yet, unreturned phone calls – they must face.

They will take unpaid or low-paid internships (now that’s a whole other conversation) and hope to work their way up. They will sling burgers or fold cardigans until whatever debt they’ve accumulated is paid off, hopefully taking on projects that interest them on the side until they can secure a full-time position.

Despite all the reports of doom and gloom, don’t worry about us. We’re going to be just fine.

Kelly Goff is graduating from San Francisco State University with a degree in journalism. 

HARTFORD — Gov. Dannel P. Malloy will meet with residents at town hall meetings across the state until there’s a bill for “bold” education reform.

The first in a series of community forums will begin 8 p.m. at the Village South Center for Community Life at 333 Wethersfield Ave., Hartford.

Malloy’s reform agenda includes closing the widest academic achievement gap in the nation by implementing changes to teacher tenure and access to preschool education.

For other tour dates and other information about scheduled dates and towns for the Governor’s Education Reform Tour go to http://governor.ct.gov/educationtour.

HARTFORD – A recent education reform workshop sponsored by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy at Central Connecticut State University set the stage for “real progress” with the state’s entrenched problems in educating all of its children.

So said State Rep. Douglas McCrory (D-Hartford), vice-chair of the legislature’s Education Committee.  McCory, who was a panelist at the event, said the state is now poised to address the academic achivement gap during the 2012 legislative session, which convenes February.

McCrory’s panel discussed ways to improve low performing school districts and promote excellence in teaching.

“Achieving equal educational opportunity is a challenge that requires real reforms,” McCrory said. “This forum was a great kick-off to the debate that lies ahead as we seek bold and innovative changes.”

Specifically, McCrory said he wants to make universal pre-school available for all children and the state’s education funding formula adjusted to provide more resources to failing school districts.

He also supports stronger teacher evaluations that are not simply based on standardized test scores, he said

“Parental involvement will also always be a critical part of any successful equation,” McCrory said.

The achievement gap refers to the disparity of academic performance between groups of students, especially by ethnicity and socioeconomic status.

According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress project, Connecticut’s achievement gap is the largest in the nation, particularly between white and African American students.

By Matt Amaral, Commentary

To say marijuana is a problem at the high school where I teach is a gross understatement. There is a tree next to the gas station across the street from campus where students smoke weed almost every morning at 7:30 AM. I drive by and see groups of them huddled in clouds of smoke. Kids walk into my class with red eyes stinking like skunk. Sometimes we suspend them. Most of the time teachers don’t realize the reason kids are giggling and scatterbrained is because they’re high, and many teachers can’t recognize the smell anyway. But no matter what we do, the problem persists because of the acceptance by parents.

In California, weed can almost be considered a culture. It is a uniting practice among a large segment of the population that doesn’t agree with its illegal label, and who furthermore believe it is a way of life. Weed will be legal in this state sooner rather than later, and no matter its status today, people go about their lives as if lighting up is the same thing as drinking coffee.

The vast majority of high school students have an easier time finding marijuana than they do buying a pack of cigarettes.

Unfortunately, on our public school campuses, smoking weed also has the aura of being what cool kids do. Smoking blunts, hitting bongs, toking joints and puffing on pipes is looked at as an essential part of their culture. It is a ceremony you need to know about, if you want to be known.

Of course, the idea of teenagers doing drugs isn’t anything new. Teenage drug use is always analyzed and bemoaned, and as it began to peak in the 80s and 90s, we kept saying things like, “Kids today…” Now, despite the fact that teenage pregnancy, drug use, and crime have gone down in recent years (all of it peaked in the 90s), marijuana use remains widespread.

When I catch a kid high at my school, I ask them, “What would happen if I called your dad?”

“Go ahead,” they tell me. “He’s probably high right now.”

So I call their dad, and sure enough he says, “Look, I know he’s smoking weed. I smoke weed. When I was his age I smoked weed too. All his friends smoke weed. Everyone I know smokes weed. What do you want me to do?”

Once again, I am forced to ask people to act like adults.

When I give my Weed Talk in class, it has a very clear message: Compare the weed smokers on this campus to the kids who don’t smoke weed. Who is more successful? Now, compare the adults you know who smoke weed to the ones who don’t, and ask yourself the same question. Weed isn’t the worst drug in the world. More people die from prescription medications every year than marijuana and alcohol combined (does anyone actually die from weed?). But I have to admit, the people who live that lifestyle—smoke blunts every day, live their lives high—aren’t as successful.

I know lawyers and doctors who smoke weed. I know teachers who smoke weed. But the big difference is that they aren’t constantly high. They light up on weekends. They toke after work. They don’t let it get in the way of their professional lives. Weed isn’t the worst thing in the world, but it can be if you make it the center of yours.

I just wish parents would act like parents. Even if you smoke weed, do you have to do it in front of your kids? Do you have to make it a part of their lives too? Do you want alcohol to be a part of their lives at 14? Would you care if they were coming to school drunk?

I guess the answer is simple, but hard to swallow. Those parents could care less whether their kids are successful or not. How could they? Because even the weed smokers I know always say, you can’t be high when you’ve got important shit to do.

What is more important than a kid’s education? Certainly not your joint, mom and dad.

Matt Amaral is a writer and high school English teacher from the San Francisco Bay Area, and a regular contributor to New America Media. His work can be read on his own blog, Teach4Real, and he is also a featured Blogger for EducationNews.org.

By Robert A. Frahm

NEW BRITAIN – It is one of the state’s largest suppliers of new schoolteachers, but after Central Connecticut State University sends its graduates into the classroom, it knows little about how they perform.

That was among the issues raised Monday as state Education Commissioner Stefan Pryor met CCSU faculty and administrators to zero in on how to improve the quality of teachers in the state’s public schools.

“In a significant sense, it all starts here,” Pryor told representatives of the teacher preparation program at CCSU, the latest stop on a “listening tour” to visit schools, meet educators and assess the needs of the state’s public education system as he completes his second month on the job.

Pryor has made teacher quality a key theme as he seeks to improve public schools and address Connecticut’s worst-in-the-nation achievement gap separating the poor from the well-to-do.

“How do we set the highest standards? … What’s the right way to insure that the activities that happen here relate to student performance?” he asked faculty from CCSU’s School of Education and Professional Studies.

Joining Monday’s discussion was Gov. Dannel Malloy, who appointed Pryor in September and who has pledged to make education a central issue during the next session of the state legislature.

“Stefan has got a very big mission to accomplish in a very short period of time,” he said.

Studies have shown that family background, economic status and other external factors can produce large variations in student performance, but many researchers say that the strongest school-based factor affecting student achievement is the quality of the classroom teacher.

Malloy described the teaching profession as a calling. “When done well, it’s a guarantee of our democracy’s success,” he said. “Unfortunately, when not done well, it’s a guarantee of personal failure.”

In Connecticut, the profession could undergo significant changes. A statewide committee is expected to issue recommendations next year to change the way teachers are evaluated, and student progress is expected to be a factor in those evaluations. Some education reformers suggest that teacher preparation programs also should be evaluated based on the performance of their graduates.

That is among the chief principles of Teachers for a New Era, a project started in 2001 by the Carnegie Corp., calling for reform of teacher preparation programs at selected colleges and universities.

“Recent research … linking individual pupil records with specific teachers in many different cities and states has established beyond doubt that the quality of the teacher has a profound influence on pupil learning,” the Carnegie Corp. said in a summary of the project.

The Connecticut Department of Education granted 331 teaching certificates to CCSU graduates in the 2009-10 school year, making Central the second largest supplier of new teachers that year, state figures show. The largest was Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven, where 383 graduates received certificates.

However, there has been little follow-up on how children learn from teachers who have graduated from teacher training programs.

“We really have a dearth of data,” said professor Nancy Hoffman, who directs CCSU’s Master of Arts in Teaching program. “Right now there is no feedback that would let us look at how our graduates’ students gain in their classrooms.”

Malloy agreed that better information is needed.

“We’ve been slow in establishing objective standards by which to measure ourselves,” he said. “Maybe going to an independent analysis by a third party [to determine] the quality of our product is appropriate.”

Pryor pressed faculty members about the standards required for entering the teacher preparation program. “What can we do to increase the number of candidates who come into your program with higher academic acumen?” he asked.

Malloy asked, “Are we doing everything we can to encourage those people to go into teaching who should go into teaching and at the same time discouraging sufficient numbers of people who … may not be as successful?”

One professor, Tim Reagan, suggested the school could recruit better students by offering more scholarships. Anne Pautz, an assistant dean, said some students avoid teaching because other careers offer better salaries. “Engineers can get so much more money,” she said.

State regulations also can be barriers, faculty members told Pryor.

Hoffman said regulations outlining specific course requirements, in some cases, are too complex and can limit the number of candidates for training programs.

“There’s a fine line between too much regulation and too little regulation,” she said later. “I hope they can re-balance.”

By Caitlin Emma, Contributor

HARTFORD — No one can evaluate a teacher’s performance in the classroom quite like another teacher, educators, union members and administrators testified at a public hearing Monday night.

The Connecticut Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union, wants state legislators to remove the State Department of Education’s (SDE) authority to set professional standards for teachers. Rather, CEA proposes an autonomous panel led by educators to determine those standards for themselves, something a number of states already do.

Lucinda Young said Wash. state’s independent professional standards board worked and it can for Conn., too 

“When you’re only in an advisory role, people really don’t have to listen to you and often they don’t,” said Mary Loftus Levine, CEA’s executive directior.

The state seems more guarded about the idea, however.

Marion H. Martinez, the associate commissioner of the Division of Teaching, Learning and Instructional Leadership at the SDE, said department members attended the hearing only to collect information about the idea of an independent professional standards board. She said the SDE has not established a position about an independent board.

“Given the fact that the commissioner is relatively new, having come on board officially Oct. 7, and the fact that we have so many new board members, they are intent on gathering additional information, hearing what other states do and then making a decision after careful deliberation,” Martinez said.

Nancy Pugliese, who leads the teacher certification division at SDE, has said that removing the education department’s authority for setting standards is a bad idea. She said the CEA has thwarted efforts by the department to update the standards for years.

The hearing took place before the legislature’s Program Review and Investigations Committee (PRI), which issued a preliminary report on teachers’ standards in late September.

“Our teachers know more about learning and academic achievement than any other group of individuals in the educational system,” Levine said. “Yet our current debate is like a traditional New England town hall meeting with the people who know the most about the subject, our teachers, left outside in the cold watching silently through the windows.”

Connecticut’s current board on professional teaching standards plays only an advisory role to the SDE and state Board of Education (SBE). Seventeen members comprise the board, including four teachers appointed by CEA and other educators, business and industry officials, school administrators and two parents of public school children.

Cheryl Prevost, an East Hartford teacher and chair of the Connecticut Advisory Council for Teacher Professional Standards, said council members think that the SDE and SBE fails to value their opinions.

“I can say with confidence that this lack of decision-making authority takes its toll on teachers who sit on the council,” she said. “They often feel as though their opinions aren’t valued when decisions are made that have an impact on how they do their jobs.”

“I believe this (advisory) council could do much more if restructured and replaced by an independent professional educator standards board that had much more decision-making authority in governing our profession,” Prevost later said.

State Sen. John Fonfara, D-Hartford, who is PRI’s co-chair, said he wondered whether public school teachers should define their own standards like some private professionals, such as lawyers or engineers.

“We have a choice as to whether we walk into attorney Kissel’s [state Sen. John A. Kissel, R-Enfield] office, but I don’t have a choice as a youngster assigned to a public school teacher.”

Other public unionized professions in Connecticut already regulate themselves through their own autonomous professional standards boards. For example, Connecticut’s fire commission and police council issue certification, develop professional standards and provide their own training.

Twenty-one states, including Connecticut, use their educational professional standards boards for advisory roles, including Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Maine and Rhode Island. CEA wants to make Connecticut one of 18 states with a standards board that makes decisions in some capacity. Boards from states like California, Georgia, Minnesota and Pennsylvania play a large to limited role in making decisions about educator licensing, preparation, disclipline and ethics.

Four states, including Delaware, Maryland, Mississippi and Texas, use semi-autonomous boards that make joint decisions with other state government agencies.

Lucinda Young, chief lobbyist for the Washington Education Association, and Jill Mack, licensure officer at Saint Joseph College in West Hartford and former member of the Vermont Standard Board for Professional Educators, both said independent professional standards boards worked in their states and it’s Connecticut’s time for one.

“For a state who claims to be on the cutting edge of education reform, the time is right,” Mack said.

Neither Vermont or Washington state suffers from an unprecendented educational achievement gap like Connecticut, said PRI member Rep. Mary Mushinsky, D-Wallingford. She asked if either state saw measurable progress in closing any form of achievement gap through their independent professional standards boards, and Young and Mack said they did not.

PRI will make final recommendations in December.

This story originally appeared at www.CTMirror.org.

HARTFORD –  As a follow up last spring’s documentary, Education vs. Incarceration: The Real Cost of Failing Our Kids, the Connecticut Public Television (CPTV) will premier a new original special, Education vs. Incarceration: A Town Hall Meeting, live on Thursday, October 6 at 8 p.m.

The television channel will also air an encore presentations on Oct. 11 at 11 p.m. and Oct. 16 at 10 a.m.

Hosted by broadcast journalist Keith Kountz of WTNH, this one-hour special focuses on the vital need for educational and judicial resources that can keep troubled youth on track in school and out of prison. The conversation will also explore how socio-economic factors and race can bring higher risks for incarceration.

The town meeting includes an interactive panel discussion and an opportunity for viewers to call in or e-mail questions during the broadcast. During the program, viewers should call 800-842-2788 or e-mail justice@cptv.org.

Panelists on Education vs. Incarceration: A Town Hall Meeting include Dr. Steve Perry – Founder of Capital Preparatory Magnet School and author of Push Has Come to Shove and Man Up! Nobody is Coming to Save Us, Jimmie Griffin – Community Activist and a leader of the NAACP’s Waterbury chapter, Michelle Cruz, Esq. – State Victim Advocate.

There will also be a number of experts in the front row participating in the discussion:

• Judge Christine Keller – Chief Administrative Judge for Juvenile Matters
• Julia O’Leary – Deputy Director, Juvenile Probation, Judicial Branch, Court Support Services Division
• William Dyson – Professor, Central Connecticut State University and Former New Haven state representative, school teacher and administrator
• Mark Benigni – Meriden School Superintendent
• Joseph Gaudett – Bridgeport Police Chief
• Aileen Keays – Research Specialist, Municipal and Regional Policy, Central Connecticut State University and lead evaluator of Waterbury’s PAL program
• Jacquelyn Santiago – Vice President of Operations, Compass
• Joey Miano, Dean of Students, New Britain High School and PAL Coach

Education vs. Incarceration: A Town Hall Meeting is a CPTV Connecting Our Communities initiative made possible by the Connecticut State University System and the Vince and Linda McMahon Family Foundation.