Welcome to Nebraska: We do things a little differently here.

Nebraska is a great – if somewhat quirky – place to live.  In many ways, we just don't quite fit in with the rest of the United States.   Politically we have a nonpartisan Unicameral and open primaries.  In the Presidential race, our electoral votes are not winner-takes-all, so in 2008 President Obama actually received one electoral vote for the congressional district that covers Omaha and the surrounding area.  While some may not be a fan of living in the middle of fly-over country, Nebraska is a great place to live.  Cost of living is low, and the economic makeup of the state makes us less susceptible to larger national trends.  We may not experience the benefits of an economic boom as much, but we also are relatively insulated from the low points as well.  Omaha fared better than any other city in the country, and the state as a whole did remarkably well during the recession.  Oh – and don’t forget we’re some of the nicest people you’ll meet, and few can match our rabid (but respectful!) love affair with all things sports related (seriously ... we sold out a stadium of over 20,000 people for UFL games).

So I knew going in to my year representing the teaching profession in this state as the 2016 Nebraska Teacher of the Year that Nebraska is a pretty special place to live in.  Now that my time is nearly up and I had the chance to talk to teachers and policy makers across the country, I can say without a doubt that Nebraska is also a pretty special place to teach in.  I learned that many things I considered to be standard across the teaching profession were actually unique to my experiences here in our state.  The more I came to realize this, the more certain I was that I needed to start blogging.  Teachers need to know that their evaluations don’t have to be driven by testing, and that (gasp) students can still succeed without assessments constantly measuring their progress. 

The need to speak up became more apparent to me when I realized just how absent teachers are from the national conversation.  The latest offending piece came from the Atlantic, who did a series recently on education.  Notably absent from the panel they consulted on education issues?  A teacher that is currently in the classroom.  Notably present?  Michelle Rhee, who for some reason we still listen too despite the fact that her efforts in DC have been completely discredited.  But if we don’t take the time to speak up, can we really blame media outlets for not including our perspective?   

So in my time so far as Nebraska Teacher of the Year, here is what I have learned about Nebraska that sets us apart.  These are not my observations, all of these things are based on people from other states informing me that what we do is not the norm where they come from.

1) We've avoided most of the educational fads

Common Core?  Nope.  Sure, some components were incorporated in some instances, but since Nebraska has a big emphasis on local district control it was up to each district to make that call.  Hearing about this has been really bizarre because I have no frame of reference for how common core actually impacts my classroom. 

Charters?  Can’t even legally operate them in Nebraska.  Being a public school teacher, and a strong union advocate, I have always been against charter schools.  In January, my stance was challenged with a very important question: “If the public schools are working, why would the demand exist for charters?”  I was reminded by my friend Nate Bowling – Washington’s Teacher of the Year and very vocal advocate on improving education – that we cannot be pro public schools just because they are public.  We have to make sure our system is working. 

We don’t need privately run schools to offer students choice because we already offer choice through public options.  Nebraska has a state wide Option Enrollment program to attend a school in another district.  Here in Omaha, after a protracted legal battle between the urban Omaha Public Schools and the surrounding suburban districts that started as a result of a fight over allocation of state funds for schools, the Learning Community was established.  It created a separate levy to fund critical programs for targeted communities in Omaha like the Early Childhood Program.  They are also piloting programs for teacher mentoring and a Jump Start for Kindergarten Program.   It also lead to the establishment of the Wilson Focus School – an elementary school with no home attendance area so all students can opt in to attend.  The Focus School has matched, or in some cases out performed more affluent suburban elementary schools in recent years. 

All of this are on top of the litany of programs that districts develop in-house.  For example in my district, Millard, students can enroll in the Montessori program, Core Academy, a K-12 IB program, career academies, or an early college program (among others).  These are all distributed across a number of schools in the district to offer a number of options for parents and students.

So why don’t we have charters?  Because parents are already afforded quality choices through our public schools.

Testing?  Stop reading if you want to avoid getting jealous.  Up until this year at the high school level, juniors took a suite of NeSA tests in the typical subjects (e.g. math, science, writing).  But just this past year the Unicameral voted to give the Department of Education authority to use a college admissions test instead (and they just officially made the move to use the ACT not too long ago).  Since more than 80% of Nebraska students take the ACT anyway, why not just use that?  In one fell swoop, we knocked several assessments off the plate.

Evaluations?  In a meeting in May I was asked what my state’s evaluation system was.  I had to answer honestly: we do not have one.  There is no state mandated system of teacher evaluation.  The state is piloting an initiative in several school districts that is based on the Danielson Model, but it is taking its time and making sure they implement it right.

There is nothing wrong with experimenting in education.  We need to experiment and try out new approaches in order for us to better ourselves, improve our quality of instruction, and make sure that what we do with them now as students will have meaning and prepare them for when they are adults.  But when we jump head long into policies that are not necessarily grounded in best practices, then there is a very human cost.  We are disrupting the ability of the next generation to get the education they deserve.  Thankfully, Nebraska has managed to avoid a number of trends that appeared to do more harm than good in other states.

2) All the Players Recognize We Want the Same Thing

Whether they are administrators, school board members, parents, or the union, there is a climate of cooperation in this state when it comes to education.  Without a doubt, there are times where unions and administrations will go at it, but at the end of the day we understand and respect where all sides are coming from.  When a bill was proposed this past year to restrict school funding at the state level (LB959), I decided to testify to the Education Committee on how that would impact teachers.  When I went down to Lincoln that day, I saw representatives from the NSEA conversing with members of think tanks, representatives from school districts, and even Superintendents themselves on how to work together to craft a narrative that would at least change if not stop LB959.  Many of my fellow teachers of the year could not imagine seeing those parties working together on any legislative issue in their home state.

Another great example of this cooperation would be the Educators Health Alliance.  All but four school districts in the state participate in the EHA for their health benefits, and use the size of their member pool to negotiate strong rates for their health plans (the plan is currently run by BlueCross BlueShield).  The board that oversees EHA is composed of representatives of the NSEA (teacher’s union), NASB (school boards), and NCSA (administrators). 

3)  Autonomy, Autonomy, Autonomy

Now, I cannot vouch for how far this extends to other districts in the state.  This is because a heavy emphasis is placed on local autonomy and control and giving communities the ability to make decisions about what is best for the education of their children.  But speaking from my experiences in Millard, I know that I feel supported as a teacher.  And one of the reasons why is because that culture of autonomy extends all the way down to the classroom level. 

My evaluation is centered around a goal that I get to set based on my needs as an educator.  So last year, my goal dealt with improving my approach to teaching writing in my history classes.  Even when the district has a focus in mind for our goals, we are still given leeway develop it based on our content and what we would like to specifically do.  This January we are rolling at a 1:1 initiative for all of our high schools, so our goals have to deal with utilizing technology in some way.  We still get to develop what the goal looks like in our PLCs and in consultation with our evaluators.  Speaking of evaluators, there was a moment when I was in D.C. this past spring where I had stunned a group of educators while we discussed evaluation.  I had several of the best teachers in the country literally not believe me when I said that my evaluator had been in my classroom eight times that year – including two full period observations.   This year my evaluator has already been in twice.  The first time my students were testing, but he stayed and wanted to see a copy of the test, and even asked about the new style questions that align to the changes in the AP national exam.  I realize now that kind of evaluator engagement is NOT the norm, and I consider myself very lucky.

Yes – of course there are initiatives that get rolled out that I have to be a part of, and there are school or district wide professional development initiatives.  Obviously, I am not completely autonomous as a classroom teacher (nor should I be).  But one of the things that I have heard after speaking with teachers in other states is that there is a greater sense of trust that we will get the job done.  The state has a climate that emphasizes local control, and districts often maintain that climate with their educators. 

4)  It Works

We are a state that does things by our own playbook – heavily emphasizing local control and taking our time steering the educational ship.  Compared to the states that were selected for Race to the Top Grants, Nebraska matched or beat all but one of them on the NAEP.  Massachusetts was the lone Race to the Top state that outperformed Nebraska (no surprise, Massachusetts has been the rockstar state for education for a while now).  Even then, if you compare Omaha Public Schools and its approximately 52,000 students to Boston Public Schools and its 57,000 students – Omaha’s graduation rate of 80.7% looks pretty impressive compared to Boston’s 65.9% (which will be something of a shock for people in the area, since OPS is often crucified as an example of a failed district).

Nebraska’s graduation rate of 89% is one of the highest in the country.  Of the states that have 80% or more of its students take the ACT, Nebraska has the highest composite average.   These stats are important.  We have been given latitude to run our classrooms, to form policies within our district, and to work together to build a great public education system – and it has worked. 

5)  …but we still have issues

Nebraska is a great state for education, but we are not without our issues.  I want to take the time to address these in separate posts, but I feel they should be mentioned here as well.

First, there is a major funding issue brewing in this state.  Nebraska ranks 49th in the country when measuring the percentage of school funding that comes from the state level.  We are overly reliant on property taxes, which not only frustrates voters inside school districts who have high property tax rates, it exacerbates inequality.  At the time where we SHOULD be talking about how we can provide more funding from the state level, there is pressure to actually CUT state funding because of a revenue shortfall that has recently hit Lincoln.  Rather than propose the necessary measures of actually raising revenue, we have fought a series of protracted battles to try and limit cuts to education and fight for what little increases in state funding that we can get.  School districts in our state are strong, but they are running on leaner and leaner budgets.  My district – Millard – has the lowest per pupil cost in the metro area, and even though our enrollment continues to increase, we have actually cut 30 positions in the past 5 years through attrition.  Other nearby districts have RIF’d positions, or frozen pay several times to deal with their tight budget situations.  School funding is going to be a major issue over the next few years.

The other major issue is race.  I am sure that acknowledging this will generate some controversy, but the facts speak for themselves.  Nebraska has one of the highest achievement gaps in the country between white students and students of color.  What gives me hope is the fact that the Nebraska Department of Education is not shying away from this fact.  On the very first page of its “Schools-At-A-Glance” report for the 2016-2017 school year, before it even mentions the major positives of our educational system, the report highlights that we have the 9^th largest achievement gap for 8^th grade math in the country.  Second to last in state funding for schools and one of the worst achievement gaps.  In my mind, those are priority issues we have to address as a state.  I am confident that we have the drive and resources to resolve both of those issues, but we have to raise awareness on both of these topics in order to see things through. 

Even though we do not go with the national flow a lot of times, Nebraska has established itself as a great state for education.  I cannot begin to articulate how proud I have been this past year to talk to people across the country about my experiences teaching here.  I hope to use this platform to promote what we do so well, and also to raise awareness about issues in education and what we can do to be even better.