New Mexico Superintendents' Report Card on Secretary-designate Skandera's Performance

February 10, 2012

Prather Consulting

Executive Summary This report card was conceived, designed, and prepared solely by Hugh Prather, Ph.D., a retired New Mexico superintendent who is an educational consultant. This report card was compiled because of its author's concern about the chilling effect that the Secretary-designate's perceived retaliatory behavior has had on the educational leaders of New Mexico and potential sanctions that might befall them if they were to speak out actively on their own behalf. The Report Card was designed to assess performance attributes that New Mexico's prior Chief State School Officers have manifested effectively. These include: training and preparation, leadership of the State Department Of Education/Public Education Department, sensitivity to the culture of the state, involvement of school district superintendents in helping make change initiatives happen, communicating with school districts, and demonstrated competence. The report card was submitted to 88 of the 89 school district superintendents or interim-superintendents (Espanola represents a unique situation and was not included) on Thursday morning, February 9, with the following cover letter below in italics: (This has been sent by me personally BCC to all superintendents in New Mexico and is being done as a private individual with no affiliation with any organization) Ladies and gentlemen, I know almost all of you personally, have worked closely with a great number of you over the years and have the utmost respect for the hard work that you're doing leading your school districts. I would deeply appreciate your help in providing me data to verify a strongly held perception of mine. I am deeply distressed with the quality of leadership being evidenced by the New Mexico Secretary of Education-designate. Many of you in private conversations have shared similar concerns with me as well, and yet the chilling effect of prospective retribution places each of you in very uncomfortable positions for publicly voicing such concerns. I have already written my Senator, laying out a clear case to not confirm the Secretary-designate if her confirmation comes before Senate Rules this session. I am taking this step to attempt to garner a clear picture of statewide perceptions by the educational leaders of New Mexico regarding her competency. Please help me by taking an anonymous survey at Survey Monkey whereby you get a chance to "grade" the Secretary-designates performance from your perspective and to provide any additional comments that I might carry before Senate Rules if I can provide testimony. Here is the link to the Survey Monkey "Report Card." http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Z6GM6CB Please take the five minutes completing this "Report Card" will require no later than tomorrow afternoon (2/10) so that I can compile the results and have them ready during the final week of the session. I thank you. Hugh 2 Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card February 10, 2012

Hugh Prather, Ph.D. Prather Consulting 2303 Calle de Rafael NE Albuquerque, NM 871221-1353 505.321.1467

The survey was closed at 5:00 PM Friday, February 10, with 48 responses at that point. An analysis of the responses indicated that three positive responses were from an identical IP address, and two negative responses were from a different but identical IP address, therefore these were only counted once each, thus netting a total number of responses of 45, or a 51% return rate. The individual response summaries for each question are found on pages 4 and 5 and all verbatim comments categorized by negative or positive follow. In summary the Secretary-designate's grade point averages are as follows, with an "A" being 4.0 and an "F" being 0.0: Leadership/Performance Attribute Training and Preparation Effectiveness of Leading the PED Sensitivity to New Mexico's Culture Involvement of Superintendents Communications with School Districts Demonstrated Competence Overall Performance Grade Point Average 1.50 1.32 1.29 1.26 1.55 1.44 1.33 Grade Equivalent D D D D C D D

Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card

February 10, 2012

Response Summary

Total Started Survey: 45 Total Completed Survey: 45 (100%)

Page: 1 1. How would you grade the Secretary-designate's training and preparation to lead the PED? answered question 45 skipped question 0 Response A B C D F Unable to grade Count I would grade her training and 11.1% 20.0% 8.9% 24.4% 33.3% preparation 2.2% (1) 45 (5) (9) (4) (11) (15) for leadership as 2. How would you grade the effectiveness the Secretary-designate's leadership of the PED in support of your district? answered question 45 skipped question 0 Response A B C D F Unable to grade Count I would grade her PED 8.9% 20.0% 2.2% 28.9% 37.8% leadership 2.2% (1) 45 (4) (9) (1) (13) (17) in support of my district as 3. How would you grade the Secretary-designate's sensitivity to New Mexico's culture? answered question 45 skipped question 0 Response A B C D F Unable to grade Count I would grade her 6.7% 20.0% 8.9% 15.6% 42.2% cultural 6.7% (3) 45 (3) (9) (4) (7) (19) sensitivity as

Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card

February 10, 2012

4. How would you grade the Secretary-designate's involvement of you and your fellow superintendents in planning and supporting educational reform in New Mexico? answered question 45 skipped question 0 Response A B C D F Unable to grade Count I would grade her involvement 11.1% 15.6% 4.4% 26.7% 44.4% 0.0% (0) 45 of myself (5) (7) (2) (12) (20) and others as 5. How would you grade the Secretary-designate's communications with your district? answered question 45 skipped question 0 Response A B C D F Unable to grade Count I would grade her communica 13.3% 15.6% 11.1% 33.3% 26.7% 0.0% (0) 45 tions with (6) (7) (5) (15) (12) my district as 6. How would you grade the Secretary-Designate's demonstrated competence as the chief state school official? answered question 45 skipped question 0 Response A B C D F Unable to grade Count I would grade her 13.3% 13.3% 8.9% 33.3% 31.1% 0.0% (0) 45 competence (6) (6) (4) (15) (14) as 7. How would you grade the Secretary-designate's overall performance as New Mexico's chief state school officer? answered question 45 skipped question 0 Response A B C D F Count My overall grade for the 11.1% 13.3% 8.9% 31.1% 35.6% 45 Secretary (5) (6) (4) (14) (16) designate is: answered question 30 skipped question 15
5 Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card February 10, 2012

8. What comments would you care to add about your perceptions of the Secretarydesignate's performance? Negative comments-Verbatim
Her design is totally along the governor's plan and is very rigid and basically, accepting to change or modification. Skandera is ignorant of New Mexico's culture and unwilling to listen to those of us in the trenches. She has lied about why the NCLB waiver hasn't been approved, saying it is because of no teacher eval system based on student performance in place when in actuality it is because she didn't involve stakeholders in the development. Rolling out the grades without letting us know what the grades are based on was irresponsible. We would never allow our teachers to grade our students in that way. We are in desperate need of carry-over funds and have been promised for 3 months. We still do not have them even after repeated requests. Again irresponsible on Secretary Skandera's part. I agree with some of the movement of reform, but I feel that the PED has pushed to hard and too fast to make very sudden changes in too many areas. I feel that the change should occur in smaller steps and gradually. We are making teachers and administrators to have to learn and adjust to too many things at one time. You can eat the entire elephant in one bite. Change is good, but with some ownership of all parties involved and in a way that you can be successful with one change at a time. It appears that some decisions were made in the grading process and in other activities that appear to have been both arbitrary and capricious to accomplish predetermined outcomes. The end goal is to make the state and its districts to look as bad as possible and then to create "growth" so that credit can be claimed. Believe she is a capable woman - but has no education credentials. She does not understand the many issues we are dealing with as we have so many children and families in crisis. Reading and Math come second to being able to eat and have a roof over your head. Secondly, the S-D says she communicates, but the conversation tends to be one way with the same info over and over. She hears what she wants to hear and puts her spin on it - then goes forth and establishes policy. She is so worried about a ridiculous waiver that she fails to provide leadership in the realm of Common Core (why are we so behind and why does true reform take a back seat to A-F) and funding that will truly make a difference. It is so sad to have a S-D who is not an educator and who has bought into the belief that administrators and teachers are the reason our students do not perform as well as those in other states. As long as the classrooms stay large, we don't have enough teachers and counselors we will fail. I am tired of trying to do it without support from the person who should be our advocate - not our enemy. The Sec-Designate does not seem to understand how schools or district's work. Her lack of experience in a classroom or as an administrator throws up barriers on a daily basis. These hurdles could have been overcome if she had the ability to listen to people who had this experience. Unfortunately, she has not 6 Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card February 10, 2012

demonstrated any of this ability. She does not collaborate with others and she seems to get very angry when questioned. It has distressed me greatly to see the chief school leader be so negative about children, education and educators in New Mexico. She should be an advocate and instead she had become an adversary and a hindrance to successfully teaching children in New Mexico. Her unwillingness to involve parents in the education of children is the antithesis of good educational practice, and that is one of the cornerstones of her third grade retention bill. Excluding parents is a guarantee recipe for school failure, yet she is not familiar with dealing with parents, so she does not understand. Perhaps her lack of being a parent has diminished her understanding of how devastating it would be for a parent to have that participation to be ripped away. She does not take input from supts. She has her own agenda. She can't find supporting documents for her actions. She bashes public education, pushes charter schools, and vouchers. Doesn't understand public school funding. She has some theoretical knowledge in effective school models, but relatively no practical experience in implementation of such. Her leadership ability in garnering a power base with local school leadership is almost nonexistent. That inability to draw in support and ownership in her initiatives has been her downfall. She is simply not experienced enough to pull it off. She has no classroom experience . She is using New Mexico as a stepping stone to another level. She does not include superintendents with decision making. She has never contacted my school, or me to see how things are going. She has never been to my school. She does not understand student achievement. The whole educational system has become a train wreck. Superintendents do not trust PED. PED does not trust superintendents. Ms. Skandera is a political soldier carrying a political agenda. She is not a practitioner and it is very evident in her leadership or lack of. The Secretary -designate talks about how much she wants to work with superintendents and districts, but she does not walk the talk. She would set meetings with the advisory council and then not show up or be very late. She treats us as though we do not know what we are doing. Her handling of the Special Ed and T& E audits was terrible. It painted all of us as cheaters and gamers. I just believe that she lacks the emotional maturity to lead education in New Mexico. Before you can lead other you have to be able to control your own emotions. It is very clear to me a non-educator cannot lead PED, she has little understanding of curriculum, bilingual education, budgets, supervision and evaluation, licensure, testing and assessment, etc. She and her staff are dishonest and untruthful. The Governor talks the eradication of corruptness in state government--she needs to look in her own backyard at PED. PED is a sad state of affairs and how terrible for our children. Failure to prepare isn't far from preparing to fail! Her focus seems to be with Policy...getting Rules in place. She hasn't shown leadership in Instruction nor does she seem to understand Rural NM Concerns and its Unique Cultures. Most disheartening is that 7 Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card February 10, 2012

she doesn't seem to understand or support the Superintendents. The delicate balancing act the superintendency is- to meet the unique needs of individual communities as directed by our elected school board members to prepare their children for the future while staying in compliance with regulations. Her perspective is so narrow and shallow that it in and of itself leaves the majority population of New Mexico out of any consideration. The Secretary-designate has tried to ramrod a conservative agenda without involvement or information about the history of NM schools, past reform efforts, or basic knowledge of education. Her lack of any experience in schools as a teacher, administrator, superintendent or principal is obvious. The fact that they were going to release the original A-F reports in the middle of winter break demonstrates that no one in her leadership team has any sense of schools or the calendars schools work under. I was at the meeting when she learned this and the look on her face, and the faces of her staff, was shock. They truly had no idea that schools might not be open the week after Christmas. This lack of knowledge and experience with schools impacts all of the recent work of the PED. Essential support services to schools have been neglected in the effort to push "reform" agendas. Beyond these criticisms though, by far her major failing is the lack of interest in or involvement from including the many diverse groups and cultures of NM. It is only in the last three months, when she began to hear from DC that the waiver application was at risk due to this lack of involvement, that she began to reach out and listen to superintendents, bilingual education groups, Native Americans, Hispanic educational organizations, teachers and parents. Her limited, right-wing policy experience in unsuccessful efforts in other states such as Florida, are hardly the skill set needed to lead education in New Mexico. The Secretary-Designate is a highly intelligent and competent person who has chosen to be a cog in the political machine. That is not a "slap", rather it is the nature of the politicization of the state school leader. We need a state school board to whom a state superintendent is accountable too. It does not work to be accountable to the governor, for obvious (political) reasons. While some of the initiatives that Secretary Designate Skandera has pursued are important, the manner in which she has done so is offensive and not sensitive to NM needs - rather a perception of NM vs the rest of the united states and that is the wrong way to look at our problems. Additionally, the experience required to obtain an administrator's license in NM is vital to understanding how the bureaucracy impacts the classroom. Without that type of knowledge, the mandates that are being made are not well thought out because of those missing pieces. I would like to be assured that the educational leader of our state has credentials equal to or surpassing my own. The Secretary Designate is a Policy person, not an educator. She has no understanding of our state, our economy, our three cultures. Her work in Florida is known not be working, yet she is trying it here. She has no deep understanding of how socio-economic impacts education. We need someone in this critical leadership position that has classroom/administrative experience. She has none. It would be nice if we could find someone from within the state that understands the needs of 8 Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card February 10, 2012

our state, understands the culture, and the people. We need someone who is not going to be attached at the hip to the governor! She has her own agenda from the governor and is just pushing through

Affirmative comments-Verbatim
This is a Cabinet Position, The Governor has the right to appoint who they want as the Secretary of Education. I am so happy to have someone that is concerned with reform for minority and poor students. As well as someone who established attainable expectations that are of a more than proficient level. She is doing a good job in moving the state forward. Finally a chance to do more for kids. The Secretary is a breath of fresh air. Education is finally on everyone's mind and we should be supportive of new ideas to improve student achievement. The secretary-designate has an educational background in public policy. She has a career background in working with (high-powered) departments of education, including the Federal Department of Education. In New Mexico, the voters spoke and established Cabinet Position, rather than an administrative (superintendent) position. One can argue that the secretary-designate is inherently qualified in both her educational background and career experience because of this constitutional shift in New Mexico. In regard to her leadership over the past year, she has worked to get to know the dynamics of the state. In doing so, she has not coddled or catered. She has taken a hard-nosed approach. But within that approach, though she is committed to the direction in which the executive has directed, she has made concerted effort to respond to input of various educational constituents, including Superintendents. She has held NUMEROUS face-to-face meetings and NUMEROUS phone/on-line conferences. She has made it clear, just as we are expected to make it clear to committees in our districts, that all input is advisory and will be considered within the scheme of the current reform goals. When considering the input that has been given, by our association, in regard to A-F grading and Reading Intervention/Retention, one simply needs to look at the current versions and reflect on what we have asked in many advisory meetings and conferences: Efforts have been made to accommodate! Thanks for the opportunity for superintendents to privately share information. Secretary Skandera has fresh, new ideas that are based around students, not unions and old policies and Initiatives. It is about time that someone shakes up NM and does the right thing for KIDS. Secretary-designate Skandera has a a very creative, sharp, and great mind. She knows how to analyze data and understand research methods. She is very capable of setting the goals as agreed upon by her and the Governor. Some of those goals are hard to implement, but they are good goals for New Mexico's students. I appreciate her push of the Reading initiative. When else in the history of New Mexico have you heard legislators debate about reading standards for 3rd Graders. Ms. Skandera asked for input on the reading bill and every bit of input she was given from my perspective was placed in the 9 Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card February 10, 2012

bill. She also had numerous meetings (9) to discuss the A-F School Grading Rule. She took most of the input, but it is sometimes hard for us Supts to realize we are "advisory", just similar to my school advisory committees. There should be some level of respect provided to the Governor for choosing Ms. Skandera, and some respect for the Secretary-designate. Something must be done and change is never easy. Skandera is accessible and open to discussions. As leaders in their own communities, School Supes can be difficult to deal with because they are used to calling the shots without being questioned much. I know she hasn't been a classroom teacher, but I don't know about her training. In the year that Secretary-designate Skandera has been in New Mexico, the conversation of public education has shifted from apathy to hope. Many of us in the state have asked for the reforms she is promoting since the inception of NCLB. Now that those reforms are apparent, we see our colleagues up in arms. In our meetings, there are repeated derogatory remarks about the Secretary, many bordering on defamatory; yet, all she has done has provide an argument to us, the school leaders, that we can do better, be better, and always improve. She has demonstrated a passion for "the little guy" by proclaiming that our poorest students can no longer be left behind. She has always been straightforward about her passions and direction, the same passions and direction that any child-centered educator upholds. She has taken our public criticism and maintained a professional demeanor. She has championed our state across the country. While we may not always agree, I ask that each administrator take the time to really reflect on our purpose and her call. If you're in this for students, then you cannot disagree with her initiatives or her urgency in achieving them. For the first time in years we have a Secretary that is attempting to bring about true reform and accountability. I appreciate the A-F School Grading Model as it gives educational institutions hope. I do have reservations with the retention plan as written. I for one am in support of the Secretary's work and feel that common ground must be found between PED and School Sperintendent's if we are going to bring about positive change in our schools. As leaders we have worked hard for the students in our state, however the fact remains we are ranked 49th for academic achievement in the nation. I cannot reiterate enough that change, as uncomfortable as it makes some feel, is imminent.

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Secretary-designate Skandera's Report Card

February 10, 2012