A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

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Amending the Indiana Constitution: What Would You Say . . . Ya Do Here?

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Justin Mack, writing for the Indianapolis Star, has an article on the ballot question to amend the Indiana Constitution this year. The question has to do with requiring a balanced budget, but it’s not at all clear what functional impact, if any, this proposed change would have on the State government. The following is the text of the proposed amendment to Article 10, Section 5 of the Indiana Constitution, the bold text added.

Section 5. (a) No law shall authorize any debt to be contracted, on behalf of the State, except in the following cases: to meet casual deficits in the revenue; to pay the interest on the State Debt; to repel invasion, suppress insurrection, or, if hostilities be threatened, provide for the public defense.

(b) The following definitions apply to this section only for purposes of the limits on the State budget under this section:

(1) “Revenue” means all income received by the state general fund and all other state funds, excluding the proceeds of bonds or other loans.
(2) “Expense” means the ordinary operating costs of State government, including any debt service payments made during the biennial budget period.

(c) The total amount of expense appropriations enacted by the General Assembly for a biennial budget may not exceed the estimated revenue of the State in the biennial budget period.

(d) A State budget enacted by the General Assembly must appropriate money for the State’s prefunded pension funds in the amount necessary to actuarially fund the accrued liability of all such pension funds during the budget period.

(e) If expenses exceed actual revenue received by the State when reconciled at the close of a biennial budget period, the subsequent biennial budget must subtract any shortfall from the projected revenue available for that subsequent biennial budget.

(f) The requirements under subsections (c) and (d) may be suspended if at least two-thirds of the members of the House of Representatives and at least two-thirds of the members of the Senate vote to suspend the requirement.

(g) A court that orders a remedy pursuant to any case or controversy arising under this section may not order any remedies other than a declaratory judgment or such other remedies that are specifically authorized by the General Assembly in a law implementing this section.

The original text in subsection (a) above, I believe, was adopted as part of the 1851 Constitution. The debt provisions would have been important because the fallout from the Indiana Mammoth Internal Improvement Act and the Panic of 1837 was still relatively fresh in peoples’ minds.

By 1840, the disastrous financial consequences of the Panic of 1837 and the Internal Improvement financing was being fully felt in Indiana. The Whigs decided not to nominate Wallace, their sitting governor, and instead nominated Samuel Bigger who had no connection to the Mammoth Internal Improvement Act. The Democratic nominee, Tilghman Howard, had been in the General Assembly at the time of the Act and had voted for it. Bigger claimed to never have supported the Internal Improvement Act. (Given its general popularity at the time, this seems at least somewhat dubious.) Bigger was also aided by the fact that William Henry Harrison was on the ballot as the Whig Presidential candidate. Harrison’s reputation in the state had improved with the rose-colored glasses of hindsight, and he had become something of a folk hero. Despite the state’s financial struggles, the Whigs retained majorities in the legislature, and Bigger defeated Tilghman.

Bigger’s honeymoon didn’t last long. the State’s payment on its debt was double its revenues. The state soon defaulted on payments and, in an effort to come to grips with the situation, the State imposed a massive tax increase (apparently up to a 300% increase in some places). Efforts were made to complete the improvements, the Wabash & Erie in particular, in order to capture revenues from the improvements. However, those efforts did not make a sufficient dent in the debt.

The struggles with that debt continued through the 1840s:

Whitcomb’s first term was devoted to addressing the State’s financial situation. Measures taken during Bigger’s tenure, a somewhat improving economy, and Whitcomb’s cuts to state employee compensation helped improve the state government’s financial outlook. During his term, he advocated for the creation of the Indiana School for the Deaf and a state mental asylum. Both initiatives were successful, but funding would have to wait until further recovery of the state’s financial prospects.

The State had made some recovery on its finances at the time of Whitcomb’s re-election bid, and he defeated Whig Joseph Marshall and Liberty candidate Stephen Stevens. However, despite the improvement on the debt situation, discussions were underway with Charles Butler, a representative of eastern and foreign bondholders to whom Indiana remained indebted. Butler had successfully negotiated a restructuring in Michigan which had similar internal improvement financial problems — also exacerbated by the Panic of 1837 and also involving the sketchy Morris Canal and Banking Company. In 1845, Butler began negotiations. Prior to the legislative session in December of 1845, Morris gave a speech in Terre Haute where he proposed that a tax should be imposed dedicated to partial repayment of the bonds. The bondholders, in turn, would take the Wabash & Erie’s revenues for the other half. He persuaded Governor Whitcomb of his plan and, together, they lobbied local and legislative leaders.

For his part, Butler attempted to scold Indiana for paying local contractors before paying bondholders and cast the State’s debt repayment obligations in moral terms, making much of the “widows and orphans who held Indiana bonds and depended on regular interest payments.” After some rough and tumble debate (one Senator called Butler’s style of writing and thought as “frothy and bombastic”) the legislature passed a bill in early 1847 that provided for payment of half of the bond obligation and traded control and revenues of the Wabash & Erie for the remainder. The debt still consumed about half of the State’s revenues, but it was becoming more manageable.

When Indiana was drafting its Constitution of 1851, it had been wrestling with a disastrous debt situation for more than a decade. The current structure of our Constitution has been sufficient to keep us more or less out of similar disasters for 160+ years. So, what’s the need for this new language? Does it do something that hasn’t been getting done? I don’t know that I even oppose this as a policy matter, but I’m always against mucking around with our Constitution where we don’t have a good handle on the need or the consequences.

This will obviously pass because “balanced budget? Sounds good!” will likely be the general take by voters considering the question. But, for what it’s worth, I think the current language has served us well enough over the years and so I’ll vote “no.”

(Update): When I initially posted this, I had meant to mention that a rule of statutory construction could lead to consequences where maybe none was intended. Let’s say that lawmakers advocating for this provision don’t really want anything to change – they just want to be seen as fiscally conservative.

A basic principle of statutory interpretation is that courts should “give effect, if possible, to every clause and word of a statute, avoiding, if it may be, any construction which implies that the legislature was ignorant of the meaning of the language it employed.” The modern variant is that statutes should be construed “so as to avoid rendering superfluous” any statutory language: “A statute should be construed so that effect is given to all its provisions, so that no part will be inoperative or superfluous, void or insignificant….” A related principle applies to statutory amendments: there is a “general presumption” that, “when Congress alters the words of a statute, it must intend to change the statute’s meaning.”

So, it’s entirely possible that a court interpreting this new language could feel compelled to read this amendment as requiring change of some sort even if legislators didn’t really intent this amendment to have much of a substantive impact on State operations.

State Impact to Stop Updating Its Website

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State Impact Indiana has been a good resource for Indiana education news since 2011. It has announced that it will stop updating its website in favor of having its stories more diffusely spread through NPR and PBS affiliates:

That change has prompted changes with StateImpact. There are no plans to update the project’s website, indianapublicmedia.org/stateimpact. That’s because local NPR and PBS station partners’ websites are home to stories from the Indiana Public Broadcasting team. These in-depth stories will be available on StateImpact’s social media accounts.

That’s a little disappointing. I have StateImpact in my Feedly newsreader. So, when they post a new story, I’d have it there waiting for me when I checked my news feed. I guess I can add a few more NPR and/or PBS sites to my reader — assuming they have RSS feeds. But, I’m afraid those stories will be mixed in with Trump’s outrage of the hour or whatever the hot issue of the day might be. I can also follow the social media feeds, but there I’m at the mercy of Twitter or Facebook’s algorithms. (You don’t have a social media account so much as Twitter or Facebook has an account that you write content for.)

More generally, I’ve been hoping for a return to the use of RSS feeds, the open web, or whatever you want to call it. I don’t know if this is like hoping for a return to a simpler time when everyone wore hats or a realistic anticipation that people will get sick of social media antics.

Stuff Flows Downhill: Inmate Population Edition

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Big hitter, the Lama. Long.

This is a family-friendly blog, so I’ll not say “shit flows downhill” in the headline. Also, I’m a little skittish about using the phrase here at all since it’d be pretty callous to refer to inmates as “shit.” That’s not my intent — rather, I’m referring to the costs of incarceration. Back in 2014, the General Assembly changed the rules so that low level felons would be incarcerated locally, generally in county jails, rather than in state prisons.

According to an AP article:

The state pays jails $35 daily for each of those inmates to cover food and staffing, but the money doesn’t pay for additional jail space. Dozens of Indiana’s 92 counties are studying, actively pursuing or developing expansion plans or are in the midst of building new facilities.

There was also supposedly a plan for the Department of Corrections to evaluate the savings it realized from not having to house these low level felons and the savings would be passed along to the counties to help them pay for the additional burden. But, last I heard (early 2016), the DOC hadn’t identified any savings, despite a 17% reduction in Department of Corrections sentences, amounting to 5,000 fewer inmates. I don’t know if there have been any developments on that front. But, per the AP article, “lawmakers passed a new law earlier this year that tries to address the jail crowding issue, which local officials say has grown since the state sentencing changes took effect in 2014. Counties can now direct a portion of the local income tax rate to go toward correctional and rehabilitation facilities. The legislation requires counties that are building or renovating jails to conduct a feasibility study to examine possible alternatives.”

Reminds me of Caddyshack:

Hey, Lama! Hey, how about a little something, you know, for the effort, you know?”
And he says, “Oh, uh, there won’t be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.”
So I got that goin’ for me, which is nice.

So, there won’t be any money, but the General Assembly has given local officials the opportunity to take the heat for passing a tax increase to fund the DOC’s inmate reduction. Not exactly total consciousness, but I suppose it’s something.

Legislative Study Committee Considers Excluding Poverty-Based Situations From Definition of “Neglect”

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I don’t know how serious the consideration is, but the Indiana General Assembly Interim Study Committee on Courts and the Judiciary received a recommendation from the Department of Child Services based on a suggestion from the Child Welfare Policy and Practice Group. (That CWPPG report is worth reading for anyone wanting a deep dive into the subject. The recommendation is to reconsider the statutory definition of “neglect” which is the most common reason for a “Child in Need of Services” (CHINS) case or designation. Specifically, they recommend excluding neglect which is based solely on poverty and limited, one-time lapses in parental judgment. The overarching problem is that Indiana’s DCS is buckling under the strain of its responsibilities.

Inadequate funding is one issue. But there is also a question of whether the system is over-inclusive. Indiana had a 90% increase in children being referred to out-of-home care from 2005 – 2017 (that seems like an odd date range to pick) while neighboring states had between 10% -40%. Indiana also has a comparatively high rate of children being referred to child protection. Only Washington, D.C., West Virginia, and Vermont have higher rates of referrals. (A caution to the reader – I don’t have a great deal of involvement with these types of cases, so I only have a very broad idea of what it means to be referred to out of home care and to be referred to child protection). The study noted that Indiana has significantly more court involvement with these cases than is common nationwide. 72% of child victims in Indiana have court cases pending compared to 29% nationally. So, the question is whether Indiana has a bigger problem or if it is unnecessarily catching families up in a dragnet.

There is a lot to unpack in the CWPPG review and recommendations, and I’ve only skimmed it. But, with respect to the statutory definition of neglect that caught my eye when I started writing this post, the current definition says:

The child’s physical or mental condition is seriously impaired or seriously endangered as a result of the inability, refusal, or neglect of the child’s parent, guardian, or custodian to supply the child with necessary food, clothing, shelter, medical care, education, or supervision.

According to the working group, this is not an uncommon definition, but it notes that other states exclude violations due solely to poverty and occasional lapses in judgment. The proposed definition would define neglect as:

The child’s physical or mental condition is seriously impaired or seriously endangered as a result of the inability, refusal, or neglect of the child’s parent, guardian, or custodian to supply the child with necessary food, clothing, shelter, medical care, education, or supervision, though the parent, guardian, or custodian is financially able to do so, or due to the failure, refusal, or inability of the parent, guardian, or custodian to seek financial or other reasonable means to do so.

I see what they’re trying to do here, but I’d revise the language somewhat. They want to excuse neglect when a parents are trying their best but just can’t provide, but they don’t want to excuse poverty due to sloth. I think they need to incorporate the “solely” concept into the definition, and I think they need to back off a bit on the failure to seek financial means. As currently written, I don’t see an acceptable poverty excuse that actually makes the cut.

But, overall, the general thrust of the idea isn’t too disagreeable. You want to avoid dragging more people into the system than you have to. You want to devote limited resources to where they can do the most good. And you don’t want to criminalize or otherwise diminish parental rights simply because a person is poor. However, where kids are suffering due to poverty, we need to do a better job of providing for them. And, of course, there is the larger problem of the economy being hollowed out and the consequent erosion of the middle class. But, I suppose that’s a bit much to put on the shoulders of DCS.

Unnecessary HIV Transmission in Scott County

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The Lancet has published a study by Gregg Gonsalves and Forrest Crawford finding that earlier implementation of a public health response could have reduced the scale of the HIV outbreak in Scott County. According to the study, the upper bound of undiagnosed HIV infections in Scott County peaked at 126 on January 10, 2015, about two months before Governor Pence declared a public health emergency. The total number of HIV infections was estimated to be 183-184 by August 11, 2015.

Initiation of a response on Jan 1, 2013, could have suppressed the number of infections to 56 or fewer, averting at least 127 infections; whereas an intervention on April 1, 2011, could have reduced the number of infections to ten or fewer, averting at least 173 infections.

Dr. Crawford in a news release summarizing the study said:

Our findings suggest that with earlier action the actual number of infections recorded in Scott County — 215 — might have been brought down to fewer than 56, if the state had acted in 2013, or to fewer than 10 infections, if they had responded to the HCV outbreak in 2010-2011. Instead they cut funding for the last HIV testing provider in the county.

According to a New England Journal of Medicine study, “free HIV testing had not been available in this community since a Planned Parenthood clinic closed in 2013.” Detection could have taken place earlier if there was a better health system in place. Even after the problem was detected, there was resistance to intervention because of moral concerns. Doctors Josiah Rich and Eli Adashi do a good job of explaining the competing policy views:

The tug-of-war in and around NSEPs and syringe access laws is an ideological one. To some, NSEPs condone and encourage drug use, dissuade injection drug users from seeking help, signal governmental acceptance of illegal behavior, perpetuate the cycle of drug crime, contradict law enforcement efforts, and threaten public health and safety. According to Robert Martinez, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy from March 1991 through January 1993, NSEPs “undercut the credibility of society’s message that drug use is illegal and morally wrong.”4 Framed in this fashion, injection drug use represents a voluntary lifestyle choice by individuals free of behavioral disease. Viewed in this light, NSEPs undermine the “war on drugs” and its attendant drug-control policies. To others, NSEPs constitute patient-centered constructs designed to assist those whom the International Classification of Diseases defines as having “mental and behavioral disorders due to psychoactive substance use.” These patients have a chronic relapsing disease that is amenable to intervention were they not stigmatized, incarcerated, deprived of employment, or kept at arm’s length from medical care. They have been ostracized and marginalized for want of effective outreach.

Ultimately, I think the evidence is on the side of needle exchange programs. Despite what one’s gut reaction might be to the programs, they do more to prevent harm than they do to increase harm. And, ultimately, that’s the moral calculus that policymakers should look at.

Participation Trophies and Hell

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I watched the Fred Rogers documentary last night. (I’m not crying. *You’re* crying!) Mr. Rogers was a pretty strong example of the immense good that religious faith can bring into the world. I’m not a religious man myself, but it’s clear that Mr. Rogers’ faith drove him and informed his work in the world. There are a lot of loud mouths who do a lot of bad in the name of God. It’s important to remember that there are also a lot of people quietly doing good because of their faith as well. (And people doing good and bad without religious guidance as well.)

But, I digress before I even got started. One scene that really got to me was a series of opinion columns and television shows where people were arguing that Mr. Rogers had corrupted a generation or two of kids by telling them that they had inherent worth. This is the crowd that is desperately worried about participation trophies. These folks argue, perversely, that we’re damaging kids by telling them that they have worth.

I’m ultimately skeptical that the people who are critical of participation trophies are motivated by a deep concern for the children involved. At some level, I think these people don’t feel good about themselves or their own accomplishments unless someone else is losing. And/or they have some vague notion that the world these days is bad compared to the past and, what the hell, let’s blame it on people mollycoddling kids these days. (Lack of historical knowledge and nostalgia goggles let them overlook that the past, by and large, was a comparatively crappy place to live.) I don’t know, maybe their own parents beat them and told them they were losers. It’s too painful to think mom & dad were jerks or incompetent parents, so they turn that pain into a virtue. “It was for my own good.”

In a similar way, I think the idea of hell has its roots in the “can’t win unless others are losing” mentality. There is a sizable group of people who seem to relish the idea of others suffering in hell every bit as much as they look forward to their own divine reward. If I had to guess, I’d say that the group who finds a lot of value in the idea of hell probably has strong, negative opinions about participation trophies.

Competition is good. It hones skills and adds excitement to an activity. But the idea that a person doesn’t have worth outside of winning and losing is pernicious. It adds unnecessary pain to the world. Somehow the idea that the world can be made better by being nice to each other and helping one another has become subject to scorn and ridicule. It’s unicorns and rainbows. Cooperative and respectful isn’t the same thing as “weak.” I don’t think Fred Rogers was anyone’s doormat. If you look at what he accomplished and how he accomplished it, I think you’ll find a strength of will that most of us have not developed.

Anyway, be nice to each other. It doesn’t mean you’re weak. We can and should aspire to make the world better. Not winning isn’t the same as being a loser.

Superintendent of Education, Dr. Jennifer McCormick Supports Conditions on Receipt of Public Funds; Won’t Run for Re-Election

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Dr. McCormick outlines her legislative agenda and announces her decision not to run for re-election in 2020.

Niki Kelly, writing for the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, reports that Superintendent McCormick will not run for re-election. Arika Herron, writing for the Indianapolis Star, reports that Superintendent McCormick believes that “any school that takes public money should be an inclusive place for LGBT students and staff.” It seems pretty clear that she does not see eye-to-eye with her Republican colleagues on what the Superintendent of Public Instruction’s role should be or with how charters and private schools should be held accountable for their receipt and use of public money. This news came as Dr. McCormick discussed the Department of Education’s legislative priorities for the upcoming session. Among the priorities she announced for the Department were providing an inclusive environment for K-12 students, holding charter school authorizers accountable both fiscally and academically, and reducing testing time.

[P]roviding children an early opportunity to learn while ensuring all K-12 students are provided an inclusive environment is pivotal to the well-being of children and Indiana’s success[.] . . . Dr. McCormick will champion for charter school quality by holding authorizers accountable, both fiscally and academically. An aligned assessment system will also live in this area. In an effort to further reduce testing time and align PK-12 efforts, assessment will once again be a part of the legislative discussion.

(emphasis added).

With respect to Dr. McCormick’s decision not to run for a second term in 2020, she said, “We’ve done some great work. When I got into this office my charge was ‘I want to do what’s best for kids.’ I think back, and I was so cute. I was so naive. Now that I’ve learned the governance structure, things are very complicated in Indiana. . . . As a parent, I would not be happy if my state superintendent … were spending time on noise and that’s simply what this has become. For that conversation to keep coming up and suck all of our energies out, to me I’m growing very weary of that, so the best way I can help shut that down is to let people know I’m not running again.” When Dr. McCormick’s Democratic predecessor won the office, the General Assembly and Governor took steps to limited its authority. The State Board of Education has been given more power in recent years, and more dramatically, legislation was passed to make the Office of the Superintendent an appointed rather than an elected position. That transition is scheduled to take effect in 2025, but with Dr. McCormick’s announcement, there is speculation that the General Assembly might try to accelerate the schedule so that the Superintendent is appointed in 2021.

The issue of inclusiveness appears to be a reference to Roncalli’s decision to terminate a long-time, well-regarded guidance counselor when the school was made aware (or forced to acknowledge) that the counselor had a spouse of the same sex. Roncalli is a private school but it’s funded — in part — with public money. The question becomes whether public money should come with conditions and, if so, what conditions should be attached. Obviously, it should and does come with conditions. Voucher money can’t just go anywhere. The voucher school has to look and act more or less like a school. If it was, for example, a tavern that labeled itself a “school,” then Rep. Behning would likely change his position. He says:

If parents have a problem with the school’s practices, employment or otherwise, Behning said they can send their child elsewhere. In that case their tuition will follow, whether it’s paid by the parent or by the state. “Parents are the ones that should be making those decisions,” he said, “rather than the government.”

Rep. Behning is obviously being a little disingenuous here. The government simply wouldn’t let parents make the tavern decision. So, as the joke goes, we’re just haggling over the price. Is discrimination on that basis against an otherwise well-qualified employee because she has a same-sex spouse something we’re willing to fund or not? I obviously fall on the “not” side of that question, and it sounds like Dr. McCormick does as well. My guess is that the General Assembly will be perfectly willing to continue subsidizing Roncalli, notwithstanding its employment practices. (Because, remember, my view of the three goals of the General Assembly when it comes to school vouchers: 1) Hurt the teacher’s unions; 2) direct education money to friends & well-wishers; and 3) subsidize religious education.)

After the Tony Bennett experience, I have to confess I was skeptical of what Dr. McCormick’s tenure might bring. People who follow this sort of thing more closely might be able to enlighten me, but I can’t say I’ve had any real cause for complaint so far.

Kavanaugh

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I was pretty set against Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination from the start. He was part of the right-wing hit brigade in the days of the Clinton impeachment – chasing Vince Foster murder conspiracy theories, leaking Ken Starr investigative matters to the press, and fixated on maximizing the focus on the most salacious details of the Clinton/Lewinsky affair. Wrote Kavanaugh about Clinton, “It may not be our job to impose sanctions on him, but it is our job to make his pattern of revolting behavior clear — piece by painful piece.” He then went on to suggest that Starr ask questions about, among other things, where Bill Clinton may have ejaculated when Clinton and Lewinsky were having sex. This didn’t have anything to do with the legal issues in question, Kavanaugh just wanted it to be painful for Clinton. I’ve said before that I think Gingrich and his group of partisans have been damaging to this country. Kavanaugh is from that group. If conservative judges are your thing, I think there are plenty of them without this level of baggage.

But, I think after today’s hearings with Professor Christine Blasey Ford, the opposition has deepened into something altogether stronger. This is true for me to some extent. Her testimony was credible while his demeanor was altogether unsuitable for a judge — particularly one with a lifetime appointment to the most powerful court in the world. He indulged his anger and mused about a Clinton-revenge conspiracy. This was, at the end of the day, a job interview.

But my thinking is a little abstract when I compare it to the women I know. Their reaction to these hearings has been visceral. (And, no, I’m not implying women are more emotional — Ford had much better control over her emotions than Kavanaugh. It’s just that today’s events hit more women where they live.) Ford’s testimony squares completely with a level of abuse that is pervasive and mostly invisible to a lot of men, including myself. Their reaction to Professor Ford was raw. I can’t speak for them, but I got the sense that, as she testified, they re-lived the gropes, the catcalls, the rapes, the attempted rapes, the coerced sex, the men laughing at their discomfort, the times they were told to smile, the times they were judged for what they were wearing, and on and on and on.

Then, in contrast to the very credible testimony from Professor Ford, a person who seemed like she was kind, honest, and trying to do the right thing; there were angry denials and claims of conspiracy. There was a resolute refusal to probe further. The absence of Mark Judge — a man who was allegedly in the room when Ford says that Kavanaugh forced himself on her and covered her mouth as she attempted to scream — spoke loudly about the Committee’s interest in fact-finding. The Senate Judiciary Committee has subpoena power. The committee could easily have compelled Judge’s testimony. They are evidently afraid of the clarity Judge’s testimony could bring.

Judging from what I’ve seen among many women I know, the familiarity of the sexual assault described by Professor Ford, Kavanaugh’s attempt to avoid consequences by deploying anger, and the Committee’s determination to look the other way in the face of Ford’s allegation will, I think, turn mere political disagreement into implacable opposition on the part of those women.

I have in my drafts, a post I never finished entitled “Donnelly’s dilemma.” At the time of the nomination, I thought he’d have a difficult decision to make. As a Democratic Senator in a conservative state, what to do with a Republican Supreme Court nominee can be a difficult balancing act. I think it’s easy now. Given how the Ford hearings played out, Sen. Donnelly might lose if he votes against Kavanaugh. However, I think he certainly will lose if he votes for Kavanaugh. Most Democrats will forgive a lot to keep a Senate seat, but not that.

General Assembly Cracks Down on Freeloading Kindergartners

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Trevor Peters, writing for WLFI, has a story on legislation that passed last year that reduces funding for kindergartners. HB 1001 was initially designed to correct a mistake the State had made, under-budgeting for about 6,000 students they didn’t plan for. In the course of the legislative process, Sen. Ryan Mishler, took issue with the State paying for kindergartners who didn’t turn 5 by August 1 of a year. Superintendent Scott Hanback of Tippecanoe School Corporation explains that there was a waiver process where, in the past, the school was likely to enroll a kindergartner — at the request of a parent — who turned five on August 5 or the 20th or the like.

Mishler was concerned that these kindergartners might double dip. Hang back and get another year of kindergarten on the State’s dime. I can back Mishler up on this. Five year olds are, by and large, a bunch of moochers. So, pursuant to HB 1001, a kindergartner who wasn’t 5 on August 1 of a year can’t be counted as a student for school funding purposes.

This year, TSC is down about 100 kindergartners. Hanback attributes this to the Mishler provision and to a lower birth rate in 2013.

Ready, Fire, Aim: Vouchers Hurt Math Scores for Low Income Students

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Ready, Fire, Aim!

Margaret Fosmoe, writing for the South Bend Tribune, has a report on the study by Mark Berends and Joseph Waddington of Indiana’s voucher program. Math scores dropped for lower income students who used vouchers to go to private schools.

The study was based on educational results of 34,587 students in 871 public schools, and 3,363 voucher students in 265 private schools. The schools and students were not identified in the study.

. . .

Students in the study were generally in about the 40 percentile in terms of math scores before transferring to private schools, then dropped to about the 35th percentile and didn’t improve.

Low income students were the ostensible reason for Indiana’s aggressive voucher policy. I’ve argued for a long time that this was a pretext — the real reason was 1) subsidizing religious education; 2) hurting teachers unions; and 3) diverting money to friends and well-wishers of policymakers — but, if you take lawmakers at their word that this was being done to help low income students, then it looks like we’ve wasted a lot of money and done some harm in the process.

Says State Board of Education member, Gordon Hendry, “The conclusions are somewhat concerning. It demonstrates the need for further study and evaluation so we can have more data about the results of this program.” With all due respect (and at least Hendry responded to the South Bend Tribune), the time for study was before we jumped into the voucher pond with both feet. Successful school systems in the rest of the world don’t do it this way. Other than the pretexts suggested above (which, to be clear, I’m not attributing to Hendry – I don’t pretend to know his motivations) and certain dogmatic ideas about the infallibility of the marketplace, there was no reason we had to try to reinvent the wheel in order to improve our schools.