Too Much Lunch to Munch

Hawaii’s state Department of Education is secretly finagling with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to reduce Hawaii’s penalty from $7.2 million to $3.6 million after a federal audit revealed that, last year, the DOE exaggerated its lunch counts.

The DOE also paid $34,000 in fines -- as well as audit and consultant fees -- due to non-compliance with the provisions of the National School Lunch Program.

The results of the audit were not provided to the Board of Education, the Hawaii State Legislature or the public. Instead, the DOE recommended the Board of Education raid the Department of Defense supplement to cover a food services "shortfall." The Board, which left the request unchallenged, complied.

Taxpayers footing the bill might never know about the penalty, unless schools fail the compliance review March 13 through April 21.

The DOE’s failure to pass the test will result in the USDA withholding 100 percent of all federal program funds immediately. The DOE cautioned principals that they will then deduct withheld amounts directly from individual school budgets.

Deadbeat DOE

Seemingly oblivious to the dire food services situation, Board of Education Member Mary Cochran publicly derided parents at a recent board meeting, calling them "deadbeats" for failing to provide their children with lunch. See http://starbulletin.com/2006/03/12/news/story01.html

However it was actually the DOE’s fault that many children were left without school lunch -- or were served just bread and milk.

Parents of public school students across the state say their children were denied a hot lunch due to computer glitches or the failure of their school to submit notices when debit cards used to purchase the lunch had balances that fell below $5.

The DOE and BOE also did not acknowledge the federal government helps to ensure that all kids may be fed for free, if the state applies under Provision 2. But if the state requests this option, it would eliminate monetary incentives to overcount lunches and would eliminate state jobs.

At Least Hawaii's Not Number 1

Based on preliminary reports, Hawaii now ranks second-worst in the nation with 66 percent of its schools failing to improve under the No Child Left Behind law.

Last March, the Education Commission of the States (ECS) released a Schools’ Status in School Improvement report in which Hawaii ranked worst in the nation with 10 percent of its schools in the sixth year of not meeting state-designed benchmarks under No Child Left Behind.

Now, the number of schools in restructuring has nearly doubled to 54 out of 284 schools.

Under NCLB, remedies include converting schools to charter status, replacing most staff, outsourcing operations of the schools to private companies or turning over control to the State Education Agency. The DOE has chosen to "turn over control" of these schools to itself despite their current failure to improve student achievement.

The DOE’s goal is to have 227 of Hawaii’s 284 schools in corrective action, preparing for restructuring or under restructuring by the 2007-2008 school year.

Under Proposal, DOE Won’t Be Held Accountable for Financial Transactions

Earlier this year, there was a major dispute between Gov. Linda Lingle, the DOE and the Hawaii State Legislature over the status of more than half a billion dollars in DOE repair and maintenance funding.

Senate Education Chair Norman Sakamoto, D-Moanalua, introduced SB 2721 to repeal the requirement that the Superintendent of Education provide an annual report of financial transactions within the DOE to the board of education. The bill was deferred and reason ultimately prevailed.

Skirting Oversight by State Budget Director

However, SB 2956, the "Fix Hawaii's Schools Act," is moving through the state Legislature and will be heard by the House Finance Committee on March 31, 2006.

The bill would create a special fund and would allow the DOE to finance leases on capital improvement projects without the approval of the Department of Budget & Finance.

This will allow the DOE to avoid constitutional debt limitations and independent fiscal oversight.

Legislators Use Bait and Switch Methods on Substitute Teachers

The state’s substitute teachers, who have been fighting for their own collective bargaining unit for 4 years, are still fighting.

They thought they made progress with SB 87, but found the bill was altered in committee so substitute teachers will be "assigned" or will be allowed to choose an existing collective bargaining group and then will have to pay yearly dues.

Full-time DOE teachers, who already are subjected to forced dues, have found that they receive little representation, with the majority of the money diverted to the labor union leaders’ political agendas.

Subs also pinned their hopes on SB 3197 that was designed to rectify the underpayment of substitute teacher wages by tying their compensation to the salary or wage increases provided to licensed Class II teachers of the DOE.

House Education and Labor committees have since neutered the intent of this bill. They removed the link to teacher pay, the per diem amounts for each class of substitute teacher, and the appropriation amounts to resolve the claims of all other personnel who were underpaid in violation of Hawaii laws. Lawmakers also took out the purpose clause that includes Judge Karen Ahn’s ruling on damages and compensation to be awarded to substitute teachers for the period between November 2000 to June 2005. The bill will be heard in the House Finance Committee on Friday.

Laura Brown is the education reporter and researcher for HawaiiReporter.com and the education policy analyst for the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii. She can be reached via email at mailto:laurabrown@hawaii.rr.com