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In trying to rebuild our capability to capture and develop knowledge and wisdom, we have to back away from some of our sacred constructs. Here are four of my own observations:

1. School is not a useful model for learning. But learning to ride a bike or a foreign language is. Schools are only good for teaching people how to be students, and maybe teachers.

2. Books, magazines, and movies are not a sufficiently useful model for capturing wisdom. Would you learn leadership or innovation that way?

3. Professional (or other highly structured) sports are not a useful ideal for play. But pick-up games are. Professional sports are a better model for work.

4. Computer games are not a useful ideal for play, any more than white bread and candy are good models for food.

I will be delving into these in more detail in the weeks to come.

This paper briefly explains why a focus on effectiveness is needed and how it might work, and it describes current federal policy related to teacher quality. It then provides some new ideas about how federal policy can stimulate change at the state and local level to help states and districts move from a qualifications focus to an effectiveness focus: That is, a focus on a teacher’s ability to improve student learning as measured by both value-added measures and other measures. If an effectiveness approach is going to succeed, three things must be in place:





• State and district capacity to collect and use high-quality data


• Knowledge about how to use these data to inform human capital policies


• The political will to focus on teacher effectiveness

Originally called School Is Money, this initiative pays students in 14 D.C. middle schools (about 3,000 students) $100 every two weeks for good attendance and behavior. The program, now called Capital Gains, deposits money into a bank account in the student's name. The city projects spending $2.7 million on the program the first year.

This experiment is one of a few similar initiatives being tried in urban school systems, including New York, Baltimore, and Chicago. It came to D.C. with the sole approval of the chancellor who reports only to the mayor. There were no public hearings.

If the public had been allowed to weigh in before the Capital Gains program was launched in October of 2008, here are some of the serious concerns that might have been raised:






• How are parents supposed to have authority over their middle school aged children's purchases when the bank accounts are in the children's name?
  
  
  




Or is the assumption that the role of low-income parents is irrelevant? Chancellor and Mayor might respond that parents at the 14 middle schools were told that they could sign a form to opt out. But imagine being the one parent telling your child she or he can't get the cash that their peers receive each week.






• The Capital Gains program asks for students' Social Security numbers to set up the bank accounts. What about the considerable number of children from families who are undocumented?
  

• What if others pressure students to turn over the money — who is going to protect them?
  

• What will happen to children's intrinsic motivation to learn? If intrinsic motivation has been replaced with extrinsic rewards, what will happen when the money runs out?
  

• How will students feel when they go on to high school and there is no monetary compensation? While the initiative might get students to attend middle school as a short-term gain, it could easily fuel longer term disappointment and cynicism.
  

ignores the detrimental effects that a system of rewards can have on intrinsic motivation. University of Rochester psychologist Edward L. Deci and three colleagues did a thorough review of all major studies on tangible rewards and concluded that they "do significantly and substantially undermine intrinsic motivation," especially with young children.

A statement by Fryer indicates a willingness to treat children as guinea pigs, "I crave for scientific evidence that things are working," Fryer said, adding that while he believed that incentive programs held promise, "the jury is still out. I actually don't care if incentives are the answer; I just care about getting an answer. If incentives aren't the answer, I guarantee you I will drop them like a bad habit." Sadly, as a result of his experiment, children might lose their good habits.

Imagine if the millions of dollars invested in this experiment were instead provided to support the kind of education that research has proven to engage middle school students: hands-on learning, field trips, smaller class sizes, relevant curriculum, and a nurturing environment. Or the funds could be invested in the badly needed professional development for teachers.

Children in our nation's capital deserve to be treated as young scholars, not as guinea pigs that need to be bribed to learn. As the editorial in The D.C. Examiner on Sept. 19, 2008, stated: "If bribing students is the answer, the adults in the education establishment are asking the wrong questions."

Fifteen years ago, President George H.W. Bush announced his America 2000 plan, which advocated drawing up “world class standards” and achievement tests. Over the next two years, the Department of Education, National Endowment for the Humanities, and National Science Foundation awarded grants to fund the development of national standards. Scholars and experts would draft standards and a national board of citizens, scholars, and others would then review the standards and provide feedback to the authors, who would revise the standards. In a nod to tradition, the Bush administration did not intend to impose these curricular guidelines on schools. Rather, the standards would be produced and states free to use them or not.

It was an interesting idea, but it died a violent death at the hands of politics. In October of 1994, the standards for U.S. history were about to be unveiled. Lynne Cheney, the former head of the National Endowment for the Humanities who had helped fund the creation of the history standards, savaged the standards for political correctness in the Wall Street Journal. A hullabaloo erupted and editorial pages and talk radio were flooded with outraged voices. In January of 1995, the Senate passed a resolution condemning the standards by a vote of 99 to 1. Not only were the history standards dead, all national education standards were condemned as unlawful and deleterious federal dabbling in local affairs.

This history is relevant to today’s consideration of national education standards because it would appear that the same impediments to enacting national standards that existed then exist now.

Fifteen years ago, President George H.W. Bush announced his America 2000 plan, which advocated drawing up “world class standards” and achievement tests. Over the next two years, the Department of Education, National Endowment for the Humanities, and National Science Foundation awarded grants to fund the development of national standards. Scholars and experts would draft standards and a national board of citizens, scholars, and others would then review the standards and provide feedback to the authors, who would revise the standards. In a nod to tradition, the Bush administration did not intend to impose these curricular guidelines on schools. Rather, the standards would be produced and states free to use them or not.

It was an interesting idea, but it died a violent death at the hands of politics. In October of 1994, the standards for U.S. history were about to be unveiled. Lynne Cheney, the former head of the National Endowment for the Humanities who had helped fund the creation of the history standards, savaged the standards for political correctness in the Wall Street Journal. A hullabaloo erupted and editorial pages and talk radio were flooded with outraged voices. In January of 1995, the Senate passed a resolution condemning the standards by a vote of 99 to 1. Not only were the history standards dead, all national education standards were condemned as unlawful and deleterious federal dabbling in local affairs.

This history is relevant to today’s consideration of national education standards because it would appear that the same impediments to enacting national standards that existed then exist now.

Nida, who joined the board in 2003, is the official with the most extensive financial links to schools he regulates. Since he went to work for United Bank, it has lent more than $55 million to charter schools, their developers or their landlords, records and interviews show. As a public official, Nida has voted repeatedly to increase student enrollment -- and thus taxpayer funding -- for charter schools that borrow money from his bank, records show.

Nida recused himself from a handful of votes affecting charter schools or developers doing business with his bank but participated in dozens of other votes and actions involving bank customers, records show.

Since 1996, the District has spent more than $2 billion in local and federal funds to build and operate charter schools. Much of that public money has gone to buy, lease and renovate school buildings that are now in private hands. Charter schools typically finance their property purchases or renovations with multimillion-dollar loans from banks and other lenders. They repay those loans using their guaranteed funding from the city. In addition to funding charters' educational operations, the District is one of the few jurisdictions in the country to provide charters with a per-child cash "facilities allotment."

The system has provided some charter students with new buildings that are among the best-equipped in the city. It also has benefited charter schools' landlords, developers, bankers and investors while taxpayers fund two separate school infrastructures.

"They are using public money to finance private real estate development," said Anne Dougherty, a community activist who opposed locating a charter school in a neighborhood where two traditional public schools were closing.

Nida is not the only member of those bodies whose private business interests intersected with a public role, The Post's review found.

Barbara "Bobbie" Hart, who chairs the credit enhancement committee, which has awarded $47 million in taxpayer financing in the past seven years to private ventures involving charters, is also a vice president at Adams National Bank and markets loans to charter schools. Since she was appointed to the committee in 2006, it has repeatedly awarded funding to Hart's loan customers, records show. Hart has recused herself from all but two votes involving applicants that had given her loan business or were about to, records show. Hart declined to comment.

Another public official whose private business overlapped his public position was Karl Jentoft, a developer who has served on both the credit enhancement committee with Hart and on the public charter board with Nida. Jentoft became a charter school developer seven years ago with the help of a bank loan he secured through Nida.

Jentoft joined the credit committee in 2006, and last year moved to Nida's charter board. In that capacity, he reviewed and recommended a lease benefiting a controversial charter school project opposed by residents in the Brady Hall neighborhood, not far from Catholic University. Within weeks, the developer hired Jentoft as a consultant on that and another charter project and began paying him $14,000 a month.

Once hired, Jentoft tried to assuage the concerns of residents who feared that moving two charter schools to a single building in their neighborhood would lead to a big increase in traffic and noise. He logged on to a local Internet discussion group last March and introduced himself as the "owners' representative" on the project. "We are working to resolve some of the obvious traffic flow issues," Jentoft wrote.

A stunned homeowner, Steve Lowe, shot back questions: Was he the same Karl Jentoft who sat on the charter board? If so, "why did you fail to mention this?"

"I did not include this or additional hobbies/projects because I do not think they are relevant to the current project," Jentoft responded. "I am not acting in my capacity as a Public Charter School board" member on this project.

Nida also had ties to the Brady Hall project. He was an unpaid board member for the developer, the Charter Schools Development Corp. His bank, United Bank, also was financing the project with loans that eventually totaled $9.2 million.

The charter board green-lighted the Brady Hall project in May, with Jentoft and Nida recusing themselves.

For all their educational goals, D.C. charter schools are businesses navigating market realities. For each child it enrolls, a charter school receives a minimum of $11,879 annually in tax money. The need to borrow large sums to buy or renovate real estate drives many charter operators to expand as quickly as possible to maximize taxpayer funding: more kids, more cash.

The growth of charter schools coincided with a decline in the number of school-age children in the District. Competition from charters accelerated the exodus from the traditional public school system and left school buildings with acres of empty classrooms.

Some District school officials have been resistant to sharing space with charters, and some charter operators preferred to find their own buildings to avoid the city bureaucracy. As a result, only about 25 percent of charter school campuses lease space in public schools or other government buildings. Most of the rest bought their own buildings or lease from private landlords.

Some charter school critics have complained that the system allows taxpayer funds to be used for private gain. The D.C. Council responded two years ago with a requirement that if a charter closes down, its net assets, including real estate, must be turned over to the city. However, the law contains so many loopholes that District taxpayers are unlikely to recoup their expenditures. It also does not prevent a charter from selling its building, keeping the proceeds and moving somewhere else.

The law also protects banks and other creditors, mandating that outstanding loans be repaid before any assets are returned to taxpayers.

Thomas A. Nida, chairman of the board that supervises one of the nation's largest charter school systems, encouraged testimony from the group on that summer evening in 2007. "And anything else you've got to say, put it in writing and we'll take it," Nida said, noting that the charter board would not decide on the move for a month. "That way we will give everybody a chance to express their views."

What Nida failed to mention was his own stake in the matter. As a senior vice president at United Bank, he had been working on a  $7 million loan to the Elsie Whitlow Stokes charter school to finance the very relocation that neighbors opposed.

By the time the D.C. Public Charter School Board approved the move in August 2007 -- with Nida recusing himself from the vote -- the loan deal was done. Nida's employer would receive hundreds of thousands of dollars in interest payments for years to come.

Homeowners on the losing end of that dispute had encountered one of the hidden financial conflicts of interest in the city's burgeoning charter school movement. Key members of the public bodies that regulate and fund the schools have taken part in official decisions that stood to benefit themselves, their colleagues, employers and companies with whom they have business ties, The Washington Post has found.

The Post's review found conflicts of interest involving almost $200 million worth of business deals, typically real estate transactions, at more than a third of the District's 60 charter schools. The conflicts are documented in thousands of pages of internal charter board documents, land records, tax returns, audits and other records reviewed by The Post.

In the 12 years since Congress authorized charter schools in the District to spur competition and improve urban education, charters have burgeoned into an independent and parallel public school system. They are private, nonprofit businesses operating under a public "charter" and largely funded by taxpayer dollars. D.C. students can attend for free. An independent seven-member charter board now oversees about 26,000 students, more than one-third of the city's public school population.

Almost 30,000 schools in the United States failed to make adequate yearly progress under the No Child Left Behind Act in the 2007-08 school year. For states with comparable data for the 2006-07 school year, the number of such schools increased by 28 percent.

Half those schools missed their achievement goals for two or more years, putting almost one in five of the nation’s public schools in some stage of a federally mandated process designed to improve student achievement. The number facing sanctions represents a 13 percent increase for states with comparable data over the 2006-07 school year.

Of those falling short of their academic-achievement goals, 3,559 schools—4 percent of all schools rated based on their progress—are facing the law’s more serious interventions in the current school year. That’s double the number that were in that...