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The news is full of Toyota recall information. That’s to be expected. But government ownership of two major Toyota competitors has to make one wonder: What’s up with all the government visibility in the matter?

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told Toyota owners to “stop driving” their recalled cars and then “clarified” his bombshell statement.

LaHood also said Transportation Department officials are considering civil penalties against Toyota for its handling of the sudden-acceleration matter. House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman said he would hold a hearing to consider how quickly and effectively Toyota responded to complaints about sticking pedals and slipping floor mats.

It’s a sad tale – one we want to safeguard against when Kentucky sets up charter schools – but it looks like there were a lot of fiscal oversight foul-ups in Ohio prior to the demise of the Harte Crossroads schools in Columbus.

Important records for Harte simply don’t exist, and the possibility of criminal activity over a three-year period is under investigation.

Now, the Harte schools are closed – completely.

Meanwhile, let’s not overlook the fact that our public school fiscal accounting system in Kentucky is no rose, either.

Way back in December, 2006, the Legislative Research Commission issued Research Report No. 338.

It outlined a number of serious problems with the Kentucky’s MUNIS education financial accounting system that prevented accurate accounting in many areas of educational expenditures. Over three years later, the program still has not been fixed. We continue to be plagued with an information black hole when we badly need accurate “bang for the buck” information as our policymakers wrestle with some tough decisions about which education programs may need to be cut.

There have also been some fiscal improprieties in Kentucky’s public schools.

Targeted money has been misdirected.

Federal stimulus money has not been properly tracked.

No one could account for the true costs of our now defunct CATS system.

And, we regularly hear nagging reports of school personnel running off with money that should have been spent on kids.

Often, these scams went undetected for years, as well.

These sorts of things happen when fiscal controls are weak.

But, here’s the big difference. While nagging reports of fiscal impropriety keep surfacing in our schools, I’m not aware of any public school getting shut down for fiscal impropriety since KERA began.

In sharp contrast, the Harte system is gone – completely. A number of other charter schools that didn’t measure up are gone, as well.

So, ultimately, which type of school do you think has a demonstrated history of more accountability – charter or public?

“What the heck is school curriculum doing in court, anyway? The answer tells us a lot about the problems of public schools.”

Dick Lilly, former member, Seattle Public School Board

We blogged a few days ago about a stunning court case in Seattle that says the school district in that city erred when it selected Discovery Math for its students.

Here is some insight from Dick Lilly on that decision worth a read.

One of his key points, “…curriculum conflicts — math teaching is only the most visible — are both a symptom and a cause of the problems the U.S. has with K-12 education. Put simply: We don’t know what to teach.”

Check the linked article to learn more about the astonishing things this court case may have uncovered.

It’s the gap few talk about – the performance gap for our top students, those who score at the “Advanced” level on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and drag home those “5” scores on Advanced Placement exams.

Now, the Center for Evaluation and Education Policy in Indiana has issued an extensive report on the growing gaps for our very top scoring kids, including a state-by-state breakdown for Kentucky. You can access both from this web page.

Here is a graph from the report that shows the growth in our top students’ White-Black NAEP Math gaps between 2000 and 2008. All of the kids included here score “Advanced” on the NAEP

Note that the graph refers to a “W-H” gap for grade 8. I believe this is a typo and should read W-B. In general, there are so few Hispanics in Kentucky’s NAEP samples that scores are not reported for them.

Similar graphs are available for reading for poor versus non-poor kids (via Free and Reduced Cost Meals analysis) and other tables and graphs cover even more gaps by sex and for AP results. In general, as the report found nationally, Kentucky’s top student performance gaps are also growing.

– Judge flunks Seattle’s high school math program

More coverage, this time a video, from KOMO TV in Seattle on the lawsuit against Discovery Math.

http://www.komonews.com/v/?i=83587497

If your Kentucky student is using any of the textbooks shown in this video, we’d like to hear about it.