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One of Florida's leaders in expanding educational options within the public-school system is also innovating in a different way: Creating a two-tiered system for determining who can access those options.

The Miami-Dade County School Board is proposing to create a separate lottery for 5% of the spots in district-operated magnet and choice programs. These would be reserved for children of school district employees, who would also have access to the general choice lottery if their children were not selected in the employees-only lottery.

On one level, the proposal, and the support it garnered from United Teachers of Dade, underscores the magnitude of a cultural shift that has swept Florida's school districts.

Almost a decade ago, then-superintendent Alberto Carvalho touted the district's 500 magnet and choice programs, as well as the fact that the majority of its students attended a school of choice.

His quote from the time still resonates: “Rather than complain about the incoming tsunami of choice, we’re going to ride it.”

Now, the nation's third-largest district boasts that more than three in four of its students participate in some sort of choice program, and that there are more than 1,000 public school options.

The fact that a labor union would seek privileged access to that array of options as an employee benefit, much as it would advocate for more paid leave or higher salaries, underscores just how deeply choice has become ingrained in Florida's public education system.

But the demand for the proposal also underscores a troubling reality. Even in a district with a multitude of learning options, spots in the most sought-after public schools remain scarce commodities. Competition is so fierce that the unions who represent school district employees are using their leverage at the bargaining table to help secure privileged access for their members.

Of course, we have to acknowledge the bigger picture. Our state's teachers are underpaid, so it's no surprise cash-constrained districts are getting creative about devising new perks that don't carry an obvious price tag. Florida's seat time requirements, constitutional class size limits and other rules limit districts' ability to create room for more students in their most sought-after schools and programs.

These are complicated problems, decades in the making.

And they offer a humbling reminder of the work ahead. Until we solve the problem of scarce educational opportunity, groups that wield the most decision-making power in our public education system, at the collective bargaining table or elsewhere, will continue to seek new ways to rig the game.

As schools in cities across the United States continue struggling to attract and retain teachers, the nation’s fourth-largest district seeks to carve out a new benefit: better odds for its employees’ children to win coveted seats at highly rated magnet schools.

The proposed Miami-Dade County Public Schools policy is set for a school board vote on Aug. 16, the same day members of the United Teachers of Dade are set to vote on a new labor agreement codifying the job benefit.

The proposal would allow parents and guardians who work for the district to "evoke an employee benefit to increase the likelihood of their child being selected during a random selection process" for district schools of choice.

It would set aside 5% of available space in magnet schools for a separate lottery open only to children of school district employees. Students who did not win seats in the employees-only lottery could also enter the public lottery for the remaining spots in the school.

The revised school choice policy also would give magnet admissions priority to children of honorably discharged U.S. military veterans. State law already requires districts to give priority to children of active-duty service members.

Reserving 5% of available spots in each magnet school for district employees would reach further than common school district policies that allow children of school employees to attend the school where their parent or caregiver works.

Pasco County Schools, in the Tampa Bay area, offers such a perk. Chicago Public Schools, the fourth-largest district in the country after Miami-Dade, sets aside two spots in the entry grade of magnet schools for children of employees who work at the site.

School choice has become commonplace in Miami-Dade. The school district's magnet brochure for the coming school year touts more than 1,000 different magnet and choice programs, and notes that three in four of the district's students now choose the school they attend.

The employee preference proposal drew praise from a top leader with the United Teachers of Dade who called it a “welcome improvement” and morale booster for employees, many of whom toil in low-paid, high-stress jobs.

“Improving the morale of employees is paramount to maintaining high-quality professional educators when so many are choosing to walk away from the profession during some of our most difficult times,” UTD First Vice President Antonio White told school board members during a June meeting.

The proposed policy was also a priority of the teachers union early in the contract negotiations process, said Jude Bruno, communications director for the United Teachers of Dade. The provision is also included in the proposed 2023-2026 contract that is up for a vote by members next month.

Bruno said the plan was to codify it in the contract so that if the school board changes the policy during the contract period, “they have to engage with us.”

Lawsuits. A judge decides parents of children on Florida tax credit scholarships can have the status of a full-blown party to a lawsuit challenging the program's constitutionality. redefinED. News Service of Florida. Palm Beach Post. Times/Herald. The program is administered by organizations like Step Up For Students, which co-hosts this blog.

Career education. A collaborative effort between schools and industry groups is expected to launch new manufacturing career academies in five Northwest Florida school districts. Panama City News Herald.

Tax credit scholarships. The program is a "win-win" for public education, a Sarasota school board member writes in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

Class size. A rule giving schools of choice more flexibility under state class-size mandates helps Brevard schools comply. Florida Today.

Teach for America. The organization plans to bring recruits to Orange County schools next year. Orlando Sentinel.

Testing. State lawmakers are already floating ideas to address concerns about excessive testing. Tampa Bay Times.

Public records. A group that picks hundreds of public-records fights  has targeted charter schools, including one in Southwest Florida. Naples Daily News.

Aspirations. Charter schools and high school sports culture figure into a Tampa Bay Times feature on the football-fueled hopes of children in the tiny town of Pahokee in interior South Florida.

Catholic schools. A Tampa Catholic school student takes part in a mission trip to help Indian tribes in South Dakota. Tampa Tribune.

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Charter schools. An Orange County charter that served dyslexic students is closing after seven months because of financial problems, reports the Orlando Sentinel. The parents of a charter in Miami-Dade are in limbo after a church decides unexpectedly to end the school's lease, reports the Miami Herald.

Virtual charter schools. In a repeat of last year, the charter school appeals commission sides with the Orange and Seminole school boards in their rejection of applications for Florida Virtual Academy schools. The state Board of Education will make the final call. SchoolZone.

Parent trigger. Two civil rights groups in Florida, LULAC and the NAACP, are opposed. StateImpact Florida.

Magnet schools. Parents plead with the St. Lucie County School Board to not close an arts magnet because of budget cuts, reports TCPalm.com. A new elementary school arts academy is in the works in Okaloosa, reports the Northwest Florida Daily News.

Career and technical. A bill filed by Sen. John Legg, R-Port Richey, would allow students to substitute industry certifications for other graduation requirements, reports Gradebook. More from the Orlando Sentinel. The Pinellas school district plans to create several new career academies for middle schools and put STEM labs in every elementary school in an effort to boost career education, reports the Tampa Bay Times. River Ridge Middle School in Pasco is realigning its curriculum to better reflect career education, the Times also reports. (more…)

AP results. Florida students rank No. 4 in the nation in the percentage of graduates passing an AP exam. redefinED. Tampa Bay Times. Miami Herald. Tallahassee Democrat. Orlando Sentinel. CBS Miami. Florida Today. Associated Press. Fort Myers News Press.

Tutoring oversight. The Tampa Bay Times elevated a handful of bad actors to taint the overall tutoring effort in Florida and ridicules a program championed by the late Sen. Ted Kennedy to help low-income families, writes Steve Pines, executive director of the Education Industry Association, in an op-ed response to the Times series and editorial.

Teacher evals and school grades. Despite the concern of Education Commission Tony Bennett and others, the two systems are not meant to be in sync. Shanker Blog.

More conspiracy! Now in Education Week.

Class size flexibility. There's bipartisan support for a bill to provide that. StateImpact Florida.

Common Core. Florida Education Commissioner Tony Bennett talks more about the why's behind Plan B. Education Week. (more…)

Tutoring oversight. In the first part of a two-part series on a requirement initially mandated by No Child Left Behind, a  Tampa Bay Times investigation finds at least 36 of 456 tutoring companies in Florida are headed by people with criminal records. In part two, the Times traces last year's last-minute legislative push to keep the mandate in place.

Educator oversight. Sarasota Herald Tribune: "As Bradenton police investigate allegations that a Manatee High School assistant football coach groped a female student, they are also trying to determine who knew about the girl's claims and why no one notified law enforcement as required by law."

Teacher bashing? A StateImpact Florida story headlined "Teachers Question Why Proposed Pay Raises Come Before Teacher Evaluations" quotes a single teacher who says, “For a while now we’ve been hearing how bad we are. [That] we need to weed out bad teachers, there’s so many bad teachers.” Ocala Star Banner editorial page editor Brad Rogers writes in this column: "There are so many wildly talented, caring and dedicated teachers in Marion County’s schools that unfairly take abuse and blame and criticism for what is wrong with our schools and our society, when in truth they represent what is most right and bright and promising about our schools and our society."

Teacher pay. Sen. Bill Galvano, chair of the Senate Education Appropriations Committee, suggests Gov. Rick Scott's proposal for across-the-board raises clashes with performance pay, reports the Florida Current. The South Florida Sun Sentinel also writes up the debate over proposals for higher teacher pay.

Strange bedfellows. The Florida Education Association plans to join the Florida Department of Education in fighting the Florida Times-Union's request for teacher evaluation data.

Tony Bennett. He talks to North Florida superintendents about teacher evals and notes he encouraged his daughter to become a teacher: "“I don’t want it written on my headstone: ‘Here lies the man that ruined the career his daughter chose.’ ” Tallahassee Democrat.

Teachers unions. The United Teachers of Dade will elect a new leader this week. Miami Herald. (more…)

Grad rates. Not good for Florida, according to this new report from the U.S. Department of Education. In 2009-10, the state’s rate was 70.8 percent, putting it No. 44 among all 50 states and Washington D.C. And unlike other estimates, the federal numbers show modestly improving trend lines rather than strong gains.

For what it’s worth, the U.S. DOE says the formula used for this report isn’t as accurate as others – and, in fact, is being phased out and replaced by a more precise formula. Coverage from Gradebook and StateImpact Florida. Nationally, the rate reached its highest point in decades. Coverage from Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Huffington Post.

Teacher pay raises. Gov. Rick Scott will seek them in his budget proposal, with an announcement set for today. Karen Aronowitz, president of United Teachers of Dade in Miami, tells the Tampa Bay Times, “Tell him to send the money, but no one is fooled by this. He’s just restoring money that was already stolen from teachers." More from South Florida Sun Sentinel and News Service of Florida.

Teach for America. EdFly Blog: “Teach for America recruits bright, motivated university graduates and puts them in classrooms with low-income, disadvantaged kids. Normally, liberals would latch on to such a notion – think Peace Corps in urban neighborhoods.” But no.

Teacher evaluations. The new system is on the right track, but it needs more work to be meaningful, editorializes TCPalm.com.

Guts. Somehow, Florida’s decision to participate in PIRLS and other international assessments is being spun in some circles as a negative. The Quick and The Ed blog credits Florida for not shying away from what could be unflattering comparisons.

Tony Bennett. He'll be in the spotlight this legislative session. Sunshine State News.

Parent power. Florida still ranks No. 2 in the Center for Education Reform’s revised Parent Power Index. SchoolZone.

Charter schools. After two F's in a row, Lee Charter Academy in Fort Myers will have to close. Fort Myers News Press. (more…)

Last Friday, I participated in a panel discussion in South Florida on the challenges facing public school administrators, and I was joined by Karen Aronowitz, the president of the United Teachers of Dade. I always enjoy talking with Karen, but we have divergent definitions of public education which lead us to disagree about how parental empowerment impacts public education.

Karen thinks public education includes only schools that are owned and operated by school boards and covered by collective bargaining agreements, whereas I believe public education includes all publicly funded education programs, including charter schools, virtual schools, special education vouchers, and tax credit scholarships for low-income children. Karen’s more narrow definition leads her to conclude that empowering parents to match their children with the learning options that best meet their needs undermines public education when parents choose learning options not owned by school boards. Under my more inclusive definition, public education is strengthened when all parents have access to the learning options their children need, especially if these options are provided through well managed public-private partnerships that extend the purchasing power of our tax dollars.

The size of Karen’s bargaining unit is tied to the number of people the Dade County school board employs; consequently she wants her school board to have as many employees as possible. Parents, especially low-income parents, have other concerns. They want their children to have the best education possible, and they don’t care about a school’s corporate governance. These divergent interests are why Karen and I disagree about how broadly we should define public education. Her union is enhanced by a narrower definition, while the interests of the parents, students and taxpayers are best met with a broader definition.

Teacher unions were once important allies in the struggle for greater social justice and equal opportunity, but they’ve de-emphasized these values as they’ve increasingly put the power of school boards over the interests of families. (In Florida, the lawyer for the state's teachers union also works for Florida's school boards association.) Nonetheless, I’m convinced teachers unions will eventually return to their progressive roots and embrace a definition of public education that includes full parental empowerment. Karen’s generation may not be capable of leading this transition, but there is a younger generation of extraordinary teachers in Dade County and elsewhere who will.