WALTER CRONKITE

The luncheon has been so successful over the years because of Cronkite’s personal involvement, which has helped ASU to convince the biggest names in American journalism to make the trip to Phoenix (usually from New York or Washington), accept an award and offer some inspiring thoughts. This year, the stars were Jim Lehrer and Robert MacNeil of PBS, and both men went to great lengths to emphasize what a special honor they were receiving.

“For people like us in television broadcasting, to be named among the best by Walter Cronkite is as good as it gets,” Lehrer said.

In Cronkite’s absence, ASU President Michael Crow took on a more prominent role in the proceedings. Crow staunchly defended his decision to invest heavily in upgrading the Cronkite School — highlighted by the new 250,000 sq. ft. headquarters. He repeated the statements of American founders who argued democracy can flourish only when the public has been properly informed by a free press committed to pursuit of the truth and to holding government accountable.

“We’re not crazy,” Crow said. “We’re dead serious, we’re dead serious, that the future of a free society, that the future of what we stand for, depends on the education of (journalism students) …”

Graphic illustration by Gabriel Utasi/Tribune

The editorial board of Arizona State University’s student newspaper, the State Press, apparently didn’t like the Tribune’s suggestion that the Arizona Board of Regents postpone any further increases in student tuition or classroom fees for at least one year. The State Press responded with an editorial Thursday that says the Tribune is well-intended but ill-informed, because regents have no choice but to keep raising tuition because the Legislature steadfastly refuses to properly fund the universities.

I can’t say I’m surprised by the State Press editorial. Students attending public colleges routinely believe elected officials don’t understand the importance of such institutions, and so they divert tax dollars to purposes of far less value. I certainly believed that 20 years ago when I was attending the University of Wyoming, and made the exact same argument as the State Press in a column for that campus’ student newspaper.

But the facts are the Arizona Board of Regents has increased tuition and other fees at a rate higher than inflation throughout this decade, while the Legislature has funded student population growth during most of those years. Lawmakers have failed to provide enough funding for building construction and maintenance during the good years. But the universities have made their own mistakes, such as when ASU failed to install enough fire sprinklers when it remodeled the Memorial Union.

Arguments about class sizes being too big or not getting the right professor ring hollow when more students can no longer afford to enroll at a public university in first place, or they have to ring up so much debt that their lives are heavily burdened for years after graduation.

And there’s another issue to consider. Capitol Media Services reported in today’s Tribune that some lawmakers are looking to grab the money that the three universities expect to bring in from this year’s tuition increases. So postponing any additional increases for a year is unlikely to harm the universities, but would be a boon for students in a tough economy and might ease growing tensions between the board of regents and the Legislature.

Forget what’s happening in Washington. Arizonans should be more focused on the escalating budget crisis right in our own backyard. Gov. Janet Napolitano is hoping (praying? tossing pennies into wishing wells?) that the funding shortfall for the 3-month-old fiscal year will be only $320 million, but is willing to consider a worst-case scenario of $850 milllion. That’s after Napolitano and the Legislature adopted a budget in late June that erased a shortfall predicted at the time to be $1.9 billion.

However, state lawmakers were told Tuesday during a special briefing that tax revenues appear to coming in at about $100 million less than state spending every month. That means the potential deficit will surge past Napolitano’s optimistic projection by, oh, well, this Monday.

Unlike a year ago, Napolitano appears to understand the scope and the depth of the budget crisis. She sounds like she’s riding hard on state agencies to limit expenses, although it would easier to see that if her budget office could produce some detailed numbers to demonstrate concrete savings. She’s also working on some rather inventive ideas, such as selling or leasing the Arizona Lottery to a private operator and accepting a chunk of cash from tobacco companies now, in exchange for reducing their overall payments under the 1999 master tobacco settlement.

But those solutions are temporary at best, providing only a one-time infusion of cash. The whole purpose of Wednesday’s special meeting for lawmakers and legislative candidates was to drive home the point that as bad as things are right now, they probably will get worse in 2009. Private economist Elliott Pollack repeated his recent presentation to state business leaders with a blizzard of facts about the economic slowdown and he predicted a real recovery won’t reach Arizona probably until 2011.

The real challenge, according to top legislative budget analyst Richard Stavneak, is Napolitano and the Legislature have crafted a $10.7 billion general fund budget, but the economy seems to be able to only support spending on a stable basis at $8.7 billlion.

The state has $120 million in savings, and then the money tree is pretty close to leafless for this year and next. And more than half of the budget (primarily K-12 education and health care spending) can’t be touched by lawmakers because they are protected by voter-approved formulas and spending mandates. If lawmakers immediately adopted a 20 percent budget cut for every state agency that they do have say over, it would save only $400 million, Stavneak said. And such cuts would have to include state prisons, the Department of Public Safety, universities and community colleges.

That’s why Sen. Thayer Verschoor, R-Gilbert, said Wednesday the Legislature should be looking at a special statewide election as soon as January to ask voters for relief from the mandates. Lawmakers likely would seek permission to temporarily cut back on state spending for school districts and to benefits provided by AHCCCS.

The only other route out of the crisis would be higher taxes. It’s pretty much guaranteed that the temporary suspension of the business personal property tax will be allowed to expire — bringing in $250 million a year starting in 2010. But there likely won’t be any other serious tax proposals, despite complaints from some Democrats and special interest groups, unless or until Napolitano decides to throw her political capital behind such an unpopular move.

ASU’S NEW WALTER CRONKITE SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM AND MASS COMMUNICATION (Tribune photo)

With a rapid decline of newspaper revenues and circulation, and broadcast media struggling as well, a lot of people predicting we are nearing the end of professional journalism as we know it today. But don’t tell that to the 1,200 students from Arizona State University who are attending journalism classes at a brand-new $71 million building in downtown Phoenix.

I participated last week in a tour of the new home for the Walter Cronkite Sschool of Journalism and Mass Communication that was sponsored by the Society of Professional Journalists. So I saw first-hand many of the issues that Tribune writer Ryan Gabrielson reported in his story today. In particular, I listened to school Dean Chris Callahan’s firm conviction that ASU journalism needed a new structure to prepare students for careers in a brave new world.

Previously, the journalism school had been spread out across a number of buildings on the main Tempe campus, and instruction took a silo approach. Students learned to be print journalists, or they learned to be TV anchors, or they learned to be photographers, or they learned to public relations experts. But rarely did they study a variety of forms and media platforms.

The new school brings everything together to emphasize digital-based curriculum that basically is supposed to prepare students to keep adapting as technology continues to change how information is gathered and is shared among people. Students can expect to be writers and videographers and sound producers and Web designers — all at the same time. Callahan also is forthright about his goal of transforming the Cronkite school into the best journalism program in the country. That means spending money on the space and equipment that will attract top faculty and students.

But I have to wonder about ASU’s timing for this venture, considering that state leaders have been told to expect the university will become a top research hub that will generate new jobs related to technology and bioscience growth sectors of the global economy. That’s supposed to be the justification for borrowing hundreds of millions of dollars for a variety of new buildings when state tax revenues are on a shaky footing. Can the state really afford to divert some of those resources to also compete with well-established institutions in the world of journalism?

Perhaps Callahan and ASU president Michael Crow have a stronger faith in the future role of journalists than I do. Or maybe I just don’t see glass-and-concrete marvels and gee-whiz gadgetry replacing proper instruction in fundamentals of good journalism — Seek the truth as independent observers and do your best to report it accurately.

TOM HORNE

Arizona schools superintendent Tom Horne had a startling annoucement today: some school districts adopted the state’s new English immersion program for Spanish-speaking students a year early, and these districts already have made dramatic improvements in bringing those students into the mainstream.

A news release from Horne’s office today says these school districts have at least doubled their pace for removing students from the status of English language learners. That includes the Florence Unified School District, which went from a  “reclassification” rate of 15 percent to 38 percent this fall.

Horne has emerged as the leading champion of immersing ELL students in four hours of language instruction each school day until they can read and write as well as their classmates who learned English as their first language. Horne has clashed publicly with school superintendents around the state, including Mesa’s Debra Duvall, who claim the state has pushed an untested program too fast with too little funding.

Unless the results reported today are a short-term aberration, this is great news for taxpayers as the state spends a signficiant amount of extra money to help ELL students — but the state is still trapped in a federal lawsuit that is seeking even more funding. Horne soon might be able to crow about finally implementing the intent of state voters who approved an English-immersion initiative in 2000 as a better way to address the problem.

Related story:
ELL problems go beyond funding

                TOM HORNE                              TERRY GODDARD

   A letter to the editor in today’s Tribune from the Goldwater Institute probably serves as the denouement for an odd public fight between state schools superintendent Tom Horne and folks who should be his natural allies – champions of the school voucher movement.
   The feud was rooted in an early June decision by Horne to suspend funding for two year-old voucher programs for disabled students and children in state foster care. That action came after the Arizona Court of Appeals ruled the two programs violate the state constitution by benefiting private schools.
   Goldwater released a statement saying Horne was wrong to suspend the two programs because the case already had been appealed to the state Supreme Court. Horne responded rather harshly, calling the people at Goldwater “liars” and urging the public to ignore anything they say.
   Goldwater and the Institute for Justice, the public-interest law firm defending the voucher program, countered by saying Horne misread the appellate court decision and he took a needless step that threatened to disrupt the education of hundreds of kids.
   In reality, Horne received bad legal advice from state Attorney General Terry Goddard. First, please note what the Court of Appeals actually said:
   “For the foregoing reasons, we vacate the trial court’s judgment and remand with direction to enter judgment for (the plaintiffs), enjoining Horne from expending public funds pursuant to the school voucher statutes.”
   That seems pretty straightforward; the voucher programs had to come an sudden stop.
   But under Arizona appellate rules, the Institute for Justice said, that order was immediately suspended when the case was taken to the Supreme Court. The higher court confirmed the suspension in a special ruling earlier this month. So, in theory, there was no need to halt the voucher programs before the Supreme Court reaches an opinion on the underlying lawsuit.
   Some have suggested that Horne should know that, since he’s a Harvard-educated lawyer. But if Horne had ignored the legal advice of Goddard’s office, Horne could have been personally liable for any money that was spent illegally. Extremely few elected officials are wealthy enough to take that gamble.
   Besides, the attorney general really should be the expert on how appellate rules work, since he has an entire office devoted to handling such cases.
   Unfortunately, Goddard’s bad advice had serious consequences. With the voucher funding already suspended, Gov. Janet Napolitano was able to justify stripping the $5 million from the new state budget.
   So the Supreme Court said the vouchers could continue for now, but there’s no money to do it.
   House Speaker Jim Weiers offered to replace that lost funding from $9 million in cash in his budget. But Goddard ruled just Wednesday that move would be illegal without a regular appropriation from the Legislature.
   Goddard had better be right about that, or he’s going to start developing a reputation of incompetence in a fundamental aspect of his job.

REP. RICH CRANDALL

   Education testing in Arizona could be headed for yet another transformational reform – this time with a focus on standardized tests for reading and writing in early grades instead of as a requirement for graduation.
   As The Associated Press reported this afternoon, Rep. Rich Crandall, R-Mesa, is leading a revolt at the state Capitol to dump the high-stakes AIMS test that has applied to prospective high school graduates since 2006. AIMS has been heavily criticized because it has been rewritten several times, the passing grades have been lowered and some students receive extra credit from their regular school work. All of this was done with the intent of boosting graduation rates, when the AIMS test was supposed to tell us who had really earned a high school diploma and who had not.
   AIMS also has come under attack because some test questions are designed by the state Department of Education as the means to compare Arizona students with students in other states. The AIMS results generally show Arizona students do well, but that doesn’t match other measures such as the National Assessment of Educational Progress.
   Crandall’s suggestion that Arizona focus on testing in lower grade levels seems to be heavily influenced by a new set of education reforms set out by the Goldwater Institute’s Matthew Ladner and Arywynn Mattix, associate director of BASIS schools. Goldwater is a Phoenix-based libertarian think tank while BASIS is a hugely successful charter school operation.
   Coincidentally, Tribune education reporter Michelle Reese and I sat down today with Ladner to discuss the proposals summarized in a July 2 report, Fortune Favors the Bold.
Ladner said the NEAP test clearly shows Arizona has made almost no progress in raising the education levels, particularly in reading, for Arizona students. In 2007, only 56 percent of fourth graders could read at that grade level, he said.
   Different experts and research groups have tried to justify Arizona’s overall lack of progress, Ladner said, as they point to Arizona’s large Hispanic population and large number of poor families. Both demographic groups have traditional lagged behind everyone else in education.
   Ladner said it’s fair to say Arizona’s education system has done remarkably well given the challenges it must deal with. But the reality is, without dramatic changes, tens of thousands of students will continue to go uneducated each year, they will drop out of school before high school graduation, and they will become a net drain on society because they can’t find good-paying jobs.
   “You’ve spent a pile of money and half of these kids can’t read,” Ladner said. “There’s no way that can ever be acceptable.”
   Reforms should focus on standarized testing in lower grade levels instead of high school (Ladner suggests the third grade) because that’s the easiest and most cost-efficient time to help students address reading and other learning deficiencies. The older they get, the harder it becomes.
   Starlee Rhodes, Goldwater’s vice president of communications, also pointed out it’s easier for parents to accept a child being held back in the third grade than it will ever be to deny diplomas to high school students.
   A legislative commission has been charged with developing an approach to replace AIMS by next year. Hopefully, the group will give serious consideration to Goldwater’s proposed reforms.

ASU President Michael Crow

Arizona State University President Michael Crow definitely knows how to give a politically correct, if not necessarily accurate, answer.

On April 17, Crow and a couple of allies from the construction industries met with the Tribune Editorial Board to promote a $1.4 billion debt package to add new buildings at the state’s three public universities and to remodel older ones.

I pressed Crow on why the universities are asking for so much when the state faces multi-billion dollar deficits. I also asked why haven’t the universities concentrated on the most pressing needs: building safety and maintenance projects that make up about one-third of the request.

Crow gave several reasons why the state should borrow all of the money now, but he also said he’d be happy to accept any amount of money that lawmakers believe the state could afford to spend at this point. If Crow and his colleagues were sincere about that, they would be lobbying just as hard for other bills in the Legislature this year that are creative ways for the universities to fund additional construction.

House Bill 2264, sponsored by Rep. Warde Nichols, R-Gilbert, would have created a permanent exception to the state sales tax on activities that take place on university campuses including merchandise sales and construction payments. Those tax savings would have to be used for building repairs and upgrades. Staff at the Joint Legislative Budget Committee estimated the universities could raise $22 million a year that way, enough to finance most of the building maintenance projects in the $1.4 billion package without taking another dime from the state.

HB2264 never went anywhere in the House, a clear sign the universities ignored it.

Another measure, House Bill 2459 by Rep. Bob Robson, R-Chandler, would transfer control of state trust lands designated for the university system to the Arizona Board of Regents. Right now, all state trust lands are managed by a single agency on behalf of several different groups include grade school districts, the state veterans home, and the Arizona School for the Deaf and Blind.

It’s not clear how much more money the board of regents could wring out of the small portion of state trust lands that belong to the universities. But the regents would have the opportunity to manage the use or sale of those lands for the direct benefit of higher education, instead of relying on an outside agency which has clients with much bigger slices of the pie to worry about.

HB2459 actually has passed the House but has completely stalled in the Senate.

My guess is the universities are so focused on the $1.4 billion package because their most powerful ally, Gov. Janet Napolitano, really wants the most expensive project in the plan – a new campus for the embryonic university medical school in downtown Phoenix with a price tag of $470 million.

ASU Polytechnic would receive one of the new buildings in a proposed $1.4 billion construction package  (photo found at http://www.asu.edu/)

Arizona governors don’t often go before public hearings at the state Legislature to testify for or against bills and other issues. Since the governor is supposed to be an equal branch of government, office-holders want to avoid the appearance of begging for something from lawmakers.

So Gov. Janet Napolitano’s appearance Thursday before two Senate committees to support $1.4 billion in construction at the three state universities was somewhat rare. It reflects the intense pressure that the three universities and the state’s heavy construction industries are applying to get the measure passed, despite Arizona’s multi-billion dollar budget shortfall.

I’m absolutely baffled as to why the universities are so determined to get the entire package right now. Only about a third of the proposal would go toward maintenance and remodeling of current buildings, which the Tribune Editorial Board said Sunday should the Legislature’s primary focus. The rest of the money would add new buildings to the various campuses, including a new home for the Phoenix medical school, a new School of Construction for Arizona State University in Tempe and a new health sciences building at the ASU Polytechnic campus in southeast Mesa.

Sure, having the additional buildings would be nice. But the Arizona Board of Regents can’t even explain how the universities will pay for their share of the debt ($20 million out of a total $102 million a year), much less where the Legislature should find the rest of the money when it has to postpone routine payments to grade school districts just to balance the budget.

Debra Duvall (Mesa Public Schools)

Arizona’s top education official faced off Wednesday at the state Capitol with several school district superintendents over what public schools should be doing to educate students who don’t speak English as their first language, and how much should it cost to do the job right.State Sen. Paula Aboud, D-Tucson, arraigned for a two-hour debate between Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne and the local superintendents because school districts are complaining loudly that the Arizona Department of Education is pushing too quickly to change the approach for dealing with English language learners, and is dramatically underestimating how much the money is needed.In 2006, the Legislature moved to end a longstanding federal lawsuit by charging the Education Department and a separate task force to develop new methods for teaching ELL students, and to inform the Legislature how much tax money it would take to fund such changes. The biggest change would be every ELL student should be separated from regular classes for four hours a day for intensive instruction in English. Most of those students would be expected to return to regular classes full-time within two years.