Vision SC Agenda

Our VisionSC 2014 agenda is here and not to be missed!

2nd Annual VisionSC Summit | Monday, November 17, 2014
Westin Poinsett Hotel | Greenville, SC

11:00 AM Opening Welcome
Former U.S. Senator Jim DeMint, Heritage Foundation

11:05 AM South Carolina’s Offshore Opportunity U.S. Representative Jeff Duncan, SC-03

Energy Panel Discussion (moderated by Representative Duncan)
Dr. James Knapp, University of South Carolina 
Former Columbia Mayor Bob Coble, Nexsen Pruett

What would offshore energy exploration mean for South Carolina in terms of potential revenue, economic development and jobs? How would it impact our tourism industry and beautiful coast? These questions and more will be explored in this panel discussion: if offshore opportunity knocks, will South Carolina be ready?

12:05 PM Break

12:15 PM A Growth Agenda for South Carolina – and America
Steve Moore, Heritage Foundation

States are looking for ways to energize their economies and out-compete their neighbors. Each state confronts this task with a set of policy decisions unique to their own situation, but not all state policies lead to economic prosperity. Using years of economic data and empirical evidence, Steve has identified 15 policy areas that have proven, over time, to be the best determinants of economic vitality. Come learn South Carolina’s – and America’s – secret for success.

Presentation of Inaugural “Carroll A. Campbell, Jr. Vision in Leadership Award” 
Presented to Greenville Mayor Knox H. White by Palmetto Policy Forum and the family of Governor Carroll Campbell.

2:00 PM Break

2:15 PM Breaking Down Barriers to Educational Choice in South Carolina
Kevin Chavous, American Federation for Children

Education Panel Discussion (moderated by Kevin Chavous)
Meka Childs, Education Management Consultant
Mike Sinclair, Principle of Brashier Middle College Charter High School
Dr. Susan Thomas, Head of Glenforest Academy 

A bi-partisan wave of state-led education innovation is sweeping the nation. Courageous leaders are breaking down barriers and finding new ways to empower opportunity for students of every zip code with high-quality, customized education options. Hear more about this exciting national brushfire and how the embers are stirring in South Carolina.

3:30 PM Break

3:45-4:30 Advancing Liberty in the States
Matt Mayer, Liberty Foundation
Dr. Oran Smith, Palmetto Policy Forum

The founding fathers created a federal system to protect the states that formed it. Yet at every turn – from healthcare to highways – states are becoming increasingly dependent. Panelists will outline a strategic road map to return the balance of power to states and provide an update on how this struggle is playing out in South Carolina…and around the country.

4:30 Closing Remarks

4:45 Adjourn

Register online at www.tinyurl.com/VisionSC2014

Our South Carolina State Standards Review Taskforce Response

TO: The South Carolina State Department of Education
FROM: Palmetto Policy Forum & Palmetto Family Council

Thank you for the invitation to submit feedback on South Carolina’s proposed Mathematics and  English Language Arts (ELA) standards.  Our goal in submitting this review is to contribute a thoughtful perspective to a constructive dialogue that results in rigorous, state‐controlled standards that will create an environment of excellence for our students and clear guidance and support for our teachers.

1. Are the standards clear, rigorous and able to be implemented without delay or significant additional professional development?  Are the Standards college and career/workforce ready?

The Standards appear to be technically college and career/workforce ready.  However, they are not rigorous enough to compel an advancement in the outcomes of the highest performing students. They represent a marginal improvement over the status quo in moving away from Common Core, but will put the state in the position of needing to raise the standards again soon if we are serious about quality and rigor.

However, a possible advantage of a stepwise path to rigor is that given the short timeline with which South Carolina is working, the implementation of the standards will not be further delayed by intensive new content mastery for many South Carolina teachers. Some standards are so rigorous as to be beyond the current reach of the typical teacher, which is fine if the implementation planning incorporates adequate time for teachers to re‐tool. But often – as in this case – the transition timelines are so fast that they adversely affect teachers with weaker content mastery and those for whom new content appears (as content shifts from one grade to another) and therefore does nothing to serve the students who the standards ultimately aim to serve.

We find the format of the proposed English standards is not user‐friendly from the teacher  perspective. It is likely that the South Carolina Department of Education (SCDE) will need to  compensate for this through supporting documents and professional development. The standards  document needs to better explain the structure of the standard. Teachers will have to spend too much energy figuring out how the standards work.

2. Do the Standards avoid the problems of Common Core State Standards (CCSS) while retaining its positive aspects?

The 2015 Standards rewriting process was created to eliminate CCSS‐related problems and advance the will of the Legislature in other areas. How did it fare?

 

Math: On the former, it is not clear whether the new standards are charting a clear path away from the concepts of "Everyday Math" rightly or wrongly associated with CCSS that have been so universally panned by parents, teachers and students alike. Several CCSS‐like references to "Mathematical Process Standards" leave this in doubt. It is also unclear whether the new Standards reflect the desire of the General Assembly, as reflected in Act 275 (2014), the "Back to Basics in Education Act," which requires "students to memorize multiplication tables to ensure that students can effectively multiply numbers by the end of fifth grade." We recommend that the Committee closely review California’s former Math standards as a model of rigor and best practice.  

ELA: The Common Core State Standards provided exemplars. We see none here, but that is advisable as this leaves these choices up to individual school districts.  A positive aspect of CCSS was its commitment to what scholars have called a "coherent, sequential knowledge” in building literacy. These draft ELA Standards do not appear to provide that level of coherence and guidance. 

We recommend that Committee closely review Massachusetts’ ELA standards as a model of rigor and best practice. 

Conclusions: This effort to craft our own South Carolina state standards in such a tight time frame was a monumental task. We trust that our suggestions for improvement are useful to the writing teams.  But as important as South Carolina developed Standards are, the lessons of this process are far broader than Standards. We suggest four important takeaways: 

1)  Federal involvement in education, especially when tied to federal funding is ill advised, and even dangerous; 

2)  Education governance in this state is perilously diffuse and unaccountable to the will of the parents, as this entire CCSS issue has demonstrated; 

3)  Parental involvement is more important than Standards or any other factor, and for parents to be involved they must have greater access to high‐quality public and private education; and 

4)  There is no more crucial force in the education of a child, outside of parents, than a well trained, effective teacher.

 

Respectfully submitted,

 

Ellen E. Weaver                          

President & CEO                        

Palmetto Policy Forum               

Oran P. Smith, PhD
President & CEO
Palmetto Family Council
 

Finding Midterm Meaning

It’s no secret what happened Tuesday night: an unmistakably Republican electoral tidal wave swept across the country. The question is why. We know we’ll hear the predictable punditry on 24-hour cable news from both the left and the right, slicing and dicing the demographics, pointing fingers of blame for losses…and of course taking all the credit for wins.

But that shallow analysis does a disservice to the millions of Americans, regardless of party, who cared enough to make their voices heard. These voters expressed their deepest held beliefs about their country and their communities…and in many cases the very real fear that the American Dream is slipping through the fingers of our generation.

Without a Presidential candidate at the top of the ticket (despite the President’s attempts to insert himself as the defining issue), what we saw in these midterms was a policy – not personality – driven election. The fact is, governors who lowered taxes to create growth and opportunity in their states won, even in traditionally moderate or left leaning environments. Those who raised taxes lost. Voters stood by governors who stood strong against Washington’s mandate to push able-bodied, working age people into the broken Medicaid system at the expense of the elderly and disabled.

Even in governor’s races in solidly blue states like Illinois, Maryland and Massachusetts we saw a repudiation of irresponsible government spending and the unsustainable “good intentions” that are bankrupting those states (and ironically, trapping the very people they claim to champion in a cycle of perpetual poverty).

Voters decisively rejected destructive identity politics that seek to divide us by race, gender, income. We saw an historic victory right here in our own back yard as Senator Tim Scott became the first black elected to the U.S. Senate from a southern state since Reconstruction. And that rhetorical “War on Women” (that never actually was)? Stick a fork in it, because it’s done with the election of Iowa’s first female Senator Joni Ernst; Elise Stefanick, the youngest woman ever elected to Congress; and the re-election of several strong female governors.

And if you really want to pack a paradigm shattering one-two punch, how about Mia Love, the first-ever black female Republican to be sent to Congress? It’s clear that voters are looking for courageous leadership that is grounded in principled ideas and promotes policy solutions to unite us in true hope, not divide us for partisan political purposes.

And therein lies both the challenge and the opportunity ahead. As the dust settles and the real work of governing begins, we know that on both sides of the aisle, the inertia of status quo thinking and the poison pill of political calculation will be as strong as ever.

But we can do better. Let’s determine on both on the left and the right that we are stronger than the culture of political cynicism and division in which we swim. Let’s recognize that commitment to our state and country can only be properly expressed in personal love of our fellow man.

  Love that enables us to put down tired political dogmas and sets us free to risk engaging in respectful, authentic conversations with people who may see things differently. To extend and inconvenience ourselves for the sake of our neighbors and communities. Not in a condescending, government-driven paternalism: after all, government can’t love anyone! But in an ennobling belief in the inherent dignity and worth of every human being…and a resulting determination to create a policy environment in which everyone can thrive:

More choices in education to allow every student the opportunity of a customized, high-quality education. Locally controlled healthcare solutions that lower cost, increase access to care and put the doctor/patient relationship first. Responsible development of energy resources that lower gas prices for families and foster energy independence. Tax policies that grow local businesses and create new jobs. And that’s just a start.

This love – and not electoral politics – is the soil out of which our ideas and future actions must grow. It is the nourishing common ground on which we stand as conservative to say that we fight not for things but for people. For the chance of every individual to realize their fullest God-given potential.

As Martin Luther King, Jr. so beautifully expressed from a jail cell in Birmingham, “…by its very nature, love creates and builds up. Love transforms with redemptive power.” Unless we put this truth into action in our public discourse and actions, this midterm will soon fade into the memory as just one more election in the never-ending cycle of negativity.

So will our leaders recognize the challenge and seize the opportunity? Let’s pray for the sake of our state and country that they do.

Ellen Weaver is President & CEO of Palmetto Policy Forum a non-partisan, 501(c)3 education foundation.