To what does rising Republican star Chris Christie attribute his success? The New Jersey governor is grateful for his parents’ decision to move from Newark, New Jersey, to a better school district and stated that education is “the single most important issue in America today for our long-term future.”
“If my parents kept me in Newark, I wouldn’t be standing here today as the 55th governor of New Jersey,” Christie said. “How many young men and women in the public school system could be the next governor of New Jersey, but they won’t because we neither have the guts nor the will to change the status quo and to stand up to the comfort of adults in favor of children. I won’t have anyone fool you that it is any different than that.”
Christie’s address was part of the university-wide forum on education. Sponsored by the Notre Dame Law Review, his comments concluded the “Educational Innovation and the Law” forum which included two panels. Christie stated that the current public education system refuses to take responsibility for its unsatisfactory results. To demonstrate the failure in Newark’s public schools, Christie pointed to statistics showing that only 23 percent of Newark students who enter the ninth grade will receive their diploma in four years, and that 90 percent of Newark high school graduates need at least one year of remedial education to even sit in a college class. “We cannot tell those children that out of no fault of their own they are bound to educational failure because we are unable to look at the educational system and say that perhaps on size does not fit all,” Christie said.
He suggested that academics and others with a hand in education often point to the complexities of the education system to justify why the status quo remains and problems go unfixed.
To illustrate his point, Christie asked the audience how many parents have been to a school’s “back to school night,” and of those people, he asked, “How long did it take you to figure out whether your kid had a good teacher or a bad teacher?” The audience responded with laughter.
He acknowledged that parent involvement certainly plays a role in education, but that a lack of parent involvement cannot be a justification for the education system’s failures.
Christie said that the same system that works for “suburban kids” is not good enough for kids from homes with greater difficulties and less family support. These kids need different strategies to help them succeed academically—like longer school days and school years. With another nod to the problem of status quo, he said that these changes don’t “fit in the union school contract.”
Christie went on to say that his main ideas for improving today’s public education system are the restructuring of the tenure system, pay differentiation for teachers of different subjects, merit-based pay for teachers, promoting school choice, a longer school day and school year, and increased focus on using technology that adapts to the educational needs of each child.
Christie outlined recent and proposed changes he advanced in his attempts to ensure that every classroom has a good teacher at the blackboard.
Christie stated that teachers must be held to high standards of accountability that do not depend exclusively on high stakes testing. Instead, objective measures like test scores and student grades should comprise only fifty percent of the assessment. The other half should be determined by subjective measures such as peer and lesson plan reviews.
“Tenure in New Jersey means at three years and one day you have a job for life,” he said.
He also advocated two changes in teacher compensation. First, teachers should be paid differently based on their subject and location. For example, math and science teachers would earn more than physical education teachers. “Does anyone in this room believe that we should be paying gym teachers as much as science and math teachers? My children’s future is not going to be determined by the complexities of physical education,” Christie said. “We need to get better science and math teachers, and to get them not to go into private industry, we need to pay them more.”
To attract quality teachers to struggling districts, these teachers would have higher salaries than their peers in comfortable suburban schools.
Second, teacher compensation should include merit pay. “I’m not an advocate of less teacher pay,” Christie said. “I’m an advocate of more teacher pay, but for good teachers.” Christie discussed of weeding out ineffective teachers and incentivizing the effective teachers with merit-based pay practices. “Everywhere else in American life we pay on merit besides education. America is based on rewarding the outstanding, rewarding the achievers, rewarding people who are producing.” Christie continued, “[In the public education system] merit plays no role in who keeps their job and who loses it. It is ridiculous. It is degrading. It is contrary to a model of success.”
His final suggestion for change is increasing competition among schools by increasing the number of charter schools, offering inter-district school choice, and implementing scholarship programs where private businesses can donate to send students from failing schools to private ones.
Christie’s comments targeted teachers unions as a wall holding up the current gravely flawed system. He noted that every year in New Jersey alone, teachers unions receive $130 million from the salaries of New Jersey teachers. Christie concluded by expressing his hope that his reforms can overcome the status quo.
“New Jersey require by law that each teacher pay $731 to the union. The union has a 130 million dollar political slush fund to help their friends and punish their enemies. That’s what we’re up against,” said Christie. He continued to describe the New Jersey Teachers’ Union as “a monopolistic behemoth that acts as a political thug across New Jersey.”
“There is nothing more important than this issue of education,” Christie said. “In years a child from Newark could be standing right here.” Christie concluded by saying, “I care about the future of this country, and I care about the individual ability of each child and what God put into them. And I think you should too.”
Kelsey Clemson is a senior psychology major, who loves fall for the crisp air, pumpkin bars, and Thanksgiving. Contact her at kclemson@nd.edu.
Contact Derek at ddefenso@nd.edu.
