Obama has it right; Hawaii teachers accept his challenge

In May, Hawaii’s teachers voted to ratify the contract settlement hammered out in January with Board of Education Chairman Don Horner and Schools Superintendent Kathryn Matayoshi.

A few weeks later, President Barack Obama wrote to me.

In his letter, the president called his Race to the Top "the most ambitious reform our country has seen in generations." The president was emphatic: "Race to the Top focuses on what is best for our students by engaging state and local leaders and educators in turning around our lowest performing schools, developing and rewarding effective teachers, adopting meaningful assessments, and tracking the progress of our students."

Teachers at first had rejected Horner’s settlement.

Hawaii’s $75 million in Race to the Top funding was put in jeopardy. None of us wanted that. So despite the heated rhetoric between HSTA and our governor, we embarked on an unprecedented dialogue with teachers throughout Hawaii.

Some critics had suggested that teachers rejected the settlement because they are afraid of evaluations. That’s not true. Hawaii’s teachers have been evaluated for 40 years. Teachers simply want evaluations to be fair, based on true performance, not on favoritism or misleading statistics.

HSTA disseminated detailed information and held countless informational meetings and Q&A sessions over a period of two weeks.

As a result of that effort, two-thirds of Hawaii’s teachers reconsidered the proposed settlement with the state and voted to ratify the contract.

We did the right thing. We have accepted the president’s terms and are prepared to meet his challenge together with the state Department of Education.

Agreeing to the teachers’ contract could be the single most important policy decision of this governor. The teachers have done their part; now it’s up to him. With his signature, the governor most assuredly could take Hawaii off the "high risk" status and secure the $75 million funding.

We are not sure why the governor has decided to call our ratification vote "invalid." Perhaps the long struggle over our contract has tired him. That’s understandable. We all get tired.

But Hawaii’s keiki need us to catch our breath. Get our second wind. And redouble our commitment to saving Race to the Top in Hawaii.

The teachers’ contract negotiated with Chairman Horner and HSTA is fair. Under its terms, teachers will make financial sacrifices during the state’s financially challenging times, deferring pay raises for a few years and accepting a new system for teacher evaluations. In exchange, the six-year contract guarantees no student furlough days, gives everyone a measure of long-term security and certainty, thereby avoiding any repeat of 2011’s conflict.

Stubbornness is not persistence. Anger is not productive. Compromise is not surrender.

Not long after students and teachers return to school next month, Hawaii’s Race to the Top probationary period will expire. Horner’s efforts allowed cooler heads on our side to prevail. We hope he will have the same success with the state.

We appreciate the support we’ve received from the public, parents and people of goodwill.

We will return to school in August committed to doing the best we can for the students entrusted to us.