Former President George W. Bush stood tall on the “Houston Miracle” in 2000, and it became a rallying cry that convinced voters his plan for education reform could re-energize America's schools.
But in 2003, after investigations by the New York Times and the Dallas Morning News, the smoke and mirrors were rolled back into the closet, and the Houston Miracle was found to be as they say in the Lone Star state, “All hat and no cattle.” Among the revelations were that test scores had been inflated and low-scoring students were excluded from taking the exams. It was less a miracle and more three-card monte.
This little bit of history is relevant because it was another Bush recently who was selling education reform — this time it was older brother and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. Bush was in Oklahoma City stumping for Republican candidates and championing his own state's educational miracle. The difference is the Florida miracle may exist though clearly much work is left to be done.
In March, officials with the National Assessment of Educational Progress released the latest test scores for the 2009 reading exams for fourth and eighth grades. For Florida, their scores were a striking example that student performance can be improved through reform. Other states including Oklahoma saw their scores languish.
The NAEP is the largest national assessment of what America's students know about various subjects. Assessments are conducted periodically in mathematics, reading, science, writing, the arts, civics, economics, geography and U.S. history. The NAEP assessments are administered uniformly using the same sets of test booklets across the nation.
In the reading scores released in March, Florida's Hispanic students scored 13 points higher than the NAEP's state average in the percentage of students earning a passing grade on the exam. More than that, in previous tests Florida students as a whole scored higher than the 50-state average in math, science, writing and reading. For its part, Oklahoma students lag behind that average in math, reading and writing. Only in science did Oklahoma students best the average.
Florida's Hispanic students now outscore Oklahoma's white students on the fourth-grade English reading exam. In fact, the average Hispanic student in Florida ties or outscores the statewide average for all students in 30 states — Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Arizona, California, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Nevada, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin and Wyoming.
That would seem strong validation of the educational reforms the state of Florida first adopted in 1999 in a plan put forward by Bush called A+ Plan for Education.
In a mission statement written for reform efforts, it was stressed that Florida schools and its government oversight must become more efficient, allowing taxpayer dollars to be used to help students and not to be sunk into administrative costs. Florida only has 74 school districts. Oklahoma has 539 school districts, employing 521 superintendents. Florida schools service a population in excess of 18.5 million according to Census estimates compared to Oklahoma's 3.6 million.
One has to wonder if numbers like that show Oklahoma's education system is being run for the benefit of administrators and bureaucrats and not for our students. How much money could be saved and put into teachers' pay, books and in classroom opportunities for our children if only Oklahoma lawmakers could get off their flat backsides and actually begin doing something other than creating slogans for their next fear campaign?
A key part of Florida's education reform plan was the assigning of a letter grade to schools based on students' scores on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test.
According to the Miami Herald, since grading of schools began in 1999, the percentage of schools receiving As and Bs has more than tripled from 21 percent to 79 percent.
The proportion of D and F schools have dropped from 28 percent to 7 percent as the state of Florida pumped new money and resources into underperforming schools. The improvements came despite that state continually raising standards on which the grades would be based.
The plan also allows students who attend schools failing to improve their scores to transfer to a better one. An “Opportunity Scholarship” that once allowed students to transfer to private schools and have their tuition paid by the state was struck down by a court.
Still, these successes have not solved all of Florida's problems. In the matter of ACT scores that indicate preparedness for college, Florida students lag behind. The average composite ACT score for 2009 graduating seniors was 19.5 while Oklahoma scored 20.7. Among the highest-performing states were Connecticut (23.5), Massachusetts (23.9) and New Hampshire (23.5). In fairness, more than 71 percent of Oklahoma students took the ACT while less than 20 percent took it in the top three states.
What all of this means is that Florida is moving forward but still faces many challenges. There is no miracle yet, but there are impressive signs that education in that state is getting better. There are no magic bullets — no one-size- fits-all answers. But it does seem obvious that accountability and efficiency that results in more dollars making it into the classroom and not into fat-cat paychecks and vehicles for Oklahoma district administrators is a good thing.
What is also clear is that lawmakers' timidity and failure not to fight for our children's educations beyond slogans and blame is reason enough to clean house at the state Capitol.

Jones is editor and general manager of the Mustang News.