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November 13, 2009 |
Click here to read printable version |
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| A critical moment with NCLB |
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The path to reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) is "daunting," writes Andrew Rotherham in U.S. News & World Report, because "serious fault lines lie just below the surface of the seemingly broad support for reforming America's education system." An overhaul of the law will likely break apart concord on Capitol Hill. Congress (and education interest groups) has had little control over the administration's disbursement of $100 billion in education stimulus money, and many observers have been pleasantly surprised by the tough reform positions the administration has taken. Yet if special interest groups and less reform-friendly members of Congress can't change "Race to the Top," they can work their will on the reauthorization process for NCLB. Indications are that they plan to do just that in a political environment now favoring them. The legislative coalition that supported the 2001 law is gone. Democrats are skittish about the overall political climate in the wake of gubernatorial elections. Republicans are loath to enable policy victories for Democrats, especially those in the Senate who may be politically vulnerable. If President Obama is serious about seeing education reform in 2010, says Rotherham, he must expend political capital himself.
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| Calling for a 'new world' of teacher prep |
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A policy brief from the Alliance for Excellent Education makes the case that too many teachers arrive to their first day of teaching unprepared for the challenges of a diverse set of learners. Requirements of teaching are now such that all students, regardless of background, must be educated to the same high level and prepared for some post-secondary education if they are to support a family and earn a decent living wage. The brief lays out five critical areas where teachers must develop competency before entering the classroom: the ability to work with diverse learners, including special education students and English language learners; the capacity to teach adolescent literacy skills regardless of content area; the ability to effectively use assessment and data to impact teaching and learning; the ability to teach in specialized teaching environments, including urban and rural settings; and the ability to convey content knowledge in a clear manner, tailored to the academic discipline. To ensure this, the brief recommends that the federal government encourage the creation of performance-based assessments that fairly and accurately measure the effectiveness of individual teacher candidates and preparation programs, and introduce a common set of standards for a candidate's performance before he or she becomes a full-fledged teacher.
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| 'Business as usual' in New Haven |
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Amid the effusive praise for the new teacher union contract in New Haven, Conn., the editors of The Washington Post sounded a note of disappointment. They call the agreement "an improvement over the previous one, but [one that] hardly contains the innovations needed for serious reform." They lament that it "preserves tenure, prevents good teachers from getting paid more than bad teachers, lets a minority of teachers block work rules to allow innovative programs, and makes no commitments to close any specific bad schools." Some of its provisions, they note, had been put in place in New York City and as such were not the result of tough bargaining. The agreement is simply "business as usual." Instead of drawing attention to New Haven, the editors would have Secretary of Education Arne Duncan highlight efforts closer to home, specifically those of D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee. She is making the unpopular decisions and fighting the difficult battles, they say, resisted by the union at every turn. "Rather than praising feel-good gestures, the Obama administration ought to be supporting the hard work of true reform."
Read more | Releated | Back to top
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| Charters vs. public: the wrong debate |
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"Positioning charter schools as the opposite of public schools, rather than a necessary supplement to public education, has poisoned the discourse," writes Nancy Flanagan on her blog Teacher in a Strange Land. It's an opposition that traditional school advocates and charter advocates both play into, to the detriment of all. Public schools and teachers are openly skeptical or negative in remarks about charter schools, and charter advocates seem "bent on repeating the worst sound bites about public schools." She evaluates in particular a screening and panel discussion in Detroit of a film about a highly successful charter in Chicago, an event well-attended by charter teachers and proponents. Flanagan reports the event had a "professional pep rally atmosphere," and panelists made many of the familiar reform recommendations, such as that new teachers, preferably from alternative preparation programs, were crucial to fixing the beleaguered Detroit system. All of these suggestions are useful, but none are the whole answer or even the whole question. "Charter World is an interesting place," Flanagan writes, "with different beliefs, incentives, and catch phrases than Public School World. It would be a shame to lose the opportunity to do something truly different with charter schools, relying instead on rhetorical flourishes and empty myths."
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| Fewer math topics bring greater mastery |
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Middle school students in Oregon in every racial, ethnic, and income group show greater mastery of mathematics than they did three years ago, which educators attribute to Oregon's drastic reduction in the number of math topics covered in each grade, The Oregonian reports. At the same time, more middle schools have organized teachers into teams that meet regularly to discuss their students' progress and learn from each other's teaching successes and failures. With fewer concepts to cover, teachers take time for more hands-on lessons, using more visual cues and more real-world examples. They also spend more time ensuring that all students have a topic down before moving on, which sometimes requires circling back to teach a concept a second or third way, but fewer topics give teachers more leeway. "They're opening math up to more kids, not just the kids who have always been successful -- the memorizers," says Winnie Miller, past president of the Oregon Council of Teachers of Mathematics. "Now it's hands-on, it's visual, it's more conceptual. Teachers build understanding in different ways, not just one way, the teacher's way." Despite this, observers fear that middle school gains could be squandered as ninth-graders encounter one-size-fits-all high school math.
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| Time for charters to take on broader challenges |
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New York State Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch has called on New York City charter operators to move away from elementary education and take on the problems of large failing high schools, according to the Gotham Schools blog. Tisch contends that charters have been the political "darlings" of the city and state, blessed with the most qualified teachers and some of the highest-achieving students. Now is the time, she said, for charter schools to expand their reach to serve more struggling high school students, English language learners, and special education students. She'd like charters to say, "I don't want to just grow my own, I don't want to operate in this zone where I am the darling,'" she explained. Instead she'd like them to dig in and ask, "What can we do to help?'" Currently, 13 of the city's approximately 100 charter schools serve high school students, though more may grow to include ninth through 12th grade classes. A plan to convert large failing high schools into charters is reportedly part of New York State's application for federal Race to the Top grants, and is one of the few concrete proposals thus far that state officials have said they'll include in the application.
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| Grading states on innovation |
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A new report from the Center for American Progress rates how well states foster innovation in education, grading them in areas ranging from finance and school management to methods for hiring effective teachers and removing ineffective ones, according to The Christian Science Monitor. The report has what The Monitor calls "an unusual consortium of authors" - the liberal Center for American Progress, Frederick Hess of the conservative American Enterprise Institute, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce -- a mix that the authors hope highlights how much agreement can be found despite the battles that often surround education debates. Despite some disharmony, the authors all agree on the standards against which states should be judged. These are good management, which includes allowing models like charter schools to flourish, and giving principals autonomy in running their schools; efficient methods of funding and spending; hiring and evaluating good teachers; removing ineffective teachers; putting in place and using good data systems; harnessing technology effectively; having a strong pipeline to postsecondary education; and creating an environment that supports reform. Florida is among the best rated, with Texas, Louisiana, Georgia, and New York performing well in some but not all areas.
Read more | See the report | Back to top
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| Florida sued over education quality |
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The national and Florida American Civil Liberties Union is bringing a class-action suit against the state on behalf of Palm Beach County students and parents, alleging it fails to ensure that all students receive the high-quality education guaranteed under the Florida Constitution, The Palm Beach Post reports. The lawsuit does not seek monetary damages, but asks a judge to set goals for increasing the district graduation rate over time. Currently, a quarter of Palm Beach County seniors do not earn a diploma or GED after four years, with the number reaching 40 percent among black students. The lawsuit also alleges overly broad accounting of graduation rates. In 2004, for example, the county reported that 66 percent of high school students graduated on time, but outside analysis found that just 56 percent graduated that year if only students who got a diploma in four years were counted. "When you have a student going into a public school system where the graduation rates are maybe that one-third to one-half of the students don't graduate, they're in an environment that is not conducive to their graduating in four years with a regular diploma," said Muslima Lewis, director of the racial justice project for the ACLU of Florida.
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| Texas incentives yield little |
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A new report shows that the Texas Educator Excellence Grant (TEEG), a merit-pay plan, did not produce the hoped-for student improvements, according to The Dallas Morning News. Researchers looked at reading scores on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills for more than 140,000 students, and found no systematic evidence that TEEG had an impact on student achievement gains. The TEEG plan gave incentive pay to teachers at about 1,000 campuses annually in lower-income neighborhoods, but was discontinued by the state legislature after 2008-09 because of design problems. Lori Taylor of Texas A&M, one of the study's authors, said a possible cause for the program's failure was that bonuses were relatively small and were given to most teachers at each school -- about 70 percent -- so incentives for individual teachers to push for higher scores were "relatively weak." In addition, campuses already had to be higher performers to qualify for the program, so it was difficult to register much improvement. Researchers also found the program had little impact on reducing teacher turnover. Gov. Rick Perry remains committed to incentive pay, however, and Texas provided nearly $200 million a year for another plan that began last year.
Read more | See the report | Back to top
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| The continuing debate over extended class time |
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Finding ways to give kids more classroom time through longer hours, a longer school year, or both is getting renewed attention, according to The Christian Science Monitor. Many reformers agree that more time at school is key, and the administration has endorsed the idea. A number of charter schools have made student gains in part through expanded schedules, and school systems have begun to experiment with the measure as well. "If you want to look at schools where [the achievement gap is narrowing], they're saying they couldn't do it without the added time," says Jennifer Davis of the National Center on Time & Learning in Boston. "Even when you get good teachers into schools, you need added time." Studies have shown that low-income students lose more than two months of reading skills over the summer, with researchers positing that more than half the achievement gap can be accounted for by the differential in summer learning opportunities. Parents who themselves didn't succeed in school and aren't highly literate will probably not cultivate these skills at home. But skeptics say adding hours and days is hugely expensive, and alone will accomplish little. Without good teachers and curricula, the problem is actually worsened.
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Seven-year initiative aims to 'shake up conversation' around school reform
The Ford Foundation has pledged $100 million to transform urban high schools in Los Angeles, New York, Newark, Philadelphia, Chicago, Detroit, and Denver.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-schools5-2009nov05,0,3644719.story
Drop in enrollment hits LAUSD hard
An exodus of students to charter schools, combined with a decline in overall enrollment, is impacting funding for the Los Angeles Unified School District.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lausd5-2009nov05,0,2782314.story
A meeting of minds
Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson and Washington Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee are engaged.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jACukubyD-OnMRzU8xi8hsAflRHQD9BQAM8O0
Forging new paths to green
First lady Michelle Obama is calling on states to improve childhood education in math and science as a way to improve U.S. energy production.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/06/MN681AG3K2.DTL
School control struggle hits nadir
A Spanish-language flier circulated in Los Angeles is saying that those who sign a petition in favor of charter schools could get deported.
http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/local/los_angeles&id=7111633 |
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| NEW GRANT AND FUNDING INFORMATION |
National Teachers Hall of Fame: Nominations
The National Teachers Hall of Fame honors exceptional career teachers, encourages excellence in teaching, and preserves the rich heritage of the teaching profession in the United States. Maximum award: $2,000. Eligibility: Nominees must have a minimum of 20 years full-time preK-12 teaching experience, and hold a valid teaching certificate or license from the state in which he or she teaches or has taught. Deadline: January 4, 2010.
http://www.nthf.org/nominate.htm
Amgen: Award for Science Teaching Excellence
The Amgen Award for Science Teaching Excellence recognizes extraordinary contributions by educators across the United States who are elevating the level of science literacy through creativity in the classroom and motivation of students. Maximum award: $5,000, plus $5,000 to the recipient's school for the expansion or enhancement of a school science program, science resources, or the professional development of the school's science teachers. Eligibility: full-time classroom teachers grades K–12 in public or private school whose major responsibilities include teaching science, and who work in California, Colorado, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, or Washington state. Deadline: February 2, 2010.
http://www.amgen.com:80/citizenship/aaste.html
Institute for Interactive Journalism/John S. and James L. Knight Foundation: New Voices Community News Grants
The Institute for Interactive Journalism and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation New Voices Community News Grants will help fund the start-up of eight micro-local news projects and support them with two educational websites. Maximum award: $25,000. Eligibility: 501(c)3 organizations and education institutions, including civic groups, community organizations, public broadcasters, schools, colleges, and universities. Deadline: February 15, 2010.
http://www.j-newvoices.org/site/story/how_to_apply/
ING: Unsung Heroes Awards
The ING Unsung Heroes Awards program recognizes innovative and progressive thinking in education through monetary awards. Maximum award: $25,000. Eligibility: full-time educators, teachers, principals, paraprofessionals, or classified staff members with effective projects that improve student learning at an accredited K-12 public or private school. Deadline: April 30, 2010.
http://www.ing-usa.com/us/stellent2/groups/dc/documents/companylobinformation/001143.pdf
For more grants, see http://www.publiceducation.org/newsblast_grants.asp
"Right now, choice is more like a land run than an open house. It's each man for himself, desperately trying to get the best you can get your hands on."
-- Aesha Rasheed, director of the New Orleans Parent Organizing Network, in The Times-Picayune, November 8, 2009
http://www.nola.com/education/index.ssf/2009/11/post_42.html
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