Editor's Notes: The PPI "21st Century Schools Project Update" is a bi-weekly email newsletter published by PPI's 21st Century Schools Project. To sign up for a free subscription, click here. (Check the box next to "Education.") Original links are included though some may have expired.
Essay: Impotent Liberalism, by Andrew J. Rotherham
News and Commentary
1. School Results and NCLB Results
2. President Bush, Education Skinflint?
3. Meanwhile in Washington....
4. A Possible Epidemic of Unaccountability in Connecticut
5. Greene and Forster Do Drugs and Sex
Departments:
6. Charter Schooling News
7. Quick Clicks
8. 21st Century Schools Project Announcements:
a.) YOU'RE Invited: PPI Friday Forum THIS FRIDAY
b.) YOU'RE Invited: PPI-NAS-NEKIA Research Conference March 11, 2004
Fact to Consider:
Two-thirds of all suburban and urban 12th graders have had sex; 43 percent of suburban 12th graders and 39 percent of urban 12th graders have had sex with a person with whom they did not have a romantic relationship.
(Source: "Sex, Drugs, and Delinquency in Urban and Suburban Public Schools," Jay Greene and Greg Forster, Manhattan Institute)
by Andrew J. Rotherham
A recent American Prospect package on education reform is well worth reading less because of what it says than for what it does not. Collectively the articles, most of which raise important points (particularly the emphasis on early childhood education -- look for a paper by PPI's Sara Mead on this issue shortly), show the incoherence and ultimately the impotence of modern liberalism when it comes to addressing today's educational problems.
For example, Robert Borosage, a leading liberal intellectual, offers the standard disclaimer that money alone is not a reform. Nonetheless Borosage then turns what could be an interesting essay on the enormous challenges public education faces and lack of support for meeting them into a call for basically more of the same, with an emphasis on the importance of the "common school." Romanticism about common schools in the face of what research shows about the demographics and outcomes of public education is an astounding feat of denial. Moreover it is a misdirection play to divert attention from the horrifying achievement gap that is one of the primary barriers to greater social equity and mobility today. We're all for more investment in public education, particularly in underserved communities, and would like to see greater support for public schools, too. Yet neither of these challenges should serve as a smokescreen for serious structural problems that result in a system that systematically undereducates minority and poor youngsters.
Similarly, the usually insightful Peter Schrag repeats some common attacks on No Child Left Behind that likely play well to much of the Prospect's readership but do not point to concrete solutions for the vexing problem of how to ensure accountability for underserved students in a heterogeneous system. Meanwhile, he buries a key quote by William Taylor of the Citizens Commission for Civil Rights that in a more rational debate would excite the liberal press and form the backbone of a true liberal critique of current educational policies. [For the record, here is Taylor, certainly no conservative apparatchik, "The federal government is doing a hell of a lot more for the states now than in the early years. A lot of the whining and bitching and moaning is coming from people who don't like the accountability provisions, so they're saying they don't have the money to do this."]
With some notable exceptions, it never seems to enter the calculus of today's establishment liberals that perhaps a system that works inadequately for too many poor and minority youngsters (and does so in all types of communities -- equity problems are not just the urban tail wagging the public school dog) needs broader reforms.
Could greater public sector choice and customization, more rigorous quality expectations, or improving our teaching force help address some of these problem and better meet the needs of America's diverse student body, particularly disadvantaged students? Of course, but these ideas all disrupt established adult interests in one way or another. As a frustrated school superintendent remarked sardonically to me recently when discussing his efforts to improve student learning in the crossfire of urban politics, "the attitude is that kids are just passing through, but the adults have to be able to get along because we have to be able to work here..."
Borosage's dismissal of phonics, reforming teacher certification, and testing as "conservative reforms" amply illustrates the sorry state of affairs. This characterization ignores the quantitative evidence pointing to phonics as an essential component of effective reading instruction. It also ignores the staggering lack of empirical evidence supporting current certification schemes, which the Education Commission of the States (hardly a conservative organization) recently pointed out.
Robert Kennedy made the case for testing and accountability almost 40 years ago when, during debate over the original ESEA, he pointed out that regular student testing is an essential part of federal efforts to ensure equity. Kennedy wasn't a "crank," to borrow Borosage's moniker, and certainly not a conservative. But he understood then what too many liberals forget today: schools are not the right unit of analysis, children are. Likewise, Albert Shanker, the legendary American Federation of Teachers president and school reformer (and another non-crank and non-conservative) also unapologetically favored testing, with consequences. Shanker also opposed numerous faddish reforms that today make many liberals swoon and didn't let romanticism get in the way of addressing hard realities. Both men exemplified real liberalism, the kind that holds the promise of helping the disadvantaged, rather than today's variety that is bold only so long as no interest group is left behind. Yes, for various positions they took, Kennedy and Shanker would likely be labeled "conservatives" in today's education debate.
The cause of this incoherence and exhausting affinity to tired shibboleths is painfully obvious -- interest group rather than ideas-based liberalism. Liberals have become beholden to institutions and organizations so today's liberal universe is essentially delineated by constellations of interest groups rather than core principles or ideas.
In education the clearest manifestation of this is the remarkable consistency with which the interests of adults and the "system" trump those of children and the infrequency with which the press or anyone else even remarks about this. It's become internalized. For example, in the current debate over NCLB numerous media stories focus on speculation about what the law might do to schools with hardly any mention of what it might do for children.
Spend time in a good urban charter school, a high-performing traditional urban public school or with Teach for America teachers. That's real liberalism in action, a muscular public sector achieving public purposes and expanding opportunity to the disenfranchised but challenging interests -- even sympathetic ones -- that thwart progress.
By contrast, to read and hear what leading liberals have to say about education in this particular package and elsewhere is to see vividly the collapse of the moral authority of liberalism because of too many compromises, conflicted interests, and a focus on affiliations rather than principles. When the issue is not school spending, liberals, in no small part because of politics, too often end up siding with the adults and not the kids. Simply being against what George W. Bush wants to do, focusing overwhelmingly on spending and criticizing NCLB, testing, or any other reform does not constitute anything even remotely approximating a progressive agenda on education in an environment where literally millions of youngsters are habitually undereducated.
Borosage is exactly right that conservatives do often push some extreme ideas (and not just on education). They will fail to address education problems over the long haul because many conservatives today are antagonistic toward the public sector and overconfident about the ability of the private sector to address social problems (and in some cases, indifferent to these problems in the first place). But this is exactly what makes today's liberal stance on education so exasperating. It leaves the field empty. And the loser in that battle is not some political candidate but the very people modern liberalism is most supposed to hold promise for in the first place.
Andrew J. Rotherham is Director of PPI's 21st Century Schools Project and editor of The Bulletin.
Children Left Behind,
The American Prospect, (February 2004):
http://www.prospect.org/print/special0402.html
Earlier this month, the School Information Partnership (SIP) launched a new website -- www.SchoolResults.org -- to provide parents, educators, policymakers, and the public user-friendly access to student performance data being generated by No Child Left Behind. At the most basic level, SIP will help cash-strapped states and districts implement NCLB by providing them with a cost-effective tool to meet the law's school report card requirements. States that collect and provide SIP with all the data NCLB requires will meet the report card requirement without having to establish their own costly systems.
More importantly, SchoolResults.org will help parents and the public get information about how schools are doing, and will provide policymakers and educators with the tools to analyze student testing data and connect with best practices from schools that are succeeding with similar populations. Right now six states -- Virginia, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Washington state, and Florida -- are online. All 50, plus D.C. and Puerto Rico, should be up by summer. Visitors to the website can look at school, district, and state level data for each assessment the state uses, view performance and if a school made AYP for each subgroup, and compare performance with demographically similar schools. In a later stage, the project will expand resources to help educators draw on best practices.
The Partnership includes The Broad Foundation, The U.S. Department of Education, Standard & Poor's, and the National Center for Educational Accountability's Just for the Kids (full disclosure: both the Broad Foundation and Standards & Poor's have supported PPI's education policy work). The Broad Foundation put up the start up funds. After the first years, states are expected to take on continuing fees, which are expected to be minimal. Standard & Poor's and Just for the Kids worked collaboratively to bring the expertise of their work with online school data tools to the project. It's a powerful data analysis tool with real analytic leverage for a variety of stakeholders and a good step toward helping educators and the public understand NCLB requirements and use the law to catalyze student achievement.
Advocacy groups and the media are making a lot of claims about NCLB, many of which are hard to substantiate but make good copy nonetheless. As Jay Mathews points out in a characteristically thought-provoking column, most of the media attention focuses on the law's potential consequences for adults, rather than what it means for kids. He also notes that much of the NCLB rhetoric from proponents and opponents alike is more about scoring debating points than making the law work. To fill this information void, Mathews asks readers to send him real accounts of how NCLB is impacting actual youngsters for good or ill.
SchoolResults.org:
http://www.schoolresults.org
"Seeking Clarity About No Child Left Behind,"
Jay Mathews, Washington Post (01/03/04):
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/
A8192-2004Feb3.html
Last week, the administration released its Fiscal Year 2005 funding requests for the federal government, including education. Other than homeland security, education was the only domestic discretionary area for which the president requested an overall increase, to $57.3, up 3 percent from 2004. This includes an additional $1 billion for Title I as well as $1 billion more for IDEA. Both requests would leave funding for these programs far below Congressionally authorized levels.
Math-proficient readers will quickly deduce that this combined $2 billion increase is greater than the $1.7 billion proposed for education overall. And that's before counting a handful of small new initiatives for adolescent literacy, an adjunct teacher corps, military dependents, and an expanded school voucher scheme. That's because the administration's also proposing to cut a host of other education programs. We're all for cleaning up some of the programs that clutter up the federal role in education, but many of the cuts proposed in this budget -- like Smaller Learning Communities -- are important investments. And it is also ironic that an administration so eager to cut "ineffective" programs also wants to spend more on school drug testing despite the lack of evidence about its efficacy.
U.S. Department of Education Budget Page:
http://www.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/
index.html?src=gu
The president's FY2005 budget requests comes less than a month after Congress finally completed work on a budget covering the 2004 fiscal year (which is already a third over). Part of that budget included a demonstration voucher program for the District of Columbia, which the Department of Education is racing to implement in time for this fall. The program had such little political support in even the Republican-controlled Congress that it had to be jammed through the Senate as part of a must-pass omnibus spending bill. But that's not stopping the administration, which now wants to take the initiative nationwide. Secretary Paige stumped for vouchers nationwide in a speech to the Heritage Foundation, and the FY2005 budget request including a $50 million "choice incentive fund" to support voucher demonstrations in other locales. Still the lack of accountability in the D.C. voucher legislation is well known. We think it's scandalous that a program being sold as a way to help D.C.'s most disadvantaged poor and minority kids escape the city's admittedly troubled system doesn't devote any attention to making sure private schools serve them well after they leave that system. We'd have similar objections to the proposed choice incentive fund, except that it strikes us as largely a piece of political pandering to the conservative base that isn't likely to go anywhere legislatively this year.
***
Meanwhile, last week D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams' State of the District address called for transferring authority for the schools from an elected board to the mayor. Williams argues that improving schools is essential to the District's economic development, that he is blamed for the schools' numerous problems anyway, and that placing authority with the mayor would improve accountability.
The history and politics of the D.C. School Board are long and complicated by issues of race and D.C. home rule. Staunch opposition to mayoral control from both the board and some city council members means this proposal faces an uphill struggle. While the Bulletin thinks Williams has a good case, we also think a kernel of advice offered by Paul Hill in a recent PPI paper is very relevant here. Hill cautioned that how a school system's board or governance is structured is less important than ensuring that roles are clearly defined and constructive. There is a risk here that Williams could win the battle but lose the war.
"Education Chief Pushes Vouchers,"
Ben Feller, Associated Press (01/29/04):
http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/
0104/29vouchers.html
D.C. Choice Incentive Program Competition (U.S. Department of Education):
http://www.ed.gov/programs/dcchoice/applicant.html
"Williams Attacks City's Status Quo,"
Craig Timberg, Washington Post (02/06/04):
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/
A17066-2004Feb5.html
"School Boards: Focus on Performance, Not Money and Patronage,"
Paul T. Hill, Progressive Policy Institute (January 2003):
http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?contentid=251238
&knlgAreaID=110&subsecid=134
In his State of the State address last week, embattled Connecticut Governor John Rowland again called for a voucher program, a proposal that has popped up in Connecticut from time to time. Private school choice supporters immediately praised the governor's proposal, but they shouldn't break out the champagne yet -- the governor is in serious danger of impeachment due to admissions of unethical behavior and an ongoing federal corruption probe. The Bulletin has yet to see any concrete details of the newest plan, but based on past Rowland-supported voucher efforts we're not betting it'll be strong on accountability. It would be too bad if the outbreak of unaccountability that seems to be infecting the governor's office spread to education in Connecticut, too.
"School Vouchers will be Revisited,"
Robert Frahm, the Hartford Currant (02/03/04):
http://www.ctnow.com/news/local/hc-edgov
0203.artfeb03,1,3397570.story?coll=hc-headlines-local
Last week's tragic fatal shooting of a student at Ballou High School in Washington, D.C., garnered attention in the nation's capital for issues of school violence, including proposals for the D.C. police to take over security in the schools. That may be a necessary improvement. As Marc Epstein persuasively argues in a recent New York Post op-ed, however, simply putting more cops in the schools won't do the trick. Making schools safe, Epstein argues, requires more fundamental -- but also controversial -- reforms to give administrators more authority to remove dangerous students who pose a threat to others and provide alternative settings for their education. Epstein's proposals include creating alternative schools for violent students, juvenile felons, and those over 17 who aren't near graduation. He also calls for changes in IDEA to make it easier for schools to discipline and remove students.
At the same time, Manhattan Institute's Jay Greene and Greg Forster just published a study debunking the popular notion that urban students are more likely to engage in risky behavior than other students. Greene and Forster looked at data to find that sex, substance abuse, and delinquency are just as common among suburban as urban students.
"School Safety: Real Answers,"
Marc Epstein, New York Post (12/23/04):
http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/14174.htm
"Sex, Drugs, and Delinquency in Urban and Suburban Public Schools,"
Jay Greene and Greg Forster, Manhattan Institute (January 2004):
http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/ewp_04.htm
Charter District Report: A new report from the Education Commission of the States examines the challenges school districts face in amending collective bargaining arrangements to support the creation of charter school districts. The report suggests that traditional collective bargaining issues such as job security and benefits, work rules, and compensation are still priorities for school districts, but that changes in collective bargaining (and in some cases state charter school laws) must keep the charter district's autonomy and flexibility intact. The report also makes several recommendations to help districts deal with these challenges.
California State Board of Education: California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appointed several well-known charter-schooling advocates to the state Board of Education last week, including Johnathan Williams, co-founder of the Accelerated School, an urban charter school in Los Angeles that provides teachers with opportunities to practice innovative curricula, test new ideas, and share what works with educators nationwide. The school was named Time Magazine's Elementary School of the Year in 2001. Appointed to a three-year term, Williams is the first charter school director to serve on the state board.
Harvard University's Innovations in American Government Awards: Harvard previously recognized Minnesota's charter school law as an outstanding innovation. This year three charter schools are among the 50 finalists. They are the SEED school here in Washington (a public college prep boarding school), America Youth Works Charter School in Texas and the Life Learning Academy in California. All three focus on helping underserved students.
EMOs Team Up: Six of the country's largest education management companies have teamed up to create the National Council of Education Providers, a trade association that will work to increase charter school funding and charter-friendly policies at the state and federal level. The council includes Mosaica, Inc., Charter Schools USA, Chancellor Beacon Academies, Edison Schools, Inc., National Heritage Academies, and White Hat Management.
Washington State: Washington is again on the verge of passing a charter school law. Not surprisingly charter schools opponents have come out to the woodwork criticizing the legislation and taking every opportunity to bash charter schooling. An op-ed by Charles Hasse, president of the Washington teachers union, argues that rather than focusing on charter schools that have "established a lackluster performance record," state legislators can better serve students by increasing support for existing public schools. That's a ridiculous either/or position to begin with but, Hasse defends his contempt for charter schools with inaccurate data. There are too many struggling charters, but multiple studies also find that many charters are making solid achievement gains and many times outperform their district peers, despite having fewer resources and harder-to-serve student populations. Hasse also raises tired arguments about academic skimming and racial segregation that are completely belied by the facts. On the other hand, an op-ed by Robin Lake, a researcher at the University of Washington's Center on Reinventing Public Education, argues that those who would block charter schools in Washington are driving away new school possibilities for low-income children and families that are asking for quality educational options.
"Collective Bargaining and Teachers Unions in a Charter District,"
Alex Medler, Bryan Hassel and Todd Ziebarth, Education Commission of the States (January 2004):
http://www.ecs.org/clearinghouse/49/71/4971.pdf
"7 Appointed to Education Board,"
Duke Helfand, Los Angeles Times (01/30/04):
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-board30
jan30,1,369009.story?coll=la-headlines-california
"Governor Appoints Charter School Leader to State Board of Education; Co-Founder of the Accelerated School is First Charter School Director Appointed to State Board,"
http://home.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/index.jsp?
ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20040130005332
&newsLang=en
Harvard University's Innovations in American Government Awards,
Top 50 Programs:
http://www.excelgov.org/usermedia/images/uploads/
PDFs/FINAL_DESCRIPTIONS.pdf
"Private Charter Managers Team Up,"
Jeff Archer, Education Week (02/04/04):
http://www.edweek.org/ew/ewstory.cfm?slug=21providers.h23
"Charter Schools: An Underperforming Distraction,"
Charles Hasse, The Seattle Times (02/04/04):
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/
2001849965_hasse04.html
"Seattle Students Ill-Served by Hostility to Charter Schools,"
Robin Lake, Seattle Times Guest Column (02/05/04):
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/
2001850694_charter05.html
America's Untapped Resource: Low-Income Students in Higher Education
By age 26, about 60 percent of those from high-income families have finished college but only 7 percent of those from low-income families have graduated. That's a problem with all sorts of negative ramifications for individuals and society. This new book edited by The Century Foundation's Rick Kahlenberg examines socio-economic disparities in higher education and their consequences and makes recommendations for reform.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect?tag=
newdemocratso-20&path=tg/detail/-/0870784854/qid%3D1076341454/
"Ted's Excellent Idea: Disclosing Admissions Practices"
A recent National Journal article by Stewart Taylor praises a proposal by Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) to require colleges to disclose data on "legacy" admissions preferences. Taylor also goes a step farther to argue colleges should disclose data on all admissions preferences and how they impact the relative academic merits of students admitted in preferred, versus non-preferred, groups. It's an interesting idea and thoughtful take on the current state of debate over college admissions preferences and affirmative action.
http://nationaljournal.com/taylor.htm
Adequacy and School Finance
A new report produced by the Campaign for Fiscal Equity argues that an additional $4.1 billion annually for New York City and $7 billion statewide would be needed for the state of New York to meet a court mandate to provide a "sound basic education" to its schoolchildren. The New York Times story linked below explains the implications of this report in light of New York's ongoing school finance debate and you can read the report itself at the Campaign for Equity's link below.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/05/education/05school.html
http://www.cfequity.org/
State of State Standards
The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation and AccountabilityWorks evaluate 30 states and find that most are only fair based on their standards, but many will improve as a result of No Child Left Behind. Lots of good data here.
http://www.edexcellence.net/foundation/publication/
publication.cfm?id=328
"Broken Hoop Dreams for Basketball Players of Coney Island"
A provocative essay by Brent Staples argues that widespread attention to, and adulation of, sports figures who rose from "rags to riches" by virtue of athletic prowess, and an emphasis on sports as a stepping stone to success, actually does a disservice to poor and minority children by encouraging them to focus on athletics at the expense of academics.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/01/opinion/01SUN3.html
NCLB Report
The Washington-based Center On Education Policy has released its 2nd annual evaluation of NCLB implementation. It's a useful survey, and though there is plenty of editorializing woven in there is also plenty of useful data.
http://www.ctredpol.org/pubs/nclby2/
NCLB Debate
National Public Radio's "Justice Talking" hosted a debate about NCLB featuring U.S. Undersecretary of Education Eugene Hickcok and Stan Karp from Rethinking Schools. You'll need audio on your computer, but it's worth tuning in at:
http://www.justicetalking.org/viewprogram.asp?progID=428
Education Winners
Over the last two weeks, the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation announced the winners of the second annual Fordham Prizes for education research and valor. The research prize was earned by economist Erik Hanushek, and the prize for valor by Howard Fuller. Both recipients have made important contributions to education reform debates, and the Bulletin congratulates them and the Fordham Foundation on their selection.
http://www.edexcellence.net/foundation/global/page.cfm?id=199
Brown Anniversary
The Spring 2004 issue of Teaching Tolerance from the Southern Poverty Law Center features a variety of resources about the 50th anniversary of the Brown decision. It's useful information for teachers or anyone with an interest in the case or its impact.
http://www.tolerance.org/teach/expand/mag/index.jsp?p=0&is=34
Please join the Progressive Policy Institute's 21st Century Schools Project this Friday, February 13, at 9:30 a.m. for a Friday Forum to discuss, "What is 'public' about public education?" The growing diversity of education choices in the United States -- including magnet schools, public school choice, supplemental services, private education management organizations, public charter schools, and even private school vouchers -- is raising new questions about what it means for a school to be "public." Critics of these new approaches castigate them as "anti-public school" while advocates for private school choice too often overlook the important public interest in, and responsibility for, children's learning. This forum seeks to move beyond stalemated debates about "public" versus "private" schooling, to help educators and policymakers more clearly define what makes public education "public" and how various reforms interact with these principles.
This discussion grows out of a PPI-published paper, Making Sense of the Public in Public Education, by Frederick M. Hess, who revisits ideas from this paper in the February 2004 issue of Phi Delta Kappan. Segun Eubanks, director of teacher quality for the National Education Association, and CATO Institute Education Policy Analyst Casey Lartigue will offer contrasting perspectives on the questions Hess raises.
For More Information, Click Here:
http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?knlgAreaID=85
&subsecid=108&contentid=252383
To RSVP, e-mail: education@dlcppi.org
Research and scientific evidence should play a central role in guiding education policy, programs, and practice. However, scientific research in education has long been the subject of intense debate. To bring greater attention to these issues, the National Education Knowledge Industry Association, the Progressive Policy Institute, and the National Academies/Center for Education will co-host an all day policy forum on research in education on March 11, 2004. Building on the success of a March 2002 event hosted by NEKIA, PPI, and the Education Quality Institute, this year's forum will provide an opportunity for educators and policy leaders to review how research-based knowledge can be translated into classroom practice. Panelists, including educators, policymakers, and national experts, will examine the concept of evidence-based education, assess efforts over the past two years to transform education into an evidence-based field, and look at future challenges. Hugh Price, former president of the Urban League, will deliver a keynote address. For a full agenda and registration information, please visit our website at:
http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?knlgAreaID=110
&subsecID=900023&contentID=252341
The forum is made possible through the generous support of the KnowledgeWorks Foundation, Standard & Poor's School Evaluation Services, and Washington Partners.
The 21st Century Schools Project Bulletin is written by Sara Mead and Renee Rybak and edited by Andrew Rotherham. The Bulletin is published every other week. For more information about us visit:
www.ppionline.org/ppi_ka.cfm?knlgAreaID=110
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