Articles in the Policy Formation category

NSBA supports ESEA flexibility bill in House

The House Education and the Workforce Committee approved a bill on July 13 that would give local school boards greater flexibility within certain federal programs.

NSBA supports the State and Local Funding Flexibility Act, which would allow school boards to re-direct federal funds from some education programs to support other initiatives that would help increase student achievement and help serve the students with the greatest needs. The legislation is one of several parts of a comprehensive reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), which Chairman John Kline (R-Minn.) is spearheading. (Read NSBA’s letter of support here.)

“For many years local school boards have asked for expanded flexibility to best meet their students’ needs,” said Michael A. Resnick, NSBA’s Associate Executive Director for Advocacy and Public Policy. “At a time when districts are facing tight budget constraints and increased accountability under federal and state laws, this legislation would help school leaders to meet those obligations.”

The measure would expand two existing provisions: The Rural Education Achievement Program, which gives greater flexibility to rural school districts in the redistribution of federal funds; and Transferability Provisions, designed to give greater flexibility to all local school districts to re-direct federal funds from certain selected programs to support other initiatives.  The bill would expand such flexibility to all local school boards as well as expand the number of the federal programs where federal funds could be re-directed.

School districts will continue to be accountable for achievement of students from low-income families, English language learners, and other at-risk groups under federal, state, and local accountability requirements. The measure would not remove achievement goals or requirements for program compliance, including civil rights.

The committee last month passed a bill increasing federal funding for charter schools and school choice as part of the ESEA reauthorization. Kline is planning to put forth two more bills as part of the ESEA reauthorization, which will deal with accountability and teacher issues, then bundle the measures into one package for a vote by the full House of Representatives. Resnick said that final language may need to be modified once other related bills have been approved by the Education and the Workforce Committee.

“It is important that federal education programs meet their goals of focusing on the students with the greatest needs,” said Resnick.  “Even in these tough economic times, school boards are ensuring that student achievement is increasing for all students.”

 

Joetta Sack-Min|July 13th, 2011|Categories: Educational Legislation, Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Federal Programs, Policy Formation|

Credit recovery increasingly embraced as dropout prevention strategy

It’s such a logical concept, you might wonder why more schools didn’t embrace it years ago. But credit recovery is a hot topic now, and with good reason.

In today’s competitive environment, dropping out of high school is no longer an option — the jobs just aren’t there. But also becoming obsolete is the idea that high school can be an endpoint of education and training. With machines able to do more and more — and do it more cheaply – the new jobs being created require special skills and training that weren’t needed on many 20th century assembly lines.

A new policy brief by the Education Commission of the States — part of ESC’s Progress of Education Reform series, does a good job of defining just what credit recovery is and isn’t (i.e., remediation) and why it’s a key tool to not only increase graduation rates, but to prepare students for future learning, either in the vocational or academic realm. And it looks at what some innovative states are doing to give high school students a better shot at attaining their goals.

Lawrence Hardy, Senior Editor

Naomi Dillon|July 5th, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Dropout Prevention, Policy Formation, Student Achievement|Tags: |

The week in blogs

How quickly does childhood pass? It seems like yesterday that I was reading my elder daughter Good Night Moon, a few hours since we completed the surprisingly dark Tale of Despereaux. Now, we’ve almost finished the truly harrowing fantasy, A Wrinkle in Time, and who knows what we’ll tackle next?

I’m overprotective. (What parent isn’t, to some degree, these days?) And as the books get progressively darker and more disturbing — because life, unfortunately gets darker and more disturbing (you learn, for example, to read the newspaper) — a voice in my head keeps repeating, “Is she really ready for this?” Considering that eight years from now she’ll be in college, the answer’s got to be “yes.”  Yes, I know, but part of me still resists.

I thought about this after reading Joanne Jacobs’ Friday blog, Violence, sex and ‘dark’ lit. It’s really a compendium of other pieces written in response to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s comment – in writing for a court majority that struck down a California law barring violent video sales to minors, on First Amendment grounds — that young adult lit is already replete with violent material. An opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal, saying that “YA” fiction is two dark seems to have gotten the discussion rolling. But the best commentary on the subject, I feel, is by Linda Holms of NPR, who takes a different view.
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Lawrence Hardy|July 1st, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Curriculum, Diversity, Dropout Prevention, Governance, Policy Formation, Student Achievement, Week in Blogs|

Eight ways to make school reform work

1210-12409560184r2oGary Galluzzo is all for “client-centered” education, and if that sounds a bit impersonal to you – aren’t we dealing with children here? — chances are it won’t after you read his article in ASBJ’s June issue, titled, “Eight Ways to Make School Reform Work.”

I admit, I recoiled a little when I heard the term. But, as Galluzzo notes, “student-centered’ and “learning-centered” “already connote humanistic education and differentiated instruction.”  Not that there’s anything wrong with that. But Galluzzo, an education professor at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., is getting at something else. Put the emphasis on the “client” and maybe some practices that mostly serve adults – the “but-that’s-the-way-we’ve always-done-its” – can be seen in a clearer light.

If you still think that Galluzzo is thinking too impersonally, his next two ideas — actually questions each teacher should ask — dispel that notion for good.

The questions: “Who am I to teach these children?” and “Do I have what these children need?”

These two questions are a novel and perceptive way to look at one side of the teacher/learner relationship. Or, as Galluzzo says, “They raise the often-undervalued factor of ‘fit.’ Simply put, some teachers are better fits form some children and schools. More pointedly, some teachers can’t close some gaps in some schools.”

Galluzzo has come up with some innovative ways to look at the enterprise of education and  where all the players, board members included, fit in. The above is just part of recommendation one. Read the other seven here.

Lawrence Hardy, Senior Editor

Naomi Dillon|June 29th, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Board governance, Governance, NSBA Publications, Policy Formation|

The week in blogs

They honored former President Bill Clinton, and heard from Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker — all pretty measured, mainstream folks. But attendees at this week’s National Charter Schools Conference in Atlanta were also subjected to some ugly and inflammatory rhetoric from people trying to cast traditional public schools in the worst possible light.

Commenting on the Georgia Supreme Court’s recent 4-3 ruling that the state was unconstitutionally commissioning charter schools that should, by law, be authorized by local school boards, Tony Roberts, president of the Georgia Charter Schools Association, offered this assessment:

“The majority of the Georgia Supreme Court has just found 16,000 innocent children guilty of choosing a better education,” Roberts said. “And even worse, the justices have sentenced them, in many cases, to failing or inadequate schools.”

“Innocent children.” Guilty.” “Sentenced.” If that kind of talk sounds a bit over the top, well, it is. But it’s all too common today in the national debate over – to use a term that has seemingly lost much of its meaning or usefulness – school reform.

Of course, school board members should not respond in kind, yet they ignore such attacks at their peril. And, unfortunately, the rhetoric will only get worse as the election season heats up. (For more on how to counter the naysayers and build trust, see Nora Carr’s Communications column in the June issue of American School Board Journal.)
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Lawrence Hardy|June 24th, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Board governance, Governance, Policy Formation, School Reform, Week in Blogs|

Classic literature falling by wayside, as students are encouraged just to read

296-1253388461oizyAre you an old-fashioned fuddy-duddy who believes that reading the literary classics is an essential foundation for a good education?

Or are you one of those pessimists who is grateful if educators can get children to read anything at all in this age of cable television, YouTube, and video games?

Those questions currently are being asked across “the pond,” where famed British professor John Sutherland recently “lashed out at the current state of education in the UK” and complained that colleges prefer “modern, culturally relevant texts to the exclusion of the classics.”

The result, he says, is that students read whatever “takes their fancy” instead of what “nourishes the soul.”

Such remarks sound like something a gray-haired professor would say—the kind of fellow who went to a traditional British boarding school and was traditionally bullied until he became a “proper gentlemen.”

The old ways of doing things are best, after all. Harrumph, harrumph.

Now, actually I know nothing of Professor Sutherland’s background. And he might not have gray hair. But, as it happens, I sympathize with his viewpoint.
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Naomi Dillon|June 23rd, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Curriculum, Governance, Policy Formation, Student Achievement|Tags: , , |

The week in blogs

“Teachers in Finland are practically rock stars,” exclaims Robert Rothman in the Alliance for Excellent Education’s blog, High School Soup. And if that sounds like a slight exaggeration  – I can imagine a class of middle schooler holding their lighted Bics aloft after a particularly scintillating lecture – it still shows how far we in America need to go to advance the status of teacher

To be sure, Finland doesn’t pay them like rock stars, Rothman adds. “Teachers salaries are about average. Rather, the country has established its preparation programs and working conditions so that teaching is a highly respected profession.”

The blog is commenting on an article in American Educator that cities the singular importance of great teaching – and a school system that nurtures and supports great teaching – to school improvement.

Should there be more emphasis in high school on vocational training? That’s the question posed this week by the National Journal on its Education blog.  Proponents point to successful apprenticeship programs in Europe and the many good technical jobs that require more than a high school diploma but not a four-year degree. Skeptics include Thomas Toch of Education Sector, who worries that a new generation of vo-tech could lead to  “watered-down expectations for many students who are already getting short shrift in our educational system.”

Board members, are you sick of No Child Left Behind? Guess what, Arne Duncan is too. Read the Education Secretary’s thoughts on ESEA reauthorization in Politico.

Finally, the NAEP History scores are out and they’re not exactly historic – at least, not in a good way. See commentary and analysis by Joanne Jacobs and Jim Hull of NSBA’s Center for Public Education.

Lawrence Hardy, Senior Editor

Lawrence Hardy|June 17th, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Assessment, Curriculum, Governance, Policy Formation, Student Achievement, Teachers, Week in Blogs|

As food costs inflate, federal funding for child nutrition remains depressed

33-12130430812yrA12787431361636935689breadwhite-thI’ve been hearing that food prices are going up, but it really didn’t hit me until I had to buy bread the other day.

I’m always willing to spend a bit more for the nutty, crunchy, whole grain type, preferably organic. But at the Harris Teeter near my house I had to shell out at least $4 for a loaf for anything other than the white stuff you cut the crusts off of in elementary school.

One of NSBA’s main complaints about the Child Nutrition Act reauthorization last year was the lack of federal funding to meet the new requirements for more nutritious foods. While there was an increase for the costs of school lunches, that only covered a portion of the increased costs—about six cents per meal.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently estimated that the federal government’s contribution for the free and reduced price lunch program will come eight cents short of the increased cost (about 14 cents) of a more nutritious meal. And rising food costs will only exacerbate the problem for school district.

NSBA’s advocacy department did the math: If a school district has 5,000 students who qualify for FRPL, that’s $400 a day in extra expenses. Over the course of a typical 180-day school year, that’s $72,000—more than the cost of a teacher.

Last night the House of Representatives began debate on its agriculture appropriations bill. NSBA is supporting report language issued by the appropriations committee that directs the U. S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to propose new rules that do not create unfunded mandates for school districts.
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Naomi Dillon|June 15th, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Governance, Policy Formation|Tags: |

Successful reform efforts often begin with attitude adjustment

One comment stood out a few weeks ago when I interviewed Patricia Holubec, a high school principal in the small, rural Skidmore-Tynan Independent School District.

A largely Hispanic district in the flatlands of south Texas, Skidmore-Tynan is not wealthy by any means: Sixty-five percent of its students qualify for free and reduced lunch, and many of its graduates must leave the area to find employment in the oil fields or state prisons that ring the district.

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Naomi Dillon|June 14th, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Dropout Prevention, NSBA Publications, Policy Formation|Tags: , , |

The suburbs have problems?

HighSchoolClassNewsweek2009I’d been assigned the suburban school district angle. Let me back up. It was March and we were discussing the coverage for our June edition. For those that aren’t aware, the production cycle for magazines is three months ahead of the release. Yes, it’s quite a challenge and a skill to project immediacy from three months ago. Just think of all that’s happened since March, then imagine what will happen in September.

At any rate, we were hashing out the details of our June issue which would feature an in-depth look at education reform through the experiences of three different school districts: an urban, rural, and suburban school system.

My mind went into a tailspin when I learned I’d be profiling a suburban district. Suburbia? What challenges do they face other than population swells and demographic shifts.  It’s rural America and the inner city where cameras always roll and headlines blare “broken system, major disparities.”  Well, I wrong — and right.

By and large, suburban issues tend to center around changes in population, which, in turn, can lead to a host of other issues, not the least of which are growing disparities among their students. These differences can often lead to achievement gaps, which was the case in Montgomery County Public Schools, which I profiled for the cover package.

Montgomery County, the largest school system in Maryland and the 16th largest in the country,  had once been a pretty homogeneous area. The school district was virtually all-white up until 1970.  Today, 37 percent of the student body is white. The rest of the students are a fairly even  mix of black, Hispanic, and Asian students. In addition, the low-income level has risen, as has the ELL population.
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Naomi Dillon|June 8th, 2011|Categories: American School Board Journal, Diversity, Governance, Leadership, NSBA Publications, Policy Formation|Tags: , |
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