Articles tagged with NSBA

Passing ESEA is critical, NSBA says

Under the banner of “ESEA Now: Our Schoolchildren, Our Economy, and Our Future,” NSBA leaders outlined the past year’s legislative successes and upcoming issues at the opening session of the Federal Relations Network (FRN) Conference on Sunday.

Pushing for a comprehensive reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) will be the most critical action school board members will take this week in Washington, D.C., NSBA Associate Executive Director Michael A. Resnick told the more than 700 FRN participants attending the three-day meeting. Closely tied to that action is adequate funding for core federal programs including Title I and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

Educators have been working tirelessly for five years to get a new version of the now decade-old No Child Left Behind Act passed, and the House and Senate are finally moving toward passage of ESEA legislation in the respective chambers, NSBA President Mary Broderick said.

“Congress’ timing is particularly fortunate for us to make a mark on the process,” Broderick said. “While both bills make significant improvements over existing law, neither is perfect, and this stage of the legislative process is the ideal time to make those changes.”

Having successfully overcome proposals to make large-scale cuts in the education budget this year, FRN participants must be aware of initiatives such as the Budget Control Act, which would instill a 7.8 percent across-the-board cut in federal programs. Further, proposals within the ESEA reauthorization would create formulas for future program funds that do not take into account the increasing numbers of students living in poverty and students with special needs.

Resnick reminded attendees that national polls during this election year show that the majority of voters are largely ambivalent about whether their members continue to serve, and some 90 House representatives coming up for reelection for the first time. Keeping this in mind, school board members should push the importance of passing an ESEA reauthorization as a major achievement.

“Why shouldn’t they want to deliver for America’s children? Why shouldn’t they want to deliver for America’s future?” he asked.

Resnick also announced plans for the National School Boards Action Center, a 501-c4 organization, which will help further push NSBA’s advocacy agenda and allow for more targeted lobbying and endorsements. One of the center’s first issues will be promoting NSBA priorities and education issues for the 2012 campaigns.

Joetta Sack-Min|February 5th, 2012|Categories: Budgeting, Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Federal Programs, FRN Conference 2012, Legislative advocacy, School Boards|Tags: , , , , , |

Celebrate Digital Learning Day today

Today, the National School Boards Association (NSBA) is proud to be a core partner in the first-ever national Digital Learning Day. This event celebrates innovative teaching practices that make learning more personalized and engaging and encourage exploration of how digital learning can provide more students with more opportunities to get the skills they need to succeed.

“The National School Boards Association has been an advocate for the use of technology to enhance teaching and student achievement for more than two decades,” said NSBA’s Executive Director Anne L. Bryant. “On Digital Learning Day, we must ensure that all students have access to these resources or we will see the digital divide widen.  Devices and content alone will not transform education.  Policies and targeted resources must also be aligned to ensure teachers have the essential professional development opportunities that are necessary to maximize learning in this exciting new age of content.”

Today, a majority of states, hundreds of school districts, thousands of teachers, and more than a million students will encourage the innovative use of technology by trying something new, showcasing success, kicking off project-based learning, or focusing on how digital tools can help improve student outcomes.

To see real examples of the positive impact digital resources are having on learning, visit here to participate in Digital Learning Day’s virtual town hall meeting today from 1-2:30 p.m. EST. NSBA will be hosting a Technology Leadership Network site visit February 19-21 in the Texas’ Klein Independent School District, one of the districts featured during the virtual town hall. To learn more about Klein Independent School District’s technology initiatives go to:  http://www.nsba.org/tlnsitevisits/klein.htm.

Naomi Dillon|February 1st, 2012|Categories: Educational Technology|Tags: , , |

In support of digital learning

Earlier this month, Ann Flynn, NSBA’s director of education technology programs, participated in a lively discussion on the impact and power of technology in schools. Hosted by the Alliance for Excellent Education, the webinar highlighted successful schools and initiatives that advance and utilize digital learning.

Speaking of initiatives, the panelists– which included award-winning science teacher Jason Pittman, Jayne Marlink of the California Writing Project and the Alliance’s Bob Wise—also spent time discussing the inaugural Digital Learning Day, the flagship event of the Alliance’s Center for Secondary School Digital Learning and Policy, which recently released the report, “The Digital Learning Imperative: How Teaching and Technology Meet Today’s Educational Challenges.”

NSBA has joined other leading education organizations as a core partner of Digital Learning Day, the culmination of a year-round national awareness campaign to improve teaching and learning, utilizing the power of today’s technology tools.

Marked for February 1, Digital Learning Day will feature a nationwide, interactive town hall meeting and a request that everyone do one of three things: start a conversation, try one new thing and showcase success.

Naomi Dillon|January 18th, 2012|Categories: Educational Technology, School Board News|Tags: , , , |

NSBA challenges Alabama immigration law

Alabama’s draconian immigration law is using “fear and intimidation to drive undocumented immigrants and their children” from the state, ”  the National School Boards Association, the National Education Association, and the Alabama Education Association argued in a amicus brief filed in the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

“This case is about the power of fear,” the three education groups say in the opening line of their brief in Hispanic Interest Coalition of Alabama v. Bentley.

The brief is one of three filed by NSBA just before Thanksgiving. The other amicus briefs were filed in two cases before the U.S. Supreme Court: Filarsky v. Delia, which concerns the qualified immunity status of a private attorney retained by the government to conduct an internal affairs investigation, and Payne v. Peninsula School District, which concerns whether parents of students with disabilities can file suit before going through a hearing process set up by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

The Alabama law, which, among other things, requires school districts to report on the immigration status of new students, has received national publicity over charges that it is being used to harass undocumented immigrants and drive them from the state.  In early October, after federal judge Sharon Lovelace Blackburn upheld most of the law’s provisions, more than 2,000 Hispanic children were absent from school, according to newspaper reports, although 500 of them eventually returned.

“When this bill passes and is signed into law, I think you will see illegals leaving north Alabama and going elsewhere,” said Alabama House Majority Leader Micky Harmon, the law’s chief sponsor, whose statement is quoted in the amicus “… This bill is designed to make these people export themselves.”

That statement, and those of other supporters, show that the legal issues in the Alabama case are nearly identical to those from a less-harsh Georgia immigration law that was recently struck down by District Court Judge Thomas W. Thrash Jr., the brief argued. Thrash found that the law’s “apparent legislative intent is to create such a climate of hostility, fear, mistrust, and insecurity that all illegals will leave Georgia.”

In the groundbreaking 1982 decision in Plyler v. Doe the Supreme Court ruled that the state of Texas violated Fourteenth Amendment protections when it sought to bar the children of illegal immigrants from attending public school

“The Supreme Court’s 1982 Plyler decision makes it clear that children have a constitutional right to a public education regardless of their immigration status,” said NSBA General Counsel Francisco M. Negrón Jr. “Measures that chill that right are patently unconstitutional, violating the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.”

In addition to its constitutional flaws, the law fails as public policy, added NSBA Executive Director Anne L. Bryant.

“The mission of public schools is to educate all students in their communities regardless of their immigration status,” Bryant said.  “Laws aimed at children exercising their right to a public education are bad public policy.”

In the Filarsky brief, which concerns whether a private attorney working for a government agency should be granted qualified immunity, NSBA was joined by the National Association of Counties, the National Conference of State Legislatures, and the International Municipal Lawyers Association.

“A decision that holds private attorneys representing school districts are not entitled to qualified immunity in that representation could be a disincentive for lawyers to continue to offer counsel to school districts across the plethora of legal specialization areas facing schools today,” Negrón said.  “The unintended consequence of such a ruling would be that school district could have difficulty retaining high quality, affordable legal counsel to represent them in their most challenging disputes.”

 

Lawrence Hardy|November 30th, 2011|Categories: School Law|Tags: , |

NSBA seeks high court input on Internet speech

Can a school district discipline a student who posts lewd or vicious material online about another student or a school employee — or is that posting protected as “off-campus” speech?

That’s a question the National School Boards Association (NSBA), the American Association of School Administrators (AASA), and six other organizations are urging the U.S. Supreme Court to answer following a pair of appellate court decisions in favor of two Pennsylvania students.

In a brief filed recently, NSBA and the other groups say that, in order to further their educational mission, “schools need authority to regulate student speech that originates off campus.”

In one of the cases, J.S. v. Blue Mountain School District, a middle school girl who was upset about being reprimanded for dress code violations posted a fake MySpace profile of her principal that, according to the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, “contained crude content and vulgar language, ranging from nonsense and juvenile humor to profanity and shameful personal attacks aimed at the principal and his family.” Nonetheless, the court, in an 8-6 decision, ruled in June that the school district had violated the girl’s First Amendment right to free speech when it suspended her for 10 days.

The other case, Layshock v. Hermitage School District, involved a Pennsylvania high school senior who also created a fake MySpace profile mocking his principal. In that case, the Third Circuit ruled unanimously for the student.

NSBA and the other groups argued that the expanding use of social networking and other forms of online communication have led to “a stunning increase in harmful student expression that school administrators are forced to address with no clear guiding jurisprudence.”

“Now is the time for the Supreme Court to resolve the question of whether and to what extent school district have the authority to discipline students for off-campus speech,” said NSBA General Counsel Francisco M. Negrón Jr. “As technology blurs the lines between on-campus and off-campus speech, school districts need clear guidance to be able to effectively address extreme off-campus speech that interferes with a safe and orderly learning environment.”

With more and more communications, as well as classes, conducted online, “grappling with the distinction between off-campus and on-campus speech,” as some courts have done, is arguably “a distinction without a difference,” the brief said.

“Courts that remain committed to the on-campus/ off-campus fiction risk discouraging school boards from using off-campus forums that benefit student learning,” the brief added. “Public school districts have been able to expand educational opportunities for students and to increase communication between school districts and their constituencies with their online presence. But school boards may be less inclined to expand educational opportunities online if their authority does not also expand. Imagine if a court held that a virtual school student who engages in lewd speech during a group online project cannot be disciplined because the conversation did not happen ‘on campus.’”

In addition to AASA, the other groups joining NSBA in the brief include, the American School Counselor Association; Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network; National Association of Elementary School Principals;  National Association of Secondary School Principals;  Pennsylvania School Boards Association; and the School Social Work Association of America.

Lawrence Hardy|November 8th, 2011|Categories: Bullying, Discipline, School Law, School Security|Tags: , , |

The week in blogs

My favorite response to the Heritage Foundation’s controversial study that teachers just aren’t as, well, smart as your typical college grad and, therefore, are way overpaid is this Modest Proposal from a reader of Jonathan Chait’s New York Magazine blog:

“How about we just don’t pay teachers anything at all and hope for the best possible outcome. That’s my kind of public policy.”

Ours too! And we have a think tank we want you to join.

Seriously, it’s fairly well known that education majors don’t score as highly on standardized tests, on average, as graduates in other fields. So, while some may consider such a study offensive and counterproductive, one could argue that there’s a certain logic in trying to compare wages by cognitive ability.

On the other hand, there’s a lot more that goes into teaching than test scores, many teachers enter the field from other majors; and cutting teacher salaries, as the report’s authors suggest, seems to be the last thing you’d want to do improve the profession. Finally, after an unprecedented year of public employee — and, especially, teacher — bashing, it’s disturbing to see teachers as targets once again.

For other views on the study, see Time magazine; former Washington D.C. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee (via Politico), and a response by report co-author Andrew Biggs.

A lot of grand ideas come out of Washington, emanating from think tanks such as Heritage and, of course, from government itself. Right now, Congress is taking a critical look at one of the biggest “grand ideas” — No Child Left Behind — struggling to preserve its goal of higher achievement for all while revising or abolishing its more onerous mandates.

That’s what’s happening here; for a view of what it was like in the trenches, read Mandy Newport, a former teacher, NSBA Center for Public Education intern, and graduate student in education policy at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., as she describes the real-world impact of NCLB.

“No chalkboard space was left in classrooms because we were required to use that space to hang standards and essential questions. Science and social studies were taken away for the younger grades and replaced with test taking skills for an hour a day … Lesson plans had to be a certain font and size and were on a template given to teachers by the district.”

But if we just paid teachers less…..

Finally, read Newport’s evenhanded — and largely positive — review of Denver’s ProComp Pay for Performance plan.

Lawrence Hardy|November 4th, 2011|Categories: Center for Public Education, Curriculum, Educational Research, Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Teachers, Week in Blogs|Tags: , , , , , |

The week in blogs

Reauthorizing the federal education bill has been a little like the reverse of that old saying:  “hurry up and wait.” No, when it comes to renewing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) — something that was supposed to happen, oh, four years ago — it’s been more like: “wait — now hurry up.”

The hurry-up happened Thursday, when the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, voted 15 to 7 to approve a bill that greatly reduces the federal role by dispensing with a complicated and flawed accountability system for determining which schools need “improvement” and which do not.

That, and many other provisions of the bill, were welcomed by NSBA, state school boards associations, and school districts that had been laboring under the strictures of ESEA’s latest iteration: No Child Left Behind. But while NSBA was happy about that — and pleased that, after waiting so long, the Senate was finally addressing these issues — it cautioned against moving too fast in committee on a bill that still has a lot of bugs.

“The bill also contains many operationally unrealistic features that will need to be addressed,” NSBA Associate Executive Director Michael A. Resnick wrote in a letter to the committee this week. “For example, it contains extensive data collection and reporting requirements, as well as overbearing specificity in several key programs areas that cross well into the micro-management of our schools.”

 NSBA didn’t get the delay in the mark-up it wanted, but the committee did accede to a call from Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky, to hold a hearing on the bill on Nov. 8.

The blogosphere has been all over the map on this process, and, rather than try to make sense of it myself, I’m going to just give you the links and … .well, you can tell me what it all means. For starters, there was the unusual agreement between Paul, a Tea Party favorite, and liberal blogger Susan Ohanian, about the need for more time.

Then there was the Progressive Policy Institute – from the so-called reformist camp – charging that the law, as currently revised, “guts school accountability.”

Alexander Russo, of This Week in Education, asked “where was [Arne] Duncan?” He said the education secretary didn’t press the committee for a bill with a more robust federal role. Meanwhile, at the Fordham Institute, Mike Petrilli said much the opposite, asserting that Duncan’s influence helped make it all happen (so far). Petrilli also called the bill an improvement over the current law.

So reaction was indeed divided, which is not surprising given the complexity of the issues and the laborious process itself. But will there be a finished product soon, and will it pass?

Not likely, Education Sector’s Anne Hyslop told the Christian Science Monitor. With this divided and sometimes sclerotic Congress, she doesn’t see a bill passing the House until well after the 2012 campaign.

Lawrence Hardy|October 21st, 2011|Categories: Elementary and Secondary Education Act, School Reform, Week in Blogs|Tags: , , , , , , , |

WH sidesteps Congress, offering relief from NCLB

The Obama administration has unveiled its plans to offer states and local school districts some regulatory relief from the more onerous mandates of the No Child Left Behind Act—a policy move that NSBA calls encouraging.

First proposed this summer, the initiative will allow states to request waivers to specific NCLB mandates in exchange for “serious” reform efforts designed to close achievement gaps and boost accountability.

For local school boards, such waivers could offer greater flexibility in the use of federal funds—or the elimination of the highly unpopular requirement that local districts set aside 20 percent of Title I funds for school choice and supplemental tutorial services.

States also can seek relief from NCLB’s accountability system, with its unrealistic expectation that all students will be 100-percent proficient by 2014, and from such punitive sanctions as forcing a low-per-forming school to fire its principals and teachers or close down.

The waivers will come at a price. The White House says states and local school districts will need to embrace new accountability standards, create tougher and more meaningful teacher evaluation systems, and make greater efforts to ensure all graduating students are college and career-ready.

“The purpose is not to give states and districts a reprieve from accountability, but rather to unleash energy to improve our schools at the local level,” Obama said in a statement released Friday.

NSBA has long campaigned for federal policymakers to fix the flaws of NCLB, and NSBA officials welcomed the Obama administration’s latest initiative.

“The proposed NCLB regulatory relief plan is a positive step as it could provide much needed assistance to local school district efforts to improve student achievement,” says Anne L. Bryant, NSBA’s executive director.

Still unclear, however, is whether individual local school boards will see the regulatory relief they want.

“The effectiveness of the plan will depend upon the details of the application requirements, the specific locally needed relief states ask for, and whether the merit of a state’s application is judged adequate by the U.S. Department of Education to receive the relief that it asks for,” Bryant notes.

The administration’s waiver program might yet need to take another step forward, suggests Michael A. Resnick, NSBA’s associate executive director for federal advocacy and public policy.

“NSBA believes that federal requirements that are educationally, financially, or operationally counter-productive at the school house level should be eliminated as a matter of policy not as a condition for states qualifying to meet new conditions,” Resnick says. “We encourage the U.S. Department of Education to provide local relief along those lines should its state-based approach fall short of the local relief needed.”

Administration officials said they’ve acted because of delays in Congress over NCLB’s reauthorization. Under the law, schools are facing increasingly serious sanctions as they approach the 2014 deadline for bringing 100 percent of the nation’s students to proficiency levels in reading and math.

One federal estimate is that 82 percent of the nation’s schools will miss that target.

“The states are desperately asking for us to respond,” U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan said last month.

Most states have indicated they will apply for waivers. The White House says the first waivers could be granted by early 2012.

 

Del Stover|September 23rd, 2011|Categories: Board governance, School Board News, School Boards|Tags: , , , , , |

NA webinar illustrates collective power of one

NSBA lobbyists are hard at work explaining to Congress the many challenges facing local school boards—and how federal policy should be shaped to help local officials do their jobs better.

But members of Congress also care what their constituents have to say, so it’s vitally important that individual school board members make their voices heard by communicating personally with their elected representatives.

That was the message of NSBA’s advocacy team, which offered a briefing on federal education policymaking during Wednesday’s National Affiliate webinar, “The Power of One: What You Can Do to Change What is Happening on Capitol Hill.”

“We can’t do it alone,” moderator Kathleen Branch, NSBA’s director of national advocacy service programs, told participants early in the webinar. “We need you to join us … to become a resource for your members of Congress.”

To prepare school board members for that task, members of NSBA’s advocacy team offered a summary of legislative and regulatory efforts in the nation’s capital—and how those efforts could impact local school districts.

One of the most important legislative efforts under way today is the long-overdue reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, said Reginald Felton, assistant executive director for congressional relations.

In the U.S. House of Representatives, lawmakers are tackling the reauthorization through a series of bills, and one promising proposal would give local school officials more flexibility and authority over the use of federal education funding, Felton reported.

Less promising was the recent passage of the Empowering Parents Through Quality Charter Schools Act, which NSBA argued was approved without sufficient review and raises concerns about how much accountability will be demanded of charter schools.

Lawmakers also are talking about consolidating several federal education programs, which is not necessarily a bad thing, Felt said. But there also is a move to expand competitive block grants, at the expense of categorical programs.

That concerns NSBA because many school systems do not have the resources to compete with larger or more affluent districts in writing grant proposals.

It’s important that NSBA and local school boards continue their efforts to influence Congress and shape policy that’s in the best interest of local schoolchildren, Felton said. “We continue to lobby members of Congress, but we’re pleased when you come to Washington and help that dialogue—or you meet with members of Congress when they’re home in your communities. We need to keep the pressure on.”

Later, Deborah Rigsby, NSBA’s director of federal legislation, briefed webinar participants about the debate on Capitol Hill over the federal budget—and the need to urge Congress to protect funding for education.

“For 2011, K-12 programs were cut by $849 million,” she said. “But they were already underfunded, so we don’t want to go [through another round] of addition cuts for fiscal 2012.”

Finally, Lucy Gettman, director of federal programs, talked about the potential impact of the Healthy, Hungry-Free Kids—last year’s reauthorization of the Child Nutrition Act—and new regulations for school meal programs that could force local school districts to raise meal prices.

At least one school system already is looking to raise the price of school milk by as much as 25 cents, she says. “What we’re very concerned about at NSBA is the impact on children and families who can ill afford a price increase [in school meals] but, conversely, about the impact on school districts … if districts are required to supplement or offset a price increase with their own state and local funds.”

Concluding the webinar, Branch yet again encouraged listeners to become more involved in lobbying federal policymakers, and she shared a number of resources that NSBA makes available for board members who are new to education advocacy work. And she encouraged board members to participate in the National Affiliate Advocacy Network.

 Finally, she said, if board members aren’t certain what to say about today’s complex policy issues, they can just call her. “That is what NSBA is here for.”

Del Stover|September 22nd, 2011|Categories: Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Leadership, School Boards|Tags: , , , , , , |

Registration open for NSBA Annual Conference 2012

Registration is now open for NSBA’s 72nd conference, held for the first time in Boston, from April 21 to 23, 2012. Join school board leaders and administrators from across the country for this premier event for school boards to learn about education issues from a national perspective, understand how federal legislation and court decisions will affect your district, and gain insights into strategies to raise student achievement and save money in your district.

In addition to the new locale, the conference will offer more than 200 sessions, plus an expanded lineup of technology sessions, important legislative and legal advocacy issues, and new opportunities to learn about new products and services in the Exhibit Hall. Discounts are available to early-bird registration National Affiliate Districts and TLN Districts only, of groups of 10 or more for the same school district. Visit NSBA’s Annual Conference website registration page for more details.

Keynote speakers include Geoffrey Canada, a nationally recognized and passionate advocate for education reform and president/chief executive officer of the Harlem Children’s Zone, and Sal Khan, founder of the Khan Academy, a free online education platform and not-for-profit organization. The General Session speaker for Saturday has not yet been announced.

Author and culinary star Chef Jeff Henderson will highlight the Sunday morning fellowship program with a talk entitled “From the Streets to the Stove: The Power of Potential.” Henderson spent 10 years in prison for dealing drugs, but while incarcerated, he discovered a passion for cooking and committed himself to turning his life around. He became the executive chef at Café Bellagio in Las Vegas and now hosts Food Network’s “The Chef Jeff Project,” which takes at-risk young adults and commits them to changing their lives through work with his catering company.
(more…)

Joetta Sack-Min|September 20th, 2011|Categories: Conferences and Events, Key Work of School Boards, Leadership, NSBA Annual Conference 2012, School Boards|Tags: , , |
Page 1 of 3123»