Year: 2009

The Future of Teacher Ed?

Eduflack AYP, early childhood education, higher ed, Teacher Education

What does it take to train a better, more effective teacher?  If you listen to the experts, a great deal.  It requires significant knowledge in the subject matter.  Strong training in effective teaching methods.  Clinical training, including that as student teacher working under a strong, veteran teacher.  Ongoing mentoring and support, both during pre-service training and once one enters the classroom for the first time.  Teaching is not for the timid or the feint of heart.  Success is the classroom requires a great deal of preparation — prep in the content, the pedagogy, the research, and how to use it all effectively.  And then, of course, there is how one successfully relates with and leads the students in the classroom and continuous, content-based professional development.

No one ever said that teaching, or teacher preparation, is easy.  There is a lot involved in effective teacher training.  There should be, when we recognize just how much is at stake.  After all, it is just the future of our nation hanging in the balance.
We also recognize that most school districts get their teachers trained close to home.  They typically come from local, in-state teachers colleges and public universities.  All too frequently, we hear that those drawn into undergraduate education programs are some of our lower-performing students.  And we unfortunately know that those traditional teacher education programs that serve some of our lowest-performing, hard-to-staff schools are among our weakest, requiring less coursework, no clinical training, and lower expectations than those programs that may be serving better-performing school districts in the suburbs?
This is the way it was, and the way it is.  And many figure it is the way it will always be.  That’s what makes the University of the District of Columbia (our nation’s capital’s public IHE) all the more interesting.  In this morning’s Washington Post, UDC announces plans to shutter its undergraduate education program.  Why?  Too low graduation rates.  Too few prospective teachers passing their praxis,  Too little impact.  The full story can be found here — www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/08/AR2009030801641.html?hpid=moreheadlines.  
The statistics at UDC require a close look.  Only 7 to 8 percent of those students enrolled in the program graduate within six years of starting it.  The early childhood education major — with 150 students — yields only four to six graduates a year.  Enrollment is down overall.  Some years, the special education major yields no graduates at all.  
UDC hopes to fix the problem by focusing on graduate education programs, providing current and aspiring teachers master’s and doctoral programs that build on their undergraduate educations.  Current undergraduate advocates blame the problems on a praxis process that tests math proficiency after one’s sophomore year (“we’re not math educators”) and on a culturally biased system that favors white students pursuing public education careers, among other excuses.
But the UDC discussion in WaPo fails to ask a few important questions.  How many UDC graduates are taking teaching jobs in DC Public Schools?  And once those graduates begin teaching careers, how are they doing?  How are their students performing?  How are they leading their classrooms?  Are they moving the needle?  But we know all too well that such results-based questions are frowned on by some in education. 
Unfortunately, the situation at UDC is not an isolated incident.  There are teacher training programs across the nation that are not providing our prospective teachers the knowledgebase and skills they need to succeed.  There are programs, particularly those that serve as pipelines into our inner-city schools, that fail to provide the content knowledge, pedagogy, and clinical training teacher need to succeed.  There are those that mean well, but just are unable to hit the mark when it comes to expectations, needs, and demands of the 21st century classroom.
For quite some time now, Eduflack has believed that the teacher education community is in dire need of a Flexner-style study of our teacher training programs.  For those unaware, back at the start of the 20th century, the Carnegie Foundation launched the Flexner Commission to study the quality and impact of our nation’s medical training programs.  Flexner’s findings were startling — so many of those programs training our future medical doctors were a disaster, with no core curricular tenets and no quality or research behind them.  The findings revolutionized medical education.  A vast majority of medical colleges across the nation had their doors closed for good.  Those that remained bolstered their quality, turning out a better doctor to meet the growing medical needs of our industrialized nation.
Isn’t it time for such an approach in teacher education?  Don’t we need a comprehensive study of our teacher training programs, one that focuses on how we crosswalk the latest in teacher educator research with current curricula, ensure that teacher training programs are empowering our teachers with research-based instructional strategies, require clinical hours, build mentoring and support networks, use data in both instruction and intervention, and ensure graduates align with both the content and skill needs of the communities and states they are serving?  Of course we do.  
There is much debate these days between how alternative teacher training programs stack up to the traditional teaching pathways.  This discussion has picked up steam because of far too many traditional programs that simply are not up to par.  It’s not that traditional teacher ed doesn’t work, its that too many institutions are not providing the strongest program possible.  And important step to remedying this is to improve our schools and departments of education.  By improving quality — both of instruction and student — we improve our schools.  And when we improve our schools, we boost our children’s chance to succeed.
There is no doubt the teacher is the heart and soul of a school.  Getting a good teacher should not be a game of educational roulette, depending on the location of the table and how much money is in your pocket.  We should never have situations like we did a decade ago in Massachusetts, where upwards of half the students graduating from some of the state’s public teachers colleges were failing the praxis after graduating from college.  if a prospective teacher graduates from an accredited institution of higher education, we should have no doubt that they are equipped with the knowledgebase, skills, and ability to succeed in virtually any classroom with virtually any kids.
A sea change is coming in teacher education.  We are investing too much in teacher supports, pipeline creation, instructional development, and effective modeling of best practices necessary to improve teacher practice.  The stakes are just too high for us to fail.  We need to ensure that every product of a traditional teacher education program is equipped to lead the classroom, knows what she is getting into, and has the support and encourage to succeed, particularly in the early years.  A Flexner Commission for Teacher Education may be just what is needed if we are to move from a collection of UDC situations to the establishment of centers of teacher training excellence throughout the nation.
    

Virtual School Cuts

Eduflack Achievement gap, AYP, charter schools, Online Education, technology

A great deal has been said (and written) lately about Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland and his plans for charter schools in the Buckeye State.  As part of his state of the state address in January, Strickland embraced the notion of charter schools … as long as they were run by not-for-profits.  It was a bold stance, once that could be a precursor to future charter fights in the years to come.

Like most states, Ohio is faced with serious budget shortfalls.  Some may say the Ohio budget may be the most challenging, in terms of potential for massive cutbacks, save for California.  Even with support from the federal government under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Ohio is having to make tough decisions on its K-12 policy priorities.
Those decisions seem to be forcing Strickland to finetune his charter school philosophy even more.  Earlier this week, as part of the Governor’s budget, Ohio proposed that virtual charter schools suffer the same fate as their for-profit brethren — elimination.  The Governor proposed slashing 75 percent of funding for the state’s virtual charter schools, affecting 34 schools serving more than 23,000 students.
In previous budgets, Ohio’s virtual charter schools received approximately $5,400 per pupil for education.  The proposed budget drops that to $1,500 per pupil in aid.  The plan makes a clear distinction in aid formulas provided to brick-and-mortar schools and these virtual academies.  The full story, courtesy of the Columbus Dispatch’s Catherine Candisky, can be found here – www.dispatch.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2009/03/01/charter.ART_ART_03-01-09_B3_UDD2SLF.html?sid=101.  
Yes, virtual schools operate on less dollars than traditional, bricks-and-mortar schools.  Duh!  With no physical infrastructure to attend to, operating costs are indeed lower.  But these schools still need to invest in the technological infrastructure, curriculum, teacher salaries and benefits, educator PD, and student assessments, to name just a few.  There are real costs associated with virtual schools, particularly if educators are to ensure that students maximize the opportunities posed to them.
But it begs larger questions.  What are we getting, even for those reduced dollars?  Are virtual charter schools working in Ohio?  The Dispatch cites on K-12 virtual school that has regularly hit AYP numbers while earning a decent “continuous improvement” grade.  But that school is operating at a 35:1 student:teacher ratio, far above the 25:1 ration the proposed state formula expected.  What about the other 33 schools?
As we are seeing in Florida, Texas, Pennsylvania, Alabama, and a host of other states, there is a real role for virtual education in the K-12 experience if it is done right, done effectively, and done with the purpose of improving access and opportunity for all students.  We also know that virtual education can be an incubator for bad practice, with those seeking to make a quick buck taking advantage of a state or school district’s desire to innovate.  One only has to look at higher education to see how a good, well-meaning idea can quickly be bastardized.
So as Ohio’s virtual charter schools are facing the virtual guillotine, we must look at their success boosting student achievement and closing the achievement gap.  Like Ohio’s Connections Academy, are all the Buckeye State’s virtual schools regularly making AYP?  If not, why not?  Is the quality of instruction (and the quality of the teacher) the same as in traditional schools?  Are they improving access for all students, particularly those in low-income and hard-to-serve communities, or are the attracting a select group of students who can receive a good education in virtually any circumstance?  Are we seeing longitudinal data on student achievement, or are students not staying in the virtual programs long enough to measure true year-on-year-on-year data?  Are the programs proven effective, and can we demonstrate it?
Virtual schools are an easy mark when it comes to education budget cutting.  Most taxpayers and policymakers are under the impression that such programs are the playgrounds of white families with some financial resources.  The urban legend goes most minority and low-income families simply don’t have the technology at home to effectively engage in online education, and they certainly don’t have the familial oversight to ensure that students, particularly those in the elementary and middle grades, are putting in the time and effort required of effective virtual education.  (Hogwash, of course, but many believe it.)  Layer on the notion that most virtual teachers are non-union, many providers are for-profit, and we just don’t trust the rigor of “computer game” education and you can see why virtual K-12 schools are an easy target during tough budget times.
Is there a role for virtual education in our K-12 infrastructure?  Absolutely.  Can new technologies level the playing field and provide learning opportunities some schools could never get?  Absolutely.  Can virtual ed boost student achievement, close the achievement gap, and meet AYP just as well as a bricks-and-mortar school?  When executed properly, absolutely.  But such programs remain a supplement to the traditional public education network.  As much as some may want them to supplant failing programs, that will never happen, at least not in our current education mindset.
We’re all for innovation, as long as we innovate within reason.  If virtual schools are going to be fully embraced as a key component of our K-12 patchwork, they must first do a better job communicating their strong academic foundations, benefits, quality, and results.  Until then, many will continue to see them as online playing when “real” students are hard at work.  And as long as that is the case, they will always face potential cuts and elimination from policymakers balancing a range of interests, especially when virtual K-12 is seen as a boutique industry (and a mostly for-profit one at that).
  

Beating Up on 21CS

Eduflack Math, Science, STEM, technology, Workforce

It’s been a rough couple of weeks for the 21st century skills movement.  Last week, at an event hosted by Common Core, 21CS (embodied by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills) got pretty bloodied by the traditionalists who believe the teaching of soft 21CS mean denying our students much needed core content in reading, math, science, and the social sciences.  The Core Knowledge Foundation was the first to weigh in (http://www.coreknowledge.org/blog/2009/02/25/21st-century-skills-fadbusters/ ) and Eduwonk has a powerful commentary on the event, and its implications for the future (http://www.eduwonk.com/2009/02/21st-century-skills-in-critical-condition.html ).

This week, the traditional media weighs in on the controversy.  EdWeek’s Stephen Sawchuk has a terrific article on the throwdown in Education Week (http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2009/03/04/23pushback_ep.h28.html?r=1644068071 ) and USA Today’s Greg Toppo weighs in on the same debate this morning (http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2009-03-04-core-knowledge_N.htm ), pitting it as 21st century skills versus core knowledge.
Eduflack gets the controversy, don’t get me wrong.  When we start talking about teaching our students “soft skills” in what is already a severely limited academic day, it sends chills down the spines of those who fear we are already falling down on the job when it comes to teaching our kids the basics.  After all, who wants to substitute “world history with “Fun with Technology?”  Who wants to forgo advanced science so we can teach “Interpersonal Communication?”  And who would even think of sacrificing a foreign language so we can offer “Teamwork 101?”
At the end of the day, though, this is all a false debate.  Do our students need 21st century skills, like teamwork, problem solving, critical thinking, and such?  Yes.  Are these skills that many have already been teaching for decades (thus questioning whether they are really 21st century skills)?  Yes.  Should we, or do we, sacrifice our core curriculum to offer this collection of soft skills in its stead?  Of course not.
The debate over 21CS skills should not be one between one set of curricular goals versus the other.  This isn’t core knowledge versus soft skills.  No, our focus should be on how we teach those core subjects that are necessary.  How do we teach math and science so that we better integrate technology and critical thinking skills?  How do we teach the social sciences in a manner that focuses on project-based learning and team-based activities?  How do we ensure that a 21st century student is not being forced to unplug when they enter the classroom, and instead uses the technologies and interests that drive the rest of their life to boost their interest and achievement in core academic subjects?  And most importantly, how do we ensure all students are graduating with the content knowledge and skills needed to truly achieve in the 21st century economy?
If anything, 21CS is guilty of bad messaging and bad PR.  In a time when everyone is concerned about both academic quality and relevance to the economy, many 21CS advocates remain focused on the need for soft skills, believing they have discovered some long, lost map to student success.  In reality, they are calling for a reinforcement of the relevance of core instruction.  Their message has been off, and as a result, they’ve painted a nice, large target on the back of a well-meaning concept.
How do we move beyond it?  The first step is shifting from 21CS skills to STEM skills.  Science-technology-engineering-math education is a strong attempt at unifying core curriculum (at least math and science) with those skills needed in today’s workforce.  STEM literacy requires a keen understanding of core knowledge, along with an adeptness of 21CS.  Most importantly, it is a concept that policymakers and business leaders understand and are starting to embrace, seeing that how a student applies knowledge is just as important as the knowledge they acquire.
Yes, STEM education faces similar criticism to 21CS, but that’s only because some haven’t seen strong, effective STEM education at work.  It isn’t all keyboarding and web development.  It is advanced math and science.  It offers history lessons in technology.  And it even figures out how to teach topics like mechanical engineering in relevant concepts for secondary school students.  In its very soul, STEM is as core knowledge as it can be.
Regardless, this shouldn’t be an either/or debate.  When we look at our K-12 schools, we look at the pipeline into postsecondary education, and we observe the ever-evolving demands for a skilled workforce, it is clear we have miles to go before we solve the problem.  The answer is not more Latin, a better understanding of ancient Greek history, or a finer appreciation for the Great Books.  The true answer is found in how use new technologies, new approaches, and altogether new ways to teach our core subjects.  How do we cultivate new learning skills while reinforcing our tried-and-true curriculum?  How do we better engage a 21st century student on that core knowledge that they just don’t have an interest in or don’t see the relevance of?  How do we better engage students, rather than asking them to unplug and power down upon entering the schoolhouse doors?
What’s clear is the Partnership for 21CS is facing its last stand.  Its positioning and messaging is quickly making it irrelevant, while stoking the engines of those who have long lept to the defense of a deeply held sense of our core academic curriculum.  The Partnership needs to go back to the drawing board, build a new messaging platform, expand its pool of advocates and endorsers, and reassert its relevance in the debate on school improvement.  Otherwise, it is just another good idea that will have failed because of bad execution and an inability to connect with both those who must lead the change and the students we are trying to impact with the reform.

A Third Evolutionary Alternative?

Eduflack Science

The battle over evolution in the classroom is always an interesting one.  As some states battle to teach creationism alongside evolution (or to eliminate the teaching of evolution altogether), it often comes down to a basic debate of science versus faith.  That comes as a surprise to no one.  But it makes for some interesting rhetorical battles at both the school district at the state levels.

What is surprising, though, is the latest Gallup poll data, reflected on the front page of today’s USA Today.  More than 1,000 adults were surveyed the first week of February, asked to weigh in on their opinion of evolution.  The results?  39 percent of Americans believe in the theories put forward by Charles Darwin and defended by Clarence Darrow down in Tennessee more than 90 years ago.  A quarter of adults (25 percent) don’t believe in evolution, siding with the Old Testament and William Jennings Bryan.  And a whopping 36 percent have no opinion on the topic.
Eduflack gets the battle lines between those who believe in fish with feet and those who do not.  But how can more than a third of adults have “no opinion” as to whether they believe the theory of evolution?  What, exactly, were they taught during their school days?  Did they have a bad experience with a monkey or in Sunday school?  It’s no wonder our school districts get confused when it comes to how to proceed on the future of such science instruction.  That 25 percent of creationists may be vocal and clear of their intents and purposes, but the 36 percent who don’t know, don’t care, or generally don’t have an opinion speak louder than all.  Or maybe there is a third alternative that we just haven’t considered yet? 

The Data Is Always Bigger in Texas

Eduflack Achievement gap, IES, Reading First, SBRR

At the start of the year, Eduflack made a couple of promises.  I would seek to throw the spotlight on positive stories that were not getting the attention they deserved.  I would look to education policy stories outside of Washington, DC.  And I would continue to my Don Quixote-like obsession with continuing to push the notion that evidence-based reading instruction works, and that it can be proven in state after state.

A few weeks ago, we talked about the exemplary results out in California, where student reading scores have significantly risen after the adoption of scientifically based reading instruction under Reading First.  This follows similar data from states from Idaho to Ohio, where we’ve seen tangible, significant impact of SBRR on student achievement.  Now we set our sights on the Lone Star State, where reading score on the state’s TAKS exam again show that evidence-based reading works if our goal is to boost student reading proficiency and achievement.
The data is clear.  Looking at 2003 data (pre-RF) and 2008 data (the supposed end of RF), third graders in RF schools who passed the TAKS reading section rose 14 percent, from 77 percent to 91 percent.  That compares to 4 percent gains for both all students and for those in non-RF classrooms.
For Hispanic students, the overall state gain was 6 percent, but Hispanic students in RF schools posted a whopping 15 percent gain.  African-American third graders did even better under RF, posting a 4 percent gain overall, but a 16 percent gain in RF classes.  Among economically disadvantaged students, those in RF classrooms saw 15 percent reading passage gains.  And limited English proficient students in RF schools saw an incredible 19 percent gain in their reading proficiency, according to TAKS.
All of this is from data available from the Texas Education Agency.  All of this flies in the face of the urban legend that Reading First had little, if any, impact on student reading proficiency.  All of it shows that evidence-based reading instruction just plain works.  Yet none of this has made its way into the policy debate.
If you talk to education reformers today, they’ll tell you the most significant challenge educators face today is closing the achievement gap.  The differences in performance between white and African-American students, between white and Hispanic students, and between rich and poor students should be a national embarrassment.  We are selling all students on the notion that they need a high school diploma and some form of postsecondary education in order to succeed in life.  But at the same time, we want to ignore that so many students are struggling to be reading proficient by the end of the third grade and will never have the literacy skills to succeed in college.
Those in the classroom will tell you that struggling fourth grade readers have a near impossible task of catching up over the remainder of their academic career.  Where they need more time and more intensity in their reading practice and instruction, they get less as they start to study other academic subjects.  Then they fall behind in social studies and science and even math because they lack the literacy skills needed to perform at grade level in other subjects.
That is why SBRR is so important, and that is why Eduflack continues to tilt at windmills here.  Forget what the IES Impact Study may have said.  It looked at a very small group of schools using a research model that can’t be replicated (as we don’t know the handful of schools that were studied).  Let’s turn our attention to what matters — student achievement.
Like it or not, the best measure we now have for student achievement is the state assessment.  In state after state, that state assessment is showing that student reading achievement is on the rise, markedly so since the introduction of RF in 2003.  Texas is just the latest collection of data points.  We’re seeing it in state after state.
What makes Texas’ data that much more interesting is the clear picture it paints with regard to SBRR and its ability to close the achievement gap.  Doing what is proven effective in literacy instruction, teachers in the Lone Star State dramatically improved student reading achievement for African-American, Hispanic, and poor students.  Students are learning, students are reading, and the major variable between 2003 and 2008 was the introduction (and requirement) of evidence-based instruction, materials, interventions, and professional development.
It all begs the question — how much more state-level data is necessary before the naysayers and the doomsdayers admit that evidence-based reading instruction works, that we can show it works, and that we can replicate its successes in schools and classrooms where too many children are still left behind?  We can get every child reading.  We just need to stay the course, and get real, proven approaches and materials into more classrooms, empower more teachers with the PD and support they need to use it, and effectively measure ongoing student progress (while offering specific interventions when needed).
If SBRR is working and proven effective deep in the heart of Texas (along with California, Ohio, and elsewhere), how can we think of putting on the brakes and denying these kids who are demonstrating real improvement?  

Trust Us, We’re With DCPS

Eduflack AFT, DCPS, IES, Michelle Rhee, SBRR

Data can be a dangerous weapon.  In public education, we use it to validate ideas, attack initiatives we are unsure of, and guide spending and policy decisions.  Over the last decade, we’ve seen a massive transformation on data and research — what counts and what doesn’t, what’s good and what’s bad, what’s evidence-based and what’s purely squishy.  Through it all, though, we clearly know that data is an important component to an effective argument.

Along the way, we have picked up a few key pointers.  There is a difference between quantitative and qualitative research, with the former a stronger measure of effectiveness.  A medical model with control groups is the ideal, but is also impossible to achieve in the schools, as no student or no class wants to be the one that receives no instruction at all, limited to sit there like a bump on a log as every other child learns.  And methodology and documentation is king, particularly so others can scrutinize the process and replicate the research study to quiet the doubting Thomases.
When the National Reading Panel released its Teaching Children to Read report, it generated a firestorm of reaction and overreaction.  Many questioned the personalities involved.  Others scrutinized the methodology, and some the findings themselves.  So it fell to Rutgers University Professor Greg Camilli to replicate the research.  He applied a broader, more appeasing methodology, and found the same essential results as the NRP.  So the research debate ended (and the field focused on fights over personalities and implementation.)
When the Institute for Education Sciences released its Reading First Impact Study last year, it was seen as the final nail in the RF coffin.  Here was the gold standard in research models — IES — finding that there was no measurable impact of the high profile reading initiative.  But those who take a closer look at the research saw real problems in the methodology.  First, the study did not take the issue of “contamination” into question, all but saying that students in RF schools received different instruction, different textbooks, and differently trained and supported teachers than those in non-RF schools.  We know that is not the case.  But even more damning is that the Impact Study looked at a relatively small sample size to reach its conclusions, and did so in a way that the research can never be replicated.  There is no public record of what actual schools were studied.  And there is little hope that such information could ever be obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests.  So hundreds of millions of dollars in education policy has been decided by a study with questionable methodology that can never be validated and replicated by another researcher, as the field scrambles to try and validate (or invalidate) the findings.
Why all of this background?  To show that the quality of research and the transparency of the process is key.  We trust that the evidence will guide us to strong policy and funding decisions.  We look for the data, believing the numbers will serve as a compass pointing toward student achievement.  And despite Mark Twain’s warnings about statistics, we still hold them to be a primary driver in our decisionmaking.  Citing data and research studies is often the final piece to closing a deal in education improvement these days.
Which is why the most recent pronouncement coming out of Washington, DC Public Schools is all the more problematic.  By now, most know of the battle between DCPS Chancellor Michelle Rhee and the American Federation of Teachers over the issues of tenure and teacher pay.  For more than a year now, Rhee has been pushing the notion of dramatically increasing salaries for effective teachers (assuming the give up tenure) and has secured outside, private funding to accomplish the pay raises.  Critics have attacked her for many reasons, one of which is the sustainability of such pay raises.  What happens when the outside foundations or corporate sponsors move on to the next issue?  How will DCPS be able to sustain the new, higher pay structure?
On a radio program yesterday, Rhee stated she had a research report from an economic consultant showing that the plan can indeed be sustained.  But she won’t name the consultant.  And she won’t release the report.  She wants us simply to take her word that she can make up the supposed $100 million pledge to DCPS for pay raises if need be, while waiving an unnamed report from an unnamed researcher to prove her point.
The full story can be found in this morning’s Washington Post — www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/02/AR2009030202785.html?hpid=moreheadlines  
Let me say for the record that Eduflack believes that Rhee’s teacher pay structure can indeed be sustained.  Quite honestly, she has no choice.  If she signs a contact with the Washington Teachers Union outlining a pay structure that will offer $135,000 salaries to non-tenured teachers, she needs to honor the CBA, regardless of changes in her financial pipeline.  A deal is a deal.  (Though Eduflack seriously doubts that AFT will ever agree to the deal, at least as it has been presented to date.)  She’s resourceful and will find the funds from other donors, or from within the DCPS budget itself if necessary.
But waiving around an unnamed research study that supposedly proves your point, no questions asked, but refusing to provide details, identifiers, or even the study itself is just amateur grandstanding.  The “I have in my hand” approach asks us to trust Rhee when, quite frankly, she hasn’t earned the trust of those she is seeking to reach.
If Rhee wants to show her teacher pay plan is sustainable, she needs to release her research study know and get it into the hands of every member of the city council and every leader at WTU and AFT.  And she needs to get its toplines to every single teacher in DCPS.  She should be making the data case now.  If she has the research, post it online, distribute it at DCPS headquarters, heck, hand it out to everyone coming to visit the Lincoln Memorial.  Get the data out there, let it speak for itself, and let your opponents see the true strength of your argument.
Trying to sidestep a major question like sustainability with a “Trust me, I’m with the government” approach just doesn’t cut it in the new era of 21st century school improvement.  Our schools, educators, and students have been sold a lot of vapor in recent years.  Victory comes to those who can prove their point, and have the data to back it up.  Until Rhee releases this economic study on the sustainability of her pay proposal, she can’t win the day.
  

“Happy Birthday to Eduflack!”

Eduflack national standards, SBRR, STEM, Teacher Education

It is hard to believe, but Eduflack is now two years old.  When I started this little endeavor, I never quite expected it to last this long (or to have the readership base that it has today).  Honestly, this was started as a cathartic exercise, an opportunity for me to think through a range of education improvement issues and get a better look at what is working and what is not.

From the beginning, I had sought to frame education through a communications lens, looking at how effective (or ineffective) we are in talking about school improvements and reforms.  The words we choose.  The rhetoric we use.  The channels we speak through.  The audiences we identify and reach.  The measurements by which we dub reform, and the communication of it, successful.
Along the way, we’ve taken many twists and turns.  The most significant is I seem to talk just as much about pure education policy as I do about its communication.  That is to be expected.  Eduflack is not your garden-variety flack.  In my professional life, I actually spend the majority of my time working on leading education policy issues, including reading instruction, high school improvement, STEM education, early childhood education, ELL, and other such topics.  My company, Exemplar Strategic Communications (www.exemplarpr.com) is more of a policy and strategy shop than a communications shop.  I spend a great deal of time with research and data, trying to figure out what the numbers tell us about what works and what doesn’t.  And I tend to focus on overall strategy, looking at how a new idea, a new organization, or a particular intervention fits into the overall education framework and how to best position that idea for maximum receptivity and impact.  So it is only natural that my personal writings would be an offshoot of the deep policy discussions I am engaging in on a daily basis.
Since its launch in March 2007, Eduflack has posted 370 entries.  That’s more than three a week.  I recognize that this is not your typical blog.  Loyal readers know I tend to write really long (most posts are at least 1,000 words).  I don’t do drive-by postings or throw up the latest gossip of the day.  I try to ground each post in recent news coverage or data release.  And there are a few topics (reading, STEM, and national standards) that I just can’t let go of, like a dog with well-chewed bone.  That’s just who I am, and that’s not going to change.
What will year three look like?  More of the same, I’m afraid.  I still refuse to admit that reading instruction is not a national priority, and I will continue to use Eduflack to advocate for evidence-based reading instruction and to spotlight those states and districts that are doing it right, those SEAs and LEAs that provide a real blueprint for how to build a better federal reading program.  I will continue to focus on STEM education, knowing it is the clearest path to linking education and the economy and ensuring that the United States has the strongest, best skilled pool of 21st century workers.  I will continue to press for national standards, believing they are a necessary pathway to real school improvement.
And in the coming year, we’ll see a few additional priorities.  I want to write more about ELL and ESL issues, particularly as states grapple with how to get our Spanish-speaking populations up to par academically.  I will spend more time on the general issue of teaching and teacher development, with a focus on the sorts of content-based, job-embedded PD we know teachers need to do their jobs well.  We’ll talk more about data-based decisionmaking, from the top all the way down to the classroom.  And issues like early childhood education and charters will be more prominent in these entries as we see the impact they have on really improving our K-12 offerings.
Of course, the self-indulgent posts updating the developmental progress of my son, Miggy, and my daughter, Anna, will continue as proudly as ever before.
I just wanted to take a moment to that everyone for their support of Eduflack, their comments, their guidance, and their interest.  I can’t tell you how gratifying it is to hear that people read this blog, share its content, and appreciate its insights.  I am particularly grateful for those who continue to send me research, positive stories, and “ideas” for posts.  Those are incredibly helpful to me and give me great optimism when it comes to the future of education improvement.  So please keep those ideas and suggestions flowing.  Just send them to eduflack@eduflack.com.  And I’m always up to an off-line dialogue or debate, if that’s what you are seeking.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.  It’s been a terrific two years for Eduflack, and I look forward to many more.  At this point, this blog is my middle child.  It requires constant care and attention.  And I’m proud of all of those who have and will contribute to its development.

School Leadership in Big D

Eduflack Achievement gap, AYP
Where exactly is the intersection between effective school district management (particularly on the financial side) and student improvement?  It’s a question that many have been asking for quite some time, particularly in this era of mayoral and state takeovers of school districts.  Usually, these takeovers happen when both the financial and the academic are failing, when community leaders see no choice but to step in and protect both taxpayer dollars and the students are public schools are intended to serve.
And then you have places like Dallas, Texas.  Over the weekend, Dallas’ mayor, Tom Leppert, indicated he is considering a mayoral takeover of Dallas ISD.  Anyone who has watched the financial “challenges” in the district, knows that something different must happen in the Big D.  And those who have watched cities such as New York and Washington, DC cede control of the schools to the mayor can point to the benefit a new outlook, new attention, and, most often, new leadership, can have on a struggling school district.
The full story of the mayor’s intentions can be found in this past Sunday’s Dallas Morning News — <a href="http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/022209dnmetmayordisd.3ebacba.html.
What”>www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/022209dnmetmayordisd.3ebacba.html.
What makes this exploratory takeover so interesting, or at least newsworthy outside of Texas?  Nothing, until the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution released its latest report yesterday.  Lots of great information in the report (particularly the issue of PISA being used as an international benchmark, but I digress), but two important nuggets for us to consider.
First, Dallas ISD ranked second among nearly 40 large-city school districts when it comes to academic gains.  While Dallas still has significant work to do, particularly compared to suburban and rural districts across the state, it is making progress.  To say that Dallas’ improvement efforts are outperforming districts like Miami, New York, and Chicago is saying something.  (Of course, critics would say Dallas was so far behind these other districts to start that they had no option but to outperform other districts, at least in terms of growth.)
Equally important, the Brown Center looked at mayoral takeovers and found the data “inconclusive” when it came mayoral control’s impact on school improvement.  Yes, there are significant benefits to mayoral takeover, including higher per-pupil expenditures, more focused leadership, and a broader “community” helping to lead the schools.  But for every NYC success story, we have the potential of Detroit, where mayoral control didn’t work, and they are now returning to the old model.    
The full story on DISD and the Brown Center is in this morning’s Dallas Morning News — <a href="http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/022509dneduurbanschools.f1d859.html
So”>www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/022509dneduurbanschools.f1d859.html
So what do we take from all of this?  First and foremost, there is no one-size-fits-all approach to fixing struggling schools.  Mayoral control can be a benefit, or it can be a burden for city leadership.  It all depends on the personalities involved, the commitment from the city, and the buy-in from teachers and administrators across the district.
Second, it demonstrates how difficult it can be to measure school effectiveness with one ruler.  The Brown Center data shows real gains, though they started from a tough spot.  The state assessment — TAKS — shows a district in need of much help.  The Newsweek rankings of the top high schools put the top secondary school (or one of them) squarely in DISD.  Layer on top of that financial mismanagement and leadership chasms, and you can see why there is a growing drumbeat for a new approach to school leadership.
It’s funny.  When Eduflack was living in Dallas (2005 and 2006), there was a citywide plan for DISD to win the Broad Prize in the coming years.  It was a bold and ambitious plan, bringing the schools and the community together to improve instruction, support teachers, and raise student achievement.  Guess the wheels fell off that bus once I left town.
Regardless, the Dallas education community is facing a serious discussion on the future of their public schools.  Mayoral control may be the answer, but it works better in cities with a strong mayor.  That’s not the Dallas model.  The improvements documented by the Brown Center are good, but they must be sustained and demonstrated over the long term.
As Robert Frost would say, Dallas has many miles to go before it can sleep.  The community is definitely aware of the need for improvement and the challenges before it.  But it takes a strong leader to move that awareness into action.  Is Superintendent Michael Hinojosa up to the challenge?  Is Mayor Leppert?  Only time will tell.  The winner will be whomever can win over the hearts and minds of the teachers, parents, and business community in Big D.  Effective change can only occur when stakeholders are buying into the plan, and so far, neither Hinojosa nor Leppert seem to have fully “sold” their vision to the audiences they need to see it through.  But change is coming …

Recovering and Reinvesting in RF

Eduflack Achievement gap, Reading First, SBRR, stimulus

By now, educators must have be living under rocks to have not heard about the enormous sums of money soon coming to school districts.  In the next month and a half, the first installment of nearly 80 billion dollars intended to prevent pending cuts to local K-12 education and allow for real school improvement is expected to flow.  How Title I and IDEA expenditures will be spent is pretty clear cut, following existing distribution formulae and providing a booster shot to those schools already receiving such funds.  The big ticket item — the State Stabilization Fund — is still working through the details.  

For those looking for regular updates on the policy and the language behind it, one of the best sources is EdWeek’s Michele McNeil and Alyson Klein’s Politics K-12 blog — blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/.  
But we know the intent of the Stabilization Fund.  Many, if not most, school districts have been planning budget cuts in these difficult financial times.  Teachers are on the chopping block.  PD is being sacrificed.  Textbook adoptions on hold.  Instructional material purchases put off for a later day.  The Stabilization Fund is intended to stop such drastic action, providing immediate funds so that NO school district faces budget cuts.  School districts are to look at their spending for FY2008 and FY2009 (the previous and current academic year), determine spending levels from those years, and then use the Stabilization Fund to prevent any reduction in spending.  Those programs that have been in the school for the past few years are to be protected, providing educators the opportunity to continue efforts that are working and having a real impact on student achievement, economics be damned.  The Fund is meant to alleviate worry and ensure investment in our classroom continues and that effective programs do not face irrational cuts.
At the same time, the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday moved the current fiscal year’s budget forward, a spending bill that was to be passed last September, but never quite broke through.  Many educators have long feared that Reading First would be zeroed out in that budget bill, denying school districts around the country needed funding to invest in the research-proven instructional materials, professional development, and technical assistance needed to get our kids reading at grade level.  That fear was realized, as the $300 million or so that was spent on RF last year was missing from the House version of the budget.
Eduflack has come to grips with the fact that Reading First is dead.  The program itself was long plagued with significant implementation problems and a poor public perception.  But its core tenets remain both true and essential.  We can get virtually every child reading at grade level by using proven-effective instruction.  The U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development (OPEPD) released data late last year demonstrating the effectiveness of our investment in research-proven reading, showing real impact on RF and non-RF schools alike.  And Eduflack has reported on a wide range of data demonstrating the programs effectiveness in states across the country, the most recent being the terrific results shown in California (http://blog.eduflack.com/2009/02/10/golden-reading-results-in-the-golden-state.aspx).  
School districts are rightfully worried about the future of their reading instruction efforts.  RF funds have been a boon to struggling schools, providing then direct funding do what is necessary to improve student reading achievement.  It has resulted in sea change when it comes to the instructional materials and PD available to our schools, whether they are RFs or not.  And it has refocused technical assistance on research-based approaches aligned with classroom instruction and embedded in real practice.  And have we ever mentioned that it just plain works?
The elimination of the Reading First program was an inevitability, but that does not mean our school districts should stop their effective use of proven-effective reading instruction.  They should still invest in the instructional materials and PD that are most effective in getting students to read at grade level.  They should still invest in classroom-based strategies for equipping students with the instruction and skills they need to achieve.  And they should still invest in teacher empowerment, ensuring educators receive the reading PD and data understanding necessary to impact student achievement.
So a simple question?  Why isn’t every state and every RF school across the country looking to use newly available State Stabilization Fund and Title I dollars to continue their literacy efforts?  The Stabilization Fund is designed to ensure that no schools are forced to cut their budgets.  Such reading investments have been part of recent budgets.  They are now facing the ax.  It just seems natural that the Fund is used to continue a school district’s investment in proven-effective reading instruction and professional development.  After all, the law is intended to prevent cuts and continue those efforts that are boosting student achievement.  In those states and districts where RF has been proven effective, it seems continuing the investment (in materials, assessment, and PD) should move forward, even if the original funding stream is gone.  The Fund was meant to replace disappearing funds.  And it becomes a slam dunk when we see that such investments are already proven effective in improving student reading skills and academic achievement?
And why can’t new Title I funds be used to expand the investment, getting it into more classrooms and more students?  If a school district has identified and successfully implemented an approach to get students reading at grade level, that approach should continue, particularly with struggling students in Title I schools.  New Title I funds available under ARRA is intended to expand good work.  Seems there are a great number of Title I schools that could benefit from increased investment in effective reading instruction, particularly if we are looking to boost student achievement and offer every student a pathway to success, as intended by the President.
Heck, there will even be chances to invest in RF concepts through IDEA funds and highly popular Response to Intervention (RtI) approaches.  And we won’t even start talking about the vast opportunities available through the soon-to-be-detailed Innovation Fund.
RF is dead, absolutely.  But that doesn’t mean we give up on teaching our kids to read or offering the research-proven approaches and interventions that are necessary to raising student literacy levels and getting all students reading at grade level.  Our states and districts know what is now working when it comes to reading instruction.  We have administrators, technical assistance providers, coaches, and teachers in place to deliver effective instruction.  After some unfortunate stops and starts, we now know the materials and curriculum that are most effective in reaching our goals.  And we have clear understanding of the professional development and ongoing support our teachers need to turn every child into a reader.  Now is the time to double down on reading, not walk away from the table.
Fortunately, the U.S. Department of Education is now providing school districts the chips to place that needed bet on student reading ability.  Reading programs in school districts across the nation are facing significant cuts.  The feds are now providing upwards of $80 billion to ensure our K-12 schools don’t face any budget cuts and, in fact, can increase instructional spending (particularly on those items that will improve student achievement).  It seems that the American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act was custom written to ensure that our federal reading investment (currently through Reading First, previously through the Reading Excellence Act) continues and that no school cut its reading programs or its reading investment, particularly those struggling schools previously identified as RF schools.
I have no doubt that ED will be developing a new federal reading initiative, one based on the most positive attributes of Reading First and enhanced through a broader interpretation of the research and a greater commitment to professional development and teacher supports.  It is a program that is needed by our schools and it is a commitment our federal government must make if we want to make good on our intent of strengthening public education and giving every child a chance at success.  Until such a program is in place, though, every RF school should be working with their district and their state to ensure that these new funds are being use to protect the instructional investments in the classroom.  And few investments are as worthy as the reading instruction programs that are boosting reading achievement for millions of kids across the nation.
Yes, school districts should be using this stimulus money to ensure that teachers stay on the job and no instructional positions are eliminated.  We can’t teach our kids without educators in front of reasonably sized classrooms.  But we must also provide those teachers with the resources, materials, TA, and PD they need to get the job done.  That investment starts with reading, particularly proven-effective reading instruction.  That is the full intent of the stimulus package.
The RF grant program may be long gone, but that doesn’t mean we stop investing in reading instruction that we know works.  The economic stimulus law gives us both the funds and the direction to keep instructional efforts moving forward.  Reading can, should, and must be at the top of that list.

Presidential Rhetoric, Education-Style

Eduflack Arne Duncan, charter schools, early childhood education, High School, NCLB, Obama, stimulus

The education game is on.  During last evening’s Presidential Address to Congress, President Obama dedicated significant time in his hour-long speech to the issue of education.  Such a commitment is typically unheard of in typical State of the Union addresses.  Often, a president will throw in a few sentences about education, one about the importance of teachers, one about the value of a college education, and then he will move onto to other issues more adept at capturing the hearts and minds of the American people.

Yes, Obama had a lot to say last night.  The economy, home ownership, energy, national security, healthcare.  All got their due.  And education was right in there as an A-list issue.  Clearly, the President sees the clear connect between an improved K-16 education system and an improved economy, how a strong education leads to good jobs and meaningful contribution.  He sees the next generation of the American workforce will require new levels of knowledge and skills that the generations before them never envisioned.  If anything, he made a clear and compassionate case for 21st century skills.
The full transcript from last night’s speech can be found here, though it is a much more impressive watch than it is a read: <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/obama_address_022409.html?hpid=topnews
Of”>www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/obama_address_022409.html?hpid=topnews
Of course, a significant potion of last night’s education segment was dedicated to higher education.  That should surprise no one.  For the past two years, Obama has spoken of postsecondary education as a primary pathway to life success.  He has pledged to get more kids to go to college, help them pay for it, and then use their talents in the community well after they earned that degree.  And in times of economic trouble, nothing hits the heart better than improving one’s lot in life through learning.  Challenging every American to seek at least one more year of education, whether it be in college or a vocational program, was a bold statement.  Stating that dropping out is never an option is always a crowd-pleaser.  And setting a goal of repositioning the United States as the nation with the highest percentage of postsecondary degree holders by 2020 is an interesting idea (though I’m curious to see how we are defining degrees and how we are equating simply earning the degree with effectively putting it to use).
A few points — some policy, some rhetoric — truly grabbed Eduflack’s attention.
On the policy front, the President made strong commitments to both charter schools and performance pay for teachers.  The latter should be no surprise.  Obama has long advocated for incentive pay, even during a tough primary knowing it may have cost him the support of teachers (or at least the teachers’ unions).  He hasn’t forgotten how important it can be to incentivize educators, particularly those in hard-to-staff communities facing real academic challenges.  By boosting funding for the Teacher Incentive Fund in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, he has signaled that performance pay (and possibly differentiated pay scales) are on the horizon.  Perhaps he may even lean to newly minted U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado for some ideas on how to take Denver’s ProComp model to national scale.
On charters, the President put charter schools firmly in the center of his education improvement agenda.  Although he provided no specific details, just by singling them out he built a bridge to an important education community and showed his design for change, innovation, and improvement in our public schools.  It is almost hard to believe that a president or two ago, a Democrat couldn’t even utter the word charter without getting the ire of the education establishment.  For Eduflack, the question for the future is whether the Administration — particularly through the Office of Innovation and Improvement and the newly created Innovation Fund — will broadly define charter schools or whether they will take the new world view pushed by Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, limiting our commitment to charters to those that are run by not-for-profit organizations.
The final policy piece?  A renewed commitment to early childhood education.  The President made clear that student learning starts “from the day they are born to the day they begin a career,” and we need to redouble our efforts to deliver real instruction and real learning to children well before they hit kindergarten.  That got applause from Eduflack, but we probably need to retool the statement to address the reality that education continues well beyond the start of a career.  Just ask all of those most recently in the workforce who we are asking to retool, or those teachers for whom we are rightfully investing in improved, content-based professional development.  Learning should be a lifelong pursuit.
And the rhetoric?  As many pundits have already proclaimed, President Obama is clearly a master of the television medium.  He knows how to deliver a speech, and knows how to do it well with real impact.  In the education portion of our program, that was most clear in his articulation of the role of parents.  Again, this has been a key component of his stump speech, and a topic touched on during the Democratic Convention last summer.  He made crystal the job of educating our students is not just left to teachers, and that parents play an equally important role by being involved, taking an interest, and leading by example.  I still believe there is a real need for an Office of Family Involvement over at the U.S. Department of Education, an infrastructure that can harness the power of a wide range of communities and focus on how the home can supplement what is happening in the classroom.  If not an assistant secretary office someone at OESE, OPEPD, or OII needs to take it on as a priority cause.
In his remarks, it is also clear that Obama (and his speechwriters) are clear in their vision and passion for how one talks about higher education and its impact on the individual and the community.  What was interesting, though, is that the speechwriters still seem to be seeking and searching for that same confident voice on K-12 education.  Yes, there were applause line for things like charter schools and dropping out is never an option, but the passion and connectivity was lacking, at least compared with other sections of the speech.Obama didn’t sell the K-12 ideas as well as he did higher education or energy.  Maybe he wanted to stay away from NCLB, maybe he wants to give EdSec Arne Duncan a full latitude in establishing the agenda, or maybe he is still waiting to find that balance between the tried-and-true and innovation (or the status quoers and the reformers, as some prefer).  Over time, we have to hope that the K-12 section, particularly with regard to elementary grades and instructional building blocks becomes clear and a true rallying cry for school improvement.  To truly sell the vision, he needs to speak with confidence and authority on some of the details, particularly as it relates to instructional innovation.
What was missing?  In his discussion of how we can effectively use our educational infrastructure to improve our economy, I wish there was clear, specific mention of STEM education. When done well, STEM education is about well more than just 21st century skills.  It is exactly about equipping all students with the math, science, and technology knowledgebase they need to contribute to the economy and fill the very jobs Obama is looking to create.
I had also hoped to hear a call for national standards.  In talking about global economic competition, we not only need clear national academic standards, but we probably need to tie those to intern
ational benchmarks (as NGA, CCSSO, and Achieve have recently called for).  The Administration has been dipping its toe into the national standards pool, and the financial commitment to improve state data systems is a good step forward.  But the rhetorical nod to a single expectation for student achievement in the United States would have been a powerful, defining statement.
What fell flat?  The attempt to brand this new approach to P-16 as a “complete and competitive education.”  While I appreciate the attempt, I don’t think the concept holds the rhetorical power we both seek and need.  The Administration is looking for a way to improve on No Child Left Behind, both as a policy and as a rhetorical statement.  It may be a punchline to jokes now, but the phrase “no child left behind” wielded enormous power in the early days of the law. It meant something, particularly when combined with lines about the “soft bigotry of low expectations.”
Lines like “dropping out of high school is no longer an option” are good initial steps.  But we still need to capture an umbrella brand and a bumper sticker phrase to define what this new era of innovative public education really stands for.  Complete and competitive are nice attributes, but they aren’t the headline.  It may just be window dressing to some, but how we talk about federal policy and the labels we ascribe to it can be just as important — even more so — than what’s under the hood.  Obama captured much of the nation with his rhetoric of “Yes, we can.”  Now we need to move that into a “yes, we can educate all” mentality.