accountability

Can We Innovate to Improvement?

Eduflack accountability, Arne Duncan, i3

Is there real, honest-to-goodness innovation entering the K-12 education space?  We seem to use the term “innovation” a great deal, but few seem to know what it really means.  The dictionary definition is “something new or different introduced.”  When the U.S. Department of Education issued its Investing in Innovation (i3) program last year, innovation was driven by what was research proven and evidence based.

Without question, i3 inspired a significant number of school districts, non-profit organizations, and thought leaders to give real thought to innovation in education.  Nearly 1,700 entities submitted applications for i3 funding.  Forty nine applicants became i3 winners.  But hundreds and hundreds of other projects, particularly some at the school district level, received high scores, indicating the opportunity and potential these education innovations could have.
This week, the Aspen Institute is hosting its Education Innovation Forum and Expo.  With a goal of leveraging the interest in i3 to “drive an innovation culture” in education, Aspen and its partners offer up a series of objectives for this meeting and the partnerships and relationships that should come from the gathering, including:
* Create a national stage to feature investment ready non-profit and for profit educational innovations
* Foster an education policy environment that is more innovation and investment friendly
* Showcase high-scoring i3 projects
* Attract more private equity investment to promising education innovations
* Provide an enduring platform for connecting innovators with venture capitalists, social innovation investors, educators, and policymakers
* Engage thought leaders from other sectors in creating a robust education innovation and R&D infrastructure
For those who have been slogging in the ed reform trenches for years, many of these objectives are discussions and actions that we simply have not engaged in to date.  Despite interest in additional dollars, the education community, on the whole, has been slow to embrace the role of for-profit interests — particularly as a partner — in public education.  We are a sector that still can’t agree on what innovation is.  And despite popular opinion, we simply have never invested in a true R&D infrastructure, at least not the way other policy sectors do.
So kudos go to Aspen, the U.S. Department of Education (an “in cooperation” partner of the event), and the partners and sponsors who are jumpstarting the discussion.  When everyone from Arne Duncan to Alan Greenspan, Mark Ecko to Joel Klein, and Paul Pastorek to Mike Johnston takes the time to spur this discussion toward a real, innovative, R&D focus, it merits some attention.
In listening to the conversations and formal discussions across the Washington Convention Center, it also raises a few observations:
* Private-sector, and even philanthropic, support for school improvement is meant to be a catalyst.  Such funding is not intended to supplant current funding from the state or local community.  Private investment is also not intended to be an unending stream of dollars for as long as a new program remains in favor.  Such dollars are a way to jumpstart the system, allowing true reformers to move change in an environment often loathe for such.
* Reductions in traditional funding streams, coupled with the possibility of new streams from the private sector, should force us to move away from the status quo.  When we are being asked to do more with less, we can’t keep funding what we have done because it is what we have done.  New dollars need to be focused on the future and on return on investment.  Innovation is an investment in promising practice, not a way to prop up what hasn’t worked in the past.
* We still do not know if we can bring innovation to scale.  Currently, we have approximately 15,000 school districts across the United States.  In the past decade, Teach for America has been deemed by many the most successful ed reform/innovation effort in public education.  According to the TFA website, the organization is working in 39 placement regions, including many of the larger, urban school districts.  If TFA increased its regions by 400 percent next year, it would be up to 1 percent of our total districts.  This is no knock on TFA, but it is a realization that we still don’t have a working model to bring innovation and reforms to scale in the United States.
Hopefully, the Aspen forum will help drive some thinking toward answering these questions.  How do we fund a true R&D research agenda?  How do we decide what is worthy of funding?  How do we make sure funding is used as intended and drives ROI?  And how do we define scalable reform in an industry so tied to the status quo?
As is typical for education, lots of questions.  If today is indication, we have real people with real influence committed to answering the questions.  We have real checkbooks to back up some of the rhetoric.  Now we just need the real ideas and real measures to move the discussion to true action.
  

Does Quality Count in Our Schools?

Eduflack accountability, assessment, AYP, stimulus

Yesterday, Education Week released its annual edu-stats extravaganza, Quality Counts.  The 2011 edition of Quality Counts, Uncertain Forecast: Education Adjusts to a New Economic Reality, hits on all of the usual topics, with a special emphasis on the economy and its impact on education.

Once again, Maryland is tops in the nation when it comes to education policy and performance, earning a B-plus (87.6 overall).  It is followed at the top of the list by New York (B, 84.7), Massachusetts (B, 82.6), Virginia (B-minus, 81.8), and Florida (B-minus, 81.5).
Nebraska rounds out the bottom of the list, earning a D-plus (68.6).  The Huskers were just edged out by DC (D-plus, 69.1), South Dakota (D-plus, 69.2), Mississippi (C-minus, 70.0), and Montana (C-minus, 70.4).
In the individual categories, Massachusetts was tops for “Chance for Success,” earning a A, while Nevada was last with a D and the U.S. average was a C-plus.  In “K-12 Achievement,” Massachusetts was again number one with a B, while New Mexico, Louisiana, DC, West Virginia, and Mississippi all earned Fs (with a national average of just D-plus).
For “Transitions and Alignment” (meaning early childhood ed, college readiness, and the economy and workforce), Arkansas, Maryland, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia all earned As.  Nebraska scored an F, with a U.S. average of C-plus.  And in “School Finance,” Wyoming was tops with a A-minus as Idaho scored a D-minus, with a C as the national average.
Perhaps one of the most interesting tools EdWeek offers is the State Report Cards, which can be found here.
Video highlights of the day’s program can also be found here, taken from yesterday’s live stream.
And what are the big takeaways?
* Despite the rhetoric, we have only seen minimal impact of the economic stimulus on the schools.  As EdWeek has often reported, much of the stimulus money is still being held back by the states, as they prepare for worsening days.  
* But it was surprising to learn how strong an impact education has had on the stimulus’ success.  For every million dollars spent in education stimulus, the nation created or saved 4.2 jobs.  That is almost twice the job  impact of stimulus spending in general.
* Once you carve away all of the stimulus-speak, the academic results remain quite disappointing.  On average, our states are earning a C, and that is likely a gentleman’s C at best.  Not a single state earns an overall A.  Only four states earn an A or A-minus for “Chance for Success.”  No states earn an A for “K-12 Achievement.”  And just one earns better than a B-plus for “School Finance.”
As we ask whether Quality Counts, it is clear that too many of our states are still struggling with basic math.  One doesn’t have to be a teacher to realize that this is not a report card any kid would want to bring home.  The only saving grace for even the top states is that we are grading on a very generous curve.  States that did well should be proud of their progress, but no one should be content with where their individual numbers stand.
Ultimately, Quality Counts provides a roadmap for where we have to head to achieve success.  If we are to read the roadmarkers correctly in this year’s edition, we can see that states are paying greater attention to issues like standards and accountability today, and we can only hope that that focus results in improved achievement and better QC grades in the years to come.

A Tea Party Comes to Education?

Eduflack accountability, ESEA, Michelle Rhee, national standards, NCLB, Obama, Parents

Today, the 112th Congress officially takes its seat.  Anyone who watched the November elections realizes that a major change in philosophy takes the gavel in Washington, riding on the momentum of the “Tea Party” movement.

Sure, we pretty much have no idea how that wave is going to affect education policy on Capitol Hill.  During the campaign, those Tea Party candidates spoke little, if at all, about education.  We know they’d prefer to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education, but we really don’t know where they stand on ESEA reauthorization, turnaround schools, charters, and all of the other topics that seem to freeze up the Congress.
But all of the analysis pieces on how the Tea Party movement will affect government in general has Eduflack thinking.  What would happen if we applied the Tea Party philosophy to education?  No, I’m not talking about federal education policy, but rather the K-12 education space in general.  Perhaps it would look a little like this:
Fiscal Responsibility (Funding) — “We are simply paying too much on public education.  The federal government keeps taking more and more from our paychecks to pay for expensive programs like Race to the Top and i3, and the states are taking more and more in property taxes to cover the rest.  We need to be smarter with how we spend our education dollars.  Why is it some of our best school districts can educate kids at $10,000 a head, while our worst-performing districts are spending close to twice that?  It just doesn’t make sense.  We need to get back to basics, focus on the core needs of our kids, and ensure we are receiving return on investment for our education dollars.  It is time to do more with less.”
Limited Government (Control) — “The federal government needs to get out of our classrooms.  No one knows what our kids need best than our local community.  We elect our local school boards to look after our interests.  They know us.  We know them.  And they held accountable for their actions.  The feds care about our money, our localities care about our kids.  We must restore local control to our schools, telling the feds to keep their noses out of how we spend our money, how we teach our kids, how we test our kids, and how we know when we are doing a good job.  Our schools, our rules.”
Free Markets (Choice) — “We need to restore power to individual parents and individual families.  As the individual is the one funding our schools, the individual should have the power to decide how those dollars are spent.  if your neighborhood schools aren’t doing the job, you should have the right to take your child — and your dollars — and go to a school that meets your needs.  Speaking through the pocketbook is the only way to get those broken schools to fix themselves, and it is the only way to ensure our kids get the education they need.  We should not just accept what we have been given.  We need to encourage choice and competition, letting the schools and the teachers who have failed us be cycled out of the system for good.”
Personal Responsibility (Parents) — “For too long we have trusted government to do what is right for our kids.  As a result, our schools are failing and our kids are uncompetitive.  It is time to take that responsibility back.  The US Department of Education isn’t going to fix our schools.  The state isn’t going to fix our schools.  Parents are going to fix our schools.  It is time for all parents to rise up and demand better.  It is time to get in schools, demand answers, and refuse to leave until those answers are put into practice.  These are our schools, and we need to retake ownership of them.”
Maybe it is just me, but aren’t we already sitting down to a tea party in K-12 education?  We are making hard choices, asking our schools to do more with less and questioning high per-pupil expenditures in struggling urban districts.  There is a growing chorus (led by the new chairman of the House Education Committee, John Kline) to restore more local control to education, taking away much of the power shift resulting from NCLB.  We’ve long talked about school choice, with the current turnaround schools effort likely leading to a greater call.  And even President Obama has been talking for the past few years on parental responsibility and how families need to take more active, hands on, and impactful roles if their kids are to be college and career ready.
Is Michelle Rhee’s Students First education’s Tea Party Patriots?  Is 50-CAN or DFER’s “Ticket to Teach” the edu-Tea Party Express?  Only time will tell …

Waiting for ESEA Reauth?

Eduflack accountability, Achievement gap, Arne Duncan, charter schools, ESEA, NCLB

New year, same fight.  As we begin the first school week of 2011, EdSec Arne Duncan renews the call for reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) in today’s Washington Post.  By painting ESEA as the latest and greatest tool in the national push for ed reform, Duncan seems to say that while everyone is waiting for Superman, the Man of Steel is simply waiting for ESEA reauth to take hold.

Duncan’s points are not new, but they are worth reiterating as we head into the latest round of ed policy fights.  
1) Republicans and Democrats have been hard at work on ESEA reauth for the past year (isn’t it more like the past five?), and ESEA is truly a bipartisan issue
2) No one likes failing schools
3) Transparency and data use are good
4) Bubble sheet exams are bad
5) Nine years later, our teachers still aren’t highly qualified
6) We are now facing a sense of urgency to do something about our schools
Perhaps most interesting are Duncan’s insights into what “reform” currently looks like and how it will be embodied in ESEA:
School districts and their local partners in inner cities and rural communities are overcoming poverty and family breakdown to create high-performing schools, including charters and traditional public schools.  They are taking bold steps to turn around low-performing schools by investing in teachers, rebuilding school staff, lengthening the school day and changing curricula.

In partnership with local teacher unions, districts are finding new ways to evaluate and compensate their teachers and staff their schools.  Some districts have reshaped labor agreements around student success — and teachers have strongly supported these groundbreaking agreements. 
If I didn’t know any better, I would have thought these words were written by incoming House Education Committee Chairman John Kline (MN) or perhaps some of the holdovers from George W. Bush’s presidential administration.  Rural ed is back in the discussion, and we are refocused on the achievement gap.  Charters are again central to fixin’ what ails us.  And we have to remind all those involved that we do indeed work with teachers and the teachers unions.
The EdSec is also quick to remind his critics (and those new Tea Partiers arriving in DC this week) that he is not a creature of Washington, noting: “Since coming to Washington, I’ve been told that partisan politics inevitably trumps bipartisan governing.  But if I have learned anything as education secretary, it is that conventional wisdom serves to prop up the status quo — and is often wrong.”
Duncan definitely earns an A for putting forward the sort of rhetoric we need to see at the start of a new, Republican congress.  There is no talk of the need for additional funding or increased budgets.  There is no mention of new programs such as Race to the Top and Investing in Innovation and edujobs.  We are “fixing” NCLB, not overhauling it.  Common Core is barely referenced, and is done so in such a way that most won’t recognize it.  Flexibility and localities are finally to play a greater role in the great ESEA fight.
But the grade for moving such rhetoric into action remains incomplete.  Is the Blueprint being revised to meet some of these new rhetorical priorities?  Is a draft of ESEA ready to be dropped in the legislative hopper as of Wednesday?  What ed programs will ultimately face cuts in the President’s budget next month?  And what regulatory changes can be made now to make ESEA tolerable for the coming year (or years)?
A new year provides Team Duncan with a fresh start to approach an issue Maryland Avenue has been trying to tackle for many years now.  Will ESEA hold the same level of priority on Capitol Hill as it seems to at ED?  Only time will tell.  Today, Duncan signaled a desire to work with the new Republican Congress.  It is a start.

Yes Virginia, Texting is Bad?

Eduflack 21CS, accountability, Students, technology

I’ll admit it.  Eduflack is not a big fan of texting.  I am pretty wired to both my iPhone and my iPad that I get emails just as fast as I get texts.  And any reader of this blog knows I tend to be a little wordy.  So other than those Tweets at @Eduflack, my writing — emails and texts — run a little long.  At this point, my texting is pretty limited to my wife (who doesn’t monitor her email as I do); my younger, hipper sister; and a few friends who drop a text occasionally.

Don’t get me wrong, though, I definitely see the value of it.  Texts provide us instant information, allowing for a real-time electronic conversation.  It provides a written record of these electronic conversations (a fact I can state with certainty, as my wife quotes from texts I sent her two years ago).  And it offers a quick way to reach a lot of people.  When my local school district had to close schools early for a recent snow, it was able to text the news to all families who signed up for text updates. 
While I would never want to see texting (and texting shorthand) replace the ancient art of actually writing in complete sentences and with words spelled out in the Queen’s English, I do see the value of texting.  And part of that value is potential interactions between students and teachers.  Questions about assignments from students.  Updates on class schedule from teacher.  Texting can be a useful classroom information management tool when used correctly.
Unfortunately, not all seem to see it that way.  On January 13, the Virginia State Board of Education is expected to restrict or outright ban teachers texting with students.  Apparently, some believe that a teacher texting a student can result sexual misconduct.  The State Board in the Old Dominion cites 120 actions in the past decade where action was taken regarding misconduct involving minors (though no mention of what role texting may have played in those 120 cases).
Additionally, the Virginia State Board is looking to prohibit teachers from interacting with students at all through online social networking (such as Facebook and Twitter).
I’m all for protecting our students.  And I’m all for eliminating inappropriate conversations between teachers and students, while providing guidelines for both parties on the proper use of electronic communications.  But this is truly a case of throwing out the baby with the electronic bathwater.
Teachers should be bound by codes of conduct, whether it be in person or virtually.  Violators should be addressed, directly and swiftly.  Just as their teachers, students should be educated on the appropriate uses of electronic media.  This should be about responsible use, not prohibition.
Yes, I realize that Virginia is proposing guidelines for restriction.  But we all realize how this slippery slope works.  Restriction offers up too much room for misinterpretation and potential problem.  Elimination is much easier to understand and enforce.
We already have too many instances of de-connecting our students in the classroom.  We have too many examples of students being unplugged from their 21st century lives so they can be taught exclusively through a 19th century medium.  Shouldn’t we be exploring how to better integrate one of the most common methods of communications for 21st century students — the text — into the current learning environment?  
Used correctly, texting (and to a lesser degree, social media) can be a powerful instructional tool.  We should be looking at ways to maximize the resources available and better engage students in their preferable mediums.  Virginia, there has to be another way to protect teachers and students, share information, and offer a more transparent communication than shutting down that which is new.  
    

Mad Men Comes to K-12 Education?

Eduflack accountability, High School, Marketing

Years ago, when Eduflack was working in the proprietary university space, he had a boss who could market just about anything.  He was the sort of salesman who could get you to slay dragons with a butter knife, believing that the right brochure, an effective website, and the right messaging platform could sell just about anything.  And with him leading the pitch, he usually could sell anything to anyone.

Of course, he did so by under-promising and over-delivering.  He identified the one issue that kept a state education official or a superintendent up at night, keyed right in on it, demonstrated empathy, and offered to help.  It almost didn’t matter WHAT he was selling, other than he was selling understanding and the promise of a solution to all that ailed a given educational leader.  Educators bought peace of mind.  He closed a deal.
And so goes the circle of life in education sales.  We expect to have companies and entrepreneurs approach school districts with the latest or best shiny object.  We expect sales to happen.  And we expect those pitches to be more savvy and sophisticated than they have ever been.
But when, exactly, did we expect to see the school district transform into the salesman?  Over the weekend, The Washington Post ran a piece on how the school district in Alexandria, Virginia had tapped the services of a marketing guru/adman to help promote the schools and better position them for private and philanthropic support.
Mad Men has officially hit our local school districts.  Instead of peddling Pan Am Airlines or the latest cigarette, we are now selling the emotional connection with our local school district.
Alexandria’s motives are noble.  It’s nationally known high school — T.C. Williams — is on the persistently lowest achieving list.  The large districts surrounding it — notably Fairfax County and Arlington County — are some of the best school districts in the nation.  And with so much money floating around school improvement these days, who wouldn’t ask how to draw more attention to Alexandria to gain some of those non-governmental dollars?
But while the motives are noble, the execution is disappointing.  Don’t get me wrong.  No one is more of an advocate for effective communications in K-12 education than Eduflack.  I have many good friends who manage communications for school districts or who work with states, LEAs, and schools on how to effectively position them.  And I myself have worked with many and SEA and LEA on communications and outreach.
But such efforts are usually focused on outcomes and results.  That old entrepreneur of a boss taught me that you always under-promise and over-deliver, particularly in education.  You don’t talk about what you can do or what you might do, you focus on what you’ve done.  It may take a little longer, but the time is well worth the effort.  Focus on student test scores or recent gains.  Target the quality of your teachers and the number of NBCTs on staff.  Key in on ratios or spending levels.  Find the data that demonstrates your excellence, and use that as your lead to show that the schools are headed in the right direction.
Unfortunately, at least the way WaPo tells the story, Alexandria seems to think that a good slogan is going to fix all that ails their suburban school district.  They brought in the “Where’s the Beef?” guy from Wendy’s to help with their marketing efforts.  And while he isn’t promising they will necessarily get a new slogan or tagline as a result of his work, he is already market testing two slogans for the LEA.  The first, “Try us, you’ll like us.”  The second, “ACPS — it’s Alexandria’s best kept secret.”  
Really?  That’s the best we have?  One slogan that can be applied to the latest widget, snack cake, or diet drink and another that’s been recycled by virtually every tourism campaign for a third-rate attraction?  
Perhaps I am overreacting here, but this seems to be an exercise of re-arranging the deck chairs.  Put the money into additional supports for teachers or additional tutoring for students.  A slogan isn’t going to get T.C. Williams off the persistently lowest achieving list.  Good teaching, good learning, and good data collection will.  So rather than channeling its inner Don Draper, perhaps Alexandria needs a little more Mr. Holland.

Looking for Online Learning Exemplars

Eduflack 21CS, accountability, AYP, Online Education, technology

Without question, K-12 virtual education opportunities are gaining more and more attention as late.  Earlier this month, the Digital Learning Council — under the leadership of former governors Jeb Bush and Bob Wise — released its Digital Learning Now! report.  In it, the new group offered up its 10 elements of high-quality digital education.

The 10 elements are core to learning success, whether it be digital or otherwise.  By focusing on issues such as student eligibility, student access, personalized learning, advancement, content, instruction, providers, assessment and accountability, funding, and delivery, the DLC makes clear that digital learning is central to the 21st century learning environment.  Online learning is no longer a topic left to the periphery.  It is core to modern-day instruction.
But the DLC’s outline of how begs a very important question — who?  This week, Eduflack was talking with a school district that is quite interested in expanding its digital learning offerings and take a major step forward in offering e-instruction and online offerings to its students.  Anticipating the time and expense involved in such forward progress, school officials were looking to do some site visits with other school districts in state.  The list of “success stories” was relatively short, but a few districts kept popping up.
After some exploration, though, a big problem arose.  The districts that were identified as best practice for online learning in the state were districts that failed to meet AYP this year.  Knowing that, can one look to model instructional practice from a district that can’t make adequate yearly progress?  It might not be fair, but AYP is the most important measure a school district faces today.  Any step one takes to improve or enhance instruction should result in improved student achievement.
It would be terrific if every state were a state like Florida, with a strong and successful online learning network that can be modeled and borrowed and stolen from.  But in this day and age, we first look to our own backyards to see what is done, particularly as we emphasize the need to demonstrate proficiency on state assessment exams.  So while we’d all love to replicate what the Florida Virtual School may be doing, we’re first going to look at what the neighboring county or the district with similar demographics on the other side of the state is up to.
It is no secret that K-12 education believes in modeling.  Few want to be first to market; everyone wants to do what a fellow successful state, district, school, or teacher is doing.  This is particularly true for digital learning, where so few truly understand it and so few are actually doing it well.  So how do we know who is an appropriate model?  Where is it happening in a district, a school, and with kids like mine?  And how do we determine if a district is indeed worth modeling?
Eduflack is all ears for those who want to identify examples of school districts who have been particularly successful in developing online learning programs, particularly those LEAs who can demonstrate return on their investment, both in usage and in student achievement.  Who wants in?  Where are our exemplars for district-based online learning programs?
 

An International Achievement Gap

Eduflack accountability, Achievement gap, Arne Duncan, assessment

The new PISA scores are here, the new PISA scores are here!  As we all know by now, the latest edition of PISA is now out, and it isn’t the prettiest of pictures.  Much of the day of/day after debate seems to be focused on the performance of China, which entered this year’s countdown at the top of the charts.  While some may want to fault the sample size (of Shanghai) or look for other reasons to discount China’s positioning, there is no getting around the truth.  The students in China who took the test did better than the students in other countries who took the test.  Blame cherrypicking of students, overprepping for the tests, or a host of other excuses, but Chinese test takers still did better than everyone else.

And what about the dear ol’ U.S. of A?  Again, we get to settle for middle of the pack, with an undistinguished placement for all categories.  Be it reading, math, or science, we are consistently average (unless you look at math, where we are now below average).
Thankfully, the US Department of Education did not try to sugar coat this or claim victories for an incredibly modest gain in science.  Instead, EdSec Duncan declared the PISA results a “wake-up call” and a “hard truth” that we are being passed by.
Hopefully, Duncan and company are successful in using such test scores to push for more substantive, results-based school improvement efforts.  But these numbers — and the numbers of recent years previous — paint a very grim picture.  We are caught in an international achievement gap.  Each year, we take great pride in the fact that we have “held our own” or managed to gain a point or two in a given subject.  At the same time, our international counterparts are making significant gains of their own, increasing the space between their students and ours.  China taking the top spot its first year in the competition merely magnifies our mediocrity and this very real achievement gap.
As a nation, we continue to focus on how our students do against students in other states.  We play games with our state standards and the resultant tests (a practice hopefully ending by most with the adoption of common core) to show increasing numbers of proficient students.  But in the process, it doesn’t matter that a 10th grader today is proficient if he can do the work of a 7th grader of 25 years ago.  We just want that proficient label, declaring victory once we can apply it to our schools and our students, standards and actual knowledge be damned.
International benchmarks such as PISA and TIMSS force us to compete on a level, fair, and painfully honest playing field.  We can’t adjust the standards and rubrics to meet our regional needs.  In many ways, these scores are far more accurate indicators of our actual student achievement than anything one sees on a state exam.
And that is why these results are so discouraging.  We are fighting to tread water (despite state numbers showing strong gains for most in recent years) as our competitors are building 21st century speedboats.  As other nations do it better and more effectively, we run a real risk of being left behind, with nothing but excuses and substandard state exams to keep us warm at night.
At the end of the day, this isn’t an issue that China (or Finland or Korea or Singapore or Canada or New Zealand or Estonia or countless others) is doing better than the United States.  The issue is that we are failing our students.  The international achievement gap is not a measure of student failures.  It is a measure of the failures of the U.S. public school system.  Unless we fight for real, systemic change, all we are doing is teaching our students a new stroke by which to tread water.  

Putting Students First

Eduflack accountability, Achievement gap, Michelle Rhee

Today, Michelle Rhee, the former chancellor of DC Public Schools, officially unveiled Rhee 2.0.  A cover story for Newsweek (no broom this time) and an Oprah segment was the perfect intro for Students First, a new 501(c)(4) led by Rhee to “to build a national movement to defend the interests of children in public education and pursue transformative reform, so that America has the best education system in the world.”


The new org breaks down its target audiences to Educators, Parents, Students, and “Everyone Else.”  It’s committed to “great teachers,” “great schools,” and “effective use of public dollars.”  

The latest embodiment of the Rhee brand also offers up four core beliefs (apparently her PR people never explained you offer things in series’ of three or five, never four).  The four beliefs:

* Great teachers can make a tremendous difference for students of every background; all children deserve outstanding teachers.

* Attending a great school should be a matter of fact, not luck; every family should be able to choose an excellent school.

* Public dollars belong where they make the biggest difference—on effective instructional programs; we must fight ineffective practices and bureaucracy.

* Parent and family involvement is key to increased student achievement, but the entire community must be engaged in the effort to improve our schools.

Most interesting in all of this, though, is the underlying structure.  Right now, the org is an advocacy group of one — Rhee.  It sets an audacious goal of raising $1 billion to create “a movement to transform public education.”  The goal seems to be to work with states and school districts across the nation on real reform efforts.  But the group seeks to garner its funding through a combination of corporate and philanthropic support, small donors, membership dues, and merchandise sales (someone needs to tell Rhee how successful the retail sales effort worked for the Stand Up effort back in 2005).

There are many unanswered questions here.  In launching such an effort, Rhee clearly has some significant seed money to launch this effort.  You don’t announce such a fundraising drive unless you already have significant commitment to back up the promise.  So Eduflack suspects there has to be tens of millions of dollars already committed to the effort.

So who will join with Rhee, staff wise?  What organizations will Students First officially partner with?  What SEAs and LEAs will be first on the client list?  Besides the $1 billion what are the measures of success?  Where will the group be located?  Will it have local chapters (like the successful DFER?)  What groups will she take on (besides the unions)?  How soon before she goes after federal funding (any subcontracting opps in RttT, i3, TIF, or SIG, anyone)?

Eduflack is always heartened by efforts that try to amplify the voice of parents and students in the school improvement process.  Too often, we exclude these key stakeholders, leaving them to simply accept what those who “know better” decide needs to be done. As a result, we have a self-fulfilling circle of status quo, where little changes and those end users — the families and students — are left to just deal with the fact the more things change, the more they stay the same … at least with student achievement numbers and a persistent achievement gap.

It is a little surprising that Rhee doesn’t want to get into the ESEA reauthorization mix, but it is a good thing.  Even if she threw the full weight of her group into reauth, she would never get the full credit for the changes she could ultimately be responsible for.  So now is the time for an agenda.  How will we measure the success of Students First in six months?  In a year?  What are the key policy issues she will focus on?  And how will they translate those policy issues into real advocacy felt at the state or local level?

As Eduflack has noted many times, PR is easy.  The cover of Newsweek just gets the ball bouncing.  Now comes the hard work for Rhee, and an opportunity to demonstrate she understands the true power of advocacy and meaningful public engagement.  First, help better diagnose the problems in public education in a way that all stakeholder audiences understand.  Then make clear there are real, workable solutions to those problems.  And wrap up by showing that Students First and its network are the holders
of the best, most actionable solutions to those problems.  

Rhee does that, and this new group of hers can launch a national movement.  Without it, we may have yet another in a long range of non-profits with noble goals, respected ambitions, and nothing left to show for it but a depleted checkbook and a lot of unfulfilled buzz.  There is already too much of that in ed reform, we don’t need any more.

  

Analyzing the Ed Stimulus’ Impact

Eduflack accountability, Arne Duncan, ESEA, NCLB, RTT, stimulus

So it is more than a year and a half since the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) was signed into law and the faucet of federal education stimulus dollars was turned on, sending a stream (either a raging river or a trickle, depending on your perspective) to states and school districts across the nation.  While much has been done (particularly from the good folks over at EdWeek’s Politics K-12 blog) on whether we are actually spending the ed stimulus dollars or not, a larger question may very well be if such spending is having any impact.

For the past year, we’ve heard how Race to the Top has completely changed the game, with states across the union overhauling their policies on data systems, teacher firewalls, charter schools, turnaround schools, and many topics in between.  A new reform era has been ushered in, according to many, leaving status quoers with nothing to show for decades worth of work.
But a new study released today by Bellwether Education Partners and Education First Consulting finds that the stimulus’ impact on education reform may not be as definitive as both cheerleaders and critics may believe.  InConflicting Missions and Unclear Results: Lessons from the Education Stimulus Funds, Bellwether’s Sara Mead and Andy Rotherham and Ed First’s Anand Vaishnav and William Porter lend an analytical eye to whether the $100 billion in ed stimulus cash is having the sea change impact we expected.
Their findings?:
* Stimulus dollars are being used primarily to make up for cuts in state and local budgets, with most of those cuts coming in the HR arena
* Districts are confused by mixed messages from the US Department of Education as to whether stimulus bucks are intended to preserve jobs or advance reform
* ARRA spending is being driven by existing processes and expected inertias in many school districts (instead of by the reform priorities in the stimulus rhetoric)
* In districts that used ARRA dollars in a strategic way, it went more to local leadership, local capacity issues, and local factors, instead of to federal reform priorities
* The edu-problems ARRA intended to solve aren’t going away
For those at the district or building level, such findings should be no surprise.  Stimulus money was primarily for stopping the bleeding, not for inventing new 21st century educational sutures.  So once the money passes from the feds to the states to the localities, those much needs dollars are used for tactical needs, not strategic visions.
What can we learn from these findings?  Bellwether and Education First offer a few insights.  First, federal funds won’t generate reform unless they are attached to clear reform requirements (does Eduflack hear NCLB?  Anybody?).  Competitive grants (like RttT and i3) have the greatest chance of driving reforms.  Formula-based programs, not so much.  Reform plans need to be strategic.  Policymakers need to support strategies that build capacity of all types (data, analytic, research, instructional).    
Most interestingly, Conflicting Missions touts the importance of advocacy in the reform process.  During the NCLB era, we lost this point, believing that the federal stick was enough to force long-term change.  It didn’t work.  In the early days of ARRA, we re-found the importance of advocacy, with the EdSec and other ED officials working hard to reach out to key groups and stakeholders so they understood the problems, what ED was doing to fix those problems, and the expected outcomes we would all reap following the fix.
Heading into ESEA reauthorization, we have lost some of that focus on advocacy.  But history tells us that effective public engagement is the best way to drive real and lasting reforms and improvements.  Erect a big tent and give all stakeholders a voice.  Make the process open and public.  Make clear the problem and the available solutions.  Give stakeholders a choice on such solutions, making clear that ED’s vision is the best for the current situation.  Underpromise and overdeliver on the agreed solutions.  Rinse and repeat.
Yes, Conflicting Missions focuses on ARRA.  But it also offers some real lessons for moving ESEA forward in 2011.  The big question, will anyone listen.
(Full disclosure, Eduflack has provided counsel to Bellwether Education Partners.)